Democratic Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has endorsed President Joe Biden’s reelection campaign, a sign of the president’s strength in uniting his party to have the backing of one of its most liberal members
That point about the rail workers isn’t accurate
After months of negotiations, the IBEW’s Railroad members at four of the largest U.S. freight carriers finally have what they’ve long sought but that many working people take for granted: paid sick days.
This is a big deal, said Railroad Department Director Al Russo, because the paid-sick-days issue, which nearly caused a nationwide shutdown of freight rail just before Christmas, had consistently been rejected by the carriers. It was not part of last December’s congressionally implemented update of the national collective bargaining agreement between the freight lines and the IBEW and 11 other railroad-related unions.
“We’re thankful that the Biden administration played the long game on sick days and stuck with us for months after Congress imposed our updated national agreement,” Russo said. “Without making a big show of it, Joe Biden and members of his administration in the Transportation and Labor departments have been working continuously to get guaranteed paid sick days for all railroad workers.
“We know that many of our members weren’t happy with our original agreement,” Russo said, “but through it all, we had faith that our friends in the White House and Congress would keep up the pressure on our railroad employers to get us the sick day benefits we deserve. Until we negotiated these new individual agreements with these carriers, an IBEW member who called out sick was not compensated.”
Old man who vaguely agrees with my politics and is just mildly disappointing or a literal shit filled dumpster fire? Hmmm tough choice.
How is Biden disappointing? Before he became President he gave every indication of being yet another appeasement-oriented centrist, but he’s actually gotten a surprising amount done. Biden has ended up being far better than I expected him to be.
What has he gotten done that you support?
I’m pretty disappointed in the Inflation Reduction Act that actually prints a trillion more dollars.
We need inherent change in the government, we need congress to get off their asses and create good bills. We need to get away from the 4th branch of government.
Not print a trillion more $ that goes to government subcontractors and the top 1%
Well, there is an exhaustive list of everything he’s accomplished in his term so far; which is a lot.
I can post a lot of links to different people talking about different things.
What has he gotten done that you support?
Or do you support every single thing in that exhaustive list? If you do support every single thing, that might be more telling of you than Biden’s ‘accomplishments’
There is far fewer things there that I don’t support than those I do. Considering majority of that list were wildly popular, and in many cases supportive of basic human decency, I suspect it is less about my personal views than you’re trying to make it.
What has he done that you support?
It’s a very simple question, I don’t know why you have such a difficult time answering it since you just spoke so highly of everything he’s done!
Not OP, but anything good for the planet I support. Anything that helps equality for all I support. All the steps he took to help us during Covid, including securing enough vaccines for everyone and helping people out of jobs due to covid with stimulus checks and small business protections (though I agree it probably could’ve been handled better, to curtail fraud), I support.
So, three large key points that in truth pertain to a LOT of small initiatives he’s done, I support. Much better than Trump would’ve done.
That being said, I wish we had better democratic alternatives for president. Biden (and honestly, a good chunk of our representatives on both sides) is just too old. We need to have term limits and age limits for all seats in government and SCOTUS.
You listed a lot of legislative issues there. What should the executive branch do for those issues? Veto the Inflation Reduction Act? Not enact bills passed by congress?
Executive branch should enforce laws passed by the legislative branch and do what they can to keep us out of more international military conflicts.
The IRA was Biden’s baby, it’s not that he was silent on the bill then it just happened to cross his desk. The executive should NOT be pushing legislation, the executive branch should NOT be trying to unilaterally pass $1T in debt relief with an executive order and should NOT promote divisiveness.
should NOT promote divisiveness.
Both sides, guys. Am I right?
do what they can to keep us out of more international military conflicts
Hard disagree. The Pax Americana is the best thing to happen to the geopolitical landscape in all of human history.
Between the dogwhistle about wanting to end our support for Ukraine, and complaining about the IRA-- the largest climate change bill passed by any nation in human history-- because it “cost too much”, I’m starting to wonder if the guy you’re replying to is on the left at all.
EDIT: Just checked their post history, and yep, they’re openly a conservative.
Do what it does whenever a Republican is in office: bully the holdouts of their own party standing in the way of their agendas. When Trump’s legislative agenda was imperilled, he used Twitter to the point where a whole generation of GOP legislators decided not to run for re-election.
Every time Manchin and Sinema held up his agenda in 2021, he should have been hitting the airwaves and social media every day to single them out BY NAME for holding up what he was elected to do.
Now imagine what he could accomplish if the people in this thread who complain so much actually went out and grassroots volunteered and got some progressives elected in their districts.
Sorry. Too busy making petitions asking others to remove Alito from the Supreme Court to do any actual, useful volunteer work.
He compromises with the Fascists a little too much for my taste.
I mean he’s the only president I’m aware of who just came out and straight called the fascists fascists, and didn’t backpedal when the fascists got mad.
But when the alternative is literally putting those fascists in office…
Oh for sure. I’ll vote for him. Just mildly disappointed I can’t vote for someone I really want.
Yeah…
That’s what everyone is complaining about.
And why everyone is more upset at the people running the national party who refuse to let Americans have a primary.
The ones who are willing to say “if you dont vote for this 80 year old who lied to you four years, have fun with trump!”.
Do t worry tho, progressives will do what we always do and vote for the lesser evil.
Doesn’t mean we have to pretend we like it
Progressive candidates lose elections, which is rather the problem here. There aren’t as many of you as your online circles would have you believe
By that logic since world peace hasnt been achieved, we need to give up.
That climate change is still happening, so fuck doing anything about.
That a wealthy ruling class has always existed so it always will.
That children dying of hunger is part of life and we just need to move on.
