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

Ideally yeah but all available data from the American electorate makes that sound impossible.

― “Big” Don Abernathy, Saturday, January 9, 2021 2:19 PM (one hour ago) bookmarkflaglink

Point me to this data.

People want medicare for all, a higher minimum wage, better funding for schools, legalized marijuana,a more robust unionization of the workforce, and at least some sort of police reform.

Nobody wants what the Republicans are offering, EXCEPT the sanctimonious/aggressive religious nationalism and white supremacy that they promote.

This is how they win elections, and this is how they will keep winning elections, because this country is a racist shithole that will never confront its dual original sins.

Y/N do you agree that this country needs a strong Republican party?

― early-Woolf semantic prosody (Hadrian VIII), Saturday, January 9, 2021 5:30 PM bookmarkflaglink

I think this country needs an underwater Republican party

Well it looks like the country narrowly voted for all of those things you list in 2020 because Biden and down ballot Dems explicitly ran on all of those things except for M4A. But that one is trickier since support for that seems to depend on what elements of it you ask people about but mostly agreed upon by Dems as a long term goal.

David Shor’s postmortem seems mostly correct on point imo

https://www.politico.com/amp/news/magazine/2020/11/12/2020-election-analysis-democrats-future-david-shor-interview-436334

Ok so then what are these liberal policies that people disagree with that you're talking about? Those policies I listed are all the big Mainstays of mainstream liberalism in this country, at least in terms of domestic policy.

If you're talking about actual left policy, then yeah, I don't think we'll be seeing that anytime soon because people are fucking morons.

I don’t know why people disagree with those policies and generally I think it’s good to challenge from the left but a scary amount of people turned out to vote for republicans.

Reactionary parties develop naturally.

It's not our job to encourage them.

GOP request to squash the impeachment trading explicitly on Biden’s request for unity.

One of the House members calling for "unity and healing" is the newly elected CO rep who vowed to bring her Glock onto the floor of the House.

Fuck...I guess he has to do what they want then.

The only Kamala Harris thread is on ILM.

https://www.cnn.com/style/article/kamala-harris-vogue-cover/index.html

Republicans in the House are countering with their own set of impeachment articles today.

Kamala Harris is (currently) the Vice-President of the United States

xp Impeachment of ... what?

Of being black and female...I was of course kidding. But it probably is a good preview of what's in store for Harris.

Man was that ever unclear

We are entering or to be honest have already entered a phase in which no "I'm obviously clowning here" po-faced assertion about an action taken by House Republicans is, in fact, obvious clowning

I'm lost. I'm that slacker in the Simpsons "Homerpalooza" episode who doesn't know anymore if he's being ironic or not. I must have misunderstood your post, eephus.

Republicans in the House are moving to impeach ILX unless mods move the Kamala Harris thread to I Love Hoops

Kamala Harris can't jump

I'm going to lock this thread while Biden is taking the oath of office, unless I lock it earlier.

why

oh right lol

let's make some more Black jokes, they're landing really well in the current environment

how's this one looking now

― shivers me timber (sic), Friday, January 8, 2021 5:37 AM (four days ago)

I just received a positive COVID-19 test result after being locked down in a secured room at the Capitol where several Republicans not only cruelly refused to wear a mask but recklessly mocked colleagues and staff who offered them one.https://t.co/wVmgroKsdf

— Rep. Pramila Jayapal (@RepJayapal) January 12, 2021

“You take an aggressive approach to #BlackLivesMatter protests but not to right-wing extremists threatening to lynch a governor if it’s for the President*’s benefit. Did I get it right, Mr. Barr?” @RepJayapal #SheGotItRight @ReallyAmerican1 pic.twitter.com/VlHxasm5Zb

— Adam Rifkin 🐼 (@ifindkarma) July 29, 2020

And it's been almost a whole hour! The corruption, the venality — truly, we didn't know how good we had it with Trump!

