The Left Case Against Supporting Joe Biden in the General Election

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The Left Case Against Supporting Joe Biden in the General Election --->>>
-Benjamin Studebaker

Trump, for all his faults, poses no existential threat to the republic. What’s more, Sanders and Robinson are deeply underestimating the damage a Biden presidency will cause. The Republican Party has become what it is because of Democrats like Joe Biden(and Obummer). These Democrats are pushing the Republican Party further and further right, and a Biden presidency will make the Republican Party even more dangerous going forward.

Joe Biden loves to tell us that “nothing will fundamentally change”. If nothing changes, another Democrat will normalise what Trump has done and frustrate the American people into voting for someone even more right-wing.

Look at what’s happened with Bush. He’s more popular than ever before. In the 00s, we recognised that Bush was nuts. Bush believed the God wanted him to bring peace to the Middle East by spreading democracy by the sword. That’s crazy! He killed hundreds of thousands of people and accomplished absolutely nothing.

But Barack Obama destroyed Libya in 2011. The civil war in that country continues to this day. And many of the people who recognised that Bush was nuts made excuses for that, and they made excuses for Hillary Clinton, the Secretary of State who urged him to do it. They acted like it was no big deal. And now people don’t think Bush’s wars were a big deal, either. They miss him. When Obama was first elected, the American people knew Bush was a terrible president. In January of 2009, Bush had a net favorability rating of negative 19. In the summer of 2016, it was plus 9. A year after that, it was plus 22.

The experience of the Obama administration made the American people decide that George W. Bush was okay. Worse, it made Trump possible.

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there's no good left case against supporting joe biden in the general election, upon any meaningful analysis

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Originally Posted by spurraider21

there's no good left case against supporting joe biden in the general election, upon any meaningful analysis

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That's a statement, not an argument. What ya got?

The argument regarding GWB is very real. It's disgusting to see Dems have a favorable view of him now.

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Originally Posted by Will Hunting

The argument regarding GWB is very real. It's disgusting to see Dems have a favorable view of him now.

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Agreed. Bush was easily the worst president in my lifetime, far, far more damaging than Trump.
https://i.insider.com/5df3a5d9fd9db2...jpeg&auto=webp

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Originally Posted by Capt Bringdown

Agreed. Bush was easily the worst president in my lifetime, far, far more damaging than Trump.

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Eh, pre-COVID I'd agree Bush was worse than Trump, but the way Trump has fucked COVID-19 up this badly he's worse than Bush.

IMO there's no good reason to vote for Trump over Biden, but if Biden pulls an Obama by immediately moving to the right and cramming austerity down our throats, there needs to be an aggressive primary campaign in 2024 for a real Democrat.

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Trump, for all his faults, poses no existential threat to the republic.

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Oh really, tell me more.

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Originally Posted by Capt Bringdown

That's a statement, not an argument. What ya got?

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i think the damage of the trump administration is being grossly understated. i think the damage of an incumbent trump no longer seeking election would be a lot worse.

i dont agree that the next republican candidate will be more inherently right wing than trump (while he's not as fundamentally conservative on all issues the way cruz would be, he has FAR more of a right wing authoritarian bend than any other republican i can remember). following the 8 years of bush... the next 2 republican candidates were mccain and romney. i dont think thats quite the nightmare scenario (in the context of american politics).

and if the goal is to push the democratic party left, you can argue that it is better done with liberal democrats in office, because thats when a lot of democrats realize that status quo liberalism isn't solving a lot of our underlying problems. it was only after 8 years of obama where Sanders became a viable name on the national front... not after 8 years of Bush. seeing republican failures just tells people that orange man bad and we just need a democrat to fix things. seeing democrats not being able to solve the issues either would make people think "maybe that aoc person has a point"

i dont think the short term ramifications of withholding support from biden can be so downplayed as it is in the OP, nor do i see a necessarily beneficial long term outcome

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Originally Posted by Reck

Oh really, tell me more.

