United States Politics Thread 46

[Linguoboy]

So one question I have is: Where the hell is Kamala? I thought the whole point of Biden nominating someone so young and dynamic was to assuage concerns about his age. Well, now those concerns are front and center of the 24-hour news cycle and Harris is nowhere to be seen--which, frankly, seems to have been the case for the entirety of her term.

It's possible that the mass media--which has been showing even more of a bizarre anti-Biden bias of late--is just ignoring her. But it really feels like the Democrats just suck terribly at succession planning and forgot about the need to give her an actual job in order to keep her in view and build public confidence in her.

[zompist]

So one question I have is: Where the hell is Kamala? I thought the whole point of Biden nominating someone so young and dynamic was to assuage concerns about his age. Well, now those concerns are front and center of the 24-hour news cycle and Harris is nowhere to be seen--which, frankly, seems to have been the case for the entirety of her term.

Kind of typical since forever. Thomas Marshall— VP under Woodrow Wilson— liked to tell a joke about a woman with two sons: one ran away to sea, the other was elected vice president… neither was heard from ever again.

It's possible that the mass media--which has been showing even more of a bizarre anti-Biden bias of late--is just ignoring her.

There was a flurry of "dump Biden" posts after the debate— e.g. Vox, Slate, CNN; and apparently the NYT keeps beating this drum. I'm sympathetic to the "oh noes" feeling about Biden's debate performance, but I'm getting more and more skeptical on this topic. Trump has been getting more incoherent too; why shouldn't he drop out? It strongly smells of "but her emails" in 2016. Was anyone seriously truly worried about Clinton's e-mail habits?

Plus, it's a stretch to assume that Harris, or anyone else, would do better. In polls she's generally done slightly worse than Biden in a matchup vs. Trump.

[Dune]

There was a flurry of "dump Biden" posts after the debate— e.g. Vox, Slate, CNN; and apparently the NYT keeps beating this drum. I'm sympathetic to the "oh noes" feeling about Biden's debate performance, but I'm getting more and more skeptical on this topic. Trump has been getting more incoherent too; why shouldn't he drop out?

With respect, I don't understand why anyone sees this as some kind of "gotcha" for the media. There's an obvious reason why no one's beating that drum: it is never going to happen. It just isn't. Yes, Trump is monumentally unsuitable as a candidate for a dozen reasons; most major media organizations have been sounding the alarm about that for nearly a decade. Trump doesn't care and his supporters don't care. No one with any sway in the Republican Party cares. The NYT could publish five brilliantly written editorials every day between now and the election calling for Trump to drop out and it wouldn't happen.

Biden dropping out could happen, though. Maybe. Right now he seems to have his heels dug in, and who knows, maybe he'll stay that way, but it isn't an outlandish fantasyland scenario. And there are people who have real pull in the Democratic Party who actually do read (and care about) opinion pieces from the Editorial Board of the New York Times, or liberal-ish pundits like Matt Yglesias or Nate Silver, or whoever. If you're in the media and you really, truly believe that Biden has no shot at beating Trump, it makes sense to put everything you have into convincing everyone on "your side" with the power to intercede. The other side stopped listening decades ago.

That obviously isn't fair, and I'm sure it's frustrating for people in the Biden camp to put up with so much criticism when the other guy is far more objectionable, but it's a rational strategy. (If you do believe that Biden is toast at this point; if you disagree with that, obviously you won't agree with calling for him to step aside.)

Plus, it's a stretch to assume that Harris, or anyone else, would do better. In polls she's generally done slightly worse than Biden in a matchup vs. Trump.

The thing about Biden vs. Trump polls is that they've been remarkably stable for a very long time. Polls are not typically all that predictive while the primaries are still ongoing, but this year, the needle hasn't moved much at all, for months and months. Which sort of makes sense: in many elections, at least one person won't be as much of a known quantity, but Biden and Trump are both incredibly familiar and people's opinions of them are pretty well calcified. By contrast, as the article you linked says, Biden's potential replacements (especially Whitmer and Shapiro, but even Harris and Newsom) have had far less exposure. It's reasonable to expect their polls to be less stable than Biden's once the national spotlight hits them.

Obviously replacing Biden with any one of them (especially Harris) could go very badly. This is what Nate Silver keeps harping on: replacing a known quantity with an unknown quantity introduces variance, potential downside as well as upside.

