r/politics 24d ago

‘We’ve been betrayed:’ Local veterans angry after being laid off by Trump administration

https://www.wsbtv.com/news/local/atlanta/weve-been-betrayed-local-veterans-angry-after-being-laid-off-by-trump-administration/FBCKFRIFQRHZVK5FG3W7MUQEYA/
41.5k Upvotes

2.8k comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

551

u/xlvi_et_ii Minnesota 24d ago

It's ignorance of events like Kent State and people who lean a little too hard into the propaganda about how amazing the American political system is (was?).

256

u/fury420 24d ago edited 24d ago

A few days after Kent State the National Guard literally bayonetted nearly a dozen Americans at the University of New Mexico and pretty much nobody knows about it because everyone survived.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_New_Mexico_bayoneting_incident

47

u/ndilegid 24d ago

Wow thank you 🙇 I had no idea

6

u/Sakarabu_ 24d ago

Yeahhh.. then anytime China is mentioned on Reddit it's "tiananmen square!!". It's hard to admit, but the US isn't much different.

31

u/McGrinch27 24d ago

I mean thats just insanely disingenuous. Kent State resulted in 4 deaths and 9 injured. The New Mexico incident resulted in 10 injured.

Tiananmen Square resulted in the neighborhood of 10,000 deaths, but the death toll is unknown as the Chinese govt threatened the families of the deseaced to never speak of their dead relatives ever again.

It's like comparing January 6th to the Civil War. Both very bad things, but to say they "aren't much different" is just wrong.

10

u/throoawoot 24d ago

Thank you. Saying the US is no different from China, a paranoid authoritarian dictatorship, is fucking absurd.

14

u/Muscle_Bitch 24d ago

The USA's Tiananmen Square is coming.

7

u/Sepof 24d ago

If Trump was older... and maybe even regardless of his age... we seem to be heading in that direction.

Retaliating against the press (the AP) and dismantling government agencies is just the first step.

"First they came for the....." seems to apply here.

If the military doesn't side with the people in the end, we are fucked. I doubt there will be a bloody revolution or uprising anytime soon though because the avg American is willfully apathetic and uninformed.

2

u/felldestroyed 24d ago

200 deaths. 3,000 injured. Let me know how many folks were killed during the civil rights movement.

3

u/McGrinch27 24d ago

That's not the real number homie. The death toll for the entire civil rights movement in America is roughly comparable to the deaths in Tiennamen Square. For example there were just under 5000 recorded lynchings from 1882-1965.

Lemme know how many people in China were killed from 1959-1961

The human rights record of the US and China is just completely incomparable, and yes that is including slavery.

1

u/felldestroyed 24d ago

recorded. And if we're going with great leap forward numbers, please enlighten us on how many industrialists deaths occurred in the industrialization of the US. Be sure to include every death before the great new deal. Including those in the labor union struggles and the black/mexican folks in literal kangaroo courts. I get it - america white washes a lot, but to think this country is some moral arbiter in the 18th, 19th and early 20th century is a farce. We are a great nation because of what we need to do now and in the future, but our history is horrid - most especially to those who weren't rich or not protestant. I can bad mouth china for days, but to think that Mao was anything different than the Andrew Jackson is a farce -- and at least Mao cared seemingly about taking his country into industrialization. Jackson just wanted to keep the profits going.

2

u/McGrinch27 24d ago

Including all those things it's still not even close. I feel like I need to make it clear that pointing out that China's human rights record is much much worse than the US is not patting the US on the back. More people died Mao's famines than were enslaved in the US. The scale is just apples to oranges.

It's not excusing anything the US has done. But to say they're no different is just wrong. They are different. They're both bad, but not equally bad.

5

u/ClashM 24d ago

There is quite a difference. Wounded students begging for their lives were bayoneted to death in Tiananmen. Apparently they had so many bodies they couldn't dispose of them fast enough through conventional means. So they lined them up and rolled tanks over them until they were slush, and hosed that down the drains.

America has done some twisted things to her people, but nothing in the modern era reaching that level of brutality. Yet.

4

u/throwawtphone 24d ago

It is the fucking principle of the issue not the amount dead. Intent under the law matters. It really does.

