Tuesday, July 09, 2024

Interesting...

Seems a definite pushback re Biden support within Democrats is happening:

 

I see the New York Times columnists are still pushing hard on his leaving - including Krugman today.

Oddly, I thought that Ross Douthat's recent column on the matter (in which he explained why he thought Biden would probably eventually give up) was decently reasoned and moderate in tone.   But it also seems wrong? 

A few other random thoughts that have been flowing through my head:

*   the polling effect of the situation seems to be dribbling out painfully slowly;

*   Trump's behaviour seems to indicate that he must, for once in his life, be taking advice from other people (that advice being:  as much as possible, keep out of this! keep out of this! Let the Democrats eat themselves and don't interrupt.)

*   the situation is so novel, my gut feeling is that there is still good reason (despite the rapidly approaching election date) not to trust polling at this point in time.  I mean, Trump will now definitely be free to go accept the Republican nomination, due to delay in sentencing.   Yet it still seems a good chance that he will be receive a sentence that restricts his campaigning.   But with him, that may actually help, because many theorise it helps his popularity with "undecideds" if people forget how bad he was first time around.   So who knows the net effect of that?  On the Democrat side, I think people are underestimating the turnout motivation for Democrats, regardless of the nominee.   Those worried about the obvious Christofascist agenda that Trump implausibly denies he would help enable, as well as women worried about their rights generally, will have good reason to vote regardless of who the nominee is.   I mean, if the most plausible replacement for Biden now is Harris, voting for Biden and Harris still means you do get Harris if Biden is later definitively diagnosed with a problem large enough to end his presidency.  So why would you not vote for Biden now?    And if a Gazan peace plan is finally realised, that also helps the small sliver of Democrat voters saying they won't support Biden.     

* what happened to Planet America last week?  Having a break when they could go on for hours about this?


 

3 comments:

  1. Hard to disagree with Kruggers

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  2. The first response to the Krugman articles links to an article by James Carville that argues ousting Biden is an imperative. He proposes a way forward.

    There is something going on behind closed doors. Biden has made it clear he will not stand down but there are plans to have him removed. Carville and Co's plan is desperate and I don't share their optimism about there being enough time but he may well be right, Biden will become worse. If there was any possibility he could improve that should have happened last year.

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  3. Biden was only supposed to be in there for one term!

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