US Politics, July 2024 - "Will you just drop out, man?"

the incumbent president, with a really good record of achievement over the last 3-plus years

Undecided voters, including many who don’t follow politics at all, don’t know about the record of achievement, they just know that Biden is old and struggled in the debate. And the Republicans and the media are going to just keep reinforcing that point which will trickle down to social media faster than Biden’s list of accomplishments domestically over the last 3 1/2 years.

He can’t effectively communicate his accomplishments.

As someone said upthread, Biden's presence is related to people not knowing about the achievements. From the start of the term he has not been a vibrant figure on TV screens (or the social media equivalent) able to trumpet his achievements. You have to be a fuckin' nerd to know about anything other than the struggles (getting things past Manchin and Sinema in the Senate) and disasters (Gaza) that have cost him support.

Undecided voters, including many who don’t follow politics at all...know that Biden...struggled in the debate

Are you sure about this? Really. Like, you can't say "people aren't paying attention" in one breath and "everyone knows Biden was terrible in the debate" in the next. We scream with frustration that "regular people" and "undecided voters" (read: fucking idiots) don't know that Donald Trump is a dangerous psychopath whose brain is rancid pudding, but at the same time we're absolutely convinced that everyone in America watched the debate and came to the conclusion that Joe Biden needs to be euthanized.

It's not just that people don't know about the achievements, it's that they actively think Things Suck. And the Biden campaign's message on that has been kind of like the messaging on the debate: Let us tell you why you shouldn't trust your own direct experience.

https://news.gallup.com/poll/1669/general-mood-country.aspx

i get the argument that it’s risky to elect harris because she’s a black woman. but americans weren’t too racist to elect a black man 16 years ago, and they very nearly elected a white woman 8 years ago. so you have to believe in a really powerful degree of intersectionality. you also have to believe not just that the harris vs generic white dem bias is large, but that so is the harris vs senile old guy with historically low approval rating

It's not really words/It's just the power to charm

Also I’m thinking something might be going on with the polling if they’re getting results like this:

Biden support slips in deep blue New York: ‘We’re a battleground state now’ https://t.co/BCjnRloMmT
— POLITICO (@politico) July 10, 2024
― frogbs, Wednesday, July 10, 2024 1:30 PM (fifty-four minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

would be nice for morale if one of these skewed polls showed him winning by a lot

i think harris would be disaster because like who is the one person who has done less for the country than biden over the last 4 years? if she had some accomplishments than sure but as it is the right and center would have a heyday with "democrats think that identity is all that matters" .. and *cough* they would be right.

I mean, what did Biden achieve during the eight years as Vice President? Or Quayle or Gore etc etc.

low information swing voters don't care about accommplishments

who is the one person who has done less for the country than biden over the last 4 years?

Senator Sinema?

that's the kind of good faith in people that always makes the dnc a winning ticket!! xp

i dont see harris as an identity pick at all tbh, and i haven’t seen any of that in the current discourse. most of the people arguing for biden to step down are rallying around her because she’s vp which confers various benefits (transfer donations to her campaign seamlessly, less risk of open convention) but freely admit they’d prefer someone like whitmer or buttogieg who polls better head-to-head against trump

“He can’t effectively communicate his accomplishments.”

Even if he was a better speaker of clearer mind who made a Rose Garden speech about his accomplishments every single week, would anyone be aware of them?

Sadly I think too many people like chaos and insanity, even if chaos and insanity are killing them.

I feel like from this point on you almost have to be garish in telling the public what you’ve done for them or it “never happened”.

Slagging off a VP for not having accomplishments is a "bitch eating crackers" deal.

yeah the idea that we should slag a vice president for being shackled to their constitutional role is strange to me. I don't want Dick Cheney.

alright guys. cool to replace the candidate with no accomplishments with the candidate with no accomplishments. got it.

imo biden shouldn’t really communicate his accomplishments. incumbent are punished for their accomplishments, not rewarded. what he should do, but is now incapable of doing, is communicate trump’s negative qualities

Like, the next time a President sends a check to every American, they need to stage a couple corny-ass Publisher’s Clearing House ambush videos and blanket TikTok with those. Then *maybe* people will remember.

it's been a good strategy so far for sure. xp

what he should do, but is now incapable of doing, is communicate trump’s negative qualities

Apparently the website summarizing the goals of Project 2025 is getting a fair amount of attention — enough that Trump had to try disavowing it, something no one but Maggie Haberman bought.

exactly, if you put Harris in it'll be chaos for a couple weeks but then the focus will be put squarely on Trump, where it belongs. and the question will be: do you really want four more years of this fucking guy? the guy who literally tried to overthrow the government his last time? if Biden stays, we'll be talking about his age from now until election day.

