I’m not entirely sure how to respond to this, seeing as your quote is of a comment made by Candelestine, so I’m not 100% sure this was intended as a response to me in the first place. Nevertheless, I do have some thoughts to share.
Main thought - I agree with you. We’re clearly on the same side, arguing about nuance. Biden is super unpopular. I’m not entirely sure he’s unpopular for the right reasons, but that doesn’t change the fact that he doesn’t poll well.
I also agree that the main reason he’s even in the race is because he’s the only one who has ever beaten Trump. I, like many others, am terrified of a future where Trump wins and ushers in a fascist dictatorship. Thus, the party wants to back a proven winner. We’re going for the least bad option here in a choice between ol Joe and a Christo-fascist state.
If there was another Democrat out there with similar name recognition who had raised their hand, we might be having a different conversation, but conventional wisdom dictates that something really catastrophic would have needed to happen under Biden to change the math on the incumbent advantage. On reflection, while Biden still isn’t my favorite, his administration has done a lot of things right. I’ve lived through both options and there’s no contest, for me, between 4 more years of Joe or 4 more years of Trump.
Regarding winning a primary without being on the ballot or campaigning - the results in NH speak for themselves. If there was an alternative who stood a chance there wouldn’t be any discussion about being on the ballot in any state. Since we already know the Dems are going all-in on Joe, the goal now is to keep the message as clear as possible and minimize muddying the waters with spoiler candidates. It wouldn’t be an issue if every state used ranked choice voting, but we need every vote and first past the post makes spoilers extremely costly.
I’m not entirely sure how to respond to this, seeing as your quote is of a comment made by Candelestine, so I’m not 100% sure this was intended as a response to me in the first place. Nevertheless, I do have some thoughts to share.
Main thought - I agree with you. We’re clearly on the same side, arguing about nuance. Biden is super unpopular. I’m not entirely sure he’s unpopular for the right reasons, but that doesn’t change the fact that he doesn’t poll well.
I also agree that the main reason he’s even in the race is because he’s the only one who has ever beaten Trump. I, like many others, am terrified of a future where Trump wins and ushers in a fascist dictatorship. Thus, the party wants to back a proven winner. We’re going for the least bad option here in a choice between ol Joe and a Christo-fascist state.
If there was another Democrat out there with similar name recognition who had raised their hand, we might be having a different conversation, but conventional wisdom dictates that something really catastrophic would have needed to happen under Biden to change the math on the incumbent advantage. On reflection, while Biden still isn’t my favorite, his administration has done a lot of things right. I’ve lived through both options and there’s no contest, for me, between 4 more years of Joe or 4 more years of Trump.
Regarding winning a primary without being on the ballot or campaigning - the results in NH speak for themselves. If there was an alternative who stood a chance there wouldn’t be any discussion about being on the ballot in any state. Since we already know the Dems are going all-in on Joe, the goal now is to keep the message as clear as possible and minimize muddying the waters with spoiler candidates. It wouldn’t be an issue if every state used ranked choice voting, but we need every vote and first past the post makes spoilers extremely costly.