But, as Silver also keeps pointing out, Biden is significantly behind. When you're behind, it's rational to increase your risk tolerance and opt for a higher-variance strategy. It's when you're comfortably ahead that you want to play it safe. I don't think most people who want to replace Biden think that it's a sure bet, but they do think that as is, the situation is pretty grim, and shaking things up is worth the risk.

[Linguoboy]

So one question I have is: Where the hell is Kamala? I thought the whole point of Biden nominating someone so young and dynamic was to assuage concerns about his age. Well, now those concerns are front and center of the 24-hour news cycle and Harris is nowhere to be seen--which, frankly, seems to have been the case for the entirety of her term.

Kind of typical since forever. Thomas Marshall— VP under Woodrow Wilson— liked to tell a joke about a woman with two sons: one ran away to sea, the other was elected vice president… neither was heard from ever again.

Except that's not how it was when Biden was Veep. Sure, he was very careful not to upstage Obama (which is one of the reason why he has such loyal support among African-Americans), but he was still regularly in the headlines (and Onion articles).

After the last election, I thought there was a strong chance that the Dems would have Biden step down about halfway through his term. That would have given Harris a couple years to grow in office before going up against Trump. But of course, I was giving them too much credit for having an intelligent plan and a commitment to representation that went beyond mere tokenism.

[alice]

Yeah but none of that will matter when the US falls to fascism.

Even if the worst happens and Trump is re-elected this November, how much of the USA will actually "fall to fascism", given its size and large areas of low population density? Should we expect large concentrations of "fascism" in places like Idaho and the South, with pockets of resistance in Vermont and San Francisco?

[malloc]

Even if the worst happens and Trump is re-elected this November, how much of the USA will actually "fall to fascism", given its size and large areas of low population density? Should we expect large concentrations of "fascism" in places like Idaho and the South, with pockets of resistance in Vermont and San Francisco?

Size and low population density are hardly obstacles to dictatorship. Russia and China are enormous with vast areas of low density yet they have managed dictatorships, even totalitarian ones, quite well for generations. Pockets of resistance imply overwhelming dominance everywhere else.

[WeepingElf]

Yeah but none of that will matter when the US falls to fascism.

Even if the worst happens and Trump is re-elected this November, how much of the USA will actually "fall to fascism", given its size and large areas of low population density? Should we expect large concentrations of "fascism" in places like Idaho and the South, with pockets of resistance in Vermont and San Francisco?

As I said earlier, I don't expect a full-fledged fascist dictatorship like Putin's Russia (let alone Nazi Germany), but a situation where "non-governmental" entities such as militias enforce the ideology of the regime. The Democrats and other opposition parties won't be banned, but elections will no longer be free and fair.

[Linguoboy]

Yeah but none of that will matter when the US falls to fascism.

Even if the worst happens and Trump is re-elected this November, how much of the USA will actually "fall to fascism", given its size and large areas of low population density? Should we expect large concentrations of "fascism" in places like Idaho and the South, with pockets of resistance in Vermont and San Francisco?

As I said earlier, I don't expect a full-fledged fascist dictatorship like Putin's Russia (let alone Nazi Germany), but a situation where "non-governmental" entities such as militias enforce the ideology of the regime. The Democrats and other opposition parties won't be banned, but elections will no longer be free and fair.

We've already seen this in previous election cycles where predominately rural militias stationed themselves at polling places in predominately "blue" districts in order to "protect" the vote: https://www.cnbc.com/2022/11/06/electio ... polls.html. We'll see more of it this November, and I don't know if public officials are prepared.

[Torco]

Even if the worst happens and Trump is re-elected this November, how much of the USA will actually "fall to fascism", given its size and large areas of low population density? Should we expect large concentrations of "fascism" in places like Idaho and the South, with pockets of resistance in Vermont and San Francisco?

