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Trump, Zelensky, and the Yang Gang


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Gonna start this off by saying I’m a younger guy who doesn’t follow politics closely, and I’m no wordsmith like knapplc so if this post seems sorta amatuerish, it is.

 

I’m sure non politicians running for the highest government office in a country isn’t a new thing, but with the advent of the internet and social media these people that were once probably largely pushed aside for more experienced candidates are able to generate an equal or even greater following compared to their peers.

 

My question is do you more politically educated people see this as more of a fad? A somewhat anti establishment growth that is prone to wane at times? Or more of a trend that is shaping future global politics? Any other thoughts are appreciated. Thanks.

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24 minutes ago, DrunkOffPunch said:

Gonna start this off by saying I’m a younger guy who doesn’t follow politics closely, and I’m no wordsmith like knapplc so if this post seems sorta amatuerish, it is.

 

I’m sure non politicians running for the highest government office in a country isn’t a new thing, but with the advent of the internet and social media these people that were once probably largely pushed aside for more experienced candidates are able to generate an equal or even greater following compared to their peers.

 

My question is do you more politically educated people see this as more of a fad? A somewhat anti establishment growth that is prone to wane at times? Or more of a trend that is shaping future global politics? Any other thoughts are appreciated. Thanks.

 

For those who don't know, the Zelensky mentioned is a comedian with no political experience outside of playing the president on a TV show who nonetheless was just elected as real-life president of Ukraine. The incumbent was mired in scandal and Ukraine is getting pretty tired of Russia's crap.

 

To your question, there's definitely an upswing in populism and anti-establishmentism globally right now, and those two things typically go hand in hand.

 

Whether those type of people wind up being good at leading when elected is yet to be seen. In a lot of ways Trump has failed; he has succeeded in a few others.

 

Macron ran & won as a political novice in France and is also mired in scandal, protests and declining popularity right now as well.

 

After seeing this presidency play out over three years I'm growing more convinced people who say things like "We need someone who isn't a career politician" or "the government should be run more like a business" are wrong.

 

Critiquing and acknowledging the flaws of political systems is easy. Is the solution electing people who have no experience or are largely ignorant about the nuts & bolts of how those systems work to lead? I don't think so.

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Social media is going away.  And, 20 years from now there will be forms of social media that we haven't even thought of yet.  These will change how this all works even more.

 

I believe social media is to blame for the rise in populism around the world.  It's very easy for misinformation to spread and start building a following.  That following essentially is based off of lies and half truths.  

 

I think as time goes by, people will become more educated on how to handle information that's coming at them. Right now, we have people who grew up with no electricity or phones, now having a smart phone.  There's a reason why elderly people are victims of scams at a much higher rate.  My 84 year old father sits and reads crap all the time and believes it.  Meanwhile, I've noticed how my kids are much more skeptical about stuff they see on line.   I think we all need to learn how to disseminate what is real and what isn't.  When the public gets better at that, the big swings in public opinion based from crap flowing through social media, should be less of a problem.  When that happens, people should be able to make better judgements on who to vote for and understand when someone is full of BS or not.

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1 hour ago, DrunkOffPunch said:

Gonna start this off by saying I’m a younger guy who doesn’t follow politics closely, and I’m no wordsmith like knapplc so if this post seems sorta amatuerish, it is.

 

I’m sure non politicians running for the highest government office in a country isn’t a new thing, but with the advent of the internet and social media these people that were once probably largely pushed aside for more experienced candidates are able to generate an equal or even greater following compared to their peers.

 

My question is do you more politically educated people see this as more of a fad? A somewhat anti establishment growth that is prone to wane at times? Or more of a trend that is shaping future global politics? Any other thoughts are appreciated. Thanks.

I think it's tied strongly to anti-establishment and populism. @BigRedBuster thinks social media is the cause, but I think social media problems are just a symptom. The cause is government and more broadly society not helping the average person. If the majority of the population return to feeling like their lives and the lives of their children are getting better, then I think we'll see populism fade.

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27 minutes ago, Danny Bateman said:

 

After seeing this presidency play out over three years I'm growing more convinced people who say things like "We need someone who isn't a career politician" 

Thanks for the reply. One of the reasons I brought this up is the current internet popularity of Yang similar to that of Trump or Sanders.

 

I occasionally listen to Joe Rogan’s podcast and he has Yang on. Didn’t pay much attention to who he was until I was on the internet and/or playing games and random people are shouting/typing ‘YANG GANG’. I think to a certain extent the whole ‘internet crowd’ is a huge boon to someone’s campaign. I kind of see that crowd as the type that doesn’t delve deep into the details and rather watches a short clip on YouTube. They probably don’t largely care how experienced someone is as long as the message resonates with them.

