May Day thinking about Joe

Submitted by Cassiodorus on Mon, 05/01/2023 - 6:38pm

Biden set to lose New Hampshire:

Meanwhile the "fearless" liberals at Truthout tell us: Sanders Calls on Biden to Fight for Working People in Debt Ceiling Battle. Sorry Bernie. You endorsed him already, and if he can ignore New Hampshire, he can ignore neighboring Vermont.

And here's something that originally appeared in the NYT:

As Biden Runs Again, Black Voters’ Frustration Bubbles

Here's a key quote:

Nocola Hemphill, an activist and state party delegate in Winnsboro, South Carolina, said she had also heard grumblings from Black voters about Biden. But she saw this as a form of accountability, not evidence of a deeper problem.

“Everyone is not happy with the administration,” she said. “And it’s not that we don’t want to see Biden run. We just want to make sure that he’s going to deliver on his promises.”

Sorry, Nocola, but Joe is too busy reconciling his contempt for you (a contempt shared by his social class) with his struggles to form nice-sounding sentences to care. He'll take your vote, however.

EXTRA CREDIT: Slate is running a hilarious piece, "What to Make of Those Alarming RFK Jr. Polls." Here, ostensibly, is what this Jim Newell author (don't know him; don't know who pays him) finds alarming:

Kennedy also offers a politics that appeals directly to the small, but existent, left side of the political horseshoe. Once a mainstream Democratic environmentalist, Kennedy has become a far more fringe figure over the past couple of decades. He has been one of the leading figures of the anti-vaccine movement since the 2000s and a proponent of the debunked theory that childhood vaccines cause autism. He was not, to say the least, a fan of the COVID-19 vaccines or mandates, and he accused Anthony Fauci and Bill Gates of teaming up to profit off them.

Omigod RFK Jr. believes in a bunch of irrelevant positions, in addition to being better than Biden on everything else! Pretty "alarming." When in doubt, scream and shout, run around in circles, and panic! Best to be safe with Biden and vote for catastrophic war in Ukraine as it dismantles the American position in the world.

Newell also offers up this gem of an observation:

The reason Democrats gave up and are basically all Team Biden is that the alternative frightens them more.

It's more believable to argue that the mainstream Democrats are all Team Biden because they're perfectly fine with the alternative -- otherwise they'd be running a more credible candidate this time around. Lastly we have this priceless comment:

Democrats shouldn’t underestimate the amount of work it’s going to take to prove to the country—to its own party’s voters—that Biden has another four grueling years in him.

They could try for an easier challenge, like, say, proving that the world is flat, or demonstrating that pigs can be made beautiful through the appropriate use of lipstick.

Tags:

#Joe Biden

Vote

Comments

Submitted by humphrey on Mon, 05/01/2023 - 7:04pm

Biden alienates other groups too.

https://www.politico.com/news/2023/05/01/hispanic-voters-biden-2024-0009...

President Joe Biden’s reelection campaign website went up last week, complete with Dark Brandon merch, a new campaign video — and a Spanish-language version of their launch page. So far, Biden is the only presidential candidate to have such a translation.

But the page itself had multiple mistakes. The Spanish-language version underwent several edits since Tuesday — a corrected accent mark here, an added-then-removed-then-added-again “Unidos” there — before settling on a final version two days later.

Spanish translations often trip up campaigns, but the recent release of Biden’s site put a spotlight on the difficulties that even seasoned campaigns have in connecting with a bilingual electorate. Many point to the fact that Biden announced Julie Chávez Rodríguez, a Latina, would serve as his 2024 campaign manager, as a sign that he’s serious about reaching these voters. But the website snafu is part of a larger question: mainly, how will his reelection effort adjust after experiencing some difficulty recruiting his 65 percent share of the Latino vote in 2020?

Bilingual outreach is still one of the most important components of presidential campaigns, said Jess Morales Rocketto, chief of Moonshot Strategies at Equis Research and a former digital organizing director for Hillary Clinton. She pointed to Bernie Sanders’ campaign in 2020 as an example of intentional Spanish usage that propelled the senator to a stronghold on Latino engagement.

Republicans are keen to expose any fissures between Biden and Latino voters. They have adopted aggressive media strategies to reach that voting bloc and accused Democrats of misunderstanding the fundamental issues that animate them.

