Do I think that an 80+ year-old person should be President? No. Do I think that President Biden is in cognitive decline or demented now? Nope, based on long observation of his public performances....
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Do I think that an 80+ year-old person should be President? No. Do I think that President Biden is in cognitive decline or demented now? Nope, based on long observation of his public performances.
For those who don't recall Biden's history, he has always been a gaffe machine. For someone who's ascended the political heights, he's acknowledged that public speaking has never been one of his strengths. A lifelong stutterer, Biden has always had the kind of disfluency that results in scrambling names, pausing, then correcting himself, often embarrassingly. Biden has been so effective at interpersonal "retail" politics that he's survived with this disability forever. The "cognitive decline" narrative has been around since long before his 2020 campaign, usually bolstered with selective video clips.
I didn't like Joe Biden for a great many reasons - he was something of a bullshitter, the whole Anita Hill thing, banking and crime legislation that account for much of the current inequality and injustice, willingness to use military force, etc. I thought he was an average specimen of a below-average political herd (U.S. Senators). As a Vice President, he was practically invisible except when he said something risible.
And yet Biden's Vice Presidential activity was responsible for getting Congressional approval during President Obama's terms, just as Vice President Harris has been doing for him. These are the mechanistic details of the President/Vice President relationship which the press never reports on. [Highly recommend the documentary, President in Waiting]. I've said before that we should be voting on the platform, not the person, because an effective presidential administration requires teamwork and not just an omnipotent leader.
I'd vote for Biden over Trump even if they were literally piloting his corpse around like Weekend at Bernie's. But this is not an explanation for all his current issues, and it's ludicrous to...
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A lifelong stutterer, Biden has always had the kind of disfluency that results in scrambling names, pausing, then correcting himself, often embarrassingly.
I'd vote for Biden over Trump even if they were literally piloting his corpse around like Weekend at Bernie's. But this is not an explanation for all his current issues, and it's ludicrous to expect people to believe that he's the same as he's always been. Compare his debate with Paul Ryan to his recent debate with Trump and then tell me he's always been like this.
The problem here is that you’re conflating naturally slowing down as someone ages with dementia. Old people start making more verbal slips than they used to and it takes them longer to process...
The problem here is that you’re conflating naturally slowing down as someone ages with dementia. Old people start making more verbal slips than they used to and it takes them longer to process information. That’s a far cry from jumping to the claim that they’re actually losing the ability to think about things or make important decisions.
For stutterers, decompensating like this is fairly normal as they get older but it’s not a sign of any deeper neurological issues. At this point, his being old isn’t the actual problem. The problem is that the media has decided they want to crusade to force him to quit and they’re going to put each and every thing he says and does under a microscope to blow it out of proportion. You could follow anyone around all day and keep a log of every time they misspoke something if you wanted to make them sound deranged. It is, certainly, much easier than actually doing any sort of real reporting at least.
I don't get why you're talking about dementia here, though. I most of the comments I've seen on this have been clear that this is normal cognitive decline from old age, and I've not really seen...
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I don't get why you're talking about dementia here, though. I most of the comments I've seen on this have been clear that this is normal cognitive decline from old age, and I've not really seen much to say that this is in any way abnormal for a fit and healthy man of Biden's age.
But the question at stake isn't "is it normal for an 81yo man to exhibit cognitive decline?". The question is whether he's the best choice for the Democrats right now - a question that encompasses many subquestions, such as "will he be able to beat Donald Trump?" and "is an 81yo man who at times seems to struggle to speak coherently going to do a good job of being a president?".
I'm not American, I'm watching from outside, and I'm not qualified to answer those questions properly. But I get a bit of second-hand embarrassment watching this whole debacle play out.
Because that’s what the right wing attack ads are and have been running with. It’s indisputable that he’s too old, but there was an open period for hashing that out over the primary season and...
I don't get why you're talking about dementia here, though.
Because that’s what the right wing attack ads are and have been running with.
It’s indisputable that he’s too old, but there was an open period for hashing that out over the primary season and nobody wanted to step up to the plate and challenge him because they were sure to lose. Every presidential candidate has some set of problems with them that makes them less than ideal. Biden’s being too old is just a thing on his con list and not even the biggest con I have with him. But he’s still clearly capable of doing the job because his administration has actually been the most progressive and effective of my lifetime despite the resistance from the other branches of government. If he starts to actually lose his marbles into his second term there are few I would count on more than Kamala Harris to effectively backstab him and invoke the 25th amendment so I really don’t see what the problem is.
I suspect most people on Tildes are not responding to the right wing attack ads, though, and most will vote for him or his replacement regardless. The question then becomes how to convince people...
I suspect most people on Tildes are not responding to the right wing attack ads, though, and most will vote for him or his replacement regardless.
The question then becomes how to convince people outside of left-wing spaces that Biden is still fit for purpose, and saying "it's not dementia, it's just the normal cognitive decline of an 80yo" doesn't seem like the winning strategy to me.
Here in the UK, during Brexit, Leave campaigners often threw around the figure of 350M as the weekly contribution to the EU from the UK. This figure wasn't true - because of various discounts, it was something like 250M, and accounting for the amount the UK received from the EU, the net sum was closer to 180M a week.
Unfortunately, when someone says "we send 350M a week to the EU" and you respond "wait a minute, it's only 250M a week", you don't win a lot of support, because it turns out that people still think that 250 million pounds is a lot of money. Instead, what the Remain campaign should have done was to explain why the EU was worth hundreds of millions of pounds, how those contributions supported British communities and businesses, how supporting other EU markets improved British soft power and opened up more opportunities for British businesses selling abroad, and so on. But no-one made the positive case for staying within the EU, and so we ended up voting for one of the biggest mistakes in our history.
When people are discussing Biden's clear signs of mental fatigue, and you respond with "but at least it's not dementia", you're not making a positive case for Biden, and you're just underscoring his main weakness. Either Biden is the best candidate the Democrats can field to be President of the US for the next four years, and you can explain why, or he needs to be replaced. Right now it feels like a lot of the discussion is focused on "it's not that bad" and "but there's no-one else", and those aren't vote-winning slogans!
You focus on his record and how shitty his opponent is. Spending all your time defending attacks is a losing proposition. If they want to win they need to get good at changing the subject or...
The question then becomes how to convince people outside of left-wing spaces that Biden is still fit for purpose, and saying "it's not dementia, it's just the normal cognitive decline of an 80yo" doesn't seem like the winning strategy to me.
You focus on his record and how shitty his opponent is. Spending all your time defending attacks is a losing proposition. If they want to win they need to get good at changing the subject or pivoting it to a strength. Even if Biden is replaced, if the reflexive posture to respond to attacks, vulnerabilities, and criticism is to try and “well ackshually” the problem away you’re gonna lose.
When people are discussing Biden's clear signs of mental fatigue, and you respond with "but at least it's not dementia", you're not making a positive case for Biden
I want people to stop ruminating the subject because it’s a stupid subject to be discussing. Saying it’s not dementia is a way of saying this is an overblown nothingburger.
Instead, what the Remain campaign should have done was to explain why the EU was worth hundreds of millions of pounds, how those contributions supported British communities and businesses, how supporting other EU markets improved British soft power and opened up more opportunities for British businesses selling abroad, and so on.
Nah it should have been 30%-40% this and 60%-70% subtly depicting the leavers as deranged racist freaks (with plausible deniability).
Either Biden is the best candidate the Democrats can field to be President of the US for the next four years, and you can explain why, or he needs to be replaced.
There is no such thing as a “best” candidate and, even if there was, it is impossible to determine how good a candidate actually is until you have actually seen them complain. Biden is the only candidate that we have good data on and Harris is a close second. Everyone else is a giant X factor and none of the polling about them means anything because none of them have been exposed to the rigors of a national campaign with the national press corps and the full weight of real oppo research being dumped against them.
He’s the candidate you have. There exists no party apparatus to do a late term replacement of a candidate that has any legitimacy.
Right now it feels like a lot of the discussion is focused on "it's not that bad" and "but there's no-one else", and those aren't vote-winning slogans!
They’re not vote winning because they’re defensive, focused on responding to allegations. Replacing him will also be defensive, because the new candidate will spend their whole time trying to prove their legitimacy once again putting themselves on the back foot. Politics isn’t about just buying the perfect product off a shelf. It’s a process. A process does not exist to replace Biden. Without the process you don’t have a candidate. Candidates are made through that process.
The problem I see is that the american public has a tendency to be ageist and to expect a president to be a national champion. If Biden can get the job, I think his team will perform well. At the...
The problem I see is that the american public has a tendency to be ageist and to expect a president to be a national champion. If Biden can get the job, I think his team will perform well. At the debate Trump appeared to dominate him and I am afraid for his chances based on perceptions of being feeble and slow.
So the Frank Luntz undecided voter panel after the debate consensus seemed to have been “Man Biden is real old but that Trump sounds fucking unhinged.” Which was the correct takeaway from that...
At the debate Trump appeared to dominate him and I am afraid for his chances based on perceptions of being feeble and slow.
So the Frank Luntz undecided voter panel after the debate consensus seemed to have been “Man Biden is real old but that Trump sounds fucking unhinged.” Which was the correct takeaway from that debate. I think these folks tend to be painfully ignorant (in that they don’t have information they ought to), but they’re not dumb (in that they will draw the correct conclusions from the info they have, that info is just usually bad). These folks are probably better indicators of how these things come off than the perspectives of people who actually follow political news.
Of course the spin and media narrative following the debate can change their recollections dramatically, which is what seems to have happened. One thing I’ve noticed about debates in general is that political partisans tend to want to view them as their guy versus the other guy beating each other down but most normies seem to just want to be reassured that things are gonna be all right and they want the one who makes them feel like it’ll be okay. Trump’s energy lately has been dark and aggressive in a way that’s offputting, even if he affects dominance.
Frankly, it seems reasonable to expect the president to deliver rousing speeches and deftly command US relations. While Biden may be wise from his years of experience, I no longer trust he has the...
Frankly, it seems reasonable to expect the president to deliver rousing speeches and deftly command US relations. While Biden may be wise from his years of experience, I no longer trust he has the stamina to do anything more than the bare minimum. I'm fully aware that his administration is doing the day-to-day work, but I'm not convinced he's delivering as a leader considering his last cabinet meeting was October 2023.
I don't think it matters anymore if he is the best choice. He was the choice and if we change now, we are certain to give the win to Trump. There is no time to do any fundraising or get enough...
I don't think it matters anymore if he is the best choice. He was the choice and if we change now, we are certain to give the win to Trump. There is no time to do any fundraising or get enough awareness of a candidate now if we try to change. Not to mention it already is a bad look if you don't run the incumbant (that hardly if ever has gone well when it happened) or change this late in the game your candidate. All of these things together is a surefire win to Trump if we changed candidates.
And I agree with some one, I'd vote for the Democrats puppeteering an old corpse over Trump. So if you ask me, it's way more important that we try to win rather than try to get a better person to run for president. It doesn't matter how much more suited the person is then Biden if he or she doesn't win. As some one said, the president is not the king (though Trump wants to believe he is and I'm sure he'll work towards making it more so if he becomes president), a lot of government leading is a the people surrounding the president (including his advisors).
It would be an absolutely crazy news cycle if the Democrats changed candidates! Low information voters exist, but there would be wall to wall coverage of a last-minute nominee change. Fundraising...
It would be an absolutely crazy news cycle if the Democrats changed candidates! Low information voters exist, but there would be wall to wall coverage of a last-minute nominee change.
Fundraising also isn't an issue cause Kamala could use Biden's warchest directly, or it could be turned into a PAC for another candidate. Considering there was just a new story today about donors (rightly) cutting off funding to Biden, the fundraising for an alternative candidate would be significantly easier too.
I'm absolutely not conflating anything with dementia, as I never said Biden had dementia. I don't know enough medically to say but from what I've seen more knowledgeable people say, he probably...
I'm absolutely not conflating anything with dementia, as I never said Biden had dementia. I don't know enough medically to say but from what I've seen more knowledgeable people say, he probably doesn't. What I'm disputing is people trying to claim that he's the same as ever -- he demonstrably isn't. It's not particularly convincing to point at a man clearly experiencing age-based cognitive decline and claim he's just dealing with the same lifelong stutter and tendency to gaffe. It does not make me feel happier or more confident voting for Biden to have supporters try to gaslight me into believing Biden's the same as ever when he's not, and it's certainly not going to win over anyone on the fence.
