Those of you diddling on policy perfection are undermining our Cause.
The following is Disneyland’s current Lincoln exhibit oration culled from four of his actual speeches:
The world has never had a good definition of the word liberty, and the American people, just now, are much in want of one. We all declare for liberty; but in using the same word we do not all mean the same thing.
What constitutes the bulwark of our liberty and independence? It is not our frowning battlements, our bristling sea coasts. These are not our reliance against tyranny. Our reliance is in the love of liberty which God has planted in our bosoms. Our defense is in the preservation of the spirit which prizes liberty as the heritage of all men, in all lands, everywhere. Destroy this spirit, and you have planted the seeds of despotism around your own doors.
At what point shall we expect the approach of danger? By what means shall we fortify against it? Shall we expect some trans-Atlantic military giant, to step the ocean, and crush us at a blow? Never! All the armies of Europe, Asia and Africa combined, could not by force, take a drink from the Ohio, or make a track on the Blue Ridge, in a trial of a thousand years.
At what point then is the danger to be expected? I answer, if it ever reach us, it must spring up amongst us. It cannot come from abroad. If destruction be our lot, we ourselves must be its author and finisher. As a nation of free men, we must live through all times, or die by suicide.
Neither let us be slandered from our duty by false accusations against us, nor frightened from it by the menaces of destruction to the Government nor the dungeons to ourselves. Let us have faith that right makes might, and in that faith, let us, to the end, dare to do our duty as we understand it.
Presidential candidate Rep. Seth Moulton chided Dems for forming a circular firing squad yet again : ‘I do think Trump is going to be harder to beat than many Democrats like to believe. And if we spend all our time rehashing votes from 40 years ago in Congress, rather than putting forward a positive vision for America, with realistic plans for how we can achieve all of our goals, then I think it’s going to be a real tough election for us.’
Seth Moulton should go back to his district and help out with local problems instead of renting an Airbnb in Miami to complain about his fellow Democrats. Oh and be another Andover and Harvard grad blaming teachers unions for poorly funded public schools he never attended. I’m done with him and hopefully have another choice on my primary ballot when I’m again a 6th district voter this coming election.
I know I won’t be the only one fed up with his grandstanding. Rich coming from a guy who divided House Democrats right out of the gate at the start of the new Congress with his half baked scheme to decapitate Pelosi.
My recollection is that Seth Moulton’s primary complaint about Ms. Pelosi was that she had been in Congress too long — his only public claims that I remember were that “it’s time for a change”. My objection at the time was that this seemed like a euphemism for “too old” and “not male”.
For Mr. Bolton to therefore chide Democrats for not falling in line behind Mr. Biden is rather ironic. That posture does make me wonder if perhaps Mr. Moulton’s primary objection to Ms. Pelosi really was her gender — at 76, Mr. Biden is essentially the same age. Mr. Biden has been around even longer than Ms. Pelosi. Mr. Biden was first elected to the Senate in 1972. He had been there more than a decade when Ms. Pelosi was first elected to Congress in 1987. It is therefore rather rich for Mr. Moulton to chide Ms. Pelosi for staying too long and then support Mr. Biden.
“Grandstanding” is exactly the right word for Mr. Moulton — even though I applaud his position on impeachment and strongly oppose that of Ms. Pelosi.
I’m quite sure that Fred will bring his boundless enthusiasm to whatever candidate we eventually nominate. While my current choice (Elizabeth Warren) is different from his, I would never suggest that his support of Mr. Biden makes him part of a “circular firing squad”.
I wish that Mr. Moulton would show all of us similar respect.
For the record, Moulton has continued to hold town halls within MA-06 since announcing for President.
That’s nice. His two primary challengers are calling on him to drop out of a race he cannot win and come home.
Why is it more wrong for Moulton to seek higher office than any of the other presidential candidates who are also incumbents?
Cause he’s the only one losing to Marianne Williamson? And doing so after losing all his influence as a House member burning his bridge to Pelosi? Cause he’s a centrist out of touch with the politics of his district on education, trade, and health care?
I just don’t like this attempt to winnow the field before any state even gets a chance to vote. Remember people like us are in a huge bubble. The vast majority of voters have not tuned in to the presidential race and probably won’t for a while.
@this attempt to winnow the field:
I invite your attention to the very first sentence of the thread-starter: “Those of you diddling on policy perfection are undermining our Cause.”
The entire thread is an attempt to winnow the field — to Mr. Biden. Since the vast majority of voters have not tuned into the presidential race, our “diddling on policy perfection” has no effect whatsoever.
Surely it’s not unduly winnowing the field to ignore self-professed candidates who will not even merit a footnote in future accounts of this race. I react the same to Mr. Steyer, by the way.
I can pen a diary here and announce my candidacy for the Democratic nomination. That doesn’t make me a viable candidate, and I think it’s perfectly reasonable to suggest that my “candidacy” be ignored.
This is at least the second time you have interpreted a diary as trying to clear the field for Biden that does nothing of the sort. Fred can clarify if he wants, but I don’t think he’s telling all other candidates to get out. In fact, he has specifically said he wants to hear from others.
I read his opening sentence as telling me that when I criticize Mr. Biden’s stance on issues, I am “diddling on policy perfection” and therefore “undermining our Cause”.
I don’t doubt that this is not the first time, nor will it be the last.
I strongly reject these assertions that challenging the chosen candidate is “undermining our Cause” — especially when those challenges are characterized as “diddling on policy perfection”.
I’ve done it before and I’ll do it again.
Not to mention the phrase “politics is the art of the possible” is always bandied about by liberals who tell their fellow liberals to aim lower and dream smaller. I never recall a conservative saying anything remotely similar.
