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History shows that the House will almost certainly be lost to the Democrats. Unless Biden was rolling with like 70+% approval, they were going to be losing seats no matter what, and with a super slim majority and redistricting, it was always bleak. The Senate might be a different story because the map favours them in 2022 to pick up 1-3 seats, but if the Democrats really cannot build a strong argument for themselves from Biden's presidency, I think even the Senate is a problem. I don't even think passing both infrastructure bills (which for the record, I think will pass relatively unchanged from their intended goals) can save them from the inevitable pendulum swing of voters.
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I'm not sure this fall popularity will really be sustained tbh. Sure, there's an shock at the speed with which the afgan government collapsed, but once this shock has passed people might just not care any more, especially if there aren't any major atrocities commited by the taliban. Heck, one year from now, Biden may even be viewed positively as being the president that wasn't afraid to cut the losses (unlikely, but who knows).
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Frankly I am surprised he didn't take even more of a hit. I don't think it weighs against Dems future success at all, despite the long odds for '22.
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On August 21 2021 03:11 JimmiC wrote:Show nested quote +On August 21 2021 03:10 farvacola wrote:
Frankly I am surprised he didn't take even more of a hit. I don't think it weighs against Dems future success at all, despite the long odds for '22. I'm with you, especially with the news cycle and peoples memories being so short being so short.
If that was intentional, well played.
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TBH, it would've been worse for Biden if Afghanistan took months to fall to the Taliban, and a bit of USA support could've stopped it from happening. The fact that it fell in weeks literally means that there was nothing that the USA could've done that could've prevented the fall besides being actively involved.
The only thing that would sink Biden in relation to Afghanistan is a terrorist action by the Taliban on USA soil. Anything less will have been forgotten by 2022.
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At the moment, I see COVID, inflation worries and the next controversy conjured up by the GOP like CRT as the biggest thorn on Democrats' side by the midterms, not a botched withdrawal from Afghanistan. Betting that Americans will largely forget this in a week or will eventually come around to the decision as the right thing to do is probably the correct decision by the White House. How likely is the median American voter going to remember this by November next year, let alone this September?
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Problem is, this Afghanistan debacle is who Biden is. Just because he hid in his basement in 2020 and ran on "norms" and competence does not mean he actually possesses the respect for norms, competence, or intelligence for office. Anyone who actually knew anything about Biden before he ran for president (again) is not remotely surprised by his behavior. While this event may be particularly egregious and bring his issues into unusually sharp focus, the trend is not an anomaly.
Nevermind that it's more and more obvious he's not even as mentally acute as he was a decade ago.
I know I could never convince the leftists here that, when specific proposals are actually made, their program is far less popular than they think it is. But administratively there is no reason to think this White House is going to perform any better. Don't forgot Biden almost "accidentally" torpedoed the bipartisan boondoggle infrastructure bill more than once.
This is Biden.
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On August 21 2021 04:14 Introvert wrote:
Problem is, this Afghanistan debacle is who Biden is. Just because he hid in his basement in 2020 and ran on "norms" and competence does not mean he actually possesses the respect for norms, competence, or intelligence for office. Anyone who actually knew anything about Biden before he ran for president (again) is not remotely surprised by his behavior. While this event may be particularly egregious and bring his issues into unusually sharp focus, the trend is not an anomaly.
Nevermind that it's more and more obvious he's not even as mentally acute as he was a decade ago.
I know I could never convince the leftists here that, when specific proposals are actually made, their program is far less popular than they think it is. But administratively there is no reason to think this White House is going to perform any better. Don't forgot Biden almost "accidentally" torpedoed the bipartisan boondoggle infrastructure bill more than once.
This is Biden.
The fact they think this president is an improvement over Trump says it all. You definitely won't be able to convince them, and by them I mean about 95% of the people on here. Best thing to do is just lurk, read and laugh and often just shake your head in disbelief but still end it by laughing at it.
Prepare for the finger pointing and reflecting whatever you say by mentioning Trump, as that's about the only thing on their mind. "Oh no, dude doesn't support Biden we must find a way to redirect it towards Trump's time in office". Rinse and repeat. Forgetting that whatever Trump had set in motion, Biden had all the possibilities to do differently (and possibly better which hilariously is hardly the case).
One clown after the other, I hope the next one at least isn't able to keel over by giving a speech and actually remembers what to say or what question he was asked 2 seconds ago.
Whoever thought it would be smart to have people of that age (and in Biden's case been a leech for so long without accomplishing anything) to be able to run for office is just ridiculous.
