Doesn’t fucking matter, I’m voting D because it’s a fucking binary system and the other choice is a dystopian totalitarian shithole and abstaining from voting is voting for said shithole.
it’s a fucking binary system
That can change but it requires people to get involved at ground level politics like school boards, city councils, county supervisors and township offices. It takes about ten years for these officials to reach congressional levels. The teabaggers did this successfully but they had a lot of financial support from wealthy conservatives.
This is something that people constantly miss. It’s why you can write off third parties. Plenty of people want to see change, but they think just winning the presidency is enough. It isn’t. You need Congress too. And getting Congress means winning individual races on the state level. And winning those often means you need to win elections for state and local positions. You can sometimes skip local and go straight to state, but very rarely can you skip state and go federal.
If we want a better system, it needs to start local with a well organized ground game across every state. You need to build up a reputation and strongholds. Greens and libertarians aren’t interested in doing this, which is I write them off as opportunistic grifters.
Yeah, the greens are especially a joke. The LP is essentially an outlet for Republicans to pretend to be “independent” every once in a while.
The Greens are absurdly good at the grift. You had Jill Stein wine and dine with Russian oligarchs and have a few pseudoscience beliefs, including vaccine hesitancy, and people still thought she’d be better for the working class and handling COVID.
Yep. Also, they don’t do anything serious at the grassroots level. Vote for them at the national level, but no candidates making their way up through the ranks by serving locally first? Get serious - that’s supposed to be my viable option as a progressive? A compromised cutout kook like Stein hanging with the likes of Putin and pushing complete nonsense as a supposed option to vote for at the national level and…nothing at the local.
Who do they think they are kidding? It might be a great way to siphon off votes to help the fascist party get into office - like 2016 - but other than making a handful of useful idiots feel that they really Showed The Man ™ by not backing Democrats, what have they done?
It takes corporations to get involved. Currently it only benefits them to have Republicans. Until the money gets involved it will never sway.
The Tea Party, at least in this one regard, has been inspirational. Imagine if a hard left wing group managed to get support and glomp onto the Democrats and force their will on the larger party like the Tea Party turned MAGA Party has. We could see some serious progress instead of having token voices to ignore come voting time, because they have no choice but to stick with the main Party line.
“We won’t vote for a budget that doesn’t include Universal Healthcare. Good luck getting support from the Republicans, they hate you.”
I agree, it would be great to see. But the success of the Tea Party was predicated on the support of conservative billionaires. The left doesn’t have any of those. Moreover, there’s no room for it in the current political situation.
In the absolute best-case Scooby-Doo ending for 2024, Trump is defeated and convicted. I think there’s at least a slim chance that this could break the GOP enough that it splinters into the Double-Down Crazy Party and the Let’s Get Back to Fleecing the Poors in a More Socially Acceptable Way Party. In this scenario, a real left-wing party could gain some traction.
So I don’t think the Republican Party can splinter and survive. The only reason they’re still holding power is because they use the power they already have to perpetuate more (e.g. voting restrictions, gerrymandering, reducing powers of parts of government that do get voted Dem). I don’t think they can lose a lot of those areas for even one election cycle without potentially losing them forever. The Dems would have to just… stop those things (apply reasonable distracting, remove excessive voter restrictions, etc) and they’ll have the controls in perpetuity (especially with the more liberal younger generations growing older).
I think the Republicans will accept any level of crazy to keep in the race.
Both parties openly backing and arming the genocide in Palestine, the most well-documented genocide in world history, despite overwhelming public opposition, is not a binary system, it’s a one-party system. We are living in dystopia already, the Democrats shave 3% off of whatever the fascist Republican platform is and say “we’re the best option.” Stop being a fool and see the system for what it is.
We see the system for what it is, so I’ll vote for the slightly less terrible party in the short term and also do the things necessary to change it in the long term.
Good luck with your attempts at incremental change, that’ve been going on for a century while our society has completely devolved into fascism, a bipartisan police state and a genocidal global empire. You are clearly the brilliant visionary we need to guide us into the uncharted future.
Yeah… things haven’t changed much in the last 100 years…what with Prohibition, women’s sufferage, a 75-day school year and Jim Crow.
Prohibition? We still have drug prohibition. Woman’s suffrage? It’s something, but women’s votes still are as useless as everyone else’s, especially if you refuse to vote for anything to actually change (and they still have a wage gap). 75-day school year - what? Jim Crow? Improvements but black communities institutionalized, ghettoized, gunned down by cops, and still a wage gap. See prohibition.
Plus, now our government is totalitarian, eating a third of GDP, massive surveillance state, largest military on earth, quarter of the prisoner’s on Earth, constantly trying to censor the internet, economy is insanely unequal and getting worse, inflation over the long term getting worse and wages not keeping up with them, housing prices skyrocketing, and currently openly engaged in a genocide despite nation-wide protests. Need me to keep going?
You are so insightful, offering how what little incremental changes we’re doing aren’t enough. Your powers of observation are impressive and really contributing every time you bring it up.