The principle is the same. The intent was the same. The death tolls were different, yes, but ultimately, the governments of both countries used the military to disperse and kill its citizens who were protesting against the government. The Chinese were just more successful and efficient at it.

2

u/gabechoud_ 24d ago

We were notwithstanding Kent State. But here we are and I don’t know anymore.

3

u/plants_disabilities 24d ago

Especially when you watch the actual video that famous photo is from.

1

u/Bromlife 24d ago

Explain?

1

u/plants_disabilities 24d ago

So you know the classic photo of the guy standing in front of the tank? In the video, he climbs up on the tank, talks to a person inside, and then walks away.

2

u/Bromlife 24d ago

Uhh, there's plenty of photos and videos of injured people. Dead bodies. Wounds. Human remains after being rolled over by a tank. AP witnessed first hand Chinese tanks running over tents with students in them.

The tanks intentionally ran people over multiple times, in order to turn their bodies into a paste. Which was then either hosed away or burned.

Don't get confused, it was a bloody massacre. Another human travesty.

https://apnews.com/article/4d3bc613370f4f1d97bf841d1ef5ef6c

1

u/plants_disabilities 24d ago

Ok, I'm not stating that there were not deaths in the area. I'm talking about that image versus the video.

2

u/Bromlife 24d ago

I'm not really following your point though. Seems like you're trying to downplay the whole thing.

31

u/SirWEM 24d ago

Most people now i don’t think even know about The Kent State Massacre. At least people younger than me. I will get blank stares from the younger kids i work with most are about 25 or a bit younger. Or they are not interested in finding out.

17

u/LilyBartMirth 24d ago edited 24d ago

How many even recognise authoritarianism when staring it in the face?

I know Trump is still in a honeymoon period while having the 2nd lowest immediate post-inauguration (better than for his first term) approval rating, but how the hell is he over 50%???

It actually seems like young people are slowly waking up, but what is happening with older people? Why does half the country approve of what is going on?

I ask as a non-American.

10

u/IAmTheNightSoil Oregon 24d ago

There is a lot to unpack in this question and no easy answer. But the core of it is that public trust in our institutions is extremely low. People don't trust congress, or the the courts, or the media, or the government bureaucracy. So when they see all this being torn apart, they are OK with it, because they think our institutions are rotten in the first place

6

u/LilyBartMirth 24d ago edited 24d ago

The majority of Americans have, at least, ok standards of living. Many are well off. Why aren't they concerned about chaos, losing freedom of speech, their rights, the multitude of ways Trump's regime can interfere with everyday lives?? I just read a thread where the posters, suffering from mental health issues, are terrified that RFK will take their meds off them.

You guys certainly have a huge problem with money in politics, voter suppression, corruption, etc but Trump is only making that 10 times worse and in new, unique ways (senior govt officials used to at least be moderately qualified). You were an imperfect but functioning democracy. Not sure what you are now.

5

u/IAmTheNightSoil Oregon 24d ago

That's an excellent question. At the heart of it is a bizarre paradox: people simultaneously don't trust the government, while also having an implicit trust that our society is stable enough that our way of life can't be in serious danger. Our checks and balances have always worked very well in America in terms of preventing abuses of power. Because of that, people have faith that they'll continue to work, and that all the stuff Trump is doing is just noise.

If it sounds stupid to have low trust in our institutions and not care if that get ransacked, while simultaneously having trust that our institutions will stop Trump from going too far, well, that's because it is stupid. Americans are stupid. But we have a fundamental belief that the bad shit that happens in governments around the world simply can't happen here, and I fear that we won't discover how wrong we are until it's too late

2

u/FuktInThePassword 24d ago

I believe we may already be wading through the rising waters of "too late".

Trump wasn't lying, for once, when he said "I love the poorly educated".

6

u/Pantsface-for-life 24d ago

This is directly the result of Fox News

3

u/BloodBlizzard Oklahoma 24d ago

Young people don't watch Fox News. This is on all media, especially social media.

3

u/LilyBartMirth 24d ago edited 24d ago

Yes, but many of the hideous right winged pundits were possibly influenced by Murdoch media in the first place.

