One of the amazing political achievements of Republicans in this election cycle has been their ability, at least so far, to send Donald Trump’s last year in office down the memory hole. Voters are supposed to remember the good economy of January 2020, with its combination of low unemployment and low inflation, while forgetting about the plague year that followed.
Since Trump’s romp in the Super Tuesday primaries, however, the ex-president and his surrogates have begun trying to pull off an even more impressive act of revisionism: portraying his entire presidency — even 2020, that awful first pandemic year — as pure magnificence. On Wednesday, Representative Elise Stefanik, the chair of the House Republican Conference, tried echoing Ronald Reagan: “Are you better off today than you were four years ago?”
And Trump himself, in his Tuesday night victory speech, reflected wistfully on his time in office as one in which “our country was coming together.”
I dunno, a good third if not half or whatever of the nation seems ready to fall back asleep and return to this dream. And another third or whatever seem ready to let them. Meanwhile the remaining third downvote you if you dare to say that “Biden is old” - an objective fact if I ever heard one.
Everywhere I look, all I see & hear is “fear” - on literally all sides.
Candidate 1: My side has a plan to enact some truly horrible, regressive shit. You thought I was a dictator the first time? Well, you haven’t seen anything yet. Get ready for my revenge tour. Also, I’m only 4 years younger than the other guy.
Candidate 2: I won’t do any of that. Everything else is just a bonus.
Candidate 3: [Does not exist]
“Undecided” Voter: Man, Candidate #2 is soooo old, you guys. I’mma just vote 3rd party or stay home.
Right, I did not explain myself well there - in the past I have gone to greath lengths to say all of that, but people still downvoted even the tiniest, most mundane, even if delivered in a three-quarters joking manner, that “Biden is old”. Also, I may have been condescending after having been challenged by people who did not really want me to answer their questions - and that part would be on me:-).
For more info, check out Jon Stewart’s position.
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May I copy and paste this several times every day?
As long as you use it for good, be my guest :)
The white conservatives aren’t friends of the Negro either, but they at least don’t try to hide it. They are like wolves; they show their teeth in a snarl that keeps the Negro always aware of where he stands with them. But the white liberals are foxes, who also show their teeth to the Negro but pretend that they are smiling. The white liberals are more dangerous than the conservatives; they lure the Negro, and as the Negro runs from the growling wolf, he flees into the open jaws of the “smiling” fox.
Malcom X
I think this is timeless.
Democracy and elections for all, we’re not on the ballot then. Do not compare the two.
Clarify; what do you mean?
Supposed to be “were” - sorry.
My point is that the black community letting another 4 years of Democrat status quo vs Republican status quo happen, was as you say, and I agree with. Today is not the same. It’s Democrat status quo vs potential end of free elections and democracy, as espoused first hand by the man at the cusp of taking victory himself. So we have to eat the shit again for 4 years. And if we don’t activate at the local and state level, every future federal election will be to protect the status quo from worse annihilation. So instead of whining about Biden, people should be fighting progressive DSA fights on the smaller stages where they are actually able to and have already begun to win. Then you build a solid democracy. Un-gerrymander the red states. Pass legislation to reform the supreme court. And have the ability to elect a third party or push the DNC to the left, for the White House. But that’s the actual and only way. Electing Trump does not move the movement forward. Full stop. I’d love to see that refuted bc it’s likely happening whether we whine about Biden being left enough.
I don’t think you can save a country founded on the back of a genocide and made strong by 300 years of slavery. I think y’all need to start fresh.
So Europe is going to ship their wealth back to Africa and Asia?
Are they?
It’s not “Biden is old” that gets you down voted, it’s “Biden is too old to do the job, so vote for the other guy who is almost as old but is worse in every way that matters” that gets the LemmyHammer.
Except that’s not what I said - it is a reaction to what people fear that I might have meant. And I understand that, I do, but it is still not what I said, and sometimes (not here though) I have even gone to great lengths to try to painstakingly say that that was explicitly not what I meant.
Btw, please allow me to clarify that I am not saying anything against you personally - you have been nothing but polite and helpful here.
I also have fears. And they go beyond Biden v. Trump in the next election. I fear that we are losing the ability to even so much as talk in a halfway civilized manner about political matters. Not that downvotes are themselves the same as impoliteness…:-)
But my main point here isn’t about the downvotes, it is that people are doing the latter b/c of being driven by their extreme fear of what is to come. Which ironically seems to be the one thing that is shared in common amongst all Americans right now - the only real difference for most people being which set of facts you choose to believe in.
I’m not really that worried about his age tbh, but I keep being told this means I’m afraid of something.
The political meta matrix surrounding Biden’s age is a bunch of bullshit. Anyone expressing concerns with his age should worry about who his vice president is. There’s really nothing to fear there unless you’re a conservative worried that the Dems could pivot off Biden’s death in office into a 14-year stretch of democratic administration. That is basically the death of the living GOP.
I dunno - personally I think his age is a whole third thing. There’s: (a) I am alive and healthy and well and President, there’s (b) I am dead now, so control passes over to my VP, while I go sit in my coffin for… forever, and then (c) I am old and so while I seem to be health enough on most days, I am also unreliable in that at any time I could zone out and miss a crucial detail in a meeting, before having to make decisions with literally nuclear consequences.
A vote for Biden would hopefully, in practical terms, translate into a vote to separate out the Commander-In-Chief role (that needs a much more active presence than e.g. a mere speaker behind a podium) from the other aspects of the Presidency, except that is simply not how the Presidency is defined.
And, I should point out, the former at least has some hope of working out the way we might want it to, whereas for Trump there is no hope at all that he would not hold on tightly to the reigns of power, and he could literally decide to assassinate someone on a mere whim, again.
There’s also Regan’s, and likely Trump if he wins, d) “I’m basically a vegetable being propped up by advisors.”
(he said the quiet part out loud:-P)
Ah, the enlightened centrist.