“What’s going to happen in this next election? I’m terrified about what could possibly happen, because our leaders matter. Who we select, who speaks for us, who holds that bully pulpit, it affects us in ways sometimes I think people take for granted,” Obama told Jay Shetty on his podcast “On Purpose.”
“The fact that people think that government — ‘eh, does it really even do anything?’ — and I’m like ‘Oh my God, does government do everything for us, and we cannot take this democracy for granted.’ And I worry sometimes that we do. Those are the things that keep me up,” she said.
“The bars are different for people in life. That I’ve learned,” she said.
Without naming Trump, she continued: “Other people can be indicted a bunch of times and still run for office. Black men can’t. You just learn to be good. And in the end, you benefit from that extra resilience.”
Me too and I’m not even American, dissolution of NATO, serving Ukaine on a platter to Russia, possibility of more war in Europe with Putin getting bolder.
No pressure Americans but your elections are kind of important for the future of the world.
There was a rider attached to one of the latest appropriations bills (which is now law) that restricts how future Presidents can pull the US out of NATO. It can’t happen now unless Congress passes an act authorizing the President to do so, or with a 2/3 vote of the Senate (the same mechanism as ratifying a treaty).
So at least on this issue, we’ve put in some safeguards in case we elect an idiot again.
Because rules and laws stopped him before
Yes, they did. He’s not in office right now because of those rules and laws
They stopped some of his bullshit, but they also failed to stop a lot of it. If he’s allowed to run for president again, that will be a huge example of rules not stopping him.
This is where states rights are again shown to be fucked. States rights to include insurrectionists on the ballot this time.
I may argue he’s not in office because the coup attempt didn’t succeed.
Though maybe that’s just me.
He did a lot of illegal things that got overturned. But the problem is while it’s being overturned it can still do a lot of damage.
Huh? How is that why he’s not in office? I would say that, in spite of all those things, he still received the second highest vote count in presidential election history.
He just happened to lose to the person who got the highest.
Yeah but a bunch of white college kids who don’t even know what Mer7aba means have decided that the way to serve the Palestinian cause is to let the guy who handed Jerusalem and the Golan Heights to Netenyahu back into office to teach the establishment a lesson so we’re fucked.
I’m starting to think they’re actually just right wingers who know that saying what they ACTUALLY want will get them dumped by all their cool allies club friends. Probably why they keep insisting on dumb fuck takes like “bErNiE wOuLd Be A cEnTrIsT iN pOlAnD!” and “AmErIcA hAs No LeFt!!!”
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There’s no economically left wing party, but it is pretty left wing about a lot of social things. Gay marriage and marijuana legalization happened in some states before much of the rest of the world for example.
Ok but really objectively consider that statement though.
Policy by policy the Dems flank left of most of Europe’s old guard of social democratic and socialist parties. Dems tend to be more in favor of new and expanded welfare programs compared to their European counterparts, they’re less likely than said counterparts to adopt right wing policy and talking points to try and appease alt-rightified voters, and on social issues there is no contest, just say the word “Roma” and watch Europeans range from saying that pulling that card isn’t fair because “that’s different” to saying that what the fascists did wrong was lose before they finished the job on the Roma.
The metric by which America has no left is one by which the western world at large has no left, and at that point what value is gained at all by insisting on it?
Policy by policy the Dems flank left of most of Europe’s old guard of social democratic and socialist parties.
In what bizzaro world!!? We don’t have basic singles payer health care like all other major western nations. Not to mention millions of other things.
Dems tend to be more in favor of new and expanded welfare programs compared to their European counterparts,
Not even. They’ve passed maybe one thing in nearly the last century that approached it. As flawed as it was. And on top of that. Large amounts of Dems have happily voted for eligibility exclusion on even pre existing social welfare programs. Making them more and more useless.
they’re less likely than said counterparts to adopt right wing policy and talking points to try and appease alt-rightified voters,
Hello, last 40 years? Hello, third way Democrats? Hello, bipartisanship over principles. Even to this day Biden still waxes poetically about how we need Republicans and how they are good.
and on social issues there is no contest, just say the word “Roma” and watch Europeans range from saying that pulling that card isn’t fair because “that’s different” to saying that what the fascists did wrong was lose before they finished the job on the Roma.
