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  • The Picard Maneuver@lemmy.world
    943·
    2 months ago

    Depending on how the election works out in November, this is either going to be remembered as an honorable and strategic move or one of the biggest political blunders in history.

    • qprimed@lemmy.mlEnglish
      391·
      2 months ago

      the Democrats have been cornered over the last 40 years. I think the only move is the bold move.

      dems have got to show the country they can make and take hard choices and whatever process is used to select a nominee, make it as transparent and democratic as possible.

      we are at the very last peaceful bulwark for a representative democratic government. light a fire under the citizenry and trust that our (possibly) last hope is our best hope. 2024/25 is gonna be rough.

      edit: youtube Ani DiFranco - Your Next Bold Move - 11/11/2016 - Paste Studios, New York, NY (apologies in advance if non-news links are bad mojo)

    • kava@lemmy.world
      272·
      2 months ago

      Biden was 100% going to lose. Kamala is probably going to lose, but at least there’s a chance.

      There was no other move here. Democrats put themselves in Zugzwang by Biden seeking re-election in the first place.

      • Xanis@lemmy.world
        61·
        2 months ago

        Nah, Biden had a chance. They fucked it up by mismanaging his image, then even allowing the debate at all, and the last nail was ironically filled by the failed Trump assassination attempt. There were a lot of little things besides these, though in the last about eight months these are the big three imho.

    • dhork@lemmy.worldEnglish
      4125·
      2 months ago

      It won’t be remembered as a blunder, because there was no circumstance where Biden would have won in November. Not after that debate.

      • Voroxpete@sh.itjust.works
        364·
        2 months ago

        It is absolutely insane that Trump told lie after lie after lie in that debate and no one gave a shit. But Biden stumbled over a few words, and somehow that makes him incompetent to be president. Seriously, what the fuck is wrong with American voters?

        • Dojan@lemmy.world
          23·
          2 months ago

          Trump isn’t held to any standard. That’s the thing. No one has any great expectations of Trump. His campaign should have been over when he mocked a reporter’s disability, but it wasn’t.

          • CharlesDarwin@lemmy.worldEnglish
            8·
            2 months ago

            That’s just it. Democrats are expected to be perfect; if the cons fuck up, lie, commit crime, even attempt a coup, it gets a collective shrug and a “boys will be boys” kind of attitude, even if it’s girls like Empty G.

        • EatATaco@lemm.eeEnglish
          101·
          2 months ago

          As others have said, Trump did what we expected him to do: lie. We expected/hoped Biden to quell the critics, and he did the opposite of it.

          But make no mistake about it, plenty of people pointed out that Trump lied during the debate. The problem is that his cultists think that if he says it, it’s true, or complaining that his lies aren’t that big so it’s not a big deal. Truth and honesty doesn’t matter to them anymore. Although, I feel like truth mattering to people is dying across the board.

        • Mike1576218@lemmy.ml
          3·
          2 months ago

          Trump lies? Why didn’t anyone say something about that??? /s I don’t think many people will vote Trump over Biden based on the debate. But I can understand everyone that won’t vote Biden (thus not vote at all) based on that debate.

        • CharlesDarwin@lemmy.worldEnglish
          2·
          2 months ago

          That’s the dumb narrative. It’s clear that if donnie even ever had any brain cells, he’s in decline. But yeah, BidenSoOld and he did freeze up, so all the lies, fascist intent, and incoherency on donnie’s side is ignored by the bothsiderist “liberal media”.

        • Melvin_Ferd@lemmy.world
          2·
          2 months ago

          That’s on people on the left more than anything. The terminally online left read while terminally online right write.

        • kava@lemmy.world
          84·
          2 months ago

          Have you not been paying attention? Every time Biden goes up to speak, he makes a fool of himself. At the debate he was mumbling and staring blankly into space with his mouth open. He then did an interview afterwards to try and calm the mood that only make it worse. Then he showed up to the NATO summit and introduced Zelensky as Vladmir Putin. He called Trump the vice president.

          All in the course of a couple of weeks. Biden simply isn’t all there. His polling numbers were on a downward trend and the key problem is that concerns about his age and mental capacity can only get worse with time. It will never get better.

          There was no other option but to change Biden. Everybody knew this after the debate. I think it took so long for him to drop out because they didn’t know who to replace him with. Kamala isn’t pilling any better and in some places worse.

          But it seems the DNC has done their research and figured Kamala is the best chance they’re gonna get. Which I think is a grim omen for the near future.

