“We’ve never been a pure democracy” sure sounds like “No True Scottsman” to me. More like oligopoly, than any kind of democracy, really.

But hey, don’t listen to me. I didn’t moderate my rhetoric to your preferred tone while casting aspersions at the Holy Democracy of America. XD

I getcha.

Yeah, the necessity of our current times seems to be following that 80-year generational cycle…

What’s sad to me is how all of this has seemed inevitable since at least as far back as the DNC boosting Trump and conspiring against Bernie in 2016. I couldn’t have guessed the form it’d take, but I knew that our Von Hindenburg Moment was on the way since the '08 crash got followed up by the astroturfed Tea Party pulling Republicans to the right while Occupy Wall Street went nowhere at all.

What’s scary is that I still can’t see even a vague outline of the future past 2025. I wouldn’t even bet we’re having elections in 2028, much less what Trump will do with the new criminal immunity for presidential acts and a supreme court majority in his back pocket.

Nobody’s coming to save us, so it’s up to us to save each other.

I getcha.

Yeah, the necessity of our current times seems to be following that 80-year generational cycle…

What’s sad to me is how all of this has seemed inevitable since at least as far back as the DNC boosting Trump and conspiring against Bernie in 2016. I couldn’t have guessed the form it’d take, but I knew that our Von Hindenburg Moment was on the way since the '08 crash got followed up by the astroturfed Tea Party pulling Republicans to the right while Occupy Wall Street went nowhere at all.

What’s scary is that I still can’t see even a vague outline of the future past 2025. I wouldn’t even bet we’re having elections in 2028, much less what Trump will do with the new criminal immunity for presidential acts and a supreme court majority in his back pocket.

Nobody’s coming to save us, so it’s up to us to save each other.

I.E.; not actually leading the charge for human rights, following along only when not doing so would have hurt their standing, and taking credit for reluctant half-measures implemented through the courts (and overturned just as easily by current courts) rather than having put in the effort to amend the bill of rights or at least to pass a federal law while they had the chance.

Seems to me that an action can have more than one purpose, and you aren’t exactly refuting the fact that Biden is losing in the polls and Republicans know it.

The uncertainty of a larger undecided pool is exactly what the DNC needs right now.

As it stands, there’s very little to suggest that my 2016 prediction that Trump would take back the presidency this year is incorrect. Biden isn’t doing any better than Hillary was at this time in the campaign cycle.

We need to get back to the point of not being able to tell who is going to win before we can swing it the other way, and switching from the candidate polling at -3 to either of the -2s puts us a third of the way there and gives us almost 50% more undecided voters to work on at the same time.

Another specious conclusion?

The polls’ own graphics show Trump losing two points to the “undecided” category in head-to-heads with most other candidates after the debate, and most of those alternative Democrats are only polling one point behind Biden.

I can understand the DNC being reluctant to switch candidates for a net polling gain of a single percentage point, but the fact that they aren’t fighting tooth and nail for every single vote they can swing is why I’m confident that they’ll be throwing this election just like they did eight years ago.

Oh, definitely not. This format is explicitly for pissing off nationalists.

Simply dismiss the validity of the governing body they worship by reference to the historical contingency of its creation, then sit back and watch as they work themselves into a froth trying to justify their imagined superiority without reference to their mythic founders.

If by “some level of Democracy” you mean that the only people whose opinions have a statistically significant impact on policy are the wealthy and a select few corporate lobbying orgs, then I don’t disagree.

Science proved that America isn’t a democracy over a decade ago: https://talkingpointsmemo.com/dc/princeton-scholar-demise-of-democracy-america-tpm-interview

I recall Democrats not getting on board with gay marriage equality until after polling showed it to be more popular than banning gay marriage.

It doesn’t come from the poll, it comes from an analysis of the results of the poll.

Also, if your best candidate is polling at the same level as an unknown, generic member of the same party, then your best candidate is a nobody.

Of course they are. Threads like these are full of die-hard blue party voters who refuse to hear any criticism.

Nah, the DNC went back to the 2016 playbook. It’s “His Turn” now and nothing is going to convince them otherwise. There aren’t even any promises, just the demand for our votes and the automatic assumption that anyone who isn’t a Biden stan is either a Trump stan or a Russian bot.

This, but unironically.

America is a country that carefully maintains the appearance of democracy with none of the substance.

"Never believe that anti-Semites are completely unaware of the absurdity of their replies. They know that their remarks are frivolous, open to challenge. But they are amusing themselves, for it is their adversary who is obliged to use words responsibly, since he believes in words. The anti-Semites have the right to play. They even like to play with discourse for, by giving ridiculous reasons, they discredit the seriousness of their interlocutors. They delight in acting in bad faith, since they seek not to persuade by sound argument but to intimidate and disconcert. If you press them too closely, they will abruptly fall silent, loftily indicating by some phrase that the time for argument is past."

-Jean-Paul Sartre

I interpreted “Dems are aiding and abetting genocide” as Gaza.

That’s only the most egregious example, I have to be nonspecific because of how many ethnic groups the Democrats are helping wipe out. Between letting the Navy poison Hawaii’s water supply and supporting the ongoing economic blockade of Puerto Rico, you’re spoiled for domestic options.

If this is what the Republicans want, why have they already filed a lawsuit to prevent the Democrats from giving the nomination to another candidate?

There’s no hiding secrets from the future.

Biden could issue an executive order requiring hospitals in red states to perform abortions or else lose their medicare funding, but won’t.

Biden could reverse his position on deportations, instead he issued an executive order to reject all asylum requests by undocumented immigrants.

Biden’s attempt to apply Title IX to trans folks like myself has been nice, but it’s not nearly enough to make me forget what he’s spending my tax dollars on.

Biden could start doing good and incredibly popular things like ending our support for genocide, but that would piss off AIPAC and those lobbyists opinions’ mean more than those of voters.

You can tell yourself that I’m a russian bot if that makes you feel better. I hope the comfort of dismissing all criticism as foreign influence is worth the consequences of repeating all the mistakes made in 2016.

I’m not getting my hopes up.

Republicans are openly planning for genocide, sure, but the Democrats are actively aiding and abetting genocide right now.

They will not suddenly find their principles and start treating the Reublican party like the existential threat they are. They will not take any action which might ensure Trump loses the election. They are more afraid of losing their campaign financiers than the campaign.