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America had three good years under Trump, until COVID hit. Domestic policy, foreign policy, economic policy - pick your metric, and things were going very well. The Biden / Harris administration has made things worse. Nearly all of those things. Some of them much worse. So if Americans simply look at past results, and make a rational deduction of who is likely to make things better for Americans, they will choose Trump. So we have nothing to worry about. Right?
Americans spent $108 billion on lottery tickets last year. There are about 250 million Americans between the ages of 19 and 80 years old. Figure half of those people never buy lottery tickets. That means the rest of them are spending nearly $1,000 per year on lottery tickets. Adjust my ham-fisted estimates however you like. But Americans spend A LOT of money on lottery tickets, trying to get rich.
Kamala Harris is running a campaign based on emotional appeal to our hopes and fears. She is avoiding discussions of policy, economics, and reality. It sounds, well, silly. But I think she may be taking the right approach.
I know what you're thinking: With her record, what else can she do?
But I think it's the right approach, regardless.
This is one of the flaws of democracy. This is one of the flaws of placing our country's destiny in the hands of people who pause "Bachelorette" so they can go buy lottery tickets. This is why Democrats want easy, hassle-free, widespread voting, among people who don't really think about things all that much.
That's their market.
I doubt that Kamala Harris is as stupid as she pretends to be. I just think she understands her market. Or perhaps she just happens to fit in perfectly with her market. I suppose it doesn't matter which one is true. Whatever.
Anyone who thinks they can get rich by buying a lottery ticket has got to like the odds of making America better by voting Democrat.
And any Republican who thinks they can get the votes of such people by discussing tax policy is just as delusional as the lottery ticket buyers.
But we believe. The lottery ticket buyers, the Republicans, all of them - they believe. They believe in the irrational. "It didn't work before? Well, let's try it again! And again and again and again! The next one will be a winner!" You've got to admire their optimism.
Maybe not their rational decision-making. But at least their optimism...
Discussion (66)
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I like your total lack of a solution. I tend to agree.
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I'm here to help.
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And it is huge.
I played golf today with my brother (who is a very good golfer - I’m OK but not on his level) and I have that optimism - or maybe it is naïveté - to think like the voters you talk about - that when I start with a birdie like I did today the great round will continue - but of course it didn’t. And being a conservative I also am able to see what has transpired under Biden/Harris, unburdened by the total idiocy they spout. That is the difference. Apparently libs believe her - or at least bet on believing her - and think her
optimismfantasy will be realized. As my brother said, we have a lot of stupid voters.To read this bio, please join Ricochet.
John Hinderacker at Powerline makes a similar point: democrats appeal to emotion, we must learn to as well.
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I reckon the nearest thing to a solution is good old-fashioned Aristotley rhetoric.
Use logic and emotion and good character. And do whatever else helps to make the truth look good, helps make our position clear, and helps make tricky things simple.
Maybe I'll get back to you just as soon as I learn how to do that effectively. Maybe in about a hundred years or so.
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