“What it tells me is that after four years, his Hispanic operation is still a mess,” said Giancarlo Sopo, a Republican media strategist who specializes in bilingual communications and Hispanic outreach. He cited word-for-word mistranslations that could be confusing for native Spanish speakers as an example the campaign is “not that serious about going after the Hispanic vote … or that they’re ill-suited for that task.”

Submitted by Cassiodorus on Mon, 05/01/2023 - 8:37pm

This portion is pretty hilarious.

@humphrey

Republicans are keen to expose any fissures between Biden and Latino voters. They have adopted aggressive media strategies to reach that voting bloc and accused Democrats of misunderstanding the fundamental issues that animate them.

I suppose that at some point Republicans will figure out that Joe has done very little for any of us and exploit that. I suppose. Of course, Republicans are unlikely to do anything at all for Latino voters.

https://www.politico.com/news/2023/05/01/hispanic-voters-biden-2024-0009... President Joe Biden’s reelection campaign website went up last week, complete with Dark Brandon merch, a new campaign video — and a Spanish-language version of their launch page. So far, Biden is the only presidential candidate to have such a translation. But the page itself had multiple mistakes. The Spanish-language version underwent several edits since Tuesday — a corrected accent mark here, an added-then-removed-then-added-again “Unidos” there — before settling on a final version two days later. Spanish translations often trip up campaigns, but the recent release of Biden’s site put a spotlight on the difficulties that even seasoned campaigns have in connecting with a bilingual electorate. Many point to the fact that Biden announced Julie Chávez Rodríguez, a Latina, would serve as his 2024 campaign manager, as a sign that he’s serious about reaching these voters. But the website snafu is part of a larger question: mainly, how will his reelection effort adjust after experiencing some difficulty recruiting his 65 percent share of the Latino vote in 2020? Bilingual outreach is still one of the most important components of presidential campaigns, said Jess Morales Rocketto, chief of Moonshot Strategies at Equis Research and a former digital organizing director for Hillary Clinton. She pointed to Bernie Sanders’ campaign in 2020 as an example of intentional Spanish usage that propelled the senator to a stronghold on Latino engagement. Republicans are keen to expose any fissures between Biden and Latino voters. They have adopted aggressive media strategies to reach that voting bloc and accused Democrats of misunderstanding the fundamental issues that animate them. “What it tells me is that after four years, his Hispanic operation is still a mess,” said Giancarlo Sopo, a Republican media strategist who specializes in bilingual communications and Hispanic outreach. He cited word-for-word mistranslations that could be confusing for native Spanish speakers as an example the campaign is “not that serious about going after the Hispanic vote … or that they’re ill-suited for that task.”

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The ruling classes need an extra party to make the rest of us feel as if we participate in democracy. That's what the Democrats are for. They make the US more durable than the Soviet Union was.

Submitted by usefewersyllables on Mon, 05/01/2023 - 7:27pm

I’m going to

enjoy not voting for Daddy Winklesniffer. My only remaining decision is who will get my protest vote.

Maybe Kanye will run again. I will not vote for the uniparty, and all the other organized “parties” (like the CO Greens) are just pathetic expressions of the uselessness of the system as it stands.

I did the Green thing the last several cycles, but that no longer even feels like a protest. Somebody has to start a Raving Loony party so that I can delude myself that my protest involves at least some semblance of humor.

Sad, innit?

—

Twice bitten, permanently shy.

Submitted by Cassiodorus on Mon, 05/01/2023 - 8:48pm

On the David Sirota, er, Lever broadcast

@usefewersyllables on "why Joe Biden is running," there was a guy who called in to the show who announced that he was running for President. You could vote for that guy maybe. I don't recall hearing his name, though maybe there's a recording of the Lever broadcast somewhere.

As for David Sirota, his general position on Joe Biden is written up in The Guardian in an essay titled "The Democrats think centrism will re-elect Biden. That’s a dangerous assumption." Equally dangerous, however, is the assumption that the Democrats are in fact planning to re-elect Joe Biden. Also probable is the notion that the Democrats are merely lining up behind Biden simply because they do not wish to award the White House to RFK Jr. or Marianne Williamson.

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The ruling classes need an extra party to make the rest of us feel as if we participate in democracy. That's what the Democrats are for. They make the US more durable than the Soviet Union was.

