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

a lot of people will die needlessly if a lot more people than we're currently seeing don't start to demand the seemingly impossible, whether it strikes one as "childish" or not. (I'm thinking mainly of climate action, but police abolition is relevant as well.)

I dunno about childish. naive and ineffective maybe

focus your outrage on the specific individuals who murder, and the specific police departments who cover for them if and when they do

there's an ongoing police brutality in the U.S. thread btw, unless this is some sort of referendum on the Biden/Harris ticket

I agree Simon, I just don't see how in this case, Biden positioning himself for police abolition and not pandering to the people afraid of looting helps him win an election anyway. I don't think it's up to Biden to make demands of the people. It has to come from the electorate.

the specific police departments who cover for them if and when they do

"if" lol

Asking a politician...

It's fine to ask for what you want, but expecting the answer to be something the general population does not accept or agree with is highly unrealistic. The main thing is to keep pushing the idea out there, honing the message and sharpening it so that lightly-engaged people can grasp what you're asking for and why.

The cultural changes necessary for effective climate action are staggeringly huge, but activists having been laying the groundwork for decades now and a lot of progress has been made since 1990. Making policing over into something that would be nearly unrecognizable next to today's policing isn't as big a shift as climate action, and BLM just jumped the issue ahead in a big way, but the work of educating people has a long way to advance, yet.

No one expects Joe Biden to become a police abolitionist overnight.

Some people do think Presidents and politicians should be leaders and point "large parts of the electorate" toward the necessary reforms to avoid societal breakdown/for human life to continue in a recognizable form.

I think presidents and politicians can do that, but that it's foolish to take it for granted that they will.

Aimless is saying what I'm trying to say but much better.

Who takes it for granted? That Joe Biden obviously isn't on 'our' side here doesn't make him immune to criticism or negate the idea that proactive leadership is required.

Having zero expectations of elected leaders is how you get... here.

Afaic, anyone calling people who are speaking the truth 'naive' and 'childish' are simply engaging in maintenance of a social order that's murdering people.

And the way this started, btw, was that someone posted the absolute bullshit letter the Biden campaign put out about the murder of Walter Wallace Jr.

the burrito that defended a generation

here we go

simply engaging in maintenance of a social order that's murdering people.

I think it is useful to differentiate between those who accept that the reality is that the current social order which is murdering people is deeply entrenched and will not yield easily, those who are simply afraid of change and have been taught that police are their bulwark against their fears, so that murdering people is a regrettable but necessary byproduct of a fundamentally correct social order, and those whose interests are most directly benefited by the active and vigorous enforcement of this social order that's murdering people.

yeah that, plus it's not ok for police to push an old guy to the ground and crack his skull open during a peaceful protest

And the way this started, btw, was that someone posted the absolute bullshit letter the Biden campaign put out about the murder of Walter Wallace Jr.

good morning!

Asking a politician, whose job is to find a compromise

His compromise was to blame the protestors, and to not say anything about the cops. Hours later, the same cops attacked a random woman, smashed every window in her car, kicked her violently in the street and then kidnapped her son to lie in a photo op that they had rescued him. I strongly hope that Biden's ticket wins election on Tuesday, but he's still six feet of white dogshit in a cellophane bag, and this is the behaviour that he pre-endorsed while denouncing protest against it:

The young mother tried to make a three-point turn when a swarm of Philadelphia officers surrounded the SUV, shattered its windows and pulled Young and her 16-year-old nephew from the car, the video shows.

A now-viral video of the confrontation shows officers throw Young and the teenager to the ground and then grab the toddler from the back seat. The scene was captured by Aapril Rice, who watched it unfold from her rooftop and told the Philadelphia Inquirer that watching a police officer take the baby was “surreal” and “traumatic.”

Mincey said police temporarily detained Young, who had to be taken to the hospital for medical treatment before she could be processed at the police station because her head was bleeding and most of her left side had been badly bruised when police threw her to the ground. She and her son were separated for hours, he said.

“Her face was bloodied and she looked like she had been beaten by a bunch of people on the street,” he told The Post. “She is still in pain.”

Her nephew also suffered injuries in the confrontation, Mincey said, and Young’s son was hit in the head leaving a large bump on the toddler’s forehead.

Mincey said Young phoned her mother while in police custody and asked her to find the boy. The toddler’s grandmother managed to find him after several hours, the lawyer said, sitting in his car seat in the back of a police cruiser with two officers in the front seats. Glass from the SUV’s broken windows still lay in the child’s car seat, he said.

“We are not your enemy,” the union said in the posts showing Young’s son. “We are the Thin Blue Line. And WE ARE the only thing standing between Order and Anarchy.”