Is that really the outlook of “moderates”?
If something is bad, just accept it. Nothing will ever improve so stop trying
It really explains a lot
This is a nonsensical interpretation of what I’ve said. If you lose elections, you don’t get a say in how the country runs. Progressives aren’t popular, and suggesting the system is rigged rather than piss-poor communication and outreach among progressives (combined with a total unwillingness to compromise and the fiery rhetoric that entails) is the reason why.
He literally called Cuba “terrorist” just a few days ago, and did the same for Xi a little while before that. He also kept in place all of trump’s international sanctions, and even added new ones on top.
He seems to try really hard to be agitative, I don’t understand how someone could see him as “appeasement-oriented”.
Cuba and China are authoritarian hell states.
Bro I am a near-total prison abolitionist, and even I know the difference between a place with poor policies driven by an increasingly dangerous internal threat of authoritarians and countries that regularly disappear dissidents.
My point wasn’t to say that they’re one and the same. I just think that any American politician who isn’t actively trying to abolish the Department of Homeland Security and permanently repeal the PATRIOT Act has no business condemning authoritarianism. I think that defending Biden or a Democrat for this reinforces the idea that it is somehow different or indicative of something else when we do it vs when China does it.
It reflects a worldview that the US is neutral/good at its core, one that I don’t share given what I know about US history. It’s barely qualified as a liberal democracy for most of its history/
When book bans happen in the US, western media doesn’t frame it as an inevitable outcome in a country with a long history of right-wing nationalism, unlike when book bans happen in China, where it’s framed as a product of communism/socialism.
Likewise, the US prison population is framed as a mistake, an error, something that “shouldn’t happen” in a “free country”, when it’s literally a legacy of Jim Crow laws (which themselves get framed in US history/media as a regrettable period, and not something that is inherently a product of the United States’ ruling social and political class).
Lastly, the US state of Florida is already practically a single-party regime under Desantis. He’s actively trying to purge the Universities down there, which is something straight out of 1930s Germany.
I mean I share your general take, but we also have to live in reality. The American people support this shit, and they get a say. That’s what democracy IS.
That’s a low quality source and you’re putting words in Biden’s mouth.
If you’d told me we could virtually eliminate Russia’s army and remove them as a competitor on the world stage for a couple billion bucks with no american troops in 2020 I would have taken that deal any day.
Hasn’t legalized cannabis on a federal level and considering his career long stance on the war on drugs, I don’t really expect that he ever would support legalization.
Before I start, let me say that Biden absolutely has my vote, because the alternative is the end of our democracy.
I’ll also say he’s away better than I thought he’d be.
But here’s how he’s a disappointment:
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He failed to appoint an attorney general that would give us a special prosecutor to go after Trump for the most egregious case of Obstruction of Justice in the history of the country, as laid out in the Mueller report. This was a matter of national security, should have been the first set of indictments against Trump, and should have happened a couple years ago.
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Student loans. Our economic engine requires a strong consumer class… Right now two generations of Americans are drowning in debt, and can’t buy goods and services from other Americans. It’s hurting EVERYBODY. Biden should be aiming to erase ALL student debt. Instead he’s taking half-measures that leave the United States still in crisis. And that’s BEFORE we talk about how weak his attempt to do this was, from a legal standpoint.
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Healthcare. We are still in crisis. The ACA was supposed to be a first step. Instead, it has been the only step, and Republicans continue to attempt to chip away at it. Why hasn’t Biden put out a universal healthcare plan? Or at least a public option? How can we ever make progress when he won’t even be the standard-bearer for these ideas?
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The Supreme Court was captured by fascist theocrats. Any future moderate (to say nothing of liberal) laws will be struck down by these assholes. Why is Biden not talking about packing the court until it once again reflects the values of the overwhelming majority of Americans?
I could go on, but the jist here is that the United States is in absolute crisis, and like Hillary before him, Biden is the “nothing will essentially change” or “incremental change” candidate. Not acceptable during an emergency.
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Status quo keeps on truckin’ along.
Rich keep getting richer. Poor people? Well, who cares about them anyway.
Use the poors as a cheap source of teeth for aquarium gravel.
Yes but don’t you see? The blue team wins (the presidency).
Hey now, the indentured servant class is very important in maintaining quality of life. Of course they care.
Like I get that is what we probably are getting, and fine, he is better than whatever the republicans are putting forward, so I’ll vote for him.
But
Come on
I wish, so much, we had a better candidate
You need a better voting system.
Any single-winner system is inherently flawed, which is why presidential systems are just straight-up worse than parliamentary ones. They’re by their nature going to be less representative. A system where the president is largely a figurehead is far better, along with a legislature which is elected proportionally using something like Mixed-Member Proportional, Single Transferable Vote, or party-list PR.
But failing that, the bare minimum to call your system democratic is to use Instant Runoff Voting. First Past the Post is just straight-up not democracy. It’s a farce. The idea that two candidates with similar views both being very successful actually makes it less likely that either will win is an obvious complete failure of the system. (And, fwiw, you could have IRV presidential elections for a powerful POTUS while also improving congress by making it proportional, if you want to go a step further than just making Congress & President both using IRV, but not as far as the fundamental constitutional change required to make the president a figurehead.)
And how do you expect us to do that, revolt? Because it turns out elected officials are reluctant to make significant changes to the system that elected them from which they profit handsomely.
Suspending reality, it would be interesting if enough progressives moved to states like Wyoming (pop 580k) and the Dakotas (780k and 890k) to move them blue. Then vote in progressive senators. For reference, NJ alone has a population of 9.2m.
If that could happen It would be great to link senators to state population.