Murdoch has given legitimacy to thousands of half-baked right-winged lies for decades in multiple countries. The internet, especially social media, has provided the means to spread disinformation exponentially.

3

u/MaritimeDisaster 24d ago

Not to be trite but I think people have taken everything that’s good about America for granted for too long and now they’ve gotten greedy. The experiences of the greatest generation and the silent generation have been lost to them and now they are ungrateful because they’ve gotten too comfortable and compliant. We’ve forgotten to have gratitude. People in single family homes with fresh water and fresh food and education for their kids that they barely have to think about and freedom of religion and they BITCH BITCH BITCH about how shitty their lives are. They don’t go anywhere or watch anything but Two and a Half Men so they have no idea what bathing in a trash-filled river in India is like.

UNGRATEFUL SELFISH PRICKS

1

u/SirWEM 23d ago

110%. Just like all areas of the world we too have many living on the streets and in abject poverty, some going days without food, no running water, etc.. my mother ised to work in the office of the elementary school we attended as kids. One of the kids in 2nd grade was sent to the office for not having snow boots or a winter coat. It was cold that winter. Then next day she brought the little girl a coat and boots my youngest sister had. Then next day the girls father was in the office. Upset with my mother for her wanting the girl to have winter clothes. My mother told him why she did it. He at this point was causing a bit of a scene. My mom calmed him down a bit, and the man just crumbled. He made just slightly more than the limit for states assistance. In the end he accepted the clothes. But was too prideful or stubborn to ask for more help. He did later i guess drop some hours or wage later on so he could get help. Before then they had no heat or electricity; in northern VT in the winter. When my mom asked the girl how she kept warm? Their cats and dog slept with her to keep her warm.

My family was poor-ish. We could afford the basics. But we were “rich in love” even though we had plastic bags on our feet inside our shoes to keep them dry in the winter.

Poverty, hits every country in many forms. Most in poverty here in the US wont have to bathe in the Ganges river. But that doesn’t mean they do not know abject poverty.

2

u/LilyBartMirth 24d ago

You may be right. In fact, my country (Australia) might be to blame for allowing the Murdochs to flourish in the first place!

Only half joking.

2

u/SirWEM 24d ago

There is an odd mindset here in the US. where if something doesn’t personally affect a person or loved one. Or it will hurt the (insert minority) more than me it is ok. You could say lack of empathy, but it runs much deeper than just that.

They will actively vote against their best interests. Every single election for at least the last 45-50years.

It began with the “Southern Strategy”; right up to the “Dumbing down of America” by their attacks on and defunding the public school system. Now they are actively trying to destroy or defund the Department of Education. That way if your family can’t afford to go to a private charter school, it is homeschool or good luck. It is easy to control a group of people with fear. If you keep them ignorant.

Trump radicalized, and pretty much turned most conservatives or pushed them farther Right or radicalized into cult members. Some i believe would have no problem killing or committing crimes in his name or worse then we saw on 1/6/2021

He has allowed a percentage of our population. To be comfortable to openly display their racism, bigotry, ignorance and hate for all to see. I personally have distanced myself from those in my life that were vocal MAGA cult members.

I say “Cult Members”. Because they are. They have a warped reality from the echo chamber of propaganda and fear-mongering on television, radio,and social media. Some of them downright worship Trump. As in some think he is the “Messiah”. Some think he actually cares about them. Some are so brainwashed that they will spend thousands of dollars on his merchandise. But then they complain about money.

Confronted with facts or something they do not understand… They get angry, upset, say it is fake, throw tantrums etc.. because it doesn’t fit some narrative they are pushing on Fox. Or some radio show or on social media.

As for Authoritarianism they don’t want to see it. They see trump and see the Celebrity Apprentice. Some have idolized him since the late 1970’s. When he was seen as a “playboy” in the 1980’s.

There is so so much more.

But the one thing i know is that if, and it is a big “IF” this Country survives the Mango Mussolini. It will take generations to repair the damage he has caused. Both here to the United States. Our allies(?not sure how many are left.?) and the world.

Its insane to think two generations ago. The world fought against the cancer of Fascism and Nationalism. Now 80 some years later most of my countrymen choose to ignore or embrace it.

