Yeah, but sometimes that really is enough
Not enough for voters who are undecided about whether to vote or not.
Democrats win when turnout is high. It’s not enough to be better than the opponent, to win they must beat apathy.
The two current candidates are so far apart the people who claim to be undecided are ignorant or stupid, willingly or otherwise. I’d understand riding the fence between Biden and Bernie, even if I’ve made my choice between them, but between Trump and Biden?
That’s the kind of person who is undecided if they want to drive to work or walk down the middle of i-95
I think you are perhaps uninformed about the economic state of the poor and working class. Biden hasn’t done a whole lot about people’s grocery bills doubling and tripling, or the soaring increases in rent while the housing supply has remained artificially low, but he’s made sure that blank checks for war appear out of thin air at every turn.
Can’t expect to win an election like this when people can’t afford to miss a day of work.
Yeahhhh, no.
Like the original commenter said, you are either ignorant or stupid.
Anyone who actively lived during Trump’s awful years in office has all the info we need to NOT vote for that fucking orange idiot, and instead CLAMBER to anyone with ANY semblance of sanity.
If you honestly think that Biden losing will help anyone in any way whatsoever (besides Trump and his little rich bastards who are as evil as he is), you, and anyone else who feels that way, are a lost cause.
Anyone who is eligible to vote actively lived through the trump years. And a third of those voters disagree with you. Calling them stupid is not an effective way to help them change their minds or voting decisions.
Day to day economic realities matter to the average voter.
I don’t give a flying fuck about changing anyones mind any more. If you actively lived through the awful Trump years, you don’t need your fucking mind changed. Most of those “third of voters” are a lost cause, so I do not give a fuck about trying to get them to maybe open their eyes just a little bit.
Also, yes, I’m sure the “economic realities” really matter to those voters when this is who they will allow back into office.
Like the original commenter said, you are either ignorant or stupid.
It’s okay if projecting makes you feel better.
Let’s just cut to the chase–is your argument that both sides are the same? Or that voting for Biden is just as bad as voting for Trump, or not voting? Or are you just arguing to stir things up? Trying to figure out where your willful ignorance lies.
I’m sure Trump will get right on that.
“My candidate is just as shitty as the other guy” isn’t quite the profound defense you think it is.
That is probably the lamest possible misinterpretation you could make, but I’m sure that’s intentional. Nobody is “both sides”-ing them but you.
I think that should say “my candidate is far less shitty than the other guy” which is a different situation.
Tell me what you think he could have done without Congress.
Let’s hear it.
Give me the actual steps that you believe Biden could have done but did not do.
Well I hope that goes the right way for you over there.
then they should be doing something to make voters want to turn out.
The only Democrat with the power to do anything at the moment is Biden, and his power is limited.
But he’s been doing a lot within that limited power.
And I genuinely don’t care whatever some asshole from hexbear with their Lemmy World alt is about to pop in here and reply with, because the fundamental issue is not Biden, it is Congress and the Supreme Court. Congress is absolutely fucked, and that is not Biden’s fault, it’s the Constitution’s fault, and the fault of Red State conservatives that have completely gerrymandered their states to hell, and the Supreme Court that did not stop them. It is not biden’s fault at the Supreme Court is now stacked with corrupt conservative justices that will strike down anything he does that they think they can make a case against.
It is very, very convenient to forget that the other two branches exist when you’re intent is to make Biden look like he hasn’t done anything or committed to his campaign promises.
i think you are heavily subestimating the power of money here.
What’s your position?
“Not a fascist dictator that openly wants to kill democracy.”
Honestly, no. In Turkey the opposition used that strategy since 2002 and lost every single vote, except the last local elections where they finally decided to do things a little differently (+ the financial crisis). If your only selling point is “not being the other guy” then your whole election campaign is basically an advertising for the other guy.
In Canada at the federal level the Conservatives are on their way to have a majority using this exact tactic, they’re voting against anything the government tries to do (even stuff they asked for in the past) and they’re promising to make everything better once elected, no one knows how, not even them.
Exactly this. It just boils down to manufacturing consent for the other guy’s terrible policies, and results in hopelessness leading to voter apathy. Braindead strategy with 0 concept of leadership.
I think it depends on the context and the details.
If your sell is “I’m not Mitt Romney,” that is pretty weak, even if you don’t like Romney.
If your sell is “I’m not Donald Trump,” that is a much more compelling thing to consider. I mean the fucker is on trial for and got impeached for some things that are truly heinous to see from a random schmuck, never mind the freaking President of the US.
It’s a losing strategy politically because people are too fucking dumb to vote against someone holding a gun to their head unless someone else is promising them a unicorn, but as a potential voter, it’s an exceptionally good reason to get off your ass and actually vote for a candidate who can win.
This. I’ve never voted for ‘not the other guy’, but I will this time. Honestly, the democrats could run Vinny the Wino and I’d vote for him over Trump.
It’s really not if you’re a wage earner in 2/3 of US states, where it’s still perfectly legal to pay you $7 an hour. Since Idaho got away with criminalizing abortion, 2/3 of the states will soon follow.
Hell, homelessness jumped 12% in 2023 alone. I’m guessing, for those people, “I’m not Trump” isn’t going to be as persuasive an argument as you might think.
What about “the economy is actually doing great Jack!” ?
It blows my mind how often people try to argue that someone should be elected on the strength of the economy when said economy isn’t doing jack shit for the poor and working class.
Unfortunately I don’t think we collectively vote to help the poor and working class in the first place.
Wish we had a party who gave a shit in order to vote for this, and that it were a much bigger plank of their platform. It’s a disgrace that anyone is unhoused in the richest nation on Earth.
I can’t even begin to describe how much more I would prefer we do this, than to continue fattening the wallets of boomers who own multiple homes and only live in one of them. We literally don’t invest in building new housing in order to maintain this status quo, and it’s absurd.