There are multiple groups who would elicit similar reactions throughout the United States. Including black, Muslims, trans, gays, and even Democrats. Oh and by the way those fascists and Nazis you were talking about. They got their start by checks notes oh, they literally got their start by emulating the United States. Not only that, around topics of which the United States still hasn’t resolved properly yet to this day. You’re batting 0 here.
You seem to have mastered the art of using many words to not say a thing, except maybe for how little you understand European politics compared to American other than “but their actual fascist parties that have elected seats have healthcare.”
You seem to have mastered the arts of deflection and not being able to address a single point made. I’ll take my skills over yours any day.
at that point what value is gained at all by insisting on it?
Make this argument in the other direction to prove your sincerity.
The value gained in there not being a fascist for president because white college kids decided not to vote strike?
m starting to think they’re actually just right wingers who know that saying what they ACTUALLY want will get them dumped by all their cool allies club friends.
So you all lost the 2016 general election all on your own then?
The absurdity of your perspective is that you believe there is a large group of voters who didn’t show up for HRC while also apparently believing not one of them is sharing their reasons why in anonymous forums.
The absurdity of yours is that you’re pretty obviously one of those people who thinks a millions of votes lead in the primary race is “the DNC establishment shoving her down our throats” and not “we have to be dragged kicking and screaming to even vote for the guy we supposedly support!”
I mean it’s either that or “a bunch of selfish pieces of shit voted for Biden specifically to fuck over progressive or leftist efforts”. You sound like the kind of person who would do just that.
If America pulls out of NATO, I wonder if NATO would disband and if the EU militarizes.
You made me wonder if Trump would pull out of NATO and ask a few NATO members to move to Russia-US alliance instead.
I think this is coming. Trump and Putin will invite the world to a Friendship Union. We can call it “FU World”…
You’re spending too much time on Reddit and Lemmy. Republicans will always support Ukraine (they hate Russia too!). The issue isn’t about support, it’s about limits. We have to have checks and balances when financing a war, this isn’t a free for all. The Republicans are just making sure the money is being spent how it’s supposed too. All of a sudden, they’re called “traitors” and “ass-kissers.” Which is just ridiculous. How soon we forget Ukraine was once considered one of the most corrupt countries on Earth.
That’s not what Trump’s actions suggested the last time in office, I have no doubt republicans hate Russia, maybe even more than Democrats, it’s Trump specifically I’m worried about.
Trump won’t pull support for Ukraine, that’s just a scare tactic from the Left. The entire government is united on the issue of stopping Russia, Trump alone can’t do much about that. If anything, he’ll just crack down harder on how/where the money is spent. Again, I hate this “just give them what they want!” mentality coming from the Left. There should always be questions, concerns, limits…etc…when giving billions of dollars to any country.
US meddling on the rest of the world only goes well if its white europeans. I’m not thrilled about the US being “strong”.
Of course, cuz black Europeans are immune to bombs and bullets
I dunno how it is in europe, but if its anything like the places I know you wouldn’t get as much attention thats for sure.
Imagine the worst outcome you can think of on the issue that’s most important to you, and that’s probably likely no matter who we elect. Both parties rule as conservatives, and conservatism in recent memory has meant a slow-burn of lost liberty.
Don’t worry though. No matter who we elect they’ll still run us further into debt in order to fund the wars in Gaza and Ukraine, because it’s making our legislators and their backers obscenely wealthy. War is one of the shitty things for which there’s always bipartisanship.
You’re part of the problem.
There is no ‘both sides are bad take’ here.
There’s Biden who at worse maintains the status quo and then there is Trump who will become a literal dictator.
No I’m not exaggerating. You fucking centrist morons can’t see you’ll be on a train for the gas chambers if he is elected again and will be shocked when it happens.
LOL
I’m a Green.
Though you’re partly right. It is the centrists who truly paved the way for fascism in this country. 40 years of lesser evils really added up.
Then I hope you’re voting for Biden if you are eligible to.
Centrists will be the death of all of us.
They’re not the centrist though. They want someone to the left of Biden. You want someone to the left of Trump.
You’re the centerist here. And yes you will be the death of the Democrat party and probably the entire country along with it.
I can’t vote for the American president.
But if I could I would still have to vote for Biden because of first past the post voting. Third way candidates are a wasted vote.
