I’m at the gym and the Fox Chyron said something about Axelrod speculating about replacing Biden.WTF is wrong with these supposed political professionals? Apparently there are also others but I sure can’t be bothered to find them, though a better person would mark their names down for eternity as unable to manage a campaign for dogcatcher, much less President of the United States. (Sorry, just remembered that Jon Lovett was one of them on last night’s PSA – which made me lose some respect for him.)
I stand by my post last night saying that Biden didn’t have a great debate. But it’s a far reach from that to consider replacing him. The logistics alone are insurmountable, nevermind that Biden’s the best choice for the party and the country even if he had a bad night. Plus, it’s his decision, not fucking David Axelrod or Ezra Klein or any other wanker. (I’ve said my piece about this when Ezra brought it up a few months ago, here and here. But, in the words of a great philosopher, “I’ve said it once before and it bears repeating now.”)
Have these people just lost the plot? Are they so far up the rectums of the DC press that they don’t know the smell of shit when it exits their useless pieholes? What is their major malfunction?
Also, I posted this on Bluesky last night in response to some poor person who was doing a little post-debate pants shitting, but it’s about as serious as one should be about replacing Biden (i.e., not at all serious):
If people are living in a fucking fantasy world, treat them as such and move on. We have an election to win.
EarthWindFire
That headline is chef’s kiss.
dr. luba
Biden this afternoon:
Let me close with this. I know I’m not a young man. I don’t walk as easily as I used to. I don’t talk as smoothly as I used to. I don’t debate as well as I used to. Well, I know what I do know. I know how to tell the truth. I know right from wrong. I know how to do this job. I know how to get things done. I know, like millions of Americans, when you get knocked down, you get back up. I know what it will take to bring this economy to everybody. I know what it’ll take to rally the world to stand up against Putin and defend freedom. And I know what it takes to keep the world safe and free for the years ahead. Folks, I give you my word as a Biden, I would not be running again if I didn’t believe, with all my heart and soul that I can do this job because, quite frankly, the stakes are too high.
https://twitter.com/BidenHQ/status/1806745985441263850
J. Arthur Crank
One can’t shit their pants if they don’t wear pants. That is my hot take.
Jerry
Just more I’M AN ALLY!!! wanting to throw the Democratic party into chaos just before the election. Doesn’t matter to them as they’ll probably benefit from more tax cuts by ol’ 34.
VFX Lurker
Hear, hear!
I donated to Biden-Harris last night, and I donated to the current Balloon-Juice fundraiser this morning. I’ll write more Postcards to Voters this weekend.
Fuck that fascist felon.
SiubhanDuinne
I always thought “Repeal and Replace” was what Republicans said about Obamacare — not what DEMOCRATS say about their President and candidate. FFS.
Frankensteinbeck
I will say it in every thread because someone has to: Trump had a much worse night than Biden. It’s not an advantage to be allowed to lie unchecked when your lies make you sound like Hitler. He directly insulted blacks and Latinos, he bragged about overturning Roe, his policy positions* were uniformly poison, and he skipped questions repeatedly to rant about immigrants like a nutcase. White liberals and the media are running around screaming with their hair on fire. I’m sure MAGA loved it. Everyone else looked at Trump and recoiled in horror.
*Some people actually watch debates to find out the candidates’ policy positions. Weird, I know!
Jerry
/takes off pants
Hmmm…yes, this is the way.
Formerly disgruntled in Oregon
Thanks mix! With you all the way on this one.
Like many of y’all, I get texts from the President. Here’s what he’s got to say today:
We’re not whiners and we’re not quitters. And neither is Joe. Let’s keep at it and win this election!
Bupalos
I think I agree that it’s now super duper thorny to replace Biden and absent a string of performances like that with a couple more freeze-ups in there, not worth talking about.
In retrospect, he should have declined to run again and things could have been nice and clean and Trump could have been maimed by the idea that late 70’s is too old no matter how good your performance was.
What we need to do now is just shift to talking up the fact that things are going well, that Biden’s governance has been stellar, that the United States has been outperforming the globe on practically every metric, that the job market is fantastic, labor unions are rising… And yeah, our guy doesn’t make quick with the snappy repartee and gotcha lies…Governance talks and post-truth bullshit walks. We need to fill in the communication gap for an excellent president that is no longer a good candidate.
zhena gogolia
thank you. Love the poster up top.
As I said in another thread, although I’m already on a monthly donation to Biden-Harris, I just gave $50 and felt much better. It helped to see him giving a great speech in NC today. I don’t know what was wrong last night, but it was clearly fleeting.
pat
The “debate” only showed what we already know:
Biden is old and trump is a pathological liar.
zhena gogolia
@dr. luba: That’s the clip I watched. His voice was strong and clear.
TeezySkeezy
only flaw in what you wrote is you elevated Manchin with each comparison. Seriously, who the *fuck* would think *Manchin* would be our fucking salvation here. Fuuuuuck these people.
By voting for Biden I *am* voting for his replacement already if it comes to it! Kamala Harris! The replacement is already there!
Leto
The O’Bros were consistent shitters on Hillary, and the few times I’ve heard them in the past year, they’re shitters on Biden. I basically stopped listening to them years ago because they don’t offer anything useful. Even in “snarky analysis”. Pod Save the World has some useful stuff, but it’s a more serious podcast dealing with foreign policy and what’s going on elsewhere.
Dangerman
Commando. Freedom
ETA: Do remember the SPF 100,000 if outside.
Jackie
Good news! The Supremes ordered Bannon to go straight to jail Monday morning!👍🏻
eldorado
the discourse: biden has to go
kamala enters the chat
the discourse: no no, not like that
George
Chaos, misdirection, click-bait headlines, and focusing on Everything Being Wrong and Needing to be Changed Right Now without having to defend the actual changes one would like to see have overtaken the American political commentariat.
MAGAts are dumb. Uninformed independents are dumb. And I’m afraid that a good number of my fellow liberals are also dumb as to how politics works and what it takes to have a functioning democracy. Biden gets stuff done and he hires good people. If anyone in the electorate decides instead to vote for the convicted felon and outright fascist who hires sycophants, sells out America, and pisses on the idea of democracy, then those voters deserve what they get, and they deserve to get it good and hard.
Bupalos
@dr. luba: That’s straight fire right there! That’s exactly the line we need.
$8 blue check mistermix
@eldorado:
It’s never the sitting VP because she’s too black and female. It’s some other horseshit unity ticket. Notice that 99% of people making these comments about replacement are white and male…
Jackie
@zhena gogolia: MazeDancer posted the entire speech for me on an earlier thread. I hope everyone watches!
Trivia Man
Im glad i was in a big crowd. I missed some of the responses because of audience reaction, but hearing TCFG jeered in real time was nice.
Some nervous reactions to joe, but overall its fine. I have confidence the fact checking can go viral and the actual CONTENT AND POLICY will get more play.
The victory laps i hear today from Goopers is also fine. Just puts them further in their bubble and less likely to work harder. Stay complacent, losers.
Jerry
I am 100% not trying to come off as an asshole here, but I just want to point out that a lot of us have already been there with this thinking. It’s good to have more people on board, but we all need to put those words into action and lots of it. Let’s go!!
Jerry
Yep, Johnny Unbeatable! He can’t be beat. All we need to do is run him in the election.
Leto
@Jackie:
one small ray of light on this poop day. But I”ll take it
Captain C
@Jerry:
I do wonder how many of the supposed ‘progresssives’ or ‘leftists’ who always seem to have an excuse for not actually supporting Democrats in general or particular have trust funds or inheritances that deep down, they know will be taxed less under TCFG or other Republicans.