It’s really hard to vote if you don’t have a home address, so those unhoused people don’t matter in our system.
It’s really hard to vote if you don’t have a home address,
And you’d think after 2016 the Democrats might have realized that they need those votes, but they’re too busy getting wealthier to care.
The entire premise is BS because Biden has a list of accomplishments from infrastructure to debt forgiveness, progressive drug guidance, progress in gender/race equality, departments like the ftc and irs being competently run again with actual resources, to judge appointments. Hmm I wonder to who’s benefit it is to ignore all that and label him “not Trump”?
Care to offer an actual list? Every time someone tries to offer an actual list it turns out to be meaningless victory laps. With the possible exception of the NLRB Cemex decision. But that’s getting it’s stress test right now so it’s a bit early to celebrate.
Here you go:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_executive_actions_by_Joe_Biden
All of it is pretty decently documented.
I mean usually people try to curate it to stuff with physical outcomes. Otherwise 90% of that list is performative crap like this one. And if you don’t think that was performative have a look at what red states are doing in schools.
You do understand he can only do so much, right? You’re calling it performative, but he can’t do most of the major things without Congress.
If you’re only complaint is “it’s not enough he should do more” then how about you tell me what your definition of “more” is, and then we can take a look at the actual laws and see if it’s something he can do without Congress.
On that action he could withhold funding. Any police officers enforcing bathroom laws can be arrested and charged. He can federalize the Texas National Guard so Abbott can’t use them on the border. He could direct Darpa to research battery technology and make any resulting patents free and open for anyone to produce.
That’s 3 ideas in his power in less than 5 minutes. The laws are already on the books. He refuses to use them and keeps running this “woe is me, congress is out of control” narrative and I’m tired of nobody calling him on it.
Care to offer an actual list?
They gave you a list. You go find the links if you’re so hell bent on handwaving them away.
If you check my post history you’ll see I do go through the entire list when it’s reasonable. I’m not trawling through a thousand EOs and NSMs for an internet stranger though. That’s dangerously close to trying to prove a negative and will take multiple months. If they want to prove a point they need to support that point. Not do the source version of waving vaguely in the direction of the White House.
cough supporting a genocide cough
Until then he was doing great yeah. Bit of a big one though.
And before you hit me with the usual I know Trump would be worse for Gaza but it doesn’t change what Biden has done
1 he always supported it, so if you say “until” you just didn’t care until it went hot, 2 I don’t think it changes it that his opponent supports it harder, but it does speak to your options.
He always supported Israel… I think the ‘until’ is in reference to Israel’s more recent and more blatant attack on Gaza - prior to that, Biden’s support for Israel wasn’t nearly as flagrant as it is now.
Like, no one would bat an eye if I told them I support my wife’s decisions, but if she started breaking into the local NICUs and stomping on people’s babies, my continued support for her decisions would be a tad sus. …especially if I regularly said “honey could you tone the baby-stomping down a bit?” as I handed her a new pair of baby-stomping boots.
I’m not a both-sides’er (unless I’m talking to a trumpanzee in an attempt to steer votes away from Agent Orange). My vote is going to Biden and I encourage anyone reading this to do the same, but our complicity in the genocide on Gaza is genuinely upsetting, partly because it’s complicity in a fucking genocide, and partly because this WILL cause voter disengagement and could hand that other dipshit the presidency on a silver platter.
Thank you for putting this so well.
The genocide started way, way before October 6th. October 6th was a reaction to increased aggression from Israeli settlers who had massively increased the amount of land they were stealing. The difference is that it was more subtle, so nobody cared, but if you forcibly remove everyone from their homeland it’s still genocide.
Obviously I’m glad Americans are waking up to the realization that Israel is an apartheid state, but it’s been true for decades. The fact that Biden has always been a Zionist was a huge red flag, but he was “the only person who could beat Trump” and now we’re stuck here.
Biden’s support for Israel wasn’t nearly as flagrant as it is now
You’re saying that about a guy who has been saying shit like “I am a zionist” every year while sucking Israel’s dick. LOL.
You’re just showing that you have 0 idea what you’re talking about and that your opinion is only based on your fantasies, reality does not seem to be of interest to you.
Obviously it wasn’t as big an issue until October 7th. I did care, just not as much was happening
you just didn’t care until it went hot
Exactly this. It’s astonishing how many people would destroy everything based on an extremely old holy war because the US didn’t suddenly reverse their long established policy when the conflict heats up again.
The Trumpists are ecstatic how easy it was to flip these morons.
The Trumpists are ecstatic how easy it was to flip these morons.
I would never vote Trump. “Morons” for having criticism of a president supplying weapons that have killed over 10k children?
These centrist democrats are ecstatic how a substantial number of their voters have no standards whatsoever and will defend anything as long as it keeps Trump out.
Downvote all you want. If you can’t criticise Biden for this you’re a piece of shit
I don’t need to “criticize Biden”. That isn’t what’s happening anyhow. What’s happening is that people are pretending Biden is the one doing this and threatening to destroy the United States if he doesn’t stop the thing which he is not doing. Sending Israel money is a fuck of a lot older than his presidency.
Just because it’s been happening for a while doesn’t make it right.
Why was Rafah a red line until all of a sudden it wasn’t? Because he knows it’s morally wrong and will lead to a lot of death but is too much of a coward to stand up for what he believes.
Just because it’s been happening for a while doesn’t make it right.
Just because you care about it now doesn’t suddenly make it more important than every concern, including preventing it from getting far worse.
It’s almost as if many of these people are just virtue signaling or falling for the propoganda. I don’t see any of these same commenters so vocally opposed to any of the other handful atrocities happening around the world, and yet they fail to think the next thought of what will the situation be like if Trump wins?
Yeah, I think a lot of them are just bad actors, faking left leanings. Paid or otherwise. This one guy posts several times every single day about the war and often lays it all at Biden’s feet. If he’s paid, Putin or whoever it is truly does get their money’s worth with so many posts and comments essentially indirectly supporting trump.
