Serious Donald Trump's Presidency 9 Months In

Do you approve of Donald Trump's presidency so far?

  • Yes

    Votes: 37 15.4%
  • No

    Votes: 178 73.9%
  • Not Sure

    Votes: 26 10.8%

  • Total voters
    241
While I do agree that Trump could be significantly more proactive in the abolishment and prevention of racism, this is not something that a president can fix all by themself. It takes many years of social change and, remember, racism almost always comes down from the parents. The best thing that we as a society, since the burden is placed upon ourselves, can do to prevent racism is raise our children to be accepting individuals, because a president saying "Stop being racist" clearly does not change everything, as Obama's presidency proved. As we can see, it's still a problem carrying over to the next presidency. However, I do think that Trump is doing a terrible job in the prevention of racism and clearly caters towards white supremacy, which only highlights the issue.
 
and if people think that eliminating racism is as simple as raising kids who are accepting then racism will exist till this world blows up
 
I don't think that and I never said I did; the entire point of the post was to say that racism isn't going anywhere just by a president saying "hey guys stop being racist"
 

Chou Toshio

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Yeah Gato, secondbest, faint—

That’s why, with Trump sure his bombastic political style is awful, but like I said (and I think you all agree) that it’s even more important to pay attention to the different executive actions Trump’s been able to take... some of the low-profile stuff likely going to be very profound even as the mainstream media get distracted chasing scandal.

In terms of actual future emissions for instance, maybe Paris Accord looks awful (and hands China more power) but doesn’t even do as much damage long term as hitting the EPA’s budget and interfering with NASA in collecting climate data for instance. Some really scary shit being done.
 

Muscle K

Banned deucer.
As an Outsider looking into present-day America, it seems that Trump has taken America in a step backwards.
As a leader, he seems to be only somewhat capable - yes, he has done several good deeds for the people of the United States, but at the same time, he has created an environment where minorities are scared to walk outside, where everyday people are in fear of being shot, where the mere act of living seems to be a struggle at all.

I'm currently not the most informed, so i'll leave my post at this, but do expect a longer, more critical post on Drumpf.
 

WaterBomb

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The US is way too big, complicated, and cumbersome of a country to be moved significantly in either direction by one man in today's culture. Especially a man who is so polarizing and generally unpopular in his demeanor. There's just too much bureaucracy, too much red tape, too many checks and balances. Even if it were different, 9 months is a pretty short time period to attempt to measure progress or regression. I think what we've seen so far is a lot of outward hot air-blowing and fumbling attempts at surface change, but most of Trump's efforts at pushing his agenda are still in their infant stages. Let's not confuse proposed policy changes and bills that have been introduced with actual policy changes and bills that have been passed into law AND have begun to function. I see a great deal of people who are 'afraid' of things they think are coming, but I don't think many measurable things have actually happened. I think, in the end, Trump will serve his term and go down in history as an unremarkable president when it comes to legislation and policy change. His painfully childish personality will only cause temporary and superficial damage to the country's reputation, all of which will immediately disappear the moment he leaves office.

As for the idea of this thread, I think we'll have a lot more to talk about in the first quarter of next year once people have done their taxes.
 

Sam

i say it's all just wind in sails
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I think what we've seen so far is a lot of outward hot air-blowing and fumbling attempts at surface change, but most of Trump's efforts at pushing his agenda are still in their infant stages. Let's not confuse proposed policy changes and bills that have been introduced with actual policy changes and bills that have been passed into law AND have begun to function. I see a great deal of people who are 'afraid' of things they think are coming, but I don't think many measurable things have actually happened.
Millions of people were literally one vote in the senate away from losing their health insurance
 

Soul Fly

IMMA TEACH YOU WHAT SPLASHIN' MEANS
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The US is way too big, complicated, and cumbersome of a country to be moved significantly in either direction by one man in today's culture. Especially a man who is so polarizing and generally unpopular in his demeanor. There's just too much bureaucracy, too much red tape, too many checks and balances. Even if it were different, 9 months is a pretty short time period to attempt to measure progress or regression. I think what we've seen so far is a lot of outward hot air-blowing and fumbling attempts at surface change, but most of Trump's efforts at pushing his agenda are still in their infant stages. Let's not confuse proposed policy changes and bills that have been introduced with actual policy changes and bills that have been passed into law AND have begun to function. I see a great deal of people who are 'afraid' of things they think are coming, but I don't think many measurable things have actually happened. I think, in the end, Trump will serve his term and go down in history as an unremarkable president when it comes to legislation and policy change. His painfully childish personality will only cause temporary and superficial damage to the country's reputation, all of which will immediately disappear the moment he leaves office.
last time i checked your EPA and state dept are proper fucked

DACA was rescinded unilaterally. Thousands of immigrants have already losing protection as we write this. These are people who voluntarily gave up their identities under federal guarantee of deferred action.

