Joe Biden, Senator from Citibank (oops, DELAWARE), to Run for President

Other than, I guess, annoying people

I imagine that if Biden wins in November that the best way for the Democrats to avoid midterm losses in 22 will be to run against Biden.

But you’re right that plenty of people will argue that there’s no difference between the two parties (taken in aggregate) and they have some plausible reasons to say so.

― silby, Sunday, March 29, 2020 5:53 P

You can say this if you're 11 years old or drool. Biden or a stand-in will vote for the judges/justices I want and name hands to regulatory agencies better than any Republican. If this isn't enough, sorry, we can't talk.

I mean if I take my posting hat off I probably agree with you but even for plenty of genuine non-drooling adults “judges and regulators” are somewhat remote arguments, relative to ppl’s urgent need to get out from under the thumb of rent, health insurance, and corporate dissolution of civic live. You can’t say “judges and the EPA!” to counter Joe Biden saying he’d veto medicare for all if it reached his desk. Maybe you can, and I just follow a lot of 20 and 30something communists on twitter. But, yet.

yet guess what -- it fires up GOP voters. And the results are the same. We need justices, judges, and regulators.

Sounds like the choice for progressive pressure groups in the general should be to run ads calling Biden stupid and pliable.

“He’ll do what we say because he is the sucking wound in the chest of our democracy and we’ll stand there and holler at him for you”

even for plenty of genuine non-drooling adults “judges and regulators” are somewhat remote arguments,

this is why Democrats lose

That’s a fantasy though he’ll just funnel free money to Monsanto or whatever idiot thing some K street flack hands him in the morning

Biden needs to campaign on how shitty and miserable he is

That might actually connect with young voters.

this is why Democrats lose

― TikTok to the (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Sunday, March 29, 2020 3:54 PM (two minutes ago)

There’s probably lots of reasons.

Are you queer?

Are you of color?

Then this election matters. Sanders lost. If you believe in any kind of leftism, then the movement matters, not the person; the people are expendable. As a queer person of color, I've made my peace with Biden getting the nomination, despite his 40 years of perfidy. Are you? Fucking grow up.

this is why Democrats lose

For far too many "progressives," running/cheering on a grandstanding, mathematically doomed presidential campaign > running for school board or city council.

I can't wait for silby to finally admit that the hundreds of thousands of black people who voted for Biden are stupid.

If by “making my peace” you mean “becoming increasing radicalized, uncompromising, and alienated from the idea of the Democratic Party good not bad” I guess that’s what’s been happening, yes.

I don’t think anyone on earth is stupid except for possibly Joe Biden.

From a UK perspective, this is all depressingly familiar.

Alfred if Biden wins in November I’ll buy you a VHS of your choice and a box of cocktail umbrellas

cheers!

I had no guarantee Sanders or Warren would win in November.

At this point I’ll adhere to my policy against counterfactual speculation

"grow up" will never make me not want to punch a face

we all know Biden > Trump. still fucking sad.

as a queer of potato color, I suggest Dem voters be less fucking stupid no matter their lack of privilege

too late

I think it would be psychologically healthier for left-wing media people who prefer Trump’s re-election to the prospect of a Biden presidency to actually say so, rather than doing months of weird concern-trolling about enthusiasm.

— Matthew Yglesias (@mattyglesias) March 29, 2020

Who here is a “media person”

the point works just as well without that word

Does it

if you're posting on twitter or facebook with your political opinions, you are a small 'm' media person. those are media. here, too, in a very minor way.

🤔

well, I personally know zero ilx people irl. you all come to me mediated. as they used to say, "on the internet no one knows that you're a dog". that's mediation. ilx is a medium. but as J.D. pointed out the point works just as well without that word.

It is uniquely stupid to blame "left-wing media people" for the reality that Joe Biden is a uniquely terrible and unloved Democratic candidate even compared to terrible and unloved Democratic candidates of yore.

Kerry was the terrible establishment compromise of his time... but he could string together a coherent sentence and make something resembling a case for the Presidency.

If "left-wing media people" don't mention that Biden excites no one... that's not going to make people more excited for him.

Yes. So far we have a clear majority of Democratic primary voters to blame for Biden's ascendance. However you measure their excitement is open to question, but it has been quite simple to count their votes and Biden has gotten the most votes. Maybe they were actually more excited about Bernie, or Warren, or Klobuchar, or Buttigeig, or someone else they didn't vote for. When it comes to excitement it's hard to measure compared to votes, which as I hasten to add once more, are easy to measure.

Matthew Yglesias can go fuck a duck

It's true he completely ignored the many left wing people who have no preference at all between Trump and Biden.

? pic.twitter.com/gm8oEuSZYr

— Holly Otterbein (@hollyotterbein) March 30, 2020

Sure to get the ILXors who were rending their garments about BernieBros in a tizzy.

@pat1944

(Aimless checks his garments, finds them intact, breathes sigh of relief.)

More horror scenes from New York City hospitals where employers are acting like generals sending their medical troops into harm's way. https://t.co/rYGqQjRTkJ pic.twitter.com/fMDHK0G9q3

— Daniel Marans (@danielmarans) March 30, 2020

Grown-ups: b-but judges!!

spoke to a close friend last night who is emergency room doctor in Jersey City and believes he's had the virus for the last couple of weeks—dry cough low fever etc.

according to him the situation is such that everybody working there just assumes they already have it or will anyway, and newly admitted patients are almost exclsuively the infected, so....

An absolutely disgraceful response from a democratic frontrunner at a time 1 Iranian is dying every 10 min as a result of coronavirus. Biden deserves absolute hell for this callous, incoherent, and morally vacuous response in the midst of a pandemic. https://t.co/145KW4zcre pic.twitter.com/CVEzNWfy2I

— Sarah Lazare (@sarahlazare) March 30, 2020

Clear, consistent and well-reasoned.

For those interested, here is @JoeBiden's full answer to @YasminV on opposing single payer health care: pic.twitter.com/gxjTN83NCg

— Sahil Kapur (@sahilkapur) March 30, 2020

Ageing about as well as his takes.

it's just stupid gibberish. the federal government supplying equipment has nothing to do with a single payer system. the single payer system would help in this crisis because millions of people just lost their employer-provided health coverage in the middle of a pandemic

also this is not the first time biden has been callous about iran.

during that paul ryan debate, he bragged that the obama administration's sanctions on iran were "the strongest sanctions in the history of sanctions."

yeah, all these news items about exceptions for the coronavirus, how the federal government will step in and cover the testing costs, how Cigna and a couple other insurance companies are taking the unprecedented step of stepping in to cover treatment costs (because it's the "right thing to do", etc etc), just highlights the endless cases where the federal govt and insurance companies are NOT stepping in to do the right thing for people in dire circumstances facing even more lethal diseases, every single fucking second of every day

I appreciate this thread as a terrific place to vent about Joe Biden's awfulness before he earns the nomination and goes against the even worse Donald Trump. Fortunately no one here who lives in the United States has an interest in depressing turnout.