I agree with you but it’ll never happen. That would require a constitutional amendment and that bar is so high it can only be cleared under the threat of national revolt (like when the voting age was lowered, or prohibition was repealed). States would not be so eager to give up their power, and three fourths of them would have to agree.
A parliamentary system with fully proportional representation would be best. The US is big though, so I think an electoral threshold of 4% may be needed. That, or require parties to fulfil the below condition before being able to participate in elections.
• They need enough support through party membership from the area’s population, as a % of the latter. On counties, this would be about 4%. On a state level, that would be 1%. On a national level, 0.25% would be enough.
You might think, why lower with each level? But the larger the population size is, the smaller the membership can be while remaining representative. This also stimulates smaller parties since now they have a chance to actually grow.
Electoral districts also need to be thrown away – counties, states, and the entire country, are where the elections get held in. Because of proportional representation, it doesn’t matter however you were to divide up areas: 25% of votes on one party means 25% of seats.
Lastly, force the Democratic and Republican Party to break up into separate parties with each no more than 20% of all seats. Or tell the parties that putting through with proportional representation as an agenda point will give them more votes. The Dems can argue, “One man, one vote”, the Reps can argue “America NEEDS to keep it Great! Vote the Dems away, get Proportional!”. Both should have this as agenda point.
I also think it critical that the supreme court of the US isn’t 7 judges. It worked for a country with 2 million people, but you lot are a country of 300+ million now. You need something like 100 members, and make the supreme court appointed by the judges themselves, who are chosen by multiple random ballots themselves.
The US Congress also could be expanded. Make the House go from 435 to 500 members, and the Senate to 250. They need to be updated for a big country.
It also makes it harder to manipulate politicians, since there are far more needed to bribe.
I have a whole writeup, if anyone is interested. I think that both Dems and Reps and anyone else can find themselves in it.
I think an electoral threshold of 4% may be needed.
I have absolutely no problem with such a threshold.
I also think it critical that the supreme court of the US isn’t 7 judges.
Okay so here’s a really controversial take. I think the problem with the SCOTUS actually stems from there being too many rights enumerated in the American constitution. I should note that I’m not a legal scholar, but I’ve read a lot of opinions from non-American lawyers who have explained this viewpoint, and it makes sense to me.
Where I live in Australia, our constitution is largely uncontroversial. It doesn’t say what rights people do and do not have, but really just lays out the basic functioning of our democratic institutions, like how elections work, how Government works, how the Commonwealth interacts with the States, etc. Rights are left to Parliament to implement. This has the interesting difference from America in that it means that our High Court decisions are largely far less political than SCOTUS’s. Because the High Court of Australia doesn’t get to make the inherently political ruling of deciding how to interpret individuals’ rights as laid out in the constitution. By putting the right to bear arms in the constitution, SCOTUS is inherently given the power to decide what should be a legislative matter of how much people are allowed to own guns. It’s what lead to the morally-good but legally-nonsense decision that lead to Americans having the right to abortion*, which itself stopped the legislature from ever feeling like it needed to do its job in relation to abortion protections, which is in turn what made the disastrous outcome of Dobbs possible.
This is, obviously, something so deeply ingrained that it would be basically impossible to change. Americans view their constitution almost like a religious text. Even though some of the founding fathers supposedly thought a constitution is something that should be basically rewritten from scratch every few decades, Americans view it as written in stone and as something that must not be changed except perhaps to enumerate more explicit rights. But fundamentally, a less politicised constitution would lead to a less politicised judicial system, which would allow each branch of government to do its part without encroaching on the others like they currently do.
I’m with you on increasing the size of the legislature though. 2 senators per state is far too few (and makes it impossible to reasonably add in a proportional system on a per-state basis). I have much the same feeling about my country. I’d like to see our Parliament almost doubled in size, especially if we were to move to a more proportional system (we currently have a proportional Senate, but use IRV for our House of Representatives).
* legally nonsense because if you look at how SCOTUS justified it in Roe, it just doesn’t make sense, legally. Somehow the right to an abortion is derived from…a right to privacy? That doesn’t make sense. And it makes even less sense when you consider that the right to privacy itself is somehow derived from the right to due process and equal rights under the law.
What exactly has Biden done wrong? He may not be as crazy left wing as you’d prefer, but really I don’t see why so many on the left are saying he’s so bad
Although I think Biden has overall done a good job I am disappointed that they’re running someone who is 80 years old. I would also like to see a general shift to the left, but at the same time I realize that the increased political division in the US makes this unlikely in the near term.
Giving up the incumbent advantage at a time like this is short sighted at best, and destructive and dangerous at worst.
People always have some reason ready to roll out when telling you to settle for some shitty candidate you don’t really like. I’m done with it. I compromised on Joe Biden to save America from Trump. I compromised in every election for my entire adult life. Now I’m voting for people I actually like. If the US is collectively dumb enough to go back to the GOP then we deserve the consequences of that choice.
You can call that selfish if you want but I’ve been waiting 35 years for the compromise candidate to be the one from my camp and there’s always a bunch of armchair poly-sci experts coming out of the woodwork to explain why that would be irresponsible in the current political climate. Well too bad, I’m not voting for the geriatric anymore.
Must be nice to be a wealthy, single, white man who knows he won’t suffer under a Trump admin.
Fuck the rest of the country, right? And our overseas allies.
Like I said, if America is collectively dumb enough to vote Republicans into power after everything that’s happened then another 4 years of a boring Democrat isn’t going to fix that problem. If we’re headed for some sort of collapse I’d rather deal with that now rather than later. Call that what you like but it’s not my way of doing things that got us in this mess in the first place so you’ll have to forgive me if I don’t put much stock in your “keep doing the same things and hope something magically changes” approach.
