Some people will be miserable no matter who is running
Can she remember what she had for breakfast? If so, she’s got my vote.
And this is why I’ll never be president.
Seriously. I NEVER know what she had for breakfast.
is it a binary thing? because there’s a very good chance it’s not mcdonald’s, which can’t be said for the other side
Well maybe you could be president if you stopped eating avocado toast and made coffee at home.
I almost always make coffee at home since I work from home, and I don’t like avocado. So maybe I can be president? Though I’m not sure if there’s ever been a US president that doesn’t like avocado.
Not in my district
She could be a human suit full of spiders and she would have my vote.
Three dwarves in a trenchcoat, even
Now let’s not go too far.
deleted by creator
We’re electing a president, not a monarch. Nobody is above criticism, and there’s a weird segment of people who act like criticism from the left exists only to help the right.
Like, I actually saw someone say we shouldn’t do it because it’s too nuanced for the average voter, and sorry but I don’t do paternalism like that. If reading criticism of how a candidate isn’t far enough left makes you vote further right, that’s a basic political literacy problem.
I mean, we could focus on defeating the GOP and the day after the election results come in start using social pressure to guide our elected officials. If the criticism risks the GOP seizing even more power, it might be counterproductive to your goals even if the criticism is valid.
Any good faith criticism of the Dem candidate should be obvious in its criticisms that R policies are inherently worse. For example, Harris’ record as DA is worth criticizing, but any bad decisions related to imprisoning people are going to be a million times worse under Trump, as Project 2025 shows.
Any good faith criticism of the Dem candidate should be obvious in its criticisms that R policies are inherently worse.
Your argument would be great if we didn’t live in the reality presented below. There are too many people sitting on the fence who legitimately cannot discern between a mediocre candidate and a career conman, criminal rapist. Where you see nuance, others see “she’s no better than Trump”.
I like Harris as much as I like Biden, which is not at all, but the alternative is the very real possibility of the end of America.
For my money those charts will look very different after the next debate.
There’s also not a combination of words that’s going to convince me leftists criticizing Dems are going to kill America. Even if Trump gets elected, you are missing every potential lesson if what you take away is “leftists too mean.”
Yeah discouraging voters has never led anywhere bad before.
Normal people don’t read lefty struggle sessions on the internet. 🙄
It’s a good thing they only let “normal” people vote.
Being honest isn’t discouraging, it’s not being infantilizing.
Exactly this. On this platform and elsewhere, there is a lot of well-meaning criticism but there are many agents of chaos or narrative pushers that disguise themselves as genuine criticism. I try to interact genuinely and give an opportunity to demonstrate that they are looking for a constructive path forward for the party.
Well, last time we pushed Biden left it was called too soon after election, give them time to form a plan. Form a cabinet, figure out policies.
Then it was midterms. Questioning the policies for misterm gives Republicans a win. They have to keep these conservative polices set by the last Republican to win over Republican voters.
Then it’s 2024. Questioning policies is a win for Republicans. They need to win this election, and then we can push them left.
I’m hoping it ends with a younger nominee.
It’s a lot easier to criticize the Democratic Party if the GOP is first discarded as useless trash and gets no votes in an election. Then we can decide who among our progressive candidates actually has the best approach forward.
Yet I keep seeing this thought assumed, that a 100% blue vote would “give them too much unchecked power”. This is the difference: We have a party while the GOP has a person. A bullet 2 inches to the right would have destroyed their whole movement.
Because when all those people do is criticize Democrats, sabotage outreach efforts, and don’t put any time or effort into defeating fascists, then it is very obvious where they stand.
Like I get it - huffing farts from time to time is great. But you gotta take a break and mix some productive advocacy and outreach if you actually care about Democracy instead of just smelling farts.
Maybe I’m super cynical, but does that really matter on Lemmy and the platforms connected to it?
Like, who’s reading this comment section that’s actually on the fence about going out and voting for a Harris ticket? It has to be a miniscule fraction.
Some people think criticizing is the same thing as not supporting.
If you want things to get better, you have to honestly and critically examine your leaders, not blindly support them and pretend they are flawless. Shutting down criticism is short-sighted nonsense and will only lead to worse candidates in the future.
Right. The problem with the current political atmosphere in America is that only one of the two parties is actually self-critical. The other is a cult of personality that can do no wrong. They set the reality from the top, and everyone below falls in line.
Only one side of the political aisle in the US will ever actually admit they were wrong about something instead of doubling down on it. Only one side will, at this point, admit defeat even.
