[Game Thread]Democratic Presidential Debate 2020, July 30 & 31

[Somewhatconcerned]

And calling them all deplorable and uneducated animals doesn’t help.

But it's ok when Trump's supporters call Democrats the "true enemies of America" and Trump retweets it?

I also never understood by supposedly being such an "anti-PC" crowd why they have such thin skin.

[szechuan]

I don't get why private healthcare has to die for public healthcare to be a thing. In most of Europe you can have both, you are just obliged to pay into public healthcare as well and when you want something done that is covered by public but want to do it in private, there are ways to get partial public coverage and just pay the remainder.
It's not really THAT complex and everyone gets what they want; Private healthcare can compete with public healthcare on a fair ground and attract wealthier customers by offering things public healthcare will not (mostly better accommodations and priority service).

I'm sure you can still get Supplemental Care (private Health Insurance) under Warrens or Sanders plan which is what Canada and UK have.

[Skroe]

This entire Medicare for all discussion misses the most important subject of it:

how do you get it past Moscow Mitch's blockade, which he will have as Senate Majority leader OR Senate Minority leader, unless Democrats get 60 votes, which they wont.

(and there aren't 51 votes for eliminating the filibuster on legislation too, so forget that).

Before we discuss what any damn plan covers or how it would be paid for, what's the plan to not get it laughed out of Mitch McConnell's office? Or hell, get it past the secretary on the way INTO the office?

If you think taking to the streets, marching on the national mall, signing petitions and making memes is going to do anything to change his position, you haven't met the closest thing America's seen to Tywin Lannister in 100 years.

[Wyrt]

I would guess the plan is to wait for Mitch to go and all the while use the GOP's denying people better healthcare as a bludgeon to hammer the GOP all over the country. The more you discuss versions of healthcare and the better you present them to the american people as actionable plans that will not cost them significantly, the more damage the GOP does to itself when it attacks such plans.

Yep. Healthcare discussion will never go anywhere otherwise. Let the Democrats try to pass it and have Mitch block it, then beat the GOP to death with it.

[Skroe]

I would guess the plan is to wait for Mitch to go and all the while use the GOP's denying people better healthcare as a bludgeon to hammer the GOP all over the country. The more you discuss versions of healthcare and the better you present them to the american people as actionable plans that will not cost them significantly, the more damage the GOP does to itself when it attacks such plans.

Yeah that's not a plan. That's a procrastination.

Here's the dirty little fact about Healthcare and Obamacare.

Pre-Obamacare, when 15% of Americans were without Healthcare, and 85% of Americans had it (either Medicare/Medicaid State aid or Employer provided), that 85% was perfectly content to let the 15% rot. For many years before. During. And after. The Democratic dream before Obamacare was "Universal Healthcare", code word for healthcare for everyone. It didn't really say a lot about premium, or what people got specifically. Just that they had it.

Obamacare was mostly about expanding coverage. Reducing costs to everyday people was done as a side thing. Reducing cost to government was a side thing. The motivating factor was trim that 15% number. And it did, to like 7%. Everything serviced that. And Americans didn't care for it, until they became acquainted with the most popular provision, which is the ban denial for pre-existing conditions.

Americans care about their fellow man in the abstract. But when it comes time to put money down to help their fellow man, most Americans don't really care to do that.

Which gets us back to the so-called plan above. it won't work. Because most the GOP counter message, which _will_ work, is that Democrats will fuck up your healthcare in the process of changing it. And that'll be more than enough to turn that so-called hammer in a pillow. Because Americans aren't thinking about their fellow man, but themselves and for the most part, they'll be content with the healthcare they have and know, rather than the one they could have.

This selfless version of the American people? The voted the Democrats into oblivion in 2010 and 2014 because in the end, it is all about them, and not the guy next to them. So to hope for some grand act of national pressure, particularly in the Senate where less populated and more conservative states can command a majority is a really, really, really bad strategy.