FCC is railroading through a repeal of title 2 and abandoning net neutrality

The house/senate have already undone a plethora of obama-era bills seeking to regulate and discipline the financial market after the 2008 crash.

The executive has mounted an assault on the fourth estate of the kinds that would make Nixon blush

literal nazis held a public rally and openly murdered/injured counter-protesters. the president tacitly condoned it.

and thats just off the top of my head. how superficial and unremarkable.

It should be a pleasant privilege to have the luxury to find Trump only annoying or a childish buffoon rather than someone who is wrecking lives and enabling dark shit every day. Good job on minimising the massive, unprecedented civic effort that has gone into containing the wanton damage his presidency has been wreaking.

As for the idea of this thread, I think we'll have a lot more to talk about in the first quarter of next year once people have done their taxes.
r/whitepeopletwitter
 
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WaterBomb

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last time i checked your EPA and state dept are proper fucked

DACA was rescinded unilaterally. Thousands of immigrants have already losing protection as we write this. These are people who voluntarily gave up their identities under federal guarantee of deferred action.

FCC is railroading through a repeal of title 2 and abandoning net neutrality

The house/senate have already undone a plethora of obama-era bills seeking to regulate and discipline the financial market after the 2008 crash.

The executive has mounted an assault on the fourth estate of the kinds that would make Nixon blush

literal nazis held a public rally and openly murdered/injured counter-protesters. the president tacitly condoned it.

and thats just off the top of my head. how superficial and unremarkable.

It should be a pleasant privilege to have the luxury to find Trump only annoying or a childish buffoon rather than someone who is wrecking lives and enabling dark shit every day. Good job on minimising the massive, unprecedented civic effort that has gone into containing the wanton damage his presidency has been wreaking.



r/whitepeopletwitter
Forgive me, I thought this thread was titled "what do you think of the Trump presidency so far", not "go on a melodramatic rant when someone has an opinion different than your own". I guess I must have misread, sorry.
 
I'm sorry that you can't handle being mildly insulted when your post was basically going "Well, nothing bad has happened to me personally, so Trump isn't that bad guys". It must be so awful to have to deal with it when others have to deal with being targeted by an emboldened group of bigots who gleefully talk about how they want to hurt and kill them.

God, privilege is one hell of a drug y'all
 

WaterBomb

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I'm sorry that you can't handle being mildly insulted when your post was basically going "Well, nothing bad has happened to me personally, so Trump isn't that bad guys". It must be so awful to have to deal with it when others have to deal with being targeted by an emboldened group of bigots who gleefully talk about how they want to hurt and kill them.

God, privilege is one hell of a drug y'all
You're right. It is indeed a great privilege to be able to go on the internet, safe behind your computer screen, and have a big circle jerk in place of a meaningful discussion. It's nice to be free of the burden of actually listening to what a person is saying, asking questions and actually attempting to understand their point of view. Only the most privileged of us are free to just dismiss the opposition and draw conclusions about them and their personal lives without knowing even the slightest bit of information about them other than a single paragraph of text that person wrote in response to an opinion piece. Yes, the internet is a truly wonderful place.

I don't think you did much more than scan my post lightly. I think you honed in on a couple sentences, had a gut reaction, and used that to draw all your conclusions about who I am. As I said, I'm happy to hear criticism and opposition to my view. I'm obviously not perfect or any more enlightened than the next person. However, if the goal of this thread is to have actual discussion and perhaps work toward understanding, we're not going to achieve that by slinging shit at each other.

I never said I couldn't handle being insulted, I just said I didn't like it because I felt it defeated the purpose of the thread. DTC is welcome to correct me here if I'm wrong, but I'm pretty sure his intentions were for us to respect each other.
 
