Arguing about voting, purity, and RIP John Lewis

[alex]

That seems like a bizarre issue to prioritize over everything else.

[NotBruceZ]

It’s a structural issue akin to prioritizing electoral reform over all else. (The two are, arguably, related.)

[alex]

I don’t see how they’re related at all. In fact, the purpose of the first one is specifically to get MORE Democrats in office.

[NotBruceZ]

The establishments of both parties use our political system to protect themselves. Do you think they support reforms which might cost them their hold on power?

[alex]

Obviously my post wasn’t written to show that in detail, and the evidence is not in there. The evidence is in the rest of the thread and in much of the rest of this forum.

@PocketChads

Anyway, your point is to convince (well, brow beat) people to vote a certain way. My point has nothing to do with how you vote, and everything to do with wishing there was some way to get you to at least see the evidence that the problem with this country goes far deeper than you’re willing to admit. Forget agreeing on a conclusion, just getting you to see the material conditions maintained by state force. Not simply ignored by the state, but actively maintained.

I agree with all of this. That doesn’t take away from my claim is that for any self-described leftist, the choice should be clear, and in more than just a 10 camps vs 9 camps kind of way. We could go down the issues one by one if you’d like; it’s really not close on any of them.

[clovis8]

Let’s flip it a bit. Name once policy where Biden is worse than Trump?

[alex]

Have you not ventured into the covid thread, or the healthcare thread, or the voting thread? I know for sure you’ve been in the police riots thread. Biden, while far from perfect, is a significant improvement on all of these.

[Jalfrezi]

Maybe I’ve misunderstood your position, which I now understand to be the US has disappeared so far down the road to fascism that no amount of reversing by Biden (or more likely his VP should he snuff it during his first term) will pull it out.

In that case you need a revolution or civil war. Is that what your activism is aimed at?

[alex]

I think that anyone who takes power wishes to maintain it, so unless we want to have a revolution every 15 years we have to accept that as part of the system. And yes try to work our way around it with term limits, separation of powers, etc.

[LFS]

@NotBruceZ

Is there a large, meaningful difference between the two for someone whose overwhelming number one issue is destroying the Democratic establishment? How does voting for Biden better accomplish that goal?

If Trump wins things will continue pretty much the way they are now, but worse.

If Biden wins, Trump refuses to leave, or invalidates the results, or his followers start shooting liberals at random, or the police stop taking local orders. Or something. Anything but a peaceful and orderly transfer of power.

So if you’re looking for things to start burning sooner than later, vote Biden!

[oneeyedtripping]

Hilary Clinton (horrible candidate) beat trump in NY by 1.7 million votes, yelling at someone from there because they won’t vote for Biden is dumb.

Most people (maybe all) on here that won’t vote for Biden are in extremely safe states like that.

[alex]

The margin is important, both in a practical sense to prevent shenanigans, and as a governing mandate.

[NotBruceZ]

Term limits are stupid.

[oneeyedtripping]

There aren’t going to be shenanigans for the presidential vote in places like NY and Illinois (besides usual suppression in poor communities). And what’ll the margin help with? Oh all those liberals from the big cities came out to vote? I don’t think the margin based on a few very blue states will matter too much

[alex]

I think the reaction to Trump claiming victory in the EC fairly or unfairly will be different if the popular vote margin is 10m compared to 2m.

[clovis8]

As I already pointed out itt this argument makes zero sense. The reason you think it doesn’t matter is people will vote. You can’t argue at the same time it’s doesn’t matter if people vote because people are voting, especially when models and polls have a margin of error.

[oneeyedtripping]

It might. If the margin comes from a few blue states the right wing media will push that narrative and they might even get an assist from the “liberal” media too.

[oneeyedtripping]

The first of my comments that you replied to specifically says the usual people that vote will vote. I’m arguing it doesn’t matter if I vote in my state and most of the people that won’t vote for Biden aren’t people that always vote in these elections. The last 5 presidential elections in Illinois have all seen fairly consistent numbers for the dem and republican and it’s never close, so what use does my vote have here?

[jerry]

They already did this last time anyway, citing the large margin in california.

[microbet]

The courts won’t care about the popular vote. The margin only matters in purple-ish states where shenanigans could make a difference. And there is no winning by 10 million votes without winning the EC by a large margin anyway.