Summary
Kamala Harris’s political skills have transformed a potentially disastrous 2024 presidential election into a competitive race.
Despite initial skepticism and a challenging campaign, Harris has improved her public image and closed the gap with Trump on key issues. Since Biden stepped aside in July and endorsed her, she has shifted from an unpopular vice president to a viable candidate, even matching Trump in polls on economic issues.
Her leadership has given Democrats a chance to prevent a Trump landslide and halt the rise of American authoritarianism.
It’s not a testament to her abilities, it’s a depressing statement about the state of America that a convicted felon, rapist, fascist loudman can be neck and neck with probably one of the smartest, most highly accomplished presidential candidates we’ve had in quite a while
I blame stupid voters AND Republicans trying to pull of a coup through voter suppression.
Up next, endless court cases in an attempt to get SCOTUS to hand over the election to Trump.
I blame Fox News the most for decades of right wing propaganda.
Rush Limbaugh too
Rupert Murdoch and the cabal
And Newt Gingrich
I blame years of powerful people trying to ensure that people are not educated and are fed a diet of misinformation with a consistent narrative.
That is part of Republican voter suppression.
Yep, the truth is it shouldn’t even be this close, but Kamala has moved significantly right in the last four years.
The Dem party doesn’t try to get landslide victories, they want to give voters the absolute minimum they need to win. It’s the only explanation for why they keep moving right after Obama’s 08 landslide
Yep, the truth is it shouldn’t even be this close, but Kamala has moved significantly right in the last four years.
Actually, that’s probably why she’s winning. Because of the nature and makeup of the Electoral College, we can consider the Presidential election biased in favor of the GOP candidate.
It’s the only explanation for why they keep moving right after Obama’s 08 landslide
I’ve explained this in detail before, so rather than reposting, I’ll just point folks over to this, https://lemmy.world/comment/12409521
The Dem party doesn’t try to get landslide victories, they want to give voters the absolute minimum they need to win.
Well, I’m sure they would if they could. But see above - it’s not possible with the current structure. I’m still hopeful that we can get Harris elected, and then have a chance of getting the 127 DC states plan to pass - https://www.vox.com/2020/1/14/21063591/modest-proposal-to-save-american-democracy-pack-the-union-harvard-law-review
Which would allow Dems to pass the required constitutional amendments to address the systemic problems with the current, erm, system.
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[…] cost the Wall-Street class anything significant…
And herein is your problem. The Wall-Street class is the most influential voting bloc in America. If you don’t bow to them, you don’t even make it onto the ballot, let alone into the oval office. The only way it is possible to get around this, in modern America, would be if you acted like you were going to play ball with Wall Street up until you’re sworn into office, and then pull the most epic bait and switch of all time on them.
To be clear, I don’t expect this from Harris. But if she were going to do it, exactly what she’s doing now would be the way you accomplish that. Let the megadonors believe that you’re on their side until you reach a point where they can’t stop you.
I am all but praying that Harris is pulling a bait and switch on Wall Street. It’s the only way I see fascism being actually stopped, instead of merely delayed or slowed by 4-8 years.
In the country that very possibly going to vote Trump back in a party moving to the left would be a death sentence.
The fact that the election is a toss up shows to me just how dumb America is.
The choice is an average politician or an orange wannabe fascist … and a good percentage of the country can’t decide? Or they choose the fascist?
The fact that it is even a close race just displays in big giant signs just generally how stupid the country has become.
I normally don’t like being that blunt or unkind but these people are literally holding the future of the world in their hands and they have no freaking clue what they are doing.
I’m not American and it is completely frustrating to sit outside as we watch a bunch of idiots being indecisive about either choosing normalcy or insanity. It’s such a hard question for America that they need to have a never ending debate about it.
Being susceptible to fascism isn’t exactly an American invention. It’s a failure of liberalism that leads to this, as democracy is eroded by capitalists.
need to have a never ending debate about it.
It’s not a debate at this point. The Trump supporters stopped living in reality a long time ago. I’m still friends with a couple on FB, and the shit they post is complete lunacy. They won’t look at anything that comes from NBC, ABC, or even CBS. Fox is hit and miss…if it’s remotely critical of anything conservative it’s an MSM conspiracy.
