In a letter published Wednesday on Medium, an anonymous group of Biden’s campaign staffers demanded the president call for a ceasefire in Gaza, citing concerns that not shifting his policy on the issue could hurt his 2024 chances.
“Biden for President staff have seen volunteers quit in droves, and people who have voted blue for decades feel uncertain about doing so for the first time ever, because of this conflict,” the Medium letter read.
“It is not enough to merely be the alternative to Donald Trump,” the campaigners continued. “The campaign has to shift the feeling in the pits of voters’ stomachs, the same feeling that weighs on us every day as we fight for your reelection. The only way to do that is to call for a ceasefire.”
Sure, still going to vote for Biden over Trump. All Biden has to do is not be Trump and he is the better option.
Sure, still going to vote for Biden over Trump
So am I. Because probably like you, voting for me is easy.
Takes less than 15 minutes even on presidential years.
Not everyone is so lucky. Some people are hours of waiting, presidential years we still hear about some places being five, eight, maybe even more hours wait
And because that is almost always caused by Republicans doing it to dem areas of their state…
We really, really need those votes. If we didn’t, Republicans wouldn’t try so hard to suppress them.
So while voting Biden is undoubtedly worth 15 minutes of my time, you have to ask yourself: is it enough for a single parent working two jobs they don’t get PTO from to stand there for half a day.
It might have been enough when Trump was actively in office. But lots of people liked the idea of Biden four years ago a lot more than they do after his first 3 years in office.
And college students may need to drive many hours to their “home” where they are registered to vote. Which they might do “often” anyway, and like combine it with laundry, a meal, and an overnight stay, but still that all comes at the expense of homework time and exam prep, plus depending on the weather that drive may get more difficult. People like to blame college kids for not voting more, especially earlier in the primaries, as if somehow it is the youth that put DT into office back then!?
Your comment providing a deeper perspective is like a breath of fresh air. Thank you for sharing it.:-)
Your comment providing a deeper perspective is like a breath of fresh air. Thank you for sharing it.:-)
And people told me I was an idiot for getting a sociology minor!
/s
Real talk tho, a big reason governments are so fucked up is at some point we all got convinced business majors and lawyers were a better pick for leaders over sociologists.
At the bare minimum we need sociologists running campaigns.
Give me somebody that went through grad school to earn barely above the poverty line for decades before becoming fed up with the system and running for office. That is someone American voters can identify with, and someone that understands how the American public thinks.
At this point I’m convinced business majors shouldn’t even be leading businesses, let alone countries. Society suffers from how they’ve determined to extract the maximum profits from things.
It’s specifically the McKinsey kids.
Ivy Leaguers straight out of school that get paid millions for “hot takes” like companies should pay CEOs more and that as a huge coincidence every company needs to downsize.
That’s just American countries.
They also do work overseas like Saudi Arabia.
It’s what blew up Pete Butteigeigs camoaign, people started talking about how he wasn’t just a former McKinsey kid, he did the real shady shit overseas. It made it really hard for him to pretend to be a progressive.
I must disagree with the last paragraph, if you meant it more broadly beyond sociologists. For one, Obama was a Harvard constitutional scholar - though I don’t think he was “barely above the poverty line for decades” - so we already tried someone who at least paid attention in school as opposed to merely paying to cover their transgressions (I am speaking about GWB, who basically flunked Yale but then went to great trouble to hide that fact - you probably already know that a “C” in grad school is flunking). Much of the criticism that he received was undeserved and horrifically out of line - e.g. how his wife & children all looked like various forms of monkeys, do you hear that dog whistle? - but some of it was also probably deserved (unfortunately I do not know precisely how to distinguish which is which, and we likely will not know for another decade or so until historians are able to piece it together; and then the likes of me may never find out b/c I’d have to sift it through all the misinformation also being spewed out, and the idiocy besides).
More recently, Fauci provided a great example when he was asked what policy he would recommend implementing during the pandemic and his response was basically “I do not know. I will help with the factual questions though.” - thereby displaying humility, and precision in stating where exactly his sphere of knowledge lay, and having the wisdom to know that that target was beyond it. i.e., scientists tend to know very little beyond the fields that they choose to study.
So for the same reason that you may not want a brain surgeon coming over to fix your toilet problems - nor vice versa I might add!!! - just b/c someone went through grad school means very little, in terms of their ability to LEAD.