I mean... every state and city in the united states -and elsewhere- has significant enough numbers of fascists and fascist sympathizers: you wouldn't generally see them in, say, social science faculties at universities, or in human resources divisions at companies... but police, private security guards, in my country for example cab drivers are famously very fash. stereotypical marxist moment for me here, small business owners and self-employed blue collar people: extremely sensitive to "it's for security" narratives, very friendly to when such narratives justify extreme measures (in their defense, they *are* moving around expensive merchandise, or guarding a store full of it, muggings affect them a lot). there's a lot of people who would tell on their neighbours to the gestapo, take the opportunity to rid themselves of a business rival, or that annoying neighbour, by telling some copper that they're a jew, or a communist, or an woke. And do you think the police, of all constituencies, won't participate in disappearing dissidents if *the president* tells them that they're criminals or -gasp- terrorists on national TV? incels, conservative religious fanatics -of which the US is full-, peterson-smelling internet people (of which many are 40 by now), they'll all play ball if they're scared enough, and do you think the media won't scare them if the president starts shouting all day everyday that it's the terrorists, they're all terrorists, trust me, i'm the best, the best, best in the world, at detecting terrorists. i detected so many terrorists, and i'm telling you, these are terrorists. through and through, i'll bet mara lago on it, i will, i will, let me tell you.... plus, if people start disappearing there's bound to be protests, some of them violent! look at those terrorists, burning down businesses, full of children, those businesses, look, decapitated babies, poor babies, they're aborting them by fire, ban abortion, ban terrorism, i'm the best.

it's not hard to initiate a fascist coup. what's hard is to get enough authorities on your side to generate some legal legitimacy, for people who care about that, and what's also hard and more impotant is to convince big business, for whom this kind of thing is extremely risky (sure. they own the media, but they also own supermarkets! what? yeah, sure, root out the commies, I'm all for it, but look, the world cup is coming up, this'll hurt sales) and even more importantly, the military. if, say, the supreme court (unlikely, full of republicans) or congress (more likely) or someone like that, say, impeaches the president, or rules his actions unconstitutional or some other legal blabla, then the military can intervene to keep order or to stop a rogue president-in-breach-of-the-law: and I think that neither big business nor the us military would be happy if trump tried, say, in 2026, which is why trump probably won't attempt it (though he will fill up as many institutions as he can with his guys, making it more and more likely in the future). but if the us military and big business supports your coup (if it is in the material interest of the military class and the burgeoisie, in 19th century marxospeak), then you can pull it off, simple as that. this is as true in the US as it is in any third world country.

[rotting bones]

A factor people keep forgetting is that independents turned against Trump after his felony conviction by a large margin. That margin is so huge, it might hand Biden the election.

[malloc]

Someone just attempted to assassinate Trump. Looks like the election is over before the first vote as already been cast. Well it was nice having a democracy.

[Ahzoh]

The guy basically handed Trump the win. Fucking idiot.

[keenir]

*sigh* this is what happens when your party spends several presidential terms making it easier for people to make and buy guns that can easily get past metal detectors.

...though I bet he blames Biden.

The guy basically handed Trump the win. Fucking idiot.

that may've been the point.

[Torco]

something tells me we're gonna see a lot of ai-generated fakes of the face of this Crooks dude.

[xxx]

you seem to find it almost normal, have you gone mad...

[masako]

The guy basically handed Trump the win. Fucking idiot.

There is still months to go. Fatalism is not going to be helpful.

[xxx]

I hope that there will be no further loss of life in the political debate,
and that this will calm the verbal violence of democratic partisans of all stripes...

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S¯ÃVl³j¯P±Àl³¾j¯TJ¯TV

[Ahzoh]

The guy basically handed Trump the win. Fucking idiot.

There is still months to go. Fatalism is not going to be helpful.

Fatalism is our reality. Trump can only gain from this politically and he and his wretched ilk will absolutely squeeze this situation dry. His entire career is built off of making himself a victim.

Meanwhile Biden is already struggling to keep himself afloat in this race.

[masako]

Fatalism is our my reality.

Suit yourself.

Trump can only gain from this politically

You have less patience than the media.

Meanwhile Biden is already struggling to keep himself afloat in this race.

I can't argue with you there...but you tallying ballots in July just seems strange.

[Ares Land]

that may've been the point.

I'm inclined to think this may be the best explanation.

I hope that there will be no further loss of life in the political debate,
and that this will calm the verbal violence of democratic partisans of all stripes...

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S¯ÃVl³j¯P±Àl³¾j¯TJ¯TV

Parroting Trumpist propaganda -- why am I not surprised?