So why did Biden announce he's picking a woman VP?

Of course there’s pushback from Bernie or Busters. That’s what their boss has been paying them to do. Their goal is to throw America into chaos to strengthen Russia’s position. If Sanders had somehow gotten the nomination, they’d have turned on him, too.

Most of Sanders’ actual supporters, however, will vote for whoever the Democrat is over Trump.

Back on topic, I strongly suspect that Biden already knew who, specifically, he wanted as VP, when he said that. He’s a good enough politician to know not to come out and say that explicitly, but I think he could still have phrased his statement a lot better.

If you have any info on how me and most of the people I know can get hooked up with this mysterious benefactor money let me know. Do I have to talk to “Q” or take a jet to Little Saint James or what?

There’s already enough great VP choices among women that I’m not too worried that some man is going to suddenly elevate to Undisputed Best Pick Ever and be shut out.

Possible he already picked someone and they said yes so they are just going through the motions to look at other women. On the other hand I don’t think he could keep a choice from leaking out.

Identity is part of VP selection – always has been and always will be. And perception and symbolism is part of the VP (and president, and all public offices, for that matter) job. It’s not some robot who makes decisions – it’s an American representing all Americans. When there hasn’t ever been a person of X or Y category, especially if that category is ~50% of the population, then that demonstrates a serious problem with how leaders are chosen. That demonstrates to that 50% that they really aren’t considered equal. Having a woman VP and Prez is only a small part of fixing that, but it’s still an important and necessary part.

Identity is part of the qualification. It always has been – and we can see this with pretty much every selection, in some way. I have no problem with the possibility of acknowledging this. Anyone who does just doesn’t realize that it’s always been like this. It’s not a coincidence that almost every VP and Prez were white men – being a white man was considered part of the qualification for most of our history, even if this wasn’t formally acknowledged.

Maybe one day we’ll have an actual equal and fair society in which these kinds of things don’t matter. But we’re very, very far from that society. In the meantime, it’s a positive good to include identity in these decisions in a way that improves these sorts of symbols of diversity.

I imagine that most of them were working for Putin long before this, but I’ll admit that I’m not privy to his hiring techniques.

I agree with all of this, and in addition, I don’t even think it was smart politically. Anyone who would swing his or her vote to Biden because he picks a woman VP was already going to vote for him anyways. He is after the swing voter.

Had he made a statement such as “I pledge to pick the best qualified person in the country regardless of gender, race, religion, or sexual orientation; however your question is well taken as it is high time that women achieve positions of national prominence, and I will pledge to fully consider every qualified woman and every other qualified person” your typical swing voter would have viewed that positively and also would have been assured that he hadn’t bought into the whole “woke” thing.

IOW, he was pandering to people who already supported him.

My guess is that he already had a short list, and it was like mostly women anyway. They, put on the spot, he just said it would be.

and of course- it’s time the USA stopped it’s sexist ways and elected a woman to the White house.

Unfortunately, the youth vote doesn’t exist. They just don’t come out. Every candidate that relies on the youth vote to win — loses

Vladimir Putin is not the reason your country and its politics are in shambles, and accusing anyone who points those things out of being in some way indebted to Today’s Boogeyman is both dismissive and unhelpful.

Every Veep choice is 100% pandering. Pandering to some electorate or other. That’s the way it has been since 1804.

This election will be won by women. Women in every state in the country, of every political stripe. Anyone paying attention can see that women’s rights are under siege by this “administration.” Women are pissed, with good reason.

Biden’s announcement was not off the cuff, nor was it unplanned. I suspect internal polling shows this advantage to Biden very clearly. It will be further cemented across the country by him naming a competent female running mate.

ETA: <deleted reference to speculative pick, missed that request initially by the OP. Sorry!>

Unfortunately, it does. Just not as much as I’d (and maybe? some of you?) would like. You’re proposing that an enormous # of people don’t exist. You’re also proposing that there are no structural reasons behind large parts of depressed youth turnout.

Amy Klobuchar would really be the cherry on this shit sundae of a candidacy. Just a human shudder.

Actually, since Putin got trump elected- yes, he is the reason.

Now sure, Putins disinformation campaign was only like the 3rd most important reason Hillary lost, but the election was so damn close that leaving Putin out would have led to a Clinton win.

Mind you, with *Moscow *Mitch in control of the senate, things would still be problematic, but note the nickname.

2018 was won by white suburban women who shifted from leaning Republican to voting Democratic. Part of that was them being sick of Trump’s shit but a woman VP could help tip them in 2020. Especially if they’re sick of Trump’s shit but then wary of the Reade allegations.

Additionally, it’s hard to see where it hurts. Unless Biden picks an awful candidate for VP (think Palin), picking a woman is basically all potential upside. There might be some small percentage who’d never vote for a female VP but I doubt they were voting Biden anyway.

There are definitely structural reasons. There are many reasons. Nevertheless, they don’t vote. Of course young people certainly exist, but they don’t go to the polls. I wish they would.

These are convenient excuses to ignore the fact that you share a country with a large ethno-fascist exterminationist cult whose politics revolve around vindication for a perceived fall.

They/we do vote. It’s not as much as it should be. It still exists. It won’t show up for Joey Fingers and his No Platform.

You’re referring to “we” — for which country is this “we” referring? I’d like to see a cite because it seems clear you have an outsider’s view of the US.