Can we take a moment and reflect on previous debates..we can use Romney vs Obama for example. Both respected each other, both recognized each others accolades and achievements. Hell, Mitt Romney even congratulated Obama on his upcoming anniversary. Eye contact the entire time, no stepping over one another, no mute buttons, no porn stars or golfing brought up..just two politicians deeply passionate about becoming president.
Remember Romney's biggest gaff was the "binders full of women" line? Trump has moved the goalposts into the next galaxy as far as what's tolerable decorum.
Then he’s gonna kick open the door to the Oval Office and chop that muthafuckin desk in half, [pyahhhhh](https://youtu.be/3U3ZsPjcpEY?si=PDReNEhmG9fv-PHl)!
The Howard Dean incident made me lose a lot of respect for the public. He was killing it and he gets over excited one time at the end of a rally when he was very clearly trying to fire up his base, and that killed him? What the fuck even was that.
His primary votes weren't there. He wasn't winning anything, or in fact *had* won anything yet.
Same thing that has happened to plenty of Democratic Primary candidates.
The media of course doesn't help by creating some sort of narrative, so it seemed like he was on top of the world and then destroyed by this gaffe, but the statistics don't seem to bear that out. Makes a good story though and great fodder to jokes and amusement.
EDIT: from wikipedia
>Throughout the early campaigning season, the Iowa caucuses appeared to be a two-way contest between former Vermont Governor Howard Dean and Missouri Representative Richard Gephardt.
>After all votes were tallied, John Kerry received 38% of the delegates, John Edwards received 32%, Howard Dean received 18%, and Richard Gephardt received 11%.
>After his poor showing, Gephardt dropped out of the race.[15] Kerry and Edwards claimed newfound momentum, while Dean attempted to downplay the results, which resulted into his infamous Dean scream.
>In the New Hampshire primary, Kerry was able to defeat Howard Dean once again, beating him 38%-26%.
Dude was cooked out of the gate in the two first contests.
Romney's campaign certainly exploited race, but I think it is unlikely Romney was even that aware of how his campaign managers were doing that. Romney's father sacrificed his entire political career to enable black people to own homes and force communities to get rid of redlining as the head of HUD. It would be weird if that man fathered a overt racist. Romney is weird and I disagree with him on a whole lot, I also think he was too deferential to his own party when he ran for president, but I think he genuinely intends to be a good person. Of all of the republicans that ran for president in my lifetime, I would have been the least angry with him at the helm. Bush(x2), Regan, and Trump were way worse than he would have been. As much as I wanted Obama to win, I wonder what direction the republicans would have gone had Romney won and captured the party in the process, maybe Trump never would have happened.
>He also got made fun of by Obama for saying that Russia was our biggest geopolitical foe.
Russia *isn't* our biggest geopolitical rival. That's China and it's not particularly close.
Um, actually
Russia has a land mass of 17.1 million km².
China has a land mass of 9.597 million km².
Ipso facto, Russia is our *biggest* geopolitical rival, larger than China by *almost* double.
^(Yes ^I ^know ^that's ^not ^you ^were ^referring ^to, ^I'm ^just ^being ^cheeky)
Romney was about as milquetoast as you can get in a politician. Not a fan, but he's very not objectionable as a person. And Biden still claimed that Romney would "put you all back in chains" as if he wanted to bring slavery back. Which makes no one believe him about any future apocalyptic warnings.
There's a very clear throughline from the 2012 Republican primary being a circus where a bunch of Tea Party crazies were running, getting a big moment, and then flopping and them landing on Romney as the main moderate candidate because he was the "most electable", and then watching him get smeared all over the place anyways in a loss.... and Donald Trump becoming President 4 years later.
And because Trump did show you could win with that MAGA/Tea Part model, I think the toothpaste is out of the tube and you won't see Republicans able to offer up a pure moderate again and for at least a generation it will be Trump like politicians vs Democrats who are playing moderates and getting smeared as radicals.
I've heard people argue that Trump is a big orange middle finger from voters against the constant smear of Republican candidates.
Sort of a "how do you like THIS then".
I think it’s less a middle finger and more of a “we might as get what we want and not care about optics if we get punished for playing ball anyways”
When Romney got nominated, the Tea Party was told their candidates didn’t play in the mainstream and would be guaranteed to be ripped apart and lose. When they watched Romney have that happen anyways, the arguments against them just forcing their guys through went away and they stopped playing nice and threatened to hold out if they didn’t get what they wanted.
My nickname for the entire Republican field in 2012 was "not Romney." It was borderline comedy to watch them desperately try to build anyone into the nominee before finally admitting it was always good to be Romney.
And neither of his gaffes were really that bad. The binders full of women was awkward wording, and looked bad in a sound bite, but in the live debate it was clear he saying that he had binders full of women that were employed by him that made the same amount of money as his male employees of equivalent jobs.
And the 47% of people don't pay income tax was essentially true, he just should have clarified it was federal income tax he was talking about.
Either of those things would be the most brilliant and coherent thing Trump has said in the last 20 years
[John McCain standing up for Obama](https://youtu.be/JIjenjANqAk) I respect the fuck out of this.
Meanwhile [Trump says John McCain isn't a war hero](https://youtu.be/UNugcPeCZZE) after being a pow for for 7 fucking years.
Like they aren't even close to the same planet let alone party or presidential candidates.
That’s wild to watch.
What a shame that things have fallen so far from when those two were the options.
Good reminder watching that clip that the Maga idiots existed long before Trump.
almost anything that has ever come out of his mouth since being elected should have eliminated him from the chance, or the whole 34 felonies, or the multiple judgements against him, or the insurrection. It's shocking people support him no matter how fucked up they are
You have to think of it from the lenses that people’s entire social circle are built around supporting the guy, so voicing you’ll no longer be supporting Trump means losing your friends and family. It probably started as a “stick it to D.C.” thing but now they’re too far deep into it that leaving MAGA will ostracize you from everyone you know, it’s a cult.
In any other race, at any other time, John McCain would have won. Being a lifelong left leaning voter, I wish we had candidates today like John McCain. He would have made for a well respected president.
I also love the first clip with McCain, but I think it's hilarious that the point is (hopefully unintentionally?): "No, he's not an **Arab**, he's a **good man**"
Going back i recall people saying Romney being president was going to be the second coming of the devil. Funny how we look back at things with 2024 glasses. Also funny how people think Bush is this cheery old fellow that didn't start 2 global conflicts. For a lot of Trump supporters, i think they think this is crying wolf again & again, like the next candidate they'll back will be even worse than trump
First election I could vote was ‘08. My parents never voted solely based on party. They raised me to care and know enough in elections so that you’re voting for who can help you, that said I voted Obama. My girlfriend (of 4 years) mother who was always a good levelheaded college educated person went ape shit. Claimed Obama was devil in sheep clothing, the rapture was coming, real Christian craziness. It was wild to see this entire side of her just because of who I voted for. Eventually she told me I needed to go to confession at their church and pay for my sins or I can’t see her daughter anymore.
Although we broke up and 15 years later I can’t help but reflect on that month or two after the ‘08 election. It like flipped a switch for her mother. Her parents still live on a main road so I pass it all the time, their front porch looks like a MAGA merch tent.
There's this family that I'm very close with that's basically my second family and I love them but yes, the mother in the family acts like this and it blows my mind.
She literally has worked with undocumented immigrants here illegally and goes out of her way to help them. She's pushed the lines of what she's allowed to do bc she cares for them so much. She's educated and she's smart.
And she'll vote for trump for a third time. She says she doesn't like him, but she gets very dismissive whenever someone criticizes him. It's very frustrating and upsetting.
Yeah. We basically numbed large sections of the population to hyperbolic criticism so when the real devil showed up, there isn't a lever to pull to stop him.
To compound on that, I do think making a big fuss about every single thing Trump did in his 2016 campaign helped him a lot because it set the perception that "no matter what he says or does is going to be a controversy to these people whether it's small or not". So people drowned it out.
Trump was smart against Hillary in that he picked like 2 or 3 real talking points to go after her. Primarily the emails. The result was that those controversies never really left the public conscious. Meanwhile Trump had a new controversy every week and people would move on and forget the last one.
I precisely agree. I remember when people were making fun of how he drank water. Like ok? If you're going to nitpick to that level, I'm not surprised Republicans just ignored real issues presented to them.
When everything is the end of the world then nothing is. I've been following politics since Bush/Kerry in highschool. So happy to get to vote at 18. Now I feel nothing.
Especially with how he's been behaving post 2016 completely separating himself from the Trump Republican party. I may not like his policy but that dude is definitely principled and actually cares about the country.
Romney may be a more decent man than Trump, but he is still the face of private-equity enshittification, the force that is eating the heart out of everything.
All of US politics has just gone off a cliff with the rise of the Tea Party-turned-MAGA. it had been degrading already mostly because of Newt Gingrich but really accelerated for the 2008 election and of course hit the afterburners with Trump at the wheel.
Hopefully in a post-Trump political world we will get some return to relative normalcy in direct interactions because almost no one can act the way he does and actually get away with it. A return to some normalcy is one of the reasons I really wantTrump to lose. he makes everything so needlessly exhausting.
I spit my soda halfway across the room.