What should i try to understand? What i can get from your post is that you don't think Trump has had any major negative effects when if you paid attention to news and what is happening in the states, then yes, he has. The fact that the alt-right and nazi's (same thing really) have become much more emboldened in general should already be a sign that he has had a noticeable impact. The fact that millions could've lost their health insurance and was only stopped by a single should also be obvious enough evidence that he is having a noticeable impact.

Yes, i had a gut reaction. A gut reaction from seeing a lot of other people try and paint Trump as a buffoon that is causing little damage when that is easily proven false. Being constantly threatened with the fact that your rights and protections from discrimination can be attacked and potentially stripped away is exhausting and draining. Even if it does not happen, that doesn't change the effect it has on those minorities that are being targeted here. You seem really ignorant to this fact at all, and seem to assume that actual policy changes need to have happened for anything to count. That can only really come from someone who is privileged enough to not be directly affected by these things, and are able to thusly shrug them off and act as though it's all no big deal

And no, insults don't defeat the purpose of the thread. Soul Fly clearly listed things that Trump has done which have a noticeable impact (which you called melodramatic ranting btw, so good job listening to someone else's opinion there), and you dismissed it all because of a mild insult at the end. This is not a professional debate at all, and trying to act as though a mild insult allows you to dismiss and ridicule a post which shows your points are wrong is ridiculous.
 

WaterBomb

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What should i try to understand? What i can get from your post is that you don't think Trump has had any major negative effects when if you paid attention to news and what is happening in the states, then yes, he has. The fact that the alt-right and nazi's (same thing really) have become much more emboldened in general should already be a sign that he has had a noticeable impact. The fact that millions could've lost their health insurance and was only stopped by a single should also be obvious enough evidence that he is having a noticeable impact.

Yes, i had a gut reaction. A gut reaction from seeing a lot of other people try and paint Trump as a buffoon that is causing little damage when that is easily proven false. Being constantly threatened with the fact that your rights and protections from discrimination can be attacked and potentially stripped away is exhausting and draining. Even if it does not happen, that doesn't change the effect it has on those minorities that are being targeted here. You seem really ignorant to this fact at all, and seem to assume that actual policy changes need to have happened for anything to count. That can only really come from someone who is privileged enough to not be directly affected by these things, and are able to thusly shrug them off and act as though it's all no big deal

And no, insults don't defeat the purpose of the thread. Soul Fly clearly listed things that Trump has done which have a noticeable impact (which you called melodramatic ranting btw, so good job listening to someone else's opinion there), and you dismissed it all because of a mild insult at the end. This is not a professional debate at all, and trying to act as though a mild insult allows you to dismiss and ridicule a post which shows your points are wrong is ridiculous.
We've established that you disagree with my point of view and that you feel I am ignorant to a lot of things you feel strongly about. This is fine, as we obviously are different people with different experiences and focuses in life. We don't know each other, so really we don't have much to go on other than our posts here. Politics, especially when it comes to human rights like we've talked about in this thread, are deeply emotional and so it's normal to feel that way about someone who doesn't see it your way.

Let me ask you a question. If you feel my way of seeing things is wrong, what do you think is the best solution? Is your goal, in a perfect world, to see me change my mind? I mean this question honestly, because I want to understand what you are striving toward. If the ideal outcome is for me to change my mind and adopt a view more in line with yours, what would be the most effective way of doing that? I don't know about you, but being disrespected and dismissed does not particularly motivate me to listen more closely, let alone change outright.

In my original post, I did not target any particular poster or comment in this thread. I did my best to read the thread intro and give my thoughts based on my own perspective. Soul responded to me directly and laid out many examples of why he disagreed with me, which is all fine. I did not dismiss them as you said i did, in fact I read every one of them, and I fully intend to look into each one and see if I can learn more about them (I can of course, because there is always something to learn). As I mentioned above, I didn't have a single problem with the response until the end. Nobody likes to be insulted, and it's perfectly reasonable to ask not to be insulted. Because I felt insulted, I responded and defended myself. In that response, I used the same sarcasm and was being generally aggressive, so I'm guilty too. Same goes for my response to your post.

Look, I know this is really difficult to do over the internet. It's impersonal, and it's entirely too easy to write people off when there's no face to face interaction. Despite that, I still try my best to have civilized discussion and respect my opponents. I do not always succeed at this of course, as I'm flawed like everyone else. But I still try, and I always desire to see people respect each other. I don't think it's wrong to want that.
 

