I know that it’s popular to dismiss President Biden. I get it. He’s old. This is the first election featuring the 2 oldest candidates, ever. So what? The future of the WORLD is literally dependent on this election. To boot Biden from the ticket and try to bootstrap another candidate is madness. Booting this incumbent and hoping his VP will succeed is like firing the cook and hoping the dishwasher will give you Michelin-quality food. Stick with the old man, and figure out a way to enact his popular policies while also expanding the Supreme Court, enacting term limits and limiting “Christian” Nationalists.
You think Republicans would turn down the chance to remove Biden from office?
How, exactly, would the explain that to their constituents? 🤨
Yes, which is why they should be trying to replace Biden, because making him the nominee is guaranteeing a second Trump term. The fact that they won’t even try and most of the party is lining up behind him as the nominee shows me that they don’t actually believe there’s a real danger.
The literal purpose of political parties and their power to both influence elections and party membership isn’t a conspiracy, this is ludicrous, this is the function of political parties. It’s not just a fan club. They exist to set the agenda, platform, and manage the coalition. You’re basically denying that political parties perform a function.
In your world, what even is the purpose of political parties?
This isn’t even about progressive politics. This is about a genocidal mummy driving us off a cliff and guaranteeing a second Trump term.
Simple, they think Biden is a weak candidate, and they have the best chances of beating him. Several have made statements towards this effect.
So, any other ideas for how Biden can be removed beyond republicans voting for a stronger opponent?
Your conspiracy is this hanging on to some way to control events when no mechanism exists. You are exaggerating a true thing (the purpose of parties) into something untrue (control over events). Very simple.
But what do they tell their constituents, who think Biden stole the election and needs to be impeached?
They can literally just not nominate him at the convention. It’s that easy. They control who the nominee is.
They could hold a condensed primary by mailing out ballots to all 50 States and then use that to inform delegates at the convention, they make the rules and since this is an emergency situation they could make new rules.
They tell their constituents exactly what they’ve been saying, what I told you. Their constituents would forgive them, that’s not difficult to understand.
If you’re advocating for just making up new rules on the fly that toss out the will of the voters, that’s just authoritarianism. That’s not us.
Republican voters: well known for understanding politics 👍
“They go low we go high” is a losing strategy.
As for the “will of the voters”? Look at the polls! Voters don’t want Joe and the will of the voters will demonstrate it when Trump fucking wins, and if you really believe that’s the end of democracy then maybe that matters a little more than primary tradition.
EDIT Relevant article to our discussion just dropped on Jacobin, here’s what Democratic Rep. Adam Smith had to say:
Republicans will believe what Trump tells them to believe. You’re just fighting this to be stubborn, it makes no sense that republicans would weaken themselves just to be consistent. They are horribly inconsistent very often.
It doesn’t matter. If everyone in this country starts betraying their values just to save it, then the nation might not be worth saving anymore. Someone has to stand up for democratic principles. And polls are not that great these days, you remember they predicted Hilary’s victory? The voters voted, and they were primaries even if you didn’t have anyone you liked running.
Don’t presume my values. I’m trans in a red state. When Trump wins I’m probably going to die.
Dumping Biden is life or death to me, so no shit I’m going to be stubborn.
Meanwhile, you would rather Trump get elected than Democrats replace Biden.
Your priorities are fucked dawg 😞
No, I actually think Biden would beat Trump if we actually had the election with him. If we look at the polling before the race to replace Santos’ seat, the dems outperformed their polling average by 8 points, and I expect something similar in the national. As I said, polls are not that great these days.
Additionally, I hope Biden does drop out, I think Harris would be a stronger candidate and improve our chances. However, I will fight this silly idea that some backroom, democratic party behind-the-scenes conspiracy group can magically save us. It cannot. The only ones that can save us is us, the voters who have to get out the vote with grassroots effort. No matter who the dem candidate is. Biden can help by resigning, but that is outside of the control of everyone but Biden. I actually think he will, though, he’s a good man.
I guess we’ll see.