The Russian / Chinese social ops did their job to perfection. These people only watch X, Newsmax, Britbart, and OANN these days.
They’re regular people outside of the internet, but they’ve walled themselves off from anything that might put a dent in their world view.
how dumb America is.
Not to mention how dumb the UK, France, Italy, Austria, the Netherlands, Hungary, Finland, Croatia, and the Czech Republic are…
By the way, what country do you live in?
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Lmao at snowflake mods. Only criticism of other countries is allowed because you’re literally man-children.
The problem is those of us who want a better life for all. For people to be able to live and not just exist, who strive for kindness. Our problem is always that we are too willing to turn our collective cheek. We are too willing to be kind for too long, be too tolerant, too understanding. Meanwhile, the angry and intolerable, and the malicious and evil, stand high atop shaky foundations yelling loudly serious threats.
This election cycle is a representation of where our own anger has gone. I just fear it has come too late.
It’s sad how uninformed people have become. They get their news from Facebook or TV. Literally zero research done so everything they base their vote on is anecdotal or just assumptions based on their own life experiences.
We need to do better about getting information to the people. The government shouldn’t have to jumó through hoops to educate the public on basic shit
It’s absolutely ridiculous but apparently there are people who didn’t know Biden dropped out
Imagine how bad it feels to have those idiots as neighbors. I moved to this neighborhood around two years ago and I was really happy that there were no visible trump flags/signs around. It’s nice that everyone can keep their politics to themselves. In the last year, somehow that changed and there were a few signs put up here and there, but in the last month, they’ve multiplied and now they’re on multiple houses on every block. I don’t understand how anyone can see what’s going on and still feel compelled to go get a sign and put it up…unless they’re just trying to put up the scariest Halloween decorations. Now the nice neighborhood I moved to two years ago looks like election headquarters for someone who tried to overthrow the government four years ago.
Dude the right is full on talking about anyone they disagree with being a demon. Literally a thing that’s never existed, and they at on top. If you’re not in a state that’s entirely unwilling to put you in a concentration camp, you might consider moving.
I mean if she really wanted to guarantee victory all she had to do was to stop sending weapons to Israel. Great job by her to keep the genocide and her chances of election going.
Guarantee a Trump victory, that is.
I agree it’s horrible that Israel has killed hundreds of Palestinians for every person killed in the Hamas attack, and Harris needs to find a way to rein in Netanyahu if she becomes President. And that may be by withholding all weapons. But if and when Trump takes power, he’s going to help his buddy Bibi nuke Gaza into a wasteland as a Final Solution to the Palestinian problem. Harris needs every last vote, even from those who support Zionism, but have other reasons for voting against Trump.
You’re very uninformed if you think that Harris coming out against Israel (which is how EVERY news network would spin it) would lead to anything but a Trump victory.
I’d argue the opposite.
The fact that Americans are possibly still voting for someone who will bring in the Fourth Reich if elected, over the first female president is a sign of just how badly Democrats have dropped the ball. ESPECIALLY after Jan 6th.
I 100% agree except why is it that “Democrats dropped the ball”?
Democrats aren’t voting for a fascist. Their politicians are not enabling a fascist. The Democratic voting base hasn’t been bamboozled by 30+ years of obvious propaganda pretending to be news.
Christians dropped the ball. Conservative immigrants dropped the ball. Legit news media dropped the ball. Large corporations and wealthy individuals dropped the ball… on purpose.
Democrats work on harm reduction because we don’t give them enough votes to make meaningful changes. A 1 or 2 vote margin isn’t enough to vote around the moles like Manchin and Sinema.
Christians dropped the ball. Conservative immigrants dropped the ball. Legit news media dropped the ball. Large corporations and wealthy individuals dropped the ball… on purpose.
There is a literal industry built on lies
To be fair, just being a corrupt industry full of scumbags is actually progress when it comes to religion. Go back 100 years let alone 500 and it was more like its own authoritarian political party. now it’s just hobby lobby with more private jets, and…well, that’s a good thing. I don’t ever want to have to expect the Spanish inquisition.
Leftists - the “don’t vote” kind - definitely dropped the ball.
