Watch President Biden’s Detroit rally tonight. Biden spoke for about 30-40 minutes, and he was outstanding. He touted the economic record of his administration, and he described his agenda for his first 100 days in his second administration.
He also described the dangerous agenda of Trump’s Project 2025. He said “Trump is a loser!”
Number #1 on his agenda would be signing legislation to make Roe v. Wade the law of the land. He promised to promote good union jobs. He pledged to protect healthcare, Medicare, and Social Security. He said he would revive the Child Tax Credit, which cut child poverty in half before Republicans blocked its renewal. There was more.
He made clear that his goal was to strengthen the middle class.
President Biden was vigorous, passionate, and articulate. The crowd was fired up.
Biden is in it to win it.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
“…and he described his agenda for his first 100 days in his second administration.”
What about his agenda for his last 180 days of his current term? He’s president **now**. Why should I believe what he’s going to do if re-elected if he’s not already doing it? I’m old enough to remember the things he was going to do in the first 100 days of *this* term.
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Biden needs Democratic control of both Houses of Congress to enact his agenda. Republicans control the House.
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Who controlled both houses his first two years?
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Roe v. Wade was decided in 2022. Democrats controlled the Senate by one vote. Republicans could filibuster any law they opposed, and they certainly would have stopped passage of a law to protect Roe v. Wade.
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Codifying Roe was one of Biden’s campaign promises. Had it been codified before 2022, it would have been a lot harder to get rid of it.
Also, what about the minimum wage increase he’s promising? That was a first 100 days promise last time. Pretty sure it’s still what Dubya raised it to in 2008.
Biden is promising to protect Social Security and Medicare, but he’s pushing to privatize Medicare (through the Advantage system) and he’s advocated cutting Social Security for 40 years (https://theintercept.com/2020/01/13/biden-cuts-social-security/).
I’ve seen this movie and I know how it comes out. Lucy will never allow Charlie Brown to kick the football.
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Dienne,
Congress operates by law, not by whim.
Biden needs a 60-vote majority to pass laws, unless he can get bipartisanship.
It is miraculous that he was able to pass major legislation during a term in which he was always at risk of a filibuster. Republicans can block whatever they want because Biden had only a one-vote majority in the first two years of his term.
At present, there are 47 Democrats, 49 Republicans, and four Independents.
Biden is a legislative genius to get any laws or programs passed.
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Then how are Republicans always able to get their agendas passed with such slim majorities? Legislative genius?
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Nothing was passed during Trump’s term other than a massive tax cut for corporations and the very rich.
What other part of the GOP legislative agenda was passed?
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Ah, good point. They waited for a Democratic president to get their agendas passed.
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Biden passed the Republican agenda? What?
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Genug! Turn the page.
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Fred,
I’m with you! Genug!
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Getting something passed with a slim majority is nothing more than a publicity stunt. The MAGA House has made it a sport to pass nonsense that will never become law. Even my former 5th graders knew you need both Houses to pass something AND then the President needs to sign it.
Your post is pure nonsense
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Both Trump and Biden used executive orders to get some of what they wanted
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Yet they delivered their base’s dream of overturning Roe. But, hey, if it’s just sport to pass things that will never become law, I guess we don’t have to worry about them, right?
It’s almost funny watching liberal believers (of which I used to be one) contorting themselves to come up with excuses for Democrats to avoid facing the obvious reasons. Democrats don’t pass significant legislation to benefit people because they don’t want to. They don’t want to because their donors don’t want them to. Their donors are the same people who donate to the Republicans. It’s all theater. Looney Tunes Coyote and Sheep Dog. They pretend to fight while they’re on the clock, but after they punch out they’re best friends.
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Dienne, something tells me that you never took a government or civics class in high school. You have no idea how a bill becomes a law. You don’t know what a filibuster is. You don’t understand that Trump added three anti-abortion judges to the Supreme Court. You don’t realize that it was the Supreme Court that overturned Roe, not Congress. It’s not too late. Take a course. There must be one online.
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Bills become laws because conservative Democrats will vote with Republicans but Republicans will not vote with Democrats. The Democratic Party routinely supports conservative candidates over their more progressive challengers. Google “rotating villain” and notice how there’s always just enough of them to defeat progressive legislation, even when Democrats had a supermajority under Obama. This is intentional to serve their true constituents (their donors) while pretending that they’re fighting for their voting constituents. They pretend that their hands are tied, but notice how fast they get what they want when it serves corporations, the rich and the military – because that’s what the donors want. Once you see it you can’t unsee it.
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From Wikipedia:
In the November 2008 elections, the Democratic Party increased its majorities in both chambers (including – when factoring in the two Democratic caucusing independents – a brief filibuster-proof 60-40 supermajority in the Senate), and with Barack Obama being sworn in as president on January 20, 2009, this gave Democrats an overall federal government trifecta for the first time since the 103rd Congress in 1993.
