The former president has publicly waffled on the Israel-Gaza war. But he told wealthy donors he supports Israel’s right to continue “its war on terror.”
These “I’m not gonna vote for Biden because my principles are too important” folks are really starting to piss me off.
Where were your principles last year? The year before? Where were they when Russia invaded Ukraine? What about the Rohingya? The Yazidi? How about here at home and what Republican power - in congress and across the courts? Where will they be if Trump wins and appoints another SCOTUS judge and packs the federal courts? When hundreds of transgender Americans are murdered? When women no longer have any autonomy over their bodies?
This isn’t about your principles. It’s not about you looking cool in a keffiyeh. This is about all of us on the left working together to reduce the most harm. You in your enormous privilege are not the main character here.
I mean seriously… get the fuck over yourselves you spoiled brats.
I suspect a lot of those people are arguing in bad faith and are actually spreading misinformation. That they never intended on voting for Biden, or always intended on voting for Trump and trying to make it seem like Biden is losing his base.
IRL, most people I know, while not happy with Biden’s response acknowledge that Trump’s view is much much worse.
The only difference between them is language. Both have no problem with slaughtering women and children and we are seeing it now. Biden doesn’t care and is supplying the weapons, just like he didn’t care when Lebanon was invaded.
Begin said Biden “rose and delivered a very impassioned speech” defending the invasion. Begin said he was shocked at how passionately Biden supported Israel’s invasion when Biden “said he would go even further than Israel, adding that he’d forcefully fend off anyone who sought to invade his country, even if that meant killing women or children.” Begin said, “I disassociated myself from these remarks,” adding: “I said to him: No, sir; attention must be paid. According to our values, it is forbidden to hurt women and children, even in war. Sometimes there are casualties among the civilian population as well. But it is forbidden to aspire to this. This is a yardstick of human civilization, not to hurt civilians.” The comments were striking from Begin, who had been notorious as a leader of the Irgun, a militant group that carried out some of the worst acts of ethnic cleansing accompanying the creation of the state of Israel, including the 1948 Deir Yassin massacre.
Psh, I’m voting for him. I’m doing a lot of other stuff to improve society in ways I think are important, but when it comes to my presidential vote, Biden is the lesser evil in a voting system that requires I take that into consideration.
Well yeah, I’m not just sitting here complaining to the internet either. I just don’t think the democrats are ever going to turn around and stop chasing the republicans if we blindly vote for them. If they let the republicans go further and further to the right without chasing them then the republican party dies as another party replaces them. If the democrats go further and further right leaving the left unserved then the same thing will happen to them. I happen to believe that we’ve reached that point. The democrats have been chasing the republicans since Reagan.
I think this is what people call accelerationism, meaning you want to crash the plane so it can be rebuilt.
I get it… It’s very frustrating to have to choose a candidate you’re not excited for, or worse. I’d ask you if you have any loved ones who require healthcare, or anyone who’s LGBT, or someone non white. They’re the people who are most at risk with the hate mongering that’s going on with that guy’s base.
No, it’s not accelerationist to just withhold your vote. Accelerationists are going to do things to bring about the anarchy state they think we need to rebuild properly. So stuff like attacking the power grid or attempting to start a race war (for white supremacist accelerationists). Not voting for someone and working to create a new political party is how the system is designed to be used.
I think they’ve started to turn around in the last decade or so, but not fast enough for my liking. They definitely were heading to the right for a good long while before that though, especially on economic issues.
Biden’s shut down of the unions; sign off on immigration policies that are harsher than Trump’s; protectionist gift to the donor class wrapped in climate change; and stance on Gaza and the protestors convinces me they aren’t. They talked a good game in 2020 but showed they understand how to play the game pretty much right away. They restored some rational stuff for COVID but other than that they ran to the right right away.
As long as you understand that not voting for Biden is 100% a vote for Trump (whether you cast a ballot or not) and you’re OK with that, then more power to you.
But I would ask, what do you think you’re achieving by not voting for him? If you voted for him in 2020 then you must hold personal ideals that at least semi-align with his, and you have to know that Trump’s are a complete 180 from them.
I’d also like to ask (since you imply you haven’t made up your mind) what Biden could do to change your mind?
