I would love a better candidate than Biden. Unfortunately I have yet to see one. They keep trying to float candidates that are further right, people that would have been solid locks for the Republican party a few decades ago. That is not the direction the party should be going.
this post was submitted on 14 Aug 2023
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So we've got RFK jR running as a Republican with a D behind his name, and Manchin and now Phillips floating primary runs against Biden from his right.
It's so nice watching centrists demonstrate that their commitment to protecting incumbents only applies when challengers come from the left.
tbh don't we want this in our politics? i know it is ugly right now but post Biden what will the game look like?
i think the right burned itself up and splintered into factions and now the "left" (see center) are also splintering
the group i see as the most united and with the clearest platform are basically the social democrats. hopefully they play the game right and manage to really set up a stronger safety net for the poorest and give space for a middle class again
While the Dems do need a deeper bench, you don’t get there by trying to primary a sitting president. It’s not going to bring anyone new to the ticket. There are several problems:
- You’re going to lose. People who primary Biden are not running because they want to be president, because they know there is not path to victory.
- Biden is already the compromise candidate. Fox screeching about how Biden is a communist doesn’t make him one. Republicans moving so far to the right that they’ve passed over the event horizon doesn’t make Biden a communist, either. You’re not going to get republican defectors, because just being a democrat is the bad part.
- The only thing a primary run will do is hurt the Biden campaign in the general. You can’t win, you can’t recruit more voters to the ticket.
You aren’t deepening the bench by doing that. We had a wide array of candidates going into 2020, and we decided on a center-right safe choice for electability. You don’t deepen the bench with a failed presidential bid against your party’s incumbent.
You deepen the bench by moving people from the House to the Senate with the full support on the democratic committee, replacing people like Feinstein by pushing them out the door if necessary. You do it by advancing younger people to positions of leadership in the party and in national and state congresses. You do it by making sure people like Newsom get air time and national exposure.
I support out of state progressive candidates wherever I can, and I think we need a better organizational tool for doing so. I liked it when the Pod Saves people were trying to help identify the seats that could be flipped, and I’d like to see that extend to the state governments. We need a cohesive strategy designed to take back state governments and judgeships as well as federal offices. We will not get there by running in a primary against an incumbent president.
We do want this in our politics, but when we have fascists calling from inside the house, it's a luxury we can't afford right now.
Once fascism is no longer a viable political path for extremists, then we can talk about improving candidate quality and having better options. From where we are currently, though, it feels like putting the cart before the horse.
People have been telling any Democrat that isn't a neoliberal "now isn't the right time for what you want" for far longer than I've been able to vote and I'm 35. Well I say fuck that. Now is a perfectly fine time, people like you just want your guy to keep winning primaries.
I will vote for the person who wins the Democratic primaries. I don't want Biden to run again. He is too old. BUT if he wins the primaries I will vote for him.
Republicans and the Christian Nationalist want to rule us from a minority. Voting may not matter anymore if they get in power. They are scared of young people voting and are looking for ways to stop it. Stop voting for Republicans, they don't believe in our democracy.
I get your feeling, and I'm actually a little bit older than you (so have had to vote for the same boring centrists), but "fuck that" isn't how you strategically defeat a coalition of rich, Conservative ideologues who have been slowly and tactfully eroding our democracy.
"People like me" haven't had their candidate yet win a primary (I'm a progressive socialist), so I'm not sure who you're referring to.
Fair enough, but again that's the same kind of thing we've been hearing for decades. We heard it about Bernie in the last two elections even though he polled better than Clinton or Biden against Trump. At this point it doesn't seem like sound advice so much as a means to convince people to vote for someone they don't actually like based on a vague appeal to the greater good.
Welcome to first past the post voting, where nobody can take any risks for fear of handing the opposition a win by default. Nothing will get better until we overhaul our voting system. We desperately need multiple parties but it's literally impossible to get there with first past the post.
Huh. I usually only hear this when progressives run for anything.
I think that Biden's challengers from his right are doing so because they think he'll die before the primaries and want to be the remaining logical choice.
Sure is interesting that they're willing to splinter the party when centrists call for perfect lockstep unity behind incumbents when it suits them.
RFK Jr is his own thing but neither Manchin or Phillips are actually running. You can't call people hypocrites for not doing something they think other people shouldn't do.
but neither Manchin or Phillips are actually running.
Yet. Both are making noises about it. Since when do politicians openly consider a presidential run and then decide against it?
And who is this guy?
Dean Phillips is one of the esteemed leaders of the school for screwdrivers, along with a Stanley Flathead, Allen Keys and Dr. Torx.
(I really don't know who they are either)
Rep. Dean Phillips (D-Minn.) does not speak for me. I disagree.
Better title: "Dean Phillips Thinks He Should Be President Instead"
This guy's mom told him he'd do a great job and now he thinks the entire country is rallying around him.
Turn it to whom? The Democrat bench is shallower than a plate of cereal.
To Dean Phillips, of course. Clearly Biden should step aside for a little-known, accomplishment-free representative from Minneapolis' suburbs who managed to under-performed Biden as an incumbent in his own district in 2020.
Biden is so old though. I know he is running and incumbency bias and all that but it makes me really want ranked choice voting so he could be a safe second choice instead of my only choice.
My main reason for support of him is I like what he has done and what is currently in the works that I want completed. incumbency bias is not even part of it for me. Its more I would like to stick to a good thing at this point rather than take a chance that is more than likely to be much worse.
okay someone leak this guys funding. the money trail doesnt lie and i guarantee there has gotta be some nefarious funding funding sources asking this guy to split the vote.
He looks like the kind of person Hollywood would show when they want to convey they are a reptilian elite.
I’d love to see conservatives like Biden make like a tree and get the f out of here.