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Re: "Now that Biden has dropped out, Democrats have the..."
Speaking of dishonest tactics, why are we only allowed to talk about your two hand-picked changes under Trump here? Start another topic if you want.
Oct 04 · 2 months ago
🐐 satch [OP] · Oct 04 at 07:44:
I'm slightly surprised that Kamala Harris is doing so well in polls, but I every time I watch Trump talk it reminds me how awful he is at pretending to be competent, something that Biden was also awful at but Harris is pulling off a lot better (still doing a bad job but the floor is low).
So I get it. But my point from the original post still stands: any actually even moderately decent Democratic candidate and Trump would be cooked. Anyone left or right from Dennis Kucinich to Joe Manchin could have won handily. The reason the race is close is because Harris is part of her party elite and cannot effectively communicate with people outside of her base.
it's impossible to reasonably evaluate counterfactuals like "Joe Manchin/Bernie Sanders would be killing it right now".
I actually don't think playing to undecideds is the right approach. Shore up the base and get non-voters out seems like the way to win these past cycles. Why fight over 10% when there are millions that aren't even part of that total?
🐐 satch [OP] · Oct 04 at 13:10:
@murdock this is what my personal causal model says about the counterfactuals. It’s impossible to *prove* that I’m right but all they really are doing is describing my casual model which says that choosing Kamala Harris as the nominee decreased the probability of Democrats winning the presidency relative to a different candidate from outside of the party establishment.
As to your point about undecideds versus non voters, I agree 100%.
👻 darkghost · Oct 04 at 20:26:
I think it would be a close race no matter the candidate. The morass that is our political reality defies reason. It's like pure id.
Both sides are willing to overlook the very kind of horribleness that they insist makes the other party unelectable. Subverting democracy, corruption, outright treason. Never mind if we do it, we are on your side. It's them you need to worry about!
"both sides are equally bad" is the most tired political take you can have. it's cheap, lazy and inaccurate. it also absolves the user of needing to dive deep into the details of any given issue. why bother, they both suck!
'Bad' is a poor choice of a quality to measure. I don't think they are 'equally' bad, and one side is particularly bad (currently) for international conflicts and the economy. They are both corrupt and evil if you wish, as in taking advantage of and lying to unsuspecting fools who think they can 'save democracy' or have 'free speech'.
Now that Biden has dropped out, Democrats have the opportunity to nominate a candidate who can beat Trump. The trouble is, they won’t. Kamala Harris is basically the second least electable Democrat after Biden. She dropped out of the 2020 primary for a reason. She was a horrible attorney general and she comes across to voters as exactly the slimy opportunist that she is. If Trump is the existential threat to democracy which many claim he is, then Democrats should act like it and nominate...