I personally believe someone in the Bernie Sanders mold has a better chance of pulling in moderate voters than a Joe Biden does.
I’m sorry but the idea that Bernie Sanders brings in moderate voters is obliterated by the fact that he gets blown out in primaries because of moderate voters
I really don’t understand this attitude after how far the entire country backslide under Trump after 2016.
Like, I get it, I felt the same way in 2016 and pissed away my vote, but you’ve got to realize how counter productive this is after how much more fucked everything got in four years right? Assuming you aren’t leaving the country, you do have to live with the consequences of another Trump presidency and further erosion of your rights.
Ribbit
Thanks for the pointless reply. Next time just downvote and spare people from having to read “I disagree with you” but in dumber form.
This comment will stay in the negatives, but anyone who is looking at this objectively knows you’re correct. They just don’t like it.
It’s getting downvoted for the “crazy left wing” part, not the “what has Biden done wrong” part.
Because he’s ancient. He’s a half century older than the majority of the voting population.
Why is this a bad thing, specifically? Like, articulate reasons that this is bad.
To say the quiet part out loud, he simply isn’t charismatic enough to hold the President position. Common people don’t feel their future to be secure under his leadership. Look at GOP’s candidates meanwhile (DeSantis, Ramaswamy, Trump) - they are all populist if not anything else.
And like it or not, this perception matters. I can guarantee he’ll recieve less votes this time (compared to last year, he can still marginally win simply because of how unpopular the Right has become).
Populists should be fought because populism is a cancer. Biden is exceptionally charismatic, in my view. Significantly more so than most Presidential candidates not named Obama or Clinton.
Biden is exceptionally charismatic, in my view
I’m sorry, but that’s a delusional take. A fricking potato has more charisma than Biden.
Populism alone isn’t bad. Sometimes, it’s the only way to get a perspective or idea out there, and make it not seem like a taboo anymore. And some ideas out there are worth supporting.
Populism is indeed always bad
Because he isn’t the one that’s going to have to living in and running the world in another 20 years or fewer.
Because there are plenty of other choices that better represent the current and future population.
Because he was alive during a time that is so drastically different than the current world.
I don’t want a representative of the population. I want someone competent who can accomplish policy objectives I share.
That’s a very individualist way to look at a national decision.
I don’t understand what you mean. The rest of the population can make the same choice in the same contest
That’s what voting is.
Biden has been great. The most transformative policies in 80 years. Great for the world.
dafuq are you on about? Do we already have political shill bots on here?
Being able to see through the RW/Kremlin propaganda fog does not make me a “shill bot.” I suppose by your metrics, AOC is also a “shill bot” for supporting Joe Biden? He’s the first in a LONG WHILE to promote any kind of true global unity on important issues. Not perfect, but DAMNED good.
Yes. AOC is controlled opposition at best. Biden’s only redeeming quality is that he’s not Trump.
He ran on getting kids out of cages and there is still a giant open-air prison for refugees on the border. He busted the railroad union. Those are two pretty big issues for the left. He’s further right than Obama, and probably futher right than Nixon, if you compare their platforms. Fighting fascism by moving further right is a really bad way to fight fascism.
I didn’t vote for Mr. Crime Bill '93 last time, and I certainly won’t be voting for the segregationist eulogizer the next time around.
“The white conservatives aren’t friends of the Negro either, but they at least don’t try to hide it. They are like wolves; they show their teeth in a snarl that keeps the Negro always aware of where he stands with them. But the white liberals are foxes, who also show their teeth to the Negro but pretend that they are smiling. The white liberals are more dangerous than the conservatives; they lure the Negro, and as the Negro runs from the growling wolf, he flees into the open jaws of the “smiling” fox.”
– Malik el-Shabazz
You didn’t, but the black congressional caucus advised on it and supported it, as did the black community overwhelmingly at the time
It ended up being the bad choice, but it wasn’t a racist choice.
…You’re gonna invoke the Black Misleadership Class at me now? All them capitalists talkin bout “buying up the block” then turning around fucking their block sideways on their way to living in a gated community? Laughable.
I am 100% pro-gentrification and believe it is possibly the only place where subsidized rent for a set period of time is truly effective at eliminating poverty.
My only real misgiving with Biden is age, but I do still agree. With how crazy and dangerous Republicans have become however, we can’t afford to take any risks. We don’t just need to beat them, we need to beat them by the largest margins possible. We need to send a sharp condemnation. Biden’s incumbency advantage is indispensable for this.
You really don’t have any additional misgivings about a man who sold out the people of the United States to the credit card companies for a few measley hundreds of thousands of dollars, and who cosponsored a large percentage of why our student loan crisis is as bad as it is? There is a reason that all predatory credit entities are based in the state he represented for his entire political career. He doesn’t get a pass after decades of being a predatory corporate shill selling out the American people. How can the Dems not be capable of fielding literally anyone remotely electable if they weren’t competing opposite truly garbage candidates like Desantis and Trump? I have the same question for the Repubs, for fielding Desantis and Trump. And neither side actually solving abortion rights, gun rights, healthcare, etc when they hold all 3 branches because they are all afraid of losing their major wedge issues, without which they aren’t confident they can win elections.
The problem is really that the whole system is fucked up.
Elections being about “the lesser evil” instead of voting FOR what you actually want is just horrible - no wonder so many people are losing faith in democracy over there…
Biden was a clear “best choice” instead of a “lesser evil” for me. I think he’s a great guy doing a great job.
I want someone who wouldn’t have greenlit the Willow Project in the Arctic. We are way past making compromises in the climate emergency.
