Joe Biden, Senator from Citibank (oops, DELAWARE), to Run for President

The full CNN story linked in clem's story, with new interviews: https://www.cnn.com/2020/04/28/politics/tara-reade-neighbor/index.html

Even the NYT is knocking down the NYT defense.

A New York Times spokesperson says Biden campaign talking points “inaccurately” suggest that the Times investigation found that Tara Reade’s allegation “did not happen.” Response to this scoop from @rubycramer @RosieGray https://t.co/ZUD6f2WSEE pic.twitter.com/LNaHvH0ZxF

— Jonathan Easley (@JonEasley) April 29, 2020

I guess the next logical post would be "Even Joe Biden is knocking down the New York Times defense."

i realize that this offends the sensibilities of the hardcore biden supporters

How many of those even exist? I have a feeling the majority of Democratic primary voters, and maybe even the majority of Biden voters, would be happy with somebody else (tho who exactly is obviously a big question).

based off of the 1988 and 2008 primaries, maybe 3-5% of the democratic electorate is hardcore biden? even that seems too high

he is a guy who waited his turn and stood near important people. he doesn't inspire much

yeah, exactly. and if it wasn't for covid and bernie dropping out -- i.e., if the primaries were proceeding as usual -- who knows what impact this would have had. the coverage would have been different.

I see ilxors here repeatedly referring to Biden as a rapist. Is Tara Reade's story that Joe Biden raped her in the US Capitol building? Or is rape a construction that ilxors are putting on the story, but Reade is not? I can take my answer offline.

here is the story:

https://www.cnn.com/2020/04/28/politics/tara-reade-neighbor/index.html

xpost you sure can

I had to look up "digital penetration" from her claim - it's digital in terms of his finger being a digit, not zeros and ones.

I beg you can we not start splitting hairs about what specific behaviors constitute rape

a very depressing xpost

Aimless out here 'just asking questions.'

Thoughtlording on this topic in a forum where 3/4 of the women who made it more vital just a few years ago already have stopped posting is not something we need

― silby, Wednesday, April 8, 2020 10:38 AM (three weeks ago)

Karl gave me the answer containing the kind of information I was asking for. If you want to split hairs, milo, don't expect me to follow along.

I wasn't splitting hairs about what constitutes rape either, I was confused by the use of the word digital.

I started wondering (on FB, not here) if Biden should step aside a few weeks ago, based on what I thought were obvious questions about his fitness to run. I'm not sure those questions were ever adequately resolved before they got pushed aside by the pandemic (where he was given an excuse--not a very credible one, I thought--to lay low).

Now this. Biden knows whether the allegations are true or not. If they're true, then obviously step aside immediately--he should never have ran. That part's easy. If he knows they're not true, though, it's still messy. You'll have a campaign that forces one prominent Democrat after another into taking his word for it and awkwardly defending him, and then his fitness for office is going to come back too--it's not like that's gone away for good. Whether that means Sanders or starting over, no idea. And I completely understand how that could be seen an insult to the two constituencies who supported him in the primaries, African-American and older voters. That's why it's such a mess.

I don't think I'll get much agreement here, but if you go back to 2016, I think Biden probably accepted that he wouldn't run again when he stepped aside for Clinton--even when she lost, I doubt he immediately thought about running. I think he got seduced by some early polling a couple of years ago and then hastily jumped in. How feckless his campaign was early on would support that, I think.

Biden knows whether the allegations are true or not

assuming you have faith in his current brainpower

That did cross my mind, yeah--somewhere in there he knows.

Shakey’s thread was locked and yet here we are.

OK. I read the CNN article Karl linked to. The evidence has risen to the point where it cannot be denied away. Biden stepping aside is by far the best outcome and him staying in would be a disaster. Both Obamas, both Clintons, Pelosi and every prominent and influential Democrat needs to back Biden into a corner and browbeat him until he relents. He's finished and it's his own fault. Putting the pieces of the campaign back together again would be extremely difficult, but Biden prolonging this will just make it that much harder.

Both Obamas, both Clintons, Pelosi and every prominent and influential Democrat needs to back Biden into a corner and browbeat him until he relents

that's why the timing of HRC's endorsement - yesterday - was very o_O. he's gotten other prominent endorsements, of course, even after the first wave of stories on reade. but to do so after this new information has come to light is just really shitty. it seemed like she was trying to send a signal that the establishment would continue to stand behind biden, no matter what. ew.