Their agenda, especially on economics, has been opposed by a majority of Americans for decades yet it has driven the last 50 years of public policy because risk averse Democrats have acquiesced to their rules of engagement. Or insist on playing by the old rules that the other side routinely breaks as a matter of course. That’s the Biden way.
It’s the same kind of splitting the baby we saw with ACA, civil unions instead of gay marriage, or the Biden-Lugar “compromise” of a UN approved unjust War in Iraq. It’s the same kind of defeatism that keeps lowering the bar on gun control and surrendering education policy to privatization. That scoffs at single payer as a pipe dream.
You’ll never see a conservative candidate tell their base overturning Roe a pipe dream, which is partially why that unlikely nightmare might actually become tomorrow’s reality. We let our court nominees twist in the wind, they fight tooth and nail for their sex predator nominees to wind up on the bench.
Sure Bidenism is better than racism or fascism, and it has my vote if it comes to that, but to argue that our choice is already limited to this small ball incrementalism or the evils of Trump does a great deal of disservice to the strength of this field and frankly the growing strength of ordinary progressive activism across America.
Republicans took a huge risk nominating Trump and have now reaped a huge reward. His election is proof there is no mainstream to restore anymore, just different variations of radical change. I favor the progressive variation over the racist one.
Maybe that’s just more evidence that being responsible adults is a liberal value that conservatives don’t share. I’ve also seen polls suggesting that Democratic voters in general WANT their officials to work together whereas Republican voters prefer their officials grandstand and look upon compromise as a four-letter word.
He wasn’t talking to you, but you seem to have an awfully guilty conscience. This diary mentioned NO candidates.
@Wasn’t talking to you:
Who do you think he was talking to or about then?
If he’s not talking about the frequent criticisms of Mr. Biden’s policies that I and others make, what do think he was referring to with the phrase “diddling on policy perfection”?
Fred has been crystal clear about which candidate he prefers, there was no need to be explicit in the thread-starter.
This is a diary that is appropriate in the general election after we have chosen a nominee. I think it’s unnecessarily divisive before even the first caucus.
The Republicans will also rehash votes from 40 years ago when you nominate a guy with a 45 year voting record. A coronation of yet another centrist, Iraq War supporting, banker money taking, past his prime politico is exactly the wrong look for the 21st century Democratic Party.
We also have to move on not only from the Clinton years but from the Obama years. Democrats win when they run on change. They lose when they run backward looking campaigns predicated on nostalgia.
Voters did not want a Kennedy or Clinton restoration. They did not want the FDR restoration promised by the likes of Humphrey and Mondale. They did not want cold, detached technocrats like Dukakis, Gore, or Kerry running on incremental change.
We have two aggressive fighters in the form of Elizabeth Warren and Kamala Harris ready to take on Trump. We have the positive new leadership/new generation vibe from Buttigieg, Booker, and Castro. We have the consistent Bernie Sanders who was on the right side of every issue Joe Biden got wrong.
So actually I am arguing two things. One, we can and should nominate a bolder and more progressive candidate than Joe Biden. Two, if we nominate Joe Biden we will lose to Donald Trump.
I refuse to make kissing his ring the litmus test for what it means to be a good Democrat and I strongly reject the false tautology that rejecting Biden re-elects Trump.
I have already publicly pledged to support the Democratic nominee for president to defeat Trump regardless of who that is. After what you’ve just said about Joe Biden, can you honestly say the same?
Trump used his July 4 event to call for young people to join the military which war veteran Moulton said was ‘quite something for someone who refused to do it himself.’
Was he wrong?
No, but it would be nice if we had a Congressman who did his job instead of running around the country attacking progressive Democrats for being soft on security or soft on teachers unions, all while failing to qualify for debates while Marianne Williamson does.
Sen. L’Italien or Rep. Ehrlich have publicly mulled primary challenges and these two tough women would work well with Speaker Pelosi to stop Trump instead of publicly dividing the caucus against her for no reason. Seth put self before party his entire political career.
I’ll vote for him if he’s the nominee. I don’t see why I have to vote for him to be the nominee in order to stop Trump or grant him immunity from legitimate criticism. If anyone else in the race goes after his family or attacks him personally, they’ll hear from me. I respect Joe, I just wish he had sat this one out. I’m sure Obama does too, since he’s the one who got him to sit out 2016.
Since Biden is the only major frontrunner candidate with viability that is validating Obama’s impressive progressive domestic and foreign policy record of accomplishment, how can you assert that Obama wishes Joe had ‘sat this one out’?
He was a major influence behind keeping Biden out of the last race, including having his pollster show him numbers that he would get third place in the the nomination to Hillary and Biden. As soon as Joe said no, Obama called for a Rose garden press conference right there to make sure he got out then and there.
I also take issue with the idea that he is the only viable front runner, that he is the only one defending Obama’s legacy-most of them are-they just want to build on it and make it better. Biden is strictly calling for a reset. It also makes it harder for him compared to other nominees to make legitimate criticisms of Obama. I think a stronger candidate is a fresh face able to run on the positive parts of Obama’s record and away from the negative parts.
Joe Biden is THE candidate with the most credibility that WILL build on Obama’s legacy.
*whispers* A lot of that legacy is bad.
Really? Exactly what part of the Obama /Biden legacy of peace, prosperity and progress is bad?
@ What part … is bad?:
It isn’t that any part of the Obama/Biden legacy is “bad”, it is that I want us to do better.
The signature accomplishment of the Obama/Biden administration was the ACA — much better than the chaos it replaced, and still not nearly good enough.
A federal appeals court is poised to rule that the ACA is unconstitutional because Congress removed the penalty that is the kingpin (or Achilles Heel) of the entire act. Without the tax, the rest of the ACA is likely to be ruled an unconstitutional mandate.
We need a health care system that cannot be destroyed by a single intransigent Congress. We need a health care system that puts private insurance companies out of business, rather than guarantees them a permanent government-ordered income.