So tell me, what is your feasible solution that will help in the short and/or long term? Or are you taking the position that the ship is unsalvageable, and we just have to go down with it? Because your vocal contributions aren’t helping with those making an effort to bale water out.
Wow, sorry, didn’t realize this was still going.
What is my feasible solution? General strike and/or total shift to third party to implement direct democracy. 100 million people can go out and waste their vote on a petty tyrant like Biden or Trump, or 100 million people can actually start making real changes. You’re all in a prison of your own making.
That’s not feasible. You start that up, the Republicans win and you lose anything you’ve gained plus more. You keep going and the Republicans keep winning, and the more they’re able to solidify their power until we’re living in a literal Christo-fascist nation.
That’s a great plan if, and only if, that is your ultimate goal.
Of course it’s feasible. Biden literally cannot win, it’s in fact the only option if you don’t want to see GOP in power again.
Thanks for your best wishes! I’m lucky enough that the hour it takes a year to vote doesn’t get in the way of the direct action I participate in the rest of the year.
Mutual aid isn’t mutually exclusive with voting.
So what do you do to improve it?
Points gun at own dick
“STOP BEING A FOOL!!!11!”
How about both of you go the fuck home and let an actual progressive do some actual good for once?
That would require getting elected, which would require them being broadly popular.
Barack Obama pulled off a surprise victory over the established Democratic candidates by campaigning on a message of hope and change. Of course his administration ended up only slightly more progressive than a standard Democrat’s, but the fact remains that a non-mainstream candidate can run and win on the promise of progressive reform.
I think Biden has been more progressive then Obama. Yeah, Obama was a minority and he was a damn good orator and importantly he wasn’t Hillary. He represented progress. But his actual policies? Nah. There is something aspirational about having someone who isn’t another old white man, and I think Obama was a decent President, just not particularly progressive.
In 20 years he’ll be viewed as the ragen of the dems for encouraging privacy to get steamrolled. He was in a position to act to protect Americans after bush and all he did was add fuel to the fire
I like to think Obama walked the worlds highest tight rope and never flinched. That was more progress than America had ever seen before. He also established that it is character not color that makes a leader. The current GOP rather burn it all down than accept these simple truths.
Biden is more protectionist, which is a damn shame, but what we need right now, sadly.
And the established dem party learned from their mistakes. It will be much tougher to slide a progressive by again.
You can tell by how the DNC bent over backwards to accomodate Sanders and his campaign, even changing the plan to get rid of the Iowa Caucus as the first primary election since Sanders thought it would favor him in 2019. (Then Buttigieg won it instead)
Of course his administration ended up only slightly more progressive than a standard Democrat’s
This is why I liked Obama.
More specifically, progressives would have to actually turn the fuck out for those progressives at the primaries.
Bernie can tell you counting on that is counting on pigs flying.
Bernie’s strategy to victory was turning out a huge number of young people and disaffected non voters. He lamented in the last months of his campaign that he wasn’t getting the numbers he needed.
It’s so much easier to blame the corrupt DNC than to recognize we need to work on turnout and a broadened message. It should be obvious after 2016 that the virtue of a righteous message is not enough on its own to get a following.
A platform of legal weed, free college, free healthcare, and student loan forgiveness couldn’t even achieve a 75% turnout of young voters – and I say that as someone who was mid 20s in 2020. You could hardly imagine a better platform for young people. There needs to be a much, much better ground game for progressives to win.
Bernie wasn’t on the ballot though, because he got fucked out of the opportunity. Of course the people who were incredibly motivated to vote for him didn’t show up when they were denied the opportunity to vote for him. That’s not a failure of Bernie’s message, that’s a failure of the establishment to embrace a message that motivates young and disaffected voters.
He was certainly on the ballot in the primaries.
It’s funny because it’s true.
Which, Biden is broadly popular?
Lol.
He sure as hell was at my (very close to national average demographics district’s) caucus in 2020. Damn near the whole room lined up for Biden nearly instantly. It was the same for Hillary in 2016, btw. These lies people like to repeat on the internet about how one progressive or another has overwhelming support and only loses out due to manipulation by the democratic party are not borne or by reality, and I think are often spread by those trying to either disenfranchise left voters, or are the voters that fell for it and are now doing the dirty work of repeating the lies.
Sorry, but you give people free food, they’ll show up and cheer for any one. Hell. May not even need to bribe them with food.
Also it’s not 2020, and I wonder how many people are okay with his support of Israel’s genocide? Or his track record on climate.
Biden is not broadly popular, and you’re telling the same lies you’re accusing others. Biden is broadly tolerated- and as always been merely tolerated.
Or his track record on climate.
Biden signed the most significant climate legislation in American history.
You lose elections because your beliefs are fringe.
The issue is they’d rather have another republican than an actual progressive
See: Al Gore vs Bush
Also, still miffed about Bernie not being a “good candidate” for the DNC in 2016.
