|
Now that we have a new thread, in order to ensure that this thread continues to meet TL standards and follows the proper guidelines, we will be enforcing the rules in the OP more strictly. Be sure to give them a complete and thorough read before posting! NOTE: When providing a source, please provide a very brief summary on what it's about and what purpose it adds to the discussion. The supporting statement should clearly explain why the subject is relevant and needs to be discussed. Please follow this rule especially for tweets.
Your supporting statement should always come BEFORE you provide the source.If you have any questions, comments, concern, or feedback regarding the USPMT, then please use this thread: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/website-feedback/510156-us-politics-thread |
United States24686 Posts
On April 09 2020 09:49 Zambrah wrote:+ Show Spoiler +I generally would prefer people who are not voting for Biden or Trump to vote third party over leaving the box blank, although I'd prefer people leave the box blank over not submit a ballot at all. Regarding the bold text, I don't care what somebody told you. If you choose to vote for a democrat, you aren't voting for that democrat to reward democratic party leadership or whoever it is that used a dumb argument to vote blue no matter what+ Show Spoiler +People in this thread frequently advocate for not voting for the candidate and instead voting for the party, else there wouldnt be such push back against voting third party. At the end of the day we both know that voting Third Party is effectively voting for noone which is effectively voting for the winner because our system is garbage. The prevailing pressure is vote party over candidate, its the prevailing everything in modern American politics. I don't understand your logic here when it comes to this party/candidate separation because they're the same thing. A vote for Joe Biden is a vote for the Democratic Party. And the problem is that if you vote for him then you are saying, "yes, DNC, I will in fact vote blue no matter who, so next time don't feel too shy about putting up another Joe Biden or Hillary Clinton because I will definitely vote for them at the end of the day." You have one of two messages to send in a battle of Team 1 vs. Team 2, and its "I will not vote for Team 1/2 for some reason," theres no nuance youre sending in this context because nuance is stripped away when theres an effective binary.
I recognize I am effectively screaming into a void by voting third party, but I am a registered Democrat and if they learn anything from my vote its that it won't go to their team if they keep this shit up. No, I did not contradict myself, these people already AGREE with progressivism, they already agree with universal healthcare, expanded social safety nets, etc. these people don't need to agree with progressivism, they need to feel safe VOTING progressive. There is a difference. Its why seeing progressives lose is so fucking irritating, progressives are the ones advocating for things most of the country agrees it wants, and yet people don't vote for them. Either they don't want the things they say the want, or they're afraid noone will elect a progressive. Again, don't need to win anyone over, people are already apparently progressive, the problem is convincing them its safe to vote for a progressive.
Again, theres no winning people over, people mostly look at a list of progressive policies, agree that they're good, and then proceed to either not vote for them, or vote for them. Overwhelmingly they don't, but the key point is they're already in the progressive realm, they just need to vote that way. I disagree, I think Hillary lose into Biden lose would establish that "these shitty old white corporate stooges aren't what the country seems to want. If milquetoast conservative cant beat TRUMP how will it beat the next garden variety Republican afterwards? This is the bare assed minimum you can ask of a candidate, beating a foot-in-mouth, serial raping, military insulting man child, if you lose to Trump you've done so because you're doing something truly and spectacularly unpopular.
And no, I really don't see Biden as being all that different from Trump. His political career revolves around compromising with Republicans, and in a world where Mitch McConnell exists, that really only means acquiescing to Republican demands without gaining anything and then probably bragging about how much Republican stuff you got done as a Democrat. I don't expect he will do anything positive for healthcare, I don't expect he will do anything positive for civil rights, I don't expect he will do anything positive about voter disenfranchisement, or money in politics, or the shit house economy, shit house wages, shit house debt issues,I don't think he'll shut down the concentration camps. Fucking hell, he's so cognitively impaired Im not even sure we'll regain any standing on the world stage!
I'm sorry but precisely nothing about Joe Biden says anything positive to me. Bernie had a life of consistent repping for things I believe in, when I went and looked back at Joe Biden's history I was extremely distressed at what he voted for and what he bragged about doing. He can say whatever he wants, politicians lie all of the time, and hes so out of it that Im not sure he knows what hes saying, his words just don't mean anything, his actions speak way louder. This just hasn't been something that seems feasible, because I'd have to go and make friends with like seven states, the people I know who aren't in those states have votes that don't matter, so changing their minds doesn't matter. Do you see why changing minds doesn't feel appealing? You have to change people's minds who live in a swing state, and who are willing to change their mind. Virginia has been a bastion of Bidenhood from who I've talked to here (or Trump hood when I have to misfortune of having to drive to Culpeper) and I don't know anybody who lives in Michigan, or any other swing state. The pool of people who this would work for is just too small because our system is garbage. It's clear you are barely reading what I'm writing at this point. How many times do I have to tell you to stop attributing those words to me?" Like I said originally, the collective "we" need to work on that problem that nearly half of the population supports a Trump-like candidate, and a chunk of the remainder doesn't see what's wrong with the democratic party right now (as well as a 2 party system, but that's another matter)." those were your words, my issue with this mindset is that the collective "we" clearly doesn't put a lot of stock into solving this issue, if this primary is any indication we are exclusively focused on moving past Trump without learning a single thing about the last ten-ish years we've been dealing with the lunatic. I'm fully aware that you don't have all of the answer, I'd argue that you, like the rest of us, have no real answers! We havent made any real effort to figure out any answers of Why Trump, How to Stop Trump in the Future, or Why We Fucking Lost to Fucking Trump Good God We LOST TO TRUMP. We're all so worried about just putting him behind us that we seem prepared to make the same sort of mistakes that have landed up with him to begin with. We're not working on it, we have no intention of working on it, so we're going to eat these erosion of norms and standards and pretend like everything is back to normal when Biden is president? So you admit you are part of the problem.No, I'd argue you are part of the problem as someone who encourages the propagation of shitty candidates by voting blue no matter who. Keep holding the blue team's candidate to the same non existent standards as the red team's, after all, we have nowhere to go but up from senile, old, white, conservative sex offenders right? We can't possibly do worse! I'm sure next time it'll be better, we might even upgrade to a mentally aware old white conservative sex offender that people have to vote for cause the red old white conservative sex offender is standing on the other side. Or maybe next time we'll get a Jeffrey Epstein. Maybe we'll get a competent Trump, an actual fascist. Because why not? If they're blue then evidently we have to bite that bullet and vote for 'em. That mentality is clearly a race to the bottom, We went from Obama/Romney/McCain (all flawed but at least sane human beings) to Hillary/Trump (a sex offending narcissist and old white conservative and one of the most deeply unpopular candidates probably ever) to Trump/Biden (two sex offending ol white conservatives) I voted for Hillary last time, but that was it, I'm done with voting for Hillary Clintons. It's been going down hill, and I expect it'll keep going down hill as long as the parties know they can win while they let it happen.
I think I'm going to stop trying to discuss this point by point with you because you have started with a conclusion and are simply justifying it. Nothing I say seems like it will change that. You have misunderstood me in a few places, in once case twice in a row despite me pointing out that you misunderstood me. I get no sense from you that you realize I generally agree with why there is a need to change, and what direction we need to go in long term, because your attitude seems to be nothing I say matters, it exists only so that you can disagree with it all. You seem like you are willing to alienate anyone who disagrees with you, even just on the smaller stuff, like the reputation of Bernie Bros predicts. You even resorted to a "no you" which is kind of entertaining in a way but calls into question why I've spent so much time conversing with you.
At it's core though, I think where we actually meaningfully disagree the most is on how much higher the stakes are in this election than in the previous several general elections. If you can't see that, I really shouldn't be trying to convince you of anything else. Most of my arguments don't make sense if you can't understand why it's significantly more important for Trump not to be reelected than it was for him to be originally elected, or for GW Bush to be reelected (although that one was pretty bad). It makes more sense for you to refuse to vote for a Democrat if you don't think the consequences of that decision will be disastrous.
|
On April 09 2020 10:33 micronesia wrote:Show nested quote +On April 09 2020 09:49 Zambrah wrote:+ Show Spoiler +I generally would prefer people who are not voting for Biden or Trump to vote third party over leaving the box blank, although I'd prefer people leave the box blank over not submit a ballot at all. Regarding the bold text, I don't care what somebody told you. If you choose to vote for a democrat, you aren't voting for that democrat to reward democratic party leadership or whoever it is that used a dumb argument to vote blue no matter what+ Show Spoiler +People in this thread frequently advocate for not voting for the candidate and instead voting for the party, else there wouldnt be such push back against voting third party. At the end of the day we both know that voting Third Party is effectively voting for noone which is effectively voting for the winner because our system is garbage. The prevailing pressure is vote party over candidate, its the prevailing everything in modern American politics. I don't understand your logic here when it comes to this party/candidate separation because they're the same thing. A vote for Joe Biden is a vote for the Democratic Party. And the problem is that if you vote for him then you are saying, "yes, DNC, I will in fact vote blue no matter who, so next time don't feel too shy about putting up another Joe Biden or Hillary Clinton because I will definitely vote for them at the end of the day." You have one of two messages to send in a battle of Team 1 vs. Team 2, and its "I will not vote for Team 1/2 for some reason," theres no nuance youre sending in this context because nuance is stripped away when theres an effective binary.
I recognize I am effectively screaming into a void by voting third party, but I am a registered Democrat and if they learn anything from my vote its that it won't go to their team if they keep this shit up. No, I did not contradict myself, these people already AGREE with progressivism, they already agree with universal healthcare, expanded social safety nets, etc. these people don't need to agree with progressivism, they need to feel safe VOTING progressive. There is a difference. Its why seeing progressives lose is so fucking irritating, progressives are the ones advocating for things most of the country agrees it wants, and yet people don't vote for them. Either they don't want the things they say the want, or they're afraid noone will elect a progressive. Again, don't need to win anyone over, people are already apparently progressive, the problem is convincing them its safe to vote for a progressive.