We need a financial system that makes it difficult or impossible for credit card lenders and big banks to destroy the lives of people who are already poor. Numerous studies like this report that medical problems or illnesses contribute to TWO THIRDS of consumer bankruptcies, even after the enactment of the ACA (emphasis mine):
This is AFTER the rewrite of the consumer bankruptcy laws spearheaded by Mr. Biden — the rewrite that makes consumer bankruptcy far more difficult and far more expensive — and AFTER the ACA.
No American who is already facing serious health issues should also face bankruptcy caused by those issues. No family should have to choose between caring for their loved ones and preserving their dignity and their home.
In retrospect, the Obama/Biden presidency failed to address the most crucial issues of our time. The ACA started as a GOP sop to the health insurance industry (it is essentially RomneyCare) that Mr. Obama advanced in his futile effort to persuade the GOP to work with him.
The Obama/Biden presidency failed to do enough about the following:
– It failed to address or slow the explosion in wealth and income concentration
– It failed to reverse our decades-long disinvestment in public transportation
– It failed to slow the increase in college costs and student debt burdens.
– It failed to make any substantive or permanent change in US climate policy.
– It failed to do ANYTHING to investigate or prosecute the compellingly documented crimes against humanity of the George W. Bush administration
– It failed to close GITMO
– It failed to end the war in Afghanistan
– It failed to end the war in Iraq
– It left the Middle East in more chaos than when it took office
I think we can do better than this. I think it starts by aiming higher and by being FAR more assertive about our vision and priorities.
Politics is the art of the possible. We all want a more progressive country. To get there a president needs the votes in Congress. Their signature achievement -ACA- was passed in the House when Pelosi was Speaker, without a single Republican vote.
And also diluted in the Senate because they were unwilling to play hardball with Joe Lieberman.
When progressives pushed FDR to move the country further to the left of the New Deal he replied ; “Make me do it.” In other words, find me the votes and I’ll sign the bill into law!
I agree with all of this. And we need a President who wants to do much more, not just 5-10% in areas and return to an earlier status quo in others.
If we run away from the Obama legacy we will play right into Asshole’s strategy to destroy every accomplishment of the Obama era.
Huh? How’s that?
We can push for great and important things without disparaging Obama at all or acting as if we are only building on his legacy.
We can say “The ACA was a good step toward the right health care future but it is not enough. We must keep moving toward universal health care.”
We can say “the Paris Accord was a step in the right direction, but it is not enough. We must have a green new deal to fight climate catastrophe.”
That doesn’t play into Trump’s hands at all and it doesn’t treat Obama as infallible.
Obama’s high moral character of integrity, honor and decency is the hallmark of his administration.
“Always the negative vibes, Moriarity.” Oddball (Donald Sutherland) in the movie Kelly’s Heroes
Come on. Peace? Are you joking? Or do you just mean no major attacks on American soil?
– Continuation of forever war, including expanded use of drones throughout the world, including use of specific kill lists with lots of collateral damage
– Continued rendition
– Gitmo still open
– Support for Saudi Arabia – across the board but specifically in Yemen
– Until the current President, their record on immigration/deportation was the worst
– Not holding the banks accountable for the financial crisis – I don’t think this one can be overstated.
And I’d really hold back too much cheerleading on the economic recovery. The stimulus was far too small and much was about riding a natural economic wave. It also included the rise of the gig economy and people not being unemployed because they work three jobs. Some high level numbers looked good, but it is widely evident that for far too many there was no recovery at all.
We can prefer his Presidency to the others in recent memory but we can also be honest about it.
Didn’t Obama bring down Osama bin Laden, the terrorist who planned the 9/11 attack?
Obama’s administration was free of corruption. No indictments, no convictions, no prison time for any government official. How quick we forget.
@No corruption:
Heh. Talk about damning with faint praise.
I absolutely EXPECT every administration to be free of indictments, convictions, and prison time for government officials.
The purpose of a primary is to choose the best nominee. This observation, while certainly true, doesn’t help narrow the field.
@Didn’t Obama bring down Osama bin Laden:
That is not a foreign policy accomplishment. It’s a one-news-cycle headline grabber. Of course I’m glad OBL was caught. The apprehension of OBL did not solve any meaningful issues or problems.
One of the consequences of my choice to make Massachusetts my lifelong home is that I know that my vote in a presidential election has approximately the same value as a bucket of spit.
I wrote in “Donald Duck” (or maybe “Mickey Mouse”, I don’t remember) instead of casting my vote for John Kerry. I’ve never been enthralled by him, and was not surprised by his mishandling of the Swift Boat fiasco.
I therefore have to confess to Fred that if Mr. Biden is the nominee, I’m likely to do the same. In that scenario, I’m quite certain that Mr. Biden will nevertheless get all eleven electoral votes from Massachusetts just as Ms. Clinton did in 2016 and Mr. Kerry did in 2004. In full disclosure, I’ll also do the same if Mr. Sanders or Ms. Harris is the nominee.
I like to think of myself as a reasonably informed issues voter. I am repelled by arguments for or against a candidate based on gender, age, skin color, or any other “identity” claim. In my view, the claim that I should support Mr. Biden because he will defeat Mr. Trump or because he’s familiar is among the weakest.
I think the stronger arguments in favor of Mr. Biden are his efforts to advance civil rights (after his early busing debacle) and his long-time and deep expertise in foreign policy.
I do think our primary votes will matter in MA. Both for local offices and for national ones. In 2016, I may have been in the minority who liked both of our options and said to everyone that I was voting for Bernie in the primary and Hillary in the general. He needed my vote more in the primary and she needed it in the general. I’m still proud of both votes.
