USA 2024 presidential election

Brussels Sprout

I saw someone say of Biden's (recorded) interview with ABS that aired last night:

"He did well enough enough so as not to alarm his supporters but not well enough to assuage his doubters…..so the worst of all worlds in terms of the election"

Brussels Sprout

Reading tweets from people who are vocally supportive of Biden and they all seem to fall into one of a few categories:

1. Why aren't people questioning Trump's abilities (whataboutism)
2. I'd vote for Biden in November even if he was receiving his last rites (missing the point)
3. This is a media generated campaign designed to generate more interest (conspiracy theory)
4. Biden's fine. There's nothing wrong with him. He had a cold! (deluded)

Examples of each:

1

2

3

4

amandstu

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122345759#Comment_122345759

"If he says yes, he's immediately goosed"

Why shouldn't he listen to advice? Does anyone around him genuinely believe he can win now?

What do they base that on? Trump can play defence from now on if he has the intelligence.

Of course ,if he doesn't show his hand he will he open to any interpretation of his intentions (not as if we don't already know but it can be laid on as thick as you like)

If Biden can't put the ball in the open net then the team is marching to the speed of its slowest player.

(I didn't watch the debate btw)

silverharp

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122346188#Comment_122346188

the one question that might dawn eventually is, what else was the media lying about, so much material there ha!

Manic Moran

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122333610#Comment_122333610

That case was the opposite, actually. In this instance, Congress (in the 1930s) actually did write a technical description which had the advantage of being clear and consistently interpreted for the last 90 years. For those 90 years the ATF, under its regulatory authority, dealt with the minutiae. All sorts of ideas to get around the statutory prohibition were dealt with, varying from folks attaching power drills to a trigger adapter or spring-loaded bump stocks. Congress didn't need to specifically write into law "The Akins Accelerator counts as a machinegun", as it fit into the general category that Congress defined, and the ATF immediately and clearly defined it as such. (Springless) Bump stocks just don't fit the definition and so, until the politicians and media got involved after Las Vegas, the ATF ruled accordingly.

What's causing the problem is that almost everyone involved has no bloody clue what bump firing is and what a bump stock (we can ignore the word "springless" because the other type is already banned) actually does, and astonishingly, listening to oral argument, that seems to include the lawyers arguing the case, let alone the judges. They only know that they are being told it's dangerous... (regardless of the veracity of the statement). One might think this is odd for an attachment which has no moving parts, surely it must be easy to understand, but see also the pervasive myths about pistol grips. In any case, under public outcry, the ATF arbitrarily tried to reverse its position, and fell flat in the court because their original position was legally the correct one under the guidelines that Congress laid out for them.

Rjd2

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122346188#Comment_122346188

https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/biden-sends-letter-democrats-time-questions-end/story?id=111742809

Those accounts are pretty much on the payroll and know their base so can't say anything of any interest sadly.

Anyway Biden pretty much daring his opponents to take him out and its not a bad strategy because I don't know if they have the balls to remove him.

Biden will get to the conference but the age issue is not going away, all it needs is another terrible debate or **** ups in interviews and its dominating the news cycle again.

Biden may still beat Trump but that would be more due to Trump dropping the ball himself which tbf is feasible as he is a very weak candidate himself, but this version of Harris is superior option than whatever Biden is in 2024.

The party can't say with a straight face that "fascism is at the doors" and then ignore all the issues with Biden who supposedly is the only man standing in front of it.

AbusesToilets

Biden sends a letter to Congress telling them to shut up and get behind him. Claiming his "victory" in the Primaries shows he has a mandate. Old man digging in now. Saw it compared to telling a grandparent they can't drive anymore.

Whatever sentiment of appreciation for his last 4 years is rapidly being eroded away. He's putting his ego ahead of the country.

tayto lover

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122355659#Comment_122355659

If you bought a new 80K car would you let Joe drive it? I wouldn't.

Rjd2

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122356160#Comment_122356160

I don't think Biden is in as bad shape as some say and the term "senile" is cruel and right wing drivel.

Nonetheless you could not watch that debate and understand he at 81 is not able to do what is arguably the most taxing job in the world.

I won't be able to do my job at 81,,,heck some would say I can't do it now LOL .

