Paul Cantrell
Sigh. My thoughts on priorities now:
1. Unifying the front against fascism.
2. Unifying the front against fascism.
3. Unifying the front against fascism.
4. All hands on deck countering voter suppression & disenfranchisement.
5. All legal hands on deck when the election goes to corrupted and partisan judicial system.
6. Wait, did we do •everything• possible for 4 and 5?
7. No, really, there’s more
…
73. Who is the perfect candidate?
74. Who is the perfect VP pick?
Paul Cantrell
Why are 73 and 74 so low?
Every credible poll I’ve seen suggests that different possible Democratic nominees fairly about the same as Biden, more or less within margin of error.
This was going to be a tough fight with Biden. It’s going to be a tough fight now. This game was never about candidate choice.
Eyes on the ball, people.
Paul Cantrell
With the caveat above, a couple of passing thoughts:
(1) I’m still deeply suspicious of where this push to oust Biden came from. The press coverage was driven hard by •something•, and it wasn’t popular sentiment.
AOC’s theory still makes the most sense to me: this came from donors. The obvious replacement is Harris, and I’d be happy with that, but…odds are good we’re instead going to end up with a substantially less progressive candidate than Biden. Alas. (But see 1-3 in the OP.)
mike bayer :python_logo:
@inthehands 100% from donors who think they're smarter than us, and they read all of what Ezra Klein writes, and they're like, wait we're the billionaires here , we get what WE want. That's how this works so get in line
Paul Cantrell
(2) In my view, it was Clinton’s support for the Iraq war that first opened the door for Obama in the first place back in ’07. If she had opposed the Iraq War, she’d probably have been president in ’08.
It is possible that Biden’s failed handling of the Gaza War similarly opened the door for today; the left didn’t have his back after Gaza. It’s a reach, but it’s possible that support for bad wars undid two Dem presidential hopefuls.
Grimly satisfying if so…but pyrrhic if fascism wins now.
Paul Cantrell
@snarkyboy
Yup. See here: https://hachyderm.io/@inthehands/112725052119536016
Snarky (he/him/his)
@inthehands Because there IS NO PERFECT CANDIDATE. Every possible candidate has pros and cons, that's how politics work. Plus, the loose coalition that the Dems rely on for support have VASTLY different ideas on what the "perfect" candidate would/should/can be. So the "perfect" candidate for one group is imperfect to another. If Dems insist on finding the "perfect" candidate, they'll just in-fight to the end and hand the Presidency to Trump.
crater🐮n
@inthehands Johnson, 1968 presidential race. Vietnam.
Paul Cantrell
@cratermoon
Oh, very good point. Hopefully the outcome is different this time.
Paul Cantrell
@virtualinanity
Very much agreed with that last sentence. A real tragedy.
wasabi brain
@inthehands him as the candidate was 70% likelihood he would lose. Kamala is probably closer to 60% and some Midwest governor with no real name recognition is probably a toss up at this point. But just no path forward with him losing Michigan and Arizona because of his rightward turns on Gaza and immigration. It’s a pity because before Gaza he was most progressive president in my lifetime
Yeshaya Lazarevich
@inthehands
Pyrrhic is a hell of an understatement
Paul Cantrell
@alter_kaker
My server has a 500 char limit, but I could have gone on a while
Paul Cantrell
Whatever happens next — and I fully expect just wave after wave of chaos and bullshit — I’d beg everyone (including myself) this one thing:
Don’t assume we’ve already lost. Don’t surrender in advance.
Don’t surrender by wallowing in cynicism. Don’t surrender by despairing. Don’t surrender by yelling impossible ultimatums into the wind.
The future is not written. We fight. Now. Always. No matter what.
Paul Cantrell
@ShortStamp @dotsonapage
That was number •73• on my priority list above. Please do not neglect numbers 1-7.
Karen
@dotsonapage @inthehands That's my issue now-who is the best candidate who stands a chance of defeating 45? And I don't have an answer.
finsox
I’m fully willing to drink the kool-aid and act super duper excited from now until Election Day, but I am struggling mightily with not believing we’ve already lost.
Paul Cantrell
@finsox
Struggle harder. We have not. Full stop. There’s no support for that assumption in the data. There’s no support for it in history. You are hearing the voice of anxiety, despair, and fascists. Tune it out, like Meg in A Wrinkle in Time tuning out IT in her mind.
This is a toss-up, and everything counts. Everything.
Josh Ourisman :apple_old_logo:
@inthehands we’ve had four presidents who never had a vice president for their entire term of office, and I think two more who had no VP for their first of two terms. 18 total who lacked a VP for at least part of their term(s).
Picking a VP is definitely not top priority now.
dr 🛠️🛰️📡🎧:blobfoxcomputer:
@inthehands There is not one voter out there that was thinking "this Biden guy is pretty cool--I wonder who he is running against"
Every Biden voter will be a Harris voter. The question is, can she change the narrative?
(The narrative is obvs BS, but it still exists and needs to be changed)
Paul Cantrell
@_Jordan
It seems to be a popular feeling, for reasons that escape me.
Jordan Kay
@inthehands @dwineman Why would I assume we’ve already lost
Paul Cantrell
@mechawatts These are all good points, and I appreciate any and every dose of well-founded optimism.
Mechawatts
@inthehands Positives:
* Harris doesn't have to be President AND campaign.
* MAGA has already spent money fighting Biden *specifically,* so that's basically wasted now.
* Harris' pick for VP and whatever drama there is around her nomination at the convention might get enough media attention to get the undecided and Double-Haters out of their malaise.
* Harris' career as a prosecutor defangs the Right's Law-and-order scaremongering.
* Harris can speak on healthcare and equality issues with xp
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