I am literally a climate lobbyist. I have a meeting with a republican rep in 2 weeks. His stance is that climate change is probably real, but is undecided on if humans cause it.
That’s what we have on the other side. That’s a MODERATE position for the other side right now. Compromise is the only way we’re gonna make any progress if we can’t get them out of office, and majorities are tough to come by
How is RFK Jr. the primary opposition? I know he wasn’t, but it feels like he was put there by the dem establishment as a threat. When I’m feeling like I would support any other democratic candidate to run in place of Biden, this barely younger absolute crank leans in and goes ‘anyone?’ Ah fuck, let’s go dark Brandon… if i have to… I guess.
it feels like he was put there by the dem establishment as a threat.
Hahahahahaha, no. He’s been entirely enabled by those on the right and their hangers-ons in the podcast dork-o-verse. He’s an entirely artificial candidate that only appeals to the fringe 5% or so that would have otherwise voted for Nader, or Jill Stein, or Kanye West.
Don’t lump Nader in with those kooks. He would have been a decent president. There’s no way he could have won, but he would have done the job fairly well.
I think he was actually bankrolled by Bannon and the like. I’m not sure why they thought a far right loon like RFK would weaken Biden. Like you said, his candidacy feels like a purposeful Biden advertisement.
Because they fundamentally don’t understand how left-leaning people think, which means they don’t understand what we want in a candidate. These are the same geniuses who convinced Kanye to run for president in 2020 because they thought he’d peel away the Black vote from the Democrats just because he was Black. (Did I mention they’re all racist AF, too?)
Newsom? I guess? Though I suppose he will run next cycle when his term as governor is up.
Yeah, the Democrats really fucked up by uniting against Bernie in 2020, and Warren fucked up by not getting behind him.
So we’re stuck with Biden, who aims too low on all our critical issues.
But it’s vital to understand that we ARE stuck with him. There’s no path to victory for anyone else in the party.
So it’s Biden or … A fascist takeover of the country.
Easy choice.
Painful. But easy.
Well that’s unfortunate. Wish we could find someone other than an old fucking white guy to represent us.
The fact that someone like Biden and Bernie exist in the same party tells you how awful the 2-party system is.
Bernie has said some really nice things about the Biden Administration.
Too be fair - the Biden administration isn’t all bad and I think when they do something good we should acknowledge that so that maybe they keep doing good things. That doesn’t mean I don’t think there are better options, though.
You can hope for better options, but it says something that the Progressive leadership doesn’t see a reason to challenge Biden in the primaries. And as some didn’t like hearing, the Progressive leadership has found Biden to be an ally in passing significant legislation. The problem of moving forward isn’t the Presidency, but Congress.
I wish more people understood that. Biden might be centrist, but every single progressive policy that has come his way he has endorsed. He would go even farther to the left if we had the right Congress.
Yeah, it says something. It says they’ll be blackballed by the party if they dared to challenge the incumbent.
I agree with all that - but the presidential candidates do a lot of heavy lifting in congressional elections. They can help drive voters to the polls and get more progressive candidates the attention they deserve. Biden isn’t getting anyone excited to go vote.
I mean, it’s not that hard to. Even simply coherent sentences are like ambrosia after the previous administration, and Joe’s got actual things to say on top of that.
Similarly, MTG and Liz Cheney. The two party system sucks for everybody involved.
But it’s extremely effective at channeling political hope and higher aspirations into it. The difference between the Democratic party and the Republican party is their respective control of their more extreme wings. The Republican party is basically defined by it at this point, while establishment Democrats dominate quite handily.
For real. Even as a white guy, I’m tired of this shit as well. Wish we could get someone younger and more progressive on the ballot. It’s time to get those old ducks out of office. They have no grasp on how shit really works these days.
I’m hoping for Newsom 2028. In the meantime, Biden will probably be infinitely better than the alternative in the general election.
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What specifically do you like about Newsom?
He’s not old.
I like how Newsom fought to deregulate zoning in California, and I think we need such deregulation nationwide.
Single-family zoning is a blight on this country.
He’s got a great smile.
I agree, but generally a party will back a sitting president of that party, additionally division of the Democratic party is what caused trump’s election in the first place.
I wonder if she’s being groomed to be the next candidate. I would like that a lot, but what the Democratic needs right now is unity, because the Republican party is very divided.
She’s probably being groomed for House leadership. She has a relatively safe seat and seems willing to put the work in being a good representative. However, to do that, she needs to build the caucuses that she is in.
If the Democratic party needs unity when the Republicans are divided, when exactly would dissent ever be acceptable? Seems like this is just a pitch to always be unified, which in turn means never challenging the party establishment.
The system has been formed that way intentionally. That’s one of the huge issues with our election system actually
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There are many that believe Biden won’t run and the seat is being saved for Gavin Newsom.
We’ll see if Biden drops out, but he is currently running.
February 2024 I expect Biden to name a successor. He would be viewed as a lame duck if he didn’t pretend to be running right now.
Ugh
Time will tell, but Newsom would still beat Trump.
In a cage march, sure
The fact that the majority here is okay to settle with a mildly dissapointing 80 year old, just so the other “evil” side doesn’t win is a bit disheartening for the state of US politics and democracy.
And this is comming from a politically shithole country I am born and living in.
She understands that we are under attack by a global RW fascist insurgency. Keeping the GOP out of the WH will save democracy in the US and around the world. Any GOP winner would stand back and allow the russian terrorists to take Ukraine and beyond.
