Xhieron

It would be very, very bad. A Haley presidency is less outright catastrophic than Trump II, but it carries its own set of terrible knock-on effects, chiefest being what it means downballot. If Haley wins the White House, it potentially also means the GOP also won Congress by non-nominal margins:

For Haley to win in a hypothetical match-up against Biden today, she’d potentially represent a 2 to 4 point better performance than Trump in the same hypothetical match-up (or more). That is, the GOP performs at least 2 points better in the Presidential election today if Haley is the candidate. That’s going to ripple down to close House and Senate contests. Haley is a scary nominee because she can actually flip voters, something that neither Trump nor DeSantis can do (spoiler candidates notwithstanding). Partisanship is high, and people who vote Haley because they view it as a return to GOP normalcy are likely to also vote for other Republicans on the ballot–even psychotic MAGA Republicans, because voters tend to be uninformed.

All of that is to say that while a Haley presidency might not be disastrous in isolation, it wouldn’t be in isolation. It would be in the context of potentially complete GOP control of the federal government. That’s a nightmare scenario for the future of the Republic and democracy in general.

So if your state has open primaries, vote for DeSantis in your local GOP primary, and vote for Biden in the general.

And this is an argument to fundamentally sacrifice the good on the altar of the perfect. Would it be better that minority positions, accomplishments, and experiences were taught as part of broader curriculums? Of course–but they’re not. Doing away with Black History Month doesn’t address that, because the alternative isn’t a broader solution, but to simply do nothing. BHM is a bandaid, but if you rip off the bandaid, it’s still a wound. With the bandaid there at least we’re forced to acknowledge the wound.

Similarly, giving away cash in the form of loan forgiveness doesn’t solve the problem of greed in upper education, but it does alleviate pain felt by an entire generation of working Americans. This is a perfect example of the problem: the fascists blocked the relief, and then what happened? Did we muscle down as a society and get to work on the difficult problems of moving higher education away from the current profit-motivated model? No, of course not. What happened instead? Right: Nothing happened. Tuition is still reprehensibly high. The only difference is that the last generation of borrowers continue to suffer, just like the next will.

The point is, BHM is not an alternative to systemic policy changes to address historic racism and other discrimination: it’s a stopgap, and lobbying for its abandonment isn’t lobbying for a societal pivot to more effective ways to address the problem. It’s lobbying that black history not be taught at all.

What on earth are you talking about? Joe Biden tried to give 20k to each of them who went to college. And he would have if the–let me check my notes here: oh, right–Nazis in the other party hadn’t sued to prevent him from giving away money.

I appreciate that Biden might not be some folks’ first choice, but if you think young people believe another four years of Grampa Joe is just barely more tolerable than the deliberate annihilation of the Republic by fascist traitors, you might need to meet one.

Lol. A bunch of folks, including Donald Trump, are saying exactly that. It’s part of the reason we’re even having this conversation.

I think the reverse is much more likely true. People are more likely to have deeply held religious beliefs and just not belong to an institution or identify with organized religion. See: https://www.pewresearch.org/religion/2023/12/07/spirituality-among-americans/

Atheism is certainly on the rise, particularly “soft” atheism or apathetic agnosticism among younger people, but it’s much harder to distinguish between people who have a deep conviction that there is nothing supernatural in reality and those who believe that, for example, there is a loving god or gods, but that god or gods cannot be explained scientifically. Members of both of those groups would nevertheless draw a hard, firm line between them, and that line would be easy to miss if the only thing you’re counting is how many people claim membership in an institution.

I agree that consequently, while data about religious affiliation might essentially be accurate, it probably paints a misleading picture about religious and spiritual belief. I just think the number of folks who believe in something immaterial is more likely to be higher than numbers portray–not lower.

Nope. You’re still wrong, but it’s not worth the trouble. I hope you never have to learn the hard way. Take it easy.

None of these are (speaking generally) legal requirements of an agreement in the US.

Source: Am lawyer who writes EULAs for a living.

There are plenty of good arguments for why a particular EULA might be legally problematic, but “no signature, no contract!” isn’t one.

Estuans interius …

Oh you bet your ass she does. She’s seen the actuarial tables. Even if all of Trump’s legal woes went away, his next VP would still be much more likely than the typical office holder to actually get the top chair. In a Trump and Biden match up, no matter who wins there’s a reasonable chance the VP ends up finishing the term.

That old white guy tried to forgive my student loans, and he failed only because the fascists on the other side of the aisle want us to be poor so we can’t supplant them. I don’t care if he’s a thousand year old Nosferatu. I will cheerfully vote for Biden with my head up and my eyes open. He wasn’t my first choice four years ago, but he’s been an excellent President.

I care a lot more about whether the President has good policy than whether he’s in my preferred generation. More importantly, I trust Joe Biden with the federal government. There are a great many young Democrats, even some ideologically closer to me, for whom I can’t say the same. Four more years of Grandpa Joe, especially with a Democratic Congress, could easily be the best chance the US will have for forward momentum in a century.

And it’s beginning to snow. 🎶

Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair.

