Unions, Progressive Dems Have Biden's Back
July 10, 2024 7:57 PM Subscribe
It’s far from “Joever” for them The United Steelworkers, Communications Workers of America, Laborers’ International Union of North America and Unite Here, among other unions, confirmed to The Washington Post that they plan to continue to support Biden, despite his disastrous debate performance last month.
“Put us in the group of doubling down unequivocally,” said Brent Booker, president of the Laborers’ International Union of North America, which represents some 400,000 U.S. workers in construction and other sectors. “He’s done more for our members than any president in my lifetime.”
These elected Democrats are standing by Joe Biden “We’re losing the plot,” Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.) told a swarm of reporters at the Capitol on Monday. “We are not talking about what we need to be talking about.”
The Biden fans span the gamut from lefties such as Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) to Democrats who’ve won in swing districts and states such as Rep. Haley Stevens (D-Mich.) and Sen. John Fetterman (D-Pa.). Members of the influential Congressional Black Caucus make up a sizable chunk of the defenders. ...
Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.), 85, drew a standing ovation at Essence Fest over the weekend when she said “it’s going to Biden” and “ain’t going to be no other Democratic candidate.”
“People are talking about ‘Biden is too old’ — hell, I’m older than Biden,” Waters declared. “And I get up every morning. And I exercise. And I work late hours. I take care of Black people. Trump has told you who he is, he defined himself. He is a no good, deplorable, lying, despicable human being.” ...
Sanders, who ran against Biden for the nomination in 2020, has also championed Biden’s candidacy. He said on CBS’s “Face the Nation” he would not participate in a proposed discussion among senators about Biden’s future, even as he pushes the president on some policy matters.
“This is not a Grammy Award contest for best singer,” Sanders said. “Biden is old. He’s not as articulate as he once was. I wish he could jump up the steps on Air Force One, but he can’t. … What we have got to focus on is policy, whose policies have and will benefit the vast majority of the people in this country.”
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), another prominent liberal, called the matter “closed,” saying Biden is the nominee.
And Omar who has been sharply critical of Biden’s handling of the Israel-Gaza war, issued one of the strongest statements of support on Monday. “He’s been the best president of my lifetime and we have his back,” she told reporters.
These elected Democrats are standing by Joe Biden “We’re losing the plot,” Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.) told a swarm of reporters at the Capitol on Monday. “We are not talking about what we need to be talking about.”
The Biden fans span the gamut from lefties such as Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) to Democrats who’ve won in swing districts and states such as Rep. Haley Stevens (D-Mich.) and Sen. John Fetterman (D-Pa.). Members of the influential Congressional Black Caucus make up a sizable chunk of the defenders. ...
Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.), 85, drew a standing ovation at Essence Fest over the weekend when she said “it’s going to Biden” and “ain’t going to be no other Democratic candidate.”
“People are talking about ‘Biden is too old’ — hell, I’m older than Biden,” Waters declared. “And I get up every morning. And I exercise. And I work late hours. I take care of Black people. Trump has told you who he is, he defined himself. He is a no good, deplorable, lying, despicable human being.” ...
Sanders, who ran against Biden for the nomination in 2020, has also championed Biden’s candidacy. He said on CBS’s “Face the Nation” he would not participate in a proposed discussion among senators about Biden’s future, even as he pushes the president on some policy matters.
“This is not a Grammy Award contest for best singer,” Sanders said. “Biden is old. He’s not as articulate as he once was. I wish he could jump up the steps on Air Force One, but he can’t. … What we have got to focus on is policy, whose policies have and will benefit the vast majority of the people in this country.”
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), another prominent liberal, called the matter “closed,” saying Biden is the nominee.
And Omar who has been sharply critical of Biden’s handling of the Israel-Gaza war, issued one of the strongest statements of support on Monday. “He’s been the best president of my lifetime and we have his back,” she told reporters.
Uh oh.
posted by kickingtheground at 8:10 PM on July 10 [2 favorites]
posted by kickingtheground at 8:10 PM on July 10 [2 favorites]
And who wants Biden to step down? All the center right, conservatives (you know crypto repubs) and their media lickspittles. Fuck you NYT.
posted by evilDoug at 8:12 PM on July 10 [54 favorites]
posted by evilDoug at 8:12 PM on July 10 [54 favorites]
Thanks for this!
I saw this earlier today:
Why Is the Squad Backing Biden So Forcefully?, New York Intelligencer, Nia Prater (or via Wayback)
and
Biden's supporters on Capitol Hill strike back, Axiois, Andrew Solender
And while the Republican candidate has largely avoided public appearances since the debate, Biden has been maintaining a full and public schedule, including today's Meeting with National Union Leaders .
I'm unsurprised by the union support, but I'm a little surprised - and especially glad - to see support from AOC and the Squad. I'm a fan of theirs, and I'm glad to see them supporting the people's pick.
Thank you for posting this, Artifice_Eternity!
posted by kristi at 8:15 PM on July 10 [19 favorites]
I saw this earlier today:
Why Is the Squad Backing Biden So Forcefully?, New York Intelligencer, Nia Prater (or via Wayback)
and
Biden's supporters on Capitol Hill strike back, Axiois, Andrew Solender
And while the Republican candidate has largely avoided public appearances since the debate, Biden has been maintaining a full and public schedule, including today's Meeting with National Union Leaders .
I'm unsurprised by the union support, but I'm a little surprised - and especially glad - to see support from AOC and the Squad. I'm a fan of theirs, and I'm glad to see them supporting the people's pick.
Thank you for posting this, Artifice_Eternity!
posted by kristi at 8:15 PM on July 10 [19 favorites]
The progressives are wisely choosing to avoid stepping on the landmine that is trying to push out a conservative Democrat president. Doing so would make Biden's removal much more difficult than pretending support for him would. The last thing anyone who wants a competent Democrat at the top of the ticket wants to do is rile up the centrists to protect their guy from the Bernie Bros or whatever.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 8:27 PM on July 10 [24 favorites]
posted by The Manwich Horror at 8:27 PM on July 10 [24 favorites]
Demanding he step down while not saying a word about what Trump word salads and spews unintelligible every day is something right up the NYT's alley.
The NYT Pitchbot will agree.
posted by Comstar at 8:43 PM on July 10 [22 favorites]
The NYT Pitchbot will agree.
posted by Comstar at 8:43 PM on July 10 [22 favorites]
This is all just my white middle-aged lady feels but it sure seems like 1. the primaries were boring so the press (NYT, who hate Biden anyway for not kissing their ass) wants to stir shit with no regard for "we decided this already in the primaries" to make the horse race more exciting and 2. a lot of people who want to ditch Biden are really not talking about the fact that we have a VP already whose job is to take Biden's place if he really does have something worse than a bad cold.
And why do they not want to talk about Kamala Harris? You know why.
I feel like being a relatively low information voter at this time in the election cycle, which used to be called "silly season", is probably smart right now because the "information" in the news seems like kicking up horseshit for the cause of having something to fill the news cycle.
posted by gentlyepigrams at 8:48 PM on July 10 [37 favorites]
And why do they not want to talk about Kamala Harris? You know why.
I feel like being a relatively low information voter at this time in the election cycle, which used to be called "silly season", is probably smart right now because the "information" in the news seems like kicking up horseshit for the cause of having something to fill the news cycle.
posted by gentlyepigrams at 8:48 PM on July 10 [37 favorites]
The thing with the president, or any major political figure, is that they’re the nexus of a bunch of funding streams based on the networking and wheeling dealing that they have done throughout their career. Biden is not anBiden is not a guy, he’s a network of donors, none of whom want to risk switching horses and falling off the gravy train. Especially as wealth concentrates into fewer and fewer Of the most ruthless hands, there’s big sectors of these streams that would be Republican if not further personal connection to the Biden machine.
This is a problem because the American electorate is still the deciding factor, and they have the last four years of the Republican noise machine blasting to them all the reasons they should hate Biden 24/7, And Biden hasn’t done a decisive enough job improving the outlook of life for the average American, Because that would require diverting government funds off the gravy train.
posted by Jon_Evil at 8:57 PM on July 10 [11 favorites]
This is a problem because the American electorate is still the deciding factor, and they have the last four years of the Republican noise machine blasting to them all the reasons they should hate Biden 24/7, And Biden hasn’t done a decisive enough job improving the outlook of life for the average American, Because that would require diverting government funds off the gravy train.
posted by Jon_Evil at 8:57 PM on July 10 [11 favorites]
While horserace media loses their shit over Biden's debate performance and ignores much more important news to bloviate about how he must drop out, actual polling indicates the debate had very little impact on voters' choices. There's a slight trend for voters who indicated they were undecided before the debate to have shifted into the Biden column after the debate.
posted by biogeo at 9:06 PM on July 10 [19 favorites]
posted by biogeo at 9:06 PM on July 10 [19 favorites]
Biden has been one of the most effective and progressive presidents of my lifetime. He snookered the house Republicans repeatedly to get policy done, forgiven billions of dollars in student debt, appointed a shitload of liberal judges, and generally kicked all manner of ass. If he's a lousy debater, who gives a fuck? And if he needs to step down after the election for health reasons, Kamala's pretty good, too.
But boy, are people forgetting how he beat Republicans about the head and neck for the entirety of his presidency up until the stupid debate.
posted by Playdoughnails at 9:08 PM on July 10 [45 favorites]
But boy, are people forgetting how he beat Republicans about the head and neck for the entirety of his presidency up until the stupid debate.
posted by Playdoughnails at 9:08 PM on July 10 [45 favorites]
Blaming the NYT or media elites is a pointless (and when coming from the admin, cynical) red herring. The plain truth is that a massive swath of Democratic voters had their confidence in him as a candidate destroyed within the first five minutes of that debate, and the media and party bigwigs are reflecting that freakout, not creating it out of thin air.
And people aren't freaking out because they're stupidly or maliciously blind to Trump's disqualifying flaws and unfairly fixating on Biden's condition (which is clearly more than a stutter or "one bad night"). They're freaking out because they're desperate for a candidate who can defeat Trump, and right now Biden's abysmal performance on one of the last big remaining stages, his stubborn refusal to acknowledge the reality of his poor polling, and his apparent inability to campaign more effectively is setting us up for a Trump landslide that takes both houses with it. You can cherry pick individual polls showing limited damage, but the bulk show an increasingly untenable position (building on years of surveys showing supermajorities of voters concerned by his age), and even limited damage is a cold comfort when he was already trailing in key states and has been consistently for months, despite cooling inflation, Trump's felonies, and a massive spending advantage that is soon to disappear.
Literally all of the state-level surveys showing Biden underwater also have the Democrats running for Senate doing markedly better. The problem is entirely with Biden, not the party writ large. You might crawl over broken glass to vote for him, but the (currently divided and demoralized) party faithful isn't enough. Some combination of his increasingly visible aging, Gaza, inflation, and anti-incumbent sentiment has made him more and more radioactive -- not just to swing voters, but core constituencies in the party like young voters and working class men of color. Acting like their loud, decisive, consistent dislike is a media creation (like folks tried to do with inflation) and pretending like all will be well if we Keep Ridin' With Biden is a recipe for utter disaster. An open convention or even just coordinating Harris carries huge risks, as well, but at least has the potential to work -- right now, I see no evidence that Team Biden has any effective plan (or capacity) to recover from this debacle.
posted by Rhaomi at 9:23 PM on July 10 [86 favorites]
And people aren't freaking out because they're stupidly or maliciously blind to Trump's disqualifying flaws and unfairly fixating on Biden's condition (which is clearly more than a stutter or "one bad night"). They're freaking out because they're desperate for a candidate who can defeat Trump, and right now Biden's abysmal performance on one of the last big remaining stages, his stubborn refusal to acknowledge the reality of his poor polling, and his apparent inability to campaign more effectively is setting us up for a Trump landslide that takes both houses with it. You can cherry pick individual polls showing limited damage, but the bulk show an increasingly untenable position (building on years of surveys showing supermajorities of voters concerned by his age), and even limited damage is a cold comfort when he was already trailing in key states and has been consistently for months, despite cooling inflation, Trump's felonies, and a massive spending advantage that is soon to disappear.
Literally all of the state-level surveys showing Biden underwater also have the Democrats running for Senate doing markedly better. The problem is entirely with Biden, not the party writ large. You might crawl over broken glass to vote for him, but the (currently divided and demoralized) party faithful isn't enough. Some combination of his increasingly visible aging, Gaza, inflation, and anti-incumbent sentiment has made him more and more radioactive -- not just to swing voters, but core constituencies in the party like young voters and working class men of color. Acting like their loud, decisive, consistent dislike is a media creation (like folks tried to do with inflation) and pretending like all will be well if we Keep Ridin' With Biden is a recipe for utter disaster. An open convention or even just coordinating Harris carries huge risks, as well, but at least has the potential to work -- right now, I see no evidence that Team Biden has any effective plan (or capacity) to recover from this debacle.
posted by Rhaomi at 9:23 PM on July 10 [86 favorites]
far from “Joever”
think the portmanteau originated (pidgenated?) with a different goal, but this is how i read it:
Joe forever
posted by HearHere at 9:45 PM on July 10 [5 favorites]
think the portmanteau originated (pidgenated?) with a different goal, but this is how i read it:
Joe forever
posted by HearHere at 9:45 PM on July 10 [5 favorites]
OMG! A Jabillion Dermocarts are screaming and crying because Biden isn't the perfect godlike one true love!
THE SKY IS FALLING! THE SKY IS FALLING!
OK let's look coldly and dispassionately at our choices: Rapey McRaperson scumbag republican scam artist and would be fascist emperor.
or
Boring McWhitebread noted regular human who has yet to leap a tall building with a single bound.
Horrors, how is one to choose?
Maybe we pull our heads out of our asses and remember he has already handily beaten the felon, and shows every indication of doing it again.
It's not rocket surgery kids. Changing our candidate will only split the ticket and guarantee the fascist takeover we'd all like to avoid.
Our current only choice is Biden or a fascist takeover. You think I'm kidding? Look at election history, see how many times a party has dumped their incumbent candidate and walked away with a win. That's a pretty small number. AND there hasn't even been a suggested candidate put forward. We're just supposed to dump him and hope Cpt. SuperGroovy is gonna ride to the rescue?
Breath, relax, and don't let your panic do your thinking.
posted by evilDoug at 9:57 PM on July 10 [27 favorites]
THE SKY IS FALLING! THE SKY IS FALLING!
OK let's look coldly and dispassionately at our choices: Rapey McRaperson scumbag republican scam artist and would be fascist emperor.
or
Boring McWhitebread noted regular human who has yet to leap a tall building with a single bound.
Horrors, how is one to choose?
Maybe we pull our heads out of our asses and remember he has already handily beaten the felon, and shows every indication of doing it again.
It's not rocket surgery kids. Changing our candidate will only split the ticket and guarantee the fascist takeover we'd all like to avoid.
Our current only choice is Biden or a fascist takeover. You think I'm kidding? Look at election history, see how many times a party has dumped their incumbent candidate and walked away with a win. That's a pretty small number. AND there hasn't even been a suggested candidate put forward. We're just supposed to dump him and hope Cpt. SuperGroovy is gonna ride to the rescue?
Breath, relax, and don't let your panic do your thinking.
posted by evilDoug at 9:57 PM on July 10 [27 favorites]
People want to replace Biden because they don't think he can beat Trump. If you are arguing that it doesn't matter what is wrong with Biden because Trump is worse, you aren't actually addressing the argument being made. Trump being so bad is why we need a stronger candidate. One that can campaign effectively.
As for who would take his place, probably Harris. She was elected to take over the presidency in case Biden couldn't perform adequately.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 10:01 PM on July 10 [47 favorites]
As for who would take his place, probably Harris. She was elected to take over the presidency in case Biden couldn't perform adequately.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 10:01 PM on July 10 [47 favorites]
People want to replace Biden because they don't think he can beat Trump.
I think Biden is more likely to beat Trump than somebody who didn't make it through a Democratic primary. Also I think Biden rolling over is more likely to put someone who takes his place (Harris or someone else, and I think most people who are against Biden continuing are not for Harris replacing him on the ballot) at a big disadvantage against Trump. So yeah, that's a fundamental disagreement: I think those folks are just plain wrong, even without getting into 2020.
posted by gentlyepigrams at 10:12 PM on July 10 [16 favorites]
I think Biden is more likely to beat Trump than somebody who didn't make it through a Democratic primary. Also I think Biden rolling over is more likely to put someone who takes his place (Harris or someone else, and I think most people who are against Biden continuing are not for Harris replacing him on the ballot) at a big disadvantage against Trump. So yeah, that's a fundamental disagreement: I think those folks are just plain wrong, even without getting into 2020.
posted by gentlyepigrams at 10:12 PM on July 10 [16 favorites]
So yeah, that's a fundamental disagreement: I think those folks are just plain wrong, even without getting into 2020.
Indeed. But that means that trying to convince them to stick with Biden by talking about how bad Trump is will obviously be ineffective.
Overwhelmingly, Harris has been the person I have heard suggested to take Biden's position. I know other names have been mentioned, but Harris really seems to be the presumptive next in line (for obvious reasons).
posted by The Manwich Horror at 10:26 PM on July 10 [5 favorites]
Indeed. But that means that trying to convince them to stick with Biden by talking about how bad Trump is will obviously be ineffective.
Overwhelmingly, Harris has been the person I have heard suggested to take Biden's position. I know other names have been mentioned, but Harris really seems to be the presumptive next in line (for obvious reasons).
posted by The Manwich Horror at 10:26 PM on July 10 [5 favorites]
I am arguing that he HAS beaten Trump. I'm NOT argueing that it doesn't matter. I AM arguing that there is NO OTHER choice to make other than losing the election.
I'm glad YOU decided on Harris, have you told her? OR asked her? OR mentioned to all of the media that HASN'T suggested Harris, that she should be the pick? In the articles I've read said she's standing with Biden. So until a giant draft Harris wave starts, and she decides to kick him to the curb, you're only offering panic and pipe dreams.
posted by evilDoug at 10:29 PM on July 10 [15 favorites]
I'm glad YOU decided on Harris, have you told her? OR asked her? OR mentioned to all of the media that HASN'T suggested Harris, that she should be the pick? In the articles I've read said she's standing with Biden. So until a giant draft Harris wave starts, and she decides to kick him to the curb, you're only offering panic and pipe dreams.
posted by evilDoug at 10:29 PM on July 10 [15 favorites]
I am arguing that he HAS beaten Trump. I'm NOT argueing that it doesn't matter. I AM arguing that there is NO OTHER choice to make other than losing the election.
And I am pretty sure that sticking with Biden gives us another four years of Trump. I don't think he can overcome the deficit he is at, especially being physically and mentally unfit for the intense campaigning that needs to be done. You can disagree, but it makes no sense to preach to Biden's critics about how awful Trump is. Everyone knows he is awful. That is why who the Democratic candidate is matters.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 10:32 PM on July 10 [20 favorites]
And I am pretty sure that sticking with Biden gives us another four years of Trump. I don't think he can overcome the deficit he is at, especially being physically and mentally unfit for the intense campaigning that needs to be done. You can disagree, but it makes no sense to preach to Biden's critics about how awful Trump is. Everyone knows he is awful. That is why who the Democratic candidate is matters.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 10:32 PM on July 10 [20 favorites]
still love you, bernie
posted by hollisimo at 10:48 PM on July 10 [11 favorites]
posted by hollisimo at 10:48 PM on July 10 [11 favorites]
Indeed. But that means that trying to convince them to stick with Biden by talking about how bad Trump is will obviously be ineffective.
I'm not trying to convince you of that, or of anything. I'm a Democratic voter who is supporting the guy we chose in the primary. Folks who want to make radical changes to the presidential campaign in the middle of the summer after the primaries are the ones who need to make an argument here: an argument sufficient to change the rules we've all been operating under for decades about how the Democrats select their candidate (in a way that seems to privilege the wishes of wealthy donors over actual primary voters, fwiw). Folks who want to make that change can't even collectively figure out who they want to have run other than "someone who we think will do better than Biden against Trump" even though there's nobody else except, realistically, Harris--who is standing with Biden.
posted by gentlyepigrams at 10:51 PM on July 10 [9 favorites]
I'm not trying to convince you of that, or of anything. I'm a Democratic voter who is supporting the guy we chose in the primary. Folks who want to make radical changes to the presidential campaign in the middle of the summer after the primaries are the ones who need to make an argument here: an argument sufficient to change the rules we've all been operating under for decades about how the Democrats select their candidate (in a way that seems to privilege the wishes of wealthy donors over actual primary voters, fwiw). Folks who want to make that change can't even collectively figure out who they want to have run other than "someone who we think will do better than Biden against Trump" even though there's nobody else except, realistically, Harris--who is standing with Biden.
posted by gentlyepigrams at 10:51 PM on July 10 [9 favorites]
A study by CSSLab on the NTY's selective framing of the age issue around Biden. Well worth having a look.
posted by Phlegmco(tm) at 11:22 PM on July 10 [12 favorites]
posted by Phlegmco(tm) at 11:22 PM on July 10 [12 favorites]
The progressives are wisely choosing to avoid stepping on the landmine that is trying to push out a conservative Democrat president. Doing so would make Biden's removal much more difficult than pretending support for him would. The last thing anyone who wants a competent Democrat at the top of the ticket wants to do is rile up the centrists to protect their guy from the Bernie Bros or whatever.
That is a... highly creative... interpretation.
Alternatively, perhaps we should take Sanders, AOC, Pressley, Omar, and Waters at their word.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 11:24 PM on July 10 [29 favorites]
That is a... highly creative... interpretation.
Alternatively, perhaps we should take Sanders, AOC, Pressley, Omar, and Waters at their word.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 11:24 PM on July 10 [29 favorites]
I wish everyone participating in this bickering could just start by acknowledging that, no matter what the actual correct course of action is, this is a shitty situation, and every option sucks in some way.
Sticking with Biden sucks because it sure looks like he's not fit, and especially because it looks like voters in swing states feel the same way.
Trying to find someone other than Biden sucks for a whole host of reasons.
But I don't know, and I doubt that anyone here really knows either. I wish there was more of an acknowledgement of that fact.
I do strongly feel, though, that if it's not Biden, it has to be Harris. It seems to me like some kind of snap primary would be a complete disaster.
posted by nosewings at 11:28 PM on July 10 [41 favorites]
Sticking with Biden sucks because it sure looks like he's not fit, and especially because it looks like voters in swing states feel the same way.
Trying to find someone other than Biden sucks for a whole host of reasons.
- If Biden essentially acknowledges that he's too old, anyone in the current administration will be viewed with suspicion for helping to cover it up until it was too late.
- Harris is the most likely successor for many reasons, most importantly funding, but she's at a disadvantage because 1. America is racist-sexist, 2. people are (fairly or unfairly) already upset at the Biden administration, and 3. the left wing doesn't like her because she's a former prosecutor.
- If the DNC simply anoints Harris (or anyone) as the chosen successor, there might be the usual grumbling about the DNC simply picking winners.
- If it isn't Harris, who is it? Who has the name recognition? Who has the funding?
- Also, if there's some sort of snap primary to try to quickly find a successor, there will be all sorts of bickering and hurt feelings.
But I don't know, and I doubt that anyone here really knows either. I wish there was more of an acknowledgement of that fact.
I do strongly feel, though, that if it's not Biden, it has to be Harris. It seems to me like some kind of snap primary would be a complete disaster.
posted by nosewings at 11:28 PM on July 10 [41 favorites]
I am not signing on to any specific alternative interpretation when I say that “maybe we should take them at their word” is a slightly silly thing to say about people in politics. We should take them as believing that they have a good reason for standing with Biden! The words are necessarily calculated.
posted by atoxyl at 11:31 PM on July 10 [8 favorites]
posted by atoxyl at 11:31 PM on July 10 [8 favorites]
I feel like being a relatively low information voter at this time in the election cycle, which used to be called "silly season", is probably smart right now because the "information" in the news seems like kicking up horseshit for the cause of having something to fill the news cycle.
Yes, indeed. The media elite live in a bubble, and the last couple of weeks have demonstrated this.
While horserace media loses their shit over Biden's debate performance and ignores much more important news to bloviate about how he must drop out, actual polling indicates the debate had very little impact on voters' choices. There's a slight trend for voters who indicated they were undecided before the debate to have shifted into the Biden column after the debate.
Yes. Within a few days of the debate, as poll numbers barely changed, it occurred to me that ordinary voters had long ago priced in the idea that Biden is very old, and maybe even not quite as sharp as he used to be. Subsequently, I've seen multiple polling experts (including from the GOP side) confirming this analysis. Many Biden voters have actually told pollsters, in so many words, "Yes, he's old -- probably too old. But he's still the better choice."
A while back, I told a conservative guy I'm connected to on social media -- a high school classmate, who has gone on at some length about his belief that Biden is a complete vegetable -- that his side may ultimately regret having hammered on the idea of Biden's purported senility so hard.
All Biden has to do now is give a good number of speeches, interviews, etc. where he comes across as reasonably coherent, and he'll clear the low bar that's been set for him.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 11:34 PM on July 10 [15 favorites]
Yes, indeed. The media elite live in a bubble, and the last couple of weeks have demonstrated this.
While horserace media loses their shit over Biden's debate performance and ignores much more important news to bloviate about how he must drop out, actual polling indicates the debate had very little impact on voters' choices. There's a slight trend for voters who indicated they were undecided before the debate to have shifted into the Biden column after the debate.
Yes. Within a few days of the debate, as poll numbers barely changed, it occurred to me that ordinary voters had long ago priced in the idea that Biden is very old, and maybe even not quite as sharp as he used to be. Subsequently, I've seen multiple polling experts (including from the GOP side) confirming this analysis. Many Biden voters have actually told pollsters, in so many words, "Yes, he's old -- probably too old. But he's still the better choice."
A while back, I told a conservative guy I'm connected to on social media -- a high school classmate, who has gone on at some length about his belief that Biden is a complete vegetable -- that his side may ultimately regret having hammered on the idea of Biden's purported senility so hard.
All Biden has to do now is give a good number of speeches, interviews, etc. where he comes across as reasonably coherent, and he'll clear the low bar that's been set for him.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 11:34 PM on July 10 [15 favorites]
I wish everyone participating in this bickering could just start by acknowledging that, no matter what the actual correct course of action is, this is a shitty situation, and every option sucks in some way.
Every option in real-world politics always sucks in some way. But they suck more if you obsess too much about how much they suck.
All the wild scenarios that people are drawing up are just fantasy football.
We have procedures for selecting candidates. Voters made their will known in the primaries. They will do so again in November. Farfetched proposals for circumventing the long-agreed-upon democratic process and the already-expressed will of the voters are not only ludicrous, they are toxic.
It also really needs to be said that unless one is a certified expert, it's a bad idea to diagnose someone else with a medical condition.
When it comes to Biden, it seems like many people's ageism and ableism has run rampant -- including educated, progressive people who should know better. They see an old man who is visibly more frail than he used to be, with a lifelong speech impediment, who had one poor debate performance, and assume they're seeing dementia.
It sure looks to me like people's discomfort and/or unfamiliarity with seeing the aging process, and seeing someone struggle with a disability, is leading them to leap to unwarranted conclusions.
We know that the Walter Reed neurologist who's been on call to the White House for the last 3 presidential administrations said Biden showed no signs of any neurological disorders a few months ago. That is the only relevant medical information we have.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 11:49 PM on July 10 [20 favorites]
Every option in real-world politics always sucks in some way. But they suck more if you obsess too much about how much they suck.
All the wild scenarios that people are drawing up are just fantasy football.
We have procedures for selecting candidates. Voters made their will known in the primaries. They will do so again in November. Farfetched proposals for circumventing the long-agreed-upon democratic process and the already-expressed will of the voters are not only ludicrous, they are toxic.
It also really needs to be said that unless one is a certified expert, it's a bad idea to diagnose someone else with a medical condition.
When it comes to Biden, it seems like many people's ageism and ableism has run rampant -- including educated, progressive people who should know better. They see an old man who is visibly more frail than he used to be, with a lifelong speech impediment, who had one poor debate performance, and assume they're seeing dementia.
It sure looks to me like people's discomfort and/or unfamiliarity with seeing the aging process, and seeing someone struggle with a disability, is leading them to leap to unwarranted conclusions.
We know that the Walter Reed neurologist who's been on call to the White House for the last 3 presidential administrations said Biden showed no signs of any neurological disorders a few months ago. That is the only relevant medical information we have.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 11:49 PM on July 10 [20 favorites]
I am not signing on to any specific alternative interpretation
In fact I will say that I agree that “they support him because they secretly think that will make it easier to remove him” is a pretty dubious interpretation. But there are plenty of reasons any politician might not believe it to be worth picking the fight that fall short of implying that they have no doubts.
posted by atoxyl at 11:49 PM on July 10 [3 favorites]
In fact I will say that I agree that “they support him because they secretly think that will make it easier to remove him” is a pretty dubious interpretation. But there are plenty of reasons any politician might not believe it to be worth picking the fight that fall short of implying that they have no doubts.
posted by atoxyl at 11:49 PM on July 10 [3 favorites]
It also really needs to be said that unless one is a certified expert, it's a bad idea to diagnose someone else with a medical condition.
For what it's worth, I don't think Biden needs to have a specific condition or disorder for his age to be a problem. It's entirely possible for him to be aging "normally" and yet still be "too old".
Also for what it's worth, I think the perception that he's too old is a bigger problem than anything else (except possibly in acute crises, which are unfortunately very real possibilities in the near future).
posted by nosewings at 12:08 AM on July 11 [8 favorites]
For what it's worth, I don't think Biden needs to have a specific condition or disorder for his age to be a problem. It's entirely possible for him to be aging "normally" and yet still be "too old".
Also for what it's worth, I think the perception that he's too old is a bigger problem than anything else (except possibly in acute crises, which are unfortunately very real possibilities in the near future).
posted by nosewings at 12:08 AM on July 11 [8 favorites]
The concerns expressed by voices ranging from the NYTimes board to Pelosi herself aren't narrowly about Biden's debate performance; they are about Biden's fitness moving forward.
The inability to have a level-headed public debate, with some people accusing others of "bloviating" (ad hominem) or deciding for others what topic is more important (whataboutism), or even AOC's "the case is closed" (is it?)-- these are all indicators of discursive elitism. Truly, it is those who claim to be on the left and for the left who consistently act like Democrat-splainers who shut down public discourse for the sake of a kind of cognitive closure. It is anti-left in behavior even as they claim to know what's best for the left.
The fair way to deal with this is to admit that there are uncertainties and at the end the day after going over the available information we have to make up our own minds on the issue. But the entire world saw a problem, and the NYTimes did not manufacture that initial response.
posted by polymodus at 2:05 AM on July 11 [10 favorites]
The inability to have a level-headed public debate, with some people accusing others of "bloviating" (ad hominem) or deciding for others what topic is more important (whataboutism), or even AOC's "the case is closed" (is it?)-- these are all indicators of discursive elitism. Truly, it is those who claim to be on the left and for the left who consistently act like Democrat-splainers who shut down public discourse for the sake of a kind of cognitive closure. It is anti-left in behavior even as they claim to know what's best for the left.
The fair way to deal with this is to admit that there are uncertainties and at the end the day after going over the available information we have to make up our own minds on the issue. But the entire world saw a problem, and the NYTimes did not manufacture that initial response.
posted by polymodus at 2:05 AM on July 11 [10 favorites]
Alternatively, perhaps we should take Sanders, AOC, Pressley, Omar, and Waters at their word.
Apparently we have very different ideas about politicians :)
posted by The Manwich Horror at 3:01 AM on July 11 [4 favorites]
Apparently we have very different ideas about politicians :)
posted by The Manwich Horror at 3:01 AM on July 11 [4 favorites]
'They make up news': Pelosi slams NY Times for 'misrepresentations' of her Biden remarks
posted by hydropsyche at 3:07 AM on July 11 [7 favorites]
posted by hydropsyche at 3:07 AM on July 11 [7 favorites]
This from one comment really jumped out at me:
...whatever delicate coalition has coalesced to beat Trump.
Right there. What is right about a system in which there's a candidate as odious as TFG, but you can barely scrape together a consensus to bet the farm on the visibly diminished incumbent? These are the best two people for the job?
It's uncharted territory and risky, but part of me wants to see if an orderly and consensual passing of the baton to Harris, with Biden still participating in the campaign, would work. If nothing else, the spotlight would be off of Trump, which he'd probably hate, especially if the public becomes enamoured with Harris, or at least caught up in the soap opera. Game Of Thrones, but real.
posted by Artful Codger at 3:42 AM on July 11 [10 favorites]
...whatever delicate coalition has coalesced to beat Trump.
Right there. What is right about a system in which there's a candidate as odious as TFG, but you can barely scrape together a consensus to bet the farm on the visibly diminished incumbent? These are the best two people for the job?
It's uncharted territory and risky, but part of me wants to see if an orderly and consensual passing of the baton to Harris, with Biden still participating in the campaign, would work. If nothing else, the spotlight would be off of Trump, which he'd probably hate, especially if the public becomes enamoured with Harris, or at least caught up in the soap opera. Game Of Thrones, but real.
posted by Artful Codger at 3:42 AM on July 11 [10 favorites]
I would like to know who the DNC leaders were who enabled this 6 months ago and failed to do anything (e.g. forced an actual primary with other viable candidates, got Biden in front of live cameras in unscripted moments, made Biden do any kind of public debate) Those people are the ones to go. I dont think its only the public-facing principals who should be held accountable. This is yet another failure of leadership by leading democrats to add to the list (this is NYC based but I will add electing Clown Eric Adams, allowing George Santos to be elected, congestion pricing, having to direct funds to blue state NY house districts) - these arent policy things these are failures to be effective party leaders, with a repeated preference for “do nothing and hope”
posted by web5.0 at 3:51 AM on July 11 [11 favorites]
posted by web5.0 at 3:51 AM on July 11 [11 favorites]
OMG! A Jabillion Dermocarts are screaming and crying because Biden isn't the perfect godlike one true love!
THE SKY IS FALLING! THE SKY IS FALLING!
so, now we're going from hippie-punching to just generally flailing around at a jabillion democrats, not to mention the independents, who are in the process of walking away from biden
too many of the american people have lost their confidence in him for him to win the election
there are two solutions - 1 - persuade these people that they can put their confidence in biden - 2 - persuade biden to step down and let someone else, probably harris, run
saying we have to, we have no other choice isn't going to work this time
oh, and the only person who can really persuade people on the confidence issue is joe biden himself - if he's not capable of pulling this off, he's not going to be president in 2025
yes, yes, i know, you would vote for a dead dog in the road over trump but that's not what tens of millions of americans are thinking - they're thinking, yes, trump's an asshole, but the other guy is barely functional - how can we vote for someone like that?
people say listen to the voters, but if you don't listen to these voters, you're going to lose
posted by pyramid termite at 4:06 AM on July 11 [22 favorites]
THE SKY IS FALLING! THE SKY IS FALLING!
so, now we're going from hippie-punching to just generally flailing around at a jabillion democrats, not to mention the independents, who are in the process of walking away from biden
too many of the american people have lost their confidence in him for him to win the election
there are two solutions - 1 - persuade these people that they can put their confidence in biden - 2 - persuade biden to step down and let someone else, probably harris, run
saying we have to, we have no other choice isn't going to work this time
oh, and the only person who can really persuade people on the confidence issue is joe biden himself - if he's not capable of pulling this off, he's not going to be president in 2025
yes, yes, i know, you would vote for a dead dog in the road over trump but that's not what tens of millions of americans are thinking - they're thinking, yes, trump's an asshole, but the other guy is barely functional - how can we vote for someone like that?
people say listen to the voters, but if you don't listen to these voters, you're going to lose
posted by pyramid termite at 4:06 AM on July 11 [22 favorites]
I have to believe that more people are thinking "yeah, Biden is old, but the other guy is a literal fascist who wants to destroy the country" and will vote accordingly, instead of repeatedly slamming their dicks into a car door like some very serious dem talking heads seem determined to do.
To quote "Sorry to Bother You": This isn't apples and oranges, this is apples and the holocaust.
posted by mrjohnmuller at 4:11 AM on July 11 [14 favorites]
To quote "Sorry to Bother You": This isn't apples and oranges, this is apples and the holocaust.
posted by mrjohnmuller at 4:11 AM on July 11 [14 favorites]
Anyone pointing out that “there’s nothing to see here, Bidens polling didn’t even take a hit from the debate” also needs to acknowledge that Biden’s polling is absolutely atrocious, he’s down like 8 points in Pennsylvania in JULY (can’t win without it) and all polling evidence is that this is going to be a landslide.
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 4:33 AM on July 11 [19 favorites]
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 4:33 AM on July 11 [19 favorites]
It's strange to go from the prior thread, which had settled into a sort of prolonged trauma response as we all admitted we weren't sure what would or should happen next, to find this one where people are back to insulting anyone who has concerns over Biden. Maybe there's a minimum number of public appearances one has to get through, before the horror sets in? At least tonight will give everyone another chance to join us in our misery and fear.
posted by mittens at 4:43 AM on July 11 [30 favorites]
posted by mittens at 4:43 AM on July 11 [30 favorites]
I guess this is the Blue MAGA thread, lol. U-S-A, U-S-A, U-S-I mean, good luck, dude, even Pelosi wants him out. That's not great.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 4:51 AM on July 11 [14 favorites]
posted by kittens for breakfast at 4:51 AM on July 11 [14 favorites]
Anyone pointing out that “there’s nothing to see here, Bidens polling didn’t even take a hit from the debate” also needs to acknowledge that Biden’s polling is absolutely atrocious, he’s down like 8 points in Pennsylvania in JULY (can’t win without it) and all polling evidence is that this is going to be a landslide.
Agreed. At this point in 2020, Biden was up something like eight or nine points nationally and ahead in all of the swing states. When you look at the poll aggregates now, for a few months Trump has held a small-ish but undeniable advantage in the swing states and even in national polling. It's kind of shocking to say this, but Trump is in a much stronger position than he was in 2020.
And while the Republican candidate has largely avoided public appearances since the debate, Biden has been maintaining a full and public schedule, including today's Meeting with National Union Leaders
Trump has been keeping quiet for a perfectly obvious reason, because he doesn't want to interrupt the ongoing chaos in the Democratic party. Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake.
I believe this rebellion against Biden will fail for the reasons articulated above. However, I also believe he is on track to lose the election to Trump. This was true before the debate, and I haven't seen any data to really convince me it's changed.
posted by fortitude25 at 4:58 AM on July 11 [7 favorites]
Agreed. At this point in 2020, Biden was up something like eight or nine points nationally and ahead in all of the swing states. When you look at the poll aggregates now, for a few months Trump has held a small-ish but undeniable advantage in the swing states and even in national polling. It's kind of shocking to say this, but Trump is in a much stronger position than he was in 2020.
And while the Republican candidate has largely avoided public appearances since the debate, Biden has been maintaining a full and public schedule, including today's Meeting with National Union Leaders
Trump has been keeping quiet for a perfectly obvious reason, because he doesn't want to interrupt the ongoing chaos in the Democratic party. Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake.
I believe this rebellion against Biden will fail for the reasons articulated above. However, I also believe he is on track to lose the election to Trump. This was true before the debate, and I haven't seen any data to really convince me it's changed.
posted by fortitude25 at 4:58 AM on July 11 [7 favorites]
For those that want Biden to stay in: what’s the plan to reverse the tide? Complain about the New York Times? Have Biden do a nonzero number of press conferences after 4 PM? Assert/hope that the polls are fundamentally wrong and Bidens support is actually much higher than what all the polls are showing?
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 5:03 AM on July 11 [13 favorites]
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 5:03 AM on July 11 [13 favorites]
If you're still supporting Biden at this point I think you have to be expecting the polling to be wrong in the way it was in 2022 where the error favoured the democrats.
I think that is a very risky assumption because 2022 was a unique election where a lot of people (not just democrats) who were extremely pissed off about Roe vs Wade being very recently overturned turned out to vote in unusual numbers for a non-presidential election.
This is a presidential election with Trump on the ballot to motivate his sickos and a super weak democratic candidate polling multiple points behind democratic senators.
posted by zymil at 5:10 AM on July 11 [4 favorites]
I think that is a very risky assumption because 2022 was a unique election where a lot of people (not just democrats) who were extremely pissed off about Roe vs Wade being very recently overturned turned out to vote in unusual numbers for a non-presidential election.
This is a presidential election with Trump on the ballot to motivate his sickos and a super weak democratic candidate polling multiple points behind democratic senators.
posted by zymil at 5:10 AM on July 11 [4 favorites]
Polls are just polls of people who answer polls. They shouldn't be assumed to have any particularly reliable accuracy.
posted by mrjohnmuller at 5:11 AM on July 11 [5 favorites]
posted by mrjohnmuller at 5:11 AM on July 11 [5 favorites]
The lesson from 2016 is it doesn't matter if you lose, because it's always someone else's fault
posted by jy4m at 5:15 AM on July 11 [7 favorites]
posted by jy4m at 5:15 AM on July 11 [7 favorites]
It’s not an assumption, it’s empirical evidence!
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 5:17 AM on July 11
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 5:17 AM on July 11
The lesson from 2016 is it doesn't matter if you lose, because it's always someone else's fault
wait, wasn't that the lesson from 2000?
posted by pyramid termite at 5:18 AM on July 11 [3 favorites]
wait, wasn't that the lesson from 2000?
posted by pyramid termite at 5:18 AM on July 11 [3 favorites]
I think the lesson from 2016 might be that if you spend all your time in-fighting and capitulating to your opponents framing (but her emails/but the debate) instead of uniting against the fundamental unfitness of the alternative, then a loss is all but guaranteed.
Like yeah. I would have prefered if Bernie had won the nom in 2016 or 2020. But he didn't, and he notably didn't pick up his ball and go home, but got on side and worked to pull the Biden admin to the left. Successfully, I would say. So if another round of Biden is good enough for Bernie and AOC, it's good enough for me.
posted by mrjohnmuller at 5:22 AM on July 11 [19 favorites]
Like yeah. I would have prefered if Bernie had won the nom in 2016 or 2020. But he didn't, and he notably didn't pick up his ball and go home, but got on side and worked to pull the Biden admin to the left. Successfully, I would say. So if another round of Biden is good enough for Bernie and AOC, it's good enough for me.
posted by mrjohnmuller at 5:22 AM on July 11 [19 favorites]
The only way to get President Harris is to elect Biden. She knows it, we all know it.
Letting the DNC handle a jumpball is insane.
If there was a single chance in hell that burning the boats with four months to go could generate a winner - at least one billionaire would be hitting the trail right now.
Anything drastic in the closing days would feel like a coup, and that wont work. If the ‘elites’ and the press are choosing our candidates outside the normal process, why bother going to vote?
Yes, this is a new low. We desperately need a better farm system and national party. Hey maybe I am wrong and Prtizker will come out of the convention and everyone will be excited to vote. But it makes more sense that Biden and Harris get out there and talk up the ticket - let Biden do for Harris what he did for Obama, let Harris get out there are make a case for Biden’s work and get people to the booth.
posted by drowsy at 5:26 AM on July 11 [7 favorites]
Letting the DNC handle a jumpball is insane.
If there was a single chance in hell that burning the boats with four months to go could generate a winner - at least one billionaire would be hitting the trail right now.
Anything drastic in the closing days would feel like a coup, and that wont work. If the ‘elites’ and the press are choosing our candidates outside the normal process, why bother going to vote?
Yes, this is a new low. We desperately need a better farm system and national party. Hey maybe I am wrong and Prtizker will come out of the convention and everyone will be excited to vote. But it makes more sense that Biden and Harris get out there and talk up the ticket - let Biden do for Harris what he did for Obama, let Harris get out there are make a case for Biden’s work and get people to the booth.
posted by drowsy at 5:26 AM on July 11 [7 favorites]
Weekend at Bernie's it is. The necrocracy has coalesced around its candidate. What we saw in the debate, and the Stephanopolis interveiw wasn't a stutter, wasn't a bad performance, it was incapacity. But the priority is as it has always been, avoid fascism, prevent or at least win the civil war. If that means we pretend Biden is not senile , i guess LFG.
posted by No Climate - No Food, No Food - No Future. at 5:32 AM on July 11 [7 favorites]
posted by No Climate - No Food, No Food - No Future. at 5:32 AM on July 11 [7 favorites]
Weekend at Bernie's is still a better movie than "Triumph of the Will"
posted by mrjohnmuller at 5:37 AM on July 11 [18 favorites]
posted by mrjohnmuller at 5:37 AM on July 11 [18 favorites]
The good news is that this settles the issue because all future worse decline in Biden's noggin will now squarely be a conspiracy on the part of NYT and cyrptofascists. You can safely ignore all live performances. If he collapses into a coma on stage, the approved description is "Biden's latest adorable gaffe".
posted by No Climate - No Food, No Food - No Future. at 5:38 AM on July 11 [3 favorites]
posted by No Climate - No Food, No Food - No Future. at 5:38 AM on July 11 [3 favorites]
Due to the empowerment of the president engineered by Trump's Supreme Court, I think it is much too dangerous to hold back a vote for whoever the democrat is (I had a democratic ballot in the primaries, which I used to vote on issues, but I didn't check the box for presidential candidate, as I found the idea of voting for Biden distasteful). I would literally vote for a dogturd over voting for Donald Trump. If that's an endorsement of Joe Biden for president, so be it.
I do not think I am a usual voter. I think most voters will be so alarmed at the prospect of voting for Biden in his state that it poses a serious risk.
I think Biden should resign, this afternoon, and Harris should run.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 5:40 AM on July 11 [12 favorites]
I do not think I am a usual voter. I think most voters will be so alarmed at the prospect of voting for Biden in his state that it poses a serious risk.
I think Biden should resign, this afternoon, and Harris should run.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 5:40 AM on July 11 [12 favorites]
One of the things I don't see addressed a lot in this discussion is the way the call for throwing out the expressed will of actual voters (in the primary) is how that intersects with the other side of the political moment: this is a time when fascists are throwing out established institutions in favor of wealth and wealthy individuals.
I get that we have a problem, not just in the specific circumstances of "Biden is four years older than he was four years ago" but also in the (lack of) depth of the Dem bench and the inability of the party's messaging machine to message like one. But at the same time, it's not all on one guy to save us from Trump, even if the one guy is Biden. It's on all of us. "It's on one guy to stop Trump" is basically fascist talk: the other side of the coin from the whole Trump "I am the only one who can save us from [bogeyman of the week]".
I'm not being flippant here. I get that we're all scared of a Trump presidency and of Biden losing. I'm not saying "we'll all survive this" because some of us won't. But I'm also scared of, or at least really concerned by, the prospect of letting the NYT set up a panic that undercuts another institution right now.
posted by gentlyepigrams at 5:48 AM on July 11 [11 favorites]
I get that we have a problem, not just in the specific circumstances of "Biden is four years older than he was four years ago" but also in the (lack of) depth of the Dem bench and the inability of the party's messaging machine to message like one. But at the same time, it's not all on one guy to save us from Trump, even if the one guy is Biden. It's on all of us. "It's on one guy to stop Trump" is basically fascist talk: the other side of the coin from the whole Trump "I am the only one who can save us from [bogeyman of the week]".
I'm not being flippant here. I get that we're all scared of a Trump presidency and of Biden losing. I'm not saying "we'll all survive this" because some of us won't. But I'm also scared of, or at least really concerned by, the prospect of letting the NYT set up a panic that undercuts another institution right now.
posted by gentlyepigrams at 5:48 AM on July 11 [11 favorites]
Would any of this have mattered nearly as much if the Democrat party had operated an effective ground game over the past several years? By that, I mean getting out there, knocking on doors (particularly in districts that aren’t traditionally favourable to them) reminding / convincing folk of the good that other commenters in this thread say this presidency has brought to ordinary citizens.
While acknowledging the bad faith amplification provided by the NYT, the intensity with which this brouhaha is hitting and the ease with which it’s set party faithful publicly against each other would suggest that said ground game hasn’t been effective or that there’s a lack of faith in its likely abilities in the lead up to polling day.
posted by Lesser Spotted Potoroo at 5:49 AM on July 11 [4 favorites]
While acknowledging the bad faith amplification provided by the NYT, the intensity with which this brouhaha is hitting and the ease with which it’s set party faithful publicly against each other would suggest that said ground game hasn’t been effective or that there’s a lack of faith in its likely abilities in the lead up to polling day.
posted by Lesser Spotted Potoroo at 5:49 AM on July 11 [4 favorites]
It's strange to go from the prior thread, which had settled into a sort of prolonged trauma response as we all admitted we weren't sure what would or should happen next, to find this one where people are back to insulting anyone who has concerns over Biden.
People who aren't paying that much attention post at the beginning of a thread. By the end of the thread, it is just people who are literally losing their minds over this looming catastrophe. I predict this thread goes the same way after a few hundred comments, assuming Biden is still running by then.
posted by snofoam at 5:56 AM on July 11 [9 favorites]
People who aren't paying that much attention post at the beginning of a thread. By the end of the thread, it is just people who are literally losing their minds over this looming catastrophe. I predict this thread goes the same way after a few hundred comments, assuming Biden is still running by then.
posted by snofoam at 5:56 AM on July 11 [9 favorites]
gentlepigrams - I for one consider that primary a real / effective primary. Was there a debate? The primary was engineered by the Biden campaign to undercut any real debate / opposition and since noone chose to do anything about it here we are. I dont think its uncommon to have that setup when reelecting a president for term 2 but someone whose job it is to lead the dems to presidency regardless of candidate clearly messed up.
posted by web5.0 at 5:56 AM on July 11
posted by web5.0 at 5:56 AM on July 11
I see the argument about undermining the voters’ primary choices in theory, but in practice there simply wasn’t a real Biden alternative on the ballot.
I think replacing Biden with Harris also addresses this problem pretty well, since Biden has been pretty clear about keeping her as VP, so most people who voted for him on the primary ballot would have assumed she’d take over if something happened to him.
posted by smelendez at 5:59 AM on July 11 [7 favorites]
I think replacing Biden with Harris also addresses this problem pretty well, since Biden has been pretty clear about keeping her as VP, so most people who voted for him on the primary ballot would have assumed she’d take over if something happened to him.
posted by smelendez at 5:59 AM on July 11 [7 favorites]
As if personal opinions aren't all we have here, Press Butt.on to Check.
And... I would argue anyone who identifies as, like, impacted by American politics has a right to comment here, or at least every American voter, or at least every likely Democrat voter, or at least every progressive democrat voter. Do you seriously mean only people who are "progressive Democrats" (by which I assume you mean party members(?)) should comment here? lol.
finally, of course this is serious. the people pretending this is unserious are the lackadaisical party who have basically sleepwalked into a terrible position in the polls and an incredibly easy-to-attack candidate, while coalescing into a cult of personality around their leader and denigrating anyone who dares say they might have a problem. That's some Blue MAGA shit for you right there.
posted by sagc at 5:59 AM on July 11 [5 favorites]
And... I would argue anyone who identifies as, like, impacted by American politics has a right to comment here, or at least every American voter, or at least every likely Democrat voter, or at least every progressive democrat voter. Do you seriously mean only people who are "progressive Democrats" (by which I assume you mean party members(?)) should comment here? lol.
finally, of course this is serious. the people pretending this is unserious are the lackadaisical party who have basically sleepwalked into a terrible position in the polls and an incredibly easy-to-attack candidate, while coalescing into a cult of personality around their leader and denigrating anyone who dares say they might have a problem. That's some Blue MAGA shit for you right there.
posted by sagc at 5:59 AM on July 11 [5 favorites]
throwing out the expressed will of actual voters
I do absolutely see gentlyepigram's point here. However, if there had been a competitive primary, I think it's possible that the problems with Biden might have come into focus earlier. I don't agree with the calls for a new mini-primary (which sounds like a nightmare), but I do understand the desire for a do-over now that we have more information on Biden's state of health and how it will affect his campaign, information that was not really available earlier.
posted by mittens at 6:05 AM on July 11 [7 favorites]
I do absolutely see gentlyepigram's point here. However, if there had been a competitive primary, I think it's possible that the problems with Biden might have come into focus earlier. I don't agree with the calls for a new mini-primary (which sounds like a nightmare), but I do understand the desire for a do-over now that we have more information on Biden's state of health and how it will affect his campaign, information that was not really available earlier.
posted by mittens at 6:05 AM on July 11 [7 favorites]
I think Biden should resign, this afternoon, and Harris should run.
