Democrats have all the spontaneity of the House of Windsor. Or, closer to home, they’re closer to what Republicans once were, a party that falls in line not in love.
Democrats have all the spontaneity of the House of Windsor. Or, closer to home, they’re closer to what Republicans once were, a party that falls in line not in love.
The time for a challenger to have stepped up to Biden was before the primaries. The only ones who did lost abysmally. You and many like you could have spent your time and effort recruiting and canvassing for someone else. But you didn’t. Instead, you just complain about Biden and have the temerity to say “any faults of Biden will be because of Trump” when you didn’t do a thing to try to get anyone to primary him.
You want to bitch and moan, not help.
To be fair, anyone that wants to run in a primary against the incumbent is already going to receive less due to the “never run against them” unwritten rule. We’ve been primed to see it as a failing strategy, and anyone that tries gets shouted down because “now is not the time.”
I’ll readily admit that some great things have been done this presidency, and Biden needs to be more vocal about that. However, his age being part of the conversation means that they’re too afraid to actually have him talk about it (it seems like).
I dunno. I haven’t felt less excited to vote in my life, and that’s due to the pressure all around.
“Vote or it’s fascism” is a great motivator to get out, but when it turns into a yearly thing it no longer it no longer feels like duty.
And yes, voting to stop fascism is a good thing. What I’m getting at is that apathy is going to win until we get someone that we can actually be excited for. Another Neo-liberal win isn’t the victory that gives me high hopes for the future.
“It’s not possible to primary Biden. Why can’t we have a candidate other than Biden?!?!”
Easy thing to say instead of actually working to put a candidate in office.
I…are you being intentionally obtuse here? My point is that “putting in the work” quickly is overshadowed by the DNC having the largest megaphone available.
And a lot of us are working to just live. “Putting in the work” means either taking away what little time you have to decompress, or not working and instead stomping for that ideal candidate, by taking leave from work.
And aside from that, I was pointing out the “why” of it. Stop being abrasive and actually come into a topic willing to listen and talk.
My point was that not even trying to put in the work and then complaining that you didn’t get your way is silly.
You assume that we knew we needed to try and prepare someone else.
A lot of us don’t like him purely because of how he handled the Israel thing
You knew how old he was. That’s not a secret.
What does his age have to do with anything?
I’ll answer your questions once you address what I wrote to you like I asked you to.
Given that the system is heavily skewed toward incumbency, your comment is a bit disingenuous. We both know that the DNC intended Biden to run. He had the advantage of thier coffers, thier PR machine, and the support of their leadership. Implying that the playing field was at all fair ignores reality.
I do agree, though, that Biden’s many faults are his own. His most recent failure, support for ethnic cleansing and denial of aid to refugees, should have made him unelectable by the party that claims to be pro-human rights… but here we are, with him as the best of two terrible candidates.
Also, any possible challengers to Biden had to know that anybody they pissed off by doing that would remember in 2026, 2028, etc., and that they should just “wait their turn” instead
Shades of Clinton’s “Russian plant” slander v. Gabbard, perhaps?
It’s not disingenuous at all. If you don’t want Biden to run, work to primary him. That’s how it works. The fact that almost no candidates even tried to primary him shows that people like the person I responded to didn’t want to actually do the hard work it takes. They just waited until the inevitable and then complained. So I am going to point that out when they bitch about Biden like this. If they had at least tried, there was at least a chance Biden wouldn’t be the nominee. They didn’t try.
The primary system is an incredibly undimocratic process. I live in West Virginia. The primary is almost always decided by the time it gets to my state. Everyone else has simply dropped out. Does my vote not matter?
How do you suggest a candidate be chosen?
A one day primary in which all candidates go against each other and everyone votes on a national voting day. We also completely get rid of the super delegate system and make it raw popular vote.
It shows nothing of the sort.
There was approximately a zero percent chance, statistically, that the superdelegates would vote for anyone beyond Biden. There was nearly no chance that a challenger would have been received with anything but contempt. This “logic” is the same logic both Reps and Dems use to gaslight third party challengers, too. “If you try real hard you can overcome our utter control of the debates and privileged position to win! We promise!”
Alternately, there WAS a choice and the vast majority of Democrats are okay with a candidate who is 100% okay cutting off aid to the victims of ethnic cleansing. I prefer to hope that that isn’t the case.
I still say that if you don’t work for change and just complain after the possibility of change has passed, you’re being ridiculous.
Bernie was willing to run despite the DNC establishment. He knew what he was going up against. He did it more than once even. Maybe he thinks that if you don’t at least make an effort to change things and just complain about them afterward, you’re being ridiculous too?