Would I want to vote for Biden? Of course not.
Do you live in the U.S.?
Did any of the 2 sides really pushed for actual healthcare? Or did anything substantial about any of the pervasive cost of living problems? Or yknow, stopped bombing other people around the planet? Or did anything about the growing nazi problem?
Its a good cop bad cop shtick, both sides are pretty bad. Not only in the US, mind you.
I’m fucking convinced you guys are going to vote that chud in again. Or let him be voted in again. There is nuance but it’s the same outcome.
The people who want to spite Biden’s genocidal support by not voting for him don’t realize that the alternative is a fascist dictator who actively relishes in the prospect of killing brown people. If you think Biden’s treatment of the Gazan war is bad, wait til you see Trump.
Same with the Ukrainian war. If Biden is milquetoast, Trump will guarantee your toast is forever black and inedible.
It’s because those people that think that don’t actually care about brown people. Nobody who actually cares about Palestine is trying to vote Trump in. Not a single one. It’s all a smoke screen. We’ve seen it before same thing happened in 2016. Same players same game.
Why don’t democrats just play it safe and run just about anyone who isn’t Biden?
The vast majority of conservatives will never vote for a democrat. The best democrats can do is try to retain support of independents who have no problem voting 3rd party or even conservative if they feel disenfranchised by the democratic party.
Why would they feel disenfranchised by Biden? Who are these hypothetical people that would piss away their vote on a 3rd party because Biden did all of the things he said he would do. Supporting Israel is literally part of being POTUS. Every single POTUS has been an Israel supporter.
I mean yes they have always had the support of the US government, they’ve also historically not been quite as openly genocidal.
What the fuck are you even talking about? Andrew Jackson was an actual president that directly initiated the forced ethnic cleansing of the Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Muscogee, and Seminoles.
And that’s just a taste of shit like that. You need to get your head out of your ass.
Well aren’t you a ray of sunshine. Did you actually read my post or did you just decide I needed to be attacked for things I didn’t say?
If you go back and read the context, I’m saying we have had bipartisan support for Israel for many years, but this year they’ve gotten significantly more genocidal than they normally are.
I didn’t say a fucking thing about what we did or didn’t do in the 1800s. Jackson was also a strong proponent of slavery, He was a well well-rounded bell end… Just because we were fuck wads in the 1800s doesn’t mean we need to openly support other people by giving them boatloads of money and guns so they can go and exterminate all the civilians they don’t like.
If you decide you still want to come at me I’m just going to block you.
They won’t, because they have an entire presidential term in two vice presidential terms worth of relationship with him. They’ve got a lot invested in him and they’re not about to just walk away from that.
I’m gonna ask my parents, both lifelong Republicans, if they’ll vote Trump again. I’m pretty sure after Jan 6 they won’t. Prior to that I would have agreed with you but I’m not sure now
Why don’t democrats just play it safe and run just about anyone who isn’t Biden?
Gods I wish they would. The DNC represents progressives like North Korea represents democracy
People like you want to have your cake and eat it too. During the primaries you swear up and down we should be okay with Biden winning the primaries because we can push him to the left. Then when that turns out not to be true you say we need to vote for him anyway.
You can’t keep doing this. You’re liars. You’re gaslighters. You’re enablers of the Republican party. You are the bad guys. You need to change.
By the time the election comes we might already be in WW3 😒
Blame everyone who thinks the democrats should run Biden again.
No. How about you tell us why not voting for Biden (effectively a vote for Trump) is the way to go.
I feel like this is so understated in this context it is almost physically painful:
Who we select, who speaks for us, who holds that bully pulpit, it affects us in ways sometimes I think people take for granted
Stop talking about trump like he’s just another bad candidate. Jesus Christ.
If they acknowledge the depth of his depravity then they go too far in tarnishing the office. They desperately want to maintain prestige so they’ll never go as far as they ought to.
If you talk about it in the way that you should, you will sound alarmist.
Unfortunately to Trump supporters this is a grandiose endorsement and exactly what they want.
The true trump idiots fucking love it. They are salivating for it. She’s black, a woman, and liberal which is the exact opposite of the people they care about. It represents everything they hate
As much as I share the same concern with Michelle, I would selfishly respond to her that if she just fucking ran for president she would win in a landslide and put an end to fucking Trump. Barack can spend the entire 4 years ridiculing the orange bezoar as first man.