I think Biden achieved a lot, but I also think this. And, to be clear, by resign, I mean that he should resign the presidency so Harris can run as the sitting president. If there is more wrangling behind the scenes to make sure this goes well, then sure, but the sooner the better. And the overwhelming reason I want this is because I think it is the strongest chance of beating Trump. (It is also true that I think Biden being so old is problematic on its own to some degree.) I would, of course, also still vote for Biden if it came to that.
posted by snofoam at 6:06 AM on July 11 [6 favorites]
I think Biden achieved a lot, but I also think this. And, to be clear, by resign, I mean that he should resign the presidency so Harris can run as the sitting president. If there is more wrangling behind the scenes to make sure this goes well, then sure, but the sooner the better. And the overwhelming reason I want this is because I think it is the strongest chance of beating Trump. (It is also true that I think Biden being so old is problematic on its own to some degree.) I would, of course, also still vote for Biden if it came to that.
posted by snofoam at 6:06 AM on July 11 [6 favorites]
Most Democrats want Biden to drop out, but overall race is static, poll finds
More than half of Democrats say Biden should end his candidacy. Overall, 2 in 3 adults say the president should step aside, including more than 7 in 10 independents. [...]
The poll finds Biden and former president Donald Trump in a dead heat in the contest for the popular vote, with both candidates receiving 46 percent support among registered voters. Those numbers are nearly identical to the results of an ABC-Ipsos poll in April.
That finding is at odds with some other recent public polls. Across eight other post-debate national polls tracked by The Post, Trump leads by 3.5 percentage points on average, compared with a one-point Trump edge in those same polls before the debate. Biden led Trump by between nine and 11 points in averages of public polls at this point in the campaign four years ago. He ended up winning by 4.5 points.
posted by whir at 6:06 AM on July 11 [1 favorite]
More than half of Democrats say Biden should end his candidacy. Overall, 2 in 3 adults say the president should step aside, including more than 7 in 10 independents. [...]
The poll finds Biden and former president Donald Trump in a dead heat in the contest for the popular vote, with both candidates receiving 46 percent support among registered voters. Those numbers are nearly identical to the results of an ABC-Ipsos poll in April.
That finding is at odds with some other recent public polls. Across eight other post-debate national polls tracked by The Post, Trump leads by 3.5 percentage points on average, compared with a one-point Trump edge in those same polls before the debate. Biden led Trump by between nine and 11 points in averages of public polls at this point in the campaign four years ago. He ended up winning by 4.5 points.
posted by whir at 6:06 AM on July 11 [1 favorite]
Mod note: One comment removed. Please remember the Guidelines and "allow others to express themselves".
posted by Brandon Blatcher (staff) at 6:07 AM on July 11 [5 favorites]
posted by Brandon Blatcher (staff) at 6:07 AM on July 11 [5 favorites]
An election is not particularly democratic when its not contested. Our norm is not to challenge an incumbent president in your party and Biden is the nominee as a result of that norm, not the will of the voters. Plus, I'm sure if someone mounted a serious primary challenge they'd face serious pressure from the party and administrtion. Who from the Biden administration was saying in 2023, lets leave this nomination to a fair and open democratic process?
On the subject of union endorsements: they're particularly bad measures in this moment since they're not meant to be quick processes and they don't address the political question we actually face. Union endorsement processes take significant time to measure the will of the members and formally set up. We've had a sudden and disturbing recent event (a debate performance so bad it calls into question the President's ability to speak and think extemporaneously, among other things). I'm betting unions haven't reassessed their stances from before the debate. Might not make a difference, but it also doesn't make strategic sense for them to rattle the party or administration right now.
Further, the questions we face now is, should Biden be the nominee, or someone else from the Democratic party like Kamala Harris? The unions have endorsed Biden over Trump. That doesn't reflect our current question. I strongly suspect they'll support whoever the Dem nominee is.
So if you're worried that you're somehow going against the will of the working class by harboring skepticism about Biden's abilities and preferring a different nominee, I think you can rest easy.
posted by Hume at 6:07 AM on July 11 [10 favorites]
On the subject of union endorsements: they're particularly bad measures in this moment since they're not meant to be quick processes and they don't address the political question we actually face. Union endorsement processes take significant time to measure the will of the members and formally set up. We've had a sudden and disturbing recent event (a debate performance so bad it calls into question the President's ability to speak and think extemporaneously, among other things). I'm betting unions haven't reassessed their stances from before the debate. Might not make a difference, but it also doesn't make strategic sense for them to rattle the party or administration right now.
Further, the questions we face now is, should Biden be the nominee, or someone else from the Democratic party like Kamala Harris? The unions have endorsed Biden over Trump. That doesn't reflect our current question. I strongly suspect they'll support whoever the Dem nominee is.
So if you're worried that you're somehow going against the will of the working class by harboring skepticism about Biden's abilities and preferring a different nominee, I think you can rest easy.
posted by Hume at 6:07 AM on July 11 [10 favorites]
The only way to win a Presidential election is by maintaining a consistent message and not undermining your own candidate. The Republicans are good at this and the Democrats are not. When the Democrats have put aside their differences and gotten behind the candidate, we have won.
We are all aware of Biden's shortcomings, although I believe some of them are being exaggerated (no, he's not senile or unable to do the job). We're also aware, or we should be, of the good work he has done in the job for the last four years. The election begins in earnest at the conventions, and if we can get over ourselves and support Biden, he will win. Elections are decided by (a) turnout, and (b) persuading the mealy middle who don't decide until election day. Both of those things are impacted by strong public support for the candidate.
Let's not pretend this is some conspiracy by the DNC. The DNC is a fundraising clearinghouse. It neither picks the candidates nor has any power to replace them. Besides, no one has seriously run against an incumbent President in a primary since 1980, and we know how that turned out. The dangers of replacing an incumbent President this close to the election should be clear -- the minority of voters who are calling for Biden to step down can't even agree on who should take his place. I've heard Harris, Whitmer, Pritzker, Newsom, Buttigieg, and several others. Why roll the dice and give up the advantage of running the only person who's actually beaten Donald Trump?
Yes, Biden is old. Yes, he's never been a good speaker and he's getting worse. But he's also doing the work and is our best shot at combating fascism. I say let's get behind him, win this election, and then start working like hell on building candidates for 2028.
posted by Ben Trismegistus at 6:14 AM on July 11 [6 favorites]
We are all aware of Biden's shortcomings, although I believe some of them are being exaggerated (no, he's not senile or unable to do the job). We're also aware, or we should be, of the good work he has done in the job for the last four years. The election begins in earnest at the conventions, and if we can get over ourselves and support Biden, he will win. Elections are decided by (a) turnout, and (b) persuading the mealy middle who don't decide until election day. Both of those things are impacted by strong public support for the candidate.
Let's not pretend this is some conspiracy by the DNC. The DNC is a fundraising clearinghouse. It neither picks the candidates nor has any power to replace them. Besides, no one has seriously run against an incumbent President in a primary since 1980, and we know how that turned out. The dangers of replacing an incumbent President this close to the election should be clear -- the minority of voters who are calling for Biden to step down can't even agree on who should take his place. I've heard Harris, Whitmer, Pritzker, Newsom, Buttigieg, and several others. Why roll the dice and give up the advantage of running the only person who's actually beaten Donald Trump?
Yes, Biden is old. Yes, he's never been a good speaker and he's getting worse. But he's also doing the work and is our best shot at combating fascism. I say let's get behind him, win this election, and then start working like hell on building candidates for 2028.
posted by Ben Trismegistus at 6:14 AM on July 11 [6 favorites]
Mod note: Another comment removed. Let's also keep the Content Policy in mind and avoid calling anyone or any group "dumb"
posted by Brandon Blatcher (staff) at 6:14 AM on July 11 [2 favorites]
posted by Brandon Blatcher (staff) at 6:14 AM on July 11 [2 favorites]
I find it profoundly amusing how in 2020, establishment Dems panicked over the thought of Bernie Sanders winning the nomination with broad progressive support, so they coalesced behind Biden, despite his age being an obvious issue even then.
Now, those same establishment Dems are panicking again, but this time the Sanders/AOC faction progressives are having to reassure *them* to keep calm and stay the course.
Finally, if you *really* want to see what is driving the knives-out-for-biden campaign in the media, consider who is the kind of person that owns a media conglomerate (hint: it rhymes with "schmoligarch"), and then take a look at this article: IRS collects milestone $1 billion in back taxes from high-wealth taxpayers.
posted by mrjohnmuller at 6:19 AM on July 11 [12 favorites]
Now, those same establishment Dems are panicking again, but this time the Sanders/AOC faction progressives are having to reassure *them* to keep calm and stay the course.
Finally, if you *really* want to see what is driving the knives-out-for-biden campaign in the media, consider who is the kind of person that owns a media conglomerate (hint: it rhymes with "schmoligarch"), and then take a look at this article: IRS collects milestone $1 billion in back taxes from high-wealth taxpayers.
posted by mrjohnmuller at 6:19 AM on July 11 [12 favorites]
Anything drastic in the closing days would feel like a coup, and that wont work.
I fucking hate how we're not going to to anything to stop a guy who already attempted one coup and who has already promised another coup complete with military tribunals of public figures because even holding Trump accountable for the laws he broke would "feel like a coup" to some ambiguous group of people (his supporters? independent voters? regular customers at some fictitious diner in middle America? who?)
It's been the same story for the past four years: "Oh, but you can't indict Trump, that would look like election interference!" and "We have to politely give him every opportunity to return those nuclear secrets he stole because anything less than that has bad optics!".
You know what also felt like a coup? January 6th 2021.
Allowing the Overton window to shift so much that an armed insurrection against the Capitol is an acceptable campaign topic for Republicans is the epic failure of our age, and I'm angry and scared that Democrats allowed it to happen and don't seem to have any other plan for fighting the rise of authoritarianism other than "vote harder".
posted by RonButNotStupid at 6:23 AM on July 11 [22 favorites]
I fucking hate how we're not going to to anything to stop a guy who already attempted one coup and who has already promised another coup complete with military tribunals of public figures because even holding Trump accountable for the laws he broke would "feel like a coup" to some ambiguous group of people (his supporters? independent voters? regular customers at some fictitious diner in middle America? who?)
It's been the same story for the past four years: "Oh, but you can't indict Trump, that would look like election interference!" and "We have to politely give him every opportunity to return those nuclear secrets he stole because anything less than that has bad optics!".
You know what also felt like a coup? January 6th 2021.
Allowing the Overton window to shift so much that an armed insurrection against the Capitol is an acceptable campaign topic for Republicans is the epic failure of our age, and I'm angry and scared that Democrats allowed it to happen and don't seem to have any other plan for fighting the rise of authoritarianism other than "vote harder".
posted by RonButNotStupid at 6:23 AM on July 11 [22 favorites]
I don't think the progressives are trying to reassure the centrists in any way. They just don't want to take the brunt of it when Biden loses and the same centrists look around for someone to blame, other than Biden or themselves; obviously, they can't be at fault.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 6:24 AM on July 11 [15 favorites]
posted by kittens for breakfast at 6:24 AM on July 11 [15 favorites]
When the Democrats have put aside their differences and gotten behind the candidate, we have won.
Really? What about all the times democrats have lost? Was it never because there is a bad candidate and always because the democrats refused to support the candidate? Given that elections are primarily decided by independent voters in a handful of swing states, this doesn't really make sense to me.
Democrats have mostly won when they have strong candidates, or when the republicans have had a weak one. Or because Ross Perot was a spoiler (which maybe wouldn't have happened if GHWB was a stronger candidate).
I've noted it a few times since the debate, but in all of these threads no one ever proposes what Biden could do to win the election, or to be a candidate that has a chance of winning the election.*
* There was a serious suggestion that he lean into being grandpa Joe and publicly assign key tasks to young people with the energy to work on them.
posted by snofoam at 6:27 AM on July 11 [9 favorites]
Really? What about all the times democrats have lost? Was it never because there is a bad candidate and always because the democrats refused to support the candidate? Given that elections are primarily decided by independent voters in a handful of swing states, this doesn't really make sense to me.
Democrats have mostly won when they have strong candidates, or when the republicans have had a weak one. Or because Ross Perot was a spoiler (which maybe wouldn't have happened if GHWB was a stronger candidate).
I've noted it a few times since the debate, but in all of these threads no one ever proposes what Biden could do to win the election, or to be a candidate that has a chance of winning the election.*
* There was a serious suggestion that he lean into being grandpa Joe and publicly assign key tasks to young people with the energy to work on them.
posted by snofoam at 6:27 AM on July 11 [9 favorites]
Or, hear me out, they want Biden to win, so that they can continue to have influence in shaping his administrations policy.
posted by mrjohnmuller at 6:27 AM on July 11 [6 favorites]
posted by mrjohnmuller at 6:27 AM on July 11 [6 favorites]
Calling on the Democratic Party or the unions or whoever to Do Something only works if it's a unified call with strong organization and clear spokespeople. And that's not what's happening here; this is more like atomized panic, and most of that panic is about what other people seem like they will or won't do.
So I find myself asking this: what can we here -- working alongside people in our virtual and physical communities -- do right now and in the near-term future? And of those things, what should we be doing? "We" here is not the Democratic Party and its leadership.
posted by kewb at 6:32 AM on July 11 [4 favorites]
So I find myself asking this: what can we here -- working alongside people in our virtual and physical communities -- do right now and in the near-term future? And of those things, what should we be doing? "We" here is not the Democratic Party and its leadership.
posted by kewb at 6:32 AM on July 11 [4 favorites]
I think there is a decent argument that progressives benefit from supporting Biden now for a variety of reasons. It's a freebie chance to support the party mainstream with no repercussions. Either the mainstream of the party will oust Biden or they won't, and the progressives get to say, "hey, we're toeing the line for the party, so also give us some of what we want." And they get to say that no matter what happens to Biden.
If Biden stays, yes, he has been doing some progressive stuff and they can keep working with him. Also, they're generally not in districts that make them vulnerable to losing if Biden drags the party down. And whoever might replace Biden is going to be a mainstream candidate, so it's not like they are giving up the chance of someone they like a lot more.
posted by snofoam at 6:34 AM on July 11 [11 favorites]
If Biden stays, yes, he has been doing some progressive stuff and they can keep working with him. Also, they're generally not in districts that make them vulnerable to losing if Biden drags the party down. And whoever might replace Biden is going to be a mainstream candidate, so it's not like they are giving up the chance of someone they like a lot more.
posted by snofoam at 6:34 AM on July 11 [11 favorites]
Since it’s all media conspiracy / ageism my question to the Joevers is what would it take for you to say “he’s unfit”? If the answer is “nothing,” then you might want to reexamine your position.
posted by iamck at 6:40 AM on July 11 [6 favorites]
posted by iamck at 6:40 AM on July 11 [6 favorites]
Biden should provide evidence he can beat Trump, Democratic leaders say
The calls came as top union leaders, more lawmakers and even some campaign staff members expressed grave concerns about his candidacy.
posted by NotLost at 6:43 AM on July 11
The calls came as top union leaders, more lawmakers and even some campaign staff members expressed grave concerns about his candidacy.
posted by NotLost at 6:43 AM on July 11
Two of the most outspoken leaders were Sara Nelson, the president of the Association of Flight Attendants, and Shawn Fain, the president of the United Auto Workers, two of Biden’s biggest labor allies.
posted by NotLost at 6:44 AM on July 11 [1 favorite]
posted by NotLost at 6:44 AM on July 11 [1 favorite]
A study by CSSLab on the NTY's selective framing of the age issue around Biden. Well worth having a look.
posted by Phlegmco(tm) at 11:22 PM on July 10
Thanks for this Phlegmco - this is so much what I think about the NYT coverage and it is doing such damage to the country.
posted by bluesky43 at 6:56 AM on July 11 [2 favorites]
posted by Phlegmco(tm) at 11:22 PM on July 10
Thanks for this Phlegmco - this is so much what I think about the NYT coverage and it is doing such damage to the country.
posted by bluesky43 at 6:56 AM on July 11 [2 favorites]
All of this mess serves to make us forget there is currently legitimacy for Harris because every single voter had this plan B in mind and pulled the lever, some twice.
One thing that is bothering me is that this feels like Ackerman wanting Gay out of Harvard. Rich person does not like recipient of money to disobey. Even when the recip is carrying the water, if they arent doing it just right, or dont look the part, whatever, then rich persons will raise hell. Pretty sure the howling and immediate call for stepping down is coming from rich donors, via their press. It bothers me very much.
Of course there is enough plausibilty to prompt honest people to voice their anxiety. I dont think Hyde of Guardian is on the take, or any Metafilter accounts, etc. But the people who have to work with the aftermath are saying press on.
Here is the harm: if we spend the time assuming Biden is walking dead - which none of us will truly know - then this tarnishes Harris if/when she is called to serve under any circumstances. She was there the whole time, is she unfit, etc. We will forget we already wanted this.
I do think that an open and frank discussion from Biden about what the conditions are for transfer might be helpful, if done well. He is quite good about talking about his limitations, and they need to tell voters that this is the same plan all tickets have, etc.
posted by drowsy at 6:57 AM on July 11 [1 favorite]
One thing that is bothering me is that this feels like Ackerman wanting Gay out of Harvard. Rich person does not like recipient of money to disobey. Even when the recip is carrying the water, if they arent doing it just right, or dont look the part, whatever, then rich persons will raise hell. Pretty sure the howling and immediate call for stepping down is coming from rich donors, via their press. It bothers me very much.
Of course there is enough plausibilty to prompt honest people to voice their anxiety. I dont think Hyde of Guardian is on the take, or any Metafilter accounts, etc. But the people who have to work with the aftermath are saying press on.
Here is the harm: if we spend the time assuming Biden is walking dead - which none of us will truly know - then this tarnishes Harris if/when she is called to serve under any circumstances. She was there the whole time, is she unfit, etc. We will forget we already wanted this.
I do think that an open and frank discussion from Biden about what the conditions are for transfer might be helpful, if done well. He is quite good about talking about his limitations, and they need to tell voters that this is the same plan all tickets have, etc.
posted by drowsy at 6:57 AM on July 11 [1 favorite]
Project 2025 is an open secret. What are Democrats doing in response?
Are they working out their own plans for how to strengthen our institutions and make them more resilient against this kind of takeover?
Are they coming up with contingency plans for how to fight/delay/disrupt Project 2025's implementation with whatever limited resources they might control should the worst happen?
Seriously. What's the plan? It can't just be "get a Democrat elected to the White House and pray that there's multiple Supreme Court vacancies coincident with a Democratic majority in the Senate"
I know it's tired and cliche to say that Democrats need a vision, but they at least need a fucking plan.
posted by RonButNotStupid at 6:58 AM on July 11 [19 favorites]
Are they working out their own plans for how to strengthen our institutions and make them more resilient against this kind of takeover?
Are they coming up with contingency plans for how to fight/delay/disrupt Project 2025's implementation with whatever limited resources they might control should the worst happen?
Seriously. What's the plan? It can't just be "get a Democrat elected to the White House and pray that there's multiple Supreme Court vacancies coincident with a Democratic majority in the Senate"
I know it's tired and cliche to say that Democrats need a vision, but they at least need a fucking plan.
posted by RonButNotStupid at 6:58 AM on July 11 [19 favorites]
Since it’s all media conspiracy / ageism my question to the Joevers is what would it take for you to say “he’s unfit”? If the answer is “nothing,” then you might want to reexamine your position.
You know what makes me think he's fit for the job? The fact that we all know he understands the power the Supreme Court recently gave him, and he rejects it. The fact that, no matter what, he will use power and influence to undo that terrible trauma that was done to our democracy. What would make me think he's unfit is if he started acting like a different person than who he is.
I was as horrified by the debate as anyone, but you know what? I don't need a president who is fast. I need a president who is wise, whose character I trust, and who knows how to delegate and use connections to get stuff done.
Honestly, isn't that the biggest thing we need for it democracy right now, someone who functions through delegating power and locating quiet solutions, rather than someone whose individual physicality is seen as the source of his political potency?
And I'm sure the doomsayers think I'm naive. Okay.
The best thing George Washington ever did for this country was quit. It was what was needed at that time, in those circumstances, because it proved he was no king but a limited public servant. Now we are at a pivotal point in this country where, I think, we need a president who fights for that same standard. I think, in some ways, there is no one better positioned to reject the power that the presidency now inappropriately has than an elder whose last acts in office will be the last word to his legacy.
posted by meese at 7:08 AM on July 11 [12 favorites]
You know what makes me think he's fit for the job? The fact that we all know he understands the power the Supreme Court recently gave him, and he rejects it. The fact that, no matter what, he will use power and influence to undo that terrible trauma that was done to our democracy. What would make me think he's unfit is if he started acting like a different person than who he is.
I was as horrified by the debate as anyone, but you know what? I don't need a president who is fast. I need a president who is wise, whose character I trust, and who knows how to delegate and use connections to get stuff done.
Honestly, isn't that the biggest thing we need for it democracy right now, someone who functions through delegating power and locating quiet solutions, rather than someone whose individual physicality is seen as the source of his political potency?
And I'm sure the doomsayers think I'm naive. Okay.
The best thing George Washington ever did for this country was quit. It was what was needed at that time, in those circumstances, because it proved he was no king but a limited public servant. Now we are at a pivotal point in this country where, I think, we need a president who fights for that same standard. I think, in some ways, there is no one better positioned to reject the power that the presidency now inappropriately has than an elder whose last acts in office will be the last word to his legacy.
posted by meese at 7:08 AM on July 11 [12 favorites]
I'd happily trade in any personal integrity Biden has and any tatters of legitimacy the US government retains for a soft coup that prevents the destruction of basic human rights in the US. President for Life Biden would be way better than President for Life Trump. Even if neither one lasted another four years.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 7:12 AM on July 11 [4 favorites]
posted by The Manwich Horror at 7:12 AM on July 11 [4 favorites]
"The fact that, no matter what, he will use power and influence to undo that terrible trauma that was done to our democracy."
Will he, though? Has he, beyond replacement value for the past 4 years? Is this the campaign of someone trying their hardest?
posted by sagc at 7:17 AM on July 11 [9 favorites]
Will he, though? Has he, beyond replacement value for the past 4 years? Is this the campaign of someone trying their hardest?
posted by sagc at 7:17 AM on July 11 [9 favorites]
Sticking with Biden sucks because it sure looks like he's not fit, and especially because it looks like voters in swing states feel the same way.
And this is going to affect down ticket races, and how people feel about the honesty of such candidates. Biden needs to go yesterday, but I think what we are learning is that he won’t, because that would require admitting he’s deteriorating, which is apparently a bridge too far.
posted by corb at 7:20 AM on July 11 [9 favorites]
And this is going to affect down ticket races, and how people feel about the honesty of such candidates. Biden needs to go yesterday, but I think what we are learning is that he won’t, because that would require admitting he’s deteriorating, which is apparently a bridge too far.
posted by corb at 7:20 AM on July 11 [9 favorites]
Biden didn't know whether or not he watched his own debate performance, thats his answer from the Stephanopolis interview he did to allay fears of his senility.
He sent a letter to congressional democrats because he couldn't handle a live meeting.
Sure the NYT is terrible, has been for my whole life, but President Feinstein is not ok, and the louder you pretend otherwise the less trust you engender.
posted by No Climate - No Food, No Food - No Future. at 7:24 AM on July 11 [7 favorites]
He sent a letter to congressional democrats because he couldn't handle a live meeting.
Sure the NYT is terrible, has been for my whole life, but President Feinstein is not ok, and the louder you pretend otherwise the less trust you engender.
posted by No Climate - No Food, No Food - No Future. at 7:24 AM on July 11 [7 favorites]
I mean, I kind of get it, if there was an openly senile candidate on the ballot who nevertheless supported my political goals, I would also still vote for him. But then again, if there was even one candidate who I agreed with in any capacity, it would be very slim picking to find a replacement. For Biden there have to be a couple dozen other white male career politicians who want to kill arabs and latinos and fondly reminesce about rumbles they got into with black teens in their youth and openly oppose universal healthcare and are squeamish about abortion. The only reason to stick with this one is a pathological inability to admit fault.
posted by jy4m at 7:27 AM on July 11 [2 favorites]
posted by jy4m at 7:27 AM on July 11 [2 favorites]
It has always been a bridge too far. Without commenting on Biden, no one has ever said oh yes the President is failing health-wise.
posted by tiny frying pan at 7:28 AM on July 11
posted by tiny frying pan at 7:28 AM on July 11
I was going to write a comment but RonButNotStupid said it better.
posted by wittgenstein at 7:34 AM on July 11 [1 favorite]
posted by wittgenstein at 7:34 AM on July 11 [1 favorite]
And I am pretty sure that sticking with Biden gives us another four years of Trump.
I like the optimism!
posted by rhymedirective at 7:35 AM on July 11 [1 favorite]
I like the optimism!
posted by rhymedirective at 7:35 AM on July 11 [1 favorite]
It's only good PR for Biden and his backers to maintain a solid front, right up until its decided to go public with a handoff. The less disagreement in public the better. I see this unfolding as Biden spending a weekend with family and advisors, taking a walk in the woods, conversing with God, etc, then a really well-managed press conference/coronation/event in front of a friendly audience where he restates his mission, his ideals and goals, and how he now believes that its time to pass the torch. I don't think he should resign the presidency, I think he should stay put and kick GOP ass, while Harris campaigns hard.
Announcement timing? The DNC convention is too late. Sooner is better: something that distracts from or messes up the RNC convention would be ideal. And of course acclaiming and focusing on Harris at the DNC convention would put that event above the fold, too.
posted by Artful Codger at 7:38 AM on July 11 [2 favorites]
Announcement timing? The DNC convention is too late. Sooner is better: something that distracts from or messes up the RNC convention would be ideal. And of course acclaiming and focusing on Harris at the DNC convention would put that event above the fold, too.
posted by Artful Codger at 7:38 AM on July 11 [2 favorites]
I like the optimism!
You don't win elections by willpower and positive visualization.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 7:44 AM on July 11 [7 favorites]
You don't win elections by willpower and positive visualization.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 7:44 AM on July 11 [7 favorites]
Question for the hive-mind: what if Biden stays in but announces his intention to step down in the next 12 to 24 months? Putting Harris more forward in campaigning, as well as stirring some enthusiasm from the next VP hopefuls?
posted by Artful Codger at 8:02 AM on July 11
posted by Artful Codger at 8:02 AM on July 11
Really? What about all the times democrats have lost? Was it never because there is a bad candidate and always because the democrats refused to support the candidate? Given that elections are primarily decided by independent voters in a handful of swing states, this doesn't really make sense to me.
Yes. Republicans have been rallying around bad candidates my entire life, and when they do, they win. They know better than we do that there is no perfect, consensus candidate.
There has not been a losing Democratic nominee during my lifetime that wouldn't have been a better President than the Republican who won. But the public perception, even (especially?) among Democrats was that Dukakis was a joke, Gore was a bore, Hillary was a scold.
posted by Ben Trismegistus at 8:06 AM on July 11 [6 favorites]
Yes. Republicans have been rallying around bad candidates my entire life, and when they do, they win. They know better than we do that there is no perfect, consensus candidate.
There has not been a losing Democratic nominee during my lifetime that wouldn't have been a better President than the Republican who won. But the public perception, even (especially?) among Democrats was that Dukakis was a joke, Gore was a bore, Hillary was a scold.
posted by Ben Trismegistus at 8:06 AM on July 11 [6 favorites]
People who have made up their mind to support the Republican candidate, whether directly or indirectly, will always have some sort of justification as to why they really wanted to vote Dem, but just couldn't because of whatever the rationalization of the day is.
posted by mrjohnmuller at 8:12 AM on July 11
posted by mrjohnmuller at 8:12 AM on July 11
People who have made up their mind to support the Republican candidate, whether directly or indirectly, will always have some sort of justification as to why they really wanted to vote Dem, but just couldn't because of whatever the rationalization of the day is.
By this logic, you can't possibly have weaker or stronger Democrats. Everyone is either voting D or a cryptofaacist. Nothing can be done to change minds or increase turnout. I don't think that is realistic.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 8:25 AM on July 11 [11 favorites]
By this logic, you can't possibly have weaker or stronger Democrats. Everyone is either voting D or a cryptofaacist. Nothing can be done to change minds or increase turnout. I don't think that is realistic.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 8:25 AM on July 11 [11 favorites]
Biden should not run again. Enough people have reasonably concluded that he is not up to the job that if he runs in November, Trump will win, which would be very bad.
Trump isn't up to the job either, but Biden's presence on the ticket stops the Democrats from pointing that out.
Is any of this fair? Trump is hardly a coherent speaker himself and tried to overthrow an election! No, it's not. But the stakes are very high, and even when things aren't fair, you still have to work with the situation in front of you.
The Decomcrats need to find someone else, and to do that ASAP.
posted by Urtylug at 8:35 AM on July 11 [3 favorites]
Trump isn't up to the job either, but Biden's presence on the ticket stops the Democrats from pointing that out.
Is any of this fair? Trump is hardly a coherent speaker himself and tried to overthrow an election! No, it's not. But the stakes are very high, and even when things aren't fair, you still have to work with the situation in front of you.
The Decomcrats need to find someone else, and to do that ASAP.
posted by Urtylug at 8:35 AM on July 11 [3 favorites]
If the distance between the Republican and Democratic platforms is so vast that even the "weakest" Dem candidate is preferable to the alternative, then how am I wrong exactly?
I mean, it's horrible news for democracy, America, and the world in general, but that's where we are. It literally doesn't matter who the Dem candidate is, because the alternative is a full blown fascist dictatorship. It seems like elected US progressives have mostly accepted this reality, while some others are obsessing over replacing Biden at the last minute, as if that would ever happen, or indeed even really matter.
posted by mrjohnmuller at 8:37 AM on July 11 [3 favorites]
I mean, it's horrible news for democracy, America, and the world in general, but that's where we are. It literally doesn't matter who the Dem candidate is, because the alternative is a full blown fascist dictatorship. It seems like elected US progressives have mostly accepted this reality, while some others are obsessing over replacing Biden at the last minute, as if that would ever happen, or indeed even really matter.
posted by mrjohnmuller at 8:37 AM on July 11 [3 favorites]
They know better than we do that there is no perfect, consensus candidate.
“Why can’t we be unified like the other side” is a popular sentiment across the political spectrum, I assure you. It’s a two party system, and party loyalty is high. Most voters are well aware that they are compromising on something.
posted by atoxyl at 8:37 AM on July 11 [3 favorites]
“Why can’t we be unified like the other side” is a popular sentiment across the political spectrum, I assure you. It’s a two party system, and party loyalty is high. Most voters are well aware that they are compromising on something.
posted by atoxyl at 8:37 AM on July 11 [3 favorites]
Announcement timing?
Just to set the table here:
Republican convention is next week, Monday through Thursday.
Democratic convention starts August 19, about five weeks away.
If August 19/20 roll around, and nothing has really changed (no Biden withdrawal, no untimely disabling health events, no overt rebellion within the party, no rules changes at the convention), the machinery will grind forward, Biden will be the nominee, Biden will be on the ballot in all jurisdictions, actual paper ballots will be printed with his name on them in many places, all the legal and elections infrastructure will be gearing up for November. It would be phenomenally more difficult to replace the candidate after that.
In my mind, there's about five weeks during which an effort to replace Biden against his wishes might succeed. It'd still be tough, but it seems like that's the window.
posted by gimonca at 8:40 AM on July 11 [1 favorite]
Just to set the table here:
Republican convention is next week, Monday through Thursday.
Democratic convention starts August 19, about five weeks away.
If August 19/20 roll around, and nothing has really changed (no Biden withdrawal, no untimely disabling health events, no overt rebellion within the party, no rules changes at the convention), the machinery will grind forward, Biden will be the nominee, Biden will be on the ballot in all jurisdictions, actual paper ballots will be printed with his name on them in many places, all the legal and elections infrastructure will be gearing up for November. It would be phenomenally more difficult to replace the candidate after that.
In my mind, there's about five weeks during which an effort to replace Biden against his wishes might succeed. It'd still be tough, but it seems like that's the window.
posted by gimonca at 8:40 AM on July 11 [1 favorite]
Seriously. What's the plan? It can't just be "get a Democrat elected to the White House and pray that there's multiple Supreme Court vacancies coincident with a Democratic majority in the Senate"
I'm terrifically afraid that this is EXACTLY the Dems plan. The GOP plan their attacks for decades, whereas the Dems are always fighting last week's battle. It's how we keep winning elections and yet somehow keep loosing power. Dems scramble to fight and win ONE election, then sit on their hands for the next few years while the GOP keeps sharpening their knives. It's how we lost Row, to be frank. The GOP chipped and whacked away at it for decades. Obama campaigned on codifying it when elected, won with a super-majority, and...did nothing. Hell, we had about a month of lead time when Dobbs was leaked to at least TRY something, even without a supermajority. And the Dems did...nothing. The GOP will take whack after whack at implementing Project 2525 for the next few decades and Dems will ignore it. I desperately want Biden to win, but I have no illusions that, if he beats Trump, he will do anything about Project 2525. This is a problem that requires a MASSIVE overhaul of the Democratic Party, and that's not something that happens from the top down but the bottom up.
posted by UltraMorgnus at 8:45 AM on July 11 [16 favorites]
I'm terrifically afraid that this is EXACTLY the Dems plan. The GOP plan their attacks for decades, whereas the Dems are always fighting last week's battle. It's how we keep winning elections and yet somehow keep loosing power. Dems scramble to fight and win ONE election, then sit on their hands for the next few years while the GOP keeps sharpening their knives. It's how we lost Row, to be frank. The GOP chipped and whacked away at it for decades. Obama campaigned on codifying it when elected, won with a super-majority, and...did nothing. Hell, we had about a month of lead time when Dobbs was leaked to at least TRY something, even without a supermajority. And the Dems did...nothing. The GOP will take whack after whack at implementing Project 2525 for the next few decades and Dems will ignore it. I desperately want Biden to win, but I have no illusions that, if he beats Trump, he will do anything about Project 2525. This is a problem that requires a MASSIVE overhaul of the Democratic Party, and that's not something that happens from the top down but the bottom up.
posted by UltraMorgnus at 8:45 AM on July 11 [16 favorites]
Talking about objectively strong and weak candidates is tricky though because of hindsight bias. The last presidential candidate who still feels “weak” to me in retrospect despite winning is… Bush in 2000, maybe? And that’s a win that famously has an asterisk attached.
posted by atoxyl at 8:53 AM on July 11 [2 favorites]
posted by atoxyl at 8:53 AM on July 11 [2 favorites]
It's really blowing my mind that "we must do all we can to defeat Donald Trump" does not include leveraging the newly granted powers of immunity by SCOTUS. Those are apparently behind a red line (one that is actually a line and not the sliding zone of, "well that doesn't count yet" in Gaza). Very inspiring, a real spirit of urgency there.
We all have to pull together and do everything to defeat Trump, except for the people who can do truly meaningful things to the Trump campaign like read damaging, confidential information from all the various investigations into the public record from a press conference lectern behind the shield of official Presidential Acts. Hell, just read out parts of what caused the mandated report to Five Eyes (or whatever the group was) from the Mar-A-Lago raid!
posted by Slackermagee at 8:54 AM on July 11 [10 favorites]
We all have to pull together and do everything to defeat Trump, except for the people who can do truly meaningful things to the Trump campaign like read damaging, confidential information from all the various investigations into the public record from a press conference lectern behind the shield of official Presidential Acts. Hell, just read out parts of what caused the mandated report to Five Eyes (or whatever the group was) from the Mar-A-Lago raid!
posted by Slackermagee at 8:54 AM on July 11 [10 favorites]
It's really blowing my mind that "we must do all we can to defeat Donald Trump" does not include leveraging the newly granted powers of immunity by SCOTUS. Those are apparently behind a red line (one that is actually a line and not the sliding zone of, "well that doesn't count yet" in Gaza). Very inspiring, a real spirit of urgency there.
Yeah, that's been a LONG running problem with the Left: an unwillingness to fight as dirty as the Right and making use of all of the levers of power available. "When they go low..." etc forever. It's why we keep loosing for winning.
It's why one side treats norms like laws and the other treats norms as inconveniences.
posted by UltraMorgnus at 8:57 AM on July 11 [4 favorites]
Yeah, that's been a LONG running problem with the Left: an unwillingness to fight as dirty as the Right and making use of all of the levers of power available. "When they go low..." etc forever. It's why we keep loosing for winning.
It's why one side treats norms like laws and the other treats norms as inconveniences.
posted by UltraMorgnus at 8:57 AM on July 11 [4 favorites]
It's really blowing my mind that "we must do all we can to defeat Donald Trump" does not include leveraging the newly granted powers of immunity by SCOTUS.
When has the threat of prosecution restrained democrats before and why do you think removing that threat will change their behavior now?
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 9:02 AM on July 11 [2 favorites]
When has the threat of prosecution restrained democrats before and why do you think removing that threat will change their behavior now?
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 9:02 AM on July 11 [2 favorites]
Yeah, that's been a LONG running problem with the Left: an unwillingness to fight as dirty as the Right and making use of all of the levers of power available. "When they go low..." etc forever. It's why we keep loosing for winning.
I am someone who emigrated from a more progressive country in my late twenties, and have now been in the US for thirty some years. Why democrats have lost elections, in my humble opinion, has been because democrats have not offered anything economically or socially substantial until the last few years. Why there is still so much enthusiasm for Biden is precisely because he has done that. First time I have seen someone even modestly approaching what for me are normal and desirable things governments provide for their populace. Up until how, it has just been one neoliberal democrat after another while the country slides further backwards into income inequality.
posted by nanook at 9:09 AM on July 11 [20 favorites]
I am someone who emigrated from a more progressive country in my late twenties, and have now been in the US for thirty some years. Why democrats have lost elections, in my humble opinion, has been because democrats have not offered anything economically or socially substantial until the last few years. Why there is still so much enthusiasm for Biden is precisely because he has done that. First time I have seen someone even modestly approaching what for me are normal and desirable things governments provide for their populace. Up until how, it has just been one neoliberal democrat after another while the country slides further backwards into income inequality.
posted by nanook at 9:09 AM on July 11 [20 favorites]
Scotus would decide Biden was not immune and rubberstamp his conciction and imprisonment. Rules are what your owners use to make you more predicatable, controllable and exploitable.
Pretty much; you can't opt to play your opponent's game and use their rules against them when the game in question is Calvinball.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 9:17 AM on July 11 [4 favorites]
Pretty much; you can't opt to play your opponent's game and use their rules against them when the game in question is Calvinball.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 9:17 AM on July 11 [4 favorites]
This thread is giving me some strong Bernie bro vibes - "only Bernie can save us and you're a fool to support Warren". The idea that this is a purely media-driven narrative is about as believable as the idea that all the Gaza protests were astro-turfed. The truth is that no one knows if Biden can win. No one knows if Harris would win. No one knows whether if Biden loses, it will be because we debated about Biden for a couple of weeks. Everyone's just scared, and I fall on the side of thinking that whichever candidate appears more vital and energetic is going to win. Which right now is Trump.
Comment on this good point:
Would any of this have mattered nearly as much if the Democrat party had operated an effective ground game over the past several years?
I'm sure this varies state-to-state, but the ground game in NC is pretty organized. Having been out to canvas once (so far) and met with the Wake Dems outreach person 1-on-1 for about 30 minutes, it's 100% focused on:
* Start with a list of registered Dems and D-leaning independents.
* Knock on their doors and let them know their vote matters, and name a couple of good local candidates in their districts.
* Ask them what their top issue is an make a note of it.
That's it. There's no trying to flip R or R-leaning independents, or having debates on the doorstep about what Biden has done, or project 2025, or any of that. It's a pure turnout battle: who gets more people who are already on their side to show up?
That's one reason a lot of people are leaning towards a replacement. The Dems rely a lot of younger voters and more informed voters, and it's hard to get them excited about Biden. And (sorry youth!) young people are much less likely to vote, or (my assumption) tend to vote only when they are more excited about the candidate versus seeing it as a civic duty.
In 2022, which had high turnout compared to most midterms, age 18-29 made up 11% of voters but 30% of non-voters. In contrast, age 65+ made up 31% of voters but only 10% of non-voters.. As much as that sucks, it means that there's a case to be made that a younger, more energetic person like Harris would get those folks out. Of course, maybe that then drives old people who are pro-corporate, pro-family values, pro-Israel, etc. to vote Trump. Who the heck knows?
posted by caviar2d2 at 9:23 AM on July 11 [6 favorites]
Comment on this good point:
Would any of this have mattered nearly as much if the Democrat party had operated an effective ground game over the past several years?
I'm sure this varies state-to-state, but the ground game in NC is pretty organized. Having been out to canvas once (so far) and met with the Wake Dems outreach person 1-on-1 for about 30 minutes, it's 100% focused on:
* Start with a list of registered Dems and D-leaning independents.
* Knock on their doors and let them know their vote matters, and name a couple of good local candidates in their districts.
* Ask them what their top issue is an make a note of it.
That's it. There's no trying to flip R or R-leaning independents, or having debates on the doorstep about what Biden has done, or project 2025, or any of that. It's a pure turnout battle: who gets more people who are already on their side to show up?
That's one reason a lot of people are leaning towards a replacement. The Dems rely a lot of younger voters and more informed voters, and it's hard to get them excited about Biden. And (sorry youth!) young people are much less likely to vote, or (my assumption) tend to vote only when they are more excited about the candidate versus seeing it as a civic duty.
In 2022, which had high turnout compared to most midterms, age 18-29 made up 11% of voters but 30% of non-voters. In contrast, age 65+ made up 31% of voters but only 10% of non-voters.. As much as that sucks, it means that there's a case to be made that a younger, more energetic person like Harris would get those folks out. Of course, maybe that then drives old people who are pro-corporate, pro-family values, pro-Israel, etc. to vote Trump. Who the heck knows?
posted by caviar2d2 at 9:23 AM on July 11 [6 favorites]
Again, if all you do is assume the rules will work for the other side then you have pre-emptively surrendered to the branch of government supporting the coup attempt. If you assume that institutions (government or electoral) will save you then you are gambling everything on, "it won't succeed this time". Where are the quiet searches for Union loyalists in Fed LEO roles? Where are the plans to derail SCOTUS taking the case? Where is literally any recognition by any democrat in a position of power anywhere in Washington DC that the old rules are a dead letter, the crisis is here, and they have to play the game that's been setup for them with the hand that's been dealt?
The game is now "avoid permanently losing democracy" and the hand is "five of a kind".
posted by Slackermagee at 9:29 AM on July 11 [3 favorites]
The game is now "avoid permanently losing democracy" and the hand is "five of a kind".
posted by Slackermagee at 9:29 AM on July 11 [3 favorites]
Mod note: One removed for using an ableist slur. See our FAQ section on Microaggressions, specifically here: "Dated/offensive/x-ist language."
posted by loup (staff) at 9:34 AM on July 11 [6 favorites]
posted by loup (staff) at 9:34 AM on July 11 [6 favorites]
As much as that sucks, it means that there's a case to be made that a younger, more energetic person like Harris would get those folks out
On the other hand, it’s arguably one of Biden’s strengths that he polls relatively well with older voters.
posted by atoxyl at 9:37 AM on July 11 [1 favorite]
On the other hand, it’s arguably one of Biden’s strengths that he polls relatively well with older voters.
posted by atoxyl at 9:37 AM on July 11 [1 favorite]
The polls have not been accurate for years, since Dobbs, as far as I can tell. Democrats keep over performing in special elections. That’s all we actually know. So arguments about how Biden or Trump poll in certain states or nationwide don’t hold much weight with me. Same with the idea that a poll shows that the debate didn’t shift support much. We really just don’t know. And therefore, to me, switching the candidate looks like a huge leap into the unknown.
posted by kerf at 9:41 AM on July 11 [3 favorites]
posted by kerf at 9:41 AM on July 11 [3 favorites]
You don't win elections by willpower and positive visualization.
To be clear, it was a comment on "four years" of Trump. If he wins this year, he's not leaving office until he dies.
posted by rhymedirective at 9:43 AM on July 11 [5 favorites]
To be clear, it was a comment on "four years" of Trump. If he wins this year, he's not leaving office until he dies.
posted by rhymedirective at 9:43 AM on July 11 [5 favorites]
The polls have not been accurate for years, since Dobbs, as far as I can tell. Democrats keep over performing in special elections.
In how many elections have they been this wrong enough for Biden to win?
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 9:44 AM on July 11
In how many elections have they been this wrong enough for Biden to win?
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 9:44 AM on July 11
Why there is still so much enthusiasm for Biden is precisely because he has done that.
This.
Biden's platform in 2020 was way more ambitious and progressive than anything Democrats had previously offered. And 2020 was (just like now) an election that had to be won at all costs, and hey--it worked!
But then some people started having buyers remorse. Fascism was defeated (for now) but all those promises about expanded social services, direct payments, increased voter protections, and student loan forgiveness had come due. Manchin and Sinema were so desperate to stop those things from happening, they literally derailed negotiations and threw away their future political careers. So we didn't get those things.
Now we're once again facing an election that must be won at all costs and the path forward is pretty clear: there needs to be some sort of New Deal where in exchange for stopping fascism yet again, Democrats need to offer a similarly ambitious slate of proposals and this time promise that they'll actually deliver them.
And this is where I think the Biden debate fits into things. It's not about Biden's heath or ability, it's about changing the priorities of the Democratic party. There's a very loud group of status-quo Democrats who want to have their cake and eat it too. They want to defeat Trump without having to campaign on the kinds of transformative policies that are necessary to win an election. Biden's health is just a wedge they're using to shake up the entire Democratic party platform.
posted by RonButNotStupid at 9:47 AM on July 11 [17 favorites]
This.
Biden's platform in 2020 was way more ambitious and progressive than anything Democrats had previously offered. And 2020 was (just like now) an election that had to be won at all costs, and hey--it worked!
But then some people started having buyers remorse. Fascism was defeated (for now) but all those promises about expanded social services, direct payments, increased voter protections, and student loan forgiveness had come due. Manchin and Sinema were so desperate to stop those things from happening, they literally derailed negotiations and threw away their future political careers. So we didn't get those things.
Now we're once again facing an election that must be won at all costs and the path forward is pretty clear: there needs to be some sort of New Deal where in exchange for stopping fascism yet again, Democrats need to offer a similarly ambitious slate of proposals and this time promise that they'll actually deliver them.
And this is where I think the Biden debate fits into things. It's not about Biden's heath or ability, it's about changing the priorities of the Democratic party. There's a very loud group of status-quo Democrats who want to have their cake and eat it too. They want to defeat Trump without having to campaign on the kinds of transformative policies that are necessary to win an election. Biden's health is just a wedge they're using to shake up the entire Democratic party platform.
posted by RonButNotStupid at 9:47 AM on July 11 [17 favorites]
To be clear, it was a comment on "four years" of Trump. If he wins this year, he's not leaving office until he dies.
Ahh, I see. That makes a lot more sense. Sorry for the misunderstanding. :)
posted by The Manwich Horror at 9:50 AM on July 11 [3 favorites]
Ahh, I see. That makes a lot more sense. Sorry for the misunderstanding. :)
posted by The Manwich Horror at 9:50 AM on July 11 [3 favorites]
They want to defeat Trump without having to campaign on the kinds of transformative policies that are necessary to win an election.
Except I watched that debate too, and Biden wasn’t campaigning on those either.
posted by corb at 9:51 AM on July 11 [8 favorites]
Except I watched that debate too, and Biden wasn’t campaigning on those either.
posted by corb at 9:51 AM on July 11 [8 favorites]
Biden is holding a press conference today at 6:30 PM at the White House.
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 9:52 AM on July 11 [3 favorites]
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 9:52 AM on July 11 [3 favorites]
I think putting another round of stimulus checks on the agenda for 2025 would get a lot of people out on election day. But given that we didn't even get the full 2000 in 2021, I suspect that isn't happening.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 9:52 AM on July 11 [2 favorites]
posted by The Manwich Horror at 9:52 AM on July 11 [2 favorites]
It really is that simple. Give cash strapped Americans money.
posted by tiny frying pan at 9:57 AM on July 11 [10 favorites]
posted by tiny frying pan at 9:57 AM on July 11 [10 favorites]
It really is that simple. Give cash strapped Americans money.
But then some folks might get money who don't deserve it! And in the US, that's untenable.
posted by Kitteh at 10:00 AM on July 11
But then some folks might get money who don't deserve it! And in the US, that's untenable.
posted by Kitteh at 10:00 AM on July 11
Except I watched that debate too, and Biden wasn’t campaigning on those either.
That's a very good point, and I'm very disappointed/disturbed that he isn't. And I personally go back and forth on a daily basis on whether or not Biden really should step down.
All I can say is that Biden's administration is made up of a lot more people than just him and they were heavily pushing BBB. It's also worth nothing that some of the talk about replacing Biden skips over Harris in favor of people who aren't really that close to the administration (i.e. Pritzger, Newsom)
posted by RonButNotStupid at 10:04 AM on July 11 [2 favorites]
That's a very good point, and I'm very disappointed/disturbed that he isn't. And I personally go back and forth on a daily basis on whether or not Biden really should step down.
All I can say is that Biden's administration is made up of a lot more people than just him and they were heavily pushing BBB. It's also worth nothing that some of the talk about replacing Biden skips over Harris in favor of people who aren't really that close to the administration (i.e. Pritzger, Newsom)
posted by RonButNotStupid at 10:04 AM on July 11 [2 favorites]
From twitter:
Several of Biden’s closest allies, including 3 people directly involved in re-election efforts, told
@jonallendc
@natashakorecki
@carolelee
they now see his chances of winning as zero.
“He needs to drop out,” one Biden campaign official said. “He will never recover from this.”
“No one involved in the effort thinks he has a path,” said a second person working to elect him.
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 10:09 AM on July 11 [5 favorites]
Several of Biden’s closest allies, including 3 people directly involved in re-election efforts, told
@jonallendc
@natashakorecki
@carolelee
they now see his chances of winning as zero.
“He needs to drop out,” one Biden campaign official said. “He will never recover from this.”
“No one involved in the effort thinks he has a path,” said a second person working to elect him.
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 10:09 AM on July 11 [5 favorites]
serious question -
If on November 5th the ticket remains Joe Biden/Kamala Harris on the ballot do you vote for them, TFG or abstain?
All this hand wringing and that is the only question to answer for yourselves.
(but please continue wring-a-dinging)
posted by djseafood at 10:15 AM on July 11 [1 favorite]
If on November 5th the ticket remains Joe Biden/Kamala Harris on the ballot do you vote for them, TFG or abstain?
All this hand wringing and that is the only question to answer for yourselves.
(but please continue wring-a-dinging)
posted by djseafood at 10:15 AM on July 11 [1 favorite]
In how many elections have they been this wrong enough for Biden to win?
If the polls miss by the same amount as they did in 2016 and 2020 but the other direction (i.e. they're overstating rather than understating Trump's support) that would produce a close win for Biden. If we're seeing similar polling errors in the same direction as the last presidential elections then we're really down by close to double digits and it's hard to imagine any candidate swap overcoming that.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 10:16 AM on July 11 [3 favorites]
If the polls miss by the same amount as they did in 2016 and 2020 but the other direction (i.e. they're overstating rather than understating Trump's support) that would produce a close win for Biden. If we're seeing similar polling errors in the same direction as the last presidential elections then we're really down by close to double digits and it's hard to imagine any candidate swap overcoming that.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 10:16 AM on July 11 [3 favorites]
If on November 5th the ticket remains Joe Biden/Kamala Harris on the ballot do you vote for them, TFG or abstain?
Objection, your Honor, asked and answered.
posted by mittens at 10:17 AM on July 11 [8 favorites]
Objection, your Honor, asked and answered.
posted by mittens at 10:17 AM on July 11 [8 favorites]
“No one involved in the effort thinks he has a path,” said a second person working to elect him.
Not working very hard, clearly.
posted by mrjohnmuller at 10:18 AM on July 11 [3 favorites]
Not working very hard, clearly.
posted by mrjohnmuller at 10:18 AM on July 11 [3 favorites]
One of the things I don't see addressed a lot in this discussion is the way the call for throwing out the expressed will of actual voters (in the primary) is how that intersects with the other side of the political moment: this is a time when fascists are throwing out established institutions in favor of wealth and wealthy individuals.
posted by gentlyepigrams at 5:48 AM on July 11 [9 favorites +] [⚑]
An election is not particularly democratic when its not contested. Our norm is not to challenge an incumbent president in your party and Biden is the nominee as a result of that norm, not the will of the voters.
posted by Hume at 6:07 AM on July 11 [8 favorites +] [⚑]
All of this mess serves to make us forget there is currently legitimacy for Harris because every single voter had this plan B in mind and pulled the lever, some twice.
posted by drowsy at 6:57 AM on July 11 [1 favorite +] [⚑]
I'm sympathetic to all three of these contradictory-at-points sentiments, and I guess it's why I think I favor "Resign and Hand It to Kamala." A president resigns, at bottom, to avoid disaster--there's an escape hatch for the Prez and everyone else built into the institution. Handing the presidency and the race to Kamala is well within the country's democratic institutions and practice.
I didn't like Kamala Harris in 2020 for The Lefty Reasons, but honestly my biggest objections to her were electoral. First, she was a disaster campaigner--do I recall correctly that she basically hired two campaign directors simultaneously, one of whom was her sister and worked against the other one, and that in the end half her campaign staff jumped ship while dragging her name in public?