However, the Senate supermajority only lasted for a period of 72 working days while the Senate was actually in session. A new delegate seat was created for the Northern Mariana Islands.[4] The 111th Congress had the most long-serving members in history: at the start of the 111th Congress, the average member of the House had served 10.3 years, while the average Senator had served 13.4 years.[5] The Democratic Party would not simultaneously control both the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate again until more than a decade later, during the 117th Congress.
The 111th Congress was the most productive congress since the 89th Congress.[6] It enacted numerous significant pieces of legislation, including the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, the Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, and the New START treaty.
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Dienne, your contempt for the USA sickens me.
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dienne77: I think someone else here is right . . . I think I’ll stop feeding the troll starting now. CBK
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BTW, when you took your civics class, did you learn that the Constitution was written by slaveholding white men to protect the power of powerful white men? Did you learn that they actually didn’t want democracy, except for those they deemed worthy of having it? Did you learn that even these powerful white men were opposed to political parties?
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Yes, I did learn that the Constitution was written by slaveholding white men. I also know that we fought a Civil War to end slavery and more than 600,000 died. I also know about the Jim Crow era. I know lots of things. But, unlike you, I love America. Without it, my family would have disappeared in Hitler’s ovens.
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dienne77: So what about white men? And even when a broken clock is right only twice a day, it’s still right at those times. The principle applies. CBK
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Rich, white merchants in New England joined with rich, white planters in the southern colonies to rebel against and declare independence from the mother country, England, because these rich people didn’t want to pay the taxes that England had levied in order to pay for its disastrously expensive war with France. To that end–tax evasion–the rich colonists used a lot of fine words about liberty and equality to recruit ordinary people to carry out a bloody revolution. Then, those same rich merchants and planters created a system of government in which all people were “created” equal, but were not equal thereafter because women couldn’t vote, any people without property (such as apprentices; servants, both indentured and nonindentured; and other such poor people) couldn’t vote, and black slaves couldn’t vote. And those same rich merchants and planters levied taxes on ordinary folks to pay off their debts to France and Spain, from which they had borrowed to finance the war (sound familiar?), so when the ordinary people who had actually fought in the war returned to their homes and farms, they found liens tacked to their doors threatening to confiscate those properties if the new taxes were not paid. This led to Shay’s Rebellion, which was violently put down by the rich merchants and planters, who then created the Constitution to replace the former Articles of Confederation so that they could have a standing army with which to put down any such popular rebellions in the future. Because liberty.
But all that fine talk about liberty was seeds scattered on fertile soil. The Supreme Court is now whetting the whacker for cutting down the seedlings all that fine talk produced and getting back to the rich merchants’ and bankers’ original original intent.
This has been the actual American history that you did not learn in school. You’re welcome.
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What I know about government is that if it works the way we were taught it does, and if Democrats were really as great as you think they are, Obama’s first year should have delivered a raft of progressive legislation to rival FDR. When that didn’t happen (the opposite, in fact – Obama continued, codified and expanded all of the Bush era abuses), I for one started wondering why. I took fretted about the obstructionism of those dastardly Republicans. I wondered why the Democrats were so weak. Finally it became inescapable: they’re not weak, they’re complicit. When Obama publicly raged about Citizens United but didn’t even attempt to correct it, it became completely clear. Democrats want to partake of the largesse of big pocket donors too. But they can’t do that if they go against the wishes of those donors, so all pretense of progressivism is just facade. Their donors allow them to talk a good game as long as they never deliver more than scraps. We don’t have a democracy. Only the illusion. I don’t know how to get democracy back but I know that voting for either party isn’t it.
Anyway, I’m occupied the rest of the weekend, so I won’t be around further. The last word is yours.
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I do not feed Trolls. Have a nice day.
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That’s the kind of kick-ass Joe Biden we’ve been waiting for.
Project 2024 will stomp on Trump and bury Project 2025.
This election will be a landslide. All of those Biden doubters are coming back with tails between their legs.
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The Washington Post lead story tonight is that pressure is growing to force Biden out.
Watch tonight’s rally in Detroit. He’s running.
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See this post: it includes video from Biden’s rousing rally in Detroit:
https://meidasnews.com/news/biden-brings-the-house-down-with-fiery-speech-in-detroit
“In one of the best moments of the speech, Biden reminded the fiery Detroit crowd that, “Unlike Donald Trump, I don’t work for big oil. I don’t work for big pharma. I don’t work for the National Rifle Association. I work for you, the American people.”
“Biden closed by talking about how age brings wisdom. “Here’s what I know: I know how to tell the truth, I know right from wrong….and I know Americans want a president, not a dictator. I also know no self-respecting American president would ever be Putin’s puppy like this guy is.””
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Classic effort of pundits to reduce cognitive dissonance: Make a bad decision and continue to find reasons to support it.
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Terrific event for Biden. The lesson for Democrats is that if they can promote good paying jobs for working people, the people will support you. The Dems need to stop working with neoliberals and start supporting working families. It was great to see some genuine enthusiasm for Biden’s candidacy.