Again, theres no winning people over, people mostly look at a list of progressive policies, agree that they're good, and then proceed to either not vote for them, or vote for them. Overwhelmingly they don't, but the key point is they're already in the progressive realm, they just need to vote that way. I disagree, I think Hillary lose into Biden lose would establish that "these shitty old white corporate stooges aren't what the country seems to want. If milquetoast conservative cant beat TRUMP how will it beat the next garden variety Republican afterwards? This is the bare assed minimum you can ask of a candidate, beating a foot-in-mouth, serial raping, military insulting man child, if you lose to Trump you've done so because you're doing something truly and spectacularly unpopular.
And no, I really don't see Biden as being all that different from Trump. His political career revolves around compromising with Republicans, and in a world where Mitch McConnell exists, that really only means acquiescing to Republican demands without gaining anything and then probably bragging about how much Republican stuff you got done as a Democrat. I don't expect he will do anything positive for healthcare, I don't expect he will do anything positive for civil rights, I don't expect he will do anything positive about voter disenfranchisement, or money in politics, or the shit house economy, shit house wages, shit house debt issues,I don't think he'll shut down the concentration camps. Fucking hell, he's so cognitively impaired Im not even sure we'll regain any standing on the world stage!
I'm sorry but precisely nothing about Joe Biden says anything positive to me. Bernie had a life of consistent repping for things I believe in, when I went and looked back at Joe Biden's history I was extremely distressed at what he voted for and what he bragged about doing. He can say whatever he wants, politicians lie all of the time, and hes so out of it that Im not sure he knows what hes saying, his words just don't mean anything, his actions speak way louder. This just hasn't been something that seems feasible, because I'd have to go and make friends with like seven states, the people I know who aren't in those states have votes that don't matter, so changing their minds doesn't matter. Do you see why changing minds doesn't feel appealing? You have to change people's minds who live in a swing state, and who are willing to change their mind. Virginia has been a bastion of Bidenhood from who I've talked to here (or Trump hood when I have to misfortune of having to drive to Culpeper) and I don't know anybody who lives in Michigan, or any other swing state. The pool of people who this would work for is just too small because our system is garbage. It's clear you are barely reading what I'm writing at this point. How many times do I have to tell you to stop attributing those words to me?" Like I said originally, the collective "we" need to work on that problem that nearly half of the population supports a Trump-like candidate, and a chunk of the remainder doesn't see what's wrong with the democratic party right now (as well as a 2 party system, but that's another matter)." those were your words, my issue with this mindset is that the collective "we" clearly doesn't put a lot of stock into solving this issue, if this primary is any indication we are exclusively focused on moving past Trump without learning a single thing about the last ten-ish years we've been dealing with the lunatic. I'm fully aware that you don't have all of the answer, I'd argue that you, like the rest of us, have no real answers! We havent made any real effort to figure out any answers of Why Trump, How to Stop Trump in the Future, or Why We Fucking Lost to Fucking Trump Good God We LOST TO TRUMP. We're all so worried about just putting him behind us that we seem prepared to make the same sort of mistakes that have landed up with him to begin with. We're not working on it, we have no intention of working on it, so we're going to eat these erosion of norms and standards and pretend like everything is back to normal when Biden is president? So you admit you are part of the problem.No, I'd argue you are part of the problem as someone who encourages the propagation of shitty candidates by voting blue no matter who. Keep holding the blue team's candidate to the same non existent standards as the red team's, after all, we have nowhere to go but up from senile, old, white, conservative sex offenders right? We can't possibly do worse! I'm sure next time it'll be better, we might even upgrade to a mentally aware old white conservative sex offender that people have to vote for cause the red old white conservative sex offender is standing on the other side. Or maybe next time we'll get a Jeffrey Epstein. Maybe we'll get a competent Trump, an actual fascist. Because why not? If they're blue then evidently we have to bite that bullet and vote for 'em. That mentality is clearly a race to the bottom, We went from Obama/Romney/McCain (all flawed but at least sane human beings) to Hillary/Trump (a sex offending narcissist and old white conservative and one of the most deeply unpopular candidates probably ever) to Trump/Biden (two sex offending ol white conservatives) I voted for Hillary last time, but that was it, I'm done with voting for Hillary Clintons. It's been going down hill, and I expect it'll keep going down hill as long as the parties know they can win while they let it happen. I think I'm going to stop trying to discuss this point by point with you because you have started with a conclusion and are simply justifying it. Nothing I say seems like it will change that. You have misunderstood me in a few places, in once case twice in a row despite me pointing out that you misunderstood me. I get no sense from you that you realize I generally agree with why there is a need to change, and what direction we need to go in long term, because your attitude seems to be nothing I say matters, it exists only so that you can disagree with it all. You seem like you are willing to alienate anyone who disagrees with you, even just on the smaller stuff, like the reputation of Bernie Bros predicts. You even resorted to a "no you" which is kind of entertaining in a way but calls into question why I've spent so much time conversing with you. At it's core though, I think where we actually meaningfully disagree the most is on how much higher the stakes are in this election than in the previous several general elections. If you can't see that, I really shouldn't be trying to convince you of anything else. Most of my arguments don't make sense if you can't understand why it's significantly more important for Trump not to be reelected than it was for him to be elected, or for GW Bush to be reelected (although that one was pretty bad). It makes more sense for you to refuse to vote for a Democrat if you don't think the consequences of that decision will be disastrous.
The chance to avoid disastrous consequences leaves the race with Bernie Sanders. You're trying to convince people that one disaster is preferable to another while both leave them to die. There may be an argument to be had there but it's best imo not to pretend nominating and electing Biden isn't also a disaster (of a different stripe admittedly).
One of Zam's major points is that members of the PMC are comfortable and will just side with the winners in the long run anyway. Combine that with only a handful of votes/voters really counting and convincing those more dedicated to order than justice is impractical as an electoral strategy.
|
Northern Ireland25405 Posts
On April 09 2020 10:27 JimmiC wrote:Show nested quote +On April 09 2020 10:08 Wombat_NI wrote:
As an aside, who knows how such things actually work. Running a narrative as ‘he’s electable’ surely has some distorting effect on the primaries no?
I know multiple people who didn’t vote on Brexit day in the inverse situation where they thought it was a done deal we’d stay in and only didn’t vote for that reason.
Added to that how huge momentum is in the primary process and the important of Super Tuesday especially.
High chance Biden could still have pulled it off anyway, but between the DNC itself and large chunks of the commentary at it never felt a particularly fair fight.
Sanders numbers in polling with a hypothetical showdown with Trump were as solid and at times exceeded Biden’s for consistent periods of time but yet the narrative is continually Biden is electable.
But hey time will tell how this all pans out. It is hard to say because the narrative of fighting against the machine is what helped Bernie raise so much money and gather support. Trump was able to ride that wave to the white house, so being seen as a outsider is not all bad, peoples perception of similar events just change depending on persepective. I was thinking the other day about how the DNC got thrashed in this thread for not canceling the primary. And since this thread is full of Bernie supporters, no one (myself included) thought that given it was pretty much won for Biden that instead of him saying it should be delayed he could have just dropped out a little sooner and no problem. If the roles had been reversed would have we thought it Biden should have dropped out to stop both the bad press and to protect the people, after reflecting I think I would have, and yet I didn't blame Bernie. Partly because I'm pragmatic I think the people would have went to vote anyway on other issues, but I think mostly because of my Bias.
Trump is a weird anomaly that we still haven’t figured out, a perfect storm of shit but yeah point taken.
Bernie should have dropped out earlier, he was done. At least he used his slightly elevated platform rather well until then and dropped out before exposing voters to a paradise of Corona spreading.
|
On April 09 2020 10:27 JimmiC wrote:Show nested quote +On April 09 2020 10:08 Wombat_NI wrote:
As an aside, who knows how such things actually work. Running a narrative as ‘he’s electable’ surely has some distorting effect on the primaries no?
I know multiple people who didn’t vote on Brexit day in the inverse situation where they thought it was a done deal we’d stay in and only didn’t vote for that reason.
Added to that how huge momentum is in the primary process and the important of Super Tuesday especially.
High chance Biden could still have pulled it off anyway, but between the DNC itself and large chunks of the commentary at it never felt a particularly fair fight.
Sanders numbers in polling with a hypothetical showdown with Trump were as solid and at times exceeded Biden’s for consistent periods of time but yet the narrative is continually Biden is electable.
But hey time will tell how this all pans out. It is hard to say because the narrative of fighting against the machine is what helped Bernie raise so much money and gather support. Trump was able to ride that wave to the white house, so being seen as a outsider is not all bad, peoples perception of similar events just change depending on persepective. I was thinking the other day about how the DNC got thrashed in this thread for not canceling the primary. And since this thread is full of Bernie supporters, no one (myself included) thought that given it was pretty much won for Biden that instead of him saying it should be delayed he could have just dropped out a little sooner and no problem. If the roles had been reversed would have we thought it Biden should have dropped out to stop both the bad press and to protect the people, after reflecting I think I would have, and yet I didn't blame Bernie. Partly because I'm pragmatic I think the people would have went to vote anyway on other issues, but I think mostly because of my Bias.
Sanders dropped out, but he also told people to keep voting for him in primaries so that he has more leverage on the party platform so wouldn't really do anything.
|
Northern Ireland25405 Posts
Yeah I mean are the stakes even that high? Trump hasn’t yet taken the US into a war. If you’re average Joe what is Biden bringing to the table that is significantly better for you than what’s there already?
He’s fucking awful to my sensibilities don’t get me wrong, would prefer him gone.