 

I could be wrong here but for those reasons I see Yang as a big player in the upcoming elections. To me, it’ll be interesting to see who encapsulates that crowd. Be it Yang, Sanders, or someone new.

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2 hours ago, DrunkOffPunch said:

Thanks for the reply. One of the reasons I brought this up is the current internet popularity of Yang similar to that of Trump or Sanders.

 

I occasionally listen to Joe Rogan’s podcast and he has Yang on. Didn’t pay much attention to who he was until I was on the internet and/or playing games and random people are shouting/typing ‘YANG GANG’. I think to a certain extent the whole ‘internet crowd’ is a huge boon to someone’s campaign. I kind of see that crowd as the type that doesn’t delve deep into the details and rather watches a short clip on YouTube. They probably don’t largely care how experienced someone is as long as the message resonates with them. 

 

I could be wrong here but for those reasons I see Yang as a big player in the upcoming elections. To me, it’ll be interesting to see who encapsulates that crowd. Be it Yang, Sanders, or someone new.

 

People like Yang and Bernie have done very, very well utilizing social media to get their message out. I'm actually really thankful that Yang is running because I think UBI is a pretty novel idea that's getting traction recently and we should deliberate it as a society as a means of supplementing or replacing some or all of the current social safety net. Akin to what @RedDenver is saying - improving the lives of the average American... maybe UBI could be part of that.

 

However, that online crowd is very vocal but they are still definitively the minority. The internet is a poor approximation of broader society. Twitter is a very poor estimation of the voting public. It's why putting too much stock into hot takes on Twitter is usually a dumb idea. It's akin to gauging a candidates support with voters by counting yard signs.

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7 minutes ago, Danny Bateman said:

 

However, that online crowd is very vocal but they are still definitively the minority. The internet is a poor approximation of broadly society. Twitter is a very poor estimation of the voting public. It's why putting too much stock into hot takes on Twitter is usually a dumb idea. It's akin to gauging a candidates support with voters by counting yard signs.

Out of curiosity how popular was Burnie when he first announced he was running in 2016? To me YANG GANG’s internet popularity has a similar feel to the whole ‘Feel the Burn’ thing. 

 

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45 minutes ago, RedDenver said:

I think it's tied strongly to anti-establishment and populism. @BigRedBuster thinks social media is the cause, but I think social media problems are just a symptom. The cause is government and more broadly society not helping the average person. If the majority of the population return to feeling like their lives and the lives of their children are getting better, then I think we'll see populism fade.

I think it festers on social media because misinformation can spread so much.  I don't think the sentiment necessarily starts there, but it spreads faster because of it.

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2 hours ago, DrunkOffPunch said:

Out of curiosity how popular was Burnie when he first announced he was running in 2016? To me YANG GANG’s internet popularity has a similar feel to the whole ‘Feel the Burn’ thing. 

 

He announced April 30, 2015 and polled around 10% in most polls shortly after his launch so not much but still significantly more than Yang's current polling of around 1%.  I agree that Yang does have some similar internet popularity but I still think it's unlikely that he gets much traction in this race.  Voters seem to be placing a big emphasis on electability this election and Sanders appears to be retaining most of his hardcore supporters that might otherwise consider voting for Yang.

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50 minutes ago, Lil' Red said:

He announced April 30, 2015 and polled around 10% in most polls shortly after his launch so not much but still significantly more than Yang's current polling of around 1%.  I agree that Yang does have some similar internet popularity but I still think it's unlikely that he gets much traction in this race.  Voters seem to be placing a big emphasis on electability this election and Sanders appears to be retaining most of his hardcore supporters that might otherwise consider voting for Yang.

It's weird that the same people would vote for Bernie and Yang since they're pretty far apart on policy and ideology. Bernie's a social democrat (who calls himself a democratic socialist), and Yang is a libertarian (maybe a social libertarian? not sure). But people also voted for Bernie or Hillary in the primary and then Trump in the general, so what do I know.

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4 hours ago, Lil' Red said:

He announced April 30, 2015 and polled around 10% in most polls shortly after his launch so not much but still significantly more than Yang's current polling of around 1%

Thanks for that. Was trying to find it myself but didn’t really know where to find it.

 

3 hours ago, RedDenver said:

But people also voted for Bernie or Hillary in the primary and then Trump in the general, so what do I know.

Yeah I read part of an article where a guy went to a Yang rally or whatever to get a feel for the people that supported him. He ran into plenty of people that had previously voted for Trump and Obama. In a way it’s like they just follow whoever they think represents the most change in the current system. 

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