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This is precisely what we need from President Biden. He’s the person who will defeat Trump in November. There is danger ahead, but if we can work together on this campaign, we can save democracy.
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I’m watching Brooks and Capehart now (published about an hour ago), PBS New Hour, and Capehart is saying what I have been and still am thinking and posting in comments and blog posts.
Brooks and Capehart on Biden’s battle to stay in the race (youtube.com)
Capehart points out that, since the [sabotaged*] debate, Biden’s critics keep demanding he proves he has the ability to lead the country, and Biden keeps meeting the challenges over and over, and the age discriminators keep coming up with more hurdles.
I think the only thing Biden is guilty of, and it isn’t a crime or a reason to reject him, is he is 81.
*Yes, I still think Biden was sabotaged (by Traitor Trump and/or his fascist MAGA Christian Nationalist cult — there is nothing these cult members will not do to take over the United States and destroy it) based on Biden’s performances after the debate and what I know with normal age-related changes to our bodies and brains.
Capehart didn’t mention what I wrote in the previous paragraph.
I’m also starting to think that one or more of Biden’s democratic critics that resents an 81-year-old being where they want to be, may have been the saboteur.
And I know what I’m talking about when it comes to getting older, because I’ve been studying what happens to our bodies and minds as we age for more than a decade to understand what is happening to me … and adjust.
We slow down, both our bodies and minds. It is a fact of life, but not a reason to throw us under a tank to get rid of us when we still may have many productive years left. As long as I’m productive, I plan to keep writing, revising, editing and publishing more novels. And I’m still doing all my own marketing.
I’ll reach 79 in about a month. The Uncle I was named after was 96 when he left and was active up until near his death. Born on August 14, 1912. I was born on August 14, too, but decades later. When I visited him even into his early 90s, I never thought his age had diminished his abilities. He was even going on road trips, hundreds of miles, and driving.
Up until a few years before the end, he was still taking his boat out and fishing for salmon. He lived at the mouth of the Smith River in Northern California. I had a great uncle who was still ranching near Deadwood in his 90s. Still saddling and riding his horses and counting his cattle until a fence rail he was standing on broke, and he fell breaking his hip.
As Biden keeps proving he does not have dementia, and his critics keep demanding more proof, I’m beginning to think he is the only one that can beat Traitor Trump and even push the barbarians (MAGA) back outside the government’s gates. End of Rant.
Back to Capehart who said what I have been also thinking: If, in the next four years, Biden dies or can’t function as president, we have Vice President Kamala Harris who will take over and become president.
Capehart said it’s like Biden’s critics forgot the US Constitution spells out what happens when a president dies or can’t do the job. The order of succession. We, who were alive when Kennedy was assassinated, may remember how JBJ was sworn in during the flight from Texas back to DC, and he was the new president before AirForce One landed.
I also know about Teddy Roosevelt becoming president, following the same line of succession, after the assassination of President McKinley. And I wouldn’t be born yet for about 45 years. So, how do I know that?
I know because I read history. And sometimes I remember what I read. Even when I’m almost 79.
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Biden’s persistent Post “Debate” VITALITY leaves me standing w/ Lloyd’s sabotage. From the very beginning the President’s performance looked “off” & as if he’d been interfered with. An awful lot of career State Department people got dosed with something a few years back. I was reminded of Havana Syndrome which we the USA denied scientifically. “In late 2016 U.S. diplomats and family members based in Cuba began reporting a wide swath of neurological symptoms, including dizziness, headaches, deafness and difficulty concentrating. This “Havana syndrome” outbreak disrupted U.S. relations with Cuba, spawned congressional hearings on the “attacks” and left some people with years of disabling symptoms. Reports from people with these symptoms also occurred in other countries, and the U.S. government labeled these cases as “anomalous health incidents.”
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/people-with-havana-syndrome-show-no-brain-damage-or-medical-illness/#:~:text=In%20late%202016%20U.S.%20diplomats,splitting%20noises%20around%20their%20homes.
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Biden is running and will win. Tonight’s rally performance has the media pundits tripping over themselves looking desperately for cover. The last several days Biden has come out swinging for the fences and hitting home runs.
Now watch the back peddling by the naysayers that will most definitely happen. Joe is in it to win it.
Diane, ignore those that attempt to spread falsehood here. When we respond to their ridiculous posts it only keeps their thread going.
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Thank you. The latest NPR-Marist poll shows Biden leading Trump, and that was conducted before his NATO press conference where his mastery of foreign policy was on display.
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bump
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This. Is. Great. To. Hear.
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Hurrah for Biden, go Joe go!
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Hi Diane: I saw the rally live–was glued to it and cheered though I was alone. I think if they keep hitting Trump with the truth and just record what he says so everyone cannot help but hear it, Biden/Harris will win, along with democracy itself.