It’s really tiring seeing you guys trot out the “it’s all leftist’s fault for not voting for us!” line again and again when the actions of your candidate give it away for the lie that it is. Leftists cannot simultaneously be the cause of every Democratic defeat, yet too insignificant a group to merit any consideration in party platform.
Go back to your handlers for better propaganda, this one doesn’t work on anyone with a pulse.
They actually can be the cause of defeat while still not having power in the party. There’s not enough leftists to win the primaries, but there are enough that if they don’t vote in the general it can cause a loss.
Then again, with the sheer number of Democratic voters who voted in 2020 but not 2024 I don’t think it’s just the leftists.
It’s not the Democrats’ fault that there are so many cowardly, weak-minded, brainwashed losers in this country who fall for every bit of propaganda the GOP puts out. Politics shouldn’t be about culture wars but that’s how the republicans get votes.
You could certainly say the Democrats should have been able to come up with a better outreach plan rather than running the same old plan that hasn’t penetrated into this group for the last several elections. It’s not as though the culture war nonsense and insane rightwing elements of the party are novel factors, such that the Dems can shrug their collective shoulders and say “Hey, we did our best, be we were flying blind into the unknown.”
It is the Democrats fault that there are so many cowardly, weak-minded losers in charge of the party though.
The Democrats are responsible for 50+ years of neglecting working Americans that created the culture you’re complaining about.
You are right about stupid people falling for stupid shit, but that’s not why democrats lost. Trump got less votes than he did in 2020, that 70 million who voted for Trump are just people who love what Trump says.
What made democrats lose are the 16 million votes Biden got that Harris didn’t get. The GOP didn’t magically make those votes disappear, those missing votes is the failure of the democratic party.
There is an industry built on lies my guy. A literal lie industry. Industrial lies
I think both can be true. That she cleaned up the situation is a testament to her skill as a candidate, and the fact this situation happened is in no small part an indictment of the Democratic party, in which she’s among its most senior leaders
no she didn’t. she had a window of positive energy she just tanked. jesus did we watch the same candidate running? lol
What evidence are you using to support your belief that she tanked? That’s a surprise to me and I’d like to understand more.
Gestures at map of results. Do I need more?
How about the fact her campaign was mired (sp?)not in what the her admin would do for Americans but instead of how shes not trump and how shes willing to silence a minority group just asking her to enforce american law? A group supported by a demographic thats very hard to turn out… Young folks.
How about the fact she repeatedly committed herself to doing the same shit as biden’s admin? An admin with historically low approval ratings?
Im sorry your candidate lost I truly am. America is officially worse off as a result. But her problem was turnout and the only shit she ran on was shit most people already have in their states that were possible wins for her.
Look at Pennsylvania weed legalization is basically assured. They have abortion peotections… Etc. so what exactly did harris offering voters in those states?
Well let’s be real honest with ourselves here. Her platform was fine and her campaign was executed very, very well. But she had only, what, 107 days to pull it off? Economists agree that her platform would have the best impact on the country, but she or anyone who would have taken her place were all swimming upstream against inflation. And since we’re being honest here, we both recognize that the Fed, not controlled by the executive branch, are the ones responsible for righting the ship. And Biden did everything he could from his chair up to and including working across the aisle in GOP majority house, and only failed when Trump intervened for sake of an election year talking point.
The map is the outcome, but it’s not evidence of any campaign tanking. She is intelligent, empathetic, and very well spoken. But the settling dust is indicating that the outcome was driven by a number of factors beyond her control.
Her platform was not fine. The few policies she put forward were either limited to incredible minor subsets of the population (capping price of just insulin, a minor payput for first time how buyers in very limited areas, a tax cut that barely puts a dent in the rise of the cost of living due to inflation), or were things most states have already done themselves.
Not to mention speed running to the right. A genocide, etc.
The number of days was not the issue. It was her complete disregard for the plight of the middle class struggling on food/housing and arabs literally watching her and bidens admin murdering their families.
Never mind the fact that she was one of the individuals that was gaslighting americans over bidens mental decline.
She had plenty of time to plan her campaign if she hadnt been too busy gaslighting people.
