How Popular Does Biden Need to Be to Beat Trump? Not Very.
nymag.com
Given the current state of partisan polarization, it’s unlikely Biden can get majority job approval next year even with the most fortunate set of circumstances. But the good news for him is that he probably doesn’t have to. Job-approval ratings are crucial indicators in a normal presidential reelection cycle that is basically a referendum on the incumbent’s record. Assuming Trump is the Republican nominee, 2024 will not be a normal reelection cycle for three reasons.
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Hillary lost because she couldn't read the writing on the wall and told everyone she deserved to win because it was her time. She was the worst person on the planet to go against Trump. The GOP spent 30 years demonizing her and she played right into their hands. Biden should have been the candidate then but that is hindsight.
And even with all of her mistakes and her total lack of charisma, she still only lost because of an archaic system that lets the winner of the popular vote lose.
It's not like this system was sprung on her at the last second. She didn't take it into account. She pretty much ignored key swing states that wound up going to Trump.
She was carried in a palanquin across the finish line in the primaries and didn't understand that she had to run the rest of the way.
Bruh. She ignored a lot of close call battleground states and instead spent the end of the campaign doing "victory laps" in solid blue states like Cali because she was obsessed with beating Obama's popular vote total...
You could argue her and her campaign should have known better, I just don't know where you'd find someone who disagreed to have that argument with.
And that's not even getting into how with population growth, popular vote totals will be record breaking damn near every election.
She was supposed to have the best campaign team in modern history, and either they were too stupid to know what the electoral college is, or they were unable to talk sense into Hillary and get her to actually win the election instead of her fucking self esteem tour to make her feel good about herself after losing to Obama.
I'm just tired of people making excuses for her one second like it's her first day in politics, then trying to claim she's the greatest political mind of her generation the next.
It can't be both.
"Shattered" is a book which goes into a bit more detail about what went wrong with the Clinton campaign. Also, this particular review represents a rare moment of lucidity from Matt Taibbi, back when he hadn't quite completed his devolution from whip-smart political correspondent into a Trump apologist for some fucking reason.
I'm not defending Clinton in the least, man.
You said she only lost because of the electoral college like it's some weird thing no one knew about...
Maybe you didn't intend to defend her, but that's what you did.
He also said "with all her mistakes and total lack of charisma". It read, to me at least, as anti-Trump and not pro-Clinton. (Even a bit anti-Clinton, as defending someone by saying they have no Charisma is... a weird way of going about it at least.)
She "only" lost if she didn't know how the scores were counted?
If neither her nor or her entire campaign team knew what decided the winner of a presidential election, I highly doubt that was the only issue with her campaign...
You will have to talk to @PugJesus@kbin.social about the valid usage of the word "only". They also said "many mistakes", so they also seem to agree that there were many other issues with her campaign.
My only point was rightly accusing Clinton of having a complete lack of charisma is a weird way to defend her. But honestly this hill has already made me too tired to bother dying on. Have a good one!
You are not wrong.
This is like saying basketball is archaic because it lets the team with the most hoops lose.
If we were deciding our leadership based on basketball games, I'd sure as shit say it was archaic.
Biden had just lost his son and didn't want the job. He later said he regretted that decision.
It's not just that, also remember that Biden had made a minor career out of losing the Democratic Presidential Nomination before Obama asked him to be VP. Much of the reason for that is that he had the tendency to say dumb shit. Remember all those "Gaffes"?
I don't think Biden could have ever become President before Trump, because we used to have higher standards for what was "Presidential". But once Trump became President, now all the dumb gaffes Biden makes are no longer a liability.
I admit I have been more impressed with Biden then I thought I would. I think a big issue is he is a much better President than he is a candidate for President.
All those "dumb gaffes" are because he has a stutter. It's actually way more impressive how well he's trained himself out of doing it constantly.
They're not all due to his stutter. He didn't stutter when he said this about Obama:
The entire nation regrets that decision.
She absolutely was. And with the pied piper strategy, she basically said who she thought the worst candidate was in the opposition's field, then lost to him.
biden would have easily won, being the outgoing vp of a well-liked (by most) two-term president. him not running in 2016 is, i think, ultimately what enabled the hateful, incoherent, diaper-wearing buffoon to even have a chance--which was only enhanced by the dnc playing favorites and essentially handing the nomination to clinton.
i get the 'why' he didn't run; but man, it sure fucked-up this country (and beyond).
Nope.
What gave trump a chance was Hillary boosting him because she thought she had a chance against him, but no chance against even Jeb Bush.
https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/11/hillary-clinton-2016-donald-trump-214428/
Also, the structure of the Republican primary meant that the person with a plurality of votes got all the delegates. And because there was such a split field and Trump was a celebrity, he got a lead in delegates which gave him more press.
if biden ran in 2016, clinton would have been a non-factor. dinglebutt would have still made it to the ballot only to waddle home in defeat.
Then why did Clinton feel her team had to boost him?
Do you know more than her campaign team?
I totally agree.
That year was probably when we would've gotten "peak" or near-peak Biden, but that was around the time when his other son Beau Biden had died, which I thought was the reason he sat out the Primaries, which might've made them a bit more interesting, but would've had the same effect of shutting Sanders out. The way I remembered it, Biden essentially saved the 2012 Obama campaign against Romney, as Obama had been having a shitty campaign and debate performance up until Biden went up against Paul Ryan and dominated. After that debate, things seemed to turn around and I thought he was a shoe-in for 2016.