BTW, Rachel Maddow is on YouTube in several places with brief but rich commentary telling it like it is, as she does so well. Joe Biden finally has taken off the gloves with Trump who won’t “get a pass” any more. It’s too early to feel relief, but I feel it anyway. And it won’t be long before the democratic big guns will be out on the circuit doing their thing for Biden and democracy.
To dienne77: About Congressional numbers: Democrats have also had to deal with that fake democrat Joe “Big Oil” Manchin all along. Also, do your own homework, and take off your see-only-the-bad glasses before you keep pestering everyone here with your extreme pessimism aimed only at democrats. CBK
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CBK, I watched it. Biden was terrific. After I wrote about it, I opened up the major news sites, and they were all dominated by anti-Biden stories.
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What a surprise !!!It takes a lot of effort to convince the 65% who tell pollsters their personal finances are good their local and state economies are good. That the National Economy is terrible. And judging by the busiest TSA day ever recorded they must be doing a lot of traveling to find this out. I am a retired member of a Union under assault . Unemployment is near 20% . The only reason the public cares more about inflation than unemployment is because they are fully employed and need not worry about it. Thank You Brandon for the fastest recovery on record. Media hype on inflation gave CEO’s the excuse to give consumers what they expected. As Boards and shareholders laughed all the way to the Bank, with increased profits that soared far over increased costs. Even as gas prices fell to a $3.20 a gallon, National Average in April of this year. CNN in a story about unemployment turned an excellent Jobs report of 300k+ jobs into bad news for Biden, turning 90% of the segment on employment to a discussion of inflation. With a picture in the background of gas at $5.39 per gallon.That is not an accident. https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/09/opinion/economy-consumer-sentiment.html
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It was good to see Biden showing evidence he is listening to his fellow Democrats. One of the significant criticism since the debate is that while he was touting his successes he was saying little in regard to how we wanted to go forward. Joy Reid was effusive about Biden’s energy in this speech and the importance of having crowds around him to feed that energy, the same Joy Reid who moments after the debate talked about how her phone was blowing up regarding the fear in all of her Democratic allies. The problem is that rallies full of Democratic supporters will not get Biden over the finish line. The rally in Raleigh the day after the debate was also highly energized yet polls the next week showed Biden losing significant ground. Biden won in 2020 with a coalition of never Trumpers and independent voters. He did better than Hilary with people of color. All of this coalition is under threat either through voters returning to Trump, as unbelievable as that seems, or those who are articulating a willingness to stay home. Two things have been consistent in the polling over the last year or two. One is that around 75% of those polled have said that they do not want either Biden or Trump. The other indication of the polls show that Biden trails Trump despite 34 felonies and 3 additional indictments along with the lunacy from Trumps social media and rallies. There are few indicators that Biden can win. He cannot win just with a Democratic and never Trumper base that will vote Democratic no matter what. What voters seem to be indicating is that the fact that the government held after 2016 Trump will not be that bad the second time either. I, for one, think our democracy is at profound risk, but that does not appear to be the consensus. Biden’s debate performance significantly wounded his chances. There is now no room for error. If we are waiting for a correction in the September debate, that is not all that promising. If he freezes in that Monet, then we are toast. Early in the fall Hilary seemed to be rebounding from coverage of her emails and Trump recorded advocating sexual assault seemed to bolster her chances. However, Comey’s announcement that reopened the email investigation two weeks prior to the election sank Hilary’s campaign. Just imagine if Biden freezes again in the fall? The press will show the video over and over. His interview with George Stephanopoulus nor his press conference with NATO assuaged fears within the party establishment or voters. The first election where I was really tuned in was 1972. I recall numerous reports leading up to the election where reporters proclaimed the profound energy around McGovern rallies, yet his landslide loss was historic. The same was true for Carter in 1980, who was bolstered by false polling leading up to the election and Mondale 4 years later. Some polls are now showing 74% of Democrats wanting Biden to drop out of the race. That’s Democrats! One thing that has been consistent since 2016 has been a public clamoring for this gerontocracy in Washington to hand over the reins to new leaders. Pelosi finally acknowledged this and stepped down while Hakeem Jeffries has done an amazing job giving us confidence. Along with performances in the impeachment and January 6th hearings by Democrats this portends a promising future for the party. Joe Biden has been the most substantial President in regard to legislation since LBJ and his successes could set up significant prosperity for us in the future. However, convincing the voters that he sees a dynamic future that he can actually see through to 2028 is a heavy lift. These are difficult times for we Democrats who love Joe Biden, but everything he has done will collapse should Trump win in November. Yes, it is risky to bring in someone else, whether it be Kamala or whomever, but the mood of the American people is clear. They want leaders who can identify and truly take on the profound challenges before us in housing, health care, higher education, gun regulation, or even immigration. Biden and his handlers have been engaged in a Rose Garden strategy for months limiting his exposure much as Gerald Ford did to hold off Reagan in 1976. However, the modern press commits little coverage to Biden in the Whitehouse because Trump and his minions run around setting the country on fire. It isn’t we Democrats who will have to get the Democratic nominee over the finish line. Yes, Biden earned 14 million votes over a non-contested primary. Those voters are going to vote for Biden no matter what. It took 81 million votes to get him over the finish line in 2020. Biden has shown little ability to convince swing voters that he is up to the job.