Just to be super clear, yes we were watching different candidates then. The country needs to walk a very nuanced path if we want to continue the recovery started by the Fed (interest rates) and Biden (IRA and CHIPS). Don’t get me wrong: Biden deciding to run for reelection was the worst possible decision he could have made. The second worst: dropping out 107 days from the election. I’m sure the private discussions about his decision were passionate, but of course she’s not going to publicly lay her boss out like that. That’s not realistic to expect her to undermine any progress Biden. You privately disagree and publicly commit. You do that until the circumstances change. The DNC is absolutely to blame. Not Harris though. It was as good as it could have been given the duration.
And then there’s the elephant in the room: she does not exist in a vacuum. We had a front row view to a horribly misogynist, criminal, fascist wannabe since (checks notes) 2015. People comparing these 2 and selecting to risk the world order just to save their regressive social views are also to blame. Because remember: all economists agree how dangerous his plan is.
Look at Pennsylvania weed legalization is basically assured.
This is primarily because every bordering state has recreational and they’re losing tons of tax revenue.
But this did get me to check on my state election results and I found a tiny silver lining in that Democrats won both the state senate and representative races.
This is primarily because every bordering state has recreational and they’re losing tons of tax revenue.
yes and what did it bring harris’ campaign as an incentive? seriously think about this. every campaign issue she put forward were all things most states that care already have or were getting this election what voters would it bring to the table for her if they were going to get them anyways why show up for harris. fuck this isnt hard.
No disagreement on that, just giving some context.
What exactly do you think would have won?
Humans are awful
Bernie Sanders
Pete Buttigieg
Or if they could have approached a very popular celebrity such as Dwayne Johnson or Taylor Swift and asked them to run.
Even Andrew Yang could have produced a better result if he made a better campaign pitch than focusing his solely on leftist pipe dreams that will bankrupt the country such as UBI.
Lol you’re funny
Anything to blame the Democrats, huh?
Look blaming the democrats is done not because the republicans aren’t to blame, but because blaming them is sort of pointless. It’s like blaming terrorists for the shit they do. Yes, it’s their fault. Yes, they’re morally reprehensible. So what? Are you going to spend time trying to come up with detailed arguments for what they could’ve done better? No, you look to the material conditions, people, and organizations responsible for fighting them, and for making sure people aren’t desperate enough to join them, because their job at least in theory is to do better. I blame the democrats because I believe they could have done better. I do not have even that small grain of hope when it comes to the republicans.
The fact that it’s close is a testament to the idiocy and racism of the American public.
That and just a dash of sexism.
TBH when her candidacy first was announced I was completely convinced that Trump had already won… A woman, AND black?
Voting is a two way street.
You can’t put all the blame on voters and none on the campaign. One of those groups gets paid millions and millions of dollars to get a D president.
When we ran a young charismatic candidate with a progressive campaign in 08, it was easy to get voters on board and red states became blue, it even carried over to flipping state governments
If we had a moderately sane Republican running, I’d agree with you.
But anyone who looks at Trump and thinks “Yep, that guy should have the nuclear football” is a fucking moron and I’m terrified that they’re allowed to operate motor vehicles.
But you can still make the argument the DNC seeing trump and using that as an excuse to run candidates more conservative than Dem voters are is also a dangerous thing…
That’s what I’m saying, you can blame 10s of millions of voters, or the handful of people at the DNC who get paid millions to get a Dem elected.
Both should do the right thing, and I get criticizing both. I even get criticizing the handful of wealthy unelected people running the DNC as the priority.
But I’ll never understand why so many people demand only voters compromise and insist the handful of unelected wealthy, powerful, and connected people running the DNC are above reproach
If the Republicans were running a sane choice, then Democrats holding to their ideals would be key. Voters would have an actual choice and candidates would need to better distinguish themselves
However we have a scenario where the Republicans candidate is not a sane choice for the future of our democracy, our country, our future, and are in some sort of bizarro world where half the population is fine with that. A bizarro world where saying the quiet part out loud is “telling it like it is”, where blatant corruption and fascism is somehow not just tolerated but even celebrated. Where it’s ok to be racist, sexist, and scapegoating is the strategy of the day
While I’m happy to be voting FOR Harris, it’s critical in so many ways to vote AGAINST Trump, his excesses, his corruption, his abuse of power, his signature for sale, his lackey for Putin, his willingness to sacrifice our future for more money today, his narcissism at the expense of the citizens a President is meant to serve
I don’t blame Democratic voters. I blame every voter. This should be a no brainer. Trump should be polling in the single digits.
