The Joseph R Biden Jr. Presidency

It's a perfectly normal response. Certainly more normal than "lol remember when harris didn't become president".

Yeah. A really monumental occasion. I'll forever remember that hour when the she-boss became POTUS while Biden got his asshole cleaned.

The option of not caring is right in front of you.

It must be hard to be so edgy and cool all the time.

It is

Spoiler:

Should I drop a fat (tax deductible) student loan payment before the end of the year?

Or is Joe gonna drop a bomb on us and wipe out my debt

Duff... wrote:The option of not caring is right in front of you.

That's exactly the point. Nobody cares because it doesn't matter. I agree with you.

undo wrote:But how?

Explaining to regular people why corporations are bad for their well being.

Nearly every American deserves a 50% raise and we could easily provide that if we had a a reasonably progressive tax structure, while still maintaining all the free market bullshit that conservatives are obsessed with. This is the primary cause of the decline in the quality of life in the United States since the 1970s (https://www.epi.org/productivity-pay-gap/).

Let the idiots trade their Bitcoin, then just tax them at 90% and provide UBI, health care and a pension for every American.

My general, simplistic take is that people hate Democrats because they advocate for half-ass policies and then don't even pass those. If they moved away from the wonky talk about "insurance markets" and "tax incentives" and other bullshit and just said "we're going to make companies successful, tax them, and give you the basic tools to make whatever you want of your life", they'd win.

Unfortunately, most Democrats are liberals who don't believe that. Instead, they would like to exploit regular people slightly less than Republicans.

Duff... wrote:It's a perfectly normal response. Certainly more normal than "lol remember when harris didn't become president".

Not in my book. It's a media-coached response to react to symbols of progress rather than progressivism. That's why publications like the NYT write it up like it's a big deal. I think you and most people who celebrate these things are just following their lead, as we often do when forming our political opinions. In general, I think the vast majority of people don't have their own political worldview and primarily parrot back things they've heard from someone else.

A procedural transfer of power under the constitution means nothing. I don't think reacting like it's a sign of the future is positive at all. It's "normal" in the sense that it is frequently covered by the media who create our sense of normalcy, but we should always question who is defining normal and if it serves us. I think it's meant to create the illusion of progress and discourage people from seeking real change.

If you wanted to celebrate her, the election was the time to do that. Or her recent France trip. Or whatever thing she actually does to affect the world.

I really think that the board liberals should listen to your more radical counterparts and try to understand where we're coming from. Even when some people do it aggressively

To Nick's point about her unpopularity, she is certainly quite unpopular and her recent poll numbers have been a story. I think there's a number of factors.

First, poll numbers aren't really that important IMO and polling has been trending down for awhile now. Politicians are less popular now than ever, so it makes sense her numbers are bad vs historical norms.

Second, she's a woman and female politicians are usually rated as less likable.

Third, she's a brown woman and they are also usually rated as less likable.

Four, and quite important, she has big "I'm cynical and fake as fuck Hillary vibes". She's so transparently calculating and people don't appreciate it. That's the reason she's always been divisive in California. She tries to have it both ways as the "tough on crime Attorney General" and the "woman of color who believes Black Lives Matter and we need police reform." She didn't reform shit when she was in charge! There's really not anything to like about her as a progressive.

***

It has been cool boarding about politics with your guys since I was a literal teenager and it's fun to see how everyone's views have or haven't changed. I appreciate that we can occasionally share these views, even as the overall cohesion of the board has fallen off a cliff.

None of what I'm saying is in anger. I know that I'm a weird dude and I have a niche point of view. I enjoy hearing from y'all who have a different idea of what's important.

chrondog wrote:

Duff... wrote:It's a perfectly normal response. Certainly more normal than "lol remember when harris didn't become president".

Not in my book. It's a media-coached response to react to symbols of progress rather than progressivism. That's why publications like the NYT write it up like it's a big deal. I think you and most people who celebrate these things are just following their lead, as we often do when forming our political opinions. In general, I think the vast majority of people don't have their own political worldview and primarily parrot back things they've heard from someone else.

A procedural transfer of power under the constitution means nothing. I don't think reacting like it's a sign of the future is positive at all. It's "normal" in the sense that it is frequently covered by the media who create our sense of normalcy, but we should always question who is defining normal and if it serves us. I think it's meant to create the illusion of progress and discourage people from seeking real change.

If you wanted to celebrate her, the election was the time to do that. Or her recent France trip. Or whatever thing she actually does to affect the world.

I really think that the board liberals should listen to your more radical counterparts and try to understand where we're coming from. Even when some people do it aggressively

Jesus fucking christ. Like you're not wrong in your analysis but the only thing that happened here is someone made a pointless swipe at Harris and someone pushed back. No one's throwing a parade over this.