Soprano2
@dr. luba: Dammit, that should have been his closing statement last night!
ETA – one good thing happened today, the SCOTUS told Bannon to go fuck himself and report to prison on Monday as ordered. LOL
pat
I have been told that all the FTFNYT opinion persons have come out and said Biden has to be replaced.
Get used to it.
Jennifer Ruben had the best response: https://wapo.st/3W2G039
What the debate told us: Biden’s facts are no match for Trump’s lies
Trump can shamelessly lie when debate moderators don’t fact-check in real time.
The rest of her column is good too.
MagdaInBlack
Thank you. I’m fed up with the hair on fire omg step aside bs. Back Biden as strongly as the republicans back theirs.
And # 10 there: spare me the shoulda crap. This is where we are, this is who we have and I believe in him. FFS back your President.
Trivia Man
@Dangerman: On my bike ride SPF 30 was fine, even for the “sun dont shine” parts. YMMV. 2 hours at high noon, starkers, would do again.
burritoboy
It’s fun to have bullshit conversations when the time is right for the bullshit conversations (who’s stronger? Superman or the Hulk? how fun was having that discussion when you were 9?)
It’s childish and, in some respects, deeply disturbing for these supposed sages to be having these bullshit conversations in places and spaces and times when they should be far better aware are not the right moments for bullshit conversations. We don’t look too askance at a nine-year trying out his “the Hulk is stronger” routine in an inappropriate moment because well, he’s nine. We expect him to grow out of it.
You want to be treated as an adult, having the discrimination to tell the right moment from the wrong moment is part of what it means to have respect for yourself and others.
TeezySkeezy
@Jerry: Except who in their right mind thinks *Manchin* is a Johnny Unbeatable? One thing to suggest the impossible task of replacing Biden…but if you pull that trigger you replace him with…Manchin? Wtf might as well just lose with dignity as is instead.
PJ
@Bupalos:
If Biden had declined to run, we would lose the advantage of incumbency (which is worth at least 5 points), the media and GOP would paint his decision as sign that he and Democrats acknowledged his Administration was a failure, there would have been months of Democratic bloodletting in finding the new Democratic candidate, the new Democratic candidate would be immediately attacked by the media, and there is a greater chance that they would lose to Trump (particularly if they are a woman, because this country is still incredibly misogynistic.) It would have been, and would still be political malpractice to run someone else instead of Biden.
Baud
@J. Arthur Crank: I resemble that remark.
Jerry
This is just anecdata on my part, but I did observe back in 2016 and 2020 that everyone I knew that supported Bernie or Elizabeth either came from a family with lots of money or they had a high paying hi-tech job. All of them more than likely benefited from 34’s tax cuts.
Bupalos
That’s not called politics, that’s called governance. It’s true that Biden’s theory is that good governance is good politics, but even he knows it’s not all of politics. You have to be able to effectively communicate as well. To convert undecideds and rally marginal supporters to your vision. It’s not something to sneeze at or call people dumb for noticing part of the equation is showing a major deficit here.
Trivia Man
@eldorado: I saw a black twitter tweet: “The biggest problem with his age is she’s black”
Fine with me! Bring her on!
Steve Crickmore
@dr. luba: So much better on the stump today from Biden. More of that!
George
@Bupalos: If Biden had declined to run again, whoever had replaced him would get his/her ass handed to him/her by Trump, full stop.
Be specific about who you think could have replaced Biden at the top of the ticket and not gotten destroyed.
Any woman? Forget about it. Trump and the media would have destroyed Warren, Klobuchar, Whitmer, Harris, et al.
Any man? Forget about it. Newsom and Buttigieg? The same.
narya
I started listening to Pod Save America this morning, and promptly turned it off–WTAF! Two or three other things: (1) I listened to Charlie Pierce’s call for subscribers, and, while his co-host was in the OBro camp, Pierce was much more measured. (2) The Supremes knocked the debate off the top of the front page of the FTFNYFT–and, frankly, it should! that Chevron decision is insane, as Kagan points out in her dissent. That is, it’s getting, and should get, much more attention than the debate. (3) I had to talk my mom off the ledge, too, and, as I said to her, why is so much of the chatter about Joe, when the real goddamned story is the endless lies from the convicted felon? (4) Project 2025 is starting to get some attention and traction. Pierce has been on it for awhile, John Oliver’s piece is getting attention, and Chris Hayes did a podcast about it (I haven’t seen the latter two for myself yet), and I know there’s other stuff out there. In short, see the title of this post.
pacem appellant
Captain Marvel, aka Carol Danvers, identifies as female. So far as I know, Wonder Woman, aka Diana Prince, also identifies as female. Since you already have a D.C. property, I’d like to suggest Captain Marvel / Mr. Fantastic for your both-genders category.
lowtechcyclist
I am tired of all the panic from Dem operatives who should know better, let alone from all the media people whose bread is buttered by spreading it.
Joe’s our candidate, period. We know he can do the job because he’s been doing it, and doing it better than any other President in my 70-year lifetime. Fuck all these stupid distractions – let’s do what we can to get him re-elected.
Frankensteinbeck
@pat:
Not an advantage when your lie is that everyone wanted Roe vs Wade overturned.
Bupalos
@PJ: There is no set number that incumbency is “worth” and in the last several decades incumbents lose about as much as they win. I think there’s a fair argument that in highly destabilized times, incumbency is not a benefit but rather a detriment.
SuzieC
@Frankensteinbeck: That’s good that you’re repeating that in every thread. I hope you’ll keep it up.
zhena gogolia
@Jackie: I’m trying to send it to everyone I know.
pacem appellant
@George:
Newsom this morning full-throatedly re-endorsed Joe Biden and said he absolutely would not be interested in replacing him so shut up already (paraphrasing).
Jerry
That’s the joke, though. As far as I know, there is no one in this country legally named Johnny Unbeatable. But all we Dems have to do is run with him and we can’t lose!
Nelle
One of my two days per week that I have the grandchildren and they are saving me from following this stupid exercise by pundits.
Many of us are the sons and daughters, grandsons and granddaughters of those who fought in North Africa, at Anzio, the Battle of the Bulge, and from island to island of the Pacific. Straighten up and carry out their legacy. They endured the Depression and turned around and fought the uniformed Nazis. Just because we’ve gotten comfortable and our Nazis are in baggy suits and red ties doesn’t mean that we wilt.
If you need to be reminded of the price that our parents and grandparents paid, go watch the Ken Burns documentary, War. Act like we inherited some spine. No, we aren’t going to sabotage Biden-Harris. We’re going to do everything we can to justify the sacrifices people have made through history. Why are the pundits and so many bringing joy to Putin, et. al. today??
Listen to this as often as you need to – An American Anthem, sung by Norah Jones
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sdjnAFqapg4&t=22s
Chris Johnson
@Captain C: Simpler than that. They’re just working for Putin. In some cases (look up Caleb Maupin, the ‘spanky tankie’) they claim to be leftists but are literally working for Russia Today. In other cases they’re stealth, but you can usually spot them by their clamoring for race and civil war (either openly, like accelerationism, or inversely, by bemoaning how obviously it is the only thing that can happen)
I hung out with these people for a while post-2016. When the amount of obvious community management got too obvious to me, I smartened up and became very, very suspicious, and have never blindly trusted ‘leftists’ again. Before I believe your leftist cred I need to know what you think about Russian imperial ambitions, and if you start whining about NATO after we’ve seen Ukraine literally invaded, I don’t need to know anything more about you :)
There has never been more incentive for Russia to bury the Zone in bullshit. Not even in 2016 did they have so very much to lose if they don’t get their balky, insane puppet over the line. There’s gonna be a LOT of money into media to get this to happen, and it no longer matters whether any media or entity maintains credibility. It’s make or break time. It’s show your colors time. Pay attention to who is talking obvious shit, around about now.
zhena gogolia
@Nelle: Wow, great comment.
