Presidential Debate Thread

[Edgy MD]

Of course there are. I know it well.

I just don't agree that he doesn't present evidence of cognitive decline.

[batmagadanleadoff]

I don't know what indicts President Biden as being in cognitive decline that somehow doesn't indict former President Trump. He's a walking string of incoherent nonsense.

Absolutely.

Please. In normal times, this cocksucker's political career would've been over eight years ago the moment he insulted a Gold-Star family. Or right after the release of the Access Hollywood grab 'em by the pussy tapes.

He cheated on his wife with a porn star and was convicted of 34 felonies for related crimes he committed. And thats being treated like not even jaywalking. His approval rating went up as did donations to his Presidential campaign.

[batmagadanleadoff]

Of course there are. I know it well.

I just don't agree that he doesn't present evidence of cognitive decline.

Of course he's showing evidence of cognitive decline. Powerful evidence. At every one of his retard rallies. So what? It doesn't seem to matter.

[Edgy MD]

So I disagreed when it was asserted otherwise. That's so what.

[batmagadanleadoff]

But again, so what? He was at the center of what should go down as the worst crime in this nation's history. He tried to steal an election with fake electors and then with a violent mob. If the mob had killed Mike Pence as part of the plan, he wouldn't have lost a half a second of sleep. Because he's a psychopath, too. And he'll get away with all of it just like the old Mafia bosses got away with everything in the days before RICO statutes because SCOTUS just made it possible. Only the street level thugs and enforcers will pay the price. Like the January 6 mob and underlings like Sidney Powell and Rudy Giuliani. And even then, if he wins the election, he'll pardon all of them anyways.

[Edgy MD]

Again, you're picking a fight with me over something you agree with.

If you think I shouldn't post that I disagree with someone that you also disagree with, I don't know what to tell you. When someone asserts something to me that I disagree with, that's what I do. It's what you do also.

[batmagadanleadoff]

Again, you're picking a fight with me over something you agree with.

If you think I shouldn't post that I disagree with someone that you also disagree with, I don't know what to tell you.

I'm not picking a fight with you. You need to use better words.

[Edgy MD]

No, I don't.

[batmagadanleadoff]

Don't you realize that when the scumbag said a few years ago that he could probably shoot somebody down on Fifth Avenue and get away with it, he was as accurate as a Tom Seaver fast ball? This country has lost its political mind.

[Edgy MD]

Absolutely nothing I've written suggests that. I haven't spoken to that at all, so this is pointless. You're taking issue with me for whatever reason, but it's not about me at all.

[batmagadanleadoff]

No, I don't.

You do. If you're accusing me of picking a fight with you, you need to use different words because I'm not picking a fucking fight with you. You gave us your "so what". I responded with my "so what". So what as in "so what because it doesn't fucking matter". So what?. The nation is in a Twilight Zone or Bizarro world of politics where this piece of shit should be trailing in every poll by twenty or thirty points. He's not. Because his bad acts don't seem to matter. Hence so what. That's what. So what. Stop taking every fucking thing personal.

[Edgy MD]

Of course it's personal.

You are addressing me, personally. About myself.

I agree that it has nothing to do with me. But it's me you're projecting your unhappiness onto, coming at me over all sorts of things that don't actually represent me at all.

I won't sweat it, but please don't ask me any more questions.

[TransMonk]

I'm bolstered by the election results in England and France this week showing that sane people can reject giving far-right and incompetent policy makers majority power.

As much as Brexit may have been a harbinger for Trump in 2016, I hope this is a sign that bullshit can be overcome in the USA this year.

[metirish]

Different systems though, as you are well aware , while Labor won 412 seats their overall vote % was 34 nationwide, I don't think the average voter here pays attention to elections in the UK and France

[TransMonk]

Sure, I was speaking more about the macro-politics of countries not sliding further into bad situations.

Obviously, apples and oranges in the process and representation. Most Americans don't understand the US system, much less any European systems.

[Lefty Specialist]

Over 200 left- and center-left candidates in France voluntarily withdrew to allow the vote to consolidate against the far right. That's teamwork.

That's my hope here, that people realize 'hey, this could be really bad' and work together to defeat the far right. Remains to be seen.

[whippoorwill]

How do their elections work? Are they over several days?

[Edgy MD]

If former President Trump loses (again) and starts fomenting and starts fomenting a putsch (again), I suppose he can be arrested on the spot under the president's orders.

[Frayed Knot]

Dem Reps Gerald Nadler (NY), Joe Morelle (NY), Adam Smith (WA), and Mark Takano (CA) call on Biden to step aside.

[Frayed Knot]

How do their elections work?