Nick said she was one of the least popular presidential candidates ever. She was briefly a front runner so that obviously isn't remotely true. The end.

I’m actually looking forward to when Pete is the nominee and liberals are trying to convince me that “Mayor Pete” is a real candidate and better option than whatever monster the Republicans put forward.

Duff... wrote:Like you're not wrong in your analysis

Thanks so much!

I've boarded with Nick long enough to know he's trolling 95% of the time. He's exaggerating about her unpopularity, but I get the gist of what he's saying. In general I wish people would troll less often in these discussions, but that's a losing battle that I'm done fighting.

I think Ned's remark that, "First Woman to Hold US Presidential Power is actually a headline that I am pretty excited about" was worth pushing back on and WP was right that it reads like "out-of-touch liberal parody". I think everyone here is pretty smart and (mostly) good faith, so the difference here was interesting to me.

You/Ned/undo started trying to dunk on people for even having an opinion and everyone was talking past each other. I thought it warranted a breakdown. Plus, I was rolling after my first post responding to undo. I like writing out my perspective on this stuff because it helps me figure out what I really think.

It's just a post.

Nick wrote:I’m actually looking forward to when Pete is the nominee and liberals are trying to convince me that “Mayor Pete” is a real candidate and better option than whatever monster the Republicans put forward.

Some people at this stupid fucking elite international relations program that I am attending worked for Mayor Pete's presidential campaign. I try to just tune out entirely whenever he is brought up in conversation but recently I told one of them that I'll happily vote for Donald Trump in 2024 if the DNC makes Peter their nominee. They all think that I am joking.

I'm still not with you guys on voting for Republicans or not voting as a remedy to useless liberalism! I think it's pretty easy to be electorally smart while not wasting too many resources on electoralism, and I don't think that electing reactionaries is a boon for socialist movements. The U.S. doesn't even have a real leftist movement, so how would that even work in this country?

I'm going to keep advocating for more radical bullshit AND voting for shitty Democrats everytime.

Pete is my only exception to the rule. A truly sinister man, imo. I'd never consent to be governed by someone like that. I actually voted for Hillary and would have voted for Biden as well if I lived in a state where my presidential ballot really mattered. I'd probably for Kamala or whatever other uninspiring milquetoast the party spits out in a few years time. At this point, I've given up all hope and barely even pay attention to American politics to be honest. But every self-respecting man must establish some limits and Pete is mine.

WP64 wrote:Pete is my only exception to the rule. A truly sinister man, imo. I'd never consent to be governed by someone like that. I actually voted for Hillary and would have voted for Biden as well if I lived in a state where my presidential ballot really mattered. I'd probably for Kamala or whatever other uninspiring milquetoast the party spits out in a few years time. At this point, I've given up all hope and barely even pay attention to American politics to be honest. But every self-respecting man must establish some limits and Pete is mine.

I think this is trolling and you won't stand behind it if push comes to shove.

Sure, it sucks that Pete is the same old shit (or even more extreme) and people are eating it up because of identity politics. But is he truly sinister? Worth voting Republican? That seems insane to me. The bleakest thing about him is that we've seen the same thing 100 times before.

Not paying attention to politics is the best thing you can do, as I've argued many many times. Yet, I still can't stop because my life is a treadmill of meaninglessness and I consume to feel something

My days of dunking are over, I will "troll" here but I hope never in a mean-spirited kind of way.

I really don't believe Pete will ever be president, Dems don't listen to voters but will just appoint whoever is next in line (Obama was the once in a generation exception to this) and Pete will never climb the ladder let alone still be around in 20 years. Cannot imagine him enjoying any rise or even treading water into the mid 2020s.

chrondog wrote:

Duff... wrote:Like you're not wrong in your analysis

Thanks so much!

I've boarded with Nick long enough to know he's trolling 95% of the time. He's exaggerating about her unpopularity, but I get the gist of what he's saying. In general I wish people would troll less often in these discussions, but that's a losing battle that I'm done fighting.

I think Ned's remark that, "First Woman to Hold US Presidential Power is actually a headline that I am pretty excited about" was worth pushing back on and WP was right that it reads like "out-of-touch liberal parody". I think everyone here is pretty smart and (mostly) good faith, so the difference here was interesting to me.

You/Ned/undo started trying to dunk on people for even having an opinion and everyone was talking past each other. I thought it warranted a breakdown. Plus, I was rolling after my first post responding to undo. I like writing out my perspective on this stuff because it helps me figure out what I really think.

It's just a post.