It is more like the trolly problem, one is bad, the other is much worse. The difference is that whether you’re a fan of a football team or not it does not affect the outcome, but voting does affect the outcome albeit marginally.
The analogy isn’t about voting it’s about their vociferous defense of Biden and categorizing people as loyal or not. And the trolley problem likewise presents the problem as only having two tracks when history shows us that’s not true. There’s nearly infinite tracks. Including one where Biden comes around on Israel and wins the election.
Oh I’m arguing in bad faith because I called out your gaslighting? Conflating disillusioned voters with voters for the other team is a top tier propaganda technique meant to shore up base loyalty. And here you are executing it to a T.
Or you know, at no point did you actually engage in discussion. You used a false equivalent and rhetoric. Which is pretty much the textbook definition of a bad faith argument.
Oh I don’t think it’s a false equivalence. You seem just about the same as the average sports ball fan to me, just with your political party. And I absolutely engaged in a conversation. You just didn’t merit a longer reply when your assertion was gaslighting. So stop doing that.
I hope people realize that that Witcher quote “If I’m to choose between one evil and another… I’d rather not choose at all.” was explicitly written to be wrong, and only served as a “Before” of a maturing character arc.
I don’t even remember that, was that from the books, games, or TV show? At any rate, no obviously I had no problem voting for him in 2020. In 2020 he wasn’t supporting the mass murder of civilians in Gaza and asylees in South/Central America. In 2020 he promised to do something to stop the red states from persecuting people. In 2020 we thought he’d have a sane plan for exiting Afghanistan and would bring our interpreters and civilian support out of the country, (Instead veterans had to go back over there and get them themselves in shit Hollywood’s going to make a movie about anytime now). In 2020 we thought he’d surge funding for the military mental health crisis. And so so much more.
Well put. The only principle we should be considering is saving as many lives as possible and preventing as much persecution as possible. Adherence to any principles which go against this simply shows those principles are not worth holding, not as absolutes at least.
Voting for the democrats isn’t saving lives though. The red states are just going ahead with massive civil rights violations anyways. If the democrats won’t step in to stop them then we don’t have a reason to vote for them anymore. The worst case scenario is already happening. It’s not in the future, it’s now.
Voting for the democrats isn’t saving lives though.
How do you prove or disprove this?
If the democrats won’t step in to stop them then we don’t have a reason to vote for them anymore
Do you not understand how our system of government works? Or do you just want some sort of left-leaning fascism? Admittedly, Bernie would make a great benevolent dictator… but that’s exactly the kind of thing that bites you in the ass eventually.
The president has more power than you think he does. Trump reminded us of that. And it’s simple to prove. What has he done to stop Abbot and DeSantis? He has how many federal law enforcement officers? And he hasn’t just arrested the Texas national guardsmen operating illegally on the border? Hell he could just call them to federal duty and send them to an ammo dump in Alaska.
Look up title 10 orders. The president is the commander in chief. If he won’t pull those guardsmen out of there it’s because he doesn’t mind what they’ve done.
The pure fucking irony of you saying that when everything I just suggested is based in existing law and precedent.
The pure fucking irony of you saying that when everything I just suggested is based in existing law and precedent.
LOL. You are clearly ignorant of the practical implications of such things and more generally of how politics works in real terms.
Every action a president takes either gains or loses political capital. The president does not operate in a vacuum… indeed our entire system of government is designed to have checks and balances and specifically to keep the authority of a president confined.
I must say, you have such an incredibly simplistic view of this… it’s quite stunning. You literally sound like a MAGAt, begging for authoritarian control.
So now we’re moving the goal posts. It’s political capital and not political system.
I agree, what he spends his capital on shows what he cares about. Good thing there’s not some black hole of a situation he’s just dumping capital into right now…
You are not going to get Arab-Americans to vote for Biden, forget it. You want us to carry water for someone slaughtering us while grinning. I voted for him in 2020 and that will be the last time I ever vote Democratic, the first time was for John Kerry in 2004. Voting Republican is of course not an option, it is third party from now on though I am making arrangements to leave the country. I am paying taxes to give myself PTSD watching Arabs get slaughtered with my tax money. I know most people don’t have the means to leave the US, but I do.
