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If Biden 'Must Step Aside,' Why Aren't Democrats Filling the Streets to Demand It?
(www.commondreams.org)
this post was submitted on 10 Jul 2024
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politics
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It's not that Biden is the only person who can beat Trump. Biden is the only person RUNNING who can beat Trump. There are plenty of people who could beat Trump, but until one of them says they want the job this entire thing is a nonstarter.
the DNC kinda prevents legitimate alternatives from succeeding though. It doesn't have to be this way but the party keeps it like this, maintaining the incumbent as the only choice.
People want more options and they would be available if it was remotely possible to overcome the DNC's favoritism to Biden.
I 1000% agree with you. The DNC shouldn't be operating as an arm of the incumbent, that's precisely why we're in this position now. I just don't know how that changes when the DNC is staffed with people chosen by the incumbent, especially before November.
The level of political analysis in this thread is like armchair traffic engineers talking about how we could eliminate traffic by just opening up another lane.
Winning an election in our current system means running a 50 state strategy and getting more votes than your opponent. Almost everyone who votes is uninformed on most issues, and will vote for the person they like most. Some vote against the person they hate most. A full third of eligible voters did not vote in the last presidential election, and that was the highest voter turnout in 120 years.
To get someone to vote for you, you need three things in this order:
That's it. All of the ads and speeches and interviews and debates are trying to accomplish those three objectives. That's why primaries are important, because it gives the candidates time to differentiate themselves and build a following of donors and volunteers.
An incumbent has a ridiculous advantage in that they have 1 and 2 completed. Everyone voting knows that Biden is the President, and they have seen him doing the job. Trump has also been President and done the job. So it just comes down to which of these two old, white shitbags can motivate enough voters to show up.
If the incumbent drops out, you are starting over at zero. The candidate must introduce themselves to the voters, and then convince them that they have the experience and gravitas to handle the job. The American voters are woefully inept at judging whether a person has the experience or gravitas, but we all believe we are good at it.
A lot of people are motivated to vote because they love Trump. A lot of people are motivated because they hate Trump. Biden might have a handful of supporters that are motivated by Biden, and there might be a few morons who hate Biden enough to vote for Trump. The real hurdle Biden needs to clear is getting people who are unenthusiastic about either candidate to show up.
So the question becomes, is there another candidate who is so energizing and charismatic that they can introduce themselves, demonstrate competence, and motivate the unenthused without alienating the already luke-warm supporters?
What does Harris get you? She's not going to change course on Israel. Youth? She's fairly unpopular among young voters. Women? Anyone who cares about women's rights is already voting against Trump. Minorities? See: Women. Plus, anyone who loves Harris is already going to be motivated to vote for Biden, because he's not likely to go the full four years.
If you don't like Harris, then who? All of the big names in the party have backed Biden and have said they aren't running. Are we going to nominate that Joe Shmoe primary challenger that couldn't even get on the ballot in half the states? He's been running for a year and I can't remember his name or tell you what his policies are.
All of these hypothetical scenarios about how the ticket would be better if the DNC wasn't corrupt, that's just bullshit. Our election system sucks, but we're not going to fix it by complaining about the team uniforms. You want to make it better? Run for office. Write your representatives. Donate and/or volunteer for a campaign. Vote out conservatives at every level of government. Talk politics with your friends and neighbors. These things will all help. Whinging about the DNC on Lemmy will not.
Yeah I was just agreeing with a specific point about how we intentionally give the incumbent even more of an advantage during the primaries. Nothing you said is exclusive to my comment. I know/agree with pretty much everything you said already. Sorry you had to write all that.
All great points. How about we both spread this message and you forgive me for posting my admittedly unproductive comment?
Isn't it convenient that no candidate who wants to stay in the good graces of the democratic party will announce their candidacy until the incumbent democratic president steps down. What an unbelievably paradoxical argument to make.
Because nobody else was allowed to run, exactly.
I would argue that anyone who meets the qualifications COULD have run, but the chances of beating the incumbency advantage were admittedly pretty low. There are a lot of institutional obstacles in the way, but that's not the same as actively preventing someone from tossing their hat in the ring. That's like saying RFK Jr was prevented from running. He just had no chance winning the Democratic primary (because he's a piece of shit) so he went independent.
The deck is clearly stacked against anyone trying to unseat an incumbent, but that's not new information. That's literally how our system works. I would prefer the DNC be neutral and have a drag out fight in the primary and then support the winner, but that's pretty tough to do when the incumbent is the de facto leader of the party.