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The system is set up deliberately to prevent doing what the voters want.
And this isn’t some conspiracy theory. Read the Federalist Papers and you’ll find they didn’t want an unruly mob making decisions. Hence why senators were picked by states originally, and why there’s an electoral college instead of popular vote for president.
And it's high time all this was fixed. Just because some dudes 250 years ago thought a system of government was good, doesn't mean it's still adequate today.
Best system of government a bunch of wealthy slavers could ask for
I didn't want Biden, but he's actually been doing fine; I was very surprised. List of accomplishments here, and overview of economic performance here.
Careful, the Joe haters really don't want to listen right now with the current state of Gaza.
I mean, if it leads to the US rethinking its policy of "Israel can kill as many children as it wants and it's all good," I'll allow it.
Honestly Netanyahu is probably banking on Trump winning, because then he can really get away with doing whatever he wants.
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Your mistake is thinking elections are, or ever were, about what the voters want.
In reality - the establishment decides how best to maintain their control, then create the illusion of choice (since both candidates who reach the point of running for president serve them, in very slightly different ways), then have the media bolster that illusion and get the public to fight with each other to make sure we don't stop to realise we're being played and point our justified rage and frustration where they actually belong (with the manipulators, not those they manipulate).
The media keeps reporting things that people engage with because those figures drive advertising. If people didn't engage with ragebait, then people like Trump wouldn't have a chance of being elected. The entire media strategy of any politician right now is to say or do the most wild shit possible so that they appear in the news. Come up with a 3 word slogan, and bam, instant support.
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How we got here is really easy, we've arrived at the ground state of First Past The Post voting. Once you have two extremists facing off against each other it takes a massive effort to get a non-extremist into office as you can just cruise into an easy victory by running your own extremist against your opponents extremist. Each side effectively has a lock on their own party and it comes down to which extremist will be slightly less off-putting to the independents. In this case the extremist on one side has aspirations to be a dictator, while the other side is so utterly bland he makes milk look spicy. If Biden was any less progressive he'd literally be a Republican.
That's basically what Biden is banking on, that he's so utterly boring and milquetoast that more independents will vote for him over the wannabe dictator of Trump while still getting enough Democrats to hold their nose and vote for him just to deny Trump the win.
You're kind of contradicting yourself. On one hand you are saying two extremists then later about that Biden is right centre.
I agree with the later part. At this moment we have one extremist and one right center guy. The reason Biden is running is to be still appealing to Republicans and independents to dissuade them from voting for trump.
Though, so much effort was put by media to make him look like he is Karl Marx reincarnated.
Biden is extremist by the standards of progressives in that he's basically not progressive. He's not a moderate Democrat, he's far right of the DNC, which puts him ever so slightly to the left of the GOP. The only viable candidate for the DNC given FPTP was either going to be far right or far left, and with the push by their core to make sure Bernie was out of the running far right it was.
Biden is not far right of the DNC, that's an asinine claim. If anything he's towards the left of the DNC. The DNC is just right-center as a whole. (There are obvious exceptions in true progressives that are under the Dem banner because of fptp, but there are like 10 of them or something).
I think the confusion in this case is also a symptom of the problem. On the one hand you have the voters and on the other hand you have the politicians. By the standards of DNC voters, Biden is far right. His platform was basically undo Trump then don't change anything after that. That's not progressive and it's not what DNC voters really wanted, but it was the best option they were given.
On the other hand you have DNC politicians. By their standards Biden might be center of the pack, but only because most of them are clumped up over on the far right. There are very few actual moderate Democrats these days. There are a handful of extremists out on the far left like Bernie, a few moderates in the middle, in then the vast majority over on the far right that a couple decades ago would have been considered Republicans.
Democrat voters haven't really changed, but the politicians have shifted right as Republicans have moved ever further right. That's why Democrat voters are unhappy with Biden, they're looking for a moderate candidate, not as extreme as Bernie, but looking to make actual reforms. That's why they loved Obama, he talked a big game on the campaign trail, and once in office was really good at spinning most of his compromises as wins (just look at Obamacare, literally a Republican healthcare plan that was somehow spun as the socialized healthcare Democrats had been pushing for).