Yeah there's really just no excuse for this. He has also confused Macron with Mitterand.. that is just not something that should be explained away, no matter how much better he is than Trump. It's...
Yeah there's really just no excuse for this. He has also confused Macron with Mitterand.. that is just not something that should be explained away, no matter how much better he is than Trump. It's unbelievable to me that he's still the Democratic candidate.
I have no horse in the race, as a Dane. But you cannot re-elect a president that confuses his ally with arguably his worst enemy, Putin. He caught his own mistake, yes, but it's just mindblowing to watch (although to be fair, American politics have been a continuing series of mindblowing events since 2015).
Another thing, my 98 year old grandfather was able to move better than Biden. Why are all his body movements so extremely slow? It's unfathomable that he is still the leader of a superpower.
You can when the alternative is a man who would openly and knowingly embrace Putin. Biden may have lost a step or two, but based on the last 4 years worth of accomplishments, the people he's...
But you cannot re-elect a president that confuses his ally with arguably his worst enemy, Putin.
You can when the alternative is a man who would openly and knowingly embrace Putin. Biden may have lost a step or two, but based on the last 4 years worth of accomplishments, the people he's surrounding himself with have not.
I remember the Trump years like it was yesterday - just constant chaos, incompetence, lies, and embarrassment. You cannot re-elect a president like that.
If you've seen one aging person, you've seen one aging person - the types and areas of debility are wildly variable. Biden's got peripheral neuropathy, or at least that's what we're told. I've...
If you've seen one aging person, you've seen one aging person - the types and areas of debility are wildly variable.
Biden's got peripheral neuropathy, or at least that's what we're told. I've seen enough elders who have that condition to believe the report is accurate, though IANAD. Sufferers can't feel their steps well and lose strength and fine balance. This usually results in a slow, cautious gait. My 85 year old water aerobics instructor at the YMCA had the same problem. Nonetheless, she was sharp as a tack, as well as plenty agile in the water.
I'm going to 100% vote for anyone who isn't Trump, and I also believe the people who a president surrounds themselves with are more important than the person themselves, so I don't necessarily...
No. Do I think that President Biden is in cognitive decline or demented now? Nope, based on long observation of his public performances.
For those who don't recall Biden's history, he has always been a gaffe machine.
I'm going to 100% vote for anyone who isn't Trump, and I also believe the people who a president surrounds themselves with are more important than the person themselves, so I don't necessarily care about his overall mental state.
BUT I'm extremely tired of the media trying to gaslight everyone into thinking Biden isn't going mentally downhill and "was just always like that" or "has a cold" or whatever it is that day. Almost all the examples in the Snopes article linked are from the past 4 years. He's just a super old dude, and its more and more apparent the older he gets. The debate was an absolute embarrassment and an eye opening experience for anyone paying attention.
At this point, I don't even think they should or even could replace him, and I don't know why any Democrats would run with that narrative either. It would basically be giving Trump the win. They need to take a page out of Trumps book and just ignore it until election day imho.
There's a difference between being older and thus being cognitively slower or having some decline and "has dementia" or "is in severe cognitive decline." What those words all mean are very...
There's a difference between being older and thus being cognitively slower or having some decline and "has dementia" or "is in severe cognitive decline."
What those words all mean are very different. And given his history, being older is going to make his speech difficulties worse regardless of his cognitive abilities. Specifically I object to the claims of dementia and the like, but I honestly don't see the media protecting him, I see them jumping on board with how so many people are saying he should step down.
At some point, though, "some normal decline" multiplied by enough years works out to be the same thing as "severe decline" in a much younger man. He's vying for the most demanding job on the...
At some point, though, "some normal decline" multiplied by enough years works out to be the same thing as "severe decline" in a much younger man.
He's vying for the most demanding job on the planet. I don't think it's unfair for people to want a person who can respond quickly to new information. I don't think it's unfair that when folks see he can't even read off a teleprompter, they question if he can handle the job he's vying for.
Is he better than Trump? Sure. But even Biden said there's like 50 people better than himself who can beat trump. Every single Not Trump voter would still vote for unknown Candidate X.
Would they stay home? Or suddenly decide to vote for Trump? Wouldn't it also be conceivable that some Not Trump stay home people would come out to vote for a new unknown?
Would they stay home? Or suddenly decide to vote for Trump?
Wouldn't it also be conceivable that some Not Trump stay home people would come out to vote for a new unknown?
Or vote third party yeah. Any successor who picks it up will not have Democratic legitimacy since they didn’t go through a primary process and they will not have been pressure tested through that...
Would they stay home? Or suddenly decide to vote for Trump?
Or vote third party yeah. Any successor who picks it up will not have Democratic legitimacy since they didn’t go through a primary process and they will not have been pressure tested through that primary process which usually shakes out all the skeletons in the closets and exposes their vulnerabilities as a candidate. An open “mini-convention” might do some of those things, particularly on the legitimacy front, but I’d be much more sanguine about doing one of those if not for the Gaza situation. Biden did weather the criticisms over Gaza through the primary process, the uncommitted voters were the main challenges he had. But if you need to now vet and argue among a slate of candidate who each have their own unsatisfactory Gaza statements (since it is, frankly, a politically no win scenario) they’re gonna be fucked. I view this as a serious enough flashpoint that it has potential to tear the party apart and lead to rioting outside the convention center.
I don't disagree with you and overall I think we should stick with Biden. But hot dang this timebomb should have been diffused years ago and Democrats should have used four years to come up with,...
I don't disagree with you and overall I think we should stick with Biden. But hot dang this timebomb should have been diffused years ago and Democrats should have used four years to come up with, market, and sell sell sell us a successor. They could have been clear NO Biden won't run it's this guy or nothing so get with it. Biden could have been using his legacy to support a new candidate but no they stuck with it. Now it's "Biden or no one" and it sucks so bad.
They've made their sticky disgusting bed and now they're having to either lie on it or be taking insane risks. The whole thing sucks.
I think the thing people are struggling to accept is that there are no “Democrats” who can make these decisions. There is no party apparatus. “The Democrats” is just a gaggle of loosely affiliated...
I think the thing people are struggling to accept is that there are no “Democrats” who can make these decisions. There is no party apparatus. “The Democrats” is just a gaggle of loosely affiliated individuals. Functionally, the President is the head of the party so nobody was ever going to be able to propose an alternative candidate but Biden himself. That’s just a weakness of our whole political system.
I hear you, and I just wanted to say I super appreciate your perspective through various comments on this thread. I think most of us are just upset about the whole dang system more than we are...
I hear you, and I just wanted to say I super appreciate your perspective through various comments on this thread. I think most of us are just upset about the whole dang system more than we are unhappy about Joe Biden
He’s not “vying for” the job of POTUS, he’s doing it, and doing a damn good job of it too, especially considering that the Republicans have been doing everything possible to prevent him from...
He’s not “vying for” the job of POTUS, he’s doing it, and doing a damn good job of it too, especially considering that the Republicans have been doing everything possible to prevent him from accomplishing anything at all for the past four years. The choice is between four more years of highly qualified and effective administration, or fascism.
I disagree. He's been given the contract for four years, coming up to an end, and he's applying as a qualified candidate for a new contract. Just like the other guy. The other guy is highly...
I disagree. He's been given the contract for four years, coming up to an end, and he's applying as a qualified candidate for a new contract. Just like the other guy. The other guy is highly unqualified to do anything outside of a jail cell, but he's also vying for the same position as the orange guy who has also done 4 years of it and, according to their traitorous camp, "done a damn good job of it" too.
I dislike Trump as much as the next guy here, but I also dislike (to a far less degree) the in house pretense that everything with a D on it is a-okay. They're not the same and we shouldn't pretend it's the same, but we should also not pretend weaknesses in the our preferred candidate doesn't exist either.
Ah, I didn't mean you specifically, but I was replying to you so that was 100% my fault, I apologize. Amendment: there appears to be a campaign level push that voters need to back everything with...
Ah, I didn't mean you specifically, but I was replying to you so that was 100% my fault, I apologize.
Amendment: there appears to be a campaign level push that voters need to back everything with D on it and pretend everything is okay. You don't hold this opinion, but I do feel it from the campaign.
Cool, then all these people should have done literally anything in the past four years rather than being a couch political genius but only from april-november in an election year. We can wish a...
Cool, then all these people should have done literally anything in the past four years rather than being a couch political genius but only from april-november in an election year.
We can wish a different political party system but we're not gonna fix it today, or realistically before the election, and we're sure not going to fix it we repeat our cycle of "election over so I don't do anything for the next 3.5 years during which I'll complain vigorously again."
Perhaps the Dems have really fucked it up and thus indirectly destroyed the country. I rather hope not. But dreams of a snap primary or any other change of candidate that won't end in lawsuits keeping a new candidate off ballots, etc are just dreams.
Next everyone will hope for faithless electors as if that's a reasonable outcome.
All of this ignores that his administration has done stuff that has helped many people including me personally. And everyone is acting like we don't have a vice president which is wild.
Everyone acting like "meh it's ok to vote in this clearly end of life man" BECAUSE we have a vice president is the wild part. I don't get why everyone is suddenly trying to normalize it as if...
And everyone is acting like we don't have a vice president which is wild.
Everyone acting like "meh it's ok to vote in this clearly end of life man" BECAUSE we have a vice president is the wild part. I don't get why everyone is suddenly trying to normalize it as if that's ever been the case?
The VP dodges a lot political scrutiny for a whole slew of reasons (mostly because their powers are arguably ill defined). If you think the VP should have more scrutiny becuase she's likely to wind up leading the country, then maybe she should be the one on the ticket. I get why she basically can't be at this point, but it's not at all unreasonable to be rightly upset at the situation the dems have willingly put themselves in while being hostile about the suggestion that it could turn out otherwise.
And that's assuming Biden dies AFTER elected and taking office.
There's all SORTS of horrible situations that we get to try and dodge just hoping he makes it that far, because IF he passes away before the election, you can expect 3 or 4 different fucking disaster shit shows depending on when exactly that is.
I'm glad his administration has helped people. He personally did not do all of it, few presidents do. Mostly they pick the people who help. I really wish the dems had listened to the many people who from day 1 said "ok, Biden's in, time to start getting the message across he's not staying" so the people who have been doing good can continue to do so, rather than being ousted because we seem to be denying that he's ancient and not in good health.
I'm really not trying to normalize it. I'm just acknowledging it's real and that everyone talking about ditching her is pretending that isn't its own political morass. I get being mad. It makes...
Everyone acting like "meh it's ok to vote in this clearly end of life man" BECAUSE we have a vice president is the wild part. I don't get why everyone is suddenly trying to normalize it as if that's ever been the case?
I'm really not trying to normalize it. I'm just acknowledging it's real and that everyone talking about ditching her is pretending that isn't its own political morass.
I get being mad. It makes sense. It's just not productive and very little of all of this spitballing by everyone across the country is realistic. But IMO it's far too late and I'm perpetually frustrated at 1x every 4 years political complaining so I have little patience for it.
She is on the ticket though. It’s the Biden-Harris ticket. All of the VP’s roles are ill defined except for one: to be on deck in case the President is no longer able to do the job. That’s not a...
then maybe she should be the one on the ticket.
She is on the ticket though. It’s the Biden-Harris ticket. All of the VP’s roles are ill defined except for one: to be on deck in case the President is no longer able to do the job. That’s not a thing to ‘normalize’ that’s literally the whole reason for the role existing. When people vote for the ticket they’re voting for the duo. I’d be much less comfortable voting the ticket if the VP was someone like Sarah Palin.
And that's assuming Biden dies AFTER elected and taking office.
Anyone has a non-zero chance of dying between nomination and the election. That Biden’s odds of dying before then are maybe 2-3% higher isn’t as big a deal as all that.
rather than being ousted because we seem to be denying that he's ancient and not in good health.
His health is fine for his age. Nobody is denying that he’s ancient, people are refuting that this is an issue worth getting worked up about in light of everything else.
Tbh I'm not interested in debating it anymore, I got to this opinion from a mix of being opposed to couch diagnosis and reading the opinion of an expert in the field (of dementia and the like,...
Tbh I'm not interested in debating it anymore, I got to this opinion from a mix of being opposed to couch diagnosis and reading the opinion of an expert in the field (of dementia and the like, whatever that technical term is) and I'm too cranky from the other subthread to want to engage with this anymore. my opinion stands as it is, fe how you like about it.
ok I believe you haven't seen it But that doesn't mean it isn't happening I didn't put words in anyone's mouth. I was in fact thinking of a thread from a specialist on the topic who was also...