About Afghanistan, Biden should've and could've done better but the mess that this decision has caused is just another example why you need people who actually know what they're doing when it comes to stuff like this. Need someone more savvy on the military front, someone who can just put his foot down when needed and say "we need to do this or we will fail". Clearly something Biden isn't capable of. Just like when Trump got elected, I'm sure a lot of people who voted for Biden did it more in the sense of voting against Trump vs voting for Biden, because they probably thought they were voting for the lesser evil.
Yeah yeah Trump wanted to pull out too, but rest assured, his initial reaction to seeing how it would explode in his face would've been way better instead of just hiding. Would've more than likely put his foot down instead of just staying incompetent.
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Yes, Trump would have firmly put his foot down by proclaiming, "I don't take responsibility" and then sulking on Twitter, lol
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It's funny how many Republicans and those that sympathize with them endlessly double down on doing the very things they routinely criticize "the left" for, particularly as they relate to discussing Trump. Instead of giving anyone else the courtesy of describing or setting forth their own perspective on things, millions upon millions of people (or at the very least the rough majority of posters in this thread and its predecessors) are stuffed into scarecrows bearing "leftist" names. Nobody is allowed to support Biden, Democrats, or anything remotely related to left-leaning politics for nuanced or complicated reasons, instead everyone belonging to a broadly ill-defined group of people necessarily believes certain things framed in hostile terms that by definition render them entirely ignorable or ignorant. Everyone is beholden to their category, and those people are always hypocrites that are wrong about just about everything!
Of course, none of that applies with any force to the groups Introvert and random pbu belong to, certainly not in a negative way. It doesn't matter that the endless critique of Biden's faculties is literally a front page news story in the Washington Examiner, National Review, and on Fox News close to every single day. It doesn't matter that most rightwing talking points walk in lockstep with one another in near perfect uniformity, especially when it comes to the general prohibition on criticizing "heroes" like Trump and Reagan. It certainly doesn't matter that hundreds of people draped in the former Republican president's name broke into Congress, Republicans at large bear absolutely no responsibility for anything that anyone who shares their views does, and any so-called Republican who says otherwise is a RINO, just like anyone who dislikes Trump for any reason. But don't forget, every "leftist" is responsible for any and all left-leaning ideas and the acts of anyone who does or says anything that can be associated with "the left." None of those dang "leftists" will ever change their mind, and none of them ever criticize anything substantively, all they do is bring up Trump.
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Afghanistan? don’t even know him, never met him. talked to him once or twice at a conference. great guy. loved me.
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On August 21 2021 04:14 Introvert wrote:
Problem is, this Afghanistan debacle is who Biden is. Just because he hid in his basement in 2020 and ran on "norms" and competence does not mean he actually possesses the respect for norms, competence, or intelligence for office.
This is what confuses me most about the right wingers. Trump put together the whole plan to pull out. He had the meeting with the Taliban. He said we would be out by Christmas.
Unless you're poking fun at Biden not being normal and maintaining the status quo of pushing back the date yet again like the presidents before him I'm not sure what you're even talking about right now. You could at least do the whole Trump 5D chess meme where he pulled out most of the troops before Biden took office so he would have to do another surge or have Afganistan fall. Trump bigly genius confirmed.
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I'm genuinely curious what people think Trump would have done better, here.
You can say "see, Biden didn't do any better" and I would disappointedly agree.
However, the leap from there to "Trump would have done way better" seems very questionable. Biden was straight-up following the Trump admin's script here. Is this not what you wanted?
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United States42490 Posts
On August 21 2021 05:20 Blitzkrieg0 wrote:Show nested quote +On August 21 2021 04:14 Introvert wrote:
Problem is, this Afghanistan debacle is who Biden is. Just because he hid in his basement in 2020 and ran on "norms" and competence does not mean he actually possesses the respect for norms, competence, or intelligence for office. This is what confuses me most about the right wingers. Trump put together the whole plan to pull out. He had the meeting with the Taliban. He said we would be out by Christmas. Unless you're poking fun at Biden not being normal and maintaining the status quo of pushing back the date yet again like the presidents before him I'm not sure what you're even talking about right now. You could at least do the whole Trump 5D chess meme where he pulled out most of the troops before Biden took office so he would have to do another surge or have Afganistan fall. Trump bigly genius confirmed.
It’s all projection. Trump literally fled to an underground bunker during the BLM protests and so Biden is metaphorically hiding. Biden is, at 78, too old to govern whereas Trump (75), who famously wanders around with toilet paper trailing from one shoe, and can’t finish a 3 page briefing is energetic.
