r/politics • u/Quirkie The Netherlands • 16h ago

Soft Paywall Obama Breaks Silence on Trump’s ‘Unimaginable’ Presidency - “Imagine if I had done any of this,” the former two-term president said.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/obama-breaks-silence-on-trumps-unimaginable-presidency/
68.4k Upvotes

94% Upvoted

2.4k comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

46

u/SchroedingersSphere 15h ago edited 15h ago

Truthfully, this is all anecdotal. I live in the south, and there are a lot of people here who voted for Obama but not Biden. I don't understand their thought process, so don't ask why, but I've heard from multiple family members that they "just couldn't vote for that woman. I voted for Obama and I gave my vote to Trump this time. I'd vote for him if he ran against Trump in a third election." Pointing out that this violates the Constitution just makes them confused and mad.

The sad thing is, they say this with pride, like I should pat them on the head because they voted Democrat and Republican. Like they were neutral and not biased, therefore their opinion is more valid. I try not to fall into the trap of talking politics with them, but they voluntarily give me these details against my will.

34

u/DEAD_VANDAL 14h ago

An unfortunate amount of Americans would legitimately rather a rapist pedophile as president instead of a woman.

0

u/AlarmingAerie 14h ago

We all know that, it's baffling they tried running with a women again. The society clearly got even more sexists since Hillary.

1

u/DEAD_VANDAL 14h ago

I think more than anything it was complacency, they wrongly assumed (as did a lot of people) that Trump was seen as such a joke that he didn’t stand a remote chance of winning again. I saw it the same way up until Election Day, cause it seemed genuinely unfathomable that any country could elect such a monster AGAIN.

1

u/AlarmingAerie 13h ago

he was actually favorite to win entire time everywhere except reddit.

3

u/sammythemc 13h ago

I live in the south, and there are a lot of people here who voted for Obama but not Biden. I don't understand their thought process, so don't ask why, but I've heard from multiple family members that they "just couldn't vote for that woman.

I think a lot of Americans judge their politicians on perceived "outsider" status. It's graded on a curve of course (Trump has been part of the establishment for years as a rich white guy real estate mogul, Obama gave the keynote address at the 2004 DNC so had a good amount of backing from the party), but for a lot of people who see the country as going downhill, they just look at politicians and vote for the one who seems the most iconoclastic. Hillary's status as the would-be first female president wasn't enough to overcome how she represented the business-as-usual establishment, so those Obama/Trump voters rejected her.

2

u/IsaacAndTired 14h ago

Obama was pretty damn present on the campaign trail for an election that had nothing to do with him. I guess what I'd ask is, what are you trying to convey with this comment? Are you suggesting Obama could have done more to win over the votes of your family? If so, can you give a specific example of something he could have done?

1

u/Imtherealwaffle 10h ago

I think its just a question of likeability / charisma. In completely opposite ways, both obama and trump had some kind of "star power" and popularity compared to other candidates. Someone like ron desantis or jd vance could do a 1:1 copy of trumps campaign and I would bet they wouldnt get nearly as many votes. Same thing for kamala compared to obama and to a lesser extent biden. They just weren't likeable enough to cultivate a big following.