You're talking about Fox News and the Daily Mail - of course Trump supporters are going to show this in the worst possible light. The left-wing media spent a good while doing the same about...
You're talking about Fox News and the Daily Mail - of course Trump supporters are going to show this in the worst possible light. The left-wing media spent a good while doing the same about Trump's ill-health and gaffes. But as I pointed out in a sibling comment, the response to that can't be "well it's not dementia".
There are three links for the record. But they were just the first ones I found with dementia in the headline as I didn't feel like reading a dozen articles to respond to someone trying to say I'm...
There are three links for the record.
But they were just the first ones I found with dementia in the headline as I didn't feel like reading a dozen articles to respond to someone trying to say I'm putting words in other people's mouths.
First it was you have seen it, now that you've seen it, those sources are meaningless because they're right wing. Trump's coverage is not relevant atm, but I object to all diagnosis by internet or pundit as a rule.
And I intended what I said so I'm not really interested in what you think my response can or cannot be. Please don't accuse me of making things up and putting words in people's mouths and then come back with more.
It’s honestly insane to me that this was sent out as a push alert. I accidentally call my dog by my son’s name at least 50% of the time and vice versa. A verbal slip isn’t a sign of cognitive...
It’s honestly insane to me that this was sent out as a push alert. I accidentally call my dog by my son’s name at least 50% of the time and vice versa. A verbal slip isn’t a sign of cognitive decline. Especially given that, as you say, this was pretty normal for him even when he was young. I distinctly remember in 2008 he asked Max Cleland (famously confined to a wheelchair) to stand up and take a bow when people were applauding him.
The NYT released a single op-ed buried several pages down saying Trump is unfit to lead and then immediately resumed running multiple front page stories every day documenting each and every verbal slip-up or gaffe. They want to crusade to make Biden quit instead of torching Trump’s standing in the polls even though they acknowledge he’s a threat to the Republic. I watched a clip the other day of Biden and Kier Starmer taking questions and the only thing the press corps wanted to do was scream “GEORGE CLOONEY” at him like a feral mob.
I always knew it was a problem how much time journalists and the press spend on Twitter. I know quite a few writers personally and I’ve observed since the pandemic that many of them have become less pleasant to be around, just needlessly combative and mean in person and less and less able to set aside their personal views and test them against objective reality. But this whole debacle is making me think their brains have been truly cooked by this. They have completely lost the plot on what their job is supposed to be. They think their job is to weaponize gossip to push a (usually petty) agenda but literally nobody wants that from them.
Joe Biden has always had a pretty deep resentment towards the Washington Press Corps and it’s pretty clear they’re trying to settle a score with him by doing this. But all it’s communicating to me is that his contempt for them is well earned.
Okay he's a bad speaker like Moses. Sure. How come their campaign isn't putting out examples of his literary genius, or a montage of world leaders, or even domestic leaders, rallying to say good...
Okay he's a bad speaker like Moses. Sure.
How come their campaign isn't putting out examples of his literary genius, or a montage of world leaders, or even domestic leaders, rallying to say good things about him?
I don't need an omnipotent leader, but I do need someone with some potency at something.
Trump cognitive decline increasingly difficult to conceal despite setting low bar Donald Trump Dementia Evidence 'Overwhelming,' Says Top Psychiatrist Daily Show montage of Trump's phonemic...
Hundreds of psychiatric professionals have spoken out about Trump's clear signs of advanced dementia, including those associated with Dr John Gartner and his Duty to Warn organization.
Trump notably does not just misname people, but demonstrably confuses identities and merges people into boxes of the same archetype (e.g. talking about winning an election against Obama or merging Nancy Pelosi and Hillary Clinton into one). He doesn't trip up and forget words, he constantly slurs and makes up things that sound phonetically similar without being aware. He gets disoriented and talks like it's a different decade. He pauses and loses focus, then jarringly starts shouting in an agitated fashion.
There are real psychiatric professionals expressing concern about Trump's mental state. Not so much Biden. He seems a bit tired and has a lifelong stutter. He is old, but present and is demonstrably running the most progressive administration in my lifetime right here and now.
Ageism notwithstanding, our realistic choice is two people of an almost identical age, one who demonstrates competency, and has a reasonable vice president, or a fascist with overt dementia. You can't just slap a new name on a ballot and expect to win; it's forfeiting by another name. Elections are decided by how many apathetic swing state voters you can talk into getting off their ass and voting, set against voter suppression and gerrymandering. That doesn't happen when you suddenly change the candidate to someone nobody knows three months beforehand.
I think the difference between the situations are that the audience that would be influenced to not vote for Trump regardless of any of his problems doesn't exist, and the audience that can be...
I think the difference between the situations are that the audience that would be influenced to not vote for Trump regardless of any of his problems doesn't exist, and the audience that can be influenced to not vote for Biden because of his faults does exist. This is why one of them gets more noteworthy headlines, clicks, comments etc. than the other. Trump has already done so many egregiously wrong things, there's nothing you can say about him that will convince anyone who is going to vote for him to not vote for him. Likewise there are some people who say they would vote for Biden even if he was actually dead and people just dragged around his corpse to keep up the show. These news articles about Biden get interest from conservatives who support Trump, conservatives who don't support Trump, people who would vote for Biden no matter what, people who aren't sure if they want to vote for Biden but also don't want Trump, and maybe some attention from those who are less engaged with the system altogether and perhaps reinforces their disengagement.
The articles about Trump don't really move the needle for anyone, because all of his negatives are already well documented. Being mentally incapable of performing the duties of his job would perhaps be among the least damaging things he'll have done to the country by that point. There's nothing new or noteworthy to glean from reading about Trump's additional criminal actions, misdeeds, shortcomings etc. because his base has demonstrated they do not care and they will vote for him no matter what. So there's no incentive to further learn about his signs of dementia and think that maybe that will somehow be what turns the tides against him, because it won't.
This is the problem with a system in which it asks people to choose between two options and the options get increasingly worse election after election. To the point where people would vote for candidates who would commit insurrection, shoot a man on 5th avenue, or have their corpse paraded around like Weekend at Bernie's, that's what our system has led to, because we're constantly being asked or told to overlook someone's faults to beat the other person who is worse.
I also don't think it's right for Democrats to change their ticket now. It's essentially trying to re-awaken the elements in this already broken-by-design system to disenfranchise people and covertly empower some people more than others to have greater influence over election outcomes to undo a grave egotistical mistake Biden made to run again by using more recently discarded rules for conventions to elect someone other than Biden. That's like replacing one broken clock with another that happens to be telling the right time the moment you switch and then quickly becomes outdated right after that moment has passed.
Agree with you. It was a painful news conference, he is noticeably older but not at all senile. His timing and his demeanor is indicative of his age but not abilities.
Agree with you. It was a painful news conference, he is noticeably older but not at all senile. His timing and his demeanor is indicative of his age but not abilities.
Yes, and then called VP Harris "VP Trump" (he didn't self-correct on this one). The BBC put together a video of some interesting moments in the press conference. Even when he's speaking...
Yes, and then called VP Harris "VP Trump" (he didn't self-correct on this one). The BBC put together a video of some interesting moments in the press conference. Even when he's speaking coherently, I find his delivery to be very poor. The establishment should stop trying to coerce Democrats and anti-Trump into voting for this old man and put up a credible candidate who can savage Trump on his awful record and horrific platform.
The last segment was pretty bad, he had that thousand yard stare like he was off in some possible future, but actually there. All these clips coming out are not encouraging.
The last segment was pretty bad, he had that thousand yard stare like he was off in some possible future, but actually there.
No there is no savaging Trump on his record. Theatrically savaging him just makes people view it as two politicians tearing into each other for normal cynical reasons, it doesn’t actually move...
No there is no savaging Trump on his record. Theatrically savaging him just makes people view it as two politicians tearing into each other for normal cynical reasons, it doesn’t actually move votes because undecided or low-propensity voters tend to be pretty disaffected about the whole enterprise. It just preaches to the choir. (An excited choir can then go on to move votes, but that’s a different mechanism). Hillary Clinton was extremely effective at savaging Trump and it amounted to her losing. It’s like the maxim about wrestling with a pig, you can’t get down in the mud with him.
Honestly it’s fine for Presidents’ delivery to be poor. It’s fine for Presidents to be mediocre public speakers even. Sure we’d all like everyone to talk like Obama, but that’s largely just drama and entertainment rather than a critical component of being effective at governance.
It's almost like he's a human that makes speech errors sometimes, especially when exhausted and stressed out. He's not making errors like you would see in someone with mental decline. He's making...
It's almost like he's a human that makes speech errors sometimes, especially when exhausted and stressed out.
He's not making errors like you would see in someone with mental decline. He's making the same errors you and I make when we're in our 20s, 30s, 40s, etc.
He didn't CONFUSE Kamala for Trump. He literally misspoke.
The headlines look bad, but this is seriously a nothing burger. Well, it should be, but it looks like it's turning into more ammo against Biden, despite the fact that half of what comes out of...
The headlines look bad, but this is seriously a nothing burger. Well, it should be, but it looks like it's turning into more ammo against Biden, despite the fact that half of what comes out of Trump's mouth is complete gibberish.
One thing the republicans have that democrats don't is solidarity, which is probably a big factor in why they often win. No matter how stupid their candidate sounds and no matter how many times he's insulted his allies and electorate, they still support him. The democratic candidate makes one speaking mistake that was quickly corrected and everyone calls for his withdrawal. It's honestly infuriating.
As others have said, this is kind of who Biden is. His skills as a politician have gotten him as far as he has despite that. It's just honestly not good though. I work in a job that is far from as...
As others have said, this is kind of who Biden is. His skills as a politician have gotten him as far as he has despite that.
It's just honestly not good though. I work in a job that is far from as visible as POTUS and frequent gaffes like this would inhibit my career. He's under a microscope right now and all he needs to do is remember his ally's name and his vice president's name. Instead he names both his biggest geo-political adversary (the man invading his ally) and his domestic rival. This is a far shout from me mixing up "bubby" (dog's nickname) and "baby" (my partner).
It's a political nightmare. And red states will try to keep them off the ballot. And someone will sue for their votes not counting. And Harris not being the presumptive replacement is going to...
It's a political nightmare. And red states will try to keep them off the ballot. And someone will sue for their votes not counting. And Harris not being the presumptive replacement is going to piss off the base. (Tell me a group that votes 93 percent Democrat and does most of the activism isn't the base) And if it isn't Harris I don't think the campaign funding carries over.
It's not viable to swap Biden out at this point, and this is something the Dems should have seen coming. Biden needs to quit doing interviews and press conferences and stick to teleprompter...
It's not viable to swap Biden out at this point, and this is something the Dems should have seen coming.
Biden needs to quit doing interviews and press conferences and stick to teleprompter speeches. In the meantime, Harris needs to be the one going out there and making the case for a second Biden term through interviews and press conferences. Have Kamala run as if she was the president, because even Biden supporters like me don't believe the man will last another four years in office. If he was even as spry as he was in '20, I'd have more hope.
Nah he should do so many press conferences that people get bored with it and stop rewarding the papers for pretending every minor grammatical error or scrambled noun is headline worthy news. The...
Nah he should do so many press conferences that people get bored with it and stop rewarding the papers for pretending every minor grammatical error or scrambled noun is headline worthy news. The press conference was fine as a press conference. There was really nothing noteworthy about it aside from the fact that everyone decided to make it into a big to-do.
The only politically-viable pathway to replacing Biden requires him to step down willingly, and Biden has flatly declared that he will not do that. Personally I think Biden's stubbornness is...
The only politically-viable pathway to replacing Biden requires him to step down willingly, and Biden has flatly declared that he will not do that. Personally I think Biden's stubbornness is slow-walking us into catastrophe, but ultimately the decision is his to make.
Anything less than Biden voluntarily withdrawing his candidacy will result in a political nightmare like @DefinitelyNotAFae mentioned. Were Biden to step down willingly, Harris would become the obvious contender for the Democratic nominee. But otherwise Harris would be stuck between defending Biden (and therefore rejecting her nomination) or abandoning him (and therefore appearing opportunistic). Imagine months of Democratic infighting before the election, with the most maximalist positions being amplified by Russian propagandists.
A lot of furries worked hard at hacking the Heritage Foundation and I just think we could all be talking about Project 2025 and how they want to enforce blue laws and tell business owners what to...
