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Thoughts on the Debate: We're doomed. (beehaw.org)

submitted 4 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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Trump was a lying liar and Biden was a hoarse doddering old man who got lost mid sentence.

On MSNBC, Joy Reid pointed out that Americans want their president to be an avatar. They want a commander who looks strong and tough, and we saw that when the populace couldn't get behind Al Gore (who she credited as being a great mind) who acted more like a policy wank than Bush, who felt more like a (New England) cowboy.

Earlier in the week, I caught a bit of Steve Bannon's radio show where he railed about how we need to eliminate the deep state -- the Praetorian Guard -- that indicted Trump and props up Biden. At the time, I wondered who this Praetorian Guard was supposed to have assassinated, who was bribing them, and which combat actions they'd fought in. If nothing else, I think this debate proves there is no deep state/Praetorian Guard because they'd have assassinated Biden last week during his preparation rather than let him get on stage.

Look, in any large enough group, there are going to be some incompetent people and some competent bad actors. We have to vote for the people who will admit to that and get rid of them. The U.S. is going to have to choose between a leader who tries to install good people to run the government and one who intends to install people bent on dismantling the government and giving loyalty to the leader alone. Even IN the debate, Trump asked Biden, "Who did you fire?" -- that you have to fire bad people ... but this was in reference to firing the General who claimed to have heard Trump call veterans "suckers and losers". I can't prove Trump did or didn't say that, but I do remember Trump skipping the memorial ceremony.

Trump said Charlottesville never happened. I remember it. Trump said Nancy Pelosi admitted responsibility for January 6th. She did not. Trump said the ex-governor of Virginia was not just for late term abortion, but infanticide. He is not. His lies were too numerous to count.

Biden lost track of his thoughts early on and blurted out "We finally beat Medicare." Trump said, "He did beat Medicare and he beat it to death." Biden said Trump had sex with a porn star while (uh, uhm stumble) his wife was pregnant. Trump asserted he did not. Biden called Trump a criminal. Trump said Biden would be the criminal when his term was over (not exact words).

It wasn't good in any direction. It was ugly. Through it, though, Trump maintained his TV-personality persona while Biden generally looked infirm.

Personally, I want a deep state that does things like: build roads, enforce food labeling laws so that the box accurately reflects the food inside, eventually hires enough judges to have a fast turn-around time for family court and the like. It should be really hard to fire them when they are speaking the truth as the understand it and easy to fire them if they are distorting the truth. Alas, I worry that Joy Reid is correct and the U.S. will vote for the guy they think is most like John Wayne.

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[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago (1 children)

sigh third option when?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Our system only allows 2 options. Any '3rd' option is a vote against your best interests. So is not voting. That said, yeah, I'd vote for a replacement.

I just heard Steve Bannon doing that fascist thing where -- when confronted with the fact that he said on his radio show that he wanted to see particular heads on spikes -- Bannon acted like that was just rhetoric. He didn't really mean it. Except he knows his followers DO mean it. And he's still calling for dismantling the government and remaking it into a permanent dictatorship.

So if that is what it means to vote Republican this election, then I'm gonna be a yellow dog democrat about it.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (1 children)

What I meant is why the Wayland keep the 2 option system? Just make it unlimited amount of options and problem solved.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago (1 children)

That can work with ranked choice voting, but we don't have that. Technically, we CAN vote for anyone over 35 and born in the U.S., but practically, this just splits the vote. This worked for Republicans when George Wallace split the Democratic vote such that Nixon won with 43%, and it worked for democrats when Ross Perot split the Republican vote such that Clinton also won with 43%.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago

Having just 2 main candidates is like having 1 candidate because there are some things they both decide to do the same. More candidates are necessary for a democracy. Some countries also implement 2 step elections that take 2 or more most voted candidates to another election. Though it's much more ExPeNsIvE to run such an election so the US won't do it.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago

I don't think Biden did that bad. Sure he slipped up once or twice but he answered every question with a relevant policy that he implemented as well as bringing up what they were trying to do next. He was able to speak clearly and reasonably.

Trumps response to questions was to dodge and lie. I don't know how anyone can walk away thinking both sides were equal or worse that trump "won".

When I see posts saying Biden was a bumbling idiot in the debate I wonder if the person even watched the debate.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 4 months ago

This wasn't a debate in this format. You should put these two individuals' suitability for being president in the context of their speeches and acts collectively and not this single event. And by speech, not TV pre-digested and edited clips. Go watch Biden's full SOTU and then give it a thought. Go watch one of the felon's rallies and give that some thought.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 4 months ago

[–] [email protected] 8 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Copying a post from a separate thread, but I think it could have been worse. Did he kinda fuck up? Yeah. But he actually talked about his plan going forward, and his achievements in the past. Post below.