I know some will say "Trump is near 80" and yeah that's fair but for some reason that does not matter as much with the US public,,,that's not fair but they can't get a new public unfortunately.

martingriff

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122346188#Comment_122346188

Why should we not ask about Trumps abilities or frailties. Shouldn't he be kept to the same standards

eire4

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122355659#Comment_122355659

Add in that with Biden the candidate its almost a certainty Democrats lose the senate and it would be a big surprise if they don't fail to regain the house. The presidential race is close but even there Biden is losing currently. This would leave the authoritarian Republicans in control of all 3 branches never mind they own the unelected poodles who do their bidding on the court. Add in project 2025 and the US is quite literally on life support right now when it comes to whats left of it being a democratic country. The authoritarian Republicans may be the ones who will turn the US into an authoritarian state with a dictator at the top but it's Biden and the corporate Democrats who most certainly are providing yet again a big assist with their hubris in pushing Biden on the electorate.

Rjd2

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122356891#Comment_122356891

Not saying any of this is wrong btw.

However I can understand Joe Bloggs saying if Trump is going to do all this abysmal stuff then "why are you persisting with the 81 year old man who is trailing in polls and clearly not in best mental condition?" ……..and what can you say to that?

eire4

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122357013#Comment_122357013

For sure thats the hubris of the corporate Democrats they continually foist bad candidates on the electorate with the messages being not anything positive but merely well you have to vote for our guy because look how bad the other guy is.

kerry_man15

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122357135#Comment_122357135

Biden should have said once he got voted in last time that he'd stand aside for a younger candidate this time and pass the baton on to someone more capable. He's definitely in decline and it's starting to become obvious. It could cost them the election.

sock.rocker*

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122356280#Comment_122356280

You literally called Biden senile on 15/4/2020 and then called him a deviant and linked an article about all the times he has been accused of acting inappropriately to women and girls.

Podge_irl

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122353589#Comment_122353589

Fair enough, I will happily defer to your expertise. I only know what I've read in some reports and from some pretty terrifyingly garbled extracts from the hearing.

But surely the ignorant lines of argument and questioning in the hearing suggests that the court should give some extra value to the judgement of those with expertise?

Brussels Sprout

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122356303#Comment_122356303

Yes of course he should. However there are 2 issues here:

1. Joe Biden's mental deterioration is demonstrably worse as evidenced by that debate. Put simply Biden is a lot further down the path of cognitive decline than Trump is.
2. Trump's been surrounded by so much scandal and negativity that it's pretty much reached a saturation point. He was impeached twice, once for trying to subvert democracy. He's been found in civil court to be liable for sexually assaulting a woman and there are many more who have accused him of sexual assault. Most recently of all he's been convicted of a felony crime. None of it barely moved the needle. His base is a cult and the rest don't seem too bothered by it all.

Short of Trump freezing up at an event or needing to be led away by handlers then nobody is going to pay much attention to him calling people by the wrong names or going off on bizarre tangents about water pressure.

Manic Moran

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122357488#Comment_122357488

When the department supposedly with expertise reverse themselves 180 degrees with not a single new thing happening (no new evidence, no new research, no new technology, no new anything except a politically motivated directive from the above), then deference to expertise can at least be seriously questioned. Firearm technology didn't change after Vegas, what changed was an instruction from the executive leadership on what should be allowed.

In any case, it seems most of the judges did listen to people with expertise (maybe from the animus briefs) given that they gave the correct outcome: the one which existed before the politicians got involved and when the ATF's experts made their own decisions, and which was consistent with the previous 90 years of technical opinion.

Podge_irl

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122358103#Comment_122358103

I'm less inclined to believe they listened to expertise rather than just split along ideological lines (which I know they don't always, or even overly frequently, do) but fair enough.

My personal view would be that the fundamental problem is more the lack of independence of the expert agencies, and the concept that they are better at interpreting technical details is still a valid one. But that ties into my priors of "everything about how America operates is essentially broken".

Manic Moran

"Why should we not ask about Trumps abilities or frailties. Shouldn't he be kept to the same standards"

Sure you can, and it's a great reason not to vote for the man, just as there are reasons not to vote for Biden. But that's not necessarily a reason to vote for the other guy.