A lot of furries worked hard at hacking the Heritage Foundation and I just think we could all be talking about Project 2025 and how they want to enforce blue laws and tell business owners what to do, and will ban anything they think is porn, and ALL of the things in that manifesto. We're all so fixated on Biden being a really typical old dude that we're pretending that Trump isn't an old dude because he makes his mistakes ... More often? And that he's not ALSO going to destroy the fundamental institutions of the country in the process. If we have two old dudes to pick from, let's do the one not doing project 2025
I agree about how insane it is that all the papers and news outlets are now jumping on every gaffe Biden makes (as if he hasn't done this his whole career), but barely a mention of his stark...
I agree about how insane it is that all the papers and news outlets are now jumping on every gaffe Biden makes (as if he hasn't done this his whole career), but barely a mention of his stark raving mad opponent who wants to rip down democracy and install himself as dear leader.
I think part of it is that Democratic voters generally are actually concerned about their candidate, and want a qualified, intelligent, fully "with it" candidate, whereas Republicans just don't care as long as there's an "R" next to their name and they spit out the right catchphrases. That will tend to drive the stories that are published in the center/left media.
I've started to also think the other part of it is that the news media in general (left/center/right) actually wants to see Trump win the election. Every now and then they'll run an editorial on his unfitness for office, or the occasional piece on Project 2025, but for every one of those, there's 5 more OpEds about Biden, or a constant barrage of front page articles about how Biden needs to step down. Where is the constant front page news about the candidate that's seemingly unable to tell the truth? Or the guy who's completely in bed with a group that wants to instate the Christian version of Sharia law? It's insane. It's like they don't realize if Trump wins, he's going to go after every news outlet that reports on him in an unflattering way, and the SCOTUS is going to be more than happy to let him do it. They're selling away freedom of the press in exchange for a few months of extra clicks.
That’s part of it but also there’s a few other dynamics at play. 1.) Journalists all spend too much time on Twitter and it leads them to engage in a lot of groupthink. This is basically what a...
I think part of it is that Democratic voters generally are actually concerned about their candidate, and want a qualified, intelligent, fully "with it" candidate, whereas Republicans just don't care as long as there's an "R" next to their name and they spit out the right catchphrases.
That’s part of it but also there’s a few other dynamics at play.
1.) Journalists all spend too much time on Twitter and it leads them to engage in a lot of groupthink. This is basically what a callout culture mob looks like when everyone involved writes under a major publication.
2.) The journos assigned to the Biden press pool have been fishing around for “Biden old” takes from them for the whole campaign and Biden and his staff have basically berated them for it the whole time and it hurt their feelings, so now they’re getting their kicks in while he’s down. This is also why I think the polls haven’t moved that much, I think most normie voters already viewed Biden as being in even worse shape than he actually is because there’s plenty of edited footage floating around on social media of verbal gaffes and calling him “pudding brain” and shit. That’s been priced into his approval ratings from the start.
3.) Democrats are anxious and anxiety and fear drive traffic and engagement. Posting shit about Biden promotes anxiety and fear so they get traffic. Bonuses and promotions depend on driving traffic so the logic is obvious to them.
4.) They sort of resent that they basically have zero ability to influence Republican politics or elections because nobody in the conservative universe listens to them or takes them seriously. Liberals do take elite media seriously, so they naturally want to throw their weight around. As a journalist, it’s a big ego boost to feel like you’re having a hand in shaping history like Woodward and Bernstein but you can basically only do that for internal Democratic Party politics now.
5.) The debate spooked the donors, who mostly don’t pay much attention as long as the politicians are picking up the phone when they call. The donors put pressure on the lower level pols who are more easily bought (usually congressmen in competitive districts) as well as on the editorial boards. But these same people are actually extremely out of touch with the party rank-and-file and the general electorate which is why it will often seem like the agenda with the elite media and what sorts of legislation are being prioritized have such a clearly plutocrat bias. It’s telling that the Squad seems to be the least spooked by these sorts of things, because they’re the least likely to get their intel about what their districts want and need from big donors. It’s also telling that so many of the congress-critters saying Biden should step down happen to have track records of not being great team players, doing things like trying to push Pelosi out as speaker and voting to censure Rashida Tlaib.
And the last note is actually the only one I think is a legitimate concern. Biden has been tied or trailing in basically every poll and that’s a serious problem. The Biden team’s argument was that once they got “serious” about campaigning you’d see the polls start turning around. The early debate was supposed to be the starting point for getting serious, but since he Britta’d it quite badly it didn’t work. So instead of marking the inflection point when Biden’s polling starts to recover, they’ve remained stagnant (and stagnant is bad). So regardless of whether it means he’s capable of doing the job, people do need to know that he’s not gonna fuck up like this again and actually has a plan to turn things around. But I don’t think hyperfixating on doing theater criticism on the effectiveness of his delivery in every public appearance is gonna help in that regard. It doesn’t actually yield useful data and it succeeds only in drilling more holes in the already leaky raft.
It's like they're trying to pull the David Tennant Doctor Who "Doesn't [he] look tired" that takes down the Prime Minister. To what end though, besides electing Trump? And I'm not saying they...
It's like they're trying to pull the David Tennant Doctor Who "Doesn't [he] look tired" that takes down the Prime Minister. To what end though, besides electing Trump?
And I'm not saying they should be pro Democrat or whatever, even if I think that a Trump Administration will immediately come back attacking the media regardless, but the "oh no he's old, people said he's old, lots of people are saying how old he is, the best people" could come from Trump's own mouth.
Yep - it's incredible - basically a few people said "he's too old to run", at which point everyone in the news ran constant stories on how he's too old to run. Then after blasting that message for...
Yep - it's incredible - basically a few people said "he's too old to run", at which point everyone in the news ran constant stories on how he's too old to run. Then after blasting that message for a couple months, they started polling people - and surprise, voters started to think "he's too old to run", at which point the media then runs a million more stories on how now lots of voters think "he's too old to run". Repeat that a few more times, and we get to where we are now - staring down the barrel of authoritarianism, because the guy who's done a great job so far seems to old.
My favorite part is that his VP is one of the top contenders that's talked about to take over for him. So...just let the guy run, get on board with voting for him, and if he doesn't make it through his next term, you're going to end up with a president who likely would have been running against Trump anyway!
It's not that weird, there's a lot of theoretical shoving Kamala aside for no apparent reason and a lot of suggesting Newsom (who actually does shut down a lot of progressive legislation afaict)...
It's not that weird, there's a lot of theoretical shoving Kamala aside for no apparent reason and a lot of suggesting Newsom (who actually does shut down a lot of progressive legislation afaict) and Pritzger and then half a dozen other men that share a skin tone, then Whitmer.
I can't imagine why they think those people are better placed to be the candidate. Nothing comes to mind. It's a coincidence surely.
I think it's too late to swap out Biden, even for Kamala. But you are correct that the DNC needs to emphasize Kamala Harris in the campaign. Have Biden do the teleprompter speeches, and have...
I think it's too late to swap out Biden, even for Kamala. But you are correct that the DNC needs to emphasize Kamala Harris in the campaign. Have Biden do the teleprompter speeches, and have Harris do the press conferences and interviews and such. Even as VP, might as well highlight her since even the people who like Biden do not think he will be able to serve for another four years.
So this is a problem for the next election, but it’s a real problem that we have such a thing as “too late” to swap out a candidate. Because there are a lot of circumstances in which you may need...
So this is a problem for the next election, but it’s a real problem that we have such a thing as “too late” to swap out a candidate. Because there are a lot of circumstances in which you may need to swap out a candidate. Even if they’re not old candidates can have medical issues, they can get assassinated (!), fresh scandals can break out at the 11th hour (like imagine if John Edward’s’ cheating scandal broke after he won the nomination!). There needs to be an orderly and democratically legitimate way to handle these sorts of edge cases, it’s pretty evident that the donor led push helped along by an elite media feeding frenzy is not leading to a situation where we’re able to have a dignified and rational discussion under these circumstances.
There are three problems here: There's no third-party voting. The only reason everyone is desperate for Biden to step down is because running an independent alongside Biden would catastrophically...
So this is a problem for the next election, but it’s a real problem that we have such a thing as “too late” to swap out a candidate.
There are three problems here:
There's no third-party voting. The only reason everyone is desperate for Biden to step down is because running an independent alongside Biden would catastrophically split the vote. As an Australian, this entire discussion of "what do we do about Biden" is Deranged US Politics.
Dems went with Biden and either just assumed he wouldn't have any mental problems for the next 8 years, or planned to be a one-term presidency but didn't have a transition plan after his first election.
Supreme court is openly controlled by anti-democratic Republicans who just made the president king, and Biden isn't willing to publicly execute them or fire them or expand the supreme court.
I don’t know how many ways I can keep restating that there is no “Dems” to decide on who to go with. Biden ran in a primary and won. Then he won a general election. Now he's won another primary...
I don’t know how many ways I can keep restating that there is no “Dems” to decide on who to go with. Biden ran in a primary and won. Then he won a general election. Now he's won another primary and plans to contest another general. “Dem’s” are just the groups of people who felt like voting in the Dem primaries and caucuses. There’s nobody making these decisions.
It's not just a few months of clicks. The trump presidency gained media outlets an unprecedented amount of success. National media outlets saw massive boosts in subscriber numbers thanks to the...
It's not just a few months of clicks. The trump presidency gained media outlets an unprecedented amount of success. National media outlets saw massive boosts in subscriber numbers thanks to the trump outrage machine. Late night shows relished at all of the new viewers tuning into their nightly dose of lazily written "orange man bad".
It's a perverse symbiotic relationship where media outlets get to constantly run bombastic faux outrage story at the truly awful outrageous stuff trump does on a daily basis, and trump gets a convenient enemy to get his base angry about, because all of his success is entirely fueled by anger and fear.
So yes, there definitely is a counterproductive motivation at play with large national center and center left media. I don't know if it's a conscious decision or not, but I'm very sure they're aware that they benefit more from a Trump presidency than a Biden one.
Oh yeah, I definitely agree. I don't think anyone here who's calling for Biden to drop out would vote for Trump instead. Hell, I'd vote for a ham sandwich before I'd vote for Trump, and I'm a...
Oh yeah, I definitely agree. I don't think anyone here who's calling for Biden to drop out would vote for Trump instead. Hell, I'd vote for a ham sandwich before I'd vote for Trump, and I'm a vegetarian. I think the real concern is that having Biden on the ticket will depress the turnout of Democratic-leaning but largely politically-apathetic voters, thus handing Trump a victory in the few swing states that decide the election.
I think the media is causing that more than Biden causing it. But I blame his PR team and the Dems for poor messaging in general because they're terrified of losing the center votes of...
I think the media is causing that more than Biden causing it. But I blame his PR team and the Dems for poor messaging in general because they're terrified of losing the center votes of conservatives who can't stand to vote Trump
But on the other hand, the role of the media is to report the news, and I don't see a universe in which Biden's debate performance and the subsequent fallout isn't newsworthy. I agree with you...
But on the other hand, the role of the media is to report the news, and I don't see a universe in which Biden's debate performance and the subsequent fallout isn't newsworthy. I agree with you that mainstream, left-leaning media outlets like the NYT are harming Biden's election prospects with their nonstop coverage, and I suspect they realize that, too -- even when the NYT editorial board called for Biden to withdraw from the race, they still insisted that Biden would be their "unequivocal pick" over Trump. But until there is some definitive resolution to this issue, it will continue to be newsworthy. We can't stem bad press with finger-pointing any more than we can stem a river with our hands.
The most pessimistic perspective to have is that media coverage of Biden's gaffes will doom his campaign. But a more optimistic perspective is to hope that media coverage will pressure him to drop out, allowing a better President to serve instead of merely the less bad option.
Him dropping out is not feasible at this point. Genuinely. There would be likely a contested convention and non-stop lawsuits about how it was illegitimate and who was allowed on the ballot or who...
Him dropping out is not feasible at this point. Genuinely. There would be likely a contested convention and non-stop lawsuits about how it was illegitimate and who was allowed on the ballot or who could get the campaign funds.
I honestly don't know what would happened. I don't think the legal challenges would be insurmountable, though. Without a doubt, dropping Biden would inject uncertainty into the election, but I'd...
I honestly don't know what would happened. I don't think the legal challenges would be insurmountable, though. Without a doubt, dropping Biden would inject uncertainty into the election, but I'd rather be uncertain about the outcome than certain that Biden will lose, which is closer to how I feel right now.