― but also fuck you (unperson), Tuesday, November 24, 2020 10:36 AM ([one thousand two hundred and twenty seven hours ago)

ok point taken

― huge rant (sic), Saturday, November 28, 2020 10:37 AM (one month ago)

Star-Studded Biden-Harris Inaugural Events To Stretch Over 5 Days, Celebrate 'America United'

https://deadline.com/2021/01/star-studded-biden-harris-inaugural-events-5-days-celebrate-america-united-1234674481/

The Biden inauguration, brought to you by Union Busting LLC.

“It is our job to hold President-Elect Biden accountable ...As an organizer whose union was busted by Ballard Spahr, I’m certainly disappointed – but my hope for change was never in Joe Biden, it has always been in our people-powered movement.” https://t.co/UEwrKQOhwt

— Jessica Benham (@jessicalbenham) January 18, 2021

my hope for change was never in Joe Biden, it has always been in our people-powered movement.

that's a completely reasonable sentiment, no matter how Biden's administration turns out or what good deeds or mistakes he instigates

The real cool kid leftist take: Biden, an unremarkable politician with no real ideas or political style of his own, is shaping up to be a far, far better president than Obama.

— Alex Yablon (@AlexYablon) January 19, 2021

I think we should be cautious but there are already some good signs for sure

If the Democrats in the senate can stay unanimous in the face of howls from the right, much good may result.

I won't quote Harvey Keitel's Pulp Fiction quip yet, but we've got a long political history of mediocrities transcending their own limitations. We'll see.

For the meantime, I feel relief. While COVID ain't going anywhere for a while, we have competent hands at last -- people who believe in government and have worked in government long enough to understand what mechanisms work and which need creation.

Tbh Covid is the only reason why I care about Biden's presidency at all.

That's enough.

This is what I've said before about Biden's ideological flexibility and how it can be a virtue. I think he's *temperamentally* a moderate, so I don't think he's ever going to suddenly become a raging socialist. But he has a situational mindset and is open to persuasion. Although that's sometimes led him to make bad compromises, it could also lead him to advocate for more progressive policies than one might expect from him at this particular moment, because he recognizes the crisis and is willing to do what it takes to solve it.

I'll also repost this tweet from the general politics thread, because I think it applies to Biden, too.

Hard to overstate how much better today's moderate Dem senators are than those of 2009, especially on stimulus. One reason I'd guess: Everyone's always fighting the last war, and "Obama's tepid recovery gave us Trump" has finally displaced "weakness on inflation gave us Reagan" https://t.co/eN6axte0PG

— Eric Levitz (@EricLevitz) January 19, 2021

Everyone's always fighting the last war, and "Obama's tepid recovery gave us Trump" has finally displaced "weakness on inflation gave us Reagan"

Well uh Obama's skin color gave us Trump. Inflation and "we hate the '60s" gave us Reagan.

But, yeah, it's true: we're in a better spot than in 2009.

Also: "we hate black people" also gave us Reagan.

Any analysis of the ascendancy of Trump that doesn’t center him first and foremost as a reaction against the first Black President is wrong, IMO

exactly

He only built a "political" base by screaming bullshit for years about how the black president was fake.

Biden will recognize Guaido as Venezuela's leader, top diplomat says https://t.co/SGNaGb03ur pic.twitter.com/pf2R3AEAQj

— Reuters (@Reuters) January 19, 2021

lol

hoo boy

Make The CIA Great Again

Thinking we might want to hold off a bit before declaring Biden vastly superior to Obama tbh. Maybe let him take a couple of lumps or have a couple of Republicans whine about the deficit.

oh I'll admit American presidents have execrable foreign policy.

Thinking we might want to hold off a bit before declaring Biden vastly superior to Obama tbh

People like hope. Same reason why Obama won a Nobel Peace Prize just for succeeding Dubya and raising high hopes. I'm willing to see what he does, more especially because my influence over what he does will be indistinguishable from nil.

As promised:

Continuing here:
Joe Biden is (currently) President of the United States