For this cycle we have far more options to choose from. If this were a binary choice between Bernie and Biden I’d probably say the same thing I said in 2016. I like Biden and think he’d make a decent president. I still like Bernie and what he stands for. That said, I frankly think we have much better choices than either of those also rans with this wide open field.
Some may despair of a circular firing squad, I genuinely think this diverse and highly qualified field will generate much needed excitement on our side and higher turnouts for both the primary and the general. Voters on our side are more likely to vote if they fall in love rather than fall in line with a candidate.
Indeed, I was referring only to the general. My current choice in the primary is Elizabeth Warren.
Biden’s record as a lifelong liberal champion of human rights in both domestic and foreign policy and the fact that Obama vetted him before entrusting him to finish his mission should he have not been able to, is what drives me not to dismiss him out of hand as some on the left seem to have done.
Again, I have not committed to any Democrat yet, but I want to hear more from ALL our candidates.
I definitely disagree with an “anybody but Biden” stance. I also disagree with a “nobody but Biden” stance. Let’s have a real primary and see where the votes fall. Warren’s in third place in the money race now, third place in most polls, and doing almost as good in the head to heads as Biden is. I wouldn’t count her, or Harris, or Buttigieg, or Bernie out just yet. Or Biden for that matter. It’s a real race.
Yes, let’s have a fair,competitive race based on real issues without the personal attacks on any of our candidates which only serve as fodder to Trump and his minions.
All of the attacks against Joe Biden within the Democratic primary have been based solely on legitimate policy differences. I hope it continues to be that way. I denounce Trump’s personal attacks on Vice President Biden and his family, they’ve been through more than enough.
So we shouldn’t try to replicate historical success?
Democrats win elections when they move forward instead of looking backward. Part of the reason Bill Clinton and Barack Obama were historically successful two term Democratic Presidents is because they were Washington outsiders and fresh faces with new ideas for the direction of their party. Two things Joe Biden is not.
Right now, suffering through the corrupt, fascist chaos of the Dorito Mussolini Turd Emperor, I’d give my right arm to return to 16 years of Clinton/Obama/Biden peace, prosperity and progress for all.
“Obamacare is a big f****** deal.” Joe Biden to Barack Obama at the signing of Obamacare into law.
OK. Let’s get real. Today, Trump is in court attempting to destroy healthcare for 20 million Americans , like me, with pre-existing conditions.
I’m a cancer survivor and without Obamacare I would be bankrupt, homeless and dead.
You’re damn right I’m supporting Joe Biden. He and Obama are the only reason I’m alive today!
So be warned. If I hear any more personal attacks on the basic decency, integrity and humanity of this progressive leader who doesn’t just talk the talk but walks the walk…. consider it a declaration of war!
Fred, you know I like you and I like your passion.
I haven’t seen any “personal attacks on the basic decency, integrity and humanity” of Mr. Biden here at BMG. I’ve seen and offered what I think are legitimate criticisms of certain aspects of his lengthy public record. Surely you agree with me that such criticisms come with the territory.
At the moment, Nancy Pelosi’s stubborn refusal to do ANYTHING about the appalling behavior of the current administration and its GOP Collaborators is a far more urgent issue than anything involving the 2020 campaign.
For better or worse, Joe Biden is the current front runner.
I don’t think any declarations of war are needed or appropriate here at BMG.
.I am declaring war on the Turd Emperor and his fascist sycophants. Not members of the BMG community.
Criticize Biden’s public record all you want.
You’d be even better off under single payer which Biden staunchly refuses to consider. The courts would be better off with young progressives who can leave a real legacy on the law, not renominating a moderate 66 year old who failed to get a fair hearing as Biden recently proposed.
Biden thinks he can cooperate with Mitch McConnell. Do you honestly believe that? After Garland? After burying the intelligence on election interference? I don’t. I think it demonstrates a profound strategic misjudgment that makes me question his ability to effectively govern.
Preventing further damage is extremely important. If this was the general and Biden was our nominee you’d have every right to shut down left of center criticism for the sake of party unity. I’d be with you doing the same thing.
We still got a year and a half to go and around 5-6 viable candidates that are more progressive and better candidates then Biden, and I’m not ready to throw in the towel to him yet.
OK, but here’s the thought experiment. Assuming McConnell remains Majority Leader, what magic are you expecting a different Dem President to work to ram his/her agenda and nominees through an obstinate Senate that Biden can’t/won’t? OTOH, if the Dems do take the Senate (and keep the House) is there really any legislation they would pass that another Dem would sign, but Biden likely to veto?
@ What magic?:
I expect a different Dem President to aggressively promote legislation that the voters prefer and that the Senate GOP majority (supported by a MINORITY of American voters) opposes.
I expect the resulting conflict to constantly remind Americans of (1) who is really working on their behalf and (2) who the GOP majority actually represents.
In the specific case of Mr. Biden, the refusal of the Obama/Biden administration to even TALK ABOUT, never mind promote, government-sponsored single-payer health care stands in stark contrast to the relentless efforts of the GOP and Mr. Trump to destroy the ACA. The next step, having abandoned the only approach that actually solves the problem, was to also refuse to talk about the public option. Mr. Biden — after decades of representing his Delaware insurance-industry constituents — certainly made no effort to argue for a public option.
We Democrats STILL refuse to do the things that make it clear to voters that we actually believe what we say.
If we actually BELIEVE the things we profess to believe, then we need to act that way.
THAT is a key difference I see between Mr. Biden and Elizabeth Warren:
Joe Biden doesn’t fight that way. Elizabeth Warren DOES.
Also, the use of the regulatory state and approach to foreign policy (and all other aspects of purely executive power) would not be comparable between Warren (or a few other candidates) and Biden.