Americans are fucking stupid. The ones who vote are stupid. The ones who run the parties are stupid. The ones who don’t vote are stupid.
I keep trying to hitch a ride off this bug infested mudball but even the aliens know to avoid it.
And in 08 a young charismatic candidate with a progressive platform got them to vote for him even in red states
The voters will vote if given a better option.
Well, this is a hurdle though: https://www.wbur.org/hereandnow/2016/07/19/gerrymandering-republicans-redmap
Bill Clinton, who won in 1992, was from the midwestern state of Arkansas. I think this trend started long before, and has to do with the center of the US shifting differently from some of the more populated areas of the US.
When we ran a young charismatic candidate with a progressive campaign in 08, it was easy to get voters on board and red states became blue, it even carried over to flipping state governments
See https://lemmy.world/comment/12409521 - but the TLDR is that 2008 isn’t comparable, since a major gerrymandering effort by the GOP took place in 2010 that took Dems by surprise - and this gerrymandering made the above virtually impossible to repeat (by design, I might add).
Or is a testament to how effective rich authoritarians have been at keeping much of the public uneducated and or fed misinformation.
It’s honestly unreal that Trump is even in the race, let alone in a position to pull off a possible win. After everything that has happened. I try to keep a positive spirit in general, but it’s not easy to be optimistic on behalf of the US right now.
It’s not unreal at all. I don’t understand why time after time people underestimate what monsters the average American is.
Well, now that it looks like Trump is actually going to pull it off, we’re all in for a world of fun over the next four years. We might actually discover just how monstrous things will get.
Four years? You’re awfully optimistic that he’ll ever leave if given power again.
Death
McDonald’s kills everything eventually
Then it just goes to someone as shitty, but likely much smarter
Sometimes cults die with their leader sometimes they don’t. JD has no charisma and pedo-supporters don’t even like him (they prefer child rapists to couch fuckers). Time will tell.
Oh, I agree. I think the amount of energy lost, when Trump dies, will be a huge blow to the MAGA movement. Will it be a coup de grace? I fucking hope so. However, if they get their project 2025 governmental structure into place, I think it will be hard to dethrone the GOP, even without Trump. I also believe that is the true hope behind that platform. They know their cult of personality is on a timer, so they are hoping to get things set-up, where they still have complete control, regardless of how motivated the cult is.
Its a historic win for accelerationists I guess. Viva la revolution.
Sometimes I wonder if the centrists are crypto-accelerationists, because they always run to the center for nonexistent votes like clockwork, and predictably always lose.
America is a fascist country and fascist leadership remains popular among enfranchised residents.
I think the dnc feared a desantis candidate more than they did a trump.
Harris will be the lightning rod for democract anger, but the DNC are ultimately the ones to blame for allowing the first convicted president.
Did she win? No? Then it doesn’t fucking matter!
What? Should she be getting a participation trophy? Sorry, I can’t hear you over how Ukraine is being annexed by Russia.
Aw man it was so close. I mean it wasn’t, but she had a fierce competitor. The demented overweight felon rapist child molester won, but it was just the better choice overall
I know right. They act like Harris was some plucky underdog. When in reality her party is only one of two that govern the most power country on earth.
How on earth is Harris being tied with the worst presidential candidate in history spun as a good thing?
Yeah, how many of those votes are pro-Harris and how many are anti-Trump?
Leave it to the modern journalist to spin a loss as a win. Comedic at best.
Panelist on pbs live election coverage was saying Harris ran a flawless campaign. They just dont get it.
Lemmy users have been repeating the same bullshit.
Why is no one discussing Dems have lost the senate and given a bigger majority in the house to Republicans. Even without Trump they are bound to control house and the senate.
Stand by for nothing happening for the next 2 years or worse.
I yearn for your optimism.
I thot nothing will b accomplished when there was a chance Harris could have won but now it is in the worse category.
ABC thinks trumps lead is insurmountable in Penn. This shit is joever.
Since Trump seems to win I think a lot of things may happen in the next few years.
Thank that to even heavier Gerrymandering in part, which according to right wingers, is a “leftist conspiracy theory”.
