Mega-Thread: 2020 United States General Election

[starlord]

so i guess the only thing people can come up with to attack biden & harris is disingenuous "both sides!!" as america is ravaged by plague & unrest under "i take no responsibility" trump.

[wunksta]

Another notion we'll fundamentally disagree on. Nothing further to debate here.

It's the 4 boxes of liberty.

[Benggaul]

Look up the date for August 8th 2016 and 2020 and tell me how big the difference in the RCP Average between Trump and the other Candidates. If anything Trump is an incumbent which might actually help him more then in 2016.

I also posted the numbers a few pages back.

Yes, you were neglecting to mention that it was her peak post-convention bump, meaning that Biden is outperforming her even without that benefit.

Again, I'm not advocating for complacency because fortunes can change in an instant and the attack on the process has probably never been as blatant as it is this year, but your claim that they're doing "about the same" is disingenuous.

[DarkTZeratul]

No, it didn't. There were compromises along the way to all of those things. Hell, allowing Jim Crow to last as long as it did WAS the compromise that ended slavery. You couldn't own them, but you could treat them as sub-human still.

Hell, if anything, it was the SOUTH'S refusal to compromise on the issue of slavery that led to the Civil War. The North wasn't taking some sort of principled absolute stance against it. Most people could see that the general attitudes towards slavery would eventually make its ending inevitable, and the South decided that it was their line in the sand and they would refuse to compromise with regards to perpetuating it as an institution, to the degree that they tried to form their own country where they wouldn't have to.

Their refusal to compromise probably hastened the destruction of their position, in fact.

[Thekri]

Such errors can be corrected in much better ways than through a voting box.

Surrendering to corporate dynasties just because the other guy is an outright power-hungry fascist, isn't the answer.

Only in a democracy, that is exactly what it means. The end of all these arguments is someone arguing for authoritarianism because they aren't mature enough to realize that Democracy was never intended to give you exactly what you want.

The point of democracy is to arrive at a comprise we can all live with. Joe Biden is the perfect example of this, very few people are super excited about him, but pretty much everyone can live with him. He is a compromise candidate because Hillary didn't win and Bernie can't win. So yes, right now you can either vote for him or the facist. Because those are the choices that America decided on to run.

A system of government where you get exactly what you want is called a dictatorship, and it is defined by the dictator getting what they want, and everyone else can eat shit. It is the most popular form of government for people who refuse to embrace reality, because they always assume such a government would honor their particular point of view, and they would not be the ones told to eat shit.

That doesn't mean you can't criticize Biden, I hope to spend the next four years criticizing him constantly. It just means compromise is part of the American political system. It means that Biden is going to have to run a country that still has Republicans in it, and it means those republicans will still be doing stuff and fighting for their agenda. It means we will still have corporations and corruption and everything else. Or you could vote for Trump, and we might have none of that stuff after another 4 years.

[starlord]

This is just pedantic at this point.

A voting bloc or a voting boycott is just one of the many ways in which you can have your voice heard -outside- of the voting box.

And that is what was being argued here.

The first ridiculous notion was that only voting is a form of expressing yourself.

It objectively isn't, and people provided ample examples in which political pressure can be exercised -outside of- voting. Their examples were not the only way and there is not even a need to go into the details of all the ways in which it can be done, that is out-of-scope. The point was proven, those who brought forth the idea that "only voting is a form of expression" have shot down their argument themselves by providing specific but not exclusive examples in which it can happen.

is that why all the non votes for bernie enabled his election?
your promotion of doublethink is telling.

[RadasNoir]

Probably not as much as all the dead Iraqi's who died from Biden vote, or those scared children who constantly had to wonder if a predator drone was about to take out their whole family thanks to Obama expansion of a program that has killed numerous innocents.

I assume that means you voted for McCain in 2008 and Romney in 2012?

Or has impotently screaming "None of you are pure!!" from the sidelines been a life-long career for you?