And he was vilified and his supporters were blamed for Clinton’s loss, as I recall. The party elite are on record noting that they would be comfortable bypassing the party’s choice. There was no real chance that Sanders would get the nomination. Regardless, your assumption that anyone displeased with Biden just sat on their hands is… somewhat ridicluous. Given that they were going up against one of the most powerful political machines in the world, the chance of them making a dent in the establishment, even if they were activists full-time, would be low.
And if you think running within the party is difficult, hoo boy. You don’t even want to talk about the anti-democratic fuckery that the GOP and DNC collude to impose on third part hopefuls.
I know it’s difficult. And I know not doing it is very easy.
Maybe the difficult thing is necessary, if for no other reason than to try to push the eventual primary winner to the left.
I really do not understand this utter defeatist attitude that primaries are pointless.
This smells an awful lot like the “poor people just need to try harder” nonsense conservatives hit people with when low income people complain about being low income.
I have campaigned for alternate candidates for many years. Unfortunately, it’s a battle that I’m meant to lose, every time. Contrast with the average party line voter, whose effort is often showing up for an hour to vote as they’re told.
And that’s why President Hillary Clinton won her 2008 primary
I read this as saying if you can’t build an electoral apparatus within the Democrat party capable of challenging the party leaders, your opinion doesn’t matter to the democrats
If you’re not a Republican, your opinion doesn’t matter to the Democrats.
10/10
I love this “it’s not worth trying” attitude as an excuse to complain.
Weirdly, I haven’t heard anyone who was pushing for Dean Phillips or Marianne Williamson make that claim or that complaint. Maybe because they actually did the work.
>I love this “it’s not worth trying” attitude as an excuse to complain.
that’s not what I said. it’s a strawman.
Yes, I know your ‘if I don’t literally say something, any inference you make is false’ game. You played it yesterday too.
And, of course, you’re allowed to interpret what I say however you like.
it’s not a game. it’s just intellectual honesty
I see. The idea that you can interpret my comment any way you like but I are not allowed to interpret any of your comments except 100% literally is intellectual honesty to you.
Interesting.
I explained my interpretation. you lampooned me using quotes. it’s just a matter of intellectually honest engagement.
Wouldn’t the intellectually honest thing be to ask me what I meant rather than decide your interpretation was correct?
It’s not about convincing someone else to run, someone needed to convince Biden NOT to run.
It’s super simple… A sitting President is the de facto leader of their party. The only person who can make the decision if they should be the candidate or not is that very person themselves.
See Johnson in 1968. He could have been the first 2+ term President since Roosevelt having served the rest of Kennedy’s term + his own term, but chose to bow out instead. In the end that was his call to make and nobody elses.
Isn’t it way too late for that? I mean there have already been primaries. That’s sort of my point.
Hence the past tense. :) But technically, nothing is final until the conventions in July and August, and nobody OFFICIALLY has enough delegates to be the candidate yet.
Fair. Most people here don’t seem to understand that the time for him to step down has most likely already passed and are still talking about how someone else could run against him (without usually naming who) and complaining that no one has when, as I said earlier, they did not do the work to even try to get someone else in there.
And people really didn’t like it when I suggested that maybe Bernie doing it twice despite the DNC being against him and knowing he didn’t have much of a chance was because he thought that trying before complaining that no one tried was the thing to do.
I love Bernie, but even if the DNC decided to not fuck with him, his time ended when he had the heart attack and the stent, and I say that as someone who literally just had a heart attack and a stent a month ago. Survival is debilitating. :( OTOH, it IS surviving…
It’s not the fault of the electorate that the democratic party has lost touch with its base.
There are potentials. Eg. Gavin Newsom. He did well on Hannity.
It’s too late for him to become the candidate, but perhaps he’ll do as vice president.
Statistically there’s something like a 50% chance that Biden dies within the next few years. No one lives forever. There needs to be a good backup.
The time for those “potentials” to run was months ago. Biden is going to be the nominee. That’s how the cookie crumbles.
Also, there’s only been one poll about a potential matchup between Newson and Trump, and granted it is from Fox, but Trump wins handily.
https://www.realclearpolling.com/polls/president/general/2024/trump-vs-newsom
Biden is currently 81. I googled and there’s something like a 10% chance he dies within the year. Similar number for Trump obviously, given he’s fat, angry and doesn’t exercise. Unfortunately God is dead, or I’d be able to factor in thoughts and prayers too.
They need to have good VP picks though.
My apologies. Unless it’s he literally can’t run for president, Biden is going to be the nominee.
I thought that was implicit. Obviously if he can’t run, he won’t be the nominee.