A buddy(ish) of mine was talking about how "ingenious" the MI state dems were in funding all of the opposing primary campaigns so in the general the dems would win because their competition was such garbage.

I said "Dude... have you never heard of 'strawmanning' candidates? Because that's as close as it comes IRL next to literally building a strawman and putting an 'R' sticker on them. This is what uniparty authoritarian regimes do to make their regimes seem democratic and legitimate."

And he thought it was "ingenious!*" It's astounding how bafflingly stupid seemingly-intelligent people can be when it comes to politics and governance. Myopic, I suppose.

A buddy(ish) of mine was talking about how "ingenious" the MI state dems were in funding all of the opposing primary campaigns so in the general the dems would win because their competition was such garbage.

I said "Dude... have you never heard of 'strawmanning' candidates? Because that's as close as it comes IRL next to literally building a strawman and putting an 'R' sticker on them. This is what uniparty authoritarian regimes do to make their regimes seem democratic and legitimate."

And he thought it was "clever!" It's astounding how bafflingly stupid seemingly-intelligent people can be when it comes to politics and governance. Myopic, I suppose.