Yeah, FWIW, Biden actually talked about expanding stuff like drug price caps to save the government shitloads of money while also saving Americans money as well. Stuff like taxing people making over 400k a year only, lead pipe abatement, funding the ACA more, giving Ukraine the aid it needs to slap the dogshit out of russia, etc etc.

If I had no idea about either president, at leask I know what Biden's future promises are and what he told us he got done in the past four years, even if he did have some sections where he kind of mucked up like this kid did.

Trump, while sounding more coherent vocally, was entirely all over the place with Afghanistan and immigrants bad (no plan?), and somehow he's going to win the war in Ukraine and bring the WSJ reporter home, for free, before he's even elected in just under five months. Oh, and apparently, he hopes he won't die before then, though he didn't sound so sure about that last night.

If I was an uninformed voter, I'd be like "Damn, biden is old, but at least he has a plan and a good team judging off his pretty amazing track record" capping insulin at $35 a mo instead of $400 is fucking awesome, not to mention the other drugs too. The massive investment in the US economy was also nice. Battery plants in Georgia, chip fabs across the country, fixing infrastructure cia the bipartisan infrastructure plan...all great stuff.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

Unfortunately, this is not in touch with the reality of our situation.

I find people, when trying to cope with the hard truth that Biden is going to lose, revert to talking about how much he SHOULD win.

He should. He's been a pretty good president (a genocide not withstanding).

That's not really relevant. Because if he loses, we are likely to lose our democracy. And currently, he's going to lose.

He is losing in the polls. He has been losing in the polls and the swing states for the entire election. At some point, this needs to change, or we're going to watch Trump get reelected. And last night made clear that as long as he is the candidate, this isn't going to change. When he applied all his effort to proving he could win the election he failed spectacularly.

I don't just mean flubbing lines. I mean he lost complete control of the narrative. He demonstrated that when trying his absolute hardest, he cannot reliably explain to voters why the vote for him. That isn't a debate problem. That's a fundamental candidate problem that doesn't appear fixable (except with a new candidate).

If he were winning, at least by a little, we could pretend that maybe that's not a big deal. But he's not. He is losing. He has been losing the entire campaign, and if he doesn't step aside, the election result will be the same as every time pollsters have asked in the last year:

President Donald Trump.

No more "it's not that bad". This debate is a clear synopsis of the campaign until now, and the outcome in November. If this debate "isn't that bad", you might as well say losing is not that bad. (It is. It really is.)

[–] [email protected] 6 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Need some hope? Watch this.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Will watch later, but can you briefly summarize so wife and I aren't freaking out until then? :(

[–] [email protected] 12 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Presidential debate performances have historically had zero discernible impact on the election. See https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Keys_to_the_White_House

[–] [email protected] 7 points 4 months ago (1 children)

I mean, Lichtman himself will tell you he's not infallible, and his system is not without controversy, but he seems to have had a pretty good track record up to this point.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 4 months ago (1 children)

With the very notable (and relevant) exception of... 2016.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Yeah, he did kind of fudge that, it's true (IIRC he said that Trump would win the popular vote rather than the electoral vote, whereas it was of course the other way round). Although I think I remember before the election he said that Trump would "win," but he didn't say exactly what he meant by that.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (1 children)

His model was previously based entirely on predicting the popular vote. Now he's switched it to just predict the winner based on EC delegates. I think we'll all be thrilled if Trump loses in November (or ideally, just plain dies), but a statistical model that doesn't factor in things like Republicans trying to pull fake or rogue elector hijinks doesn't fill me with confidence. And who knows what SCOTUS will do if it's thrown to them (Lichtman also predicted Al Gore's 'win').

Also, looking at the list, I'm pretty sure ~~more than~~ 6 are false:

True
If you inspire 650,000 to conduct write-in votes against you, is that a challenge? In any case, not counting this as False.
True
Mostly true (and RFK really pulls from Reps anyways, polls show)
Debatable, so I won't count
Debatable, so I won't count
Debatable. He did push a lot of changes, but the number of rightward-changes that happened under his watch (like Roe being overturned, MQD being bolstered, etc) have overshadowed basically everything else)
False. This entire year has been non-stop protests, and not just over Gaza (1)
False. Whether it was a bullshit thing to prosecute or not (it was), Hunter's conviction is a major talking point on the Right to attack Biden (and specifically, to push independents towards viewing Biden and Trump as equally criminal). (2)
False. Between the Afghanistan withdrawl and Gaza, he's got military and foreign policy failures in both flanks' eyes. (3)
False. I think that if Republicans had not been paid by the Kremlin to sandbag aid to Ukraine, he might have had one, but as of now Ukraine is not a success, and I can't think of any others that are known to voters. (4)
False. He was never considered charismatic like Obama, or a "National Hero". (5)
False. Trump's charisma among his base is a trademark of his populist campaign. It's why Trump can dominate the Right and DeSantis falls flat. (6)

[–] [email protected] 4 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Ok, yeah, just trying to cling to what little hope there is here---DON'T DEPRIVE ME OF MY HAPPY PLACE. 😉

I do think Lichtman's right about debates not changing outcomes, tho...but of course there's a first time for everything...

