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The United States [Election] thread of 2024
Hahnsoo1
Make Ready.We Hunt.Registered User, Moderator, Administrator admin
Make Ready.We Hunt.Registered User, Moderator, Administrator admin
Here it is... your general US election thread for the year 2024. It is a critical election with two fairly unpalatable presidential candidates who should be eating tapioca pudding in a retirement home, who instead will duke it out for control of the free world. US presidential elections as of late have become a stressful and contentious time on these forums, with a lot of infighting and poor posting habits that lead to accounts being jailed and/or banned. The moderators will be watching this thread more closely than any other thread on Debate and Discourse.
Also, a lot of congressional seats and governorships will be elected this year. Feel free to discuss those, but don't be surprised if all the oxygen is sucked out of the room by the presidential election discussion. Some of these side discussions may be easier to do in the appropriate state-level political threads.
General Rules and Posting Guidelines
Most of these rules and guidelines are already standing policy in Debate and Discourse political threads, but they are being reiterated here so you have absolutely no excuse for not knowing them. Some of them are for this specific thread only. You are responsible for these rules and reading the OP (and the entire thread, for that matter) if you want to participate in this discussion.
Who Are The Candidates?
Okay. Stop. Just stop. Get out of the thread. We don't really have time to educate you if you aren't willing to put one iota of research into this topic, or you live under a rock (unlikely, since you post here). If you want to post here, don't do so from a position of ignorance of the very basic topics. For very basic information about the upcoming election (Presidential, Congressional, Gubernatorial, or other), head to Ballotpedia.
Topics to Avoid
Not infractable (EDIT: Okay, maybe a little infractable, as a treat, but we'll give you a warning by default), but generally fruitless avenues of discussion that will get a LOT of side eye from the moderators.
Thread Locks
This thread will almost inevitably get locked due to some sort of infighting or trolling or whatever. When this thread gets locked early, it will be locked for a minimum period of 24 hours (possibly longer based on mod coverage).
New Election Threads
After this thread is locked at 100 pages, the Moderators will create the next OP for the new Election thread. Don't spin up a follow up thread (unless it's about a specific off-topic subject instead of the election, of course). Repeated bad behavior or doomposting may result in thread-kicks being carried over into new Election threads.
Mods will update this OP over time as more things need to be said. We'll hopefully also announce in the thread if there are other rules/guidelines that are being added, but you are responsible for knowing the stuff in this OP.
Also, a lot of congressional seats and governorships will be elected this year. Feel free to discuss those, but don't be surprised if all the oxygen is sucked out of the room by the presidential election discussion. Some of these side discussions may be easier to do in the appropriate state-level political threads.
General Rules and Posting Guidelines
Most of these rules and guidelines are already standing policy in Debate and Discourse political threads, but they are being reiterated here so you have absolutely no excuse for not knowing them. Some of them are for this specific thread only. You are responsible for these rules and reading the OP (and the entire thread, for that matter) if you want to participate in this discussion.
- Be Kind - This is THE most stressful topic for a lot of the posters here. Now is NOT the time to deploy the snark cannon or the condescension engine or "fucking fuck FUCK", no matter how much you dislike another poster. Be gracious. Be kind. Realize that we're all stressed out here.
- Walk Away - If discussion is getting too heated or you find yourself replying to the same person over and over again in a short period of time... maybe you should talk a breather and walk away from the thread for a bit. I encourage folks, if they are getting into a fight here, to just stop posting and do something else. You don't need to win Internet points. It's not worth it.
- Stay On Topic - It's tempting to go down tangents or rabbit holes, but the election thread is bloated and difficult to read as it is. If your commentary does not pertain directly to the 2024 Election, consider making a God Damn Separate Thread.
- No memes or tweets without commentary and sourcing - If you link to a tweet or a screenshot of a tweet, copy and paste the full text of the tweet, and then source the author and why that author is important to listen to. With links being broken to tweets on a constant basis (and Twitter/X no longer working properly anymore, let alone on these forums), this is more important now than it was 4 or 8 years ago. YouTube video links (or Instagram or whatever) should also be sourced with a general synopsis of what's in the video, along with the subject or author of the video and why they are important.