Words have meaning. Far right is literally fascists and Nazis. Are you saying that Biden is a fascist?
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Biden is not closer to the GOP than the DNC. Either you are idolizing the GOP in thinking Biden could represent their platform, or you misunderstand that the DNC is not so far left from Bidens platform. Bernie is literally a different party but ran on the democratic platform for the elections, but the DNC itself identifies with Biden and Clinton politics.
It is a little bit of a contradiction and I had a hard time following the logic. But your post made me think of something else. If you have one extremist candidate by definition you have two, because from the perspective of the followers of the atypical extremist candidate (a trump like figure) status quo will be an extreme for them
Extremism needs to be judged by the standards of that party in this context. An extreme Democrat is either a radical socialist like Bernie Sanders, or utterly non-progressive like Biden. Likewise extremist for the GOP would be a fascist like Trump, or someone so far left as to almost qualify as a progressive.
I can't help but notice that you couldn't come up with leftist GOP extremist.
I think you were able to do it with Democrats was because Democrats are really everyone else who doesn't identify themselves as Republicans. With the first past the post, those different parties have no option but to work together as one.
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Give me milquetoast extremism or give me death!
I don't really understand your charge against Biden. Skimming headlines from afar it seemed like he was supposedly the most progressive president in a very long time. Where do you think one should read up on his record in office if we want to judge his presidency?
Biden has largely just maintained the status quo. He hasn't done anything to meaningfully progress anything. None of the problems facing the US or the world have been even remotely addressed by him. The best that could be said is he hasn't made most things any worse, although he's really giving it the college try with his support for Israel recently. The only reason Biden looks remotely progressive is because he undid all the stuff Trump fucked up. Just because the previous guy was running backwards doesn't mean you get credit for returning to where you started when you've done fuck all since then.
As for where to find his accomplishments, I've got no idea as he has very few worth mentioning. He's managed to keep the economy going so there's that I guess, and he supported Ukraine, but really that should be considered the bare minimum. Domestically he's doing nothing of particular note.
Climate change is by far the most serious problem facing the US and the IRA is a genuinely substantial step towards addressing that.
Sadly too little too late. Something like that if done a decade or two ago might have worked, but at this point it's a bandaid on a sucking chest wound. Dealing with climate change is going to require not only the kind of investment the IRA authorizes but equivalent foreign policy pushes, as well as a significant domestic PR campaign. The petrochemical companies have been allowed free reign to push their messaging for too many decades and now a significant portion of the US literally believes climate change is a hoax. It's going to take something like the public awareness campaign that was instituted against tobacco companies to undo that damage and the best time to have done that was a decade ago. The second best time is now.
That's an interesting perspective, thanks for sharing.
Just because the previous guy was running backwards doesn't mean you get credit for returning to where you started when you've done fuck all since then.
I disagree with this point enthusiastically. If he steered the boat ten miles up river, that's still a major achievement, especially if the previous captain had just drifted from bank to bank while he was actively putting holes in the hull. We don't know how Biden would have sailed if he'd taken charge where the previous guy did, maybe he'd have stayed in one place, gone down stream, or maybe he'd taken another ten miles the right way, we'll never know.
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Short answer: no proportional representation. Long answer: lack of proportional representation. If you are going to have voting, at least let people vote for the candidate they want rather than the least worst option.
At the very minimum ranked ballots.
Imagine if Americans knew what ranked choice voting was and how it would benefit them.
If you aren't aware and half a minute and a half to spare:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gq7N2hmX9FI
Biden because no party is going to deny a sitting President the opportunity to run again. It has to be their choice to not run (Johnson, '68).
Trump because enough Republicans still believe 2020 was "stolen" from him.