Also, looking at the list, I’m pretty sure more than 6 are false.

You mean for Biden now, or for previous elections?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (1 children)

For Biden now. I've updated my comment above with the list and my assessments.

I do think Lichtman’s right about debates not changing outcomes, tho

What confuses me is how debates don't play into whether a candidate is considered charismatic (questions 12/13).

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (1 children)

~~It's possible that the Dems would have held the House, barely, if the New York Democratic party hadn't completely screwed up redistricting, so that's maybe a "soft false~~." I think what he means by "charismatic" is someone like Reagan who appeals to the other side of the aisle (Reagan Democrats in this case); Trump is only charismatic to his own followers. I consider the Afghanistan withdrawal to be, overall, a highly positive thing; yes, it was handled badly, but it's the easiest thing in the world to keep a forever war going, and at least there Biden put a stop to it, so I give him high marks for that at least. Anyway, I wonder if that is considered a foreign policy failure; I don't, but others might. Not trying to blindly defend Lichtman or anything, just trying to cling to whatever shred of hope remains. I think it ends up sort of being how Lichtman himself interprets the keys a month or two before election day.

EDIT: Rereading key #1, "After the midterm elections, the incumbent party holds more seats in the U.S. House of Representatives than after the previous midterm elections," I guess that even if the NY Dems hadn't screwed up there probably would have been a smaller majoirty than before, ergo false.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

I think what he means by “charismatic” is someone like Reagan who appeals to the other side of the aisle (Reagan Democrats in this case); Trump is only charismatic to his own followers.

I don't think working "across the aisle" is really what this is about; I think this is purely about voters' perceptions of them as people. But in either case, Biden sure isn't winning anyone over with his personality who wasn't already firmly center-right Neoliberal.

I consider the Afghanistan withdrawal to be, overall, a highly positive thing; yes, it was handled badly, but it’s the easiest thing in the world to keep a forever war going, and at least there Biden put a stop to it, so I give him high marks for that at least.

Gaza and Afghanistan are polar opposite reactions, depending on what flank of the Democratic party you're on:

Gaza is an unmitigated disaster to the anti-war/anti-genocide/anti-SetCol Left flank, and a moderate success to the pro-Israel/ pro-war Neoliberal Right flank.
Afghanistan is an unmitigated disaster to the pro-war Neoliberal Right flank, and a moderate success to the anti-war Left flank.

Not trying to blindly defend Lichtman or anything, just trying to cling to whatever shred of hope remains.

Understood. I guess for me my anger is more important right now, because this was so avoidable, and Trump feels like he's close to coming back because of the DNC's endless hubris (again). And I've already seen people trying to somehow blame the anti-genocide/ pro-Palestinian protesters for this over on Reddit, since they reflexively scapegoat any and all centrist Dem failures, and they don't have a Bernie or Nader to scapegoat this time.

[–] [email protected] 24 points 4 months ago (2 children)

I'm shocked that the guy who has handlers to make sure he doesn't wander off had a sub-par debate. /s

These two candidates are there because they're useful idiots for the billionaire class. Neither of them give a damn about anyone, and it's probably past time to stop pretending Trump 2.0 isn't happening and have an exit strategy.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 4 months ago

Unfortunately for a lot of us there isn't an exit strategy. No country worth moving to wants an almost 40 year old, single, uneducated, factory schmuck :/

[–] [email protected] 8 points 4 months ago

Generally speaking, if the oligarchs don't think you'll be useful to them, you don't make it far enough up in the food chain to be considered a candidate. They don't play the game of "Maybe this person will do what I tell them once they're in office," they play of the game of "Only people I know will do what I say will get onto the ballot."

[–] [email protected] 3 points 4 months ago (2 children)

Most Americans don't care a fig about debates, or even watch them, but Joe's performance was certainly less than stellar, it's true. Um, early days, still? My fondest wish is that Joe would step aside for J.B. Pritzker.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

I am here to gently wake you up.

