8mo ago

But it'll all be fine, I'm sure it'll blow over and never affect me

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If you live in Nevada, Arizona, Texas, Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Georgia, or Florida (really any of the fifty states, but these are the most critical), AND you don't want to see Donald Trump elected for a second term, you must vote for Joe Biden in November. Yes Biden is a doddering old man who is experiencing rapid cognitive decline, and yes it is totally unacceptable that these are our choices, but disengaging does not solve the problem, it only makes it worse.
Believe me, I completely understand the inclination to just say to hell with it and check out, but we can't do that. I have been as guilty of it as anyone but I now fully recognize it was a mistake. But it's not too late to make it right. Voting is not only a right, it is a responsibility. If we, the people, want to rule, we must be vigilant and responsible.
Right now, our priority is damage control and harm reduction. I know, it has been that way for far too long, and that is extremely frustrating, but it is nonetheless the reality of the situation. We must vote for Biden this year, and then we MUST stay engaged so that we can work toward nominating the best possible candidate in 2028. We must stay informed and vote, diligently, in every state, local, and primary election.
- Decisions are made by those who show up; it really just comes down to that.
  And if the other side is better at getting people to show the fuck up…. You need to make an effort to do the same. Even if it is a far from ideal choice.
  
  If the other side is better at showing the fuck up*
  Ftfy we are the sides. Cavalry ain't comin
  
  Everything you said should be enough to get people to vote, but the sad reality is reducing it to that may not be enough.
  I understand why it isn't enough for a lot of people. I think the biggest reason people don't vote is they don't feel their vote matters all that much, and/or they see a certain futility in the whole thing. I understand why, in the face of that apparent futility, many people feel powerless and thus choose to disengage. But, yes, as you've said, disengagement does nothing and the only way to take back power is greater engagement. The powerful want us to feel powerless, they want us to be disengaged and they want us to be misinformed, thus we gain power by being informed and engaged, which will lead to us feeling empowered, which promotes even greater engagement.
  
  Personally, I vote in every election. I’m a very well educated, very well informed voter. I know the issues, I know the candidates, I know their track record. Basically, you couldn’t find a more ideal voter. But, I only have one vote.
  And so does every illiterate, uninformed, uninterested person who might stumble into a voting booth by accident.
  The only thing I CAN do is show up, and hope an idiot with a different view stays home. And even if they vote as well, I’ll at least have the satisfaction of knowing I negated their vote.
  I might not always get what I want, but I’ll damn sure show up just in case more of my guys do. Voting is a team effort and I’m doing my part.
  
  You can also combat the propaganda, misinformation, and poorly informed people on social media. You can donate and volunteer, too.
  
  I wonder if it would help him to frame his campaign more along those lines “you’re not just voting for me, you’re voting for my entire administration.”
  
  Really needs to highlight the key players in his cabinet. Dudes like a master bench carpenter.
  
  Don't forget to contrast it with Trump's circle!
  Disbarred rapist hair dye sweat lawyer Giuliani
  Somehow-less-appealing than Karl Rove strategist Steve Bannon
  His daughter
  His son-in-law
  A postmaster who didn't see the need to keep mail sorting machines
  Alina Habba
  ...I'm sure he'll stick Mike Lindell in charge of something too.
  It's a real turd dream-team.-
  
  Any President who encourages a genocide is by definition a bad President I'm sorry to say. The ethnic cleansing campaign is already almost complete, all on his watch with his defending Israel and giving them weapons and cover in the UN and in public. Hell, he even lied about the reason on the debate (the one thing he lied about and Trump told the truth about lol). People should still feel free to vote for him, especially if you live in a swing state, but we shouldn't minimize that millions of Gazans are currently refugees. I hope he fucking shapes up on this issue by November. I don't want him to take all these votes for him as an endorsement of his pro genocide policies.
  
  Thanks, I dislike that, too. The difference between this genocide and others, is that the US is directly involved in this one. Palestinian children are being killed by our bombs, dropped by equipment based on our technology, from deals we've given them, and ordered by politicians we are supporting. If the US wasn't involved, I wouldn't care as much. But they are. Blinken runs interference for them, defending Israel at every opportunity. We block resolutions against them in the UN. The press uses loaded language with Hamas and the passive voice with Israel caused tragedies and massacres. We promise retribution against the ICC if they prosecute Netanyahu (if you ever need proof we're the baddies, look at that. Threatening vengeance against international court when they are trying to punish a genocide). Biden has gone around Congress to give stuff to Israel multiple times. They avoid applying any pressure to Israel to let in aid, instead using the vastly inefficient and more expensive failure of a pier. He keeps saying it's not a genocide despite a bunch of other countries saying it is. They block news of bad things Israel does and actively lie about it. People in his administration have left over these things. I agree with you that the US should be less involved and not be the World Police. But you seem to think this means I want us to go in. If we were not involved, that would be a VAST improvement over the status of quo, of being involved in purely bad ways. At least if we weren't involved, I wouldn't feel responsible as an American in a democracy to use my vote to affect change in some way, to do good, agonizing over whether to vote for a "Hitler" because his holocaust is abroad and he's got better domestic policies. I hate the DNC for putting those of us with a conscience in this position.
  Now, this doesn't mean I think people should vote for Trump. Maybe I should've emphasized that more. He's obviously worse. But he's not causing this right now, Biden is. So he's a bad President. I can acknowledge he's better than Trump on this and all other issues, and still criticize him for that.
  I agree some explanation would be nice at least.
  
