Sanders is correct in the need for unity behind whoever is the nominee, to prevent fascism, but I think he’s incorrect on the position of Biden’s continued candidacy.
I feel like this conversation is basically:
Against Biden: “He’s old as fuck and you’re in denial.”
For Biden: “I’m aware he’s old as fuck and I think you haven’t fully considered the legal, financial, and political ramifications of him dropping out at this stage in the race.”
Ad nauseam, forever. None of us know what’s going on. The reporting has been awful and full of motivated framing and anonymous sources. Half of it is the typical “Democrats in disarray,” which is such a beloved media topic that there’s been memes about it since before the internet. It’s ok to just not know when you aren’t privy to solid information.
To me it just looks like their stalling. Like an early 90s PC that made that screeching noise whenever it connects to your modem. They know Biden old, it’s too late to prep a replacement, let’s waste time repeating that so there’s even less time to find a replacement. This feels almost like a republican move of placating and dragging things out because a decision was made as a party and they don’t really wanna backtrack on it but they know not even appearing to acknowledge it would make the party even less popular. I don’t really know what to say here, I’m all for just nominating AOC and telling everyone above 50 or unwilling to let a women or someone who isn’t a dinosaur run for the presidency to f*ck right off. The reason we need parties and can’t have representives who are actually popular with the populace is because our political institutions are built on a lack of proportional representation and no one in a position to actually wants to change that.
I would say the argument against Biden is that he will lose. If he came off the debate and turned in performance after performance like the State of the Union, this would have gone away. Instead, he did some teleprompter speeches, an interview, and a press conference that were passable at best. I think if we stick with him, he’ll keep sounding borderline senile for the next two months, the questions will die down but not go away, and then he’ll probably get curb-stomped again in the September debate.
In my opinion, that press conference and the UN meeting killed the hope in my mind. How can we back a president that in the same day calls his political opponent his Vice President and then also introduces Zelensky as his wartime opponent on stage at the UN.
There’s just no hope left for him. If they don’t swap him out, we lose. It’s as simple as that in my mind. The polls look awful so to run him you’d have to assume he won’t slip up like that again. Why would you?
I’ll back Biden’s rotting corpse over Trump
I mean I will too, but there are a lot of stupid people in this country who won’t.
The thing is, changing 0olitical leaders mid stream is usually an act of desperation followed by a loss at the election. This one feels like a self fulfilling prophecy with 5he same outcome. If you have no knowledge of Joe you may not be aware that he’s always been a gaffe machine. Who cares, he’s very effective and knows what he’s doing.
Old age is not a “gaffe” that’s the point. He’s getting decrepit to the point of being unfit permanently, that’s the reason he got away with years of gaffes and now this is a real problem for the party.
Americans understand how old age works, it’s not temporary, and it’s obvious he’s reaching that point that all people eventually do where things start to decline rapidly.
I saw Joe mix names up when he was a Senator. That’s not old age, that’s just just Joe.
Personally I’d take Joe, old age and all, over Trump.
Personally I’d take Joe, old age and all, over Trump.
So would I, but that’s not the point.
On a scale from 1-100 where 100 is the perfect president and 25 is the minimum to be qualified, Trump is at a 3 and Biden is a 9.
It doesn’t matter that he’s still several times better than the fascist when he no longer has the cognitive capabilities required to do the job.
I don’t know about your little scale. Biden has signed as much meaningful legislation as FDR, who was one of our best presidents.
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I guess they weren’t in cartoon form. No wonder why that doesn’t matter to you.
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he no longer has the cognitive capabilities required to do the job.
Okay give examples of how things have declined. Give specific examples of ways he has gotten worse.
His past four years as President have proven he can do a very good job, despite the verbal gaffes that he’s been criticized for over his entire career. Making speaking mistakes has been a well-known and well-criticized trait of his since long before I voted for him, or even before I voted for him on Obama’s ticket.
His performance as President alone should be enough to reelect him. In all honesty, I want more of what we got in the last four years. And he’s shown no signs of deterioration, we’ve just gotten more media coverage pretending that his gaffes are new.
I’m okay with his admin doing a Weekend At Biden’s throughout his term if they have to…IF he wins. It definitely DOES matter. The alternative will be very, very bad.
That being said, I wish he’d step aside and let someone else run.
So he’s never been competent. That doesn’t surprise me but it’s still not a reason to vote for him.