I mean, LBJ and Truman's accomplishments before the vice presidency didn't inspire confidence either.

Harris ran an abysmal campaign. But that was ages ago.

82% rise in home prices under biden now THAT's an accomplishment!

legislatively biden accomplished an unusual amount. but what he accomplished were enormous spending packages which are (unfairly or not) perceived to have caused the inflation everyone is pissed at him about. he definitely shouldn’t talk about that any more than necessary

Map, I’m not really going against you here. It’s how completely splintered the media is today. Biden probably wasn’t shameless enough to sell what he’s done to a world that isn’t the one he’s familiar/comfortable with.

Unperson has cited Biden's accomplishments many times in the politics threads, not sure if you missed those posts or just refuse to believe them. The ACA has been such a blessing to me that I consider Obama the best prez of my lifetime, but I wouldn't argue against Biden very strongly.

haha i'm just shitposting now tbh i've reached my politics quota for the day

One of my best friends, a lifelong diabetic, learned a couple months ago his insulin bill dropped to $50 montly. That's the kind of accomplishment that saves lives.

that's a good one for sure! i'd be curious to know how much every other bill he has has risen.

probably not at the level of an unregulated insulin bill but that overall rise affects a lot more people

iirc prescription drug price negotiation is the one thing they did that polls well. bidens best attempt to make this point during the debate was the “we finally beat medicaid” quote

i'd be curious to know how much every other bill he has has risen.

Probably most of them. Judging by a conversation last week he doesn't blame Biden for the price of eggs.

good thing no one, historically, has ever had the nerve to judge the president and his administration for their daily living costs.

Because a president only has so much control over inflationary costs? But your irony is noted.

worth mentioning this shit only becomes the president's fault when there's a Democrat in office, the two biggest economic crashes of my life came under GWB and Trump yet for both of them the line was still "well at least they were good on the economy"

toss in GHWB too

alright guys. cool to replace the candidate with no accomplishments with the candidate with no accomplishments. got it.

It's impossible for her to have accomplishments (as VP).

This feels like the flip side of the Hillary "most qualified ever" argument in 2016, though - there aren't really qualifications for being the best President or Presidential accomplishments until you're in the office. All you can go on is how effective you think they can be as President and how decent their goals might be.

(I don't think Harris has decent goals or have doubts she'd be a highly effective President... but we're trying to clear the lowest possible bar here of two guys who are widely disliked and have melting brains.)

W's economic crash is the primary reason we got Obama, HW's economic crash is the primary reason we got Clinton.

The idea Republicans don't get blamed for the economy doesn't have much merit IMO - under Trump everyone was white knuckling it waiting for the next crash until COVID when suddenly people got free money and extended unemployment and it turns out people like those things a lot.

map's right to be infuriated by a country increasingly uninterested in the plight of the working poor, and the post-COVID inflation's hit them particularly hard while I know asshole who are like, "Santorini was gorgeous last week, but, ugh, did you see how high gas is here?" The system is execrable and stupid.

I mean yeah it's true people blamed GWB for a lot of that shit but it did not change people's opinions that Republicans = economic strength even as that's been proved wrong over and over and over again

he only looked like was around 140 years old just now with the new brit PM. his arms are so stiff.

must be nap time. he was talking so slow.

"what he should do, but is now incapable of doing, is communicate trump’s negative qualities"

Harris is doing it though. And she's good at it! posting this again here. its only a month ago but feels like its 10 years old. but she has gotten way better at communicating. she just seems so sane!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ne3-KA8ja6g

she can prosecute trump like nobody's business. she's got the facts at her fingertips. that's what you need. quickness. its in short supply.

An advantage of Harris vs. Trump is that they would absolutely attack her for lots of things, but they won't be able to resist especially attacking her for being a Black woman. There was already that NY Post thing calling her "the first DEI president," and there would be a lot more of that — but racist/sexist attacks are a much more double-edged weapon politically than saying "he's too old/out of it," they risk turning off a lot more people. And non-MAGA people overall already get turned off by Trump being insulting, that was one thing in that Luntz focus group on the debate, Trump's low marks came not so much from nonstop lying as when he turned particularly mean. Trump insulting another old white guy is one thing, but it would carry more potential cost against a younger nonwhite woman.

And again, she has an advantage just by not being old as fuck. Biden’s biggest liability with voters wiped out.

And Harris provides a narrative of change that I suspect a huge amount of the electorate would fucking love. Is that change real? No, but it at least provides the veneer of change plus a charismatic leader who is well spoken and is well poised to bring abortion to the forefront of the conversation.