So Ive seen a lot of people talking about how the democrats are refusing to have fair primaries in several states and just deciding not to have primary elections or arbitrarily removing people from the ballot in several states. And I'm just going to say, uh, duh. Of course they are. They didn't hold a fair primary in 2016, nor in 2020. Here they're just trying to quash any alternative to Biden.
Like, the democrats dont actually care about democracy. They care about advancing their own power. They'd rather lose and maintain their power within their organization, than win with a change in leadership. Much like how in 2016 they went all in with promoting and defending Hillary, they're doing it with Biden, for better or for worse.
In all fairness, it's not normal for an incumbent running again to face primary challengers, and to be fair, I'm not really convinced replacing Biden is actually a good idea. I mean, Im not really convinced anyone else would do better than Biden himself is, as I've discussed previously. While Biden has low approval numbers and a "generic democrat" does better, name any democrat and I'm not convinced they'll surpass Biden. Much less any establishment backed democrat. As I demonstrated previously, Harris does WORSE then Biden. If you put buttigieg up, same thing. Heck I'm not even sure a progressive like sanders could take trump this time around either. And Dean Phillips and Marriane Williamson? Williamson is a no go due to the woo woo stuff. She has a progressive platform but I could see a lot of people being turned off by her. She's nowhere near as polished as Bernie was. Phillips could be interesting. I think he's moderate and experienced enough to, in a future election, be a democratic rising star, and I low key like the dude due to his forwardist shifts (i also learned zach graumann, yang's campaign manager from 2020, is his campaign manager this time, so he basically is the de facto forwardist candidate). But yeah, due to his willingness to come out against the democrats and dem established candidates, he's gonna be blackballed for that. I know he said recently that he's lost a lot of his connections within the democratic party over his coming out against biden, and all of the same old talk about not being a "team player" and blah blah blah (F the team, that's my mentality).
And yeah, let's face it. The dems don't want a challenge. They want to rig the process for biden. I dont mean rigging as in stuffing ballot boxes, i mean influencing the process in such a way that their preferred candidate wins "legitimately". Like, taking people off of ballots, not giving them campaign funding or campaign tools, not giving them air time, pretending they dont exist, blah blah blah.
And yeah, under a normal election cycle here's exactly how I'd feel about 2024. I mean, I could've told you this was happening. The democratic party has been playing chicken with their voters for a while. They dont give them what they want. They tell them what they want and what they're going to get and manufacture consent. This backfired hilariously in 2016, and in 2020, it worked to get trump out, but I could've told you it would be a few months and the people would turn on Biden, because he didnt have a plan. He was just the anti trump guy, and nothing more. And as he's struggled to pass anything at all, he looks extremely ineffective, no one is passionate about him, no one really wants him, but the dems have their heads up you know where so hard that basically we're stuck with him. And normally, I'd just be for letting the dems F around and find out. They dug us into this hole, I really feel no inherent loyalty toward the democratic party given how they behave the way that they do. And honestly, under normal circumstances, i'd just let them fail by their own ineptitude.
The only reason Im rallying behind them this time is donald trump. After january 6th, I believe trump is legitimately dangerous. Like he actually does pose as much of a threat to democracy as the dems say he does. ANd whatever issues the dems have are relatively minor compared to trump and his list of crimes. He's literally too dangerous to allow into office again, and I see electing trump as about as dangerous as the weimar republic letting the nazis get into power in 1932. So I really do not think that we can afford to be screwing around with a literal fascist and/or authoritarian who wishes to destroy democracy altogether as the literal alternative.
I also kind of worry about other things too. I think that biden has, despite all of the issues with the party, made some overtures toward progressives that resonated with me. He's been pro union, he wanted to pass a $15 minimum wage, he wanted to pass a solid climate agenda, he wanted to forgive some student debt, he did meet the left half way. And he has governed in a way that I find acceptable. And I believe he earned my vote, regardless of whatever screwery the dems are doing. This isn't to say that I don't think phillips and williamson are better. They definitely are. But I'm not really gonna stick my neck out this time on an alternative.
Also, none of the alternatives are really that much better. If I had to go with anyone it would be phillips and he would just be a younger biden. Sure, he supports M4A in theory, and possibly some UBI trials, but who knows how he'd actually govern in practice.
And let's face it, im not really big on jobist leftism at this point. And honestly, a lot of the big sticking issues that the left is making their line in the sand issues, like israel/palestine, im not particularly interested in agreeing with the left, if anything i back biden.
So...do I really like progressives these days and do they really warrant a protest vote over Biden? Not really.
And yeah. Looking at where the country is, what the alternatives are, and where most people are, I dont even think most complaints against Biden are legit. inflation, fair point, crap IS more expensive and pay hasnt gone up to compensate. People are still reeling from that. But beyond that people are screaming about imaginary crime waves and caravans of illegal immigrants, and the MAGA people are just in their own alternative reality. Their grievances arent legit, if anything these people are dangerously delusional, and again, I've kind of accepted that regardless of how I feel about the dems, I really think we should address trump and this maga crap first BEFORE we play out our own internal civil war here.
This isn't 2016 or 2020 any more. We cant just let the dems F around and find out, because there might not be an electoral system left to correct from their mistakes in in the future if Trump and the maga people get their way.
So yeah. Im not saying the dems are right. I admit they're scumbags too. Total scumbags. They dont want a fair process, I admit that. I just think that we should take care of trump before we start taking on the dems again. One threat is far more immediate and dangerous than the other. And yeah, that's just how I feel. Crap on the dems all you want, i dont care. but let's just take care of trump first.
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