Monday, April 3, 2023

Oh god why: Manchin floating run for president?

 So, this is a weird election cycle. Despite Biden being the incumbent, he's being challenged from the left and the right. Now Manchin is potentially floating throwing his hat in the ring. And I have to wonder "oh god, why?" Seriously, this dude has net negative approval ratings country wide. And honestly? I think most democrats hate the guy. Even CENTRIST democrats. Like, the people who like Biden and Clinton and the like? Yeah, even most of them, to my knowledge, hate Joe Manchin. 

Manchin is literally the epitome of a DINO. He's from west virginia, one of the most right leaning states, and his talking points sound very republican. He was the one who tanked Biden's agenda and the child tax credit and screaming about entitlement societies. My reaction to that was not positive and me wishing he would screw off to the republicans. He's a moderate republican by modern standards. He's not a Trumper, but his politics to me are more reminiscient of Romney and McCain than either the democrats or the republicans.

Heck in the above video Kyle also mentioned a "no labels" third party that talked about like, "centrist" third party runs, but centrist in this sense just means "moderate conservative". They're the type who thinks that the democrats, even the Biden democrats are "too far left" and thinks they're dragging us to "socialism". And then there's the right that's going full MAGA. So you got these people being displaced from the GOP and sometimes the dems, who are like "well we need a rational center". Basically, their views are akin to what mine were when I was a conservative around 2007-2011ish, barring my detour into Ron Paul and tea party support. Ya know, we need moderation and compromise and blah blah blah. But in reality I was on the right. Basically, that's these guys. And they're floating people like Joe Lieberman, the moderate democrat who screwed over Obamacare and kept it as moderate as it was. Like really, who do these people think that they are? Maybe their views are gaining in popularity, but I see them more popular on THE RIGHT these days than the left. I mean, think about it. On the left, in the democrats, your two big factions are the centrists and the progressives. The centrists like Biden, the progressives like Bernie and the like. While yes, there are a handful of blue dogs and blah blah blah, this is mostly a relic of the past. Meanwhile, what does the right look like? Well, you have the MAGA people...and you have the people who wish we could be rid of this MAGA crap. And theres increasing resistance to the MAGA movement, but those people are largely outnumbered by the MAGA people. SO if anything, I think these people would splinter off from the republicans, not the democrats. 

To be fair I can see why some "new democratic" types seem to want move away from the dems as progressives gain more influence, it seems clear they're not the future of the party any more.This is what many articles discussing "no labels" seems to be about. Which seems kinda funny since the centrists are the ones always bullying the left into supporting them. Funny how Biden lurches just a tiny bit left and these guys start acting like the country no longer revolves around them. And then they look at people like me and shame me for going third party in 2016 and 2020, hypocrites. 

It really is amazing how centrists just form third parties when they wanna, but when the left does it they scream bloody murder. Anyway, all I can say is, nananana, hey hey hey, goodbye.

Really, I think it's good for the country for all of these coalitions to come apart at the seams. That's what realignment is about. I just hope that what comes after is better than what we have now. 

I really would ideally like a four way election in 2024, it's kind of a sign that the realignment is coming. I really think there have been two major warring GOP factions and two major warring democratic ones, and it's not healthy for all of these factions to back candidates they hate to avoid other candidates they hate. Democracy is really about pushing for who you really want. And I would love to see the centrists break away from the GOP and the progressives to break away from the democrats. Then maybe we can get some actual freaking representation up in here. 

What does this mean for Biden? Well, to me, it's showing that Biden is failing to keep his coalition together, and splinter factions are forming left and right. It's bound to happen when you represent such ideological diversity from Joe Manchin to Bernie Sanders. You cant keep all of those factions happen. Biden tried to be the compromise, but the centrists (who are just closest conservatives) are unhappy, progressives are unhappy, no one is getting what they want. It's bound to happen. This triangulation strategy and talk of big tents has to fail after a while. It's why I split off in 2016 and 2020, although I would prioritize keeping the trump/desantis faction out of office in 2024. As for the GOP...I suspect they might have their own issues. I could see mass defections from the GOP toward a centrist movement if Trump or DeSantis get the nomination. While lots of the crazed nutters like them, more sane republicans are getting understandably displaced, and not liking them dems, what are they going to do? The fact is, two options are just too few any more. We really need at least four parties to even begin to properly represent people properly. Ideally 6-8.

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