The sun had risen Tuesday morning before Young was finally reunited with her 2-year-old son, Mincey said. Police held Young for several hours, but eventually released her without charges, her lawyers said. The boy’s family then took him to the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, where doctors treated him for the head injury and then released him.

The family’s lawyers said police have not yet told Young where to find the damaged SUV or the family’s belongings that were inside it, including her son’s hearing aids.

And as noted earlier, the union that published the false propaganda generated by stealing a child was engaged in an emphatic campaign against Biden's election, to which his immediate reaction is to absolutely and totally capitulate.

People can speculate that his plan is to switch rhetoric sharply after the election and carefully explain to an unthinking populace that murder and kidnapping are bad, but his constant public reaching out to oligarchs and Republican mega-assholes for cabinet roles doesn't inspire confidence that capitulation-via-compromise will not be his ongoing strategy.

Asking a politician, whose job is to find a compromise

Here’s the problem right here. A politician’s job is to govern or legislate. Compromise is sometimes necessary, but it’s not the directive ffs

absolutely disgusting that Joe Biden condones the stealing of children by specifically denouncing protests against that specifically

:)

look maybe he can find a compromise between denouncing absolutely all protest against police brutality, and denouncing specifically playing football with an infant in barricaded streets, just in case the latter happens

Here’s the problem right here. A politician’s job is to govern or legislate. Compromise is sometimes necessary, but it’s not the directive ffs

― error prone wolf syndicate (Hadrian VIII), Saturday, October 31, 2020 12:11 AM (one minute ago) bookmarkflaglink

And that governing is given by a mandate of many millions and all the differences that come along with it. Is it still so difficult to imagine that in a country built on systemic racism and that have built this insane prison system and as allowed countless murdering by the police the people is going to be more receptive to fear of looting than racial justice? Who do you even think are your neighboors? Do you realise it’s the same country that has elected Trump? Why would Biden crash his chance of winning an election by saying stuff the majority of americans didn’t want to hear for decades? Dude just wants to get elected. It’s not like most major positive changes in the US didn’t come from incredible work the activists have done and politicians were either forced to accept the new realities or were inspired by.

Why would Biden crash his chance of winning an election by saying stuff the majority of americans didn’t want to hear for decades?

I guess I just wonder...what is this stuff? The stances we're talking about w/r/t race, health care, climate are popular with the general electorate. But we're habituated to this posture, this conditioned fear on the part of the historically abused, that to speak up against your abuser—to actually craft a message around it—is just too dangerous. Better to avoid the message, and when you can't, better to apologize.

Meanwhile the klepto-racist axis is totally at liberty to be up front with their message, they do it freely, proudly, and to their great advantage. Whaddayaknow, it turns out people really want to believe in something! So much so that even THIS fucking disaster happened.

Dude just wants to get elected.

A message we can believe in!

When the Pyrannas left school they were called up, but were found by an Army board to be too mentally unstable, even for national service. Denied the opportunity to use their talents in the service of their county, they began to operate what they called The Operation. They would select a victim, and then threaten to beat him up if he paid them the so called protection money. Four months later they started another operation, which they called The Other Operation. In this racket they selected another victim, and threaten *not* to beat him up if he *didn't* pay them. One month later they hit upon The Other Other Operation. In this the victim was threatened if he didn't pay them they would beat him up. This, for the Pyrannas Brothers, was the turning point.

Whut

Joe Biden's response to daily televised footage of police brutality: pledge to increase the cops' funding for training, repeatedly saying they should shoot citizens exercising their civil rights, instead of beating and gassing them.

HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS IN LOUSVILLE, KY: do some investigative journalism into local cop training, finding "A training slideshow used by the KSP — the second largest police force in the state — urges cadets to be 'ruthless killers' and quotes Adolf Hitler advocating violence."

One slide, titled “Violence of Action,” in addition to imploring officers to be “a ruthless killer,” instructs troopers to have “a mindset void of emotion” and to “meet violence with greater violence.”

A line from Adolf Hitler’s fascist and anti-Semitic manifesto, Mein Kampf, is featured in the slide: “the very first essential for success is a perpetually constant and regular employment of violence.”

The presentation also links to a Hitler page on Goodreads, a database of quotes and books.

Two other slides quoting Hitler bring his total to three, making him the most quoted person in the presentation.

It’s not like most major positive changes in the US didn’t come from incredible work the activists have done and politicians were either forced to accept the new realities or were inspired by.

This is something of a party line here to excuse the low expectations ("he just wants to get elected"), but positive change has required a combination of activism and political leadership - you've just never seen the latter in your lifetime.