Edit: If Kamala loses, and it looks like she might, I’m blaming her and her campaign. She could have swooned the beliefs of America if she had ran on something better.
Her political skills are trash.
Kamala gained the most approved points after Biden gave her the race.
Since then, her approval rating has plummeted compared to her early numbers, and I think this is because Kamala doesn’t really know what to believe.
You can see it with Tim Walz. There was a lot of momentum when Kamala took up the mantle, and that momentum was carried through once the Walz pick came out. Then, around the DNC, the campaign’s tone shifted, crawling back to the ethos of the Biden administration. I think this is because Kamala couldn’t decide to break away from Biden or not, and because she waited so long, she was around a lot of the same people in the Biden administration, and those people influenced her platform. You can also see this with marijuana and how she changed sides in her time between being DA and senator. Also, how she didn’t really have a solid platform to begin with, which should have been established right when Walz was picked.
I’m not here to call her out as a flip flopper. I’m pointing to how she could have steamrolled this election, but chose not to. It saddened me so much when the campaign had silence Tim for his views and policies when those views and policies were the key to victory.
It’s truly embarrassing as hell to have a Democratic party that can’t absolutely crush a clown like Trump. The Democratic establishment isn’t just out of touch, it’s weak as fuck. Yes, this is on Kamala, but it’s also on Obama, and the Clintons, and Pelosi, and Schumer, and the whole “anyone but Bernie” coalition. This is the consequence of running to the center instead of tackling wealth inequality head on.
I appreciate the input, but the things Vaush criticizes as shortcomings are positions about other nominally socialist or communist countries. The video I linked isn’t about socialism, it is about the US government.
That’s totally fair, but I think that serious issues with Second Thought’s philosophy should be understood when viewing any of his material.
I also wasn’t talking about Democrats failing to get things done. That’s a small part of it, but it’s mostly about who they are, how they message, and who they listen to. If the Democrats achieved everything they set out to do, I seriously doubt the situation with income inequality would be any better. In fact, Democratic initiatives have often made it significantly worse.
I think we all benefited from Bernie’s runs in 2016 and 2020 resulting in a marked change to Democratic party philosophy, but it’s not nearly the change the Democrats needed to be able to effectively message in the world we live in.
Maybe this says more about the electorate than the Democratic party.
That’s what 50+ years of neoliberalism does to a population. It’s a world wide phenomenon.
Any cortortion you have to in order to not ask the leadership any questions whatsoever, or question their motivations or strategy even a little bit. You’ll go far in corporate life.
She seems to have lost worse than Hillary…
She was not only a women, she’s a black women.
Yeah ignore the fact that she stepped hard to the right and supported a genocide
Think of all the Dick Cheney supporters who voted for Kamala.
Dick Cheney probably has more followers on his only fans than voters he brought to the table.
Could be true if he actually brought positive numbers I don’t think onlyfans has negative numbers but I have also not spent any money there 👀
I have also not spent any money there 👀
Sounds like something a subscriber to Dick Cheney’s only fans would say.
Dick Cheney is an obvious dominatrix character from a Quentin terrantino movie
Both candidates supports Israel’s genocide. If people didn’t bother to vote because of that then fuck them all. I hope they enjoy Trump.
Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar drastically outperformed Harris.
She did better than Biden. For some voters, maybe it was about that, but mostly she was campaigning on “more of the same” in a country that desperately wants change.
She objectively did not.
66 mil votes < 81 mil votes.
I stand corrected, she did better than Biden would have in this election.
A wet towel would have performed better than Biden.
The DNC will continue to lose HARDER!! Until the morale improves
are you kidding me. how is someone like trump even able to get nominated much less win a general. satan I miss last millenium.
You could start by reading the article and actually responding to their arguments, as they explicitly address what you are stating here right at the beginning.
Lol what a spin.
Not fumbling the ball at the touchdown line is traditionally difficult for Democrats
The fact that the election is a toss-up, rather than a Harris landslide, is proof that American democracy is already fully collapsed.
I would have said this aged like milk after Trump’s landslide-even-the-popular-vote victory, but even milk doesn’t sour this fast. This aged like unrefrigerated shellfish.
Aged like a wet fart.
Aged like a sushi delivery order where they sandwich the sushi container between my edamame boxes.