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There are those who – still – think that Donald Trump — who has proved himself to be a pathological liar, racist and misogynist, convicted felon and seditious traitor — is somehow preferable to Biden.
These people cannot – in clinical terms – be called rational. They detest facts, they hate the truth, and even though they often fly American flags at their homes (the elected ones like flag lapel pins), they are opposed to the vast majority of core democratic values and principles embedded the the Constitution. Some of these people even have the unmitigated gall to call themselves ‘patriots.’
Obviously, they’re not.
There is simply no way to get around the fact that Trump is a criminal, and January 6th was a violent insurrection DESIGNED to overthrow the results of the 2020 presidential election that he lost.
But first, let’s look back to 2016, when Trump DID knowingly and willingly take LOTS of help from Russian intelligence agencies to win* against Hillary Clinton. (NO, Clinton did NOT run a “terrible” campaign, and YES Jim Comey’s ‘October surprise’ that was recycled endlessly by the mainstream media, DID have a direct effect on the election outcome.).
Robert Mueller was prevented from pursuing a counterintelligence investigation of the Trump campaign, but he did indict a host of Russians, including a dozen at the Internet Research Agency – termed a “Russian troll farm” – and its sugar daddy, Yevgeny Prigozhin, who was a “close confidant” of Vladimir Putin, leader of the Wagner Group, which participated in Putin’s Ukraine war, and who then turned against the war and died in an ‘accidental’ plane crash last summer that was not very accidental at all.
Mueller also indicted a dozen Russian intelligence officers. According to the Justice Department,
“All twelve defendants are members of the GRU, a Russian Federation intelligence agency within the Main Intelligence Directorate of the Russian military. These GRU officers, in their official capacities, engaged in a sustained effort to hack into the computer networks of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, the Democratic National Committee, and the presidential campaign of Hillary Clinton, and released that information on the internet under the names ‘DCLeaks’ and ‘Guccifer 2.0’ and through another entity.”
The US Senate Intelligence Committee, which investigated the 2016 election, noted that
“the Russian government engaged in an aggressive, multifaceted effort to influence, or attempt to influence, the outcome of the 2016 presidential election…Manafort’s presence on the Campaign and proximity to Trump created opportunities for Russian intelligence services to exert influence over, and acquire confidential information on, the Trump Campaign. Taken as a whole, Manafort’s highlevel access and willingness to share information with individuals closely affiliated with the Russian intelligence services, particularly Kilimnik and associates of Oleg Deripaska, represented a grave counterintelligence threat…”
“Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered the Russian effort to hack computer networks and accounts affiliated with the Democratic Party and leak information damaging to Hillary Clinton and her campaign for president. Moscow’s intent was to harm the Clinton Campaign, tarnish an expected Clinton presidential administration, help the Trump Campaign after Trump became the presumptive Republican nominee, and undermine the U.S. democratic process…While the GRU and WikiLeaks were releasing hacked documents, the Trump Campaign sought to maximize the impact of those leaks to aid Trump’s electoral prospects. Staff on the Trump Campaign sought advance notice about WikiLeaks releases, created messaging strategies to promote and share the materials in anticipation of and following their release, and encouraged further leaks. The Trump Campaign publicly undermined the attribution of the hack-and-leak campaign to Russia and was indifferent to whether it and WikiLeaks were furthering a Russian election interference effort.”
https://www.intelligence.senate.gov/sites/default/files/documents/report_volume5.pdf
There is just NO DOUBT but that Trump was and is a Russian asset and a traitor to his country.
So, too, there are people who still complain Joe Biden has not been “effective. ” Now, it is true that Biden has not cured cancer or fixed the climate change problem or delivered world peace. But he has been trying. And he IS being effective.
David Frum, former W. Bush speech writer wrote this in The Atlantic just a day ago:
“Biden has been an astonishingly successful president…With a wafer-thin majority in the House and Senate in his first two years (and despite losing the House for his second), Biden enacted more major liberal legislation than any other president since Lyndon B. Johnson.”
Bloomberg News put it like this:
“Access to affordable health care is Biden’s crowning achievement… the number of people who signed up for an Obamacare plan for 2024 surged to 21.3 million.At the start of Biden’s term, about 12 million Americans had health insurance through Obamacare, or more formally, the Affordable Care Act — and that level hadn’t changed much since 2015…Many of the new enrollees live in Republican strongholds such as West Virginia and Louisiana, where sign-ups increased 80% and 76%, respectively.”
“The economy added 14.8 million jobs over the first three years of his term, more than any president in US history over the same period. What’s more, unemployment has held below 4% for the longest stretch since the 1960s.”