That said, ofc leaders should LISTEN to experts, not shit on them as DT did, especially within their area of expertise. Much of the economic struggles we are having today derive from the power of “corporations”, which were a thing that did not used to exist, but Bill Clinton (as he says many times) ignored them (he did set us up with many overseas treatises I am told, but domestic affairs on the other hand tended to be neglected under his administration - I thought the consensus was? oh right, you probably know way more than that than I!:-D), and ignored Robert Reich his cabinet secretary who tried to help with domestic policies.
So this is a lot of words to say that people can do well what they have been trained to do, but that does not mean that they can do everything, especially things that have very little to do with their training. Angela Merkel could, so ofc it’s not mutually exclusive, just not a sure thing either.
Also, at this point you probably would have to be insane to WANT to enter the political sphere, unless you were doing it for the $$$$$.
just b/c someone went through grad school means very little, in terms of their ability to LEAD
You out arguing that not ever sociologist would be a good president…
Cool man, no idea who told you they should, but I think everyone agrees
People like to blame college kids for not voting more, especially earlier in the primaries, as if somehow it is the youth that put DT into office back then!?
Entrenched leadership wants to ignore everyone who isn’t a conservative boomer. Blaming everyone else means they can dismiss them as unreliable.
If Covid hadn’t pushed vote by mail so hard in 2020, Biden would not have won. It was only because vote by mail increased voter engagement that Biden got it.
Engagement is going to be down in '24, vote by mail won’t be the same option it was in lots of places, and that’s going to make it a lot harder for Biden to win.
Not just vote by mail.
Lots of states finally moved away from requiring a specific polling location to anywhere in your city/county.
Which essentially broke the biggest waits. Who would stand in line for hours instead of driving to a different one if they had the option?
Pre-covid my 15 minute round trip for voting was about an hour at best, including 30 minutes driving. Because the polling location I had to go to wasn’t the closest, served a large area, and was pretty tiny with very few machines. They never even had stickers.
Now I get to go to the “rich” polling location that’s in walking distance, has a bunch of machines and volunteers, and gives out legit breakfast bags to every voter.
That also drastically helped Biden, I believe it’ll stick around tho.
Engagement is going to be down in '24
I highly doubt this.
Ikr?? Voting is so easy in my state. I get the ballot in the mail, like everyone in my state. I get a voting guide. I vote then drop it off 15 mins from my house. Everyone can vote even if they’re working.
All Biden has to do is not be Trump and he is the better option.
That’s all he has to do to get votes, but he needs a campaign staff. Can you imagine dedicating energy to work to get someone elected who you aren’t exactly passionate about?
Maybe he doesn’t need a campaign staff. He could keep his head down and just see what happens on election day. I’d almost welcome it.
I can because there are always more staffers, just like there are always new fools that decide to work for Trump. There isn’t a union of staffers after all, so I’m not at all worried about a handful of them.
All Biden has to do is not be Trump and he is the better option.
Good news. That’s the extent of Democrats’ ambition.
Lol, ok then…
As will I, but I will also take every opportunity I have to try and make him be less of a trash person. As difficult of a task as it is.
“I’m going to vote for the guy but do my best to convince others he’s trash. Hopefully they still vote for him too!”
So, one should never criticize the party they’re supporting? Like the blind Trump followers?
No, not never. But goddamn, pick your moments. Ten months out from an election with trump leading the polls is impressively poor timing.
The best moment for criticism was 2020 in the primaries but the progressive/youth wing of the Democratic coalition feels voting in primaries abhorrent (and loves screeching about hating the party during the general election.)
I don’t know if you’re old enough to remember how close 2016 and 2020 were but goddamn, elections these days are won on the margins. And if my snarky comments about Biden make one progressive kid sit this election out, that’s one too many.
its infuriating because all he has do is setup some shitty arbitrary line Israel already crossed such as barring support/arms sales to countries with high child casualty rates and he doesn’t even have to mention Israel to sidestep the whole problem like a coward.
Some people get mad when the US plays world police, some when it doesn’t. There is always something to be outraged about.
Personally I don’t think a ceasefire is a good idea. Hamas will, again, turn around and commit more atrocities, as will Israel. It’s delusional to think they will ever stop. No one in Hamas or the IDF will magically come to their senses.
So, for now I’m just waiting for the end result. Hamas is clearly losing and all we can do is hope something good comes of it.
If you killed my family and destroyed my town to take out Hamas, the first thing I’d do is start Hamas 2. You can’t indiscriminately bomb your way out of terrorism.
The only possible outcome I can imagine where these atrocities make Israelis and Palestinians safer is if the UN Security Council enforces the 1967 borders and the ICC tries the senior leadership of Hamas and Israel for crimes against humanity. The world has to say “Never Again” to these atrocities.
