• givesomefucks@lemmy.world
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    5 months ago

    Remember when we had functional adults running for president?

    Feels like lifetimes ago, but it only stopped being a thing when Trump showed up and Dem leadership decided we don’t need to find a good candidate anymore.

    • paddirn@lemmy.world
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      5 months ago

      Part of these past two elections feels like it’s just the hubris of the top candidates, unable to bow out or allow anyone else to stand in for them. 2016 was Clinton psyching herself up to be The First Female President and thinking that Trump was a joke (most of us did see him as a joke candidate and that’d it’d be a cakewalk). I think in Biden’s case, he didn’t see any other strong mainstream Dem contenders and felt he was the best shot the Dems had at beating Trump. They seem to completely ignore their progressive wing and just assume they need a centrist candidate to have a hope of winning. I just wish he’d change his VP pick, Harris is just dead weight. He needs to shake-up his campaign and pick Stacy Abrams or something (though obviously this didn’t work for McCain/Palin).

      • sensiblepuffin@lemmy.world
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        5 months ago

        Shaking up your strategy only works for progressive (or progressive-lite) candidates. For the conservatives they’d need to find a somehow even whiter and even more masculine VP to bolster their chances.

    • dingus@lemmy.world
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      5 months ago

      There were moments during the debate last night where I just sat there dumbfounded at the absurdity of our current reality

      • givesomefucks@lemmy.world
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        5 months ago

        The worst part is trump has been exactly the same the last three elections.

        His bullshit is normalized to most voters.

        Biden wasn’t great in 2020, but he’s a hell of a lot worse now. Which is why we never see him compared to other presidents when they were in office.

        So for Republicans last night went fucking perfectly. And for Dems, it went about as bad as it could have.

        There’s just no reason to run a candidate voters don’t like or agree with just because the other candidate is so much worse. Even if we stop the worst, we still don’t get what we want.

        None of it makes logical sense, which is probably why Biden’s few supporters only want to talk about how dangerous trump is. It’s really really hard to come up with a reason Biden should be the candidate. Even being an incumbent doesn’t matter when you have terrible approval ratings, those make incumbency a hindrance not an advantage

        • dingus@lemmy.world
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          5 months ago

          While I agree that Biden no longer really seems fit to be president, the dangerous Trump argument is absolutely not one to be downplayed. A man that attempted to overthrow the government in a tantrum when he didn’t get his way should be absolutely nowhere near close to becoming president again. A sack of potatoes or Biden’s literal decomposing corpse would be a better president.

          I agree that it’s disappointing that these are our only two options and that the Dems could not figure out a better candidate this go around.

          • givesomefucks@lemmy.world
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            5 months ago

            the dangerous Trump argument is absolutely not one to be downplayed

            Which is why it’s so bad Biden insists on staying in the race.

            If he thought beating trump was the most important thing, he’d have announced years ago that he wouldn’t run again.

            But he’ll never stand down. Because he wants a second term more than stopping trump from having a second.

            And people realizing Biden is risking that for his own ego, makes him even less likely to stop trump.

            Historically “vote for me or else” doesn’t work well

            We know what works to motivate Dem voters: young, charismatic, and progressive sounding candidates.

            We can’t get that to stop trump, because 82 year old Biden won’t retire.

      • The Pantser@lemmy.world
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        5 months ago

        You mean when they started to argue like children who the better golfer was? The people don’t give a shit who is better at golf. Unless we can end wars with a golf-off between world leaders.

    • Jesus@lemmy.world
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      5 months ago

      Dem leadership decided we don’t need to find a good candidate anymore.

      People had Warren, Sanders, Buttigieg, and Klobuchar to pick from. Voters picked Biden.