Submitted by usefewersyllables on Mon, 05/01/2023 - 9:12pm

I don’t think

@Cassiodorus

that the dems have any clue what they want, other than to make sure that nobody else gets what they want. Or something. It is all so far beyond self-serving that I can’t fucking stand it anymore.

I’ll vote, because I always do. If there’s no humor available, I’ll just fill out my ballot with a Hershey bar. No smiley.

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Twice bitten, permanently shy.

Submitted by earthling1 on Mon, 05/01/2023 - 9:52pm

The ultimate protest vote

@usefewersyllables
is Vladimir Putin write in.
Dismal itiz.

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Neither Russia nor China is our enemy.
Neither Iran nor Venezuela are threatening America.
Cuba is a dead horse, stop beating it.

Submitted by travelerxxx on Tue, 05/02/2023 - 12:05am

Let's dance

@earthling1

The ultimate protest vote is Vladimir Putin write in.

Nah, too dour. Me, I'm going for the always-exciting Maria Zakharova.

Submitted by The Liberal Moonbat on Tue, 05/02/2023 - 5:22am

The Federal Government Right Now

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In the Land of the Blind, the One-Eyed Man is declared mentally ill for describing colors.

Yes Virginia, there is a Global Banking Conspiracy!

Submitted by Cassiodorus on Tue, 05/02/2023 - 6:33am

The difference being --

@The Liberal Moonbat that in the current situation the self-destruct is intentional, and the Federal government crew will not press an actually-functioning "cancel self-destruct" button because they can't stop lying about the self-destruct situation. Not only can't they stop lying to everyone else, but they can't stop lying to themselves.

It's the Russians, you see, they're the ones who will self-destruct. Later, you see, the Republicans will self-destruct, and an actually-functioning President Joe Biden will be re-elected in a landslide. Also, I have some south Florida real estate to sell you.

PS I greatly enjoyed the movie clip.

—

The ruling classes need an extra party to make the rest of us feel as if we participate in democracy. That's what the Democrats are for. They make the US more durable than the Soviet Union was.

Submitted by wokkamile on Tue, 05/02/2023 - 10:24am

Biden set to lose

NH to RFK Jr or MW? A fersure at this point. I see RFK Jr winning it by a good margin. Biden might even finish 3d behind MW.

But what's more important to Biden, what his team would really care about, is losing NH in the general, and to just about any R nominee. It's only a handful of EC votes, but as we know in recent times a few EC votes can make all the difference.

In the general, it's lining up that probable nominee Biden will lose that state as many Ds register write-in protest votes for RJK Jr, MW, and maybe the late Barney or Betty Hill.

Submitted by Shahryar on Tue, 05/02/2023 - 2:41pm

"You have to vote D!!! What if R wins!!??"

they'll say.

Selling off Alaskan land for oil fields was such a stupid move. Why believe anything he has to say? I mean, they all lie so I won't vote for any of them. And by "they" I mean candidates who are well-funded by donors.

Submitted by Cassiodorus on Tue, 05/02/2023 - 7:18pm

The Rs will in all likelihood have an answer for that.

@Shahryar I can give you two offhand answers myself.

""You have to vote D!!! What if R wins!!??" 1) You should have thought of that when you all fell in line behind Team Biden, which will spectacularly fail to capture the vote that doesn't freak out about what happens if the R wins. At any rate, Joe is spectacularly poised to lose in 2024, for all of the reasons I've mentioned in this diary and in the past two ones.

And also 2) One thing that might happen if the R wins is that we might get something more closely approximating a sane foreign policy, which is not something we're getting now.

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The ruling classes need an extra party to make the rest of us feel as if we participate in democracy. That's what the Democrats are for. They make the US more durable than the Soviet Union was.

Submitted by ban nock on Tue, 05/02/2023 - 8:37pm

The only thing Dems have going for them

is Trump and DeSantis. DeSantis is horrid on TV or live, and Trump will be so indicted, if Rs have anyone presentable waiting in the wings they could win.

Biden is slipping into senility, I'm amazed he has made it this far, Harris is disliked by everyone. Kennedy and Williamson are a protest vote, they can't win anything. The D party has been losing more of the Hispanic vote steadily and predictably every election. One of these days more of them will vote R than D.

I hope more people run, they are needed.