Gore won. He just fucked up by playing by the rules back when people thought that mattered. The brooks brother rioters knew better, and the right wing court put the fix in.
Also, not to be a pill, but nader took a small percentage of the votes in Florida in that election as a progressive. Most of those probally would have gone to Gore, making the bullshit soft coup the GOP pulled off impossible if he wasn’t in the race.
First past the post means vote for the lesser evil and pressure the fuck out of them to get the system changed. Thats it. The system doesn’t let anything else work.
Nader didn’t just take a small percentage, he deliberately targeted swing states to sabotage Gore for stepping on the Green Party’s turf by running on climate issues.
Literally the green party exists today because they refused to let the usual process 3rd parties swear is the actual reason they exist play out, and let the major party that is closest to them adopt their policies.
And you can see that “fuck you this is my shit!” mentality to a certain degree among modern NoVote “progressives”, it isn’t enough if Biden literally delivers on everything Bernie said he would and more, because he’s “the DNC” and he’s not Bernie so it’s obviously not good enough and you should still refuse to vote for him.
it isn’t enough if Biden literally delivers on everything Bernie said he would and more, because he’s “the DNC” and he’s not Bernie so it’s obviously not good enough and you should still refuse to vote for him.
i’m torn between jill stein and cornel west, but if dark brandon returns and actually accomplishes this, i will vote for him. tell your boy to get to work.
To add in, the court didn’t have the authority to intervene. Congress is supposed to decide elections that are tied or otherwise in doubt.
And didn’t Gore actually win the recount after all was said and done?
And didn’t Gore actually win the recount after all was said and done?
Yes but he conceded before then.
Concessions don’t have legal force. The legal force is the state secretary. Or SCOTUS giving itself power.
Right but everything moved forward once he conceded.
nader took a small percentage of the votes in Florida in that election as a progressive. Most of those probally would have gone to Gore
Absolutely! Steve “three-shirts” Bannon and wealthy conservatives are trying their best to dilute the Biden vote by encouraging/financing RFK, Jill Stein, West and the No Labels party
Fucking Gore couldnt even win his own home state, a state that overwhelmingly vote Clinton both times. Had he been able to do that he wouldnt have needed Florida.
And what is it with liberals always blaming the 3% that vote 3rd party, and never the 15+% of Democrats that flipped party?
Because Harris would then become the default nominee and Biden knows she can’t win. It’s either that or a punishing primary resulting in some other nominee, but who would that be? Could they beat Trump? It would be a big gamble. Biden running for a 2nd term is a gamble too, but it probably is the safer bet. His real mistake was having someone as unpopular as Harris as a VP.
I think he would be happy to hand it off to her if he thought she could win.
I also think that it didn’t occur to Biden that Trump would still be viable after being defeated in 2020, but of course, like many of us, he underestimated both the cowardice of most Republican leaders and the depravity of Trump’s base.
Simple reason is more people who vote Democrat disagree with you than agree with you in terms of policy.
Your two options are “convince more people to share my views” or “complain online”
Do you think people actually want a progressive candidate?
The term “you get the politicians you deserve” is often correct, regardless of country and culture.
EDIT: Downvotes? I thought this place was better than Reddit… If you disagree, please highlight how the demand for progressive policies has been shown by the electorate…
How about no President over the age of 60? I want young politicians. I also want term limits.
Please no. An age cap is fine. But term limits will just add gas to the fire of corruption.
This is something you can actually observe too. Districts that have implemented term limits have seen corruption go up, not down.
How? Wouldn’t that do the opposite?
Term limits in Congress mean we lose experience. So we’re forced, right away, to rely on outside experts for everything from technical knowledge on fracking to getting a bill passed correctly. This is the first axis on which lobbyists and parties gain more control over representatives.
The second axis is campaigns themselves. A lot of time in office is actually spent campaigning and fundraising. Especially in the house where you’re up every two years. This means your name and reputation is your brand. However, with term limits people will not have time to build those brands. So anyone looking to move up to the Senate, Governorship, Presidency, or wherever else will likely have to depend on “outside” money far more. They simply will not have had time to build up their own funds. This money, of course, comes with strings.
Even staying in place would require abiding by those strings in the long run. Once fundraising is no longer expected of the representatives they become vulnerable to a primary by their party. The party simply shifts funds to another candidate and that’s the end of a problem for them.
The third axis is the predetermined length of a politician’s public political career. Only senators and representatives that toed the line get cushy jobs provided by the party or lobbyists. While that’s already true to some extent, many politicians end their career when they don’t have the popularity to get elected anymore. This also means they don’t have much political capital to spend getting cushy jobs unless a personal connection grabs them. With politicians being forced into retirement at young ages, with plenty of popularity and capital, they’re going to get offers they can’t refuse. As long as they’re a “team player.”
Another way to think about term limits is making the politicians employees of their party. And while that’s not a bad thing in systems with a lot of parties (like ranked choice voting and proportional representation); it’s catastrophic in a two party system. Because the oligarchs will waste no time literally buying the legislature.