"66% of caucusgoers think Biden did not legitimately win the 2020 election, and 68% of those voters are backing Trump. Just 16% of those voters are picking DeSantis while an even smaller 6% share are caucusing for Haley."
New Hampshire:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2024/01/23/new-hampshire-voters-trump-trials-2020-election/
"About half of those who voted in the New Hampshire Republican primary Tuesday believed the false claim that President Biden did not legitimately win the 2020 presidential election, according to preliminary exit polls, underscoring the persistence of Trump’s false claims within the GOP that the last presidential election was stolen from him.
Of those voters who believed Biden did not legitimately win the 2020 election, an overwhelming majority — nearly 9 in 10 — voted for Trump in the New Hampshire primary on Tuesday, while about 1 in 8 voted for former U.N. ambassador Nikki Haley, the only remaining major challenger to Trump for the Republican presidential nomination."
By voters giving Republicans the house, and the MAGA crowd power to push Trumps agenda.
If voters hadn't given the house to republicans, Trump would not be as powerful, and Biden would not have run for a second term.
Biden is running to prevent Trump from winning, because he believes he still is the best candidate for that.
People want Trump for the same reason they hate Biden.
They are simply unwilling to admit what their candidate has done since Biden took office.
biden is the nominee because it is historically political suicide for a party to primary their incumbent. and in this case since the other viable nominee is trump, primarying biden feels like small d democratic suicide for the country. smart people who don't like biden (for whatever reason, I include myself in that group) will get behind a biden candidacy enthusiastically just to. keep trump out.
trump is the nominee because the republican party as currently constructed is no longer a political party but a cult. a cult of white male grievances that not only seeks to opress anyone not white and male but also has adapted old testament principles where the only ones who had any status at all were males. and the thing is, trump doesn't believe in anything they do (except the racism and misogyny). he just accepts those people because they love him, he gives them permission to act as they do because he does. and the adolation from the people is the thing that drives narcissists. and the one thing those people want more than anything else is power for the sake of controlling other people. they want trump because trump wants their idolation and trump will give them everything just to be cheered. and yes I meant idolation.
if the people don't like this cycle's choices, they should have voted in their party's primaries. this year or 4 years ago.
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This is a process that has worked for a long time.
There was not a generational change behind Obama as there usually would be. That change is coming, but it's not ready for this presidential cycle.
This is a process that has worked for a long time.
Fact is a state by state process of choosing Presidental candidates has worked. This long and torturous screed doesn't address that.
…by design
Unfortunately the Republicans actually late listening to their voters where Democrats are not.
Granted it's because Biden is an incumbent..
I assume you meant hate listening.
How does 70% of Dems wanting a ceasefire, and Biden refusing, translate to listening to voters? Voters wanted fundamental changes to police with defending, Biden's solution, more funding and cop cities in Atlanta and Baltimore, to be trained by IDF no less. The only people the DNC and the RNC listen to are the wealthy. The working class has no say, influence, or voice in politics.
Nah, sorry. I was on my phone.
Republicans are actually listening to their voters and picking the candidate they want to run. Granted, he's a shit candidate and shouldn't be allowed to run, but thats a different issue.
Biden wanted another term, so the DNC machine got on it and is pushing it down our throats despite the majority of dems not wanting it, because what are we gonna do? vote for trump? No, but they might have turn out problem circa 2016.
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Because a whole generation of Americans found a source of information that agrees with their dated belief systems. Regardless if they're completely wrong. Thanks Meta!
Dems don't listen to constituents. They pay us lip service. That's why I'm a Leftist. Dems are center-right (essentially what Nixon was).
The thing is, though, I think most (or at least enough) voters actually do want this. Trump is clearly the preferred Republican candidate and that's been obvious for some time. On the Democrats side, Biden is the lead candidate and likewise, it has been obvious that he was likely to be it for months. Ergo, it's a Biden-Trump rematch.
Obviously nobody is happy about this, but it's hardly surprising.
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this post was submitted on 24 Jan 2024
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