[DarkTZeratul]

The same way the BLM movement brought change. Not through lining up in voting boots, but by taking to the streets.

And if you refuse to vote, and Trump wins a second term, exactly how receptive do you think they'll be to your protests? Will they give you what you want and institute progressive policies? Or will they shoot you with tear gas and continue to fuck you in the ass even harder while actively setting back your cause by years?

[beanman12345]

And if you refuse to vote, and Trump wins a second term, exactly how receptive do you think they'll be to your protests? Will they give you what you want and institute progressive policies? Or will they shoot you with tear gas and continue to fuck in the ass even harder while actively setting your cause back by years?

My displeasure with the Democratic Party's establishment is indeed so great that I'd not be upset if Trump won the elections again in 2020.

just putting this out there Rochana the guy is a non us citizen who said he'd come to the us to vote for trump.

[Mihalik]

Another notion we'll fundamentally disagree on. Nothing further to debate here.

So you're one of those Viva la Revolution Tankies or what?

You do understand that in America once the fascists got hold of the full might of the state/military industrial complex and dismantled all the inbuilt checks the game is over?

3 Tankies who once broke a window then circle jerked about it for a month on reddit won't amount to jack shit when the brownshirts come for them...brownshirts backed by an actual tank.

Do you honestly think there were no leftist revolutionaries who thought the exact same thing as you do back in 1932? And most of those lefties were combat veterans.

Get off your fucking delusional horse.

[beanman12345]

So you're one of those Viva la Revolution Tankies or what?

You do understand that in America once the fascists got hold of the full might of the state/military industrial complex and dismantled all the inbuilt checks the game is over?

3 Tankies who once broke a window then circle jerked about it for a month on reddit won't amount to jack shit when the brownshirts come for them...brownshirts backed by an actual tank.

Do you honestly think there were no leftist revolutionaries who thought the exact same thing as you do back in 1932? And most of those lefties were combat veterans.

Get off your fucking delusional horse.

Until then, I honestly don't care about anything else much. Until then it can all burn down to the ground for all I care.

Viva la Revolution!!!!

[Mihalik]

I disagree strongly.

In my opinion BLM brought more change over the past few months through taking to the streets than any election and voting has done the past few decades.

None of that change amounts to anything once the brownshirts start shooting people and there's no one to stop them. Do you fucking get that?

[Edge-]

Just a question.

How long does this line of reasoning hold up?

The year is 2024. Your options are for voting between a Democrat who is only 60% like Trump vs. Trump Jr. of the Republican Party.
The year is 2028. Your options are voting between a Democrat who is only 90% like Trump vs. Trump Jr. who arguably is 125% as fascist as Trump was.
The year is 2032. Your options are voting between a Democrat who is 101% like Trump, but luckily he is not as bad as Clinton Jr. a republican who believes he can gain the most votes by being 200% as obnoxious as Trump.

At some point having no principles at all and just voting for the lesser evil is going make you end up with the evil you always tried to avoid.

I mean, the Democratic party continues to trend leftward.

https://www.politifact.com/factcheck...ve-obama-says/

If you compare Biden’s platform to an absolute concept of liberalism, it is the most progressive. Tracking shifts within his party, Biden has moved to the left compared with where Obama and some previous Democratic nominees stood.

Biden, a centrist Democrat, is running on a more progressive platform rather than a more conservative platform, but here you are arguing that Democrats are running to the right.

In his own time, though, Biden is hardly in his party’s ideological vanguard, at least compared with previous nominees such as George McGovern.

He's not the most progressive ever in context, but the arc is bending towards the left if you look at where the Democratic party is now compared to say, the 90's.

[Hadriker]

This is just pedantic at this point.



It objectively isn't, and people provided ample examples in which political pressure can be exercised -outside of- voting. Their examples were not the only way and there is not even a need to go into the details of all the ways in which it can be done, that is out-of-scope. The point was proven, those who brought forth the idea that "only voting is a form of expression" have shot down their argument themselves by providing specific but not exclusive examples in which it can happen.