      • mommykink@lemmy.worldEnglish
        185·
        2 months ago

        Yeah. Tbh I dislike Harris 10x more than Biden but I know she’ll actually be able to stand up to Trump at the next debate. There was never any amount of prep the Biden team could’ve given to Joe that would’ve helped him in September. It’s for the best, but things just got a lot less predictable now.

    • Nimo@lemmy.world
      41·
      2 months ago

      Biden had no choice but to withdraw - the polling suggest he was going to lose to Trump. The problem is a) the VP has largely been abscent so hasn’t really been able to develop a strong profile and b) the VP is Kamala Harris. The problem the Democrats face is not having a candidate that galvanises the same level of support as Trump. There is simply a dearth of credible candidates. Personally, I would encourage Mitt Romney to defect to the Democrats and get him to stand or Jimmy Carter.

    • CharlesDarwin@lemmy.worldEnglish
      2·
      2 months ago

      Biden was most likely going to lose, let’s just be honest about that. He might have squeaked out a popular win, but lose the EC (and given our stupid system, that’s the only thing that matters).

  • gravitas_deficiency@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
    551·
    2 months ago

    This is wild.

    I also think it’s objectively the right call, in the context of taking the most aggressive and pragmatic approach to stopping the fascists.

    Also, in response to this quip from the relevant WaPo article:

    The Democrats’ predicament — a candidate dropping out after sweeping mostly unchallenged through the party primaries to become the presumptive nominee — is unknown in the modern era.

    We need to be absolutely, completely fucking crystal clear here: the root cause of all this drama (as well as the electoral faceplant in 2016) is the DNC leadership and how they run the primary. They let the donor class sideline extremely compelling candidates because they’re not neoliberal or corporate-friendly enough for their tastes, and then we get a milquetoast “electable” candidate.

    Edit: lol fuck they’re just gonna try to steamroll it with Harris

    There are very real reasons why so many people are unenthused by Biden, despite his accomplishments on paper. Pretending the primary process is actually fair and actually yields the best leadership candidates is an exercise in self deception.

    At any rate: I hope the DNC’s old and new guard can just agree to be pragmatic and stop the fucking fascists at all costs for the next few months.

    • EatATaco@lemm.eeEnglish
      3·
      2 months ago

      I also think it’s objectively the right call,

      I have no idea. I think it’s a damned-if-you-do-damned-if-you-don’t situation. Picking the next nominee is going to be a clusterfuck. Mike Johnson already calling for him to resign. It’s going to be challenged in court. This is going to be a constant fight until the election. What about the donors who have give money to Biden, but then don’t like whoever they go with? Do they go with Harris? She isn’t much more popular and (this isn’t me being sexist, but understanding Trump’s misogyny) are they really going to run another woman against him? And there is no guarantee that people that need to be swayed are going to be happy with whoever is picked.

      But then again, how do you continue with Biden? If the next debate isn’t perfect for him, he’s doomed. Can they take that risk?

  • PonyOfWar@pawb.social
    533·
    2 months ago

    Probably the right decision, I think, if very late. Will be interesting to see how the Democrats will go about this now. Kamala Harris seems like an obvious replacement, but is she really popular enough? Might be because I’m European, but she was never on the news for anything here and I know next to nothing about her.

    • dhork@lemmy.worldEnglish
      281·
      2 months ago

      One thing that is important for non-Americans to understand is that the next steps are totally up to the delegates at the Democratic National Convention, most of whom were chosen as a result of the Primaries and 99% were won by Biden’s campaign. I think that Democrats may stage some quick events, like a debate or other public forum, to show off their bench and introduce voters to their main candidates in a way that they couldn’t earlier in the year. But the ordinary voters’ role in the process is over until the General Election in November. The candidate will be chosen by delegates who were prepared to vote for Joe Biden.

      If Biden endorses Harris at any point, she is the is the nominee. Things only get interesting if he declines to endorse her. (Edit: as I wrote this, Biden has already endorsed Harris. It’s done, Lemmy. Eat your vegetables and vote for the bland candidate “no one” likes.)

    • Sconrad122@lemmy.world
      16·
      2 months ago

      That’s generally true for all VPs. Biden was rarely on the news during the Obama years, same with Pence in the Trump years. She’s not an ideal candidate, but she does have some freedom of motion that is unprecedented. She gets to own the incumbency as the VP but only partially. Time and messaging will tell if she is able to define her candidacy by the positive things the Biden administration has done and the positive things that she can do moving forward or if Republicans will succeed in tying her down with whatever negative aspects of the Biden administration they can latch onto. It will be hard for them to pitch her as some kind of puppet for Biden or the DNC seeing as they spent some much air trying to convince everyone that she was puppeteering Biden from the start. If she can get a solid VP candidate (and there is a deep bench of Democratic Senators and Governors that she could pull from) and inject some energy into this campaign (suddenly Trump is the old man in the race), I think she’s got a really strong shot. There’s an outside chance someone will attempt to contest her at the convention, but as much as my personal views may be likely to better align with a more left-leaning candidate, I think the atmosphere of hesitancy from folks calling on Biden to step down or primary ing Biden in the first place suggests that the likelihood of a strong contender appearing and damaging her candidacy is low. I know there were plenty of folks on here who thought getting Biden to step down was some effort by the elite or the Republicans to steal away the incumbency advantage from the Democrats, but I really have a hard time seeing this as anything but a positive step in the campaign to beat Trump in November