Age Caps are great. Age Caps simply require you to retire at retirement age. And for that side step much of the tomfoolery I’ve described above. Long serving politicians are more accountable to their constituents and it’s harder for lobbyists and party die hards to influence Congress.
Everything you wrote already happens
So how about we think of something that won’t make it worse
Money is considered speech, lobbyists already buy politicians and write bills. The only difference would be they’d have to buy a different politician every decade or 2
Sounds like lobbying should be outlawed.
In other words, you don’t think it would improve anything.
Yes. But we should be fixing that, not making it happen more. Thus the analogy of adding gas to an existing fire.
This is an unpopular opinion that I share. Everyone loves to talk about term limits as a solution.
Term limits will just make the revolving door to cushy corporate jobs spin faster, it doesn’t solve the roots of the problem.
We need to do something about citizens united and lobbying.
The reason that congresspeoe get paid well is that we do NOT want a system where you have to be rich to be in Congress. You SHOULD be able to have a career as a politician, otherwise who would do it? That’s right, only the rich.
If we wanted regular people to be able to serve in Congress with low term limits, we’d have to make sure they can go back to their career and not have to sell out to corporate interests and set up a job on K Street. Maybe if we treated public service like military service, where your job is protected by law while you serve?
I completely agree with you on term limits.
But if you’re the kind of person who argues against term limits by asking the person you’re talking to to visualize lobbyists’ influence as a three dimensional metric space, you’re also the kind of person who knows that age based term limits are absolutely a violation of human rights and an example of ageism.
So even if we set aside the fact that it would take a constitutional amendment to do just because the constitution is what legally defines the roles and requirements of federal office, it’d have to be a constitutional amendment because agism violates the 14th.
I’m not against the idea in principle, of course. Democracy itself often feels like one of those late night “There’s gotta be a better way“ commercials. The problem is that their central assumption derived from the enlightenment that man was a rational actor who could both be trusted to work in his own interest and (at least amongst the noble and wealthy) self-sacrifice for the good of all.
Of course it’s ageism. But there are certain jobs that require retirement because of age related problems creating critical issues. I don’t think we should be politely standing by as someone with Alzheimer’s is in a position to affect leadership of the country. They should have an age limit, just like the military. (which is 62)
As to whether it would require a constitutional amendment, I’m not sure. I’m not a constitutional scholar. But term limits would likely require it if age does. We’re not getting one easier than the other. If we do put in the effort let’s make sure we’re doing the right thing, not some corporate lobby astroturf thing.
And yes the extent to which our government is a gentleman’s agreement has become glaringly obvious in my lifetime.
There are some fundamental issues with our democracy that I think need addressed, but I don’t think age restrictions or term limits would do anything useful. There are already mechanisms in place that are supposed to handle the case of age-related incapacity - these need strengthened, but that doesn’t require an amendment. The other problem I hear this is supposed to address is out-of-touch representatives - which should be addressed by strengthening our voting process. Reverse Citizens United, make it easier for young people to vote, and you’ll see an improvement.
Getting states to use ranked choice voting would go a long way and can be done today.
Clearly we should drop the minimum age too. I do mean allow literal children to hold office; it’s ageist to do otherwise.
Well, minimum age requirements are constitutional because they’re literally in the constitution. I’m about as far from a constitutional literalist as you can possibly get (I think it’s a deeply flawed and outdated document), but at least as of right now it’s literally the foundation of the US legal system.
There are a number of reasons to be concerned about adding additional requirements on top of the current set of requirements. The whole Trump thing highlighted the degree to which the entire system is built around an assumption of good faith, and I’m more concerned about that than the fact that DiFi has no business being in the senate at her age. The problem, as I see it, isn’t all of the old people. It’s systemic issues that go to the heart of this particular form of government. I mean, Reagan didn’t know where he was for most of his second term, but the real damage he did to the country has nothing to do with his cognitive decline.
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Because young people are dumb as fuck too. It’s the same reason racism is bad - the distinction between the two groups is meaningless.
For instance, you’re incredibly naive if you think congresspeople believe all the shit they say. They’re elected representatives saying things their constituents want said even if they disagree with them.
I work with a climate lobby and one of the Republicans I was talking to drives an electric car and powers his house with solar. His official position is “climate change might be caused by people, but the jury is out.” He fuckin knows, he just can’t say it.
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What exactly would term limits accomplish? Bernie Sanders would be prevented from running, but people like Kyrsten Sinema would be fine.
The solution to bad candidates is to vote them out in the primary or work towards ranked choice voting so that people have a legitimate 3rd option in the general.
If you want to know what term limits actually do check out Missouri. Basically by eliminating “blood sucking bureaucrats” you eliminate anyone who can actually write effective legislation.
So… Most legislation ends up being insane and unenforceable or written by special interest groups and handed to dummies who don’t seem to be able to even read it.