Elite support for issues makes them real. Single-payer healthcare was a real possibility from Truman through the mid '70s and then became a distant fantasy when no powerful Democrats were left to champion it - and only became a (faint) possibility again because its most famous proponent made two serious runs at the Democratic nomination from the outside.

As long as Joe Biden's sole emphasis is on the evils of protesting or on "coverage" rather than healthcare quality or access or the laughable impossibility of a Green New Deal or abandoning fossil fuel subsidies, that's license for lesser lights to maintain the status quo. It's similar to the Lieberman/Manchin gambit ("sorry, we just can't pack the court - I really really want to but Joe won't let us!) in restraining the possibility of anything better than this pile of shit we've got now.

ugh, I hate how I always learn about how Joe Biden thinks cops should shoot citizens exercising their civil rights after I vote for Joe Biden!!

I would love if, at least for the next five days, we all collectively stopped with the sarcastic and ironic language. It's an upsetting time and it's hard enough to tell who is being sincere without this constant scrim of irony in everyone's posts. I would deeply appreciate it if the language on this board was sincere for a few days so that we don't tear each other to shreds about points that we don't even believe in.

Van Horn Street, perhaps you missed this part of my posts, but Walter Wallace Jr. was my neighbor. The people who were beaten and whose son was stolen for an FOP propaganda photo-op? Also my neighbors. The neighborhood we share is overrun with cops right now, fulfilling the usual cop duty of intimidating the citizens protesting their right to survive in their own neighborhood.

Remember also that of the Philadelphia cops implicated in the racist meme Facebook scandal of last year, 96% are still on the force, and the others have sued the department for wrongful termination.

I keep repeating myself here and elsewhere and offline, too, because all of this bears repeating until policing in the US is drastically altered or abolished altogether.

I would love if, at least for the next five days, we all collectively stopped with the sarcastic and ironic language. It's an upsetting time and it's hard enough to tell who is being sincere without this constant scrim of irony in everyone's posts. I would deeply appreciate it if the language on this board was sincere for a few days so that we don't tear each other to shreds about points that we don't even believe in.

― Fuck the NRA (ulysses), Saturday, October 31, 2020 2:27 AM

OTM. Weaponized sarcasm gets an FP every time I see it.

This is something of a party line here to excuse the low expectations ("he just wants to get elected"), but positive change has required a combination of activism and political leadership - you've just never seen the latter in your lifetime.

Elite support for issues makes them real. Single-payer healthcare was a real possibility from Truman through the mid '70s and then became a distant fantasy when no powerful Democrats were left to champion it - and only became a (faint) possibility again because its most famous proponent made two serious runs at the Democratic nomination from the outside.

― Donald Trump Also Sucks, Of Course (milo z), Saturday, October 31, 2020 1:40 AM (nine hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

I think political leadership is essential but comes after.

Post-70s, was there a massive movement for single payer health care? I’ve seen more energy spent on other issues, for which there have been significant wins; and I’ve also seen a massive pushback against the general idea of paying more taxes. I think Sanders doesn’t become hyper popular without post-2008 activism, the general realisation that inequality is growing at a fast pace and growing need for climate change action. It seems to me that he was always the same old Sanders, but that a (large enough) group of people found a champion in him.

The leadership of politicians in general, but especially the president, is not a matter of creating a constituency for a policy where none existed, but rather picking up on a policy that has already gathered significant support and transporting those policy ideas 'the last mile', by finding an expression of the idea that can be sold to the broad public who aren't yet up to speed, then put into a bill, passed into law, and ultimately accepted by the governed.

Post-70s, was there a massive movement for single payer health care?

No... but that's what I said up there? From Truman until the mid-70s, it was a possibility because powerful people pursued it. It's how we got Medicare and Medicaid to start with. This push for single-payer (and Medicare) did not come from "activism," it was a product of the pursuit of a political goal.

You specifically noted "progressive change" - but reactionary change (like, say, the post-9/11 natsec apparatus) are just as firmly entrenched and certainly did not come from people marching in the streets. You cannot dismiss the impact of elites (politicians and media) setting the terms of what's realistic and what's "childish and naive."

It seems to me that he was always the same old Sanders

Weaponized sarcasm gets an FP every time I see it.

― scampo-phenique (WmC), Saturday, 31 October 2020 15:00 (two hours ago) link

I doubt this. I don't think you're always able to make a distinction between what you interpret as "weaponized" sarcasm and what is actually garden-variety sarcasm. I also think you're likely to be more forgiving when it comes from someone you know.

My own desire is for, yes, more bannings.

― Scampos Runamuck (WmC), Sunday, August 30, 2020 12:25 PM (two months ago) link

I don't doubt this.