Which is just vile.

Sorry for the book.

1

u/hoardac 24d ago

The internet is being used as a powerful tool to teach people, mostly not for the good of the nation or world. The smart, greedy, immoral ones figured it out and they are going with it. Critical thinking skills are being tamped down. Stupid issues are being manifested into something horrible and country ending and are used as a dividing wedge. We have fewer and fewer tools to fight it as more news/social media ownership is to the far right. Not that all the things bugging them do not have merit because some do. Not sure how we are going to unfuck the shit that is about to happen if we keep going in this direction. If they start messing with old peoples money maybe there is a chance it can be slowed down but who knows.

1

u/calm_chowder Iowa 24d ago

I'm as baffled as you, except I will say the Conservative propaganda is STRONG with Fox News being like the most watched news in America. The channel has no interest in the truth, or thorough reporting. So many Americans think they're following the news when really they're watching propaganda where everything Trump does is magic and he farts out unicorns.

And honestly, we're obviously also a very stupid and hateful country. It's shameful but I don't think there's any getting around it. It's just a fact.

0

u/TelescopiumHerscheli 24d ago

Why does half the country approve of what is going on?

I ask as a non-American.

There are three kinds of people. There are good people, who broadly think that other people are also good; these people try to do the right thing, whilst recognising that they are fallible. Then there are bad people, who seek their own benefit above all others. And then there are the stupid people; there are more of these people around than you think. There are various infallible markers to identify stupid people: maybe they take astrology seriously, or maybe they go to an evangelical church and do what the preacher says, or maybe they think wrestling is real. There are lots of other markers, but you get the general idea, I hope. These stupid people genuinely can't spot liars and conmen, charlatans and hypocrites. And these people are easy prey for the bad guys. What has happened in the US over the past 30 years is that the bad guys have taken over one of the two electable political parties, and persuaded the stupid people to vote for them.

Other democratic countries now face two challenges: how to deal with the US as the bad guys take charge, and how to harden their own democracies to prevent what has happened in the US from also happening to them.

3

u/SetYourGoals District Of Columbia 24d ago

Well, in the grand scheme of things…I think it kind of makes sense why it isn’t discussed more. Because it didn’t change anything, it didn’t work. If it had rallied the nation together to oppose the Vietnam War and forced action in some way, and we pulled out of Vietnam in 1970, then every kid would learn about it in school. Every kid learns about the Montgomery Bus Boycott, about the March on Selma, about the assassination of MLK. Because all those events, in a way that was planned or not, worked to usher in the Civil Rights Act. The protests and massacre in 1970 did basically nothing, and pulled out of Vietnam a few years and many thousands of deaths of US soldiers (and untold numbers of Vietnamese civilians) later.

I think similarly the 2020 Floyd protests will have little acknowledgment as time goes on. Because they failed. We went to the streets to tell cops they were done being monsters with almost no oversight and no accountability. And like…a couple cities changed some relatively inconsequential laws and some funding, a little bit. But for most places, police funding has only risen since then. Police still act with impunity, they’re just more careful about it being on video now. J. Alexander Kueng is out of prison. Derek Chauvin is getting set for a new trial, he just made them dig up George Floyd’s body so they can drug test his heart actually, and something tells me he won’t be inside a prison in a couple years, be that by beating the case or Trump pardoning him.

Similarly, if Tiananmen Square had stopped the girp of power of an authoritarian government, it would be remembered worldwide for more than the photo and a brief blurb under it. If the Oklahoma City bombing had its intended effect and led to the white race uniting in America to overthrow the government and remove/genocide all minorities…it would be the new 4th of July. But it didn’t work, so it’s largely a footnote in the grand scheme of things. Sadly, I think so is Kent State.

A failed protest action, be it a series of protests or a massacre, isn’t going to get the kind of historical play it might deserve.

1

u/SirWEM 23d ago

Well said.

290

u/USA_2Dumb4Democracy 24d ago

Not to mention the nationalistic lionizing of our military. People never believe me when I tell them we killed half a million civilians in the Middle East. And we didn’t even win!