And if you dare to disagree with their bullshit of course the means you love genocide. Literally have had several commenters use those exact words.
This one guy posts several times every single day about the war and often lays it all at Biden’s feet. If he’s paid, Putin or whoever it is truly does get their money’s worth with so many posts and comments essentially indirectly supporting trump.
Are you talking about me? Do you seriously think someone pays me to post rather than me just being a person who is horrified about what’s happening?
Given that your last post was about Bob Dylan and it was 3 weeks ago, I’m kind of struggling to see where you got the idea I was referring to you. Makes me wonder why you thought that…
So if you are against genocide, you don’t get a candidate that can represent you. And americans would rather drag their dick through miles of broken glass than to vote 3rd party.
Voting 3rd party in a primary is throwing your vote away, plain and simple. If we want better candidates, handily defeat the GOP so that it has no choice other than to ditch the completely fascist support, or collapse. That’s the only chance we have of getting more progressive candidates to vote for. Start in local elections, move to state, then get some of these people into higher office.
Hoping that suddenly the incumbent Democrat candidate will become a super progressive person at the 11th hour is just a fantasy.
My point exactly with “crawling through miles of glass before voting third party”. A nation of defeatists.
Stop the disinformation. Voting 3rd party in this general election is just going to help Trump and the fascists. You’re either a naive fool, or a disinformation agent.
Again, my point exactly. You are almost combative about voting for anyone who doesn’t support the genocide. Good job.
I don’t need to torture my penis to know it would have a bad outcome to do so, kind of like giving my vote to trump with an extra step while pretending to be a martyr
Until then he was doing meh. After that he was also doing meh, because that has been the official policy of the US for at least the last 50 years.
So you have either “meh” or “let’s do turbo genocide and have oil companies write environmental policy” (not even going into all the criminality). I find “meh” to be the clearly superior option, even if it doesn’t align with my politics.
But if someone criticises the “meh,” this is somehow an issue with the person and not the “meh”?
You picked a funny time to start criticizing.
I mean idk if it’s that funny of a time. Even if they were criticizing 5-6 months ago, and who’s to say they weren’t, it’s a much more engaged in conversation right now, so it’s not a fuckin shocker that people are gonna start talking about it.
When the genocide started? Gosh yeah you’re right what a mystery
Biden bragged about cutting social security, has no desire to reform healthcare, and doesn’t care about income inequality or labour rights. He looks at America’s race-to-the-bottom economy and he’s like “yeah. Everything is working just fine here”
Also, many of the things you listed here are basically just “not Trump/not Republicans” in their own way. You really think “appointed competent people to run government departments” is a positive and not just a non-negative point (as compared to what his opponents would do)?
Also, Biden is obviously fucking senile and I’m tired of people pretending he’s not just because they’re afraid it will give Trump power. It’s totally fine to vote for Biden because he was the lesser evil, but let’s not pretend he was ever a good option. When you ignore reality because it makes it harder to like your preferred candidate, you are doing the exact same thing the MAGA idiots do.
Before you accuse me of anything, you should know I’m Canadian and have absolutely no dog in this fight. This is my unbiased outsider perspective. I could give a shit who wins the next election in the US, but I’m tired of people lying to themselves about either of the candidates not being a steaming pile of shit.
Also, many of the things you listed here are basically just “not Trump/not Republicans” in their own way.
-
substitutes everything the candidate runs on to “I’m not the other guy”, because the other guy doesn’t run on those things
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accuses candidate of running on “I’m not the other guy”
LMAO yup
My point was “he appointed competent people to run some departments and gives them enough resources to do their jobs” isn’t a point in his favour. It’s only a neutral point. It’s the baseline that should be expected from someone in his office. You’re saying “Biden doesn’t actively strip the government for parts”. It only makes sense as a point in his favour if you assume that the alternative is “starve the beast” tactics (which TBF it definitely is). It can only be considered a positive as compared to his opponent.
I disagree with you first statement. It is definitely a point in his favor because the election doesn’t happen in a vacuum, you must take into account who the alternatives are.
Seriously. An election is a single event where people decide between some options they are presented with. It is not some kind of wide-reaching manifesto or affirmation of faith/loyalty.
The point is that you should hold the Democrats and Biden accountable for being evil and not doing good things that make people’s lives better (which they absolutely have the power to do). They sit back and watch the world burn, then when election time comes they say “at least we didn’t start any of these fires” (they just don’t bother extinguishing them)
Again I disagree. They are not doing enough maybe, but they are doing something. Rescheduling pot, insulin prices, student debt cancelation… (I’m over in Europe so I only know about some things, I’m sure there’s more that I don’t know).
.
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I’m Canadian and have absolutely no dog in this fight.
Then kindly shut the fuck up. I’m an American, I’ve ACTUALLY had to live in this country with Trump and Biden as president, and it’s no contest for me. I’d take Biden at his worst over Trump any day. That doesn’t mean Biden is good, it means Trump is just that fucking bad.
I’d take Biden at his worst over Trump any day. That doesn’t mean Biden is good, it means Trump is just that fucking bad.
Yeah I 100% agree. That’s exactly my point. The conversation here is whether Biden can stand on his own merits or whether the only thing he has going for him is that he’s not Trump.
Are you stupid or do you just watch Fox
There are no good options. Right now it seems they either support Israel or don’t support Ukraine. No one is on the right side(imo) on both options. Sanders is the closest but even he wants strings attached to Ukraine aid.
IMO there should always be strings attached to military aid, lest the military industrial complex have too much of an incentive to pull strings and keep conflicts going longer than necessary.
Ok…too many strings then.
It’s pretty rare for anyone to praise Biden on his own merits, especially on Lemmy. So maybe don’t get so irate because in comparison to trump, people praise him
And yes you have every dog in this fight, the US is kinda fuckin important for global stability
The US is currently the world’s dominant Imperialist power, if “global stability” means extracting vast amounts of wealth from the global south then perhaps your idea of “global stability” needs to be reevaluated.
