Biden has always been gaffe prone. What you mistake for senility is the same Biden who was VP. Back then they just kept him off of center stage. He does appear old and frail to me and I do worry about his age. I'd rather have just about anybody on the planet than Biden as president, but in a race to the bottom, I'll still take him over Trump. I don't think he is significantly less than he was 2 decades ago. It's just he was never much. But at least he won't go into a possibly amphetamine fueled rage tweet session at 3am. His presence will be felt by what is absent from the current clown. 0 > -2. I'll take Fletch for President over Biff Tannen.
If you've ever heard Biden speak in a different setting, you'd know he's not remotely senile and actually pretty damn smart/thoughful. He's just someone that needs to take a second to gather his thoughts before speaking, and unfortunately, you don't really get that opportunity in a Presidential campaign (debates, answering town hall questions, etc). But you DO get that as President. And there have been plenty of questions about Trump's senility - in particular when looking at both his tweets and his actions. Combine that with an unwillingness to listen to advisors and his total faith in his own instincts, and you get a powder keg. He's just lowered the bar so far down for himself that you ignore it.
Trump has lowered the bar so low that I do not even include him. I do not understand why people continuously compare Trump as if he is some metric we should measure against. The argument "He is not as bad as Trump" is just a terrible statement. Im not looking for someone who is better than Trump. I am not looking for a turd that doesnt smell as bad. I am looking for someone who can act as a competent leader. Im not looking for someone who can act a little less incompetent. And I am looking for someone who can be elected. Which leads me to my point. If the goal is to remove Trump from office, you do not want Biden on stage debating him in the current debate format. Im not debating whether Biden is better than Trump. That isnt the discussion. He is just not electable with the current fickle voter block.
Because he's the opponent. When you say you wouldn't vote for Biden, the practical effect is that you're more OK with Trump than Biden. You're also the one that made this comparison: It might be funny to joke about Trump launching nukes at anyone who makes fun of him, but if its anyone who is going to do it prematurely, its going to be a leader who is not in the right frame of mind. Trump will destroy him. You're the one that claimed that Trump is not senile or less senile or whatever than Biden. If you believe Trump is senile, then its clear senility doesn't prevent electability regardless.
Did you listen Trumps speech yesterday? Either his dentures were coming loose or he had a mini stroke.
I never stated I wouldn't vote for Biden. I stated I do not believe he is electable over Trump. Now whether anyone chooses to toss their vote because of their conviction is a fair and reasonable. Its not fair to climb on ones high horse to judge and declare 'if you're not for us, you're against us' BS. So no, its not the practical effect on ones belief. Its a terrible point and only serves to push marginal people further away from your argument. I never commented on Trumps state of mind. Im not focused on Trumps temperament at this stage of the game. It appears I have a fundamental difference on why I believe Trump is a bad president. I do not fear he is going to nuke a country. I do not fear he is going to get us in WWIII. Or Iran. Or he is selling out our country to Putin to allow Russian troops walk down our streets. I have a massive problem how he continues to see how far he can push the legal line. I have a problem with how he continues to provoke and divide and use his power to create chaos. I have a problem with the continue abuse of power, not just him, but for the last two decades. He is setting the tone for future presidents.
The post I quoted from... So you don't fear the President who doesn't listen to his military, intelligence, or state department advisors and just assassinated an Iranian general might get us in WW3, but you do fear it about ... Joe Biden? The guy who has years of foreign affairs and experience and has never shown himself it to be impulsive or do anything dangerous or crazy?
Us Democratic moderates worry about the bolded, the other stuff is just far left projection. Voting for Trump or abstaining is choosing to hold your nose and support the bolded, it sucks but this is where we are.
When I started I wouldnt vote for Biden, I am referring to the primaries. We have a ways to go before the general. No, I do not fear Trump getting us into WWIII in this current economic climate... or in any major conflict. Yes I have concerns of any elderly candidate who can rapidly deteriorate. I dont have this concern with Warren. I do with Biden and Sanders. And to an extent with Trump if he is reelected.
Biden's a walking gaff machine .... Just two days ago , after being attacked by Iran , he confuses Iran and Iraq. There is reason to question his mental capacity.
I never said there is no reason to question his mental capacity, my issue is with people calling him senile. Biden has always been a gaff machine.