- Limit your quoting and linking of an article - DO give us the source and the author and why it is important. But if you post text from the article, leave it at 3-5 paragraphs, TOPS. 1 paragraph, with relevant sentences bolded, is best. People do NOT need to read the entire article here! They can just follow your link. Give them enough to entice them to read the article, and leave it at that.
- Images should be spoilered - For best posting practices, because images take different formats on different devices, please spoiler tag your images. This includes screenshots of Tweets and Articles. We'll give SOME lee-way about this (not all pics are created equal), but in general, giant images tend to be annoying on mobile, and sometimes smaller images blow up to a large size on desktop. If you do post an image of anything, accompany that image with some commentary or opinion. If you don't have an opinion about it that you are willing to share, you shouldn't be posting it.
- This isn't a comedy standup show - This is not the place to practice your tight five or post a drive-by of a meme and leave it at that. You aren't boomers (the forum is getting old, but not THAT old)... don't just post unfunny political cartoons or a tired Anakin/Padme meme with political text. Don't post drive-by "gotchas" just to rile up the thread. Don't make snarky one-liners as replies. This kind of behavior will get you jailed or banned.
- No doomposting - Look, we get it. The last decade has been rough, and this past year has been ESPECIALLY rough. It's easy to lose hope or to give into despair. What we cannot allow you to do is to spray that all over the forums. We can't provide mental health services for you. This place cannot be the dumping ground for your trauma. Find help and assistance, or find some other social media to use instead of therapy (not recommended, but I know that's what most people do). But you can't do this here, and this will get you thread-kicked.
- No livetweeting events - What we mean by this is that it's pretty annoying to post "Wow, I can't believe he said that!" and not have any reference to who "he" was or what was actually said. If you are posting events happening in real-time at that moment, you better do a good job of identifying a news source that people can look up and the actual content of the events that are happening.
- No relitigating the 2016 Hilary Clinton vs. Donald Trump Election - Look, we know this is one of the prior elections that got us into this mess. But there's nothing we can say about this that hasn't already been repeated and flamed back and forth a hundred times in the past decade. Talk about the present, not the past.
- The use of political violence - This is a long-standing rule on the entire forums, but we cannot allow folks to endorse or imply political actions that result in violence. This includes death threats and threats of violence against public figures.
Who Are The Candidates?
Okay. Stop. Just stop. Get out of the thread. We don't really have time to educate you if you aren't willing to put one iota of research into this topic, or you live under a rock (unlikely, since you post here). If you want to post here, don't do so from a position of ignorance of the very basic topics. For very basic information about the upcoming election (Presidential, Congressional, Gubernatorial, or other), head to Ballotpedia.
Topics to Avoid
Not infractable (EDIT: Okay, maybe a little infractable, as a treat, but we'll give you a warning by default), but generally fruitless avenues of discussion that will get a LOT of side eye from the moderators.
- The results of any individual poll - This is distinct from talking about the accuracy of a given poll result (the infamous biases that exist with phone polling, for example) or discussing the legitimacy of a poll. In general, any single poll is going to be meaningless unless context is given against other similar polls or the methodology/sample size used in the poll. "Latest CNN poll shows..." is pretty useless, and results change on an almost daily basis as part of our cursed 24 hour news cycle.
- In-depth medical discussion about dementia - I know the few of you who are health care professionals and doctors, but the rest of you have no business diagnosing someone who you've never examined with any sort of mental illness or dementia. We get it, they're old. This is a fruitless topic that leads to a lot of dumb things that laypeople say when they read WebMD.
- Palestine/Israel - This is an important topic, but take it to the MENA thread. Folks can post articles about it if it pertains directly to the US elections, but take further discussion to the MENA thread. "I'd like to talk more about this, but let's take it over to the MENA thread." - Use this line. You have permission from me.
- US Immigration policy - Again, an important topic, but take it to the existing Immigration thread. This one is a bit more lax because we're likely to see a lot of arguing about this from the candidates and the US political parties, but in-depth discussion of immigration policy should take place in the Immigration thread.
- Ukraine - In-depth discussion of what's going on in Ukraine should probably be routed to that thread.