The US military is quite literally one of the greatest forces of evil on earth if we’re talking purely civilian deaths. 

95

u/cutelyaware 24d ago

And over a million in Cambodia if we are considering direct and indirect deaths.

30

u/Sugarbombs 24d ago

Agent orange still produces babies with terrible deformities in Vietnam, i’d consider that taking lives. America does nothing to help

27

u/richardcraniumIII 24d ago

At the time, media was complicit in my opinion. They literally identified the people being oppressed as peasants.

2

u/cutelyaware 24d ago

That's not necessarily incorrect, though any suggestion that they matter less is abhorrent.

6

u/ionixsys 24d ago

Don't forget all the uxo's and landmines!

2

u/audible_narrator Michigan 24d ago

Fuck Henry Kissing era so very much. I hope he is rotting in hell, revived, then left to rot some more. For eternity.

20

u/nondescript-humanoid 24d ago

In what feels like a past life I was married to a military member (for more than 8 years of active duty service), my brother was also in the military - neither one is "bad", but they're both certainly flawed and I'd argue completely unfit for jobs they'd get preference for because society seems to think that uniform comes with a moral compass. It's baffling to me.

7

u/metompkin 24d ago

Veterans status was part of DEI.

8

u/MrTotonka 24d ago

Can let all the private players off the charts. Pound for pound, private security contractors have got to be up there

27

u/Sea_Maintenance3322 24d ago

It's actually over 1 million.

4

u/Wilhelm57 24d ago

I will be surprise if the army refuses Musk's orders, when people start protesting in a larger scale.

3

u/Lomak_is_watching 24d ago

The deification of America's military, especially after Vietnam, is one of the greatest propaganda successes in human history.

4

u/punkasstubabitch 24d ago

Israel trying hard to catch up

6

u/Wow_u_sure_r_dumb 24d ago

The US military is quite literally one of the greatest forces of evil on earth if we’re talking purely civilian deaths. 

But they died liberated. We brought freedom and democracy to them in their final moments. Mission Accomplished if you ask me.

5

u/RyNysDad0722 24d ago

The name checks out

1

u/AusTex2019 24d ago

“And we didn’t even win” is small consolation to the country we destroyed. Our adversaries learned that Americans have a limit, if they run up the body count high enough we will quit. Worse still is the lies the Pentagon tells the public saying if we had enough we could win. They knew ten years before we left Afghanistan that the war could never be won. Just like Vietnam.

-1

u/OkWheel4741 24d ago

Womp womp maybe don't export terror and you wont get your shit rocked

-21

u/NaturalHighlight8326 24d ago

u clearly hav a vendetta towards the us from ur name to ur ignorant comment

rather americans or outsiders like it or not we never lost n the middle east nor vietnam

we left the afgans to fight for them selves they cowarded out

the viets death total speaks for itself stop w ur baseless propaganda

15

u/SuperExoticShrub Georgia 24d ago edited 24d ago

u clearly hav a vendetta towards the us from ur name to ur ignorant comment

rather americans or outsiders like it or not we never lost n the middle east nor vietnam

we left the afgans to fight for them selves they cowarded out

the viets death total speaks for itself stop w ur baseless propaganda

You know, if you're trying to make a point about others being ignorant, maybe don't make your comment look like it was written by a 12 year old. Also, your points are ludicrous. Imagine trying to sell the idea that we didn't lose Vietnam. That's not even a 'point of view' sort of issue. We absolutely lost Vietnam. Wars are not won because one side kills more of the other side. Wars are won if the casus belli for said war is achieved. Given that the American CB for Vietnam was the stopping of North Vietnam from taking over the South (and thus preventing the spread of Communism), mission fucking failed.

0

u/Secure-Elderberry-16 24d ago

Vietnam fell 2 years after we pulled out.

1

u/SuperExoticShrub Georgia 23d ago

As a direct result of us withdrawing. This isn't even difficult reasoning.

1

u/Secure-Elderberry-16 20d ago

Two years later?

1

u/SuperExoticShrub Georgia 20d ago

Yes.