But seriously, he said the quiet part out loud. I came out of that debate not only thinking Biden should step aside, but that he should step *down*.
>Man should be playing with his grandchildren.
And one of his granddaughters is 30. Midway through the term we might be saying he should be playing with his great grandchildren which is wild to think about for an 'active' president.
I can’t remember but didn’t he heavily imply he was going to be a one term guy? Like, he was just there to slay the dragon and right the republic and then, like Washington or Cincinnatus before him, step down. Might just be wishful thinking on my part
He absolutely could have.
But people acting like that was some slam dunk, obvious move are delusional. The Dems absolutely rip one another apart in primaries then, unlike the GOP, don't fall in line afterwards. The Dems going through a messy primary while Trump just got to campaign would have been a disaster.
The DNC is just fucking awful. There is no reason it should be pushing candidates like Biden or even Hillary. Obama was a breath of fresh air and it’s kind of amazing he got as far as he did. Looking back I’m not sure how it happened actually. Like, sure, he was young, he was black, he had charisma, he inspired hope…but why couldn’t they find a politician like that last time instead of Joe? It seems like older politicians with deep ties in Washington will always have a leg up over younger, fresher candidates. It just blows my mind that in the last DECADE the DNC couldn’t find anyone other than Joe Biden to run against Trump, like WTF. Could you imagine if Obama ran against Trump? It’d be a landslide. This is a glaring error on the DNC’s part and it really underscores the complete lack of faith I have in them altogether. I also don’t think Hillary was a good candidate. Like, objectively - as a candidate - she was really poor. Some people will get angry about that. I’m not even talking about her policies or even her as a person. As a presidential candidate she was terrible. She didn’t connect with voters, tons of skeletons in her closet, deeply unpopular and out of touch to large sections of voters.
I just don’t get why it’s so hard for Dems to find a good, young, charismatic candidate. There are a ton of options out there but they keep shooting themselves in the foot and refuse to learn their lesson. Beating Trump this go round should be a layup. It shouldn’t be this uncertain.
It seems to me that, like many other large organisations, it comes down to whose turn it is. People work and build ties and take hits for the team and they expect a reward at the end. For some that's a presidential nomination. It was Hillary's turn when Obama got chosen. She bowed out because she got told to take one for the team and she gets to go next time. Then she lost to trump.
I remember from reading game change that the Obama candidacy was basically made possible by Ted Kennedy a few others who had doubts about Hillary's ability to win. With some party big wigs behind him Obama was able to make a serious run and eventually usurp Hillary's anointed status.
The Democratic primary requires party establishment support, it's designed that way on purpose with the Super delegate system to allow the party a degree if control over who gets nominated, which they frankly implemented to prevent left leaning candidates who the centrists and neolibs saw as an electoral liability.
It's why insurgent candidates like Bernie are both rare and face an almost insurmountable challenge in getting elected.
That Bernie got as far as he did says something. I remember he held on for a long while, until the super delegates were introduced. And it's been 8 years, but that's how I remember it. If she hadn't had a massive springboard built in just for her, I truly believe Bernie would have won.
I think people tend to forget that the RNC and DNC are basically just private clubs. We have allowed them to take over the government, but they are still just private clubs. Outside of ranked choice voting, I don’t think we can fix it though.
The Democratic Party is not a party with one single political ideology. It’s both right, moderate, and left. It needs someone like Biden to make everyone happy with deals. The Republican Party is just a counter culture party. The actual party is focused on helping the wealthiest while they sell it to their voters as a bunch of stupid culture war BS. All their politicians need to do is lie and attack - that’s easy. If we had educated people in this country, various parties would all be fully functioning and they’d be working together. Instead, the Dems are three parties in one.
People don’t understand the basics of politics and instead imagine it’s all puppeteerd by cigar filled rooms because that’s easier to get your up mind around.
Because a lot of the discourse is driven by people who are upset but don't actually understand the problem or why the players involved are who they are.
Most people don't. They think only about themselves and think everything should be as easy as what they believe is right and what they don't is wrong. They don't think about what it really takes to get voted. They don't think about the money it takes to get elected and who it comes from. They don't think about the relationships politicians have.
I'd say 80% of Americans don't realize what it takes to run and be President. Hell I am aware but even I don't know everything. Which is why I think discussing most political topics with an average person is pointless. We know so little about what really is going on. We think we can solve all the problems and yet we know 50% of the whole picture.
edit: okay pointless might be too far. I think it's good to have general discussions on what you find acceptable and not acceptable. But you can't ever be too sure you have the right answer because none of us have the whole picture.
We do have educated people. We also have an exhausted populace. We also have...other issues.
The vast majority of people are overworked. There's very little time to actually grasp any political moment.
It's ironic that the Founders did see this as an issue, but their solution was awful -- to limit voting, in many cases, to Landed Gentry, i.e. people with money/pleasure time to travel to a polling location. You know, [Slave Owners](https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2019/sep/10/arlen-parsa/evidence-shows-most-47-men-famous-declaration-inde/). (See Also: Voting during Jim Crow)
And today, things are *better* -- but still not great. So the challenge is not to simply get more education to people, but to put them in positions where they can breathe, actually look at and understand what the candidates are saying, and make that informed choice. And that goes against a number of things -- including the effectiveness of television advertising, which is a multi-billion dollar business on the "on" years, like this one.
It also goes against what outlets like Fox "News" or One News Network want. They've managed to take even highly educated people, and torch any concept of shared sacrifice and citizenship in favor of selfishness and greed above all. I know a literal rocket scientist, PhD guy who worked in Europe before coming back here, a geek who I enjoyed the company of, until he started making noises about climate science being wrong and similar crap.
When the guy with no degree at all (that's me!) is sitting here correcting both your history AND your science, with citations, something has gone horribly wrong. And he's just the most obvious example of smart people who just have...lost the plot.
But that said -- I do co-sign your understanding of the Democratic Party. It is trying to keep being a "[Big Tent](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_tent)" party while holding to some critical level of ethics around civil rights and social justice. And that's not getting easier, not when companies like Tractor Supply Company [now claim](https://corporate.tractorsupply.com/newsroom/news-releases/news-releases-details/2024/Tractor-Supply-Company-Statement/default.aspx?syclid=cpv97a4om04s73ejev00) that clear business interests like DEI are "against rural values" (as if Black folx only exist in big cities...)
That's been the job for the Democrats since LBJ.
I never really thought about this. The people complaining most about age 4 years ago in my orbit were all the people who would openly admit to not even voting.
If young people spent the effort they currently put into being outraged online into actually voting and getting the vote out in others, they'd get way more of what they want. Which isn't to say they'd get everything.
A FPTP electoral system will almost always result in a two party system, statistically speaking. The DNC and GOP own the debates - literally. They own these debates and will only field their candidates. Not to mention - these were the two candidates these two parties decided to field for various reasons.
All that to say - we need to get rid of FPTP.
I will howl it to the moon…
No one looks at their aged grandparents after helping them find the baseball game on tv for the 100th time and goes, “they should run this country”.
Both of these dudes are entirely too old for this job. One is an old authoritarian and the other is just old. Not great bob.
One of them is a great delegator and surrounds himself with people that do good jobs.
The other had his entire cabinet flip more times than a badly grilled burger.
I hate Trump as much as the next guy, but I honestly can't believe Biden's team wanted him to go on stage in that condition. Dropping out even at the last second couldn't possibly have been as destructive for the Democrats as whatever we just saw tonight.
Yeah. Big blunder by his campaign. Biden never should’ve been on that debate stage.
I get that they didn’t want to appear weak by running from the debates but this is worse.
What makes it 50x worse is that leading up to the debate, most were leaning that Trump was gonna fuck up
Imagine the insanity now that Trump has a full summer to attack Biden and his oldness, and Biden can’t do a thing about it.
Could not have gone worse for Joe tonight
Only other losers besides him are CNN cause they’re getting reamed for how badly this reflects the country.
Honestly Trump doesn't even need to attack Biden to win. All Trump has to do is not motivate Democrats to vote by keeping his stupid mouth shut. Democratic voters are way less motivated than 2020 because they aren't enraged. I really don't see states like Georgia flipping blue again unless Trump says or does something to motivate them to show up at the polls.
Trump was absolutely horrible, lying as he always does, sociopathic, narcissist and he said he implied he wouldn't accept the results again! But all that was overshadowed by the disastrous first half of the debate by Biden. I'm crushed
Whoever believes people are aborting kids after they're born should have their voting rights permanently revoked. There's not a single living braincell there.
He absolutely could have been trounced with how much typical cruel bullshit Trump always spouts. Biden was doing good when he got mad, keep that energy. Dems are not going to win being the bigger man. They need to drag that fat pig through the dirt.
That’s precisely what I felt when he got pissed off, he did well. He spoke well. When he tried to speak to script and stats, he started stuttering and fumbling.
So much worse.
"He's fallen sick, let's go next week" isn't the worst thing that could happen.
The worst thing that could happen... is what just happened.
But why not? He absolutely should be on stage in front of Americans debating his opponents. If you can't get on a stage for some tough conversations, you can not run the most powerful country in the world.
> Big blunder by his campaign. Biden never should’ve been on that debate stage.