Again, the Senate will suddenly go along just because one Dem has more passion than another? Sorry, I am extremely skeptical of that premise. I’m also very skeptical of the premise that Biden won’t fight for people since he’s been doing that for decades.
@again the Senate:
Of course the hypothesized 2020 Senate won’t go along. There will be elections in 2022 and 2024.
The point of Ms. Warren’s response (did you watch it?) was to emphasize the role of the President in keeping the people engaged in the fight, so that the people force Mr. McConnell to either do their will or be replaced by someone who will.
I’ve been watching Mr. Biden for as long as you, and we’ve each been watching Ms. Warren for at least as long as she’s been in public office.
I invite you to offer clips showing Mr. Biden demonstrate leadership comparable to that of Ms. Warren.
Christopher and Fred unintentionally embody the same self-compromising spirit of risk averse policy making that has come to define the Democratic Party in my lifetime. Reagan and now Trump are the most extremely conservative presidents ever nominated by the Republican Party. Instead of moving to the middle the GOP has moved so far to the right it’s statistically to the right of far right parties in Europe like the National Front and the Alternative for Germany. It’s equally racist, sexist, xenophobic, and homophobic but far more opposed to the welfare state than those entities. Far right economically and socially.
I don’t think you can compromise with this beast as Joe Biden is proposing and hope reasonable Republicans emerge. I think you fight it.
The last GOP majority took over 50 meaningless votes to repeal ACA. It was to signal to their base this was a priority and to nuke the popularity of a bill most Americans initially supported. They dragged Hillary Clinton to purely political hearings to destroy her once sky high approval rating. McConnell broke every Senate norm in pursuit of power.
We can sit there and pre-emptively surrender OR we can drag Trump officials who actually broke the law into hearings. Acosta covered up a pedophile, we should hang his name around every 2020 Senate candidate. Make Collins and Gardner own Acosta. The ads write themselves “these senators sold out your state to help a pedophile friend of Donald Trump”. It’s easy, it’s honest, and it’s exactly what they would do if the shoe was on the other foot.
They impeach Clinton over a blow job and we can’t even hold hearings on a single act of real lawlessness from any number of administration officials. Kids are dying on our watch and Pelosi would rather talk about touring her private vineyards with Bono and attacking her most popular member.
This is political malpractice. I am convinced if Biden runs an anemic “return to normalcy” campaign he loses or is stuck to a single term when he runs for re-election as an 82 year old who did the bare minimum to undo Trump while maintaining his civility with the other side. Against any competent and young Republican he will lose in 2022. Kiss the Supreme Court goodbye.
W took a stolen election as a mandate to go to war for no reason and a 3% re-elect into a mandate to go to try and kill social security. Obama wins a filibuster proof majority and a 6 point landslide and focused his entire first term on making nice with the party the voters soundly rejected. He even bragged ACA was written by Heritage. The GOP would never take a Brooking Institute policy and brag about it.
They broke politics. They need to be disempowered and punished. No amount of compromise or civility can fix it. The only one of the five frontrunners who doesn’t get this is Joe Biden.
New polling out today shows why Biden is leading. He owns two key Democratic demographics: voters over 50 ( like me ( a Clinton supporter) and Terry ( a Sanders supporter) and African Americans.
Joe Lieberman was doing great with these demographics as Gores heir apparent in 2004. It didn’t last.
Biden is rapidly losing African American support to Harris, Sanders, and Warren. They’ve each doubled their share of the black vote and he’s lost 20% of it since the last debate. This trend will continue as more black voters are informed about his mixed record on issues important to them from desegregation to mass incarceration.
I agree he’s currently the second choice of most Sanders supporters, but that says more about who likes Sanders (older white and black voters and voters without degrees) than it does about ideology. They are at the opposite ends of the ideological spectrum of the 2020 field. As more Sanders voters learn this, perhaps their support will shift to Warren and Harris too.
It’s hypocritical to run on your 50+ years of political experience and then claim a cutoff on any part of that record that’s over 8 years old. It’s also ridiculous to crown a nominee (didn’t help us in 2016) this early in the process. Not when there are 4 other candidates with a credible shot at the nomination and general with much better stances on the issues.
Al Sharpton explained why blacks support Biden on Mornin Joe today: “These so called progressives have an ivory tower view of the black vote. Their loyalty to Biden is indicative of their loyalty to Obama and that by voting for Biden, they’ll stop Trump from completely rolling back Obama’s record.”
I neither doubt nor deny that is true today. At this stage in 2007 Barack Obama was getting clobbered by Hillary Clinton in the black vote. They wanted another Clinton to rollback the Bush agenda, until they discovered that a more progressive black candidate was viable after he won Iowa.
Right now polling shows a five way tie in IA and NH between the five front runners, all within the margin of error from one another. If Harris wins IA, it could lead to a similar rallying affect that destroys Biden’s high numbers with black voters overnight. If the next debate stage actually has all the front runners on it, they will continue to publicize Biden’s mixed record on civil rights and criminal justice and his numbers will continue to go down.
The last debate should have been a solid reality check on both Biden’s inevitability and the invulnerability of his black support. It’s already gone down by double digits.
Sen. Warren can only hope that you are right, James. Right now, I’m more inclined to believe Reverend Sharpton on why black voters will support their friend and ally, Joe Biden, because he’s the guy who took them to the dance 50 years ago and they’re goin home with him.
It’s all about trust and loyalty, my friend.
And name recognition and Obama nostalgia. The insurmountable lead with black voters you describe has been cut in half already. Only 26% of Democrats are voting for Biden right now nationally, with his closet competitors cutting his once double digit lead to 6 points.. So there seems to be hunger for an alternative (or two) and we will see if this shifts even more after the July and September debates when voters actually decide.
I’ll add this, if you are supporting Biden because he is your favorite candidate than I respectfully disagree with that choice. If you are supporting him over a candidate you like more because he is more ‘electable’ or leading the polls-I suggest you reconsider.