“Inflation was supposedly undermining “Bidenomics” when the consumer price index peaked at 9.1% in 2022, according to prevailing media narratives featuring many prominent economists. The CPI has since plummeted at an unprecedented rate to 3.1%. The resulting disinflation — occurring while gross domestic product expanded 3.2% last quarter — is unmatched in modern history and the opposite of the 1970s, when inflation took eight years and five months to subside to 3%.”
“US energy transition spending topped $303 billion last year, according to BloombergNEF. That’s a record and two-thirds higher than before Biden entered office.”
“American households are wealthier and in better financial shape than ever before by almost any measure… Federal Reserve data show household net worth rose to a record $156.2 trillion at the end of the fourth quarter of 2023, from $131.4 trillion at the end of 2020. The stock market, where more than half of all households are invested, has surged.”
“The US was in the midst of its worst spasm of violence in decades when Biden took office…Biden’s 2021 stimulus bill included an unprecedented $350 billion for state and local governments, which he strongly encouraged them to spend on law enforcement.”
Note: NOT A SINGLE REPUBLICAN VOTED FOR THAT BILL.
As of late May, Biden had appointed 200 federal judges. As Pew Research put it,
“Nearly two-thirds of the federal judges President Joe Biden has appointed so far are women, and the same share are members of racial or ethnic minority groups, according to a Pew Research Center analysis of statistics from the Federal Judicial Center…no president has ever appointed a slate of judges consisting mostly of women or racial and ethnic minorities.”
Until Joe Biden.
Now, the kicker.
“According to a New York Times/Siena poll, 73% of registered voters say Biden is too old to be an effective president…”
Let’s get this straight. Joe Biden has been an INCREDIBLY effective president, but the misplaced perception is that grandaddy can’t dance.
It seems to me that the American people should dance along with the dude who’s fixed the broken Trump economy and who’s invested in jobs and fighting climate change, and who’s committed to “liberty and justice for all,” and who HAS NOT incited any violent insurrections.
As journalist Anne Applebaum recently asked, “What kind of country elects a criminal and an insurrectionist as its president?”
Singer Shania Twain said it like this:
“You’ve got to dance with the one that brought you,And you can’t go wrong.”
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There is just NO DOUBT but that Trump was and is a Russian asset and a traitor to his country.
If anyone is left, in U.S. intelligence, who doubts this, then he or she must stop using the term intelligence with regard to him- or herself.
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Bob: With all we know about Trump and the rest of the gang, I wonder now, and I know I will wonder later, why . . . in this window of time where Biden is still president, and where the president now has unmitigated power secured by SCOTUS, . . . why Biden doesn’t follow his oath to protect from domestic threats and throw Trump and the Trump gang in jail. It’s far beyond politics, which would indeed explode, but rather is about national defense, which needs to be waked up to the real-life implications of what’s going on. CBK
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The Supreme Court just gave Biden permission to lock Trump up.
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Diane: My thinking exactly. When a friend said (paraphrased) . . . think what THEY would say and do, I said, this is exactly the time to do it with impunity–in terms of national defense, and NOT in terms of political expectations. Democrats have been working under Trump’s intimidation factor for way too long anyway. It’s like cringing after hitting a bully. CBK
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Great summary, Democracy!
Putin and Trump: A Backgrounder | Bob Shepherd | Praxis (wordpress.com)
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All of this has been public for years, yet Biden gets no traction. Go out and talk to people who do not read the NYTimes and they will articulate the same concerns expressed by the paper. It isn’t just Biden’s age but his frailty. Add to that the frustration that the contemporary issues of the day that most impact average Americans, like housing, the cost of healthcare, and the cost of higher, even k-12, education. Bloomberg news may be right, but I am going on Medicare this year faced with accepting a corporatized Advantage plan that will cost me $170 more per month than my pension health care or a straight Medicare plan that would cost me almost $500 for the same coverage. The problem Bloomberg, NYTimes, Washington Post et al, is that they are corporate entities who provide golden health care plans for their leadership unaware of the challenges faced by every day citizens. Yes, the list of Biden’s accomplishments are impressive, but their greatest impacts will be down the road only if somehow Trump is defeated. If not, we will see none of the benefits. The Atlantic has reported that the Trump campaign is feeling downright cocky about their prospects in November due to Biden’s apparent frailty. I hope they are wrong, but if Biden can’t convince voters he’s up for another four years. We will be facing a catastrophe.
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pabonner: Fox News, Fox News, Fox News . . . . CBK
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Also people who watch CNN and MSNBC, and people who don’t watch much television news at all.
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Flerp: I know people who won’t watch anything but Fox News. But it’s a big country. Do you flip around, Flerp, like I do to catch what’s going on with the opposition press? CBK
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I don’t watch cable news, or even much live TV.