I disagree about the inevitability of that outcome but I acknowledge the feeling. Despair has weighed heavy. I think with the current SCOTUS, and a recent coup attempt, it would be better not to...
I disagree about the inevitability of that outcome but I acknowledge the feeling. Despair has weighed heavy. I think with the current SCOTUS, and a recent coup attempt, it would be better not to deliberately throw everything in disarray. Dems could absolutely be messaging their way out of this but apparently they aren't.
It's not a legal challenge, it's a political one - the law is whatever SCOTUS says it is, and if SCOTUS believe they can screw the Dems without getting lynched, they'll block it regardless of...
I don't think the legal challenges would be insurmountable, though.
It's not a legal challenge, it's a political one - the law is whatever SCOTUS says it is, and if SCOTUS believe they can screw the Dems without getting lynched, they'll block it regardless of whether it's a sensible legal ruling. Their existing rulings are legally absolutely indefensible.
Or they vote third-party, which has historically been equivalent to throwing away your vote. One of my buddies is firm in voting for someone else on the ticket who isn't Trump or Biden...
Or they vote third-party, which has historically been equivalent to throwing away your vote. One of my buddies is firm in voting for someone else on the ticket who isn't Trump or Biden...
The time between the debate and before all of this I was in the 'give him a break' camp, but its getting silly now. I would say that he should step down, but who else from the dems is looking...
The time between the debate and before all of this I was in the 'give him a break' camp, but its getting silly now. I would say that he should step down, but who else from the dems is looking presidential right now? Newsom? Buttigieg? I think Newsom is the closest, but he just doesn't have it yet.
I would like to see the US get away from this crazy campaign cycle.
Visiting all these small towns, eating ice cream, etc.. I get why they do it, but its out of control. Do a couple debates and call it. Two or three months tops. I might be cynical, but these guys spew the same stuff and do a fraction of it when they get in office.
I like Biden and I think he was a good President. But everyone who thinks he has the best chance to win the presidency this fall are deluding themselves. The more defenses of Biden I read the more...
I like Biden and I think he was a good President. But everyone who thinks he has the best chance to win the presidency this fall are deluding themselves. The more defenses of Biden I read the more and more they resemble "who are you going to believe, me or your own lying eyes".
I have issues with Biden's positions through his career. Pretty difficult not to when someone has been in politics as long as he has. But I agree that I generally like what has been accomplished...
I have issues with Biden's positions through his career. Pretty difficult not to when someone has been in politics as long as he has. But I agree that I generally like what has been accomplished by his administration.
The problem is the dems have no good data on how potential candidates would perform.
I think the only way dems improve their chances is
Biden steps down, commits to backing whoever is selects to run in his stead
lightning round primary, this does two things: provides legitimacy for whoever is selected, if Kamala is selected this supports the VP selection process.
I think any other path carries too much risk of chaos and dissent. If step 1 doesn't happen then the Trump campaign is armed with some potent material: "the dems are in disarrary", "look how scared of Trump they are" etc. If step 2 doesn't happen anyone unilaterally selected is going to be kneecapped be party drama.
So in that sense I think Biden has the best chances. The problem is the chances are slim and we have no good data on alternatives.
Edit: someone please give me a time machine and 2020 Bernie
I disagree Biden has the best chance, but I do agree there is no good option. It’s really a rock and a hard place situation. At the end of the day, going with Harris over Biden probably has wildly...
I disagree Biden has the best chance, but I do agree there is no good option. It’s really a rock and a hard place situation.
At the end of the day, going with Harris over Biden probably has wildly varying outcomes — it could go very poorly for sure. But right now this race is Trump’s to lose and I would pick the risky high variance plan over sleepwalking into an election loss.
But I think what they are saying is that he has this de facto best chance because we have essentially no data on anyone else. It’s like “what’s a better odds to roll 20, a 20 sided die or a...
But I think what they are saying is that he has this de facto best chance because we have essentially no data on anyone else. It’s like “what’s a better odds to roll 20, a 20 sided die or a mystery die?”
Now I don’t think it’s quite that bad. We have some idea of our alternatives. I too would prefer risky bet at this point. What I don’t want to happen is that we take a risky option and then tank our odds further with drama.
The only problem is that you are exactly correct in 2022. However, it is 2024; if there is a change to the presidential ticket at this point, it is basically just handing a win to Trump. The GOP...
Biden steps down, commits to backing whoever is selects to run in his stead
The only problem is that you are exactly correct in 2022. However, it is 2024; if there is a change to the presidential ticket at this point, it is basically just handing a win to Trump. The GOP would have a field day, and would try - and potentially succeed, with the way the SCOTUS current is - at keeping the new candidate off ballots in a lot of places, potentially even in swing states.
Biden should have been a one-termer. He's not. Now it must be dealt with.
Agreed. I think it's within our capacity (Biden's intransigence not withstanding) to execute this without providing the GOP too much ammo. Hypothetically candidates/nominees can experience life...
Biden should have been a one-termer. He's not. Now it must be dealt with.
Agreed.
The only problem is that you are exactly correct in 2022. However, it is 2024; if there is a change to the presidential ticket at this point, it is basically just handing a win to Trump. The GOP would have a field day, and would try - and potentially succeed, with the way the SCOTUS current is - at keeping the new candidate off ballots in a lot of places, potentially even in swing states.
I think it's within our capacity (Biden's intransigence not withstanding) to execute this without providing the GOP too much ammo. Hypothetically candidates/nominees can experience life events that cause them to withdraw (illness, injury, family concerns). The GOP isn't going to give an inch but I don't think this strategy is an auto-fail with well executed.
I do think Biden being publicly forced off the ticket is an auto-fail. And I don't think the dems actually would pull off the strategy cleanly enough.
I guess I really would just like to see some type of playmaking, rallying, SOME type of energy.
But who has a better chance? Outside of wildly speculating or going on gut instinct, all the polls still show Joe Biden has the best shot to beat Trump (versus any of the usual suspect who's names...
But who has a better chance? Outside of wildly speculating or going on gut instinct, all the polls still show Joe Biden has the best shot to beat Trump (versus any of the usual suspect who's names have been floated). Harris is slightly less disliked than Biden, but overall Biden is still most likely to win.
I mean that's not really a concrete fact. The polls are all over the place, I don't think we can really say much at this point. Here's one from today showing they're tied in head to head matchups...
overall Biden is still most likely to win.
I mean that's not really a concrete fact. The polls are all over the place, I don't think we can really say much at this point. Here's one from today showing they're tied in head to head matchups against Trump:
Do I think that an 80+ year-old person should be President? No. Do I think that President Biden is in cognitive decline or demented now? Nope, based on long observation of his public performances.
For those who don't recall Biden's history, he has always been a gaffe machine. For someone who's ascended the political heights, he's acknowledged that public speaking has never been one of his strengths. A lifelong stutterer, Biden has always had the kind of disfluency that results in scrambling names, pausing, then correcting himself, often embarrassingly. Biden has been so effective at interpersonal "retail" politics that he's survived with this disability forever. The "cognitive decline" narrative has been around since long before his 2020 campaign, usually bolstered with selective video clips.
I didn't like Joe Biden for a great many reasons - he was something of a bullshitter, the whole Anita Hill thing, banking and crime legislation that account for much of the current inequality and injustice, willingness to use military force, etc. I thought he was an average specimen of a below-average political herd (U.S. Senators). As a Vice President, he was practically invisible except when he said something risible.
And yet Biden's Vice Presidential activity was responsible for getting Congressional approval during President Obama's terms, just as Vice President Harris has been doing for him. These are the mechanistic details of the President/Vice President relationship which the press never reports on. [Highly recommend the documentary, President in Waiting]. I've said before that we should be voting on the platform, not the person, because an effective presidential administration requires teamwork and not just an omnipotent leader.
I'd vote for Biden over Trump even if they were literally piloting his corpse around like Weekend at Bernie's. But this is not an explanation for all his current issues, and it's ludicrous to expect people to believe that he's the same as he's always been. Compare his debate with Paul Ryan to his recent debate with Trump and then tell me he's always been like this.
The problem here is that you’re conflating naturally slowing down as someone ages with dementia. Old people start making more verbal slips than they used to and it takes them longer to process information. That’s a far cry from jumping to the claim that they’re actually losing the ability to think about things or make important decisions.
For stutterers, decompensating like this is fairly normal as they get older but it’s not a sign of any deeper neurological issues. At this point, his being old isn’t the actual problem. The problem is that the media has decided they want to crusade to force him to quit and they’re going to put each and every thing he says and does under a microscope to blow it out of proportion. You could follow anyone around all day and keep a log of every time they misspoke something if you wanted to make them sound deranged. It is, certainly, much easier than actually doing any sort of real reporting at least.
I don't get why you're talking about dementia here, though. I most of the comments I've seen on this have been clear that this is normal cognitive decline from old age, and I've not really seen much to say that this is in any way abnormal for a fit and healthy man of Biden's age.
But the question at stake isn't "is it normal for an 81yo man to exhibit cognitive decline?". The question is whether he's the best choice for the Democrats right now - a question that encompasses many subquestions, such as "will he be able to beat Donald Trump?" and "is an 81yo man who at times seems to struggle to speak coherently going to do a good job of being a president?".
I'm not American, I'm watching from outside, and I'm not qualified to answer those questions properly. But I get a bit of second-hand embarrassment watching this whole debacle play out.
Because that’s what the right wing attack ads are and have been running with.
It’s indisputable that he’s too old, but there was an open period for hashing that out over the primary season and nobody wanted to step up to the plate and challenge him because they were sure to lose. Every presidential candidate has some set of problems with them that makes them less than ideal. Biden’s being too old is just a thing on his con list and not even the biggest con I have with him. But he’s still clearly capable of doing the job because his administration has actually been the most progressive and effective of my lifetime despite the resistance from the other branches of government. If he starts to actually lose his marbles into his second term there are few I would count on more than Kamala Harris to effectively backstab him and invoke the 25th amendment so I really don’t see what the problem is.
I suspect most people on Tildes are not responding to the right wing attack ads, though, and most will vote for him or his replacement regardless.
The question then becomes how to convince people outside of left-wing spaces that Biden is still fit for purpose, and saying "it's not dementia, it's just the normal cognitive decline of an 80yo" doesn't seem like the winning strategy to me.
Here in the UK, during Brexit, Leave campaigners often threw around the figure of 350M as the weekly contribution to the EU from the UK. This figure wasn't true - because of various discounts, it was something like 250M, and accounting for the amount the UK received from the EU, the net sum was closer to 180M a week.
Unfortunately, when someone says "we send 350M a week to the EU" and you respond "wait a minute, it's only 250M a week", you don't win a lot of support, because it turns out that people still think that 250 million pounds is a lot of money. Instead, what the Remain campaign should have done was to explain why the EU was worth hundreds of millions of pounds, how those contributions supported British communities and businesses, how supporting other EU markets improved British soft power and opened up more opportunities for British businesses selling abroad, and so on. But no-one made the positive case for staying within the EU, and so we ended up voting for one of the biggest mistakes in our history.
When people are discussing Biden's clear signs of mental fatigue, and you respond with "but at least it's not dementia", you're not making a positive case for Biden, and you're just underscoring his main weakness. Either Biden is the best candidate the Democrats can field to be President of the US for the next four years, and you can explain why, or he needs to be replaced. Right now it feels like a lot of the discussion is focused on "it's not that bad" and "but there's no-one else", and those aren't vote-winning slogans!
You focus on his record and how shitty his opponent is. Spending all your time defending attacks is a losing proposition. If they want to win they need to get good at changing the subject or pivoting it to a strength. Even if Biden is replaced, if the reflexive posture to respond to attacks, vulnerabilities, and criticism is to try and “well ackshually” the problem away you’re gonna lose.
I want people to stop ruminating the subject because it’s a stupid subject to be discussing. Saying it’s not dementia is a way of saying this is an overblown nothingburger.
Nah it should have been 30%-40% this and 60%-70% subtly depicting the leavers as deranged racist freaks (with plausible deniability).
There is no such thing as a “best” candidate and, even if there was, it is impossible to determine how good a candidate actually is until you have actually seen them complain. Biden is the only candidate that we have good data on and Harris is a close second. Everyone else is a giant X factor and none of the polling about them means anything because none of them have been exposed to the rigors of a national campaign with the national press corps and the full weight of real oppo research being dumped against them.