TheValkyries

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Nobody likes to be insulted and nobody likes to be ignored. You forget that your initial opinion is one that’s just not grounded in reality for many people who are already ignored in many facets of life. At what point is it no longer on them to treat your ignorance with more kindness and instead on you to not ignore them.

Like that’s the whole jig of privilege, privileged people who aren’t constantly actively thinking about it don’t even know that their uninformed opinions are uninformed because for so long the privileged opinion was the only one that mattered in the grand scheme of things. The inter connectivity of the internet and modern communications has significantly changed that so now the privileged are confused when they’re called out on providing their uninformed position. Like bruh, it’s cool that you don’t know everything no one person can know everything just take your licks when you get called out for not knowing and move on, people are allowed to be mad about things like this cuz like I said this position of “I’m sorry I was ignorant of it all” isn’t cute or endearing and deserving of polite coddling and free education it’s constant and exhausting to them and often employed in bad faith.
 

WaterBomb

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Nobody likes to be insulted and nobody likes to be ignored. You forget that your initial opinion is one that’s just not grounded in reality for many people who are already ignored in many facets of life. At what point is it no longer on them to treat your ignorance with more kindness and instead on you to not ignore them.

Like that’s the whole jig of privilege, privileged people who aren’t constantly actively thinking about it don’t even know that their uninformed opinions are uninformed because for so long the privileged opinion was the only one that mattered in the grand scheme of things. The inter connectivity of the internet and modern communications has significantly changed that so now the privileged are confused when they’re called out on providing their uninformed position. Like bruh, it’s cool that you don’t know everything no one person can know everything just take your licks when you get called out for not knowing and move on, people are allowed to be mad about things like this cuz like I said this position of “I’m sorry I was ignorant of it all” isn’t cute or endearing and deserving of polite coddling and free education it’s constant and exhausting to them and often employed in bad faith.
In going back and rereading my first post, I see now where things turned bad. I started out from an informed position, then drifted into areas I'm far less informed about. I also minimized the struggle of a great many people, albeit unintentionally. So in that respect, I deserved some lumps. I'll take them. As for privilege, well...that is a discussion for another time. I'm not stupid, I know I enjoy a great many privileges that others do not enjoy. I just grow weary of it being jammed down my throat all day every day. Which, of course, I can't complain about because underprivileged people have crap jammed down their throats every day their whole life. I'm just trying to raise my 1 and 2 year old sons as best I can, and the countless evils of this world just overwhelm me sometimes.
 
I personally strongly dislike Trump and the GOP congress but I tried to make my opinion in the OP very lukewarm (had to put an opinion b/c of cong rules) so as to steer the thread in any significant direction.

I'd prefer if people didn't dogpile on guys just because of their opinion. It hasn't been that bad in this thread but I think you'll be surprised how much better you can get your point across when you convey your opinion in a different way.

E.g my Trump voting Dad gets upset at things like the "Resist" slogan, but he is far more understanding when I tell him about how many people are upset that Trump can be very impulsive, the tax plan has a lot of issues in an America that has a high national debt and increasingly bad income inequality, and that Trump and the GOP congress goes against a lot of American people's values.
 

atomicllamas

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As for the idea of this thread, I think we'll have a lot more to talk about in the first quarter of next year once people have done their taxes.
Have you looked into the tax plans proposed by the Senate or House? My understanding is that if either of these plans pass my taxes are probably going to remain unchanged. But people who lose out are those making 30-45k a year, people who own houses, people who have kids, anyone who moves, and people with medical expenses (worse for more people under the house plan somehow .-.). That being said I don't think its fair to say "I'll look at my taxes next year and see if it works out for me," even if your taxes end up being lowered there are a lot of really stupid parts of this plan, for example it increases the deficit by over 1 trillion dollars and that money will mostly be distributed to Corporations and Billionaires via tax cuts. It's essentially a stimulus tax plan which would maybe be reasonable if unemployment was high, but right now its basically at full employment and the economy is doing well (unironic thanks Obama), so all this will do is increase inflation and exacerbate the level of wealth inequality (which will make the economy worse in the long run). Fun fact, if I moved because the company I worked for required me to transfer to a different location, I would not be able to write that off, but if a corporation decided to shut down one of their plants and move it to China, they would be allowed to write off the expenses of their move, really making America great again.

