You can't change or fix people who have their vote. Mental models are rigid, and people are, broadly speaking, emotional and irrational. They vote vibes, not facts. So, "what do?" as the kids would say. You keep folks who want to come to the US who might be vulnerable once in the US out of the US to protect them (which this administration is assisting with through their anti immigration efforts). The people who want to leave [1]? You help them leave for developed countries, which there are many. The people who will remain and should be protected? You protect them if you have the resources or network to do so. The global economy continues to reconfigure to decouple from the US [2]. Time marches on. These are harm reduction and risk mitigation mechanisms, perfect is not possible nor the target.
These are system problems. Think in systems. No different than having an abusive family you have to decouple from for self preservation, just at geopolitical scale. Capital, people, information are all mobile, and can relocate as needed. There is nothing on US soil that cannot be replaced or replicated elsewhere on the globe (besides perhaps national parks and other similar public goods, which can hopefully be protected until improved governance emerges). Please, challenge me on this if you think it's wrong, I've put much thought into it to provide guidance to others.
The only thing we had of value was trust (value of US treasuries and the dollar) in the rule of law and stability, and we burned it up. Humans are tricky. Get as far away as you can from harmful humans.
[1] https://news.gallup.com/poll/697382/record-numbers-younger-w... ("In 2025, 40% of women aged 15 to 44 say they would move abroad permanently if they had the opportunity. The current figure is four times higher than the 10% who shared this desire in 2014, when it was generally in line with other age and gender groups.")
> You can't change or fix people who have their vote. Mental models are rigid, and people are, broadly speaking, emotional and irrational. They vote vibes, not facts. So, "what do?" as the kids would say.
So don't present a candidate with shit vibes that people wont vote for? Democrats lost this election, if they got as many votes as they usually do they would have won.
Democrats in power would rather lose the election than break down their own power structure, that is the main reason Trump could get re-elected.
You blame Democrats, I blame the people who voted for this and are shocked he did what he said he was going to do.
Mass deportation? Tariffs? Dismantling the government? Hate? All things he campaigned on. He is doing exactly what his voters were told he was going to do. Dems are going to win those votes? Unlikely, they’re not going to run a candidate that appeals to their values, which aren’t going to change.
> “He’s not hurting the people he needs to be”: a Trump voter says the quiet part out loud
A Trump voter hurt by the shutdown reveals the real reason the president attracts hardcore supporters.
> The president’s particular brand of identity politics — the racist attacks on blacks and Latinos, the Muslim ban, his cruel treatment of women — similarly depends on negative rather than positive appeals. Antoine Banks, a political psychologist at the University of Maryland, wrote a book on the connection between anger as an emotion and racial politics. When politicians gin up anger, an emotion that necessarily has a negative target, voters tend to think about the world in more racial (and racist) terms. Trump makes his voters angry, he centers that anger on hated targets, and that makes them want to take his side.
> This is what makes Trumpism work. This is the dark heart of our political moment. Even people who are tremendously vulnerable themselves, like Crystal Minton, support Trump because of his capacity to inflict pain on others they detest. The cruelty, as the Atlantic’s Adam Serwer says, is the point.
These are system problems. Think in systems. No different than having an abusive family you have to decouple from for self preservation, just at geopolitical scale. Capital, people, information are all mobile, and can relocate as needed. There is nothing on US soil that cannot be replaced or replicated elsewhere on the globe (besides perhaps national parks and other similar public goods, which can hopefully be protected until improved governance emerges). Please, challenge me on this if you think it's wrong, I've put much thought into it to provide guidance to others.
The only thing we had of value was trust (value of US treasuries and the dollar) in the rule of law and stability, and we burned it up. Humans are tricky. Get as far away as you can from harmful humans.
[1] https://news.gallup.com/poll/697382/record-numbers-younger-w... ("In 2025, 40% of women aged 15 to 44 say they would move abroad permanently if they had the opportunity. The current figure is four times higher than the 10% who shared this desire in 2014, when it was generally in line with other age and gender groups.")
[2] Global Trade Is Leaving the US Behind - https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2026-02-12/on-tra... | https://archive.today/dsI9R - February 12th, 2026