As for waiting out Mitch McConnell? He'll be around until the day he dies. And his successor, which he'll choose, will be him but younger. This is the highly ideological GOP, not the compromise one. There won't be any Bill Frists and Bob Doles. They';ll be Trent Lotts and Mitch McConnells. Look at John Thune. That's the future.

It'll be "no, and too fucking bad" until Democrats can somehow come to a compromise with the Republicans, or get 60 votes.

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Yep. Healthcare discussion will never go anywhere otherwise. Let the Democrats try to pass it and have Mitch block it, then beat the GOP to death with it.

It's not nearly the weapon you think or hope.

https://news.gallup.com/poll/245195/...ositively.aspx




So much for the weapon to beat the GOP to death with. It has all the potency of Strom Thurmond's mummified schlong.

Oh and that was taken during the 2018 election btw.

The GOP message of "Democrats are fucking with the healthcare that YOU ALREADY HAVE AND LIKE" will be powerful and will be successful, because Americans don't give a crap about the 20% of National Adults who don't think their Healthcare quality is excellent or good, or the 31% who don't think their coverage is excellent or good.

The American body politic as a whole, will let them drown in bills and drown in health issues, and not give a fig. That is the country we live in. It cares, so long as it is cheap. And before you say differently, I'll just point to the even more long term and somewhat less complicated problem of homelessness in the richest and most developed country the world's ever known. Americans never want affordable housing anywhere NEAR them, and rather not pay for it in general. Progressive do. Americans as a whole do not. Expanding affordable housing, up to this point, has not been a vote getter. The default American position is: "we're all in this together, unless I have to pay more or it inconveniences me. In that case good luck".

Neither has been making healthcare better for for people. Because most people (A) have had healthcare one way for another, before Obamacare was an idea and (B) are reasonably happy with it.

The winning argument... the ONLY winning argument, is one to make healthcare cheaper. That could be an effective tool for Democrats to a degree. Obama tried it with Obamacare. It didn't really work politically, because the cost controls were indirect in nature. But there are more on the nose ways of doing it (government sets service costs, like Japan).

But this idea you have that Americans will take to the streets and to the polls over a healthcare issue that, as they perceive it, would largely not benefit them directly? Yeah. It's not a weapon. It's not even a threat. McConnell and co would love you to try. It's a terrible misreading of the mood of Americans to think the ideological desire for Medicare for All by progressive translates into the makings of a popular national movement. Republicans would see that top line: 80% and 69%, and laugh their way to win after win with it by posing it as an issue of the status quo, which Americans know and like, versus scary change and all that comes with it. Americans reliably vote for the status quo.

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Oh and before some knuckledragging buffoon (not you of course Wyrt) reading my reply comes in with "well you conservative just don't want M4A"... I've (A) talked at length about healthcare position (which is, bring Japan's here) before and (B) am not even discussing how M4A would work, but rather how the process of making it happen via the US Senate would go. Which is to say, it wouldn't. Not within any reasonable future political horizon.

It's cold water on a thread with a discussion that's gotten absolutely fantastical. Hey guys, I absolute adore talking about how the US will go too Mars one day. I can describe how many launches it'll take to build the vehicle, the whole mission architecture, what they'll do, the time table. The engines. The ships. But unless I can offer up something rock solid about how the damn thing would be paid for it's just a dream and nothing more. And right now, NASA, with about $22 billion a year give or take isn't going to Mars anytime soon without a lot more money that Congress won't give it. So I kind of don't waste my time. The Mars ship would need nuclear engines. Those are not being paid for. Ergo, we're not going to Mars until Congress approves them, which earliest, won't be until late this decade.

With M4a, it is not happening, until the Congress - namely the Senate - votes in favor of it. That needs 60 votes. You have a Republican Party that will pretty much never go for it. So let's save the dreaming about if supplemental insurance will be allowed for another day.

Your problem is McConnell and the Senate he leads.

Saint Sanders will get elected.
Pelosi will have a larger House.
And McConnell will paint Sanders as Lenin+Castro+Mao, weaponize the healthcare argument in a way that alienates suburban swing voters from Democrats, and watch as he grows his Senate majority in 2022. That's how this works, if you just assume your righteous argument has currency for all Americans.