This is the laziest shit ever. It’s very convenient to say that things are as simple as that but they obviously aren’t.
I didn’t say things were simple. I said the US is the largest Imperialist power in the world, which is true, and suggested reevaluating your world view.
The US is not holding onto hegemonic power for “stability,” nations can govern themselves just fine. The US is holding onto hegemonic power for profit.
No, it’s absolutely not simple, but it is glaringly obvious that pretending the US is important on the global stage for “stability” is purely a western viewpoint that ignores the US’ contributions as a supporter of terrorism around the world whenever its profits are threatened.
Tankie gon’ tank
What have I said makes me a tankie? Saying that the US is bad for the world, actually? That’s all forms of Leftism, whether they be Anarchist, Marxist, or so forth.
If you’re just going to resort to Ad Hominem instead of defending your claims or addressing my counters to them, why even reply?
The guys who fund terrorists and dictatorships all over the world are important to global stability, but not in the way you think.
You can try to pretend trump was good for the world because US bAd but he wasn’t.
Who said Trump was good? Nobody in this thread, that’s for damn sure
They’re simping for him. They don’t need to state the obvious directly for me to notice it
Pointing out the facts about Biden is not “simping” for that pile of shit Trump. It’s like when someone criticizes Biden, we’re required to also provide a list of why Trump is bad.
Have you seen the guy? He’s completely open about his quid pro quo corruption. He hired his entire family to positions of power because why not. He shared top secret documents like it was nothing, while hiding them at his shitty golf resort. He’s painfully fucking blatant and obvious about how shitty he is. We don’t need to supply a list of why he sucks because the dude is a cartoon supervillain. Trust me, when I talk about how shitty Genocide Joe is, I’m definitely not pushing for another 4 years of that asshole Trump.
The reason we have to point things out about Biden is because a ton of otherwise smart people have fallen for this nonsense that he’s somehow good, when he’s nothing but a covert shill for corporations and war, just like every candidate has to be when they become the president of the United States. People like me are tired of the kindergarten-level “if you’re not voting for Biden, you’re voting for Trump” logic that we have to hear on repeat on a daily basis. Why can’t they both be shit? Why can’t it simply be a conversation of why democracy in the US is dead and the fact that we need some sort of political revolution or a goddamn miracle at this point?
Making the assumption that we like A because we criticized B and vice versa is just stupid and dismissive. The world is not that black and white and everyone knows that. This kind of attitude is absolutely counterproductive to unhooking ourselves from these Groundhog Day elections every 4 years where we’re forced to pick from a right-winger or a right-winger.
Wtf? The guy who blew up the general who beat ISIS while he was on a peace mission in a third country? The guy who escalated the drone warfare across Iraq and Syria? Who escalated the trade war with China?
No, America did not stop being an evil empire or start being good for global stability under Trump.
What the hell are you talking about? Nothing I said resembled trump support
You were implying Trump was good because the US is bad, but Trump’s foreign policy was as destructive as every other presidents.
Stop thinking that you vote “for” someone in a FPTP system. You don’t. You vote against the guy you don’t like.
It sucks, and I hate it, but don’t delude yourself into thinking otherwise. We’re playing a badly-designed game with a shitty controller and we’re only allowed to press a button once a year at best.
Think Twitch Plays Pokemon, but with a lot more trolls and no moderation. There will be a constant stream of people voting to do something stupid and destructive, so you spend all of your time voting against them.
Oh, and their votes count for more, so they can win even if there’s fewer of them. All we can ever hope to do is try to stop them and hope they don’t fuck everything up and give themselves even more power before the next time we’re allowed to pick a move.
Yay America. Greatest democracy in the world right there.
Both Democrats and Republicans have a vested interest in keeping the system as it is. They won’t change it unless citizens make them change it.
Honestly I’m kind of losing hope that it’s even possible at this point.
Positive change in the American system usually comes from the bottom up. If you’re interested in fixing the system, the first step is to switch your local elections to Approval Voting, probably through a referendum. There’s a whole bunch of reasons, and lots of second and third steps, but that’s the first one.
Whenever people come up with these solutions I’m reminded that it took Jon Stewart over a decade to get money for 9/11 first responders.
If it takes that long to do something so universally desired, it’s going to take a thousand years to change our voting system.
But it’s nice to dream.
If it takes that long to do something so universally desired, it’s going to take a thousand years to change our voting system.
Things never seem to change, until they do. And then you’re amazed they were ever the old way at all. As someone who remembers walking through an airport pre-9/11, in a state that put Ann Richards in the governor’s office, its funny to think about what was “normal” 30 years ago. Hell, its funny to think about what was normal 20 years ago, under Bush. Or 10 years ago, under Obama.
I’m old enough to remember when a black President was telling the country he could settle race tensions between a Harvard Professor and a city cop by having a beer with them.
Flying planes into buildings probably won’t help change our voting system.
Historically speaking, I have to disagree. One of the most transformative moments of our history since Pearl Harbor. It gave birth to wave after wave of right-wing election wins and a subsequent hard-right shift in voting rights, election policy, and court composition.
Right: It would make things even worse.
Maybe I’m just cynical. I still vote every chance I get, even for local stuff. I’m a big supporter of approval voting, but I’m not hopeful that it’ll become the norm in the US.
I mean, you can’t just hope it’ll happen, you have to decide to be the person that switches your local elections. I would have done mine already but I’m too disabled to do work, so this is one of the ways that I try to help instead.
I’m still mad that the ballot initiative to move away from FPTP failed in Massachusetts 😢
It is impossible. Most people don’t see a problem with this. Especially the trolls who have more power than they should.
The only time things have even marginally changed in the US there’s been violence. Civil rights, suffrage, the labor movement, ending slavery: All of them required thugs cracking skulls before they could happen.