In what domains is Biden a significant upgrade here? That the possible death or stepping down of RBG is high up there is more an indictment on the lifetime terms of the Supreme Court elevating its political important than anything else.
|
On April 09 2020 10:33 micronesia wrote:Show nested quote +On April 09 2020 09:49 Zambrah wrote:+ Show Spoiler +I generally would prefer people who are not voting for Biden or Trump to vote third party over leaving the box blank, although I'd prefer people leave the box blank over not submit a ballot at all. Regarding the bold text, I don't care what somebody told you. If you choose to vote for a democrat, you aren't voting for that democrat to reward democratic party leadership or whoever it is that used a dumb argument to vote blue no matter what+ Show Spoiler +People in this thread frequently advocate for not voting for the candidate and instead voting for the party, else there wouldnt be such push back against voting third party. At the end of the day we both know that voting Third Party is effectively voting for noone which is effectively voting for the winner because our system is garbage. The prevailing pressure is vote party over candidate, its the prevailing everything in modern American politics. I don't understand your logic here when it comes to this party/candidate separation because they're the same thing. A vote for Joe Biden is a vote for the Democratic Party. And the problem is that if you vote for him then you are saying, "yes, DNC, I will in fact vote blue no matter who, so next time don't feel too shy about putting up another Joe Biden or Hillary Clinton because I will definitely vote for them at the end of the day." You have one of two messages to send in a battle of Team 1 vs. Team 2, and its "I will not vote for Team 1/2 for some reason," theres no nuance youre sending in this context because nuance is stripped away when theres an effective binary.
I recognize I am effectively screaming into a void by voting third party, but I am a registered Democrat and if they learn anything from my vote its that it won't go to their team if they keep this shit up. No, I did not contradict myself, these people already AGREE with progressivism, they already agree with universal healthcare, expanded social safety nets, etc. these people don't need to agree with progressivism, they need to feel safe VOTING progressive. There is a difference. Its why seeing progressives lose is so fucking irritating, progressives are the ones advocating for things most of the country agrees it wants, and yet people don't vote for them. Either they don't want the things they say the want, or they're afraid noone will elect a progressive. Again, don't need to win anyone over, people are already apparently progressive, the problem is convincing them its safe to vote for a progressive.
Again, theres no winning people over, people mostly look at a list of progressive policies, agree that they're good, and then proceed to either not vote for them, or vote for them. Overwhelmingly they don't, but the key point is they're already in the progressive realm, they just need to vote that way. I disagree, I think Hillary lose into Biden lose would establish that "these shitty old white corporate stooges aren't what the country seems to want. If milquetoast conservative cant beat TRUMP how will it beat the next garden variety Republican afterwards? This is the bare assed minimum you can ask of a candidate, beating a foot-in-mouth, serial raping, military insulting man child, if you lose to Trump you've done so because you're doing something truly and spectacularly unpopular.
And no, I really don't see Biden as being all that different from Trump. His political career revolves around compromising with Republicans, and in a world where Mitch McConnell exists, that really only means acquiescing to Republican demands without gaining anything and then probably bragging about how much Republican stuff you got done as a Democrat. I don't expect he will do anything positive for healthcare, I don't expect he will do anything positive for civil rights, I don't expect he will do anything positive about voter disenfranchisement, or money in politics, or the shit house economy, shit house wages, shit house debt issues,I don't think he'll shut down the concentration camps. Fucking hell, he's so cognitively impaired Im not even sure we'll regain any standing on the world stage!
I'm sorry but precisely nothing about Joe Biden says anything positive to me. Bernie had a life of consistent repping for things I believe in, when I went and looked back at Joe Biden's history I was extremely distressed at what he voted for and what he bragged about doing. He can say whatever he wants, politicians lie all of the time, and hes so out of it that Im not sure he knows what hes saying, his words just don't mean anything, his actions speak way louder. This just hasn't been something that seems feasible, because I'd have to go and make friends with like seven states, the people I know who aren't in those states have votes that don't matter, so changing their minds doesn't matter. Do you see why changing minds doesn't feel appealing? You have to change people's minds who live in a swing state, and who are willing to change their mind. Virginia has been a bastion of Bidenhood from who I've talked to here (or Trump hood when I have to misfortune of having to drive to Culpeper) and I don't know anybody who lives in Michigan, or any other swing state. The pool of people who this would work for is just too small because our system is garbage. It's clear you are barely reading what I'm writing at this point. How many times do I have to tell you to stop attributing those words to me?" Like I said originally, the collective "we" need to work on that problem that nearly half of the population supports a Trump-like candidate, and a chunk of the remainder doesn't see what's wrong with the democratic party right now (as well as a 2 party system, but that's another matter)." those were your words, my issue with this mindset is that the collective "we" clearly doesn't put a lot of stock into solving this issue, if this primary is any indication we are exclusively focused on moving past Trump without learning a single thing about the last ten-ish years we've been dealing with the lunatic. I'm fully aware that you don't have all of the answer, I'd argue that you, like the rest of us, have no real answers! We havent made any real effort to figure out any answers of Why Trump, How to Stop Trump in the Future, or Why We Fucking Lost to Fucking Trump Good God We LOST TO TRUMP. We're all so worried about just putting him behind us that we seem prepared to make the same sort of mistakes that have landed up with him to begin with. We're not working on it, we have no intention of working on it, so we're going to eat these erosion of norms and standards and pretend like everything is back to normal when Biden is president? So you admit you are part of the problem.No, I'd argue you are part of the problem as someone who encourages the propagation of shitty candidates by voting blue no matter who. Keep holding the blue team's candidate to the same non existent standards as the red team's, after all, we have nowhere to go but up from senile, old, white, conservative sex offenders right? We can't possibly do worse! I'm sure next time it'll be better, we might even upgrade to a mentally aware old white conservative sex offender that people have to vote for cause the red old white conservative sex offender is standing on the other side. Or maybe next time we'll get a Jeffrey Epstein. Maybe we'll get a competent Trump, an actual fascist. Because why not? If they're blue then evidently we have to bite that bullet and vote for 'em. That mentality is clearly a race to the bottom, We went from Obama/Romney/McCain (all flawed but at least sane human beings) to Hillary/Trump (a sex offending narcissist and old white conservative and one of the most deeply unpopular candidates probably ever) to Trump/Biden (two sex offending ol white conservatives) I voted for Hillary last time, but that was it, I'm done with voting for Hillary Clintons. It's been going down hill, and I expect it'll keep going down hill as long as the parties know they can win while they let it happen. I think I'm going to stop trying to discuss this point by point with you because you have started with a conclusion and are simply justifying it. Nothing I say seems like it will change that. You have misunderstood me in a few places, in once case twice in a row despite me pointing out that you misunderstood me. I get no sense from you that you realize I generally agree with why there is a need to change, and what direction we need to go in long term, because your attitude seems to be nothing I say matters, it exists only so that you can disagree with it all. You seem like you are willing to alienate anyone who disagrees with you, even just on the smaller stuff, like the reputation of Bernie Bros predicts. You even resorted to a "no you" which is kind of entertaining in a way but calls into question why I've spent so much time conversing with you. At it's core though, I think where we actually meaningfully disagree the most is on how much higher the stakes are in this election than in the previous several general elections. If you can't see that, I really shouldn't be trying to convince you of anything else. Most of my arguments don't make sense if you can't understand why it's significantly more important for Trump not to be reelected than it was for him to be originally elected, or for GW Bush to be reelected (although that one was pretty bad). It makes more sense for you to refuse to vote for a Democrat if you don't think the consequences of that decision will be disastrous.
I'm pretty sure we do fundamentally disagree on the differences between Trump and Biden. I dont know your life situation, but if I look at Biden's voting history I don't believe he will do a single thing to improve my life, and seeing as my life hasnt been notably worse under Trump, theyre effectively equal considering I don't give two shits how America looks abroad since it mostly doesn't affect me. But yes, this election is uniquely important. In four years THAT election will be uniquely important, and so on and so forth, because at the end of the day this is the sort of rhetoric that drives my problem with voting for Biden, this ever present "yeah but the other guy" bullshit. The next election will always be super important and we cant afford to care about who the candidate is because the other candidate is over there on the other side being on the other side. This shit isnt convincing because I've been hearing it for my entire life. Every presidential election during my 25 years of life has been the most important one and we can't possibly afford to lose it. Its a tired argument and frankly between Obama and Trump I just haven't noticed any serious changes in my life that indicate to me that the difference between Biden and Trump of all people is going to be crazy huge.
There is one person who I will always remember in these situations who given a slightly better candidate may have swayed me, and its Plansix, who argued effectively, in my opinion, in the personal case with his wife's healthcare. If there is an iota of a chance of me debasing myself by voicing support for a sex offender its because I believe that Biden would actually improve healthcare (or forgive student debt, but el oh fucking el on that front) unfortunately all evidence of his previous voting history indicates he wouldn't, but I will always remember Plansix and his plight when I consider how I place my vote.
And yeah, as far as Im concerned theres no alienating anyone to anything, if disagreeing with someone on the internet is enough to turn you away from progressivism you were probably never going to go progressive any ways. I've seen enough people uncomfortable with being angry at the state of politics and I can't pretend that I feel particularly sorry that people are made to feel uncomfortable about people angry about another old white sex offender with anti-progressive views despite all the assurances that people DO want universal health care, that people DO want a better prison system, that people DO want a social safety net, that people DO want less corporate money and power in politics.
But yeah, you're not going to convince me with what you've put forth, and frankly we disagree immediately on the time frame we want to pursue real change in. You may be in a place in your life where you can afford the long term, but plenty of us aren't in that position in the US, and I sure as shit won't be pursuing any sort of long term in the US if real actual change doesn't start happening.
|
|
|
I want someone to clearly articulate the threat replacing RBG with a Republican actually presents.
That the already conservative majority supreme court will violate the constitution (and they don't now) or simply that they will continue to produce legitimate rulings that Biden supporters disagree with? Like when they denied extending Wisconsin absentee voting
|
Northern Ireland25405 Posts
On April 09 2020 11:03 Zambrah wrote:Show nested quote +On April 09 2020 10:33 micronesia wrote:On April 09 2020 09:49 Zambrah wrote:+ Show Spoiler +I generally would prefer people who are not voting for Biden or Trump to vote third party over leaving the box blank, although I'd prefer people leave the box blank over not submit a ballot at all. Regarding the bold text, I don't care what somebody told you. If you choose to vote for a democrat, you aren't voting for that democrat to reward democratic party leadership or whoever it is that used a dumb argument to vote blue no matter what+ Show Spoiler +People in this thread frequently advocate for not voting for the candidate and instead voting for the party, else there wouldnt be such push back against voting third party. At the end of the day we both know that voting Third Party is effectively voting for noone which is effectively voting for the winner because our system is garbage. The prevailing pressure is vote party over candidate, its the prevailing everything in modern American politics. I don't understand your logic here when it comes to this party/candidate separation because they're the same thing. A vote for Joe Biden is a vote for the Democratic Party. And the problem is that if you vote for him then you are saying, "yes, DNC, I will in fact vote blue no matter who, so next time don't feel too shy about putting up another Joe Biden or Hillary Clinton because I will definitely vote for them at the end of the day." You have one of two messages to send in a battle of Team 1 vs. Team 2, and its "I will not vote for Team 1/2 for some reason," theres no nuance youre sending in this context because nuance is stripped away when theres an effective binary.