[Gestopft]

I don't get why private healthcare has to die for public healthcare to be a thing. In most of Europe you can have both, you are just obliged to pay into public healthcare as well and when you want something done that is covered by public but want to do it in private, there are ways to get partial public coverage and just pay the remainder.
It's not really THAT complex and everyone gets what they want; Private healthcare can compete with public healthcare on a fair ground and attract wealthier customers by offering things public healthcare will not (mostly better accommodations and priority service).

Firstly, there are certainly people in the Progressive wing of the Democratic Party that see a role for private insurance as supplemental, sort of in a manner like you mentioned, but I think there's a few differences in how our system has evolved that might make a "private on top of public" harder to sell, or harder to transition to. So to attempt to answer you:

1) Most people with private insurance get it through their employer- which is just an objectively poor system- but major changes to insurance, such as converting employer-sponsored insurance into a marketplace or introducing a competing public option would in all likelihood cause large ripples in the private insurance market.

2) After the fate of "if you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor," there is a particular sensitivity to how changes to insurance (such as those above) would potentially alter provider networks. A competing public option may very well result in a lot of employers steering their employees towards that if it's cheaper for the company. The easiest way to avoid people having to change providers would be to have a universal 'network' with Medicare as the insurance. Leaving much of a role for private insurance, wherein providers (or employees) could choose to take only public, only private, or both (however that would work) could potentially result in more people having to switch providers.

3) Healthcare is really, really expensive here. When you tell people that are already struggling with the prices of premiums, deductibles, copays etc. that you have this idea where you can get health insurance on top of your health insurance, the costs will sound outrageous to people whose reference point is the insane prices of American healthcare.

4) Switching to any sort of publicly-provided health insurance will require convincing people that not only will the costs go down, but that quality won't. Running on a "and you can also buy supplemental insurance" doesn't exactly make the quality argument sound confident.

5) Many of the politicians with the strongest support for public healthcare are appealing to people's (justified) frustration with the healthcare status quo- those that build support by using insurance companies as a foil don't have a lot to gain by carving out a role for them in their policies.

6) Sanders has set the tone for this discussion, so the public consciousness in the healthcare debate (at least on the Democratic side) is largely occupying an arena he built.

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Yeah that's not a plan. That's a procrastination.

The strategy appears to be waiting for enough Baby Boomers to die off.

[Skroe]

The strategy appears to be waiting for enough Baby Boomers to die off.

Yeah that's not gonna work either. The boomers said the same thing on foreign and economic policy, with regards to the Greatest Generation. Then the Boomers decided to become their parents and launch the War on Terror and cause the biggest financial Crisis since the 1930s.

Generation X and Millennials will likely be more liberal than their parents, but what that's going to do is shift what is defined as a liberal and what is defined as a conservative, and rather than some grand unifying political moment, disagreements will turn into divisions will turn into canyons. From a political angle, if the Democratic Party of mid 2030s looks like Elizabeth Warren, then the Republican Party could very well look like Steve Bullock. I don't want to repost my old post, but let's recall the fundamental scrambling of political allegiances from around 1960 through 1980, where what being a Democrat and being a Republican meant fundamentally shifted and people shifted with them. Lots of people in the Democratic Party besides Elisabeth Warren "used to be a Conservative". And well, we have a name for ex-Kennedy Democrats... "Neoconservatives".

The waiting game is another "I hope" moment and it's going to end in disappointment too.

[Draco-Onis]

Yeah that's not gonna work either. The boomers said the same thing on foreign and economic policy, with regards to the Greatest Generation. Then the Boomers decided to become their parents and launch the War on Terror and cause the biggest financial Crisis since the 1930s.