No she would not win. I guess you just don’t realize how many Democrats are just as racist as Republicans. There is still to much racism amd sexism in our country.
And if you point to Obama I point to how many Democrats I know said Obama wasn’t to bad because he was at least half white and raised by whites.
Sick as that is its the truth and something we are long way from changing.
Plus she isn’t as popular as you think neither is Obama. I loath his neoliberal ass and is partly to blame for where we are now. Because he bailed out the banks instead of the people and turned a lot of blue couler workers into maga fanatics that Trump used to turn our country into a hell hole.
Apologies for my ignorance, but just why hasn’t she run for office?
Thanks! I appreciate the information, and I apologize. I guess I could’ve looked it up.
I can’t blame her, but damn. Is it too cliche to say that’s why she’d be a great candidate?
Michelle would not win in a landslide.
Every election that is just an extension of the Clinton lineage is a bad play for democrats.
I’d be concerned whatever the outcome.
You reckon Jan 6th was a one off?
yes, if the next leader doesn’t sell conspiracy as hard as maga.
If the democrats ran just about anybody but Joe, they’d be a shoe-in.
Brace yourselves for Trump 2.0, everyone. The Clinton lineage must go on!
It’s never going to be that easy. I’m sure each of us can find a candidate we like better but a successful run is more than that:
- fund raising - to some extent whoever raises the most money wins, and I’m pretty sure President Biden has
- name recognition - is everyone familiar with your favorite candidate? You really can’t beat the familiarity of someone who is already President
- middle of the road enough to attract many different voters, especially those independents sitting in the middle
- has beaten Trump before
While I think the President is doing a great job, I’d prefer someone more progressive. However that might alienate more voters than it would attract. I will not risk another trumptastrophe by insisting on more Progressiveness over electable, “progressive enough” and not insane
The age thing does bother me, but I can only dream of doing that well at that age.
We should focus on VP. We want someone in the wings and we want them to build name recognition, and that hasn’t worked for the current VP
So after this, if trump loses and runs again, you’ll be ok with continuing to support candidates you don’t fully align with just to stop the boogie man? What about once trump is gone and the Republicans have some new piece of shit boogieman in the running? What will it take for you to be comfortable voting with the people that you most closely align with?
I never understood this absolutism. I’ll vote for the candidate closest to my views every time, and have voted for third party candidates in the past. But it’s ridiculous to vote based on only one issue
What other choice do some of us have? I would love a centrait president. Like actual centrist. I know going further left that that is impossible at this current point, but even centrist is a super long shot to even win the primary. Bernie can’t even get enough people who support him to vote for him.
So let’s say Project 2025 becomes P2029. P2033. P2037. As a gay man, I need to keep pushing that back. If not, me and my community get even more fucked than we are. That’s when things like genocide start to happen. I don’t get the choice of risking a republican being elected. The only hope I have is either as younger people start getting to voting ages, and older people die out, and religion starts to disappear, that maybe things will change.
It’s either that or I leave. Granted, me and my boyfriend are highly considering it, for multiple reasons. But it won’t be something we can consider. It’s something we will need to do.
Bernie was robbed of the nomination by a last second rule change on the floor of the convention where the votes weren’t even accurately represented in the final decision.
The left keeps moving to the right to try to appeal to voters, while aligning independents. They could stop, and move the far right further left. But dems are too concerned with appealing to the wrong people.
The best you can do is arm yourself and participate in your local elections and communities. At the end of the day you can only completely rely on yourself and those around you.
I don’t disagree, but it also only works out so well for many, many people. Like depending on where someone lives, their community is largely the people they needed to be protected from. I’m lucky in that I live in Portland. A fairly progressive, if not at least performative prgressives, but at least we won’t be the first to go. But since I have sympathy and empathy for people, I would rather it not come to that. Accelerationsm is just sacrificing marginalized communities. And I get you’re not much of an ally, and that’s fine. I’ll take people who don’t care but are willing to let us live our lives. But for the rest of us, I can’t get behind the mentality of just throwing people in the fire and saying “Well I’m just gonna watch over myself.” That’s a part of how things like dictators happen. And once that happens, participating locally won’t be enough, because things like local elections wont be a thing anymore.