  For one, there has been some sort of genocide level event happening somewhere in the world pretty much continuously for decades.
  We're not selling any of them arms at the moment.
- doddering old man who is experiencing rapid cognitive decline
  Only in the media. Also, according to the media, the orange 34 count felon is completely fine, A-okay, in fact.
  Get a grip America. Biden's policies are popular with Democrats AND Republicans
  
  Didn't watch the debate, huh? Its all true.
  
  I did. But I also watched a number of his speeches before and after. He over prepared and tripped over his own feet. Reagan likely was in decline for over half his years but they celebrate him now.
  Biden did horrible, but he seemed unnaturally prepped to me. I don't care what the practiced Biden does, I'm more concerned with what he's like over a cup of coffee or an ice cream cone.
  
  Didn’t watch the debate, huh? Its all true.
  Now do more than watch the debate. Listen to Biden speak on every other recent occasion. Would you like to be judged for your worst performance or your average?
  
  There's a reason why people were saying he was like this for years now. Funny how it was all confirmed the instant it wasn't completely controlled n scripted.
  
  There’s a reason why people were saying he was like this for years now. Funny how it was all confirmed the instant it wasn’t completely controlled n scripted.
  An assertion that is easily proven false, of course. But hey, let's not let facts get in the way of a good yarn.
  
  So do you just lie all the time?
  
  Someone said it best a couple weeks ago here.
  "Just because Alfred is getting too old to take care of things doesn't mean you put the Joker in charge of the Bat Cave."
  
  We aren't talking about trump right now
  
  He does fine, when there is a teleprompter.
  
  You got downvoted, but it’s very clear that the Adderall shortage hit the nominees hard.
- If you want to be more strategic, if you can convince right wingers to not vote that also can make a difference. Feed your red-hat uncle's ideas about how voting is rigged so he shouldn't bother. Tell your maga neighbor you'll drive him to the polls and then don't.
  This is an existential crisis. Don't think the right wing won't do anything they can to win.
  
  Or convince them to vote RFK. My dad would normally vote Trump, but he's an anti-vaccine nutter, so I'm trying to convince him to vote RFK instead.
  
  This is such a great strategy, also mention how tRump passed the Unconstitutional bump stock ban and doesnt give a damn about the 2nd amendment.
  
  If the republicans win, I wonder what the MAGA cultists' reaction to the immediate repeal of the 2nd amendment would be. The republicans would never allow citizens to own guns since that'd be a threat to their rule.
- The problem is, the people who are swayed by this argument were already going to vote Blue no matter who.
  To win the election, you need to convince voters who are still doubting between Trump and Biden. And they have definitely heard this argument before, so a different argument is needed.
  
  No, the point of the argument is to convince the people who are not planning to vote at all to show up.
  
  The last presidential election had ~60% turnout. That's one of the highest turnouts EVER. People sitting at home are indeed the problem.
  
  While voter apathy is a big problem, it is likely that voter suppression targeted at the tie breaking areas has more of an effect on the overall outcomes. Suppression includes duscouraging engagement, leading to apathy.
  Like I have voted in every election that I could, but my electoral college votes always went to the person I voted against. Even locally the vast, vast majority of my votes were for the losing party. It is really hard to not be apathetic, and for me voting is a breeze.
  
  Agreed. And to your point, competitive states without voter suppression like Wisconsin and Michigan had turnout of around 75%, while Texas (which is most known for suppressing voters) only achieved 60% turnout.
  
  Texas is mostly a cultural issue. The left in this state are a bunch of defeatist do-nothings who think Texas will always be red. I cannot tell you the number of times I've talked to a like minded person, asked them about voting, only for them to give some half-hearted excuse why they didn't/won't.
  With the way early voting works here, suppression is hard to pull off. For 2 weeks you can show up at any polling place to vote, even the ones in the rich white neighborhoods. The last time I voted, it took all of 10 minutes. There's no doubt some fuckery with voter registration, but you have plenty of opportunity to check your status online ahead of the election.
  