Trivia Man
@narya: Overturning Chevron is a BFD. Essentially every regulation from any agency, state or federal, is open to challenge. The deepest pockets have the most to gain and an army of lawyers. My only thought is – don’t surrender and make it easy. Continue to enforce every regulation. Remind me again how many troops Roberts has to enforce this?
Captain C
@lowtechcyclist:
I kind of wonder how much of it is either embellished or outright made up by the latter type. Or for that matter, how many of the former are out-of-favor Mark Penn types.
Bupalos
@George: I think whoever won an unendorsed primary (I personally assume Gretchen Whitmer) would have a much better shot than Biden. You can go all day on all the identities that Trump just necessarily can destroy through sexism or racism or homophobia, but generally I think that’s the crouch that has got us where we are. Biden is a very bad candidate now. The visible declines related to his age and the electorate’s (somewhat silly) feelings about what a president should be like make him a bad candidate, and I refuse to accept that all we have are bad candidates. We’ve got some killer options in fact.
I just want to add on the end of each of these that the equation has now changed a lot, and it is very very thorny to try and do something fundamentally undemocratic to get another candidate. The primaries are done, they were not contested. We’re pretty well locked in absent something that is viewed as truly disqualifying like what McConnell did at the podium.
RaflW
@George: I get this sentiment. And, for example, 849,624 people voted for Joe Biden in Alabama in 2020. They’re getting it good and hard all the time there, and will get it even worse in ’25 if Trump wins.
I’m wildly upset at the stupidity and self-centeredness of MAGAloons. But none of the 80 or more million Democrats who will turn out this fall deserve to get what we’re already getting (Chevron gone, bribes ok’d, 1000s of J6 convictions thrown into doubt, etc), much less what Project 2025 would unleash.
Eyes on the prize. Please. (eg: I kicked in to the Leadership School this morning, but whatever makes each of us a contributor – time, postcards, conversations with family, etc)
dark patriot
@pacem appellant:
i think they meant Shazam/Captain Marvel
Lyrebird
@eldorado: For REAL. These ignorant insulting PEOPLE!!!
And MisterMix, I am so so so with ya on this:
TBone
This. This is how I feel about these farking corksuckers.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=LfT8PRJXfFM
Eolirin
@Bupalos: Yeah, you know, if you just look at how many two term presidents there are, I think you miss something important about the change in dynamic; in the past, the trend has usually been for the incumbent to increase their margins if they win reelection, but the recent trend, since Obama, has run the other way.
Mike E
@Bupalos: “In retrospect, he should have declined to run again…an excellent president that is no longer a good candidate.”
The fuck outta here with that shit.
Chris
So who is everybody’s favorite fantasy duo for the leadership of the nation?
I stand by Teal’c and Bra’tac from Stargate SG-1 as my favorite politicians.
cain
@pat:
I think it’s fine that the moderators don’t fact check – they said that from the onset.
No, what I’m mad about is when a question was asked, the moderators should have said “Trump did not answer the question” – that’s where they come in. Otherwise, Im not sure what the difference between them an an AI moderator and a “hey google set a timer for 2 minutes”. I mean literally, we don’t need them – there is no value otherwise. Hell the AI can say that too.
Miss Bianca
@Formerly disgruntled in Oregon: Just kicked in for a monthly contribution. Fuck the debate, fuck the whiners, fuck the quitters, fuck the haters, let’s just fucking get on with it.
Tom Hamill
@Bupalos: agree.
A Ghost to Most
Some Democrats need to grow a set of ovaries. We got this.
Eolirin
@cain: If there’s a need for the moderators to say “Trump did not answer the question” because audience needs to hear that said to understand that that’s what’s happening that’s… kind of insane to me, honestly.
What are they supposed to do, not move on? I saw people say they asked him certain questions again to try to get him to actually answer them and he still didn’t. I suppose the moderators being able to cut mic, or interrupt and demand a return to topic could work, but it’d be much more confrontational than we’ve seen any of the mainstream media people be willing to get near.
The format itself just doesn’t work when someone’s going to Gish Gallop their way through it.
Mai Naem mobile
Axelrod’s been dissing Biden since day one. I don’t know if its because Biden didn’t hire him for a job he wanted or if it’s some personal stuff left over from the Obama admin. I don’t count Democratic political strategists for much. Clinton and Obama were once in a generation candidates elected only after their predecessors left a total shitshow. Even Biden won because TFG was so crazy, incompetent and corrupt. I don’t think Carville, Begala, Messina, Plouffe, Donilon or Dillon made that big a difference in winning the campaigns.
Eyeroller
The press is really showing their ass all over the place on this. Now my Firefox Pocket feed has a hot take from the Guardian “10 Minutes to Destroy a Presidency: Headlines all over the world show Biden is too cognitively weak and physically frail to be President.” Jesus Christ. Of course that has been the narrative since before Biden won the primary in 2020.
cain
I will say this – the people asking for Biden to step down – they didn’t want him in the first place. They are using this debate to push their agenda of removing Biden. They were temporarily were silenced because of the SOTU. Now, this debate gives them an excuse to go after him again.
Fuck them. These assholes are the same people who have been screaming at us and panicking for 40 years. It’s not BIden that we need to replace, it’s these assholes. We need to stop listening to them – fuckers like Axlrod had their 15 minutes about 15 years ago. They can fuck off into the sunset. I have nothing to learn from these idiots. If we listen to any of them we would be fucked.
If we were to do what they suggest – replacing a white old male with a young white male (yes ,it’s all white males) and sidelining the black woman? Yeah, I’ll re-iterate that WILL be political death. Black people have seen this shit before.
Newsom refusing to step up is great political instincts. He’ll get his chance. So will Pete. Right now, we need unity.
These PUMAs can fuck right off. GO Biden!
Bupalos
@Eolirin: Since Carter it’s
one term
two term*
one term
two term
two term*
two term*
one term
That’s 4-3 for the incumbents, if Joe loses it’s tied. Go back one more to Ford and it’s a losing record. And 3 of the 4 two terms were pretty much generational communications savants, Reagan, Clinton, Obama. And yes, every second term was a lower margin for the incumbent in the second election than the first.
When I look at it, I think W is the only average communicator to have won a second term.
gene108
A Republican superpower is their ability to say the same thing in lockstep with each other. It drives their point into people’s perspectives.
Even if it’s outright bullshit, they keep repeating it in unison.
Also, the Republican Party has for years been purging its ranks of those who do not fall in line.
I think Democrats need to fire the operatives that were panicking during the debate and texting media or whatever. I don’t encourage trying to polish Biden’s bad debate performative, but how can these assholes lose the plot so easily.
Is it too much to expect to keep your doubts to yourself? How does it help Democrats when these operatives are trashing Biden?
I hate everybody and everything.
scav
@Bupalos: oooooo! The With One Weird Trick card!!
pacem appellant
@dark patriot: Shazam is also D.C. I’m sticking with my suggestion as a Marvel comics fan.
