Joe Biden on 2020: "I have the most progressive record of anyone who would run"
39 replies, posted
You have to take into account that the Democratic vote isn't something that's going to be split equally to every candidate. Left-leaning voters are going to vote for someone like Bernie, Warren, or Tulsi. Joe Biden entering the race doesn't split that vote, because those people weren't going to vote for him to begin with. In fact it actually helps the left candidates to have him in the race because he's splitting the centrist vote more.
You have to remember that Clinton basically edged out a win over Bernie (people say she fuckin' dominated him, but considering he went from "Bernie who?" to "Foxy Grandpa" during the primary, only losing by 8% or so is a hell of an accomplishment). Hillary was the establishment Democrat, with Bernie being the more progressive option. We now have a mix of multiples for either side. This is going to result in more of a division than what we saw in the last Democratic primary, which had Hillary, Bernie, and 3 other dudes who were easily forgettable.
Fair enough.
I think this is an interesting take from someone who voted for Trump and has expressed disappointment in his term so far. Obviously you shouldn't choose someone just because they are a career politician but has Trump's difficulty in wrangling Congress to push his agenda, his disastrous foreign policy track record, or the amount of nepotism in his administration not shaken your belief in the idea that an outsider would always be preferable? Especially when the career politician we are talking about here has made a career out of being a moderate re-conciliator, which I believe is something you have said America needs in the past.
Well the age requirement is 35 and I don't think anyone who is in their upper 30's or 40's "understands what it's like to be young in the modern world", at any time in history. Additionally I'm not sure what that use that insight would be to the President of the United States of America.
For the sake of brevity I agree but I'm pretty sure who I think is better and who you think is better are wildly contradicting in this case.
If it were anyone else I wouldn't have dignified this with a response, and I'm really not trying to put you on the spot or make too fine a point or anything, but you voted for Donald Trump. I just have a hard time believing this is a serious criticism.
I align more with Biden than I do with Bernie but I would vote Bernie in the primary or support the "New Left" as represented by Ocasio-Cortez et al because I feel like America badly needs it's political Overton window pushed to the left. People like Obama, Biden, and Clinton aren't terrible politicians but they are too willing to give ground to the right in this country which has gone off the rails in recent years. America needs a combative left right now.
I think this is an interesting take from someone who has expressed interest in public office before. Have you never considered the possibility that someone like Biden just might love what he does, and feels like he was born to be a lawmaker, or a president possibly?
I'm curious to know what you like about Bernie considering he fits most of the criteria you have for dismissing a given candidate out of hand.
Killing ICE is stupid though, it's just symbolism, someone still has to do ICE's job, probably Customs and Border Protection. What's important is who is in charge of ICE, not that ICE exists.
ICE's issues honestly seem to run much deeper than simply who is running them. Better to start from scratch and do it right.
That's not an excuse to vote Biden over Bernie though. Bernie's had a stellar track record of putting sensibility over his policies and what he wants. When Hillary won the nomination, he didn't accuse her of the electoral manipulation she actually did, he accepted it and actually started campaigning for her because he understood what's on the line. Bernie is an honest, sincere politician who's actively been on the front lines fighting for people's rights before he had even entered office, and has a proven track record of improving the lives of the people he represents. Biden meanwhile is a career politician of the likes of Hillary and Bill Clinton, who care more about being in power than they do policy, actively voting against liberal interests in favor of trying to court conservatives. Biden himself has voted for repealing desegregation laws, against women's rights in regards to abortion and sexual harassment, and was an author of the bill that is one of the reasons we have such a high incarceration rate for such minor things like marijuana possession. Also Biden is just straight up a fucking creep especially around women. Just look it up, if you care anything at all about sexual assault you'd never even think about touching the fucker. Biden is about the worst politician the democrats have this go round and it's so infuriating he's the frontrunner for the polls. Voting for him above Bernie is ludicrous.
It's a bit weird how people seem to turn off their critical brains when they look at Trump. Biden is a politician from one of those liberal elite states but uh so is Trump. I've seen people very critical that AOC doesn't get the minutae of the facts correct but Trump seems to get the names of countries entirely wrong without people batting an eye.
I'm not saying be nice to politicians but hold all of them to the same standard.
We really do not need another round of passive neoliberal left-wing governments, we are on the brink of climate collaspe with wealth inequality spiralling out control, all while facing the increasing popularity of far right populists.
What we need is this next round of governments to be strong fighting, they need to be tackling wealth inequality and climate change head on, to restore faith in the political system. Everyone is tired the corporate welfare and half-solutions that have been implemented for the past decade or so while everyone seems to be getting poorer and worse off.
This isn't just the next American president I'm talking about, globally the mainstream left needs to take these next elections strong, not afraid to take on risky policies and new
initiatives forward. We can't afford to keep running the same old "at least it's not as bad as the centre-right" party governments anymore, or the far-right will keep winning elections and we'll be seing more Trumps and more Bolsonaros taking over countries.
Unfortunately standards don't exist for Republican politicians. And that's a huge part of the issue. The Republican party, and to a huge degree its supporters as well, don't hold their own up to the same standards they hold Democrats and independents up to. The Democrats may be a shit party themselves but at least they're hard on their own just as they are with the Republicans.
Just go back to bed, Joe. You came and went just fine.
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