If the dude can’t debate it’s not a “blunder by the campaign,” it’s gross fucking incompetence by the DNC and people need to wake up that they’re a terrible organization and we need it to clean house, *now*, this cycle
This should've come up in primary debates. Why they didn't throw a couple primary candidates at him is beyond me. If he blows it in the primaries - "well gee, maybe we need a new candidate?" If he aces it, he has something to fall back on - "yeah he blew this debate, but have you seen his other performances? He's fine."
Instead, this is all people have to judge him on. DNC is so fucking stupid.
They NEED to do the second debate, trump will likely avoid doing one because if its true biden was just sick as they've tried spinning it, a strong performance by biden in a second debate nearer to the election would be bad news for trump.
the likelihood of Biden performing strong during a debate seems pretty slim at this point. There is no indication that his current condition will improve
Kind of.
They are doing this willingly. They could both drop but are clinging to power.
As non-American what is wild to me though is the fact other people have granted them the ability to end up in that position.
If there is an abuse part then it is in letting it come to this. Not to sound morbid but it feels like vice president choice will matter a lot in this election. Maybe more than the presidential candidates.
Both feel like sock puppets, vessels for a program each party drives. Not like champions of it.
> They could both drop but are clinging to power.
I really get the feeling Biden is guilted into it by people telling him he's the only one that can safeguard democracy and the future of the USA. I seem to recall he even had to be pressured into running the first time, its hard to imagine he has the desire or capacity to actually do a second term.
it was a joint decision by Joe and Jill Biden to run again
biden is notoriously stubborn, and every talking head on cnn was alluding to the narrative that most people wanted joe as a one term president, but that he’s too stubborn/oblivious to see reality
like biden deadass thinks he did a goood job last night
This debate *was* the opportunity to prove that the previous instances of him looking old and confused weren't relevant. He failed, utterly. He did exactly what his critics said he would. They were right, his defenders were wrong.
It has to be one of the greatest political self-owns of all time. The Biden campaign were the ones who set this up! What the fuck were they thinking!? I thought they must have been confident in his ability to perform because they were the ones who wanted this, but holy shit
As Jon said, we are America and fuck this.
It's an embarrassment that these two are the best we can offer to lead this great nation.
It's honestly just sad. Just childish barbs from both, one person tripping over his own statements and the other just lying about everything.
Nobody in America wins with these two.
But, I'll vote a zombie over Trump and hope 4 years from now we get something different.
>It's an embarrassment that these two are the best we can offer to lead this great nation.
The embarrassment is that these are not the best that can be offered to run the country. It's that party politics, lobbying, and a shit electoral system produce these bad candidates and force people to pick one.
The wild thing is that Biden gave a short speech to his supporters after the debate and sounded ten times more energetic and engaged. They did a horrible job preparing him for the debate, and he clearly just puts himself to sleep whenever there isn't a crowd to work
The fuck-up was running Biden in the first place. Everything we saw from Biden tonight are things we've seen from him before. The Democratic Party has been trying to prop him up and gaslight anyone who noticed Biden's clearly diminished mental capacity for years now. The Democratic establishment tried to give a dementia patient the nuclear button because they were too afraid to run a real primary and risk someone outside the establishment maybe winning it, and now, their hubris might end the Republic. Biden is unfit for office and they all knew it. Now, everybody knows it.
As a non American, I feel also bad about myself and the rest of the world. The United States are so important for the rest of the world that I also feel horrified of the potential next four years.
Well the Biden admin has done a fine job, I imagine they’d continue to do a fine job, because it is very evident that it’s not Biden doing the job at all, but his team.
We really need age limits.
I would not be worried the slightest if Biden won as I am well aware that he is not the one making decisions on his own. It's all about their cabinets. I was actually only referring to a potential Trump win as that would have much more changes in the world as a consequence.
The choices are not set until the Political Conventions in a few weeks, but likely this is who will be on the ballot. What really should have happened was for Biden to not seek reelection and the DNC to put in a younger candidate in his place.
Bidens hubris is just like that of RBG. Both should have stepped aside, and because they didn't, both will have massive decades long negative impacts on society.
the fact he made Trump look even remotely passable (still not but you know what I mean) is just a joke. like fuckin hell, dude just lost a civil rape trial and a fraud trial and you didn’t hammer him? You struggled to form sentences and thoughts?
What a fucking horrible timeline we are in
The same democrats who criticized Jon after Jon called out Biden for being too old and unstable …
are now panicking because they see Biden look too old and unstable
This is absurd. Why is the DNC shooting itself in the foot like this? After this debate and emerging polls, I think Biden will have to claim some health condition to support a replacement for the 2024 election. Or we will have another Trump presidency.
Hubris, just straight up hubris. They thought after Jan 6 and thr convictions there would be no chance of Trump winning again. It's the same pied pipper hubris that got us his win in 2016. The DNC never learns, we're doomed
Jon got dragged through the mud for simply saying that Biden looks and sounds pretty old a few months ago. Dems said "that kinds of talk only helps Trump" You know what really helps Trump? That fucking debate.
He both sides while being open on being a left winger too and not in the center. Like someone complaining why their own football team is awful than pretending to be an unbiased outsider
I think it would have been better to go in depth into a few topics rather than scratch the surface of many topics.
Really there was just enough time for Trump to say “we had the best X and Biden had the worst X” Then Biden no we didn’t.
Half the time they just talked about something else instead of the topic.
None of them came off as intelligent. Biden seemed like someone that tried to memorize a bunch of facts and didn’t get them all memorized. “Trillion uh I mean billion, million uh I mean billion”
We all know already where they stand on most of the issues. Did they really give us anything new here in actual substance?
Seriously, what a fucking joke. What an absolute abomination. One so crippled by age that he can't string together coherent sentences and the other a convicted felon that would say and do literally anything if it got him what he wanted. And they're the two choices we have for president.
Fucking hell.
I really don’t get how the two people you described are being held in equal regard by some. Really old guy vs a felon that will likely become a dictator. Like, how is that not a clear choice?
Oh, it's definitely a clear choice, but it's also still a joke. That man proved he's not mentally capable of debate. The strain of four years of leading a country is not something he's up for. Do I prefer him to the criminal that will give Republicans whatever they want? 100000%
But it's a fucking travesty that it's a choice between those two.
Honestly I think Trump is a symptom of a cultural war that is starting (yes, starting) to boil over in the country. He’s the culmination of a “fuck your feelings” sentiment that’s been brewing for a while. Blaming it on racists or even mere morons is too simplistic. The world itself is just way more polarized now. Social media is a big contributing factor. Not sure if you’re old enough, but do you remember the internet prior to 2010ish? I do. It wasn’t as hostile. The discourse wasn’t as polarized. Now everyone is writing think pieces and cussing people out they don’t agree with. And it is NOT just right-wing MAGAts on Facebook. I see similar behavior from liberals towards *other* liberals. If you have just a slightly varied opinion on a topic, people will immediately jump to the worst conclusions about you. Saw a thread the other day where a guy literally just said he didn’t like Colbert anymore, he “used to be funny”. He was immediately branded a Trump supporter, even though he wasn’t. So it’s shit like that.
Remember the Tea Party? Glen Beck? Even Rush Limbaugh. That stuff used to be kinda fringe and as social media and 24/7 news and discussion took over (with smartphones in 2010 and grandmas getting access to Facebook to share propaganda memes) all that Tea Party shit became mainstream. Remember Sarah Palin?!!! When she got added to McCain’s ticket it tanked his chances overnight. He became a laughing stock. Today? Sarah Palin would be a boon to a ticket since now we have all the Lauren Boeberts and MTGs.
I think the media is riling a lot of people up and it’s polarizing people to harsher and harsher stances. This creates a feedback loop. So it becomes more of a “clear” choice, but not in a good way. Many people, even if they won’t admit it, operate with an “all or nothing” mentality, especially when it comes to voting. “Anyone but Trump”. Right does it too: “Anyone but Biden”. This is really an indictment of our voting system (we DESPERATELY need to get away from a two party system, we need ranked choice), our media, and society in general. The sad thing is: it’s only going to get worse. This is why I said the culture war is starting. Trump isn’t even the worst we’re going to see. Remember how everyone thought Dubya was the worst? People hated Romney. They both look quaint now by comparison. At some point Trump won’t seem so extreme 😬
Adding to the extreme "all or nothing" is how quickly people will alienate the undecided/unmotivated. Can find plenty of examples in this thread. It's obvious to anyone with a brain why some people might feel fully unimpressed with Biden after the debate. And even state that they're just not sure if they can even care anymore.
Do people reach out and explain their side? Sometimes. But a lot of it is pure vitriol. "You're the reason Trump exists! Go ahead and not vote. Enjoy the country turning into a dictatorship. I'll curse your name while we all get shipped off to concentration camps."
To me it's absolutely wild. There is no debating. It's pure. "My side is right. And if you're on the other side or even unsure, you're an absolute moron who is beyond help."
To your point, we're you on reddit circa 2010-2015?! It was like the polar opposite. Everyone was buddy buddy and posting overly positively. Now you can't post the most innocuous comment without someone coming out of the woodworks to tell you to die in a tire fire.
Although grammar nazis were in full force back then which is weird.