I recognize I am effectively screaming into a void by voting third party, but I am a registered Democrat and if they learn anything from my vote its that it won't go to their team if they keep this shit up. No, I did not contradict myself, these people already AGREE with progressivism, they already agree with universal healthcare, expanded social safety nets, etc. these people don't need to agree with progressivism, they need to feel safe VOTING progressive. There is a difference. Its why seeing progressives lose is so fucking irritating, progressives are the ones advocating for things most of the country agrees it wants, and yet people don't vote for them. Either they don't want the things they say the want, or they're afraid noone will elect a progressive. Again, don't need to win anyone over, people are already apparently progressive, the problem is convincing them its safe to vote for a progressive.
Again, theres no winning people over, people mostly look at a list of progressive policies, agree that they're good, and then proceed to either not vote for them, or vote for them. Overwhelmingly they don't, but the key point is they're already in the progressive realm, they just need to vote that way. I disagree, I think Hillary lose into Biden lose would establish that "these shitty old white corporate stooges aren't what the country seems to want. If milquetoast conservative cant beat TRUMP how will it beat the next garden variety Republican afterwards? This is the bare assed minimum you can ask of a candidate, beating a foot-in-mouth, serial raping, military insulting man child, if you lose to Trump you've done so because you're doing something truly and spectacularly unpopular.
And no, I really don't see Biden as being all that different from Trump. His political career revolves around compromising with Republicans, and in a world where Mitch McConnell exists, that really only means acquiescing to Republican demands without gaining anything and then probably bragging about how much Republican stuff you got done as a Democrat. I don't expect he will do anything positive for healthcare, I don't expect he will do anything positive for civil rights, I don't expect he will do anything positive about voter disenfranchisement, or money in politics, or the shit house economy, shit house wages, shit house debt issues,I don't think he'll shut down the concentration camps. Fucking hell, he's so cognitively impaired Im not even sure we'll regain any standing on the world stage!
I'm sorry but precisely nothing about Joe Biden says anything positive to me. Bernie had a life of consistent repping for things I believe in, when I went and looked back at Joe Biden's history I was extremely distressed at what he voted for and what he bragged about doing. He can say whatever he wants, politicians lie all of the time, and hes so out of it that Im not sure he knows what hes saying, his words just don't mean anything, his actions speak way louder. This just hasn't been something that seems feasible, because I'd have to go and make friends with like seven states, the people I know who aren't in those states have votes that don't matter, so changing their minds doesn't matter. Do you see why changing minds doesn't feel appealing? You have to change people's minds who live in a swing state, and who are willing to change their mind. Virginia has been a bastion of Bidenhood from who I've talked to here (or Trump hood when I have to misfortune of having to drive to Culpeper) and I don't know anybody who lives in Michigan, or any other swing state. The pool of people who this would work for is just too small because our system is garbage. It's clear you are barely reading what I'm writing at this point. How many times do I have to tell you to stop attributing those words to me?" Like I said originally, the collective "we" need to work on that problem that nearly half of the population supports a Trump-like candidate, and a chunk of the remainder doesn't see what's wrong with the democratic party right now (as well as a 2 party system, but that's another matter)." those were your words, my issue with this mindset is that the collective "we" clearly doesn't put a lot of stock into solving this issue, if this primary is any indication we are exclusively focused on moving past Trump without learning a single thing about the last ten-ish years we've been dealing with the lunatic. I'm fully aware that you don't have all of the answer, I'd argue that you, like the rest of us, have no real answers! We havent made any real effort to figure out any answers of Why Trump, How to Stop Trump in the Future, or Why We Fucking Lost to Fucking Trump Good God We LOST TO TRUMP. We're all so worried about just putting him behind us that we seem prepared to make the same sort of mistakes that have landed up with him to begin with. We're not working on it, we have no intention of working on it, so we're going to eat these erosion of norms and standards and pretend like everything is back to normal when Biden is president? So you admit you are part of the problem.No, I'd argue you are part of the problem as someone who encourages the propagation of shitty candidates by voting blue no matter who. Keep holding the blue team's candidate to the same non existent standards as the red team's, after all, we have nowhere to go but up from senile, old, white, conservative sex offenders right? We can't possibly do worse! I'm sure next time it'll be better, we might even upgrade to a mentally aware old white conservative sex offender that people have to vote for cause the red old white conservative sex offender is standing on the other side. Or maybe next time we'll get a Jeffrey Epstein. Maybe we'll get a competent Trump, an actual fascist. Because why not? If they're blue then evidently we have to bite that bullet and vote for 'em. That mentality is clearly a race to the bottom, We went from Obama/Romney/McCain (all flawed but at least sane human beings) to Hillary/Trump (a sex offending narcissist and old white conservative and one of the most deeply unpopular candidates probably ever) to Trump/Biden (two sex offending ol white conservatives) I voted for Hillary last time, but that was it, I'm done with voting for Hillary Clintons. It's been going down hill, and I expect it'll keep going down hill as long as the parties know they can win while they let it happen. I think I'm going to stop trying to discuss this point by point with you because you have started with a conclusion and are simply justifying it. Nothing I say seems like it will change that. You have misunderstood me in a few places, in once case twice in a row despite me pointing out that you misunderstood me. I get no sense from you that you realize I generally agree with why there is a need to change, and what direction we need to go in long term, because your attitude seems to be nothing I say matters, it exists only so that you can disagree with it all. You seem like you are willing to alienate anyone who disagrees with you, even just on the smaller stuff, like the reputation of Bernie Bros predicts. You even resorted to a "no you" which is kind of entertaining in a way but calls into question why I've spent so much time conversing with you. At it's core though, I think where we actually meaningfully disagree the most is on how much higher the stakes are in this election than in the previous several general elections. If you can't see that, I really shouldn't be trying to convince you of anything else. Most of my arguments don't make sense if you can't understand why it's significantly more important for Trump not to be reelected than it was for him to be originally elected, or for GW Bush to be reelected (although that one was pretty bad). It makes more sense for you to refuse to vote for a Democrat if you don't think the consequences of that decision will be disastrous. I'm pretty sure we do fundamentally disagree on the differences between Trump and Biden. I dont know your life situation, but if I look at Biden's voting history I don't believe he will do a single thing to improve my life, and seeing as my life hasnt been notably worse under Trump, theyre effectively equal considering I don't give two shits how America looks abroad since it mostly doesn't affect me. But yes, this election is uniquely important. In four years THAT election will be uniquely important, and so on and so forth, because at the end of the day this is the sort of rhetoric that drives my problem with voting for Biden, this ever present "yeah but the other guy" bullshit. The next election will always be super important and we cant afford to care about who the candidate is because the other candidate is over there on the other side being on the other side. This shit isnt convincing because I've been hearing it for my entire life. Every presidential election during my 25 years of life has been the most important one and we can't possibly afford to lose it. Its a tired argument and frankly between Obama and Trump I just haven't noticed any serious changes in my life that indicate to me that the difference between Biden and Trump of all people is going to be crazy huge. There is one person who I will always remember in these situations who given a slightly better candidate may have swayed me, and its Plansix, who argued effectively, in my opinion, in the personal case with his wife's healthcare. If there is an iota of a chance of me debasing myself by voicing support for a sex offender its because I believe that Biden would actually improve healthcare (or forgive student debt, but el oh fucking el on that front) unfortunately all evidence of his previous voting history indicates he wouldn't, but I will always remember Plansix and his plight when I consider how I place my vote. And yeah, as far as Im concerned theres no alienating anyone to anything, if disagreeing with someone on the internet is enough to turn you away from progressivism you were probably never going to go progressive any ways. I've seen enough people uncomfortable with being angry at the state of politics and I can't pretend that I feel particularly sorry that people are made to feel uncomfortable about people angry about another old white sex offender with anti-progressive views despite all the assurances that people DO want universal health care, that people DO want a better prison system, that people DO want a social safety net, that people DO want less corporate money and power in politics. But yeah, you're not going to convince me with what you've put forth, and frankly we disagree immediately on the time frame we want to pursue real change in. You may be in a place in your life where you can afford the long term, but plenty of us aren't in that position in the US, and I sure as shit won't be pursuing any sort of long term in the US if real actual change doesn't start happening.
Sounds reasonable to me. You don’t win elections by appealing to people’s considerations of others, you gotta throw them a bone personally too.
Largely my life hasn’t changed much, it would have changed for the better under Corbyn’s Labour platform but hey it lost. Lost because people think they’d do worse under it. Winning or losing is just selling it to people.
In this country I fear we’re doomed to just keep my generation in debt and off the housing ladder forever because those who were able to afford to buy property did and don’t want it touched.
Likewise in the States healthcare reform will forever be immune from reform I fear for similar reasons.
|
United States24686 Posts
On April 09 2020 10:40 GreenHorizons wrote:Show nested quote +On April 09 2020 10:33 micronesia wrote:On April 09 2020 09:49 Zambrah wrote:+ Show Spoiler +I generally would prefer people who are not voting for Biden or Trump to vote third party over leaving the box blank, although I'd prefer people leave the box blank over not submit a ballot at all. Regarding the bold text, I don't care what somebody told you. If you choose to vote for a democrat, you aren't voting for that democrat to reward democratic party leadership or whoever it is that used a dumb argument to vote blue no matter what+ Show Spoiler +People in this thread frequently advocate for not voting for the candidate and instead voting for the party, else there wouldnt be such push back against voting third party. At the end of the day we both know that voting Third Party is effectively voting for noone which is effectively voting for the winner because our system is garbage. The prevailing pressure is vote party over candidate, its the prevailing everything in modern American politics. I don't understand your logic here when it comes to this party/candidate separation because they're the same thing. A vote for Joe Biden is a vote for the Democratic Party. And the problem is that if you vote for him then you are saying, "yes, DNC, I will in fact vote blue no matter who, so next time don't feel too shy about putting up another Joe Biden or Hillary Clinton because I will definitely vote for them at the end of the day." You have one of two messages to send in a battle of Team 1 vs. Team 2, and its "I will not vote for Team 1/2 for some reason," theres no nuance youre sending in this context because nuance is stripped away when theres an effective binary.
