this post was submitted on 14 Oct 2024
533 points (99.4% liked)

politics

19043 readers
3901 users here now

Welcome to the discussion of US Politics!

Rules:

  1. Post only links to articles, Title must fairly describe link contents. If your title differs from the site’s, it should only be to add context or be more descriptive. Do not post entire articles in the body or in the comments.

Links must be to the original source, not an aggregator like Google Amp, MSN, or Yahoo.

Example:

  1. Articles must be relevant to politics. Links must be to quality and original content. Articles should be worth reading. Clickbait, stub articles, and rehosted or stolen content are not allowed. Check your source for Reliability and Bias here.
  2. Be civil, No violations of TOS. It’s OK to say the subject of an article is behaving like a (pejorative, pejorative). It’s NOT OK to say another USER is (pejorative). Strong language is fine, just not directed at other members. Engage in good-faith and with respect! This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban.
  3. No memes, trolling, or low-effort comments. Reposts, misinformation, off-topic, trolling, or offensive.
  4. Vote based on comment quality, not agreement. This community aims to foster discussion; please reward people for putting effort into articulating their viewpoint, even if you disagree with it.
  5. No hate speech, slurs, celebrating death, advocating violence, or abusive language. This will result in a ban. Usernames containing racist, or inappropriate slurs will be banned without warning

We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.

All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.

That's all the rules!

Civic Links

Register To Vote

Citizenship Resource Center

Congressional Awards Program

Federal Government Agencies

Library of Congress Legislative Resources

The White House

U.S. House of Representatives

U.S. Senate

Partnered Communities:

News

World News

Business News

Political Discussion

Ask Politics

Military News

Global Politics

Moderate Politics

Progressive Politics

UK Politics

Canadian Politics

Australian Politics

New Zealand Politics

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
 

"FEMA also been accused by former president Donald Trump, the Republican nominee, and other Republicans of not being able to respond well enough to Helene because it had diverted disaster relief funds to help migrants.

That is not true, because while FEMA administers the Shelter and Services Program, funding for it comes from a separate pot of money funded by Congress for U.S. Customs and Border Protection.

Other false claims that have circulated include that people taking federal relief money could see their land seized or that that $750 is the most they will ever get to rebuild. FEMA has pushed back against the false claims and conspiracy theories, setting up a page on its website to combat misinformation and rumors."

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] Nightwingdragon@lemmy.world 79 points 2 days ago (6 children)

Trump has now successfully sown distrust in FEMA.

FEMA. An agency created to help people recover from natural disasters.

We can put that right up on the list with news organizations, the Department of Education, our election system, and children's hospitals.

The damage that Trump has done to this country will take decades to recover from. If we ever can. You figure, with the 3 stooges on the bench willing to carry on Trump's legacy, we're looking at 40 years minimum of lingering Trump fuckery.

And there's a very good chance he'll become President again. At that point, we as a country deserve whatever we get.

[–] CharlesDarwin@lemmy.world 30 points 2 days ago (1 children)

TBF, the crazies have been talking about deranged things in relation to FEMA for decades. Like everything else, dementia donnie did not build that, he just walked in the front door and put his name on this shit.

For instance, the hatriot radio types were talking about Clinton's "FEMA death camps" way back in the 90s.

[–] mostdubious@lemmy.world 14 points 1 day ago (1 children)

thank you. i'm glad somebody has a memory longer than last week. this also feeds right back into my belief that it is not the politicians that are the problem (they're just a symptom), it's conservatives in general. if we are going to live in a society, they have to be removed from it.

[–] CharlesDarwin@lemmy.world 8 points 1 day ago (1 children)

As to the last part, the reason cons fight so hard against a properly liberal (in every meaning of that term) education is because they know that getting a proper education is highly likely to NOT churn out a reprogrammable meatbot ready for Republicans to dump propaganda in their heads...

[–] mostdubious@lemmy.world 5 points 1 day ago (2 children)

and while i agree that people should get a proper liberal education, higher learning has been watered down to accommodate all the idiots that don't want to be there but have to have a degree to join the workforce. there are people who actually want to deep dive into their studies but are subjected to dumbed down classes.

so there's a part of me that doesn't want them to be there. honestly, i think people should take trade courses for certification and leave higher learning to those who are higher learners.

and both should be free.

and you should have to pass a knowledge test in order to vote.

[–] Nightwingdragon@lemmy.world 6 points 1 day ago (1 children)

higher learning has been watered down to accommodate all the idiots that don’t want to be there but have to have a degree to join the workforce.

This. This, this, this, this, this.

