We trust millions of Americans to vote by phone every week for something as important as Dancing With the Stars but a trivial matter like Democratic Primary is a bridge too far?
If enough Dems didn’t want Kamala there would be a process for some kind of open race. There isn’t. No bid deal.
Remember we have parties that elect candidates by whatever method they choose. Lots of “undemocratic” rules on the R side since Donnie took over.
I have a short memory but I imagine reason most didn’t like her before was because they already loved Bernie
ETA or maybe that’s why they hated her so much more than why they didn’t like her
She got outflanked by Bernie and Warren on the left and Pete was the more appealing young candidate. She was a promising candidate with no path who is probably most remembered ironically for delivering a flaming takedown of Biden in one of the debates.
Let’s also remember that Kamala has shifted heavily toward decriminalizing marijuana
1 Like
It’s not even lukewarm.
I have a young person in my home who says his friends are super stoked, and the reason is because they hated Biden. So I’m a little worried that will fade with time.
2 Likes
A terrible VP like Pain can do serious damage to a campaign, but in my lifetime I don’t think there’s been a VP pick that was a huge help.
Gore probably best VP in our lifetime, followed by Biden.
Evangelicals were still kinda trump-skeptical in 16 before the pence pick IIRC. That was close enough of an election that it might have actually made the difference.
Now I’m not sure if you’re being ironic? What do you think the presidential field would have looked like in 2016 and in 2020 without a primary process? One of the strongest empirical results I know of from political science is that first past the post leads to a 2-party system.
I mean we have Kamala as a coin flip to be president, almost exclusively because Biden picked her to be VP.
Hey Doc, good to see you’re still around.
1 Like
Hil and Jeb? Idk, what difference does it make what I think about that?
Sure, so what?
For sure, I think maybe she’s a big game player and at her best when the stakes are highest. Maybe the Iowa State Fair with butter statues and corn dogs just didn’t get her blood pumping.
And now the prosecutor has a case she wants to try. And ample evidence.
Mainly, that primary elections are handled by the states, and they don’t really have the authority to make states pay for and run a new primary after they already ran a primary. There’s also the fact that the nomination rules don’t allow for a backup primary in the event that the winner doesn’t want to win. The only rules that exist to handle this are the rules for the release of delegates. One could maybe, maybe revising the system to allow for emergency caucuses (not primaries) in the event of the presumptive nominee abdicating, but those aren’t especially democratic, either, and they’re unlikely to be used ever again, and right now, they’re just not in the rules.
Ultimately, the nomination process isn’t especially democratic, and I’m not sure it has to be. I’m not terribly uncomfortable with any party picking their nominee by whatever means they choose, as long as the American people have the final say as to which party nominee actually gets the levers of power. It does add legitimacy and popular support to the process that hoi polloi, or at least self-identifying party members thereof, have a say in the process of a party picking a nominee, but if voters don’t like insiders anointing a nominee, they are free to not vote for that person.
In this case, people voted for Biden knowing full well that Kamala would be the one to take over if he were incapacitated in any way. Well, now he’s out, so Kamala takes over. The only thing that’s especially unusual here is Biden bowing out voluntarily after securing the presumptive nomination but prior to inaugurating day 2025. But if he were to be assassinated or suffer cardiac arrest or something in this window, wouldn’t Kamala still be the presumptive nominee for the same reason she would be if that were to have happened in January? Kamala, at least to me, has a fair bit of legitimacy as a voted-on successor. That we also follow the rules of the insiders and let the delegates get formally released but then to dutifully line up behind Kamala also seems legitimate to me. It’s an unprecedented situation, but I don’t see any shenanigans here. Passing the torch to Kamala would seem to reflect the will of the people and the rules of the process better than any other outcome.
5 Likes
Republicans are concurrently:
-
Threatening to sue the DNC for fraud for misleading them about the candidate.
-
Insisting that Joe Biden remains the nominee.
-
Insisting that Joe Biden resigns because he’s not fit to be president.
-
Insisting that Kamala Harris should take over immediately because Joe Biden is mentally incompetent, and saying that Kamala is an incompetent DEI hire.
2 Likes