In the U.K. the local member of Parliament you vote for (roughly equivalent to your Congressman) in the national election helps to
determine which party leader in the next Prime Minister. This means that the P.M. always has the majority in the Parliament.

The complaint about our system and its Electoral College is that the popular vote winner isn't always the actual winner. But their system
often isn't any better. In the U.K. elections this week the Liberal Party won 63% of the seats in Parliament by winning 34% of the vote.
But now that's the party that will control both the executive AND legislative branches until the next election ... which will happen when
the party in power decides it will happen. That's supposed to happen in the next five years but the party in power can alter that time
frame if they so choose.

The British Conservative Party (roughly equivalent to out Republicans) took 24% of the vote but hold just 19% of the Parliament. The
Liberal Democrats won 12.2% of the votes and will hold 72 seats in Parliament, while the Reform Party received more votes (14.3%) but
will control MANY fewer seats (5) compared to the party which finished third. iow, the party who received fewer votes will control approx
14x as many seats.

[Edgy MD]

What I see as a flaw in British and Irish parliaments — that the prime minister/taoiseach always has control of the legislature, giving them full power and the minority the role mostly of complaining and discrediting the majority as best as they can until they can ultimately win defections from the governing coalition — the British and Irish I've spoken with defend this system pretty vigorously.

I imagine a president of the US guaranteed to have the legislature on his or her side would push through extreme legislation unchecked, and when the opposition gets in power, the first thing they'd do is overturn 100% of that legislation.

But it doesn't really work that way over there. You start throwing out popular programs, and you don't get four years until those people with the longest memories get to try to take it out on you. You instead can get thrown out pretty quickly. Amazin'.

[metirish]

[Chad ochoseis]

It's a nice thought. But nobody is saying the process doesn't matter, and nobody is attempting a coup. People are just asking him to recognize that he needs to voluntarily step aside unless he can demonstrate that he continues to have the mental capacity to handle a campaign through November, so that the only government-owned buildings Trump ever sees the inside of again are courtrooms and prisons.

And we need to recognize that whether he steps aside now voluntarily or when Mother Nature forces him to do it in the next couple of years, we're really voting for President Harris.

[Edgy MD]

For what it's worth, the two stations I listen to in the car have a CSPAN affilliate in between them. When neither college outlet has a satisfying song, I stop at the CSPAN station and listen to public affairs until they start taking calls and I get outraged at how horribly misinformed we all are.

On the weekend, lacking official public affairs to broadcast, CSPAN often airs candidate rallies. I hear Biden in these and he sounds lucid, focused, and inspiring. I realize he has a teleprompter, and he's frequently repeating a text from a previous rally, but you can hear him going off script comfortably, responding to the audience, correcting himself without being confused if he trips over a word.

I don't now what the answer is, and I fully realize that an account of him with a script in front of a supporting audience is a low bar to clear, but he clears it well and professionally and even polished, low though it may be.

* * *

Also, one small optimistic neuron in my head fired the other day. People's impressions of Vice President Harris were set early, years ago. The press absorbed her act, drew their conclusions, and cemented it into the mindset of the populace. It has largely gone unchanged over the last four years except to get distorted in the cycles of malice of the monstrous, never-not-campaigning wing of the Republican party. But my notion is that she has surely grown in her poise and ability to project herself in public in the last three years, all while being scarcely covered, and if she gets thrust into the spotlight, she may take a lot of folks by surprise.

Indeed, being a former prosecutor, and a dogged one, she may be just who America needs to confront a criminal and treasonous opponent.

I emphasize the word "may" of course, because I can only guess at the unfolding scenario, and it was just one neuron firing.

* * *

Also also, it's kind of waste of words (and at least a little disingenuous) for President Biden to use his letter to his fellow Democrats to make the case for himself over former President Trump. For them, it's certainly not a choice between those two for president, it's a choice among President Biden or Vice President Harris or somebody else for candidate.

And the primary, of course, wasn't actually a contest, so much as the typical bypassing of a contest that an incumbent is almost always given by all but the most radically divergent party members.

[Bob Alpacadaca]

This was an interesting part:

“I feel a deep obligation to the faith and the trust the voters of the Democratic Party have placed in me to run this year. It was their decision to make. Not the press, not the pundits, not the big donors, not any selected group of individuals, no matter how well intentioned,” Biden said.

“The voters — and the voters alone — decide the nominee of the Democratic Party. How can we stand for democracy in our nation if we ignore it in our own party? I cannot do that. I will not do that.”

This is technically a letter to Congress, but it's really open letter to the world. Now, it's much easier for him to send a letter. The written word doesn't show signs of decline. He needed to say something like this at a podium, forcefully and clearly. That would be much more convincing to people who are skeptical.