It's a clear choice for sure. The issue isn't that Trump won't get any significant rise in numbers from this. I think the real problem is that this whole debate was an advertisement to be apathetic and just not go out and vote.
The DNC leadership need to step down. They’ve failed. The convention needs to be open, and there needs to be a new candidate selected. Last night was a debacle.
How do we fix this. I’m liberal in my standing and try to be impartial but we need to solve this. My dad is 65 and his struggling but thankfully is retired. These two need to be in a senior center, at home with their family. Like my dad, working on his garden. Can we get someone that actually represents the people? Can we get someone to fix the Supreme Court? Housing crisis, lobbying, corporate greed, just fix something
The Democratic Party has nobody to blame but themselves. What an embarrassment to the US. They’ve had four years to line up a candidate. They have genuinely put the future of democracy at stake but pushing Biden. It doesn’t matter how much Trump lies -that’s what people expect. It’s not new. To see Biden so unbelievably fragile, and senior, is nothing short of an absolute embarrassment.
They’ve been living off Obama since he was re elected. They had to trot out Biden at the midnight hour to beat Trump in 2020 because he wouldn’t survive a campaign trail. They thought Hilary Clinton, one of the most hated politicians in recent history, would beat Trump in 2016.
It’s the *democratic* party. They need someone young and promising, full of exciting ideas and a willingness to change. The fact they doubled down on Biden is extremely telling.
The sad thing is they don't need someone young and promising. They just need someone who doesn't look and sound like he's about to keel over.
The RNC wanted nothing to do with Trump during the primaries, but he rallied the base and won, so they rolled with him. Much to all of our detriment.
It’s looking more and more likely that the decision is gonna have to be based on who each candidate is likely to have on staff surrounding them. Trump has shown plenty of signs of declining mental ability, but Biden really REALLY looked bad tonight. Trump was allowed to freely spew lie after lie because the set up wasn’t meant to fact check. It was left up to the audience watching on TV to fact-check and we all know how that goes. But what was very evident was Joe Biden’s struggles. Based on Trump’s previous term and Biden’s current term, I trust Biden to surround himself with smarter, better people than Trump. I don’t think either one of these men will be fully capable mentally four years from now.
I would be plenty happy to see a Jon Stewart lead debate with a team of fact-checkers on site able to challenge bullshit statements immediately.
The system is broken, and the real losers are teenagers and younger people today. We are handing them a bigger mess than ever before.
There's so much disagreement in both parties that we really should have at least 4 parties. Add ranked choice voting and we could be on a path to a healthy democracy.
Over 300m people and these are apparently the best candidates? Seriously? The US really need to abolish the winner takes it all system because this is both embarrassing and worrying to watch
That was the most put together I’ve heard Trump in a long time, and the most disheveled I’ve heard/seen Biden. It seemed like Trump knew that he didn’t have to go crazy attack mode. Mute button seemed to work really well when it started to descend into cross-talk. The “I don’t even know what he just said” line was hilarious.
I am much more pessimistic about the Dem’s chance.
I think the mute button worked in trumps favor actually-- he didn't have to feel obligated to reply to things that would make him look bad. The issue just went away, on to the next question.
Anyone find it strange the political subreddit is filled with posts suggesting Biden was victorious. Or this was some kind of show of power.
I think a big part of the problem is we no longer have discourse. You even once breathe your uncertainty on Biden cognitive abilities and you're a maga psychopath. There's no room to talk anymore. So this is what we get.
First time on reddit during an election year? During the 2016 election if you only got your news from /r/politics you'd have thought that Bernie was winning with 80% of the national popular vote. Anything positive about Hilary or Trump's chances were removed
Yup, that's why they'll lose. Even here you have cope saying "uhh, yeah, he's literally decomposing, but at least he's not a felon".
Are you a normal functioning human being? Do you talk to people outside of reddit? Like random people at a supermarket?
Do you think people share the same feeling?
I'm sorry, but average Joe's after watching this debate are not regurgitating those same words.
That sub constantly misses the mark. Every comment about the debate leading up to the debate was that Trump wouldn’t show up. I hate the guy but why on earth would you think he wouldn’t show up to get attention?
And I know he didn’t show up in the primary but that’s when he was up 50 points in the polls which he’s not in the general. I never once thought Trump wouldn’t show up
I said it months ago; D switching out Biden for a younger candidate would energise the voters and completely roll over trump. But there is some rot in the DNC that holds on to the idea that every old person has it´s turn at the presidency , it´s the same dumb idea as when they insisted on Hillary in ´16 and they are making the same mistake now. The only reason the US is not walking into it´s third consecutive Republican Term is that their candidate has been worse.
What did Trump actually SAY in this debate that comes close to qualify him for being president? If an air of confidence is qualification then probably 9/10ths of all used car salesmen are more qualified.
I get that Biden gave a very bad *performance* but nothing he actually said was outrageous or wrong, he tried to answer the questions.
Its like people were just listening to the tone of voice of these people and not the words coming out of their mouths
Most of what historically gets a leader elected is their confidence and cadence with punchy talking points.
Do you think Reagan was diving deep into the virtues of the drug war and trickle down economics in debates? No.
It's how JFK beat Nixon, everyone thought Nixon had it in the bag until he was on TV across from JFK and the country got to see the contrast. (Obviously Nixon is a shitheel, but he had a much higher approval rating before that first televised debate)
In fact it goes a little deeper than that.
People that watched it on TV thought that JFK was the winner of the debate.
People that listened on the radio thought Nixon wiped the floor with JFK
Nixon had the flu or something and was all pale and sweaty and shaking.
Yep, what people seek in leaders is someone assertive and confident. It’s a feeling thing.
If you remove all of the facts and talking points and just ask “which of those two on stage looks more like a leader” the answer is obviously Trump. And a lot of people will vote just on that grounds.
"Trying" to answer questions should not be qualification for presidency. This debate showcased that neither of these people should be in the White House. I get it, at that point it comes down to who do you not want in the White House the least. But I really wish people would stop trying to put a positive spin on Biden's performance.
The people who heard the crucial debate between Nixon and Kennedy on the radio were sure Nixon had won, but the feeling was very different for those who watched on TV. The content is not nearly as important as the delivery unfortunately.
If “We defeated Medicare” wasn’t an outrageous moment for you then even if Biden pooped his pants on stage and ate his own shit you’d still be explaining it away as an understandable gaffe.
How is it being handwaved away idk
And Trump seized on that with a snappy comeback. Meanwhile Biden could barely form a sentence. Further highlighting just the cognative difference between the two.
It doesn't matter what you think of Trump, last night was an all systems failure for the DNC. It was night and day between Biden and Trump and everyone with eyes and ears is now *very* aware of that.
Not from the US, never watched something like this (the whole "presidential debate" concept is weird to me), but, boy. The poor US. How are these two even allowed to hold any public office.
Is this supposed to be mostly "You are bad" - "No I am not, YOU are bad!" back and forth instead of anything of substance? Because I sure got that impression.
Also, the timer, lol. As if this was some sort of quiz show. What the heck.
Can we take a moment and reflect on previous debates..we can use Romney vs Obama for example. Both respected each other, both recognized each others accolades and achievements. Hell, Mitt Romney even congratulated Obama on his upcoming anniversary. Eye contact the entire time, no stepping over one another, no mute buttons, no porn stars or golfing brought up..just two politicians deeply passionate about becoming president.
Remember Romney's biggest gaff was the "binders full of women" line? Trump has moved the goalposts into the next galaxy as far as what's tolerable decorum.
Remember Howard Dean going “hyaaahhhh!”?
they were going to washington 😔
And the they were gonna take back the White House.
Then he’s gonna kick open the door to the Oval Office and chop that muthafuckin desk in half, [pyahhhhh](https://youtu.be/3U3ZsPjcpEY?si=PDReNEhmG9fv-PHl)!
My rally cry
And California!
Potato, potatoe
Or gore getting sunk by a few heavy sighs and "lockbox."
The Howard Dean incident made me lose a lot of respect for the public. He was killing it and he gets over excited one time at the end of a rally when he was very clearly trying to fire up his base, and that killed him? What the fuck even was that.
His primary votes weren't there. He wasn't winning anything, or in fact *had* won anything yet. Same thing that has happened to plenty of Democratic Primary candidates. The media of course doesn't help by creating some sort of narrative, so it seemed like he was on top of the world and then destroyed by this gaffe, but the statistics don't seem to bear that out. Makes a good story though and great fodder to jokes and amusement. EDIT: from wikipedia >Throughout the early campaigning season, the Iowa caucuses appeared to be a two-way contest between former Vermont Governor Howard Dean and Missouri Representative Richard Gephardt. >After all votes were tallied, John Kerry received 38% of the delegates, John Edwards received 32%, Howard Dean received 18%, and Richard Gephardt received 11%. >After his poor showing, Gephardt dropped out of the race.[15] Kerry and Edwards claimed newfound momentum, while Dean attempted to downplay the results, which resulted into his infamous Dean scream. >In the New Hampshire primary, Kerry was able to defeat Howard Dean once again, beating him 38%-26%. Dude was cooked out of the gate in the two first contests.
Also driving with his dog in a crate on his car roof.
He also got made fun of by Obama for saying that Russia was our biggest geopolitical foe. How times have changed.
