But would anyone really care?
ETA: I think anyone who attacks Biden will be punished by the voters. Someone like Bernie can do it and hold on to his dedicated base, but will lose softer supporters.
Not showing up for the debates would be mind-bogglingly idiotic for Biden. It’s not only that he needs to be seen and heard to get the Democratic electorate enthusiastic about voting for him. It’s also that Trump would hammer the SHIT out of him for not appearing in the debates, DSeid is correct, it would make him look like a coward, but more importantly it would make Trump CALL him a coward to the entire country including the critical industrial states that are desperately needed to win. Biden the Pussy, Biden the Pussy, Biden the Pussy, is the message that all of those blue collar workers would be hearing NON STOP, and believe me, it will work. There is absolutely nothing that I can think of that would be more suicidal than to not appear in the debates. I can’t believe this is even being discussed.
Didn’t Trump skip some debates?
He did skip one debate, to prove a point: that not as many people would give a shit about the debate if he wasn’t there. I’m pretty sure he was right, too. That’s a little different than Biden blowing off ALL the debates.
Yes. Biden needs to show for the debate.
It’s been traditional for yea-many decades for front-runners to sit out some campaigning—because they can. They can preserve funds; they can avoid the chance of making negative headlines. The fact that Biden hasn’t showed for each and every event so far is not really a story (though some are trying to make it one).
But the debates are major. Yes, Trump will try to call Biden _____, ______, and _____ no matter what Biden does—but Biden sitting out the debate would be a big enough deal that Trump could get some genuine traction out of it.
You can tell from Trump’s tweets what worries him by which candidates he goes after and how he labels them.
The strategy against Bernie is to characterize him as a crazy socialist, hence the moniker “Crazy Bernie.” Trump employs a similar strategy with Warren, poking at her attempts to identify with Native Americans and mocking it.
Biden clearly worries Trump the most. He knows his best hope is for the Democrats to beat him or severely weaken him before the convention. Trump uses the moniker “Sleepy Joe” because he wants to plant the seed that Biden is too old and weak for the job. He’s hoping that it’ll catch with viewers at home when they watch him spar with a younger field.
I wouldn’t put much stock in who worries whom. Reagan was going to be easy to beat, and the Carter folks were worried about Howard Baker. Trump was going to be easy to beat, and the Dems were more worried about Jeb! or Rubio.
Who knows whether Trump really worries most about Biden for any reason other than that he looks like the most likely Dem nominee right now, and if so, who knows that he’s right to do so?
And a much more reputable poll, the Des Moines Register poll, confirms Biden’s low numbers in Iowa, and gives Bernie even lower numbers:
Biden: 24%
Sanders: 16%
Warren: 15%
Buttigieg: 14%
Harris: 7%
Klobuchar: 2%
O’Rourke: 2%
No other candidate tops 1%.
Biden’s -5 since the previous DMR poll (in March), Bernie’s -9, Warren’s +6, and Pete’s +13.
We already knew that the debates would be a thing, but I think that with Biden’s numbers slipping a little, they take on added significance.
Keep your eyes on Buttigieg - the Google Trends search data reveal that he’s generating a lot of interest. Whether it’s positive, negative, or somewhere in between is hard to say, but he’s generating buzz for sure. He’s also staking a claim as a more moderate voice on some issues, which is smart. I hope this doesn’t come out the wrong way, but Pete Buttigieg in some ways is like a white, gay version of Barack Obama. He’s something voters haven’t really ever seen before and voters are curious, and they seem to like him the more they get to know him.
As there were questions about whether America “was really ready for a Black candidate” in 2008, there will be similar questions as to whether or not we’re “really ready” for a gay candidate in 2020. We just might be. I still think Biden will have to stumble first to create an opening for Buttigieg and others, and I would not write off Kamala Harris just yet either. However, Harris’ campaign appears to be a little flat right now and will need good debate performances to boost her profile.
Calling first place, now up to 9 points above the next closest, (that’s 50% more saying they support him than that next closest), “low numbers” is a … novel … way to spin that. Even calling it a slump from March is untrue, as first the 3 point shift (not 5) is within the 4 point MOE, and second because the methodology was adjusted, so “the results are not directly comparable to past Iowa Polls of this presidential field”.
The big deal is that current choice and methods moved Buttigieg up so much and that in Iowa now it is a virtual tie for the second place position between Sanders, Warren, and Buttigieg. That’s a big drop in relative strength for Sanders. Even more worrisome to him is that Warren and Harris both lead him on the second choice metric. Warren is tied with Biden as “on the list”. Sanders not.