In a Real Politik sense, this is a weakness.
Even Fox was calling out the tone after Trump was shot. They acknowledged Trump himself has used language akin to encouraging violence on many occasions, while the worst the left has done is label him a fascist - a mostly accurate term. Yet, people had been praising those violent remarks while calling out democrats, even after discovering the shooter was a devout Republican.
There is no introspection among them.
even after discovering the shooter was a devout Republican.
Was he? He’d voted in what, one election as a registered Republican and made one tiny donation to ActBlue. I doubt he was a terribly devout anything politically. I suspect once more about him becomes public it’s going to be about fame seeking.rather than a political message. After all his name is going to be in the history books, and would have been there more prominently if he’d landed the shot.
They interviewed his colleagues at school and they were adamant that he was very much on the conservative side.
Then why target Trump? Surely he wrote some kind of something about his goal there? I doubt he thought killing Trump would trigger the meteoric rise of a “true” conservative leader who would mobilize the right under Trump’s martyrdom and that no one would notice his political affiliation in the process.
You can ask him, if you’d like…
The working theory is that he was part of Project 2025, and felt betrayed (as all of Trump’s former supporters have been) when he disavowed himself of involvement in it (as he pretty much had to since it was terrorism).
It’s a stupid pattern. Trump claims he supports X with no plan to support X, then when talking to X’s opponents, says he opposes X; then does nothing either way unless it benefits him. Millions of people are only slowly figuring this out.
You can ask him, if you’d like…
Let me just pull out my Ouija board, though I’ve never been the best with it…
The working theory is that he was part of Project 2025, and felt betrayed (as all of Trump’s former supporters have been) when he disavowed himself of involvement in it (as he pretty much had to since it was terrorism).
A 20 year old community college student was “part of” Project 2025? In what context do you mean here?
Like I said, I suspect the 20 year old community college student that had voted as a Republican in exactly one election and made exactly one small donation to a Democrat PAC was probably not stewed into a murderous rage against the presidential candidate that is the de facto cult leader of the party he was registered as for political reasons.
Supposedly his final social media post was a message on Steam reading: “July 13th will be my debut, watch how it goes” That feels much more like chasing notoriety than a political manifesto.
Go ask a psychologist, there are a billion fucking reasons for a human to snap and do irrational shit.
People don’t even need to snap to be consistently irrational.
Exactly. Those in the highest positions of power should damn well have criticism. The argument otherwise seems to imply that accountability and transparency have no place in American politics
It’s funny how the tribalism of those demanding unwavering support of The Chief is very much a walk back from the spirit of Democracy (“they represent us”) and into Monarchy (“we owe fealty to them”).
The less Democratic a country is - and hence the less representative its leaders are - the worse this shit is.
The reality of the situation is the time for that is November 6th and later (or during the primaries or the last 4 years).
For the months between the primary concluding and the general election concluding, if you support the candidate, then criticism is a distraction that undermines the goal of getting them elected.
So you are free to criticize of course, but it’s a practical concern to be aware of that you are convincing others to not vote at all or vote against the candidate.
Probably, but misogyny and racism is easier to call out than defending an old man who shouldn’t be behind the wheel of a car, let alone a country.
And Trump is still too damn old, even ignoring the fact that he’s a repugnant human being to boot.
Trump’s very obviously much less mentally competent than Biden. Biden rambled a couple of times. Trump rarely forms a coherent sentence at all.
I’ll say that Biden sounds less competent at a glance. Like if you watch and go through his mental process, you understand how the mistake he made happened but you know the substance of what he was trying to say.
Usually Trump says stuff that, on the surface, sounds like maybe something but if you try to think about it it makes no sense.
I’m sure the Russians already have their list of alliterative agitprop ready to test on .ml before pushing the best ones to prod on Reddit and Facebook.
I mean just reprint the copmala material from when she was announced as VP pick and you’re golden.
I was a major biden naysayer. Id always love more but this was a huge ask that was answered. Lets kick republican ass
If we get someone better, I’ll be shocked.
The positive take would be to start with the “Trump is too old for 4 more years as a President” memes.
Instead we have these “those who don’t instantly bend the knee are against us” memes that, frankly, have quite the wiff of the typical Far-Right/Foreign Propaganda Op purposefully sowing division on the Left.