I recognize I am effectively screaming into a void by voting third party, but I am a registered Democrat and if they learn anything from my vote its that it won't go to their team if they keep this shit up. No, I did not contradict myself, these people already AGREE with progressivism, they already agree with universal healthcare, expanded social safety nets, etc. these people don't need to agree with progressivism, they need to feel safe VOTING progressive. There is a difference. Its why seeing progressives lose is so fucking irritating, progressives are the ones advocating for things most of the country agrees it wants, and yet people don't vote for them. Either they don't want the things they say the want, or they're afraid noone will elect a progressive. Again, don't need to win anyone over, people are already apparently progressive, the problem is convincing them its safe to vote for a progressive.
Again, theres no winning people over, people mostly look at a list of progressive policies, agree that they're good, and then proceed to either not vote for them, or vote for them. Overwhelmingly they don't, but the key point is they're already in the progressive realm, they just need to vote that way. I disagree, I think Hillary lose into Biden lose would establish that "these shitty old white corporate stooges aren't what the country seems to want. If milquetoast conservative cant beat TRUMP how will it beat the next garden variety Republican afterwards? This is the bare assed minimum you can ask of a candidate, beating a foot-in-mouth, serial raping, military insulting man child, if you lose to Trump you've done so because you're doing something truly and spectacularly unpopular.
And no, I really don't see Biden as being all that different from Trump. His political career revolves around compromising with Republicans, and in a world where Mitch McConnell exists, that really only means acquiescing to Republican demands without gaining anything and then probably bragging about how much Republican stuff you got done as a Democrat. I don't expect he will do anything positive for healthcare, I don't expect he will do anything positive for civil rights, I don't expect he will do anything positive about voter disenfranchisement, or money in politics, or the shit house economy, shit house wages, shit house debt issues,I don't think he'll shut down the concentration camps. Fucking hell, he's so cognitively impaired Im not even sure we'll regain any standing on the world stage!
I'm sorry but precisely nothing about Joe Biden says anything positive to me. Bernie had a life of consistent repping for things I believe in, when I went and looked back at Joe Biden's history I was extremely distressed at what he voted for and what he bragged about doing. He can say whatever he wants, politicians lie all of the time, and hes so out of it that Im not sure he knows what hes saying, his words just don't mean anything, his actions speak way louder. This just hasn't been something that seems feasible, because I'd have to go and make friends with like seven states, the people I know who aren't in those states have votes that don't matter, so changing their minds doesn't matter. Do you see why changing minds doesn't feel appealing? You have to change people's minds who live in a swing state, and who are willing to change their mind. Virginia has been a bastion of Bidenhood from who I've talked to here (or Trump hood when I have to misfortune of having to drive to Culpeper) and I don't know anybody who lives in Michigan, or any other swing state. The pool of people who this would work for is just too small because our system is garbage. It's clear you are barely reading what I'm writing at this point. How many times do I have to tell you to stop attributing those words to me?" Like I said originally, the collective "we" need to work on that problem that nearly half of the population supports a Trump-like candidate, and a chunk of the remainder doesn't see what's wrong with the democratic party right now (as well as a 2 party system, but that's another matter)." those were your words, my issue with this mindset is that the collective "we" clearly doesn't put a lot of stock into solving this issue, if this primary is any indication we are exclusively focused on moving past Trump without learning a single thing about the last ten-ish years we've been dealing with the lunatic. I'm fully aware that you don't have all of the answer, I'd argue that you, like the rest of us, have no real answers! We havent made any real effort to figure out any answers of Why Trump, How to Stop Trump in the Future, or Why We Fucking Lost to Fucking Trump Good God We LOST TO TRUMP. We're all so worried about just putting him behind us that we seem prepared to make the same sort of mistakes that have landed up with him to begin with. We're not working on it, we have no intention of working on it, so we're going to eat these erosion of norms and standards and pretend like everything is back to normal when Biden is president? So you admit you are part of the problem.No, I'd argue you are part of the problem as someone who encourages the propagation of shitty candidates by voting blue no matter who. Keep holding the blue team's candidate to the same non existent standards as the red team's, after all, we have nowhere to go but up from senile, old, white, conservative sex offenders right? We can't possibly do worse! I'm sure next time it'll be better, we might even upgrade to a mentally aware old white conservative sex offender that people have to vote for cause the red old white conservative sex offender is standing on the other side. Or maybe next time we'll get a Jeffrey Epstein. Maybe we'll get a competent Trump, an actual fascist. Because why not? If they're blue then evidently we have to bite that bullet and vote for 'em. That mentality is clearly a race to the bottom, We went from Obama/Romney/McCain (all flawed but at least sane human beings) to Hillary/Trump (a sex offending narcissist and old white conservative and one of the most deeply unpopular candidates probably ever) to Trump/Biden (two sex offending ol white conservatives) I voted for Hillary last time, but that was it, I'm done with voting for Hillary Clintons. It's been going down hill, and I expect it'll keep going down hill as long as the parties know they can win while they let it happen. I think I'm going to stop trying to discuss this point by point with you because you have started with a conclusion and are simply justifying it. Nothing I say seems like it will change that. You have misunderstood me in a few places, in once case twice in a row despite me pointing out that you misunderstood me. I get no sense from you that you realize I generally agree with why there is a need to change, and what direction we need to go in long term, because your attitude seems to be nothing I say matters, it exists only so that you can disagree with it all. You seem like you are willing to alienate anyone who disagrees with you, even just on the smaller stuff, like the reputation of Bernie Bros predicts. You even resorted to a "no you" which is kind of entertaining in a way but calls into question why I've spent so much time conversing with you. At it's core though, I think where we actually meaningfully disagree the most is on how much higher the stakes are in this election than in the previous several general elections. If you can't see that, I really shouldn't be trying to convince you of anything else. Most of my arguments don't make sense if you can't understand why it's significantly more important for Trump not to be reelected than it was for him to be elected, or for GW Bush to be reelected (although that one was pretty bad). It makes more sense for you to refuse to vote for a Democrat if you don't think the consequences of that decision will be disastrous. The chance to avoid disastrous consequences leaves the race with Bernie Sanders. You're trying to convince people that one disaster is preferable to another while both leave them to die. There may be an argument to be had there but it's best imo not to pretend nominating and electing Biden isn't also a disaster (of a different stripe admittedly). One of Zam's major points is that members of the PMC are comfortable and will just side with the winners in the long run anyway. Combine that with only a handful of votes/voters really counting and convincing those more dedicated to order than justice is impractical as an electoral strategy.
The disaster I've been talking about is more immediate than the one you are talking about, but I generally agree with you. The latter disaster is note quite as hopeless at this point, but we are rapidly going there.
On April 09 2020 11:03 Zambrah wrote:Show nested quote +On April 09 2020 10:33 micronesia wrote:On April 09 2020 09:49 Zambrah wrote:+ Show Spoiler +I generally would prefer people who are not voting for Biden or Trump to vote third party over leaving the box blank, although I'd prefer people leave the box blank over not submit a ballot at all. Regarding the bold text, I don't care what somebody told you. If you choose to vote for a democrat, you aren't voting for that democrat to reward democratic party leadership or whoever it is that used a dumb argument to vote blue no matter what+ Show Spoiler +People in this thread frequently advocate for not voting for the candidate and instead voting for the party, else there wouldnt be such push back against voting third party. At the end of the day we both know that voting Third Party is effectively voting for noone which is effectively voting for the winner because our system is garbage. The prevailing pressure is vote party over candidate, its the prevailing everything in modern American politics. I don't understand your logic here when it comes to this party/candidate separation because they're the same thing. A vote for Joe Biden is a vote for the Democratic Party. And the problem is that if you vote for him then you are saying, "yes, DNC, I will in fact vote blue no matter who, so next time don't feel too shy about putting up another Joe Biden or Hillary Clinton because I will definitely vote for them at the end of the day." You have one of two messages to send in a battle of Team 1 vs. Team 2, and its "I will not vote for Team 1/2 for some reason," theres no nuance youre sending in this context because nuance is stripped away when theres an effective binary.
I recognize I am effectively screaming into a void by voting third party, but I am a registered Democrat and if they learn anything from my vote its that it won't go to their team if they keep this shit up. No, I did not contradict myself, these people already AGREE with progressivism, they already agree with universal healthcare, expanded social safety nets, etc. these people don't need to agree with progressivism, they need to feel safe VOTING progressive. There is a difference. Its why seeing progressives lose is so fucking irritating, progressives are the ones advocating for things most of the country agrees it wants, and yet people don't vote for them. Either they don't want the things they say the want, or they're afraid noone will elect a progressive. Again, don't need to win anyone over, people are already apparently progressive, the problem is convincing them its safe to vote for a progressive.
Again, theres no winning people over, people mostly look at a list of progressive policies, agree that they're good, and then proceed to either not vote for them, or vote for them. Overwhelmingly they don't, but the key point is they're already in the progressive realm, they just need to vote that way. I disagree, I think Hillary lose into Biden lose would establish that "these shitty old white corporate stooges aren't what the country seems to want. If milquetoast conservative cant beat TRUMP how will it beat the next garden variety Republican afterwards? This is the bare assed minimum you can ask of a candidate, beating a foot-in-mouth, serial raping, military insulting man child, if you lose to Trump you've done so because you're doing something truly and spectacularly unpopular.