So unless we have about 10% of the population willing to put themselves in harm’s way we’re stuck like this.
Do you really believe that nothing has changed over the decades? That seems like a very privileged stance.
Well yeah, plenty has changed. I’m talking about fixing our voting system. That would give lasting change, where we don’t have to worry so much about losing all that progress that people before us fought so hard for.
In regards to America’s voting system, nothing has changed for nearly a century. We’re just now starting to see support for ranked choice, but it will take a few decades of people pushing it constantly for it to go anywhere, and all of that time will have to be under a Democrat.
Sort of. On one side, they already benefit when the system is more fair, while the other side does everything in their power to rig the system in their favor, trying to lock their opponents out of ever having a chance.
Look at what Texas is trying to do. They’re trying to lock statewide office behind the barrier of number of counties voting for them instead of population. That way Democrats will never again have a statewide office as all the tiny counties with almost no population are Republican-leaning.
So while one side is happy with the status quo, the other side is fighting tooth and nail to make the rules less fair.
They won’t change it unless citizens make them change it.
They’ll send a fucking SWAT team to the house of any citizen tries to change it.
Honestly I’m kind of losing hope that it’s even possible at this point.
At some point, “we just need to vote for the most right-wing Democrat and then blame the leftists any time we lose” is not a productive long term strategy.
You need to study the two parties closely, from honest and reliable news resources. The parties are worlds apart. You will find corruption in any system unfortunately.
No you really don’t. It’s pretty fucking obvious that Republicans are awful. They’ll come right out and say it.
The problem is that Democrats also get me further from my political goals, and will continue all of the bullshit that I hate because they either don’t see a problem with it or they’re hamstrung by the structure of government.
There isn’t an option to vote for better. Only less worse.
Better almost always routes through less worse.
Well Better should hurry the fuck up because it’s been getting more or less worse my entire life.
Voting is for harm reduction, action is for positive change. You need both.
That’s exactly my philosophy: You don’t vote for better. You vote for less worse.
If you want better you gotta work for it. And probably get your skull cracked in.
Except, as far as I can tell, the system is designed such that citizens can’t make them change it-- what are you going to do, vote for nobody and force the government to fix it’s shit before electing a new president? I mean, you could revolt but I think we all know how quickly the government would act to squash any meaningful attempt to. And if Project 2025 is allowed to play out, then military can be dispatched to handle simple protests instead of the police, so good luck pressuring the government to do anything at that point.
They already put snipers on rooftops at every University for the Palestine protests. Supposedly this was for public safety as there was intel that things would turn violent, but who really knows the truthfulness of such intel or where the order came down from? When the military becomes your police, this act would pale in comparison.
Remember this when you go to the polls, or when you are considering not to.
Need to stop looking at the big picture first. There’s more than just the presidential or senatorial or even Congressional elections. There are local elections that have a much bigger impact on how your life goes than you realize. Do you know who your mayor is? Do you know who your state senator or alderman is? Most people know who their governor is but do you know who your lieutenant Governor is? Who is your state’s attorney general? Generally speaking the Secretary of State administers your electoral process in your state, do you know who your secretary of state is? Did you vote for your secretary of state? Did you bother to find out who was running against them in the primary election?
These are the questions most people don’t ask don’t even think to ask, and these are the questions that have the largest impact on how our country is actually run. In the long run the presidential election doesn’t matter as much as these because these are what determine how the president ends up actually getting elected. I almost lament the 17th amendment changing the way senators are chosen. Because when senators were chosen by the legislatures in the state people had to pay more attention to what their state legislature looked like.
The military, among both officers and enlisted, is actually pretty split politically, and a good number can and will refuse to obey an order they perceive to be unconstitutional, or outright commit mutiny. For all that the military warns about insider threats, it is also woefully unprepared to deal with them as well. Military servicemembers are also significantly stricter with the use of deadly force than police from my experience, although that may simply be due to my having served in the SSBN force.
Sure. I agree it won’t change unless citizens push for a change. But choosing to not participate is not pushing for a change. That’s just capitulation. Choosing to not vote is not a signal of protest. It’s a signal of someone who doesn’t care what the outcome is.
Voting is the first and most basic step in pushing for change. Doing more is good, but you definitely can’t skip that step.
We live in a society…. yaaawn…… zzzz
there are a few l33t moves like voting in primaries and local elections and judicial. It does not make it great but every little bit counts. Its sucks. Your not voting on if you are sodomized or not but if there is going to be lube or not. Not voting means no lube.
I’ve been voting consistently in every election since I turned 18 in the year 2000.
There isn’t any lube if you lose. And you lose constantly. Depending where you are you lose literally every time. I never voted for Scott Perry but that asshole is still my rep.
And even if you win some court somewhere, or a couple hundred idiots in another state, or lobbyists can decide you don’t get lube.
Don’t expect lube.
It reminds me a lot (the voting situation) with articles on how people don’t like obamacare. Yeah people are not wild about it but they really don’t like the situation before it. Its half a loaf and I don’t want to go back to no loaf but yes indeed I would like a universal health care full loaf.
Technically we get to press the button twice because there’s primaries (and, to a lesser degree, caucuses), but people need to be engaged in the process a lot earlier than the September/October/November period in which most people actually are paying attention.
there’s primaries
Except not really because everyone said they won’t run they’ll just let Biden have it
Stop focusing so much on the president. There are other positions in the party, ones who influence how our elections are handled, who are actually more important in the long run.
Why can’t we just have a good candidate?
Why can’t we just have a good reality?
Because Brandon is the worst and the DNC doesn’t care if they win
Right, because he’s the only reason reality isn’t all perfect sunshine and rainbows.
My point is that nothing’s perfect. You often have to settle for what’s real.
Plus, there’s at least one person I can think of that’s worse than Brandon. Do you need a hint?
If you want a great democracy you must devote time and money to develop good candidate from the ground up, and who besides the rich oligarchs who can hire surrogates has the time or money?
