The quote:
“Given Joe Biden’s incredible record, given Donald Trump’s terrible record: he should be mopping the floor with Donald Trump. Joe Biden is running against a criminal. It should not be even close. And there is only one reason it is close. And that is the president’s age.”
Hillary Clinton ran against a sexual predator. She should have mopped the floor with him. She didn’t.
Any election against Trump will be close. The problem isn’t age. The problem is Trump supporters.
The problem is that Republicans don’t vote for a candidate they vote for a party. The Republicans could run Hitler’s reanimated corpse as their candidate and as long as it had that R next to its name it would get their vote. Democrats on the other hand are much more likely to not vote for or not even show up to vote at all for a candidate they don’t particularly like. It’s why good Democrat candidates always beat Republican candidates of any kind, but bad candidates usually lose. Democrats massively outnumber Republicans, but the Democrat party nearly always runs the worst possible candidate. If Republicans win any election it’s not because they had a good candidate, it’s always because Democrats ran a bad one.
My pet theory is that the establishment wing of the party (that largely controls the DNC) wants to have a specific coalition that keeps them in power within the party. Like, if Democrats wanted to be the party of the working class or appeal to rural voters, they could but would require leadership that isn’t from New York, San Francisco, or other similarly rich places.
So, under the leadership of Clinton, Pelosi, and Schumer, they chose to make the swing voters the ones they appeal to most. Maybe Bernie’s positive populism would have matched up better against Trump’s negative populism than Clinton’s outdated neoliberalism. But leadership and the DNC would rather lose an election and keep control than win but lose their place atop the party hierarchy.
My pet theory is that the establishment wing of the party (that largely controls the DNC) wants to have a specific coalition that keeps them in power within the party. Like, if Democrats wanted to be the party of the working class or appeal to rural voters, they could but would require leadership that isn’t from New York, San Francisco, or other similarly rich places.
I think it’s simultaneously less conspiratorial and more nefarious than that: the establishment wing of the party likes power and power means control over campaign funding, so they pander to large corporate donors by suppressing anti-corporate populists.
No, the problem is democrats refusing to run a real populist against a fake populist like Trump. Instead we get the same establishment garbage, which is exactly what the Trump campaign is geared towards defeating. Schiff is also incorrect - Kamala would be just as bad in this regard.
If Dems run a real populist who is a champion of the people, not the corporations, Trump would be exposed and the whole MAGA movement would fall apart at the seams.
If a populist can’t beat Biden in a primary then they won’t beat Trump in the general
There was no primary in good faith, Biden didn’t even entertain a debate with those running. His admin colluded with state DNC boards to cancel primaries in some states, and remove contenders from the ballot in others. Establishment Dems bullied and threatened major contenders behind the scenes to prevent them from even attempting to run. In light of recent events it’s quite obvious why.
So to me this isn’t a valid argument for Biden’s legitimacy, quite the opposite in fact. And quite ironic in an election where “democracy is on the line.”
Kamala Harris could win “overwhelmingly”
Citation needed.
Yes, but that was before everyone saw a sundowning POTUS on that debate stage.
Attitudes have changed amongst the DNC establishment, at least according to the reporting.
Anecdotally, I’ve heard similar feelings echoed in far left/socialist circles.
I will say I haven’t seen any new polling that take recent events into account. I assume those figures exist, I just haven’t seen you come across my feeds yet.
Polls have her doing better than Biden. You could do worse than running a woman when abortion is on the ballot (and by worse I mean, for example, a catholic who’s visibly queasy about actually supporting bodily autonomy). She also gets you back the anti-genocide vote, and she’s responsible for a lot of Biden’s support among black Americans.
She also gets you back the anti-genocide vote
I hadn’t heard that she’s diverged from the administration on this issue. But I would add that the anti-genocide vote is also anti-cop, and Harris is a cop.
The last polling I saw on her actually had her doing considerably better than Biden. Her approval rating is about the same, but her disapproval is much lower. She’s not the strongest candidate, and I don’t particularly like her, but she’s got a better shot than Biden at this point.
The reason given in the article is “Because I, Adam Schiff, think so” - all the hard data we have (competive polls, opinion polls, historical references) gives a pretty bleak outlook for a Harris presidency.