I’m supporting Joe Biden because I like Joe Biden more.
Why do you like him better than Warren?
Why do I like Joe Biden best?
You already know. I bonded with him in 2008 on a rope line in Manchester, NH when I confided in him that I was a gay activist and a cancer survivor, like him. He leaned in close and whispered in my ear: “If you promise me to keep fighting, I’ll keep fighting too.”
And that’ s when I lost it for Joe.
@trust and loyalty:
Interesting. Surely it is important to specify who we’re talking about when we discuss trust and loyalty.
Fifty years ago, Mr. Biden was a newcomer to the Democratic Party (he began his adult life as a registered Republican).
I wonder who Mr. Biden brought to the dance when he was courting the segregationists in the early 1970s, and what dance he was attending. His most recent disclosures suggest that Mr. Biden might not necessarily been returning the trust and loyalty offered him by Mr. Sharpton and and others.
Similarly, I wonder who Mr. Biden was dancing with in 1991 when he contemptuously dismissed the allegations of Ms. Hill in order to speed the ascension of Clarence Thomas to the Supreme Court.
It seems pretty clear that in 2005, Mr. Biden was dating the major credit card companies as he sponsored and championed the new bankruptcy law that betrayed virtually the entire working-class and most middle-class families — especially those being destroyed by runaway health care costs. Mr. Biden demonstrated great trust and loyalty to those major Delaware constituents and donors. I’m pretty sure that that’s not the dance Mr. Sharpton is talking about.
I wonder what happens to the trust and loyalty of the black community as more and more of its members learn of just how many dances Mr. Biden was attending, and who he was bringing to those dances.
Biden blasts Trump for not defending democracy at a major foreign policy speech today in New York : “The world sees Trump for what he is: insincere, ill-informed and impulsive-and sometimes corrupt, dangerously incompetent and incapable, in my view, of world leadership and leadership at home.”
“Fifty years ago, Mr. Biden was a newcomer to the Democratic Party (he began his adult life as a Republican).” says Tom.
Hell, Elizabeth Warren started out as a Republican, too. So what. That never stopped me from actively campaigning with her for the US Senate. And it won’t stop me from supporting her again if she is our nominee.
Hey, our own friend, James, worked for the United Independent party candidate Evan Falchuk. Both of them are now Democrats.
@Hell …:
Understood, that was sort of my point. I don’t hold it against him. I’m instead pushing back a little on the assertion that he was vigorously supporting black and Hispanic people fifty years ago.
Joe Biden will NEVER pass all the litmus policy purity tests of some progressives.
That is THE reason I became disillusioned with ‘progressive purists’ in ’68 when my guy, Gene McCarthy refused to endorse Humphrey over Nixon thus extending the Vietnam War 5 years.
And McGovern over my guy, Senator Edmund Muskie of Maine in ’72 because the father of the Clean Air and Clean Water Act wasn’t ‘liberal’ enough. and had been Humphrey’s running mate in ’68.
And Ralph Nader over Vice President Al Gore in 2000 allowing GWB to steal the election. Nader claimed there was ‘no difference between the two’ ( Gore was, and is, the world leader on environment/climate change) and won 90,000 votes in Florida which Gore ‘lost’ by 550 votes.
Don’t get me started on ‘holier than thou’, ‘mental masturbating’, liberal purists.
It’s hard to take you or Christopher seriously that you aren’t disparaging supporters of other candidates or calling for a Biden coronation when you use language like this. ‘Circular firing squad’ and ‘progressive purity tests’ are phrases that make little sense in a primary.
You’re 68’ analogy is spot on for the general. I strongly agree with it. I know better than most that third parties don’t work in a first past the post system and I strongly supported Hillary Clinton after she won the nomination. Unlike friends who abstained or wrote in or choose an unqualified Russian backed Jill Stein-I proudly voted for Hillary. I’ll also add Biden could learn from Humphrey who late in that campaign apologized for supporting that war and distanced himself from his predecessor.
I know some deranged lefties who are glad Trump won since it removed Hillary from politics and led to AOC and DSA growth. I would much rather live in a world where she’s president, the Supreme Court is safe, and foreign and climate policy is sane. I will happily vote for Joe Biden November 2020 to restore that world. I will also happily exercise my options in the primary. I think we can both live with this, no?
“…and distanced himself(Humphrey) from his predecessor(Johnson).”
Why should Joe Biden distance himself from the most consequential president of our lifetime — Barack Obama?
Obama was a great President, but an imperfect one. I am saying there are things Obama-Biden got wrong and I want the next Democratic President to learn from their mistakes. Biden is in a great position to tell us what he wished he would have done differently or what he learned.
Moreover the important point is I that while I agree with you about uniting behind the nominee, I disagree we have to do that during the primary.
Barack Obama is the best president of our lifetime according to the latest Pew Research poll.
So again, why should Joe Biden run away from the Obama/Biden record?
At least follow my arguments! Have I not complained on this very thread about trying to winnow the field before any states get to even vote? How exactly does that square with calling for a Biden coronation? Let me be as clear as I can – I AM NOT! I just find some of the criticism unfair and/or irrelevant.
I am saying the critiques are fair and are relevant and if we don’t air them out during the primary they will haunt the nominee in the general. This isn’t even about Biden-all the candidates have pros and cons and we shouldn’t insist that we avoid talking about the cons. I have my reservations about Warren and my disagreements with her. I am open and honest about them
I can say Hillary made mistakes we can learn from without excusing the other people and factors involved in her loss or limiting the significance of her nomination and popular vote win. I can support Warren while admitting she messed up the DNA questions and made the wrong call on the medical device tax. Why can’t we do the same thing for Biden or the other candidates? I see that skepticism as making us stronger, not weaker.