Fair enough, rumbled on all counts. I was being hyperbolic, and don't actually FP every instance of weaponized sarcasm I see. I do usually grimace at them, though. I FP'd a post of yours this morning that seemed to be one of a long string of posts designed to get people het up without making a clear point; I felt better immediately and didn't worry about the damage to your FP count since I had already FP'd you a month ago.

Great post, by the way. You called me out on my obvious bullshit clearly and without a cryptic image in place of a stated point.

did you like that DemAnon video though

You specifically noted "progressive change" - but reactionary change (like, say, the post-9/11 natsec apparatus) are just as firmly entrenched and certainly did not come from people marching in the streets. You cannot dismiss the impact of elites (politicians and media) setting the terms of what's realistic and what's "childish and naive."
― Donald Trump Also Sucks, Of Course (milo z), Saturday, October 31, 2020 12:43 PM (five hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

I think the evangelical vote, which is a massive voting bloc, proves my point. Other countries who do not have that specific population do not see the rights to abortion as threatened quite like in the US.

Elites doesn't mean anything to me, but the media does have an impact. That being said, citizens are still able to be critical of any media presented to them.

Other countries who do not have that specific population

The people of Poland would like to speak to you. I don't know what the evangelical vote has to do with top-down reactionary policies becoming firmly entrenched, though.

I'm sorry elite doesn't mean anything to you, but it does have a pretty standard meaning.

https://www.reactiongifs.com/r/2011/11/obnoxious.gif

Poland has a large catholic constituency and enough people for PiS to win elections, do you think the ‘elites’ live in such a vacuum?

Poland has a large catholic constituency

Yes. Now contrast that with your previous statement: "... the evangelical vote, which is a massive voting bloc, proves my point. Other countries who do not have that specific population do not see the rights to abortion as threatened quite like in the US.Other countries who do not have that specific population do not see the rights to abortion as threatened quite like in the US."

do you think the ‘elites’ live in such a vacuum?

Again... "a combination of activism and political leadership."

If the Democratic political leadership endorses an idea, any idea at all - it becomes the ride or die position for about a quarter of the country automatically, because their team endorsed it. Likewise, if leadership actively rejects and ridicules the Green New Dream Or Whatever, that quarter of the country also rejects and ridicules it, making it harder for the activists to make inroads.

Well other that in Poland they are mainly catholics and that in the US you have a mix of different christians it doesn't really refute my point that politicians are not going to contradict what their electorate is asking for.

If the Democratic political leadership endorses an idea, any idea at all - it becomes the ride or die position for about a quarter of the country automatically, because their team endorsed it. Likewise, if leadership actively rejects and ridicules the Green New Dream Or Whatever, that quarter of the country also rejects and ridicules it, making it harder for the activists to make inroads.

Up until the GND is so popular the democratic leadership has no choice but to position itself for it, Biden has been elected to his position by being able to ignore the GND, hence, not enough people are for the GND for it to be yet a game changer.

Well other that in Poland they are mainly catholics and that in the US you have a mix of different christians

it doesn't really refute my point that politicians are not going to contradict what their electorate is asking for.

Up until the GND is so popular the democratic leadership has no choice but to position itself for it, Biden has been elected to his position by being able to ignore the GND, hence, not enough people are for the GND for it to be yet a game changer.

I really just meant that countries without a christian block of anti-abortion fanatics don't face the same pressure over women's rights.

That's not true - perhaps you've heard of... Saudi Arabia? - but also irrelevant? Again - "a combination of activism and political leadership."

The idea that a politician's only role is to rubber stamp a proposal that has now reached some magical number of public support bears no relation to reality.

The discussion is about democracies, outside of them it’s indeed different, everything that I’ve said was framed with the notion of elections. In Saudi Arabia it’s indeed not christiannity nor a country with many elections, good job on picking that up, but let me guess that abortion rights policies wouldn’t be too popular among a famously religious saudi population, and that even if the leadership suddenly believed it was the right thing to do, the prospect of it ever happening would be slim. Hence my point again, politicians with an electoral imperative aren’t too keen on going against what is popular with the base.

Aimless, twice, has said it better than I did, at this point we are just repeating ourselves. I just think we have fundamentaly different views of how democracy works and that’s quite okay.

The idea that a politician's only role is to rubber stamp a proposal that has now reached some magical number of public support bears no relation to reality.

Just because you can poorly paraphrase someone's clearly stated position to make it sound idiotic doesn't address their position or make it idiotic.

Up until the GND is so popular the democratic leadership has no choice but to position itself for it, Biden has been elected to his position by being able to ignore the GND

Yes. That quote does not misrepresent VHS's thinking. Good for you. Now you might contrast and compare it with "only", "rubber stamp" and "magical number".