Originally published via The Daily Bell:
One electorally counts out Trump, who is now beating Biden in a new poll, at his own peril. The man has nine political lives, it would seem.
But that’s not the interesting part. The devil is in the details, as they say.
We’ve previously at The Daily Bell debunked the “democracy” façade, which simply does not exist in the United States. It’s a shell game.
The patron saint of cynicism himself, George Carlin, put it best:
“Americans are led to feel free through the exercise of meaningless choices. There are only two political parties. There is a reduction of the number of media companies. Banking has been reduced to only a handful of banks. Oil companies. These are important, and you’re given very little choice…. You know what your freedom of choice in America is? Paper or plastic.”
(And in many places that have banned plastic bags, that’s not even true anymore.)
The respondents in the poll are, apparently, ideologically sympathetic to Carlin.
17% of the overall respondents across party lines support Trump’s bid to become president in 2025. A paltry 7% of the total respondents support Biden – the sitting president of these United States!
The numbers are even more heartbreaking for Team Democrat when we dive deeper into the results. Within his own party, only a tiny minority of Democrats, 16%, are “enthusiastic” about Biden’s 2024 bid. Most democrats – by more than a 4:1 ratio, don’t want their own president to run again.
Only 33% of Republicans are likewise “enthusiastic” about a Trump 2025 presidency.
Overwhelming majorities in each party, Democrat and Republican, would rather not see any more of their respective candidates, Biden or Trump. But most report they will vote anyway, whether out of a sense of duty or opposition to the other party’s candidate or whatever.
Almost no one, regardless of partisan affiliation, wants a Trump-Biden redo from 2020 – but that’s exactly the scenario that the tea leaves prophesize as of February 2023.
The picture this poll paints is two sets of people being offered utterly cringy, crap choices they don’t want but are forced to accept for the sake of defeating their opponents. Very few American voters these days vote for anything.
Voting has become mostly just an exercise to demonstrate opposition to their chosen ideological boogeyman, be he a fascist or a communist or a terrorist or whatever ist – definitely not because they were inspired by their chosen guy.
Fear and hate are not animating emotions that promote a healthy, vibrant Democracy™.
But the system works out for a narrow set of interests.
This poll reflects the cosmetic sort of Democracy™ the corporate state prefers, not actual “rule by the people.” Elections are a random football game on local TV on a lazy Saturday that the audience is indifferent to because they don’t identify with either team. But they watch anyway — out of inertia or habit or boredom — and the advertisers and football players and executives get rich nonetheless even if no one really cares about the product they’re selling.
To add insult to injury, the national security state is willing to go to war with its own citizens in the name of protecting this sort of absurd, theatrical pseudo-democracy.
Barring entirely plausible unforeseen circumstances, such as the Deep State dumping Biden before the ’24 elections, we’re on track to get more of exactly what we don’t want: a Biden-Trump rematch.
Ben Bartee is an independent Bangkok-based American journalist with opposable thumbs. Follow his stuff via Armageddon Prose and/or Substack, Locals, Gab, and Twitter.
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