What I find amusing is that the primary season hasn’t even officially ended yet. The convention is in August. There are numerous states that haven’t even cast a ballot for Biden. And we’re already absolutely inundated with “You have to vote for him or you’re a traitor to your nation!” hyperbole.
You’d think people could at least save their most hysterical outcries until the general election season has officially started. But no. Everyone on Lemmy is expected to bend the knee right now, at this very instant, because otherwise Trump might become President… six months early?
There’s simply no room in the political calendar for any kind of criticism of the sitting President.
Biden hasn’t been great. He dragged his feet on issues he campaigned on (e.g., student debt relief), he sounds eve older than he is, and perhaps most gallingly, he didn’t unequivocally renounce the genocide in Gaza immediately. Inflation sucks and wages aren’t high enough for most to survive, let alone thrive. I can name a dozen progressives off the top of my head I’d rather have as president.
First past the post voting and the two-party system give us little chance at the national level for meaningful fast change.
But have you seen the shit Trump has promised he will do as president? We all learned an important lesson from the first Trump presidency: take him seriously, not literally. I shouldn’t need to list the things Trump has promised to do, but here’s a highlight reel:
Enthusiastically support Israel’s “invasion” of Gaza
Waste billions on a useless border wall
Deploy the military domestically to “fight crime”, “coincidentally” in blue states
Slash federal education spending and let states handle their own education
Repeal background checks, reopen the gun show loophole, roll back federal laws against gun trafficking, and make it easier for kids under 21 to get guns
Undo Title IX trans rights
And he won’t stand in the way of any of the Project2025 insanity the GOP wants to pursue.
So, on the left, you have an old man who has maybe made things a little better for some too slowly while ignoring a genocide. On the right, you have an old man who endorses that same genocide, promises to make the country an actively worse place for many, and who has empirically proven he will encourage and endorse insurrection and treason to stay in power.
The best play for the future is two-pronged:
For the medium/far future: push for electoral reform like IRV/ranked choice voting at the local/state level (to get people used to it), endorse third-party candidates, run for local office, donate time/money to causes that matter to you.
For the near term, to allow the first bullet point to take root and thrive: Don’t let Trump get elected, which means, unfortunately, voting for Biden.
Democrats can’t win without the progressive caucus, and even in the most conservative part of a largely leftist social media site and the best thing that people who claim to be left are saying is ‘Biden was a shit president and I fucking hate having to vote for him’
Does anyone here really think Biden can rely on progressives right now? Honestly, maybe everyone here would say they’d do it anyway, but who here actually thinks a majority of leftists would show up for that POS?
If Biden is steadfast on this position on Isreal he loses. There’s no amount of street-corner-preaching about the end of days that will convince leftists to vote for Biden.
I’m a progressive, volunteered for Bernie’s campaigns. I don’t remember electing you to speak for me, maybe you don’t have your finger so squarely on the pulse of every single progressive.
I plan to vote for Biden, am I excited about it, no. Is the Democratic Party going to put up anyone else, no. Would me holding back my vote matter, no.
There is no world where “not voting for the least bad option” equals anything other than the most bad option winning. You can be upset that that’s the word you happen to find yourself in, no one asked me if having to pick between the two jackboots of the capital class was how we should arrange things either.
One thing I haven’t heard is what’s the alternative. You have my full attention, what would you actually concretely hope to have happen. Let’s say you could convince a large number of Democratic Party voters to follow your lead, what would you have them do?
Perhaps watching the Democratic Party leadership gut the chances of Sanders twice to put up boring ass garbage candidates has hardened my heart. Would you have them sit out the primary convention, great Biden still wins because of super delegates. Would you have them protest and hold back their votes in November, great trump wins. Is there some other thing that’s supposed to happen? What’s the plan?
I am very happy for your politics, honestly I am. I wish more people were as involved as that.
Bidens approval is at 38% right now. That is the second lowest approval rating of any incumbent president in their third term in modern history, second only to carter. The lowest third year approval rating where the incumbent won reelection was Obama with 45%. Biden can afford to lose 3% of his popular vote, assuming 2020 turnout and ignoring the electoral vote(spoiler, that’s a worse situation)
If you’d like to ignore reality and argue that Biden hasn’t lost any fraction of his support from this conflict, just because you personally could concede that issue, then feel free to completely ignore me. Keep reassuring everyone those numbers aren’t real and pray that this doesn’t sink him.