Wrong. You vote for the person you want your states delegates to go to.
To win a person has to get to 270Logically this means you really only have 2 choices if you want to pick a winner. In a dichotomy you’re voting for someone just as much as against someone, really.
I have never voted for the person I want my state’s delegates to go to, because that person lost the primary.
You vote against the guy you don’t like.
What if I don’t like any of them?
There will be a constant stream of people voting to do something stupid and destructive, so you spend all of your time voting against them.
I would simply not participate in a system that sounds this miserable and tedious. I would play a game that’s more productive and enjoyable.
Oh, and their votes count for more, so they can win even if there’s fewer of them.
But it doesn’t matter, because casting a vote for Ralph Nader from my bright red state of Texas is still the reason Al Gore lost Florida in a 5-4 SCOTUS decision.
What if I don’t like any of them?
Join the club.
I would play a game that’s more productive and enjoyable.
That’s not possible. We voted on what game we’re playing and we glued the cartridge into the console. Much to my disappointment we don’t get to change the game, or not play, or even ignore it.
It’s a stupid world and we all live in it.
But it doesn’t matter, because casting a vote for Ralph Nader from my bright red state of Texas is still the reason Al Gore lost Florida in a 5-4 SCOTUS decision.
Exactly: The system is built to let them win as much as possible. You’re not going to ever beat it. It’s like Getting Over It with Bennett Foddy except even more frustrating and without the pleasant voiceovers.
That’s not possible.
That’s very possible. It’s just not what Americans are used to doing.
We voted on what game we’re playing
That’s a naive perspective, as it misses the historical, financial, and sociological roots of the game. You can’t play a game of basketball if the other team picks up the ball and walks off the court.
This is Lockean Theory 101, and its the entire basis of democracy. We use democratic tools to divine popular intent. But when the democracy is subverted and political leadership is divorced from public sentiment, the institutions fail. But if institutions aren’t failing because people are too afraid to withdraw their support from them, the system is implicitly endorsed and corrupt officials get to continue abusing their social mandates.
It’s a stupid world and we all live in it.
Its only as stupid as we make it. Atm, we’ve got a country that’s invested an enormous amount of time, energy, and labor hours in infesting our senior population with brain worms. That needs to change and simply voting isn’t going to be the thing that does it.
We agree on all of this. You just have some small glimmer of hope and mine’s been crushed by reality.
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That’s an early-stage FPTP system. After a bunch of people with minority support start winning you end up with two options, and you vote against the one you hate least because there’s not really a choice anymore.
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If I’m given the choice between chocolate and vanilla, choosing vanilla doesn’t make it my favorite. It’s just the least bad option because caramel isn’t available. I’m not for vanilla, I’m against chocolate.
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you can’t prove this.
With no offense intended, I feel this could be worded a little better. It could also just be my tired brain, though.
“Well, that’s not a very enticing platform! Who is your opponent?”
“Donald Trump.”
“You have my vote.”
Student loan relief, aca support and expansion, negotiating with Medicare, support for democracy at home, support for Ukraine abroad…I could go on.
Only clowns and bad faith actors would even try to pretend Biden hasn’t gone to bat for average Americans. He’s also got concrete policy. The GOP has none.
FUCKING FACTS
https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2024-opinion-biden-accomplishment-data/
https://www.whitehouse.gov/oneyear/
I CAN’T FUCKING BELIEVE how fucking often I hear this goddamn BULLSHIT about how Biden is simply “not trump” and hasn’t done much, like holy fucking Christ.
If ANYTHING, Biden should be over-commended given that he accomplished all of this with THE MOST CHAOTIC AND DO-NOTHING congress EVER.
I think it’s interesting folks take this as talking about Biden.
Biden has a platform, Biden and the Democrats have accomplishments … what does Trump and the last decade of Republican congressional dominance have?
“DEMOCRATS ARE DESTROYING THIS COUNTRY!!” “HEALTHCARE IS A MESS!! I’VE GOT A BRILLIANT PLAN I DIDN’T PASS OR EVEN PROPOSE IN CONGRESS LAST TIME. WE’RE GOING TO GET IT DONE THIS TIME. IT WILL BE SO MUCH BETTER THAN WHAT THE DEMOCRATS CAME UP WITH. NO I’M NOT SHARING IT NOW, YOU MUST BE SURPRISED.” “I MADE MY RICH FRIENDS MONEY!!”
They have Project 2025 and it’s horrifying.
Well, when you make your name into a brand, then mark your followers with the same, and your brand is a plague on the world… yeah, that kinda is enough. I’d vote for an off-cut of shit-smeared shag carpet if it meant I could rest easy knowing that the next wave of vomit being spewed on Twitter wasn’t directed at some of the most vulnerable and under represented peoples on the planet. And if you are wondering if I’m purposefully being ambiguous about to whom I refer, let me sate your curiosity and call former President Trump the cunt he is. Trump is a cunt.
If his platform is “not demolishing democracy” then take my vote
You’ve got yourself a deal. Whether or not we have democracy will not change whatsoever during his term.
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Might want to edit your comment to mention Trump by name, because “he” was Biden in the last two comments.
I thought he was saying Deal… as in deal with it. But it was Deal… as in ok I’m in.
Edit: From the downvotes I’m thinking a lot made the same mistake?
Edited for clarity
No, both sides are not the same.
Pretty fucking relevant in this thread it seems.
You know the US does this too, right?
But unironically also vote for Biden. I wish there was more acknowledgement that there has to be some way to pressure a candidate to earn votes, being much less bad isn’t going to get the 50k low info swing voters that decide the election
You know the US does this too, right?
I’m not disagreeing.
Yes, but when we do it it’s for the greater good. Not the same.
Impossible to determine if sarcasm or troll without tag
Sarcasm actually
Also apologies for posting it twice, it wasn’t that funny
glad they posted it twice so we can all play both sides, upvote one in case it’s sarcasm, downvote the other in case of troll.