Given the makeup of the candidates, they should host the debates at 5.30, right after the early bird special but just behind the Jeopardy/ Wheel of Fortune power hour
From the New York Times: Biden, Sanders, Social Security and Smears Lying about a rival is bad, even if you don’t like his past positions. By Paul Krugman Opinion Columnist While the news media has been focused on the “spat” between Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders, something much more serious has been taking place between the Sanders campaign and Joe Biden. Not to sugarcoat it: The Sanders campaign has flat-out lied about things Biden said in 2018 about Social Security, and it has refused to admit the falsehood. This is bad; it is, indeed, almost Trumpian. The last thing we need is another president who demonizes and lies about anyone who disagrees with him, and can’t admit ever being wrong. Biden deserves an apology, now, and Sanders probably needs to find better aides. That said — and this is no excuse for the Sanders camp — it would be good to have Biden explain why, in the more distant past, he went along with the Beltway consensus that Social Security needed to be pared back. First, about that Biden smear: In 2018 Biden gave a speech attacking Paul Ryan, the then-speaker of the House, for wanting to cut taxes on the rich and pay for those tax cuts by cutting Social Security and Medicare. There was nothing in his remarks that should bother progressives. However, a Sanders adviser recently circulated a snippet from the video of the event that made it appear that Biden was actually supporting Ryan’s position and calling for Social Security cuts. A few days later a newsletter from the Sanders campaign quoted Biden out of context and made the same claim. If you want a parallel, it’s as if I were to say, “Some white nationalists claim that Jews are responsible for all our problems,” and a political campaign put out a release saying, “Krugman says ‘Jews are responsible for all our problems.’” Biden did make a misstep in his counterattack, mislabeling the misrepresented video clip as “doctored,” but that doesn’t mean he’s not still due an abject apology. Instead, however, the Sanders campaign has doubled down. Rather than admitting that it smeared a rival, the campaign is going around claiming that Biden has a long record of trying to cut Social Security. There is, unfortunately, some truth in that claim — but it doesn’t excuse either the original lie or the refusal to admit error. So, about the element of truth in the criticism of Biden: Once upon a time, there was a peculiar consensus among media figures and would-be centrists that the long-run cost of entitlement programs was America’s biggest problem, that Social Security in particular was in crisis and that something had to be done, with the solution including benefit cuts. This consensus wasn’t based on hard thinking; it was about the attitude politicians were expected to display. As I wrote way back in 2007, proclaiming a Social Security crisis requiring cuts was seen as a “badge of seriousness,” a way of showing how statesmanlike and tough-minded you were. The candidate I was criticizing, by the way — the guy I said had been “played for a sucker” — was a politician named Barack Obama. But Biden was certainly pulled in by that conventional wisdom, too, so it’s not hard to find old quotes in which he suggested possible Social Security cuts in the name of fiscal responsibility. But that was then. These days, Biden, like many Democrats, is calling for an expansion of Social Security benefits. That doesn’t make his previous statements irrelevant; he should acknowledge that he has changed his position, and his history on the issue is one reason progressives worry that, if elected, he might fritter away his political capital in vain attempts to reach bipartisan compromise. (His role in passing the draconian 2005 bankruptcy bill, which got Elizabeth Warren involved in politics, is another.) None of this, however, justifies the Sanders campaign’s lying about recent statements by a man who, after all, may well be the Democratic presidential nominee — and who would, whatever his centrist history, be infinitely more progressive than the current occupant of the White House. And the smearing of Biden reinforces the concerns some of us have about Sanders. There has always been an ugly edge to some of Sanders’s support, a faction of followers who denounce anyone raising questions about his positions — even Warren! — as a corrupt capitalist shill. Until now, however, you could argue that Sanders himself wasn’t responsible for the bad behavior of some of his supporters. You can’t make that argument now. The dishonest smears and the doubling down on those smears are coming from the top of the Sanders campaign; even if they aren’t coming directly out of Sanders’s mouth, he could and should have stopped them. The fact that Sanders isn’t apologizing to Biden and replacing the people responsible says uncomfortable things about his character. I don’t want to go overboard here. While there is a Trumpian feel to some of what we’re seeing from the Sanders campaign, Bernie Sanders is no Donald Trump. As we’ve just seen, there are some real issues with the people surrounding him, but they’re nothing like Trump’s gang of thugs. And in practice a Sanders presidency, like a Biden presidency, would be a vast improvement, morally as well as substantively, on what we have now. But right now, Sanders and his campaign are behaving badly, and they need to be called on it.
