> this level of participation would never happen in the US
It probably would. We just don’t have an issue that imminently and clearly threatens the wellbeing of 2/7ths of the population, and for which a simple solution (e.g. withdrawing a bill) presents itself.
When American cities get pissed off and form a consensus, they certainly turn out.
I bet that if you didn’t tell people who was president, the vast majority of Americans would notice exactly no differences between the last president. Slightly different tax rates and slightly different employment rates maybe, but practically no detectable difference. People’s retirement accounts are still healthy, people have jobs, wage growth (or non growth) is similar. The only difference is the level and type of rhetoric. Businesses might notice that it’s a bit easier to get things done, but the actual change between Obama and Trump is benign when you take the media out of it. Deportations of illegal aliens was actually higher under Obama if that’s your issue. But the US is characterized by stability and even under Trump, the US is a functionally stable as it has ever been. Under Reagan, a certain element was convinced the sky was falling, under Obama, the same thing. The US isn’t perfect, but it’s all going along reasonably well. The media likes to create non-stop urgency over everything, but that helps them sell more ads. I don’t buy into the hype that the world is ending. We could always be better and not everyone will ever be happy, but for most of us, American politics is two sides of the same coin and we like it like that. We don’t want revolutionary shifts every four or eight years; we want stability and predictability — that’s why our economy is so strong and our currency so safe.
Nobody’s wellbeing is being immediately affected by this president any more than the last one.
Very few people in the USA feel that their wellbeing is being threatened by Trump in the same way that many people in HK feel threatened by the Chinese government.
As a relative portion of the population, no. 2/7 of the US population don’t think that Trump is going to result in their being thrown into essentially concentration camps. He’s horrible, but it won’t result in that.
It probably would. We just don’t have an issue that imminently and clearly threatens the wellbeing of 2/7ths of the population, and for which a simple solution (e.g. withdrawing a bill) presents itself.
When American cities get pissed off and form a consensus, they certainly turn out.