edit: source for the deficit thing (I was trying to find the breakdown I read too, but I don't remember the article :x
http://thehill.com/policy/finance/economy/357831-gop-tax-plan-will-explode-deficit-wharton-study )
 
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WaterBomb

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Have you looked into the tax plans proposed by the Senate or House? My understanding is that if either of these plans pass my taxes are probably going to remain unchanged. But people who lose out are those making 30-45k a year, people who own houses, people who have kids, anyone who moves, and people with medical expenses (worse for more people under the house plan somehow .-.). That being said I don't think its fair to say "I'll look at my taxes next year and see if it works out for me," even if your taxes end up being lowered there are a lot of really stupid parts of this plan, for example it increases the deficit by over 1 trillion dollars and that money will mostly be distributed to Corporations and Billionaires via tax cuts. It's essentially a stimulus tax plan which would maybe be reasonable if unemployment was high, but right now its basically at full employment and the economy is doing well (unironic thanks Obama), so all this will do is increase inflation and exacerbate the level of wealth inequality (which will make the economy worse in the long run). Fun fact, if I moved because the company I worked for required me to transfer to a different location, I would not be able to write that off, but if a corporation decided to shut down one of their plants and move it to China, they would be allowed to write off the expenses of their move, really making America great again.

edit: source for the deficit thing (I was trying to find the breakdown I read too, but I don't remember the article :x
http://thehill.com/policy/finance/economy/357831-gop-tax-plan-will-explode-deficit-wharton-study )
That's kind of what I was saying in that part of my post. Tax law affects everyone, but it's complicated and hard to really know how it's going to affect people individually until we've done our taxes. My wife and I have two kids and a house so we certainly fit several criteria you mentioned, but we're all going to see something of course. I didn't mean the tax plan wasn't worth discussing, I just meant in January we'll see how it actually plays out and thus will have more data.
 

Chou Toshio

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What's going to happen outside the administration: I'm going to go out on a limb and say that having Trump come into power has the potential to do a lot of long-term good for the country; insofar as this shock to the system is pulling in people's attention. I think that there is good reason to believe that Trump's presidency will result in overall a much higher degree of civil engagement and interest in government.
There will likely be a lot of political conversations that wouldn't have occurred otherwise.
The market will discover that there is a demand for facts and objective analysis-- probably one that didn't exist up until now-- and will evolve to deliver it.
This interest will create a wider awareness of how digital platforms are shaping our lives, how not paying for journalism is affecting the media landscape, and how much valuable content there is out there in non-traditional outlets like podcasts and youtube, and there is probably a real chance for some of the best and most reasonable voices to win in the competition for attention now; there is a lot better chance for them now than there was pre-Trump. Having Trump visibly in power will foster greater distaste for shock/bullshit and more demand for substance and objectivity from both the right and left.
I have faith that as people see how white identity politics and victim-identity politics play out, there will be more liberals and conservatives coming out to reject both-- and that Americans will come to realize that there are many values we share, many issues we are dealing with in common, and overlap where consensus can be built.

If you believe, like I do, that the majority of Americans will come to believe in many liberal positions (or have liberal positions without knowing it) that favor more Americans when barriers of communication compartmentalizing us are broken down, then you should probably see what Trump has done to the country's overall discourse as short-term terrible, but long-term giving great potential for a lot of good. I believe Bernie is right to say that the majority of Americans, when they have things explained, approve of very progressive policy ideas-- in a broader sense, when we can have a wider civil awareness and inclusive dialogue, the overall net movement will be blossoming liberalism.

Some conservative principles will also end up with more limelight and I'd argue that's a good thing too-- it would probably be a net good for parts of the left to be challenged to think more about how personal responsibility, fostering internal locust of control > fostering victimhood, and valuing families have the power to better lives of the individuals. What is the value of markets? What does it mean to be a sovereign nation? How much immigration is too much? These are questions I think even Bernie Sanders would agree are important and legitimate.

Trump could be the disaster that kicks off a lot of good-- for technology to be better understood, and for tech & media to be shaped better for dialogue and objectivity over shock and tribalism, for the best of conservative and liberal ideas to take center stage, and for both sides to be sharpened and bettered because of it. Long-term, these types of positive results do not seem unrealistic.
 