Biden has been losing the whole time, pretty badly. I listened to Pod Save America to get their read, and one of them pointed out that predicted election outcomes can change in one of two ways: a major event can force a big shift, or you can rise or fall slowly over time. Tonight showed that neither is coming for Biden. At his best possible opportunity, he didn't under perform, he made it far worse. The theory that he could slowly gain ground with media appearances is now popped.

Biden is a nice guy, but he's experiencing a pretty normal cognitive decline, and voters aren't going to magically come around to him when they've been telling pollsters for months that he's going to lose.

That isn't going to change unless the nominee changes. You're right that this isn't the end for Biden. But sadly, that's because it's actually been over for a long time. It's time to pick up the pieces and begin the overdue work of fielding a competitive nominee.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago

Although if he did, then (I think) a key would be lost!

[–] [email protected] 23 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (2 children)

Canadian here.

I am not looking forward to this very much. If Trump gets into power, our local politicians are going to crank it into overdrive. They already pander to that demographic, so it's just going to get worse. Not nearly as bad as in America, but nobody wants to live under bad leadership and have their safety taken from them.

I don't really understand how we got to this point. But it just seems like all these grifters came out from the woodwork and are just being crazy in plain sight with no consequences now.

I'm sure they were always there, but I don't feel like it was nearly as bad as it has been. Maybe it's just recency bias clouding my memory, but like... dang.

I would love to see some sort of ranked ballot voting or other method of voting come into place for every democracy. No vote should go to waste because of having to pick between the lesser of two crappy choices.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (2 children)

I agree with a lot of what you're saying, but it's easy to choose the better of two choices here. Debate or not, how is it even a question who to vote for when one guy is openly a fascist?

[–] [email protected] 5 points 4 months ago (1 children)

I think you're out of touch.

Fascism isn't unpopular. It's very popular when people are feeling desperate.

I keep hearing people say stuff like this: He can't win! He's so fascist! He can't win, Biden did such a good job if you actually look at the facts!

That's not how elections work. People vote based on what they think will satisfy their interests, and a lot voters don't see any reason to vote for Biden, and so they'll stay home. People don't need to vote for Trump for Trump to win. They just need to give in, and Biden is a "give in" machine. He's poison to voter hope or enthusiasm, and he's going to lose if he doesn't get off the ticket.

If we want to take the threat of Trump seriously, no more hiding our heads in the sand.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (1 children)

Sorry, I think I did misread your comment, apologies.

I do realize it's growing in popularity, I am not suggesting anyone hide their head in the sand, though.

I was trying to say that this narrative of "were doomed" and "theyre both bad choices" feeds into this problem. Its more false equivalency, and discourages voting. I realize you weren't saying this, and that this IS what people are saying. But I still find it gobsmacking that people are seriously saying it's hard to choose.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago

Not the person you were replying to, but the "doom" spouter here. I realize you are 100% right that my post might make people less inspired to vote. I'm sorry for that. I was very distressed at the time. My intent was to emphasize that: while a rational person might complain about either candidate, one is substantially worse and we MUST vote in favor of democracy when the other choice (and his advisors) are openly saying they want to dismantle the institutional expertise that understand how stuff works (which materials are suitable for building roads on various substructures, or where groundwater migrates and how to prevent contamination, and yes, how to figure out how a virus works). They call these people "the deep state", which minimizes the reason we want them to keep their apolitical jobs. Of course the experts -- like everyone --will likely have political opinions, but that doesn't mean they are partisan. As long as they look at data and derive truthful results regardless of their personal politics, it doesn't matter. Obviously we should fire those who can't do their job or hide/ignore/promote information such that their results are distorted to favor a personal agenda (also knowing that some data SHOULD be rejected if acquired by dubious means, isn't reproduced in other trials, etc.).

Anyway, I apologize for the negativity. Thank you for calling me out! :-)

[–] [email protected] 4 points 4 months ago (1 children)

I think you might be misunderstanding my intent. I agree lol there really is no question, which is the better option.

Some people still might vote independent, or they might want to vote independent, but rather vote Democrat because they feel if they don't, they're not helping to fix the problem.

This is common in Canada as well. Having a ranked ballot or some sort of choice voting system would allow people to pick a primary or secondary choice in the event that their first pick doesn't have enough votes. That way, a vote wouldn't be left out, and everyone gets a say regardless of their first pick.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago

A choice voting system would allow me to vote against Biden, but also capture my choice of Biden over Trump. The lies surrounding election integrity would not resolve with a choice voting system.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 4 months ago

It has gotten worse. The steady decline of decency in political discourse took a precipitous dive with Trump. Canada is always out of sync with the US political pendulum, PP is our inevitable swing and it's fucking depressing to watch ignorance and bigotry be celebrated so confidently.

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