I used to be a big term limits fan, now that I’ve seen what actually happens… It’s a fucking mess, we need professional legislators.
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What will that do? We have term limits already for POTUS. Also, what happens if life extension starts becoming a thing? We’ve seen how hard it is to rid ourselves of the ridiculous outmoded EC; imagine if there were a rule about an arbitrary age being deemed “too old”?
Not surprising, this is pretty much why he ran 4 years ago. He never wanted to be president, but his party had literally nobody (whom they would allow) that could step up and be a real contender.
That “allow” part being a rather substantial issue for those not really paying attention back in 2016.
Yeah I’m kind of confused at that part. Do they mean allow as in someone who’ll toe the party line or as someone who is middling enough to gather votes from both sides? I thought we had some good options, Bernie Sanders being one of them.
I’m not sure you can say he never wanted to be president. He ran in 1988 and 2008 before running in 2020. It sounds more like he always wanted to be president, but I could believe he’d prefer to not feel like he has to run for another term.
he was also all geared up to run in 2016, but then his son died. If I recall, Hilary Clinton actually waited for Biden to decide he couldn’t run before she entered the race.
That’s because it’s bullshit. The lemmy consensus on this kind of thing is badly skewed to the left and is basically pure amateur hour. Without doubt there are many intelligent and well-informed users who have a better grasp of the realities of US electoral politics, they just aren’t the majority, and so we find objectively ridiculous comments receiving tons of up votes while anyone who dares to mention an unpopular truth is downvoted to Hades
Well yes, you are correct in that at points in the past he wanted to. But I honestly felt that in 2020, he either thought his time for it had passed, or he wasn’t confident he was the best candidate to win. He mulled running for quite a while, and only really entered definitely when it was obvious there was really no other choice left for the DNC. But for a long time (too long really) nobody was even sure that he would run.
Getting 2016 vibes this time around…
Or it is just the vocal few that are more openly speaking out…
Polling and all, it will be in the history books come 2024.
If the history books aren’t burned.
Books were being banned and censored way before this decade.
Not sure what you are trying to point out that is not new…
Old problems are still problems. Pointing out their age does nothing to solve them.
Scaremongering…
Bogeyman Trump, does that work on people? Does it really scare them into voting for the blue team?
Oh I remember you. Yea, we the patriots sure as fuck aren’t voting for the blatant republican anti-american fascists.
Awesome, nice to meet you again!
Yeah, it seems to work. Not sure how well it will work this time though.
We won’t know the details until late 2024…
The details like how long Trump is going to spend in prison?
Trump’s gonna burn the history books and replace them with McDonalds menus.
Seems to be just some good old fashioned scaremongering of the burning of books and such…
Honestly, this reminds me of 1968. Old president supports war unpopular with youth, people protest, the GOP choose a failed candidate from the previous election, y’know?
Trump also seems the type to actively sabotage any sort of peace process to boost his own campaign.
And he has that Southern Strategy down pat.
Reminds me of 1933: A right wing guy briefly in jail for a coup attempt got out early and became German chancellor.
This is by far the more accurate historical analogy.
Thanks for the info!
The 1968 United States presidential election was the 46th quadrennial presidential election, held on Tuesday, November 5, 1968. The Republican nominee, former vice president Richard Nixon, defeated both the Democratic nominee, incumbent vice president Hubert Humphrey, and the American Independent Party nominee, former Alabama governor George Wallace. This was the last election until 1988 in which the incumbent president was not on the ballot. Incumbent president Lyndon B. Johnson had been the early front-runner for the Democratic Party’s nomination, but he withdrew from the race after only narrowly winning the New Hampshire primary. Eugene McCarthy, Robert F. Kennedy and Humphrey emerged as the three major candidates in the Democratic primaries until Kennedy was assassinated. His death after midnight on June 6, 1968, continued a streak of high-profile assassinations in the 1960s.
God. Trump keeps on fucking us.
Yup
And yet, most people don’t want to vote for Biden. He won because people voted against Trump. I’m not convinced it will work again.
I do. I’m an old progressive and he’s been the most progressive president in my lifetime outside of Carter, and honestly he’s probably been more progressive than Carter.
I don’t get the ambivalence about Biden at all from anyone who’s not a hard core Republican.
Could not agree more.
I know progressiveness is a low barrier in the USA, but what makes him so progressive?
The Build Back Better plan is basically a list of stuff progressives have wanted for years.
I just believe there are better options out there that have been repeatedly snubbed by the players in power, media, and an overall systemic problem with the political system that Biden, and others like him, will never attempt to address, let alone acknowledge.
I don’t disagree with what you said, but I do believe that “the most progressive” so far is simply not good enough.
Though my problems are less about Biden directly, and more about the fact that last election and most likely the next election it is a complete illusion of choice. Do we want someone who has effectively promised to make everything worse for the 99%, or the only other name on the list?
Well, I voted against Trump last time, and this time I’m split. Yes, I’m voting for Biden, but that doesn’t mean I’m not voting really really hard against Trump.