We spent decades telling people, some of which quite frankly have no business in college, that college is literally the only path forward. And then when all of these people show up and find college to be way, way too hard for them, we continued to (and continue to) dumb down the education we provide so more people will graduate with increasingly worthless degrees.

It's how we've traditionally handled everything in the US. Rather than give people the tools to rise up to meet the standards, we simply drop the standards and then wonder why so many so-called college graduates having no clue what they're talking about.

But the graduation percentages are all that matters. Push them through the system for 13 years, give them the same diploma that you give students who actually earned it, and then wonder why employers consider diplomas in general worthless. And the same thing is happening with college degrees now.

[–] mostdubious@lemmy.world 3 points 1 day ago

But the graduation percentages are all that matters.

capitalism ruins everything. this is literally the money changers in the temple. the only temple that actually matters.

[–] CharlesDarwin@lemmy.world 5 points 1 day ago

I think our schools should start teaching critical thinking, media literacy and how to spot and name logical fallacies from a very early age and all through the 12th grade. You don't have to be university-bound to learn this stuff; this should be foundational. It also gives people the tools to be more autodidactic - the poorly-educated talk about how they "did their own research" and others should do this, too. With proper instruction, I would actually think this is a good thing; however, for people who are primed for nonsense and not armored with critical thinking skills, this often does not turn out well. Otherwise, with a properly educated citizenry, I would think "doing your own research" would not have the negative connotation it now does.

But schooling should be done in such a way that people can, and have the will to, learn new things.

[–] frezik@midwest.social 34 points 2 days ago (3 children)

As usual, Trump only amplifies something that was floating around for decades. FEMA has long been the target of conspiracy theories. You can get a taste of it from the old X-Files movie. Being a federal department that gets to do extraordinary things in emergencies tends to make it a target.

[–] Ultraviolet@lemmy.world 23 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

The difference is back then, it was relegated to the insane fringe. The premise of the X-Files is "what if all those farfetched conspiracy theories were true", evil FEMA was in the same category as cryptids and alien abduction. Now it's part of the platform of the second largest political party in the country. It's roughly equivalent to campaigning on killing Bigfoot, if not worse because at least the latter is harmless.

[–] Nightwingdragon@lemmy.world 13 points 2 days ago

I somewhat disagree with this.

The conspiracy theories that have been floating around were the typically outlandish and unrealistic conspiracy theories of the time. You know, like the moon landing being fake. And with social media being nonexistent and the conspiracy theories being so batshit crazy, it was near impossible for these theories to gain any kind of critical mass or be taken seriously.

And Trump doesn't amplify existing things. He creates conspiracy theories around literally everything and just hopes some of them stick. Mostly around migrants. Or he ties them back to migrants.

FEMA? Fema can't help you because they gave all their money to the migrants. Child Care? Gas? Those would plummet in price if we just got rid of all the migrants, if you believe what Trump said at the debate. 20,000 Hatians in Ohio? If we were to just get rid of them, it would solve whatever problems your state is having too! Judges in his trials can't be impartial because they have Mexican heritage.

The real problem is that there are far more openly racist people in our country than we were willing to admit to. We all have that creepy Uncle Joe in our family that only comes around for holidays, looks at his niece just a little too long, and spends half the day spouting racist bullshit, but never really considered just how many Uncle Joes there are in this country. Trump realized that and has simply been tapping into their racism ever since. That's all it is. Trump has simply coralled the most gullible and racist into one huge voting bloc, and we severely underestimated how big that bloc could get.

And now it's too late. There are enough of them in this country where they are openly embracing the racism and saying "Yeah, we want it this way." And theree may be enough of them to get what they want.

[–] Maggoty@lemmy.world 10 points 2 days ago

People forget the conspiracy theories from Katrina. Where they accused FEMA of stockpiling body bags in New Orleans before the hurricane. And of course the 9/11 conspiracies which weren't helped by the Bush administration actually lying to make sure we ended up in not one, but two wars.

[–] Railcar8095@lemm.ee 9 points 2 days ago

At that point, we as a country deserve whatever we get.

I'm not saying this isn't true, just please don't drag the rest of the world with you. Psychos in the world are taking notes, if Trump wins they'll follow his lead.

[–] SkunkWorkz@lemmy.world 6 points 1 day ago

Not just Trump. Elongated Muskrat couldn’t help himself.

[–] rayyy@lemmy.world 3 points 1 day ago

we as a country deserve whatever we get.

That would be death, destruction and collapse - enjoy.

[–] rayyy@lemmy.world 3 points 1 day ago

Trump has now successfully sown distrust in FEMA

Putin, and Trump.