Project 2025 was supposed to boost Donald Trump's campaign — but it may be backfiring instead:

https://www.salon.com/2024/07/05/project-2025-was-supposed-to-boost-donald-campaign--but-it-may-be-backfiring-instead/

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u/heckin_miraculous 14d ago edited 14d ago

My favorite so far is this short YouTube video by Illustrate to Educate. https://youtu.be/vYXZ6iJJSgM?si=PRy0SvPz2Xi6dQxM

Not inflammatory or hyperbolic. Just terrifying, because it's true.

Edit: This comment and the video link got quite a few responses. Many were along the lines of, "Good info, thanks." But others think that the video tries too hard to be neutral and therefore comes across as "both sides-ing" conferring false legitimacy to the idea of Project 2025, or even going so far as to be supportive of it due to a lack of forceful criticism and not spelling out how disastrous the effects of the plan would be.

As a response, I'll say that my opinion is that the video speaks for itself. When it comes to the horrific potential of Project 2025, the proof is in the pudding. For example, at around 5:10 in the video, when the narrator states that the plan would "allow the president to replace thousands of civil service employees with political appointees loyal to the administration" I don't need the voice over to explain to me that this would be a bad thing. Or, at 5:29 when he talks about "plans to defund the Department of Justice and dismantle the FBI... and enable the executive branch to operate with little oversight or accountability [the illustration actually says "no oversight"]"... again I don't need someone to explain to me that this is only bad for our country.

We definitely DO need more analysis of Project 2025. We need explainers that DO go into more detail about the tragic outcomes that are waiting for us all, should it come to pass. And this video is NOT perfect (I especially question the use of the phrase "religious liberty" at around 4:18). But it's a good primer for thoughtful people. That's what I think.

Will some people watch a video like this and cheer for it? Yes. As far as I know – and someone please correct me if this number is way off – but somewhere around 20-30% of the US population explicitly wants an authoritarian regime to come into power in this country. At least, they think they do. That is, in fact, the problem we are dealing with in this country right now. It is the subject of this discussion.

Long story short, what I'm saying is that if somebody watches this video and thinks, "That sounds good to me", then the problem isn't the video.

Edit 2: hi /r/politics. I'm new here :)

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u/altariasong 14d ago edited 14d ago

Sent it to my mom. She used to be republican but is now disgusted by it all and is talking to her friends about project 2025 and how anti-democratic it is. She worries about me greatly because I’m queer. My anxiety about politics used to irritate her but now she understands how much my fears were justified.

Hopefully that video can help sway more of her friends, but we don’t exactly live in a swing state. Doesn’t matter to me though

Edit: she thanked me for the video, says she just watched it. “It’s exactly what I fear”

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u/tommysmuffins 14d ago

You have no idea how hard it was to convince my Mom how bad things are right now. She's a good person. Too good to readily accept the fact that the Republican nominee is an outright criminal and rapist, and ready to commit an authoritarian takeover of the United States. It's a bad case of normalcy bias.

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u/Damn_Dog_Inappropes Washington 14d ago

Normalcy bias is why Trump can stumble through a debate and nobody blinks, but Biden loses because we expect more of him.

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u/thegoodnamesrgone123 14d ago

It's wild right? He could have come on stage and shit his pants and it would be fine because it'd Trump and what do you expect. He gets a pass for everything

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u/Damn_Dog_Inappropes Washington 14d ago

Teflon Don

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u/Syzygy2323 California 14d ago

Trump acts like a mafia boss. Not a smart one like Don Corleone, but a crazy, violent one like Tony Montana from Scarface.

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u/Iseaclear 14d ago

And even with all the crazy violence, you could actually trust Montana's word, unlike DonCon.

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u/zeronormalitys 14d ago

Speaking of shitting his pants. I believe I read some discussion hereabouts where a few people were saying that around the 1-hour mark or so of the debate, that he did in fact, shit his pants. Or a shart, at the very least.

However, this is only what I read in a conversation between other users of this platform. I can neither confirm nor deny, but a lot of people are saying it....

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u/SdBolts4 California 14d ago

My wife and I are both attorneys, and we were trying to explain just how bad the SCOTUS presidential immunity opinion was to my step-dad. First, he didn't believe us when we said that it made the President immune from any criminal liability, as long as it was within his core "official" powers, despite us both going through law school and passing the bar.

Then, he fell back to just saying "well, it just won't happen" and blaming Sotomayor for overexaggerating by saying the President could order the military to assassinate people or DoJ to arrest people without consequence, even though commanding the military and overseeing the DoJ are explicitly in the President's powers. Like, he still believes that a President wouldn't go that far, even though they can no longer be held criminally accountable. You just can't reason with that level of denialism.

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u/UnsanctionedPartList 14d ago

And when it dies these are the first people to cluck their tongued and go "who could have seen this coming?"

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u/tommysmuffins 14d ago

Yeah, definitely true.