Trump speaks and confuses Obama with Biden, Pelosi for Haley and the GOP keep quite knowing it’ll blow over by the next news cycle. Biden makes similar gaffes and Democrats panic and call for replacing him thus keeping it alive in the news with a new headline everyday. Who gives a fuck what George Clooney thinks?
Trump has a cult that excuses everything he does. Democrats look on that with envy and start orderin’ people to shut up and put on the nikes.
The problem is that the gaffes are just the tip of the iceberg.
Many prominent Biden allies are pushing for him to step down. It’s not the media or George Clooney- its Congressmen. It’s a crisis when many of your closest allies question your ability to do the job.
Democratic candidates are crying as they leave “reassurance” meetings with Biden. They understand better than anyone else that their election chances are dire with Biden as an anchor at the top of the ticket.
It’s a crisis when the Republicans are on track to control all 3 branches of government in a few months.
Because Republicans fall in line. Republicans are on record saying if Trump ever gets elected president, it will be the death of the party. Now, those same people have orange paint on their lips from kissing his ass so much. They don’t question Trump’s crazy ideas or statements, because he’s the party leader. Democrats don’t do that, and at times it’s good to question our candidates, I feel this is not that time.
We’re 4 months from the election. The DNC convention is even sooner. No way can a new candidate become familiar with independents and gain their confidence in that time. This change needed to happen way sooner, which is the DNCs and Biden’s fault for not encouraging potential challengers to Biden. Now, there’s doubt in everyone’s minds when if there were challengers that failed to compete against Biden, we would KNOW, that Biden is still the best.
People are only whining because that’s easy to do. Constructive criticism is harder and part of that, in regards to Biden, is offering a solid alternative that everyone will like more than Biden, so quickly. Making ourselves look so disorganized, and adding to this negative headline is not doing us any favors, and Trump loves it.
The thing is Dems usually pretend to be slightly less bad than Republicans. This “just shut up and vote for our man” is typically a Republican strategy.
And all the conspiracy theories and vile attacks are on brand for MAGA. Now a growing part of the Dem supporters act in the same way as the MAGA crowd.
Also i cannot help but remember someone who posted a quote form 1984 the other day:
“The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command.”
This is where we are at for people making up all sorts of BS why Biden messing up his speeches, walking in the wrong directions and being blitzed out on stage is somehow not signs of an old men with dementia.
AOC is attracting my fancy but the country is far too polarized, among many other things, for her to rake office. I agree with Bernie. Let Biden be the W guy and this time I dont think he can lie his way out of not stepping aside for Kamala. He will become too old in office. We got Nixon for doing this same stratagem. Its not a winning one for the folk of the land. May Gene Wilder remind you who they are.
The opinion piece: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/13/opinion/joe-biden-president.html
Bernie isn’t a Democrat most of the time (not sure if he is one this year…), represents a state that will remain safely deep blue even in the event of a Trump landslide, and is far removed from the constituencies where voter support for Biden is cratering. So it’s not surprising for him to have this opinion.
Not to mention his vested interest in the idea that politicians should remain in power long into old age.
He is absolutely right. Joe Biden is the best man.
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Bernie is old enough to remember 1968 and how Nixon finally won.
Knowing that democrats will religiously do the opposite of whatever progressives suggest, I don’t think it’s necessarily a bad way for him to approach this, similar to AOC. If Biden stays in past the convention they can seamlessly try to bolster his support, and if he steps down they’ve made it clear they’ll support whatever Dem nominee happens to be moved in.
Biden is looking for anything to grasp onto to justify to himself to stay in the race, if progressives joined in on the calls for him to step down it would probably only dig him in further since he really hates the left. It’s a very strange dynamic honestly the way this is going.
There’s not much Sanders can do to influence things so he is opting for not rocking the boat and hoping the neolibs who are close to Biden get him to step out. That would be my theory at least.
I’m sure he’s well aware that conservatives desperately want Biden to stay in the race.
I love the idea that by progressives coming out to support Biden we can get corpo Dems to be like “Holy shit guys, we gotta remove him!”
They could have also just stayed shut the fuck up and let corpo Dems eat corpo Dems here. The squad is a fucking sold out joke with the exceptions of Bowman, Omar, and Bush.
Where is Bernie or AOC on Gaza? Where are they supporting Omar after getting censured. Why won’t they go on the progressive media outlets that out them into power any more?
Like whatever. If they came out against Buden they’d get thrown in a wood chipper and it would be cited as a reason to keep Biden. I get the real politik of it, I just don’t like it.