Eyeroller
@Bupalos: Carter got one term because of the economy and especially the Iranian hostage crisis–that was the “emails” of that campaign. George HW got one term also due to the economy, and he also pissed off Republicans by raising taxes when he’d allegedly promised not to. Trump got one term because…Trump.
Eyeroller
@gene108: It doesn’t help Democrats but it gets Plouffe and Axelrod and McCaskill on TV. Funny how these “analysts” always arrive at the conclusion that fits the preferred media narrative.
Fraud Guy
MANCHIN/WHITMER? I have to log in to Bluesky to find that poster and block them just on the principle that someone that dumb should not be platformed.
cain
@Eolirin:
He’s not going to answer any questions. This is Rovian – just make your own reality and the media loves it. They aren’t trying that hard because the point is to keep eyeballs on the shit show.
I think it will blow over in about a week because the SCOTUS Chevron decision is gigantic blow to modern governance. We are going to tilt into a maestrom of shit because of an extreme right wing supreme court. We’re going to need Biden’s political acuity to figure out.
Going to re-iterate the last comment, these old political hacks are not the right people for this time – this supreme court is off hte rails and we are going to have to do things that are going to outside normal political work – centrists dems from the 90s are not going to help us. We’re going to have to expand the supreme court, and start doing things to blunt these people.
It is clear that the SCOTUS has declared war on the federal govt.
sdhays
Something that occurred to me this morning (I’m sure I’m not the only one, but I did come up with it myself) – I think it was brilliant to have the debate now. Sitting Presidents usually struggle in the first debate because they’re fucking busy. Campaign stuff is important, but always secondary to their day job. So Biden just got his lackluster performance out of the way in June.
No one who doesn’t sniff Beltway farts is going to really care about this debate in less than a week. And a silver lining is that the perception in Trump world that he aced his
dementia examdebate makes it more likely he will show up for the next one, where Presidents who aren’t total shit often have stronger performances.And that will be when people are starting to pay attention.
Betsy
While all the bipedal monkeys are running around today saying “oh no, Biden old!” —something much much worse than last night happened this morning, which is the fascist Supreme Court overturned Chevron.
That’s, how do I say this — Chevron is the basis for the modern administrative state.
Goodbye workplace safety. Goodbye financial regulations. Goodbye environmental protection. Goodbye anti-human trafficking regulations. Goodbye consumer protections. Goodbye product safety rules. Goodbye clean air and water protections. Goodbye mining regulations. Goodbye pharmaceutical regulations. Goodbye fish and wildlife laws. Goodbye.
Chris
@cain:
That’s a lot of it. The one other thing, which I’m seeing from people who previously were never Biden bashers, is the fact that years and years of the steady drumbeat of “Biden is old” and “Biden should step down” has seeped into enough people’s minds, that the first time Biden had a bad night and they found themselves shitting their pants and worrying about the future, the narrative was ready-made for them to fall into.
This is one of the ways in which propaganda really works, in ways that are less obvious than “wow, this paper endorsed that candidate, so I guess I’m going to follow that candidate too!”
Betsy
@cain: thank you for that
Suzanne
@Bupalos: I think you’re right. The train has gone too far down the track.
But I still maintain that this was a major unforced error on the part of the Biden campaign. They should never have gone into an event of this format if he can’t do it well.
And I do think the concerns about Biden’s age have “leveled up”. Before tonight, most people who were complaining about his age were at core trying to say that he wasn’t on the same page as them in some important way. Now there is genuine concern about basic robustness for a really stressful job, and not all of it can be dismissed as bad faith. Old people have good days and bad days. The President can’t be having bad days.
It’s glib to be like, “Whelp, full speed ahead! Donate and write postcards!”. Biden and his team need to be showing us that he is vigorous and capable and not going to be sidelined by a cold, FFS.
Bupalos
I think the Democratic party should have grown a set, and the set attached to Gretchen Whitmer would have been perfect.
We are where we are, and the “Maybe I don’t walk or talk or tell outrageous lies that well, but I can govern like a muthafucker” can probably work and give us a puncher’s chance. No better feeling in the world than a puncher’s chance landing.
Sister Golden Bear
Great pre-birthday gift — SCOTUS denies Bannon’s appeal, so he’s going to jail. Hoping he feels every minute of the DTs. Yeah I’m that petty.
A little sing in his dishonor: Was Not Was’ Hello Dad… I’m in Jail
H.E.Wolf
Quoted because thank you.
Chat Noir
@dr. luba: Thanks for posting this. I watched the video and his sincerity is palpable and a balm for the lies he had to face last night. I’m all in for Biden-Harris and look forward to voting for them this fall like I did in 2020!
PJ
@Eyeroller: Carter and GW Bush had single terms a) because party members thought they were weak and tried to take them down – Ted Kennedy in the first place, Buchanan in the second; and b) there were significant third party challenges, Anderson against Carter, and Perot against Bush. I don’t know enough to say if Carter would’ve won without Anderson in the race (probably not), but I doubt Clinton would’ve won if Perot hadn’t run.
Trump lost because he fucked up the Covid response and destroyed the economy and was clearly incompetent and crooked.
There’s no interparty or third party challenger here, and everybody paying attention knows who Trump is and what he’ll do. I think this gives Biden an advantage despite being – horrors – old.
zhena gogolia
@Suzanne: Did you watch today’s speech in NC?
Do you remember Trump being airlifted to Walter Reed?
TBone
@A Ghost to Most: 💜
dlw32
I’ve never been a Biden fan. Even as a young man he was prone to gaffes. And he looked terrible last night. And if he, President Biden, felt like he wasn’t the right candidate, I’m all for some other Democrat…
But that all said, even if he were in a coma, Biden would still be a better president than the unhinged turd that has announced he intends to destroy the checks and balances in the system so he can go and do whatever the eff he feels like.
Eyeroller
@Bupalos: I’m sorry, but I do not believe that the American public will vote for any woman for President, not even a white woman, for another 10-20 years. That’s just the way it is. Americans have long been reluctant to vote for women for positions with significant power. Governorships are not seen the same way as President.
TBone
@Betsy: 🎯
Joy in FL
I don’t remember who posted the link (in an earlier post) to President Biden’s speech in North Carolina. (Thank you!) I watched the whole speech (not the whole video) and it was great.
I sent the YouTube link to three of my friends who I know were disappointed (at best) in the debate so if they want to see something real and encouraging, they can.
Also, the dress that Dr. Biden wore at the event– it wasn’t pretty, but it was excellent. It brought to my mind the contrast between her VOTE dress and that despicable coat that had “I really don’t care…” on it. What a difference in people.
I’ve been proud to be a Democrat a lot lately. Today I am disgusted by a lot of the public moaning and losing being spewed by Ds who ought to keep quiet until they feel better or they should apply to be bots at (the former) Twitter or something.
Captain C
@Eolirin: “OK Donnie, you haven’t answered the question but you’re out of time. Mr President, your response?”
gene108
@Bupalos:
Normal rules of what can sink a campaign do not apply to Trump.
1. He’s a convicted felon
2. He was found to defraud lenders and owes $400 million pending appeal.
3. A court found he sexually assaulted E. Jean Carroll.
4. He owes her $85 million
These are just the court cases that’ve been adjudicated. This ignores family separation, the disastrous handling of the pandemic, his three other pending criminal trials, and more.
Yet Trump’s still competitive.
If Democrats replaced Biden, they’d cede the benefit of incumbency solely to Trump, as Trump was President. The whole campaign would be “I was President. My opponent knows nothing”, and it might prove to be an advantage.