Generation X and Millennials will likely be more liberal than their parents, but what that's going to do is shift what is defined as a liberal and what is defined as a conservative, and rather than some grand unifying political moment, disagreements will turn into divisions will turn into canyons. From a political angle, if the Democratic Party of mid 2030s looks like Elizabeth Warren, then the Republican Party could very well look like Steve Bullock. I don't want to repost my old post, but let's recall the fundamental scrambling of political allegiances from around 1960 through 1980, where what being a Democrat and being a Republican meant fundamentally shifted and people shifted with them. Lots of people in the Democratic Party besides Elisabeth Warren "used to be a Conservative". And well, we have a name for ex-Kennedy Democrats... "Neoconservatives".

The waiting game is another "I hope" moment and it's going to end in disappointment too.

I don't think you should discount the possibility that this never happens and the republican party remains the party of Trump while another third party rises to fill the void. Your prediction is something I would have agreed with before the radical shift after Obama right now I don't see how the GOP can come back from this ledge. It simply doesn't look like they have the leadership to do this pretty much all of them have become Trump slaves and the base along with it. That radical fanatical base is not going to vanish after Trump is gone if anything it's bound to get more radicalized.

I just don't see people like you going home.

[Skroe]

I don't think you should discount the possibility that this never happens and the republican party remains the party of Trump while another third party rises to fill the void. Your prediction is something I would have agreed with before the radical shift after Obama right now I don't see how the GOP can come back from this ledge. It simply doesn't look like they have the leadership to do this pretty much all of them have become Trump slaves and the base along with it. That radical fanatical base is not going to vanish after Trump is gone if anything it's bound to get more radicalized.

I just don't see people like you going home.

Oh that's certain possible of course. I was merely offering one angle to it. You're offering the other here. On this topic though, I'll say again, we should not discount American's remarkable ability to retcon their personal histories and move with the flow of public sentiment. Remember, everyone was for the Iraq War, before everyone was against it. Everyone was for fighting terrorism wherever it may lie, before they were against it. Everyone was government deregulation and tax cuts, but they were against it.

These things that happened in the 1990s and 2000s were done by Democrats and Republicans alike, because they were broadly popular and electoral winners. They didn't get here because Republicans made them possible. Democrats authored their fair share of it all, and Democratic voters rewarded them for it.

People, of course, have a right to change their mind. But Americans go a step further and change their history to always be on the right side of the issue.

As I said, I think it's going to happen with Donald Trump. Oh don't get me wrong. The Republican Party will be much further right post-Trump than it was 10 years ago, but the petty corruption, the crudeness, the whole Royal Tenenbaums act with his whole stupid family, the Russia hugging, the obviously intentional cruelty... that's all going to be stuff everyone's neighbor voted for, but never anyone themselves.

Americans of course, won't learn anything from it. I mean we didn't with the War on Terror. We're in Year 19... there hasn't been a major terrorist attack here since 9/11, but some Americans were still so piss-themselves terrified at ISIS that they talked in terms like that the US suffered a major terrorist attack from it.

And now? Nobody thinks about them anymore.

Our ability to forget can be a powerful strength. The British are on the flip side of that. They've navel gazed over the disaster that is the Iraq War since just after the minute it started. In many ways, the road to Brexit began in the Iraq War. Brexit, Corbyn, May and now Johnson are like a national pennance for a people so convinced at the enormity of their fuckups, they're ready to retire to a small English village and quietly end it all. America's ability to forget is a source of regeneration that pushes us over some real shit.

But it also means that there is no ownership of mistakes and no learning from them, as the next financial crisis will illustrate.

As for me, as I've stated before, I'll never go back to the Republican Party, until every individual who had anything to do with Trump is out of it. Apology isn't enough. It's a career ending failure. So long as it continues to be some no-knowing workers / Neo-Confederate / luddite-ignoramus rural party, they can eat shit.

Who can tell the future? But I wouldn't doubt that a growing Democratic Party eventually fissures into a de-facto new Republican Party and a more Progressive Democratic Party. If Biden wins, progressives will have lost their chance for years to come, but will stay in coalition in the hopes of influencing outcomes. If Biden loses, progressives will have an "We are right!" moment and demand sole decision making on the party future but it will also render it impossible for centrist Democrats to stay in a coalition with a left-wing Democratic leadership. This is basically what happened during and after 1968.