🤖 posting the “Anti-Harris Memes are an Op by the Far Right” 🤝 🤖 posting “Anyone complaining about Anti-Harris memes is an Op by the Far Right”
Good point: good old Stupidity is also a valid explanation for having a knee-jerk reaction of starting fights with those whose help you need.
deleted by creator
eyup. new directive is pushing the harris bad narrative now that project get joe to drop is complete.
It’s not a narrative as much as it is a fact. Her approval numbers are pretty terrible. Not insurmountable, but not great.
Found one.
Harris is my least favorite alternative and most risky but I’ll happily campaign for her if that’s who they decide.
Trump sure is old.
Her approval numbers are pretty terrible.
Well, she is an uppity woman, after all.
/s
I know you’re being sarcastic, but I worry that people take that attitude. Some not voting for her because she’s a woman, and then her supporters taking the Hillary Clinton angle that any criticism must be misogyny. All that did was ignore legitimate criticism that pointed out her low approval and failure to speak to her constituents. In the end, Dem voters didn’t turn out.
There is legitimate criticism which is substantive and specific. And then there is the “I don’t know what it is, but there’s something about her I just don’t like” which invariably and (to me at least) is quite obviously a gut reaction against strong-minded, intelligent and bold women.
Hillary Clinton got both. I’ve yet to see any substantive criticism of Harris… it’s all been in the latter vein. Like literally “she’s just not likable”.
I don’t have a criticism of her, but I do have concerns. My biggest concern are the people who won’t vote for her based on her gender or race. As you said, they’ll shroud it in ambiguous statements about just not liking her, but that’ll be the reason for some people.
As for me, she’s not as centrist as Biden, which is nice, but not as progressive as I’d like to see. But I’ll vote for whomever the nominee is because they’re not Trump. Knowing I’d have to vote for Biden again was bothering me though, he’s given his life to public service, but his time was done, too many concerns.
My biggest concern are the people who won’t vote for her based on her gender or race.
Agree with you broadly. Yet… this type of concern is exactly why we end up with candidates like Biden. I say at this point pedal to the metal, let’s go all in and make it stick. For me she’s progressive enough given that no electable candidate will be as progressive as I’d like.
The fairest behaviour is one where a person’s gender and race are irrelevant and all that counts are that person’s actions.
This is equally valid on the positive side and on the negative side: only people who are prejudiced will be celebrating of decrying her gender and/or race.
The fairest behaviour
Are you new here?
It’s funny that the technique of bating away valid criticism on somebody by claiming said criticism is relly an “-ism” is exactly the technique Zionists are using to bat away criticism of a Genocide so horrible that they have snipers activelly shooting children on the head when they’re playing at home.
If ethno-Fascists are using to justify child murder the very same argumentative techniques one uses to defend one’s “chief”, one might want to have a real hard think about why one feels the need to use the same discourse technique as child-murdering modern NAZIs rather than using truth and logic to defeat the criticism.
Removed by mod
deleted by creator
If you’re banking against the religious vote you’re setting up to lose
The religious vote that keeps losing in deep red states on abortion?
She’s a woman, and she’s black, of course there will be opposition.
It’ll be interesting to see what minor controversy from her past that voters glom onto and equivocate with Trump’s blatant assault on democracy.
This idea that any criticism of her is invalid and just misogyny/racism is bullshit. She is a very flawed candidate, ESPECIALLY for people of color.
Why especially for people of color?
Her activity as a prosecutor. A particular standout for me was prosecuting lower income parents of color for school absenteeism. While I firmly believe children should be educated, I don’t think throwing overworked low income parents in jail is going to help keep those children in school, well supervised, and ultimately safe.
She could have dodged all this criticism by running as a Republican (and then getting ignored by all the old white guys at the RNC).
I don’t know.
I really dislike Harris. She’s probably the bottom of my pick list for the nominee and a Dem President.
But it’s not like a gaping sore of a liability the way Biden was.
I’m excited the conversation can finally shift to “Trump fell asleep during his own convention? Doesn’t he seem tired in his speech?”
I think it being a woman nominee is an interesting newsworthy discussion point at a time when the other party is actively working to harm women - even if she’s the last of the many other qualified women I’d rather see in the position.
I don’t like her, I don’t like listening to her nonsensical off the cuff statements, I thought she did very poorly in the 2020 campaign, I am anxious about a law enforcement politician as President in a system with too much Presidential power over the Justice department.
But in spite of all that, I just don’t care enough to push back strongly on her.