Second, in a post-Bernie 2016 election year when everyone was trying to come up with a hallmark redistributive plan, Harris' plan struck me as the dumbest. (I liked Cory Booker's "Baby Bonds" even though I couldn't support him since he supports privatizing public schools.) Hers was like, a wonky expansion of EITC that had the dual facepalm of providing nothing to the poorest people or to the middle class who vote reliably. If you were a voter wanting Clintonism to finally die, you looked elsewhere.
But I think this year she would have access to a more top-shelf campaign apparatus, she'd inherit the war chest apparently, and she could run on a version of Bidenism instead of a version of Clintonism (inflation would dog her by association, I will admit). She's well positioned to resolve some of the things that hobbled her first campaign, and is there a single person among us who wouldn't want to see her ripping into Donald Trump three times a day with all the ferocity of someone who is a prosecutor and a not-elderly person?
posted by kensington314 at 10:22 AM on July 11 [14 favorites]
posted by gentlyepigrams at 5:48 AM on July 11 [9 favorites +] [⚑]
An election is not particularly democratic when its not contested. Our norm is not to challenge an incumbent president in your party and Biden is the nominee as a result of that norm, not the will of the voters.
posted by Hume at 6:07 AM on July 11 [8 favorites +] [⚑]
All of this mess serves to make us forget there is currently legitimacy for Harris because every single voter had this plan B in mind and pulled the lever, some twice.
posted by drowsy at 6:57 AM on July 11 [1 favorite +] [⚑]
I'm sympathetic to all three of these contradictory-at-points sentiments, and I guess it's why I think I favor "Resign and Hand It to Kamala." A president resigns, at bottom, to avoid disaster--there's an escape hatch for the Prez and everyone else built into the institution. Handing the presidency and the race to Kamala is well within the country's democratic institutions and practice.
I didn't like Kamala Harris in 2020 for The Lefty Reasons, but honestly my biggest objections to her were electoral. First, she was a disaster campaigner--do I recall correctly that she basically hired two campaign directors simultaneously, one of whom was her sister and worked against the other one, and that in the end half her campaign staff jumped ship while dragging her name in public?
Second, in a post-Bernie 2016 election year when everyone was trying to come up with a hallmark redistributive plan, Harris' plan struck me as the dumbest. (I liked Cory Booker's "Baby Bonds" even though I couldn't support him since he supports privatizing public schools.) Hers was like, a wonky expansion of EITC that had the dual facepalm of providing nothing to the poorest people or to the middle class who vote reliably. If you were a voter wanting Clintonism to finally die, you looked elsewhere.
But I think this year she would have access to a more top-shelf campaign apparatus, she'd inherit the war chest apparently, and she could run on a version of Bidenism instead of a version of Clintonism (inflation would dog her by association, I will admit). She's well positioned to resolve some of the things that hobbled her first campaign, and is there a single person among us who wouldn't want to see her ripping into Donald Trump three times a day with all the ferocity of someone who is a prosecutor and a not-elderly person?
posted by kensington314 at 10:22 AM on July 11 [14 favorites]
I don’t think the relevant past polls are 2016 and 2020. I think the relevant past polls are post-Dobbs only. I read about one election where the Democratic candidate lost, but overperformed by 20 points. That tells me the poll was fundamentally wrong.
posted by kerf at 10:26 AM on July 11
posted by kerf at 10:26 AM on July 11
"and is there a single person among us who wouldn't want to see her ripping into Donald Trump three times a day with all the ferocity of someone who is a prosecutor"
I'd venture to say she should be doing this already.
posted by djseafood at 10:27 AM on July 11 [17 favorites]
I'd venture to say she should be doing this already.
posted by djseafood at 10:27 AM on July 11 [17 favorites]
If on November 5th the ticket remains Joe Biden/Kamala Harris on the ballot do you vote for them, TFG or abstain?
I don't want to be nasty, or single you out, but this has been answered a dozen times. The concern is that Biden will lose to Trump. We don't want Biden to lose to Trump. If we can get a candidate less likely to lose to Trump, that is much better. If we can't we will do what we can to try to prevent him from losing to Trump.
So the concern here, if it is unclear, is that we don't want the Democratic candidate to lose to Trump. I hope that clarifies things.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 10:27 AM on July 11 [23 favorites]
I don't want to be nasty, or single you out, but this has been answered a dozen times. The concern is that Biden will lose to Trump. We don't want Biden to lose to Trump. If we can get a candidate less likely to lose to Trump, that is much better. If we can't we will do what we can to try to prevent him from losing to Trump.
So the concern here, if it is unclear, is that we don't want the Democratic candidate to lose to Trump. I hope that clarifies things.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 10:27 AM on July 11 [23 favorites]
I'd venture to say she should be doing this already.
She should be! Despite a foundational antipathy toward Harris I have to come to think that the Biden Administration has been baffling in the way it has positioned her, and that the Biden campaign has probably unfairly written her off as an entity. Honestly in light of recent events it just feels like she has been sidelined because her presence on the ticket as a vibrant and eager pol makes Biden's presence on the ticket look pretty questionable.
posted by kensington314 at 10:30 AM on July 11 [12 favorites]
She should be! Despite a foundational antipathy toward Harris I have to come to think that the Biden Administration has been baffling in the way it has positioned her, and that the Biden campaign has probably unfairly written her off as an entity. Honestly in light of recent events it just feels like she has been sidelined because her presence on the ticket as a vibrant and eager pol makes Biden's presence on the ticket look pretty questionable.
posted by kensington314 at 10:30 AM on July 11 [12 favorites]
I don't know if BIden can recover, but if he's going to drop out he will probably do it right after the RNC finishes next week, or during Trump's acceptance speech. Why waste the opportunity to step on Trump's big moment.
posted by interogative mood at 10:32 AM on July 11 [4 favorites]
posted by interogative mood at 10:32 AM on July 11 [4 favorites]
Damn I said I was out on these threads cause they're SO damn depressing. I think the pro-biden 'lets just back him to the hilt' has the best of intentions (beat fucking dictator in waiting); the anti-biden the perception (and maybe reality) that he's too old to do the job and needs to step aside have the best of intentions.
But if the very strong democrats are this divided, no fucking way Biden wins. The horrific NYT and the rest of the lemming political media WILL NOT LET THIS GO! They showed that with butter emails and John Kerry's 'fake medals'. And if Biden shows a tiny bit of his age, that focus will get supercharged (as if it isn't bad enough right now).
And these jackasses in the politico-media dont really give a shit that the fascists are a coming nightmare. Given dictatorships are not exactly famous for their respect of a free press, I have no clue what is motivating them. Just today Trumps Secretary of Retribution said he has a hit list of democrats that the fascists are coming after - news in the political media? (besides the Guardian) of course not.
No amount of efforts by the democrats will change this, none. Do any of you have any confidence that the democratic party mandarins can pull off changing the narrative?
So the only hope of winning with Biden is for the voting populace is to disbelieve ALL the bullshit about the Biden and voting accordingly. And right now they are not doing that. Maybe they will as we get closer to the election and the people not paying attention will start freaking out?
IMO Biden wins the popular election by quite a bit, but gets crushed in the EC and the dems lose both house - narrowly, but they lose.
In my next to useless option, no offense to the motivations and reasons of the 'keep Biden folks, but I think it's better to replace him. Run with Harris, emphasis the hell out of Dobbs, the IVF outlawing and the national pregnancy registry that will happen under the Trumpist dictatorship (and then flood the zone with all the Project 2025 nightmares).
Sorry for this long comment, but like all of you I'm totally freaking out with what will happen starting Jan22, 2025.
posted by WatTylerJr at 10:32 AM on July 11 [1 favorite]
But if the very strong democrats are this divided, no fucking way Biden wins. The horrific NYT and the rest of the lemming political media WILL NOT LET THIS GO! They showed that with butter emails and John Kerry's 'fake medals'. And if Biden shows a tiny bit of his age, that focus will get supercharged (as if it isn't bad enough right now).
And these jackasses in the politico-media dont really give a shit that the fascists are a coming nightmare. Given dictatorships are not exactly famous for their respect of a free press, I have no clue what is motivating them. Just today Trumps Secretary of Retribution said he has a hit list of democrats that the fascists are coming after - news in the political media? (besides the Guardian) of course not.
No amount of efforts by the democrats will change this, none. Do any of you have any confidence that the democratic party mandarins can pull off changing the narrative?
So the only hope of winning with Biden is for the voting populace is to disbelieve ALL the bullshit about the Biden and voting accordingly. And right now they are not doing that. Maybe they will as we get closer to the election and the people not paying attention will start freaking out?
IMO Biden wins the popular election by quite a bit, but gets crushed in the EC and the dems lose both house - narrowly, but they lose.
In my next to useless option, no offense to the motivations and reasons of the 'keep Biden folks, but I think it's better to replace him. Run with Harris, emphasis the hell out of Dobbs, the IVF outlawing and the national pregnancy registry that will happen under the Trumpist dictatorship (and then flood the zone with all the Project 2025 nightmares).
Sorry for this long comment, but like all of you I'm totally freaking out with what will happen starting Jan22, 2025.
posted by WatTylerJr at 10:32 AM on July 11 [1 favorite]
I don't know if BIden can recover, but if he's going to drop out he will probably do it right after the RNC finishes next week, or during Trump's acceptance speech. Why waste the opportunity to step on Trump's big moment.
The chaotic good troll's dream would be for Biden to drop out via press conference about 10 minutes before Trump is scheduled to get up to spew his bile.
posted by kensington314 at 10:35 AM on July 11 [7 favorites]
The chaotic good troll's dream would be for Biden to drop out via press conference about 10 minutes before Trump is scheduled to get up to spew his bile.
posted by kensington314 at 10:35 AM on July 11 [7 favorites]
Weekend at Bernie's is still a better movie than "Triumph of the Will"
The literal problem here is that, as a piece of propaganda, no it isn't.
posted by penduluum at 10:35 AM on July 11 [10 favorites]
The literal problem here is that, as a piece of propaganda, no it isn't.
posted by penduluum at 10:35 AM on July 11 [10 favorites]
I don’t think the relevant past polls are 2016 and 2020. I think the relevant past polls are post-Dobbs only. I read about one election where the Democratic candidate lost, but overperformed by 20 points. That tells me the poll was fundamentally wrong.
The Dobbs effect further complicates things, but there is also a baseline level of wrongness we've seen in polls specifically about Donald Trump running for president. His pattern of support is different enough from how presidential elections used to play out that nobody seems to know how to predict what the electorate will look like when he's on the ballot, and that poisons the whole result. So far I've seen no indication that anyone has definitively solved that problem even *before* you add abortion as a factor.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 10:37 AM on July 11 [4 favorites]
The Dobbs effect further complicates things, but there is also a baseline level of wrongness we've seen in polls specifically about Donald Trump running for president. His pattern of support is different enough from how presidential elections used to play out that nobody seems to know how to predict what the electorate will look like when he's on the ballot, and that poisons the whole result. So far I've seen no indication that anyone has definitively solved that problem even *before* you add abortion as a factor.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 10:37 AM on July 11 [4 favorites]
The horrific NYT and the rest of the lemming political media WILL NOT LET THIS GO!
They are reporting. You're sounding very pro-censorship.
posted by iamck at 10:37 AM on July 11 [4 favorites]
They are reporting. You're sounding very pro-censorship.
posted by iamck at 10:37 AM on July 11 [4 favorites]
They are *selectively* reporting, based on the political agendas of their owners. Anyone thinking that American media right now is some sort of bastion of impartial truth is severely fooling themselves.
posted by mrjohnmuller at 10:40 AM on July 11 [10 favorites]
posted by mrjohnmuller at 10:40 AM on July 11 [10 favorites]
> Given dictatorships are not exactly famous for their respect of a free press, I have no clue what is motivating them.
Journalism is a lot easier when you're told what to print.
posted by torokunai at 10:42 AM on July 11 [1 favorite]
Journalism is a lot easier when you're told what to print.
posted by torokunai at 10:42 AM on July 11 [1 favorite]
Biden's not going to drop out absent some truly black swan event. He's going to disappear almost entirely from the campaign scene, other than to occasionally MC something, do brief unscripted joke-cracking appearances and the occasional interview with a sympathetic journalist. They're going to erase his sundowning (and IMHO he's NOT senile or even close, he's just a shitty speaker who had a bad day) by saying "Old Joe's too busy running the country" and talk about good things he's done.
All this time, It's Harris who's going to be running around the country trash-talking Trump, and while Harris was shitty at campaigning for herself, she's going to be nearly S-tier at trashing Trump, who Will Not Cope with a BLACK WOMAN calling him stupid and shitty and senile. And there's going to be all the 2028 wannabes (Newsom, Whitmer, Beshear, Pritzker, you name it) running around the country talking about Dobbs/Roe, Project 2025, climate change, and all the slightly more progressive but not too much because regular people hate hippies things the Dems have done or are trying to do. The point being that it Doesn't Fucking Matter who's at the top of the ticket: the point is to beat Trump like a drum. Loser, Senile, Criminal, Rapist. Every question about Biden is going to get answered with "so what?" It's Not. About. Biden, will be the message.
Yes, if we could snap our fingers and replace Biden with Generic Yet Charismatic Moderate 50something White Dude, that would make things better. But we cannot do that, again absent some black swan event. We can't do a backroom deal to swap Biden for Pritzker, because everyone will squawk about it being not small-d democratic. We can't do James Carville's fucking stupid town hall primary idea, because a) it will be subject to incredible Republican fuckery, and b) it will devolve into the same thing a real primary would, which is 35% of Dems absolutely insisting a Progressive! FIREbrand!1!! will bring The Peepul to a landslide victory and everyone else being like oh gods no fuck that shit they'll lose all but Vermont and Hawaii, and we end up with someone everyone can hold their nose for but nobody really finds compelling.
Just watch: it's gonna turn into Biden as this distant spectral benevolent overlord and Harris making Trump burst blood vessels. People will go along with it just fine.
posted by outgrown_hobnail at 10:44 AM on July 11 [9 favorites]
All this time, It's Harris who's going to be running around the country trash-talking Trump, and while Harris was shitty at campaigning for herself, she's going to be nearly S-tier at trashing Trump, who Will Not Cope with a BLACK WOMAN calling him stupid and shitty and senile. And there's going to be all the 2028 wannabes (Newsom, Whitmer, Beshear, Pritzker, you name it) running around the country talking about Dobbs/Roe, Project 2025, climate change, and all the slightly more progressive but not too much because regular people hate hippies things the Dems have done or are trying to do. The point being that it Doesn't Fucking Matter who's at the top of the ticket: the point is to beat Trump like a drum. Loser, Senile, Criminal, Rapist. Every question about Biden is going to get answered with "so what?" It's Not. About. Biden, will be the message.
Yes, if we could snap our fingers and replace Biden with Generic Yet Charismatic Moderate 50something White Dude, that would make things better. But we cannot do that, again absent some black swan event. We can't do a backroom deal to swap Biden for Pritzker, because everyone will squawk about it being not small-d democratic. We can't do James Carville's fucking stupid town hall primary idea, because a) it will be subject to incredible Republican fuckery, and b) it will devolve into the same thing a real primary would, which is 35% of Dems absolutely insisting a Progressive! FIREbrand!1!! will bring The Peepul to a landslide victory and everyone else being like oh gods no fuck that shit they'll lose all but Vermont and Hawaii, and we end up with someone everyone can hold their nose for but nobody really finds compelling.
Just watch: it's gonna turn into Biden as this distant spectral benevolent overlord and Harris making Trump burst blood vessels. People will go along with it just fine.
posted by outgrown_hobnail at 10:44 AM on July 11 [9 favorites]
>another round of stimulus checks on the agenda for 2025
c'mon man
Initial Jobless Claims, 1967-now
posted by torokunai at 10:46 AM on July 11 [2 favorites]
c'mon man
Initial Jobless Claims, 1967-now
posted by torokunai at 10:46 AM on July 11 [2 favorites]
Joblessness has little to do with it. Most Americans have little to no savings for emergencies. Stimulus checks have been and would be ecstatically welcome.
posted by tiny frying pan at 10:51 AM on July 11 [15 favorites]
posted by tiny frying pan at 10:51 AM on July 11 [15 favorites]
Stimulus checks are always a good idea, good politics and good policy.
posted by Gadarene at 10:54 AM on July 11 [14 favorites]
posted by Gadarene at 10:54 AM on July 11 [14 favorites]
I don’t think we’re getting checks when inflation is still the headline concern (albeit decreasingly so).
posted by atoxyl at 10:55 AM on July 11 [2 favorites]
posted by atoxyl at 10:55 AM on July 11 [2 favorites]
>What is right about a system in which there's a candidate as odious as TFG, but you can barely scrape together a consensus to bet the farm on the visibly diminished incumbent?
The right is a coalition of single-issue voters:
~25% Nationalist Christians aka the neo-Nat-Cs.
~25% Rentier Class aka the GMFY contingent
~25%+ grab-bag of Flat-Earthers, "Ultra"-Orthodox American Jews, MRA who love what they see in Trump, 2A/ III%ers, etc. etc.
There's some overlap but that's how Trump gets to 45%+ in 2024 after the disaster of 2017-2020.
posted by torokunai at 10:59 AM on July 11
The right is a coalition of single-issue voters:
~25% Nationalist Christians aka the neo-Nat-Cs.
~25% Rentier Class aka the GMFY contingent
~25%+ grab-bag of Flat-Earthers, "Ultra"-Orthodox American Jews, MRA who love what they see in Trump, 2A/ III%ers, etc. etc.
There's some overlap but that's how Trump gets to 45%+ in 2024 after the disaster of 2017-2020.
posted by torokunai at 10:59 AM on July 11
>Stimulus checks are always a good idea, good politics and good policy.
I'm sure the GOP House will get right on that.
posted by torokunai at 11:01 AM on July 11 [1 favorite]
I'm sure the GOP House will get right on that.
posted by torokunai at 11:01 AM on July 11 [1 favorite]
If you're still supporting Biden at this point I think you have to be expecting the polling to be wrong in the way it was in 2022 where the error favoured the democrats.
I realize this is a bit upthread, but it seems to be a common misconception among people so I feel it's worth addressing. The polling was not wrong in 2022 - it was extremely accurate. What was wrong was the assumption that Biden's unpopularity would being the party down or that general polls, like "Do you think the economy is going well?" indicated bad news for Democrats. But polls of specific candidates never suggested a red wave. (Source: sorry, Twitter - specifically Jeet Heer and Josh Ettingermentum for those that rather not click)
posted by coffeecat at 11:01 AM on July 11 [6 favorites]
I realize this is a bit upthread, but it seems to be a common misconception among people so I feel it's worth addressing. The polling was not wrong in 2022 - it was extremely accurate. What was wrong was the assumption that Biden's unpopularity would being the party down or that general polls, like "Do you think the economy is going well?" indicated bad news for Democrats. But polls of specific candidates never suggested a red wave. (Source: sorry, Twitter - specifically Jeet Heer and Josh Ettingermentum for those that rather not click)
posted by coffeecat at 11:01 AM on July 11 [6 favorites]
For some levity that I need right now, I gave 💥NEEDS MORE BOOM💥 ("Any scene, directed by Michael Bay" - previously) the prompt: "trump biden debate"
INT. DEBATE STAGE - NIGHT
The STUDIO AUDIENCE gasps as the backdrop, a GIANT AMERICAN FLAG, starts to ripple in an otherworldly wind. The lights flicker eerily.
Suddenly, the stage splits open, revealing TWO GIGANTIC ROBOTIC PODIUMS. A booming, bass-heavy score THUNDERS through the room as the podiums transform into TWO MASSIVE ROBOTS, TRUMPBOT and BIDENATOR.
TRUMPBOT
(voice echoing)
I brought back football, Joe.
BIDENATOR
(voice mechanical)
You're the worst president America ever had, Donald.
They square off, sparks flying as their metal fists CLASH with a deafening CRASH. The audience watches, mesmerized.
Suddenly, Trumpbot lunges, his fist morphing into a GIANT RED TIE, wrapping around Bidenator. Bidenator counters, his chest opens revealing a EXPLODING ICE CREAM CONE. The tie burns away.
BIDENATOR
Will you shut up, man?
A WHIP PAN to the audience reveals CHRIS WALLACE, now in a SPEEDBOAT, on a fake lake that has sprung up in the studio.
CHRIS WALLACE
(robotic voice)
Gentlemen, the question is about the Supreme Court...
Suddenly, he's INTERRUPTED by a horde of FLYING ROBOTIC BALD EAGLES swooping down from the ceiling. They transform into a GIANT AMERICAN FLAG and hang in mid-air.
Suddenly, the floor splits as BIDENATOR and TRUMPBOT tumble into a SUBTERRANEAN ARENA, where they continue to battle. The audience watches on, eyes wide with fear and excitement.
Finally, BIDENATOR pins TRUMPBOT. With a final roar, Bidenator's eyes glow bright blue.
BIDENATOR
Vote. Now.
Suddenly, the entire studio SHAKES as a GIANT EXPLOSION rips through the arena.
The STUDIO WALLS collapse, revealing an IMAX SCREEN with the words: "VOTE NOW" emblazoned across it. The audience CHEERS.
BIDENATOR and TRUMPBOT, now back to their podium forms, stand amidst the rubble. The robotic Chris Wallace in his speedboat emerges from the debris.
CHRIS WALLACE
(robotic voice)
And that concludes our debate.
As the crowd roars, the scene ends with a final, subtle EXPLOSION - a single FIREWORK taped to the back of Chris Wallace's speedboat, SPARKING and then BOOMING, filling the studio with colorful smoke.
FADE OUT.
posted by ShooBoo at 11:13 AM on July 11 [1 favorite]
Click to see TRUMPBOT and BIDENATOR fight it out.
INT. DEBATE STAGE - NIGHT
The STUDIO AUDIENCE gasps as the backdrop, a GIANT AMERICAN FLAG, starts to ripple in an otherworldly wind. The lights flicker eerily.
Suddenly, the stage splits open, revealing TWO GIGANTIC ROBOTIC PODIUMS. A booming, bass-heavy score THUNDERS through the room as the podiums transform into TWO MASSIVE ROBOTS, TRUMPBOT and BIDENATOR.
TRUMPBOT
(voice echoing)
I brought back football, Joe.
BIDENATOR
(voice mechanical)
You're the worst president America ever had, Donald.
They square off, sparks flying as their metal fists CLASH with a deafening CRASH. The audience watches, mesmerized.
Suddenly, Trumpbot lunges, his fist morphing into a GIANT RED TIE, wrapping around Bidenator. Bidenator counters, his chest opens revealing a EXPLODING ICE CREAM CONE. The tie burns away.
BIDENATOR
Will you shut up, man?
A WHIP PAN to the audience reveals CHRIS WALLACE, now in a SPEEDBOAT, on a fake lake that has sprung up in the studio.
CHRIS WALLACE
(robotic voice)
Gentlemen, the question is about the Supreme Court...
Suddenly, he's INTERRUPTED by a horde of FLYING ROBOTIC BALD EAGLES swooping down from the ceiling. They transform into a GIANT AMERICAN FLAG and hang in mid-air.
Suddenly, the floor splits as BIDENATOR and TRUMPBOT tumble into a SUBTERRANEAN ARENA, where they continue to battle. The audience watches on, eyes wide with fear and excitement.
Finally, BIDENATOR pins TRUMPBOT. With a final roar, Bidenator's eyes glow bright blue.
BIDENATOR
Vote. Now.
Suddenly, the entire studio SHAKES as a GIANT EXPLOSION rips through the arena.
The STUDIO WALLS collapse, revealing an IMAX SCREEN with the words: "VOTE NOW" emblazoned across it. The audience CHEERS.
BIDENATOR and TRUMPBOT, now back to their podium forms, stand amidst the rubble. The robotic Chris Wallace in his speedboat emerges from the debris.
CHRIS WALLACE
(robotic voice)
And that concludes our debate.
As the crowd roars, the scene ends with a final, subtle EXPLOSION - a single FIREWORK taped to the back of Chris Wallace's speedboat, SPARKING and then BOOMING, filling the studio with colorful smoke.
FADE OUT.
posted by ShooBoo at 11:13 AM on July 11 [1 favorite]
Breaking:
NBC News confirms: The Biden campaign is quietly assessing the viability of Vice President Kamala Harris' candidacy against Donald Trump in a new head-to-head poll.
@MSNBC
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 11:16 AM on July 11 [5 favorites]
NBC News confirms: The Biden campaign is quietly assessing the viability of Vice President Kamala Harris' candidacy against Donald Trump in a new head-to-head poll.
@MSNBC
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 11:16 AM on July 11 [5 favorites]
I don’t think we’re getting checks when inflation is still the headline concern (albeit decreasingly so).
Correct! Don't think anyone said we'd be getting them.
posted by tiny frying pan at 11:21 AM on July 11 [2 favorites]
Correct! Don't think anyone said we'd be getting them.
posted by tiny frying pan at 11:21 AM on July 11 [2 favorites]
The frothing at the mouth ranting and name calling against hypothetical traitorous progressives in a thread about actual progressives standing by Biden (or whomever the nominee ends up being) is absolutely fucking unhinged.
posted by Glegrinof the Pig-Man at 11:23 AM on July 11 [10 favorites]
posted by Glegrinof the Pig-Man at 11:23 AM on July 11 [10 favorites]
> NBC News confirms: The Biden campaign is quietly assessing the viability of Vice President Kamala Harris' candidacy against Donald Trump in a new head-to-head poll.
They're quietly looking for evidence that they can use to say Biden should stay on the ticket, more like. You're not going to hear about this if Harris polls better.
posted by dis_integration at 11:35 AM on July 11 [1 favorite]
They're quietly looking for evidence that they can use to say Biden should stay on the ticket, more like. You're not going to hear about this if Harris polls better.
posted by dis_integration at 11:35 AM on July 11 [1 favorite]
The frothing at the mouth ranting and name calling against hypothetical traitorous progressives in a thread about actual progressives standing by Biden (or whomever the nominee ends up being) is absolutely fucking unhinged.
Could you point to some of the unhinged, frothy, ranting you're referring to? Because I've seen no such thing in this thread.
posted by multics at 11:43 AM on July 11 [8 favorites]
Could you point to some of the unhinged, frothy, ranting you're referring to? Because I've seen no such thing in this thread.
posted by multics at 11:43 AM on July 11 [8 favorites]
The horrific NYT and the rest of the lemming political media WILL NOT LET THIS GO!
They are reporting. You're sounding very pro-censorship.
SERIOUSLY ??? Thats what you took from my comment? I dont know how you came up with "under Trump the press is fucked" to I'm pro-censorship? Honestly I usually have pretty thick skin, but this one got me. I can't tell if this is trolling or legit your take.
Can't you see how the NYT et all are screwing over Biden, just like they screwed over Hillary and before her Kerry, with their ridiculous water carrying for the republicans ? E.g., a crucial NATO summit wasn't framed on NATO's role in Putins War on Ukraine, it was about 'will Joe look old'. Where was the reporting on Trumps vow to to destroy Nato. And the Court decision in Trump v United States making him our future dictator is ALREADY of the media's agenda.
And my key point is that the polite-media complex will not stop with 'Joe is Old' for a single minute.
Pre-censorship. Damn.
posted by WatTylerJr at 11:45 AM on July 11 [7 favorites]
They are reporting. You're sounding very pro-censorship.
SERIOUSLY ??? Thats what you took from my comment? I dont know how you came up with "under Trump the press is fucked" to I'm pro-censorship? Honestly I usually have pretty thick skin, but this one got me. I can't tell if this is trolling or legit your take.
Can't you see how the NYT et all are screwing over Biden, just like they screwed over Hillary and before her Kerry, with their ridiculous water carrying for the republicans ? E.g., a crucial NATO summit wasn't framed on NATO's role in Putins War on Ukraine, it was about 'will Joe look old'. Where was the reporting on Trumps vow to to destroy Nato. And the Court decision in Trump v United States making him our future dictator is ALREADY of the media's agenda.
And my key point is that the polite-media complex will not stop with 'Joe is Old' for a single minute.
Pre-censorship. Damn.
posted by WatTylerJr at 11:45 AM on July 11 [7 favorites]
I just don’t get it. They continue to play by the 2008 play book and it ain’t 2008 no more. They think people calmly look at facts and decide but if they did then they wouldn’t have voted for the turd in the first place.
Find the most charismatic candidate and run with it. Grab an actor if you have to. I do truly wish Matthew McConaughey had run for Texas governor back in the day - a centrist republican. Gavin Newsom? Someone. Admit that the base votes with their guts not their heads and lean into that. Then find a way to get that nazi Cheeto on stage in a way that holds his feet to the fire and he actually embarrasses himself and loses face and that’s it. Hound him over and over on the same question till the facade breaks. Give him no option to charm his way out. People have to see him break face live (and being a narcissist it is actually hard to do); when they see him lose confidence in himself then the spell with be broken and people can think sensibly again.
Americans at large won’t vote for Harris, because sexism and racism, but also the charisma factor.
That’s it that’s all. Charisma.
posted by St. Peepsburg at 11:47 AM on July 11
Find the most charismatic candidate and run with it. Grab an actor if you have to. I do truly wish Matthew McConaughey had run for Texas governor back in the day - a centrist republican. Gavin Newsom? Someone. Admit that the base votes with their guts not their heads and lean into that. Then find a way to get that nazi Cheeto on stage in a way that holds his feet to the fire and he actually embarrasses himself and loses face and that’s it. Hound him over and over on the same question till the facade breaks. Give him no option to charm his way out. People have to see him break face live (and being a narcissist it is actually hard to do); when they see him lose confidence in himself then the spell with be broken and people can think sensibly again.
Americans at large won’t vote for Harris, because sexism and racism, but also the charisma factor.
That’s it that’s all. Charisma.
posted by St. Peepsburg at 11:47 AM on July 11
I feel like due to PTSD from past New York Times bullshit, people are seeing the NYT as the driving force of this story when I don’t think it is this time. This kind of reporting is driven by powerful Democrats and the public freaking out.
posted by johngoren at 11:49 AM on July 11 [11 favorites]
posted by johngoren at 11:49 AM on July 11 [11 favorites]
So sick of hearing that female candidates don't have charisma. I like Harris' charisma, you don't, that's fine. But like, the statements on SO MUCH in these threads is just, like, your opinion, man.
I don't see a lot of facts, but do see a lot of things stated as facts. Important to remember, I know I'm trying. ✨️
posted by tiny frying pan at 11:50 AM on July 11 [11 favorites]
I don't see a lot of facts, but do see a lot of things stated as facts. Important to remember, I know I'm trying. ✨️
posted by tiny frying pan at 11:50 AM on July 11 [11 favorites]
New York Times editorial board declares Trump ‘unfit to lead’
posted by caviar2d2 at 11:53 AM on July 11 [3 favorites]
posted by caviar2d2 at 11:53 AM on July 11 [3 favorites]
I'm sure the GOP House will get right on that.
Make the offer. Force the Republicans to run on saying they will vote against ordinary people getting money.
Like the idea that Biden would be convicted if he broke the rules, don't assume they will win. Make them come and get you. Force them to spend the resources and time responding while your side acts decisively. People might get excited if they thought anyone was willing to fight for them.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 11:53 AM on July 11 [5 favorites]
Make the offer. Force the Republicans to run on saying they will vote against ordinary people getting money.
Like the idea that Biden would be convicted if he broke the rules, don't assume they will win. Make them come and get you. Force them to spend the resources and time responding while your side acts decisively. People might get excited if they thought anyone was willing to fight for them.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 11:53 AM on July 11 [5 favorites]
Can't you see how the NYT et all are screwing over Biden
Honestly, not really. I will grant you that their characterization of the neurologist as a "Parkinson's specialist" is unfair given that the doctor specializes in mobility, even if yes, he's also published on Parkinson's - but it's not like that's his focus. Like I've argued on other threads, the story here isn't the debate - the story is the number of politicians, party insiders, donors, etc. that are turning on Biden - which you would not expect to happen unless they have reason to fear that the debate was not an anomaly. When more and more damning leaks come out, is the press supposed to ignore it? Again, I know I'm not terribly old (late 30s) but I've never seen anything like this before - it's news. It's the job of the press to cover the news.
And the Court decision in Trump v United States making him our future dictator is ALREADY of the media's agenda.
Huh? Since I know "tone" can be hard to convey over text, I'll spell out my tone is genuinely confused here. I regularly consume NPR, NYTimes, and the New Yorker. They all covered recent Supreme Court ruling extensively (articles, podcast, editorials, etc.) and they all covered these as massive threats to democracy and the functioning of government, especially if Trump gets elected.
E.g., a crucial NATO summit wasn't framed on NATO's role in Putins War on Ukraine, it was about 'will Joe look old'. Where was the reporting on Trumps vow to to destroy Nato.
For what it's worth, NATO and its historic move of taking on China directly was a top headline on the NYTimes website - I think yesterday. There was also ample reporting about how NATO membership is worried about Trump, and trying to "Trump-proof" NATO.
posted by coffeecat at 11:59 AM on July 11 [12 favorites]
Honestly, not really. I will grant you that their characterization of the neurologist as a "Parkinson's specialist" is unfair given that the doctor specializes in mobility, even if yes, he's also published on Parkinson's - but it's not like that's his focus. Like I've argued on other threads, the story here isn't the debate - the story is the number of politicians, party insiders, donors, etc. that are turning on Biden - which you would not expect to happen unless they have reason to fear that the debate was not an anomaly. When more and more damning leaks come out, is the press supposed to ignore it? Again, I know I'm not terribly old (late 30s) but I've never seen anything like this before - it's news. It's the job of the press to cover the news.
And the Court decision in Trump v United States making him our future dictator is ALREADY of the media's agenda.
Huh? Since I know "tone" can be hard to convey over text, I'll spell out my tone is genuinely confused here. I regularly consume NPR, NYTimes, and the New Yorker. They all covered recent Supreme Court ruling extensively (articles, podcast, editorials, etc.) and they all covered these as massive threats to democracy and the functioning of government, especially if Trump gets elected.
E.g., a crucial NATO summit wasn't framed on NATO's role in Putins War on Ukraine, it was about 'will Joe look old'. Where was the reporting on Trumps vow to to destroy Nato.
For what it's worth, NATO and its historic move of taking on China directly was a top headline on the NYTimes website - I think yesterday. There was also ample reporting about how NATO membership is worried about Trump, and trying to "Trump-proof" NATO.
posted by coffeecat at 11:59 AM on July 11 [12 favorites]
Way, way back - ok, as far back as March or April, I suggested that the Democrats' campaign machine should be on TFG like a rash, 24/7... attacking, mocking on social media, joke memes, dirty tricks, insults, the works... keep him on his back foot, defensive and angry til he explodes, one way or another.
Instead, he's zipping along on cruise, while the Biden campaign squirms in the glare of the camera lights.
Wiser heads must have prevailed, I guess...
posted by Artful Codger at 12:00 PM on July 11 [7 favorites]
Instead, he's zipping along on cruise, while the Biden campaign squirms in the glare of the camera lights.
Wiser heads must have prevailed, I guess...
posted by Artful Codger at 12:00 PM on July 11 [7 favorites]
Americans at large won’t vote for Harris, because sexism and racism, but also the charisma factor.
If that's true, then why would they vote for Biden? Trump is already running against Harris - he has ads showing Biden falling down, looking confused during the debate, etc. that then ask "Do you really believe this guy will be president for another four years?" And then they pivot to attacking Harris. I'd say one of the best reasons for Biden to step down is that then the campaign and all the surrogates and other resources could go towards amping up Harris.
And yeah, I don't like all of her politics, but I actually find her charismatic and a lot of reporters who have spent significant time with her on the trail are pretty united in saying she's talented at working a room and connecting with voters.
posted by coffeecat at 12:05 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
If that's true, then why would they vote for Biden? Trump is already running against Harris - he has ads showing Biden falling down, looking confused during the debate, etc. that then ask "Do you really believe this guy will be president for another four years?" And then they pivot to attacking Harris. I'd say one of the best reasons for Biden to step down is that then the campaign and all the surrogates and other resources could go towards amping up Harris.
And yeah, I don't like all of her politics, but I actually find her charismatic and a lot of reporters who have spent significant time with her on the trail are pretty united in saying she's talented at working a room and connecting with voters.
posted by coffeecat at 12:05 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
mrjohnmuller I have to believe that more people are thinking "yeah, Biden is old, but the other guy is a literal fascist who wants to destroy the country" and will vote accordingly, instead of repeatedly slamming their dicks into a car door
Um, cousin. I hate to tell you this but they did vote for Trump, once in 2016, once in 2020. Biden barely scraped by in 2020. I'm not sure why you think we should have any faith in the decency or self preservation of the average American at this point. Close to half the country is either actively pro-Fascist or willing to accept Fascism as the price for corporate tax cuts or whatever.
Young people are being radicalized by right wing scumbags in huge numbers. Not that you could ever acutally count on the youth vote but these days a lot of those youth think Joe Rogan is god and Andrew Tate is sensible.
I am incapable of thinking that those people will suddenly say "huh, maybe Fascism is bad after all" and start voting Biden.
If you meant you must believe that anyone not firmly in the Trump camp will pull through and vote for literally anyone the Democrats put up because Trump is so awful I would point you to the rest of American history. Simply saying 'the other side is horrible and will bring Fascism' is not, actually, the winning strategy you seem to think it is.
You can, sometimes, drive voters to the polls by fear. But when that's the only approach the Democrats take they tend to lose.
posted by sotonohito at 12:12 PM on July 11 [17 favorites]
Um, cousin. I hate to tell you this but they did vote for Trump, once in 2016, once in 2020. Biden barely scraped by in 2020. I'm not sure why you think we should have any faith in the decency or self preservation of the average American at this point. Close to half the country is either actively pro-Fascist or willing to accept Fascism as the price for corporate tax cuts or whatever.
Young people are being radicalized by right wing scumbags in huge numbers. Not that you could ever acutally count on the youth vote but these days a lot of those youth think Joe Rogan is god and Andrew Tate is sensible.
I am incapable of thinking that those people will suddenly say "huh, maybe Fascism is bad after all" and start voting Biden.
If you meant you must believe that anyone not firmly in the Trump camp will pull through and vote for literally anyone the Democrats put up because Trump is so awful I would point you to the rest of American history. Simply saying 'the other side is horrible and will bring Fascism' is not, actually, the winning strategy you seem to think it is.
You can, sometimes, drive voters to the polls by fear. But when that's the only approach the Democrats take they tend to lose.
posted by sotonohito at 12:12 PM on July 11 [17 favorites]
They are *selectively* reporting, based on the political agendas of their owners. Anyone thinking that American media right now is some sort of bastion of impartial truth is severely fooling themselves.At the risk of derailing, this canard, so common across this site, is really laughable and needs to die a rapid death. There is no top-down collusion within or across the reporting arms of reputable media organizations to paint Biden as X and Trump as Y, or to cover any other issue in a particular way. The publisher/executive editor/board chair/etc. isn’t sitting there Sharpie-ing fiercely worded memos to his underlings to go after Joe harder on the verbal flubs, or to skip that story about the misdeeds of the senator who's his golf buddy. Like, even just logistically day to day, it doesn’t work that way, and most journalists wouldn't work in that kind of an environment (source: multiple decades working in media, currently for a global wire service).
Of course there can broadly be institutional biases within a media organization, and of course outlets like Fox News and the opinion/editorial pages are a different story, and of course individual stories can be flawed because of bad editorial decisions, but generally speaking, journalists cover whatever’s news, and you know who decides what’s news? You do. We all do. Every time you click on and read a story, you’re telling “The Media” what matters to you, and they listen.
Like it or not, the mental capacity of the current US president is news of interest to the entire world.
posted by pwe at 12:23 PM on July 11 [23 favorites]
Americans at large won’t vote for Harris, because sexism and racism, but also the charisma factor.
I think we're probably all a little bit nail-biting about the combined impact of US misogyny and racism on a single candidacy in Harris. But I think there's reason to believe fatalism about this is a little bit off the mark.
While the Obama presidency didn't demonstrate that we live in a post-racial society, it demonstrated that a Black candidate can win, particularly with a strong message that addresses the moment, against a weak candidate.
While the 2016 race gives everyone here trauma that will resonate down through the ages, it demonstrated that a woman can win the popular vote. Can a different woman not win 2%, 3% more of the popular vote? To me that doesn't seem accurate. Hillary was a candidate who had been so defamed and slagged and turned into a hate object on the right for 30 years, in addition to being seen as an avatar of neoliberalism and war hawkery on the left (me included), then she got waylaid by a deeply narcissistic main character effort by James Comey, in addition to some pretty shitty campaign decisions based on bad assumptions about a midwest "firewall." And in spite of ALL of that, she won the popular vote. I know that this logic feels dismissive of the lived experience of women, like I just fully acknowledge that to a lot of ears this angle sounds totally dismissive. But I just personally look at Hillary as a candidate, her win in the popular vote, and could totally see a future female Dem candidate getting a stronger popular vote outcome, leading to an EC win.
As for charisma, I dunno. What is charisma? Donald Trump has a charisma. I was always in the minority in not finding Obama particularly charismatic, though I supported him in the primary and the general. People called Hillary not charismatic, but I mean, everybody I knew who wanted to vote for a woman sure found the idea of voting for a woman to hold a certain . . . charismatic appeal. Harris is different than all of these people. Will the army of AKAs knocking every door in the swing states find Harris uncharismatic? Nah, I think they'll be basking in her charisma. Will Harris be seen as more or less charismatic in the extremely important Philly and ATL regions? I say more. Will the many of us who want to see a woman of color elected president in our lifetime look at Harris and say, oof, she's missing a charisma piece? I don't even really like Harris, but I'd cast that vote with a lump in my throat. I just think charisma is largely a stand-in for our prejudices and preferences. One thing Harris has is the ability to campaign before 10am and after 4pm, which feels downright magnetic to me at this point.
posted by kensington314 at 12:27 PM on July 11 [11 favorites]
I think we're probably all a little bit nail-biting about the combined impact of US misogyny and racism on a single candidacy in Harris. But I think there's reason to believe fatalism about this is a little bit off the mark.
While the Obama presidency didn't demonstrate that we live in a post-racial society, it demonstrated that a Black candidate can win, particularly with a strong message that addresses the moment, against a weak candidate.
While the 2016 race gives everyone here trauma that will resonate down through the ages, it demonstrated that a woman can win the popular vote. Can a different woman not win 2%, 3% more of the popular vote? To me that doesn't seem accurate. Hillary was a candidate who had been so defamed and slagged and turned into a hate object on the right for 30 years, in addition to being seen as an avatar of neoliberalism and war hawkery on the left (me included), then she got waylaid by a deeply narcissistic main character effort by James Comey, in addition to some pretty shitty campaign decisions based on bad assumptions about a midwest "firewall." And in spite of ALL of that, she won the popular vote. I know that this logic feels dismissive of the lived experience of women, like I just fully acknowledge that to a lot of ears this angle sounds totally dismissive. But I just personally look at Hillary as a candidate, her win in the popular vote, and could totally see a future female Dem candidate getting a stronger popular vote outcome, leading to an EC win.
As for charisma, I dunno. What is charisma? Donald Trump has a charisma. I was always in the minority in not finding Obama particularly charismatic, though I supported him in the primary and the general. People called Hillary not charismatic, but I mean, everybody I knew who wanted to vote for a woman sure found the idea of voting for a woman to hold a certain . . . charismatic appeal. Harris is different than all of these people. Will the army of AKAs knocking every door in the swing states find Harris uncharismatic? Nah, I think they'll be basking in her charisma. Will Harris be seen as more or less charismatic in the extremely important Philly and ATL regions? I say more. Will the many of us who want to see a woman of color elected president in our lifetime look at Harris and say, oof, she's missing a charisma piece? I don't even really like Harris, but I'd cast that vote with a lump in my throat. I just think charisma is largely a stand-in for our prejudices and preferences. One thing Harris has is the ability to campaign before 10am and after 4pm, which feels downright magnetic to me at this point.
posted by kensington314 at 12:27 PM on July 11 [11 favorites]
.
posted by tiny frying pan at 12:27 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
posted by tiny frying pan at 12:27 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
New York Times editorial board declares Trump ‘unfit to lead’
(NYT gift link)
posted by box at 12:32 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
(NYT gift link)
posted by box at 12:32 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
Donald Trump has a charisma.
a dead skunk in the middle of the road has charisma, too - ewwww polecat!
posted by pyramid termite at 12:34 PM on July 11
a dead skunk in the middle of the road has charisma, too - ewwww polecat!
posted by pyramid termite at 12:34 PM on July 11
Like it or not, the mental capacity of the current US president is news of interest to the entire world.
So why the fuck wasn't it of interest four years ago when tens of thousands of Americans were dying every day from Covid and the then-president was suggesting that people drink bleach while insisting that there were enough ventilators and PPE?
They just let him say whatever bullshit he wanted and they hardly ever called him on it. There were never any headlines about his nonsensical evening press conferences (which the media dutifully covered) nor did anyone in the media suggest that he was unfit to lead us during a national fucking emergency.
I agree that outside of conservative circles there's no dark room where the media prepares it's message. But I do think the media is self-interested and cowardly and unusually deferential to Republican narratives.
posted by RonButNotStupid at 12:39 PM on July 11 [14 favorites]
So why the fuck wasn't it of interest four years ago when tens of thousands of Americans were dying every day from Covid and the then-president was suggesting that people drink bleach while insisting that there were enough ventilators and PPE?
They just let him say whatever bullshit he wanted and they hardly ever called him on it. There were never any headlines about his nonsensical evening press conferences (which the media dutifully covered) nor did anyone in the media suggest that he was unfit to lead us during a national fucking emergency.
I agree that outside of conservative circles there's no dark room where the media prepares it's message. But I do think the media is self-interested and cowardly and unusually deferential to Republican narratives.
posted by RonButNotStupid at 12:39 PM on July 11 [14 favorites]
I think we're probably all a little bit nail-biting about the combined impact of US misogyny and racism on a single candidacy in Harris. But I think there's reason to believe fatalism about this is a little bit off the mark.
While the Obama presidency didn't demonstrate that we live in a post-racial society, it demonstrated that a Black candidate can win, particularly with a strong message that addresses the moment, against a weak candidate.
I would agree with this were it not for the fact that Obama ran in the primaries and beat Hillary Clinton fair and square. That gave him a legitimacy (some would say inevitability) that added excitement to his campaign in the general.
Saddling Harris with the nomination by fiat, four months before the election, would (in my opinion) be deeply unfair to her. She would face all the racism and sexism without any of the momentum generated by being the successful winner of months of primaries.
I think Harris can be President (I voted for her in the 2020 primaries). But I think putting her (or anyone, really) in the candidate's seat this late in the game and expecting her to ramp up and win it all is deeply deeply risky.
posted by Ben Trismegistus at 12:42 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
While the Obama presidency didn't demonstrate that we live in a post-racial society, it demonstrated that a Black candidate can win, particularly with a strong message that addresses the moment, against a weak candidate.
I would agree with this were it not for the fact that Obama ran in the primaries and beat Hillary Clinton fair and square. That gave him a legitimacy (some would say inevitability) that added excitement to his campaign in the general.
Saddling Harris with the nomination by fiat, four months before the election, would (in my opinion) be deeply unfair to her. She would face all the racism and sexism without any of the momentum generated by being the successful winner of months of primaries.
I think Harris can be President (I voted for her in the 2020 primaries). But I think putting her (or anyone, really) in the candidate's seat this late in the game and expecting her to ramp up and win it all is deeply deeply risky.
posted by Ben Trismegistus at 12:42 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
So why the fuck wasn't it of interest four years ago when tens of thousands of Americans were dying every day from Covid and the then-president was suggesting that people drink bleach while insisting that there were enough ventilators and PPE?
They just let him say whatever bullshit he wanted and they hardly ever called him on it. There were never any headlines about his nonsensical evening press conferences (which the media dutifully covered) nor did anyone in the media suggest that he was unfit to lead us during a national fucking emergency.
Is this true? I have a pretty old-fashioned media diet--I get my news primarily from a national and a local newspaper, and a few podcasts associated with newspapers. And so "headlines about his nonsensical evening press conferences" are substantially where I learned that Donald Trump was an idiot talking about horse dewormers and bleach and whatever else. I remember thinking that the media were basically constantly horrified, and that would be coming from the Washington Post which is probably similar to the NYT's coverage?
posted by kensington314 at 12:44 PM on July 11 [10 favorites]
They just let him say whatever bullshit he wanted and they hardly ever called him on it. There were never any headlines about his nonsensical evening press conferences (which the media dutifully covered) nor did anyone in the media suggest that he was unfit to lead us during a national fucking emergency.
Is this true? I have a pretty old-fashioned media diet--I get my news primarily from a national and a local newspaper, and a few podcasts associated with newspapers. And so "headlines about his nonsensical evening press conferences" are substantially where I learned that Donald Trump was an idiot talking about horse dewormers and bleach and whatever else. I remember thinking that the media were basically constantly horrified, and that would be coming from the Washington Post which is probably similar to the NYT's coverage?
posted by kensington314 at 12:44 PM on July 11 [10 favorites]
I think the problem with stories about Trump is that nothing ever sticks. He's SO awful that it's impossible to surprise anyone anymore. His supporters love him no matter what (and often celebrate his awfulness), and I'm hard-pressed to think of anything else he could do that would be considered shocking at this point.
Basically any story about Trump would have been a career-ender for any other politician, but Trump manages to skate by making awfulness the norm.
posted by Ben Trismegistus at 12:52 PM on July 11 [12 favorites]
Basically any story about Trump would have been a career-ender for any other politician, but Trump manages to skate by making awfulness the norm.
posted by Ben Trismegistus at 12:52 PM on July 11 [12 favorites]
Saddling Harris with the nomination by fiat, four months before the election, would (in my opinion) be deeply unfair to her. She would face all the racism and sexism without any of the momentum generated by being the successful winner of months of primaries
Look how reasonable Sander's supporters are after he got outmanuevered by bog standard coalition politics, they certainly didn't hold any grudges
Everything is going to be just fine
posted by lescour at 1:05 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
Look how reasonable Sander's supporters are after he got outmanuevered by bog standard coalition politics, they certainly didn't hold any grudges
Everything is going to be just fine
posted by lescour at 1:05 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
So why the fuck wasn't it of interest four years ago when tens of thousands of Americans were dying every day from Covid and the then-president was suggesting that people drink bleach while insisting that there were enough ventilators and PPE?
This is just completely false, sorry. The below are all from the NYTimes published in 2020:
Trump’s Focus as the Pandemic Raged: What Would It Mean for Him?
Injections of Bleach? Beams of Light? Trump Is Self-Destructing Before Our Eyes
U.S. Officials Say Covid-19 Vaccination Effort Has Lagged
Most Patients’ Covid-19 Care Looks Nothing Like Trump’s
‘Don’t Be Afraid of Covid,’ Trump Says, Undermining Public Health Messages
With ‘Cure’ Comment, Trump Exaggerates Known Benefits of Another Covid-19 Therapy
They Didn’t Drink the Bleach, but They’re Still Drinking the Kool-Aid
Trump Suggested ‘Injecting’ Disinfectant to Cure Coronavirus? We’re Not Surprised
And I could continue, but I think you get the idea - though I'm certainly not holding my breath that this will actually put to rest this Blue MAGA conspiracy theory, given how entrenched it seems.
posted by coffeecat at 1:06 PM on July 11 [17 favorites]
This is just completely false, sorry. The below are all from the NYTimes published in 2020:
Trump’s Focus as the Pandemic Raged: What Would It Mean for Him?
Injections of Bleach? Beams of Light? Trump Is Self-Destructing Before Our Eyes
U.S. Officials Say Covid-19 Vaccination Effort Has Lagged
Most Patients’ Covid-19 Care Looks Nothing Like Trump’s
‘Don’t Be Afraid of Covid,’ Trump Says, Undermining Public Health Messages
With ‘Cure’ Comment, Trump Exaggerates Known Benefits of Another Covid-19 Therapy
They Didn’t Drink the Bleach, but They’re Still Drinking the Kool-Aid
Trump Suggested ‘Injecting’ Disinfectant to Cure Coronavirus? We’re Not Surprised
And I could continue, but I think you get the idea - though I'm certainly not holding my breath that this will actually put to rest this Blue MAGA conspiracy theory, given how entrenched it seems.
posted by coffeecat at 1:06 PM on July 11 [17 favorites]
Look how reasonable Sander's supporters are after he got outmanuevered by bog standard coalition politics, they certainly didn't hold any grudges
Part of the reason we were/are mad is because we knew this is the exact situation we would be in!!!
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 1:10 PM on July 11 [10 favorites]
Part of the reason we were/are mad is because we knew this is the exact situation we would be in!!!
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 1:10 PM on July 11 [10 favorites]
>but Trump manages to skate by making awfulness the norm.
These are the people who put "FJB" on their homes. Trump 2024 is their personal "FU" message to us; the worse he is the better the message he becomes. The rabid right doing this is only 20% of the population I guess, but it's enough, maybe.
