It's quite hypocritical of the liberals to cry about this when Trump does it, yet when Biden fat shames somebody, you're cool with it.
I don't message much around D&D, so you absolutely will not find an instance of me crying about anything really. Thanks for the response though.
Yet you felt the need to provide a lengthy, mocking, "trying to be cute and funny" response to me, claiming Don Jr is hypocritical? I guess you don't like it when I called you out that your side stoops to similar levels. mmkay.
Wow, now you're hurling insults and calling people intellectually disabled? I guess when you're out of fact, logic and reason, you have to resort to insults. It's all you've got left.
Disagree - I think there's plenty of upside. Assuming he wins the nomination, he needs to generate some excitement - which he alone doesn't really do. An exciting VP who will be the frontrunner in 2024 helps do that - whether he uses it demographically (minority, woman, youth, etc) or positioning (progressive, etc), he can excite some part of the base. If he's running again in 2024, no one cares much about the VP. Imagine, for example, Biden-Warren. Disappointed Sanders/Warren progressives will immediately get excited because they know she's the favorite for Dem nominee in 2024 if they win in 2020. Most people who want Biden to win want him because they think he can beat Trump - not because he's some sort of amazing guy they want to have as President for 8 years. This helps address that.
Well, he seems to be running away from the idea now. That should tell you what his advisors think of the idea. It makes him look weak and essentially a lame duck. The underlying narrative is obvious: it’s an admission that he’s too old to serve two terms. But at what point does he become too old? After year one? Two? Three? Four? The sheer fact that we even have to ask that question is a net negative. What you’re saying makes sense, and I don’t necessarily disagree with the logic. The optics of it, however, are terrible for him given his status as a shaky frontrunner that people are meh on to begin with.
Regardless of how you feel about the idea of "one term Joe", I think it is the inevitable truth and the responsible thing to do. Running for re election at 82 years old? Being president at 85+ years of age? Those strike me as not only implausible but also irresponsible. I can't see this ending up a positive for Joe in terms of perception unless he finds Obama 2.0 to be his running mate, and even then the idea is fraught with electoral peril. That VP pick is going to be the most scrutinized in history. And for what it's worth, this concern applies to Bernie as well.
Not sure I'm buying that. Being a one-term president isn't going to give your VP an incumbency advantage. The presidency often swings to the other party after the incumbent is gone, even if his VP is the party's next nominee. Bush Sr is the only modern example of a VP who was able to capitalize. Nixon and Gore were both VPs who became nominees and then lost. What is a real phenomenon, though, is that an incumbent president has an advantage when seeking re-election. All else equal, wouldn't it be better to pick a candidate who can definitely do round 2 then a candidate who will groom another candidate for round 2? That said, I'm not worried about these guys' ages. Totally fine with him dying in office. My only concern would be if his mental acuity started to erode and he didn't have the wisdom to recognize it and resign (or would bully his people into not invoking the 25th). If Trump went senile, I'm sure he still wouldn't give it up. But, Biden might.
I'm sure he has some drop off, just as Trump seems to have. But, if you've been around elderly people with senility, dementia, or similar you'll know it can get much, much worse. Don't need a president to be at the very height of his powers so long as he can hear advice from his staff and have the wisdom to separate the wheat from the chaff.
To clarify - I don't think it's helpful during the primary, for the reasons you all stated. But when he has to re-unite the party after a pretty divisive primary in policy terms, basically saying he's going to be a "caretaker" and basically just serve as an anti-Trump for 4 years with no other political ambitions can help heal wounded feelings and energize people who otherwise think their favorite candidate is irrelevant for 8 more years. It also makes it easier for him to theoretically push his "I can work with the GOP" argument (though I think that is hopeless anyway).
I agree with you on that. One thing I'm struck by is the acceleration of the pendulum. After the offense of electing Obama, we swung far in the other direction with Trump creating and even greater offense. If we swing so far the other way that we put a "socialist" in the Oval Office, the right is going to be irate and the blowback is going to be severe. Electing a moderate -- or even better, a caretaker -- may instead slow the pendulum swing and reduce the heat a bit in national politics. And, I feel like we're going to need a period of detox, of de-Trumpification, to rebuild the institutions that have been under attack. If the next president is not looking for a 'return to normalcy' but instead is pushing for the next big transformation in society, we're going to be doing it while wounded. It's probably not in the maximal interest of the DNC or the liberal agenda, but might be healthiest for the country, depending on your lens.
This is my biggest reason for being Pro-Biden. Basically, he's boring. I would like to go 4 years without hearing about how terrible the President is and having him or her in the news everyday. I feel like Biden turns down the temperature a lot and will recede into the background to some degree. Ultimately, for the long-term health of the country, I agree we need to stop bouncing back and forth on the pendulum - all we'd do is expend endless energy on policies that get overturned 4-8 years later and create constant uncertainty in people's lives.
