US Politics Mega-thread - Page 4233 (2024)

There are so much things wrong with all of this. But many people need a reality check. Obviously MAGA morons. Also those saying Biden absolutely needs to be replaced by their own pet candidate. And even more so those who now think Biden did ok and he just had a cold and a bad night. But, I have seen only Biden surrogates say that. No one anti Trump that is analyzing this said they were not shocked and worried.

The first issue is that Biden should have run in 2014. He was vice president after a long career in DC politics. For 'personal reasons' he didn't run against Clinton. He was already too old in 2020.

Second is Trump. Trump was a failed businessman who then decided to play a successful businessman in reality tv. Even I was fooled by the media back in 2016, thinking Trump actually was a billionaire. The media did this. Full stop. NBC & MSNBC created Trump. Then CNN ran with him hard. Why should a failed businessman who f*cked a p*rn star and who committed fraud over and over even be on the stage of a GOP primary? That was unacceptable. Every US voter should have instantly recognized that. As should the media. The fact that in 2016 we cared more about how funny it was to see Trump make fun of Jeb Bush is the problem.

Third issue is about post-truth politics. The MSM and also social media have absolutely no idea how to deal with post-truth politics. I'll get to how the Dems also have not dealt with this. Buit media first. If the media don't change how they deal with post-Truth, then Democracy is at risk. You cannot have a democracy with politicians who constantly lie about anything, and the media lets them. Trump is an idiot and a buffoon. He is really good in hijacking the media cycle, looking good on tv, and finding people loyal to him. But he is incompetent. He doesn't know how government works. Whatever he is going to try to do to government in his second term, most of it is going to fail because of that. But, post-Truth politics is here to stay. We will get extremely competent post-Truth politicians. Probably on the far right, but maybe also on the left. We have them now all over Europe as well. And if the media don't completely change how they deal with it, every western country is headed towards becoming a flawed democracy. No exceptions.
This includes fact checks. If you can't fact check Trump, then don't invite him to a debate. Period. If you do, it is part on you if democracy is lost. If you worry that Trump will walk off halfway the debate if you do your journalistic due diligence, then don't even invite him.

Fourth, the Democrats have no idea how to deal with Trump. After 8 years, they still have no clue. Why didn't Biden deliberately weaponize the DoJ against Trump? He is going to accuse you of it doing anyway. Trump's supporters are going to believe you did anyway. So why not just do it? Why not just remove Trump from the chessboard. There is literally only upsides to this. Instead, he and Garland waited 2 years to appoint a special council. Biden is even going to lock up his own son to make it look like he is impartial regarding Trump's trials. How insane is that? He did everything he could to support his son Hunter. But now he is throwing his son Hunter under the bus, just so he can continue using the absolute worst strategy to deal with Trump. Now I don't know how exactly how to most successfully deal with Trump in terms of media spin and US politics. I am not a politician. But I don't see much that Biden did effectively, apart from the Dark Brandon thing that kinda worked. Why isn't Kamala Harris on tv every week absolutely blasting Trump and playing the bad cop while Biden is the competent good cop focusing on running the country? I should make a fifth point about Kamala Harris because something very strange is going on with her as to why no one likes her, we don't see her, but she also wasn't replaced. But I didn't do enough of a deep dive into her. And she isn't that important. Back to Trump. Trump literally was responsible for the deaths of millions of Americans, AND tried to steal the election results from the American people, AND tried to kill his on vice President. And Biden is just using kitty gloves. We have a complete normalization of Trump as a presidential candidate. And part of that is on Biden and his team.

Fifth. Biden's presidency has been shockingly competent. Biden did more than Obama did in 8 years. And Obama had a term where he controlled both the house and the senate. This isn't talked about enough. While Biden has failed to attack Trump, he also failed to spin his own successes. No one expected Biden's administration to be so good at running the country.

Sixth, people in Biden's administration must know Biden is too old to run for president against Trump. These people are around him every day. I am absolutely sure Biden knows what he is doing and is sharp when talking to world leaders at the G7. And it is actually insane how much Biden traveled abroad. Jet lag hits you hard when you get older. And Biden is ancient. So I have no doubt these people think that Biden right now can be president. And if they aren't doctors, they can't know if Biden is likely to be able to do so in 4 years. But that's not the problem. The problem is beating Trump. And you do that on tv. Not in the oval office.
These people decided that Biden was too old, too senile to do a superbowl interview. If they do that, why is he allowed to run again? Even back in 2020, most people assumed Biden would be a one term president because of his age. What is wrong with the Democratic party that they can't set up a new presidential candidate that can easily blow Trump away? That's literally the function of a political party: to create competent appealing candidates for all positions of office. The US has 330 million people. There's a ton of states, tons of people in congress, tons of talented staffers, tons of local administrators. Where is your recruitment program for top talent?
These people knew. And they did nothing. Because they wanted to keep their own jobs. They'd rather have 10% odds to be a Biden staffer in the White House for 4 more years, but 90% odds that Trump wins, than 100% odds they lose their White House staffer job, but Trump loses.