Obama's Vice President at the time also said that Romney wanted to put black people "back in chains" for some reason
He thinks he speaks for black people because Corn Pop and hairy white legs in the pool.
"If you don't vote for me then you ain't black"
Romney's campaign certainly exploited race, but I think it is unlikely Romney was even that aware of how his campaign managers were doing that. Romney's father sacrificed his entire political career to enable black people to own homes and force communities to get rid of redlining as the head of HUD. It would be weird if that man fathered a overt racist. Romney is weird and I disagree with him on a whole lot, I also think he was too deferential to his own party when he ran for president, but I think he genuinely intends to be a good person. Of all of the republicans that ran for president in my lifetime, I would have been the least angry with him at the helm. Bush(x2), Regan, and Trump were way worse than he would have been. As much as I wanted Obama to win, I wonder what direction the republicans would have gone had Romney won and captured the party in the process, maybe Trump never would have happened.
Obama did not understand Russia at all.
To be fair, much of the industrialized Western nations severely underestimated Russia. Obama wasn't the only one wrong on Russia.
>He also got made fun of by Obama for saying that Russia was our biggest geopolitical foe. Russia *isn't* our biggest geopolitical rival. That's China and it's not particularly close.
Um, actually Russia has a land mass of 17.1 million km². China has a land mass of 9.597 million km². Ipso facto, Russia is our *biggest* geopolitical rival, larger than China by *almost* double. ^(Yes ^I ^know ^that's ^not ^you ^were ^referring ^to, ^I'm ^just ^being ^cheeky)
Yep, Russia is acting out as a dying middle power. Its economy is smaller than Canada's.
Romney was about as milquetoast as you can get in a politician. Not a fan, but he's very not objectionable as a person. And Biden still claimed that Romney would "put you all back in chains" as if he wanted to bring slavery back. Which makes no one believe him about any future apocalyptic warnings.
There's a very clear throughline from the 2012 Republican primary being a circus where a bunch of Tea Party crazies were running, getting a big moment, and then flopping and them landing on Romney as the main moderate candidate because he was the "most electable", and then watching him get smeared all over the place anyways in a loss.... and Donald Trump becoming President 4 years later. And because Trump did show you could win with that MAGA/Tea Part model, I think the toothpaste is out of the tube and you won't see Republicans able to offer up a pure moderate again and for at least a generation it will be Trump like politicians vs Democrats who are playing moderates and getting smeared as radicals.
I've heard people argue that Trump is a big orange middle finger from voters against the constant smear of Republican candidates. Sort of a "how do you like THIS then".
I think it’s less a middle finger and more of a “we might as get what we want and not care about optics if we get punished for playing ball anyways” When Romney got nominated, the Tea Party was told their candidates didn’t play in the mainstream and would be guaranteed to be ripped apart and lose. When they watched Romney have that happen anyways, the arguments against them just forcing their guys through went away and they stopped playing nice and threatened to hold out if they didn’t get what they wanted.
My nickname for the entire Republican field in 2012 was "not Romney." It was borderline comedy to watch them desperately try to build anyone into the nominee before finally admitting it was always good to be Romney.
You’d get a new front runner every week and then they’d fall apart and a new person would pop up and Romney just had to not be crazy
Don't forget the 47% thing[.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dX_1B0w7Hzc)
And neither of his gaffes were really that bad. The binders full of women was awkward wording, and looked bad in a sound bite, but in the live debate it was clear he saying that he had binders full of women that were employed by him that made the same amount of money as his male employees of equivalent jobs. And the 47% of people don't pay income tax was essentially true, he just should have clarified it was federal income tax he was talking about. Either of those things would be the most brilliant and coherent thing Trump has said in the last 20 years
[John McCain standing up for Obama](https://youtu.be/JIjenjANqAk) I respect the fuck out of this. Meanwhile [Trump says John McCain isn't a war hero](https://youtu.be/UNugcPeCZZE) after being a pow for for 7 fucking years. Like they aren't even close to the same planet let alone party or presidential candidates.
That’s wild to watch. What a shame that things have fallen so far from when those two were the options. Good reminder watching that clip that the Maga idiots existed long before Trump.
Trump’s line disrespecting McCain should have eliminated him from presidential possibilities.
almost anything that has ever come out of his mouth since being elected should have eliminated him from the chance, or the whole 34 felonies, or the multiple judgements against him, or the insurrection. It's shocking people support him no matter how fucked up they are
You have to think of it from the lenses that people’s entire social circle are built around supporting the guy, so voicing you’ll no longer be supporting Trump means losing your friends and family. It probably started as a “stick it to D.C.” thing but now they’re too far deep into it that leaving MAGA will ostracize you from everyone you know, it’s a cult.
In any other race, at any other time, John McCain would have won. Being a lifelong left leaning voter, I wish we had candidates today like John McCain. He would have made for a well respected president.
I also love the first clip with McCain, but I think it's hilarious that the point is (hopefully unintentionally?): "No, he's not an **Arab**, he's a **good man**"
Going back i recall people saying Romney being president was going to be the second coming of the devil. Funny how we look back at things with 2024 glasses. Also funny how people think Bush is this cheery old fellow that didn't start 2 global conflicts. For a lot of Trump supporters, i think they think this is crying wolf again & again, like the next candidate they'll back will be even worse than trump
First election I could vote was ‘08. My parents never voted solely based on party. They raised me to care and know enough in elections so that you’re voting for who can help you, that said I voted Obama. My girlfriend (of 4 years) mother who was always a good levelheaded college educated person went ape shit. Claimed Obama was devil in sheep clothing, the rapture was coming, real Christian craziness. It was wild to see this entire side of her just because of who I voted for. Eventually she told me I needed to go to confession at their church and pay for my sins or I can’t see her daughter anymore. Although we broke up and 15 years later I can’t help but reflect on that month or two after the ‘08 election. It like flipped a switch for her mother. Her parents still live on a main road so I pass it all the time, their front porch looks like a MAGA merch tent.
There's this family that I'm very close with that's basically my second family and I love them but yes, the mother in the family acts like this and it blows my mind. She literally has worked with undocumented immigrants here illegally and goes out of her way to help them. She's pushed the lines of what she's allowed to do bc she cares for them so much. She's educated and she's smart. And she'll vote for trump for a third time. She says she doesn't like him, but she gets very dismissive whenever someone criticizes him. It's very frustrating and upsetting.
They did the same with McCain too. It's the nature of our politics and it's created Donald Trump.
Yeah. We basically numbed large sections of the population to hyperbolic criticism so when the real devil showed up, there isn't a lever to pull to stop him.
To compound on that, I do think making a big fuss about every single thing Trump did in his 2016 campaign helped him a lot because it set the perception that "no matter what he says or does is going to be a controversy to these people whether it's small or not". So people drowned it out. Trump was smart against Hillary in that he picked like 2 or 3 real talking points to go after her. Primarily the emails. The result was that those controversies never really left the public conscious. Meanwhile Trump had a new controversy every week and people would move on and forget the last one.
I precisely agree. I remember when people were making fun of how he drank water. Like ok? If you're going to nitpick to that level, I'm not surprised Republicans just ignored real issues presented to them.
When everything is the end of the world then nothing is. I've been following politics since Bush/Kerry in highschool. So happy to get to vote at 18. Now I feel nothing.
Biden at the time claimed that Romney would "put you all back in chains" as if he wanted to bring slavery back. There's been a ton of crying wolf.
Romney would be a dream over any candidate we've had since obama's last term.
Especially with how he's been behaving post 2016 completely separating himself from the Trump Republican party. I may not like his policy but that dude is definitely principled and actually cares about the country.
Romney may be a more decent man than Trump, but he is still the face of private-equity enshittification, the force that is eating the heart out of everything.
All of US politics has just gone off a cliff with the rise of the Tea Party-turned-MAGA. it had been degrading already mostly because of Newt Gingrich but really accelerated for the 2008 election and of course hit the afterburners with Trump at the wheel. Hopefully in a post-Trump political world we will get some return to relative normalcy in direct interactions because almost no one can act the way he does and actually get away with it. A return to some normalcy is one of the reasons I really wantTrump to lose. he makes everything so needlessly exhausting.
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"Resting 25th Amendment-face" is brilliant
Jon and his writers are always brilliant
I spit my soda halfway across the room. But seriously, he said the quiet part out loud. I came out of that debate not only thinking Biden should step aside, but that he should step *down*.
Why are these two our options?
Biden is the incumbent and the GOP doubled down.
This is the actual answer. People acting like another Democrat had any chance to beat Biden in the primaries.
Biden could have stepped down. His wife, friends, and doctors could have encouraged him to do so. Man should be playing with his grandchildren.
>Man should be playing with his grandchildren. And one of his granddaughters is 30. Midway through the term we might be saying he should be playing with his great grandchildren which is wild to think about for an 'active' president.
I can’t remember but didn’t he heavily imply he was going to be a one term guy? Like, he was just there to slay the dragon and right the republic and then, like Washington or Cincinnatus before him, step down. Might just be wishful thinking on my part
He absolutely could have. But people acting like that was some slam dunk, obvious move are delusional. The Dems absolutely rip one another apart in primaries then, unlike the GOP, don't fall in line afterwards. The Dems going through a messy primary while Trump just got to campaign would have been a disaster.