Hamas part 2 or 29, it doesn’t matter, because there is no solution. Maybe if cults weren’t involved it would be a different story. The UN has no power in changing the outcome.
The best result would be Hamas and the IDF disappearing from the world, but I doubt either of those things will happen.
The latter for obvious reasons, the former because the many orphaned children now have good (and, honestly, legitimate) reason to hate Israel.
I would like Islamic groups participating in terrorism to disappear as well. The whole middle east situation is FUBAR. It needs a clean slate to work with.
Some people get mad when the US plays world police, some when it doesn’t.
Maybe if the US actually pulled out of the middle East everyone would be happy. But they’re not; they’re actively supporting Israel’s genocide.
This is the way
This thread is wild… is it seriously shocking to people here that Biden campaigners (plurality young people) are upset about his response to the genocide in Gaza?? Yes, obviously we need to vote for him, but it’s crazy that criticism is labeled as astroturfing or attempts to sabotage his chances.
I really hate that every time someone criticizes him, some dumbass replies with “Yeah well Trump is way worse”
Yeah no shit lol, just because I hate the current president doesn’t mean I’m automatically selecting the deranged orange.
That’s why I dislike “approval” polling. I haven’t approved of most of the people I’ve voted for. That’s the point of our system: You vote for people you hate and they do things you don’t like.
Looks at what happens when people vote for someone they like. The bigots coalesce and you get Trump.
Yeah, bigots get a candidates that they like and they went to the polls with a big smile on their face. They had a reason to vote. Everyone else? “Here, have this old out-of-touch jackass that we pushed through the primaries by having all the other candidates drop down right before super tuesday, while keeping Warren in to split votes with Bernie, and having all our buddies in big media tell everyone about the supposed miracle comeback from biden”. Covid won 2020 for biden, but he thinks he’s hot shit. The closest thing to hot shit about him is what’s in his diaper.
Also why the fuck are people working for free lmao
Have you never spent your spare time contributing to something you care about? I spend time contributing to open source code and Wikipedia, previously I’ve spent time building stuff to make a local park nicer. I could definitely see myself spending time campaigning for a political party if I felt the future of my country depended on it.
When you’re doing something like that, spending time on something you have a passion for together with others, it’s typically more fun and fulfilling than tiresome. You should try it some time.
If you want to see any of your political goals come to fruition, volunteering is by far the best way to do that.
Volunteer for local campaigns often. Participate heavily. Consider becoming a citizen lobbyist.
I love the work I do for Citizens Climate Lobby, for instance.
I’m upset too, but there is more than one issue in the world. These people need to put things in perspective. If Trump wins, America is literally over.
So, genocide is a “single issue” which means it should be ignored? How can you hope for any semblance of change if you start by overlooking literal genocide
It isn’t overlooking it to accept that there’s nothing we can do about it. There will be no viable candidate who opposes Israel, and that’s the unfortunate truth. There are still significant differences however between the two candidates, and I don’t want the one who’s likely to start a domestic genocide to win.
There’s blood on our hands, and we don’t have a way to wipe it off. I’d rather accept it and try to move forward than try in vain to clean them.
How can you hope for any semblance of change
I don’t. I gave up hope a while ago. Feels nice.
How can you hope for any semblance of change…
You balance it against your other priorities
It isn’t a literal genocide, but a figurative one, which is the source of the disagreement.
0.0044% of Gazans have been killed. The US killed the same net amount of civilians during the Battle of Mosul, and Gaza is three times as dense as Mosul.
This number will go up, because this war is being brutally waged, and Israel does deserve criticism for it. But words matter, and genocide is a dumb word to use because it has actual meanings, and requires specific intent
0.0044% of Gazans have been killed.
???
The population of the Gaza Strip is just over 2 million (2.048). The amount of Gazans killed in the past three months is 22600, as of today. That is, by my math, 1.13% of the population that has been killed in those three months, or 1 out of every 100 people.
To add to this, genocide (as defined by the UN) does not just include directly killing a particular group:
Definition Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide
Article II
In the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:
- Killing members of the group; 2. Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; 3. Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; 4. Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; 5. Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.
So in addition to killing 20k+ Gaza civilians, Israel’s response has displaced countless others with their intense and indiscriminate bombing (see points #2, #3, possibly #4). NYT and other sources claim that up to 1.8 million Gazans have been displaced, which NYT claims is 80% of their population. This is in addition to the conditions Gaza was already being subjected to, such as being denied water and electricity (#3) by Israel.
The evidence overwhelmingly shows that this is genocide. “Figurative” is such a sleazy doublespeak way of excusing the behavior here.