I wish Biden would drop out too but it seems exceedingly unlikely. imo his strength purely as a candidate has only improved since the start of the pandemic. as much as it seems obvious to all of us that this moment only reinforces the vitality of a strong social safety net, universal healthcare, etc. I fear that to the average voter the overwhelming takeaway is fear, uncertainty, and a desire to return to "normalcy" no matter how insufficient that normalcy was for millions of Americans. and if nothing else, Biden has always been the return to normalcy candidate.

Schumer and Pelosi and Obama and the Clintons don't give a fuck

i hope he is finished, and that the DNC doesn't choose instead to keep his campaign on life support until november. i don't know who is the person or group to pressure, or how exactly this works. i would hope that someone in his campaign has some sort of conscience, or maybe just understands how grueling it would be - in the years after america knowingly elected a serial sexual assaulter, a second SC justice with a history of sexual assault was confirmed, #metoo, everything - to force millions of people to knowingly choose another assaulter, this time with a D next to their name.

for people who care about this, all of our leverage to get him to drop out is right now. with every passing day it will get harder and harder.

imo his strength purely as a candidate has only improved since the start of the pandemic.

ironically, he gets stronger as he disappears more and more. what if he just...went away, and someone else was the nominee? could be a very popular move!

i don't know who is the person or group to pressure, or how exactly this works.

A critical mass of people saying "I will not vote for Joe Biden, whether I'm in Wyoming or Florida."

That assumes the party godfathers would rather win than lose without bowing to pressure, which is a big assumption.

how grueling it would be - in the years after america knowingly elected a serial sexual assaulter, a second SC justice with a history of sexual assault was confirmed, #metoo, everything - to force millions of people to knowingly choose another assaulter, this time with a D next to their name.

they know the system works against survivors and they don't give a fuck and are just delighted that's gonna swing in their favor this time

xp to Karl:

afaics, people like HRC were relying on Biden's word for this. Hard as it may be to believe, politicians rely on personal friendships and trust relationships developed in private. Biden's private denials and reassurances would carry much more weight with them that his public denials.

roxymuzak - yeah, i think you're right. and i think them not doing anything is probably what's going to happen. i'm not the most optimistic person, but the only thing i can think of that provides hope is the idea of it all imploding for biden right now, in these weeks. that seems like the only possible way that it happens. there was a time when it was looking like even brett kavanaugh was going to go down. in the end, lindsey graham and his boys shut it down. i was so filled with rage with the GOP back then, because democrats were doing the right thing and speaking up about it and saying and doing the right things, generally, which left me with the impression that perhaps something had changed in the democratic party. now democrats are the ones who hold the power to do the right thing.

everyone who "cared" about kavanaugh and christine blasey ford but is looking the other way on Reade is full of shit imo. this isn't over yet, but it's looking pretty shameful for democrats.

on the plus side, it's very good to see you here, even on a really depressing topic :)

xp aimless

yeah, i can understand that for sure. for HRC, though, there's a difference between doing the standard biden-defense talking points and deflections, and announcing your full-throated endorsement of the man on a day when it's become clear that he did something fucked up (and destroyed reade's career in addition) and lied about it

xp - if you think the stakes around a Supreme Court seat are high, the presidency is even more crucial to the balance of power.

at this point there is more evidence than there was against kavanaugh

what is infuriating about both situations, though, is that there are other options! kavanaugh was one of many, many blowhard conservative judges for trump and republicans to install in the supreme court. they could have just bowed to public pressure and nominated someone else, endure a couple bad days of criticism from the worst people in the universe (limbaugh, whatever), and then enjoyed a bi-partisan senate vote for a non-sexual assaulter candidate.

with biden, there are also other options. this situation can and likely will get more excruciating as we get closer to november, and the other options really are cut off. but right now, in april? months before the convention? at a time when, in normal times, primaries would still be going on and people would still be arguing about which candidate would be best? as whiney mentioned, there are 6 months to go! that's not why he said it, but it's a good point!

xp

his strength purely as a candidate has only improved since the start of the pandemic