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“Everyone who disagrees with me is a secret agent”
No, not everyone that disagrees with me is a secret agent. A good chunk of them are. The rest are the idiots that believe and agree with them.
I’m still waiting for a good argument about how no voting or voting 3rd party gets better outcomes.
Maybe I’m the idiot for thinking there might be a good argument for it. Who knows?
The rest are the idiots that believe and agree with them.
Like any good conspiracy, it accounts for any possible contrary evidence one might encounter. If you find someone you disagree with irl, or someone online who doesn’t seems like a secret agent, then it’s simple - they’re just people who have been manipulated by secret agents! The secret agents are still surrounding you and influencing every aspect of your life, regardless of silly things like “evidence” or “falsifiability.” It’s completely indistinguishable from a schizophrenic convinced they’re surrounded by lizard people.
I’m still waiting for a good argument about how no voting or voting 3rd party gets better outcomes.
It’s pretty simple. In a negotiation, having a credible threat of not cooperating gives you more bargaining power than if you show up like, “I will accept any deal you give me, I need this!” Voting is a negotiation. If politicians know that you’ll vote for them no matter what you do, then they have no reason to listen to your concerns, whereas if you say, “I’ll only vote for you if you do this, otherwise I’ll vote third party” then they have an incentive to do the thing in order to earn your vote.
This means you know that your actions will have a greater chance of getting Trump elected, which means you value [whatever policy change you’re looking for] more than [the difference between Biden and Trump]
That’s correct. When the policy change in question is “stopping genocide,” I consider that a completely valid position, tyvm.
Even if it means the break down of democracy in your own country so you will never be able to use voting as negotiation in the future?
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The US doesn’t have a democracy and never has.
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Trump was already president once and we didn’t have “a complete breakdown of democracy.”
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You aren’t actually stopping it though, you’re continuing it and making things worse for everyone else
I’m not doing any of that. The people who are doing it are.
“I’ll only vote for you if you do this, otherwise I’ll vote third party” then they have an incentive to do the thing in order to earn your vote.
Don’t they only have an incentive to do the thing if the third party you vote for instead has a chance to beat them? Which will never be the case unless we see voting reform.
No. If a third party gets, say 5%, it tells the candidate that they could potentially pick up that 5% by moving closer to that party’s positions.
Voting reform is great. It also goes directly against the self-interest of both major parties so they will only ever support it if they believe they have to in order to win.
That seems like an over-simplified or even naive example. Like, a candidate moving their platform has just as much chance to lose 5% of their base as it does picking up those third party votes.
Also, realistically, there isn’t one singular thing that people vote third party for - there’s lots of little “one things” that particular individuals vote third party over, so it’s a more difficult matter than simply “moving closer to those party’s positions” - it’s going out and figuring out what exact positions those votes left you for and trying to incorporate them piecemeal into your platform, all in a way that maintains your current base, or at least gains you more votes than you lose…
IDK man, I don’t see the draw there. Surely it’s much easier to find that 5% in centrists or undecided voters, rather than the very principled people that decide to vote third party.
Ok then, if they believe they can win without me and people like me, then they can go right ahead. But I’d better not hear anyone blame the left when the democrats move right and lose.
Getting 5% is also important because it qualifies the party to get millions of dollars in federal grant money.
Voting is a negotiation? Since when? Voting is a privilege that the ruling class can take away from us at any time if they think they can get away with it. Something kind of like what Trump did after the last election. I remember Jan 6th.
It’s always been a choice between a shit cupcake and a poop cookie. The best thing you can do is minimize damages so you can keep trying to organize for 4 more years or at the very least, stay out of the camps.
Also, if you don’t vote or vote 3rd party, they don’t have to think or care about you anymore. Your not a vote they need to get, because your throwing your vote away. Its basic first past the post voting strategy. I don’t like first past the post for this reason.
If you are bot, “foreign spy”, or whatever, your post was good at muddying the water, keep it up, your master will be pleased. If your not, this argument was bad and unconvincing try again. Not even conservative voters are dumb enough to vote 3rd party.
Also, if you don’t vote or vote 3rd party, they don’t have to think or care about you anymore. Your not a vote they need to get, because your throwing your vote away.
And if you always vote for them no matter what they do, then they don’t have to think or care about you anymore, because they know you’ll vote for them regardless.
If you are bot, “foreign spy”, or whatever, your post was good at muddying the water, keep it up, your master will be pleased.
Oh thank you, I actually am a foreign spy. Do you think you could rate me 5 stars? I really need this job.
Ugh it’s really tiresome to keep coming up with bits to make fun of this conspiracy theory. Can’t y’all get into like flat earth stuff instead, so I can have some new material to work with? It’s all the same crap.
And if you always vote for them no matter what they do, then they don’t have to think or care about you anymore, because they know you’ll vote for them regardless.
You got it! That is the shit system in the US.
Oh thank you, I actually am a foreign spy. Do you think you could rate me 5 stars? I really need this job.
Lol, good sense of humor.
I sympathize, it gets depressing. That is why, I don’t blame anyone from no voting or 3rd party voting. I just wish people would do that without justifying it. Not make it out to be this big brained strategy. There are a lot of good meaning ignorant people who will read that stuff and think they are materially improving things by no voting or 3rd party voting. The progressive fight is super hard and a pain in the butt. If you need a rest King/Queen, take it.
The only real way to get change to happen is getting enough people educated and organized to turn the democrat or republican candidate into a 3rd party candidate by numbers, that is the only way they suffer. Until then we have to play their stupid game.
The only real way to get change to happen is getting enough people educated and organized to turn the democrat or republican candidate into a 3rd party candidate by numbers, that is the only way they suffer.
And how exactly do you envision that happening without anyone ever making the case for it or trying to justify that position?
“I’m unable to grasp nuance” There’s one of you in every thread.
This is the definition of bad faith, kids.