Whatever faults they possess they accuse the other side of.
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On August 21 2021 06:36 Belisarius wrote:
I'm genuinely curious what people think Trump would have done better, here.
You can say "see, Biden didn't do any better" and I would bitterly agree. However, the leap from there to "Trump would have done way better" seems very questionable.
Biden was straight-up following the Trump admin's script here. Is this not what you wanted?
Unless you subscribe to the "the deep state/military industrial complex intentionally betrayed Biden to punish him for exiting Afghanistan" theory (which I can see why you would), there are good reasons to think this would have been done better under just about any president. Joe is pretty bad at foreign policy and has always been. Trump was a bungler, but he at least realized that the Taliban was the power in the country, and thus negotiated with them directly.
The worst aspects of the crisis seem related to unfounded idealism and faith in the Afghan government. For all Trump's mistakes and failings, they were usually in the other direction. Too little faith in allies.
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I like "competence, respect for norms, and intelligence for the office" as a critique of Biden, after we just got out of 4 years of Trump. Bold play to not expect anyone to remember anything.
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We can just look at how he treated the kurds, and assume it wouldve gone the same way. Maybe he would've accounted for the ANA instantly though. Probably would've been his first instinct.
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On August 21 2021 04:52 farvacola wrote:
It's funny how many Republicans and those that sympathize with them endlessly double down on doing the very things they routinely criticize "the left" for, particularly as they relate to discussing Trump. Instead of giving anyone else the courtesy of describing or setting forth their own perspective on things, millions upon millions of people (or at the very least the rough majority of posters in this thread and its predecessors) are stuffed into scarecrows bearing "leftist" names. Nobody is allowed to support Biden, Democrats, or anything remotely related to left-leaning politics for nuanced or complicated reasons, instead everyone belonging to a broadly ill-defined group of people necessarily believes certain things framed in hostile terms that by definition render them entirely ignorable or ignorant. Everyone is beholden to their category, and those people are always hypocrites that are wrong about just about everything!
Of course, none of that applies with any force to the groups Introvert and random pbu belong to, certainly not in a negative way. It doesn't matter that the endless critique of Biden's faculties is literally a front page news story in the Washington Examiner, National Review, and on Fox News close to every single day. It doesn't matter that most rightwing talking points walk in lockstep with one another in near perfect uniformity, especially when it comes to the general prohibition on criticizing "heroes" like Trump and Reagan. It certainly doesn't matter that hundreds of people draped in the former Republican president's name broke into Congress, Republicans at large bear absolutely no responsibility for anything that anyone who shares their views does, and any so-called Republican who says otherwise is a RINO, just like anyone who dislikes Trump for any reason. But don't forget, every "leftist" is responsible for any and all left-leaning ideas and the acts of anyone who does or says anything that can be associated with "the left." None of those dang "leftists" will ever change their mind, and none of them ever criticize anything substantively, all they do is bring up Trump.
I mean, I did say "leftists here." The dominant line of thought in this thread, as expressed on the very last page, is that Biden/Dems are doomed in 2022 unless they pass their policy agenda. I am saying that once this policy agenda becomes an actual proposal that can be seen, analyzed, scrutinized, and yes, attacked, that it is going to become far less popular, to the extent polls reflect voter sentiment accurately even now.
Moreover, I meant in the second paragraph that one should not have, nor ever should have had, faith in Biden to do what progressives wanted in competent manner anyways. Biden has never been a smart, considerate, honest politician and expecting him to execute the duties of his office in a competent manner was something to be hoped for rather than assumed.
Lastly, I'm not really sure how much of that complaint applies to me as I think I have been very critical of Trump, and of course I didn't even bring him up in my post. And that's kind of why I laugh at all the "but Trump!" we're getting. Deflection so we can ignore that Biden promised us that what is now happening wouldn't happen, or his terrible response in general, be it his military actions, speeches, or interviews. I don't know what Trump would have done... on the one hand he wanted to get out. On the other hand, he continued to let his officials delay leaving. I do think the moment Americans were being attacked (as they are now, according to reports), that he may have been moved to action. But I don't know. This isn't "Trump's plan" they're following, and both candidates in 2020 were promising to get us out of there as soon as possible.
Biden was warned, and went ahead anyways, and this is the result. That's on him, and his cabinet officials like Austin and Blinken. Pointing out that Biden is still the man he always was, is, I think, only an attack on those who pretended otherwise.
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EPT