This appears to be the case on a surface level because he's said and done virtually nothing within public earshot or eyesight to change perception of him one way or the other, while his opponent Trump has made a historical ass of himself daily with his handling of this crisis. Once the pandemic starts to subside in the fall as the curve flattens further, and once Biden is actually forced onto a public podium and forced to actually speak full, coherent sentences about actual political policies and platforms, let alone attempt to "debate" his opponent over them, who will have plenty of ammunition saved up to unload on him (and far too much of it actually legitimate and true compared to his previous opponent)... that is almost certain to change. The wider media apparatus that basically allowed him to sleepwalk to the nomination after preemptively crowning him nominee after only 3 state primaries and is now widely ignoring the deepening of these sexual misconduct allegations will also laser in on him in from an adversarial standpoint like they did with Clinton back in Fall of 2016 when coverage on a purported "scandal" of the candidate becomes most profitable to deploy, deep into the primary. Except this time instead of fabricated "But her emails!!" nonsense it'll be a real sexual misconduct allegation corroborated and supported by a troubling number of outside sources. I'd also think his general cognitive decline that's been widely laughed off and ignored won't be given the same leniency once Trump has one or more viral moments making fun of him over it on a debate stage.

the Dems did manage to oust Al Franken but I just can't imagine them doing the same with Biden

like how would it even work? Biden's already got a ton of delegates. I don't really get this part of the process at all.

with biden, there are also other options.

If Biden drops out, then what? Who steps up to contest for the nomination? How does that process work? How do candidates (either folks re-entering the nomination race, or new folks) campaign? How are they chosen, with many primaries already over and others cancelled? Are all of Biden's delegates re-assigned to his former rivals, proportionally? Show your work. Walk through the process. And please try to remember that I didn't want Biden to be the nominee, and I don't like that he is the nominee.

xpost with frogbs

Well I mean they only started having primaries in like the 1960s, right? And they managed to nominate candidates for a couple hundred years.

Once the pandemic starts to subside in the fall as the curve flattens further

I believe there will be a second surge in September-October if not slightly earlier (August?).

The wider media apparatus that basically allowed him to sleepwalk to the nomination after preemptively crowning him nominee after only 3 state primaries and is now widely ignoring the deepening of these sexual misconduct allegations will also laser in on him in from an adversarial standpoint like they did with Clinton back in Fall of 2016 when coverage on a purported "scandal" of the candidate becomes most profitable to deploy, deep into the primary.

Journalists hated Hillary Clinton in a deeply personal way (and she hated them right back). They like Joe Biden.

Well I mean they only started having primaries in like the 1960s, right? And they managed to nominate candidates for a couple hundred years.

So what you're saying is, the Democratic Party should go back to the "smoke-filled room" model, and (by implication) you think a morally and ethically acceptable candidate is more likely to emerge from a return to that process?

give it to the candidate with the second most delegates

jk that isn't fair either, much as i would like it.

i think the biden delegates can rally around someone of their choosing. that's how it works.

Show your work. Walk through the process.

my more considered response is that it's not up to me (or anyone else here) to do that, but that i'm very confident it can be done. there are lots of very intelligent people out there. this is not impossible. it's not our job to come up with the process on a messageboard. for people like us, our job is to make sure that political leadership understands that a bunch of people don't want to vote for an assaulter. l

here is my less considered response.

as i said recently, if it were up to ME, i would just mail ballots out to everyone who voted in democratic primaries this year and last time around. any previous 2020 candidate, from beto to now, could be on the ballot (or not - they could opt out). since it's me doing it and i don't have to be realistic, i would also make it ranked choice, and it would be a national primary, rather than state by state with delegates.

let's take some Q&A

If Biden drops out, then what? amazing things
Who steps up to contest for the nomination? the next president of the united states
How does that process work? well it's complicated
How do candidates (either folks re-entering the nomination race, or new folks) campaign? they don't. since these goddamn elections never end, they already campaigned the last several months, we're all already exhausted from hearing about these people so much for the last year, and i know who john hickenlooper is.
How are they chosen, with many primaries already over and others cancelled? do-over. "do-over?!?!" yeah, do-over. it's unprecedented, but it's a better option than Biden as a nominee, at this point.
Are all of Biden's delegates re-assigned to his former rivals, proportionally? no

in general though, to unperson i would suggest letting joe biden and the DNC do the hard work of defending biden and arguing that it's not possible to nominate anyone else 6 months before an election (i wrote the previous sentence in a way encouraged to make people from other countries vomit in disbelief). everyone else who cares should be doing the hard work of saying that biden isn't acceptable

To add a thought, KM and unperson, you would still leave Biden on this ranked ballot, right?

well, not if he's withdrawing from the race, which is what he should be doing

if they really think there is nothing to these charges they can launch their own investigation, or turn to a neutral body, or something of that kind. he should be able to defend himself if he really thinks he's innocent.

i don't know the process. but ignorning this isn't going to work.