And no, I really don't see Biden as being all that different from Trump. His political career revolves around compromising with Republicans, and in a world where Mitch McConnell exists, that really only means acquiescing to Republican demands without gaining anything and then probably bragging about how much Republican stuff you got done as a Democrat. I don't expect he will do anything positive for healthcare, I don't expect he will do anything positive for civil rights, I don't expect he will do anything positive about voter disenfranchisement, or money in politics, or the shit house economy, shit house wages, shit house debt issues,I don't think he'll shut down the concentration camps. Fucking hell, he's so cognitively impaired Im not even sure we'll regain any standing on the world stage!
I'm sorry but precisely nothing about Joe Biden says anything positive to me. Bernie had a life of consistent repping for things I believe in, when I went and looked back at Joe Biden's history I was extremely distressed at what he voted for and what he bragged about doing. He can say whatever he wants, politicians lie all of the time, and hes so out of it that Im not sure he knows what hes saying, his words just don't mean anything, his actions speak way louder. This just hasn't been something that seems feasible, because I'd have to go and make friends with like seven states, the people I know who aren't in those states have votes that don't matter, so changing their minds doesn't matter. Do you see why changing minds doesn't feel appealing? You have to change people's minds who live in a swing state, and who are willing to change their mind. Virginia has been a bastion of Bidenhood from who I've talked to here (or Trump hood when I have to misfortune of having to drive to Culpeper) and I don't know anybody who lives in Michigan, or any other swing state. The pool of people who this would work for is just too small because our system is garbage. It's clear you are barely reading what I'm writing at this point. How many times do I have to tell you to stop attributing those words to me?" Like I said originally, the collective "we" need to work on that problem that nearly half of the population supports a Trump-like candidate, and a chunk of the remainder doesn't see what's wrong with the democratic party right now (as well as a 2 party system, but that's another matter)." those were your words, my issue with this mindset is that the collective "we" clearly doesn't put a lot of stock into solving this issue, if this primary is any indication we are exclusively focused on moving past Trump without learning a single thing about the last ten-ish years we've been dealing with the lunatic. I'm fully aware that you don't have all of the answer, I'd argue that you, like the rest of us, have no real answers! We havent made any real effort to figure out any answers of Why Trump, How to Stop Trump in the Future, or Why We Fucking Lost to Fucking Trump Good God We LOST TO TRUMP. We're all so worried about just putting him behind us that we seem prepared to make the same sort of mistakes that have landed up with him to begin with. We're not working on it, we have no intention of working on it, so we're going to eat these erosion of norms and standards and pretend like everything is back to normal when Biden is president? So you admit you are part of the problem.No, I'd argue you are part of the problem as someone who encourages the propagation of shitty candidates by voting blue no matter who. Keep holding the blue team's candidate to the same non existent standards as the red team's, after all, we have nowhere to go but up from senile, old, white, conservative sex offenders right? We can't possibly do worse! I'm sure next time it'll be better, we might even upgrade to a mentally aware old white conservative sex offender that people have to vote for cause the red old white conservative sex offender is standing on the other side. Or maybe next time we'll get a Jeffrey Epstein. Maybe we'll get a competent Trump, an actual fascist. Because why not? If they're blue then evidently we have to bite that bullet and vote for 'em. That mentality is clearly a race to the bottom, We went from Obama/Romney/McCain (all flawed but at least sane human beings) to Hillary/Trump (a sex offending narcissist and old white conservative and one of the most deeply unpopular candidates probably ever) to Trump/Biden (two sex offending ol white conservatives) I voted for Hillary last time, but that was it, I'm done with voting for Hillary Clintons. It's been going down hill, and I expect it'll keep going down hill as long as the parties know they can win while they let it happen. I think I'm going to stop trying to discuss this point by point with you because you have started with a conclusion and are simply justifying it. Nothing I say seems like it will change that. You have misunderstood me in a few places, in once case twice in a row despite me pointing out that you misunderstood me. I get no sense from you that you realize I generally agree with why there is a need to change, and what direction we need to go in long term, because your attitude seems to be nothing I say matters, it exists only so that you can disagree with it all. You seem like you are willing to alienate anyone who disagrees with you, even just on the smaller stuff, like the reputation of Bernie Bros predicts. You even resorted to a "no you" which is kind of entertaining in a way but calls into question why I've spent so much time conversing with you. At it's core though, I think where we actually meaningfully disagree the most is on how much higher the stakes are in this election than in the previous several general elections. If you can't see that, I really shouldn't be trying to convince you of anything else. Most of my arguments don't make sense if you can't understand why it's significantly more important for Trump not to be reelected than it was for him to be originally elected, or for GW Bush to be reelected (although that one was pretty bad). It makes more sense for you to refuse to vote for a Democrat if you don't think the consequences of that decision will be disastrous. I'm pretty sure we do fundamentally disagree on the differences between Trump and Biden. I dont know your life situation, but if I look at Biden's voting history I don't believe he will do a single thing to improve my life, and seeing as my life hasnt been notably worse under Trump, theyre effectively equal considering I don't give two shits how America looks abroad since it mostly doesn't affect me. But yes, this election is uniquely important. In four years THAT election will be uniquely important, and so on and so forth, because at the end of the day this is the sort of rhetoric that drives my problem with voting for Biden, this ever present "yeah but the other guy" bullshit. The next election will always be super important and we cant afford to care about who the candidate is because the other candidate is over there on the other side being on the other side. This shit isnt convincing because I've been hearing it for my entire life. Every presidential election during my 25 years of life has been the most important one and we can't possibly afford to lose it. Its a tired argument and frankly between Obama and Trump I just haven't noticed any serious changes in my life that indicate to me that the difference between Biden and Trump of all people is going to be crazy huge. I have no incontrovertible proof that this election is different from the other ones you were unhappy with, in terms of consequences. The only thing I can do is tell you "I told you so" which I hope doesn't happen because it will be during a very bad day for both of us. One suggestion I would make is for you to look outside of just your own life for trying to compare the candidates, past and present.
There is one person who I will always remember in these situations who given a slightly better candidate may have swayed me, and its Plansix, who argued effectively, in my opinion, in the personal case with his wife's healthcare. If there is an iota of a chance of me debasing myself by voicing support for a sex offender its because I believe that Biden would actually improve healthcare (or forgive student debt, but el oh fucking el on that front) unfortunately all evidence of his previous voting history indicates he wouldn't, but I will always remember Plansix and his plight when I consider how I place my vote. I was always fond of Plansix.
And yeah, as far as Im concerned theres no alienating anyone to anything, if disagreeing with someone on the internet is enough to turn you away from progressivism you were probably never going to go progressive any ways. I've seen enough people uncomfortable with being angry at the state of politics and I can't pretend that I feel particularly sorry that people are made to feel uncomfortable about people angry about another old white sex offender with anti-progressive views despite all the assurances that people DO want universal health care, that people DO want a better prison system, that people DO want a social safety net, that people DO want less corporate money and power in politics. The significant issue isn't just one disagreement on the internet, it's the collection of mindsets that form a culture which can have a real impact, positive or negative.
But yeah, you're not going to convince me with what you've put forth, and frankly we disagree immediately on the time frame we want to pursue real change in. You may be in a place in your life where you can afford the long term, but plenty of us aren't in that position in the US, and I sure as shit won't be pursuing any sort of long term in the US if real actual change doesn't start happening. I hope the next 4+ years of trump and his family provide you the shorter term relief you need.
|
The US is definitely doomed at its current pace as far as I can see. Even when the old generation dies I fully expect them to be replaced by a new generation of younger republicans who inherited their grandparents four rental properties and now rent them out themselves while buying more houses to continue strangling the housing market and making more money for themselves to further extract what they can from the Have-Nots.
Any time I hear someone who wants that sort of long form change thats all I can imagine. Current Haves staying Haves and Having even more while Have-Nots continue to Not Have, and likely have even less.
Being on Twitter since the quarantine has made me pessimistic though, what can I say.
|
On April 09 2020 11:20 micronesia wrote:Show nested quote +On April 09 2020 10:40 GreenHorizons wrote:On April 09 2020 10:33 micronesia wrote:On April 09 2020 09:49 Zambrah wrote:+ Show Spoiler +I generally would prefer people who are not voting for Biden or Trump to vote third party over leaving the box blank, although I'd prefer people leave the box blank over not submit a ballot at all. Regarding the bold text, I don't care what somebody told you. If you choose to vote for a democrat, you aren't voting for that democrat to reward democratic party leadership or whoever it is that used a dumb argument to vote blue no matter what+ Show Spoiler +People in this thread frequently advocate for not voting for the candidate and instead voting for the party, else there wouldnt be such push back against voting third party. At the end of the day we both know that voting Third Party is effectively voting for noone which is effectively voting for the winner because our system is garbage. The prevailing pressure is vote party over candidate, its the prevailing everything in modern American politics. I don't understand your logic here when it comes to this party/candidate separation because they're the same thing. A vote for Joe Biden is a vote for the Democratic Party. And the problem is that if you vote for him then you are saying, "yes, DNC, I will in fact vote blue no matter who, so next time don't feel too shy about putting up another Joe Biden or Hillary Clinton because I will definitely vote for them at the end of the day." You have one of two messages to send in a battle of Team 1 vs. Team 2, and its "I will not vote for Team 1/2 for some reason," theres no nuance youre sending in this context because nuance is stripped away when theres an effective binary.
I recognize I am effectively screaming into a void by voting third party, but I am a registered Democrat and if they learn anything from my vote its that it won't go to their team if they keep this shit up. No, I did not contradict myself, these people already AGREE with progressivism, they already agree with universal healthcare, expanded social safety nets, etc. these people don't need to agree with progressivism, they need to feel safe VOTING progressive. There is a difference. Its why seeing progressives lose is so fucking irritating, progressives are the ones advocating for things most of the country agrees it wants, and yet people don't vote for them. Either they don't want the things they say the want, or they're afraid noone will elect a progressive. Again, don't need to win anyone over, people are already apparently progressive, the problem is convincing them its safe to vote for a progressive.