He’s the candidate you have. There exists no party apparatus to do a late term replacement of a candidate that has any legitimacy.
They’re not vote winning because they’re defensive, focused on responding to allegations. Replacing him will also be defensive, because the new candidate will spend their whole time trying to prove their legitimacy once again putting themselves on the back foot. Politics isn’t about just buying the perfect product off a shelf. It’s a process. A process does not exist to replace Biden. Without the process you don’t have a candidate. Candidates are made through that process.
So tl;dr if you're explaining, you're losing.
The problem I see is that the american public has a tendency to be ageist and to expect a president to be a national champion. If Biden can get the job, I think his team will perform well. At the debate Trump appeared to dominate him and I am afraid for his chances based on perceptions of being feeble and slow.
So the Frank Luntz undecided voter panel after the debate consensus seemed to have been “Man Biden is real old but that Trump sounds fucking unhinged.” Which was the correct takeaway from that debate. I think these folks tend to be painfully ignorant (in that they don’t have information they ought to), but they’re not dumb (in that they will draw the correct conclusions from the info they have, that info is just usually bad). These folks are probably better indicators of how these things come off than the perspectives of people who actually follow political news.
Of course the spin and media narrative following the debate can change their recollections dramatically, which is what seems to have happened. One thing I’ve noticed about debates in general is that political partisans tend to want to view them as their guy versus the other guy beating each other down but most normies seem to just want to be reassured that things are gonna be all right and they want the one who makes them feel like it’ll be okay. Trump’s energy lately has been dark and aggressive in a way that’s offputting, even if he affects dominance.
Frankly, it seems reasonable to expect the president to deliver rousing speeches and deftly command US relations. While Biden may be wise from his years of experience, I no longer trust he has the stamina to do anything more than the bare minimum. I'm fully aware that his administration is doing the day-to-day work, but I'm not convinced he's delivering as a leader considering his last cabinet meeting was October 2023.
I don't think it matters anymore if he is the best choice. He was the choice and if we change now, we are certain to give the win to Trump. There is no time to do any fundraising or get enough awareness of a candidate now if we try to change. Not to mention it already is a bad look if you don't run the incumbant (that hardly if ever has gone well when it happened) or change this late in the game your candidate. All of these things together is a surefire win to Trump if we changed candidates.
And I agree with some one, I'd vote for the Democrats puppeteering an old corpse over Trump. So if you ask me, it's way more important that we try to win rather than try to get a better person to run for president. It doesn't matter how much more suited the person is then Biden if he or she doesn't win. As some one said, the president is not the king (though Trump wants to believe he is and I'm sure he'll work towards making it more so if he becomes president), a lot of government leading is a the people surrounding the president (including his advisors).
It would be an absolutely crazy news cycle if the Democrats changed candidates! Low information voters exist, but there would be wall to wall coverage of a last-minute nominee change.
Fundraising also isn't an issue cause Kamala could use Biden's warchest directly, or it could be turned into a PAC for another candidate. Considering there was just a new story today about donors (rightly) cutting off funding to Biden, the fundraising for an alternative candidate would be significantly easier too.
I'm absolutely not conflating anything with dementia, as I never said Biden had dementia. I don't know enough medically to say but from what I've seen more knowledgeable people say, he probably doesn't. What I'm disputing is people trying to claim that he's the same as ever -- he demonstrably isn't. It's not particularly convincing to point at a man clearly experiencing age-based cognitive decline and claim he's just dealing with the same lifelong stutter and tendency to gaffe. It does not make me feel happier or more confident voting for Biden to have supporters try to gaslight me into believing Biden's the same as ever when he's not, and it's certainly not going to win over anyone on the fence.
It’s not “gaslighting” to point out that this is an election between 2024 Biden and 2024 Trump, not between 2012 Biden and 2024 Biden.
Yeah there's really just no excuse for this. He has also confused Macron with Mitterand.. that is just not something that should be explained away, no matter how much better he is than Trump. It's unbelievable to me that he's still the Democratic candidate.
I have no horse in the race, as a Dane. But you cannot re-elect a president that confuses his ally with arguably his worst enemy, Putin. He caught his own mistake, yes, but it's just mindblowing to watch (although to be fair, American politics have been a continuing series of mindblowing events since 2015).
Another thing, my 98 year old grandfather was able to move better than Biden. Why are all his body movements so extremely slow? It's unfathomable that he is still the leader of a superpower.
You can when the alternative is a man who would openly and knowingly embrace Putin. Biden may have lost a step or two, but based on the last 4 years worth of accomplishments, the people he's surrounding himself with have not.
I remember the Trump years like it was yesterday - just constant chaos, incompetence, lies, and embarrassment. You cannot re-elect a president like that.
Yes I already said he's that he's obviously still better than Trump. That doesn't mean he's good.
If you've seen one aging person, you've seen one aging person - the types and areas of debility are wildly variable.
Biden's got peripheral neuropathy, or at least that's what we're told. I've seen enough elders who have that condition to believe the report is accurate, though IANAD. Sufferers can't feel their steps well and lose strength and fine balance. This usually results in a slow, cautious gait. My 85 year old water aerobics instructor at the YMCA had the same problem. Nonetheless, she was sharp as a tack, as well as plenty agile in the water.
What I'm hearing is that Biden should conduct his next conference from the pool. :D
That's interesting, I've never heard that before. I don't think he's sharp as a tack though.
I'm going to 100% vote for anyone who isn't Trump, and I also believe the people who a president surrounds themselves with are more important than the person themselves, so I don't necessarily care about his overall mental state.
BUT I'm extremely tired of the media trying to gaslight everyone into thinking Biden isn't going mentally downhill and "was just always like that" or "has a cold" or whatever it is that day. Almost all the examples in the Snopes article linked are from the past 4 years. He's just a super old dude, and its more and more apparent the older he gets. The debate was an absolute embarrassment and an eye opening experience for anyone paying attention.
At this point, I don't even think they should or even could replace him, and I don't know why any Democrats would run with that narrative either. It would basically be giving Trump the win. They need to take a page out of Trumps book and just ignore it until election day imho.
There's a difference between being older and thus being cognitively slower or having some decline and "has dementia" or "is in severe cognitive decline."
What those words all mean are very different. And given his history, being older is going to make his speech difficulties worse regardless of his cognitive abilities. Specifically I object to the claims of dementia and the like, but I honestly don't see the media protecting him, I see them jumping on board with how so many people are saying he should step down.
At some point, though, "some normal decline" multiplied by enough years works out to be the same thing as "severe decline" in a much younger man.
He's vying for the most demanding job on the planet. I don't think it's unfair for people to want a person who can respond quickly to new information. I don't think it's unfair that when folks see he can't even read off a teleprompter, they question if he can handle the job he's vying for.
Is he better than Trump? Sure. But even Biden said there's like 50 people better than himself who can beat trump. Every single Not Trump voter would still vote for unknown Candidate X.
This is simply not true.
Would they stay home? Or suddenly decide to vote for Trump?
Wouldn't it also be conceivable that some Not Trump stay home people would come out to vote for a new unknown?
Or vote third party yeah. Any successor who picks it up will not have Democratic legitimacy since they didn’t go through a primary process and they will not have been pressure tested through that primary process which usually shakes out all the skeletons in the closets and exposes their vulnerabilities as a candidate. An open “mini-convention” might do some of those things, particularly on the legitimacy front, but I’d be much more sanguine about doing one of those if not for the Gaza situation. Biden did weather the criticisms over Gaza through the primary process, the uncommitted voters were the main challenges he had. But if you need to now vet and argue among a slate of candidate who each have their own unsatisfactory Gaza statements (since it is, frankly, a politically no win scenario) they’re gonna be fucked. I view this as a serious enough flashpoint that it has potential to tear the party apart and lead to rioting outside the convention center.
I don't disagree with you and overall I think we should stick with Biden. But hot dang this timebomb should have been diffused years ago and Democrats should have used four years to come up with, market, and sell sell sell us a successor. They could have been clear NO Biden won't run it's this guy or nothing so get with it. Biden could have been using his legacy to support a new candidate but no they stuck with it. Now it's "Biden or no one" and it sucks so bad.
They've made their sticky disgusting bed and now they're having to either lie on it or be taking insane risks. The whole thing sucks.
I think the thing people are struggling to accept is that there are no “Democrats” who can make these decisions. There is no party apparatus. “The Democrats” is just a gaggle of loosely affiliated individuals. Functionally, the President is the head of the party so nobody was ever going to be able to propose an alternative candidate but Biden himself. That’s just a weakness of our whole political system.
I hear you, and I just wanted to say I super appreciate your perspective through various comments on this thread. I think most of us are just upset about the whole dang system more than we are unhappy about Joe Biden
There's some Not Trump voters already doing this because of the Israel/Palestine situation.
He’s not “vying for” the job of POTUS, he’s doing it, and doing a damn good job of it too, especially considering that the Republicans have been doing everything possible to prevent him from accomplishing anything at all for the past four years. The choice is between four more years of highly qualified and effective administration, or fascism.
I disagree. He's been given the contract for four years, coming up to an end, and he's applying as a qualified candidate for a new contract. Just like the other guy. The other guy is highly unqualified to do anything outside of a jail cell, but he's also vying for the same position as the orange guy who has also done 4 years of it and, according to their traitorous camp, "done a damn good job of it" too.
I dislike Trump as much as the next guy here, but I also dislike (to a far less degree) the in house pretense that everything with a D on it is a-okay. They're not the same and we shouldn't pretend it's the same, but we should also not pretend weaknesses in the our preferred candidate doesn't exist either.
Ah, I didn't mean you specifically, but I was replying to you so that was 100% my fault, I apologize.
Amendment: there appears to be a campaign level push that voters need to back everything with D on it and pretend everything is okay. You don't hold this opinion, but I do feel it from the campaign.
Cool, then all these people should have done literally anything in the past four years rather than being a couch political genius but only from april-november in an election year.
We can wish a different political party system but we're not gonna fix it today, or realistically before the election, and we're sure not going to fix it we repeat our cycle of "election over so I don't do anything for the next 3.5 years during which I'll complain vigorously again."
Perhaps the Dems have really fucked it up and thus indirectly destroyed the country. I rather hope not. But dreams of a snap primary or any other change of candidate that won't end in lawsuits keeping a new candidate off ballots, etc are just dreams.
Next everyone will hope for faithless electors as if that's a reasonable outcome.
All of this ignores that his administration has done stuff that has helped many people including me personally. And everyone is acting like we don't have a vice president which is wild.
Everyone acting like "meh it's ok to vote in this clearly end of life man" BECAUSE we have a vice president is the wild part. I don't get why everyone is suddenly trying to normalize it as if that's ever been the case?
The VP dodges a lot political scrutiny for a whole slew of reasons (mostly because their powers are arguably ill defined). If you think the VP should have more scrutiny becuase she's likely to wind up leading the country, then maybe she should be the one on the ticket. I get why she basically can't be at this point, but it's not at all unreasonable to be rightly upset at the situation the dems have willingly put themselves in while being hostile about the suggestion that it could turn out otherwise.
And that's assuming Biden dies AFTER elected and taking office.
There's all SORTS of horrible situations that we get to try and dodge just hoping he makes it that far, because IF he passes away before the election, you can expect 3 or 4 different fucking disaster shit shows depending on when exactly that is.
I'm glad his administration has helped people. He personally did not do all of it, few presidents do. Mostly they pick the people who help. I really wish the dems had listened to the many people who from day 1 said "ok, Biden's in, time to start getting the message across he's not staying" so the people who have been doing good can continue to do so, rather than being ousted because we seem to be denying that he's ancient and not in good health.
I'm really not trying to normalize it. I'm just acknowledging it's real and that everyone talking about ditching her is pretending that isn't its own political morass.
I get being mad. It makes sense. It's just not productive and very little of all of this spitballing by everyone across the country is realistic. But IMO it's far too late and I'm perpetually frustrated at 1x every 4 years political complaining so I have little patience for it.
She is on the ticket though. It’s the Biden-Harris ticket. All of the VP’s roles are ill defined except for one: to be on deck in case the President is no longer able to do the job. That’s not a thing to ‘normalize’ that’s literally the whole reason for the role existing. When people vote for the ticket they’re voting for the duo. I’d be much less comfortable voting the ticket if the VP was someone like Sarah Palin.
Anyone has a non-zero chance of dying between nomination and the election. That Biden’s odds of dying before then are maybe 2-3% higher isn’t as big a deal as all that.