@mental masturbating liberal purists:
All those things happened after the party had chosen a nominee. I share your disgust with them.
We haven’t even had the first caucus yet. No primary votes have been cast or counted. We’ve had just one debate.
It just isn’t possible to have “progressive purists” of the sort you describe in the 2020 campaign because it’s too early. What we have instead is vigorous and energetic jostling, shoving, and pushing as more than two dozen candidates and their supporters try to elbow their way to the starting gate.
You and Christopher like Joe Biden. James and I like Elizabeth Warren. Others like others.
I’d like to just leave it at that.
Conflating Biden to Lieberman is really hitting below the belt. 🙂 You’re gonna have to do a lot better than that to win this race!
Is it?
You’re a West Wing fan Christopher. Remember Bruno Gianelli? We win when we fight. I’d rather do that than cower in a corner asking the GOP to stop hurting me. Biden is definitely going to do that.
Biden’s the guy who once publicly fantasized about taking Trump behind the gym. We might want to be careful with violent imagery, but I suspect Biden will take it directly to Trump.
Will he? Or will he meekly say “my time is up” and hope the conversation moves somewhere else. Biden rejects impeachment, he rejects accountability, and he is running to restore the status quo the voters rejected in 2016. Biden has all of Hillary’s flaws as a candidate, with none of her virtues.
He’s an establishment creature with an even lengthier paper trail when the voters clearly reject insiders. He’s a pro-war/pro-business Democrat when the base and independents alike want to move on from foreign entanglements and curtail corporate power, and unlike Hillary, he won’t make any history if he wins.
He’s got nothing but Obama’s coattails to ride on, they weren’t enough to propel Clinton to the White House and they won’t propel Biden. He also has taken millions in speaking fees and book deals and his son has questionable business practices. I don’t care about any of that stuff personally, but Trump is already dredging it up and Biden is clearly unprepared to deal with that kind of scrutiny if he can’t handle a civil debate about his education policy record among members of his own party.
If Trump can make this contest about a choice between his outsider brand of politics and “another swamp creature”* like Biden he wins a second term.
*i don’t think he or Hillary are swamp creatures, but it’s much easier to portray them as such than an anti-establishment candidate like Bernie or s fresh face like Harris, Warren, or Buttigieg. None of whom have a decade of experience in DC, Buttigieg being a total DC outsider.
Well, I for one believe the presidency is the ultimate establishment office. My reaction to much of the above is – you say it like it’s a bad thing. “My time is up” was simply an acknowledgement he ran out the clock in a debate. Let’s not make a metaphor out of it.
The last establishment candidate to win was HW Bush and he lost his next election.
He certainly didn’t lose because he was establishment. He lost because the economy wasn’t doing well and people tend to blame the incumbent.
Actually, no. We don’t win when we fight. James Carville was a Lousiana bred, no-holds-barred, bare knuckle brawler of the finest caliber. It was just this pugnacity of his that invited Republicans to fight that much longer and harder.
We never win when we fight, Aaron Sorkin’s fantasia aside… Which makes it all the more poignant that it was none other than Bill Clinton who said, ‘When we get people to think, we win. And so do they. And, the other side is real good at getting people NOT to think…’
Despite the irony, Clinton was right: we win when we get people to think — and, perhaps more importantly, they win too..
He consistently sided with the credit card companies over ordinary people throughout his Senate career. He sided with his Republican friends in the Senate over Anita Hill. He sided with his white constituents and segregationist colleagues over his black constituents during the busing debate. He sided with the Bush administration over the Iraqi people and American troops sent who died in that useless conflict. He sided with Mitch McConnell over House Democrats in budget deals as Vice President. He sided with outsourcing corporations over American workers. That last bit was fatal to Hillary in the upper Midwest.
I mean this is the kind of record that will continue to get exposed throughout this primary and drive down his numbers with blacks and blue collar whites alike. None of this helps him in the general either, since Trump can continue to lie with impunity about opposing the war and taking on outsourcing corporations or the drug companies. Biden is the white male version of Hillary, we have much better choices in 2020 than we did in 2016. We shouldn’t pretend it’s a binary choice between Biden and Trump.
Is there anything more one can add to that? Probably not.
I’m noticing that Warren is making slow steady progress in the polls. My hunch is that she is drawing support from Sanders and Biden, mostly from Sanders while Harris is rising with support drawn from Biden.
I met with an old friend yesterday for burgers and beers and political conversation (doesn’t get much better than that.) In short, I told him there are two candidates that I will support fully, in Harris and Warren and then there is the rest of the field that to me, offer little chance of beating Trump and even if elected, will send us down the same neoliberal spiral that will deliver Trump 2.0 soon enough.
Then again… those of us not predisposed to hate either Hillary Clinton in particular or women in general, feel compelled to point out that Hillary Clinton got 65,853,514 people to vote for her, second only to Barack Obama in all of US history and garnering significantly more than the titular ‘winner’ (whiner) whose advantage stemmed from that vestigial appendix of slavery, the ‘electoral college’. Or, if you are simple-minded allow me to put it in this manner: Hillary Clinton received more votes than any white man in US history. Why would you turn your back on 65,853,514 votes?
Who is that told you 65,853,514 isn’t good enough? Who is it that told you that the perfect is the always and forever antagonist to the good?
Somebody must have told you. It’s far too complex an idea for you to have derived on your own…
In other words, he did a fairly decent job representing Delaware in the Senate. I for one don’t like to fault people for that.
@representing Delaware:
There is a difference between finding fault and supporting for president.
The GOP is chock-full of elected officials who represent corporate executives, significant shareholders, and large financial institutions. There’s no “fault” in that, but I don’t support them as Democratic Party nominees for President.