I personally think the only path to victory is Biden about facing in Isreal. That’s what I’d do if I was organizing: do everything in my power to push Biden to see reason. I can’t campaign on “yea Biden is materially supporting a genocide, but he’s not irredeemable” to progressives that are camping on campuses for weeks to months over it. There is nothing I could do to convince those people to vote.
Spend your time how you want but I think it’s far more sensible to try and sway Biden than it is to convince an entire cohort to vote for a candidate that’s complicit in genocide.
Ok, but concretely, how do you want to do that? This meme?
I believe you, you think that Biden’s support for Israel will ensure his defeat. What do you think could get him to change his position, I highly doubt he’s browsing lemmy.
I get your frustration and I read some of your other comments and I don’t really disagree with you. The thing is, the people disagreeing with you in this thread agree with the deeper concern. I’m concerned that Biden’s support for Israel will make him lose too. I don’t believe there is anything the voting public can do to change that support. I believe that support has been bought and paid for by the capitalists that want that support for whatever awful reason they have, and that our shambling “plutocracy in democracy clothing” means we won’t be able to change that.
So I look at the line you are pushing and I think, what are the likely outcomes of this effort.
Biden retracting his support for Israel, no.
Some people on lemmy getting disenchanted and sitting home, maybe.
The horse race obsessed media running endless stories about Biden losing the left and the youth vote, which while true, act as a flywheel suppressing more voters, absolutely
And I just can’t figure out the point. Maybe you are more optimistic than me, maybe you still believe that shouting into the social media zone could swell a grassroots rebellion, get Biden to change his stance, and secure his victory. I just have a hard time believing it.
Now if you told me you were going to start a super pac and throw 10s of millions of dollars at the campaign but only if they move on Israel, yea, that could work. Shitposting here isn’t doing anything but demoralizing pragmatic leftists that understand what a shitty fucking dumpster fire of a system we have and are also worried Biden’s unwavering support for Israel is going to fuck us all over. And I struggle to understand who that helps
If I believe that Biden will lose because of a position he’s taken himself, and i believe that nothing I say could sway the people we need to vote in November even if I could make it convincing, what else is there to do but anything to get Biden to reverse course?
The sad thing here is that Biden is able to move on things. He was essentially republican before the 2020 primary! Bernie and Warren had a lot to do with that. You campaigned for Bernie, you already know that!
I think if progressives are loud enough, the people in Biden’s circle can break through to him. I’m more optimistic than you are.
We lost the 2016 election because moderates were overconfident and condescending to their constituents; if nothing else I will cut them down, even a little, so they might not repeat that mistake.
What I find amusing is that the primary season hasn’t even officially ended yet. The convention is in August. There are numerous states that haven’t even cast a ballot for Biden. And we’re already absolutely inundated with “You have to vote for him or you’re a traitor to your nation!” hyperbole.
You’d think people could at least save their most hysterical outcries until the general election season has officially started. But no. Everyone on Lemmy is expected to bend the knee right now, at this very instant, because otherwise Trump might become President… six months early?
There’s simply no room in the political calendar for any kind of criticism of the sitting President.
Biden hasn’t been great. He dragged his feet on issues he campaigned on (e.g., student debt relief), he sounds eve older than he is, and perhaps most gallingly, he didn’t unequivocally renounce the genocide in Gaza immediately. Inflation sucks and wages aren’t high enough for most to survive, let alone thrive. I can name a dozen progressives off the top of my head I’d rather have as president.
First past the post voting and the two-party system give us little chance at the national level for meaningful fast change.
But have you seen the shit Trump has promised he will do as president? We all learned an important lesson from the first Trump presidency: take him seriously, not literally. I shouldn’t need to list the things Trump has promised to do, but here’s a highlight reel:
And he won’t stand in the way of any of the Project2025 insanity the GOP wants to pursue.
So, on the left, you have an old man who has maybe made things a little better for some too slowly while ignoring a genocide. On the right, you have an old man who endorses that same genocide, promises to make the country an actively worse place for many, and who has empirically proven he will encourage and endorse insurrection and treason to stay in power.
The best play for the future is two-pronged:
Democrats can’t win without the progressive caucus, and even in the most conservative part of a largely leftist social media site and the best thing that people who claim to be left are saying is ‘Biden was a shit president and I fucking hate having to vote for him’
Does anyone here really think Biden can rely on progressives right now? Honestly, maybe everyone here would say they’d do it anyway, but who here actually thinks a majority of leftists would show up for that POS?