So which ones are you doing to make sure your voice is heard, to make sure these candidates speak to your issues in order to gain your vote?

You seem to be dodging what should be an easily answerable question if you were actually serious about using your vote in this way to affect change.

[Mihalik]

Well perhaps the Democratic congress shouldn't have authorized Trump's enhanced spying program passed with Bush Jr. as well as Biden and expanded with Obama.

https://citizentruth.org/democrats-r...ory-of-abuses/

And if Trump wins, in the next 4 years whatever veneer of attempted respectability will be gone, and the handful of guardrails will be dismantled.

Then you can shake your fist at those Democrats 8 years ago while you sit in an overcrowded concentration camp after a good session of enhanced interrogation peppered with a sporadic old school beating.

But let's be honest... That won't happen to you, cuz you'll fall in line and will be reporting your neighbor to the Trumpstapo.

[Benggaul]

I don't see Biden virtual DNC convention being that big of a bump or the bump lasting very long. The biggest news was Harris being picked as VP and a significant percent of the DNC voters are not enthused with Harris. Part of the reason Obama won in 2008 was because he got the Youth Vote out. Now I now many on here want to discredit and disparage younger voters, but from what I'm seeing Millennials will no longer be a small part of the voting block, and Biden picked a candidate that doesn't give them a whole lot of reason to vote. Their reason to vote for Biden is how terrible Trump would be if elected. We tried that strategy and it didn't work out last time. I think it will this time, but doesn't change the perspective.

https://www.pewsocialtrends.org/essa...20-electorate/

You missed the part where I said that that was Hillary's peak and Biden was already performing better without that bump. It's not a matter of whether or not Biden also gets a DNC bump--it's already fairly significantly different from Hillary's run contrary to your statement. I honestly don't really expect much of a fluctuation in his numbers between now and November for the sole reason that the past few years have been polarizing enough that most people have already made up their minds.

The "Youth Vote" has always been sporadic but largely liberal. I don't recall what the numbers were in 2016 but I don't think there was much of a turnout then for their demographic (not sure if "Z" was involved or only "Millennials"...I'm not great at generational cutoffs). They're likely not "enthused" about Biden--but then, hardly any of us here are--but from my experience they're largely not okay with Trump destroying their collective futures either, so I'd say it's a toss-up as to whether or not they'll come out en masse in November. It would certainly be preferable (for a Biden victory) if they did, but I think even if they voted at the 2016 levels it would be a much better chance for Biden than Hillary had in 2016 given how energized Democrats are in general to get that infected pustule out of the White House.

[RadasNoir]

Nope, I voted for Obama in 2008, and I actually bought and believe the Lesser of two evils crap in 2012. Looks like voting for gradually decline makes the country still decline.

The rest of the country doesn't deserve to suffer just because you're mad at your younger self for believing that Obama might have been the One.

[Benggaul]

Only in areas where they’d voted the right people in office. Everywhere else? Nothing has changed. Including on the federal level.

It's also been, sadly, largely cosmetic change. The BLM protests should be incurring large policy changes, but due largely to the GOP Senate majority and the upcoming elections, instead all we're getting is racist statues removed and #BLM hashtags everywhere.

[beanman12345]

Remember back when we were discussing whether it was illegal for the Trump campaign to advise Kanye? Here’s a new piece of analysis that explains how it COULD be illegal.



https://www.washingtonpost.com/polit...th-kanye-west/

If anyone wants the full text, use incognito on chrome.

This is in response to Kushner admitting he met with Kanye in Colorado.

Thank you that was a good read. Not like the DOJ would ever investigate anyways. "Is problematic, at best" yeah, not good.

[Thepersona]

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs...10414013488548


https://foreignpolicy.com/2013/03/01...tion-boycotts/

Removing yourself from the political process only hurts yourself.

My dude, that's exactly what happened here in Chile (in the 2017 elections). The far left boycotted the election, and by result the right wing canidate won, and we're now deep in shit.