Edit: sorry my link should work now
Textbook Case of Genocide is as literal as you can get. From a Jewish Holocaust and “genocide” expert.
Weird because words still have meanings even if this person disagrees.
Pretty sure he knows the definition of “genocide” better than you.
Weird because I don’t
Too bad trump and Biden are the only two people so I just have to be pro genocide.
You don’t have to. You can have your own views and make the best decision available to you given the circumstances.
So you’re saying not to vote? Or that we should write-in a vote for a non-genocider?
No I’m saying that you can vote for someone and not agree with everything they stand for because that’s the best option you have. We do need reforms in America, but is that a reason to not vote or to wait around until all the conditions are perfect for you to vote your ideals?
So if I disagree with one pro-genocide politician less than the other, I should support a pro-genocide candidate? That’s not reasonable, it’s falling prey to a false choice. I hate to paraphrase the Declaration of Independence at Americans, but at least the founders understood when the course of human events made it necessary to dissolve political ties.
So what is the move? It’s clearly wrong to vote for Biden and you say not voting is a waste. So be frank and say what you’re thinking clearly and plainly.
They did say it clearly. But let me see if I can’t help.
You can have a slap in the face
Or a rusty shank to the neck
One or the other.
If you don’t pick, one will be picked for you.
I get not wanting to vote for him. I do. But not all of us get that luxury.
I’m gay. Me and my boyfriend are talking about leaving the country. He’s got one last semester of nursing school. Lots of places are desperate for nurses. We can probably get out. If we do, then I can say we get to move.
If the Republicans win, it won’t just be get to, it will become need to as well. Any queer person who stays is taking a big risk. But not everyone will be able to leave.
Between the push for a fascist theocracy with Trump as the dictator as he uses phrases pulled from the Nazis and gives us their plans under Project 2025, I don’t get the luxury of saying “Well, let’s see if we can’t come back from this.” When we talk about being terrified of a Republican presidency, we are not exaggerating.
This isn’t a light decision to make. I hate it. Even if the dems win, we might still leave. Project 2025 will just turn to Project 2029. Project 2033. Eventually they will win. But in the mean time I have to decide between voting for Joe who supports Isreal
Or risk Trump who supports Isreal, but also supports the same thing here
It’s Biden or Trump
A slap in the face or a rusty shank to the neck
Vote people that has naunces on the downballot.
Just so we’re clear, the source for this article is an anonymous post to Medium that claims to be from 17 staffers.
This is not “news”
https://medium.com/@BidenHQforCeasefireNow/dear-president-biden-we-need-a-ceasefire-now-f48b732b2433
And it didn’t even provide any evidence that volunteers were quitting in droves.
17 does not equal droves
The letter was organized by campaign staffers. Five of them confirmed the authenticity of the letter to West Wing Playbook. Those staffers, who were granted anonymity because of their concern of backlash, said they were motivated to organize their letter out of a sense of moral responsibility.
https://www.politico.com/news/2024/01/03/biden-campaign-anonymous-letter-israel-hamas-00133705
Nice try though to ignore the issue.
You realize that article uses the same source right? It explicitly states it early on.
Yes, and states that the authenticity of those behind it were confirmed. So it’s not “claims to be from 17 staffers”, we know for a fact that it IS from 17 staffers. It is only anonymous to protect them from getting attacked from AIPAC and related groups, as they have been doing to anyone that criticizes Israel and has any prominence.
Where does it say that the identities were confirmed? I’ve read the entire article like 3 times looking for it and can’t seem to find it.
Did you not read the comment of mine you previously replied to? Where I quoted from a Politico article?
Yes, I’m referring to the politico article. Where does it say in the politico article that the identities were confirmed?
Literally the part I quoted above.
Gotta love the abusive-relationship mechanic from the dems.
“Yes, I’m a toxic piece of shit, but without me you’ll be starving on the streets. So stop complaining, make me a sandwich, and tell me you love me. Now.”
And anyone suggesting that maybe they should leave anyway… is smeared as just wanting to drive victims into homelessness and prostitution.
If you want people to vote for you, be good enough to vote for on your own merits.
If you’re struggling to get votes despite your opponent being literally Trump, then you need to take a long hard look in the mirror.
It’s only because Democrats are so shitty at cannidate choice that we got trump in the first place
Bold of you to assume they aren’t propping up unpopular candidates on purpose.
And while they’re at it, they very directly propped up Trump as well. Hillary Clinton is responsible for everything Trump did.