Yes, this is why we must unequivocally support the guy who couldn’t get any laws passed to protect against said RW fascist insurgency. The guy who can’t get his own party to pass voting rights expansion. The guy with no plan to counter the hijacked Supreme Court, and who has steadfastly refused to develop one. Yup, this is the guy that’ll stop American Fascism.
Always blaming everyone except for the actual fascists is exactly where the fascists want you.
No one’s blaming biden for the facists existence but are you expecting the facists to stop themselves? If not someones gotta do it, like maybe the commander in chief of the country under attack.
Don’t dwell on the past. Plan ahead. Vote. Give him the tools. This is a global emergency.
What makes you think he’ll use those tools when he won’t use the ones he already has? This is like when the police say they need more resources in order to tackle police brutality.
What tools does he need and how do I give them to him
A country with no elected R politicians at any level or as close to that as possible. VOTE
The Democrats had control of both the White House and Congress, and they still didn’t codify Roe v. Wade into law.
It’s so easy to keep the status quo going when you’re able to convince both sides that it’ll be the literal end of the world if the other side wins. Keep voting for one of the two parties which are chosen for you, it’ll turn out alright.
bro we gave him the presidency and congress for two years
sigh
Manchin, Sinema, and fillabusters prevented any real change during those two years. IIRC Biden and congressional democrats were able to use budget reconcillation rules to get past the 60 vote rule to get stuff done, after they placated Manchin and Sinema though.
This is correct. They had to shove a ton of initiatives into the reconcilation to get anything done with Sinema and Manchin blocking everything.
It’s so easy to keep the status quo going when you’re able to convince both sides that it’ll be the literal end of the world if the other side wins. Keep voting for one of the two parties which are chosen for you, it’ll turn out alright.
It’s so easy to keep the status quo going when you’re able to convince both sides that it’ll be the literal end of the world if the other side wins. Keep voting for one of the two parties which are chosen for you, it’ll turn out alright.
It’s so easy to keep the status quo going when you’re able to convince both sides that it’ll be the literal end of the world if the other side wins. Keep voting for one of the two parties which are chosen for you, it’ll turn out alright.
And exactly how would Biden get anything through a Senate currently spilt between the two parties? You would need 60 votes to overcome the constant filibusters the Rs would throw up since this would not be a budgetary vote.
Last time I checked, there are only 48 Dems plus three independents who caucus with the Dems, for a total of 51. We’d need at least 62 to account for Sinema and Manchin, so expecting Biden to solve this is delusional.
The filibuster exists. Biden isn’t all powerful. None of the things you mentioned would get past the current congress.
Biden isn’t perfect. But trump is the end of America. Vote Biden 24
If it were reversed, Trump would be bullying the GOP senators in his way (and he might even pull a couple of Democrat votes because they lack party unity)
Trump isn’t bullying his way past 60 senators and the house for anything major. They passed one major piece of legislation (tax cuts) when he was in office. That’s it. No Obamacare repeal, no abortion legislation, nothing of significance. And now they don’t have any platform anyway so….
The choice is between guy we don’t like and aren’t that excited about, and literal fascists. If you have a viable, shot in hell alternative, glad to hear. If not, you’re doing the work of the fascists.
Ribbit
100%
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No. You’re pushing a Kremlin propaganda line.
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Did you post a source?
What you stated is false. No matter what your personal RW/Kremlin disinformation manipulated beliefs may be, the Biden admin DO NOT support russians murdering and kidnapping Ukrainian children.
What is your source for this claim?
We’re not making anything. All the profit goes to American arms manufacturers.
Biden wasn’t my first choice in 2020 and I really wish he was younger, but he has done extremely well as President so far. If he wins again and stays healthy, I have almost no concerns he will continue to get things done.
but he has done extremely well as President so far.
pfffft who decided that
Dark Brandon did.
I think the rail unions might disagree, as well as everyone who’s going to spend the rest of their lives in debt slavery to colleges, as well as everyone throwing out college plans due to his letting affirmative action get gutted, so… Fuckin lmao…
Tell me more about Republican judges being Biden’s fault.
Maybe he should’ve ran with the ‘legal and aboveboard’ plan B first, because now I don’t believe for a second it’s in his interest or the interest of his party to see relief go out. But y’know, feel free to shake out more of that insufferable settler blue-no-matter-who table salt.
Blue no matter what? No. Blue as long as the only other choice is a Republican? Yes.
Might want to check recent news on rail unions…
He has accomplished a lot. But the issue is that the Biden administration is pretty bad at showing this. Maybe it has something to do with them being so busy at doing the changes they need.
The issue for people is to understand what’s going on. Most people are not able to comprehend what makes a good president to begin with because the tasks they do are so complex.
Omg this guy doesn’t know what an opinion is!
Yes… Destroying Unions and allowing the Supreme Court to undo 50-100 years of progress was doing extremely well as a president.
Age notwithstanding, any incumbent president in the last 50 years would be absolutely overjoyed to run for re-election with Biden’s record; tons of new blue-collar jobs, strong economy, relative lack of major fuck-ups or controversies or other drama except manufactured RW ragebait. Basically everything swing voters want and nothing they don’t want.
Nor is there any real reason to fret about base turnout, given that liberals will view the Republican candidate winning as apocalyptic and show up simply to vote against that person, however disappointed they may be in Biden and whatever performative statements they make about their votes not being guaranteed.
Pretty much the only negative for Biden is age, but that is a pretty big negative.
The campaign needs to see to make Kamala Harris digestible. More than with most campaigns, the way she is viewed is immensely important due to Biden seemingly able to keel over at any moment.
They could also replace her.