We'll find out in November at least.
posted by torokunai at 1:11 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
These are the people who put "FJB" on their homes. Trump 2024 is their personal "FU" message to us; the worse he is the better the message he becomes. The rabid right doing this is only 20% of the population I guess, but it's enough, maybe.
We'll find out in November at least.
posted by torokunai at 1:11 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
Donald Trump has a charisma.
I do wonder a little how much more he has left in the tank. While the world focused on Biden's performance at the debate, Trump seemed to be having trouble, and you can see it in all his recent rallies too. He's still got a little of the old sass. (I will go to my grave thinking "Yeah he beat Medicare, he beat it to death!" is one of the greatest comebacks in any presidential debate.) But things like repeating the Hannibal Lecter joke, that's diminishing returns right there. There's some thin line, I think, between an appealing 'America is crumbling' rhetoric and 'All I ever do is complain,' that I think an effective Dem campaign could get a crowbar into. There are plenty of apocalypse-worshippers who want to hear how we're all going to die from mentally ill migrants released from their asylums...but I don't know how much that constant griping really inspires turnout?
Anyway, all that to say, worries over Harris' charisma are misplaced. Just let her and Trump laugh, on the same stage, the same screen, and let America decide who's got the charisma.
posted by mittens at 1:16 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
I do wonder a little how much more he has left in the tank. While the world focused on Biden's performance at the debate, Trump seemed to be having trouble, and you can see it in all his recent rallies too. He's still got a little of the old sass. (I will go to my grave thinking "Yeah he beat Medicare, he beat it to death!" is one of the greatest comebacks in any presidential debate.) But things like repeating the Hannibal Lecter joke, that's diminishing returns right there. There's some thin line, I think, between an appealing 'America is crumbling' rhetoric and 'All I ever do is complain,' that I think an effective Dem campaign could get a crowbar into. There are plenty of apocalypse-worshippers who want to hear how we're all going to die from mentally ill migrants released from their asylums...but I don't know how much that constant griping really inspires turnout?
Anyway, all that to say, worries over Harris' charisma are misplaced. Just let her and Trump laugh, on the same stage, the same screen, and let America decide who's got the charisma.
posted by mittens at 1:16 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
Also, can we please stop repeating myths about Sanders supporters? A majority of his voters were women. Among young people, his coalition was racially/ethnically diverse. Most of us saw Biden bringing in Sanders to co-author the Democratic 'unity platform' as a good sign, and we voted for Biden in 2020. We're not the problem.
posted by coffeecat at 1:17 PM on July 11 [27 favorites]
posted by coffeecat at 1:17 PM on July 11 [27 favorites]
The problem in my opinion is less that NYT has it out for Biden or is in the tank for Trump. The problem is that they have a vested interest in maintaining horse-race coverage that requires a degree of both-sidesism that's frankly appalling to anyone who understands how unbalanced that is and how much that contributes to a general sense among poorly informed voters that Trump is better and Biden is worse than either actually are.
Any mainstream outlet covering Trump's faults and slipups as consequentially as they do Biden's would have to maintain wall-to-wall negative Trump coverage, 24/7. That doesn't work for media outlets, especially not for those that care more about clicks and ad dollars (i.e., everybody) than fidelity in reporting or any hypothetical responsibility to support a healthy functional democracy. So they moderate their coverage of Trump, and they're harsher in their criticism of Biden, because it seems to the naive observer (or cynical executive) more "fair and balanced" that way.
posted by Two unicycles and some duct tape at 1:18 PM on July 11 [15 favorites]
Any mainstream outlet covering Trump's faults and slipups as consequentially as they do Biden's would have to maintain wall-to-wall negative Trump coverage, 24/7. That doesn't work for media outlets, especially not for those that care more about clicks and ad dollars (i.e., everybody) than fidelity in reporting or any hypothetical responsibility to support a healthy functional democracy. So they moderate their coverage of Trump, and they're harsher in their criticism of Biden, because it seems to the naive observer (or cynical executive) more "fair and balanced" that way.
posted by Two unicycles and some duct tape at 1:18 PM on July 11 [15 favorites]
Biden's not going to drop out absent some truly black swan event.
The 2020's being the 2020's, I would not be at all surprised to have one happen. Would kind of expect it at this point.
posted by jenfullmoon at 1:22 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
The 2020's being the 2020's, I would not be at all surprised to have one happen. Would kind of expect it at this point.
posted by jenfullmoon at 1:22 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
There are open threads on Metafilter about Project 2025, and what Trump's love of Putin may mean for Ukraine. They're getting less than 1/10th the comments as these Biden threads. There have been repeated exhortations in these threads that we should be shouting about Trump the whole time, and I'm not saying that his egregious shit doesn't deserve to be carved into the cheap marble of Mar a Lago for future generations to spit on, but the facts are the facts and even the people who say we should be talking about Trump are here, not in the Trump threads.
posted by snofoam at 1:27 PM on July 11 [9 favorites]
posted by snofoam at 1:27 PM on July 11 [9 favorites]
Look how reasonable Sander's supporters are after he got outmanuevered by bog standard coalition politics, they certainly didn't hold any grudges
okay, I laughed, because at the time, as a Bernie supporter, it did feel a little bit like, hey buddy, you didn't figure out how to anticipate and counter something like the Clyburn move at all?
BUT, the reason this comment really stings is because the bog-standard coalition politics are so painful to consider in their larger historical context.
2008 Obama beats the Clinton establishment with an insurgent campaign-from-nowhere; wounds are nursed
2016 the combined Obama/Clinton establishment muscle Joe out in favor of Hillary (Joe would have won)
2020 the combined Obama/Clinton establishment muscle Bernie out in favor of a now-much-older Joe (Bernie would have won--as would have any Dem other than maybe Buttigieg and Harris, just my instinct)
2024 the establishment is now trying to muscle Joe out in favor of anyone, and Bernie Sanders basically in the same health he was in three years ago.
How dumb is the amorphous party establishment whenever it decides to form like Voltron to sideline a candidate deemed to be a bad risk or an outsider? So dumb. The dumbest Voltron.
posted by kensington314 at 1:31 PM on July 11 [11 favorites]
okay, I laughed, because at the time, as a Bernie supporter, it did feel a little bit like, hey buddy, you didn't figure out how to anticipate and counter something like the Clyburn move at all?
BUT, the reason this comment really stings is because the bog-standard coalition politics are so painful to consider in their larger historical context.
2008 Obama beats the Clinton establishment with an insurgent campaign-from-nowhere; wounds are nursed
2016 the combined Obama/Clinton establishment muscle Joe out in favor of Hillary (Joe would have won)
2020 the combined Obama/Clinton establishment muscle Bernie out in favor of a now-much-older Joe (Bernie would have won--as would have any Dem other than maybe Buttigieg and Harris, just my instinct)
2024 the establishment is now trying to muscle Joe out in favor of anyone, and Bernie Sanders basically in the same health he was in three years ago.
How dumb is the amorphous party establishment whenever it decides to form like Voltron to sideline a candidate deemed to be a bad risk or an outsider? So dumb. The dumbest Voltron.
posted by kensington314 at 1:31 PM on July 11 [11 favorites]
Look how reasonable Sander's supporters are after he got outmanuevered by bog standard coalition politics, they certainly didn't hold any grudges
I think that feud has been mostly one sided.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 1:32 PM on July 11 [6 favorites]
I think that feud has been mostly one sided.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 1:32 PM on July 11 [6 favorites]
Part of the reason we were/are mad is because we knew this is the exact situation we would be in!!!
While I’d worry less about his neurological health and speaking skills, it’s not as if Bernie wouldn’t be fielding age and succession questions four years into a term. I’m over being mad about 2020. I will cop to being mad, though about the way Biden’s team doesn’t seem to have really thought out what happens if the issue blows up despite their best efforts, since they evidently were aware enough of the potential issue to be making efforts.
posted by atoxyl at 1:36 PM on July 11 [6 favorites]
While I’d worry less about his neurological health and speaking skills, it’s not as if Bernie wouldn’t be fielding age and succession questions four years into a term. I’m over being mad about 2020. I will cop to being mad, though about the way Biden’s team doesn’t seem to have really thought out what happens if the issue blows up despite their best efforts, since they evidently were aware enough of the potential issue to be making efforts.
posted by atoxyl at 1:36 PM on July 11 [6 favorites]
2020 the combined Obama/Clinton establishment muscle Bernie out in favor of a now-much-older Joe (Bernie would have won)
Oh my gods no he would not have. The Saint Bernie who hadn't yet had Hillary's giant binder of stupid shit he'd said and done over the years and that she pointedly did not throw at him might have beat Trump—might—just from Trump fatigue. But the guy who everyone would have known about his praising the fucking Sandinistas would have lost in a landslide, and the likelihood of the Republicans' not having their own version of that binder is nil to vanishing.
posted by outgrown_hobnail at 1:38 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
Oh my gods no he would not have. The Saint Bernie who hadn't yet had Hillary's giant binder of stupid shit he'd said and done over the years and that she pointedly did not throw at him might have beat Trump—might—just from Trump fatigue. But the guy who everyone would have known about his praising the fucking Sandinistas would have lost in a landslide, and the likelihood of the Republicans' not having their own version of that binder is nil to vanishing.
posted by outgrown_hobnail at 1:38 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
I don't want to get into a back and forth rehashing 2020, but I will say one thing. It is a sad comment on our politics that on the rabid right and in the swingier districts, probably more people would identify Hillary as a socialist than they would Bernie.
posted by kensington314 at 1:40 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
posted by kensington314 at 1:40 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
Oh no! Not the Sandinistas! Consider my pearls clutched.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 1:42 PM on July 11 [14 favorites]
posted by The Manwich Horror at 1:42 PM on July 11 [14 favorites]
People always under-rate Sandinista. It's a bit bloated, but it has some of Joe Strummer's best songs on it.
posted by kensington314 at 1:45 PM on July 11 [17 favorites]
posted by kensington314 at 1:45 PM on July 11 [17 favorites]
There's no way to know now, but considering a shambling zombie who can barely navigate his way through a sentence won in 2020, I'm not sure why anyone thinks Sanders couldn't have won. He's too radical? I mean, the sitting president in 2020 built a chunk of border wall around Mexico and outlawed abortion, I don't think radicals are really a problem in American politics. Unless it's just leftist radicals, and if that's the case, I think the DNC needs to sit down and really think about how it arrived in the mess it's in right now.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 1:47 PM on July 11 [10 favorites]
posted by kittens for breakfast at 1:47 PM on July 11 [10 favorites]
I think most people would have asked who the Sandinistas were. Now, the Sandersnistas, that's another thing
posted by dis_integration at 1:56 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
posted by dis_integration at 1:56 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
And I could continue, but I think you get the idea - though I'm certainly not holding my breath that this will actually put to rest this Blue MAGA conspiracy theory, given how entrenched it seems.
I read through all of the links you provided and I didn't find any calls for Trump to resign. Not even from the columnists. There's a lot of ink about how Trump said something that isn't true or misrepresented facts and it all lays out an extremely negative picture about his overall ability to perform the job, but not even the columnists suggest that Trump should go or not run for reelection.
If anything, this just makes me angrier. Why is the New York Times continuing to legitimize Trump's candidacy by giving him a platform and treating him as if he were a normal candidate and not a guy who irresponsibly told people to drink bleach? How can they in good conscience run a story about his economic policies knowing how dangerous he was at handling Covid?
posted by RonButNotStupid at 2:05 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
I read through all of the links you provided and I didn't find any calls for Trump to resign. Not even from the columnists. There's a lot of ink about how Trump said something that isn't true or misrepresented facts and it all lays out an extremely negative picture about his overall ability to perform the job, but not even the columnists suggest that Trump should go or not run for reelection.
If anything, this just makes me angrier. Why is the New York Times continuing to legitimize Trump's candidacy by giving him a platform and treating him as if he were a normal candidate and not a guy who irresponsibly told people to drink bleach? How can they in good conscience run a story about his economic policies knowing how dangerous he was at handling Covid?
posted by RonButNotStupid at 2:05 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
If anything, this just makes me angrier. Why is the New York Times continuing to legitimize Trump's candidacy by giving him a platform and treating him as if he were a normal candidate and not a guy who irresponsibly told people to drink bleach? How can they in good conscience run a story about his economic policies knowing how dangerous he was at handling Covid?
They did run an editorial today calling for him to drop out of the race, FWIW.
posted by kensington314 at 2:06 PM on July 11 [6 favorites]
They did run an editorial today calling for him to drop out of the race, FWIW.
posted by kensington314 at 2:06 PM on July 11 [6 favorites]
Trump being unfit for office is certainly still true, but for the reality-based community, it is no longer news.
posted by snofoam at 2:08 PM on July 11 [6 favorites]
posted by snofoam at 2:08 PM on July 11 [6 favorites]
> I'm not sure why anyone thinks Sanders couldn't have won.
bloomberg would have jumped in as a third party candidate in order to throw the election to trump.
posted by bombastic lowercase pronouncements at 2:15 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
bloomberg would have jumped in as a third party candidate in order to throw the election to trump.
posted by bombastic lowercase pronouncements at 2:15 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
Honestly, not really. I will grant you that their characterization of the neurologist as a "Parkinson's specialist" is unfair given that the doctor specializes in mobility, even if yes, he's also published on Parkinson's - but it's not like that's his focus
This is a very good example of what people who disagree with you are talking about here. If this is your basic explanation of the Doctor visiting the White House, it is extremely wrong, and the NYT, NY Press, et al need to be called out for it, and the story retracted. Ironic too, that the NY Post gets their story ideas from a noted COVID denier.
And the NY Times alone has over 100 articles about Biden's age.
posted by The_Vegetables at 2:22 PM on July 11 [6 favorites]
I read through all of the links you provided and I didn't find any calls for Trump to resign. Not even from the columnists. There's a lot of ink about how Trump said something that isn't true or misrepresented facts and it all lays out an extremely negative picture about his overall ability to perform the job, but not even the columnists suggest that Trump should go or not run for reelection.
Ok, but look, you complained upthread "So why the fuck wasn't it [Trump's mental fitness] of interest four years ago when tens of thousands of Americans were dying every day from Covid and the then-president was suggesting that people drink bleach while insisting that there were enough ventilators and PPE?" So I provided you those articles about his handling of COVID that were critical of Trump re:COVID.
But okay, if you want to see articles in the NYTimes from 2020 making it explicit that Trump should not get re-elected, here you go:
Top G.O.P. national security officials call Trump ‘unfit to lead’ and back Biden.
President Trump Is Unfit for This Crisis. Period. His narcissism is a grave danger to our health.
A former top military commander under Trump is among 489 security leaders who say he is unfit for office.
The Times’s Indictment of President Trump: Readers react to a special section of the Sunday Review that outlined how the president has “gravely damaged the United States” and why he is “unfit to lead the nation.”
Trump’s supporters dismiss behavior that many of his critics find disqualifying.
The Republican Party Is Attacking Democracy: Our survival as a nation depends, above all, on the loser accepting the results of an election.
posted by coffeecat at 2:34 PM on July 11 [13 favorites]
Ok, but look, you complained upthread "So why the fuck wasn't it [Trump's mental fitness] of interest four years ago when tens of thousands of Americans were dying every day from Covid and the then-president was suggesting that people drink bleach while insisting that there were enough ventilators and PPE?" So I provided you those articles about his handling of COVID that were critical of Trump re:COVID.
But okay, if you want to see articles in the NYTimes from 2020 making it explicit that Trump should not get re-elected, here you go:
Top G.O.P. national security officials call Trump ‘unfit to lead’ and back Biden.
President Trump Is Unfit for This Crisis. Period. His narcissism is a grave danger to our health.
A former top military commander under Trump is among 489 security leaders who say he is unfit for office.
The Times’s Indictment of President Trump: Readers react to a special section of the Sunday Review that outlined how the president has “gravely damaged the United States” and why he is “unfit to lead the nation.”
Trump’s supporters dismiss behavior that many of his critics find disqualifying.
The Republican Party Is Attacking Democracy: Our survival as a nation depends, above all, on the loser accepting the results of an election.
posted by coffeecat at 2:34 PM on July 11 [13 favorites]
This is a very good example of what people who disagree with you are talking about here.
Dude, I know. I characterized that as an example of the NYTimes being "unfair." Disagree with me all you want, but don't pick fights that don't exist.
posted by coffeecat at 2:36 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
Dude, I know. I characterized that as an example of the NYTimes being "unfair." Disagree with me all you want, but don't pick fights that don't exist.
posted by coffeecat at 2:36 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
Philadelphia Inquirer Op-Ed today:
President Joe Biden’s debate performance was a disaster. His disjointed responses and dazed look sparked calls for him to drop out of the presidential race.posted by darkstar at 2:37 PM on July 11 [7 favorites]
But lost in the hand wringing was Donald Trump’s usual bombastic litany of lies, hyperbole, bigotry, ignorance, and fear mongering. His performance demonstrated once again that he is a danger to democracy and unfit for office.
In fact, the debate about the debate is misplaced. The only person who should withdraw from the race is Trump.
My problem is the NYT stuff is the examples are so many opinion pieces but the main headline stuff always seems to be mild or treating Trump as legit, this whole time.
But I would LOVE to stop arguing about exactly how shitty the shitty NYT is, so away I go.
posted by tiny frying pan at 2:44 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
But I would LOVE to stop arguing about exactly how shitty the shitty NYT is, so away I go.
posted by tiny frying pan at 2:44 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
The only person who should withdraw from the race is Trump.
Why not both?
posted by snofoam at 2:45 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
Why not both?
posted by snofoam at 2:45 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
I think the problem isn't so much the media hates Biden or favors Trump as something much more insidious.
The soft bigotry of low expectations, as one famous right wing racist put it.
The fact is the media is mostly made up of liberalish people. They EXPECT Trump to be a stupid, senile, crazy, bigoted fuckup and frankly so does everyone else in America. Even his supporters, they just like it that he's a stupid, senile, bigoted, crazy fuckup.
That's the Republican brand. "Hi we're Republicans and we're dumb as shit but we'll hurt the people you want us to hurt yeehaw USAUSAUSA"
The simple fact is that Trump is exactly what the Republicans want. Simplistic, bombastic, "tough", "strong", stupid, crazy, biligerant, egomaniacal, vindictive, bullying, cruel, etc.
But the Democrats have been trying to position themselves as the party of being at least slightly smarter. "Hi, we're the Democrats, we're bland as fuck and you hate us because Americans are stupid, but you also know we're the competent ones who can fix the shit your Republican friends broke".
A senile Democrat doesn't match the Democratic brand.
It's man bites dog vs dog bites man.
For you the day that Trump was stupid, crazy, cruel, bigoted, vindictive, and threatening to install himself as a Fascist dictator was the most important day of your life. But for eveyrone else it was Tuesday.
When the DEMOCRAT is incompetent, senile, unable to complete a sentence, and so on that's news because that's not what Democrats present themselves as being.
That's why the Democrats are making a big deal about Biden's apparent inability to do his job and the Republicns don't give a shit about Trump's obvious inability to do his job.
Basically it's a matter of different expectations. We expect Democrats to be at least semi-coherent and not total dumbshits, while Republicans have no similar expectations.
This is why Trump's obvious non-Christianity isn't an issue. This is why Boebert's public indecency charge wasn't a factor in her reelection. That's why Matt Goetz can be the closest thing to an admitted pedophile as you have in the US government and it doens't matter.
Becuse the Republicans don't care about that stuff. The job of elected Republicns is to fuck over the percieved enemies of the voting Republicans, say 'Murca is the greatest, abuse minorities, degrade and debase migrants, and make the rest of the world kiss the boot.
Nothing else, not drug use, not sex crimes, not theft, fraud, obvious stupidity, naked hypocracy, or stupidity and inability matters to the Republican voters.
Also? For you Liberals just now realizing how totally shitty and worthless the NYT is? Welcome to the club! Us lefties have hated the NYT with a passion for a whle now. Glad to have you, there's not a newsletter or a secret handshake but if you say "Ugh, the NYT" we'll be all "yup, they're awful".
if nothing else, it seems we can agree on that.
posted by sotonohito at 2:46 PM on July 11 [22 favorites]
The soft bigotry of low expectations, as one famous right wing racist put it.
The fact is the media is mostly made up of liberalish people. They EXPECT Trump to be a stupid, senile, crazy, bigoted fuckup and frankly so does everyone else in America. Even his supporters, they just like it that he's a stupid, senile, bigoted, crazy fuckup.
That's the Republican brand. "Hi we're Republicans and we're dumb as shit but we'll hurt the people you want us to hurt yeehaw USAUSAUSA"
The simple fact is that Trump is exactly what the Republicans want. Simplistic, bombastic, "tough", "strong", stupid, crazy, biligerant, egomaniacal, vindictive, bullying, cruel, etc.
But the Democrats have been trying to position themselves as the party of being at least slightly smarter. "Hi, we're the Democrats, we're bland as fuck and you hate us because Americans are stupid, but you also know we're the competent ones who can fix the shit your Republican friends broke".
A senile Democrat doesn't match the Democratic brand.
It's man bites dog vs dog bites man.
For you the day that Trump was stupid, crazy, cruel, bigoted, vindictive, and threatening to install himself as a Fascist dictator was the most important day of your life. But for eveyrone else it was Tuesday.
When the DEMOCRAT is incompetent, senile, unable to complete a sentence, and so on that's news because that's not what Democrats present themselves as being.
That's why the Democrats are making a big deal about Biden's apparent inability to do his job and the Republicns don't give a shit about Trump's obvious inability to do his job.
Basically it's a matter of different expectations. We expect Democrats to be at least semi-coherent and not total dumbshits, while Republicans have no similar expectations.
This is why Trump's obvious non-Christianity isn't an issue. This is why Boebert's public indecency charge wasn't a factor in her reelection. That's why Matt Goetz can be the closest thing to an admitted pedophile as you have in the US government and it doens't matter.
Becuse the Republicans don't care about that stuff. The job of elected Republicns is to fuck over the percieved enemies of the voting Republicans, say 'Murca is the greatest, abuse minorities, degrade and debase migrants, and make the rest of the world kiss the boot.
Nothing else, not drug use, not sex crimes, not theft, fraud, obvious stupidity, naked hypocracy, or stupidity and inability matters to the Republican voters.
Also? For you Liberals just now realizing how totally shitty and worthless the NYT is? Welcome to the club! Us lefties have hated the NYT with a passion for a whle now. Glad to have you, there's not a newsletter or a secret handshake but if you say "Ugh, the NYT" we'll be all "yup, they're awful".
if nothing else, it seems we can agree on that.
posted by sotonohito at 2:46 PM on July 11 [22 favorites]
Welp: Biden just introduced Zelenskyy as "the president of Ukraine, President Putin!"
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 2:55 PM on July 11 [13 favorites]
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 2:55 PM on July 11 [13 favorites]
‘And now over to President Putin’.
My GOD. Wake up!!!
posted by HandfulOfDust at 2:56 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
My GOD. Wake up!!!
posted by HandfulOfDust at 2:56 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
Putin his foot in his mouth is not what Biden needed in this moment
posted by oulipian at 2:57 PM on July 11 [13 favorites]
posted by oulipian at 2:57 PM on July 11 [13 favorites]
Welp: Biden just introduced Zelenskyy as "the president of Ukraine, President Putin!"
Which he immediately self-corrected.
posted by darkstar at 3:11 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
Which he immediately self-corrected.
posted by darkstar at 3:11 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
Hopefully when this kind of slip-up happens in the war room someone is there to double-check.
posted by snofoam at 3:12 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
posted by snofoam at 3:12 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
Urgent memo from Moscow that simply says: "No take-backs!"
posted by mittens at 3:12 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
posted by mittens at 3:12 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
Why not both?
Oh man, what an opportunity. Biden could say, "I would be more than happy to drop out of the race in favor of my Vice President, and will pledge to do so, if Donald Trump drops out of the race for being a 34-time convicted felon and serial defendant who is unfit to lead and significantly more cognitively impaired than I am."
Some Republicans might actually view that as an opportunity to push Trump out for someone more manageable.
posted by Ben Trismegistus at 3:13 PM on July 11 [8 favorites]
Oh man, what an opportunity. Biden could say, "I would be more than happy to drop out of the race in favor of my Vice President, and will pledge to do so, if Donald Trump drops out of the race for being a 34-time convicted felon and serial defendant who is unfit to lead and significantly more cognitively impaired than I am."
Some Republicans might actually view that as an opportunity to push Trump out for someone more manageable.
posted by Ben Trismegistus at 3:13 PM on July 11 [8 favorites]
15 minutes to the press conference. Here is the official White House feed.
posted by interogative mood at 3:17 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
posted by interogative mood at 3:17 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
News conference set for 7pm now.
posted by cashman at 3:35 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
posted by cashman at 3:35 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
News conference set for 7pm now.
Oh no, we're skirting the edge here! Everyone knows The Rules: Never Get Biden Wet, Never Feed Biden After Midnight, Biden No Talky Only Sleepy After 8.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 3:45 PM on July 11 [10 favorites]
Oh no, we're skirting the edge here! Everyone knows The Rules: Never Get Biden Wet, Never Feed Biden After Midnight, Biden No Talky Only Sleepy After 8.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 3:45 PM on July 11 [10 favorites]
DETROIT/WASHINGTON, July 11 (Reuters) - United Auto Workers President Shawn Fain met with the union's executive board late on Thursday to discuss his deep concerns with President Joe Biden's ability to defeat Donald Trump in the November election, three sources familiar with the matter said.
posted by mittens at 3:56 PM on July 11 [6 favorites]
posted by mittens at 3:56 PM on July 11 [6 favorites]
Via 538:
SoCal Research Poll in Virginia matchups dropped today:
Biden: 47
Trump: 44
Harris: 47
Trump: :47
posted by darkstar at 3:56 PM on July 11
SoCal Research Poll in Virginia matchups dropped today:
Biden: 47
Trump: 44
Harris: 47
Trump: :47
posted by darkstar at 3:56 PM on July 11
News conference set for 7pm now.
I must admit, watching a blank screen in the far-off future of 19:02, it's dispiriting to see this event going haywire before Biden even shows up.
posted by jackbishop at 4:01 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
I must admit, watching a blank screen in the far-off future of 19:02, it's dispiriting to see this event going haywire before Biden even shows up.
posted by jackbishop at 4:01 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
does Joe Biden know about the press conference
posted by dusty potato at 4:02 PM on July 11 [12 favorites]
posted by dusty potato at 4:02 PM on July 11 [12 favorites]
This is fucking bizarre. Something is up
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 4:06 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 4:06 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
My observation at this point is that proponents of Biden staying are trying to keep the focus on Trump because it sidesteps the question entirely and because that's the only candidate 2024 Biden looks good in comparison to. If you ran him against 2016 Trump before it was widely understood how terrible he would be or 2012 Romney, 2008 McCain, etc, I don't think he'd win. Maybe this would work among undecided voters who only have these two choices to pick from (I lied - there's actually a third choice of "They both suck, I'm sitting this one out"), but for what's essentially an intraparty conversation where there's at least one obvious alternative, it's not really convincing.
posted by ndr at 4:07 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
posted by ndr at 4:07 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
Well, this is a fucking terrible way to show the nation that everything’s under control.
posted by not just everyday big moggies at 4:08 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
posted by not just everyday big moggies at 4:08 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
Why do I feel like they're gonna send out Tim Robinson in a Biden suit
posted by kittens for breakfast at 4:08 PM on July 11 [6 favorites]
posted by kittens for breakfast at 4:08 PM on July 11 [6 favorites]
Biden is probably just hammer-fighting his way down a long hallway Oldboy-style, past all the people trying to prevent him from Speaking to the American People. Sure he looks tired all the time. You try fighting three dozen people with a hammer every time you want to get in front of a microphone.
posted by Two unicycles and some duct tape at 4:10 PM on July 11 [22 favorites]
posted by Two unicycles and some duct tape at 4:10 PM on July 11 [22 favorites]
Classic power move. We'll be eating out of his hand by the time he shows up.
posted by mittens at 4:11 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
posted by mittens at 4:11 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
I'm on the AP YouTube waiting for it to start, listening to what sounds like a cross between Sam Spence's NFL Films music and the music from that medal scene at the end of Star Wars.
posted by cashman at 4:12 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
posted by cashman at 4:12 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
FYI: press conferences are often delayed.
Breathe, people.
posted by darkstar at 4:12 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
Breathe, people.
posted by darkstar at 4:12 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
BIDEN: Doth not Kamala bootless kneel?
KARINE: Speak, hands, for me!
posted by mittens at 4:14 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
KARINE: Speak, hands, for me!
posted by mittens at 4:14 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
FYI: press conferences are often delayed.
Ugh, so this works on early-2000s concert rules, where the doors are 7:00, the "show" is supposedly at 8:00, and sometime around 9:00 the band shows up and does a few leisurely soundchecks?
posted by jackbishop at 4:15 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
Ugh, so this works on early-2000s concert rules, where the doors are 7:00, the "show" is supposedly at 8:00, and sometime around 9:00 the band shows up and does a few leisurely soundchecks?
posted by jackbishop at 4:15 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
OK, the pit orchestra is almost ready to play the overture...
posted by Artful Codger at 4:15 PM on July 11
posted by Artful Codger at 4:15 PM on July 11
The feed I'm watching has the live camera... various people in headsets or on the phone keep messing with the flags. It's kind of interesting, because you can feel the pressure just looking at them. Earlier they were replaying Biden speeches, including the VP debate in 2008, where Biden was on freaking fire. I really miss that guy.
posted by netowl at 4:15 PM on July 11
posted by netowl at 4:15 PM on July 11
Look, this was supposed to start two hours ago.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 4:17 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
posted by kittens for breakfast at 4:17 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
That's funny, my feed is just people arguing past each other back and forth... oops thats this brower tab.
posted by No Climate - No Food, No Food - No Future. at 4:18 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
posted by No Climate - No Food, No Food - No Future. at 4:18 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
FYI: press conferences are often delayed.
Breathe, people.
darkstar, you remember what this press conference was supposed to accomplish, right?
posted by not just everyday big moggies at 4:19 PM on July 11 [8 favorites]
Breathe, people.
darkstar, you remember what this press conference was supposed to accomplish, right?
posted by not just everyday big moggies at 4:19 PM on July 11 [8 favorites]
The NYT (uh, sorry, I guess?) notes in their live commentary that running the conference at this hour all but guarantees a larger TV audience, including casual viewers who may be tuning in for shows like “Jeopardy!” and are about to be presented with a special report.
posted by whir at 4:20 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
posted by whir at 4:20 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
I mean, didn't think it was weird at first (I mean, I assumed the initial delay was because NATO went long), but it's getting into weird territory...and the music doesn't help.
posted by coffeecat at 4:21 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
posted by coffeecat at 4:21 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
I get it now. The plan is to keep us all in this YT lobby until November.
posted by Two unicycles and some duct tape at 4:21 PM on July 11 [7 favorites]
posted by Two unicycles and some duct tape at 4:21 PM on July 11 [7 favorites]
including casual viewers who may be tuning in for shows like “Jeopardy!”
Ahhh, but without infuriating casual viewers who were watching Wheel!
posted by mittens at 4:22 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
Ahhh, but without infuriating casual viewers who were watching Wheel!
posted by mittens at 4:22 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
I mean... you can say that some people are just looking for any opportunity to seize on Biden's weakness, which as maybe one of those people I'll kinda cop to, but the reality is hundreds of thousands of regular voters who just want to see whether what they've been hearing about the President is true or not turned on the TV/youtube at 6:30 and are still watching a blank screen.
posted by dusty potato at 4:22 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
posted by dusty potato at 4:22 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
is the music, like, merry go round broke down, or maybe hail to the chief, but played on a gramophone with a wonky spring? that would be perfect
posted by seanmpuckett at 4:22 PM on July 11
posted by seanmpuckett at 4:22 PM on July 11
If they start playing Hall of the Mountain King I'm closing my laptop for the night.
posted by mittens at 4:23 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
posted by mittens at 4:23 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
I agree that all of this was generated by the media, who are addicted to Trump, they continue to campaign for Trump
I just fear that, without Sanders, and without a robust primary, do democrats lack a campaign leader with the ability to generate the earned media NYT will give to fascists?
posted by eustatic at 4:24 PM on July 11
I just fear that, without Sanders, and without a robust primary, do democrats lack a campaign leader with the ability to generate the earned media NYT will give to fascists?
posted by eustatic at 4:24 PM on July 11
What about Swan Lake?
posted by Two unicycles and some duct tape at 4:24 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
posted by Two unicycles and some duct tape at 4:24 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
The music (which for people on YouTube, if you switch to AP feed or NYTimes you'll hear it) is a range of classical music, and given what I know of recent Russian history, it's giving me strong palace coup vibes (not that I actually think that's what happening, but....)
posted by coffeecat at 4:25 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
posted by coffeecat at 4:25 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
without infuriating casual viewers who were watching Wheel
Exactly. This is the Biden 2024 coalition.
I am hopeful someone will queue up Yakkity Sax, personally
posted by whir at 4:25 PM on July 11
Exactly. This is the Biden 2024 coalition.
I am hopeful someone will queue up Yakkity Sax, personally
posted by whir at 4:25 PM on July 11
My partner just suggested that Biden should come out and dance to the music.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 4:26 PM on July 11
posted by kittens for breakfast at 4:26 PM on July 11
Here we go....
posted by mochapickle at 4:27 PM on July 11
posted by mochapickle at 4:27 PM on July 11
The teleprompter section is going well.
posted by netowl at 4:28 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
posted by netowl at 4:28 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
Is this a war announcement?
posted by mochapickle at 4:29 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
posted by mochapickle at 4:29 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
The teleprompter section is going well.
Not particularly, I don't think.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 4:29 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
I'm not trying to be a dick, but maybe Biden should try some shorter sentences.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 4:29 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
posted by kittens for breakfast at 4:29 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
someone get him some water!
posted by mittens at 4:30 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
posted by mittens at 4:30 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
He's doing OK - but none of us are watching for a history lesson.
posted by coffeecat at 4:32 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
posted by coffeecat at 4:32 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
I hate that "lead the world" bullshit.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 4:32 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
posted by The Manwich Horror at 4:32 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
Say more about cheaper groceries and corporate greed!
posted by mittens at 4:33 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
posted by mittens at 4:33 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
Much better once he was able to clear his throat. The sections on inflation coming down and the border are good.
posted by darkstar at 4:33 PM on July 11
posted by darkstar at 4:33 PM on July 11
I'm saying it's going well because he's loud. It's AMERICA, you better be loud.
Anyway, I hope if he can't handle questions today he just walks. If he's not standing down he should know his limits.
posted by netowl at 4:34 PM on July 11
Anyway, I hope if he can't handle questions today he just walks. If he's not standing down he should know his limits.
posted by netowl at 4:34 PM on July 11
Good lord, is he actually trying to campaign on bringing peace to Gaza?
posted by The Manwich Horror at 4:34 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
posted by The Manwich Horror at 4:34 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
I'll hand it to Biden that he's managing to be coherent enough that I'm briefly roused out of my "whoever it takes to beat Trump" pragmatism to remember how horrible this man's politics are.
posted by dusty potato at 4:34 PM on July 11 [8 favorites]
posted by dusty potato at 4:34 PM on July 11 [8 favorites]
I'll hand it to Biden that he's managing to be coherent enough that I'm briefly roused out of my "whoever it takes to beat Trump" pragmatism to remember how horrible this man's politics are.
Because he supports NATO?
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 4:35 PM on July 11
Because he supports NATO?
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 4:35 PM on July 11
"Vice president Trump"
posted by The Manwich Horror at 4:35 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
posted by The Manwich Horror at 4:35 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
Oh for fucks sake
posted by kittens for breakfast at 4:35 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
posted by kittens for breakfast at 4:35 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
Vice president trump?
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 4:35 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 4:35 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
Did he just call Kamala Trump? Joe... please, no.
posted by mochapickle at 4:36 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
posted by mochapickle at 4:36 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
Jesus. The "The reason I picked Vice President Trump" thing might have just done it, even though for the majority of this press conference he's sounded pretty much like his own self from the past 5, 6 years.
posted by cashman at 4:36 PM on July 11
posted by cashman at 4:36 PM on July 11
The point at which he moved from prepared remarks to press conference was painfully apparent. Kudos on the prepared remarks at least.
posted by Two unicycles and some duct tape at 4:37 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
posted by Two unicycles and some duct tape at 4:37 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
So, this is the slick preprepared part that will help us gloss over the weak press conference?
posted by snofoam at 4:37 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
posted by snofoam at 4:37 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
Jfc
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 4:38 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 4:38 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
This is painful.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 4:38 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
posted by The Manwich Horror at 4:38 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
"Look folks...well...anyway."
posted by mittens at 4:38 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
posted by mittens at 4:38 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
He said he doesn't think is VP is qualified to be president, in which case why the fuck was she on the ticket? That's the whole point of a vice president!
posted by Pseudonymous Cognomen at 4:38 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
posted by Pseudonymous Cognomen at 4:38 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
I really hope at least some of the people on this pre-determined list ask him a difficult policy question.
posted by coffeecat at 4:39 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
posted by coffeecat at 4:39 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
I tuned in for LESS than 30 seconds, heard him say "Vice President Trump," and shut the window so fast I might have sprained my finger.
Can we please put this poor man out of his misery?
posted by leftover_scrabble_rack at 4:39 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
Can we please put this poor man out of his misery?
posted by leftover_scrabble_rack at 4:39 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
I can't watch this at all, but it sounds like the black swan event is happening?
posted by jenfullmoon at 4:40 PM on July 11
posted by jenfullmoon at 4:40 PM on July 11
It was really garbled, but I think he was trying to say he did think she could beat Trump.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 4:40 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
posted by The Manwich Horror at 4:40 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/IncurableCoughOfDeath
posted by Rhaomi at 4:40 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
posted by Rhaomi at 4:40 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
This question about his legacy has inspired a good answer.
posted by mittens at 4:40 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
posted by mittens at 4:40 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
This is so much worse than I was expecting. He’s done for.
posted by not just everyday big moggies at 4:40 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
posted by not just everyday big moggies at 4:40 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
A man with a lifelong speech impediment makes one slip of the tongue, and y'all panic.
Geez, people. Grow some fucking spines.
Also: I reiterate what I said before about people being uncomfortable with disability... and mistaking a speech impediment for dementia.
It's sheer ableism.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 4:41 PM on July 11 [12 favorites]
Geez, people. Grow some fucking spines.
Also: I reiterate what I said before about people being uncomfortable with disability... and mistaking a speech impediment for dementia.
It's sheer ableism.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 4:41 PM on July 11 [12 favorites]
...did he just suggest federal rent control? Did I misunderstand that?
posted by mittens at 4:42 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
posted by mittens at 4:42 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
He’s made multiple.
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 4:42 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 4:42 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
HE REFERRED TO HIS RUNNING MATE BY THE NAME OF THE BIGGEST THREAT TO AMERICAN DEMOCRACY. Slip of the tongue or not, the optics are EXTREMELY not great.
posted by leftover_scrabble_rack at 4:43 PM on July 11 [15 favorites]
posted by leftover_scrabble_rack at 4:43 PM on July 11 [15 favorites]
Geez, people. Grow some fucking spines.
No one is panicking. It is painful to watch someone perform this badly, but everyone who wasn't desperately in denial expected something like this. It is just generating a lot of vicarious embarrassment.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 4:43 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
No one is panicking. It is painful to watch someone perform this badly, but everyone who wasn't desperately in denial expected something like this. It is just generating a lot of vicarious embarrassment.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 4:43 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
It's not the slips of tongue so much as the rambling answers that are kinda hard to follow.
posted by coffeecat at 4:44 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
posted by coffeecat at 4:44 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
Whatever staffer told Biden that the "hunch over with terrifying whisper for emphasis" move is a good go-to has to be some sort of mole...
posted by dusty potato at 4:44 PM on July 11 [11 favorites]
posted by dusty potato at 4:44 PM on July 11 [11 favorites]
No panic here, it just highlights what he definitely wanted to somewhat dispel. I'm down to vote Biden, or if he dips, VP Harris. I'll also be trying to figure out anybody I know who is considering voting trump, and convincing them to do otherwise.
posted by cashman at 4:44 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
posted by cashman at 4:44 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
Yes, it is embarrassing.
It's embarrassing watching the press circling like jackals.
So far I think Biden is well-prepared and handling it with grace.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 4:45 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
It's embarrassing watching the press circling like jackals.
So far I think Biden is well-prepared and handling it with grace.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 4:45 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
I have to trust my eyes, and to me this is fine. If this Biden had showed up to the debate, none of this freakout would have happened. He's smiling, making sense.
posted by netowl at 4:46 PM on July 11 [7 favorites]
posted by netowl at 4:46 PM on July 11 [7 favorites]
His follow-up answer on Harris was good.
posted by darkstar at 4:46 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
posted by darkstar at 4:46 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
He sounds fine to me. I mean, he won't be fine because no one will ever think of him in any other way than "senile zombie" or whatever, but he's lucid and sounds forceful to me. The story will only be "painful to watch" from here on out, no matter what he says or does. No one cares about NATO, no one cares about student loans, no one cares about nuclear power, all the questions are the same, all the comments are the same.
posted by os tuberoes at 4:46 PM on July 11 [6 favorites]
posted by os tuberoes at 4:46 PM on July 11 [6 favorites]
Okay, press, he has answered the fitness question five hundred times already tonight, can we please have better questions? Because he's warmed up now, he's doing well, I want to hear his answer on any other question.
posted by mittens at 4:47 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
posted by mittens at 4:47 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
Ok, his first policy question and the answer is pretty garbled.
posted by coffeecat at 4:47 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
posted by coffeecat at 4:47 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
Personally I do think Biden is performing a bit better than he could have. IMO it's actually the worst-case zone where nobody on either side is going to have their priors dispelled.
posted by dusty potato at 4:47 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
posted by dusty potato at 4:47 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
Also: I reiterate what I said before about people being uncomfortable with disability... and mistaking a speech impediment for dementia.
People especially tend to make that mistake when the speech impediment results in using the wrong names, losing their train of thought, and when it suddenly manifests at the age of 80.
So far I think Biden is well-prepared and handling it with grace.
I wish I were watching the conference you're watching.
Whatever staffer told Biden that the "hunch over with terrifying whisper for emphasis" move is a good go-to has to be some sort of mole...
I've seen him do the "lean in and whisper" thing in older speeches. It was supposed to seem earnest and "off the cuff". It used to work. Now it just sounds like he is Angus Scrimm.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 4:48 PM on July 11 [7 favorites]
People especially tend to make that mistake when the speech impediment results in using the wrong names, losing their train of thought, and when it suddenly manifests at the age of 80.
So far I think Biden is well-prepared and handling it with grace.
I wish I were watching the conference you're watching.
Whatever staffer told Biden that the "hunch over with terrifying whisper for emphasis" move is a good go-to has to be some sort of mole...
I've seen him do the "lean in and whisper" thing in older speeches. It was supposed to seem earnest and "off the cuff". It used to work. Now it just sounds like he is Angus Scrimm.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 4:48 PM on July 11 [7 favorites]
It's embarrassing watching the press circling like jackals.
IT’S A FUCKING PRESS CONFERENCE.
Of the many, many things I’m not going to miss about this year, the Biden dead-enders and their endless “but the refs are so mean!!” are going to rank high up there.
posted by not just everyday big moggies at 4:50 PM on July 11 [24 favorites]
IT’S A FUCKING PRESS CONFERENCE.
Of the many, many things I’m not going to miss about this year, the Biden dead-enders and their endless “but the refs are so mean!!” are going to rank high up there.
posted by not just everyday big moggies at 4:50 PM on July 11 [24 favorites]
Yeah, the press is in the same place right now as they were when chasing the "Dean scream" and "Hillary's emails" shiny objects.
They've defined their own reality. There's really nothing Biden can do to convince them he's fine. They've decided he's not, so no answer he can give them will stop them from asking the same questions over and over.
But this is as good as any press conference he's given in the last several years.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 4:52 PM on July 11 [6 favorites]
They've defined their own reality. There's really nothing Biden can do to convince them he's fine. They've decided he's not, so no answer he can give them will stop them from asking the same questions over and over.
But this is as good as any press conference he's given in the last several years.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 4:52 PM on July 11 [6 favorites]
He's also...not answering the question right now.
posted by coffeecat at 4:52 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
posted by coffeecat at 4:52 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
Honestly, if a president can't stand up to some dorky nepobaby who works for the Financial Times or whatever, what will he do when he faces Vladimir Putin?
posted by kittens for breakfast at 4:52 PM on July 11 [6 favorites]
posted by kittens for breakfast at 4:52 PM on July 11 [6 favorites]
He's standing up to them just fine.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 4:53 PM on July 11 [7 favorites]
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 4:53 PM on July 11 [7 favorites]
But this is as good as any press conference he's given in the last several years.
It just isn't. You might argue it isn't bad enough to justify him stepping down. I'd disagree but it would be a comprehensible position. But this is really much worse than he used to be.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 4:53 PM on July 11 [7 favorites]
It just isn't. You might argue it isn't bad enough to justify him stepping down. I'd disagree but it would be a comprehensible position. But this is really much worse than he used to be.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 4:53 PM on July 11 [7 favorites]
He's also...not answering the question right now.
Yes, this would be a good opportunity to talk about how to Trump-proof NATO just in case.
posted by mittens at 4:53 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
Yes, this would be a good opportunity to talk about how to Trump-proof NATO just in case.
posted by mittens at 4:53 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
Then stop complaining about them being tough. That's their job.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 4:54 PM on July 11 [8 favorites]
posted by kittens for breakfast at 4:54 PM on July 11 [8 favorites]
the press circling like jackals
The second press person asked the question about his health and fitness because he dodged the question from the first one. The third one asked the question again because he dodged the second one too. The fourth one asked the question again because he dodged the third. I don't think it was circling like jackals, I think it was doing their job, trying to get a straight answer to a difficult question. As it is, Biden still mostly dodged; "when I stop getting things done is when you should worry" is not exactly the conversation-ender I think he hoped it might be. But I think the press here has been entirely fair and as deferential as needed while still trying to get a straight answer to the question on everyone's minds.
posted by Two unicycles and some duct tape at 4:54 PM on July 11 [10 favorites]
The second press person asked the question about his health and fitness because he dodged the question from the first one. The third one asked the question again because he dodged the second one too. The fourth one asked the question again because he dodged the third. I don't think it was circling like jackals, I think it was doing their job, trying to get a straight answer to a difficult question. As it is, Biden still mostly dodged; "when I stop getting things done is when you should worry" is not exactly the conversation-ender I think he hoped it might be. But I think the press here has been entirely fair and as deferential as needed while still trying to get a straight answer to the question on everyone's minds.
posted by Two unicycles and some duct tape at 4:54 PM on July 11 [10 favorites]
Then stop complaining about them being tough. That's their job.
I said they were embarrassing. And they are.
They're allowed to do it. And he's fielding their hits just fine.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 4:55 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
I said they were embarrassing. And they are.
They're allowed to do it. And he's fielding their hits just fine.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 4:55 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
And by the way, guess what? This ain't a joke, number one -- I'm serious here folks. [cough] Serious here. Number two, (inaudible). Well, look, I'm -- anyway...
posted by Rhaomi at 4:56 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
posted by Rhaomi at 4:56 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
The second press person asked the question about his health and fitness because he dodged the question from the first one. The third one asked the question again because he dodged the second one too. The fourth one asked the question again because he dodged the third
He answered all those questions. What about his answers constituted "dodging", in your view? What answer could he give that you would consider not "dodging"?
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 4:57 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
He answered all those questions. What about his answers constituted "dodging", in your view? What answer could he give that you would consider not "dodging"?
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 4:57 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
And he's fielding their hits just fine.
He’s literally not answering the questions being asked of him.
posted by not just everyday big moggies at 4:58 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
He’s literally not answering the questions being asked of him.
posted by not just everyday big moggies at 4:58 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
this is as good as any press conference he's given in the last several years.
I would hope so. This is only the fourth press conference of his entire presidency.
posted by whir at 4:58 PM on July 11 [9 favorites]
I would hope so. This is only the fourth press conference of his entire presidency.
posted by whir at 4:58 PM on July 11 [9 favorites]
They're allowed to do it. And he's fielding their hits just fine.
That's one opinion, but the point is that they're here to throw punches. This man is the leader of the nation, his mental state is under serious question. Any reporter in this position would be deeply remiss to use this opportunity to throw soft balls.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 4:59 PM on July 11 [6 favorites]
That's one opinion, but the point is that they're here to throw punches. This man is the leader of the nation, his mental state is under serious question. Any reporter in this position would be deeply remiss to use this opportunity to throw soft balls.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 4:59 PM on July 11 [6 favorites]
While I disagree with his blockade of China EVs, I think he is explaining a difficult, complex issue in a way that will make sense to viewers.
posted by mittens at 4:59 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
posted by mittens at 4:59 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
This whole thing is pretty fine. A slip but the rest of it, he sounds fine. Sounds like the same guy he's been the past few years. He's an old man. He sounds like an old man. Sounds fine. He's explaining situations, talking about policies, and doing so in a clear manner. He 100% did well enough to continue on after today from what I've seen. Shaky start but he definitely turned it into a normal press conference.
posted by cashman at 5:00 PM on July 11 [7 favorites]
posted by cashman at 5:00 PM on July 11 [7 favorites]
He’s literally not answering the questions being asked of him
He is though. Some of ya'll are never gonna let him go now.
posted by os tuberoes at 5:01 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
He is though. Some of ya'll are never gonna let him go now.
posted by os tuberoes at 5:01 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
I concur with those who say people mostly see here what their preconceptions are leading them to see. He's doing... okay. Not providing a lot of fire and energy, but not losing the thread much. For those who want to see competence, he's describing complicated situations lucidly. For those who think he's decrepit, he's low-energy and makes occasional flubs.
posted by jackbishop at 5:02 PM on July 11 [6 favorites]
posted by jackbishop at 5:02 PM on July 11 [6 favorites]
Omg it's all opinion stop stating everything as a fact we can still have nuance if we believe
posted by tiny frying pan at 5:02 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
posted by tiny frying pan at 5:02 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
I mean, if the only answer someone considers acceptable to questions about his health is, "You're right, I'm unable to do the job any longer, I'll resign now", then I guess by that definition he's not answering them acceptably. *shrug*
Some people just won't accept any other answer.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 5:03 PM on July 11 [7 favorites]
Some people just won't accept any other answer.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 5:03 PM on July 11 [7 favorites]
Said how I felt, then I look on twitter and see Dr. Greg Carr, Associate Professor of Afro-American Studies at Howard University, feeling and saying the same:
Donald Trump is a blathering idiot reality star clown whose every addled, free association sentence should alarm any sane human being in full command of their own faculties. Joe Biden is an older man.posted by cashman at 5:05 PM on July 11 [18 favorites]
Whose policies are more likely to harm you? (those without means to flee?)
None of this is giving me confidence in his ability to do well in another debate - I'm not saying he's bombing, but he's often going on tangents, his speech is often garbled, and he's reminding me of the family member you avoid asking questions because you know they're going to give you a long spiel that's hard to follow. It's not terrible - but it's not inspiring confidence either.
posted by coffeecat at 5:05 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
posted by coffeecat at 5:05 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
Answer on China was very good. Context, clarity, diplomatic but direct, supported with examples. He clearly knows his stuff, and no real sign of mental decline in that answer.
Frankly, I thought the Pivot to Putin was well done: turn a question with an implicit critique into an opportunity to talk about your policies and positions.
Answer went long, though, and then got off topic (but not egregiously so).
posted by darkstar at 5:06 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
Frankly, I thought the Pivot to Putin was well done: turn a question with an implicit critique into an opportunity to talk about your policies and positions.
Answer went long, though, and then got off topic (but not egregiously so).
posted by darkstar at 5:06 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
Some people just won't accept any other answer
Expecting posters who hate Biden to have anything charitable to say is a mug's game
posted by lescour at 5:06 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
Expecting posters who hate Biden to have anything charitable to say is a mug's game
posted by lescour at 5:06 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
all i know is that he doesn't finish half of his sentences without changing the subject - he's struggling sometimes to remember where he is at with his sentences
at the least, he's not very inspiring
posted by pyramid termite at 5:09 PM on July 11 [6 favorites]
at the least, he's not very inspiring
posted by pyramid termite at 5:09 PM on July 11 [6 favorites]
Whose policies are more likely to harm you? (those without means to flee?)
Nobody is saying Trump is better. The point of selecting another candidate is to have a better chance of beating Trump. This inability to hear anything critical about Biden without immediately saying "oh so Trump is better?" is not great.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 5:09 PM on July 11 [28 favorites]
Nobody is saying Trump is better. The point of selecting another candidate is to have a better chance of beating Trump. This inability to hear anything critical about Biden without immediately saying "oh so Trump is better?" is not great.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 5:09 PM on July 11 [28 favorites]
Expecting posters who hate Biden to have anything charitable to say is a mug's game
You're not wrong! I've banged my head against that brick wall too many times.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 5:10 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
You're not wrong! I've banged my head against that brick wall too many times.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 5:10 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
cashman: "This whole thing is pretty fine. A slip but the rest of it, he sounds fine. Sounds like the same guy he's been the past few years. He's an old man. He sounds like an old man. Sounds fine. He's explaining situations, talking about policies, and doing so in a clear manner. He 100% did well enough to continue on after today from what I've seen. Shaky start but he definitely turned it into a normal press conference."