Truth x Facts
Like in 2016, and the DNC’s Pied piper strategy
In a letter published Wednesday on Medium, an anonymous group of Biden’s campaign staffers demanded the president call for a ceasefire in Gaza
Surly they couldn’t be lying about being campaign staffers, could they? I suppose they have to remain anonymous to protect themselves from violent and deranged Biden cultists.
“Fake news!”
The letter was organized by campaign staffers. Five of them confirmed the authenticity of the letter to West Wing Playbook. Those staffers, who were granted anonymity because of their concern of backlash, said they were motivated to organize their letter out of a sense of moral responsibility.
https://www.politico.com/news/2024/01/03/biden-campaign-anonymous-letter-israel-hamas-00133705
Nice try though to ignore the issue.
You should have posted the Politco article instead of the Newsweek. You are even citing the Politico article! The Newsweek article is hot garbage.
Fair enough. I saw the Newsweek article first and the Politico article only after I had posted the former here.
Newsweek is a terrible, terrible publication.
Ssssshut the fuck up
Excuse the world for being inherently suspicious of efforts that make space for letting Trump back into the White House after “letting the establishment learn their lesson” worked so outstandingly well in 2016.
Nobody’s ignoring the issue, they’re rightfully questioning the motives of the people who are stoking the flames on the issue.
This smells like #WalkAway psyop bullshit. Anon letter on Medium as a source, lol please.
The letter was organized by campaign staffers. Five of them confirmed the authenticity of the letter to West Wing Playbook. Those staffers, who were granted anonymity because of their concern of backlash, said they were motivated to organize their letter out of a sense of moral responsibility.
https://www.politico.com/news/2024/01/03/biden-campaign-anonymous-letter-israel-hamas-00133705
Nice try though to ignore the issue.
I jumped to conclusions, at least someone has confirmed it’s legit. Wasn’t ignoring it but the astroturfing “Anon outside any verifiable or published source says” is a problem that keeps recurring.
They are entitled to their opinions, and I’m not even in disagreement - the entire conflict is an abomination and horrendous… but I’m curious who they’d vote for otherwise. No one worth talking about in US politics would chart a different course.
It’s much easier to hold your nose and vote for the (much!) less bad option than it is to decide to spend your time and effort working for their campaign.
17 people is not a significant portion of his campaign staff, and the campaign hasn’t even mobilized for staffing heavily yet.
The letter is the latest example of internal rifts not just within the Democratic Party but within the Biden operation over how to approach the conflict. Since the fall, a flurry of protest letters — often written without names attached — have urged the president to support a ceasefire. In November, 500 political appointees and staff members from 40 government agencies anonymously signed one letter, while another letter included the names of over 500 alumni of Biden’s 2020 presidential campaign. White House interns also sent a letter to the president and staffers on Capitol Hill have also sent similar letters to their bosses. Biden supporters have raised questions about the veracity of those numbers, noting that the anonymity makes it impossible to confirm.
How about 500 people? Is that number more significant?
Not particularly, no. Something to the tune of 2-3 million people volunteered for the Biden campaign in 2020
The 500 number isn’t volunteers, but “political appointees and staff members from 40 government agencies”.
Ah well then definitely no.
It’s good to see that people are putting pressure on Biden to do the right thing vis-a-vis Israel and Gaza. I think it’s the right thing to do and I’ve been so disillusioned to see American democracy reduced to a booster contest between soulless ghouls that must never be challenged or questioned™.
It’s not at all surprising to see toxic, bad-faith rhetoric deployed in his defense, tho. If there’s one thing I can count on from the Dem establishment is that when faced with unsolicited input from young people, out comes the reductionist rhetoric about how anything that isn’t ball-slobbering of their candidate and whatever the party has handed down as its agenda is a vote for fascism.
As it did in 2016, the Democrats are going through energetic disagreements over their future direction as a party- and as it did in 2016, the establishment is going to have to decide whether it can afford to alienate its younger/leftier constituency in order to chase votes to the center
The problem is that younger people often don’t vote. So chasing their votes is a losing strat. Younger citizens need to actually get out there and make sure that they are casting votes, otherwise they will continue to not be taken seriously
I’m sure if younger people were given a reason to give a shit they’d come out and vote. Even the candidates that are supposed to be more relatable to younger voters(Dems) have tone deaf talking points that revolve around the stock market, unemployment, gas prices, and inflation, none of which are an accurate metric that would define economic opportunity for the youth. Kind of a self fulfilling prophecy.