- The philosophical principles of voting in general - We have a separate thread for that. It's a garbage fire, but it exists. Have at it over there.
- The usual Leftist vs. Liberal arguments - We know. It's a longstanding thing on these forums. As much as we all enjoy a circular firing-squad (spoiler alert: We don't), if this starts happening, that's the RIGHT time to walk away. Don't escalate. Use the report button. Post about something else. No political affiliation needs you, Joe/Jane Internet, to defend its honor or whatever. This one IS likely to lead to infractions or thread-kicks or a thread lock.
- Project 2025 - Yeah, this is the game plan given by conservative thinktanks in the US if they obtain enough power. But this is all stuff that happens AFTER the election. It's not their game plan for winning this election. There is a current thread about Project 2025, so lead discussion of Project 2025 here.
- Do not keep making the argument that Trump will be worse than Biden - This is 100% obvious. Everyone knows this. You do not need to make this argument. Yet, it keeps getting made. If you feel compelled to say this in the thread for some reason, take a step back and actually listen to what people are saying. Especially don't keep harping about how Trump will be so much worse for the LGBTQ+ members of our forum! This has ONLY led to bloody and pointless arguments that eventually lead to thread locks. No one here is voting for Trump. Whether or not they are voting or voting for Biden is their own personal dilemma and not yours. Do your political canvassing out there in the real world. Note that you can compare the candidates all that you want. But "Trump will be worse", while technically true, tends to be used as a dismissal or rebuff for criticism of Biden, and you can do better than that. Address the criticisms and arguments.
- 7/16/2024 Addedum - The Trump Rally shooting and assassination attempt - Try to avoid talking about the shooting except how it directly pertains to the Election. We plan on having a separate thread to discuss the shooting. Doomposting based on how this will bump Trump chances is not allowed in this thread, as are snarky comments about the shooting in general.
Thread Locks
This thread will almost inevitably get locked due to some sort of infighting or trolling or whatever. When this thread gets locked early, it will be locked for a minimum period of 24 hours (possibly longer based on mod coverage).
New Election Threads
After this thread is locked at 100 pages, the Moderators will create the next OP for the new Election thread. Don't spin up a follow up thread (unless it's about a specific off-topic subject instead of the election, of course). Repeated bad behavior or doomposting may result in thread-kicks being carried over into new Election threads.
Mods will update this OP over time as more things need to be said. We'll hopefully also announce in the thread if there are other rules/guidelines that are being added, but you are responsible for knowing the stuff in this OP.
Hahnsoo1 on
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It’s not like Manchin in WV or Tester running concurrently in Montana- Brown is a stridently pro-labor progressive who the GOP has trouble against in a dogshit boomer-brained state where they control everything else
The idea that there's some candidate that is going to somehow avoid all this bullshit is a fantasy. There's always just another target.
The biggest issue is right now is the internal back biting and such.
Really we need to be learning the lesson from France. Put our internal squabbles aside till the Fascist are beat. Then you just do the in fighting afterwards. The damage being done is by allowing the press to continue the feeding frenzy by Dems giving them tid bits about wanting Biden to step down.
Also again if you want to look what happens when you have a president step down and have a contested election look at 1968. It goes poorly for the party that does it.
Of course they're not polling better, they're not campaigning. The fact that Biden isn't massively overperforming compared to them is bad.
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LBJ staying in and winning maybe just leads to Reagan winning the nation on white resentment in 1972 because that shark was already lurking in the deep.
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Yeah agreed this is being done far too publicly, but the fact is that Biden failed in a way that someone competing at his level just can’t fail. It puts everyone in a bad situation, but the people questioning and calling for him to step aside have a point. He’s the wrong person to be where he is right now.
That doesn’t mean I won’t vote for him if he’s there, but I feel like he’s a liability.
https://apnews.com/article/77b050b1c5c39aec2ef633281d082566
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No candidate “avoids bullshit,” but this implies all bullshit is equally effective or, arguably, interchangeable.
The quality of the candidate is in part, the capacity to weather, deflect and turn around the bullshit, which different candidates succeed at to different degrees.