[tyrlaan]

It's more a function of that M4A is not really that popular with the general populace and is something that will probably be a political poison pill during the general.

I don't think that's true?

M4A is quite popular. What's effective, however, is fear mongering. So politicians drum up the fear over losing existing health insurance. Despite the fact that everyone knows our current system is broken af, they get scared into thinking that loss of their current insurance would be a bad thing.

It's not that dissimilar to the BS talking point that M4A will make your taxes go up. Well, duh, yeah, but you save how much on premiums, deductibles, medical bills, etc. that it's a net decrease in costs. But no, we need to focus on stoking fear that middle class taxes will be more and not provide any context.

[Cthulhu 2020]

@Dacien - even high profile and respected democrats are starting to sound the alarm. David Axelrod is one of them. I don’t agree with his politics, but he is politically savvy. He’s trying to warn the left about these far left policies, policies that have little support in middle America.

I like my employer sponsored healthcare.

Ugh, this is going to sound so bad to some
here. I don’t reply to the flaming crap, not worth my time.

I worked my arse off to get what I have. Sacrificed a lot to have the healthcare coverage I currently have, which carries into retirement supplementing Medicare.

Why should I have to give up my coverage for government run coverage?

Typical right versus left argument, I know.

I read the replies above; there’s no way a government run plan is better than me having private employer sponsored coverage.

"I worked hard to get what is considered mediocre average health care by first world standards, so we shouldn't have to improve the country as a whole because I suffered some to get where I am and I'd feel as if my efforts were for nothing if the country was better for everyone!"

Not to dunk on you bro but yeah that's about as lukewarm a right wing response as you can give.

Medicare runs fantastically. Everyone under it fucking loves it. It works amazingly well.

As for how to pay for it, we could start by repealing the Trump tax cuts on the ultra wealthy and corporations, keeping middle class tax cuts. Then repeal the Bush tax cuts on corporations. Then repeal the Clinton tax cuts on corporations.

Trump's increased the budget tremendously, like, massively. Nobody's asking how we're going to pay for all of the excess debt he's racking up. Not even the Democrats. That tends to be a Republican only thing because they believe having a higher tax than 5% on the ultra wealthy and corporations is "stealing" while a 30% tax on the middle class is just fine.

[Draco-Onis]

Oh that's certain possible of course. I was merely offering one angle to it. You're offering the other here. On this topic though, I'll say again, we should not discount American's remarkable ability to retcon their personal histories and move with the flow of public sentiment. Remember, everyone was for the Iraq War, before everyone was against it. Everyone was for fighting terrorism wherever it may lie, before they were against it. Everyone was government deregulation and tax cuts, but they were against it.

These things that happened in the 1990s and 2000s were done by Democrats and Republicans alike, because they were broadly popular and electoral winners. They didn't get here because Republicans made them possible. Democrats authored their fair share of it all, and Democratic voters rewarded them for it.

People, of course, have a right to change their mind. But Americans go a step further and change their history to always be on the right side of the issue.

As I said, I think it's going to happen with Donald Trump. Oh don't get me wrong. The Republican Party will be much further right post-Trump than it was 10 years ago, but the petty corruption, the crudeness, the whole Royal Tenenbaums act with his whole stupid family, the Russia hugging, the obviously intentional cruelty... that's all going to be stuff everyone's neighbor voted for, but never anyone themselves.

Americans of course, won't learn anything from it. I mean we didn't with the War on Terror. We're in Year 19... there hasn't been a major terrorist attack here since 9/11, but some Americans were still so piss-themselves terrified at ISIS that they talked in terms like that the US suffered a major terrorist attack from it.

And now? Nobody thinks about them anymore.

Our ability to forget can be a powerful strength. The British are on the flip side of that. They've navel gazed over the disaster that is the Iraq War since just after the minute it started. In many ways, the road to Brexit began in the Iraq War. Brexit, Corbyn, May and now Johnson are like a national pennance for a people so convinced at the enormity of their fuckups, they're ready to retire to a small English village and quietly end it all. America's ability to forget is a source of regeneration that pushes us over some real shit.