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Yeah, that's where the case against supporting Biden falls apart. Too much downside.

It's worth pointing out that the Democrats moving gradually to the right over the last 30 years is what put us in this position, but we can't go back and change that.

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Originally Posted by spurraider21

seeing republican failures just tells people that orange man bad and we just need a democrat to fix things. seeing democrats not being able to solve the issues either would make people think "maybe that aoc person has a point

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Hadn't even thought about this but great point tbh

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Originally Posted by Will Hunting

The argument regarding GWB is very real. It's disgusting to see Dems have a favorable view of him now.

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I wonder how much of that is just knowing not even Bush would have fucked the pandemic response up as badly as Trump. I mean it's fucked up Bush was killing people in the middle east for no good reason but Trump is killing us for no good reason, and I guess I don't give a shit about Iraqi lives compared to my own and those around me.

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Originally Posted by baseline bum

I wonder how much of that is just knowing not even Bush would have fucked the pandemic response up as badly as Trump. I mean it's fucked up Bush was killing people in the middle east for no good reason but Trump is killing us for no good reason, and I guess I don't give a shit about Iraqi lives compared to my own and those around me.

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Whatever it is I don't like it. Trump fucking up a pandemic as badly as a 3rd world country would shouldn't normalize a president lying us into a war so he can give Halliburton no bid contracts or responding to a hurricane as badly as Bush responded to Katrina.

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Originally Posted by Will Hunting

Whatever it is I don't like it. Trump fucking up a pandemic as badly as a 3rd world country would shouldn't normalize a president lying us into a war so he can give Halliburton no bid contracts or responding to a hurricane as badly as he responded to Katrina.

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presidents get away with shit as long as the economy is rolling. thats because the economy, generally speaking, is what voters actually experience on a day to day basis. going to work, paying bills, sending kids to school, etc.

voters here dont experience whats happening in iraq or afghanistan.

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Originally Posted by Will Hunting

Eh, pre-COVID I'd agree Bush was worse than Trump, but the way Trump has fucked COVID-19 up this badly he's worse than Bush.

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Even before that though he was nonchalantly ordering drone strikes, killing generals without even notifying congress. Speaking freely with the likes of Putin, Kim, etc.

Little by little Trump has fucked our democracy. The pandemic might have saved us from an all out assault on it.

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Originally Posted by Reck

Even before that though he was nonchalantly ordering drone strikes, killing generals without even notifying congress. Speaking freely with the likes of Putin, Kim, etc.

Little by little Trump has fucked our democracy. The pandemic might have saved us from an all out assault on it.

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that's pretty Plandemic of you

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Originally Posted by Reck

Even before that though he was nonchalantly ordering drone strikes, killing generals without even notifying congress. Speaking freely with the likes of Putin, Kim, etc.

Little by little Trump has fucked our democracy. The pandemic might have saved us from an all out assault on it.

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I don't think people appreciate how much long term economic carnage the pandemic is going to do. It's going to accelerate wealth inequality and consolidation of small businesses. Even if COVID-19 has saved us from another Trump term its accelerated America's path towards becoming a modern day feudal oligarchy where the bottom 90% of the population owns nothing.

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Originally Posted by Capt Bringdown

That's a statement, not an argument. What ya got?

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who are you voting for?

C'mon man. You know the thing.

Basically, OP's posted argument is for the democrats to save the republican party from itself.

If Joe Biden wins the election, the democrats will have won 7 of the last 8 popular votes in presidential elections. It's really the republican party that's on its way to irrelevance in national elections if it doesn't reverse course to more moderate candidates. If Trump loses and the lesson learned is that the GOP needs an even further right wing candidate, then I think you'll see the GOP possibly go the way of the Whig Party.

The left that did these backflips against Clinton got us Trump and a shit federal judiciary for the next three decades.

Might as well finish the job for Trump.