Without even looking at polls, and knowing how much racism and misogyny there is, as well as the outcome of 2016, I have my doubts about Kamala as a viable candidate.
This is simply not true. Its this close because half the population has been raped by education defunding and copious amounts of right wing propaganda. Allowing people and entities to control large swathes of media networks has been disastrous. Repealing the Fairness Act has been a fucken tragedy. It could be anybody, literally. Throw Harris up there and watch the machine get to work. This isn’t a mystery. This isn’t about age. Its about the death throws of the Republican Party, and them ending democracy to hold onto power. Ya’ll are eating it up and being divided. Just keep drinking that juice, I guarantee this push has republicans somewhere behind it.
Could you describe the push you’re referring to? We all saw the debate, then the poll drop, then the calls for Biden to step aside. Which of those events have republicans behind them? We all just want the best chance at beating Trump, and many of us think that’s not Biden. I don’t think the media is to blame for reporting on what each congressperson is saying – that’s kinda their job, and that’s whats going to get clicks – but I do think they are to blame for the opinion articles that are saying “I’m not voting, you shouldn’t either.” Obviously that is horseshit. If Biden’s the nominee, you gotta vote for him. But I struggle to think that the drama surrounding Biden’s candidacy is somehow sparked by some hidden republicans pulling the strings. The dude just performed really poorly in a debate that he himself wanted, and then he doubled down with some awful awful soundbites about him being okay with Trump winning, as long as he tried his best.
Its like dude, have some fuckin awareness. The stakes aren’t low enough for you to be self satisfied with doing your best.
The focus on Biden’s age at the 11th hour is what is strange. We knew the dude was ancient, shit we expected Harris to have to take the torch mid term. But now its too old? Right before the elections? Now is the time? I dont think so bud. None of this new and it could not come at a worse time for Democrats. I’ve seen a fucken dizzying amount on Biden’s age, but none on how Trump sounded like a martian lunatic? Something smells fishy to me boss.
I mean, the age thing has been a concern for a while, but Democratic messaging really played it down, and the State of the Union was also a pretty good reliever in that sense. But the debate was a lot lot worse than the State of the Union, and that just completely shattered the illusion that Biden is in command, in terms of not only his own health but in the election, itself.
You’re asking why now? Well, the debate is what sparked this. But now is the time because we are afraid of what a Trump presidency could mean, especially after the Supreme Court decisions last week. Now is the time because the debate just exposed Biden’s greatest electability weakness (not, necessarily, his ability to make decisions based an a talented and experienced group of advisors). And now is the time because we think he won’t win, and that this whole time the United States have been asking for a younger candidate, so why don’t we give them one?
I don’t think you really need a Republican conspiracy behind all that to explain why there is such panic in the democratic party right now. But thanks for answering my question genuinely.
Remember after Jan 6 when Republicans overwhelmingly were shocked and disgusted eith trump and publicly decried his actions, and then in a few weeks they basically sucked his dick? Why do democrats publicly want to show dissatisfaction and disdain amongst their own party and they stick to it so the media gets stuck in this endless loop while we jsut had a political debate where the Republicans top nominee (which was publicly trashed by his party for Jan 6th) said the absolute worst will happen if the country elects him?
So much in fighting on the dem side with a guckin dictator in waiting for the Republicans. Get your shit together dems
So what you’re advocating is figuratively sucking the candidates dick no matter what terrible thing he does (aka blind worship), like republicans do?
And that would make you different than them, how exactly?
Not really. Let’s say people don’t vote at all because they don’t like this guy or that guy. Who benefits? The Republicans at this stage. Let’s say a real third party surfaces. Hypothetically let’s say AOC. Who benefits? Republicans because now a democratic vote is split among 2 candidates. Brain worm Kennedy won’t split the republican vote to benefit the democrats because there’s no cult of worm following for him.
I hate to say to vote for the lesser of two evils. Both sides have done wrong. But personally I’ll not vote for an outright dictator-to-be in trump. And that is for this moment in time mind you. These are supposedly the best candidate these 2 parties offer and they both suck. But again personally I feel we can work something out with democrats while Republicans have a single agenda, theirs.
A vote for Biden is a vote for Harris… so…