She’s boring in the neoliberal way we’ve gotten used to, but she’s not addled and she’s not a neo-Nazi, and with an interesting VP pick she’s a ticket I could potentially even be excited about four months from now instead of watching her be put into a nursing home as the October surprise.
I’d love to see an actual competitive open convention, but barring that I’m just going to accept a turd sandwich that’s palatable, as even that seemed like a stretch a week ago, and I’ll take what I can get.
If you’d like something to be excited about consider how much psychological damage losing an election to a woman of color will do to not just trump, but Bannon and miller.
I’d love for them to feel their ideology so rejected that they give up and finish drinking themselves to death.
If you’d like something to be excited about consider how much psychological damage losing an election to a woman of color will do to not just trump, but Bannon and miller.
Hell, there’s a part of my cold, cold heart that will be warmed to know that Hillary Clinton might live to see a woman become POTUS, and that woman will not be a Clinton.
I want to see this so bad!!
Just a reminder that Harris has a voting record to the left of all Senate Democrats.
https://www.govtrack.us/congress/members/kamala_harris/412678/report-card/2020
from your own link, that’s only because she’s the least bipartisan dem in the senate.
govtrack’s “left-right ideology” ranking is flawed, it doesn’t look at the content of the bills at all. in govtrack’s own words the ideology ranking “may be measuring something else, perhaps something more closely related to partisan-ness”.
Not compromising with fascists is a good quality to have as well.
Almost as if the US democrats where assholes through and through (still better that the Republicans, before you accuse me of supporting Trump).
Lol nah, just Russian bots acting like Americans. “Biden is too old, we need anybody else in order to beat Trump!”, “Kamala is too black/isn’t manly enough/isn’t black enough/is too womanly to beat Trump!”
Or maybe they’ll push the angle that “<candidate> was pushed down our throats by the political elite so vote third party/Trump to teach them a lesson!”
Not everyone critizising the DMC is a russian bot. 🙄
Sure, some of them are just galaxy brain cynics whose only political participation is actively sabotaging democratic outreach efforts because they like the way their farts smell.
There is a difference between being critical when it is warranted, and doing literally nothing besides that.
What’s better? Smelling you own farts, or drinking the Kool-aid that the US has a functioning democracy?
Any propaganda in favor of the DMC which tries to sell them as anything but the lesser evil is just insulting your intelligence.
The non-bots criticizing the DMC are helping usher in fascism and they know it.
Yes, criticizing a supposedly democratic party is the most fascist thing one can do. /s
If the only alternative is a fascist president and the election is a popularity contest, then we need to win the popularity contest and we can squabble afterward. THis is something repugnicans do so much better than us, rally behind, and we really need to do that right now. En masse
I don’t think that noting that both sides are bad but one is the lesser evil will make people vote for Trump.
Fuck off propagandist
We can’t verify anyone’s identity online to see if they are russian trolls due to the anonymising nature of the Internet so we instead have a look at their content and user history and make a decision based on that
Usually trolls act like trolls
Right, and the important distinction is that’s all they do. They go into political communities and agitate. They don’t talk about dogs or games or ways they are opposing Trump. Pretty much all they do is attack Democrats.
What do the Russians have against DMC?
Maybe it was never tricky to rock a rhyme.
Don’t they also love their Adidas?
I mean, there are valid reasons to be anti-Harris, she’s still a right-winger. Leftists aren’t going to be happy voting for any right-winger by default.
Harris could take a firm anti-genocide stance, or promise something big and popular like Medicare for All, which would see increased voter turnout from the Left. However, given her track record, I doubt she would pivot in this direction, instead focusing on being a younger and healthier Joe Biden, essentially. That should make liberals more likely to turn out, so still a net-gain for the Dems.
It’s really too early to tell.
She campaigned for President by proudly supporting Medicare for all.
Yes, then dropped out before the Primaries. This was during a time when there were other candidates like Bernie and Warren pushing hard for it. We will see if she takes this back up, or tries to maintain a “younger Biden” approach.
Harris called for a ceasefire in Gaza in March. She co-sponsored Bernie’s Medicare for All bill. She spent most of her VP term focusing on abortion rights. She pushed for Marijuana rescheduling, which is still ongoing. She checks all the boxes for me.
We will have to see where she moves her campaign. America in 2024 is not America in 2020, where progressive policies were salient. Now, the bar has been lowered to “no genocide,” yet genocide is still a popular DNC position, despite the wishes of the electorate.