I’d vote for Andrew Johnson before I voted for Donald Jackass Trump.
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Who’s most people? If you understand what’s at stake then you know Trump can’t be your option.
Not wanting to vote for Biden and voting for Biden are different things
Aside from anecdotal evidence, according to cnbc surveys 70% of people surveyed said Biden shouldn’t run again and of that 70%, 57% identified as democrats. https://www.cnbc.com/2022/12/09/majority-of-americans-dont-want-biden-or-trump-to-run-again-in-2024-cnbc-survey-shows.html
I’m not saying people won’t/shouldn’t vote for Biden, but I am saying that more people will vote against Trump, not for Biden.
I don’t think any reasonable, rational person would vote for Donald Trump. The unfortunate truth is there are a lot of unreasonable, irrational people who are allowed to vote.
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Sure, but I’d be lying if I said he was in my top 3 choices.
Not helpful.
This is why we have no honesty in politics.
For fucks sake. He’s trying to do everything he can to alert the country their democracy is in grave danger to the point of admitting he wouldn’t still be there if he didn’t think he had the best chance of stopping Trump.
And at the sidelines we have endless hand-wringing about his age and calls for a better candidate.
THEY ARENT STEPPING UP BECAUSE THEY AGREE BIDEN HAS THE BEST CHANCE.
Everyone complains the Democrats suck at messaging and then bitch about everything they say and do, even when it’s honest, straightforward, and easy to understand.
THEY ARENT STEPPING UP BECAUSE THEY AGREE BIDEN HAS THE BEST CHANCE.
This is not at all the only conclusion one would draw from an incumbent president not drawing challengers. Incumbent challenges usually cause division and a divided party may be in a worse place than a party unifying around a bad candidate. If Biden decides to run, we’re pretty much stuck with him.
That is kinda fair.
I am totally dismissing both Cornell West* (thanks for the correction) and Robert Kennedy Jr because of their third party runs in this environment, and anyone else wanting to challenge Biden would need to make a very solid case that they are a better pick.
It’s worth saying I wanted Bernie. I don’t think even trying to pivot to him would be a good idea.
Also RFK is batshit.
Cory Booker
I don’t think this is who you meant. Cornell West maybe?
I think we’re stuck with Biden. We’d be in a better place if he’d had some humility and announced he wasn’t going to run again so we could have a primary with worthy candidates in it, but he didn’t, so here we are.
Yeah, him, and thanks for the correction. It’s late, I’m tired and obviously cranky.
Also agreed, but he would have needed to say that four years ago and honestly, that move to have everyone else step aside back then so Biden could get the nomination destroyed the credibility of every one of those younger candidates.
To be clear, I’m fine with him and his age, I just think the minimal quote that will inevitably be amplified may be too useful for the hand-wringers and GOP.
That’s fair, but they’ll also do that with anything he says while taking credit for his accomplishments.
Oh of course, I wouldn’t expect anything less than their lowest.
Or, they could actually do more for the people.
Yeah because the NoVote crowd sure made that easy to accomplish letting the GOP back into the house.
It’s a vicious cycle.
-
Democrats win but don’t get a supermajority
-
People balk that they aren’t doing anything and need to be taught a lesson to go further left
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Republicans win the subsequent midterm because of poor turnout
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The country gets dragged to the right, and people balk that Democrats aren’t making things better or stopping them
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Republicans win the presidency and Congress
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People complain that it’s Democrats faults because they didn’t do anything to inspire them to vote
Withholding a vote to push Dems left would work if Republicans actually were basically the same. But because they’re right wing extremists, all it accomplished is the opposite. The country moves right, not left.
I like how in your example the Republicans get to push the country right but the Dems cant push it left. Republicans are not winning super majorities every time they do things, and yet they get it done. There’s a large monied wing of the Democrats that works as hard as the Republicans to block a lot of progress, and time and time again magic spoiler democrats come out of nowhere and theres always just enough of them, really curious how there’s always just enough of those types to keep the rich donors safe.
Democrats do not want to do what they say they want to do as much as Republicans want to do what they say they want do.
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“Our democracy” has been dead for a century. You guys are like rats running around a maze with your moronic “lesser of two evils” between two parties all controlled by the same interests.
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Overall in total, I probably agree, but the raw quote of saying that he’d probably not be running if Trump wasn’t running is giving certain groups too much ammo. They won’t present or repeat everything said, just that tiny quote or versions of it.
OTOH if the GOP wants Biden to drop out all they have to do is get Trump to do the same. So it’s on them. They want Biden out all Trump has to do is continue to shit his pants in FL and never run again.
“all they have to do” LOL
I mean, yeah, but…….
He didn’t say probably. He said he wasn’t sure. Those are two vastly different things.
Fine, the implication drawn by hand wringers and the GOP will be the same. They don’t care about your semantics.
