Current Affairs Joe Biden POTUS #46

[BirkenheadBlue]

Thats a very hard question to answer in a yes or no isn't it? It depends what his strategic goals were, surely?

Well the same as the strategic goals of most people who run in a Primary, I'd imagine?

To win.

If that WASN'T his goal (as posited as an option by @Ruairi77) and his goal was to move the Party line to the Left, then what are you guys complaining about??!! Mission accomplished!

 

[catcherintherye]

wow,
Biden was the VP to a black president for 8 years.
Biden would vote for and endorse Sanders in a split second over Trump.
I'm kinda stunned that the message you seem to be getting is so far off base.

Ok so because he ran with Obama that negates his support for segregation?

Obama is a long way from Sanders politically. He too was quite a centrist, moderate Democrat. The sort of program Sanders would have presented for America, to look at America's military, to look at healthcare, at labour reforms, systemic racism etc butcrucially the concept that ordinary people can govern society would have been far too dangerous. I'm not saying he publicly states his support, but privately he'd rather have a Trump governing America.

We have seen it in this country. Multiple Labour politicians broke ranks to publicly support the Brexit leaning Boris Johnon, never mind privately.

These people are millionaires, in the pockets of the super rich. They know what side of the bread is buttered and all that.

 

[Ruairi77]

Fair enough, I didn't drill down to regional polls. No national polls, in fairness it looks pretty close. Bidens peak lead appears to be 10, Sanders 9. At certain moment each of them had a slightly bigger lead over Trump, and I probably looked at a time when Sanders was ahead,

Either way, not allowing Sanders to run, was an ideological not a practical decision, which is sort of the core point here.

Sanders did run,
infact, Sanders was allowed to run on the Democratic ticket wit out joining the party. Pretty accommodating.

 

[catcherintherye]

to become president and if he couldn't do that, drive the party left.

If he wanted to become President I'd say it was a mistake. If his aim was to drive the party to the left, maybe not.

I think it's a good question though, and a weakness for Sanders. It's difficult to know exactly what his game plan was.

 

[BirkenheadBlue]

Well I've given you headline voting figures. There is also a likelihood in key marginals, Michigan, Iowa etc Sanders polls strongly. I mean I haven't seen said polls, but on the ground the offer of a radical alternative from Sanders could have played very well.

They didn't want a socialist running. They chose to run with an awful candidate in 2016 who could very easily have achieved the impossible of having Trump win, over allowing a socialist to run. Thats the reality.

Bernie might well have beaten Trump, it'll be one of the great unknowns of US politics forever. But I don't believe there was much polling around to show he had a better chance than Clinton did during the Primaries.

 

[BirkenheadBlue]

Ok so because he ran with Obama that negates his support for segregation?

Obama is a long way from Sanders politically. He too was quite a centrist, moderate Democrat. The sort of program Sanders would have presented for America, to look at America's military, to look at healthcare, at labour reforms, systemic racism etc butcrucially the concept that ordinary people can govern society would have been far too dangerous. I'm not saying he publicly states his support, but privately he'd rather have a Trump governing America.

We have seen it in this country. Multiple Labour politicians broke ranks to publicly support the Brexit leaning Boris Johnon, never mind privately.

These people are millionaires, in the pockets of the super rich. They know what side of the bread is buttered and all that.

Oh come on... The conflation with the UK/Labour situation was ropey enough, but don't then bring Brexit into it for goodness sake. It's not like there was some hard dividing line between Labour and the Tories on that issue. (And I'm VERY VERY VERY pro-Remain, for reference)

 

[tsubaki]

Can people stop conflating the US and UK on this issue please?

As awful as Johnson is (and god knows, he truly is) he isn't - or at least certainly WASN'T at the time of the election - as historically unpopular and hated as Trump is. You can certainly argue that he SHOULD be, but he isn't/wasn't.

I think this overstates the importance of getting rid of Trump though; that it is the focus of their efforts and they’ll focus on unity to that end. There isn’t any reason to believe that.

Centrists have had well funded goes at unseating AOC, Omar and others where dodgy links and uselessness were ignored so long as they replaced the left. Why would they stop that if they’d lost power?

@tsubaki @catcherintherye
Question for you both, and I'd really love just a 'yes' or 'no' answer just on this one question.

Was it a bad strategic decision for Bernie (especially after what he'd learned in 2016) not to join the Democratic Party before running again in 2020?

No, because it binds people by it. If the Dems allow non-Dems to stand then why should he have signed up?

 

[Ruairi77]

Ok so because he ran with Obama that negates his support for segregation?

His support for segregation was 40 years ago, he came out and apologized. Normally this would just be pandering but he went on to become the right hand man to the first black president. He never rocked the boat and did exactly what was asked of him.
In America, the symbolism of this was huge. It's why Biden has such huge favorability numbers among African Americans.
His devotion to Obama gave him South Carolina and then super Tuesday. No one would consider him a racist.

 

[catcherintherye]

Bernie might well have beaten Trump, it'll be one of the great unknowns of US politics forever. But I don't believe there was much polling around to show he had a better chance than Clinton did during the Primaries.

Well I mean common sense would tell you he had a better chance. Lots of people warned about it and polling indicated he had a better chance as well. However, preventing a left leader and ensuring a centrist figure standing was more important than beating Donald Trump. I mean that is indisputable from what happened in 2016. They got what they wanted and we all have to pay the price for their idiocy.

 

[Ruairi77]

If he wanted to become President I'd say it was a mistake. If his aim was to drive the party to the left, maybe not.

I think it's a good question though, and a weakness for Sanders. It's difficult to know exactly what his game plan was.

Sorry, i know it seems like i'm picking on you but I think Sanders's game plan was extremely clear.
It didn't work in 16 and he changed nothing and tried again in 20 where he got wiped out.
He should have joined the party and built consensuses with the moderates in the years in between.
He'd have had a much better shot and would have fostered a less hostile base.
His politics are bang on (except for his stance on immigrant visas) but his process is open to question.

 

[BirkenheadBlue]

No, because it binds people by it. If the Dems allow non-Dems to stand then why should he have signed up?

This is where the logic falls down. The Democrats could easily have changed the rules between 2016 and 2020 to only allow registered Dems to run, but they didn't.

One of the biggest problems that people have with Bernie is that his record of consensus/coalition building is weak at best. This would have been a (small) step to allaying some of those fear.

Unless of course he had no real desire but to win, and was just trying to move the party line - in which case he succeeded in his aim!

 

[Ruairi77]

If the Dems allow non-Dems to stand then why should he have signed up?

To build party unity. Maybe the other candidates wouldn't have been so quick to jump on the Biden band wagon before super Tuesday if they saw Sanders as a team player.

 

[BirkenheadBlue]

Well I mean common sense would tell you he had a better chance. Lots of people warned about it and polling indicated he had a better chance as well. However, preventing a left leader and ensuring a centrist figure standing was more important than beating Donald Trump. I mean that is indisputable from what happened in 2016. They got what they wanted and we all have to pay the price for their idiocy.

Can you link to those polls?

It's NOT indisputable though is it. Saying "well Hillary lost so it's indisputable" is post hoc thinking.

 

[BirkenheadBlue]

To build party unity. Maybe the other candidates wouldn't have been so quick to jump on the Biden band wagon before super Tuesday if they saw Sanders as a team player.

This.

 

[tsubaki]

To build party unity. Maybe the other candidates wouldn't have been so quick to jump on the Biden band wagon before super Tuesday if they saw Sanders as a team player.

Unity doesn’t extend to people on the left though, as we saw. Signing up to a system that’s rigged against you, and will actively go after you if you don’t go along with it, is daft.