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PDC

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ehhhhhhhh no

Chou Toshio

i have a lot of friends who are moderates. i don't know about you, but the "shock to the system" you are attributing to trump generally turns into a humorous discourse on late night talk shows which turns his antagonisms and evil actions into those of a goofball emperor who can't tie his own shoes; the outlook that our current president lacks sensibility and motivation or a clear goal is not only false, but outright misleading and pernicious in outcome. the idea that a "shock" or an "insane event" can fundamentally change a system which recycles itself on spectacle every decade is laughable. a bit over a decade ago we started a never-ending war, and a bit over a decade later we've already run full circle back into the same machinations and conclusions which led us to continuing that war back then. certainly going to war and reaping nothing in the long run would wake people up and "question the system," but it clearly did not. there exists no event that can shake the fundamental trust that everybody in america has towards its electoral / political system.

what are we going to talk about in the next 4 years? everyday our president does something absolutely ludicrous, but by the next 24 hour news cycle it is either brushed aside, or turned into the butt of a joke. if people could make look at the man in office without the scope of lol he's orange or lmao he's so incapable!! we could possibly make process, but sadly that appears impossible at this rate. by the time this is all over we'll be back at square one and ready to elect him again. like i said, all my moderate friends detest trump, but at the end of the day their heart belongs to the current structure and changing it is tantamount to anarchy to them.

on "digital awareness," contrary to your assertion of higher awareness of trickery and buzzwords and whatever other tactics that are used, i only see an acceleration of these techniques in an ever-growing metadata age. i can claim "fake news" all i want, but at the end of the day that term has already been relegated to a punch-line or something like that. the people who were targeted by these campaigns haven't improved their logical perception or changed their understanding of modern media. you can post a million articles from wsj / nyt about how russian firms use metadata and mass bots to produce false pieces, but those sources are already compromised by trump's crusade at worst, and inaccessible at best.

i don't think that trump's presidency signals the death knell for white victimhood either. the victim complex has only skyrocketed in recent months and continues to be the trump card for the party's future. white victimhood is probably the absolute best tactic for drawing in moderates as the majority of that central group agrees that saying the n word is bad or something, but at the same time feels threatened by a nightmare of becoming a minority or admitting to contributing to systematic causes of discrimination. everybody in my town would probably agree saying slurs out loud is bad, but ask them if they feel if they personally contribute to inequality or if they identify as something other than american and all bets are off. identity politics for the white majority is at an all time high; keep in mind the situation manifests itself as a very eloquent argument that appeals to both the liberal and the conservative. take it from somebody who watches fox news daily whenever i am at my own house, white identity politics is the face of modern conservatism (unless you're white and muslim, like in the case of syria, which then your identity is portrayed as something else).

here's a good analogy. trump is the martin skhreli of politics. people look at somebody as a hero because they're "exposing the system by abusing it" or something like that. these people are assholes, but people treat their abhorrent shitty terrible evil actions with valor because they believe for whatever shitty reason this expose will change anything.

i'm watching fox news right now. it's black friday. people are rushing to stores on this day of sale because they can't afford any other day to purchase what they need. and they're sucking off the market and praising the holy tribunal of the economy, what a life.
 

Chou Toshio

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Your points are fair enough PDC. My perception is definitely affected by these mechanisms as well— and what I see as an increase in conversations and energizing around these topics may just me being trapped in a partly self-created bubble of people dedicated to ideas, principles, free speech. I have no data.

But I don’t think Trump supporters, actual conservatives, moderate liberals, progressives— I don’t think there is a group that genuinely wants ideas to be quashed, for echo chambers to strengthen, for the infrastructure of the internet to inherently tribalize us— or those that do are just the most malicious parts of those groups, who are not caring about their proposed ideals, but instead about power consolidation and personal enrichment.

I’m not saying those oligarch-seeking elements of the center right and center left don’t exist or deny the power they possess, and of course there are white nationals and left extremists who want to fuel tribalism (though I bet these groups are tiny), but I think with enough awareness and enough incentive in the market for supplying substance, things could go in the right direction.


Let me put it this way— there is a lot higher chance for Bernie Sanders (or a similar candidate) to win at some point because Hillary lost.

I would argue that the awareness of problems with the DNC and energy to fix them is completely unlike where it was under Obama. While Bernie-crats face an uphill battle, the fact that these conflicts are happening at all is a good thing.
 
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