In fact there’s a pretty good argument that they ought to pick their strongest 2028 candidate - which is almost certainly not Harris - and Biden should secretly promise that person that he’ll resign after the midterms in order to get them to agree to join the ticket; the odds are pretty strong he doesn’t make it through 4 years anyway, and this way there’d be a solid plan in place when he finally runs into whatever medical setback forces him out.
They’ll avoid the problem in favor of short term benefit. Any belief I had that the Democratic insiders had a long-term masterplan went out the window with how little they’ve done to pump up Harris. I don’t even want her to be an eventual nominee, but I thought they’d be purposefully building her as the trusted heir apparent. Instead they just dumped no-win issues on her while making her mostly invisible in the administration’s wins.
That sounds like what happened to every vice president we’ve had in my lifetime. And that’s close to 6 decades now.
Yeah, but there’s a real difference when that VP is a Joe Biden or Dick Cheney who didn’t really have an expectation to be the heir apparent, and when the president is old enough that not finishing a term is a real possibility. There’s an uncomfortably high (though still low) chance Biden actually has to be replaced on the campaign trail, and while that’s never a good thing, it’s a lot worse when you’ve saddled your VP with tasks like solving immigration and getting voting rights passed when she never really had the power to do either of those things. “Eats shit on tough issues so the president doesn’t have to” is a valuable service from a VP, but not if you want people to be ready to accept her at any moment as a drop in replacement.
So you’re trying to talk about two different things and joining them together. On one hand being the heir apparent, and on the other having the president keel over.
Biden was absolutely the heir apparent. If his son hadn’t died he would have ran, and our country may have been on a much different course than it’s been for the past 6 years. For many of us, the idea of Cheney becoming president because of health reasons was pretty damn scary. For both bush terms!
Speaking of heir apparent, George Sr was definitely not considered qualified to follow in Reagan’s footsteps. He actually called Reagan’s policies voodoo economics.
In any case, if the president did have to step down hypothetically in 2 years, Kamala Harris is not going to appear any dumber than any of the other VP s we’ve had in my lifetime. She would be a placeholder until the next election, just like any of the others would have been.
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Kamala Harris has done exactly what a Vice President is supposed to do, but she isn’t going to be President after Biden, at least not yet.
If that’s the biggest negative, that’s not so bad compared to all the other possibilities.
Not only is he old, but he’s pretending that doesn’t matter. I think that’s pretty disingenuous.
The only major fuckup was the failure of student loan debt cancellation, and the pullout from Afghanistan. But arguably the latter wasn’t his fault, as it had been put in place before he was in office.
Military-wise, the pullout of Afghanistan was a huge success. The Russians lost 535, the British lost 16,000. On top of it the United States evacuated 250,000+ civilians in 3 weeks who were never part of the pull-out. Many think of it as a failure but it was the largest humanitarian airlift effort in human history. If there was a fuckup it occurred in 2020 when Trump told the Taliban they can have Afghanistan. That is where everything fell to pieces.
Well, not to mention, Afghanistan had a few other knock-on effects on the, um, former Soviet Union.
During my government-paid vacation to Afghanistan, those we fought against were mostly Iranian or Pakastani, not actual Afghani people. If we did run into an Afghani it was usually a teenager. Given I was there in 2008 and 2012 and not in 2020, the feeling that any pull-out would be messy was already present. The locals didn’t believe we would ever leave, we told them in 2012 we didn’t think we were the right culture to help them out of the darkness and that we wouldn’t stay forever. The United States never invested in Afghanistan, Congress blocked all grain shipments despite military intelligence showing it would result in farmers growing opium. I know for many Americans the only view of the nation was war images, but those of us on the ground saw more than that. The Afghani culture is really cool, they are the best horsemen I have ever seen, deeply caring and understanding. They also are a broken people who don’t view themselves as a nation but as tribes of people. In the end those I met and spoke to were very interested in western culture and we fostered a great relationship. The largest problem they faced was foreigners from the West and South bringing war to their villages and forcing their strict religious rules on them.
I do believe that Afghanistan will never recover, India or China are going to exploit the nation for it’s resources and leave nothing for the people there. Maybe either of those nations will run the Taliban out, but it won’t be anytime soon.
If there’s one thing the US will do, it’s get you hooked on drugs. You can be an army vet or a small country and it’s just the same.
That’s an interesting perspective, thanks for sharing it.
It’s only my perspective from what I saw around the Parwan Province of Afghanistan.
That, and stabbing the rail workers union in the back.
Actually, most of them ended up getting their sick days anyway in the end, due to the combined efforts of Biden and Bernie: http://www.ibew.org/media-center/Articles/23Daily/2306/230620_IBEWandPaid
Holy shit, I guess I missed that news because of the reddit debacle. That’s fabulous news.
From abroad at least Biden seems like a very poor candidate. As he’s chosen to stand again the dems have little choice but get behind him or risk a devisive primary season splitting the party.
But the republicans look set to select a very poor candidate too. It says a lot about how broken US politics is that were probably going to see a rerun of the last election with two elderly candidates battling it out in a deeply divisive and particularly polarised election.
The election will basically come down to how many people don’t like Donald Trump. That’s not great.
Biden seems like a very poor candidate.
Why?
- He promised he wouldn’t run.
- He’s old and likely has experienced cognitive decline.
- He’s the most anti-union president since Reagan, and supposedly a Democrat.
- The border is as bad or worse than under Trump.
- He’s not actually able to campaign effectively for himself or others.
If we weren’t stuck in the two party system, we’d absolutely have a much better candidate.
We can stop pretending he’s accomplished. Our nation is still extremely divided, and it’s getting worse. Our economy is okay for the top 60%, but we still have insane opioid crisis, homeless crisis, housing crisis and the bottom 40% are not better off. They are fighting against inflation, while being told that they just need to suck up $5/gallon gas prices. Inflation seems to be getting under control more, and the Ukraine response was decent. He did okay.