His health is fine for his age. Nobody is denying that he’s ancient, people are refuting that this is an issue worth getting worked up about in light of everything else.
Dementia is not a discrete designation, though. When cognitive decline tied to structural changes in the brain is severe enough, it's dementia.
Tbh I'm not interested in debating it anymore, I got to this opinion from a mix of being opposed to couch diagnosis and reading the opinion of an expert in the field (of dementia and the like, whatever that technical term is) and I'm too cranky from the other subthread to want to engage with this anymore. my opinion stands as it is, fe how you like about it.
I've not seen anyone talk about dementia, least of all in this thread, so I don't know why you're putting that word in other people's mouths.
ok
I believe you haven't seen it
But that doesn't mean it isn't happening
I didn't put words in anyone's mouth. I was in fact thinking of a thread from a specialist on the topic who was also objecting to use of dementia (and Alzheimer's)
I didn't accuse anyone in this thread of saying it. So I don't know why you believe I did, nor why you decided to come in hot.
You're talking about Fox News and the Daily Mail - of course Trump supporters are going to show this in the worst possible light. The left-wing media spent a good while doing the same about Trump's ill-health and gaffes. But as I pointed out in a sibling comment, the response to that can't be "well it's not dementia".
There are three links for the record.
But they were just the first ones I found with dementia in the headline as I didn't feel like reading a dozen articles to respond to someone trying to say I'm putting words in other people's mouths.
First it was you have seen it, now that you've seen it, those sources are meaningless because they're right wing. Trump's coverage is not relevant atm, but I object to all diagnosis by internet or pundit as a rule.
And I intended what I said so I'm not really interested in what you think my response can or cannot be. Please don't accuse me of making things up and putting words in people's mouths and then come back with more.
It’s honestly insane to me that this was sent out as a push alert. I accidentally call my dog by my son’s name at least 50% of the time and vice versa. A verbal slip isn’t a sign of cognitive decline. Especially given that, as you say, this was pretty normal for him even when he was young. I distinctly remember in 2008 he asked Max Cleland (famously confined to a wheelchair) to stand up and take a bow when people were applauding him.
The NYT released a single op-ed buried several pages down saying Trump is unfit to lead and then immediately resumed running multiple front page stories every day documenting each and every verbal slip-up or gaffe. They want to crusade to make Biden quit instead of torching Trump’s standing in the polls even though they acknowledge he’s a threat to the Republic. I watched a clip the other day of Biden and Kier Starmer taking questions and the only thing the press corps wanted to do was scream “GEORGE CLOONEY” at him like a feral mob.
I always knew it was a problem how much time journalists and the press spend on Twitter. I know quite a few writers personally and I’ve observed since the pandemic that many of them have become less pleasant to be around, just needlessly combative and mean in person and less and less able to set aside their personal views and test them against objective reality. But this whole debacle is making me think their brains have been truly cooked by this. They have completely lost the plot on what their job is supposed to be. They think their job is to weaponize gossip to push a (usually petty) agenda but literally nobody wants that from them.
Joe Biden has always had a pretty deep resentment towards the Washington Press Corps and it’s pretty clear they’re trying to settle a score with him by doing this. But all it’s communicating to me is that his contempt for them is well earned.
Okay he's a bad speaker like Moses. Sure.
How come their campaign isn't putting out examples of his literary genius, or a montage of world leaders, or even domestic leaders, rallying to say good things about him?
I don't need an omnipotent leader, but I do need someone with some potency at something.
Trump cognitive decline increasingly difficult to conceal despite setting low bar
Donald Trump Dementia Evidence 'Overwhelming,' Says Top Psychiatrist
Daily Show montage of Trump's phonemic aphasia
Interview with Dr John Gartner about Trump's signs of dementia
Hundreds of psychiatric professionals have spoken out about Trump's clear signs of advanced dementia, including those associated with Dr John Gartner and his Duty to Warn organization.
Trump notably does not just misname people, but demonstrably confuses identities and merges people into boxes of the same archetype (e.g. talking about winning an election against Obama or merging Nancy Pelosi and Hillary Clinton into one). He doesn't trip up and forget words, he constantly slurs and makes up things that sound phonetically similar without being aware. He gets disoriented and talks like it's a different decade. He pauses and loses focus, then jarringly starts shouting in an agitated fashion.
There are real psychiatric professionals expressing concern about Trump's mental state. Not so much Biden. He seems a bit tired and has a lifelong stutter. He is old, but present and is demonstrably running the most progressive administration in my lifetime right here and now.
Ageism notwithstanding, our realistic choice is two people of an almost identical age, one who demonstrates competency, and has a reasonable vice president, or a fascist with overt dementia. You can't just slap a new name on a ballot and expect to win; it's forfeiting by another name. Elections are decided by how many apathetic swing state voters you can talk into getting off their ass and voting, set against voter suppression and gerrymandering. That doesn't happen when you suddenly change the candidate to someone nobody knows three months beforehand.
I think the difference between the situations are that the audience that would be influenced to not vote for Trump regardless of any of his problems doesn't exist, and the audience that can be influenced to not vote for Biden because of his faults does exist. This is why one of them gets more noteworthy headlines, clicks, comments etc. than the other. Trump has already done so many egregiously wrong things, there's nothing you can say about him that will convince anyone who is going to vote for him to not vote for him. Likewise there are some people who say they would vote for Biden even if he was actually dead and people just dragged around his corpse to keep up the show. These news articles about Biden get interest from conservatives who support Trump, conservatives who don't support Trump, people who would vote for Biden no matter what, people who aren't sure if they want to vote for Biden but also don't want Trump, and maybe some attention from those who are less engaged with the system altogether and perhaps reinforces their disengagement.
The articles about Trump don't really move the needle for anyone, because all of his negatives are already well documented. Being mentally incapable of performing the duties of his job would perhaps be among the least damaging things he'll have done to the country by that point. There's nothing new or noteworthy to glean from reading about Trump's additional criminal actions, misdeeds, shortcomings etc. because his base has demonstrated they do not care and they will vote for him no matter what. So there's no incentive to further learn about his signs of dementia and think that maybe that will somehow be what turns the tides against him, because it won't.
This is the problem with a system in which it asks people to choose between two options and the options get increasingly worse election after election. To the point where people would vote for candidates who would commit insurrection, shoot a man on 5th avenue, or have their corpse paraded around like Weekend at Bernie's, that's what our system has led to, because we're constantly being asked or told to overlook someone's faults to beat the other person who is worse.
I also don't think it's right for Democrats to change their ticket now. It's essentially trying to re-awaken the elements in this already broken-by-design system to disenfranchise people and covertly empower some people more than others to have greater influence over election outcomes to undo a grave egotistical mistake Biden made to run again by using more recently discarded rules for conventions to elect someone other than Biden. That's like replacing one broken clock with another that happens to be telling the right time the moment you switch and then quickly becomes outdated right after that moment has passed.
Agree with you. It was a painful news conference, he is noticeably older but not at all senile. His timing and his demeanor is indicative of his age but not abilities.
This is no worse then when Donald Trump called Tim Cook "Tim Apple" to his face.
If you watch the video it seems he just said the wrong thing by accident, then corrected himself quickly.
Yeah, but that's the problem, he does so, a lot.
Yes, and then called VP Harris "VP Trump" (he didn't self-correct on this one). The BBC put together a video of some interesting moments in the press conference. Even when he's speaking coherently, I find his delivery to be very poor. The establishment should stop trying to coerce Democrats and anti-Trump into voting for this old man and put up a credible candidate who can savage Trump on his awful record and horrific platform.
The last segment was pretty bad, he had that thousand yard stare like he was off in some possible future, but actually there.
All these clips coming out are not encouraging.
No there is no savaging Trump on his record. Theatrically savaging him just makes people view it as two politicians tearing into each other for normal cynical reasons, it doesn’t actually move votes because undecided or low-propensity voters tend to be pretty disaffected about the whole enterprise. It just preaches to the choir. (An excited choir can then go on to move votes, but that’s a different mechanism). Hillary Clinton was extremely effective at savaging Trump and it amounted to her losing. It’s like the maxim about wrestling with a pig, you can’t get down in the mud with him.
Honestly it’s fine for Presidents’ delivery to be poor. It’s fine for Presidents to be mediocre public speakers even. Sure we’d all like everyone to talk like Obama, but that’s largely just drama and entertainment rather than a critical component of being effective at governance.
Interesting insight, cheers.
It's almost like he's a human that makes speech errors sometimes, especially when exhausted and stressed out.
He's not making errors like you would see in someone with mental decline. He's making the same errors you and I make when we're in our 20s, 30s, 40s, etc.
He didn't CONFUSE Kamala for Trump. He literally misspoke.
How many times have you said X while thinking Y?
The headlines look bad, but this is seriously a nothing burger. Well, it should be, but it looks like it's turning into more ammo against Biden, despite the fact that half of what comes out of Trump's mouth is complete gibberish.
One thing the republicans have that democrats don't is solidarity, which is probably a big factor in why they often win. No matter how stupid their candidate sounds and no matter how many times he's insulted his allies and electorate, they still support him. The democratic candidate makes one speaking mistake that was quickly corrected and everyone calls for his withdrawal. It's honestly infuriating.
As others have said, this is kind of who Biden is. His skills as a politician have gotten him as far as he has despite that.
It's just honestly not good though. I work in a job that is far from as visible as POTUS and frequent gaffes like this would inhibit my career. He's under a microscope right now and all he needs to do is remember his ally's name and his vice president's name. Instead he names both his biggest geo-political adversary (the man invading his ally) and his domestic rival. This is a far shout from me mixing up "bubby" (dog's nickname) and "baby" (my partner).
He then went on to call Kamala Harris 'Vice President Trump'. Link
I don't often physically cringe but this went and did it.
It's just sad now. This man can't govern a country.
So... why not replace Biden? Anyone that's voting him is presumably voting mostly because he's not Trump?
It's a political nightmare. And red states will try to keep them off the ballot. And someone will sue for their votes not counting. And Harris not being the presumptive replacement is going to piss off the base. (Tell me a group that votes 93 percent Democrat and does most of the activism isn't the base) And if it isn't Harris I don't think the campaign funding carries over.
Idk why people think it's viable at all.
It's not viable to swap Biden out at this point, and this is something the Dems should have seen coming.
Biden needs to quit doing interviews and press conferences and stick to teleprompter speeches. In the meantime, Harris needs to be the one going out there and making the case for a second Biden term through interviews and press conferences. Have Kamala run as if she was the president, because even Biden supporters like me don't believe the man will last another four years in office. If he was even as spry as he was in '20, I'd have more hope.
Nah he should do so many press conferences that people get bored with it and stop rewarding the papers for pretending every minor grammatical error or scrambled noun is headline worthy news. The press conference was fine as a press conference. There was really nothing noteworthy about it aside from the fact that everyone decided to make it into a big to-do.
The only politically-viable pathway to replacing Biden requires him to step down willingly, and Biden has flatly declared that he will not do that. Personally I think Biden's stubbornness is slow-walking us into catastrophe, but ultimately the decision is his to make.
Anything less than Biden voluntarily withdrawing his candidacy will result in a political nightmare like @DefinitelyNotAFae mentioned. Were Biden to step down willingly, Harris would become the obvious contender for the Democratic nominee. But otherwise Harris would be stuck between defending Biden (and therefore rejecting her nomination) or abandoning him (and therefore appearing opportunistic). Imagine months of Democratic infighting before the election, with the most maximalist positions being amplified by Russian propagandists.
A lot of furries worked hard at hacking the Heritage Foundation and I just think we could all be talking about Project 2025 and how they want to enforce blue laws and tell business owners what to do, and will ban anything they think is porn, and ALL of the things in that manifesto. We're all so fixated on Biden being a really typical old dude that we're pretending that Trump isn't an old dude because he makes his mistakes ... More often? And that he's not ALSO going to destroy the fundamental institutions of the country in the process. If we have two old dudes to pick from, let's do the one not doing project 2025
I agree about how insane it is that all the papers and news outlets are now jumping on every gaffe Biden makes (as if he hasn't done this his whole career), but barely a mention of his stark raving mad opponent who wants to rip down democracy and install himself as dear leader.
I think part of it is that Democratic voters generally are actually concerned about their candidate, and want a qualified, intelligent, fully "with it" candidate, whereas Republicans just don't care as long as there's an "R" next to their name and they spit out the right catchphrases. That will tend to drive the stories that are published in the center/left media.