It also confirms that Biden may solidly lead, but on the basis of being the rational, comfortable … decent and normal … choice - fewer are enthused about him than supporters of others are. If someone else convinces voters they could beat Trump just as assuredly and solidly that support could be poached easily. Biden is their default not their love.
We’re talking about a candidate who’d been at 40% in national polls a month ago, and is still mostly in the mid-30s currently. Instead of running away from the field, he’s ahead by single digits.
To quote the man himself, that’s a big fucking deal at this point. In Iowa, where they’re paying attention already, there’s nothing automatic or inevitable about his nomination. The nomination isn’t going to just come to him; he’s going to have to work for it. So far, it isn’t clear whether he’s up to it.
National polls and polls of likely Iowa caucus goers are not comparable things, you know that. Running away with it has been the expectation of no one.
If anything in Iowa his lead above the the next closest has expanded since March. That is a big fucking deal. No one has gotten closer to him there.
The last Selzer Iowa poll was March. It is just catching up to Buttigieg’s bump there which happened in April and drove his national media attention. It’s been 9 to 14 in different polling houses there since.
Biden winning Iowa, let alone the nom is definitely not automatic or inevitable, but barring his melting down or someone doing something that allows them to break out of the pack below him, it is coming to him. That’s the inertia.
The more likely battle now is for who gets to take second. That person will have a chance to convince voters in NH and beyond that they can be equally relied upon to beat Trump and do so with more excitement and inspiration than Biden offers. Those not second in Iowa will hobble along but they will be nevertheless done.
I’m betting on Harris (even though she is first choice of only 7%) or Warren as second there. The way the caucus works is that you can change your vote if your first choice doesn’t hit 15%. Sanders and Buttigieg are so far not looking they as likely to be that next choice of those that didn’t hit the threshold as either of those two are.
Yeah, I’m aware of that. Ultimately Iowa will have more of an effect on the national numbers than vice versa. It’s also likely a leading indicator in that people in Iowa can’t help but tune in earlier.
I’ve seen people say that all over the place.
In March, it wasn’t even clear that he was running.
Meanwhile, he’s got 3 competitors within 10 points, with nearly 8 months to go. 24-14/15/16 just isn’t that big an advantage, this far out. And his lead over Sanders may have increased, but now he’s got three candidates, not just one, who can catch up to him with a good month.
Oh, bullshit. This is like having a 3-game lead in a pennant race in mid-June. You’ve got a lot of faith in inertia, in a situation where there are a lot of forces acting on the race, and an eon of time.
LOL.
Specifics on that caucus process:
Not understanding how that works for the virtual caucus goers who have participated on other dates beforehand though. The virtual ones count for 10% of each district’s delegates. What if different ones are nonviable and viable during the virtual sessions?
I don’t know, but it’s a damn good question.
BTW, I readily grant it is not a fait accompli. Edwards was in the lead on the Selzer poll at this point (29 to 23 and 21 for Obama and Clinton respectively) and, with the help a pregnant mistress while his wife had terminal cancer, managed to blow it to second on caucus day. Trump was up by 5 to the next closest in the first Selzer there after he announced (August) and lost a close one to Cruz in Iowa, who wasn’t close at that point.
But it is much more than a 3 game lead in June, especially since the forces acting on the race are not so likely to change much. The main force acting on the race is that most are most concerned with being sure of beating Trump. Unless Biden does something that convinces voters that’s not him, or someone else convinces voters they can do such even better, little will change other than shuffling below, even though he does little to inspire or to excite.
IMHO.
We’ve got a string of six debates ahead; those are rather significant forces. There are certain to be other issues ahead where Biden has to decide whether to disown some aspect of his past, since too much of his past doesn’t fit well with where Democrats are now - and if he has to pull another Hyde because he’s reaffirmed his views lately before having to flip on himself, it’s going to cost him support.
And of course, even if Biden maintains his current level of support in Iowa, support could shift among his main challengers. There’s reason to believe Warren’s been cutting into Sanders’ support, and that could continue to happen, making Iowa a very close two-horse race.
Or just as likely IMHO, some other shift or consolidation of support that we can’t see coming, happens. Kamala Harris gets a run of good press, and people gravitate to her from supporting Warren and Buttigieg, or from simply being undecided; of one of the 0%-2%ers has some standout moments in the first debate, and people realize this candidate’s also got a great record, and that person takes off.
It’s June, Biden’s lead isn’t that big, and there’s a lot of forces acting on this field in an unpredictable manner.