  I have read a lot of reports on how Texas doesn't provide polling places in poorer, minority neighbourhoods, forcing them to travel far to vote.
  And I have also heard reports of people who had to stand in line for hours to vote in Texas. Again, in poorer, minority neighbourhoods.
  Are you saying those reports are not true?
  
  they're true and you'll only see them the most in houston and san antonio and a little bit in a dallas and austin.
  source: me, a poor brown man who used to live in texas and tried to vote there for 5 years.
  the excuses they come up to de-register you are with are laughable to hear; but texan officials will say it with a straight face and texan "liberals" will justify it by saying "it's the law".
  
  moving from san francisco to austin has taught me that texan "left" is further right than in most places; but yes, they're defeatists to the extreme and it makes sense given the state's political recent history.
  
  The left in this state are a bunch of defeatist do-nothings who think Texas will always be red.
  Couple that with a state party that cuts funding to progressives because they're not republican-adjacent enough.
  
  While voter apathy is a big problem, it is likely that voter suppression targeted at the tie breaking areas has more of an effect on the overall outcomes. Suppression includes duscouraging engagement, leading to apathy.
  And Congress could have done something about it when Democrats had the majority in both houses. In one hand, they had the John Lewis Voting Rights Act, and in the other, they had the continued preservation of the Jim Crow Filibuster.
  Democrats chose to keep the filibuster.
  
  So "Shut up, we're not going to listen to your concerns, we are owed your vote" is sure to work!
  
  The debate fallout has made the fence-sitters' decision for them.
  Dems need a parachute candidate pronto. Kamala would win, too.
- Ohio used to be a swing state, too, right? Not sure of it still is or if it isn't, how that turned around. But maybe they should be in the list?
  
  We went for Obama twice and trump twice. It’s complicated. We’re mostly just extremely gerrymandered and divided. Columbus is extremely liberal, rural Ohio is frequently terrifyingly conservative
  
  We did do the right thing in most of the special elections these last twelve months, though
  
  Hell yeah we did. We often do the right thing when faced with a direct democratic clear choice.
- Important to talk to people we know, and make sure they actually vote.
- If you want to be more strategic, if you can convince right wingers to not vote that also can make a difference. Feed your red-hat uncle's ideas about how voting is rigged so he shouldn't bother. Tell your maga neighbor you'll drive him to the polls and then don't.
  This is an existential crisis. Don't think the right wing won't do anything they can to win.
- But ~~the economy~~ rich people's yacht money though!
- It would be nice if Biden or the Dems or really anyone had a plan to protect us or to somehow stop what we're seeing happen before our eyes, but it just seems that there's no end and the second a republican gets in power it's all over for us
  
  I can't count the number of times I've heard people insist that Biden's DOJ is doing a great job, but also that all these Republican leaders are committing crimes with impunity.
- I so want nothing to do with this election, I feel so defeated and disgusted by all of it BUT I keep reminding myself that if I don’t vote then I essentially voted for whoever ends up winning. And that could easily be Trump. And in my view he’s not just an awful candidate, he’s an existential threat eat to democracy. So I will vote. But damn, literally almost anyone else could beat Trump, why this is our choice is so insane.
- Hear hear
- If it's that dire, why is it not more important than Biden's massive ego and power hunger that he doesn't care to step down even if it pretty much means Trump's gonna win?
- You need to vote to make sure the electors just ignore you.
  Get the plane tickets while they’re cheap.
- you must vote for Joe Biden
  The problem with the Handmaid's Tale was that people just didn't vote hard enough.
  
  I've never read the Handmaid's Tale, I really don't know much about it. I don't know how analogous that story is to our current situation, if it is at all. But I do know that there is a real danger posed by Trump and the Republican party. Is the Democratic party completely harmless? Absolutely not, but I don't think they are as great a threat to democracy as the Republicans. We should vote for Biden as a harm reduction measure. Yes, just like in 2020. I know people get tired of hearing that, I know people are fed up with the constant hounding to vote for the lesser of two evils, but that is the situation we are in.
  That being said, voting for Biden in this general election lIs iterally the bare minimum that we must do to defend democracy, and if that is all we do, no, it absolutely will not be enough. I think a lot of us, myself very much included, dropped the ball over the last four years and didn't do nearly enough to try and push for more meaningful changes. That has to change, and, again, I'm including myself in that. I need to do more, most of us do. We need to do everything we possibly can to ensure that by February 2029 we will have a better president in the White House, a better Congress, and a better supreme court, as well as better governors and better state legislatures in as many states as possible.

162 comments