You’re correct but I see you’ve been downvoted by people who think young people “just don’t vote” and this defeatist attitude is prevalent in the democrat fanbase. It’s always “the president can’t do that” when it comes to helping people where obama and biden can only offer breadcrumbs in 12 years, but somehow trump can turn the entire country into a fascist hellhole in just 4 years.
Give young people a reason to vote and they will: https://www.pewresearch.org/2008/11/13/young-voters-in-the-2008-election/
But nah, it’s instead either “they don’t vote so we don’t need to care about them” or “if we shame them hard enough then they must vote for us!” Then when the democrats inevitably lose an election, it’s somehow the voters’ fault as if democrats are owed votes.
well he fired all the staffers who admitted to cannabis use even though he promised not to
hard to work and get the job done with someone who flip flops on everything he says probably quit too
So I can’t volunteer for a campaign if I smoke weed?
Hmm, let me see. Ceasefire in a country that has nothing to do with us and doesn’t effect us in the slightest
OR
We elect a literal fascist who actually admitted he will be a dictator and use the military against his enemies at home
Tough choice
I’m sorry that pushing for Biden to be a better person is such a problem for you. Trump is a monster, but that doesn’t mean we should ignore everything Biden does and pretend he’s perfect.
I don’t see anyone pretending Biden is perfect though?
I see a whole lot of people saying “a sane rational actor instead of a fucking psychpath and his cult.”
You’re in survival mode. So calling on the better of two options to condemn genocide and call for a cease fire is a waste of time?
I guess you have to compromise your morality to survive, but damn…
When the implied threat behind that call is letting the fascist wannabe dictator into office, yes it’s a dangerous waste of time.
I’m a Palestinian here in America and I feel fucking violated by how many people are ready to let me hang by the klansman’s rope on the excuse of being mad about what Israel is doing to my cousins in the Levant.
Meanwhile the man they’re supposedly so mad at for his inaction has been pressing Israel on de-escalation, negotiating prisoner swaps, and negotiated Gaza the right to access their own offshore natural resources to use the revenue for their own development.
Biden at his worst is doing more for the Palestinian community than these supposed allies of ours are doing at what they insist are their best.
What else is there left to conclude except that vote hostagers prefer Palestinians dead rather than living, dead Palestinians don’t call them out for enabling the circumstances that let Israel and racist Americans get away with tormenting and killing us.
Every cult likes to think they’re sane and rational.
Even the Cult of Biden.
that doesn’t mean we should ignore everything Biden does and pretend he’s perfect.
who is doing that? where?
He’s not perfect. He’s like getting 6 hours of sleep, tolerable. Trump is like getting 45 minutes of sleep a week, concerning and dangerous. 8 hours of sleep isn’t on the ballot and probably won’t be next time either
Oh shut the fuck up, that’s not what any of this even is, not to mention it’s not about being a “better person”. There is far more complexity to this whole mess. This shit doesn’t start nor end with Biden.
Your other responses in comments are just as shortsighted and simplistic, but go off ig
“Genocide is fine if it doesn’t happen to me” is not a take I was expecting to see being upvoted.
Uh… Israel is killing Gazans using American-made weapons right now.
Ceasefire in a country that has nothing to do with us and doesn’t effect us in the slightest
a brutal lie in the first part, a gross lie in the second part. mind you, I’m not pushing for any of the two octogenarian that will be elected.
A group of staffers working on President Joe Biden’s reelection campaign warned the president that his volunteers are quitting “in droves” over his handling of Israel’s military response in the Gaza Strip.
“A group”? Two people said a thing? Well lets blast it out there like it’s fuckin’ true! FFS.
This is a garbage article. Newsweek is digging for clicks and does not give a shit about America. Just like all the corporate news sewers: CNN, NBC, ABC, WaPo, NYT who covered Trump relentlessly and repeated whatever insanity he spewed as if he were not a demented rapist fraud who can’t stop lying.
Fuck newsweek for this, whatever they are now is just twitter with a masthead.
The letter was organized by campaign staffers. Five of them confirmed the authenticity of the letter to West Wing Playbook. Those staffers, who were granted anonymity because of their concern of backlash, said they were motivated to organize their letter out of a sense of moral responsibility.
https://www.politico.com/news/2024/01/03/biden-campaign-anonymous-letter-israel-hamas-00133705
Way more than two people. Nice try though to ignore the issue.
“Way more than two” being five? Okay. Is five “droves”?
It is not. Way to hang on to trying to make this legit. It’s bullshit intended to stoke FUD and you’re all onboard. Give it up.
17 people behind the letter alone, discussing the many other people they’ve personally seen quit over the past three months.
What issue? That unpaid interns or those one step below are not agreeing with long-term political decisions that were practically made before they were born and only understand the surface of the subject?