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Flerp: A great disparity of persons and habits of becoming informed (or not) has its problems, but also the advantage that even the opposition cannot know for sure what’s going to happen in a national election . . . unless they stack the deck and cheat enough to make a difference. And there’s the rub. CBK
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Most voters do not watch Fox News, the so called mainstream media or read the NYTimes. Many are just starting to pay attention to the election. This isn’t because they are merely intentionally ignorant, but because they find other ways to fill their time. So, events like the Debate or even the last State of the Union Address is when many tune in. The conventions will be the next to be watched by a few more. The visuals of Biden simply cannot be unseen.
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2024/07/biden-fades/678978/?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=author-david-frum&utm_term=Author+Following+-+David+Frum
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pabonner: My auto mechanics, when asked about it, just shrugged and said it was a mess–apparently not one they wanted to indulge in. I did what I could. CBK
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Paul,
Did you see Biden’s rally in Detroit?
At this point, despite two weeks of bashing by the national media, Biden still polls even with Trump, and the latest Marist poll shows him ahead of Trump by 2 points. No other Democrat polls better.
The national media breathlessly reports when any elected official says Biden should drop out.
Biden says he’s in it to win it.
When will the party pull together?
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Yes. I replied to your post earlier. Rallies of supporters is a pretty easy lift. Those of us who are in the Democratic camp are not the greater concern. Independents, “double haters”, and men of color have to be convinced and there is little evidence that they are persuaded by political theater.
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Glad again to hear he did well. I watched a little bit of it myself and he looked pretty good. This is an incredibly low bar, though.
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If you had stayed to watch the whole 40 minutes, I think you would have been impressed.
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We’re approaching g the point where national polls don’t tell us enough, and we need to look at more granular analyses of contested states and “paths to victory.” I know 538 says the win probabilities are close to a coin flip, while Nate Silver has a substantial edge for Trump in win probability. But I find the following “paths to victory” analysis less eggheady. Be warned, it is sobering.
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Flerp: Yes, and under granular analysis, did Trump just compare his picking for vice president to “the Apprentice”? CBK
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“Unless the basic contours of the race change and some of the Sun Belt battleground states become more competitive (which is unlikely), Mr. Biden’s only viable path for winning is to carry Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconson.
Each of the three states poses particular challenges for Mr. Biden. Current polling shows him trailing Mr. Trump by as many as five points in Pennsylvania and Wisconsin and more narrowly in Michigan.
The deficit in Pennsylvania must be particularly disconcerting for Mr. Biden and his campaign, given the time and resources devoted to the state. He has made 10 visits since the beginning of this election cycle and has outspent Mr. Trump and his supporters on network television ads by a margin of over two to one in the last 30 days, according to an analysis by the ad-tracking firm AdImpact.
Michigan poses other obstacles for Mr. Biden. It is near the bottom third of states in the country when ranked by the percentage of people with college degrees; inflation has hit Michigan working-class voters hard and influenced their views of the economy and the election. The war in Gaza has also hurt Mr. Biden among the 300,000 Arab voters in the state who overwhelmingly supported him in 2020. And third-party voters were decisive in Mr. Trump’s victory in Michigan in 2016: This year, multiple states will include Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and the Green Party candidate Jill Stein on ballots.
Of all the battleground states, Mr. Biden had been performing best in Wisconsin. Voters’ perception of the economy had been more favorable there than in other battleground states. However, in two polls released this week, Mr. Trump has pulled ahead of Mr. Biden. Ms. Stein is on the ballot, increasing the challenge for Mr. Biden in liberal areas like Madison.
Republicans clearly understand that these three battleground states are Mr. Biden’s only remaining path to 270 electoral votes. A Miriam Adelson-backed super PAC just committed to spending $61 million to support Mr. Trump in these three states.”
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Nate Silver told us that Trump had no path to victory in July 2016.
I don’t get how Nate Silver could ever say that it’s possible to interpolate from JULY polling or data whether a candidate will win in NOVEMBER!
Here is my response about how much it means when a candidate seems to have a “clear path to victory” in JULY:
President Michael Dukakis
President Al Gore
President John Kerry
President “she who may not be named”
Based on July polls, they are the winners!
Remember back in the days when the REPUBLICANS (even Trump!) were the ones who wanted to change the electoral college?
The Hill
“Trump calls for revolution, blasts Electoral College” by Alicia M. Cohn – 11/07/12 5:26 AM ET
“The real estate mogul and host of reality show “The
Apprentice” has been an outspoken supporter of Mitt Romney. He used Twitter to
object vehemently to the Electoral College system that he predicted would give
the win to Obama and the popular vote to the GOP challenger…… Trump called the Electoral College “a disaster for a democracy … a total sham and a travesty.”
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Polls aren’t perfect. On the other hand, they are not meaningless. And in recent elections, they have tended to underestimate rather than overestimate Republican support. So completely dismissing battleground state polling data would be unwise, in my view.
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No one is “completely dismissing” battleground state polling. Who are you talking about?
