You mean the guy whose campaign is literally being run by the same people that gave us Sarah Palin?
How about swing voters in the middle? They’re the ones who really decide elections.
The point of going into the primaries as an underdog is to convince people that the front runner isn’t good enough. And you can’t just switch off the message the day after the convention. Saunders spent the primary season telling everyone that Clinton shouldn’t be President. People heard that message and Trump won the election. Now Uygur wants to spend the primary season telling everyone that Biden shouldn’t be President.
If Cenk Uygur really believed that Trump is an existential threat to democracy, he would be rallying support to Biden not challenging him. I feel Uygur’s main goal is feeding his own ego.
You see? I got you to do due diligence for me. I’m too lazy. You next assignment is to look into this Palin connection and tell me why it matters. Maybe “the same people” are good at their job and don’t care where the money comes from.
Well it’s to persuade people that you’re the best candidate. Just as with a job interview, it’s not about trying to claim that others would be incapable of doing the job. And underdogs have won the nomination, and the presidency.
But OK, I’ll concede that with the current format of US politics and primaries in particular, it’s a distinction without much difference. And of course Cenk has made it clear that his motivation is to provoke a genuine primary, not to have any illusions of winning the presidency.
That isn’t the interpretation I’d go with.
I’d say it is more like the Democrats tried to play it safe; to go with the person who’d “earned” the nomination the most, the person that the donors liked more, and not who seemed to be garnering the most popular support.
Just waving Biden through with no actual competition is repeating the error.
(also, personally I’d put factors like the last-minute FBI investigation announcement into Clinton higher in importance than any of this, but that’s a different topic).
Splitting the vote and giving Trump the White House again would be a much graver error.
A primary contest is not splitting the vote.
But splitting loyalties can do nothing but help Trump…unless you honestly believe that a challenger could gather even more support then Biden currently has.
Based on what I know about Steve Schmidt, and what I read on his Wikipedia page:
- He’s been a political campaign consultant for decades.
- He worked with Republican candidates up through 2016; he ran Schwarzenegger’s successful re-election campaign for California governor in 2006.
- He was a leader of John McCain’s 2008 campaign, though he was apparently not behind the selection of Palin as the VP candidate (a choice made by Rick Davis); Schmidt and Palin did not get along at all.
- Despite his work with GOP candidates, he’s a supporter of gay rights and same-sex marriage.
- He left the GOP in 2018, due to Trump, and was a founder of The Lincoln Project, the PAC which aired anti-Trump ads during the 2020 election cycle.
- In 2020, he announced that he was joining the Democratic Party.
I do think a challenger could gather more support. More to the point, if a challenger even gets up to 20, 30 percent, the writing would already be on the wall and it would a signal to Biden to drop out.
Look, I don’t doubt there is risk. But every option at this point has risk. Right now with polling neck and neck we’re sitting on a whole pile of risk, with even a minor gaffe or Comey-like announcement handing the white house back to Trump. Despite everything Trump’s done.
It’s not Biden’s fault, it’s just the result of various political realities in the US today.
Not to hijack here, but the problem with convincing 37 states that it’s in their interest to abolish the EC is that there are (probably at least) 14 where it isn’t.
Convincing people to give up an advantage, even one that is arguably unfair, is a steep hill to climb.
Thanks. I like that. Nothing like someone who’s spent time in Hell to point out where we might locate the fire hydrant (forgive me, tortured metaphor. I’ll stop now).
Oh, it’s fine but we kind of wrung that discussion to a stalemate.
But if Biden gets 70, 80 percent, it’s not a signal to the challenger to drop out?
Biden needs to be made aware of where his weaknesses are. I feel he doesn’t want to face that. Whether a robust challenge would do that depends on whether he can shore up his strengths. I hope he can, but only Joe knows if he wants to or can do that. Would he decide it might be better if he step aside? Well, it’s way too early to go there, but I could see it happening.
What weaknesses are those? Are you thinking of his age and his slowing speech? Don’t you think he’s aware of that already?
I don’t know. How is it that the President whose policies created a record number of jobs polls worse today than the one who created far fewer? Yes, it’s early days but damn that’s dispiriting. How would Joe answer that question, in a way that could push the needle?
If you don’t know what weaknesses Joe Biden has, what exactly do you think he should be aware of?
Sounds like you answered your own question.
How about:
- Relentless negative messaging by the GOP and MAGAts, including, yes, harping on the idea that “Biden is old and senile”
- Despite a strong job market, and strong consumer spending, increases in interest rates and inflation (especially on energy and food) have led to many Americans feeling pessimistic about the economy