I don’t disagree with your logic in general, but Trump isn’t a boogeyman. A boogeyman isn’t real. A boogeyman can’t hurt you. We all saw how Trump ran things. It’s not an imagined threat.
What would it take to be comfortable voting FOR someone and not AGAINST the other one? Easy: ranked choice voting.
I fully support ranked choice and we have mountains to climb in many states before its enacted
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He was popular enough to beat Trump the 1st go round, why would people not vote for him now when the alternative is 4 more years of god knows what fresh hell?
Because Trump’s approval numbers are higher than Biden’s.
To be clear, I don’t support Trump at all but we have to look at cold hard facts. Biden does not look like a great candidate right now at a macro scale. Democrats have a real problem of loving to self-hate, and they end up skewering their own candidate. The prevailing opinion amongst my friends is “well Biden didn’t do anything”. Personally I find that to be untrue, but that’s the narrative.
The real key is that Democrats lose when voter turnout falls. Biden is not an exciting candidate, and for some people it is an ordeal to vote, and they may not do it for Biden. A lot of people forget this… It’s not that Trump would get more votes, it’s that Biden will get less.
Democrats are formulating a perfect way to fumble this to Trump, and I’m terrified.
The campaign hasn’t started yet. Right now, it’s a one sided conversation. And the polls are all based on people who answer unknown numbers and land lines. It’s a built in selection bias.
Every single election both large and small since 2020 has been heavily skewed to the left. I’m not saying don’t worry, but dont despair. And work on convincing your friends. That’s the single best thing you could possibly do.
I think you’re selling the polls a little short. The good ones have corrected a lot of that kind of bias, though nothing is perfect. And bad polls are always bad polls.
The scary reason is that we need a campaign or conversation to get people away from Trump. The dude sucks. Any president of the past 40 years should have a higher approval rating than Trump.
Though I secretly have a theory that the Supreme Court is going to rule against Trump and kick him off. It’ll give Republicans the exit that they need from him, but they can blame the courts and capture all his followers. All the candidates will run on pardoning him, and they’ll keep that radical part of the party but just redirect them.
3 years of propaganda, most of their base complaints against Biden arent true, but perception is reality.
Trump is hard lining who he’s going to hurt. They love that
The Dems will still vote dem other than hating Bidens Gaza stance, because they see Trump as awful.
But gerrymandering and shenanigans being what they are, the fight isn’t fair and the GOPs thumb is heavily on the scale.
Anyone who votes like that really doesn’t understand the difference between the two at all.
Like who?
So Biden is a Clinton now? Is everything you don’t like a Clinton?
Can she run for VP and we just swap her out instead of Kamala Harris? Hell, they could go back to reusing old Obama/Biden signs from the 2008/2012 campaigns. Otherwise Harris is just deadweight for this campaign, she’s been absolutely useless the past 4 years (though that’s probably been the traditional role of VPs anyways).
The Dems need a candidate who will annihilate Trump.
I’m terrified of the outcome no matter who wins… Our system is seriously broken if these are the best candidates we, the supposed bastion of freedom and democracy, can come up with.
We all are. There is no good outcome, only one that is less bad than the other.
Michelle said a thing
Oh brother…her and her elite inner circle will be fine. When I say BOTH sides are guilty of using scare tactics to get votes, this is what I’m talking about. Democrats and the Left want to scare people into thinking the world will end if a Republican becomes President. They all said the same thing when Trump became President in 2017.
“Both sides” is a tired old argument that doesn’t hold water. If you haven’t seen the damage Republicans have done in the past 8 years on the Federal and State level, you need to look harder, my dude. The Democrats aren’t amazing, but they aren’t actively stripping people’s rights away and trying to erase minority groups from existence. There is no Democratic “Plan 2025”.
It’s a balance. I don’t agree with everything that the Republicans do, just like I don’t agree with everything the Democrats do. However, both parties are flawed and both parties are doing things in the interests of different groups.
“government do everything for us, and we cannot take this democracy for granted.” Government is not the same as democracy… Democracy is what D’s and R’s try to sufficate so the government can continue to be run by private companies. There is a word for this…
“Well, well, of it isn’t the consequences of my actions.”