The problem is that even if the debate was fluke and he doesn't have any more significant public declines, "the guy he's been the last few years" has left him underwater nationally and in the swing states when he needs to be at minimum a few points ahead, despite the improving economy, Trump's convictions, and an overwhelming spending advantage that Trump is about to erase. Staying a course that has not worked so far and is trending worse is not a sufficient strategy for making up that deficit, and that was before the debate and aftermath resulted in literally half of his own supporters saying he should step down.
posted by Rhaomi at 5:10 PM on July 11 [12 favorites]
The problem is that even if the debate was fluke and he doesn't have any more significant public declines, "the guy he's been the last few years" has left him underwater nationally and in the swing states when he needs to be at minimum a few points ahead, despite the improving economy, Trump's convictions, and an overwhelming spending advantage that Trump is about to erase. Staying a course that has not worked so far and is trending worse is not a sufficient strategy for making up that deficit, and that was before the debate and aftermath resulted in literally half of his own supporters saying he should step down.
posted by Rhaomi at 5:10 PM on July 11 [12 favorites]
Expecting posters who hate Biden to have anything charitable to say is a mug's game
Him being a terrible person and him being senescent are completely orthogonal to each other.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 5:10 PM on July 11 [9 favorites]
Him being a terrible person and him being senescent are completely orthogonal to each other.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 5:10 PM on July 11 [9 favorites]
Nobody is saying Trump is better.
Yes, some people are. If you aren't, the tweet wasn't meant for you.
posted by cashman at 5:11 PM on July 11
Yes, some people are. If you aren't, the tweet wasn't meant for you.
posted by cashman at 5:11 PM on July 11
He answered all those questions. What about his answers constituted "dodging", in your view?
I guess let's wait for a transcript so we can make sure we're on the same page, but my impression was he redirected concerns to "look at the accomplishments of my administration" at least twice. Yes, he's done good things over the last three years. That is not an answer to the question. The press tonight, much like a lot of us here, was looking for some sign that the President is *now*, *tonight*, and for the next four months, capable of campaigning and winning the election in November.
He's gone on to do more to reassure people than he did with his earlier responses, by answering a few difficult questions more coherently than expected. He's doing better than I expected, and I think when the dust settles he'll have won over a lot of the doubters. But his early responses seemed focused on the accomplishments of his administration, and nothing about the accomplishments of his administration speaks to that point directly. That's what constitutes "dodging" to me.
posted by Two unicycles and some duct tape at 5:11 PM on July 11 [7 favorites]
I guess let's wait for a transcript so we can make sure we're on the same page, but my impression was he redirected concerns to "look at the accomplishments of my administration" at least twice. Yes, he's done good things over the last three years. That is not an answer to the question. The press tonight, much like a lot of us here, was looking for some sign that the President is *now*, *tonight*, and for the next four months, capable of campaigning and winning the election in November.
He's gone on to do more to reassure people than he did with his earlier responses, by answering a few difficult questions more coherently than expected. He's doing better than I expected, and I think when the dust settles he'll have won over a lot of the doubters. But his early responses seemed focused on the accomplishments of his administration, and nothing about the accomplishments of his administration speaks to that point directly. That's what constitutes "dodging" to me.
posted by Two unicycles and some duct tape at 5:11 PM on July 11 [7 favorites]
bin laden was in Pakistan, Joe
posted by clavdivs at 5:11 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
posted by clavdivs at 5:11 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
Yes, some people are. If you aren't, the tweet wasn't meant for you.
No one here is praising Trump.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 5:12 PM on July 11 [12 favorites]
No one here is praising Trump.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 5:12 PM on July 11 [12 favorites]
I agree that he's mostly doing fine, after some shaky moments at the start. He's pretty strong on foreign policy, and I think he's probably strategically correct to pivot every question into foreign policy, even if it does come across as kind of dull when watched in aggregate.
posted by whir at 5:13 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
posted by whir at 5:13 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
Also, this isn't twitter.
posted by coffeecat at 5:13 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
posted by coffeecat at 5:13 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
Okay, he's still going to hell for that Gaza answer.
posted by mittens at 5:13 PM on July 11 [7 favorites]
posted by mittens at 5:13 PM on July 11 [7 favorites]
Hamas aren't in the West Bank, Biden is a moron and a moral idiot. And who cares about his numbers in Israel?
posted by Pseudonymous Cognomen at 5:13 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
posted by Pseudonymous Cognomen at 5:13 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
Regardless of whether I agree with him, he is more coherent and present than he was in the debate or the interview. I don't think his performance will excite anyone, but it does imply he still can be cogent. I'm personally disappointed because I'm quite sure he'll lose, but people who have an investment in him soldiering on for whatever reason may take heart.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 5:13 PM on July 11 [6 favorites]
posted by kittens for breakfast at 5:13 PM on July 11 [6 favorites]
Staying a course that has not worked so far and is trending worse is not a sufficient strategy for making up that deficit, and that was before the debate and aftermath resulted in literally half of his own supporters saying he should step down.
That's fine too. I'm talking about this press conference and what many came in to see, which is to discern if he was even capable of moving forward. He is. I don't think it's a secret the one thing most people can agree on is neither him nor the other guy are ideal candidates. So if "they" can convince him to move on, I'd like that too, and I'll vote Harris. I haven't been on here for years so I know there are likely different factions of folks who feel certain ways and line up in certain camps, and I'm probably not in any of those. I'd just not like to have disaster next January.
posted by cashman at 5:14 PM on July 11
That's fine too. I'm talking about this press conference and what many came in to see, which is to discern if he was even capable of moving forward. He is. I don't think it's a secret the one thing most people can agree on is neither him nor the other guy are ideal candidates. So if "they" can convince him to move on, I'd like that too, and I'll vote Harris. I haven't been on here for years so I know there are likely different factions of folks who feel certain ways and line up in certain camps, and I'm probably not in any of those. I'd just not like to have disaster next January.
posted by cashman at 5:14 PM on July 11
well, i guess incoherent leadership is fitting for an incoherent people in an incoherent time - and we are so blessed! - no matter who wins, we will have an incoherent president
posted by pyramid termite at 5:15 PM on July 11 [6 favorites]
posted by pyramid termite at 5:15 PM on July 11 [6 favorites]
He's pretty strong on foreign policy, and I think he's probably strategically correct to pivot every question into foreign policy
I mean, it is a press conference at the NATO summit.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 5:15 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
I mean, it is a press conference at the NATO summit.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 5:15 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
I don't know, combination of age, he seems to be tongue tied and that other times gets across pretty well then
anyway
posted by clavdivs at 5:16 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
anyway
posted by clavdivs at 5:16 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
He's pretty strong on foreign policy
You mean "horribly fucking wrong on foreign policy" w/r/t Israel particularly, people have been calling him "Genocide Joe" for the last 10 months for a good reason.
posted by Pseudonymous Cognomen at 5:17 PM on July 11 [7 favorites]
This performance is not bad enough to substantially increase the demand tomorrow that he drop out. But it's not good, y'all. I can't imagine watching this and thinking it's good.
posted by penduluum at 5:18 PM on July 11 [14 favorites]
posted by penduluum at 5:18 PM on July 11 [14 favorites]
Did one of his coaches tell him that saying "by the way" is a way to cover disfluency? It's good advice, but it's pretty conspicuously a practiced compensation.
posted by jackbishop at 5:19 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
posted by jackbishop at 5:19 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
He is definitely a bit better than he was during the debate. But he is mumbling. He loses his train of thought. He makes major errors and doesn't realize it. Sometimes he just drops a sentence halfway through with a "whatever". I don't think this is going to reassure anyone.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 5:19 PM on July 11 [7 favorites]
posted by The Manwich Horror at 5:19 PM on July 11 [7 favorites]
Hamas aren't in the West Bank, Biden is a moron and a moral idiot.
Hamas sees West Bank as battleground with new Israel gov'tposted by Artifice_Eternity at 5:19 PM on July 11
Gaza's ruling Hamas Islamists are building ties with militant groups in the West Bank, seeking to attract support beyond the enclave by backing Palestinians involved in near daily unrest that Israel's new hardline government has vowed to crush.
"Some times my staff talks a lot" (ha ha ha)
posted by coffeecat at 5:20 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
posted by coffeecat at 5:20 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
That has nothing to do with what Biden was talking about, but good job Googling "Hamas west bank" that quickly.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 5:20 PM on July 11 [13 favorites]
posted by The Manwich Horror at 5:20 PM on July 11 [13 favorites]
But it's not good, y'all. I can't imagine watching this and thinking it's good.
Well, some people have richer imaginations that others, and that's ok.
posted by os tuberoes at 5:20 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
Well, some people have richer imaginations that others, and that's ok.
posted by os tuberoes at 5:20 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
I mean, yeah, when I say "strong" I mean "able to demonstrate a coherent understanding of the subject," not "is carrying out policies I think are wise or right."
posted by whir at 5:21 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
posted by whir at 5:21 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
Is it ok to be really worried that Trumps going to win cause of Biden’s current state and the horrid media coverage, without being called a Biden-hating dead ender? Asking for a friend.
posted by WatTylerJr at 5:23 PM on July 11 [9 favorites]
posted by WatTylerJr at 5:23 PM on July 11 [9 favorites]
I guess maybe a lot of y'all have never watched a full Biden interview or press conference.
I've watched scores of them. This is pretty much like any other, going back at least as far as the 2020 campaign. The only difference I see is that he speaks more quietly and a bit slower. But when he speaks more slowly, he's less likely to stumble over his words.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 5:25 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
I've watched scores of them. This is pretty much like any other, going back at least as far as the 2020 campaign. The only difference I see is that he speaks more quietly and a bit slower. But when he speaks more slowly, he's less likely to stumble over his words.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 5:25 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
His weird Trumpian whispers are not great optics.
posted by coffeecat at 5:25 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
posted by coffeecat at 5:25 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
Hoarse voice: Yes
Occasional flubs: Yes
Low energy: Yes
Clear mastery of the subject: Yes
Sign of senility/dementia: None
Overall: 6.5 out of 10
posted by darkstar at 5:26 PM on July 11 [9 favorites]
Occasional flubs: Yes
Low energy: Yes
Clear mastery of the subject: Yes
Sign of senility/dementia: None
Overall: 6.5 out of 10
posted by darkstar at 5:26 PM on July 11 [9 favorites]
Talk about not sticking the landing. Oy vey.
posted by metaxa at 5:26 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
posted by metaxa at 5:26 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
Is it ok to be really worried that Trumps going to win cause of Biden’s current state and the horrid media coverage, without being called a Biden-hating dead ender? Asking for a friend.
I'm definitely concerned about the press coverage. But I think if Biden loses, the biggest cause will most likely be inflation.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 5:26 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
I'm definitely concerned about the press coverage. But I think if Biden loses, the biggest cause will most likely be inflation.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 5:26 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
lol omg oh Jesus fuck are we now asserting a reality that Hamas operates in the West Bank in any substantial way because our bumbling leader said so?
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 5:26 PM on July 11 [7 favorites]
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 5:26 PM on July 11 [7 favorites]
"no-one is saying I can't win" (except for the dozens of people who've come out in the last few weeks saying just that and asking for you to stand down as candidate, that is)
posted by Pseudonymous Cognomen at 5:26 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
posted by Pseudonymous Cognomen at 5:26 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
hmm - nice zinger at the end - "listen to him"
posted by pyramid termite at 5:27 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
posted by pyramid termite at 5:27 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
Next public appearance he makes, I'm playing a drinking game. I'll take a shot every time he says "by the way". I hope that the MetaTalk obituary thread after I die of acute ethanol toxicity is nice.
posted by jackbishop at 5:27 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
posted by jackbishop at 5:27 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
Next public appearance he makes, I'm playing a drinking game. I'll take a shot every time he says "by the way". I hope that the MetaTalk obituary thread after I die of acute ethanol toxicity is nice.
I don't get it, is this mocking his stutter and one of his coping strategies?
posted by os tuberoes at 5:28 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
I don't get it, is this mocking his stutter and one of his coping strategies?
posted by os tuberoes at 5:28 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
This is pretty much like any other, going back at least as far as the 2020 campaign.
Pretty much how it appeared to me (and clearly some others) as well. I'd love for him to recognize his old manness and turn it over to Harris, but I guess it's gonna take some more time. Peace out MeFi. Don't get so caught up hitting "Post Comment" that you never look around you for people you know who are going to vote Trump, and talk to them about not doing that.
posted by cashman at 5:28 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
Pretty much how it appeared to me (and clearly some others) as well. I'd love for him to recognize his old manness and turn it over to Harris, but I guess it's gonna take some more time. Peace out MeFi. Don't get so caught up hitting "Post Comment" that you never look around you for people you know who are going to vote Trump, and talk to them about not doing that.
posted by cashman at 5:28 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
I think we're all kind of screwed. That was about as good as Biden gets in 2024, and it will probably get people to dial back their demands that he step down. That's good for people who want Biden to run, but I'm not convinced it's good for people who want Trump to lose in November.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 5:28 PM on July 11 [17 favorites]
posted by kittens for breakfast at 5:28 PM on July 11 [17 favorites]
I'd say this was the outcome a lot of us feared - not good enough to convince skeptics and provided more clips for Trump to campaign with, but not bad enough that he'll be easily convinced to step down.
posted by coffeecat at 5:28 PM on July 11 [16 favorites]
posted by coffeecat at 5:28 PM on July 11 [16 favorites]
lol omg oh Jesus fuck are we now asserting a reality that Hamas operates in the West Bank in any substantial way because our bumbling leader said so?
I'm not asserting that Hamas is operating in the West Bank because Biden says so.
I'm asserting it because Hamas says so:
I'm not asserting that Hamas is operating in the West Bank because Biden says so.
I'm asserting it because Hamas says so:
"We see that the prime mission that we are doing is to reinforce resistance in the West Bank and support it with what it needs to pursue its work and develop it," said Zakaria Abu Maamar, a member of Hamas's political office.posted by Artifice_Eternity at 5:29 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
"The more we make things harder on the occupation, the more we confront it and hurt it, the more we can foil its policies."
Listen to him? What was the end thing there about Trump???
posted by tiny frying pan at 5:29 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
posted by tiny frying pan at 5:29 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
This is what the rest of the Biden campaign will be like.
posted by No Climate - No Food, No Food - No Future. at 5:29 PM on July 11 [6 favorites]
posted by No Climate - No Food, No Food - No Future. at 5:29 PM on July 11 [6 favorites]
Not all of the reassurance we needed, but more than I expected at least. A lot can happen between now and September. I guess we'll see.
posted by Two unicycles and some duct tape at 5:30 PM on July 11
posted by Two unicycles and some duct tape at 5:30 PM on July 11
Listen to him? What was the end thing there about Trump???
Yeah I admit I don't get it, if that was a zinger. Maybe someone can explain?
posted by Two unicycles and some duct tape at 5:30 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
Yeah I admit I don't get it, if that was a zinger. Maybe someone can explain?
posted by Two unicycles and some duct tape at 5:30 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
Listen to him? What was the end thing there about Trump???
I took it as him saying, "if you think what Donald Trump does or says matters, then listen to him"
posted by os tuberoes at 5:31 PM on July 11
I took it as him saying, "if you think what Donald Trump does or says matters, then listen to him"
posted by os tuberoes at 5:31 PM on July 11
I don't get it, is this mocking his stutter and one of his coping strategies?
I don't think it has anything to do with his stutter. He seemed to resort to it whenever he lost the thread of what he was trying to say and shifted to a different rehearsed talking point.
I'm not asserting that Hamas is operating in the West Bank because Biden says so.
Biden very clearly intended to say Gaza and screwed up. Just like when he called Harris Trump.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 5:31 PM on July 11 [6 favorites]
I don't think it has anything to do with his stutter. He seemed to resort to it whenever he lost the thread of what he was trying to say and shifted to a different rehearsed talking point.
I'm not asserting that Hamas is operating in the West Bank because Biden says so.
Biden very clearly intended to say Gaza and screwed up. Just like when he called Harris Trump.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 5:31 PM on July 11 [6 favorites]
The “Listen to him” response was basically saying that the best antidote to Trump zingers on Truth Social is to actually pay attention to what he says, because if you really listen to him, the zingers fade to relative insignificance in the face of Trump’s fascist rhetoric.
posted by darkstar at 5:32 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
posted by darkstar at 5:32 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
I don't think it has anything to do with his stutter. He seemed to resort to it whenever he lost the thread of what he was trying to say and shifted to a different rehearsed talking point.
I guess. A lot of the rhetoric here is so off-the-chain-nasty it's hard to tell.
posted by os tuberoes at 5:34 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
I guess. A lot of the rhetoric here is so off-the-chain-nasty it's hard to tell.
posted by os tuberoes at 5:34 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
ok, he was being asked about trump saying that biden's too old, rambles too much and has mental processing problems - i forget the phrase that was used - and biden said "listen to him"
and just listen to trump - he's even more incoherent than biden is
that's what biden was attempting to say
posted by pyramid termite at 5:34 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
and just listen to trump - he's even more incoherent than biden is
that's what biden was attempting to say
posted by pyramid termite at 5:34 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
"Listen to him" was not that deep. Biden was effectively just saying "this asshole" about the reporter.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 5:34 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
posted by kittens for breakfast at 5:34 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
Needed more emphasis on "HIM" I guess
posted by tiny frying pan at 5:35 PM on July 11
posted by tiny frying pan at 5:35 PM on July 11
Now that it's over, I do have a question. People keep referring to his speech impediment, when he referred to Zelenskyy as Putin, and Harris as Trump. What's the specific diagnosis people are referring to there, with related word substitutions? I don't associate that with a speech problem per se, but I'd like to understand what people are talking about.
posted by mittens at 5:35 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
posted by mittens at 5:35 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
Rep. Jim Himes, ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee, immediately after the press conference:
Joe Biden’s record of public service is unrivaled. His accomplishments are immense. His legacy as a great president is secure.posted by Rhaomi at 5:35 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
He must not risk that legacy, those accomplishments and American democracy to soldier on in the face of the horrors promised by Donald Trump.
A lot of the rhetoric here is so off-the-chain-nasty it's hard to tell.
Well said.
posted by penduluum at 5:36 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
Well said.
posted by penduluum at 5:36 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
I'm asserting it because Hamas says so
January 2023? I think you'll find that there has been a material change in circumstances since then in Hamas' ability to operate outside Gaza (which also probably gives Palestinians in the West Bank a good reason to support them, honestly; if I were a Palestinian I'd find "death to Israel" a compelling proposition, considering that they're engaged in a campaign of genocide and state-backed settler violence).
posted by Pseudonymous Cognomen at 5:36 PM on July 11 [6 favorites]
January 2023? I think you'll find that there has been a material change in circumstances since then in Hamas' ability to operate outside Gaza (which also probably gives Palestinians in the West Bank a good reason to support them, honestly; if I were a Palestinian I'd find "death to Israel" a compelling proposition, considering that they're engaged in a campaign of genocide and state-backed settler violence).
posted by Pseudonymous Cognomen at 5:36 PM on July 11 [6 favorites]
I just left a Chamber of Commerce clambake. There were at least four Democratic officeholders and civil leaders there more fit to be President than Biden, ranging from village councilmen you’ve never heard of to George Latimer who just won what might be this year’s most expensive and contentious race short of the Presidency. There are probably five thousand such around the country.
That anyone is defending the idea that it MUST be Biden is just plain absurd. He is easily replaced and everyone knows he should be replaced. Failing to do, if it happens, is impotence. Who can believe Democrats can make hard calls if they can’t make this easy one?
posted by MattD at 5:39 PM on July 11 [10 favorites]
That anyone is defending the idea that it MUST be Biden is just plain absurd. He is easily replaced and everyone knows he should be replaced. Failing to do, if it happens, is impotence. Who can believe Democrats can make hard calls if they can’t make this easy one?
posted by MattD at 5:39 PM on July 11 [10 favorites]
i don't think his mind is gone - but i still believe he's really struggling at times to get through his day with enough energy
you just can't do as much when you're old - and i'm 67 next month, so i think i know a little about that
posted by pyramid termite at 5:41 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
you just can't do as much when you're old - and i'm 67 next month, so i think i know a little about that
posted by pyramid termite at 5:41 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
more fit to be President than Biden...George Latimer
Hard pass on any more right-wing AIPAC-funded genocide deniers, thanks.
posted by Pseudonymous Cognomen at 5:46 PM on July 11 [6 favorites]
Hard pass on any more right-wing AIPAC-funded genocide deniers, thanks.
posted by Pseudonymous Cognomen at 5:46 PM on July 11 [6 favorites]
1) This Rorschach test will change little, we see what we want, or what we are paid to see.
2) This will be how the press handles Biden as long as he is in the race. It is his But-her-emails.
3) He is more sane and knowledgeable than Trump, even if he is relaying canned answers and often doesn't understand the question. Trump is clearly worse.
4) Either no one has told the emperor that he is naked, or they have and he has forgotten. Either way, he intends to go full RBGinsburg and never let go.
5) Absolutely nothing i've seen here today makes me think anyone should vote for Trump or abstain from voting for whichever candidate has the best chance of beating Trump, even if best chance is a poor chance.
6) Today could have been when Democracts got renewed hope and energy and a fresh start on the campaign by having Joe announce his retirement, and hand off to Harris. Instead, since he will never be younger or sharper, this is where we are trapped. Don't worry, apparently Biden thinks the campaign doesn't really start until after Labor-Day!
posted by No Climate - No Food, No Food - No Future. at 5:46 PM on July 11 [13 favorites]
2) This will be how the press handles Biden as long as he is in the race. It is his But-her-emails.
3) He is more sane and knowledgeable than Trump, even if he is relaying canned answers and often doesn't understand the question. Trump is clearly worse.
4) Either no one has told the emperor that he is naked, or they have and he has forgotten. Either way, he intends to go full RBGinsburg and never let go.
5) Absolutely nothing i've seen here today makes me think anyone should vote for Trump or abstain from voting for whichever candidate has the best chance of beating Trump, even if best chance is a poor chance.
6) Today could have been when Democracts got renewed hope and energy and a fresh start on the campaign by having Joe announce his retirement, and hand off to Harris. Instead, since he will never be younger or sharper, this is where we are trapped. Don't worry, apparently Biden thinks the campaign doesn't really start until after Labor-Day!
posted by No Climate - No Food, No Food - No Future. at 5:46 PM on July 11 [13 favorites]
Biden won when Trump was burdened by scandals and failure on all sides. There was no respite for Trump. None of that is in front of mind now. And Biden's win, without this current headwind (deserved or not) and with all that baggage on Trump, was extremely narrow.
This is such a shitshow party, oh my god. Betting the house on Dobbs voters not showing up in polling AND pulling the lever for Biden instead of leaving it blank.
posted by Slackermagee at 5:47 PM on July 11 [8 favorites]
This is such a shitshow party, oh my god. Betting the house on Dobbs voters not showing up in polling AND pulling the lever for Biden instead of leaving it blank.
posted by Slackermagee at 5:47 PM on July 11 [8 favorites]
Yeah Trump has like a reverse incumbency advantage
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 5:48 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 5:48 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
He's toast. I guess we have to hope the Democratic leaders in congress have the moral courage to do the right thing.
God help us all.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 5:49 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
God help us all.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 5:49 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
To me, the most damning moment was not any of the obvious flubs, but when asked if his team presented him with polling data showing Harris doing better than him, would he step down, in a presser with many pauses he didn't hesitate - "No." Making pretty clear he cares more about his ego than democracy.
posted by coffeecat at 5:51 PM on July 11 [14 favorites]
posted by coffeecat at 5:51 PM on July 11 [14 favorites]
I have some chronic fatigue like symptoms resulting from long covid (thanks for sending people back to work while they were contagious, Joe.) I can sound a lot like Biden did there. Especially when I am tired (which is quite often.) Mixing up names, losing my train of thought, simply not being able to think clearly or organize my thoughts.
The thing is, I should absolutely not be president. I shouldn't be in charge of running the most important election in decades. It sucks to realize you have lost your edge, and aren't getting it back. But it changes what you are capable of.
At least I'm batting 1000 on not sending weapons to support an ongoing genocide.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 5:58 PM on July 11 [7 favorites]
The thing is, I should absolutely not be president. I shouldn't be in charge of running the most important election in decades. It sucks to realize you have lost your edge, and aren't getting it back. But it changes what you are capable of.
At least I'm batting 1000 on not sending weapons to support an ongoing genocide.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 5:58 PM on July 11 [7 favorites]
People keep referring to his speech impediment
Biden has had a lifelong stutter, which has been clinically diagnosed. I think that’s the impediment people are referring to. It causes a lot of the other coping mechanisms that folks have pointed out, like curtailing a sentence with “anyway” or using a temporizing phrase like “Look”. Stuttering also enormously amplifies public speaking anxiety, which might explain some of the other flubs.
Not sure if mixing up names is a symptom of stuttering, but I’ve been mixing up people’s names since I was in my 20s without having a speech impediment, and I can only imagine that additional speaking anxiety would make it worse.
posted by darkstar at 6:02 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
Biden has had a lifelong stutter, which has been clinically diagnosed. I think that’s the impediment people are referring to. It causes a lot of the other coping mechanisms that folks have pointed out, like curtailing a sentence with “anyway” or using a temporizing phrase like “Look”. Stuttering also enormously amplifies public speaking anxiety, which might explain some of the other flubs.
Not sure if mixing up names is a symptom of stuttering, but I’ve been mixing up people’s names since I was in my 20s without having a speech impediment, and I can only imagine that additional speaking anxiety would make it worse.
posted by darkstar at 6:02 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
Anyway, Rep. Jim Himes (D-Connecticut), ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee, has joined those calling for Biden to step down.
posted by coffeecat at 6:05 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
posted by coffeecat at 6:05 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
Biden has had a lifelong stutter, which has been clinically diagnosed. I think that’s the impediment people are referring to. It causes a lot of the other coping mechanisms that folks have pointed out, like curtailing a sentence with “anyway” or using a temporizing phrase like “Look”. Stuttering also enormously amplifies public speaking anxiety, which might explain some of the other flubs.
That is true, but in this case it seemed to happen several times where Biden appears to have lost his train of thought and moved on to something else. It seemed to be covering a loss of focus rather than a loss of articulation.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 6:08 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
That is true, but in this case it seemed to happen several times where Biden appears to have lost his train of thought and moved on to something else. It seemed to be covering a loss of focus rather than a loss of articulation.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 6:08 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
But minutes after the press conference wrapped up, at least two more Democratic lawmakers called for Biden to step aside — a sign his problems are far from over.posted by Rhaomi at 6:13 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
"Today I ask President Biden to withdraw from the presidential campaign,” Rep. Scott Peters (D-Calif.), wrote in a statement obtained by POLITICO. “The stakes are high, and we are on a losing course.”
I feel like the Biden campaign thinks it can survive just by slowing down the rate at which things get worse. Publicly, this tactic seems to be semi-working, because calls to quit have been steady more than accelerating, but that is changing and will totally change by the time we get to the point of no return on switching candidates. Harris/? 2024!
posted by snofoam at 6:19 PM on July 11 [6 favorites]
posted by snofoam at 6:19 PM on July 11 [6 favorites]
I feel like Biden’s inner circle is kind of terrible for letting him full on Don Quixote this campaign. He has been a dutiful public servant and seems like a good man. He doesn’t deserve to spend his twilight years as a joke or ruining his legacy.
posted by snofoam at 6:25 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
posted by snofoam at 6:25 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
I wonder if there's anything to the timing of this email I just got, "from" Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona:
posted by knotty knots at 6:25 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
Let me be clear: President Biden and I are determined to lower costs for student loan borrowers, to make repaying student debt affordable and realistic, and to build on our separate efforts that have already provided relief to 4.75 million Americans – no matter how many times Republican elected officials try to stop us. That’s why our Administration will continue to implement the SAVE Plan to the fullest extent possible to help borrowers access lower monthly payments.And I wonder if they've planned similar messaging spates from other Biden Administration initiatives tonight and in future days? It has a real ring to it of "look, see everything he's doing, just stay the course bro I promise it'll be fine bro"
posted by knotty knots at 6:25 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
I feel like Biden’s inner circle is kind of terrible for letting him full on Don Quixote this campaign. He has been a dutiful public servant and seems like a good man. He doesn’t deserve to spend his twilight years as a joke or ruining his legacy.
Between Iraq and Gaza he has a lot of blood on his hands.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 6:27 PM on July 11 [7 favorites]
Between Iraq and Gaza he has a lot of blood on his hands.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 6:27 PM on July 11 [7 favorites]
And, to be extremely clear about this: I'm glad for the student loan reforms and I shudder to think what would be in a DeVos email about federal student loans.
posted by knotty knots at 6:28 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
posted by knotty knots at 6:28 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
And I wonder if they've planned similar messaging spates from other Biden Administration initiatives tonight and in future days?
I would expect so. It’s a standard campaign strategy to coordinate social media communications with live events like this.
Especially important for Biden now, of course, to coordinate messaging. But also, I would expect more if it as a matter of now heading into what the most folks consider the traditional beginning of the campaign season in August/September.
posted by darkstar at 6:32 PM on July 11
I would expect so. It’s a standard campaign strategy to coordinate social media communications with live events like this.
Especially important for Biden now, of course, to coordinate messaging. But also, I would expect more if it as a matter of now heading into what the most folks consider the traditional beginning of the campaign season in August/September.
posted by darkstar at 6:32 PM on July 11
It must have been effective because the Biden haters have gone back to taunts of genocide Joe, etc.
posted by interogative mood at 6:33 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
posted by interogative mood at 6:33 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
It must have been effective because the Biden haters have gone back to taunts of genocide Joe, etc.
Look at the news in the immediate aftermath. Pretty much every headline was about "vice president Trump". I don't think this helped him.
But also, if people are going to claim Biden is a "good man", then expect there to be some pushback from people who remember the victims of his foreign policy,
posted by The Manwich Horror at 6:35 PM on July 11 [16 favorites]
Look at the news in the immediate aftermath. Pretty much every headline was about "vice president Trump". I don't think this helped him.
But also, if people are going to claim Biden is a "good man", then expect there to be some pushback from people who remember the victims of his foreign policy,
posted by The Manwich Horror at 6:35 PM on July 11 [16 favorites]
And his domestic policy! Everyone loves to forget that he was one of the sponsors of the Violent Crime Control Act of 1991!
posted by adrienneleigh at 6:40 PM on July 11 [7 favorites]
posted by adrienneleigh at 6:40 PM on July 11 [7 favorites]
The problem, for team Biden, is that his job tonight was to unquestionably refute the accusations that he's losing it. And he failed. He was kind of OK much of the time. But he NEEDED to be a lot better than kind of OK much of the time. He needed to be spot on for pretty much all the time.
If 100 is perfection, and 50 is average, then Biden came in around 45. Which in isolation isn't awful. But since he needed to be in the upper 80's to really put the speculation about his mental health to rest then what might otherwise have been a middle of the road press conference was a disaster for him.
When you're down a lot, you have to do better than just OK to recover the lost ground.
But he's the candidate. That's obviously not going to change despite the fact that he's falling apart while we watch. All it takes is him being stubborn and he can bring the country down, and he's clearly got plenty of stubborn even if he doesn't have the whatittakes to look good for the people watching on TV. I think all the speculation about him dropping out is pointless, he's not going to.
The only way Joe Biden isn't the candidate in November is if he dies between now and then. If nothing else the past few days, and this press conference, have proven that.
Artifice_Eternity I guess maybe a lot of y'all have never watched a full Biden interview or press conference.
Considering this is his, what, fourth in his entire four years as President, I don't think you can really complain about people not watching enough Biden press conferences. He's been hiding from the press since he was elected.
Also, regarding the endless "zomg abelism" stuff about Biden, do you REALLY think you can scold the average idiot American watching this into thinking Biden is 100% there mentally by saying that over and over? No one is saying he's unfit to be a president because of his stutter. No one is saying he'll likely lose because of his stutter. Give it a rest.
snofoam He doesn’t deserve to spend his twilight years as a joke or ruining his legacy.
I'm more concerned because I don't think my son deserves to grow up in a civil war or a fascist hellscape because one old man wouldn't admit he can't win. I don't give half a shit about Joe Biden or his legacy.
The Manwich Horror Between Iraq and Gaza he has a lot of blood on his hands.
That's 100% true, but I can see why the Biden fans are angry that we keep saying it. Because it's been true for every President ever and up until just now with Biden it was only a tiny fringe of us really deranged and childish lefties who had the laughable and naive idea that a President didn't actually need to be a war criminal and genocide enabler.
Nixon backed genocide. Carter backed genocide. Reagan backed genocide. Bush I backed genocide. Clinton backed genocide. Bush II backed genocide. Obama backed genocide. I can see how to many people it seems unfair that suddenly people care when they didn't used to.
And as a cynical bastard I'm 100% sure the only reason anyone outside childish foolish leftist hippies cares is because it's being livestreamed. All the other genocides backed by US Presidents happened with less public awareness, even Pol Pot was able to keep the coverage of his genocide at a lower level than Netanyahu is able to.
posted by sotonohito at 6:41 PM on July 11 [19 favorites]
If 100 is perfection, and 50 is average, then Biden came in around 45. Which in isolation isn't awful. But since he needed to be in the upper 80's to really put the speculation about his mental health to rest then what might otherwise have been a middle of the road press conference was a disaster for him.
When you're down a lot, you have to do better than just OK to recover the lost ground.
But he's the candidate. That's obviously not going to change despite the fact that he's falling apart while we watch. All it takes is him being stubborn and he can bring the country down, and he's clearly got plenty of stubborn even if he doesn't have the whatittakes to look good for the people watching on TV. I think all the speculation about him dropping out is pointless, he's not going to.
The only way Joe Biden isn't the candidate in November is if he dies between now and then. If nothing else the past few days, and this press conference, have proven that.
Artifice_Eternity I guess maybe a lot of y'all have never watched a full Biden interview or press conference.
Considering this is his, what, fourth in his entire four years as President, I don't think you can really complain about people not watching enough Biden press conferences. He's been hiding from the press since he was elected.
Also, regarding the endless "zomg abelism" stuff about Biden, do you REALLY think you can scold the average idiot American watching this into thinking Biden is 100% there mentally by saying that over and over? No one is saying he's unfit to be a president because of his stutter. No one is saying he'll likely lose because of his stutter. Give it a rest.
snofoam He doesn’t deserve to spend his twilight years as a joke or ruining his legacy.
I'm more concerned because I don't think my son deserves to grow up in a civil war or a fascist hellscape because one old man wouldn't admit he can't win. I don't give half a shit about Joe Biden or his legacy.
The Manwich Horror Between Iraq and Gaza he has a lot of blood on his hands.
That's 100% true, but I can see why the Biden fans are angry that we keep saying it. Because it's been true for every President ever and up until just now with Biden it was only a tiny fringe of us really deranged and childish lefties who had the laughable and naive idea that a President didn't actually need to be a war criminal and genocide enabler.
Nixon backed genocide. Carter backed genocide. Reagan backed genocide. Bush I backed genocide. Clinton backed genocide. Bush II backed genocide. Obama backed genocide. I can see how to many people it seems unfair that suddenly people care when they didn't used to.
And as a cynical bastard I'm 100% sure the only reason anyone outside childish foolish leftist hippies cares is because it's being livestreamed. All the other genocides backed by US Presidents happened with less public awareness, even Pol Pot was able to keep the coverage of his genocide at a lower level than Netanyahu is able to.
posted by sotonohito at 6:41 PM on July 11 [19 favorites]
expect there to be some pushback from people who remember the victims of his foreign policy
And his domestic policy over a 30+ year Senate career, come to that (crime bill? Also his handling of the Anita Hill hearings is part of the reason Clarence Thomas is on the Supreme Court).
posted by Pseudonymous Cognomen at 6:42 PM on July 11 [10 favorites]
And his domestic policy over a 30+ year Senate career, come to that (crime bill? Also his handling of the Anita Hill hearings is part of the reason Clarence Thomas is on the Supreme Court).
posted by Pseudonymous Cognomen at 6:42 PM on July 11 [10 favorites]
Not great, not terrible. But Biden needs to be vigorous to throw off the image of unenergetic, not just lucid. The various flubs he made aren't doing any favors. I am grading based entirely on how well he is acting the role of a politician, not the substance of his responses. Many of the questions he fielded are quite unfair and leading, but being able to handle them is part of the game. I don't know if he's met the bar of being able to convincingly take the fight to Trump.
Biden's stuttering problem is fairly well-known - what's significant isn't that it exists, but that it's something he's successfully suppressed for decades and becoming more obvious lately.
posted by ndr at 6:52 PM on July 11
Biden's stuttering problem is fairly well-known - what's significant isn't that it exists, but that it's something he's successfully suppressed for decades and becoming more obvious lately.
posted by ndr at 6:52 PM on July 11
Palestine is also an imprisoned population trapped in a fraction of their own lands and denied autonomy, freedom, and frequently food and basic services. The terrorist attack on Israel was horrific, but terrorists are often caused by oppression. How do you fight for freedom against people who would prefer you dead and gone? (The right wing, not all of Israel) And the Israeli armed forces are quite frankly slaughtering civilians and vital infrastructure. Not to mention probably specifically targeting media and press. Being a journalist in Palestine is more dangerous than being a Russian general.
I don't think Biden saved himself. I'm not sure he could have at this point. I certainly don't think he's covered for 'Ill have done my goodest' if he loses and Trump is King
posted by Jacen at 7:07 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
I don't think Biden saved himself. I'm not sure he could have at this point. I certainly don't think he's covered for 'Ill have done my goodest' if he loses and Trump is King
posted by Jacen at 7:07 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
I feel like Biden’s inner circle is kind of terrible for letting him full on Don Quixote this campaign.
If Biden actually had a cold at the debate (and I am skeptical), all they had to do was leak that before the debate. Then the takeaway would've been the old guy did pretty good for having a cold.
posted by kirkaracha at 7:09 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
If Biden actually had a cold at the debate (and I am skeptical), all they had to do was leak that before the debate. Then the takeaway would've been the old guy did pretty good for having a cold.
posted by kirkaracha at 7:09 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
John Crace's take on the press conference over at the Guardian. I think it is basically accurate.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 7:51 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
posted by The Manwich Horror at 7:51 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
Pretty much every headline was about "vice president Trump".
Huh, not at the NYTimes, WashingtonPost, or CNN, as far as I can tell (though FoxNews seems to be highlighting both that and some "Determined On Running" malapropism that hadn't otherwise jumped out at me).
I've swung back and forth on this a couple times between the debate and now. I guess at this point I don't have confidence that either scenario is necessarily more likely than the other to avoid terrible outcomes.
(Has anyone put together aggregate polling averages for Harris v. Trump [v. Kennedy] in the swing states? Shortly after the debate, people were posting an individual set of swingstate polls showing Harris having significantly greater chances than Biden, and upthread someone posted a more recent individual poll showing the opposite. And I think we're all at least a little bit prone to dismissing whichever one doesn't line up with our gut sense of things.)
posted by nobody at 7:56 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
Huh, not at the NYTimes, WashingtonPost, or CNN, as far as I can tell (though FoxNews seems to be highlighting both that and some "Determined On Running" malapropism that hadn't otherwise jumped out at me).
I've swung back and forth on this a couple times between the debate and now. I guess at this point I don't have confidence that either scenario is necessarily more likely than the other to avoid terrible outcomes.
(Has anyone put together aggregate polling averages for Harris v. Trump [v. Kennedy] in the swing states? Shortly after the debate, people were posting an individual set of swingstate polls showing Harris having significantly greater chances than Biden, and upthread someone posted a more recent individual poll showing the opposite. And I think we're all at least a little bit prone to dismissing whichever one doesn't line up with our gut sense of things.)
posted by nobody at 7:56 PM on July 11 [2 favorites]
"I can not express how greatly affected I am at this new proof of public confidence and the highly flattering manner in which you have been pleased to make the communication. At the same time I must not conceal from you my earnest wish that the choice had fallen upon a man less declined in years and better qualified to encounter the usual vicissitudes of war."
-George Washington to President John Adams.
posted by clavdivs at 7:57 PM on July 11
-George Washington to President John Adams.
posted by clavdivs at 7:57 PM on July 11
Via CSPAN, Biden speaking extemporaneously to National Union leaders at the AFL-CIO earlier today. (About 10 minutes.)
posted by darkstar at 8:20 PM on July 11
posted by darkstar at 8:20 PM on July 11
The Manwich Horror: Between Iraq and Gaza he has a lot of blood on his hands.
sotonohito: That's 100% true, but I can see why the Biden fans are angry that we keep saying it. Because it's been true for every President ever and up until just now with Biden it was only a tiny fringe of us really deranged and childish lefties who had the laughable and naive idea that a President didn't actually need to be a war criminal and genocide enabler.
You did namecheck Obama subsequently, but in my middle aged non-American first-time-having-a-Democrat-president-in-my-adulthood life, I got a taste of it when Syria happened as well as 2014 Palestine. So this checks out. (At this point I'm keeping my Obama/Biden pin I got out of historical curiosity since it's the kind of cruft you can't find here)
Anyway, I'm more concerned by the anecdote relayed in this CNN piece (read it before I slept so this is before the press con) - not a single full cabinet meeting since Oct 2023?? Surely that's.... idk you tell me Americans.
posted by cendawanita at 8:56 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
sotonohito: That's 100% true, but I can see why the Biden fans are angry that we keep saying it. Because it's been true for every President ever and up until just now with Biden it was only a tiny fringe of us really deranged and childish lefties who had the laughable and naive idea that a President didn't actually need to be a war criminal and genocide enabler.
You did namecheck Obama subsequently, but in my middle aged non-American first-time-having-a-Democrat-president-in-my-adulthood life, I got a taste of it when Syria happened as well as 2014 Palestine. So this checks out. (At this point I'm keeping my Obama/Biden pin I got out of historical curiosity since it's the kind of cruft you can't find here)
Anyway, I'm more concerned by the anecdote relayed in this CNN piece (read it before I slept so this is before the press con) - not a single full cabinet meeting since Oct 2023?? Surely that's.... idk you tell me Americans.
posted by cendawanita at 8:56 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
Whoa, that AFL-CIO speech is genuinely excellent politicking, even accounting for the couple stumbles toward the end, which he pretty gracefully (but not perfectly) recovers from. I really didn't think he still had that in him.
Unfortunately, the most successful (albeit perhaps a bit overused) rhetorical moves on display there aren't applicable to press conferences or, probably, audienceless debates. And, unfortunately, he doesn't seem to be able to reliably deliver this level of performance. If he could, he should be doing (specifically working-class?) town halls all the time.
Or go ahead and replace him next week if that's likely to work out better, but watching that was maybe the first time I could understand how there might be genuine Joe Biden fans out there, and not just a whole country of people choosing him in a primary because they think other people will be more likely to vote for him, and/or convincing themselves they love him because it makes the whole of politics feel more palatable.
posted by nobody at 9:21 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
Unfortunately, the most successful (albeit perhaps a bit overused) rhetorical moves on display there aren't applicable to press conferences or, probably, audienceless debates. And, unfortunately, he doesn't seem to be able to reliably deliver this level of performance. If he could, he should be doing (specifically working-class?) town halls all the time.
Or go ahead and replace him next week if that's likely to work out better, but watching that was maybe the first time I could understand how there might be genuine Joe Biden fans out there, and not just a whole country of people choosing him in a primary because they think other people will be more likely to vote for him, and/or convincing themselves they love him because it makes the whole of politics feel more palatable.
posted by nobody at 9:21 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
I'm extremely troubled by this. The more I think about it, the more troubled it makes me feel, which is why I'm still awake.
Like I said a while ago, I think that Biden's performance was such that it refuted the idea that he's totally incoherent, but I don't think that was enough. Before the debate, I hoped that Biden would take the advantage of the format and essentially use the platform as a town hall, ignoring Trump and setting forth his vision for the country in a positive and dynamic manner. Instead he did everything but piss his pants on stage. Tonight I feel like he addressed the issue of whether he's competent well enough (he seems more or less in there), but he still didn't really bring any reason to get excited about four more years of him other than it won't be four more years of Trump.
That's not enough, and to low-interest voters it won't be enough to get them off the couch. Biden needs to be dynamic and inspiring. We may be relieved to see a merely mediocre event as opposed to a massively disastrous event, but mediocrity may not cut it this time.
If Biden had truly bombed this conference, people who are pleading for him to step down would have real ammo. But I think the bar is low enough for this to be a win. That means the party would have to oust him, and I just don't think that's going to happen. If it happened anyway, I don't think the American people would vote for the end product of a non-democratic process. Biden had to resign; any other way of changing the candidate will just not end well. And I don't think Biden will resign after tonight.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 9:28 PM on July 11 [8 favorites]
Like I said a while ago, I think that Biden's performance was such that it refuted the idea that he's totally incoherent, but I don't think that was enough. Before the debate, I hoped that Biden would take the advantage of the format and essentially use the platform as a town hall, ignoring Trump and setting forth his vision for the country in a positive and dynamic manner. Instead he did everything but piss his pants on stage. Tonight I feel like he addressed the issue of whether he's competent well enough (he seems more or less in there), but he still didn't really bring any reason to get excited about four more years of him other than it won't be four more years of Trump.
That's not enough, and to low-interest voters it won't be enough to get them off the couch. Biden needs to be dynamic and inspiring. We may be relieved to see a merely mediocre event as opposed to a massively disastrous event, but mediocrity may not cut it this time.
If Biden had truly bombed this conference, people who are pleading for him to step down would have real ammo. But I think the bar is low enough for this to be a win. That means the party would have to oust him, and I just don't think that's going to happen. If it happened anyway, I don't think the American people would vote for the end product of a non-democratic process. Biden had to resign; any other way of changing the candidate will just not end well. And I don't think Biden will resign after tonight.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 9:28 PM on July 11 [8 favorites]
Oh my god, i just heard about the line "I'm going to get Japan and Korea back together." Holy shit, that's even worse than calling Zelenskyy "Putin".
posted by adrienneleigh at 9:32 PM on July 11 [10 favorites]
posted by adrienneleigh at 9:32 PM on July 11 [10 favorites]
Biden speaking extemporaneously to National Union leaders at the AFL-CIO earlier
If there are genuine concerns that Biden is experiencing sundowning (cognitive issues later in the day) him being coherent and generally together when speaking extemporaneously at an event in the morning isn't evidence that that isn't happening.
not a single full cabinet meeting since Oct 2023?? Surely that's.... idk you tell me Americans.
My first thought when I read that was that Biden's handlers are keeping the people who could collectively pull the trigger on the 25th Amendment when presented with evidence of incapacity from any extended interactions with him.
posted by Pseudonymous Cognomen at 9:35 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
If there are genuine concerns that Biden is experiencing sundowning (cognitive issues later in the day) him being coherent and generally together when speaking extemporaneously at an event in the morning isn't evidence that that isn't happening.
not a single full cabinet meeting since Oct 2023?? Surely that's.... idk you tell me Americans.
My first thought when I read that was that Biden's handlers are keeping the people who could collectively pull the trigger on the 25th Amendment when presented with evidence of incapacity from any extended interactions with him.
posted by Pseudonymous Cognomen at 9:35 PM on July 11 [4 favorites]
bidens losing it but all he has to do to stop the 25th is write a letter to congress that says i’m fine don’t sweat it and he’s capable of that. there’s no 25th on the table
posted by dis_integration at 9:59 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
posted by dis_integration at 9:59 PM on July 11 [3 favorites]
My first thought when I read that was that Biden's handlers are[...]
I don't know. A genuinely senile president probably just makes the cabinet positions more powerful, unless he ends up the sort of senile where he starts making impetuous, rash decisions (besides, heh, the potentially rash, impetuous decision to stay in the race right now).
posted by nobody at 10:03 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
I don't know. A genuinely senile president probably just makes the cabinet positions more powerful, unless he ends up the sort of senile where he starts making impetuous, rash decisions (besides, heh, the potentially rash, impetuous decision to stay in the race right now).
posted by nobody at 10:03 PM on July 11 [1 favorite]
If there are genuine concerns that Biden is experiencing sundowning (cognitive issues later in the day) him being coherent and generally together when speaking extemporaneously at an event in the morning isn't evidence that that isn't happening.
The problem with the senility argument is, it’s basically unfalsifiable, as most ideological assertions are.
If Biden performs well in the day, then it can be dismissed by suggesting “well, then he is sundowning at night.”
If he performs well at night — by, say, giving a very cogent, informed, subtle, relevant, and amply supported response on China — then it could be dismissed by suggesting “well, he has good days and bad days.”
If it’s pointed out that he has had tests by a neurologist every year with no diagnosis of dementia, then it’s dismissed as “well, you can’t trust the Walter Reed specialists to tell the truth about that.”
A comment upthread suggested that Biden being a terrible person and also being senescent are orthogonal premises. But when the person that is reading the tea leaves to draw the diagnosis that Biden is senescent is the person that already believes that Biden is a terrible person, then the two conclusions are not orthogonal at all. Confirmation bias is a real thing, after all.
I don’t know if some of you realize just how much you disastrously undermine your own credibility in talking about Biden’s cognition when you call him a genocider, a coprolite, an evil man, and that you hate him. I mean, I believe that you believe those things. But it means your arguments about his relative cognitive state are worse than useless.
Who knows what will happen tomorrow? Maybe Biden will drop out and someone else will take his place on the ticket and will win in November. That seems really unlikely to me. There are a lot of people that actually like Biden, which I get is incomprehensible to some, but they do exist, and they’re not a trivial number. It seems really unlikely to me that dumping the guy that they love, that they voted for, that they donated to, would not have a disastrous effect.
Again, I get that many folks don’t feel that way about Biden. But if you don’t really understand on an emotional level why people actually like Biden, if that idea is so foreign to you, except as an intellectual exercise, because you hate the guy so viscerally, then maybe you aren’t in a great position to be drawing conclusions about how the election would go if he were ousted.
Anyway, way too much energy and attention on this. I swear to myself every election season that I won’t let myself get baited into these threads. Maybe I’m the one in cognitive decline.
posted by darkstar at 11:02 PM on July 11 [17 favorites]
The problem with the senility argument is, it’s basically unfalsifiable, as most ideological assertions are.
If Biden performs well in the day, then it can be dismissed by suggesting “well, then he is sundowning at night.”
If he performs well at night — by, say, giving a very cogent, informed, subtle, relevant, and amply supported response on China — then it could be dismissed by suggesting “well, he has good days and bad days.”
If it’s pointed out that he has had tests by a neurologist every year with no diagnosis of dementia, then it’s dismissed as “well, you can’t trust the Walter Reed specialists to tell the truth about that.”
A comment upthread suggested that Biden being a terrible person and also being senescent are orthogonal premises. But when the person that is reading the tea leaves to draw the diagnosis that Biden is senescent is the person that already believes that Biden is a terrible person, then the two conclusions are not orthogonal at all. Confirmation bias is a real thing, after all.
I don’t know if some of you realize just how much you disastrously undermine your own credibility in talking about Biden’s cognition when you call him a genocider, a coprolite, an evil man, and that you hate him. I mean, I believe that you believe those things. But it means your arguments about his relative cognitive state are worse than useless.
Who knows what will happen tomorrow? Maybe Biden will drop out and someone else will take his place on the ticket and will win in November. That seems really unlikely to me. There are a lot of people that actually like Biden, which I get is incomprehensible to some, but they do exist, and they’re not a trivial number. It seems really unlikely to me that dumping the guy that they love, that they voted for, that they donated to, would not have a disastrous effect.
Again, I get that many folks don’t feel that way about Biden. But if you don’t really understand on an emotional level why people actually like Biden, if that idea is so foreign to you, except as an intellectual exercise, because you hate the guy so viscerally, then maybe you aren’t in a great position to be drawing conclusions about how the election would go if he were ousted.
Anyway, way too much energy and attention on this. I swear to myself every election season that I won’t let myself get baited into these threads. Maybe I’m the one in cognitive decline.
posted by darkstar at 11:02 PM on July 11 [17 favorites]
this is as good as any press conference he's given in the last several years.
I would hope so. This is only the fourth press conference of his entire presidency.
Huh? The Washington Post says it's his 37th.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 11:11 PM on July 11 [7 favorites]
I would hope so. This is only the fourth press conference of his entire presidency.