But I’d hope we can do better than okay.
Did anyone expect anything different? I don’t recall incumbent presidents ever having a real primary.
Jimmy Carter did-- Ted Kennedy challenged him for the 1980 presidential nomination. The result was them doing so much damage to each other that the ultimate winner of the primary (Carter) came out battered and bruised, giving Reagan the edge he needed to win the general. And we all know how well that worked out for the planet. (Spoiler alert: horrifically.)
That was the opposite tho…
That was “moderate” party leaders trying to sabotage a progressive at any cost.
That fucked America up reeeeeeeally badly. But the people who decided to do it got what they wanted: an excuse to tell voters that progressives can’t win.
That was “moderate” party leaders trying to sabotage a progressive at any cost.
Wait, what? I thought Jimmy Carter was considered really progressive for his time. And Ted Kennedy wasn’t some perfect progressive hero, he had some pretty major blemishes on his record like Chappaquiddik. So I always saw it as more pointless infighting than any kind of centrist-vs-progressive showdown like 2016.
Then again, my parents were in high school when all this was going down, so my knowledge is obviously pretty limited, lol.
I thought Jimmy Carter was considered really progressive for his time
Which is why he got a primary challenger…
From Ted Kennedy, who was also extremely progressive for his time. 1980 was progressive vs progressive (which is part of how Reagan was able to win so decisively in the general, by portraying himself as being a centrist-- even though nothing could be further from the truth).
https://lemmy.world/comment/958758
I already had this conversation 14 hours ago, I’m not having it again.
Who is the moderate and who is the progressive in this?
Carter is our most progressive president since FDR…
The “moderates” were the ones running the party that allowed a primary…
I thought my comment was pretty clear, but hopefully that’s clearer
Not everyone’s American and not everyone knows history from 42 years ago of foreign countries.
It’s pretty clear from context.
It’s really not.
I mean, things like primary challenger and stuff like that aren’t really terms non-Americans are familiar with. I also wasn’t quite sure which of the two people I didn’t know was the progressive one.
Also, OP’s ignoring that Kennedy was also a progressive hero, too. The primary was progressive vs. progressive-- which is part of the reason it’s remembered today as the poster child of pointless infighting that did nothing but benefit the opposition. I’ve literally never heard anyone here in the States have OP’s take on the primary until this thread.
Reading it again the confusion is in Canada the party leader is basically the PM candidate.
I guess in the US the president is not the party leader. Without that knowledge, you don’t know what’s going on.
Ted Kennedy, champion of the moderates, is very much not a self-obvious implication.
I explicitly said the problem was the party leaders allowing a primary.
That was “moderate” party leaders trying to sabotage a progressive at any cost.
That fucked America up reeeeeeeally badly. But the people who decided to do it got what they wanted: an excuse to tell voters that progressives can’t win.
Sink two progressives in one blow, and hope you get a moderate in 4 years.
If Carter did 8, Kennedy would have likely been president next, maybe for another 8 years. Moderates were losing the party. Having a republican beat a weakened Carter let them tell voters that the party had to move right and that progressives couldn’t win.
In Canada the leader of the party is basically the PM (Prime Minister) candidate. One and the same.
So reading those words would mean that the PM, who is the party leader, would have had to allow a challenger. (which isn’t how it works here, but anyway.)
hat was “moderate” party leaders trying to sabotage a progressive at any cost.
Wait, what? I thought Jimmy Carter was considered really progressive for his time. And Ted Kennedy wasn’t some perfect progressive hero, he had some pretty major blemishes on his record like Chappaquiddik. So I always saw it as more pointless infighting than any kind of centrist-vs-progressive showdown like 2016.
Then again, my parents were in high school when all this was going down, so my knowledge is obviously pretty limited, lol.
People don’t understand the importance of this endorsement. AOC is considered as the next generation. Most 16-24 yr olds agree heavily with her and would identify closer to the left.
If Democrats play it smart, they could hold a majority for 10-20yrs. We are seeing swing states lean more blue than red ( Wisconsin, Michigan, Minnesota, North Carolina, Arizona, and Virginia). This is a huge problem for Republicans bc they always relied on these states to combat large democratic states.
Man, screw Biden. I would rather vote for AOC
Biden is pretty unambiguously awful, and only looks good against any Republican. AOC is doing the right thing here, but long-term we have got to get rid of these cobwebheaded oldsters and move on to the next generation, or the generation after.
When we do, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez would be a good choice.
I don’t agree, but I’m objectively curious why you hold that opinion.
AOC is a great choice, but Biden is far from awful. Certainly not ideal, but let’s be reasonable.
“we’re under a fascist insurgency and we must ensure that the GOP doesn’t gain the White House, this is why we must vote for a politician who refuses to do anything to prevent this insurgency from gaining strength like expanding the court or making abortion available on federal land and who refused to use their constitutional authority to prevent giving the House GOP any concessions on the budget/debt ceiling”
wtf is happening. This is a - rep for AOC in my eyes. She realizes the fucker is real old right? Elect someone younger please.
Anything else would do nothing but make chaos, it’s a really bad look if your own party doesn’t back you anymore. Same with the VP, a president dropping their VP would also be a really bad look.
Cry all you want about “old white guy” but for this election he’s the shoo-in. Yeah he’s too old, I think so too, yeah I want a real progressive. But damn it all, he’s done pretty great stuff and damn the democrats for not shouting about it more.
For a party to primary their own president, that would signal nothing but weakness.
