The left needs to show Democrats that they will lose more votes than they gain if they run to the center instead of to the left. The left does need to communicate this to Dems, but I don't see the coordination necessary to do that effectively. Simply not voting isn't enough; that'll just be spun as "oh well the left is unreliable and never turns out to vote, that's why you always have to cater to the Ken Bones of the world rather than the people who are supposed to be your base."
Biden will do all the stuff Trump does, maybe worse, but libs will stop protesting it (and even start defending it) because now that the dang cheeto is out of the White House they can go back to brunch. I'd say this is 90% true, but the one thing Biden won't do is brazenly undemocratic shit like suggesting he might stay in office even if he loses an election. Yes, the bar could not be lower, and yes, we don't have a functioning democracy anyway. But there is a difference between a bourgeois democracy where all the key players still largely treat it as a democracy and open fascism with a leader who holds power until he dies or is violently expelled. I don't think anyone in the country has an answer for the latter, and I'm not sure we want to bet everything on figuring that one out on the fly.
Biden in 2020 will ensure a more competent fascist in 2024. Probably, but even in that worst-case scenario that still gives us four years to come up with a response, in contrast with trying to handle even Baby's First Fascism right now. Plus, as likely as Biden 2020/Cotton 2024 looks right now, a lot of shit can happen in four years. I can imagine a future where 2024 arrives in the middle of an even worse economy with the pandemic still firmly in everyone's memory. Maybe Medicare for All (a popular policy before the recession and the pandemic) is what the Democratic candidate runs on and naked, dead-eyed fascism isn't as appealing as Trump's circus. Maybe between extremism, demographic shifts, and the neocon/fascist split in the Republican intelligentsia the GOP can't figure out how to produce an appealing presidential candidate anymore (the party establishment failed spectacularly at this in 2016) and there's a narrow consensus against them for a few cycles.
In short, a better-organized left would want to accelerate things as much as possible, and would thus want Biden to lose. The American left is not in that position right now. Voting for Biden is still a shit option, of course; I'm just struggling to see any better one.
Amen to this comrade. Edgy white kids with virtually nothing to lose under a Trump presidency will say otherwise, but another Trump term could mean curtains for actually left wing politics in America or at least there's a much larger chance of that than any successful revolution happening.
I'm not sold on either voting for Biden or not voting for Biden, but we're at the stage where the feds are doing mass street-level abductions and cracking skulls on the direct orders of the president -- and there are always worse parts that come out later. We're playing with fire. I think the "dang cheeto in the White House" and "Bush was worse" memes have outlived their value to an extent, and undersell how fast things are unraveling.
The big arguments against voting for Biden are:
In short, a better-organized left would want to accelerate things as much as possible, and would thus want Biden to lose. The American left is not in that position right now. Voting for Biden is still a shit option, of course; I'm just struggling to see any better one.
Amen to this comrade. Edgy white kids with virtually nothing to lose under a Trump presidency will say otherwise, but another Trump term could mean curtains for actually left wing politics in America or at least there's a much larger chance of that than any successful revolution happening.
I'm not sold on either voting for Biden or not voting for Biden, but we're at the stage where the feds are doing mass street-level abductions and cracking skulls on the direct orders of the president -- and there are always worse parts that come out later. We're playing with fire. I think the "dang cheeto in the White House" and "Bush was worse" memes have outlived their value to an extent, and undersell how fast things are unraveling.