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Originally Posted by spurraider21

i think the damage of the trump administration is being grossly understated. i think the damage of an incumbent trump no longer seeking election would be a lot worse.

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No fan of Trump, but I fail to see how he is an existential threat. I think this line is trotted out by Liberals (and their neo-con allies) as a cover for their policy weaknesses. The Liberal objections to Trump are aesthetic. The Democrats didn't mention impeachment once during their convention - even though Trump's conduct was supposedly a threat to our constitutional order not so long ago. Everyone knows their pearl-clutching is fake.
There are reasonable cases to be made against the re-election of Trump- the sky is falling doesn't seem to be convincing anyone besides the true believers.
The fact that polls are so close at the moment is astonishing.

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Originally Posted by Capt Bringdown

No fan of Trump, but I fail to see how he is an existential threat. I think this line is trotted out by Liberals (and their neo-con allies) as a cover for their policy weaknesses. The Liberal objections to Trump are aesthetic. The Democrats didn't mention impeachment once during their convention - even though Trump's conduct was supposedly a threat to our constitutional order not so long ago. Everyone knows their pearl-clutching is fake.
There are reasonable cases to be made against the re-election of Trump- the sky is falling doesn't seem to be convincing anyone besides the true believers.
The fact that polls are so close at the moment is astonishing.

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He's actively trying to suppress the vote and isn't trying to hide it, that's namely the existential threat. You give him another 4 years to jam the courts with more right wing zealots (including a likely RBG replacement), he could get a court ruling that allows him to do stuff like send DHS agents to monitor voting precincts in swing states or create unnecessary bureaucracy around voter registration.

Setting that aside, there's no end in sight for COVID-19 if he gets re-elected, and the rest of the world will continue to shun us. We'll be isolated in a COVID-19 infested shithole while the rest of the world has recovered.

Like I said before, I don't think we should elect Biden and fall asleep like we did with Obama in 2008. Once Biden wins groups like BLM should ramp up the protesting even more (I'm 50% serious about this and 50% saying it just to trigger conservatives) to make sure there's a fire under his ass from the left. Obama didn't have anyone on the left keeping him honest, which inevitably led to him governing on a center right wing agenda.

There's a small part of me that agrees with you in the sense that another term of Trump likely leads to another Great Depression and a populist revolt, but I think the more likely outcome is more divisive violence like we're seeing now.

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Originally Posted by Capt Bringdown

No fan of Trump, but I fail to see how he is an existential threat. I think this line is trotted out by Liberals (and their neo-con allies) as a cover for their policy weaknesses. The Liberal objections to Trump are aesthetic. The Democrats didn't mention impeachment once during their convention - even though Trump's conduct was supposedly a threat to our constitutional order not so long ago. Everyone knows their pearl-clutching is fake.
There are reasonable cases to be made against the re-election of Trump- the sky is falling doesn't seem to be convincing anyone besides the true believers.
The fact that polls are so close at the moment is astonishing.

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you asked me, not nancy pelosi. idgaf how the dems posture during their convention

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Originally Posted by Will Hunting

Like I said before, I don't think we should elect Biden and fall asleep like we did with Obama in 2008. Once Biden wins groups like BLM should ramp up the protesting even more (I'm 50% serious about this and 50% saying it just to trigger conservatives) to make sure there's a fire under his ass from the left. Obama didn't have anyone on the left keeping him honest, which inevitably led to him governing on a center right wing agenda.

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This is just wrong and in bad faith.

You dont come to the table with threats like we'll burn shit if you dont concede this and that. That's not how you get what you want done.

If Biden wins I dont think he'll shut Bernie out. The door is already open and a relationship already exists there.

I can only hope we get the senate. If we somehow manage to flip it, I dont think you'll see a lot of hand wringing on passing substantive common sense legislation.

Since the environment is the easiest one and an issue both Bernie and Biden are on page one on, I'd say start there.