    • brucethemoose@lemmy.world
      6·
      2 months ago

      That’s a good thing.

      Here (in the US), people know Clinton, Biden, but (in my experience) they don’t really know Harris. She’s a blank slate who’s suddently going to become more of a name now that she’s Trump’s opposition.

    • pyre@lemmy.world
      5·
      2 months ago

      Biden wasn’t popular either. people didn’t vote for him, they voted against the other guy.

      everyone hates Harris for saying weird shit, not being very charismatic, and being a prosecutor, all fair… but her voting record is actually incredibly good.

    • MNByChoice@midwest.social
      51·
      2 months ago

      She hasn’t been in the news or public in 4 years in America. I doubt she would win the nomination if she ran on her own.

      • Azal@pawb.social
        3·
        2 months ago

        Pretty much post Roe v Wade she’s been out at the very forefront on the abortion debate because Biden being a catholic and male was about the worst possible person to put on this, vs Harris’s main job was to show the White House’s position on it.

        Oh, not been in the news… right. Same news that’ll talk Biden’s age all day, not Trump’s age or his lies.

      • Riskable@programming.devEnglish
        7·
        2 months ago

        This is just a side effect of being VP. VPs never get thought about much because they only have one real job and it only ever has to get done once in a while.

        Once she’s the nominee she’ll gain popularity. Not only that but just having a chance at being the first woman president (and not being a widely-unliked, out-of-touch outgrowth from a political dynasty) is a big boost among independents.

    • Riskable@programming.devEnglish
      17·
      2 months ago

      Correction: It was posted to Whitehouse.gov and sent to the press and several other outlets simultaneously. It’s just that the overflowing latrine that is x.com is the place where people notice and amplify such things quickest.

    • goferking0@lemmy.sdf.org
      41·
      2 months ago

      Look he’s got COVID, not like he can make a recording… (or he’s doing that poorly that he can’t even do a recording)

      • kava@lemmy.world
        1·
        2 months ago

        Call me tin foil hat man but I think the COVID was just a way to take spotlight off of Biden so he couldn’t say anything stupid

        Almost every time he’s spoken publicly in the last few weeks he’s made some gaffes. Imagine a press statement and he mixes up Kamala’a name with someone else.

        Not worth the risk. Biden speaking in public is too risky, might mess up the message they’re trying to send.

  • mercano@lemmy.world
    14·
    2 months ago

    I wish he had done this last November. I voted in the Republican primary this year just because the Democratic Primary was seen as non-competitive. I would have much rather had a chance to vote for a candidate I liked rather than voting against a candidate I didn’t like.

  • SuddenDownpour@sh.itjust.works
    121·
    2 months ago

    This would have been much less of a clusterfuck if they hadn’t hidden that Biden’s state had already been declining for a long while now, or if he had been consequent with his declared intentions of being a one-term president from the very beginning, and there had been real primaries.

    The very obvious good news is that whoever is chosen now will have much better momentum than Biden, even if only by virtue of being capable of reaching out to low information voters, while Trump’s less obvious cognitive decline is going to become far more evident now.

  • fantasyocean@lemmy.myserv.one
    144·
    2 months ago

    All the way up until this past Friday I was certain he was going to hold on with a feeble death grip until the very end. While I’m extremely excited about this, I hope that liberals leftists and everyone left of center realizes, now that he’s out, you absolutely have to support Kamala. She may be a cop, and all cops are bastards. But we can save the criticisms until after we’ve blocked the hyper fascists

    • Baron Von J@lemmy.world
      13·
      2 months ago

      I hope that liberals leftists and everyone left of center realizes, now that he’s out, you absolutely have to support Kamala the Democratic nominee no fucking matter who it is at this point.

    • ClamDrinker@lemmy.world
      71·
      2 months ago

      Not to mention just like with other things, Republicans are not open to removing the bastard cops in place, the Democrats at least contain people that want to do so. Sadly you have two choices, so pick the one that gets closest to what you want.