Huh? The Washington Post says it's his 37th.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 11:11 PM on July 11 [7 favorites]
I don’t know if some of you realize just how much you disastrously undermine your own credibility in talking about Biden’s cognition when you call him a genocider
Genocide enabler, certainly. Unless you're denying that Israel's campaign of extermination in Gaza constitutes genocide (in which case the ICJ and most of the leading scholars on the subject are in disagreement with you). Am I supposed to be neutral about genocide, or the fact that the president of the US is enabling it while funding and arming the country committing it? I think the fact that you believe objectivity in the face of moral horror is a desirable state of mind says quite a bit about you, none of it particularly good.
And it's quite possible to believe that Biden is objectively evil for his actions re Gaza while also believing that there are serious questions about his cognitive capabilities (concerns which have been raised by many people who have interacted with him and observed a very definite decline in capability over the course of his presidency, with episodes increasing in frequency over the past year).
posted by Pseudonymous Cognomen at 11:14 PM on July 11 [12 favorites]
I feel like Biden’s inner circle is kind of terrible for letting him full on Don Quixote this campaign.
I find this take so bizarre. Biden's inner circle is terrible for... supporting his candidacy?
I'm gonna guess they have a much better understanding of his current state of being than anyone forming an impression from glimpses of him on TV and the internets.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 11:15 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
I find this take so bizarre. Biden's inner circle is terrible for... supporting his candidacy?
I'm gonna guess they have a much better understanding of his current state of being than anyone forming an impression from glimpses of him on TV and the internets.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 11:15 PM on July 11 [5 favorites]
If Biden performs well in the day, then it can be dismissed by suggesting “well, then he is sundowning at night.”
If he performs well at night — by, say, giving a very cogent, informed, subtle, relevant, and amply supported response on China — then it could be dismissed by suggesting “well, he has good days and bad days.”
If it’s pointed out that he has had tests by a neurologist every year with no diagnosis of dementia, then it’s dismissed as “well, you can’t trust the Walter Reed specialists to tell the truth about that.”
Yes, this is where we're at. Anything that may happen will be interpreted to support the belief in his decline, by those who hold that belief... which includes a lot of the press.
There are a lot of people that actually like Biden, which I get is incomprehensible to some, but they do exist, and they’re not a trivial number. It seems really unlikely to me that dumping the guy that they love, that they voted for, that they donated to, would not have a disastrous effect.
Again, I get that many folks don’t feel that way about Biden. But if you don’t really understand on an emotional level why people actually like Biden, if that idea is so foreign to you, except as an intellectual exercise, because you hate the guy so viscerally, then maybe you aren’t in a great position to be drawing conclusions about how the election would go if he were ousted.
Louder, for those in the back.
I started this thread with a post about the strong support Biden is getting from unions and a number of progressive Dems. He also has strong support from the Congressional Black Caucus (as one of the articles I linked to up top notes). And he's always had strong support from the black community.
It's been... interesting... to watch lefty MeFites explain away those statements of support. It's incomprehensible to some that real-world black people, progressives, and union leaders actually support Biden because he's delivered for them, again and again. They literally refuse to even consider that this could be true.
When Ilhan Omar says not just that he's a good president, but that he's the best president of her lifetime, she's putting her reputation on the line for him. You can presume that she's dissembling or being strategic in some way. But when I see people presuming to interpret away the actual words of actual black people in order to suggest they know that said black people don't really believe what they're saying, it looks more than a little condescending and patronizing to me.
And yet it is true, whether you accept it or not. There's plenty of other evidence for it out there... if you're open to seeing it. But my major takeaway from this thread is that people will see what they want to see... and nothing else.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 11:30 PM on July 11 [20 favorites]
If he performs well at night — by, say, giving a very cogent, informed, subtle, relevant, and amply supported response on China — then it could be dismissed by suggesting “well, he has good days and bad days.”
If it’s pointed out that he has had tests by a neurologist every year with no diagnosis of dementia, then it’s dismissed as “well, you can’t trust the Walter Reed specialists to tell the truth about that.”
Yes, this is where we're at. Anything that may happen will be interpreted to support the belief in his decline, by those who hold that belief... which includes a lot of the press.
There are a lot of people that actually like Biden, which I get is incomprehensible to some, but they do exist, and they’re not a trivial number. It seems really unlikely to me that dumping the guy that they love, that they voted for, that they donated to, would not have a disastrous effect.
Again, I get that many folks don’t feel that way about Biden. But if you don’t really understand on an emotional level why people actually like Biden, if that idea is so foreign to you, except as an intellectual exercise, because you hate the guy so viscerally, then maybe you aren’t in a great position to be drawing conclusions about how the election would go if he were ousted.
Louder, for those in the back.
I started this thread with a post about the strong support Biden is getting from unions and a number of progressive Dems. He also has strong support from the Congressional Black Caucus (as one of the articles I linked to up top notes). And he's always had strong support from the black community.
It's been... interesting... to watch lefty MeFites explain away those statements of support. It's incomprehensible to some that real-world black people, progressives, and union leaders actually support Biden because he's delivered for them, again and again. They literally refuse to even consider that this could be true.
When Ilhan Omar says not just that he's a good president, but that he's the best president of her lifetime, she's putting her reputation on the line for him. You can presume that she's dissembling or being strategic in some way. But when I see people presuming to interpret away the actual words of actual black people in order to suggest they know that said black people don't really believe what they're saying, it looks more than a little condescending and patronizing to me.
And yet it is true, whether you accept it or not. There's plenty of other evidence for it out there... if you're open to seeing it. But my major takeaway from this thread is that people will see what they want to see... and nothing else.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 11:30 PM on July 11 [20 favorites]
When Biden claimed to have seen pictures of 40 beheaded babies from Oct 7, was he just being a liar or was it a sign of his failing mental capabilities?
posted by Iax at 12:07 AM on July 12 [11 favorites]
posted by Iax at 12:07 AM on July 12 [11 favorites]
I still really want to know, as someone who can't vote and will be impacted, what the fuck does it mean for a US President to not hold a full cabinet meeting since October of last year? Is that a hater question? Other génocidaires/ethnic cleansers can seem to run a more regular schedule (Putin, Netanyahu, Modi... The last whose country is actually the largest democracy in the world) so my question is strictly from the liberal west-wing-poisoned mindset. State Dept briefing notes can make hay on a lot less for other countries.
posted by cendawanita at 12:12 AM on July 12 [4 favorites]
posted by cendawanita at 12:12 AM on July 12 [4 favorites]
(can you imagine if this invites a Google search results regarding how little the rest also meets their cabinet 💀)
posted by cendawanita at 12:15 AM on July 12 [3 favorites]
posted by cendawanita at 12:15 AM on July 12 [3 favorites]
But my major takeaway from this thread is that people will see what they want to see... and nothing else.
And this goes for you as well. There are plenty of actual minorities here, myself include, not just Ilhan Omar, and perhaps it is you who are not listening and "starting" threads with the intention of sucking all the air out of a discussion. This thread is not being moderated properly and in fact hasn't been a possibility to do so, given the explicit intentions of the OP from the very start as you now admit.
posted by polymodus at 12:56 AM on July 12 [9 favorites]
And this goes for you as well. There are plenty of actual minorities here, myself include, not just Ilhan Omar, and perhaps it is you who are not listening and "starting" threads with the intention of sucking all the air out of a discussion. This thread is not being moderated properly and in fact hasn't been a possibility to do so, given the explicit intentions of the OP from the very start as you now admit.
posted by polymodus at 12:56 AM on July 12 [9 favorites]
I don’t know if some of you realize just how much you disastrously undermine your own credibility in talking about Biden’s cognition when you call him a genocider, a coprolite, an evil man, and that you hate him.
It is entirely possible to think someone is morally vile and not believe they are incompetent. I remember arguing a lot with folks who thought G. W. Bush was genuinely stupid. He wasn't. He had a tendency to malapropisms and a played up "aw shucks" folksiness, not too dissimilar from Biden in the same era. He was also a wretched person with hundreds of thousands of deaths on his head and damaged the well being of tens of millions of people.
Biden is a morally bad person. His support for Maliki in Iraq under Obama, his work strengthening the ability of creditors to exploit people, his support for a racist crime bill, his opposition to desegregation. These aren't aberrations, or blemishes on an otherwise sterling career. They are indicative of someone willing to help the powerful hurt the weak if it advances his career. Gaza is by far the worst, but it's the culmination of a vile life's work. Selling weapons to be used for the mass murder of civilians, lying about seeing murdered children for political gain, taking every step possible to prevent a genuine humanitarian response from the rest of the world, these aren't something novel. They are part and parcel of who Biden is and always has been. But he used to be a lucid if gaffe prone politician, capable of keeping a train of thought going for more than 60 seconds. And that has changed.
It isn't personal odiousness that makes him ramble, stare off into the middle diatance, or confuse Harris for Trump or Asia for Europe (the former did Heat of the Moment, the latter the Final Countdown). And sadly that, rather than everything else about him, is what seems most likely to cause him to lose this election, and give the world's largest economy and military (not to mention the daily welfare of hundreds of millions) into the hands of fascists.
It's been... interesting... to watch lefty MeFites explain away those statements of support. It's incomprehensible to some that real-world black people, progressives, and union leaders actually support Biden because he's delivered for them, again and again. They literally refuse to even consider that this could be true.
If you believe the coordinated statements of politicians about an extremely contentious issue are their heartfelt beliefs, and that the official statements of people on the minority divide of political power about the leader of the party are not carefully measured for political effect, I don't know what to tell you. The leftish wing of the Democratic party didn't all just decide independently to come out in support of Biden near simultaneously because they were moved by personal loyalty or admiration for Joe Biden. If you are that willing to buy a political line, and take official statements at face value, it is easy to understand how you might think Joe Biden actually cares about anything beyond Joe Biden.
And please don't act like you are aghast that people take issue with something Ilhan Omar says or invoke her ethnicity to imply people who disagree with you are racist. Where was this deep respect for Omar's opinion when she was begging Biden to enforce his own "red line" over Rafah? Invoking her Blackness to silence Biden's critics is gross.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 2:05 AM on July 12 [19 favorites]
It is entirely possible to think someone is morally vile and not believe they are incompetent. I remember arguing a lot with folks who thought G. W. Bush was genuinely stupid. He wasn't. He had a tendency to malapropisms and a played up "aw shucks" folksiness, not too dissimilar from Biden in the same era. He was also a wretched person with hundreds of thousands of deaths on his head and damaged the well being of tens of millions of people.
Biden is a morally bad person. His support for Maliki in Iraq under Obama, his work strengthening the ability of creditors to exploit people, his support for a racist crime bill, his opposition to desegregation. These aren't aberrations, or blemishes on an otherwise sterling career. They are indicative of someone willing to help the powerful hurt the weak if it advances his career. Gaza is by far the worst, but it's the culmination of a vile life's work. Selling weapons to be used for the mass murder of civilians, lying about seeing murdered children for political gain, taking every step possible to prevent a genuine humanitarian response from the rest of the world, these aren't something novel. They are part and parcel of who Biden is and always has been. But he used to be a lucid if gaffe prone politician, capable of keeping a train of thought going for more than 60 seconds. And that has changed.
It isn't personal odiousness that makes him ramble, stare off into the middle diatance, or confuse Harris for Trump or Asia for Europe (the former did Heat of the Moment, the latter the Final Countdown). And sadly that, rather than everything else about him, is what seems most likely to cause him to lose this election, and give the world's largest economy and military (not to mention the daily welfare of hundreds of millions) into the hands of fascists.
It's been... interesting... to watch lefty MeFites explain away those statements of support. It's incomprehensible to some that real-world black people, progressives, and union leaders actually support Biden because he's delivered for them, again and again. They literally refuse to even consider that this could be true.
If you believe the coordinated statements of politicians about an extremely contentious issue are their heartfelt beliefs, and that the official statements of people on the minority divide of political power about the leader of the party are not carefully measured for political effect, I don't know what to tell you. The leftish wing of the Democratic party didn't all just decide independently to come out in support of Biden near simultaneously because they were moved by personal loyalty or admiration for Joe Biden. If you are that willing to buy a political line, and take official statements at face value, it is easy to understand how you might think Joe Biden actually cares about anything beyond Joe Biden.
And please don't act like you are aghast that people take issue with something Ilhan Omar says or invoke her ethnicity to imply people who disagree with you are racist. Where was this deep respect for Omar's opinion when she was begging Biden to enforce his own "red line" over Rafah? Invoking her Blackness to silence Biden's critics is gross.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 2:05 AM on July 12 [19 favorites]
I will continue supporting Joseph Biden because my quality of life has improved over the last 4 years. I am happy with his presence and leadership. There are a few valid critiques here, but most of the criticisms of Biden seem mean-spirited to me.
I think the fact that the main criticism about him is his age is a testament to the tremendous job he has done during his administration. As for I/P, he is doing what any U.S. president — any NATO president — would be doing, and he is actually working toward a ceasefire. A war only stops when both parties want it to stop. Joseph Biden cannot stop the war in Gaza. No single human being on earth can. Not even the most powerful person can stop a war that the two parties don’t want to.
I have a lot of empathy for him because I know what it’s like to do a job well, but people will find any reason to criticize you because it is their job to do so.
posted by ichomp at 2:07 AM on July 12 [4 favorites]
I think the fact that the main criticism about him is his age is a testament to the tremendous job he has done during his administration. As for I/P, he is doing what any U.S. president — any NATO president — would be doing, and he is actually working toward a ceasefire. A war only stops when both parties want it to stop. Joseph Biden cannot stop the war in Gaza. No single human being on earth can. Not even the most powerful person can stop a war that the two parties don’t want to.
I have a lot of empathy for him because I know what it’s like to do a job well, but people will find any reason to criticize you because it is their job to do so.
posted by ichomp at 2:07 AM on July 12 [4 favorites]
What is happening in Gaza isn't a war. It is a genocide. No one is demanding Biden stop it unilaterally. What has been asked is that he do what is possible. Instead he has done everything possible to enable it.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 2:11 AM on July 12 [18 favorites]
posted by The Manwich Horror at 2:11 AM on July 12 [18 favorites]
Joseph Biden cannot stop the war in Gaza.
People, reasonable people, reasonable people with jobs in the relevant sectors, would like to see more of this: US announces sanctions on Israeli settlers over West Bank violence (crylaugh for a thousand years that this is not in Gaza though and for good reason) -- and not distinctly close to norm breaking stuff (and your own norms at that!) like this: Exclusive: Some US officials say in internal memo Israel may be violating international law in Gaza -- or even blatantly crazy ahistorical shit like this: US Gaza aid pier to be permanently dismantled after operating for just 20 days – Pier, which has delivered the equivalent of a single day’s pre-war land aid deliveries in two months, will reportedly be removed in a few days’ time. Or just whatever this is: The UAW’s federal monitor twice pressured the union to back off its call for Gaza ceasefire, then launched an investigation
In the most imperial core phrasing possible, there's a reason why people are also angry and upset about what's going on in Sudan but for the same reason Trump being crazy, venal, and corrupt isn't news, their hearts are breaking while they keep their head down to do the work because at least the work can be done. We have Muslim mefites here who also have explained their own political economy and calculus as to why they're voting Biden too, you know, for perfectly reasonable justifications for them, related to how far you think the current round of violence and sieging and annexation in Palestine is normal or not, especially in comparison with other conflicts.
posted by cendawanita at 2:41 AM on July 12 [17 favorites]
People, reasonable people, reasonable people with jobs in the relevant sectors, would like to see more of this: US announces sanctions on Israeli settlers over West Bank violence (crylaugh for a thousand years that this is not in Gaza though and for good reason) -- and not distinctly close to norm breaking stuff (and your own norms at that!) like this: Exclusive: Some US officials say in internal memo Israel may be violating international law in Gaza -- or even blatantly crazy ahistorical shit like this: US Gaza aid pier to be permanently dismantled after operating for just 20 days – Pier, which has delivered the equivalent of a single day’s pre-war land aid deliveries in two months, will reportedly be removed in a few days’ time. Or just whatever this is: The UAW’s federal monitor twice pressured the union to back off its call for Gaza ceasefire, then launched an investigation
In the most imperial core phrasing possible, there's a reason why people are also angry and upset about what's going on in Sudan but for the same reason Trump being crazy, venal, and corrupt isn't news, their hearts are breaking while they keep their head down to do the work because at least the work can be done. We have Muslim mefites here who also have explained their own political economy and calculus as to why they're voting Biden too, you know, for perfectly reasonable justifications for them, related to how far you think the current round of violence and sieging and annexation in Palestine is normal or not, especially in comparison with other conflicts.
posted by cendawanita at 2:41 AM on July 12 [17 favorites]
(Anyway, current Palestine thread is here if you want to see how well the ceasefire work is going. Spoilers I guess, both in the media and psychological sense)
posted by cendawanita at 2:44 AM on July 12 [4 favorites]
posted by cendawanita at 2:44 AM on July 12 [4 favorites]
When Biden claimed to have seen pictures of 40 beheaded babies from Oct 7, was he just being a liar or was it a sign of his failing mental capabilities?
It's called confabulation, and it happens to everybody who doesn't have a perfect brain like me. Whether it be people earnestly believing that they saw video of Flight 11 crashing into the World Trade Center on the morning of September 11, 2001 or someone being utterly convinced their mugger was a person who it could not possibly have been, human brains make shit up all the fucking time. They conflate events, order events wrongly, rewrite memories wholesale. It's what brains do. It's one big reason why false convictions are so depressingly common.
You hear about 40 babies being beheaded, which you obviously find distressing. Some time later, you hear that there are pictures. Many times you will then develop a distinct memory of having seen those pictures, just like I have a distinct memory of seeing Challenger explode as it was happening even though I didn't. Fur years I was convinced that I had. I later discovered that it would have been almost impossible and that I was likely conflating several memories.
posted by wierdo at 2:59 AM on July 12 [3 favorites]
It's called confabulation, and it happens to everybody who doesn't have a perfect brain like me. Whether it be people earnestly believing that they saw video of Flight 11 crashing into the World Trade Center on the morning of September 11, 2001 or someone being utterly convinced their mugger was a person who it could not possibly have been, human brains make shit up all the fucking time. They conflate events, order events wrongly, rewrite memories wholesale. It's what brains do. It's one big reason why false convictions are so depressingly common.
You hear about 40 babies being beheaded, which you obviously find distressing. Some time later, you hear that there are pictures. Many times you will then develop a distinct memory of having seen those pictures, just like I have a distinct memory of seeing Challenger explode as it was happening even though I didn't. Fur years I was convinced that I had. I later discovered that it would have been almost impossible and that I was likely conflating several memories.
posted by wierdo at 2:59 AM on July 12 [3 favorites]
But do you have staffers on hand who found themselves having to correct you, though? And if you are in a similar situation (perhaps with a family member instead of a staffer) what would you decide about your own self that first you confabulate then second you keep repeating it, thereby dismissing the work that other person has to do to correct you?
In a different discussion, it's often been pointed out that trying to understand how to run a country's economy by applying what you understand of running a household often leads you to strange rightwing-friendly conclusions about keeping a balanced budget.
Biden isn't some guy or a guy. And he's not just doing some job.
WaPo Nov 2023: Biden yet again says Hamas beheaded babies. Has new evidence emerged?
"Yet again". In the field we also say having a confab but that's really about having an informal discussion but not so much about hallucinating so much it becomes policy. Other people can lose their offices for much less.
posted by cendawanita at 3:12 AM on July 12 [11 favorites]
In a different discussion, it's often been pointed out that trying to understand how to run a country's economy by applying what you understand of running a household often leads you to strange rightwing-friendly conclusions about keeping a balanced budget.
Biden isn't some guy or a guy. And he's not just doing some job.
WaPo Nov 2023: Biden yet again says Hamas beheaded babies. Has new evidence emerged?
"Yet again". In the field we also say having a confab but that's really about having an informal discussion but not so much about hallucinating so much it becomes policy. Other people can lose their offices for much less.
posted by cendawanita at 3:12 AM on July 12 [11 favorites]
It's called confabulation, and it happens to everybody who doesn't have a perfect brain like me. Whether it be people earnestly believing that they saw video of Flight 11 crashing into the World Trade Center on the morning of September 11, 2001 or someone being utterly convinced their mugger was a person who it could not possibly have been, human brains make shit up all the fucking time.
There is a big difference between misremembering details of a brief, chaotic situation, or having memories distort over years of seeing images in different contexts, and volunteering that: “I never really thought that I would see and have confirmed pictures of terrorists beheading children,” less than three hours after those claims were made by Netanyahu's spokespeople. I was also distressed about those claims. I also saw a lot of other disturbing images. Somehow I never thought I saw any infants being decapitated. I wonder why Biden did.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 3:13 AM on July 12 [10 favorites]
There is a big difference between misremembering details of a brief, chaotic situation, or having memories distort over years of seeing images in different contexts, and volunteering that: “I never really thought that I would see and have confirmed pictures of terrorists beheading children,” less than three hours after those claims were made by Netanyahu's spokespeople. I was also distressed about those claims. I also saw a lot of other disturbing images. Somehow I never thought I saw any infants being decapitated. I wonder why Biden did.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 3:13 AM on July 12 [10 favorites]
Did they pull them from the incubators first
posted by fullerine at 3:26 AM on July 12 [4 favorites]
posted by fullerine at 3:26 AM on July 12 [4 favorites]
Huh? The Washington Post says it's his 37th.
You're right, I was repeating information I got from the NYT live chat which looks to have been lacking context. It depends on what you count as a press conference, but according to the American Presidency Project the number is indeed 37 if you're counting solo and joint press conferences. Mea culpa!
posted by whir at 3:33 AM on July 12 [4 favorites]
You're right, I was repeating information I got from the NYT live chat which looks to have been lacking context. It depends on what you count as a press conference, but according to the American Presidency Project the number is indeed 37 if you're counting solo and joint press conferences. Mea culpa!
posted by whir at 3:33 AM on July 12 [4 favorites]
Ryan Grim interviews major Biden donor Dmitri Mehlhorn on why Biden won't drop out. There isn't anything too shocking, but it is an interesting perspective from someone close to Biden.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 3:51 AM on July 12 [2 favorites]
posted by The Manwich Horror at 3:51 AM on July 12 [2 favorites]
What is happening in Gaza isn't a war. It is a genocide. No one is demanding Biden stop it unilaterally. What has been asked is that he do what is possible. Instead he has done everything possible to enable it.
I am absolutely demanding that? We have two carrier groups and whatever long range aircraft can come out from our bases in Europe and the middle east to set up a No-Fly Zone and issue an ultimatum that the conflict is over. We ran this exact play for Operation Deliberate Force against the Serbian forces in the late 90s with one carrier group (IIRC) when ~10,000 Bosnians had been killed. There have been at least 38,000 Gazans killed (and I will not believe that number until the war is two years past and Gaza's government has physically counted the survivors)
Israel is not surrounded by friends and old allies, the US can quietly demand the end of the war (like Carter with Begin on Lebanon) while threatening to very publicly repudiate them and threaten their air power.
We have literally done this before for less both militarily and diplomatically.
posted by Slackermagee at 4:46 AM on July 12 [16 favorites]
I am absolutely demanding that? We have two carrier groups and whatever long range aircraft can come out from our bases in Europe and the middle east to set up a No-Fly Zone and issue an ultimatum that the conflict is over. We ran this exact play for Operation Deliberate Force against the Serbian forces in the late 90s with one carrier group (IIRC) when ~10,000 Bosnians had been killed. There have been at least 38,000 Gazans killed (and I will not believe that number until the war is two years past and Gaza's government has physically counted the survivors)
Israel is not surrounded by friends and old allies, the US can quietly demand the end of the war (like Carter with Begin on Lebanon) while threatening to very publicly repudiate them and threaten their air power.
We have literally done this before for less both militarily and diplomatically.
posted by Slackermagee at 4:46 AM on July 12 [16 favorites]
Biden mindlessly repeating IDF propaganda about beheaded babies: well obviously what is happening is, technically, called a “brain fart” we all have them. No harm no foul am I right.
Biden invented an atrocity and people are defending his bullshit as a slip of the tongue. Blue maga is a helluva drug.
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 4:51 AM on July 12 [17 favorites]
Biden invented an atrocity and people are defending his bullshit as a slip of the tongue. Blue maga is a helluva drug.
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 4:51 AM on July 12 [17 favorites]
Clinton was running into press headwinds (both historical and But Her Emails types) and lost while the entire party (some of them grumblingly) supported her. Biden won when the wind was at his back and Trump had a six figure body count. Biden now has press headwinds every day, 24/7, about his fitness to lead. The entire party is NOT united behind him. The usual blue-not-matter-who cocktail circuit donors are NOT united behind him. The third party candidate is polling at ~10% and it looks like a lot of those are coming from Biden, given his lagging in the polls.
Every light is blinking red here. It does not matter if everything is actually fine in the West Wing, public perception is irrevocably poisoned.
This specific thing cost Clinton the election in 2016!
posted by Slackermagee at 5:02 AM on July 12 [31 favorites]
Every light is blinking red here. It does not matter if everything is actually fine in the West Wing, public perception is irrevocably poisoned.
This specific thing cost Clinton the election in 2016!
posted by Slackermagee at 5:02 AM on July 12 [31 favorites]
Reminder that lying (or "having a brain fart", lol come on) about Gaza and Palestinians is not just a one-time thing:
The hate in his heart is genuine, and it's not going away.
posted by Glegrinof the Pig-Man at 5:51 AM on July 12 [18 favorites]
According to NBC News, another guest, Dr. Nahreen H. Ahmed, “was taken aback when she showed Biden prints of photos of malnourished children and women in Gaza—to which Biden responded that he had seen those images before. The problem, the doctor said, was that she had printed the photos from her own iPhone.” Biden was clearly making up the fiction of having seen the pictures before as a way not to have to look at them. As Ahmed rightly notes, Biden’s behavior “speaks volumes to the dismissive nature of the administration when it comes to strong-willed action towards a permanent cease-fire or, at a bare minimum, a red line on the invasion of Rafah.”And no, I'm not going to attribute any of his hatred to mental acuity or stuttering or whatever shitty lie people want to come up with to defend the man. He's had a lot of hate for a lot of different groups, and he holds these grudges for decades. As the article notes, he's perfectly capable of showing empathy and humanity to groups he likes, even genocidal maniacs.
Biden’s callousness at that meeting is all the more striking because, when dealing with non-Palestinians, the president has long been famous for his empathy and fellow-feeling, especially for those distressed by death. Biden is a great humanitarian—unless the humans are Palestinians.
In holding fast to his position that there should be no red lines for Israel, Biden is shutting his ears to not just Muslim Americans but also the large majority of his own voters, and a growing body of dissent inside his own administration.
The hate in his heart is genuine, and it's not going away.
posted by Glegrinof the Pig-Man at 5:51 AM on July 12 [18 favorites]
Much of this thread (and elsewhere) demonstrates that confirmation bias is a helluva thing.
Those who wanted Biden to do well in the press conference think he did well. Those who expected him to fail think he did poorly.
I'm not suggesting either opinion is right or wrong, but the disparity of opinions demonstrates that they are based on more than just Biden's objective performance.
posted by Ben Trismegistus at 5:55 AM on July 12 [5 favorites]
Those who wanted Biden to do well in the press conference think he did well. Those who expected him to fail think he did poorly.
I'm not suggesting either opinion is right or wrong, but the disparity of opinions demonstrates that they are based on more than just Biden's objective performance.
posted by Ben Trismegistus at 5:55 AM on July 12 [5 favorites]
The cognitive decline is way overblown (IMO) but the media headwinds are not.
I hate that an election once again hinges on some bullshit perception thing while the real risks between the competing administrations go unchecked.
I hate that I’m holding my breath watching a press conference or summit speech parsing every word for a stumble when, in reality, I would mostly watch exactly zero of these things normally.
I hate that TFG had press conferences like the video on the top of this page that’s just pure bullshit. And that’s when he was being reined in by adults in the room.
And by hate I mean I’m scared.
posted by mazola at 5:55 AM on July 12 [4 favorites]
I hate that an election once again hinges on some bullshit perception thing while the real risks between the competing administrations go unchecked.
I hate that I’m holding my breath watching a press conference or summit speech parsing every word for a stumble when, in reality, I would mostly watch exactly zero of these things normally.
I hate that TFG had press conferences like the video on the top of this page that’s just pure bullshit. And that’s when he was being reined in by adults in the room.
And by hate I mean I’m scared.
posted by mazola at 5:55 AM on July 12 [4 favorites]
The press conference was OK. Going forward I think we're either going to have string of more or less OK performance leading to a November loss, or he finally shits himself on stage so badly that we can make a desperate stab at some other outcome.
posted by paper chromatographologist at 6:08 AM on July 12 [5 favorites]
posted by paper chromatographologist at 6:08 AM on July 12 [5 favorites]
The hate in his heart is genuine, and it's not going away.
Honestly, genuine hate would be preferable to my suspicion, which is that Biden was out of touch enough to thinkhe could frame this war as fighting terrorism and that voting public would gobble it up like they did Iraq. I don't know, of course. Maybe his moral compass genuinely is scewed enough by bigotry to believe he is doing the right thing. Maybe he just despises Palestinians or Arabs or Muslims or whatever group he sees them as and wants to hurt them.
Also, I wanted to say, several people have reacted to mentions of Gaza as if it were some new attack that Biden haters are just delighted to invoke to score points. But really and truly, many people who did not have strong feelings about Biden either way came to hate him because of what he did to the people of Gaza.
I have never liked Biden. I thought he was basically a pro-corporate , kind of racist dude like a ton of other Democratic politicians of his age. I wasn't thrilled when he won the primary, but I knew Warren was a long shot and I could see the logic in choosing a middle of the road, nonthreatening old white guy as the anti-Trump candidate, even though he was way too old. And he was going to be a one termer amyway, most likely.
All this is to say, while I wasn't a fan, I didn't hate Joe Biden. Gaza changed that. If his opponent were anyone but Trump, I would have nothing to do with this man, who helped commit a horrible genocide and shows not the slightest bit of repentance. It is a nightmare that the other candidate is worse. And even more of a nightmare that Biden is no longer even able to campaign effectively. This isn't some Bernie Bro hurt feelings. This is moral horror at what Joe Biden has revealed himself to be.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 6:20 AM on July 12 [21 favorites]
Honestly, genuine hate would be preferable to my suspicion, which is that Biden was out of touch enough to thinkhe could frame this war as fighting terrorism and that voting public would gobble it up like they did Iraq. I don't know, of course. Maybe his moral compass genuinely is scewed enough by bigotry to believe he is doing the right thing. Maybe he just despises Palestinians or Arabs or Muslims or whatever group he sees them as and wants to hurt them.
Also, I wanted to say, several people have reacted to mentions of Gaza as if it were some new attack that Biden haters are just delighted to invoke to score points. But really and truly, many people who did not have strong feelings about Biden either way came to hate him because of what he did to the people of Gaza.
I have never liked Biden. I thought he was basically a pro-corporate , kind of racist dude like a ton of other Democratic politicians of his age. I wasn't thrilled when he won the primary, but I knew Warren was a long shot and I could see the logic in choosing a middle of the road, nonthreatening old white guy as the anti-Trump candidate, even though he was way too old. And he was going to be a one termer amyway, most likely.
All this is to say, while I wasn't a fan, I didn't hate Joe Biden. Gaza changed that. If his opponent were anyone but Trump, I would have nothing to do with this man, who helped commit a horrible genocide and shows not the slightest bit of repentance. It is a nightmare that the other candidate is worse. And even more of a nightmare that Biden is no longer even able to campaign effectively. This isn't some Bernie Bro hurt feelings. This is moral horror at what Joe Biden has revealed himself to be.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 6:20 AM on July 12 [21 favorites]
I'm thinking that there's still a better than even chance that Biden will back out. As I mentioned, it has to be stage-managed properly to preserve momentum and to retain solid Biden supporters, and to give Harris the best possible launch.
Gaza horrible, Biden horrible for enabling it. We get it. But it's just about orthogonal to the presidential election. There's no scenario where electing Trump, directly or by withholding your vote, will make that situation improve, is there? Ok, maybe Trump gives Israel a freer hand and the military action ends sooner?
US enablement of Gaza is a fact. A Trump second term will be worse than aBiden Harris term; that's also a fact. There's simply no better option than electing the Democrat. Move forward.
posted by Artful Codger at 6:57 AM on July 12 [9 favorites]
Gaza horrible, Biden horrible for enabling it. We get it. But it's just about orthogonal to the presidential election. There's no scenario where electing Trump, directly or by withholding your vote, will make that situation improve, is there? Ok, maybe Trump gives Israel a freer hand and the military action ends sooner?
US enablement of Gaza is a fact. A Trump second term will be worse than a
posted by Artful Codger at 6:57 AM on July 12 [9 favorites]
Yeah, the sad but simple equation in American politics is: if you want things to improve somewhat on an institutional level, you need to elect a whole bunch of democrats. Enough to outweigh the deliberately useless ones who obstruct everything, and enough forward thinking ones to outweigh the ones who are stuck in the past. Maybe even enough good ones to institute some reforms that change the way power is won and wielded. The only rational argument against voting Dem regardless of who the current figurehead happens to be is if you want to accelerate the collapse of the American state, in the hopes of something more progressive arising from rubble eventually. And while that argument might be rational, I consider it a little cold blooded.
posted by mrjohnmuller at 7:12 AM on July 12 [6 favorites]
posted by mrjohnmuller at 7:12 AM on July 12 [6 favorites]
As a non-American looking in from the outside, this reminds me a lot of when the British Crown would wheel out Queen Elizabeth in her waning years, or the Catholic Church and aged popes that clearly should just retire. Hell, I remember when the US press used to make fun of USSR leaders for being ancient, and they were only in their 70's.
I know my country will just have to put up with whatever choice Americans make in this election, sharing a bed with an elephant and all that, but damn, the gerontocracy is just kind of a sad and pathetic look for the self-styled leader of the free world.
posted by fimbulvetr at 7:24 AM on July 12 [5 favorites]
I know my country will just have to put up with whatever choice Americans make in this election, sharing a bed with an elephant and all that, but damn, the gerontocracy is just kind of a sad and pathetic look for the self-styled leader of the free world.
posted by fimbulvetr at 7:24 AM on July 12 [5 favorites]
“Last Chance, USA,” Sarah Kendzior, Sarah Kendzior’s Newsletter, 10 July 2024
“My Thoughts On Where We Are,” Jay Kuo, The Status Kuo, 12 July 2024
“Warner Bros. Discovery CEO Endorsed Donald Trump Without Endorsing Donald Trump,” Parker Molloy, The Present Age, 12 July 2024
“July 11, 2024 ,” Heather Cox Richardson, Letters from an American, 12 July 2024
posted by ob1quixote at 7:24 AM on July 12 [3 favorites]
“My Thoughts On Where We Are,” Jay Kuo, The Status Kuo, 12 July 2024
“Warner Bros. Discovery CEO Endorsed Donald Trump Without Endorsing Donald Trump,” Parker Molloy, The Present Age, 12 July 2024
“July 11, 2024 ,” Heather Cox Richardson, Letters from an American, 12 July 2024
posted by ob1quixote at 7:24 AM on July 12 [3 favorites]
“We just need an opportunity for deregulation, so companies can consolidate and do what we need to be even better.”David Zaslav, continuing to be The Worst
posted by pxe2000 at 7:27 AM on July 12 [6 favorites]
There are a lot of people that actually like Biden, which I get is incomprehensible to some, but they do exist, and they’re not a trivial number. It seems really unlikely to me that dumping the guy that they love, that they voted for, that they donated to, would not have a disastrous effect.
Well, as a progressive whose candidate never wins I can tell you - most would take a few weeks to grieve, but then they'd see what was at stake and they'd vote against Trump. Especially if their guy does "the patriot thing" (to quote infamous lefty, Tim Kaine) and endorses his VP (or whoever it ends up being).
posted by coffeecat at 7:29 AM on July 12 [11 favorites]
Well, as a progressive whose candidate never wins I can tell you - most would take a few weeks to grieve, but then they'd see what was at stake and they'd vote against Trump. Especially if their guy does "the patriot thing" (to quote infamous lefty, Tim Kaine) and endorses his VP (or whoever it ends up being).
posted by coffeecat at 7:29 AM on July 12 [11 favorites]
I'll be honest - I didn't think Trump would run again. I thought he didn't want the job the first time around (only ran to raise his business profile) and hated every minute of it while he was doing it. I thought he would find an excuse to decide to focus on his businesses or whatever and leave politics up to others. I underestimated (a) Trump's need for adulation and (b) the calculus that he would have to run for a chance to avoid jail.
I also thought that most Republicans would drop Trump like a hot potato the moment he was out of office. We had all those stories about how most Republicans in government secretly hated Trump and thought he was an idiot. I was sure they would jump at the chance to forget all about him and move on to other leaders. So I also underestimated the chokehold that the MAGA rank-and-file would have on the GOP and how most Republican politicians are craven weenies who will say anything to get elected.
I think most Democrats - at least those in positions of power - thought the same thing. And I think if Trump hadn't run, Biden wouldn't have either. I think he truly meant what he said in 2020 about being a bridge candidate -- the expectation was that he would retire and 2024 would be Harris v. Rubio or something.
But when Trump decided to run, I believe Biden and others made the decision (a decision I agree with) that the incumbency advantage was too important to give up, and that another ugly primary fight would divide the party and make it harder to beat Trump.
I say all of this to say that this isn't some centrist conspiracy or neoliberal plot. It is a collection of judgment calls based on the information that is available at the time. I don't think the situation we are currently in is what anyone wants, but regardless, we all know what needs to happen in November.
posted by Ben Trismegistus at 7:43 AM on July 12 [11 favorites]
I also thought that most Republicans would drop Trump like a hot potato the moment he was out of office. We had all those stories about how most Republicans in government secretly hated Trump and thought he was an idiot. I was sure they would jump at the chance to forget all about him and move on to other leaders. So I also underestimated the chokehold that the MAGA rank-and-file would have on the GOP and how most Republican politicians are craven weenies who will say anything to get elected.
I think most Democrats - at least those in positions of power - thought the same thing. And I think if Trump hadn't run, Biden wouldn't have either. I think he truly meant what he said in 2020 about being a bridge candidate -- the expectation was that he would retire and 2024 would be Harris v. Rubio or something.
But when Trump decided to run, I believe Biden and others made the decision (a decision I agree with) that the incumbency advantage was too important to give up, and that another ugly primary fight would divide the party and make it harder to beat Trump.
I say all of this to say that this isn't some centrist conspiracy or neoliberal plot. It is a collection of judgment calls based on the information that is available at the time. I don't think the situation we are currently in is what anyone wants, but regardless, we all know what needs to happen in November.
posted by Ben Trismegistus at 7:43 AM on July 12 [11 favorites]
It's been... interesting... to watch lefty MeFites explain away those statements of support. It's incomprehensible to some that real-world black people, progressives, and union leaders actually support Biden because he's delivered for them, again and again. They literally refuse to even consider that this could be true.
When Ilhan Omar says not just that he's a good president, but that he's the best president of her lifetime, she's putting her reputation on the line for him. You can presume that she's dissembling or being strategic in some way. But when I see people presuming to interpret away the actual words of actual black people in order to suggest they know that said black people don't really believe what they're saying, it looks more than a little condescending and patronizing to me.
To add to what The Manwich Horror said in response to this: it's pretty rich to accuse other Mefites as racist for pointing out the pretty obvious truth that all politicians sometimes lie or make statements primarily for political reasons (even our favorites!) and then go on to engage in tokenism which is, you know, racist. Especially to do it to Ilhan Omar is kinda beyond the pale - did you believe her when she accused the Biden admin “of greenlighting the massacre of Palestinians”? Or do you only care about what a Black person has to say when you can cherry pick it to support your point? What about the fact that polls (you can find this upthread) suggest that a plurality of Black voters think Biden should step down? And not that the Congressional Black Caucus can or should be used to speak for all Black people, but since you brought it up elsewhere in your post, there is recent reporting suggesting that it's split over support for Biden. Talk about condescending and patronizing.
posted by coffeecat at 7:47 AM on July 12 [17 favorites]
When Ilhan Omar says not just that he's a good president, but that he's the best president of her lifetime, she's putting her reputation on the line for him. You can presume that she's dissembling or being strategic in some way. But when I see people presuming to interpret away the actual words of actual black people in order to suggest they know that said black people don't really believe what they're saying, it looks more than a little condescending and patronizing to me.
To add to what The Manwich Horror said in response to this: it's pretty rich to accuse other Mefites as racist for pointing out the pretty obvious truth that all politicians sometimes lie or make statements primarily for political reasons (even our favorites!) and then go on to engage in tokenism which is, you know, racist. Especially to do it to Ilhan Omar is kinda beyond the pale - did you believe her when she accused the Biden admin “of greenlighting the massacre of Palestinians”? Or do you only care about what a Black person has to say when you can cherry pick it to support your point? What about the fact that polls (you can find this upthread) suggest that a plurality of Black voters think Biden should step down? And not that the Congressional Black Caucus can or should be used to speak for all Black people, but since you brought it up elsewhere in your post, there is recent reporting suggesting that it's split over support for Biden. Talk about condescending and patronizing.
posted by coffeecat at 7:47 AM on July 12 [17 favorites]
NPR/Marist Poll today: Biden Leads Trump
Among registered voters nationally including leaners, Biden receives 50% to 48% in the two-way presidential matchup. Two percent are undecided. Biden and Trump were tied (49% to 49%) in last month’s pre-debate NPR/PBS News/Marist survey.posted by darkstar at 7:58 AM on July 12 [2 favorites]
US enablement of Gaza is a fact. A Trump second term will be worse than a Biden Harris term; that's also a fact. There's simply no better option than electing the Democrat. Move forward.
But the discussion is in part about whether Biden is the best candidate. That he has irretrievably alienated some important voters seems very relevant.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 7:59 AM on July 12 [7 favorites]
But the discussion is in part about whether Biden is the best candidate. That he has irretrievably alienated some important voters seems very relevant.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 7:59 AM on July 12 [7 favorites]
After Biden's debate performance, the presidential race is unchanged [NPR | July 12]: The race for the presidency remains statistically tied despite President Biden’s dismal debate performance two weeks ago, a new national NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist poll finds.
posted by mazola at 8:01 AM on July 12 [3 favorites]
posted by mazola at 8:01 AM on July 12 [3 favorites]
I think a statistical tie at this point, with no momentum, is a problem. He won't win with a statistical tie. I won't say stridently that it is something that demonstrates he should drop out, but it doesn't prove anything in the other direction either.
posted by kensington314 at 8:26 AM on July 12 [10 favorites]
posted by kensington314 at 8:26 AM on July 12 [10 favorites]
From the NYTimes: Donors Freeze Roughly $90 Million as Long as Biden Stays in Race.
posted by coffeecat at 8:31 AM on July 12 [6 favorites]
posted by coffeecat at 8:31 AM on July 12 [6 favorites]
crossing the streams here, fwiw...
> The only question that is germane: What affects voters in swing states who can be moved - either to stay home for TFG or switch/come out for Biden?
Nevada: July 12, 2024 LEADER Trump +4.6
Arizona: July 12, 2024 LEADER Trump +4.1
Georgia: July 12, 2024 LEADER Trump +4.8
Pennsylvania: July 12, 2024 LEADER Trump +3.0
Michigan: July 12, 2024 LEADER Trump +0.3
Wisconsin: July 12, 2024 LEADER Trump +1.1
posted by kliuless at 8:39 AM on July 12 [10 favorites]
> The only question that is germane: What affects voters in swing states who can be moved - either to stay home for TFG or switch/come out for Biden?
Nevada: July 12, 2024 LEADER Trump +4.6
Arizona: July 12, 2024 LEADER Trump +4.1
Georgia: July 12, 2024 LEADER Trump +4.8
Pennsylvania: July 12, 2024 LEADER Trump +3.0
Michigan: July 12, 2024 LEADER Trump +0.3
Wisconsin: July 12, 2024 LEADER Trump +1.1
posted by kliuless at 8:39 AM on July 12 [10 favorites]
That he has irretrievably alienated some important voters seems very relevant.
Those "important" voters each have to resolve it for themselves. Do they help achieve the best possible outcome, according to their beliefs and principles, or do they support Trump, or not vote, in protest, even if it makes most everything worse, including in Gaza?
Asking seriously - would Harris running be enough of a reset for such voters to get past their anger at Biden re Gaza?
posted by Artful Codger at 8:44 AM on July 12
Those "important" voters each have to resolve it for themselves. Do they help achieve the best possible outcome, according to their beliefs and principles, or do they support Trump, or not vote, in protest, even if it makes most everything worse, including in Gaza?
Asking seriously - would Harris running be enough of a reset for such voters to get past their anger at Biden re Gaza?
posted by Artful Codger at 8:44 AM on July 12
The trends are not terrible in most of those. That's with the age 'scandal'/info in place. The screws will tighten on the real choice going forward and the fundamentals favour Biden (honesty is important, age important, but less so).
posted by mazola at 8:45 AM on July 12 [1 favorite]
posted by mazola at 8:45 AM on July 12 [1 favorite]
Nevada: July 12, 2024 LEADER Trump +4.6
Arizona: July 12, 2024 LEADER Trump +4.1
Georgia: July 12, 2024 LEADER Trump +4.8
Pennsylvania: July 12, 2024 LEADER Trump +3.0
Michigan: July 12, 2024 LEADER Trump +0.3
Wisconsin: July 12, 2024 LEADER Trump +1.1
you're giving me ulcers with this
posted by dis_integration at 8:46 AM on July 12 [6 favorites]
Arizona: July 12, 2024 LEADER Trump +4.1
Georgia: July 12, 2024 LEADER Trump +4.8
Pennsylvania: July 12, 2024 LEADER Trump +3.0
Michigan: July 12, 2024 LEADER Trump +0.3
Wisconsin: July 12, 2024 LEADER Trump +1.1
you're giving me ulcers with this
posted by dis_integration at 8:46 AM on July 12 [6 favorites]
Asking seriously - would Harris running be enough of a reset for such voters to get past their anger at Biden re Gaza?
I think so. Most of them are genuinely torn between wanting to stop Trump, and the awfulness of being asked to support a man who helped destroy their homeland, slaughter their coreligionists, and in some cases kill their families. I think not having to actually select the man who made the call to provide Netanyahu with weapons and push his propaganda globally would be much easier to swallow.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 8:51 AM on July 12 [9 favorites]
I think so. Most of them are genuinely torn between wanting to stop Trump, and the awfulness of being asked to support a man who helped destroy their homeland, slaughter their coreligionists, and in some cases kill their families. I think not having to actually select the man who made the call to provide Netanyahu with weapons and push his propaganda globally would be much easier to swallow.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 8:51 AM on July 12 [9 favorites]
I have a strong suspicion that part of the reason that we're continuing to see Trump lead in polls is that the people who are willing to vote for him are and have been fully committed since he announced he was going to run again. Biden doesn't have that luxury, but what he (or any potential replacement) does have is the distinct possibility that support will firm up as election day draws near and the folks who don't care for Biden or his replacement but really don't want Trump are forced to make a decision.
posted by wierdo at 8:57 AM on July 12 [6 favorites]
posted by wierdo at 8:57 AM on July 12 [6 favorites]
Trump also made a hell of a lot of money from being Grifter in Chief. I suspect that there's millions of corruption that didn't get uncovered. Maybe he's actually a billionaire now.
There is zero justification for Biden being slightly left of Trump re: Palestine. The right wing attack was both enabled by Netanyahu, and turned into genocide from the beginning. Anything short of extreme sanctions and immense political pressure to not genocide is, at best, a huge moral failure.
Nothing changes the fact that Trump is Unquestionably Worse and will be worse, but damn Biden. Why do you look so evil here.
posted by Jacen at 8:59 AM on July 12 [4 favorites]
There is zero justification for Biden being slightly left of Trump re: Palestine. The right wing attack was both enabled by Netanyahu, and turned into genocide from the beginning. Anything short of extreme sanctions and immense political pressure to not genocide is, at best, a huge moral failure.
Nothing changes the fact that Trump is Unquestionably Worse and will be worse, but damn Biden. Why do you look so evil here.
posted by Jacen at 8:59 AM on July 12 [4 favorites]
Asking seriously - would Harris running be enough of a reset for such voters to get past their anger at Biden re Gaza?
One thing that gives me hope is that ousting Biden would hold SOMEONE accountable for enabling Netanyahu. Its less about is Harris better than Biden.
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 9:10 AM on July 12 [2 favorites]
One thing that gives me hope is that ousting Biden would hold SOMEONE accountable for enabling Netanyahu. Its less about is Harris better than Biden.
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 9:10 AM on July 12 [2 favorites]
While we're staring into our crystal balls, one thing that has been on my mind is, I have no idea what swing state voters care about. We talk about Biden not being able to inspire them, which, okay, we have no idea whether that's true (wouldn't it be nice if politics were boring--maybe we need a boring, uninspiring president).
Last month Ipsos did a swing-state voter poll that asked what issues were important to them--and which candidate was more likely to address those issues effectively. "Respondents say the most important issues facing the country are inflation (49%), immigration (30%), political extremism (24%) and crime or gun violence (23%)."
If your main concerns are inflation or immigration, according to the poll, Trump's your guy. Which...well, you know, that's absolutely crazy, and speaks to the point that nobody who suffers from inflation actually understands inflation. And there's a real question over what Biden could do about inflation in the next few months. Someone has already mention sending out more checks, which would be absolutely inflationary, but maybe BidenBucks would make people feel comfortable enough about inflation to quit worrying about it for a while? I don't think there's time to really rein in corporate profits, although maybe if you hit that "IRS collection $1 billion from rich people" button hard enough, people would see that some important work has been done? (As for immigration, if that's a voter's main concern, I don't think there's any real hope for them.)
If your concern is political extremism, well, you're probably going to choose Biden. That's where the boring normality becomes a virtue, even if it's not particularly inspiring.
As for crime? Well, the "control guns not girls" line is kind of interesting, isn't it? Biden got loud during the press conference on the point about guns--sort of weirdly loud, it was an odd moment--but voters for whom crime is a concern do tend to pick Biden, in this poll. Again this seems more like a vote for normalcy.
(Abortion and climate not being highly represented in the poll makes me want to give up on humanity and go live in the forest, but, we have to look at what people actually want, not what they should want.)
For all the gaffes, the question about his presentation, his age, all the stuff that has occupied these last few Biden threads, it's odd to think how the answer could really come down to prices. Many voters have simply never lived through a period of high inflation before. It's a shock, it's something you're not conceptually ready for if you haven't been through it. If Biden--or Harris, or whoever it ends up being--can't address that, then we're looking at a future where the price of eggs has lead to fascism.
posted by mittens at 9:22 AM on July 12 [10 favorites]
Last month Ipsos did a swing-state voter poll that asked what issues were important to them--and which candidate was more likely to address those issues effectively. "Respondents say the most important issues facing the country are inflation (49%), immigration (30%), political extremism (24%) and crime or gun violence (23%)."
If your main concerns are inflation or immigration, according to the poll, Trump's your guy. Which...well, you know, that's absolutely crazy, and speaks to the point that nobody who suffers from inflation actually understands inflation. And there's a real question over what Biden could do about inflation in the next few months. Someone has already mention sending out more checks, which would be absolutely inflationary, but maybe BidenBucks would make people feel comfortable enough about inflation to quit worrying about it for a while? I don't think there's time to really rein in corporate profits, although maybe if you hit that "IRS collection $1 billion from rich people" button hard enough, people would see that some important work has been done? (As for immigration, if that's a voter's main concern, I don't think there's any real hope for them.)
If your concern is political extremism, well, you're probably going to choose Biden. That's where the boring normality becomes a virtue, even if it's not particularly inspiring.
As for crime? Well, the "control guns not girls" line is kind of interesting, isn't it? Biden got loud during the press conference on the point about guns--sort of weirdly loud, it was an odd moment--but voters for whom crime is a concern do tend to pick Biden, in this poll. Again this seems more like a vote for normalcy.
(Abortion and climate not being highly represented in the poll makes me want to give up on humanity and go live in the forest, but, we have to look at what people actually want, not what they should want.)
For all the gaffes, the question about his presentation, his age, all the stuff that has occupied these last few Biden threads, it's odd to think how the answer could really come down to prices. Many voters have simply never lived through a period of high inflation before. It's a shock, it's something you're not conceptually ready for if you haven't been through it. If Biden--or Harris, or whoever it ends up being--can't address that, then we're looking at a future where the price of eggs has lead to fascism.
posted by mittens at 9:22 AM on July 12 [10 favorites]
The optics of "ousting" Biden against his will, especially as some sort of punishment for Gaza, would be disastrous. His leaving must be seen as him reluctantly making way for the good of the party, the country etc etc. and graciously anointing and supporting whoever is the new candidate. Surely you all see this.
As per mittens post above, Gaza isn't high on most voters' lists of concerns. And the pro-Israel lobbies remain strong. It is what it is.
posted by Artful Codger at 9:23 AM on July 12 [2 favorites]
As per mittens post above, Gaza isn't high on most voters' lists of concerns. And the pro-Israel lobbies remain strong. It is what it is.
posted by Artful Codger at 9:23 AM on July 12 [2 favorites]
Asking seriously - would Harris running be enough of a reset for such voters to get past their anger at Biden re Gaza?
