this post was submitted on 16 Jun 2026
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Leopards Ate My Face
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Seems a pattern tbh, expensive toys lead to expensive mistakes?
You could argue that its cultural. The US has always been a country that values opportunism and individualism. Both parties appeal to people’s feelings of national identity or manifest destiny, only to then skillfully curb the narrative back to personal freedom and personal responsibility.
When you teach people to value self-sufficiency and individualism, you get a populace that is mostly apolitical. Good luck trying to mobilize those people for any sort of grand project that requires a lot of personal sacrifice over many years.
I would argue that the rise of Christo-fascism contradicts you. As well as the prevailing conservative movement.
But I do agree that the US somehow has less than expected populism due to these movements. With what you describe, any promise in alignment with self interests should do well. Yet currently a majority is grumbling that everything's been going against that for 50+ years, and yet the big political shifts haven't been to popular-concession-du-jour, but to expanding/retracting social democratic reforms.
I would argue the US populace is heavily propagandised, to the point of propaganda exhaustion, and apolitical for that reason more than because of any independence from the state.
This in turn is excellent breeding ground for sycophants and cronies in power, which would explain the repeatedly poor results in international dealings where power selection might have more bias towards competency.
Trump administration is repeatedly outmaneuvered by Russia, Canada, Mexico, China and now Iran. Notable examples also cover UAE, Israel, North Korea, EU, India and Japan. And the US has had a massive upper hand going into those situations. The fall of the petro-dollar was unimaginable (before a post-oil world) 5 years ago, and yet it's now a real possibility (pending logistical issues of the new currency), and with the dismantling of US soft influence, increasingly inevitable.
none of this is new though
Trump's just adopted that mantra