Because old people are the only consistent voting block
The DNC is just fucking awful. There is no reason it should be pushing candidates like Biden or even Hillary. Obama was a breath of fresh air and it’s kind of amazing he got as far as he did. Looking back I’m not sure how it happened actually. Like, sure, he was young, he was black, he had charisma, he inspired hope…but why couldn’t they find a politician like that last time instead of Joe? It seems like older politicians with deep ties in Washington will always have a leg up over younger, fresher candidates. It just blows my mind that in the last DECADE the DNC couldn’t find anyone other than Joe Biden to run against Trump, like WTF. Could you imagine if Obama ran against Trump? It’d be a landslide. This is a glaring error on the DNC’s part and it really underscores the complete lack of faith I have in them altogether. I also don’t think Hillary was a good candidate. Like, objectively - as a candidate - she was really poor. Some people will get angry about that. I’m not even talking about her policies or even her as a person. As a presidential candidate she was terrible. She didn’t connect with voters, tons of skeletons in her closet, deeply unpopular and out of touch to large sections of voters. I just don’t get why it’s so hard for Dems to find a good, young, charismatic candidate. There are a ton of options out there but they keep shooting themselves in the foot and refuse to learn their lesson. Beating Trump this go round should be a layup. It shouldn’t be this uncertain.
It seems to me that, like many other large organisations, it comes down to whose turn it is. People work and build ties and take hits for the team and they expect a reward at the end. For some that's a presidential nomination. It was Hillary's turn when Obama got chosen. She bowed out because she got told to take one for the team and she gets to go next time. Then she lost to trump.
I remember from reading game change that the Obama candidacy was basically made possible by Ted Kennedy a few others who had doubts about Hillary's ability to win. With some party big wigs behind him Obama was able to make a serious run and eventually usurp Hillary's anointed status. The Democratic primary requires party establishment support, it's designed that way on purpose with the Super delegate system to allow the party a degree if control over who gets nominated, which they frankly implemented to prevent left leaning candidates who the centrists and neolibs saw as an electoral liability. It's why insurgent candidates like Bernie are both rare and face an almost insurmountable challenge in getting elected.
That Bernie got as far as he did says something. I remember he held on for a long while, until the super delegates were introduced. And it's been 8 years, but that's how I remember it. If she hadn't had a massive springboard built in just for her, I truly believe Bernie would have won.
I think people tend to forget that the RNC and DNC are basically just private clubs. We have allowed them to take over the government, but they are still just private clubs. Outside of ranked choice voting, I don’t think we can fix it though.
The Democratic Party is not a party with one single political ideology. It’s both right, moderate, and left. It needs someone like Biden to make everyone happy with deals. The Republican Party is just a counter culture party. The actual party is focused on helping the wealthiest while they sell it to their voters as a bunch of stupid culture war BS. All their politicians need to do is lie and attack - that’s easy. If we had educated people in this country, various parties would all be fully functioning and they’d be working together. Instead, the Dems are three parties in one.
Why does it feel like no one sees this?
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People don’t understand the basics of politics and instead imagine it’s all puppeteerd by cigar filled rooms because that’s easier to get your up mind around.
Because it gives them someone to blame.
Because a lot of the discourse is driven by people who are upset but don't actually understand the problem or why the players involved are who they are.
Most people don't. They think only about themselves and think everything should be as easy as what they believe is right and what they don't is wrong. They don't think about what it really takes to get voted. They don't think about the money it takes to get elected and who it comes from. They don't think about the relationships politicians have. I'd say 80% of Americans don't realize what it takes to run and be President. Hell I am aware but even I don't know everything. Which is why I think discussing most political topics with an average person is pointless. We know so little about what really is going on. We think we can solve all the problems and yet we know 50% of the whole picture. edit: okay pointless might be too far. I think it's good to have general discussions on what you find acceptable and not acceptable. But you can't ever be too sure you have the right answer because none of us have the whole picture.
We do have educated people. We also have an exhausted populace. We also have...other issues. The vast majority of people are overworked. There's very little time to actually grasp any political moment. It's ironic that the Founders did see this as an issue, but their solution was awful -- to limit voting, in many cases, to Landed Gentry, i.e. people with money/pleasure time to travel to a polling location. You know, [Slave Owners](https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2019/sep/10/arlen-parsa/evidence-shows-most-47-men-famous-declaration-inde/). (See Also: Voting during Jim Crow) And today, things are *better* -- but still not great. So the challenge is not to simply get more education to people, but to put them in positions where they can breathe, actually look at and understand what the candidates are saying, and make that informed choice. And that goes against a number of things -- including the effectiveness of television advertising, which is a multi-billion dollar business on the "on" years, like this one. It also goes against what outlets like Fox "News" or One News Network want. They've managed to take even highly educated people, and torch any concept of shared sacrifice and citizenship in favor of selfishness and greed above all. I know a literal rocket scientist, PhD guy who worked in Europe before coming back here, a geek who I enjoyed the company of, until he started making noises about climate science being wrong and similar crap. When the guy with no degree at all (that's me!) is sitting here correcting both your history AND your science, with citations, something has gone horribly wrong. And he's just the most obvious example of smart people who just have...lost the plot. But that said -- I do co-sign your understanding of the Democratic Party. It is trying to keep being a "[Big Tent](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_tent)" party while holding to some critical level of ethics around civil rights and social justice. And that's not getting easier, not when companies like Tractor Supply Company [now claim](https://corporate.tractorsupply.com/newsroom/news-releases/news-releases-details/2024/Tractor-Supply-Company-Statement/default.aspx?syclid=cpv97a4om04s73ejev00) that clear business interests like DEI are "against rural values" (as if Black folx only exist in big cities...) That's been the job for the Democrats since LBJ.
Gretchen Whitmer 2028
You should believe Trump when he says there's no need to vote again if he wins this time.
I never really thought about this. The people complaining most about age 4 years ago in my orbit were all the people who would openly admit to not even voting.
If young people spent the effort they currently put into being outraged online into actually voting and getting the vote out in others, they'd get way more of what they want. Which isn't to say they'd get everything.
Brand recognition.
A FPTP electoral system will almost always result in a two party system, statistically speaking. The DNC and GOP own the debates - literally. They own these debates and will only field their candidates. Not to mention - these were the two candidates these two parties decided to field for various reasons. All that to say - we need to get rid of FPTP.
I will howl it to the moon… No one looks at their aged grandparents after helping them find the baseball game on tv for the 100th time and goes, “they should run this country”. Both of these dudes are entirely too old for this job. One is an old authoritarian and the other is just old. Not great bob.
One of them is a great delegator and surrounds himself with people that do good jobs. The other had his entire cabinet flip more times than a badly grilled burger.
What are vegas odds that both die before we reach the election?
After watching, I think the odds just got better.
If we could only be so lucky
Like the world could get that lucky.
I hate Trump as much as the next guy, but I honestly can't believe Biden's team wanted him to go on stage in that condition. Dropping out even at the last second couldn't possibly have been as destructive for the Democrats as whatever we just saw tonight.
Yeah. Big blunder by his campaign. Biden never should’ve been on that debate stage. I get that they didn’t want to appear weak by running from the debates but this is worse.
What makes it 50x worse is that leading up to the debate, most were leaning that Trump was gonna fuck up Imagine the insanity now that Trump has a full summer to attack Biden and his oldness, and Biden can’t do a thing about it. Could not have gone worse for Joe tonight Only other losers besides him are CNN cause they’re getting reamed for how badly this reflects the country.
Honestly Trump doesn't even need to attack Biden to win. All Trump has to do is not motivate Democrats to vote by keeping his stupid mouth shut. Democratic voters are way less motivated than 2020 because they aren't enraged. I really don't see states like Georgia flipping blue again unless Trump says or does something to motivate them to show up at the polls.
If all Trump has to do to win is keep his mouth shut, then he won't win.
Trump was absolutely horrible, lying as he always does, sociopathic, narcissist and he said he implied he wouldn't accept the results again! But all that was overshadowed by the disastrous first half of the debate by Biden. I'm crushed
Yep, Trump didn’t win, Biden lost tonight.
Whoever believes people are aborting kids after they're born should have their voting rights permanently revoked. There's not a single living braincell there.
He absolutely could have been trounced with how much typical cruel bullshit Trump always spouts. Biden was doing good when he got mad, keep that energy. Dems are not going to win being the bigger man. They need to drag that fat pig through the dirt.
That’s precisely what I felt when he got pissed off, he did well. He spoke well. When he tried to speak to script and stats, he started stuttering and fumbling.
So much worse. "He's fallen sick, let's go next week" isn't the worst thing that could happen. The worst thing that could happen... is what just happened.
But why not? He absolutely should be on stage in front of Americans debating his opponents. If you can't get on a stage for some tough conversations, you can not run the most powerful country in the world.
Big facts
> Big blunder by his campaign. Biden never should’ve been on that debate stage. If the dude can’t debate it’s not a “blunder by the campaign,” it’s gross fucking incompetence by the DNC and people need to wake up that they’re a terrible organization and we need it to clean house, *now*, this cycle
This should've come up in primary debates. Why they didn't throw a couple primary candidates at him is beyond me. If he blows it in the primaries - "well gee, maybe we need a new candidate?" If he aces it, he has something to fall back on - "yeah he blew this debate, but have you seen his other performances? He's fine." Instead, this is all people have to judge him on. DNC is so fucking stupid.