They don’t care about truth and reality either. If you play the game of addressing every GOP slander and lie you’ll lose every time. They just keep flinging crap at the wall in the hopes something sticks. They don’t care how many buckets it takes.
addressing every GOP slander and lie
I’m not doing that, I’m just saying it’s unhelpful to give them ammunition that is or could be specifically age-oriented or imply retirement, etc, when that’s the absolute number one attack point by the opposition, Dem or GOP. This isn’t hard to understand.
And I’m saying it’s pointless to worry about ammunition when they just make everything up anyway. Playing defense doesn’t work. You’re looking at this statement purely defensively. You need to look at it and spin it offensively. “I care so much about this country and protecting it from blatant fascism that I’m going into the breach once more.” That’s the sentiment.
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Better question, do you want to be elected by embracing the bombing of children and families by our ally Israel? Because that is what is going to happen. It doesn’t matter we know Trump would be no different…but our tax dollars going to kids being killed makes people pissed the fuck off. Stand up to Israel, Regan did it when he was a Senator, he can too!
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Would probably be more entertaining too.
“This election season is sponsored by… Cocaine.”
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So who is supposed to run against Trump in 2028? Biden can’t… does he think the idea is to just kick the can down the road another 4 years?
The idea is Trump kicks the can
You think that fat fuck is going to live another 4 years?
Whitmer I reckon, Progressive governor of a swing state, and who knows first hand that the ultra right are fucking dangerous loons that need the hand of God brought down on them.
My money is on Gavin Newsom.
I don’t disagree, but man is that guy a dead ringer for Patrick Bateman.
Newsom is just another neoliberal garbage politician
The question wasn’t who the best candidate is, It’s who is supposed to run against Trump.
Why, so we can 4 more years of the status quo thats killing all of us? Trump isnt the problem, hes a symptom of the problem.
I don’t like him, it’s just that I think he’s the most likely candidate that we’ll be stuck with.
Assuming the party doesn’t just go with Manchin as a fuck you to progressives.
Biden is already the fuck you to progressives
Trump won’t win the nomination in 2028, so if he’s still alive and still semi-intelligable, he’ll launch a third party campaign that splits the conservative vote and gives the Dems 4 more years. You saw it here first.
Pritzker or Manchin (though I doubt the democrats would allow it) have enough crossover they could get votes from all sides.
Manchin (though I doubt the democrats would allow it)
Honestly, if he announces his candidacy for 2024, I suspect a chunk of the “You’re a Trump supporter if you are even slightly dissatisfied with Biden” crowd will happily jump ship.
I hate Manchin so much. But I would definitely vote for him over Trump. Better an ordinary asshole grifter and a fascist grifter with his own cult.
The reason the democratic party won’t call a 14a3 vote to ban Trump from office even though the vote to ban is designed to fail is because the axis of DMFI and AIPAC is invested in exactly two partisan candidates for POTUS. Otherwise, we would not be in this pickle.
I love acronym salad
Yeah can we not blame Israel lobbyists for this? It feels a bit uncomfortably antisemitic to say it’s all because of Israeli money and they control our politics.
It is uncomfortable, isn’t it
Ohhhhh so ONLY Joe can beat Trump! That’s why he’s doing it everyone, no one else has any chance!
This makes zero fucking sense outside of the incumbents advantage. The biggest talking points around the country to get ’moderates’ and ‘undecideds’ to vote for Trump, vote third party, or abstain from voting are almost completely centered on him personally and to a lesser extent the DNC. It also ignores the many 2020 voters who were “I can’t believe they’re going to make me vote for Joe Biden”, people which anecdotally is everyone I know irl that voted for him.
If he had stepped aside and let another primary happen not only do we lose all that baggage(a good portion of which I will freely admit is horsehit and the remainder mostly also apply to Trump) and the candidates could use the primary to get the electorate excited about something new and different, which would be a big gain in the fight to stop fascism. I’m gonna vote for you again Joe, but this is a foolish take imo
Historically incumbents have a huge advantage. It would be foolish to throw that away.
Since 1980, 3 of the 7 incumbents have lost.
Yeah, one of them had a hostage crisis plague his presidency, the next got spoiled into total oblivion by a billionaire with some charts, and the last killed over a million Americans by sowing plague misinformation because it made him look bad.
A preponderance of extraordinary circumstances does not establish a trend worth placing bets on.
It’s a good thing Biden hasn’t had any major crises during his presidency or spoiler campaigns launched, so we can just pretend he’s not like the others.
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Biden’s been resolving crises handed to him by the last guy
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Cornell West and RFK ain’t Ross Perot
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it’s a good thing you’re smart enough to vote for Biden anyways instead of being a pissant who lets fascism win because he doesn’t like one old guy with an ice cream tooth right?
Keep telling yourself everything’s going great man. Biden’s term has not been a time of slow and steady improvement for many people and not a lot of people are going to think it’s all just Trump’s fault.
