I think I've got this figured out.
Biden is as good as gone. The math is obvious: Anyone still willing to vote for him will gladly vote for his replacement. The ticket can only gain votes by replacing Biden.
Right now we are in a transition period where Democrats are being acclimated to the idea. The puppeteers play cat and mouse with his lucidity by mistiming the adderall-amphetamine cocktail that gives him vitality. The plan is to let this drag out all the way to the convention to avoid discussion of his replacement.
It was really surprising to see how immediate the reaction on MSNBC and CNN was during the debate. These networks control the message so thoroughly that for the majority of their panel guests to suddenly jump ship raises the hackles of my spidey senses.
Biden can reliably be counted on to fight to stay in. This was probably foretold long ago during discussions of whether he should even run in 2024. When insiders saw how he had changed his mind about being a "transition" president amid his declining mental acuity they had to come up with a plan for what is essentially an inner-party coup. Any vigorous primary against him would be unlikely to succeed, and it historically has been the death knell for the incumbent.
The next step is where things get interesting. Insiders have known, and prepared for this, for a long time. Witness the "remote" convention they have planned. There's no way the Democrats are going to do this on the up and up. My gut tells me this is a setup to put someone at the top of the ticket who couldn't possibly have gotten there through the usual channels. People have long speculated it's gonna be Gavin Newsom but I think that's too easy. I mean, if things ran their natural course he'd be more than likely but I don't see things running their natural course. There will be a push for Kamala but if there's anyone who could possibly do worse than Biden on the ticket it's Harris.
They are screwed with Kamala Harris as V.P. They cannot win with her at the top of the ticket, and they can't replace her on the top of the ticket without admitting she was never qualified to step into the role. Those are terrible optics. They can't pair her up with someone from the large field of qualified female candidates because that would be two women on the ticket, and it was said when Hillary lost that America was ready for a black man as president but not a woman. So don't look for a Harris-Klobuchar ticket.
Strategically, you have to promote Kamala as if she's always been prepared and ready, but then pick such a competent V.P. that it's understood, yet unspoken, that he's there to make sure she isn't really in charge.
Depending on how grim things start to look for the Democrats, my odds are on Mayor Pete being shoehorned in as the CIA toady he is, but if they end up needing a Hail Mary, I think they could easily win with Bernie.
Comments
Not in 10,000 years would they pick Bernie!
They fought against him too long, too hard, and way too dirty in 2016 and again in 2020. They'd sooner pick TRUMP!!!
Watch the Dumbfuck party go glug, glug, glug....
There is no justice. There can be no peace.
Very true
I was even going to mention that. They could lose to Trump and be fine in 2028, but then I heard that up to 8 Senate seats could flip if this goes pear shaped so I think that opens the small crack of a possibility.
“He may not have gotten the words out but the thoughts were great.”
It has been pear shaped
for quite some time. The only way it will get *more* pear shaped will result in all our deaths.
Twice bitten, permanently shy.
Bingo…
.
That was obvious the next day when he spoke more coherently and forcefully. He was given the proper cocktail. But they gave the game away with they said for a week that he needed a stroke showing at the debate or he would need to be replaced. And the way the media started talking about his mental health and how he needed to be replaced was ready to go. They were given their talking points before the debate began.
Another setup was Obama grabbing Joe’s hand and leading him off stage. There was no need for him to do that. Unless it was to lead to his poor debut performance.
On Kamala replacing Joe I just watched Tulsi's takedown of her which she never recovered from. She dropped out after that debate. Thanks, Tulsi!
I hate being played.
“When out of fear you twist the lesser evil into the lie that it is something good, you eventually rob people of the capacity to distinguish between good and evil.”
~ Hannah Arendt
CIA: This is what we do
We overthrow so many foreign leaders it just seems so reasonable we would do it to ourselves eventually. That's why my gut tells me to watch out for that rodent Pete.
That's an interesting point about Obama at the fundraiser. He could have sidled up next to Joe an put his arm around him and started waving to the audience. I expected them to relish the moment. Almost as if Obama wanted to make him look bad, huh?