If Biden is steadfast on this position on Isreal he loses. There’s no amount of street-corner-preaching about the end of days that will convince leftists to vote for Biden.
I’m a progressive, volunteered for Bernie’s campaigns. I don’t remember electing you to speak for me, maybe you don’t have your finger so squarely on the pulse of every single progressive.
I plan to vote for Biden, am I excited about it, no. Is the Democratic Party going to put up anyone else, no. Would me holding back my vote matter, no.
There is no world where “not voting for the least bad option” equals anything other than the most bad option winning. You can be upset that that’s the word you happen to find yourself in, no one asked me if having to pick between the two jackboots of the capital class was how we should arrange things either.
One thing I haven’t heard is what’s the alternative. You have my full attention, what would you actually concretely hope to have happen. Let’s say you could convince a large number of Democratic Party voters to follow your lead, what would you have them do?
Perhaps watching the Democratic Party leadership gut the chances of Sanders twice to put up boring ass garbage candidates has hardened my heart. Would you have them sit out the primary convention, great Biden still wins because of super delegates. Would you have them protest and hold back their votes in November, great trump wins. Is there some other thing that’s supposed to happen? What’s the plan?
I am very happy for your politics, honestly I am. I wish more people were as involved as that.
Bidens approval is at 38% right now. That is the second lowest approval rating of any incumbent president in their third term in modern history, second only to carter. The lowest third year approval rating where the incumbent won reelection was Obama with 45%. Biden can afford to lose 3% of his popular vote, assuming 2020 turnout and ignoring the electoral vote(spoiler, that’s a worse situation)
If you’d like to ignore reality and argue that Biden hasn’t lost any fraction of his support from this conflict, just because you personally could concede that issue, then feel free to completely ignore me. Keep reassuring everyone those numbers aren’t real and pray that this doesn’t sink him.
I personally think the only path to victory is Biden about facing in Isreal. That’s what I’d do if I was organizing: do everything in my power to push Biden to see reason. I can’t campaign on “yea Biden is materially supporting a genocide, but he’s not irredeemable” to progressives that are camping on campuses for weeks to months over it. There is nothing I could do to convince those people to vote.
Spend your time how you want but I think it’s far more sensible to try and sway Biden than it is to convince an entire cohort to vote for a candidate that’s complicit in genocide.
Ok, but concretely, how do you want to do that? This meme?
I believe you, you think that Biden’s support for Israel will ensure his defeat. What do you think could get him to change his position, I highly doubt he’s browsing lemmy.
I get your frustration and I read some of your other comments and I don’t really disagree with you. The thing is, the people disagreeing with you in this thread agree with the deeper concern. I’m concerned that Biden’s support for Israel will make him lose too. I don’t believe there is anything the voting public can do to change that support. I believe that support has been bought and paid for by the capitalists that want that support for whatever awful reason they have, and that our shambling “plutocracy in democracy clothing” means we won’t be able to change that.
So I look at the line you are pushing and I think, what are the likely outcomes of this effort.
And I just can’t figure out the point. Maybe you are more optimistic than me, maybe you still believe that shouting into the social media zone could swell a grassroots rebellion, get Biden to change his stance, and secure his victory. I just have a hard time believing it.
Now if you told me you were going to start a super pac and throw 10s of millions of dollars at the campaign but only if they move on Israel, yea, that could work. Shitposting here isn’t doing anything but demoralizing pragmatic leftists that understand what a shitty fucking dumpster fire of a system we have and are also worried Biden’s unwavering support for Israel is going to fuck us all over. And I struggle to understand who that helps
If I believe that Biden will lose because of a position he’s taken himself, and i believe that nothing I say could sway the people we need to vote in November even if I could make it convincing, what else is there to do but anything to get Biden to reverse course?
The sad thing here is that Biden is able to move on things. He was essentially republican before the 2020 primary! Bernie and Warren had a lot to do with that. You campaigned for Bernie, you already know that!
I think if progressives are loud enough, the people in Biden’s circle can break through to him. I’m more optimistic than you are.
We lost the 2016 election because moderates were overconfident and condescending to their constituents; if nothing else I will cut them down, even a little, so they might not repeat that mistake.