Suzanne
@Fraud Guy:
I mean, maybe if what they really meant is that Manchin should be fired from a cannon into the surface of the sun, and Whitmer is the one to light that fuse….. that’s something I could get behind.
Lyrebird
@gene108:
I totally relate and I am not trying to deflect what you are saying, I am just really pro mental health right now, espeically for us on the pro democracy side.
Unless you really don’t like cats, I do recommend looking at the kitten photos in Tamara’s post at least for a couple minutes.
Glad you are here!
TBone
So much navel gazing. I’m almost glad I got a pot belly in my old age, can’t see it anymore 😆
Eyeroller
@PJ: You’re right, the primary challenge by Teddy against Carter was a significant factor as well as the other things. I don’t think Anderson was a factor. But as you said, GHW wasn’t liked in his own party, because he seemed too patrician even for them as I recall, and because of the tax thing. Perot was a major factor in that election. So we do have historical precedents to see what happens when a party doesn’t support its candidate, don’t we?
H.E.Wolf
It’s quite striking how hard some folks are working to dump and/or denigrate Biden and Harris, both of whom are very effective people who act on their belief in good governance, and who have been doing their jobs since Day One of this term.
Back to the postcard table. I’m on Team VFX Lurker today!
Shalimar
So sick of politics and especially news organizations. it’s so hard finding people not to hate.
TBone
@TBone:
PSA: if you need a giggle, I highly recommend this. It’s not long.
3Sice
New dump Friday, headed into a holiday week.
This story will be click dead by the Sunday morning shows. OTOH someone has a sentencing date coming up.
Captain C
@Sister Golden Bear:
I hope he gets caught trying to make pruno and winds up in solitary, or with extra time.
Yutsano
@dark patriot: Which is really Captain Marvel/Captain Marvel, since both (as far as I know) say Shazam to transform.
Suzanne
@zhena gogolia:
Yes and yes.
I don’t think Trump is vital and vigorous. I think he’s a walking comorbitity, shitting his pants as he has to have his gross self schlepped around in a golf cart.
I’m not voting for him.
PJ
@sdhays: As I mentioned in another thread, on Monday the Supreme Court is either going to say Trump can’t be prosecuted for anything he did in office, or they are going to make sure he can’t be tried until 2025. This is going to be way bigger news than this debate, which will just be one more layer of the “Biden Old!” attacks.
Also, Trump gets sentenced on July 11. I know the media will downplay it for all they are worth, but just maybe this will have some impact on the election.
3Sice
@H.E.Wolf:
It’s the best play for a GOP win. They wouldn’t be flogging it otherwise.
lowtechcyclist
@Betsy:
I’m not saying you’re wrong, I’m just saying I don’t understand.
Chevron was decided in 1984. I would have understood us to have a modern administrative state before then. I agree this is a big step backwards, but I can’t see that it takes us back to the functional equivalent of a non-working bureaucracy. It worked reasonably well in 1983.
Fraud Guy
Ok, found them and glanced at a few of their most recent posts. A deserved block has been applied.
Bupalos
@Chris: It’s probably worth thinking about the idea that Biden’s age has been an issue for years and years.
This almost sounds like “you always say he’s too old, you said it in 2008 and 2012 and 2016 and 2020 and you’re still saying it now 16 years later????
I mean, at some point those folks have to be right, no? The first people I hear talking about biden’s age are old people that know what it means to be >75. The second group are very young people who are like “Good god!!! WTF.” The largest contingent in denial are 30-60, gradually watching their eyesight change and backs hurt and vocabularies shrink… who are like “how dare you!!! age is just a number!!!”
TBone
@Sister Golden Bear: 💙😍
Joy in FL
@Suzanne: Sometimes I wish we had little heart emojis for comments. I would put one on what you wrote: “I mean, maybe if what they really meant is that Manchin should be fired from a cannon into the surface of the sun, and Whitmer is the one to light that fuse….. that’s something I could get behind.”
gene108
@Eyeroller:
Hillary got more people to vote for her than voted for Trump.
A woman can get voters to support her. The problem is the EC is so unevenly weighted that getting millions of more votes, nationally, might not win the EC.
There are literally more of us than there are of them. It’s proven true for every presidential election, since 1992, except for 2004. The only hope Republicans have is winning is a few competitive states going their way.
oldgold
@gene108: So, you are recommending we conduct ourselves like the MAGA cult and support our candidate blindly.
We have a serious problem. We need to accept this reality and explore how to deal with it. That includes considering having Biden step aside. Perhaps, this is not the solution, but we need to explore all options. At this point, the problem is that serious.
Rusty
He got stronger as the debate went on, Trump just stopped answering questions and went off on his own tangents which was downright weird. Biden has been the most effective Democrat of my voting life. It was a hard night to watch, but he is our candidate and I’ve been sending him a bit each month. I’m not stopping now. Go Joe and Kamala, you’re our team!
Eyeroller
@gene108: That’s true for any Democrat, of course. I just feel like the headwinds were particularly strong for Hillary.
TeezySkeezy
@Jerry: yeah but i could think of better candidates than manchin. To be very clear, I do not think replacing biden is a good idea, but if it was going to happen yes Newsom would be light years better than Manchin. But please no one lecture me about how that would still fail because Im not suggesting we do it. Replacing Biden generally would be a foolish risk; replacing him with Manchin is certain failure.
TBone
Ya know what? When I was absolutely dirt poor, I was a Berner. I sent in my $27.
I voted for Hillary. Because I’m part of a team. Please get over the shitting on me and my kind. It’s tiresome.
Our options:
No one is getting a pony. Your choices are a proven, old workhorse or a squealing, evil pig.
GTFOH with the replacement bullshit. Read the room.
japa21
I think it is important to realize, pundits are just that, pundits, with a particular axe to grind or ideology to promote.
More interesting is how last night is being reported in the press.
I am seeing a lot of stories basically saying “Biden showed his age and Trump showed that he is a prolific liar” with the latter reminding people of why they didn’t like him in the first place.
Basically, I don’t think the debate itself moved many, if any people, one way or the other. Biden gave the GOP a little ammunition to use against him. Trump gave the Dems a ton of information.
rikyrah
Bryan H., Esq. (@X_BryanH) posted at 9:55 AM on Fri, Jun 28, 2024:
The Supreme Court has:
-Overturned Roe v. Wade (50+ years of precedent)
-Overturned Chevron (40 years of precedent)
-Overturned affirmative action (60+ years of precedent)
-Allowed cities to criminalize homelessness
And this is all because 1 man became president in 2016.
(https://x.com/X_BryanH/status/1806702961499795813?t=xyHC67BzbS_CLSr7K9myuw&s=03)
Trivia Man
@Chris: Kodos and Kang?
Bupalos
@gene108: There’s lots of risks with it and the point I take from your list there is that none of us should presume we really know the “political rules” in play anymore. I’ll grant that.
I just think we constantly overrate the risk of doing nothing. I think there was always great risk in running someone this old and I don’t see any reason to believe incumbency is still a benefit. When we say “well it was a benefit for Reagan and Clinton and Obama” I think we can also say “well it wasn’t for Carter and Bush I and Trump.” Maybe there’s just as much an incumbency penalty, and it’s just that really talented communicators overcome it and run-of-the-mill folks don’t?
rikyrah
AnnaMaria (@annamaria1word) posted at 8:54 AM on Fri, Jun 28, 2024:
Wow some of y’all really hate old people. I feel bad for your grandparents. Also, you’re going to get old someday if you’re lucky and I hope you remember how you acted.