Yes to Tulsi. I still wear my Tulsi shirt proudly. To me it says "fuck all y'all"
“He may not have gotten the words out but the thoughts were great.”
Yep Obama could have done that
just as easily as taking his hand. Biden was basking in the applause and not frozen. I thought it was a setup from the moment I saw it.
Maybe Trump will pick her for VP? I’d love to see it..
“When out of fear you twist the lesser evil into the lie that it is something good, you eventually rob people of the capacity to distinguish between good and evil.”
~ Hannah Arendt
It's a daily
back-and-forth drama, one day it appears the Joe Must Go forces have the upper hand, and the next day it looks like Jill is going to insist that Joe stick around longer. Appears to be a very split party, with no clear good options. Had there been a clear obvious pick to replace Joe, say from the VP slot, we would be about to hear the incumbent announce he is stepping aside. But there is no clear front runner to replace him, and his VP gets very mixed reviews and is considered a problem the party has to find a way to work around.
Lettuce be clear though: if Joe does step aside, the party on short notice will need someone who can pick up and hold votes in the places that matter. So, no Mayo Pete, fcs. A lightweight with a not great track record as Trans Sec. So, no Gavin Newsom. The DP already has CA locked up, as well as the French Laundry elites. No Vermonter Bernie. The party leaders would not countenance it, and not much sense in replacing the really old with the really old.
No one is clamoring for another Hillary campaign. And Michelle O is not interested in running.
That leaves just a few obvious picks, and by far and away the most often mentioned are Gov Gretchen Whitmer of MI and Gov Josh Shapiro of PA, a dynamic, attractive ticket. Two hugely important swing states immediately put back in the D column. Those two and Kamala would vie for the nomination in an open convention or could begin campaigning in the month or so lead up to the convo. Let the 4k convention delegates decide.
But only if Joe steps aside. I think if he doesn't do the right thing in the next week, Ds are stuck with him.
But you aren't accounting for corruption
The way I see it, we couldn't have gotten to this point organically. People have their thumbs on the scale and it's not just about winning the election. You offer up some good, logical choices but logic isn't what the party is running on. One thing I'll agree with is they will let it go to the open convention. I think some serious shenanagans are gonna go on with this virtual roll call.
“He may not have gotten the words out but the thoughts were great.”
Well I know
plenty about DNC corruption, in 2016, 2020 and this year in the anti-primary coronation period. They'll rig things easily if at the time they feel it's needed, but on the Biden situation, we have to credit Jill, Anita Dunn and a handful of other Bidenistas for doing a decent and mostly effective job of concealing and limiting the cognitive decline evidence that apparently was beginning to be more obvious starting last summer. There are the party powerbrokers and elite, but not all are deep enough insiders to know for sure and for those deep insiders not all reasoned that what they might have seen personally or in a video news clip was more than just a one-off. People will believe what they are inclined to believe.
The party, and esp the elite/insiders/powerbrokers, are split right now. It's not simply a matter of thumbs on the scale, but thumbs being placed on either side of the scale.
My position is the primaries were rigged (again) this year, but (see above) the party was at least half asleep about the real nature of Biden's mental decline due in major part to the effective coverup. So it's probably more true than not that many in the elite class of the party were shocked when they saw the debate. But I'm not sure who you think the DP has in mind to put at the top of the ticket who would otherwise be unnominatable if done by organic processes.
Re Kamala, who could be nominated by open convention organic processes, just to note that she is being elevated somewhat in Ds estimation, perhaps with some quiet behind-the-scenes improvement in la présentation, perhaps just by virtue of being mentioned as a leading name to replace Biden, or bc she has been more vetted than any other of the names being mentioned so there would be no surprises. She's also not being discounted bc she's being backed by black leaders in the party (notably Clyburn) in the event Joe drops out. They will fully back her, and that is a key DP constituent group, the same one that put Biden over the top in 2020. So not wise to underestimate her chances at an open convo.
This conversation between Nathan Robinson and Cenk Uygur
is interesting:
Some initial observations:
1) It would seem that the presence of Nathan Robinson is a calming influence upon Cenk Uygur. At any rate, Uygur looks better here than he usually does. His anecdotes are entertaining and enlightening.