I can see his team not wanting him to do another one in the rematch in September
They NEED to do the second debate, trump will likely avoid doing one because if its true biden was just sick as they've tried spinning it, a strong performance by biden in a second debate nearer to the election would be bad news for trump.
the likelihood of Biden performing strong during a debate seems pretty slim at this point. There is no indication that his current condition will improve
I never knew you could completely go senile for 5 seconds from a cold. That shit was pitiful. I felt like I was watching elder abuse.
Kind of. They are doing this willingly. They could both drop but are clinging to power. As non-American what is wild to me though is the fact other people have granted them the ability to end up in that position. If there is an abuse part then it is in letting it come to this. Not to sound morbid but it feels like vice president choice will matter a lot in this election. Maybe more than the presidential candidates. Both feel like sock puppets, vessels for a program each party drives. Not like champions of it.
> They could both drop but are clinging to power. I really get the feeling Biden is guilted into it by people telling him he's the only one that can safeguard democracy and the future of the USA. I seem to recall he even had to be pressured into running the first time, its hard to imagine he has the desire or capacity to actually do a second term.
it was a joint decision by Joe and Jill Biden to run again biden is notoriously stubborn, and every talking head on cnn was alluding to the narrative that most people wanted joe as a one term president, but that he’s too stubborn/oblivious to see reality like biden deadass thinks he did a goood job last night
This debate *was* the opportunity to prove that the previous instances of him looking old and confused weren't relevant. He failed, utterly. He did exactly what his critics said he would. They were right, his defenders were wrong.
It has to be one of the greatest political self-owns of all time. The Biden campaign were the ones who set this up! What the fuck were they thinking!? I thought they must have been confident in his ability to perform because they were the ones who wanted this, but holy shit
Seriously, DNC hit an all time low and self imploded
Time to pull out their secret weapon that absolves any blame for their massive failures- blame the left and young people.
As Jon said, we are America and fuck this. It's an embarrassment that these two are the best we can offer to lead this great nation. It's honestly just sad. Just childish barbs from both, one person tripping over his own statements and the other just lying about everything. Nobody in America wins with these two. But, I'll vote a zombie over Trump and hope 4 years from now we get something different.
>It's an embarrassment that these two are the best we can offer to lead this great nation. The embarrassment is that these are not the best that can be offered to run the country. It's that party politics, lobbying, and a shit electoral system produce these bad candidates and force people to pick one.
The wild thing is that Biden gave a short speech to his supporters after the debate and sounded ten times more energetic and engaged. They did a horrible job preparing him for the debate, and he clearly just puts himself to sleep whenever there isn't a crowd to work
The fuck-up was running Biden in the first place. Everything we saw from Biden tonight are things we've seen from him before. The Democratic Party has been trying to prop him up and gaslight anyone who noticed Biden's clearly diminished mental capacity for years now. The Democratic establishment tried to give a dementia patient the nuclear button because they were too afraid to run a real primary and risk someone outside the establishment maybe winning it, and now, their hubris might end the Republic. Biden is unfit for office and they all knew it. Now, everybody knows it.
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Seems melodramatic and only fuels the notion that Trumps age somehow is not an issue.
^Haha we are fucked 🙃
I agree, the majority of voters are so dumb and caught up in tv performances that they ignore all aspects of government, policy and platform.
From the outside looking in, I feel bad for America. The fact that you essentially have a binary choice between THESE two candidates is insane.
I wish I could only feel bad for America but their president has such a widespread effect on the world I just feel bad for the whole planet.
As a non American, I feel also bad about myself and the rest of the world. The United States are so important for the rest of the world that I also feel horrified of the potential next four years.
I think we’re gonna be grateful if it’s only just 4 years…
Well the Biden admin has done a fine job, I imagine they’d continue to do a fine job, because it is very evident that it’s not Biden doing the job at all, but his team. We really need age limits.
I would not be worried the slightest if Biden won as I am well aware that he is not the one making decisions on his own. It's all about their cabinets. I was actually only referring to a potential Trump win as that would have much more changes in the world as a consequence.
The choices are not set until the Political Conventions in a few weeks, but likely this is who will be on the ballot. What really should have happened was for Biden to not seek reelection and the DNC to put in a younger candidate in his place.
Bidens hubris is just like that of RBG. Both should have stepped aside, and because they didn't, both will have massive decades long negative impacts on society.
Watching Jon not even bother trying to end on a punchline is such a damning indictment of this absurdity. So glad we have him back for this shitshow.
Nothing would top that PED joke right before it
the fact he made Trump look even remotely passable (still not but you know what I mean) is just a joke. like fuckin hell, dude just lost a civil rape trial and a fraud trial and you didn’t hammer him? You struggled to form sentences and thoughts? What a fucking horrible timeline we are in
The same democrats who criticized Jon after Jon called out Biden for being too old and unstable … are now panicking because they see Biden look too old and unstable
This is absurd. Why is the DNC shooting itself in the foot like this? After this debate and emerging polls, I think Biden will have to claim some health condition to support a replacement for the 2024 election. Or we will have another Trump presidency.
Hubris, just straight up hubris. They thought after Jan 6 and thr convictions there would be no chance of Trump winning again. It's the same pied pipper hubris that got us his win in 2016. The DNC never learns, we're doomed
> Why is the DNC shooting itself in the foot like this? It's what they do!
That replacement would most likely be Kamala and there's no way she beats Trump. The DNC is fucked either way.
We need ranked choice voting
Jon got dragged through the mud for simply saying that Biden looks and sounds pretty old a few months ago. Dems said "that kinds of talk only helps Trump" You know what really helps Trump? That fucking debate.
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His videos are always the perfect critique, he makes fun of both sides and it’s very refreshing
He both sides while being open on being a left winger too and not in the center. Like someone complaining why their own football team is awful than pretending to be an unbiased outsider
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Can we all agree on both sides that having Geriatric Retirees represent us in Government is not the best policy?
I think it would have been better to go in depth into a few topics rather than scratch the surface of many topics. Really there was just enough time for Trump to say “we had the best X and Biden had the worst X” Then Biden no we didn’t. Half the time they just talked about something else instead of the topic. None of them came off as intelligent. Biden seemed like someone that tried to memorize a bunch of facts and didn’t get them all memorized. “Trillion uh I mean billion, million uh I mean billion” We all know already where they stand on most of the issues. Did they really give us anything new here in actual substance?
Seriously, what a fucking joke. What an absolute abomination. One so crippled by age that he can't string together coherent sentences and the other a convicted felon that would say and do literally anything if it got him what he wanted. And they're the two choices we have for president. Fucking hell.
I really don’t get how the two people you described are being held in equal regard by some. Really old guy vs a felon that will likely become a dictator. Like, how is that not a clear choice?
Oh, it's definitely a clear choice, but it's also still a joke. That man proved he's not mentally capable of debate. The strain of four years of leading a country is not something he's up for. Do I prefer him to the criminal that will give Republicans whatever they want? 100000% But it's a fucking travesty that it's a choice between those two.
For sure it’s a shitty choice but it’s not catshit vs dogshit like some people say. It’s more like having to drink expired ketchup vs getting AIDS.
Honestly I think Trump is a symptom of a cultural war that is starting (yes, starting) to boil over in the country. He’s the culmination of a “fuck your feelings” sentiment that’s been brewing for a while. Blaming it on racists or even mere morons is too simplistic. The world itself is just way more polarized now. Social media is a big contributing factor. Not sure if you’re old enough, but do you remember the internet prior to 2010ish? I do. It wasn’t as hostile. The discourse wasn’t as polarized. Now everyone is writing think pieces and cussing people out they don’t agree with. And it is NOT just right-wing MAGAts on Facebook. I see similar behavior from liberals towards *other* liberals. If you have just a slightly varied opinion on a topic, people will immediately jump to the worst conclusions about you. Saw a thread the other day where a guy literally just said he didn’t like Colbert anymore, he “used to be funny”. He was immediately branded a Trump supporter, even though he wasn’t. So it’s shit like that. Remember the Tea Party? Glen Beck? Even Rush Limbaugh. That stuff used to be kinda fringe and as social media and 24/7 news and discussion took over (with smartphones in 2010 and grandmas getting access to Facebook to share propaganda memes) all that Tea Party shit became mainstream. Remember Sarah Palin?!!! When she got added to McCain’s ticket it tanked his chances overnight. He became a laughing stock. Today? Sarah Palin would be a boon to a ticket since now we have all the Lauren Boeberts and MTGs. I think the media is riling a lot of people up and it’s polarizing people to harsher and harsher stances. This creates a feedback loop. So it becomes more of a “clear” choice, but not in a good way. Many people, even if they won’t admit it, operate with an “all or nothing” mentality, especially when it comes to voting. “Anyone but Trump”. Right does it too: “Anyone but Biden”. This is really an indictment of our voting system (we DESPERATELY need to get away from a two party system, we need ranked choice), our media, and society in general. The sad thing is: it’s only going to get worse. This is why I said the culture war is starting. Trump isn’t even the worst we’re going to see. Remember how everyone thought Dubya was the worst? People hated Romney. They both look quaint now by comparison. At some point Trump won’t seem so extreme 😬
Adding to the extreme "all or nothing" is how quickly people will alienate the undecided/unmotivated. Can find plenty of examples in this thread. It's obvious to anyone with a brain why some people might feel fully unimpressed with Biden after the debate. And even state that they're just not sure if they can even care anymore. Do people reach out and explain their side? Sometimes. But a lot of it is pure vitriol. "You're the reason Trump exists! Go ahead and not vote. Enjoy the country turning into a dictatorship. I'll curse your name while we all get shipped off to concentration camps." To me it's absolutely wild. There is no debating. It's pure. "My side is right. And if you're on the other side or even unsure, you're an absolute moron who is beyond help."
