I’ll admit I’m not absolutely delighted with everything Biden has done (the abrupt withdrawal from Afghanistan was a mistake, in execution if not in its ultimate goal), but overall I like what he’s done so far: COVID, infrastructure, climate change and the environment, fighting gun violence, Federal appointments including judges, abortion rights, etc. He absolutely shines by comparison to his predecessor, which is certainly a low bar to clear.
I wonder if he’ll be too old to run and win in 2024, let alone to capably serve in a second term, but I would vote for him over any of the likely Republicans mentioned so far.
I don’t think it matters who the Democratic candidate is, 2024 will be another vote for or against Trump even if the GOP candidate is just a member of the cult (which is the only way to get nominated).
Instead of mods we need an sdmb parliamentarian. Also I think it’s premature to declare this an omnibus thread until it has a budget score.
In seriousness - Biden, Bernie and Trump were all tok old in 2020. It’s really an indictment on our political system that the younger crop hasn’t been able to emerge really.
I really think the dems need to have a competitive primary and see if anyone can get traction.
As a conservative who voted for Biden largely because I won’t vote for the GOP in its current form, I would say he has met my expectations–but my expectations were incredibly low, essentially “don’t actively try to end democratic government in the United States.” I am glad that he pushed back against the Generals and got us out of Afghanistan, I think the hit he took because of that was basically a hit any President who had the guts to pull out would’ve taken–because the President simply lacks the operational knowledge or competence to know or recognize the withdrawal is problematic. The frank reality is the Pentagon fucked up the withdrawal including multiple career high ranking Generals. Which is fine, part of the job of the Presidency is you take the political hit when things like that happens.
I think fear of exactly that has left us entangled in lots of situations we ought not be entangled in.
Politically I think Biden has probably done about as best as he could to manage the politics of his “party.” A core issue in the United States is how hyper partisan everything is, so I had essentially no real belief that Biden would be a transformative President. Nothing short of an historically atypical landslide result in the House and Senate combined with a President of the same party is really going to see a big transformation of American politics, we’re in the trenches for everything else.
Due to Republicans not being fit to govern any period of time in which they are not in complete control of government is as benefit, almost no matter what is occurring.
Part of the reason our country is so dysfunctional is we have congressional elections every two years and there’s a weird portion of the electorate (several studies/polls have shown it to be around 10%) who just always vote against whomever is in power.
Another core issue is American government is so slow and unresponsive (by design) that you’re usually voting on the way you “feel about the country”, even though the people currently in power often times won’t have the effects of their decisions felt for some years later–Obamacare being a classic example of it, for good or ill most of the effects of that law didn’t even kick in until Obama’s second term, but people were already voting on it in 2010 (years before they really knew how it would work out.)
Here is the biggest problem for the Democrats right now: we are not experiencing any real inflation. Yes, that is from Robert Reich, who seems to be almost as “far left” as Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, but the issue appears to be real: business is able to operate with relative impunity due in large part to corporate monoculture.
The parties are essentially owned by business. They are powerless to address this and seem to be hesitant to do so. Biden is not an enemy to big business, so he/the Ds are going to be eaten by this. The voters will observe this failure and turn to the alternative, who will most certainly make things worse. But the Republicans are better on economic matters, so they will end up back in charge and global warming will return to being a myth.
538 has polls showing how Democrats might vote in the 2024 primary. In each and every case, Biden wins handily against every single possible contender, with the exception of Harris who gets kinda, sorta close- or at least closer than any. In third place was Newsom. Popularity polls that include Republicans are worse than useless.
Next 538 compared Biden and other Dems vs trump. Biden wins almost every time, once there is a tie. Only Harris has a shot and maybe Abrams. Biden is the only Dem who can beat trump.
Now sure, it is possible that health issues may mean Joe can’t run. Or, health issues or orange jumpsuits prevent trump from running- in that case, maybe Joe can retire, as the other Repubs are not that popular.
Mayor Pete can’t win. I like Warren, but if we are looking for younger, she is out. I like Abrams, but she won’t run vs Biden.
The polling in the Georgia Governor’s race has been concerning. Abrams has been consistently behind by about five points since March. Whereas Warnock overtook Walker at the end of June and has opened up a bit of a lead. Of course, we’re still talking about very small differences and a lot of time to go until November.
But I’d say the biggest difference in these two races is that Abrams is running against an actual, experienced politician and Warnock is running against a dumpster fire of a candidate.
Exactly. I can live with Kemp as long as we retain Warnock. Kemp is not as MAGA crazy as most Republicans, and in fact was opposed by Trump.
I believe the Democratic Party could win every single Senate race this cycle. The Republicans have put up the most absurd, extremest candidates and they should ALL be easy to defeat.
At first, I was surprised it took so long for Biden to hold his first state dinner. Then I remembered some of the extenuating circumstances from the last couple of years. Duh.