What they are saying is that you are wrong that the race is already decided because those battleground states polls mean Biden will lose.
You just pointed out that the Republicans ignored those July polls and won!
Polls aren’t meaningless, On the other hand, they are not perfect.
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I’m not talking about anybody. I’m just saying that these polls are meaningful data and should not be ignored, even if they’re not perfect.
“you are wrong that the race is already decided because those battleground states polls mean Biden will lose.”
I never said the race is already decided or that these battleground state polls mean Biden will lose.
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And I never said we should dismiss polls.
In fact, I have never heard anyone say polls should be “dismissed”. They should be taken with a grain of salt, the way I suspect you take those polls that show that Biden is beating Trump in some battleground states.
Polls aren’t meaningless, On the other hand, they are not perfect.
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And I never said you said we should dismiss polls.
This is a great conversation.
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Did everyone see Bernie Sanders’ excellent piece arguing FOR Biden to be the nominee? It was in today’s NYT.
“I will do all that I can to see that President Biden is re-elected. Why? Despite my disagreements with him on particular issues, he has been the most effective president in the modern history of our country and is the strongest candidate to defeat Donald Trump — a demagogue and pathological liar. It’s time to learn a lesson from the progressive and centrist forces in France who, despite profound political differences, came together this week to soundly defeat right-wing extremism.”
Bernie acknowledges disagreements with Biden, but makes the same critique of the media I do:
“But for over two weeks now, the corporate media has obsessively focused on the June presidential debate and the cognitive capabilities of a man who has, perhaps, the most difficult and stressful job in the world. The media has frantically searched for every living human being who no longer supports the president or any neurologist who wants to appear on TV. Unfortunately, too many Democrats have joined that circular firing squad.”
…
“Enough! Mr. Biden may not be the ideal candidate, but he will be the candidate and should be the candidate. And with an effective campaign that speaks to the needs of working families, he will not only defeat Mr. Trump but beat him badly. It’s time for Democrats to stop the bickering and nit-picking.
I understand that some Democrats get nervous about having to explain the president’s gaffes and misspeaking names. But unlike the Republicans, they do not have to explain away a candidate who now has 34 felony convictions and faces charges that could lead to dozens of additional convictions, who has been hit with a $5 million judgment after he was found liable in a sexual abuse case, who has been involved in more than 4,000 lawsuits, who has repeatedly gone bankrupt and who has told thousands of documented lies and falsehoods.”
Listen to Bernie.
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Im glad to see that The NY Times was willing to post at least one pro-Biden piece. Their coverage on the front page has been hysterical.
I the end, the GOP will have a hard time, no matter how many millions they spend, convincing the American people that an insurrectionist, a convicted felon, and a liar should be re-elected.
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The failsafe here is that Trump is the most odious and insane candidate for President ever.
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When I reach 80, I only wish I could do half as well as Biden did at his NATO press conference and at the Detroit rally.
Oh wait… I am 80!
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Well, as if the politics and process of this election wasn’t crazy enough . . .
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I have never stopped supporting his run. He surrounds himself with the best and the brightest. Antony Blinken is just another testament to his wisdom and leadership.
Every American should watch this, especially those who are not far removed from their own family’s immigration moment. This interview provides a cogent explanation of where foreign policy drives domestic policy. A fine example of the Biden cabinet, Blinken is brilliant. We need to keep building coalitions with other countries because we all have a shared interest on these issues.
Have we heard any of this from the other side? No. We’ve heard bluster, complaints about power structure and money, and pandering toward authoritarians. Blinken and Biden’s vision is one of humility, decency, progress, and cooperation that will benefit Americans and other nations alike. He admits the mistakes of the past with careful analysis. These are the people who should be running our government, not the extremists who want to prop up their cronies.
https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/p/american-conversations-secretary?r=ottd6&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=email&fbclid=IwZXh0bgNhZW0BMQABHRn2aW1RVD5yO02RMAELLwgWmNrtz9fv_l7UTBV8pH7LflxIovTnYHukZg_aem_F7p9pHIRX7lcnkq9giXITA&triedRedirect=true
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I agree, LG. I don’t care if he is not good on the debate stage. I care that he surrounds himself with really good people and makes thoughtful decisions. I judge by his record not by the debate. I judge Trump by his record. He has nothing to show for his four years in office.
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Absolutely, Biden should be judged by his record. I admit that I didn’t know much about him prior to him running other than that he was a former senator and vice-president. Beyond his accomplishments as president, his vision for rebuilding the middle class is also what turned me into a supporter. I want to see him continue what he’s started.
As far as his career-long speaking gaffes go, my guess is that the mental energy to combat his disability (stutter) is beyond what most of us could imagine unless we have suffered the same. He doesn’t make a big deal about it, but I cannot help think it must affect his communication skills far more than any of us could know. This is not a condition of his age, as a whole—however, getting older certainly doesn’t help.
Heather Cox Richardson has released Part 2 of her interview with Blinken. I’m about to take it in.
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