(https://x.com/annamaria1word/status/1806687634225525179?t=7XKY3Y9JYf-LIClUYwVSkQ&s=03)
Eyeroller
@oldgold: You’ve been Johnny One Note on this since the beginning of the primaries but the answer is YES, we should behave like Republicans and support our candidate. We have two examples within the last 50 years of Presidents losing re-election at least partly due to weak party support or intraparty challenges (one on each side). These “consultants” and “operatives” and “analysts” and the occasional “legislator” are actively harmful.
rikyrah
Mark Joseph Stern (@mjs_DC) posted at 11:58 AM on Fri, Jun 28, 2024:
Nobody is prepared for this jolt to the legal system. The Supreme Court has shifted an unfathomable amount of power from Congress and the executive brach toward unelected, unaccountable federal judges. This will fundamentally alter how government works. https://t.co/0R84QxKFD9 https://t.co/LcMAQAfot6
(https://x.com/mjs_DC/status/1806733800904311180?t=m-Nja_19hNW4wF9_sDK2Vg&s=03)
Suzanne
@Bupalos:
As I noted in a previous thread, I am 44, born in 1980, and I am exactly the median age of American adults. Most of my friends, even the ones who are most aligned to the Dems, have made comments about Biden being fucking old. He’s significantly older than SuzMom, FFS, and my mom is not in great health, either!
I am voting for Joe, absolutely. And after that, I’m not voting for another fucking old person! It’s amazing how youth and vigor were seen as assets to the Presidency when Boomers were young and vigorous.
gene108
@Suzanne:
He lucked out with whatever traits he inherited that a lack of exercise and a poor diet haven’t caught up with him the way it would most other people.
If the any co-morbidities haven’t developed into anything physically evident after 78 years, I doubt they will bother him going forward.
He’s one of the worst and luckiest human beings that’s ever lived.
Bupalos
@oldgold: Biden is the only one who can decide to step aside, and the time to do that was a year ago, not now. Not unless he pulls a McConnell or two.
rikyrah
Kurt Eichenwald (@kurteichenwald) posted at 2:08 PM on Fri, Jun 28, 2024:
That SCOTUS overruling ANOTHER precedent – this one that established the Chevron doctrine, which has been cited in literally thousands of federal cases – was signaled by the court in 2022. Then I said the ruling in West Virginia v. EPA was the most important in decades…/
Kurt Eichenwald (@kurteichenwald) posted at 2:09 PM on Fri, Jun 28, 2024:
…because it showed that the conservatives were gearing up to take regulatory administration out of the hands of experts and place it in the hands of the political hacks that now occupy our courts . It is an obscene power grab by this court, which has already ripped away…/2
Kurt Eichenwald (@kurteichenwald) posted at 2:11 PM on Fri, Jun 28, 2024:
…the authority of Congress, state legislatures, state courts etc. whenever it wants to drive policy. No precedent is safe. Stare decisis is over. This is an activist court unlike any in our country’s history.
Mark Lemley broke down the court’s imperial power grabs, and how..3
Kurt Eichenwald (@kurteichenwald) posted at 2:13 PM on Fri, Jun 28, 2024:
…it is crippling institutional power in every other element of the federal and state government in a must-read article, “The Imperial Supreme Court,” from the Harvard Law Review published in 2022. Please read.
https://t.co/TDmRo6oRNA
(https://x.com/kurteichenwald/status/1806767895235420325?t=vIZmY2KJzT70YqMVnvz5DA&s=03)
Captain C
@PJ:
Reagan got 51% of the national vote, so hightly doubtful. I checked on Wikipedia, and if you add up all the states that Reagan got less than 50% in and added their electoral votes to Carter’s total (ie. assuming every 3rd party vote went to Carter), Carter wins 273-265, but such an assumption is highly questionable at best. If you assume that Carter gets all of Anderson’s votes (also highly questionable), and the Carter + Anderson total is higher than Reagan’s in a particular state, that gets Carter to 200 EVs, not nearly enough to beat Reagan’s 338 in that case.
Most polls and analysis that I saw showed that without Perot, the votes would go roughly 50-50 to Clinton and Bush, respectively, so Clinton probably still wins.
3Sice
@Rusty:
The side by side shot of Biden calling dumbass a loser is great. Trump looks like a truant 13 year old getting called to count. CNN was doing Joe no favors last night and dickhead John King got the dump Biden ball rolling immediately post debate.
rikyrah
Norman Ornstein (@NormOrnstein) posted at 1:54 PM on Fri, Jun 28, 2024:
Agencies have professionals with deep substantive expertise. Judges have nothing but their ideological biases. This is a renegade court usurping legislative and executive power. It is an illegitimate court.
(https://x.com/NormOrnstein/status/1806763221111521298?t=tdhu3vcrSCWARE0RXIYozw&s=03)
Lapassionara
@Eolirin: Obama was elected in 2008 after the economy had gone into a freefall and Bush had so badly mismanaged the Iraq war.
Obama even won Indiana, which I don’t expect to go blue again in my lifetime.
So yes, his 2012 win was not as robust. But it was still a solid victory.
rikyrah
Serious Black (@NicsuPR) posted at 0:31 PM on Fri, Jun 28, 2024:
This #BlackJob thing has always been the issue I have with Republicans claiming that the undocumented are replacing African Americans. What job are we supposed to be competing for against people who just got here, can barely speak English and have questionable education?
(https://x.com/NicsuPR/status/1806742280533115188?t=JqycXKPLoqTZZbhaYoG1Yw&s=03)
Captain C
@rikyrah: Anyone who pushed the “reminding us about the Supreme Court is blackmail!” bullshit in 2016 should be forced to make a self-flagellating TikTok in which they apologize for their egotisitical cluelessness and urge people not to listen to them on anything important ever again.
jonas
@Bupalos: I think had it been clear early on that the GOP was going to shun Trump after 1/6 and move on, Biden probably would have announced that he was not running again, but when it became clear that Republican voters were going to close ranks around Trump, Joe knew he had to stay in. I don’t think a bruising Democratic primary this spring would have gone well. Harris of course would have been the favorite, but regardless of who the nominee would have been, it would have been a knock-out, drag-out fight that would have distracted everyone from the main goal, making sure Trump isn’t re-elected. Given Biden’s age and frailties, that was a big roll of the dice. I think as long as we don’t have another major incident where he acts like he did last night, we’re probably ok. But in the meantime, pray there’s no bout of pneumonia or Covid or anything in the final stretch of the campaign, or that he doesn’t have a bad fall or something.
Conversely, feel free to pray that any combination of those things happen to Trump.
moonbat
(Reads original post)
Whew! I see everyone has finally got a grip on themselves since last night and aren’t putting too much weight on a single debate four months before the general… (reads comments)
Oh…never mind.
Carry on pants shitting as needed. Because the more you demoralize our side, the better our chances are!
And while you are at it, tell me one Democratic candidate that 1) would agree to replace the incumbent, should the incumbent decide to step aside 2) would be able to get a majority of the nation, not to mention Democrats, to vote for them at this stage of the game 3) would not throw our staunchest voters — African Americans — under the bus by not being Kamala Harris. I’ll wait.
Bupalos
@gene108: Hillary could have won and came within a handful of votes in the right places. Honestly I think she could have taken Trump down in a 2020 rematch by a better margin than Biden, and in any event I think it’s ridiculous to use her as some proxy for all women candidates. She’ll tell you herself, she’s not a natural political talent. She had a lot of holes in her game. It’s not fair to generalize that to women. THAT is the stuff of self-fulfilling prophecy here.