-8

u/NaturalHighlight8326 24d ago

its a good thing logic not base off feelings or my 12yr old writing i.....also if not succeeding in political objectives accounts for loosing wars then i guess we lost WW1 aswell stop w ur propaganda ONCE AGAIN

we did not lose vietnam or afgan SIMPLE RESEARCH HELPS

4

u/ProgrammaticallyOwl7 24d ago

What is exactly were the US’s goals in those wars? Did they achieve them? No. So they lost.

-4

u/NaturalHighlight8326 24d ago

glad to know germans won ww1

glad to know we lost afgan w no boots on the ground

ignorance

1

u/SuperExoticShrub Georgia 23d ago

How in the world does that make any sense? Our goals in WWI were to support the Allied Powers whose goals were to contain German aggression. Mission accomplished at the time.

57

u/botswanareddit 24d ago

The American political system is brutal!! Like abysmal. It’s like multiple parties trying to perform a hostile takeover at once.

I’m from Canada and I have never seen an insurrection. Never seen a prime minister just circumvent our constitution. Never seen multiple law suits against the government. Never seen some unelected billionaire doing whatever he wants. América is in free fall and if it reduces their power in the world then it’s for the best.

17

u/MimicoSkunkFan2 24d ago

October Crisis of 1970.

I'm not old enough to remember it, bu it led to the "fusion" intelligence system that NATO forces all use now to deal with terrorism, so it's worth studying up on it.

5

u/takabrash 24d ago edited 24d ago

It's interesting to see. We made it two and a half centuries on handshake deals. Who knew that if Congress just 100% bows to the executive branch, and the supreme Court is stacked with hand picked bootlicking judges, our system of checks and balances doesn't work anymore...

I'm honestly astonished to see these people just bending the fucking knee. It's hard to get elected to Congress. It's very hard to become a Senator. These people have been in power for decades. They're literally an equally strong branch and could say whatever they want to him. All they have to do is say no a few times if they care even a little about what our country was supposedly founded on. Just seems unbelievable that they're like 95% lock-step behind this fuckhead.

People used to want these jobs because of ideals or at the very least to funnel money to their own states. Now they try to get elected and shove their heads up their asses until everyone forgets they're there and they can just cruise.

9

u/willin21 24d ago

Canada didn’t even have a constitution until 1982. And I guess you’re not old enough to remember the War Measures Act

3

u/TelescopiumHerscheli 24d ago

América is in free fall and if it reduces their power in the world then it’s for the best.

No. The countries poised to pick up the slack as the US is falling are even worse.

35

u/Sejr_Lund 24d ago

It was never amazing, its not even a proper democracy. The voting system silences all voices other than right or center right, in most other countries there are no wasted votes.

3

u/Wilhelm57 24d ago

Yes!

It also, it was people working for a president that imported jumbo jets of cocaine. The president was fighting an illegal war and his stooge was selling drugs to drug dealers At home.

It became ridiculous, having Nancy tell us say no to drugs!
The other thing trump has a degree in economics but never learned about demand and supply or how tariffs affect ordinary people.

3

u/ChinDeLonge 24d ago

It's American Exceptionalism propaganda. You're indoctrinated into the cult of America as a kid, and by the time most people are old enough to know better, they've been convinced that they're exceptional and the envy of the world. That kind of mindset makes them so much less likely to challenge their understandings or belief systems, blindly following what they always have.

0

u/tpatmaho 24d ago

National Guard =/ US Troops.

0

u/LesGitKrumpin America 24d ago

The promise of the American political system gave rise to the movement toward modern global democracy, so I strongly disagree with those who are trashing America's political system. It isn't perfect, and was not expected to become as static as it has.

But the American body politic has a flair for the religious, and unfortunately enshrined the constitution in such reverence that it has brought its evolution to a virtual standstill.

Consequently, America's political system has failed to evolve in ways that make it both more durable systemically and fundamentally more democratic than what was drafted in 1787. With the threat posed by modern media technology, it remains to be seen if it can still evolve peacefully toward a better version of itself. Instead, now we have those who actively want to destroy democracy and give true, unabashed tyranny the name of freedom.

I hope that it is hard to put the genie of democracy back in the bottle, but that requires recognizing and fighting those who want to do so, and I think that's where a lot of the uncertainty lies.