2) Jill Biden does look guilty of elder abuse. And it's happening right there in public. Full-frontal criminality might be fun to watch for the sheer schadenfreude of it, but it doesn't help the Democratic Party cause.
3) The open convention thing looks like the highest-probability option right now, if only because there are significant forces that want to hang on to a Biden presidency. Kamala Harris, the most obvious option to replace Biden, does not like the Biden appointees. (Sure, nobody likes Kamala Harris. This reinforces the point.)
4) Uygur dramatically over-estimates the Democrats' chances. Sure, the likelihood is that replacing Biden with anyone else increases those chances. The problem is that the Biden presidency has been historically bad for the past two years (see e.g. inflation, wage stagnation, high interest rates, Ukraine, Gaza) and, having told everyone that you have no choice but to vote for Genocide Joe, they're now going to try a bait-and-switch marketing ploy and a campaign that will have to begin at a very late date. Trump may be "unpopular," but a lot of working people were better off under Trump. (Oh, sure, that wasn't because of Trump, but still, they were.) And ALL of the Democrats will be tried and found guilty of cheering on this anti-democratic process. So the ship is going down. We are getting Trump and some very long coat-tails.
5) Sure, this is entertaining. Vote for Jill Stein already. She's on the ballot and she doesn't support genocide.
“One of the things I love about the American people is that we can hold many thoughts at once” - Kamala Harris
Cenk loves
to hear himself pontificate and prognosticate. And I'm not entirely convinced he's got a stellar or consistent prediction track record in recent elections. But, that's his boast anyway.
He's probably going to be right if Ds again nominate Geriatric Joe, certain victory for DJT and the Rs, but not too long ago wasn't it 99% certain that Hillary was going to win? I wouldn't bet the house on Donald even against Geriatric. Too strange and unpredictable an election year, and the fun is only beginning in July.
Moi, I'm in this discussion hoping Jill finally gets the message and tells Joe to step aside, and my interest there is primarily out of self-preservation -- to avoid the 95% likelihood of US v Ru and WW3 happening if Joe somehow manages to shuffle and mumble his way to another term. Right now, today, if Joe steps aside, it looks like Kamala has the advantage winning the nom. Not an endorsement, just an assessment of the political landscape.
Bye Bye Biden
My best guess is that it’s going to be Kamala, but only because so much of that money is tied up in the Biden Harris reelection, so nobody else can use it. They’re going to have to find someone who is not hated by most people for VP. I don’t have any idea who they will pick.
Biden is gone though. As someone who used to work with the elderly, I saw the signs as early as 2015-2016. When they were talking about replacing Biden for Hillary, I said that I hope not because he’s going senile. Looking at the way people walk and talk will tell you a lot.
I half believe that they might give him a “hot shot” which would give him a mild stroke or seizure. Then he could come on TV and say how much he wanted to stay the President but because of his health, it would be better if he stepped down.
At this point, nothing would surprise me. I still don’t see the Democrats winning.
Same page
I think they are waiting for the most opportune time to reveal Joe's health problems, either by withholding drugs or administering them. It will happen about a week before the convention, but the masses will have seen it coming so as to soften the shock.
I think where a lot of people go wrong is they try to lay odds on the general election using logic and probability. My angle on it is to determine who is behind the clandestine effort to oust Joe, and who would be their choice? Clearly, Mayo Pete is the CIA favorite. I think he was supposed to win in 2020 but he got ground into the floor during the debates. Assigning him to be Transportation Secretary was supposed to be a fluff job to repair his reputation but then they struck down an effort to increase braking capabilities of trains, broke a train union strike just before a train derailment, and had planes rip open in flight. So much for the rehab... but they will still proceed with the grand plan.
“He may not have gotten the words out but the thoughts were great.”
Weird how out of sight Pete has been
With all the problems I’d think he would be on the next 24/7. Unless I’m just not reading the right sites.
“When out of fear you twist the lesser evil into the lie that it is something good, you eventually rob people of the capacity to distinguish between good and evil.”
~ Hannah Arendt