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Like I said that’s the only part I can understand, but just because something has been a trend doesn’t mean it will stay one or even that there won’t be exceptions. I see that side of it, but I’m still suspicious he can do it again
It’s been more than 100 years since an incumbent didn’t run for a second term and their party maintained the presidency (excluding Calvin Coolidge who technically didn’t run two terms, but basically did). No one knows what would happen if he were not to run, but history has shown that it’ll probably lead to a Republican win. It’s easier to predict the outcome having the incumbent run, and probably against the same person last time. Not saying it’s the best decision, but it is the most logical one.
That’s pretty much what I’m getting at, I get all the logical reasons but like you said the logical call ain’t always the right one. It’s too late now to second guess but him saying this is a bad idea, it makes it seem like there was a different outcome but it was decided without the will of the people being considered. If he was super popular it would be a different story, but he ain’t
the logical call ain’t always the right one
Except it is. They said it’s not always the best, which is true, but you can’t know in advance what the best choice is. Making illogical choices leads to worse outcomes on average. I really shouldn’t have to explain this.
In my entire lifetime no president has ever been super popular. That’s just not a thing any longer.
Which kinda further supports what I’m saying?
Except if your waiting for the guy that’s super popular you’re bus is never coming.
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We don’t know it’s certain he can do it again either
Biden didn’t have a four year presidency filled with deep economic issues for the average person last time, we were also in a plague, and had seen insane political activism all year. Inflation wasn’t on everyone’s mind and there weren’t two serious wars going on that we are funding with him as the CMC. He’s not popular or well liked even by his voters
Additionally Trump was and had been obviously more looming and visible to the average voter who really doesn’t pay much attention to politics or even the news for that matter. People were animated to get him out. I don’t think it will happen that way this time. Most folks have short memories and vote with their pocket book.
Again I’ll crawl over glass to for him because there’s only two possibilities and I hope I’m wrong, but it seems like they are playing prevent defense, and prevent defense prevents you from winning. I don’t feel confident in the slightest
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Primary elections aren’t free and fair. The party leadership picked them
Picked them by counting the millions more votes they got
For the millionth time the lefties run into the wall of “wouldn’t have happened if ya fucking turned out!”
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Centrists are his biggest risk in this election. I run in mostly far left/anarchist circles socially, everyone is begrudgingly voting for Biden again, because fascism. Meanwhile the self professed centrists/moderates in my family, at work, and even online I’ve spoken to or over heard are the ones on the fence about Biden and either want to not vote at all or for a third party. Anecdotal as hell, but i think the centrists are gonna fall for the old “republicans are better for the economy” bullshit
Exactly. Leftist voters will be biting their tongue voting for Biden, but they’ll be voting for him. Centrists will stay home bitching about gas prices being Bidens fault.
I’m not so sure about this. The number one issue in the midterms for voters was the economy, but that didn’t translate into a Republican victory. Democrats actually gained ground in the Senate, and Republicans only took the House by single digits.
The only conclusion I can draw from this is that voters no longer believe Republicans are better for the economy. If it leads to effectively a tie result, it would seem the myth has been finally dispelled.
All Biden has to do is remind those suburban centrists that the Republicans want to force their daughter/granddaughter to carry their rapist’s baby to term.
No we don’t. Covid won 2020 for the democrats, Biden was just along for the ride.
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I agree with all of this, which is why I’ve lost all hope we can turn the ship of state around before we hit the iceberg of climate change. Oh well…
But I’m encouraged because the last time the climate changed this abruptly it brought down hereditary monarchies so maybe this change will get rid of nation states entirely.
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You must not be subscribed to /m/climate
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Yes, the democrat establishment favorite did win the democrat establishment race. No, the democrat establishment do not represent the feelings of most Americans.
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People didn’t bother to vote once the fix was in. We learned in 2016 what was up
Right by the time my state had its primary the DNC had declared Biden the presumptive nominee. My voice didn’t matter because the way primaries are done
Yes, the popular vote in the establishment democrat dominated primaries. Voter participation rate is terrible in the general election and even worse in party primaries.
I don’t understand your point. Of course the candidate with more votes wins. If more of the voters pick establishment Democrats, then that’s who wins.
If moderates need to earn the votes of progressives, then progressives also need to earn the votes of moderates. If more voters are going with moderates, then the progressive candidate needs to do more to earn their vote.
For as much as this is harped about with Biden and establishment Democrats, I’m surprised the corollary isn’t obvious to people. The progressive candidate does not automatically deserve votes by the virtue of being progressive.
Well, in the end they will keep the status quo going, since they know people will vote for just about anyone that runs in the blue party.
2016 Sanders vs. Hillary reminds me that people are willing to stay home or change party.
Biden thought that Trump would be politically finished if he lost the 2020 election --and in a rational world he would’ve been-- but he underestimated both the cowardice of Republican leaders and the slavish devotion of Trump’s followers, as did many of us, myself included. That’s why he feels obligated to take the safe route instead of stepping down. If Trump was gone or otherwise not the existential threat that I and many others believe he is, I doubt very much that Biden would be running again.