Again, theres no winning people over, people mostly look at a list of progressive policies, agree that they're good, and then proceed to either not vote for them, or vote for them. Overwhelmingly they don't, but the key point is they're already in the progressive realm, they just need to vote that way. I disagree, I think Hillary lose into Biden lose would establish that "these shitty old white corporate stooges aren't what the country seems to want. If milquetoast conservative cant beat TRUMP how will it beat the next garden variety Republican afterwards? This is the bare assed minimum you can ask of a candidate, beating a foot-in-mouth, serial raping, military insulting man child, if you lose to Trump you've done so because you're doing something truly and spectacularly unpopular.
And no, I really don't see Biden as being all that different from Trump. His political career revolves around compromising with Republicans, and in a world where Mitch McConnell exists, that really only means acquiescing to Republican demands without gaining anything and then probably bragging about how much Republican stuff you got done as a Democrat. I don't expect he will do anything positive for healthcare, I don't expect he will do anything positive for civil rights, I don't expect he will do anything positive about voter disenfranchisement, or money in politics, or the shit house economy, shit house wages, shit house debt issues,I don't think he'll shut down the concentration camps. Fucking hell, he's so cognitively impaired Im not even sure we'll regain any standing on the world stage!
I'm sorry but precisely nothing about Joe Biden says anything positive to me. Bernie had a life of consistent repping for things I believe in, when I went and looked back at Joe Biden's history I was extremely distressed at what he voted for and what he bragged about doing. He can say whatever he wants, politicians lie all of the time, and hes so out of it that Im not sure he knows what hes saying, his words just don't mean anything, his actions speak way louder. This just hasn't been something that seems feasible, because I'd have to go and make friends with like seven states, the people I know who aren't in those states have votes that don't matter, so changing their minds doesn't matter. Do you see why changing minds doesn't feel appealing? You have to change people's minds who live in a swing state, and who are willing to change their mind. Virginia has been a bastion of Bidenhood from who I've talked to here (or Trump hood when I have to misfortune of having to drive to Culpeper) and I don't know anybody who lives in Michigan, or any other swing state. The pool of people who this would work for is just too small because our system is garbage. It's clear you are barely reading what I'm writing at this point. How many times do I have to tell you to stop attributing those words to me?" Like I said originally, the collective "we" need to work on that problem that nearly half of the population supports a Trump-like candidate, and a chunk of the remainder doesn't see what's wrong with the democratic party right now (as well as a 2 party system, but that's another matter)." those were your words, my issue with this mindset is that the collective "we" clearly doesn't put a lot of stock into solving this issue, if this primary is any indication we are exclusively focused on moving past Trump without learning a single thing about the last ten-ish years we've been dealing with the lunatic. I'm fully aware that you don't have all of the answer, I'd argue that you, like the rest of us, have no real answers! We havent made any real effort to figure out any answers of Why Trump, How to Stop Trump in the Future, or Why We Fucking Lost to Fucking Trump Good God We LOST TO TRUMP. We're all so worried about just putting him behind us that we seem prepared to make the same sort of mistakes that have landed up with him to begin with. We're not working on it, we have no intention of working on it, so we're going to eat these erosion of norms and standards and pretend like everything is back to normal when Biden is president? So you admit you are part of the problem.No, I'd argue you are part of the problem as someone who encourages the propagation of shitty candidates by voting blue no matter who. Keep holding the blue team's candidate to the same non existent standards as the red team's, after all, we have nowhere to go but up from senile, old, white, conservative sex offenders right? We can't possibly do worse! I'm sure next time it'll be better, we might even upgrade to a mentally aware old white conservative sex offender that people have to vote for cause the red old white conservative sex offender is standing on the other side. Or maybe next time we'll get a Jeffrey Epstein. Maybe we'll get a competent Trump, an actual fascist. Because why not? If they're blue then evidently we have to bite that bullet and vote for 'em. That mentality is clearly a race to the bottom, We went from Obama/Romney/McCain (all flawed but at least sane human beings) to Hillary/Trump (a sex offending narcissist and old white conservative and one of the most deeply unpopular candidates probably ever) to Trump/Biden (two sex offending ol white conservatives) I voted for Hillary last time, but that was it, I'm done with voting for Hillary Clintons. It's been going down hill, and I expect it'll keep going down hill as long as the parties know they can win while they let it happen. I think I'm going to stop trying to discuss this point by point with you because you have started with a conclusion and are simply justifying it. Nothing I say seems like it will change that. You have misunderstood me in a few places, in once case twice in a row despite me pointing out that you misunderstood me. I get no sense from you that you realize I generally agree with why there is a need to change, and what direction we need to go in long term, because your attitude seems to be nothing I say matters, it exists only so that you can disagree with it all. You seem like you are willing to alienate anyone who disagrees with you, even just on the smaller stuff, like the reputation of Bernie Bros predicts. You even resorted to a "no you" which is kind of entertaining in a way but calls into question why I've spent so much time conversing with you. At it's core though, I think where we actually meaningfully disagree the most is on how much higher the stakes are in this election than in the previous several general elections. If you can't see that, I really shouldn't be trying to convince you of anything else. Most of my arguments don't make sense if you can't understand why it's significantly more important for Trump not to be reelected than it was for him to be elected, or for GW Bush to be reelected (although that one was pretty bad). It makes more sense for you to refuse to vote for a Democrat if you don't think the consequences of that decision will be disastrous. The chance to avoid disastrous consequences leaves the race with Bernie Sanders. You're trying to convince people that one disaster is preferable to another while both leave them to die. There may be an argument to be had there but it's best imo not to pretend nominating and electing Biden isn't also a disaster (of a different stripe admittedly). One of Zam's major points is that members of the PMC are comfortable and will just side with the winners in the long run anyway. Combine that with only a handful of votes/voters really counting and convincing those more dedicated to order than justice is impractical as an electoral strategy. The disaster I've been talking about is more immediate than the one you are talking about, but I generally agree with you. The latter disaster is note quite as hopeless at this point, but we are rapidly going there.
I mean that one too (which will make our reaction to covid look like a flawless masterpiece, and the consequences a quaint mistake by comparison imo), but I'm more referring to the people who faced disaster under Obama-Biden's administration.
|
|
|
So no election Biden does not guarantee you will get the rulings you want. But it does make it a lot more likely and more important to that, it means that past battles won on women's rights, environment and so on will likely be kept.
As a guy who prefer for things to get worse so, it will burn, and the people will revolt, I could see why that would not matter. But for people who don't think that is a guarantee and think there is very little chance for something better to come out of letting it burn, it is pretty damn important.
That would require people to look over their incredibly limited horizon, instead of drowning in their sour pettiness because "their" candidate got shafted by the deep state, the corrupt, the rich, "them", aliens, fascists, lizard people and what else gets suggested.
But it's somewhat habitual in the US, the best comparison can be drawn to US gun laws. Somebody makes a suggestion as to improve the situation in the US - the usual answer is "that doesn't fix it". No it doesn't. There is no solution that "fixes" everything in one go. But because it doesn't fix everything, it doesn't even get considered.
Same here. Is Biden a slimy creep? Absolutely. Will he "advance the progressives" in the US? Pretty sure he won't. But what he can and probably would do is make sure that there's the potential for a more progressive president in the future who doesn't have to fight an incredibly far right stacked surpreme court.
I absolutely can't (and honestly, don't want to either) understand why someone would argue that "not voting" is better than voting for Biden. It's politics, it's inherently dirty. The republicans know that (clearly). If you can't bring yourself to vote for someone who's a bit "touchy" because your inner white knight gets saddened a little, lol.
You have the choice between someone who definitely will make things worse for many people (predominantly women) in the US, and someone who doesn't. You don't even need to look at the party platforms, it's a complete no-brainer. The only reason to not "do the right thing" and swallow your pride is, as mentioned, sour and childish pettiness.
And it usually goes without saying, but it seems to be clarified: the "morals" that some people here discuss, at least to some degree, will prevent you from ever getting a politician that you'd be happy with. Politics are dirty, and republicans/rep-voters play the game properly, whereas DNC and "liberals" (which btw is a pretty broad term, there's quite a few self proclaimed people here that i wouldn't describe as liberal) are simply too stupid to do so.
The USA is corrupt to the very core. Not just since Trump. I'd rather have someone who at least slightly aligns with my views even though it means i have to wash my hands afterwards, than having the option to watch my country go further and further down the far right rabbit hole while jerking myself and my fellow "liberals" off because we're so morally superior.
|
On April 09 2020 11:01 Wombat_NI wrote:
Yeah I mean are the stakes even that high? Trump hasn’t yet taken the US into a war. If you’re average Joe what is Biden bringing to the table that is significantly better for you than what’s there already?
He’s fucking awful to my sensibilities don’t get me wrong, would prefer him gone.
In what domains is Biden a significant upgrade here? That the possible death or stepping down of RBG is high up there is more an indictment on the lifetime terms of the Supreme Court elevating its political important than anything else.
The earth is on fire, the economy has collapsed, there's a global pandemic, international relations are at an all-time low, unemployment is at a record high, hospitals are oversaturated and undersupplied... So yeah, I'd say the stakes are pretty high.
At least Biden wants to do something in the positive direction about climate change and healthcare and social progress, even if it's not as drastically progressive as Sanders. Biden certainly isn't regressive like Trump. I wonder how many people have actually read Biden's platforms before dismissing him as being a disaster comparable to Trump: https://joebiden.com/joes-vision/
|
So I notice the 'credible rape allegations against Biden' side is swept away by the 'vote logic' side, but there's a fundamental problem with doing that.
Democrat voters actually do care about that.
WHEN Trump and the Republicans blast the airwaves about that, it will erode people's support for Biden. Republicans laugh that off. Trump grabs girls by the pussy? It shows what a MAN he is, and we want a MAN for President! What MAN wouldn't want to be able to do that? Trump's such a cool guy!
Democrats want such people out of politics and not in the White House. You may remember a bunch of people ON THIS VERY forum complaining about a certain Mr. Kavanaugh under similar circumstances. You can't credibly say 'oh how terrible we've got a probable sexual offender elected to the Supreme Court by the evil Republicans NOW LET'S ALL VOTE FOR THE PROBABLE RAPIST'.
As much as you argue for voting 'truths' and 'oh how bad Trump is', to vote for Biden and dismiss these credible allegations is a permanent, irreversible abandonment of the moral high ground.