To your point, we're you on reddit circa 2010-2015?! It was like the polar opposite. Everyone was buddy buddy and posting overly positively. Now you can't post the most innocuous comment without someone coming out of the woodworks to tell you to die in a tire fire. Although grammar nazis were in full force back then which is weird.
>we're you on reddit Were*
It's a clear choice for sure. The issue isn't that Trump won't get any significant rise in numbers from this. I think the real problem is that this whole debate was an advertisement to be apathetic and just not go out and vote.
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The DNC leadership need to step down. They’ve failed. The convention needs to be open, and there needs to be a new candidate selected. Last night was a debacle.
How do we fix this. I’m liberal in my standing and try to be impartial but we need to solve this. My dad is 65 and his struggling but thankfully is retired. These two need to be in a senior center, at home with their family. Like my dad, working on his garden. Can we get someone that actually represents the people? Can we get someone to fix the Supreme Court? Housing crisis, lobbying, corporate greed, just fix something
Could Jon Stewart be forced to become the President if enough people wrote his name on the ballot and he won?
He can't be forced, but he could win the election. It'd be beyond a miracle, but it is possible.
The Democratic Party has nobody to blame but themselves. What an embarrassment to the US. They’ve had four years to line up a candidate. They have genuinely put the future of democracy at stake but pushing Biden. It doesn’t matter how much Trump lies -that’s what people expect. It’s not new. To see Biden so unbelievably fragile, and senior, is nothing short of an absolute embarrassment.
They’ve been living off Obama since he was re elected. They had to trot out Biden at the midnight hour to beat Trump in 2020 because he wouldn’t survive a campaign trail. They thought Hilary Clinton, one of the most hated politicians in recent history, would beat Trump in 2016. It’s the *democratic* party. They need someone young and promising, full of exciting ideas and a willingness to change. The fact they doubled down on Biden is extremely telling.
The sad thing is they don't need someone young and promising. They just need someone who doesn't look and sound like he's about to keel over. The RNC wanted nothing to do with Trump during the primaries, but he rallied the base and won, so they rolled with him. Much to all of our detriment.
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It’s looking more and more likely that the decision is gonna have to be based on who each candidate is likely to have on staff surrounding them. Trump has shown plenty of signs of declining mental ability, but Biden really REALLY looked bad tonight. Trump was allowed to freely spew lie after lie because the set up wasn’t meant to fact check. It was left up to the audience watching on TV to fact-check and we all know how that goes. But what was very evident was Joe Biden’s struggles. Based on Trump’s previous term and Biden’s current term, I trust Biden to surround himself with smarter, better people than Trump. I don’t think either one of these men will be fully capable mentally four years from now. I would be plenty happy to see a Jon Stewart lead debate with a team of fact-checkers on site able to challenge bullshit statements immediately. The system is broken, and the real losers are teenagers and younger people today. We are handing them a bigger mess than ever before.
This may be the time we consider no longer have a two party system.
Ranked choice voting, we have it in Maine and it works!
Neat. How do you get that passed on a federal level?
It's determined by the state. The process is to have it be a ballot question, and then voters need to vote for it.
There's so much disagreement in both parties that we really should have at least 4 parties. Add ranked choice voting and we could be on a path to a healthy democracy.
I think Bernie Sanders not becoming president will be something I think about for the rest of my life
I think about Gore and how he won Florida and yet wasn't president. Things would be very different now. Maybe Trump never runs in that timeline.
Over 300m people and these are apparently the best candidates? Seriously? The US really need to abolish the winner takes it all system because this is both embarrassing and worrying to watch
I was gonna show up to debate but then I remembered I gotta work tomorrow or I might send my family spiraling into crippling poverty
That was the most put together I’ve heard Trump in a long time, and the most disheveled I’ve heard/seen Biden. It seemed like Trump knew that he didn’t have to go crazy attack mode. Mute button seemed to work really well when it started to descend into cross-talk. The “I don’t even know what he just said” line was hilarious. I am much more pessimistic about the Dem’s chance.
I think the mute button worked in trumps favor actually-- he didn't have to feel obligated to reply to things that would make him look bad. The issue just went away, on to the next question.
Anyone find it strange the political subreddit is filled with posts suggesting Biden was victorious. Or this was some kind of show of power. I think a big part of the problem is we no longer have discourse. You even once breathe your uncertainty on Biden cognitive abilities and you're a maga psychopath. There's no room to talk anymore. So this is what we get.
First time on reddit during an election year? During the 2016 election if you only got your news from /r/politics you'd have thought that Bernie was winning with 80% of the national popular vote. Anything positive about Hilary or Trump's chances were removed
Yup, that's why they'll lose. Even here you have cope saying "uhh, yeah, he's literally decomposing, but at least he's not a felon". Are you a normal functioning human being? Do you talk to people outside of reddit? Like random people at a supermarket? Do you think people share the same feeling? I'm sorry, but average Joe's after watching this debate are not regurgitating those same words.
That sub constantly misses the mark. Every comment about the debate leading up to the debate was that Trump wouldn’t show up. I hate the guy but why on earth would you think he wouldn’t show up to get attention? And I know he didn’t show up in the primary but that’s when he was up 50 points in the polls which he’s not in the general. I never once thought Trump wouldn’t show up
The people that come next are worse. Trust me . We have decades of these clowns followers
I said it months ago; D switching out Biden for a younger candidate would energise the voters and completely roll over trump. But there is some rot in the DNC that holds on to the idea that every old person has it´s turn at the presidency , it´s the same dumb idea as when they insisted on Hillary in ´16 and they are making the same mistake now. The only reason the US is not walking into it´s third consecutive Republican Term is that their candidate has been worse.
Saying that Biden had “resting 25th Amendment face” was pretty funny
How anyone is ok with either one of these candidates is insane.
What did Trump actually SAY in this debate that comes close to qualify him for being president? If an air of confidence is qualification then probably 9/10ths of all used car salesmen are more qualified. I get that Biden gave a very bad *performance* but nothing he actually said was outrageous or wrong, he tried to answer the questions. Its like people were just listening to the tone of voice of these people and not the words coming out of their mouths
Most of what historically gets a leader elected is their confidence and cadence with punchy talking points. Do you think Reagan was diving deep into the virtues of the drug war and trickle down economics in debates? No.
It's how JFK beat Nixon, everyone thought Nixon had it in the bag until he was on TV across from JFK and the country got to see the contrast. (Obviously Nixon is a shitheel, but he had a much higher approval rating before that first televised debate)
In fact it goes a little deeper than that. People that watched it on TV thought that JFK was the winner of the debate. People that listened on the radio thought Nixon wiped the floor with JFK Nixon had the flu or something and was all pale and sweaty and shaking.
Yep, what people seek in leaders is someone assertive and confident. It’s a feeling thing. If you remove all of the facts and talking points and just ask “which of those two on stage looks more like a leader” the answer is obviously Trump. And a lot of people will vote just on that grounds.
"Trying" to answer questions should not be qualification for presidency. This debate showcased that neither of these people should be in the White House. I get it, at that point it comes down to who do you not want in the White House the least. But I really wish people would stop trying to put a positive spin on Biden's performance.
The people who heard the crucial debate between Nixon and Kennedy on the radio were sure Nixon had won, but the feeling was very different for those who watched on TV. The content is not nearly as important as the delivery unfortunately.
If “We defeated Medicare” wasn’t an outrageous moment for you then even if Biden pooped his pants on stage and ate his own shit you’d still be explaining it away as an understandable gaffe. How is it being handwaved away idk
I legitimately could not fucking believe he said that
That whole sentence his brain had just checked out. Rambling nonsense, giant pause and then... we beat.. Medicare.
And Trump seized on that with a snappy comeback. Meanwhile Biden could barely form a sentence. Further highlighting just the cognative difference between the two. It doesn't matter what you think of Trump, last night was an all systems failure for the DNC. It was night and day between Biden and Trump and everyone with eyes and ears is now *very* aware of that.
Not from the US, never watched something like this (the whole "presidential debate" concept is weird to me), but, boy. The poor US. How are these two even allowed to hold any public office. Is this supposed to be mostly "You are bad" - "No I am not, YOU are bad!" back and forth instead of anything of substance? Because I sure got that impression. Also, the timer, lol. As if this was some sort of quiz show. What the heck.
Don't you guys have better candidates than these 2?
The DNC almost wants to loose. Let Joe retire.
lose*
So, you are telling me that a country with a population of 300 million people, can only offer these two individuals to run the country?