u/HazyDavey68

On my many trips east from Western MA, I remember seeing the Virgin Mary statue on the eastbound side of Mass Pike around Warren, MA. There was an article about the history of the statue which involved a man who installed it after his wife survived cancer. I looked for it today, but didn’t see it. Anyone know if it’s still there or if not, what happened?

People in Texas, Alabama, Ohio, Indiana, etc. love their public college teams. They are red voting states. MAGAs are not known for supporting socialism but they wear gear from a publicly subsidized institution. They downplay the importance of education while rooting for schools with solid higher education credentials.

I'm thinking of stopping in Utica on my way to the midwest. It will be basically dinner and a hotel overnight. Is it a good place to stop and do you have an recommendations?

Trump and his team make lots of outrageous claims out of court. These include the election fraud claims and most recently, the allegations about vandalism in the reflecting pool. Do people understand that there are very few consequences with making unprovable statements in the media, but lawyers cannot do the same thing in court if there is no chance of evidence to back up the claims? So, lots of MAGA theories fall apart when subjected to our legal system.

Progressives tend to promote policies that aim to prevent future problems: vaccines, crime prevention, addressing climate change, diplomacy to prevent wars, universal healthcare with primary care, early intervention in education, consumer/food/product safety regulations.

Conservatives, on the other hand, tend to support policies that address a problem after it occurs: virus therapeutics , incarceration, disaster relief, military intervention, emergency room care for uninsured people, criminal justice consequences for kids that don’t flourish in school, and letting the market sort out problems with consumer abuses and harms from dangerous food/products.

I feel like the prevention approach is cheaper and more efficient but the reactive approach is more dramatic and easier to showcase.

In the past year or so, we have seen Netanyahu doing whatever he wants to the point that some Americans who previously supported him or were neutral now have problems with his tactics. We have seen the US health insurance system looking like it's going to collapse under it's own weight. There are other examples around wealth inequality, public health, the environment, and political spending.

In some ways, progressives couldn't ask for a better scenario to justify their policy proposals so I'm wondering if these conditions will accelerate change in the opposite way that MAGA people were expecting?

Currently, one party controls the Executive and Legislative branches of government in the US and arguably, controls the Judicial branch.

I'm wondering how voters who may lean Republican, or are basically on the fence, will be feeling about that and how much it might motivate them to sit this one out or vote for Democrats solely on the issue of checks and balances?

Edit for typos

Date: July 2026. My evidence is his recent speech and arrest at the US Capitol. He gave one of the most precise and concise explanations of the abuses and corruption of the Trump/Vance administration we have ever heard. He called for their impeachment, conviction, and removal.

He did all this while in his Air Force uniform, so he is in pretty big trouble.

I can't remember seeing something as bold as this done by a regular person. He really put himself out there. It will be interesting to see how this plays out as we near our nation's birthday.

Very soon we will be seeing "FREE JASON WATSON" stickers.

The floodgates appear to be completely open when it comes to money in elections. Interestingly, sometimes the candidate with less funding still wins an election. Right now, I don't think that is a function of other person having more money behind them but more likely related to a weak well-funded candidate. It does demonstrate that the better funded candidate doesn't have to win 100% of the time.

I wonder if we will ever reach a point where the sheer amount of money backing someone becomes a stigma for a candidate? Some kind of political Jiu Jitsu where one's financial support becomes a liability. (Kind of how someone's excessive wealth might play a role.)

Obviously, this relies on some kind of disclosure or press investigation into the situation and given the current media atmosphere, that will probably not be a popular beat for journalists. Maybe this is just wishful thinking.

If you look back on photos and articles about the Bicentennial activities, everything looks to be more festive and much better attended. In 1976, Ford was president and the country had just been through Watergate, Vietnam and unemployment rate was over 7%. So, it wasn't a great time for the US. Plus, the population of the US today is over 100 million more than 1976, so you would expect bigger crowds just based on that.

Edit: Seems that the bots have gotten their marching orders with this one. Some variation of "liberals/Democrats hate America" is the MAGA bot response here. We get it, you guys cannot or will not look beyond the surface level. So, waving a flag and saying you love America is more patriotic than wanting to hold your government accountable and speaking out in an effort to "form a more perfect union."