There are those who believe it is correct to vote for the lesser evil. Which is fine. I'm not voting for Biden because I'm enthralled with him, it's because I think his issues are outweighed overall by the issues Trump has. But that has its limits, and those limits vary from voter to voter. There are Democrats being bandied about I will not vote for, even while I refuse to vote for Trump. There are others who will vote for any Democrat vs Trump and there are some who, on principle, will say "you want my vote? Earn it. " I usually fall under this last category, though this election cycle is a bit of an outlier for me.

Trump's negatives are well known. The conversation right now in the media is about Biden's negatives. To court a number of voters, the talk needs to be about the positives, they have some work to do here. Even on today's headline on CNN, it's "world leaders watch to see if Biden fails at NATO summit". That's not a positive talking point, and it's not a reason to vote for someone.

Manic Moran

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122358154#Comment_122358154

I agree with you that the agencies should be the people in charge of technical/scientific interpretations, but remember that what brought this to court in the first place was a political, not technical directive. The agency's technical experts were directly overridden by the White House. Anyone who understood bump stocks knew that the ATF had been instructed by the President and his appointee to play a losing hand. And sure enough, they lost, to the surprise only of people who felt that they knew what should be right without actually looking into the specifics.

I agree there may have been an ideological split, but I think we may differ on the nature of it. I was rather concerned to see Sotomayor's dissent focused on the result of the ruling. "This ruling lets lethal weapons amongst the population". So what? If so, write a better law. She complains that the opinion uses six diagrams, as if it's a bad thing when discussing technical matters. I'm with Gorsuch's concurrence: "It may well be that these things should be banned, but this law doesn't do that." The ideological split here isn't in the conservative/liberal position people tend to talk about, but in the concepts of judicial interpretation.

Dohnjoe

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122356303#Comment_122356303

At a base level people want a level of "strength" in a leader. When one guy is barely coherent in a debate and the other is at least able to speak and project. Doesn't matter what's being said, the former has already lost.

Podge_irl

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122358232#Comment_122358232

Ok, point well taken. I would worry that this decision has rather put the responsibility solely in the hands of people who have no real idea what they are talking about as opposed to tackling the issue of executive overreach into agency interpretation of statue. I still struggle with the idea of the judiciary claiming to be the ultimate arbiters of very complex technological concepts that they repeatedly demonstrate they have no proper understanding of.

I don't think we actually disagree on the latter point. I agree with you on the dissent (and many of the "liberal" dissents have a similarly worrying bent to them), I just don't believe the majority opinion was reached in good faith. But again, that could just be me projecting.

odyssey06

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122358174#Comment_122358174

"There are Democrats being bandied about I will not vote for"

Just curious, who are they? If you will not vote for them, it is likely others will not.

Manic Moran

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122358504#Comment_122358504

Newsom, Clinton, Harris.

odyssey06

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122358709#Comment_122358709

Thanks. I wonder if there's many actual 'swing' voters who could potentially be shifted from voting Trump to voting for a Democratic candidate other than Biden e.g. as per your previous post

there are some who, on principle, will say "you want my vote? Earn it. " I usually fall under this last category, though this election cycle is a bit of an outlier for me.

Or if it is a case vast majority have decided, I'm not voting for X, I'll either vote for Y or not vote.

AbusesToilets

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122358755#Comment_122358755

If someone is willing to vote for Trump at this stage, they're not a swing voter. Frankly they're willingly seditious at best, dangerous fanatics at worst. I have exactly zero sympathy or willingness to countenance a modern Republican voter at this stage.

odyssey06

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122358821#Comment_122358821

Well, that said, whether you call them 'swing voters' or insert alternative term here, some cohort is a factor in switching the polls 5% this way or that. But seems like abstainers are a bigger impact. Is Biden say losing 'poll' voters to Trump, or just losing 'poll' votes and Trump holding steady? That's me musing, not a rhetorical question.

amandstu

I heard them say on CNN that Biden's polling numbers are back up to what they were before the debate.

Not sure if that is good news or bad.

I wonder if this (and forthcoming?) episodes have given a boost to 3rd party candidates?

Seema like the upcoming Nato meeting might be very important for Biden now..

Brussels Sprout

Colorado's Michael Bennett becomes the first Senator to question Biden running again.

Senator Michael Bennet told CNN he expected the president to lose to Donald Trump by a "landslide", but stopped short of telling him to end his candidacy.

source