It seems to me that life has changed significantly in the past few years, and not just because of Covid-19. Trump has redefined what “normal” feels like, and IMO not in a good way. His attack on Twitter claiming that they are suppressing free speech is just the latest example in a long string of things that I would have never even thought possible back when Obama was president. I think many of these things would likely also not have happened under a “normal” Republican President like Mitt Romney or John Kasich. I have a desire to return to the “good old days” as they were before Trump. My question is would a campaign theme of returning to normal resonate with enough people to be a winning campaign theme for Biden? What do you all think? Yes, I realize the irony that based on traditional definitions this would make the Democrats the conservative party.
As a singular campaign slogan “let’s get back to normal” would be a mistake. While people would like the return of decency and respectability to the roll of the POTUS what they don’t want is a return to business as usual from the federal government. Too many issues and problems that many feel have been left unaddressed for many years.
Everybody wants change of some sort even if those changes are polar opposites.
I also wish for a return to normal, but I don’t think it would be an effective campaign theme because it wouldn’t galvanize enough unmotivated adults to actually go vote.
It was low Dem turnout that really cost Hillary the 2016 election, and to beat Trump this year we have to motivate the highest possible turnout. Everyone who thinks Trump is an abomination is already motivated; the rest need a message that gets them off their asses, and “let’s get back to normal” (coming from a guy who, let’s face it, is not the most inspiring to begin with) wouldn’t get it done.
I think something about “true leadership” – coupled with concrete, non-insane plans to combat COVID and rebuild – would be more motivating.
“When America needed a real leader, Donald Trump proved he wasn’t one.”
^ This, too.
Ok. Switch the R and D and there are some eerie similarities to the 1920 election.
An unpopular racist president whose family was running things behind the scenes.
A gaffe prone nominee from the opposition party who was selected because he seemed electable.
People making fun of a candidate for making up new words.
Yikes :eek:
I am genuinely flabbergasted every time someone unironically & completely seriously says Biden would bring us a “return to normalcy.” I wonder if these people only started paying attention to our sick political system the moment Trump was inaugurated. Before Trump, a president was impeached over a blowjob, we saw the Supreme Court steal a presidential election, we spent a trillion dollars of taxpayer money to invade a sovereign nation based on lies, and judge seats -including eventually a Supreme Court seat- sat empty for years because Mitch McConnell decided that no Democratic president should ever be allowed to have a say in our judiciary. Is this the normalcy we will be returning to? Hard pass.
Trump is just a symptom of the disease. Getting rid of him changes nothing. And btw, someone worse than Trump will be the next Republican president, as is tradition. Every Republican president has been worse than the last, while the Democrats have only been seat warmers fixing messes and accomplishing nothing in between.
I think this OP is probably about six weeks too late to be relevant. At least according to Matt Yglesias, not an early fan of Biden: Joe Biden Has a Plan For That
You can check Yglesias’ accuracy by taking a look at Biden’s campaign “Vision” page: https://joebiden.com/joes-vision/
But the most important consideration for Biden’s agenda is whether he gets the Congress he needs:
I think that Trump is going to try and co-opt this idea of returning to normal. Returning to normal means different things to each side. The Republicans will be seeking a return to before COVID-19. Non-Republicans will want to go back to before Trump. Sure, there may be things about the federal government that people disliked, but right now most people would sure like a functioning central authority. In that sense, I think “going back to normal” might be a strong call to action.
I don’t know how Biden expresses that, however. He has certainly made an impression by acting presidential, while Trump continues to actively avoid that. Biden will need something more. Right now, Biden is really suffering because he has no plans, and that’s becoming more and more obvious. He needs to start standing for something, rather than simply not being Trump.
I genuinely wonder how close they are to saying he’d Make America Great Again.
This is the sort of comment that I saw and heard a lot of in 2016, before Election Day and in the “analyses” afterward. It was egregiously wrong then and was part of the insidious false wisdom that helped elect Donald Trump. It’s even more horribly misguided now.
Now, I understand that Sunny Daze posted only three minutes after I gave a link to Joe Biden’s website where he describes the pretty detailed plans Sunny says he doesn’t have, and where I linked an article literally titled “Joe Biden Has A Plan For That”, but given that everyone posting in these political threads has a stated interest in this election and has demonstrable internet access and their own agency, I’d like to ask those of you not in the Trump camp to Do The Research instead of repeating false and horribly damaging “wisdom” about what’s
Again, this sort of disinformation helped elect the criminal POTUS and the criminal Republican Senate majority we’re currently suffering from. It would be grand if my friends on the left stopped helping them.