So, to be clear, I have always been of the mind that even if I don't approve of his handling of Gaza, I live in a swing state and thus I would still vote for Biden. But not all my local friends feel that way - and I have reason to think at least some of them would happily vote for Harris, who has signaled she's upset at how Biden has handled Gaza. Not that anyone thinks she's going to be radical on the issue, just you know, better.
The optics of "ousting" Biden against his will, especially as some sort of punishment for Gaza, would be disastrous. His leaving must be seen as him reluctantly making way for the good of the party, the country etc etc. and graciously anointing and supporting whoever is the new candidate. Surely you all see this.
I don't think anyone is arguing Biden should be ousted as a punishment for Gaza? I just see people arguing that he should step down because he's a weak candidate and cannot win - and that sure, if this has the consequence that some people upset about Gaza now vote Blue instead of Cornell West or staying home, that's a net positive.
posted by coffeecat at 9:27 AM on July 12 [4 favorites]
So, to be clear, I have always been of the mind that even if I don't approve of his handling of Gaza, I live in a swing state and thus I would still vote for Biden. But not all my local friends feel that way - and I have reason to think at least some of them would happily vote for Harris, who has signaled she's upset at how Biden has handled Gaza. Not that anyone thinks she's going to be radical on the issue, just you know, better.
The optics of "ousting" Biden against his will, especially as some sort of punishment for Gaza, would be disastrous. His leaving must be seen as him reluctantly making way for the good of the party, the country etc etc. and graciously anointing and supporting whoever is the new candidate. Surely you all see this.
I don't think anyone is arguing Biden should be ousted as a punishment for Gaza? I just see people arguing that he should step down because he's a weak candidate and cannot win - and that sure, if this has the consequence that some people upset about Gaza now vote Blue instead of Cornell West or staying home, that's a net positive.
posted by coffeecat at 9:27 AM on July 12 [4 favorites]
I don't think anyone is arguing Biden should be ousted as a punishment for Gaza?
It seems at least one is, and it seems there are a number of people in the thread for whom "Genocide Joe" is their most important issue.
But yeah, "not Genocide Joe" could be one more positive for Harris.
I admit I'm just curious to see if the Democrats will continue to slide to a defeat because they can't abandon the old habits of polls and the magic of incumbency despite their candidate's current weaknesses, or will they jump out of that rut and take a risk on a younger and more capable candidate? The system needs some bold moves and some shaking up.
posted by Artful Codger at 9:49 AM on July 12 [1 favorite]
It seems at least one is, and it seems there are a number of people in the thread for whom "Genocide Joe" is their most important issue.
But yeah, "not Genocide Joe" could be one more positive for Harris.
I admit I'm just curious to see if the Democrats will continue to slide to a defeat because they can't abandon the old habits of polls and the magic of incumbency despite their candidate's current weaknesses, or will they jump out of that rut and take a risk on a younger and more capable candidate? The system needs some bold moves and some shaking up.
posted by Artful Codger at 9:49 AM on July 12 [1 favorite]
It seems at least one is, and I think there are a number of people in the thread for whom "Genocide Joe" is their most important issue.
I urge you to actually read what I wrote:
One thing that gives me hope is that ousting Biden would hold SOMEONE accountable for enabling Netanyahu.
This is fundamentally different than "Biden should be ousted because of Gaza".
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 9:51 AM on July 12 [7 favorites]
I urge you to actually read what I wrote:
One thing that gives me hope is that ousting Biden would hold SOMEONE accountable for enabling Netanyahu.
This is fundamentally different than "Biden should be ousted because of Gaza".
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 9:51 AM on July 12 [7 favorites]
Artful Codger Gaza horrible, Biden horrible for enabling it. We get it. But it's just about orthogonal to the presidential election. There's no scenario where electing Trump, directly or by withholding your vote, will make that situation improve, is there?
Of course there's no way Trump will improve things.
But guess what? A LOT of the Muslim voters in Michigan, the people Biden is in desperate need of, say they can't see how Trump would be any worse and they're preparing not just to stay home in November but to actually vote for Trump. Yes, they know about his Muslim ban talk. They say Biden's support for Israel's genocide means there's no point in keeping him around. Direct quote: "we can survive Trump, we can't survive Biden".
You can say those people are stupid, or wrong, or short sighted, and you might even be right.
But they exist, they're a critical voting population in a critical state, and so no the Israeli genocide in Gaza is not fully orthoganal to the election. Biden actively hurt himself and his election chances by supporting Israel's genocide and being not just callously indifferent to Palestinian suffering but to actively relish it and want more suffering.
I hear a lot about Biden's supposed empathy. If it exists at all it seems only to extend to people in his own demographics becuase he literally said he has no empathy for young people and he actively loathes and hates Palestinians. I guess if you're an older white guy he really feels for you though.
Personally I plan to vote for the senile, evil, genocide enabling, anti-empath, who puts his own ego above the country. Biden sucks but in my calculous Trump is (somehow) worse.
Other people, who have relatives and friends in Gaza, see the situation differently and I'm not going to tell them they're wrong.
posted by sotonohito at 9:53 AM on July 12 [16 favorites]
Of course there's no way Trump will improve things.
But guess what? A LOT of the Muslim voters in Michigan, the people Biden is in desperate need of, say they can't see how Trump would be any worse and they're preparing not just to stay home in November but to actually vote for Trump. Yes, they know about his Muslim ban talk. They say Biden's support for Israel's genocide means there's no point in keeping him around. Direct quote: "we can survive Trump, we can't survive Biden".
You can say those people are stupid, or wrong, or short sighted, and you might even be right.
But they exist, they're a critical voting population in a critical state, and so no the Israeli genocide in Gaza is not fully orthoganal to the election. Biden actively hurt himself and his election chances by supporting Israel's genocide and being not just callously indifferent to Palestinian suffering but to actively relish it and want more suffering.
I hear a lot about Biden's supposed empathy. If it exists at all it seems only to extend to people in his own demographics becuase he literally said he has no empathy for young people and he actively loathes and hates Palestinians. I guess if you're an older white guy he really feels for you though.
Personally I plan to vote for the senile, evil, genocide enabling, anti-empath, who puts his own ego above the country. Biden sucks but in my calculous Trump is (somehow) worse.
Other people, who have relatives and friends in Gaza, see the situation differently and I'm not going to tell them they're wrong.
posted by sotonohito at 9:53 AM on July 12 [16 favorites]
Ousting to hold Biden accountable for Gaza. That's what you've just said.
I won't belabour the point further.
posted by Artful Codger at 9:54 AM on July 12 [2 favorites]
I won't belabour the point further.
posted by Artful Codger at 9:54 AM on July 12 [2 favorites]
Not trying to get into a back-and-forth, but my reading on what MisantropicPainforest wrote above is how it would feel good to them personally, not that this should be the official public framing of the matter. (Seemed pretty clear to me)
Anyway, something I've been thinking about on the topic of media bias....
Something that has bothered me is how little we know about Kennedy supporters. The media for the most part has ignored him besides to point out how he believes in a lot of conspiracy theories. And I get they don't want to platform him. But right now most of the Democrats, even Biden, are within the margin of error of beating Trump when it's a two-way race. They haven't done too much polling with most alternates in terms of a 3-way race, but Biden really takes a hit with a 3-way race. So my question, which reporting seems to have ignored, is who are these RFK Jr. voters? How many are just people who don't want to vote for either Trump or Biden, but would happily vote for Harris? Seems worth reporting on.
posted by coffeecat at 9:55 AM on July 12 [4 favorites]
Anyway, something I've been thinking about on the topic of media bias....
Something that has bothered me is how little we know about Kennedy supporters. The media for the most part has ignored him besides to point out how he believes in a lot of conspiracy theories. And I get they don't want to platform him. But right now most of the Democrats, even Biden, are within the margin of error of beating Trump when it's a two-way race. They haven't done too much polling with most alternates in terms of a 3-way race, but Biden really takes a hit with a 3-way race. So my question, which reporting seems to have ignored, is who are these RFK Jr. voters? How many are just people who don't want to vote for either Trump or Biden, but would happily vote for Harris? Seems worth reporting on.
posted by coffeecat at 9:55 AM on July 12 [4 favorites]
Ousting to hold Biden accountable for Gaza. That's what you've just said.
Its not? Like are you being willfully obtuse? This isn't a complex issue.
I think Biden should be ousted because of his Gaza policy != if Biden is ousted, he would be held accountable for his Gaza policy.
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 9:59 AM on July 12 [6 favorites]
I think Biden should be ousted because of his Gaza policy != if Biden is ousted, he would be held accountable for his Gaza policy.
I didn't say that, but sorry if my wording implied that I thought some sort of reckoning would now be forthcoming.
posted by Artful Codger at 10:09 AM on July 12
I didn't say that, but sorry if my wording implied that I thought some sort of reckoning would now be forthcoming.
posted by Artful Codger at 10:09 AM on July 12
Biden has always been known as a gaffe machine. This goes back at least a quarter century. This was always part of his persona, and it’s always been something that his supporters briefly cringe at, and then move on.
via dKos: Biden's gaffes aren't new. The media's obsession with them is
via dKos: Biden's gaffes aren't new. The media's obsession with them is
The morning after President Joe Biden's Thursday night press conference, much of the press was forced to reluctantly admit that the president spent an hour “deftly” answering questions from 10 different reporters in an unscripted event where he "comfortably waded” through complex issues involving economics, the military, and foreign affairs.posted by darkstar at 10:40 AM on July 12 [9 favorites]
Biden gave lengthy, thorough answers, several of them containing genuine news. That included giving a more complete account of what it has been like for the U.S. to engage in a situation in the Middle East with few reliable leaders, a large number of players, and constantly shifting alliances. He also dealt with issues as intricate as China’s influence in the Pacific and as immediate as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. But as expected, much of the media focus has been on a single gaffe.
mittens: And there's a real question over what Biden could do about inflation in the next few months. Someone has already mention sending out more checks, which would be absolutely inflationary, but maybe BidenBucks would make people feel comfortable enough about inflation to quit worrying about it for a while
since people don't understand inflation or care to understand it, this isn't even a terrible idea in a strictly give people a reason to vote for you way
it would be something bold that has a direct effect, and it's not illegal if the president does it etc
posted by lescour at 11:01 AM on July 12 [2 favorites]
since people don't understand inflation or care to understand it, this isn't even a terrible idea in a strictly give people a reason to vote for you way
it would be something bold that has a direct effect, and it's not illegal if the president does it etc
posted by lescour at 11:01 AM on July 12 [2 favorites]
Apropos of the FPP title, the Sunrise Movement has called on Biden to step down.
posted by coffeecat at 11:40 AM on July 12 [4 favorites]
posted by coffeecat at 11:40 AM on July 12 [4 favorites]
Meanwhile, while we're talking about who supports Biden as a candidate: the Heritage Foundation is considering lawsuits to keep Biden on the ballot.
posted by adrienneleigh at 11:57 AM on July 12 [11 favorites]
posted by adrienneleigh at 11:57 AM on July 12 [11 favorites]
Another lens to follow for the election:
It’s finally time to release my newest project: followthecrypto.org/posted by mazola at 12:21 PM on July 12 [3 favorites]
This website provides a real-time lens into the cryptocurrency industry’s efforts to influence 2024 elections in the United States [@molly0xfff | Mastodon]
I dunno, that Heritage piece is weak. "We might do something, maybe, just you watch!" Then four hundred experts explain why that's not possible. Also, it was from July 4, which was centuries ago.
posted by mittens at 12:22 PM on July 12 [4 favorites]
posted by mittens at 12:22 PM on July 12 [4 favorites]
Looks like that outreach to core constituencies is doing JUST. FINE. THANKS.
posted by Rhaomi at 12:37 PM on July 12 [5 favorites]
As President Joe Biden tries to talk with Democratic lawmakers and relieve their concerns, a virtual meeting with members of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus on Friday appears to have caused more problems than it solved.Edit: CNN has a transcript of Biden's response to Levin on the call.
For starters, Biden showed up an hour late to the Zoom call, according to a source familiar with the meeting, and it didn’t get much better from there. [...]
The source said leaders of Bold PAC — the political arm of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus — tightly controlled who could ask a question. Reps. Gabe Vasquez and Marie Gluesenkamp Perez both used the “raise hand” feature on the Zoom call, and both had their hands lowered by organizers of the call and were not allowed to speak, the source said.
But one Democrat who did get to speak was Rep. Mike Levin. Levin’s question, however, was more of a comment: He said it was time for someone else to lead the party, and he called on Biden to step down.
According to the source, Biden responded to Levin’s comment. The host tried to end the meeting, but Biden said he had time for one more question. Despite the president trying to take another question, the host — Rep. Linda T. Sánchez — ended the meeting anyway.
Still, Levin managed to get the last word. Soon after the call, the San Diego-area congressman became the 19th congressional Democrat to call on Biden to withdraw from the race.
posted by Rhaomi at 12:37 PM on July 12 [5 favorites]
I dunno, that Heritage piece is weak. "We might do something, maybe, just you watch!" Then four hundred experts explain why that's not possible.
I think adrienneleigh's point wasn't that the Heritage Foundation could successfully keep him on the ballot, but rather to suggest that if the Heritage Foundation wants to fight for him to stay on, that might be a good signal that him stepping down from the race might be in our/the country's better interest.
posted by nobody at 12:45 PM on July 12 [10 favorites]
I think adrienneleigh's point wasn't that the Heritage Foundation could successfully keep him on the ballot, but rather to suggest that if the Heritage Foundation wants to fight for him to stay on, that might be a good signal that him stepping down from the race might be in our/the country's better interest.
posted by nobody at 12:45 PM on July 12 [10 favorites]
Oh man, what an opportunity. Biden could say, "I would be more than happy to drop out of the race in favor of my Vice President, and will pledge to do so, if Donald Trump drops out of the race for being a 34-time convicted felon and serial defendant who is unfit to lead and significantly more cognitively impaired than I am."
Some Republicans might actually view that as an opportunity to push Trump out for someone more manageable.
posted by Ben Trismegistus
The optics of "ousting" Biden against his will, especially as some sort of punishment for Gaza, would be disastrous. His leaving must be seen as him reluctantly making way for the good of the party, the country etc etc. and graciously anointing and supporting whoever is the new candidate.
posted by Artful Codger
What if – and go with me for a minute here, folks – what if the Dems, with Biden's full knowledge and approval, are running something like the following play:
Fact: The RNC is before the DNC (mid-July v. mid-August).
Speculation: The Dems wait until Trump is formally locked in as candidate by the RNC, while allowing the media, and the Trump camp in particular, to speculate about and exploit Biden's age and health to bake in that issue for both candidates.
Then, at the Dem convention, Biden resigns and makes a smooth public handover to Harris and gets fully behind her candidacy, making much of being responsible by citing age and health reasons, to compare and contrast to Trump not doing it, with most of what we are seeing now – e.g. Harris being much more prominent, and Biden refusing to go – is setting up that play.
It would be impossible for the Reps to do that to Trump at that late stage. It would, of course, be impossible to do it to him at any stage without him tearing the party down in an orgy of retribution. But the closer to the election it is, the more destructive it would be.
Those who think the Dems could not plan that well should remember how Biden and Manchin very successfully fooled the Reps into thinking that the IRA bill was dead.
posted by Pouteria at 1:08 PM on July 12 [4 favorites]
Some Republicans might actually view that as an opportunity to push Trump out for someone more manageable.
posted by Ben Trismegistus
The optics of "ousting" Biden against his will, especially as some sort of punishment for Gaza, would be disastrous. His leaving must be seen as him reluctantly making way for the good of the party, the country etc etc. and graciously anointing and supporting whoever is the new candidate.
posted by Artful Codger
What if – and go with me for a minute here, folks – what if the Dems, with Biden's full knowledge and approval, are running something like the following play:
Fact: The RNC is before the DNC (mid-July v. mid-August).
Speculation: The Dems wait until Trump is formally locked in as candidate by the RNC, while allowing the media, and the Trump camp in particular, to speculate about and exploit Biden's age and health to bake in that issue for both candidates.
Then, at the Dem convention, Biden resigns and makes a smooth public handover to Harris and gets fully behind her candidacy, making much of being responsible by citing age and health reasons, to compare and contrast to Trump not doing it, with most of what we are seeing now – e.g. Harris being much more prominent, and Biden refusing to go – is setting up that play.
It would be impossible for the Reps to do that to Trump at that late stage. It would, of course, be impossible to do it to him at any stage without him tearing the party down in an orgy of retribution. But the closer to the election it is, the more destructive it would be.
Those who think the Dems could not plan that well should remember how Biden and Manchin very successfully fooled the Reps into thinking that the IRA bill was dead.
posted by Pouteria at 1:08 PM on July 12 [4 favorites]
Looks like that outreach to core constituencies is doing JUST. FINE. THANKS.
Maybe things would be going better if there was actual outreach to core constituencies instead of carefully orchestrated meetings with limited questioning and tightly controlled access meant to present a curated illusion of "unity" rather than the real thing? Just a thought.
posted by Pseudonymous Cognomen at 1:11 PM on July 12 [4 favorites]
Maybe things would be going better if there was actual outreach to core constituencies instead of carefully orchestrated meetings with limited questioning and tightly controlled access meant to present a curated illusion of "unity" rather than the real thing? Just a thought.
posted by Pseudonymous Cognomen at 1:11 PM on July 12 [4 favorites]
My favorite Biden gaffe is when he said even if Harris was better to beat Trump, Biden would stay in the race.
That and how he doesn't trust polls but he has all these polls that show him winning and that nobody says he isn't doing well. Those are the two stutters that are my favorite.
Typical boomer, would rather destroy the country than suffer to see anyone younger have a chance.
posted by No Climate - No Food, No Food - No Future. at 1:19 PM on July 12 [11 favorites]
That and how he doesn't trust polls but he has all these polls that show him winning and that nobody says he isn't doing well. Those are the two stutters that are my favorite.
Typical boomer, would rather destroy the country than suffer to see anyone younger have a chance.
posted by No Climate - No Food, No Food - No Future. at 1:19 PM on July 12 [11 favorites]
I think adrienneleigh's point wasn't that the Heritage Foundation could successfully keep him on the ballot, but rather to suggest that if the Heritage Foundation wants to fight for him to stay on, that might be a good signal that him stepping down from the race might be in our/the country's better interest.
Yes, nobody is exactly correct about my point.
Along with several other right-wing mouthpieces, Donald Trump, Jr. has also said he hopes Biden is the nominee, but I can't re-find my link right now.
posted by adrienneleigh at 1:25 PM on July 12 [1 favorite]
Yes, nobody is exactly correct about my point.
Along with several other right-wing mouthpieces, Donald Trump, Jr. has also said he hopes Biden is the nominee, but I can't re-find my link right now.
posted by adrienneleigh at 1:25 PM on July 12 [1 favorite]
I know we're in reading tea-leaves territory, but this seems potentially significant (certainly a contrast to his recent visit to PA):
Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, Sen. Gary Peters, Rep. Elissa Slotkin, and UAW President Shawn Fain will not attend Biden's appearance in Michigan - AP
posted by coffeecat at 1:25 PM on July 12 [6 favorites]
Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, Sen. Gary Peters, Rep. Elissa Slotkin, and UAW President Shawn Fain will not attend Biden's appearance in Michigan - AP
posted by coffeecat at 1:25 PM on July 12 [6 favorites]
Then, at the Dem convention, Biden resigns and makes a smooth public handover to Harris and gets fully behind her candidacy, making much of being responsible by citing age and health reasons, to compare and contrast to Trump not doing it, with most of what we are seeing now – e.g. Harris being much more prominent, and Biden refusing to go – is setting up that play.
EGG zackly. You get it. Could work!
It's so dispiriting to see the Trump campaign currently in cruise mode; the usual callouts of his lies and bombast, but that's a given and no longer newsworthy. And their campaign seems to not put a foot wrong. Even this Heritage Foundation announcement. It ls just one more of many small but well-executed moves.
Meanwhile, the Biden campaign is in the headlines for all the wrong reasons. Not least the on-screen slaying of his competence. And that Hispanic caucus thing. So many own goals...
It seems that only a bold and risky move will change the momentum. A well-orchestrated passing of the torch to Harris could be that move.
Do SOMETHING!
-sigh-
posted by Artful Codger at 1:35 PM on July 12 [2 favorites]
EGG zackly. You get it. Could work!
It's so dispiriting to see the Trump campaign currently in cruise mode; the usual callouts of his lies and bombast, but that's a given and no longer newsworthy. And their campaign seems to not put a foot wrong. Even this Heritage Foundation announcement. It ls just one more of many small but well-executed moves.
Meanwhile, the Biden campaign is in the headlines for all the wrong reasons. Not least the on-screen slaying of his competence. And that Hispanic caucus thing. So many own goals...
It seems that only a bold and risky move will change the momentum. A well-orchestrated passing of the torch to Harris could be that move.
Do SOMETHING!
-sigh-
posted by Artful Codger at 1:35 PM on July 12 [2 favorites]
Trump Is Planning for a Landslide Win: And his campaign is all but praying Joe Biden doesn’t drop out. (The Atlantic gift link)
One of the two principals tasked with returning Trump to the White House, [Chris] LaCivita had long conceived of the 2024 race as a contest that would be “extraordinarily visual”—namely, a contrast of strength versus weakness. Trump, whatever his countless liabilities as a candidate, would be cast as the dauntless and forceful alpha, while Biden would be painted as the pitiable old heel, less a bad guy than the butt of a very bad joke, America’s lovable but lethargic uncle who needed, at long last, to be put to bed.posted by kirkaracha at 2:20 PM on July 12 [18 favorites]
...
As the likelihood of a Trump-versus-Biden rematch set in, the public responded to the two candidates precisely as LaCivita and his campaign co-manager, Susie Wiles, had hoped. The percentage of voters who felt that Biden, at 81, was too old for another term rose throughout 2023, even as the electorate’s concerns about Trump’s age, 78, remained relatively static. By the end of the primaries, the public’s attitude toward the two nominees had begun to harden: One was a liar, a scoundrel, and a crook—but the other one, the old one, was unfit to be president.
In the months that followed, Trump and his campaign would seize on Biden’s every stumble, his every blank stare, to reinforce that observation, seeking to portray the incumbent as “stuttering, stammering, walking around, feeling his way like a blind man,” as LaCivita put it to me. That was the plan. And it worked. Watching Biden’s slide in the polls, and sitting on hundreds of millions of dollars for an advertising blitz that would punctuate the president’s visible decrepitude, Trump’s team entered the summer believing that a landslide awaited in the fall.
Only one thing could disrupt that plan: a change of candidates atop the Democratic ticket.
There was always a certain danger inherent to this assault on Biden’s faculties. If Wiles and LaCivita were too successful—if too many Democrats decided, too quickly, that Biden was no longer capable of defeating Trump, much less serving another four years thereafter—then they risked losing an ideal opponent against whom their every tactical maneuver had already been deliberated, poll-tested, and prepared. Campaigns are usually on guard against peaking too soon; in this case, the risk for Trump’s team was Biden bottoming out too early.
...
Biden quitting the race would necessitate a dramatic reset—not just for the Democratic Party, but for Trump’s campaign. Wiles and LaCivita told me that any Democratic replacement would inherit the president’s deficiencies; that whether it’s Vice President Kamala Harris or California Governor Gavin Newsom or anyone else, Trump’s blueprint for victory would remain essentially unchanged. But they know that’s not true. They know their campaign has been engineered in every way—from the voters they target to the viral memes they create—to defeat Biden. And privately, they are all but praying that he remains their opponent.
What if – and go with me for a minute here, folks – what if the Dems, with Biden's full knowledge and approval, are running something like the following play:
I like this post-RNC DNC bait-and-switch plan! Speaking strictly about how Democrats can pull off a win against Trump… my latest made-up scenario is that Joe Biden hands the candidacy to Kamala Harris, who then selects Joe Biden as her running mate. Could this be just wacky enough to work?
posted by inkytea at 2:46 PM on July 12 [2 favorites]
I like this post-RNC DNC bait-and-switch plan! Speaking strictly about how Democrats can pull off a win against Trump… my latest made-up scenario is that Joe Biden hands the candidacy to Kamala Harris, who then selects Joe Biden as her running mate. Could this be just wacky enough to work?
posted by inkytea at 2:46 PM on July 12 [2 favorites]
BREAKING: BIDEN ANNOUNCES AGREEMENTS ON CEASE FIRE BETWEEN ISRAEL AND HAMAS
Also reported as “phase one” on NBC. Looks like it’s for real.
posted by darkstar at 2:51 PM on July 12 [4 favorites]
Also reported as “phase one” on NBC. Looks like it’s for real.
posted by darkstar at 2:51 PM on July 12 [4 favorites]
I can't wait to see all the "he's so...OLD" ads a Harris campaign might put out in September/October.
posted by nobody at 2:52 PM on July 12 [1 favorite]
posted by nobody at 2:52 PM on July 12 [1 favorite]
February 26: Biden hopes cease-fire, hostage deal to pause Israel-Hamas war can take effect by next Monday
February 27: Israel and Hamas distance themselves from Biden’s optimism on Gaza ceasefire deal
May 6: Gaza cease-fire talks at 'critical stage,' US says, after Hamas claims it accepted proposal
May 7: ‘The goal is to destroy Gaza’: Why Israel rejects a ceasefire with Hamas
May 31: Biden says Israel has agreed to ‘enduring’ Gaza ceasefire proposal
June 1: Israel says permanent Gaza cease-fire plan is a ‘nonstarter,’ undermining Biden
Would be nice, but I'll believe it when it actually happens.
posted by Rhaomi at 3:05 PM on July 12 [14 favorites]
February 27: Israel and Hamas distance themselves from Biden’s optimism on Gaza ceasefire deal
May 6: Gaza cease-fire talks at 'critical stage,' US says, after Hamas claims it accepted proposal
May 7: ‘The goal is to destroy Gaza’: Why Israel rejects a ceasefire with Hamas
May 31: Biden says Israel has agreed to ‘enduring’ Gaza ceasefire proposal
June 1: Israel says permanent Gaza cease-fire plan is a ‘nonstarter,’ undermining Biden
Would be nice, but I'll believe it when it actually happens.
posted by Rhaomi at 3:05 PM on July 12 [14 favorites]
Fair point, yes.
posted by darkstar at 3:08 PM on July 12 [1 favorite]
posted by darkstar at 3:08 PM on July 12 [1 favorite]
And so…Netanyahu reverses on key Israeli concession in ceasefire talks
posted by darkstar at 3:11 PM on July 12 [2 favorites]
posted by darkstar at 3:11 PM on July 12 [2 favorites]
Wow, who could have possibly seen that coming?? Might as well have Charlie Brown running the show, since apparently the only thing that matters is trying your best, even if nothing is learned or accomplished.
posted by not just everyday big moggies at 3:13 PM on July 12 [9 favorites]
posted by not just everyday big moggies at 3:13 PM on July 12 [9 favorites]
Oh goody the megathreads are back
posted by Jarcat at 3:42 PM on July 12 [8 favorites]
posted by Jarcat at 3:42 PM on July 12 [8 favorites]
yesterday he's at the NATO meeting then address the press and finally had his real test today by going to Michigan.
Michigan Gov. Whitmer, Sen. Gary Peters, Rep. Elissa Slotkin, and UAW President Shawn Fain will not attend Biden's appearance in Michigan - AP
I wouldn't read anything into this as a matter of fact this needed be about Joe as the governor said: "I think Joe Biden needs to be Joe Biden,” she said earlier this week. “And I think that showing up and connecting with people, that’s who he is, that’s what he loves to do … I’m anticipating you’ll see a very energized president who is able to connect with folks all across the state.”
if I were running the party, I'd have the local politicians canvassing the state just like how Biden has a lot of the cabinet out there tauting the economy and what not. the problem nominating someone other than Biden is that vice president Harris will be cut out as the person who will be running should have the freedom to pick whoever they want for vice president. vice president Harris could run but I don't think she'd win she has the executive experience but not the legislative, other than the senate, in my opinion.
posted by clavdivs at 4:04 PM on July 12 [1 favorite]
Michigan Gov. Whitmer, Sen. Gary Peters, Rep. Elissa Slotkin, and UAW President Shawn Fain will not attend Biden's appearance in Michigan - AP
I wouldn't read anything into this as a matter of fact this needed be about Joe as the governor said: "I think Joe Biden needs to be Joe Biden,” she said earlier this week. “And I think that showing up and connecting with people, that’s who he is, that’s what he loves to do … I’m anticipating you’ll see a very energized president who is able to connect with folks all across the state.”
if I were running the party, I'd have the local politicians canvassing the state just like how Biden has a lot of the cabinet out there tauting the economy and what not. the problem nominating someone other than Biden is that vice president Harris will be cut out as the person who will be running should have the freedom to pick whoever they want for vice president. vice president Harris could run but I don't think she'd win she has the executive experience but not the legislative, other than the senate, in my opinion.
posted by clavdivs at 4:04 PM on July 12 [1 favorite]
Dude, Biden could be full on catatonic on stage, and some of y'all would still be calling this media lies.
posted by iamck at 4:39 PM on July 12 [5 favorites]
posted by iamck at 4:39 PM on July 12 [5 favorites]
He was anything but catatonic tonight, and yesterday, and the day before, but keep banging that drum.
posted by wierdo at 5:18 PM on July 12 [5 favorites]
posted by wierdo at 5:18 PM on July 12 [5 favorites]
“We Are Deeply, Messily Divided on the Biden Situation,” Choire Sicha, New York Magazine's Dinner Party, 12 July 2024
Sounds like everyone needs a hug.posted by ob1quixote at 5:33 PM on July 12 [2 favorites]
“Joe Biden’s Cynical Turn Against the Press,” Jay Caspian Kang, The New Yorker, 12 July 2024
posted by ob1quixote at 5:37 PM on July 12 [4 favorites]
posted by ob1quixote at 5:37 PM on July 12 [4 favorites]
Expecting posters who hate Biden to have anything charitable to say is a mug's game
*Taps the sign again*
posted by lescour at 5:45 PM on July 12
*Taps the sign again*
posted by lescour at 5:45 PM on July 12
He was anything but catatonic tonight, and yesterday, and the day before, but keep banging that drum.
Is this the bar for winning a presidential election? The debate was a low, but the other appearances have all been better, good for an 81 year-old, but also not inspiring. I wish his record would be enough to convince that tiny sliver of the electorate who actually matter to pull us back from the brink of possibly global destruction, but he’s not even the strongest campaigner of the 80-somethings currently in office in the Democratic Party.
posted by snofoam at 6:02 PM on July 12 [8 favorites]
Is this the bar for winning a presidential election? The debate was a low, but the other appearances have all been better, good for an 81 year-old, but also not inspiring. I wish his record would be enough to convince that tiny sliver of the electorate who actually matter to pull us back from the brink of possibly global destruction, but he’s not even the strongest campaigner of the 80-somethings currently in office in the Democratic Party.
posted by snofoam at 6:02 PM on July 12 [8 favorites]
Ironically, watching his rallies and interviews and press conferences over this past week has only improved my perception of Biden. I like him more now than I did when I was paying little attention to anything but the list of domestic policy achievements his administration has had
posted by wierdo at 6:12 PM on July 12 [6 favorites]
posted by wierdo at 6:12 PM on July 12 [6 favorites]
Ironically, watching his rallies and interviews and press conferences over this past week has only improved my perception of Biden
How is that ironic? That is literally their intent.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 6:17 PM on July 12 [2 favorites]
How is that ironic? That is literally their intent.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 6:17 PM on July 12 [2 favorites]
Is this the bar for winning a presidential election
ooh let's see Reagan, Andrew johnson, to some degree Ulysses s Grant, for different reasons Woodrow Wilson. let's just take Woodrow Wilson should he have resigned after his health crisis but then we'd be left with the president Marshall and those two had a rift. the dude had such a sense of humor that Wilson moved his office away from his, there was assassination attempt on him in 1915 and yet after a stroke the inner circle kept this from Marshall. it wasn't a lot of transparency but we have a little bit more transparency today. reading a few comments I have to agree with the people who said that he's reacting to sound bites and going back to then like talking about his neurologist etc. there's an loose axiom about the presidency, never complain never explain and he's doing both. so if I were running the party I would stick to Biden, and don't comment on those who detract, you want to get your candidate into the office and if he cannot carry that out in a year or two then the vice president can take over it could be like a Howard Taft situation, she could become president and supreme Court Justice. there are many possibilities but you got to get the candidate in. the principles of ideology are set on both parties and is going to be very little a new Democratic candidate can do to shift the opinion unless that candidate has about 10 trillion dollars worth of plans and the way to end Wars, I don't know.
posted by clavdivs at 6:28 PM on July 12
ooh let's see Reagan, Andrew johnson, to some degree Ulysses s Grant, for different reasons Woodrow Wilson. let's just take Woodrow Wilson should he have resigned after his health crisis but then we'd be left with the president Marshall and those two had a rift. the dude had such a sense of humor that Wilson moved his office away from his, there was assassination attempt on him in 1915 and yet after a stroke the inner circle kept this from Marshall. it wasn't a lot of transparency but we have a little bit more transparency today. reading a few comments I have to agree with the people who said that he's reacting to sound bites and going back to then like talking about his neurologist etc. there's an loose axiom about the presidency, never complain never explain and he's doing both. so if I were running the party I would stick to Biden, and don't comment on those who detract, you want to get your candidate into the office and if he cannot carry that out in a year or two then the vice president can take over it could be like a Howard Taft situation, she could become president and supreme Court Justice. there are many possibilities but you got to get the candidate in. the principles of ideology are set on both parties and is going to be very little a new Democratic candidate can do to shift the opinion unless that candidate has about 10 trillion dollars worth of plans and the way to end Wars, I don't know.
posted by clavdivs at 6:28 PM on July 12
How is that ironic? That is literally their intent.
Because I keep being told he's a senile, sundowning old man who can't hold a thought to its conclusion and couldn't inspire anything but pity in any but his most die hard supporters. Including by you, if memory serves.
That's why it's ironic.
posted by wierdo at 6:35 PM on July 12 [3 favorites]
Because I keep being told he's a senile, sundowning old man who can't hold a thought to its conclusion and couldn't inspire anything but pity in any but his most die hard supporters. Including by you, if memory serves.
That's why it's ironic.
posted by wierdo at 6:35 PM on July 12 [3 favorites]
‘OMFG’: Biden’s mistakes push shocked US allies toward Trump
posted by The Manwich Horror at 6:35 PM on July 12 [2 favorites]
posted by The Manwich Horror at 6:35 PM on July 12 [2 favorites]
Because I keep being told he's a senile, sundowning old man who can't hold a thought to its conclusion and couldn't inspire anything but pity in any but his most die hard supporters. Including by you, if memory serves.
That's why it's ironic.
These events are intended to present him as someone who believes in things and is up to the job. That's why they bothered to do fake interviews with preapproved questions. It is unsurprising that after consuming propaganda you were swayed by it. That's what it does.
His genuinely (so far as can be ascertained) unscripted performances have been somewhere between bad and catastrophic.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 6:38 PM on July 12 [7 favorites]
That's why it's ironic.
These events are intended to present him as someone who believes in things and is up to the job. That's why they bothered to do fake interviews with preapproved questions. It is unsurprising that after consuming propaganda you were swayed by it. That's what it does.
His genuinely (so far as can be ascertained) unscripted performances have been somewhere between bad and catastrophic.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 6:38 PM on July 12 [7 favorites]
His genuinely (so far as can be ascertained) unscripted performances have been somewhere between bad and catastrophic.
You keep saying this, but it isn't what I see at all. As I said, keep banging your drum.
posted by wierdo at 6:40 PM on July 12 [1 favorite]
You keep saying this, but it isn't what I see at all. As I said, keep banging your drum.
posted by wierdo at 6:40 PM on July 12 [1 favorite]
Are you being ironic?
No?
Biden was near incoherent during the debate, vaguely unhinged on Morning Joe, and struggled to manage the piss poor job at the NATO summit press conference. He sounded somewhat better in interviews, but we know bow his campaign told them what questions to ask. Which isn't what you do if you think you have a competent candidate.
You keep saying this, but it isn't what I see at all. As I said, keep banging your drum.
I think standards are so lowered that he'd be getting praise so long as he didn't piss himself on stage. I can't change your opinion on his performance. That's subjective. I can only say that he made numerous errors, couldn't maintain his train of thought, and seemed like it took all his strength to respond to very basic questions. I don't think that performance would be seen as anything other than disturbing if he hadn't looked near dead during the debates. If disagreeing about that is "banging a drum" I am afraid I will have to continue soing so.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 6:46 PM on July 12 [10 favorites]
No?
Biden was near incoherent during the debate, vaguely unhinged on Morning Joe, and struggled to manage the piss poor job at the NATO summit press conference. He sounded somewhat better in interviews, but we know bow his campaign told them what questions to ask. Which isn't what you do if you think you have a competent candidate.
You keep saying this, but it isn't what I see at all. As I said, keep banging your drum.
I think standards are so lowered that he'd be getting praise so long as he didn't piss himself on stage. I can't change your opinion on his performance. That's subjective. I can only say that he made numerous errors, couldn't maintain his train of thought, and seemed like it took all his strength to respond to very basic questions. I don't think that performance would be seen as anything other than disturbing if he hadn't looked near dead during the debates. If disagreeing about that is "banging a drum" I am afraid I will have to continue soing so.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 6:46 PM on July 12 [10 favorites]
(he buzzes like a fridge / he's like a detuned radio)
posted by mittens at 7:05 PM on July 12 [4 favorites]
posted by mittens at 7:05 PM on July 12 [4 favorites]
(he buzzes like a fridge / he's like a detuned radio)
Look, I talked in maths one time!
posted by The Manwich Horror at 7:06 PM on July 12 [7 favorites]
Look, I talked in maths one time!
posted by The Manwich Horror at 7:06 PM on July 12 [7 favorites]
My recommendation based on a couple decades following mefi political threads on Metafilter is to just ignore the opinions of the long time Biden haters. No amount of back and forth will get them to change their minds. They out their energy into sabotaging Biden and don’t care about the consequences. It is better just to put your energy elsewhere towards local organizing and get out the vote and working to convince people who can be convinced.
It is out of our hands if Biden is or isn’t the candidate in the near future.
posted by interogative mood at 7:07 PM on July 12 [9 favorites]
It is out of our hands if Biden is or isn’t the candidate in the near future.
posted by interogative mood at 7:07 PM on July 12 [9 favorites]
There is no US ceasefire deal. There’s a demand for total surrender by the US that is simply being rebranded a “ceasefire deal”. We know this because the US can unilaterally compel Israel to stop its bombing, siege and occupation overnight and they don’t
Adam Johnson, on Twitter
posted by adrienneleigh at 7:14 PM on July 12 [7 favorites]
Adam Johnson, on Twitter
posted by adrienneleigh at 7:14 PM on July 12 [7 favorites]
I don't hate Joe Biden. I admit that I hate Donald Trump.
Kamala Harris was my head-over-heart pragmatic choice in 2020; Liz Warren is closest to my ideals but I felt she was (a) too liberal to get elected, and (b) too old. (Ha ha ha. #killMeNow)
Plus, my daughter was born in the same hospital as Vice (for now) President Harris, and I met Ms. Harris when she was running for San Francisco DA and she asked me for my vote at the bus stop. (Tiny, but I was a lineman in football.)
I think she, like Hillary Clinton, might not be very good at running for president, but she would be excellent at being president.
Finally, I think as a former prosecutor she would kick the shit out of Trump if he had the stones to face her. #assumesBallsNotInEvidence
posted by kirkaracha at 7:17 PM on July 12 [22 favorites]
Kamala Harris was my head-over-heart pragmatic choice in 2020; Liz Warren is closest to my ideals but I felt she was (a) too liberal to get elected, and (b) too old. (Ha ha ha. #killMeNow)
Plus, my daughter was born in the same hospital as Vice (for now) President Harris, and I met Ms. Harris when she was running for San Francisco DA and she asked me for my vote at the bus stop. (Tiny, but I was a lineman in football.)
I think she, like Hillary Clinton, might not be very good at running for president, but she would be excellent at being president.
Finally, I think as a former prosecutor she would kick the shit out of Trump if he had the stones to face her. #assumesBallsNotInEvidence
posted by kirkaracha at 7:17 PM on July 12 [22 favorites]
Netanyahu reverses on key Israeli concession in ceasefire talks
So, a couple of days back Haaretz dropped their long-term journalism piece (which once again underlies my general :/ about the state of western media coverage - USUALLY, the foreign media is the one that has plenty of things to say and cover about a warring nation and will surface just about any old thing eg Putin and his Botox regiment. But oh no, no matter how much even liberal media bangs their head against the fascist chokehold on their country, the Western media acts like the deluded aunty at Christmas.)
How Netanyahu Has Systematically Foiled Talks to Release Hostages From Hamas Captivity
I posted chunks here if but it's basically a month-by-month and play-by-play insider journalism of just how well Bibi does not in fact, give a toss.
(A couple of comments below is another piece by al-Monitor re: how the Egyptians feel like they're getting punked by this whole negotiations process - so you're doing a heckuva job Joey with that foreign policy portfolio)
posted by cendawanita at 7:20 PM on July 12 [8 favorites]
So, a couple of days back Haaretz dropped their long-term journalism piece (which once again underlies my general :/ about the state of western media coverage - USUALLY, the foreign media is the one that has plenty of things to say and cover about a warring nation and will surface just about any old thing eg Putin and his Botox regiment. But oh no, no matter how much even liberal media bangs their head against the fascist chokehold on their country, the Western media acts like the deluded aunty at Christmas.)
How Netanyahu Has Systematically Foiled Talks to Release Hostages From Hamas Captivity
I posted chunks here if but it's basically a month-by-month and play-by-play insider journalism of just how well Bibi does not in fact, give a toss.
(A couple of comments below is another piece by al-Monitor re: how the Egyptians feel like they're getting punked by this whole negotiations process - so you're doing a heckuva job Joey with that foreign policy portfolio)
posted by cendawanita at 7:20 PM on July 12 [8 favorites]
Biden is teetering. Trump's plan? Let it happen
posted by Artful Codger at 8:09 PM on July 12 [1 favorite]
posted by Artful Codger at 8:09 PM on July 12 [1 favorite]
Great article on the Biden rally and other campaign events in Detroit today…
Via Detroit Free Press:
Crowd chants as invigorated President Joe Biden rallies in Detroit: 'Don't you quit'
Greeted with huge applause by a crowd of thousands at Renaissance High School who chanted "Don't You Quit" and "We've Got Your Back" and interrupted him several times to show their support, Biden appeared not only ready to take the fight to Trump, who is running against Biden for reelection, but to feed off the crowd's ceaseless energy, his voice remaining strong and his demeanor feisty during a 35-minute address.
posted by darkstar at 8:23 PM on July 12 [7 favorites]
Via Detroit Free Press:
Crowd chants as invigorated President Joe Biden rallies in Detroit: 'Don't you quit'
Greeted with huge applause by a crowd of thousands at Renaissance High School who chanted "Don't You Quit" and "We've Got Your Back" and interrupted him several times to show their support, Biden appeared not only ready to take the fight to Trump, who is running against Biden for reelection, but to feed off the crowd's ceaseless energy, his voice remaining strong and his demeanor feisty during a 35-minute address.
posted by darkstar at 8:23 PM on July 12 [7 favorites]
darkstar: “Crowd chants as invigorated President Joe Biden rallies in Detroit: 'Don't you quit'”“WATCH LIVE: Biden holds campaign event in Detroit as Democrats debate possible withdrawal from race,” Joey Cappelletti, Zeke Miller, and Seung Min Kim, AP via PBS News, 12 July 2024
posted by ob1quixote at 8:41 PM on July 12 [4 favorites]
“Joe Biden’s Cynical Turn Against the Press,” Jay Caspian Kang, The New Yorker, 12 July 2024
... This is normal presidential nominee behaviour across the board now...? (I am still not touching, outside as comedy material, his tendency for verbal flubs. I'm still asking about things that indicate planning and forethought. Like: is it normal to not have full cabinet meetings for nine months now?)
posted by cendawanita at 10:58 PM on July 12 [1 favorite]
... This is normal presidential nominee behaviour across the board now...? (I am still not touching, outside as comedy material, his tendency for verbal flubs. I'm still asking about things that indicate planning and forethought. Like: is it normal to not have full cabinet meetings for nine months now?)
posted by cendawanita at 10:58 PM on July 12 [1 favorite]
Mod note: A few deleted. Those of you who are here to attack other members, create drama, and show off, please stop or we will ask that you discontinue commenting in politics threads (and begin banning after that). Our space here is limited, and most people would rather use it to discuss developments and have a conversation rather than be a forced audience to a virtual bar fight. Act like grown-ups or go somewhere else.
posted by taz (staff) at 11:10 PM on July 12 [24 favorites]
posted by taz (staff) at 11:10 PM on July 12 [24 favorites]
(tmh, come back!!!)
posted by mittens at 5:35 AM on July 13 [2 favorites]
posted by mittens at 5:35 AM on July 13 [2 favorites]
Brian Beutler, Desperate Times, Desperate Measures, And The Biden Question: "The McCain-Palin history is valuable today as a guide through uncertainty when the status quo looks hopeless: First, only take extraordinary risks if you’re really on course to lose, as McCain was. Then, if you conclude you must, act within the bounds of civic obligation. Don’t place your own interests above the country’s. Don’t place crooks, frauds, or incompetents one dying breath away from apocalyptic power. Under today’s circumstances, despite plenty of uncertainty, that sums to a strong case for a new Democratic ticket."
posted by mittens at 6:14 AM on July 13 [1 favorite]
posted by mittens at 6:14 AM on July 13 [1 favorite]
> Like: is it normal to not have full cabinet meetings for nine months now?)
trump held very few full cabinet meetings, i imagine he found them boring. obama apparently had about 3 or 4 a year but it’s surprisingly hard to find out about this. apparently in the past many presidents held cabinet meetings at least monthly. i don’t think this matters very much, it’s not the most concerning thing about him.
posted by dis_integration at 6:45 AM on July 13 [3 favorites]
trump held very few full cabinet meetings, i imagine he found them boring. obama apparently had about 3 or 4 a year but it’s surprisingly hard to find out about this. apparently in the past many presidents held cabinet meetings at least monthly. i don’t think this matters very much, it’s not the most concerning thing about him.
posted by dis_integration at 6:45 AM on July 13 [3 favorites]
To indirectly build on the mod note - I think it's worth to keep in mind that while perhaps a couple users hate Biden, most of us arguing that Biden should step down are discussing here from a point of genuine anxiety over November, and a desire to put forward the best candidate. I know I have been pretty negative of Biden in this thread, but honestly, if he had done an average job during the debate, I (like I imagine most Democratic voters and critics of Biden in this thread) wouldn't be questioning whether he should be on the ticket. I mean, I wouldn't have been excited about voting for him, but I'm used to begrudgingly voting for Democrats. I'm not motivated by hatred or a desire to witness his downfall - we don't "keep banging our drum" (a rather dismissive and unconstructive bit of phrasing) out of stubbornness, but because it seems to many of us that the central problem and its main downstream consequences are still there.
We are a little over two weeks past the debate and I have never seen the Democratic Party this divided in my lifetime. The divide is at all levels - on Capital Hill down to the grassroots (like us weirdos hashing things out here). Not only that, but this historic divide is happening in the face of what many believe to be a make or break election for the country. If Democrats - especially on Capital Hill - ever felt motivated to be united, it would be now. And yet, they're not. Something is wrong.
A key part of the job of the president is to lead their party by uniting different factions within it to support their legislative agenda. This is true of Congressional leadership too - I have the usual progressive complaints about Pelosi (mainly for being overly hostile to the Squad), but I have genuine respect for her talent at getting Congress to fall in line. And the Biden Administration is utterly failing right now to unite the party - we've learned from reporting that he waited several days before reaching out to key senior leadership on the Hill, that he's frequently over an hour late to Zoom meetings, then those Zoom meetings are carefully orchestrated to prevent dissent being voiced (i.e. the recent Hispanic Caucus meeting), he's narrowed his inner circle down to just three old white men with intense loyalties to the Biden family (always a good sign), Biden is increasingly angry and at a recent campaign rally blamed the media (sound familiar?), and refuses to engage with polls showing that the majority of voters in his party want him to step down - instead he blames amorphous "elites" (sound familiar?). At his recent visit to Michigan, all prominent local Democrats were mysteriously "too busy" to be involved - and yes, that's pretty odd - it's standard for such people to provide introductory speeches at rallies.
People may feel this is unfair, but if a majority of your grassroots and Congressional members tell you they believe you should step down for the good of the country for reasons that are backed up with data, and you respond with anger, further isolating yourself from critique, and undermining the free press, you're a bad leader - you're not fit to be president (and yes, of course that goes for Trump too). Truly, this isn't about gaffes - if his only problem was occasional verbal slip-ups, all of this wouldn't be happening. Biden and his administration have had two weeks to meet with and calm the fears of his party's membership - and if anything, they've made things worse in those two weeks. I was pretty sure he had to go after the debate, but it's his response to this moment that has made me fairly certain.
posted by coffeecat at 8:25 AM on July 13 [30 favorites]
We are a little over two weeks past the debate and I have never seen the Democratic Party this divided in my lifetime. The divide is at all levels - on Capital Hill down to the grassroots (like us weirdos hashing things out here). Not only that, but this historic divide is happening in the face of what many believe to be a make or break election for the country. If Democrats - especially on Capital Hill - ever felt motivated to be united, it would be now. And yet, they're not. Something is wrong.
A key part of the job of the president is to lead their party by uniting different factions within it to support their legislative agenda. This is true of Congressional leadership too - I have the usual progressive complaints about Pelosi (mainly for being overly hostile to the Squad), but I have genuine respect for her talent at getting Congress to fall in line. And the Biden Administration is utterly failing right now to unite the party - we've learned from reporting that he waited several days before reaching out to key senior leadership on the Hill, that he's frequently over an hour late to Zoom meetings, then those Zoom meetings are carefully orchestrated to prevent dissent being voiced (i.e. the recent Hispanic Caucus meeting), he's narrowed his inner circle down to just three old white men with intense loyalties to the Biden family (always a good sign), Biden is increasingly angry and at a recent campaign rally blamed the media (sound familiar?), and refuses to engage with polls showing that the majority of voters in his party want him to step down - instead he blames amorphous "elites" (sound familiar?). At his recent visit to Michigan, all prominent local Democrats were mysteriously "too busy" to be involved - and yes, that's pretty odd - it's standard for such people to provide introductory speeches at rallies.
People may feel this is unfair, but if a majority of your grassroots and Congressional members tell you they believe you should step down for the good of the country for reasons that are backed up with data, and you respond with anger, further isolating yourself from critique, and undermining the free press, you're a bad leader - you're not fit to be president (and yes, of course that goes for Trump too). Truly, this isn't about gaffes - if his only problem was occasional verbal slip-ups, all of this wouldn't be happening. Biden and his administration have had two weeks to meet with and calm the fears of his party's membership - and if anything, they've made things worse in those two weeks. I was pretty sure he had to go after the debate, but it's his response to this moment that has made me fairly certain.
posted by coffeecat at 8:25 AM on July 13 [30 favorites]
We are a little over two weeks past the debate and I have never seen the Democratic Party this divided in my lifetime.
i have - in 1968 - george wallace split the party by taking the south with him and starting his own party - the anti war people further fractured the party and there was an awful convention in chicago
posted by pyramid termite at 8:42 AM on July 13 [2 favorites]
i have - in 1968 - george wallace split the party by taking the south with him and starting his own party - the anti war people further fractured the party and there was an awful convention in chicago
posted by pyramid termite at 8:42 AM on July 13 [2 favorites]
Robert Reich made the case that this is primarily the donor class and money who are primarily driving the wedge in Who exactly is trying to push Biden out? and in a practical way that's not wrong.
In other news Republicans ramp up attacks on Kamala Harris amid swirl over Biden future [The Guardian] so there's that.
posted by mazola at 8:48 AM on July 13 [1 favorite]
In other news Republicans ramp up attacks on Kamala Harris amid swirl over Biden future [The Guardian] so there's that.
posted by mazola at 8:48 AM on July 13 [1 favorite]
…if a majority of your grassroots and Congressional members tell you…
I’d quite sincerely like to see the math behind this assertion.
posted by darkstar at 9:53 AM on July 13 [6 favorites]
I’d quite sincerely like to see the math behind this assertion.
posted by darkstar at 9:53 AM on July 13 [6 favorites]
apparently in the past many presidents held cabinet meetings at least monthly.