Eolirin
@Bupalos: I don’t think splitting the timeline that way works though. You only have parity because you start with a one term president.
But again, if you go back, Obama’s second election was harder than his first, and this is the first time that’s happened since Truman; even though he won, he did not have an advantage going into that election from being the incumbent, it was harder than the first one. That he won was in large part because he was starting from such a high position. And I think we can agree that Romney was not a political match to Obama in any way.
So there’s an issue of candidate quality differences; I’d point out that you can flip Reagan and Clinton, if you want to talk about them being world class communicators, as not just being two term presidents, but also as presidents who could beat an incumbent.
But the difficulty in drawing conclusions from any of this is that Trump is also not an ideal candidate. So it’s going to be down to whether enough of the voters in Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin are more afraid of Biden’s age and Kamala being a black woman or whether they’re more afraid of an unhinged convicted felon promising a fascist take over of the country. I’m honestly okay with people feeling pretty meh about their choices as long as they settle on not supporting the convinced felon wanna-be dictator.
gene108
@oldgold:
1. Republicans have been blindly supporting their guy ever since 9/11.
2. I never said to polish Biden’s debate performance.
3. THESE ARE SUPPOSED TO BE FUCKING PROFESSIONALS WHO WANT DEMOCRATS TO WIN IN 2024.
4. Airing misgivings in public has never helped a candidate.
5. All I expect is for them to not blurt out shit to media, before the debate even ends. Not a big ask, in my opinion.
Omnes Omnibus
@Bupalos: You keep saying someone should have replaced Biden. That doesn’t make it true.
wjca
Let’s see. Taking “several” as 4:
Doesn’t look all that “about as often” to me. In fact, the two guys who lost had serious problems happening. Bush I had high unemployment, coupled with his right wing being unhappy with him for raising taxes. Trump had Covid, compounded by his flailing around over it. Biden has nothing like that.
Eyeroller
@jonas: He’s not actually frail. Do people not actually have much experience with old people who really are frail? They can’t ride bikes, among many other things. I think he had a facelift years ago that has aged poorly–he has that kind of look. If he walks a little gingerly, well, he walks without assistance. Frail old people usually need a cane or even a Rollator.
Chris
@oldgold:
Well, the Republican ability to stand in lockstep behind whoever the current candidate is no matter how utterly preposterous he may be and how long his odds of winning may seem, led to the election of the most universally dismissed and underlooked candidate since at least 1948, which in turn led to four years of Republican control of government, two Supreme Court seats and incalculable lesser appointments, which in turn has led them to achieve goals that they’ve been trying to achieve for fifty years or more, and which, ultimately, has a reasonable chance of unraveling the entire democratic system and leaving them in charge of a fully Putinized country.
It turns out that a voter base that’s willing to stick by its candidate through thick and thin as long as he doesn’t gore their sacred oxes can yield some surprising results, sometimes when you least expect them (let’s face it, Republicans until November 2016 were absolutely convinced that it was game over and they’d blown their last shot). That actually does seem like something Democrats might want to ponder when (assuming it’s a when and not an if) they’re finally through shitting themselves, yeah.
pat
Biden Confronts Doubters After a Halting Debate Performance
In an energetic speech in North Carolina, President Biden sought to reassure Democrats but acknowledged, “I don’t debate as well as I used to.”
The latest from NYT.
Fraud Guy
@Suzanne:
I found their account. Nope. Pure, unadulterated idiot.
jonas
@rikyrah: It’s the casually racist assumption that Black people mostly just work entry-level, manual labor jobs. The people whose jobs are most threatened by illegal immigration are other recent/undocumented immigrants for the most part.
wjca
Let’s see, “since Obama” is . . . Trump. Period. Last time I did statistics (admittedly a while ago) one lone point did not constitute a trend.
YMMV
Sister Golden Bear
@rikyrah: But trans and queer people can’t have rights because those rights “don’t have precedent in American traditions,” amirite.
Judicial Calvinball.
raven
@Eyeroller: I use a cain and I’m not frail.
Chris
@Trivia Man:
I assume we mean the Simpsons characters and not the Star Trek characters.
Bupalos
@Omnes Omnibus: I have not one said “someone should have replaced biden.”
I have said Biden should have decided not to take this risk, not have endorsed in a primary, done a “take it from me going into your 80’s as president is not something we want. I ran in 2020 as a bridge to the future and to remind this country of its soul. Time for democracy to tell us where we go from here…”
I would hope that and Trump standing there would overcome any kind of divisions that might form in the party, and I think in this case a primary could have been an absolute positive, with most candidates running to claim Biden’s legacy rather than run against it. I think Whitmer would have won because she was made in a lab for 2024 and I think we’d be in a much better place.
I also acknowledge there’s a lot that could go wrong in that string. There’s just a lot that could go wrong in this timeline too. Biden underweighted the risks of standing pat.
pajaro
If Biden had wanted to step down, he would have needed to do it more than a year ago. When people talk about “ceding incumbency” they aren’t just talking about the next campaign, they are talking about the effect of being a lame duck for the last part of his presidency. I assume he didn’t want to give up the real benefits in governance for hypothetical benefits in the future if he announced he was leaving. That also leaves the question of who might be the better candidate. Having beaten Trump, I assume Biden thought he would be the strongest possible candidate. (It’s unclear he would have felt as strongly if the Republicans had done the right thing and convicted Trump in the second impeachment trial.). He won in part because of his ability to appeal to all parts of our incredibly diverse coalition. I don’t know that there’s another candidate who would be likely to have done better at uniting the coalition if given the time, but it’s clear in my mind that there’s no one who can do it now.
Eolirin
@gene108: If Michigan, Wisconsin, and PA become even a couple of percentage points more blue, the GOP does not have a winnable map for the foreseeable future.
Hopefully we can also shore up Nevada, but we don’t strictly speaking need it.
And with us making inroads in AZ, GA, and NC it’s going to become even more impossible in the long run (the NC supreme court loss was a huge blow, though). I think we will eventually flip Texas, if our system of Democracy can be allowed to limp along long enough, and we can stop voter suppression from getting even worse. If that happens they really have no chance of a map.
Eyeroller
@raven: Cane usage doesn’t equal frail, but frail frequently requires cane usage. That is, if I see somebody who does not use a cane, they are rarely frail. If you’re using a cane due to chronic pain you won’t show other markers of frailty.
cmorenc
@Mike E: Honestly, Biden is not as good a candidate in 2024 as he was in 2020, but neither is Trump, and Trump is certainly a more putridly foul person than he was even then. Much as we admire and support Biden as a President, the voters who will decide this election see it as a Hobson’s choice between two very undesirable alternatives, and will, if they get engaged enough to turn out, will choose the one who seems the safer to muddle the country through with the least harm until they get a reset in 2028 to new, younger, better choices.
raven
@Eyeroller: Mine is a balance and mobility issue, I should probably use it even more than I do!
burritoboy
Yes, by this point, you should support Biden. That’s because you are in coalition with a large group of people and: the well-established processes of how we all agreed to make decisions together has led us to this candidate in this political moment. We all agreed to these processes a long time ago. There were both moments when you could have changed the processes and moments when you could have changed the people (the candidates) in the past. You were either unprepared to do so then and / or couldn’t find a candidate. That’s on no one but yourself – no one will simply hand you (or should hand you) that level of collective power without you showing them something incredibly powerful or moving. (What that might be…..well, you didn’t try, did you? And it still hasn’t been done – people suggesting inane cartoon theoretical candidates still aren’t doing anything – they haven’t even reached out to the candidates to see if they are willing to run!)