Kamala may try to run her campaign on big hope and promises, ie progressive policies and toning down the warhawkish Biden foreign policy, but given the right-wing trajectory of the DNC she may try to focus on garnering establishment support now that she has essentially been handed the nomination.
Only time will tell.
Now that “Genocide Joe” is out, the Lemmy-Leftists LARPing as communists have gone mask-off and are just proudly pushing accelerationism.
It was always a front.
She is just as genocidal as Biden. We are being critical because at least for me I was gaslit into voting for Biden despite all the red flags.
I knew that Biden was anti-Arab and specifically anti-Palestinian. But liberals assured me it will be fine. Well it isn’t fine we got a genocide. Once bitten twice shy.
Well, good thing Trump doesn’t have any red flags at all right?
Still on the Trump Train, huh?
deleted by creator
What will the tankies use to justify not voting now?
Probably her prosecution of Marijuana possession.
Genocide was my red line.
The guy doing genocide dropped out. Might as well vote for a roll of the dice.
Well, the dice on Kamila’s side is much more likely to be the end of it.
Trump accepted a huge donation from a woman who made him promise the annexation of Palestine. That annexation will not be good for the Palestinians.
https://nymag.com/intelligencer/article/miriam-adelson-trump-2024-campaign-donor-israel.html
I doubt Biden wasn’t going to stop Israel from annexing Palestine, either. Remember his “red line” they blew past? They’re basically equal on genocide, except for some words by Biden. With Kamala, I’m not sure yet, so she’s got that going for her.
She came out early in favor of a ceasefire. As VP, she is complicit, but she’s ultimately powerless to change it. As a result I don’t hold her responsible. I doubt that there will be much publically said, as Biden will be president until January 20th at Noon, but given her being a former prosecutor, she clearly respects the law. And I am going to assume international law, she’s a strong woman, and I feel that she’s not going to cowtow to Israel, in my opinion.
Trump’s son in law, Jared Kushner has openly called for the opening of the Palestinian beaches and then a construction of a Trump Tower. You can call that equal if you want. Biden has been at least slowing offensive aid packages, Netanyahu is very upset and has been openly condemning it as Biden being pro Hamas. Imagine Biden, famed Zionist, being pro Hamas.
He’s still been giving them tons of weapons and bypassing Congress to do that. Even delayed weapons have been going through so it hasn’t really mattered in the end because they have enough weapons to cover them during a delay or two. Plus any delays are made up for by other expedited shipments. Once again, just words and theater. They’re pantomiming for each other’s base and opposition basically. The US just needs the slightest excuse from Israel that they won’t bomb civilians, despite continuing to do so, and then it’s bombs away. Not to mention all the criticism and excessive force approved of by Biden against pro Palestinian protestors. Materially, there’s no difference.
So far, from what I’ve heard and seen, I have much more faith in Kamala on this issue than Biden. Which isn’t much, it’s a low bar, but she isn’t actively causing a genocide, so she’s got my vote more than Biden. Not that it means anything in this system that barely passes for democracy, because of the state I live in.
Additionally, we know Trump’s position of the illegal settlements during Trump’s last administration.
Look into Pompeo Doctrine. It’s the throwing out of the long-standing position that settlements are inconsistent with international law.
If you are seriously still considering Biden and Trump equal on this after I have given you verification and the actual truth, then you aren’t worthy of further discussion and you aren’t arguing in good faith, either you are a Tankie or a Russian Troll or a bot.
https://www.axios.com/2024/02/23/israel-settlements-blinken-pompeo-trump-illegal
ссыкло
Biden doesn’t care about the illegal settlements either. He says he does, but he hasn’t done anything to change the fact that they’re increasing, nor the facts on the ground in terms of settler violence. He put out a few sanctions on like 4 guys, ignoring all the others, and sanctioned one military unit, which is still getting money because of the billions of dollars we give the rest of their government. They need to sanction the whole government like they do Russia for Ukraine, or at least high up government officials or business leaders. Otherwise, it’s just for show, like shouting ACAB while arresting one bad cop, and then giving the rest of the corrupt department money, military vehicles, and promotions.
Rhetorically, they say different things, sure, but in terms of how things affect Palestinians, they’re basically the same. Biden just wrings his hands and shakes his head more before giving Israel the weapons and money, while Trump high fives them. Either way the genocide progresses at the same rate. They can’t bomb them any faster without ruining the rest of the international cover they have, or ruining the land they want to take with nuclear radiation.