Mr. Biden’s support for the 2005 bankruptcy law rewrite was a knee in the groin and knife in the back to virtually every American of every class who suffers from astronomical medical bills (even while covered by insurance), skyrocketing bank and credit card fees, and predatory lending practices.
If I was a majority shareholder of Mastercard, I’d be very happy about Mr. Biden’s representation. I’m not a majority shareholder of Mastercard.
You do realize lots of said companies are headquartered in Delaware, right? They were literally his constituents.
@ they were literally his constituents:
Of course I realize that, that’s the point of my comment. There are poor blacks living in Delaware. There are middle-class families devastated by medical bills living in Delaware.
Mr. Biden worked for just one very select group of constituents when he championed the bankruptcy rewrite, and that’s my point.
Fred wrote of “trust and loyalty”, as if black and Hispanic voters were the only constituents Mr. Biden worked for. I’m pointing out that when it was time to choose between working for the rich and powerful versus working for the poor and suffering, Mr. Biden chose the rich and powerful.
That’s just a fact.
Corporations are not people Christopher.
But they are staffed by people, and when you have a large business in a given jurisdiction they by definition have an impact on the economy of said jurisdiction. Heck even Elizabeth Warren has responded to the medical device industry in a way that some see as inconsistent with her record and views otherwise because those businesses are in MA.
For the record, she was wrong on that.
That’s a valid point for debate, but for me her actions in that regard are just as understandable, and for the same reasons. The presidency obviously has a different constituency than other offices. It was designed to be the only office with a national constituency. I say let’s put more stock in what the candidates propose to do as President than what they have done in other offices as long as the latter doesn’t completely shock the conscience. If you can’t understand or don’t like that being a Senator carries different political obligations and mandates than being President, take it up with James Madison.
I mean he was wrong about a lot of things too. Slavery being the first, women not being able to vote, and having a Senate. All bad ideas.
If that is a response to my Madison reference then I would point out we’ve amended the Constitution to eliminate slavery and ensure voting rights for women, but we still have the same basic structure he played a large role in creating. My point is the overlapping and sometimes seemingly contradictory mandates were deliberate, and I for one think are valid in a large and diverse federal republic.
For the record, she was not not, at all, wrong on corporations.
Corporations are, merely, an iteration on the idea of unions. Surely you are not opposed to unions?
While I, personally, don’t like corporations (and still less find palatable the power that they wield), I can’t find any method of legally denying their existence that does not, also, deny the existence of unions. I don’t, necessarily, like it… but there it is.
I suppose I could forgo unions to deny corporations. I’m not certain that’s an altogether sane methodology, however.
That’s nice Christopher. You aren’t most voters. My old bankruptcy firm represented several Obama-Trump counties in IN, MI, and WI not to mention the kind of districts we flipped in IL in 2018. All of these places were hit hard by the recession and foreclosure crisis. It would be very easy for Trump to lie and say he was unbought while pointing out all the money Biden took from the companies that made ordinary people go broke. Warren’s entire legal career was devoted to restoring consumer protections Biden helped eviscerate serving his home state.
What does it matter that I am not “most voters”? I’m not trying to be most voters. Last time I checked like everyone else I have the opportunity to cast MY own vote for the person I most want to see as President of the United States. If everyone does the same then the question of whom the party should nominate will answer itself. The party should nominate the person the primary voters and caucus attendees choose. This is why I don’t want to pressure people to exit the race yet. If I were either an unpledged convention delegate or a pledged delegate after the first ballot, then I would be more responsible for partisan strategy.
I’m simply saying most voters do not think like you and the “he’s from Delaware” defense won’t fly with them. Just as the “Hillary’s from New York” defense didn’t help her in 2016. Warren takes zero dollars from corporate interests or big donors. She’s unbought and unbossed. Trump lied about these things, but it helped him win primary debates and beat Hillary where it counted.
Like I said, I respect you and Fred for supporting your candidate. I wish you would both stop concern trolling when his primary opponents and their supports on this thread have legitimate criticisms about his record. It’s getting old and it’s not winning him any friends here.
I don’t concern troll so if you respect me as you say please accept that my comments are always sincere. Nobody has a perfect record, and I have said all along I prioritize resume qualifications when selecting a President. Are you suggesting that when critiques are made that supporters should not either defend the record or state why those critiques are less important to them?
First I would appreciate if we all recognize that this is a primary. If there’s is any appropriate time to have a debate about progressive values it’s a Democratic primary! You’ve both argued that in the past. That is entirely different from a “circular firing squad” or “progressive purity test” or “mental masturbation”.
Bernie said it best in his first debate with Hillary “I don’t give a damn about your emails”. It was all about policy. I think if we can center this debate on those grounds it’ll be healthier for the site and for the party. Harris’ criticisms of Biden on busing are valid and policy centered. She personalized the effect the policies had on her upbringing, and even Biden critics like Tom and Whoopi Goldberg have disagreed about whether that angle was fair. It’s still a debate with having, especially with black voters making up such a valued constituency
Fred’s gold standard is “most electable progressive”. It’s one I actually have adopted as part of my switch from Bernie to Warren. I might adopt it again if I switch back to Pete or adopt Harris.
For me, Biden doesn’t presently meet that test.
I should be able to say that without having to answer to charges of damaging the eventual nominee. Which to me has been the implied basis for a lot of these exchanges here recently. None of us knows who will win. If he wants to be nominated he should be willing answer his progressive critics rather than trying to silence them.
I certainly haven’t said you’ll damage the eventual nominee, and I have not interpreted the comments of others that way either.
Sure, but I don’t think you’ll need to. I think a majority of voters are ready for change and hungry for somebody new.
“Make America Hate Again” is IQ45’s message according to NY Mayor and presidential candidate Bill DiBlasio on Morning Joe today.