I would feel better if those who are supposed to be political experts didn't beclown themselves this way. The choice is:
1) Biden
2) Harris
3) Total chaos / royal rumble, serious risk of coalition crack up.
Leading an anti-fascist coalition is very hard. There is no Aaron Sorkin solution here.
You could propose:
Biden holds a press conference from the East Room with Harris: "I don't think I can serve another full 4-year term. I'm not running, endorsing Harris, and telling all my delegates to vote for Harris."
At least that is a halfway plausible plan. Anything else courts disaster.
anyway I can’t think of any way that unceremoniously ejecting the incumbent Dem president from the ticket, four months before the election, with no agreement on a successor, no process to pick one, and most people pushing the idea assuming it WON’T be the vice presidents, could possibly backfire
yeah i'm not convinced the congressional Republicans would vote no, but that is of course a good point
nonetheless, they could swap roles in the campaign for purposes of the November election
again, i'm just thinking this out loud here, i totally get that it may make no sense or be dumb
Absolutely. The complete failure to engage with the fact that a contested convention basically means - at best! - recreating the bitterest, sharpest rows from the middle of the primary season a little over two months before the election is maddening.
As you know, I am pretty sceptical of reading race into *everything*, but the repeated failure of all these people to admit that the only feasible non-Biden choice *is* the black Vice President is remarkably notable - absolutely honking foghorn here.
Do you think it’s that she’s black more than that she is a woman? Or both? (Genuine qu). What I see (from afar) of the red states seems to be v heavily and systematically targeting womens’ rights. Appreciate this is Dems but still…
I suspect it’s both tbh. Or a subtler thing where she isn’t perceived as what British politicians used to call “clubbable” (you could hang around with someone at your private club, rather than club to death) because of race and sex. But I doubt a white female VP would be overlooked like this?
Yet these pundit dipshits think people would magically stop being sexist and racist because someone didn't deal with a firehouse if lies on live TV is driving me up the wall.
Let’s say the pundits get their contested convention. Is there any realistic way that a brutal fight among delegates doesn’t alienate voters? And will those who favor someone who lost still vote for the winning candidate? This scenario is all downside.
Indeed. A brutal fight *on television*, where the people picking the nominee have not been chosen to actually pick a nominee but to lool good confirming Joe Biden - somehow going to produce an upside for the Democratic party…how exactly?
I’m not seeing any of their opinions explain why a “better”candidate than Biden would make a difference. Biden IS a better candidate than Trump but Trump voters are not assessing things rationally.
The contortions to avoid Harris are deeply unseemly; the base could possibly get input as to who Harris should choose as her VP but that’s basically it.
And to what end? A candidate is supposed to be built up over many months. Of the 12-15 names regularly floated, the average voter would recognise the name of 3-4, but identify with any policy position? 0-1.
How would that be a viable candidate later this year?
They can't, but also they shouldn't.
Yes, obviously. The Democrats are not having a public fight on TV. Some Democrats are briefing the press about their panic - but that is many, many degrees less bad than doing it live on air.
I agree a contested convention could be ugly. But I think anointing a candidate without any democratic input, especially when that candidate has been chosen by the same people who insisted on Biden, will create its own unique ugliness - and people advocating that option are overlooking that.
As @jbouie.bsky.social has pointed out elsewhere though, this would also likely mean him resigning the Presidency with immediate effect. He cannot be unfit to be a candidate while simultaneously being fit to be President.
I think that would have been a reasonable thing to say a year ago, but not now: I have to do this extraordinary thing of dropping out after I seemed out of it in the debate...but really I'm fine for now?
That avoids a messy open convention and doesn't alienate black women. But is Harris a better match up against Trump than Newsom, Whitmer or Shapiro? I don't think so.
This morning my brain was mulling over the complete horror of the GOP response to anyone other than Biden.
When Trump calls the new Dem nominee illegitimate and disqualified from office and beats that drum nonstop and media asks every Dem for 4 months if that person is legit it’s gonna be not great
Bonus bad time because he could skip the fall debate with some excuse of how it’s not legit and then boom part of the reason to swap (Biden can’t debate) is null
I mean much of the online left in 2019 was saying Biden shouldn’t run at all. And they were as delusional as these brokered convention normie liberal dipshits.