Seventh. The debate strategy was horrible. Ignoring the fact that Biden's own team strategy with this debate was to just show that Biden wasn't old. And that's why they had the debate early. Let's look at what Biden was actually trying to do. Biden was trying to have a radio-style policy debate with facts and numbers. That's insane! It was actually the Biden team that asked CNN to make sure Trump couldn't interrupt. When in fact those interruptions in the first Fox News debate by Trump were the reason people thought Biden won that debate. All you had to do is for Biden to start next to a raving lunatic Trump and have Biden say some very simple things. Crack a few jokes. Say Trump shouldn't even be allowed to run. And say you are a steady hand at the wheel. Instead, Biden's staffers crammed Biden's head full of policy talking points. And Biden thought he could recall all of that and talk circles around Trump, giving lectures about how the economy works, how many good treaties we have, rattle off numbers and statistics like a policy wonk. Biden tried to be Al Gore in 2000. Problem is, Biden isn't Al Gore. Biden is 81, not 52 which Al Gore was in 2000. And it is 2024, not 2000. Al Gore was debating W Bush, not Trump. And Al Gore lost that debate. The only thing they should have told to Biden was "Just listen what Trump said. Then when it is your turn, just remind the audience of how insane those Trump lies are. That Trump is a criminal and wants to be a dictator from day one, but that the country has been stable under your presidency." Yes, Biden wouldn't even have been able to do that. But it was not just the execution that was bad. The strategy was horrible as well. The worst part is where Biden was asked about abortion and he started talking about a girl who was murdered by an illegal immigrant. So he was simply not coherent to do any strategy. But the strategy should have been to keep it simple and basic. Just do the same thing every time. 1) Call Trump a liar. 2) Point out how unhinged and nonsensical the lies are. Like post-birth abortions. 3) Call him a danger to the country. Say either Jan6/abortion/loving dictators/project 2025. 4) Then say your economy/your green deal/your infrastructure deal/your competence/your alliances. That's it.

All Biden had to do was say "Look, I am old. I am slow. I can't debate properly anymore. But I am not a crazy criminal. That guy over there is. He shouldn't even be allowed on the stage with me. I have a great team around me. When that guy was a president, it was chaos. Everyone that worked for him in his White House now says that guy is a danger to the country. My presidency has been one of competence. And I can offer that the the American people for 4 more years."

And have Biden literally say that same thing over and over.

Don't have Biden cite exactly which general said what about Trump not visiting which US graveyard in France. Don't have Biden cite the percentage increase in taxes on billionaires. BAN HIM FROM SAYING ANY NUMBER. In a mock debate, any time Biden tries to give a detail or a number. END THE MOCK DEBATE. Take a break and start over in the afternoon or the next day. Even having Biden try to explain to the audience that congress had a bipartisan border deal and that Trump called Johnson to block it because Trump wants chaos at the border probably would be too complex. To complex for Biden to put into words. But also too complex for the viewer to understand. And it won't score as a one liner. Just have Biden say "We all remember Jan6, where HIS supporters, people he called to the capital, beat our cops. And our politicians, both Republicans and Democrats, had to flee. And that guy, he wanted to hang Mike Pence. His vice president. He wanted to kill him. That's despicable!"

What people don't seem to get is that the questions don't matter. Especially not with this format. It is not a debate. It is a bunch of elevator pitches interrupted by CNN questions. You aren't supposed to answer the questions. You should completely ignore them. Trump answered ZERO questions. Half the questions he started to talk about the border and illegal immigration. And guess what. PEOPLE THINK TRUMP WON THE DEBATE.

Eight, the debate format is horrible. Ignoring the fact that tv debates isn't how voters should decide who would be the best president. And ignoring that these debates are way less important than people in the media make them out to be. This format is horrible. If the Dems had a competent candidate that could blow away Trump in a debate, then part of the strategy should have been for the Democratic candidate to constantly attack CNN and the format. Say Gavin Newsom was up there. Have Newsum attack the moderators EVERY SINCE TIME after Trump lied and the moderators didn't fact check Trump. Do it relentlessly. That's what Trump would do if they did fact check him. Just say the format is unfair, anti Democratic, below even the basic journalistic standards, and go after Jake Tapper and Dana Bash personally.
Also the camera optics and the split screen, so the Biden debate prep team had a mock debate, they had Biden on the same split screen that they knew CNN would, and Biden's mouth was constantly open. And they then concluded "Yes, let's do a June CNN debate, no audience, split screen, no interruptions." That's insane to me. If Biden really had a could, they should 100% have canceled the debate. But they didn't even tell the media that Biden had a cold but would continue with the debate anyway. It is just insane. Those people should be fired and disbarred from politics for 20 years.

Nine, Trump's debate performance was absolutely horrible. People don't talk about this because Biden was worse. But this Trump would not have won the 2016 primaries. Even with this format, any young sharp debater in the Democratic party would have wiped the floor with Trump. Trump was good on climate 'because we had H2O'. Trump was also demented and confused. He just does it in a commanding and confident way.

Tenth, you can't replace Biden. It is just not possible. The risk of losing if you replace Biden is just too large. I think there's a ton of people that would have beat Trump in a debate. But many of them would run very poorly as a presidential candidate vs Trump. People all have their own pet favourite politician to replace Biden. But the fact is, Trump is going to spin this against you. Biden was Trump's kryptonite, and might still be. Trump will come up with nicknames for Newsom, Andy Beshear or Pete Buttigieg. Like Trump did with everyone before, except Biden. The Dems will look like a chaos party, when they should be running on being the party of order and competence. They will lose the incumbent bonus. It will look like a backstab and a betrayal of Harris/the back woman voters. It will prove Trump's lies about Biden correct. If Trump was correct about Biden all that time, what else was he correct about? On top of that, if Biden can't be president in 2025, why can he be president right now? Should they not use the 25th amendment right now?
Replacing your incumbent presidential candidate with a complete unknown wildcard is a way way way bigger problem than losing a tv debate is. It will open a completely new can of worms will will be impossible to control.