Yeah, thanks. I think I’ll just ignore those as well if I were in a position of power, and you would too.
What is this “moral responsibility,” and why is it just now relevant? There were, are, and will be much bigger and worse issues, like climate change, but no one is talking about moral responsibility and blasting the ones who are in charge like it is happening right now with the Israel/Palestine crisis.
Maybe it is just the age of massive misinformation and propaganda campaigns from all sides (some are engaging much more than others) with which I have a problem. Because, in the end, I applaud people who stand up for what they think is right, like those interns. It just comes across as too selective to be a principle. I mean, the Israel/Palestine issue has been ongoing for what? 50 years? It’s not even the first hot phase or siege of Gaza. And then you start working in politics and then you became aware of the politics and stopped working there? What?
Do you really have no other choice but one of those two over there?
We really have no other choice
Their system automatically makes a winner of the biggest party. In any country that uses that system, it automatically leads to two main parties alternating in power. The advantage is that you don’t need “messy” and “unstable” coalitions, but can have strong leadership with a solid base instead. Except that perhaps string leadership is a dangerous thing to have in many cases, and except that if the balance tends towards 50/50, you can easily have problems getting anything done.
It’s the structure of our “first past the post” system. Basically, each party gets one representative on the presidential ticket. The two major parties have primaries where the top candidates compete in a vote within themselves, and the winner gets put on the presidential ticket for that party.
The obvious problem with that is that the party convention picks the candidate, not the voters. So it’s possible to buy a party’s candidate or for the conventions to snub popular choice in favor of not shaking things up too much in the status quo.
The latter point, the democratic party picking lukewarm candidates that are moderate at best because the establishment doesn’t want to disturb the status quo, has been a problem for a long time and is a major reason democrat voters don’t go to the polls.
Yup, so sayeth both sides of America’s one-party system.
People are afraid to back anyone but the big two. They say things like “throwing your vote away” and “you’re letting them win” if you don’t vote one of the big 2.
I understand their point, but we need a systemic change to our political system for the kind of change we want to happen to actually happen.
“throwing your vote away” and “you’re letting them win”
For the two parties in power, what’s better than convincing people that this is true? Actually making this true.
This isn’t just a thing that’s “said.” It’s actually the case, and it’s been proven both statistically and experimentally. The system has been crafted specifically to cause that outcome, reinforced over decades to ensure that there are no other viable opportunities for choice.
A third party would have to win an absolutely massive percentage of the vote; Ross Perot in 1992 did better than any non-major-party candidate in the prior 80 years or any year since, he won nearly 20% of the popular vote, but took exactly zero electoral votes. (By contrast, a major party politician could conceivably game the electoral college—that is, get exactly 270 electoral votes—and take office with just 23% of the popular vote.) In fact, no third party candidate has taken any electoral votes since 1968; and no third party has beaten the trailing major party since Theodore Roosevelt in 1912, who still only came in second.
“The system is perfectly designed to produce the results it’s producing.” If it never produces a third party victory, that’s because it can’t.
Unfortunately, to have any hope of changing it, we have to vote for the people who actually want to keep having elections.
Change can happen internally as well. That’s what happened to the republican party. It’s not the same party it was 20 years ago.
But in order to break the 2 party system, it likely has to be done on a grassroots scale in local elections first and slowly climbing to a national scale.
Change can happen internally, yes. And I hope it does. But the means to do that isn’t “not voting in the general election,” especially when the stakes are so high. The way change happens internally is the same way we break the two-party system, because they have no incentive to change if everything is working fine for them right now.
Which makes sense. Campaign volunteers tend to skew younger, and the younger demographic really cares about the Israel/Palestine debacle.
But, again, what are they going to do? Campaign for “no President has done more for Israel” Trump?
https://www.cnn.com/2022/10/16/politics/trump-american-jews-israel/index.html
But, again, what are they going to do? Campaign for “no President has done more for Israel” Trump?
Not campaign at all. Which I’m sure someone here will interpret as being identical to campaigning for Trump.
Yeah who needs political activism anyway! Oh wait… that’s how we got into this fucked mess in the first place.
You can absolutely be an activist who doesn’t work under a particular party or politician
Yes exactly. Like the displaced mentally ill guy who yells at the commuters downtown. Completely free of corporate entanglements.
It pretty much is, or if they push to a 3rd party who will end up taking away 5-10% of the vote, that’s just as good as campaigning for Trump.
Stein, Kennedy, West have absolutely no hope of winning even a single state, much less the election, but they will make it certain that Biden doesn’t win.