One thing worth noting is just how much the Cabinet has grown. There are 15 executive departments whose heads participate in the meetings (as well as other cabinet-level positions); there were only seven before World War II and they were all in pretty wide-ranging areas of public life. For a group of that size where each participant has a pretty wide range of likely overlapping responsibilities, getting them all in a room together on the regular makes a lot of sense. For the current makeup of the Cabinet, well, I can see why the President might want to hear from, say, both the Secretary of Transportation and the Secretary of Veterans' Affairs, but there's no really good reason both of those debriefings should be part of the same event, since they're unlikely to really provide needed context for each other's issues.
posted by jackbishop at 9:55 AM on July 13 [1 favorite]
One thing worth noting is just how much the Cabinet has grown. There are 15 executive departments whose heads participate in the meetings (as well as other cabinet-level positions); there were only seven before World War II and they were all in pretty wide-ranging areas of public life. For a group of that size where each participant has a pretty wide range of likely overlapping responsibilities, getting them all in a room together on the regular makes a lot of sense. For the current makeup of the Cabinet, well, I can see why the President might want to hear from, say, both the Secretary of Transportation and the Secretary of Veterans' Affairs, but there's no really good reason both of those debriefings should be part of the same event, since they're unlikely to really provide needed context for each other's issues.
posted by jackbishop at 9:55 AM on July 13 [1 favorite]
I read the Reich piece - his basic point, that donors wield a lot of power, is obviously true and a gross reality of our fragile democracy. But his argument that donors are the only ones who want Biden to step down seems pretty tenuous. There has been ample reporting, some of which has been linked to above by myself and others, that what most politicians are saying in public doesn't match what they are telling reporters in private. (Most recently, reports that an overwhelming majority of Senators do not support him staying in). I'd also say it's a stretch to claim, as he does, that "Almost all [Congress] have been publicly supportive of Biden." The majority have given mealy-mouthed statements about 'supporting Biden's decision, which they hope he makes soon' or 'I will always support the current nominee, which is currently Biden, but if it were to be someone else, I would also support them.' Even top leadership. And while Reich dismisses Clooney as a political nobody, like Frowner pointed out above, Clooney cares about his relationships to Democratic politicians - he wouldn't have published that Op-Ed if he didn't have approval from most of them. And like I said above, I don't care about Clooney as a celebrity, but the main has connections - he has insight into what powerful people are thinking, whether he deserves that insight or not.
And finally, I find it pretty striking that Reich doesn't address voters at all - like the fact that 76% think Biden is not mentally fit to be president, that he has a 36% approval rating, that a majority of Democrats think he should step down, etc. The donor class and politicians are responding real grassroots unease.* And while unlike the historian-turned-Biden-surrogate-class (aka Heather Cox Richardson - a hack increasingly detested by many colleagues), I won't claim that having a PhD in history allows me to predict the future - but yeah, 1968 should be a warning that if Biden continue to dig in his heels, odds are in favor of the convention being a shit show.
*On that note, the NYTimes reported yesterday that "the Movement Voter Project — a political action committee that supports grassroots progressives and Democrats — said it would be joining the chorus of donor groups asking Biden to step aside. The PAC, surveying its grassroots partners, found that 74 percent of its respondents wanted another candidate — a rebuttal of the president’s claim that only “elites” were trying to push him out."
posted by coffeecat at 9:55 AM on July 13 [11 favorites]
And finally, I find it pretty striking that Reich doesn't address voters at all - like the fact that 76% think Biden is not mentally fit to be president, that he has a 36% approval rating, that a majority of Democrats think he should step down, etc. The donor class and politicians are responding real grassroots unease.* And while unlike the historian-turned-Biden-surrogate-class (aka Heather Cox Richardson - a hack increasingly detested by many colleagues), I won't claim that having a PhD in history allows me to predict the future - but yeah, 1968 should be a warning that if Biden continue to dig in his heels, odds are in favor of the convention being a shit show.
*On that note, the NYTimes reported yesterday that "the Movement Voter Project — a political action committee that supports grassroots progressives and Democrats — said it would be joining the chorus of donor groups asking Biden to step aside. The PAC, surveying its grassroots partners, found that 74 percent of its respondents wanted another candidate — a rebuttal of the president’s claim that only “elites” were trying to push him out."
posted by coffeecat at 9:55 AM on July 13 [11 favorites]
darkstar, thanks for the link to the Detroit rally. Truly joyous!
And a good reminder that the horrible vibes here are happening in a weird doomer bubble, while across the country, there are millions of ordinary people of all different backgrounds who overwhelmingly chose Joe Biden as the Dem nominee, and who are excited at the prospect of a second Biden term.
If the Democratic party and affiliated groups can snap themselves out of circular firing squad mode, Biden has a very good chance of winning this thing, and defeating Trump again.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 10:34 AM on July 13 [4 favorites]
And a good reminder that the horrible vibes here are happening in a weird doomer bubble, while across the country, there are millions of ordinary people of all different backgrounds who overwhelmingly chose Joe Biden as the Dem nominee, and who are excited at the prospect of a second Biden term.
If the Democratic party and affiliated groups can snap themselves out of circular firing squad mode, Biden has a very good chance of winning this thing, and defeating Trump again.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 10:34 AM on July 13 [4 favorites]
Bernie Sanders: Joe Biden for President
I will do all that I can to see that President Biden is re-elected. Why? Despite my disagreements with him on particular issues, he has been the most effective president in the modern history of our country and is the strongest candidate to defeat Donald Trump — a demagogue and pathological liar. It’s time to learn a lesson from the progressive and centrist forces in France who, despite profound political differences, came together this week to soundly defeat right-wing extremism.posted by Artifice_Eternity at 10:37 AM on July 13 [9 favorites]
If the Democratic party and affiliated groups can snap themselves out of circular firing squad mode, Biden has a very good chance of winning this thing
No he doesn't? If Democratic partisans determined the outcome of elections we wouldn't even be having this conversation, because Hillary Clinton would be finishing her second term and we'd be talking about Tim Kaine running against someone like Nikki Haley. As it is, Biden is not popular, his approval rating has been at or below 42% for the last 3 years, and 76% of voters think he shouldn't be running. This is not a winning candidate, regardless of what the Democratic Party may or may not do, because unaffiliated voters and swing states are what determines the outcome of elections.
posted by Pseudonymous Cognomen at 11:38 AM on July 13 [4 favorites]
No he doesn't? If Democratic partisans determined the outcome of elections we wouldn't even be having this conversation, because Hillary Clinton would be finishing her second term and we'd be talking about Tim Kaine running against someone like Nikki Haley. As it is, Biden is not popular, his approval rating has been at or below 42% for the last 3 years, and 76% of voters think he shouldn't be running. This is not a winning candidate, regardless of what the Democratic Party may or may not do, because unaffiliated voters and swing states are what determines the outcome of elections.
posted by Pseudonymous Cognomen at 11:38 AM on July 13 [4 favorites]
Robert Reich is representing the timid, we-must-always-do-things-this-way, establishment Democratic core. I think Biden has been quite good overall in this term, and others have confirmed it. But who decided he had enough in the tank for a campaign and 4 more years? It's obsessing over polling (and a really terrible political system) that explains both Trump and Biden, two flawed candidates, as the party choices.
Biden needs to deliver a couple or more real barnburners, Democratic pollsters need to proclaim that Biden can win (even if its not true), and the party needs to visibly coalesce around him. And FFS, artillery on Trump! If this is not forthcoming, then a well-choreographed handoff is the only remaining play.
posted by Artful Codger at 12:08 PM on July 13 [2 favorites]
Biden needs to deliver a couple or more real barnburners, Democratic pollsters need to proclaim that Biden can win (even if its not true), and the party needs to visibly coalesce around him. And FFS, artillery on Trump! If this is not forthcoming, then a well-choreographed handoff is the only remaining play.
posted by Artful Codger at 12:08 PM on July 13 [2 favorites]
If you wish you had a succinct, mainstream explanation of the horrors of Trump's Project 2025 you could send to your friends and relatives, People magazine has provided one. Please spread this link. No matter how bad you think it is, it's worse. https://people.com/what-is-project-2025-inside-far-right-plan-trump-presidency-8622964
-- [@stevesilberman | Mastodon]
Accessible and shareable, thx People.
posted by mazola at 12:43 PM on July 13 [8 favorites]
-- [@stevesilberman | Mastodon]
Accessible and shareable, thx People.
posted by mazola at 12:43 PM on July 13 [8 favorites]
Biden’s Detroit speech yesterday was one of his best ever. I think that Biden is winning the argument of why he should be reelected. This catastrophe might have been just the kick in the ass his campaign needed.
posted by interogative mood at 1:38 PM on July 13 [1 favorite]
posted by interogative mood at 1:38 PM on July 13 [1 favorite]
I think that Biden is winning the argument of why he should be reelected
Not in swing states he isn't (he's polling consistently behind in Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Georgia, and behind in Michigan in most polling). People who were already going to vote for Biden aren't the ones who need convincing, and nothing he's done in the last two weeks has moved the needle much with the voters he does need to convince (or indeed with skeptical members of his own party, as evidenced by calls for him to drop out of the race continuing).
posted by Pseudonymous Cognomen at 1:45 PM on July 13 [5 favorites]
Not in swing states he isn't (he's polling consistently behind in Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Georgia, and behind in Michigan in most polling). People who were already going to vote for Biden aren't the ones who need convincing, and nothing he's done in the last two weeks has moved the needle much with the voters he does need to convince (or indeed with skeptical members of his own party, as evidenced by calls for him to drop out of the race continuing).
posted by Pseudonymous Cognomen at 1:45 PM on July 13 [5 favorites]
I'm suspicious of polls in general, and while I'm not tracking the pulse of this story, my barometer is strongly affected by the fact that every time I see a No-Joe being asked for their opinions on electability, it's some person I've never heard of. Apparently it's possible for even senators to come out of the woodwork.
I don't know enough about the future to change my vote, and I haven't heard any thing from the people who say they do. I feel like there are a LOT of exploitable downsides, so for the time being In gonna dance with the one what brung me.
At any rate, everybody should wait until after the RNC –which I assume is going to be an abject shit show– to think beyond first impressions.
posted by rhizome at 1:59 PM on July 13 [1 favorite]
I don't know enough about the future to change my vote, and I haven't heard any thing from the people who say they do. I feel like there are a LOT of exploitable downsides, so for the time being In gonna dance with the one what brung me.
At any rate, everybody should wait until after the RNC –which I assume is going to be an abject shit show– to think beyond first impressions.
posted by rhizome at 1:59 PM on July 13 [1 favorite]
Ruwa Romman: "Between Gaza and bad policies on immigration and lgbtq rights, we're actively losing parts of our coalition. The current strategy will not only make us lose in November but will have down ballot ramifications at every level. Our competition isn't the GOP, it's the couch."
posted by mittens at 2:03 PM on July 13 [6 favorites]
posted by mittens at 2:03 PM on July 13 [6 favorites]
None of the Georgia Democratic Congressional delegation (2 senators and 5 (out of 14) reps) have called for Biden to not run. The AJC/WABE collaboration Politically Georgia called all the Georgia DNC delegates and only 2 out of 124 + 9 alternates said that they think Biden shouldn't run.
Now of course the flip side of that is how we all know Georgia is a 50/50 Republican/Democratic voting state yet only 5 out of 14 Congressional reps are Democrats and that Kemp and Raffensperger are working to ensure that voter suppression of all types will be out in full force. But Biden still has the support of Georgia Democrats.
posted by hydropsyche at 2:06 PM on July 13
Now of course the flip side of that is how we all know Georgia is a 50/50 Republican/Democratic voting state yet only 5 out of 14 Congressional reps are Democrats and that Kemp and Raffensperger are working to ensure that voter suppression of all types will be out in full force. But Biden still has the support of Georgia Democrats.
posted by hydropsyche at 2:06 PM on July 13
Sorry, mittens, I missed your post on preview but now it looks like I was responding directly to you. I respect the heck out of Ruwa, but I don't think she can really speak for all Georgia Democrats the way, say, Senator Warnock can.
posted by hydropsyche at 2:08 PM on July 13 [2 favorites]
posted by hydropsyche at 2:08 PM on July 13 [2 favorites]
None of the Georgia Democratic Congressional delegation (2 senators and 5 (out of 14) reps) have called for Biden to not run. The AJC/WABE collaboration Politically Georgia called all the Georgia DNC delegates and only 2 out of 124 + 9 alternates said that they think Biden shouldn't run.
That's nice. Biden is polling consistently 5 points behind in Georgia, though. Do the voters not get any consideration, in this calculus?
posted by Pseudonymous Cognomen at 2:08 PM on July 13 [4 favorites]
All I was trying to say was that the people who are experts on getting Democrats elected in Georgia are still sticking with Biden. People are free to disagree with me, but as a Georgian, that's my feeling.
posted by hydropsyche at 2:16 PM on July 13 [2 favorites]
posted by hydropsyche at 2:16 PM on July 13 [2 favorites]
Do the voters not get any consideration
I mean, Georgia did have a primary?
posted by mittens at 2:22 PM on July 13
I mean, Georgia did have a primary?
posted by mittens at 2:22 PM on July 13
I mean, Georgia did have a primary?
Pretending that a non-competitive primary that had turnout less than 1/3rd of 2020 means anything is kind of absurd, honestly.
posted by Pseudonymous Cognomen at 2:24 PM on July 13 [4 favorites]
Pretending that a non-competitive primary that had turnout less than 1/3rd of 2020 means anything is kind of absurd, honestly.
posted by Pseudonymous Cognomen at 2:24 PM on July 13 [4 favorites]
So but what are you asking for, for the voters? A primary do-over?
posted by mittens at 2:26 PM on July 13
posted by mittens at 2:26 PM on July 13
interogative mood
I don't think anyone here is trying to sabotage Biden or help Trump. There are people here who aren't going blue MAGA and chanting "Go Joe" in unison, but I think that's a lot healthier than the alternative and probably more productive. After all, if clapping harder worked then Clinton would have won in 2016.
And, again, it's barely two weeks out of the debate debacle and people take a while to shift gears. Once it's absolute that Biden is the nominee and there's no possibility of anything else, as it seems will almost certainly happen, you'll stop hearing people calling for him to step down.
But comrade, democracy isn't a united front and everyone pulling together. It's a bunch of people shouting at each other and pulling in all different directions until things are settled. If you think Biden's awful appearances are harmless but people on a tiny message board are shifting the national mood you might be overestimating the influence of MeFi just a touch.
mittens Did either party have an actual primary this year? It's not traditional to have a real primary when your party has a one term President sitting in the White House. I think, in retrospect, it would have been a very good idea to have abandoned that tradition, but even I can't honestly accuse the Democrats of doing anything unprecedented by not having a real primary.
The Republicans, however, did break with tradition by just anointing Trump the candidate without having a genuine primary. Which just goes to show that they're a cult of personality now not an actual political party. I mean, if the part where they LITERALLY chose not to have a Party Platform in 2020 and instead had a simple statement that the Republican Party was going to do whatever Trump wanted and no past platform could be considered to be valid or influential in any way.
So yeah, I do think the Biden campaign saying Biden won the primary and the people have spoken is, at best, disingenuous. But it's also nothing new.
In ordinary circumstances with a candidate who wasn't being seen as mentally unfit by many voters it wouldn't matter and no one would comment about the lack of a real primary.
I think, at this point, Biden has successfully run out the clock and there is no chance of him being replaced at all.
posted by sotonohito at 2:30 PM on July 13 [4 favorites]
I don't think anyone here is trying to sabotage Biden or help Trump. There are people here who aren't going blue MAGA and chanting "Go Joe" in unison, but I think that's a lot healthier than the alternative and probably more productive. After all, if clapping harder worked then Clinton would have won in 2016.
And, again, it's barely two weeks out of the debate debacle and people take a while to shift gears. Once it's absolute that Biden is the nominee and there's no possibility of anything else, as it seems will almost certainly happen, you'll stop hearing people calling for him to step down.
But comrade, democracy isn't a united front and everyone pulling together. It's a bunch of people shouting at each other and pulling in all different directions until things are settled. If you think Biden's awful appearances are harmless but people on a tiny message board are shifting the national mood you might be overestimating the influence of MeFi just a touch.
mittens Did either party have an actual primary this year? It's not traditional to have a real primary when your party has a one term President sitting in the White House. I think, in retrospect, it would have been a very good idea to have abandoned that tradition, but even I can't honestly accuse the Democrats of doing anything unprecedented by not having a real primary.
The Republicans, however, did break with tradition by just anointing Trump the candidate without having a genuine primary. Which just goes to show that they're a cult of personality now not an actual political party. I mean, if the part where they LITERALLY chose not to have a Party Platform in 2020 and instead had a simple statement that the Republican Party was going to do whatever Trump wanted and no past platform could be considered to be valid or influential in any way.
So yeah, I do think the Biden campaign saying Biden won the primary and the people have spoken is, at best, disingenuous. But it's also nothing new.
In ordinary circumstances with a candidate who wasn't being seen as mentally unfit by many voters it wouldn't matter and no one would comment about the lack of a real primary.
I think, at this point, Biden has successfully run out the clock and there is no chance of him being replaced at all.
posted by sotonohito at 2:30 PM on July 13 [4 favorites]
So but what are you asking for, for the voters? A primary do-over?
A candidate who can beat Trump? Joe Biden is not that candidate. He will lose Georgia.
posted by Pseudonymous Cognomen at 2:30 PM on July 13 [2 favorites]
A candidate who can beat Trump? Joe Biden is not that candidate. He will lose Georgia.
posted by Pseudonymous Cognomen at 2:30 PM on July 13 [2 favorites]
Pseudonymous Cognomen I suspect you're right. I fear you're right. But I also think we've actually hit the limit on when anything can really be done. If he, god forbid, he dropped dead tomorrow I think it'd go to Harris by default because there's just not enough time now.
There was right after the debate, but Biden's campaign ran a successful delaying effort and I don't see how anything short of the Biden dying or otherwise being completely incapacitated is going to change who the nominee is.
It sucks, but I think the window of opportunity has passed and we're stuck with him now.
I will repeat my statement that the two candidates are proof that America is a has been broken nation that may never recover. Out of three hundred and eighty MILLION people those two are the best we can come up with? Really? Not one single person out of the other 380 million Americans is a better candidate than either Trump or Biden?
If that's true, as the major parties are claiming, then America is a lost cause.
posted by sotonohito at 2:37 PM on July 13 [1 favorite]
There was right after the debate, but Biden's campaign ran a successful delaying effort and I don't see how anything short of the Biden dying or otherwise being completely incapacitated is going to change who the nominee is.
It sucks, but I think the window of opportunity has passed and we're stuck with him now.
I will repeat my statement that the two candidates are proof that America is a has been broken nation that may never recover. Out of three hundred and eighty MILLION people those two are the best we can come up with? Really? Not one single person out of the other 380 million Americans is a better candidate than either Trump or Biden?
If that's true, as the major parties are claiming, then America is a lost cause.
posted by sotonohito at 2:37 PM on July 13 [1 favorite]
Jake Sherman: 'During @JoeBiden’s call with the Congressional Progressive Caucus, the president said his staff passed him a note to “stay positive you are sounding defensive.” Biden read the note aloud to participants on the call.'
Katie Rogers with some context: '"Lawmaker on the call says president was "making fun of his staff" who passed him the note, and context was him acknowledging the note but then being the way he wanted to be on the call. "Not like he didn’t know what he was doing."'
(and yeah, sotonohito, I was just misunderstanding the thrust of pseud. cog.'s complaint there--although I guess you could say that Biden's mental state, and maybe more importantly his actual positions, were in full view during the primaries--thus the uncommitted campaign, right?--but he did get a higher percentage of votes from Democrats who voted in the primary, than Trump got from Republicans--Haley got something like 12%?)
(anyway my ears always perk up when we're talking about georgia b/c south carolina (where i'm at) is one of the fastest-growing states in the country, and if georgia can go blue...could sc too?)
posted by mittens at 2:42 PM on July 13 [5 favorites]
Katie Rogers with some context: '"Lawmaker on the call says president was "making fun of his staff" who passed him the note, and context was him acknowledging the note but then being the way he wanted to be on the call. "Not like he didn’t know what he was doing."'
(and yeah, sotonohito, I was just misunderstanding the thrust of pseud. cog.'s complaint there--although I guess you could say that Biden's mental state, and maybe more importantly his actual positions, were in full view during the primaries--thus the uncommitted campaign, right?--but he did get a higher percentage of votes from Democrats who voted in the primary, than Trump got from Republicans--Haley got something like 12%?)
(anyway my ears always perk up when we're talking about georgia b/c south carolina (where i'm at) is one of the fastest-growing states in the country, and if georgia can go blue...could sc too?)
posted by mittens at 2:42 PM on July 13 [5 favorites]
although I guess you could say that Biden's mental state, and maybe more importantly his actual positions, were in full view during the primaries--thus the uncommitted campaign, right?
His positions yes (uncommitted was basically entirely a Gaza protest vote) but not really his mental state. His administration had largely kept him away from the public eye until the debate (the last press conference before the previous one was 8 months ago). That's part of why the media and political elite is annoyed - a lot of people were told, sometimes quite literally "Yes, we know you haven't seen much of Biden lately, but don't worry, he's fine, just wait until the campaign starts and you'll see." (One example is an interview with Rob Klain for this episode of the Run Up)
And then you have the fact that the DNC decided not to allow primary debates or even a CNN Town Hall, and not all states even had primaries - in some, Biden was the only option on the ballot.
I wouldn't say we're stuck with Biden quite yet - the window for doing some sort of ad-hoc pseudo primary is indeed rapidly closing, but handing things over to Harris is still a viable option in the coming week. A number of polls will be released tomorrow, and we know Biden's team is doing some internal polls about Harris. I suspect that if those polls are bad for Biden and good for Harris, we'll see more defections by members of Congress. Then there's the Lester Holt interview - which may be as short as 15min, but will be unedited. And finally we have the RNC convention - this will provide a sense of their general election strategy (and Trump's VP pick). If all of these new developments look increasingly bad for Biden's chances, and the Democratic Party continues becoming more and not less divided, it's still possible he'll relent. I'm not holding my breath or anything, but it still seems within the realm of possibility.
posted by coffeecat at 3:05 PM on July 13 [6 favorites]
His positions yes (uncommitted was basically entirely a Gaza protest vote) but not really his mental state. His administration had largely kept him away from the public eye until the debate (the last press conference before the previous one was 8 months ago). That's part of why the media and political elite is annoyed - a lot of people were told, sometimes quite literally "Yes, we know you haven't seen much of Biden lately, but don't worry, he's fine, just wait until the campaign starts and you'll see." (One example is an interview with Rob Klain for this episode of the Run Up)
And then you have the fact that the DNC decided not to allow primary debates or even a CNN Town Hall, and not all states even had primaries - in some, Biden was the only option on the ballot.
I wouldn't say we're stuck with Biden quite yet - the window for doing some sort of ad-hoc pseudo primary is indeed rapidly closing, but handing things over to Harris is still a viable option in the coming week. A number of polls will be released tomorrow, and we know Biden's team is doing some internal polls about Harris. I suspect that if those polls are bad for Biden and good for Harris, we'll see more defections by members of Congress. Then there's the Lester Holt interview - which may be as short as 15min, but will be unedited. And finally we have the RNC convention - this will provide a sense of their general election strategy (and Trump's VP pick). If all of these new developments look increasingly bad for Biden's chances, and the Democratic Party continues becoming more and not less divided, it's still possible he'll relent. I'm not holding my breath or anything, but it still seems within the realm of possibility.
posted by coffeecat at 3:05 PM on July 13 [6 favorites]
For your consideration…
In summer 2020, there were several polls showing Biden losing Georgia to Trump by 1 to 7 points. (There were other polls showing Biden ahead, as well. The polling for GA was all over the place in Summer 2020.)
Most folks figured Biden to lose GA, though. Obama had lost GA in 2008 to McCain by just over 5 points, and lost GA to Romney by over 7 points. I think it bears repeating: Barack Obama lost Georgia twice, the second time by 7 points to Romney.
Hillary Clinton lost GA to Trump by 5 points, as well. In fact, no Democrat had won the state since Bill Clinton in ‘92, and he only won GA by less than 1 point when he did.
Happily, though, Biden won GA by 0.23% in 2020! Stacey Abrams helping to mobilize the vote, and Warnock, a popular, Black, former pastor, running for Senate, were key factors in boosting Biden’s win. It certainly didn’t hurt that Kamala Harris was on the ticket. Warnock won’t be on the ballot this year, so even before the current summer fretting started, most folks figured Biden would have a very tough time winning the state again, and a lot of the national pundits gave it a very low chance.
That said, the most recent poll of GA — Morning Consult, conducted from 7/1-7/4 — shows Biden down by only 1. The previous three polls of GA showed Biden down by 5, but these were taken right after the first debate, with the most recent of those three, by Emerson, polling through July 2nd. (For reference, the first debate this year was on June 27th.) The takeaway is that Trump probably got a few point debate bounce, but that it may have already disappeared, and the state race is now within the MoE.
I suspect the reason that Stacey Abrams is backing Biden now is because she sees him in an MoE race in GA, which is probably a bit better than where they expected they might be. And perhaps if they can get into the heart of the campaigning season after the RNC, they can start moving those numbers up. Especially when Biden surrogates like Warnock and Obama start hitting the trail in GA in earnest.
posted by darkstar at 3:11 PM on July 13 [2 favorites]
In summer 2020, there were several polls showing Biden losing Georgia to Trump by 1 to 7 points. (There were other polls showing Biden ahead, as well. The polling for GA was all over the place in Summer 2020.)
Most folks figured Biden to lose GA, though. Obama had lost GA in 2008 to McCain by just over 5 points, and lost GA to Romney by over 7 points. I think it bears repeating: Barack Obama lost Georgia twice, the second time by 7 points to Romney.
Hillary Clinton lost GA to Trump by 5 points, as well. In fact, no Democrat had won the state since Bill Clinton in ‘92, and he only won GA by less than 1 point when he did.
Happily, though, Biden won GA by 0.23% in 2020! Stacey Abrams helping to mobilize the vote, and Warnock, a popular, Black, former pastor, running for Senate, were key factors in boosting Biden’s win. It certainly didn’t hurt that Kamala Harris was on the ticket. Warnock won’t be on the ballot this year, so even before the current summer fretting started, most folks figured Biden would have a very tough time winning the state again, and a lot of the national pundits gave it a very low chance.
That said, the most recent poll of GA — Morning Consult, conducted from 7/1-7/4 — shows Biden down by only 1. The previous three polls of GA showed Biden down by 5, but these were taken right after the first debate, with the most recent of those three, by Emerson, polling through July 2nd. (For reference, the first debate this year was on June 27th.) The takeaway is that Trump probably got a few point debate bounce, but that it may have already disappeared, and the state race is now within the MoE.
I suspect the reason that Stacey Abrams is backing Biden now is because she sees him in an MoE race in GA, which is probably a bit better than where they expected they might be. And perhaps if they can get into the heart of the campaigning season after the RNC, they can start moving those numbers up. Especially when Biden surrogates like Warnock and Obama start hitting the trail in GA in earnest.
posted by darkstar at 3:11 PM on July 13 [2 favorites]
Uh....it looks like Trump got shot at a rally? I won't lie, this has been a fantasy of mine, but also...Fuck. Something tells me this isn't going to help.
posted by coffeecat at 3:25 PM on July 13 [3 favorites]
posted by coffeecat at 3:25 PM on July 13 [3 favorites]
https://www.cnn.com/politics/live-news/election-biden-trump-07-13-24/index.html
posted by jenfullmoon at 3:35 PM on July 13
posted by jenfullmoon at 3:35 PM on July 13
Speaking of Morning Consult polling, the trend has been very clearly good for Biden since January.
Beginning this year, they had Biden down by 8 in GA. Every month, Biden has narrowed that lead by a point, on a pretty consistent trend.
He is now only 1 point behind. That is not an argument, in my view, for “he’s going to lose Georgia.”
posted by darkstar at 3:35 PM on July 13 [1 favorite]
Beginning this year, they had Biden down by 8 in GA. Every month, Biden has narrowed that lead by a point, on a pretty consistent trend.
He is now only 1 point behind. That is not an argument, in my view, for “he’s going to lose Georgia.”
posted by darkstar at 3:35 PM on July 13 [1 favorite]
Yeah it looks like he got hit in the ear, going by some footage of the aftermath. It shows a little blood on his ear and face.
We might need a bigger thread.
posted by mrjohnmuller at 3:37 PM on July 13 [1 favorite]
We might need a bigger thread.
posted by mrjohnmuller at 3:37 PM on July 13 [1 favorite]
Trump rushed off stage at rally after what sounded like shots (NYT)
Thoughts and prayers for the MetaFilter moderation team.
posted by box at 3:38 PM on July 13 [16 favorites]
Thoughts and prayers for the MetaFilter moderation team.
posted by box at 3:38 PM on July 13 [16 favorites]
I am curious about the fists in the air. Is it just a weird reflex? I can’t even conceive of him being brave in any actual dangerous situation. Was this staged? Will it be a so-called “illegal”? Will Trump claim they are not sending their best marksmen?
posted by snofoam at 3:42 PM on July 13 [3 favorites]
posted by snofoam at 3:42 PM on July 13 [3 favorites]
Not jokingly, but this is bad news for Joe Biden.
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 3:44 PM on July 13 [5 favorites]
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 3:44 PM on July 13 [5 favorites]
My immediate reaction is a carefully staged stunt via the Secret Service given the shit they may (who will ever know given how outside civilian control they operate) have pulled on Jan 6th in support of Trump.
posted by Slackermagee at 3:44 PM on July 13 [2 favorites]
posted by Slackermagee at 3:44 PM on July 13 [2 favorites]
If this was an actual assassination attempt, then I think the race just changed fundamentally. And I mean in a way that our discussions to date — whatever position you take on Biden — may become substantially moot. This is a terrible moment for our democracy.
posted by darkstar at 3:46 PM on July 13 [6 favorites]
posted by darkstar at 3:46 PM on July 13 [6 favorites]
Whatever actually happened, we are about to witness the birth of roughly a billion new bespoke conspiracy theories, from all sides.
This definitely does not bode well for the national political temperature.
posted by mrjohnmuller at 3:48 PM on July 13 [4 favorites]
This definitely does not bode well for the national political temperature.
posted by mrjohnmuller at 3:48 PM on July 13 [4 favorites]
You should never, ever shoot at anyone or anything unless you can hit what you aim at. Range time is important!
posted by adrienneleigh at 3:48 PM on July 13 [5 favorites]
posted by adrienneleigh at 3:48 PM on July 13 [5 favorites]
Yeah, Omar’s “if you come for the king” and many other lines from The Wire seem applicable here.
Even if this was somehow staged, it wouldn’t matter after ten years of so many people denying the existence of truth itself. This I seems like it may become a world-changing moment.
posted by snofoam at 3:51 PM on July 13 [3 favorites]
Even if this was somehow staged, it wouldn’t matter after ten years of so many people denying the existence of truth itself. This I seems like it may become a world-changing moment.
posted by snofoam at 3:51 PM on July 13 [3 favorites]
Could this even be staged? Like just grazing him?
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 3:55 PM on July 13 [1 favorite]
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 3:55 PM on July 13 [1 favorite]
Honestly it sounded like a lot of shots to not also hit someone else maybe, although I suppose the crowd is actually a lot further back they the seem in some of the photos.
posted by snofoam at 3:58 PM on July 13
posted by snofoam at 3:58 PM on July 13
He managed to briefly bully above and past the secret service (who are all very strong men and women literally trained to keep him down and get him out) for a fist pump photo op after being clipped in the ear.
It's entirely possible that this is the real deal but like, boy howdy.
posted by Slackermagee at 4:00 PM on July 13
It's entirely possible that this is the real deal but like, boy howdy.
posted by Slackermagee at 4:00 PM on July 13
Could this even be staged? Like just grazing him?
Is there any video/photo evidence of the blood prior to Trump dropping to the ground? Seems like having several Secret Service members pile on top of you in that moment of chaos provides plenty of opportunity to get cut without having been shot. Not saying this happened; just saying that’s the obvious alternative if he wasn’t shot.
posted by not just everyday big moggies at 4:03 PM on July 13 [1 favorite]
Is there any video/photo evidence of the blood prior to Trump dropping to the ground? Seems like having several Secret Service members pile on top of you in that moment of chaos provides plenty of opportunity to get cut without having been shot. Not saying this happened; just saying that’s the obvious alternative if he wasn’t shot.
posted by not just everyday big moggies at 4:03 PM on July 13 [1 favorite]
TRUMP POSTposted by box at 4:04 PM on July 13 [2 favorites]
TRUMP POST
TRUMP POST
My initial impression is that it’s real.
The dramatic photos of him with his fist raised defiantly in front of the flag, blood on his face, are…powerfully moving. I can’t imagine he would have wanted to be shot, and I absolutely condemn it, but this moment, and those photos, are a gift from heaven for Donald Trump’s campaign.
posted by darkstar at 4:05 PM on July 13 [6 favorites]
The dramatic photos of him with his fist raised defiantly in front of the flag, blood on his face, are…powerfully moving. I can’t imagine he would have wanted to be shot, and I absolutely condemn it, but this moment, and those photos, are a gift from heaven for Donald Trump’s campaign.
posted by darkstar at 4:05 PM on July 13 [6 favorites]
Someone aimed at the king and missed.
Yes, this, like EVERYTHING ELSE, will only be to his advantage.
posted by jenfullmoon at 4:10 PM on July 13 [1 favorite]
Yes, this, like EVERYTHING ELSE, will only be to his advantage.
posted by jenfullmoon at 4:10 PM on July 13 [1 favorite]
“Biden VS Trump: How Democracies Die” [41:44]—Brigitte Empire, 13 July 2024 14:00 -0400 UTC (i.e., before the incident.)
posted by ob1quixote at 6:54 PM on July 13 [1 favorite]
posted by ob1quixote at 6:54 PM on July 13 [1 favorite]
We were at a lovely salmon dinner with friends, when someone mentioned what was going down re "the shots". I have the gist, but I'm choosing to avoid any news about it til at least tomorrow.
I am glad that Trump wasn't killed; that's not how I want things to be done. And I can also feel sick about how this will just cement him in harder with his base, as a card-carrying martyr now.
I expect that finished designs for the new T-shirts and flags will be in the hands of the printers before sunrise.
posted by Artful Codger at 7:35 PM on July 13 [4 favorites]
I am glad that Trump wasn't killed; that's not how I want things to be done. And I can also feel sick about how this will just cement him in harder with his base, as a card-carrying martyr now.
I expect that finished designs for the new T-shirts and flags will be in the hands of the printers before sunrise.
posted by Artful Codger at 7:35 PM on July 13 [4 favorites]
Back to the Biden topic, George Conway posted the following on Twitter/X: Joe Biden could take a nap in the middle of 5th avenue and I’d still vote for him.
posted by interogative mood at 10:04 PM on July 13 [4 favorites]
posted by interogative mood at 10:04 PM on July 13 [4 favorites]
AOC to anonymous Democrat who said party resigned to Trump win: ‘Retire’
posted by audi alteram partem at 9:20 AM on July 15 [4 favorites]
posted by audi alteram partem at 9:20 AM on July 15 [4 favorites]
Harris outdoes Biden in 2 state polls (archive.is link to NYT newsletter)
In these polls of PA and VA, both Biden and Harris have double-digit leads over Trump among people under 45, women, non-white people, and white people with college degrees.
posted by box at 9:48 AM on July 15 [1 favorite]
In these polls of PA and VA, both Biden and Harris have double-digit leads over Trump among people under 45, women, non-white people, and white people with college degrees.
posted by box at 9:48 AM on July 15 [1 favorite]
And from YouGov:
Arizona - 🔴 Trump +7
Georgia - 🔴 Trump +4
Michigan - 🔴 Trump +2
North Carolina - 🔴 Trump +4
Nevada - 🔴 Trump +4
Pennsylvania - 🔴 Trump +3
Wisconsin - 🔴 Trump +5
posted by coffeecat at 11:55 AM on July 15 [1 favorite]
Arizona - 🔴 Trump +7
Georgia - 🔴 Trump +4
Michigan - 🔴 Trump +2
North Carolina - 🔴 Trump +4
Nevada - 🔴 Trump +4
Pennsylvania - 🔴 Trump +3
Wisconsin - 🔴 Trump +5
posted by coffeecat at 11:55 AM on July 15 [1 favorite]
Until looking at the poll result charts that box linked to above, I don't think I realized quite so starkly how, when you slice up the electorate in various ways, Trump wins so few of those categories (but wins them by large enough margins to still result in a near-tie).
I fear where we went wrong was ever giving white men between the ages of 45 and 65 the right to vote.
posted by nobody at 12:12 PM on July 15 [7 favorites]
I fear where we went wrong was ever giving white men between the ages of 45 and 65 the right to vote.
posted by nobody at 12:12 PM on July 15 [7 favorites]
Biden to announce changes to SCOTUS
Glad to see this.
posted by ichomp at 4:17 PM on July 16 [5 favorites]
Glad to see this.
posted by ichomp at 4:17 PM on July 16 [5 favorites]
I fear where we went wrong was ever giving white men between the ages of 45 and 65 the right to vote.
To be fair, that plus being reasonably wealthy were the intended voting class when the country started. This tension between folks that think everyone should have a say and folk that think only the correct people should has been with us from the start and is basically what the whole fight is about for me (all the good policy stuff follows from that).
posted by VTX at 5:27 PM on July 16 [1 favorite]
To be fair, that plus being reasonably wealthy were the intended voting class when the country started. This tension between folks that think everyone should have a say and folk that think only the correct people should has been with us from the start and is basically what the whole fight is about for me (all the good policy stuff follows from that).
posted by VTX at 5:27 PM on July 16 [1 favorite]
> So my question, which reporting seems to have ignored, is who are these RFK Jr. voters?
here's a lurid VF profile, excerpting some (relevant) lowlights...
RFK Jr.'s Family Doesn't Want Him to Run. Even They May Not Know His Darkest Secrets.
-Trump courts RFK Jr's support in leaked phone call
-RFK apologises over leaked call of Trump coaxing support
-Woman Who Accused RFK Jr of Sexual Assault Says He Apologized by Text
note when looking at swing state polls kennedy is hovering around 8%, at least double the margin biden is trailing trump.
posted by kliuless at 8:54 PM on July 16 [2 favorites]
here's a lurid VF profile, excerpting some (relevant) lowlights...
RFK Jr.'s Family Doesn't Want Him to Run. Even They May Not Know His Darkest Secrets.
Kennedy looked for heroes outside the family bubble, befriending Roger Ailes, the late Fox News founder who at the time was an independent TV producer and adviser to Richard Nixon...also btw...
When Trump was elected president in November 2016, Kennedy secured an audience with him at Trump Tower. Friends warned Kennedy not to take the meeting, concerned he would end up like Mitt Romney, whose attempt to curry favor with Trump over dinner left Romney publicly humiliated. When Kennedy emerged from Trump Tower, in January 2017, he claimed to the press that Trump had asked him to chair a “commission on vaccine safety and scientific integrity.” That same day Trump adviser Hope Hicks said the two talked about autism but Trump didn’t commit to a commission on vaccines.
Kennedy’s meeting with Trump was the inflection point that broke his relationship with Riverkeeper, the nonprofit for which he was the chief prosecuting attorney and the public face... “On Monday morning he’s giving a speech saying, ‘Do not believe any scientists [on vaccines],’” recalls a person with close ties to Riverkeeper. “And on Tuesday, ‘You’ve gotta believe the scientists when it comes to climate change or what we’re doing to the river.’”
[...]
In 2018 Kennedy involved himself in a largely forgotten vaccine controversy in the American Samoan islands. That year, two children died after receiving the MMR vaccine, sparking an island-wide furor. Though it was later revealed that two nurses made a critical error administering the vaccines, accidentally introducing expired muscle relaxants into the formula, Kennedy’s nonprofit took to social media to hype the deaths as evidence of vaccine dangers.
Under public pressure, the Samoan prime minister Tuilaepa Sailele Malielegaoi halted MMR vaccines on the island. In June of 2019 Kennedy and Hines flew to Samoa, lending celebrity wattage to local anti-vaccine advocates, giving press interviews, and taking a private meeting with the PM.
Over the ensuing months, the island was hit by the largest measles outbreak in its history, infecting 5,707 citizens and killing 83 people, most of them children... In an interview with filmmaker Scott Kennedy (no relation), who made a documentary called Shot in the Arm, which will appear on PBS this fall, RFK Jr. becomes vividly agitated when confronted with the facts of the Samoa case, insisting that “I had nothing to do with people not vaccinating in Samoa, I never told anybody not to vaccinate.”
[...]
The year after the Samoa episode, the COVID pandemic began, ultimately killing millions of people—but it was a stroke of political and financial fortune for Kennedy, who found a ripe audience for his anti-vaccine claims, tapping into a newly fertile online world of misinformation, conspiracy, and distrust of pharmaceutical companies on podcasts and social media. High-profile podcasters like Joe Rogan allowed him to spout his conspiracy theories unchecked, and Kennedy built a following among pseudoscientists and self-styled influencers hawking supplements and alternative medicines under the banner of “wellness,” aligning with figures like Aubrey Marcus, a podcaster, poet, and self-styled guru of “Total Human Optimization” who hosted a fundraiser for Kennedy in Austin last March.
The man had met his time...
When Kennedy emerged as a candidate for president, in April 2023, his body and face had become transfigured by what he has called a regimen of “organic testosterone.” Kennedy showed off his unusually puffy body in campaign workouts, going shirtless in an infamous push-up video. “I mean, he’s unrecognizable,” says a family intimate who has known him for decades. “It’s like a body-snatching thing.”
His campaign also became pumped up, powered by cash infusions from his vice presidential pick, Nicole Shanahan, the ex-wife of Google cofounder Sergey Brin, and from Timothy Mellon, an heir to the Mellon banking fortune who has given $30 million to the super PAC supporting Kennedy while also giving $50 million to Donald Trump’s campaign—an alignment of interests that critics suspect is strategic, financing Kennedy’s campaign to draw votes from Joe Biden and thereby boost Trump.
[...]
Perhaps the most influential figure in Kennedy’s orbit is Jay Carson, who worked as an aide to Bill Clinton when Clinton and Kennedy were friends and neighbors in Westchester County. Disenchanted with politics, Carson moved to Los Angeles and reinvented himself, becoming a producer for House of Cards and creating the series The Morning Show. After divorcing his first wife, producer Sarah Treem (creator of The Affair), he befriended Kennedy in an AA meeting and during the pandemic became a COVID-lockdown skeptic. He got remarried to a self-described “journey designer” in Topanga Canyon, started attending a high-end survivalist school in Utah (whose clients also include Lachlan Murdoch and Drew Barrymore), and became a close adviser to Kennedy.
[the next paragraph here, like most of the rest of this, is appalling]
Fifty-six years after the death of Robert F. Kennedy, the stage belongs to Bobby Jr., even as he has morphed into something closer to Donald Trump than anything related to his father or uncle, cultivating power, like Trump has, by sowing distrust and peddling misinformation. Kennedy’s personal history is not dissimilar to Trump’s, a bottomless well of scandal that, over time, has immunized people against its real-world consequences. The Kennedy name, the fantasy and celebrity of it, is its own shield, blinding people to the fine details of Kennedy’s actual beliefs and thereby making him an appealing and easy vessel for discontent with Biden and Trump. As one family member told me, the Kennedy name “just swims around in people’s heads, associated with sailboats and preppy clothes.”
Kennedy finds himself in a role that is tailor-made for the pathologies that his family and friends describe: the white knight, the anti-hero, the spoiler, threatening not only what’s left of the family legacy but the democratic enterprise itself. Whereas his ex-wife or his friends were once collateral damage to his pathologies, now it’s the entire nation. “All of Bobby’s oldest friends, nearly his entire family, and even the living aides to RFK Sr. have said that his candidacy is dangerous and unwise and likely to elect Donald Trump,” says cousin Stephen Kennedy Smith. “But he won’t or can’t stop. It’s sad. I guess that Bobby just has to go where the followers are.”
[...]
Behind the scenes, some hope Bobby’s own children might come to the rescue.
-Trump courts RFK Jr's support in leaked phone call
-RFK apologises over leaked call of Trump coaxing support
It was Kennedy’s son, Robert F Kennedy III, who posted the footage online early on Tuesday.-Trump endorses vaccine conspiracy theory in leaked call with RFK Jr.
The younger Kennedy said in the post on X, formerly Twitter, that he wanted to expose Trump’s “real opinion” on immunisations, but he swiftly deleted the clip.
-Woman Who Accused RFK Jr of Sexual Assault Says He Apologized by Text
note when looking at swing state polls kennedy is hovering around 8%, at least double the margin biden is trailing trump.
posted by kliuless at 8:54 PM on July 16 [2 favorites]
Via Newsweek, new Morning Consult poll post-shooting:
posted by darkstar at 10:33 PM on July 16 [1 favorite]
Donald Trump has not received a poll boost in the first presidential election survey conducted since the failed assassination attempt on Saturday.So Biden gained three points in the previous week compared to Trump gaining two. Battleground polls show Trump with a higher margin, but many are still within MoE. The race is still very tight, with four months to go.
The poll, conducted by Morning Consult of 2,045 registered voters on Monday, reveals that Trump is leading Joe Biden by just one percentage point with 46 percent, compared to the president's 45 percent. The poll has a margin of error of plus or minus two percentage points.
The findings also reveal that Trump's lead has narrowed slightly since the firm's previous survey, conducted between July 12 and 14, which put Trump two percentage points ahead with 44 percent to Biden's 42 percent.
posted by darkstar at 10:33 PM on July 16 [1 favorite]
New AP-NORC poll shows 70% of Americans want Biden to withdraw from the race -- including nearly 2/3rds of Democrats and half of Black Democrats. Only 3 in 10 Democrats are very confident that he has the mental capacity to serve effectively.
Meanwhile, a memo from BlueLabs based on polling over 15,000 voters across seven battleground states found every alternative Democratic candidate outperforming Biden by an average of three points, increasing support from independents, infrequent voters, and under-40s by between 9-12%.
posted by Rhaomi at 9:03 AM on July 17 [5 favorites]
Meanwhile, a memo from BlueLabs based on polling over 15,000 voters across seven battleground states found every alternative Democratic candidate outperforming Biden by an average of three points, increasing support from independents, infrequent voters, and under-40s by between 9-12%.
posted by Rhaomi at 9:03 AM on July 17 [5 favorites]
Data for Progress poll of likely Black voters in seven swing states:
- Harris has a net +7 approval advantage over Biden
- Harris outperforms Biden by 3 points in a 6-way race (including RFK, West, Stein, and Oliver)
- Younger Black voters significantly more likely to support Trump over Biden/Harris (28% for Trump among under-45s vs. ~5% for over-65s)
- Split 43-49 on supporting/opposing Biden dropping out, though a 52-42 majority support him reconsidering his run
- If Biden dropped out, more would be angry than happy (44-37), but if he is replaced by Harris specifically, the reaction flips decisively towards being happy with the outcome (68-22)
- 63% would want Biden to endorse Harris if he dropped out, versus having an open convention (17%) or endorsing another candidate (11%)
posted by Rhaomi at 1:31 PM on July 17 [9 favorites]
- Harris has a net +7 approval advantage over Biden
- Harris outperforms Biden by 3 points in a 6-way race (including RFK, West, Stein, and Oliver)
- Younger Black voters significantly more likely to support Trump over Biden/Harris (28% for Trump among under-45s vs. ~5% for over-65s)
- Split 43-49 on supporting/opposing Biden dropping out, though a 52-42 majority support him reconsidering his run
- If Biden dropped out, more would be angry than happy (44-37), but if he is replaced by Harris specifically, the reaction flips decisively towards being happy with the outcome (68-22)
- 63% would want Biden to endorse Harris if he dropped out, versus having an open convention (17%) or endorsing another candidate (11%)
posted by Rhaomi at 1:31 PM on July 17 [9 favorites]
Biden has Covid.
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 3:23 PM on July 17 [4 favorites]
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 3:23 PM on July 17 [4 favorites]
Perfect opportunity to exit gracefully to take care of his health. What reasonable person is going to hold that against an octogenarian?
posted by not just everyday big moggies at 3:29 PM on July 17 [6 favorites]
posted by not just everyday big moggies at 3:29 PM on July 17 [6 favorites]
Earlier today he said that he would drop out if a doctor told him too. I forget the exact wording but seems related.
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 3:35 PM on July 17 [2 favorites]
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 3:35 PM on July 17 [2 favorites]
Here it is: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/17/us/politics/biden-health-election-drop-out.html
4 hours ago it was reported that Biden said he would drop out for a health issue, now he has Covid.
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 3:44 PM on July 17 [4 favorites]
4 hours ago it was reported that Biden said he would drop out for a health issue, now he has Covid.
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 3:44 PM on July 17 [4 favorites]
Nancy Pelosi in the bushes with a blowpipe.
posted by Rhaomi at 4:06 PM on July 17 [7 favorites]
posted by Rhaomi at 4:06 PM on July 17 [7 favorites]
During Schumer's one-on-one meeting with Biden on Saturday, "Schumer forcefully made the case that it would be better for Biden, better for the Democratic party, and better for the country if he were to bow out."Schumer's office did not deny the report when asked.
posted by Rhaomi at 4:23 PM on July 17 [4 favorites]
Democrats Persuade Party to Slow Biden’s Nomination as Discontent Persists (NYTimes).
(It looks like it's being pushed back a week so far, from the end-of-July fast-track the Biden campaign might have been pretending was because of the Ohio ballot issue to, now, the first week in August).
posted by nobody at 4:30 PM on July 17 [3 favorites]
(It looks like it's being pushed back a week so far, from the end-of-July fast-track the Biden campaign might have been pretending was because of the Ohio ballot issue to, now, the first week in August).
posted by nobody at 4:30 PM on July 17 [3 favorites]
vote like you're voting for Covid!
Because why not already.
posted by mazola at 4:43 PM on July 17 [2 favorites]
“The private conversations with the Hill are continuing,” a senior Democratic adviser told CNN, speaking on condition of anonymity to avoid alienating the campaign and the White House. “He’s being receptive. Not as defiant as he is publicly.”
“He’s gone from saying, ‘Kamala can’t win,’ to ‘Do you think Kamala can win? “ the adviser said. “It’s still unclear where he’s going to land but seems to be listening.
posted by tiny frying pan at 6:38 PM on July 17 [1 favorite]
“He’s gone from saying, ‘Kamala can’t win,’ to ‘Do you think Kamala can win? “ the adviser said. “It’s still unclear where he’s going to land but seems to be listening.
posted by tiny frying pan at 6:38 PM on July 17 [1 favorite]
Seems like that democratic advisor is putting pressure on Biden to drop out by leaking that.
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 7:29 PM on July 17 [3 favorites]
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 7:29 PM on July 17 [3 favorites]
So, at first I thought Biden was just being a stubborn ego maniac (and maybe he is), but now I wonder if part of what we've witnessed in the past few weeks is actually that Biden is very out of touch with the general populace insofar as he underestimates the impact of his current condition (even if it's just natural aging) vs. overestimates racism/sexism. Perhaps in the 75+ age bracket, he's correct - most people in that bracket would rather have a frail and confused-seeming old white guy than a much more vibrant and competent Black woman in charge of the country. But the under 40s? I'd say most will go for the latter option, even some people with a bit of racist and/or sexist beliefs. I mean, the polls have been clear now for weeks - she's either as good or significantly better than him. Yet if the reporting linked to above is correct, he still can't quite believe that she might have as good of chance as he does.
posted by coffeecat at 7:57 PM on July 17 [3 favorites]
posted by coffeecat at 7:57 PM on July 17 [3 favorites]
I mean, he is ALSO a stubborn egomaniac.
posted by adrienneleigh at 8:00 PM on July 17 [6 favorites]
posted by adrienneleigh at 8:00 PM on July 17 [6 favorites]
Nancy Pelosi in the bushes with a blowpipe.
new darmok vocab just dropped
posted by lalochezia at 7:21 AM on July 18 [7 favorites]
new darmok vocab just dropped
posted by lalochezia at 7:21 AM on July 18 [7 favorites]
(tmh, come back!!!)
(This is me. Just needed a break to cool off. :) )
Biden has Covid.
I hope he recovers quickly. I also think it would be best if he retired. For all the previous reasons, because we can't predict the outcome of covid in a man his age, and because long covid is much more likely in people who return to stressful work before they have fully recovered.
posted by pattern juggler at 10:26 AM on July 18 [4 favorites]
(This is me. Just needed a break to cool off. :) )
Biden has Covid.
I hope he recovers quickly. I also think it would be best if he retired. For all the previous reasons, because we can't predict the outcome of covid in a man his age, and because long covid is much more likely in people who return to stressful work before they have fully recovered.
posted by pattern juggler at 10:26 AM on July 18 [4 favorites]
New thread: Biden may be edging closer to dropping out of presidential race
posted by NotLost at 9:06 PM on July 18 [2 favorites]
posted by NotLost at 9:06 PM on July 18 [2 favorites]
« Older All naming strategies are futile | Crows and Magpies Snatch Anti-Bird Spikes to Build... Newer »
posted by djseafood at 8:01 PM on July 10 [9 favorites]