I yelled at a couple of senior citizens last night for prattling on about murder weapons and crime in chicago for 15 minutes ruining a dinner I'd just spent 4 hours making. I get that nihilism is a reasonable response to the bleak present before us and bleaker future we all have to look forward to but I don't really need this bullshit in my life particularly here.

I'd also invite you to revisit who was starting to dunk on who, here. I wasn't really defending Harris so much as Braden.

I replied to Nick’s comment because it smacked of unnecessary out of the blue misogyny the way so much of the tired, leftists big mad at Kamala Harris narrative does. And the “she boss” bullshit WP responded with suggested the he does, in fact, care.

I just get really fucking annoyed when folks who are otherwise advocating for good policy keep proving that misogyny is alive and well on the left.

I think my politics are becoming increasingly revanchist, which probably is a reflection of my petit-bourgeois socio-economic background. I am sure there are gendered and racial aspects as well. But to reduce politics to a competition over which "folks are advocating for good policies" is incredibly reductive. The Obama years should have dissuaded anyone from believing that, imo.

There is a reason that Mayor Pete refuses to disclose the consulting work that he did at McKinsey. He was apparently tasked with the innocuous duty of instituting "market reforms" in developing countries, which means fundamentally reorganizing the allocation of resources based upon price signals. Who really cares if the poorest in a society are unable to afford bread as a result, right?

Once you realize how liberal elites actually go about manufacturing consent for their rule (not democratically) and how they reproduce themselves sociologically, it is really, really difficult to ever offer them your support no matter how odious the alternative option might be. As someone who spends time around the children of wealthy people who organize fundraiser events for Democrats, I am painfully aware that we simply are not on the same team.

When we’re talking about politics on a national level, some reductivism is called for. The point of my post was that unprompted, inaccurate misogyny was uncool.

You’d be hard pressed to get the average American voter to understand and agree with all that complicated political theory. Why lose the audience right outta the gate by being misogynist?*

*fully aware I’m probably giving the audience too much credit here.

I’m still trying to figure out how that post was so obscenely misogynist.

Eh, it wasn't that bad.
WP and Chrono were pretty much right that it would be ridiculous for me to actually be excited about that historic headline. But it was and is a historic headline. As is Harris the politician.
But to use the headline as an excuse to call her the most unpopular, terrible, whatever... when she... isn't? That seems like misogyny. And bitterly taking swipes at women when the option of not doing so is right there in front of you would be a good step for a leftist movement that's had its problems with misogyny.

Anyway, my reflexive desire to defend Kamala Harris does probably come across as a bit silly on a board of mostly leftists. But I think there’s a discussion to be had on WP’s use of “revanchist” up thread. Correct me if I’m wrong, but doesn’t that typically refer to a politics of resentment, revenge... a desire to get back something that was taken from you? Very understandable position in a country where the middle class was gutted and runaway wealth and unchecked capitalism led to this insane wealth gap...

But. I tend to shy away from the politics of resentment in the age of trumpism. A leftist politics of white male resentment is gonna have a real hard time becoming the gold standard when the fascists and religious fundamentalists have pretty much cornered that market. Any winning coalition from the left is going to need to focus on women and black and brown voters. And unprompted attacks on the most high vis, most powerful woman of that demographic in the history of US politics is a bad look imo.

Ned Braden wrote:a good step for a leftist movement that's had its problems with misogyny.

To be completely honest, I have literally no idea what you are talking about. The majority of the members of the informal socialist caucus in Congress are women of color (Talib, Ilhan, AOC, Pressley). In cities like Chicago, the socialist movement is being led by black female union representatives working in the public sector like the late Karen Lewis. My critique of Kamala is entirely ideological and has nothing to do with her gender or race. She just sucks. Period.

And yeah, revanchism is a politics of revenge. It isn't scientific. I am just being honest about what motivates my own personal disdain for liberal virtue signaling. The left needs to learn how to fuel popular resentments upwards (by focusing on class) rather than allowing the right to always redirect them downwards (towards migrants and the poor). I grew up in a comfy middle class suburb but all of my grandparents were semi-literate working class immigrants. They were all New Deal Democrats and trade unionists. None of them were able to reach their full human potential because of the circumstances of the birth.

It is for that reason that I spend my free time trying to help the labor organizing efforts of Black migrants in southern Italy. It isn't motivated by liberal universalist principles of human rights (although of course that isn't a bad thing to believe in) but out of an absolute undying commitment to make sure that the same liberal bourgeoisie Italian families that exploited by ancestors won't get to do the same to these African migrant workers. There is no reason why personal resentments cannot be directed towards social justice campaigns. If you've ever actually talked to a black woman in a non-professional setting you'll realize that they've got a whole lot of social resentments and personal grievances to be channeled into the public sphere.