I want to see who upvoted this comment so I can block them.
You actually can see that, somehow.
You can do it through the instance API.
Admins at lemmy.ml used vote tracking against me to retaliate by deciding what communities to ban me from after I spoke out against disinformation. They felt that censorship wasn’t enough, they felt the need to be malicious in order to make a point. Sucks to be them though, they forgot the part about keeping your cards close to the chest.
I don’t even get it honestly.
Yeah, while it’s possible to explain away contrary perspectives and any contrary evidence, it’s better to block them out altogether so that you never hear anything that could challenge your conspiracy theory in the first place.
It’s not a “conspiracy theory” when there’s an actual well-documented conspiracy.
It’s well documented that everyone who disagrees with you is a secret agent?
No one said that. More bad faith here with the straw man logical fallacy. This guy checks all the bad faith boxes.
Block, but not because this person disagrees, rather they can’t debate in good faith and are just trolling.
When the opponent is Trump, isn’t that exactly the right thing to do?
FYI: Most of those braindead “am I not allowed to criticize Biden???” comments and posts on social media are a concerted effort by right-wingers from /pol and other such sewers, trying to get people to not vote against Trump. Don’t fall for it. These aren’t “lefties” or “tankies”. Just downvote, report, and ignore.
This year, that is exactly enough for me to vote for “not his opponent.”
I mean… I usually agree with the sentiment the comic is trying to convey, but OTOH the “My Opponent” in this case is Trump.
In a system where all the non-winning votes are lost in a step and not counted at the end, like the USA form of weak democracy, this becomes a valid tactic.
It’s not only the presidential vote that’s like this, but ALL fucking votes. It’s astonishing how weak the US system is.
And still some see the US constitution as this pinnacle of democracy when it’s vastly outdated by now
Even the founding fathers anticipated a lot of reforms and for the whole thing to become obsolete quite soon but yet here we are with people worshipping them as this infallible being and weighting their words on a scale as if it’s impossible for them to be wrong
Even the founding fathers anticipated a lot of reforms and for the whole thing to become obsolete quite soon
…which is why they built a mechanism into it to make alterations. But the people upset about things like the electoral college don’t have the support necessary to use that mechanism.
The problem is that even a Constitutional Convention gives more power to land than people. If one actually happened it would probably end with amendments forbidding divorce, abortion, and interracial marriage.
The problem is that even a Constitutional Convention gives more power to land than people.
Specifically in the case of a Constitutional Convention 2/3 of states have to agree to have one and 3/4 of states have to agree to any changes.
You’d have an easier time convincing the federal government to condense a few states - we don’t really need TWO Dakotas, and Montoming seems like a good idea. Maybe also split California into a few pieces. The whole “land over people” thing is only really a problem because a couple of states blow the curve - House apportionment is done in a fashion that mathematically minimizes the average difference in people/representative between states while having a fixed number of representatives, but California blows the curve by being so utterly massive compared to any other state and there just not being enough representatives to go around. So all but a few states are pretty close in terms of people/representative, a couple are sitting at the 1 representative minimum while being tiny, and California blows the curve on the other side.
Either increase the House size, merge some of the smallest states, split California up or all of the above - and all of those can be done without passing an amendment.
Of course, then Texas will invoke the clause in the Joint Resolution for Annexing Texas to the United States and split itself into five states, each of which gets its own Senators and whatever number of Representatives the math would work out to.
It’s a shame they made it so hard to modify. Both the 2/3 of both houses or 3/4 of states routes are quite unfeasable when there are only two quite polarised parties… :-/
The whole 2 parties thing isn’t even in the constitution tho, is it? I’m not American so I might not be as familiar with the details
The voting system makes it so the system will always tend toward two parties. Parties aren’t in the constitution at all. That’s where you get occasional independent candidates
No, parties and primaries (which are just parties borrowing election infrastructure to choose who they support) aren’t in the Constitution at all. But first past the post voting always trends towards two party systems as a stable equilibrium.
It’s not. We’ve had third parties before, and we do still occasionally have independents take seats in congress(we have 3 currently)
They’ll never be even close to majority though, and they will never take the presidency.
So to be honest the #1 reason I’m voting Biden by far is that he’s not Trump. But if you want another reason, how about that he finally stuck it to TurboTax and created a free federal tax filing system?
I’m hearing this a lot lately too. Not from the Biden campaign, mind you. Just as a straw man in memes and comments in spaces like this.
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If my shitposts on a barely-used social network can swing an election then we’re in even worse shape than I thought.
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No you aren’t. You’re being told that this is all that’s happening, but you aren’t going to look for yourself.
To be fair, we should not have to look. Aren’t these people spending money on a campaign?
Yes-- campaigns that involve influencing people’s opinions with covert guerrilla campaigns across social media with no accountability. Among the other shady tactics in their playbooks.
Proof please? I’ve been enjoying the dark brandon ads myself
If you aren’t seeing the campaign because they aren’t reaching you, you still aren’t seeing this, and just being told what to think.
You’re basically reiterating my point, but somehow appear to be excusing being a sheep.
What? I never said I don’t seek the truth. I said I shouldn’t have to. #bothsides and the rhetoric in the comic are stupid.
If you claim the campaign is saying something, but openly admit the campaign is not reaching you, then you are doing exactly what I said: not looking for yourself and just parroting what you were told the are saying.
The campaign is not reaching me through advertising, but I am reaching the campaign through Google.
I am reaching the campaign through Google.
The glue eating search engine?
Mmmm yummy
Wtf are you even talking about? I’m so confused.
This isn’t difficult. The Biden campaign is not saying what the OP is claiming they “see a lot of,” he has provided plenty of platform and has seemingly gone out of his way to me minimize mentioning trump (although I expect that the change). The claim that it’s happening a lot is just mindlessly parroting a talking points being fed to them.
What don’t you understand about this?
You seem to be under the impression that I agree with the OP…?