I remind you we successfully had two terms of a man who was tarred as the stupidly paradoxical “Atheist Kenyan Muslim Socialist,” a variety of things not actually true, while Biden is being judged on things people are actively seeing with their own two eyes.
Before you start campaigning is going to be a high-water mark. Unless your name ID is low. The attacks have not begun yet.
Well, actually they are starting up because both the Republicans and the media are just gonna do the same thing to the next person in line.
There are a ton of funny similarities to 1968 though
Tester's been surprisingly good on the campaign trail - he put up an actual defense of abortion rights in the senatorial debate a month or so back, for example. And I think the current governor's issues with fucking with property taxes us going to be an issue that has an effect here - there's a billboard for Ryan Busse (the Dem gubinatorial candidate) I've driven by that says bluntly "GREG GIANFORTE RAISED YOUR PROPERTY TAXES" that really sums up that point.
I think this map and breakdown is important.
First overall vote is not the big deal its the states you win. Nixon ran the field for the most part. And fuck Wallace to his right won Jim Crow land.
If LBJ and the Dems don't shit the fence with the convention and so on Wallace and Nixon split the Republican vote enough that a Dem cruises to victory. Its like 1992 but instead Perot screwing Bush the Dems fuck up so badly Bush still wins.
This map and that 0.7% isn't the 0.7% you are thinking. Its 14.2% since Wallace stole mostly from Nixon not Humphrey.
Again a contested convention is basically more months of Dems in disarray and attacking each other publicly. Then hoping we can make sure the name on all the ballots in every state is the new candidate. And then hoping all that internal damage isn't enough to screw us as the Press spends the next 3 months attacking that candidate as well.
This was never an easy election. Yes its harder now. But Biden dropping out this late will produce way more issues and weaknesses. Again the best thing the Dems can do now is circle the wagons. Get on a message. And go on the attack verse Trump and what he is planning to do.
Because right now a convicted felon who spends his time screaming about immigrants and lying is being pushed out of the news so the press can enjoy its Dems in disarray feeding frenzy.
This is what I feel as someone that regularly talks to independent and right leaning people. It was easy to defend Obama in 2012. You can dismiss crazy conspiracy theories and point to a record. And honestly Biden’s record isn’t bad, you can make that argument. But when someone publicly shits the bed you can’t defend that. You can’t defend against the argument a person makes against themself.
Biden needs to do one of 2 things:
1. He needs to fucking bring it. He needs to get his ass on TV every day and sell it. He’s in the hole, he needs to come out of it and be a fucking rockstar. Not just “oh this one interview for DC insiders or calling into morning joe and calling it a day” he needs to stand up and go to the American people and show he can do it. Do whatever it takes to get his ass on the air and be confident and competent and dominant, to show that the debate was a one time thing.
2. If he can’t do that for whatever reason he needs to drop out. Stop making excuses, shit or get off the pot.
The only thing I can think of worse then a ticket with Harris at the top would be with mayor Pete
Come Overwatch with meeeee
But you can't replace Biden either. If you don't pick Harris you alienate a group as well as looking like aholes. And who are you going to replace Biden with at the 11th hour? And it's not even obvious if it's even legally possible, and any such candidate wouldn't be democratically chosen.
Real rough time ahead for the Democrats it would seem. Not sure how it's going to shake out but it feels like it's handing the Trump campaign all they could ask for.
Frankly, from what I've seen with my own eyes I don't think he's up to the job at this point. And I think that perception will only get worse as time goes on. It'll take something big for Biden to regain people's confidence, and I don't think he's got it in him. Dems need to be finding a replacement sharpish.
If he drops out before November I’ll vote for the Dem. If he stays in I’ll vote for his warmed-over corpse. Anything to deny fascism the chance to succeed where January 6 failed.
We’ve been talking a lot about how bad it’ll be if Biden wins, it’s way past time to talk about how bad it’ll be if he doesn’t.
1) Appointments.
Obviously in the last week we've been thinking a lot about the courts. So those appointments are a huge deal. Alito and Thomas are getting fairly old. Lower courts make a billion decisions and importantly are going to have a ton more power in the wake of Chevron's repeal. Biden's appointed a ton of judges, and they have been the most diverse of any president. That's true both in terms of demographics but also backgrounds. He put a former public defender on the Supreme Court, for example. But there's also a ton of labor lawyers in the lower courts now. That never really happened before.