Imo there are two groups Biden really needs to do well with to win. Liberals, and swing voting college educated white voters in the suburbs (white suburban types who voted republican but are now having second thoughts)
Maybe the second group would be open to his let’s return to normal agenda but the first would not. The first group feels the country has been broken for years and all we get is lip service and token reforms.
However I think the liberals will vote for Biden no matter what, they just won’t be enthusiastic voting in 2020 and they’ll probably sit out in 2022.
Not sure how white suburban voters will feel.
Anyway I think Biden would win in 2020 with that message (or any message really) and then lose congress in 2022.
At this point, I think Biden’s strongest issue is the leadership question. Trump has shown he doesn’t have it. Biden needs to ask people “What happens if Trump get re-elected and we have another serious crisis in the next four years? Do you want to go through all of this again?”
At this point I honestly believe Biden’s best hope of winning is simply to promise to continue giving people stimulus checks.
The genie is out of the bottle with this and people aren’t going to want to go back to not getting those checks ever again. It’s a very simple and direct issue and there isn’t shit anyone can do to talk themselves out of not agreeing with it. You could say it’s bribing the electorate but I don’t really give a fuck.
“Remember how awesome that was? I’m going to make it a recurring thing.” It’s not really possible to have a better concept to campaign on.
Putting aside the fact that it’s bad idea, how is it an issue Biden wins? Trump can match any promise Biden makes. Trump can even promise more than Biden does because Trump is less tied down by issues like telling the truth or understanding the real world. If Biden goes stupid and promises everyone a $1200 check every month, Trump will just outstupid him and promise everyone a $12,000 check every week. If this election gets decided on the basis of who can tell the biggest and dumbest lies, Trump’s a lock.
Thanks to xenophon41 for a reality-based post. Another thread has turned into a “Trump/Biden == Same/Same” echo chamber. And some Bernie-brats are planning to stay home rather than vote for the “right-wing” Joe Biden. :smack:
I’ve about given up on Millennial Democrats coming to their senses.
You’re welcome, and I invite everyone to join me and thee in posting primary source citations and factual reporting on Biden and Democratic Party platforms. Because the real policy agenda is never going to be shown on television or accurately described in opinion pieces.
Just as HRC found in the 2016 campaign, the candidate can give a two hour speech or interview, speaking substantively on all policy issues important to voters and the “news” report will provide a three minute story on a five second sound bite about Trump.
In depth reporting and fact-based policy discussions do in fact abound within available media platforms. But they require some work on the part of the consumer, unlike the pithy and portable cynicism available through social media and unlike the superficial segments on the major media infotainment venues.
I hope we can all be smarter than we were four years ago (myself definitely included).
How is it is a stupid idea? A UBI during the pandemic has support across the ideological spectrum- from Rashida Talib to Andrew Yang to Justin Amash. It has majority support among voters, and it would guarantee containment of the virus as millions of people wouldn’t need to leave the house for work. Just because the dinosaurs that run our only 2 political parties refuse to even acknowledge UBI’s growing support does not make it a stupid idea. They refuse to acknowledge a lot of things, including reality.
Anyway, Trump wouldn’t “outstupid” a Biden UBI proposal, because ultimately he is McConnell’s loud but well-behaved pet. Trump has wanted a massive & expensive infrastructure bill for years, and Pelosi has even recently been dangling the prospect of such a bill in front of his face to entice him. Cocaine Mitch simply says “no” and our imbecile president demurs and stays silent about infrastructure spending, as he was trained to do. Trump would never support any sort of UBI for that reason.
Matt Yglesias is at best a political pundit whose sole job is cheerleading for Democrats. If that’s who is considered a fact-based policy reporter… Ooo boy, we’re in trouble.
Here’s some other articles, all from the current campaign season, along with (as posted before) Biden’s self-stated agenda. Don’t take Yglesias’ word for it (I didn’t either).
Fact check it. There’s plenty of sources out there to find official, non-speculative agendas. You can navigate the internets, right?