But it also means that there is no ownership of mistakes and no learning from them, as the next financial crisis will illustrate.

As for me, as I've stated before, I'll never go back to the Republican Party, until every individual who had anything to do with Trump is out of it. Apology isn't enough. It's a career ending failure. So long as it continues to be some no-knowing workers / Neo-Confederate / luddite-ignoramus rural party, they can eat shit.

Who can tell the future? But I wouldn't doubt that a growing Democratic Party eventually fissures into a de-facto new Republican Party and a more Progressive Democratic Party. If Biden wins, progressives will have lost their chance for years to come, but will stay in coalition in the hopes of influencing outcomes. If Biden loses, progressives will have an "We are right!" moment and demand sole decision making on the party future but it will also render it impossible for centrist Democrats to stay in a coalition with a left-wing Democratic leadership. This is basically what happened during and after 1968.

I agree with you on a lot of points especially the last, one way or another this election will decide the future of the democratic party.

[Michh]

Why are you ignoring the fact that these alleged "Normal everyday americans" who voted for Trump are uneducated non College Graduates?

Neither does educating them as they keep on spouting typical Trump Rhetoric and talking points and are unwilling to listen whatsoever.

I’m not sure exactly what you’d like me to say about UP voting mostly for Trump. Their vote counts as much as EP does. Unless you think that everyone that didn’t go to college is a complete moron and shouldn’t be allowed to vote, which is wrong on both accounts. Going to college doesn’t necessarily make you smarter than people who don’t. Some people are just dumb, period. I didn’t go to college and I’ll put my job and yearly income up against anyone, and it took a lot of hard work to get here.

I’m not sure it’s fair to judge people based on their level of education alone. Plenty people I know didn’t go to school, but they’re making 150-200k every year and will be millionaires when they retire.

What makes someone with a degree in social justice any better than the other person?

Also, your problem (and others) is you seem to think of people don’t support your person and your policies, then it’s obvious they’re gun toting, backwards ass rednecks who are too stupid to make the right decision.

I honestly don’t know what to tell you, other than come down off your righteous high horse and meet middle America and maybe you’ll get a feel for why people disagree with you. It takes something you (and others) currently do not have; rationale.

It’s the exact reason I am often here reading these forums, forums that are mostly left wing. And not just left wing, but full blown socialist left wing.

[szechuan]

I’m not sure exactly what you’d like me to say about UP voting mostly for Trump. Their vote counts as much as EP does.

You said

It’s so very telling that none on the left get Trumps appeal to normal everyday Americans.

There's absolutely no reason for any Democrat to appeal to Trump Voters.

I’m not sure it’s fair to judge people based on their level of education alone.

You're the one wanting to Judge others in Education on the border why not in Politics?

Plenty people I know didn’t go to school, but they’re making 150-200k every year and will be millionaires when they retire.

Your point being? Trump is a Narcissistic Person with a weak comprehension on the English language as well as a poor understanding of History and he's Rich.

What makes someone with a degree in social justice any better than the other person?

When someone doesn't follow a Toxic Racist like Trump?

Also, your problem (and others) is you seem to think of people don’t support your person and your policies, then it’s obvious they’re gun toting, backwards ass rednecks who are too stupid to make the right decision.

If you think this is solely about Policy you are wrong, Trump Fans should stop acting Racist and Toxic like Trump.

I honestly don’t know what to tell you, other than come down off your righteous high horse and meet middle America and maybe you’ll get a feel for why people disagree with you. It takes something you (and others) currently do not have; rationale.

Righteous High horse for pointing out that Trump and his followers are Toxic Racists?

It’s the exact reason I am often here reading these forums, forums that are mostly left wing. And not just left wing, but full blown socialist left wing.

Good for you?

[tyrlaan]

It’s the exact reason I am often here reading these forums, forums that are mostly left wing. And not just left wing, but full blown socialist left wing.

Ha.