Meanwhile, you also have the entire executive branch to staff. On those appointments I'd argue he's been even better. His has been the most aggressive NLRB, FTC, CFPB (short history, but still), EPA, etc. etc. etc. I can remember. Hell, DOJ has started a criminal investigation into price fixing by landlords. This has been a pro-little guy administration, consistently.
2) Let's Talk About Labor
This has been the friendliest administration to labor in history either ever or since FDR. But bum, what about the railroad strike that Biden prevented? It's true, he viewed the disruption to the supply chain as a big enough emergency to prevent a strike. But he kept working at it. IBEW press release.
Biden also became the first sitting president to join a picket line, ever, when he joined the UAW picket line last September. Friendly rules towards organizer mean we've seen new unions form all over the country. The UAW finally managed to unionize one southern auto plant, though they failed at another. This is a major policy success that the left should celebrate. And we should want it to continue.
3) Climate
As mentioned above, this has been a strong EPA. But then what did Biden spend his most political capital on, sacrificing his relationship with the 51st vote in the Senate in the process? IRA, which was the largest investment in solving the climate crisis in history. Should we want more? Absolutely. Was it a major risk to get it passed and harm the rest of his term? Yes. Is it working? Well in terms of investing money, yeah. Which will have a ton of downwind effects, like reducing asthma. Will it "solve" the climate crisis? No. Mitigate, yeah we're starting. And it says something that he was willing to lose Manchin forever to get this bill passed.
4) Economy More Broadly
Unemployment rate around 4% for two years now. Speaking anecdotally, most teens I teach have a job. In a genuinely shitty economy they'd be competing against people with grad degrees for their lifeguarding, shelf stocking, serving, etc. jobs (not that I'm bitter about this). We've also seen income outpace inflation, especially in the bottom quartile, which is not a sentence I've said before about the American economy.
5) Education
Keeps trying to forgive student loans, despite the opinions of the corrupt judiciary. Has done so for a ton of people ($144 billion worth, obviously lots more exist). We've seen some forumers express shock and joy at how much their lives have changed as a result. He's also the first president in my lifetime to NOT fuck up K-12 education, which has been nice as an educator. I love Obama, but his Department of Education fucking sucked.
Biden's Policy Flaws
Are mostly the two things specifically mentioned as side eyeable in the OP and I want to respect that. Only thing I'll say is that Biden historically is movable and does figure out when he's wrong on stuff eventually. Needs to be pushed.
Most Importantly, the Meta Reason the Left Should Vote for Biden (or Harris)
This administration came in with let's say extremely low expectations from the left. Biden was maybe my seventh choice in the 2020 primary? (Warren, Castro, Inslee, Booker, Harris, Sanders) And while you can argue they haven't gone far enough, they have pursued a larger strategy of making policy with the idea of making things work better for people at the bottom. This means that they would accept some inflation if it meant the working class had jobs and could put food on the table. And statistically (I know there are lots of individuals who are struggling, which sucks, obviously) things are improving for people in the bottom 40% of income faster than they have before. Politically this has been... not great. Because the people who are opinion leaders are not in that group. And in fact are mostly in the group that's done a little worse (~75th-95th percentile, the truly rich are fine, obviously). That's a real risk. And if Biden loses, the lesson will almost certainly be (after acrimony about his age) that Democrats shouldn't pursue those policies again because it was not worth the political cost. That's a crisis for the ability to implement left wing policies in the future.
Second, Biden took away the media's precious Afghan War. Again, paid a significant political cost for doing a good thing. That's a lot more brave than I expected from a man who historically is a weather vane who goes where the party goes.
Beyond that, AOC's reason is that Biden being president means that you're in an environment where you can persuade people instead of an environment where you're fighting for your life.
Sorry I Can't Not Say It
His opponents are Donald Trump and John Roberts. Fuck those fascist assholes.
They need to double down on his record and get him out there every day fighting like the republic's future depends on it (because it does.) I have no qualms with Biden, he had a bad night. Give me a cold and lack of sleep, and I'd be largely unintelligible too. This infighting is killing the whole show, however.