Really? Everyone who isn’t actively campaigning for Biden is campaigning for Trump? Is there anything else to which Biden is entitled by virtue of being the second worst candidate?
If I don’t sell everything I own and donate every dime to Biden, have I actually sold everything I owned and donated it to Trump?
Is there anything else to which Biden is entitled by virtue of being the second worst candidate?
Well now that you ask, you also need to talk about how amazing the economy is, and how young and vigorous he is, and like how much safer we are with a secure Israel and stuff.
Any conversation that isn’t talking about how amazing Biden is, is propaganda for Trump.
(Excuse me while I go wash my mouth out.)
Everyone who isn’t actively supporting Biden will make sure Trump wins. Yes.
Well, you’ve certainly worked out who to blame.
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Can you provide an example of a US election where a POTUS has stood aside from reelection and a better candidate took their place and won?
I’ll go ahead and wait.
So if I’m not out bothering my neighbors by knocking on doors and littering the highway with signs I’m campaigning for Trump?
If you aren’t supporting Biden you are actively helping elect Trump. Yes.
Libs are fucking deranged
Case in point.
Per Biden himself, there are 50 others who can beat Trump. So, if Biden withdrew his candidacy- like he promised he would last time, there’s zero risk.
In fact, I would say not doing so is the greater risk.
I guarantee all fifty of those other people would also support Israel.
The neat part about America is that it doesn’t care what you think, and will do heinous shit regardless. But you still have to vote or you’re a bad person.
Oh, there’s no doubt Biden should bounce, and if Trump gets convicted, or otherwise removed from consideration at the RNC in July, I expect Biden to bow out and we’ll get a new candidate at the DNC in August.
biden bowing out after a trump conviction is probably the only thing that’s more dangerous than biden not bowing out.
The trials don’t begin until late spring, early summer at the earliest, so him bowing out after a conviction is going to be an insanely short window for whoever takes up the canidacy (and is after primaries,) He needs to be bowing out now to let the primary process actually happen.
Anything else means running the risk of trump winning.
Oh, the primaries aren’t going to happen. Any replacement, on either side, will have to be at the conventions in July and August.
which will probably be before trump’s conviction(s).
I’m okay with trump leaving the next guy with a shit show, but Biden is supposed to be the “rational adult in the room”.
Yes, it is indeed a choice between eating shit and being flayed alive.
Like yes…i might survive eating shit, and I definitely don’t want to be flayed alive, but wow…what a choice to have to make. Rock The Vote, 2024. Lol.
Man, it’s like - every president for the past four decades has been in a shit eating contest, and Biden is the least shit-eating so far - is ‘he eats too much shit’ really the issue you want to make central to his candidacy? Especially when most voters are in favor of continuing to eat shit, for god knows what fucking reason?
I’m surprised how many people seem to have forgotten South Park’s episode about deciding whether you want to vote for a douche or a turd sandwich.
Because it’s only “eating shit” to the privileged, for folks that live the difference every second of the day, that difference is between a luxury buffet and being the one who’s actually at risk of being flayed alive.
I’m tired of this black mirror episode, can we go back to the 90’s please?
If idiots are too fucking stupid to vote for Biden, because of a religious war…well, it kind of fits in with the past decade of idiocracy. You get what you fucking deserve.
Yeah but the rest of us don’t deserve it
That’s the great part about democracy: Everyone gets the consequences of bad decisions!
This is the best summary I could come up with:
Biden has faced immense pressure from members of his own party over the United States’ policies in light of the surprise Hamas attacks on Israel on October 7, which killed about 1,200 people and resulted in roughly 240 hostages, including some Americans.
In a letter published Wednesday on Medium, an anonymous group of Biden’s campaign staffers demanded the president call for a ceasefire in Gaza, citing concerns that not shifting his policy on the issue could hurt his 2024 chances.
“Like so many others, we continue to be devastated by Hamas’s attack against Israeli civilians on October 7th—it was a vile assault, one that touched the consciousness of the country,” the letter read.
“Biden for President staff have seen volunteers quit in droves, and people who have voted blue for decades feel uncertain about doing so for the first time ever, because of this conflict,” the Medium letter read.
The staffers’ letter comes on the same day a U.S. Department of Education policy adviser told the Associated Press that they submitted their resignation in protest of the president’s handling of the war in Gaza.
According to the progressive Working Families Party, 64 members of Congress—all Democrats—have also called for a ceasefire or cessation of Israel’s military actions in Gaza.
The original article contains 693 words, the summary contains 209 words. Saved 70%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!