I think you'll find that people that claim that these forums have a distinct political slant will claim that said slant is towards the ideology they hate the most.

[Ghostpanther]

I did not watch the debates. But from what I have read, the highlights and comments from Democratic political strategists, Joe Biden was the winner.

[kaelleria]

I did not watch the debates. But from what I have read, the highlights and comments from Democratic political strategists, Joe Biden was the winner.

He's the winner as much as he came in with a big lead and will probably still have a big lead coming out of it... He did ok, which is really all he needed to do. Night 2 did not have a clear winner, unlike Night 1.

[JohnBrown1917]

You’re not missing anything. Because of Bernie’s success in 2015 most candidates believe they have to pander to the far left with socialist ideas to win the nomination. Then they’ll make the ultimate pivot to the center in the general election. So, they can’t be seen on record as 100% supporting those polices, and they perform mental gymnastics trying to support not support these positions that have very low support with middle America.

lol imagine thinking bernie or single-payer is socialist/far left.


Why cant dems be the way you folk think they are?

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There's absolutely no reason for any Democrat to appeal to Trump Voters.

With the low voter turn-out in the lower classes in the US(below 50%!) you'd figure that trying to get that vote would be a winning strategy. But instead you get conservative liberals trying to argue you need to get Trump voters.

[Thekri]

He's the winner as much as he came in with a big lead and will probably still have a big lead coming out of it... He did ok, which is really all he needed to do. Night 2 did not have a clear winner, unlike Night 1.

That is all Biden really needs though. He knows what his strengths are, and he doesn't want to rock the boat. What a lot of people who are heavily invested in politics don't seem to realize is that Biden's support really has very little to do with Joe Biden, his base is the people that just really want Obama back. That is why are these attacks on Biden's record isn't really registering in the polls. They don't care, they just want that face in the White House because they are comfortable with that and don't really want anything new or different.

Which hilariously makes Biden's campaign pretty much the polar opposite of what got Obama elected in the first place. Don't underestimate the value of voters who don't care about politics. It is why Yang will lose, he is overestimating voters. Biden isn't, all he needs to do is stay familiar and friendly looking.

[Drutt]

It was better than NBC where Chuck Todd had more talk time than 1/2 the candidates...

No argument there, but we can hold the bar far higher than that!

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The British are on the flip side of that. They've navel gazed over the disaster that is the Iraq War since just after the minute it started. In many ways, the road to Brexit began in the Iraq War. Brexit, Corbyn, May and now Johnson are like a national pennance for a people so convinced at the enormity of their fuckups, they're ready to retire to a small English village and quietly end it all. America's ability to forget is a source of regeneration that pushes us over some real shit.

This is absolutely incorrect. The Iraq War was in no shape or form a driving force for Brexit.

It's the result of decades of successive governments blaming the EU for failed domestic policies that have nothing to do with the EU, decades of newspaper misinformation campaigns, lack of education regarding the actual function of the EU, desperation after austerity (see: failed domestic policies) and flat out lying on the part of the Leave campaign. It's the result of older boomers, who didn't fight in the World Wars, voting for with their nostalgia for a time before the EU (most of those survivors of those who took part in WW2 voted Remain). It's the result of scaremongering over immigration, a trend going back decades all the way to Enoch Powell's "Rivers of Blood" speech.

Literally no one I know has ever, ever seen it or spoke of it as a way to avoid another Iraq. Linking Brexit to Iraq is just people trying to turn 2+2 into 5. The biggest faction who voted for Brexit (older cultural conservatives and Eurosceptics) were overwhelmingly in favour of the Iraq War, and surprise surprise, read the same "newspapers" (term used loosely) that wholeheartedly supported it back in the day.

This idea that the UK population is hand-wringing about Iraq is truly strange. Practically no one talks about it outside of an inevitable occasional swipe at Blair, and not because they're guilty about it. There's no ongoing obsession and no lingering guilt in the general public. It's even more bizarre to try and link it as a direct cause of Brexit, and that does a huge disservice to the actual underlying causes which have roots stemming from before the 1970s.