In short, this is exactly why the US is in such a disastrous state. That's exactly how the political spectrum inches to the right. The Democrats give moral ground for expedient reasons, so the Republicans yank on the rope and drag it further to the right. The Democrats lose something else they can actually reasonably fight over. And suddenly the Republicans can promote the absolute worst (I'm sure there's something worse than Trump under a rock somewhere, and I'm sure you're going to see him soon).
Biden has no chance. A lot of Democrats will not vote for someone with that kind of allegation hanging over him. Young people and young women definitely won't. Trump's base is rock solid, he will get his vote no matter what. Every attack he launches at Biden is going to land even without making stuff up, and he'll make stuff up too. Biden has the verbal charisma of an asthma attack, policies that are lukewarm to the most enthusiastic Democrat, and is visibly suffering mental degradation.
He's still better than Trump, and he's still not going to win.
|
On April 09 2020 12:27 m4ini wrote:Show nested quote +So no election Biden does not guarantee you will get the rulings you want. But it does make it a lot more likely and more important to that, it means that past battles won on women's rights, environment and so on will likely be kept.
As a guy who prefer for things to get worse so, it will burn, and the people will revolt, I could see why that would not matter. But for people who don't think that is a guarantee and think there is very little chance for something better to come out of letting it burn, it is pretty damn important.
That would require people to look over their incredibly limited horizon, instead of drowning in their sour pettiness because "their" candidate got shafted by the deep state, the corrupt, the rich, "them", aliens, fascists, lizard people and what else gets suggested. + Show Spoiler +But it's somewhat habitual in the US, the best comparison can be drawn to US gun laws. Somebody makes a suggestion as to improve the situation in the US - the usual answer is "that doesn't fix it". No it doesn't. There is no solution that "fixes" everything in one go. But because it doesn't fix everything, it doesn't even get considered.
Same here. Is Biden a slimy creep? Absolutely. Will he "advance the progressives" in the US? Pretty sure he won't. But what he can and probably would do is make sure that there's the potential for a more progressive president in the future who doesn't have to fight an incredibly far right stacked surpreme court.
I absolutely can't (and honestly, don't want to either) understand why someone would argue that "not voting" is better than voting for Biden. It's politics, it's inherently dirty. The republicans know that (clearly). If you can't bring yourself to vote for someone who's a bit "touchy" because your inner white knight gets saddened a little, lol. You have the choice between someone who definitely will make things worse for many people (predominantly women) in the US, and someone who doesn't. You don't even need to look at the party platforms, it's a complete no-brainer. The only reason to not "do the right thing" and swallow your pride is, as mentioned, sour and childish pettiness. + Show Spoiler +And it usually goes without saying, but it seems to be clarified: the "morals" that some people here discuss, at least to some degree, will prevent you from ever getting a politician that you'd be happy with. Politics are dirty, and republicans/rep-voters play the game properly, whereas DNC and "liberals" (which btw is a pretty broad term, there's quite a few self proclaimed people here that i wouldn't describe as liberal) are simply too stupid to do so.
The USA is corrupt to the very core. Not just since Trump. I'd rather have someone who at least slightly aligns with my views even though it means i have to wash my hands afterwards, than having the option to watch my country go further and further down the far right rabbit hole while jerking myself and my fellow "liberals" off because we're so morally superior.
I don't think telling young women that the only reason they aren't supporting a credibly accused rapist or a "slimy creep" as you say is sour childish pettiness and equating Bernie supporters legitimate grievances about the system to lizard people conspiracies is going to have the rallying effect you desire.
|
Norway28672 Posts
even if people believe that biden as a candidate and person is equally bad to trump and thus that it makes no difference, do these people also believe that president biden would nominate an equally bad replacement for RBG as trump would?
|
On April 09 2020 12:27 m4ini wrote:Show nested quote +So no election Biden does not guarantee you will get the rulings you want. But it does make it a lot more likely and more important to that, it means that past battles won on women's rights, environment and so on will likely be kept.
As a guy who prefer for things to get worse so, it will burn, and the people will revolt, I could see why that would not matter. But for people who don't think that is a guarantee and think there is very little chance for something better to come out of letting it burn, it is pretty damn important.
That would require people to look over their incredibly limited horizon, instead of drowning in their sour pettiness because "their" candidate got shafted by the deep state, the corrupt, the rich, "them", aliens, fascists, lizard people and what else gets suggested. But it's somewhat habitual in the US, the best comparison can be drawn to US gun laws. Somebody makes a suggestion as to improve the situation in the US - the usual answer is "that doesn't fix it". No it doesn't. There is no solution that "fixes" everything in one go. But because it doesn't fix everything, it doesn't even get considered. Same here. Is Biden a slimy creep? Absolutely. Will he "advance the progressives" in the US? Pretty sure he won't. But what he can and probably would do is make sure that there's the potential for a more progressive president in the future who doesn't have to fight an incredibly far right stacked surpreme court. I absolutely can't (and honestly, don't want to either) understand why someone would argue that "not voting" is better than voting for Biden. It's politics, it's inherently dirty. The republicans know that (clearly). If you can't bring yourself to vote for someone who's a bit "touchy" because your inner white knight gets saddened a little, lol. You have the choice between someone who definitely will make things worse for many people (predominantly women) in the US, and someone who doesn't. You don't even need to look at the party platforms, it's a complete no-brainer. The only reason to not "do the right thing" and swallow your pride is, as mentioned, sour and childish pettiness. And it usually goes without saying, but it seems to be clarified: the "morals" that some people here discuss, at least to some degree, will prevent you from ever getting a politician that you'd be happy with. Politics are dirty, and republicans/rep-voters play the game properly, whereas DNC and "liberals" (which btw is a pretty broad term, there's quite a few self proclaimed people here that i wouldn't describe as liberal) are simply too stupid to do so. The USA is corrupt to the very core. Not just since Trump. I'd rather have someone who at least slightly aligns with my views even though it means i have to wash my hands afterwards, than having the option to watch my country go further and further down the far right rabbit hole while jerking myself and my fellow "liberals" off because we're so morally superior.
No chance of convincing you (I'm not even convinced myself) but if we look a little above the horizon, voting for Biden means that the left represents the status quo in 2024 (Biden won't run twice but he'll appoint someone else that will obviously win a primary). This is a crucial moment for the left in America, with two generations in a row that are overwhelmingly more progressive than the boomers and Gen X. What was that, 70% of under 45 for Sanders over Biden?
Now as the democratic party, we are clearly telling them: fuck you, we do not care what you want, we won't give you anything (provided there is no progressive vp pick or other offer for the progressive side, which we shouldn't expect based on 2016). This is something that will hit a lot of that new generation in the core of their formative political years. They will remember this, and probably that will be reflected in their willingness to side with a democrat again.
Meanwhile in 2024 the Overton window has shifted to the right, the moderate republicans are now a cherished part of the democratic base. The republicans have to choose between a fascist/fascist adjacent candidate like Trump, and a populist on the Tucker Carlson side. Both are atrocious for the country obviously, and both have an excellent chance of winning against the uninspiring candidate that the "left" will have to defend, further discredited by Biden's dementia having been made apparent in the meanwhile. The Tucker Carlson type candidate will probably get a tooon of leftwing votes from the Sanders side, even though he'll probably be dishonest in his leftwing advocacy. I know that they'll fuck me over if I ever trust them and even I can listen to most of what Saagar Enjeti says on Rising and find myself agreeing on a lot, I can't imagine that a lot of leftists in America don't feel the same.
So on one side, you have the possibility that Trump attempts to seize control as a fascist, and RBG. Both quite real and direct threats, although RBG is a question of losing 5-4 instead of losing 6-3, it's not a direct change.
On the other, you have the apparent impossibility of offering anything even mildly progressive in the next eight (fucking) years and the very direct risk of alienating an entire generation of voters as a result and pushing them in the upper left bracket, offering them to republicans, when they clearly belong in the bottom left bracket on policy.
The second has more lasting effect, but the first is more present. It's also clearer that the first is true and not entirely clear for the second: other stuff could happen between now and 2024 that could change things, but surely we can agree this is the most likely scenario.
Other issue to throw in, because why not: all of the older people who are leftists but voted for Biden because of electability reasons are now validated in their choice: their candidate is indeed electable. They will never vote for a leftist again.
Because I'm not sure what is worse, it wouldn't take a lot to sway me if I was american. As I said, just a good VP pick would be enough. I would guess a lot of people think like me and just need a sign to give them the right direction, because right now the right direction is unclear, and I didn't find the bunch of insults that I've seen on Twitter so far as the only argument for why Biden should be voted for to be super persuasive.
|
On April 09 2020 12:44 Liquid`Drone wrote:
even if people believe that biden as a candidate and person is equally bad to trump and thus that it makes no difference, do these people also believe that president biden would nominate an equally bad replacement for RBG as trump would?
The supreme court only matters because it has historically been non partisan (or tried its hardest to appear that way). If the court is packed with lunatics, it loses all power. Their only currency is the respect given them by both sides of the aisle. Roberts may seem to understand this at times, but for the most part he only cares about "legacy", which is similar.
We've known since 1830 that it is possible to just... Ignore the supreme court, with absolutely nothing happening, as long as the president is popular enough.
It is also possible to pack the court with a simple majority in Congress and the presidency, which has been floated before. Would the court start swinging like crazy and would it eventually collapse from the absurdity? Sure, but there is no real viable alternative when they're literally encouraging people to die for a single goddamn state supreme court seat (of which there are hundreds).
The supreme court is already lost for a generation without court packing. The Republicans are playing constitutional hardball, which must be answered in kind. Biden does NOT have the appetite to do that, but that doesn't matter. Have to force him to do it via large house majorities.
I'm not as hopeless as the others in the thread, as if our life expectancy was what it was in 1970 then the GOP would already be a dead party. Are there young Republicans? Yeah... something like 25-30%. That's not a party.
People getting more conservative as they age is a myth -they tend to stay locked in at their current beliefs, and the world tends to advance.
That said, not voting is the fastest way to convince politicians that you're not worth pandering to. Leave the presidential spot blank if you must, but fill out the rest.
|
|
|
|
|
|
EPT