It’s not complicated. The reality is that most Americans just aren’t socialists. They’re not fascists either–at least not yet–but voting blocks that have been reliably Democratic for the last fifty-ish years (since the GOP adopted the Southern strategy) are only in the party by default. Black families have historically been relatively conservative, as have Hispanic families. That the Democrats are left of the only other major party only makes it the party of Marxists and anarchists for want of an actual left party, since the alternative for the young generation of leftists is to essentially not participate in the political process at all.

It’s a consequence of first-past-the-post elections and the way campaigns are funded, but the result is that the Democratic party includes elements that are genuinely right of center, but it can’t risk alienating them because right of center represents the majority of the country’s population. If the Democrats were to lose the Marxists on its far left flank to a true left party, the GOP would just win every national election. Similarly, if the Dems lost its conservative labor wing in the Rust Belt, same outcome. In a parliamentary government, or if FPTP were eliminated, those two wings would be separate parties and form a coalition to govern (and the fascists on the right of the GOP along with more traditional conservatives like Romney would similarly be separate parties). Since we don’t have that, the two parties basically have to try to stay as close to the ideological center within their own caucuses as possible, because any deviation in either direction hemorrhages voters and loses elections.

Make no mistake: the GOP political strategy involves shutting the government down and shifting public opinion so that Biden eats the blame for it. They lost the messaging fight this time, so they kicked it down the road so they can try again next year. They want “Biden Shutdown” in the news at election time, but they’ll settle for increasing the deficit by cutting programs designed to help the old, poor, and vulnerable while defunding the profitable IRS so they and their rich donors can continue to commit tax fraud and evasion. If they play their cards right, they can have both, because it doesn’t matter anymore what’s actually going on in DC. It only matters what the propaganda outfits can enrage people about.

Oh yeah? Well I love Joe Biden, and I’m not ashamed to say it. Let’s talk about the last two administrations:

Joe Biden tried to forgive my debt. Donald Trump tried to take away my health insurance. Joe Biden thinks we need more trains. Donald Trump thinks we need more walls. Joe Biden lowered my student loan bills. Donald Trump raised my taxes. Joe Biden released people who were convicted on marijuana charges. Donald Trump locked up children for coming to the US. Joe Biden wants to be president. Donald Trump wants to be Vladimir Putin. Joe Biden told me to join a union. Donald Trump told me to drink bleach.

Is the Biden administration perfect? Of course not, but the man has actually tried (and occasionally succeeded) to do things that would actually benefit me personally. https://www.whitehouse.gov/therecord/

The reality is that for most people on most days, what’s happening in DC has only a very small impact on our lives. Our state and local governments are vastly more consequential. But this administration, despite being faced with an opposition party composed of literal fascists, is fighting tooth and nail to make life better for real people without losing the Republic in the process. Given the current state of SCOTUS and Congress, it’s nothing short of a miracle Joe Biden has accomplished anything at all. He’s not as far left as me, but he’s as far left as we’ve got right now, and never mind the fact that the other guy wants to destroy our country so he can stay out of prison.

Joe Biden has conviction, he has compassion, and he has ability. I like the agenda, and I like the man.

He is. One piece is the US. The other is China.

No one on that side of the aisle is deliberately leaving the prick in Congress. It wasn’t going to pass due to Republican obstruction, even if the entire Democratic conference had voted for it (and the Democrats previously initiated a measure earlier this year). The question wasn’t “Do you want this asshole out of Congress?” It was “The asshole stays. Do you want your opponent next year to get to campaign on you voting to oust him prior to a conviction, and do you want to be on record for being in favor of ousting Congress members without a conviction if the GOP takes the chamber and decides to weaponize the practice in '25?”

Conviction is the rubric because it’s a bright line with a high bar. Bad public opinion and lying on the campaign trail is just politics. This year’s egregious exception is next year’s status quo. Notice how everything is an “insurrection” for the fascists now? Same deal.

Electioneering isn’t just an argument. It’s the only rational argument.

Good luck fighting off Pentagon drones with your hobby weapon.

Yes, and while we’re at it, yes to any other bad faith strawman argument you’ve got. GTFO with that bullshit.

In the civilized world, you have to justify your need for a gun with the presence of the aforementioned varmints. No yard, no varmints, no gun.

No one needs a machine gun to hunt deer, and no one needs a handgun. Handguns are lousy for self defense (“buy a shotgun”, to quote the President). All they’re good for is killing humans and making gun shareholders richer.

And no gun is going to help you if the government comes for you either. The cops are coming with tear gas, body armor, and tanks, and most importantly there’s no amount of cops you can kill that will get them to leave you alone.

All of the justifiable bases for having a gun are solved with a double barrel shotgun. Even if you’re being mauled by a bear, if two rounds of buckshot don’t stop it, you weren’t gonna make it anyway.

License shotguns like cars and get rid of everything else. “Only criminals will have guns!” That’s what your shotgun is for. And if the criminals are getting locked up for having mobile armories, even better. We can replace the current prison population of black drug users with actual gangsters.