Biden staying at 35% in this crowded field was unsustainable. It was inevitable that Joe Biden was going to find himself having to compete for the nomination.
That he’s now closer to the rest of the pack isn’t what concerns me. What concerns me about Biden is that he has bobbled some relatively routine ground balls, and we’re not even in the debates yet.
I don’t disagree with any of this.
I’d add that, in the end, Joe Biden is going to have to be more than just “electable”. Voters inevitably want to know why they should vote for him, as opposed to Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders, or Kamala Harris. His campaign has been keeping him out of sight, which makes me wonder whether they really believe that he can just coast to the nomination. That turned out to be a nearly fatal mistake for Hillary Clinton.
Many, many people I know will not vote for Biden. Biden’s record is flat out worse than Hillary’s, and is so Republican-lite you’re essentially trading almost everything the left wants. Seriously, a lot of people including me, are at the stage of “please we’ll even vote for the cop (Harris) just do not run Biden.”
Biden has a few okay policies like the LGBT Equality Act thing, but if you look at his record it’s a trainwreck. He’s rated very poorly by environmental organizations, he pioneered Civil Asset Forfeiture, and so on. Here’s the thing, we can’t just keep following the Republican Party right. It always goes like this, the Republicans do X and the Dems figure since someone got elected, rather than governing on values instead what we need to do is X-lite. Triangulation is I suppose an okay strategy for winning elections but a piss poor strategy for long term progress. If you follow it long enough it gets to in 2050 we’ll be seeing a race between two candidates and the Republicans will say we should gas minorities and the Democrats will say maybe we should at least give them a last meal. Do I actually think it will get that bad? Probably not, if anything an actual revolt would probably happen before that point, but that’s where the strategy leads to.
In The Anatomy of Fascism, among other histories of fascism, Fascism is diagnosed as an attack on Leftism that exploits increasing resentment and disillusionment with weak Liberal policies, where a far-right figure promises to address real grievences people have with the system with reactionary (and often false) solutions. That is, rather than addressing the problems in a substantive way, e.g. adopting leftist solutions or taking any ideological stance at all, the liberal wing (the center-right of the Democratic party here) instead fails to address anything of substance and slowly caves to an increasingly radicalized ethno-nationalist wing.
It doesn’t really matter if this Liberal wing occasionally wins, by not addressing the fundamental issues it’s still furthering the resentment and is liable to cause an even harder blowback in the future because nothing is perceived to have changed during the Liberal administration’s reign.
We need somebody who is going to govern on strong values and for actual, hard positions. Compromise is not a goal, it’s a means. You can not compromise with a party who has made it abundantly clear they have no desire to, and at this point the Republicans’ entire strategy is “wait for Dems to do something, claim they’re doing your own worst behavior, watch as the Democrats act ‘responsibly’ and get a philosophical victory and then take what you want anyway.” Republicans may believe a lot of terrible, bigoted things, but don’t say they don’t govern on those values to the best of their ability. And personally, I think governing on our own values is far more important than trying to force the system to work with a party who has made it clear that to it, the system is a game to be exploited until they get what they want.
A lukewarm Liberal candidate whose platform is “beat Trump” and “the Republicans will come to their senses” is, regardless of whether it’s cynical or naive, extremely damaging to our country, and electing him does absolutely nothing but convince the party it’s a strategy that we should pursue in the future, as we make increasingly less progressive “compromises” because we have to run the “safest” most center candidate since we just have to beat Trump 2, Trump 3, Trump 4, they’re even worse than Trump n-1! And as we win the White House, the Republicans win the agenda. And I’m sorry, but I’m not playing that game, even if we get some short term gains from Biden.
Sure, maybe we elect Biden and history doesn’t bend that way. Maybe the US dissolves. Maybe we have a communist revolution. Maybe Millenials and Gen Z becoming increasingly large voter blocs crowbars the leadership farther left regardless very quickly in 8-12 years. But I do not like the precedent running Biden sets, and I legitimately think running Biden is a losing strategy regardless given how much of the progressive wing hates Biden.
(Also he can’t stop being questionable at best with women and do we really need both wings of the nation to have that problem, regardless of which one is worse? It’s a bad idea anyway, don’t forget the Democrats largely aren’t hypocritical on the sexual harassment issue as of late, we’ve purged a few of our own due to it like Franken. It’s absolutely a huge issue, especially with Kavanaugh so fresh in everyones’ minds. It doesn’t matter if Trump is gross with women, him pointing it out can and will hurt Biden with his base, Biden slinging back tells Trump’s base nothing they don’t already know and willingly look past).