Throwing around nonsensical “alternatives” when those aren’t actual alternatives doesn’t fix your own responsibility. You want that level of power? Work for it – show us what you can do! If your statement is “somebody else isn’t doing it right”, well, that’s an abandonment of your own responsibility, and of your own freedom. No one can maintain your own freedom but yourself.
zhena gogolia
@Chris: Three Supreme Court seats.
Eyeroller
@raven: If you fall and break something, that’s a good way to become frail, so be careful.
Bupalos
@wjca: OK take it to 5 decades and it’s tied. Look, the point is there isn’t some rule about incumbency. If things are going badly when you’re in, you’re probably going out. If things are going well, you’re probably staying in. But more and more the destabilizations we’re seeing from climate change to globalization to rising inequality to social media and artificial intelligence are putting a big bad thumb on the scale people are using to assess “how things are going.” It seems to me very likely that in itself, incumbency is now a disadvantage. But all I really want to establish is that we don’t actually know the rules here.
Chris
@zhena gogolia:
Apologies, miscounted there.
Jackie
@A Ghost to Most:
Yes! I’m noticing the same whiners hardly ever post here when life is sunshine and lollipops.
I’ve got a full cupboard of pie today.
raven
@Eyeroller: Zactly, I especially use it in the shower room at the Y!
Searcher
@Fraud Guy: When their off-handed first choice for the Democratic candidate is the least progressive Democrat in the Senate/third least progressive Democrat in Congress, they’ve already told on themselves without the need for further investigation.
Bupalos
@Searcher: Anyone who overlooks Whitmer for Manchin gets a big fat raspberry from me.
PJ
@Bupalos:
This is your fantasy. I’m glad you are enjoying it, but it doesn’t help anyone else.
Joe made a calculated decision, based on over 50 years of experience in electoral politics, that it would be better for the country for him to be the Democratic candidate in 2024. You obviously disagree, and are understandably upset because he blocked your fantasy from happening.
But we all have to live in reality, and the reality is that Biden is the Democratic candidate, and continually moaning that he’s old and is going to lose because of it only serves to depress Democratic enthusiasm, which we’re actually going to need if we’re going to win in reality.
UncleEbeneezer
@Chris Johnson: These are the same people who brag about how they’d totally punch (hypothetical) Nazis but now throw a tantrum when you nicely ask them to stop using “Zionist” as a slur or perpetuating Anti-Semitic stereotypes and Jewish Conspiracy Theories.
UncleEbeneezer
Ksmiami
@rikyrah: pave over the Court and let the chips fall as they may.
UncleEbeneezer
UncleEbeneezer
UncleEbeneezer
UncleEbeneezer
I also saw a Tweet claiming Latino focus groups thought Biden was better and that the campaign made a record fundraising haul in the hour after the debate.
zhena gogolia
@Chris: Easy to miss the last one, since it happened during the fucking election.
UncleEbeneezer
@oldgold: Oh no, not supporting Democrats blindly! The horror!!!
Yes, fucking go to bat and fight dirty and be selective and only highlight the positives etc., for the better candidate who has been a great president and also isn’t a goddamn Fascist. It’s so weird that people get so fucking hung up on the notion of supporting Dems.
Our side constantly bitches about how Dems always go high when the Republicans go low and how Dems won’t play hardball etc…well this is when we are supposed to play hardball. Hardball is sucking it up, putting your feelings to the side, STFU about imaginary replacements, and support our damn President. Stop worrying about people seeing you as “blindly partisan” or stuck in an echo-chamber or “whatever-the-fuck.”
FFS, we have a great president/candidate, with a great record and a winnable election in front of us. Act like it.
Omnes Omnibus
@Suzanne: Those things are still assets. Primary voters just rated the old guy higher on other things in 2020.
UncleEbeneezer
This is how you do it:
Chris Johnson
@UncleEbeneezer: Sure. Trump can’t mask anymore, even to curry favor. He’s got worse, got more insane.
You cannot campaign for the general election in the same way you try to bully a Republican primary into going your way and obeying you.
These reactions are authentic because Trump is authentic. He’s authentically a creep, criminal and psycho who wants to kill off most people, and he does not care do u?
Spin is not necessary. He has shown his whole ass, and it’s untidy.
Chris
@zhena gogolia:
Oh believe me, I remembered the one appointed mid-election. And I remembered the frat boy who blubbered through his confirmation hearing after showing up to it piss-drunk. Gorsuch right at the beginning was the one that slipped my mind. Apparently Trump’s last two nominations were so outrageous and memorable that they made me forget the stolen Supreme Court seat one at the beginning.
(Welp, that’s it. I’m clearly old and senile. And at 36, it’s only going to be downhill from here. Stick a fork in me, I’m done).
Jinchi
Agreed. Whatever damage these pundits and Democratic strategists think Biden did in a 90 minute debate, they’ve compounded it 100 times over with their public meltdown.
Why on Earth would we trust them to pick his replacement at what would be a chaotic contested Chicago convention?
oldgold
@UncleEbeneezer: “FFS, we have a great president/candidate…”
We do not have a great candidate. At this point Biden’s campaigning skills are much less than above reproach. He is hard to watch and/ or listen to. If he remains our candidate, and I think he probably will, a new method of campaigning is going to have to be devised. The old jetting around to rallies model is not going to work for him.
Damien
@oldgold: I’m sorry, but have you watched his rallies? His interactions with people? Biden is indeed a great candidate, which is why I and the overwhelming majority of Democrats voted for him in the primary
I honestly cannot believe that a single bad debate in JUNE has people losing their shit like this.
Chris Johnson
@oldgold: just waiting for you to suggest RFK as the more-easy-to-listen-to alternative. Let’s just say I don’t find you trustworthy right now, and am not really interested in your takes when I could just ask twitter blue-checks and get the same thing, sometimes from guys with numbers after their nyms.
I likewise won’t ask for your solution, because it will entail underpants gnomes, “???” and profit! While conveniently not mentioning WHO is intended to profit from what you’re trying like hell to push.
F off.
evodevo
@rikyrah: And you can bet the corps/oligarchs etc. will be directing their lawsuits toward TX and the 5th circuit…
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@cain:
Exactly.
And what frankensteinbeck said: Trump had a worse night.
CNN had a worser night.
Soprano2
@Eyeroller: No, the emails thing was a bogus issue that they ginned up into a big thing. The Iranian hostage crisis was legitamely a big deal.
LanceThruster
Clinton/Kaine
“We’re getting the old band back together and taking it out on the road.”
Ironcity
@Eolirin: Well, there is a statistically significant sample ./s
Soprano2
@Eyeroller: Yes, my husband is 77 and has vascular dementia. He walks very, very, very slowly, but still without assistance. Biden is not frail. I’m still not sure what to think about TCFG. I don’t know if someone in the later stages of dementia could do what he did last night. It was repetitive, but not in the way people with dementia repeat things.
sab
@Soprano2: But in the run up to the Iranian hostage crisis the CIA deliberately kept Carter out of the loop because they didn’t like him.
sab
@Soprano2: Dementia aside, narcissistic personality disorder really fucks up your reasoning. Your brain or soul or whatever is so needy that nothing else registers. You need to be best, and nothing else matters.
I have run into very few of them in a fortunate life, and those few were amazingly toxic individuals.