The taxpayer was lied to repeatedly and under the belief of many many many lies, unwittingly voted to get rid of it.

Democracy is good until the public votes for something unpalatable. In that case they were lied to and/or they are unfit to choose for themselves.

Are you saying they weren't lied to? Like Trump saying he knew nothing about Project 2025 which was a lie.

> Are you saying they weren't lied to?

I think Trump & team have been very open about their intentions. There's even his entire first presidency to look at. At most, some of his voters might be surprised that he actually follows through on exactly what he promised (for example some of those voting for him now surprised about being targeted by ICE, including farmers fearing for their cheap workforce).

So sure, lots of lies, on the other hand and at the same time everything was planned and prepared quite openly.

We can actually show that the American public are lied to, and continue to be lied to.

Yes - I can get the point you are making - “democracy for me but not for thee” is BS. Sure!

But the evidence is that theres one media network which is simply selling whatever story works, along side a 50+ year effort to kill trust in institutions. We can even show that the republican machinery gave up on bipartisanship - hell, it’s even public knowledge.

But that wouldn’t make a whit of a difference to voting patterns, or your point. Because your point doesn’t need to be based in the long history of complicated malfeasance that rots all English speaking democracies. It’s anchored in your current state and argument.

So yeah, people voted.

> unpalatable

See, this is a weasel word. Nobody said it was unpalatable, they said it was bad, because it is.

Do you want bad things to happen? No? Okay then, everyone should be on the same page.

Did they say "Democracy is bad"? For that matter, did they say "Democracy is good"?

No, they didn't. In case you don't know, that's called a "straw man fallacy".

well the republican party has been talking for decades about removing EPA, DOE, etc. and has gotten lots of votes on those premises, so "they" make good on that promise and now the "voter has been lied to"? you could have made the same claim if the republicabs did nothing.

The lie is that getting rid of these agencies is a good thing.

Saying that something is good (or bad) feels more like an "ought" statement than a proper "is" statement, ie not in a category that's capable of being a lie.

People who keep parroting this take are the most hypocritical bunch I have ever seen. Because if the premise is true then when these institutions existed then those were also voted by taxpayers to exist, right? But that time these “taxpayers” made noise about how government can’t be trusted and majority is muzzling their right of speech and first amendment etc etc. Now they when they are in the majority they turn around and say stuff like majority rules, government can be trusted etc.

And I know people like to play both sides so let me add. The big government hoopla exists only on one side.

Well the behavior of agencies has changed quite a lot since that whole mechanism was voted into existence, no? Sometimes it takes awhile for the consequences of a change to play out.

Another smoke and mirror argument. The “majority” government which decided that these agencies should get tax payers money was there till 6 months ago. So, it has not been “awhile”.