I've started to also think the other part of it is that the news media in general (left/center/right) actually wants to see Trump win the election. Every now and then they'll run an editorial on his unfitness for office, or the occasional piece on Project 2025, but for every one of those, there's 5 more OpEds about Biden, or a constant barrage of front page articles about how Biden needs to step down. Where is the constant front page news about the candidate that's seemingly unable to tell the truth? Or the guy who's completely in bed with a group that wants to instate the Christian version of Sharia law? It's insane. It's like they don't realize if Trump wins, he's going to go after every news outlet that reports on him in an unflattering way, and the SCOTUS is going to be more than happy to let him do it. They're selling away freedom of the press in exchange for a few months of extra clicks.
That’s part of it but also there’s a few other dynamics at play.
1.) Journalists all spend too much time on Twitter and it leads them to engage in a lot of groupthink. This is basically what a callout culture mob looks like when everyone involved writes under a major publication.
2.) The journos assigned to the Biden press pool have been fishing around for “Biden old” takes from them for the whole campaign and Biden and his staff have basically berated them for it the whole time and it hurt their feelings, so now they’re getting their kicks in while he’s down. This is also why I think the polls haven’t moved that much, I think most normie voters already viewed Biden as being in even worse shape than he actually is because there’s plenty of edited footage floating around on social media of verbal gaffes and calling him “pudding brain” and shit. That’s been priced into his approval ratings from the start.
3.) Democrats are anxious and anxiety and fear drive traffic and engagement. Posting shit about Biden promotes anxiety and fear so they get traffic. Bonuses and promotions depend on driving traffic so the logic is obvious to them.
4.) They sort of resent that they basically have zero ability to influence Republican politics or elections because nobody in the conservative universe listens to them or takes them seriously. Liberals do take elite media seriously, so they naturally want to throw their weight around. As a journalist, it’s a big ego boost to feel like you’re having a hand in shaping history like Woodward and Bernstein but you can basically only do that for internal Democratic Party politics now.
5.) The debate spooked the donors, who mostly don’t pay much attention as long as the politicians are picking up the phone when they call. The donors put pressure on the lower level pols who are more easily bought (usually congressmen in competitive districts) as well as on the editorial boards. But these same people are actually extremely out of touch with the party rank-and-file and the general electorate which is why it will often seem like the agenda with the elite media and what sorts of legislation are being prioritized have such a clearly plutocrat bias. It’s telling that the Squad seems to be the least spooked by these sorts of things, because they’re the least likely to get their intel about what their districts want and need from big donors. It’s also telling that so many of the congress-critters saying Biden should step down happen to have track records of not being great team players, doing things like trying to push Pelosi out as speaker and voting to censure Rashida Tlaib.
And the last note is actually the only one I think is a legitimate concern. Biden has been tied or trailing in basically every poll and that’s a serious problem. The Biden team’s argument was that once they got “serious” about campaigning you’d see the polls start turning around. The early debate was supposed to be the starting point for getting serious, but since he Britta’d it quite badly it didn’t work. So instead of marking the inflection point when Biden’s polling starts to recover, they’ve remained stagnant (and stagnant is bad). So regardless of whether it means he’s capable of doing the job, people do need to know that he’s not gonna fuck up like this again and actually has a plan to turn things around. But I don’t think hyperfixating on doing theater criticism on the effectiveness of his delivery in every public appearance is gonna help in that regard. It doesn’t actually yield useful data and it succeeds only in drilling more holes in the already leaky raft.
It's like they're trying to pull the David Tennant Doctor Who "Doesn't [he] look tired" that takes down the Prime Minister. To what end though, besides electing Trump?
And I'm not saying they should be pro Democrat or whatever, even if I think that a Trump Administration will immediately come back attacking the media regardless, but the "oh no he's old, people said he's old, lots of people are saying how old he is, the best people" could come from Trump's own mouth.
Yep - it's incredible - basically a few people said "he's too old to run", at which point everyone in the news ran constant stories on how he's too old to run. Then after blasting that message for a couple months, they started polling people - and surprise, voters started to think "he's too old to run", at which point the media then runs a million more stories on how now lots of voters think "he's too old to run". Repeat that a few more times, and we get to where we are now - staring down the barrel of authoritarianism, because the guy who's done a great job so far seems to old.
My favorite part is that his VP is one of the top contenders that's talked about to take over for him. So...just let the guy run, get on board with voting for him, and if he doesn't make it through his next term, you're going to end up with a president who likely would have been running against Trump anyway!
It's not that weird, there's a lot of theoretical shoving Kamala aside for no apparent reason and a lot of suggesting Newsom (who actually does shut down a lot of progressive legislation afaict) and Pritzger and then half a dozen other men that share a skin tone, then Whitmer.
I can't imagine why they think those people are better placed to be the candidate. Nothing comes to mind. It's a coincidence surely.
I think it's too late to swap out Biden, even for Kamala. But you are correct that the DNC needs to emphasize Kamala Harris in the campaign. Have Biden do the teleprompter speeches, and have Harris do the press conferences and interviews and such. Even as VP, might as well highlight her since even the people who like Biden do not think he will be able to serve for another four years.
So this is a problem for the next election, but it’s a real problem that we have such a thing as “too late” to swap out a candidate. Because there are a lot of circumstances in which you may need to swap out a candidate. Even if they’re not old candidates can have medical issues, they can get assassinated (!), fresh scandals can break out at the 11th hour (like imagine if John Edward’s’ cheating scandal broke after he won the nomination!). There needs to be an orderly and democratically legitimate way to handle these sorts of edge cases, it’s pretty evident that the donor led push helped along by an elite media feeding frenzy is not leading to a situation where we’re able to have a dignified and rational discussion under these circumstances.
There are three problems here:
I don’t know how many ways I can keep restating that there is no “Dems” to decide on who to go with. Biden ran in a primary and won. Then he won a general election. Now he's won another primary and plans to contest another general. “Dem’s” are just the groups of people who felt like voting in the Dem primaries and caucuses. There’s nobody making these decisions.
It's not just a few months of clicks. The trump presidency gained media outlets an unprecedented amount of success. National media outlets saw massive boosts in subscriber numbers thanks to the trump outrage machine. Late night shows relished at all of the new viewers tuning into their nightly dose of lazily written "orange man bad".
It's a perverse symbiotic relationship where media outlets get to constantly run bombastic faux outrage story at the truly awful outrageous stuff trump does on a daily basis, and trump gets a convenient enemy to get his base angry about, because all of his success is entirely fueled by anger and fear.
So yes, there definitely is a counterproductive motivation at play with large national center and center left media. I don't know if it's a conscious decision or not, but I'm very sure they're aware that they benefit more from a Trump presidency than a Biden one.
Oh yeah, I definitely agree. I don't think anyone here who's calling for Biden to drop out would vote for Trump instead. Hell, I'd vote for a ham sandwich before I'd vote for Trump, and I'm a vegetarian. I think the real concern is that having Biden on the ticket will depress the turnout of Democratic-leaning but largely politically-apathetic voters, thus handing Trump a victory in the few swing states that decide the election.
I think the media is causing that more than Biden causing it. But I blame his PR team and the Dems for poor messaging in general because they're terrified of losing the center votes of conservatives who can't stand to vote Trump
But on the other hand, the role of the media is to report the news, and I don't see a universe in which Biden's debate performance and the subsequent fallout isn't newsworthy. I agree with you that mainstream, left-leaning media outlets like the NYT are harming Biden's election prospects with their nonstop coverage, and I suspect they realize that, too -- even when the NYT editorial board called for Biden to withdraw from the race, they still insisted that Biden would be their "unequivocal pick" over Trump. But until there is some definitive resolution to this issue, it will continue to be newsworthy. We can't stem bad press with finger-pointing any more than we can stem a river with our hands.
The most pessimistic perspective to have is that media coverage of Biden's gaffes will doom his campaign. But a more optimistic perspective is to hope that media coverage will pressure him to drop out, allowing a better President to serve instead of merely the less bad option.
Him dropping out is not feasible at this point. Genuinely. There would be likely a contested convention and non-stop lawsuits about how it was illegitimate and who was allowed on the ballot or who could get the campaign funds.
I honestly don't know what would happened. I don't think the legal challenges would be insurmountable, though. Without a doubt, dropping Biden would inject uncertainty into the election, but I'd rather be uncertain about the outcome than certain that Biden will lose, which is closer to how I feel right now.
I disagree about the inevitability of that outcome but I acknowledge the feeling. Despair has weighed heavy. I think with the current SCOTUS, and a recent coup attempt, it would be better not to deliberately throw everything in disarray. Dems could absolutely be messaging their way out of this but apparently they aren't.
It's not a legal challenge, it's a political one - the law is whatever SCOTUS says it is, and if SCOTUS believe they can screw the Dems without getting lynched, they'll block it regardless of whether it's a sensible legal ruling. Their existing rulings are legally absolutely indefensible.
Or they vote third-party, which has historically been equivalent to throwing away your vote. One of my buddies is firm in voting for someone else on the ticket who isn't Trump or Biden...
Or they live in a state where the Electoral College votes are all but predetermined, meaning all choices there are a wasted vote.
The time between the debate and before all of this I was in the 'give him a break' camp, but its getting silly now. I would say that he should step down, but who else from the dems is looking presidential right now? Newsom? Buttigieg? I think Newsom is the closest, but he just doesn't have it yet.
I would like to see the US get away from this crazy campaign cycle.
Visiting all these small towns, eating ice cream, etc.. I get why they do it, but its out of control. Do a couple debates and call it. Two or three months tops. I might be cynical, but these guys spew the same stuff and do a fraction of it when they get in office.
I like Biden and I think he was a good President. But everyone who thinks he has the best chance to win the presidency this fall are deluding themselves. The more defenses of Biden I read the more and more they resemble "who are you going to believe, me or your own lying eyes".
I have issues with Biden's positions through his career. Pretty difficult not to when someone has been in politics as long as he has. But I agree that I generally like what has been accomplished by his administration.
The problem is the dems have no good data on how potential candidates would perform.
I think the only way dems improve their chances is
I think any other path carries too much risk of chaos and dissent. If step 1 doesn't happen then the Trump campaign is armed with some potent material: "the dems are in disarrary", "look how scared of Trump they are" etc. If step 2 doesn't happen anyone unilaterally selected is going to be kneecapped be party drama.
So in that sense I think Biden has the best chances. The problem is the chances are slim and we have no good data on alternatives.
Edit: someone please give me a time machine and 2020 Bernie
I disagree Biden has the best chance, but I do agree there is no good option. It’s really a rock and a hard place situation.
At the end of the day, going with Harris over Biden probably has wildly varying outcomes — it could go very poorly for sure. But right now this race is Trump’s to lose and I would pick the risky high variance plan over sleepwalking into an election loss.
But I think what they are saying is that he has this de facto best chance because we have essentially no data on anyone else. It’s like “what’s a better odds to roll 20, a 20 sided die or a mystery die?”
Now I don’t think it’s quite that bad. We have some idea of our alternatives. I too would prefer risky bet at this point. What I don’t want to happen is that we take a risky option and then tank our odds further with drama.
The only problem is that you are exactly correct in 2022. However, it is 2024; if there is a change to the presidential ticket at this point, it is basically just handing a win to Trump. The GOP would have a field day, and would try - and potentially succeed, with the way the SCOTUS current is - at keeping the new candidate off ballots in a lot of places, potentially even in swing states.
Biden should have been a one-termer. He's not. Now it must be dealt with.
Agreed.
I think it's within our capacity (Biden's intransigence not withstanding) to execute this without providing the GOP too much ammo. Hypothetically candidates/nominees can experience life events that cause them to withdraw (illness, injury, family concerns). The GOP isn't going to give an inch but I don't think this strategy is an auto-fail with well executed.
I do think Biden being publicly forced off the ticket is an auto-fail. And I don't think the dems actually would pull off the strategy cleanly enough.
I guess I really would just like to see some type of playmaking, rallying, SOME type of energy.
But who has a better chance? Outside of wildly speculating or going on gut instinct, all the polls still show Joe Biden has the best shot to beat Trump (versus any of the usual suspect who's names have been floated). Harris is slightly less disliked than Biden, but overall Biden is still most likely to win.
I mean that's not really a concrete fact. The polls are all over the place, I don't think we can really say much at this point. Here's one from today showing they're tied in head to head matchups against Trump:
https://www.ipsos.com/en-us/ABC-News-Washington-Post-Ipsos-July-2024-Survey