We know he'll leave, one way or another.
Which is probably why Trump is starting to run the fuck away from it.
I think more and more this whole "Biden needs to step down" thing is looking like a political elite and media freakout.
All of his best stuff is basically just solid administration for the country and the biggest thing he tried to get done had to be neutered to make other Democrats happy. He doesn't have balancing the budget or Obamacare to run on as great accomplishments, he's asking for another four years again because Trump is bad. While true, it's not an exciting campaign to run on again.
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If the party was worried about his ability to do his job they would get through the election and then find a way to shelve him before midterms.
If they were worried about him winning the election they wouldn't be feeding a media narrative about mental competency, they'd be trying to keep a lid on things as maneuvering went on.
Really just a dogshit party
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On top of this we have papers publish actual falsehoods on support here.
At the same time the news is ignoring the other candidate completely who is relishing that. So he can do his shit without coverage and attacks.
Also if you wandering what Biden has done since then:
Multiple rallies including in PA. ABC interview which was fine not light the world on fire. A random interview with Morning Joe today. More rallies.
This is one of those the press latched on to a freak out. Then like all of us who have doom scrolled have pushed that doom spiral freaking more people out. Its cyclical.
Yet we get weird polls and hard to track actual effect but also in general debates have short term small effects at most. But long term reporting cycles of circular firing squads does cause damage.
Also if you dig stuff up, you can see the press has tried to run this before it just caught traction this time.
This is getting further compounded by the Dems, for once genuinely, being in disarray. I sincerely don't know who they're talking to or what they know or don't know, but these Dem Party people were wheeling out Feinstein for however long and keeping up the wall of silence around her, but one crack from Biden and they're running for the exits.
It's cultivated such a genuinely awful environment that there's not really much left to talk about but vote for whatever Dem is on the ticket in November and not really worry about anything between now and then.
Damn shame he couldn’t have brought that to the debate because I just don’t know how many better opportunities he will get to put that infront of the American people.
The Inflation Reduction Act is like 70% of a modern American political party platform in one bill.
Problem is everyone has forgotten Trump was bad and they think of his time in office fondly and think "it wasn't so bad" and the media is more then happy to not do anything about that issue. If they can even reach people.
Yet another reason Trump is now scared of Project 2025 catching on in the public consciousness.
Inflation Reduction Act and the Infrastructure deal are both huge pieces of legislation with long reaching positive impacts for a huge part of the population.
I mean look at EB's list of actions beyond that.
Obamacare was considered an albatross in many ways in 2012.
As many as he wants he's the fucking President. He could hold a press conference once in a while and that would help instead of running the fewest of any modern president.
He could probably get a rally on tv because people want to see if he'll fuck up like he did at the debate.
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But I know a LOT of people who voted for Biden in 20 who have sworn not to this year as a result of his unwavering support for the Palestinian genocide. I don’t know if they will necessarily back Harris but literally anyone but Biden would shore up Dem support in SE MI.
You can't give someone a pirate ship in one game, and then take it back in the next game. It's rude.
There's a scheduled press conference this week I believe. One problem is he hates the press for being vapid morons, which he's not wrong about.
I get it. All I'd ask is work to convince them he's at least persuadable and the stakes are super high, especially for the Arab-American community. Ideally Israel shitcans Netanyahu by November and a cease fire happens.
To me the best argument for a change in the ticket is that putting Whitmer on it wins Michigan (and probably Wisconsin and maybe Pennsylvania).
Their headline: "Clyburn says he's for Harris 'if Biden ain't there'"
Actual Clyburn quote?
"I'm for Biden-Harris. I'm going to be for Biden if Harris ain't there. I'm going to be for Harris if Biden ain't there."
I've seen the notion gain a lot of traction the last couple months about how there is zero incentive for anybody to ever do anything but shit on Democrats. If you're right, obviously. If you're left, demonstrates your superiority. If you're center, demonstrates your objectivity. And so the media relentlessly shits on them, and any weakness gets ALL the eyes, so every little scrap and crumb must be hyper analyzed and brought out to display their hubris and foolishness and get the clicks.