Biden could have stopped this genocide from day one, not only he didn’t but he continues to supply the weapons and political cover for Israel to continue massacring women and children. There’s enough Arab-Americans to swing the election one way or another. Biden and the Democratic Party will have to earn our votes rather than extract them from us by scaring us with Trump.
It’s your right to vote 3rd party, but doing so makes it only more likely that Trump will take office and ruin not just Palestine but the ability for Arab Americans and possibly every foreign born, and possibly non-white person in general, to live in the US. In our current political system, third parties count for nothing, it’s a wasted vote. I’m not thrilled by Biden either but voting for president has to be strategic.
By not sending weapons, by withholding financial aid, by not justifying the crimes and by not vetoing the U.N. ceasefire vote multiple times. Reagan and Bush Sr. were able to do so.
No surprise that Thurmond-loving Biden is to their right somehow.
He won in 2016 despite me voting for Clinton. In 2020 I thought Biden couldn’t be worse, but I got a genocide. In 2024 I’m voting for someone I like for a change. Clinton too is never getting a vote from after she posted this. Cheering and justifying a genocide is where I part ways with the Democratic Party.
You are funny. Arab Americans and Muslim Americans do overlap and both care deeply about Palestine, but are still two different groups. Most Arabs in the US are actually Christian, and the news article I linked to mentioned Arab Americans.
Being pro-palestine is not the definition of the left, the truth is things would only be worse for Palestine if Trump is elected, and in exchange for this punishment of the Dems the potential losses are immense and not just for Palestine. Being pro-palestine is very popular among the far right as well, and they are cheering for Trump just the same as you have been implicitly.
Liberalism and the Democratic Party are on the right. Joe Biden was friends with Strom Thurmond. Joe Biden demonized “busing” and other programs to integrate schools. Joe Biden cheered the slaughter of women in children in Lebanon in 1982. Biden is basically Trump but with more eloquence. Their actions are the same. Palestinians are getting slaughtered right now, protestors are getting beaten up and jailed right now. Trump is just the boogeyman Democrats use to get their voters to stop demanding anything.
Obama gave people hope. Then Biden ran a very progressive campaign after Hillary lost a normal campaign. Our principles were always in play. Nothing has changed, Biden still has to earn votes and nothing Trump said is different from what Biden is doing. He’s just saying it out loud. For the record Israel just bombed a known refugee tent camp and this is what other countries are saying. This is what the White House said. Either Biden is a joke that keeps getting played by Netanyahu or Biden thinks we’re a joke. Either way is not going to win him votes. And his entire job is to win votes by representing the people. I doubt the kids being denied their college degrees care much whose in white house when the police stormed their protest encampment.
Biden still has to earn votes and nothing Trump said is different from what Biden is doing. He’s just saying it out loud.
You have to be in a position to not be affected by Republican policies to think that. Really to be single-minded about one issue, no matter how valid in itself, while ignoring everything else that affects so many so badly.
You may think you get virtue points for this but what you are showing is just how incredibly privileged and selfish you are.
I’m not doing it for “points”. The entire idea that this is some child’s game is the problem. People are already dying in massive numbers, here and abroad. Democrats want to just continue the status quo, while the republicans keep changing the status quo.
The entire idea that this is some child’s game is the problem
It’s precisely that you can’t wrap your head around the fact that this is NOT a child’s game where you get to personally pick - for everyone else - the one issue that matters to you this week that is the problem.
These “I’m not gonna vote for Biden because my principles are too important” folks are really starting to piss me off.
Where were your principles last year? The year before? Where were they when Russia invaded Ukraine? What about the Rohingya? The Yazidi? How about here at home and what Republican power - in congress and across the courts? Where will they be if Trump wins and appoints another SCOTUS judge and packs the federal courts? When hundreds of transgender Americans are murdered? When women no longer have any autonomy over their bodies?
This isn’t about your principles. It’s not about you looking cool in a keffiyeh. This is about all of us on the left working together to reduce the most harm. You in your enormous privilege are not the main character here.
I mean seriously… get the fuck over yourselves you spoiled brats.
I suspect a lot of those people are arguing in bad faith and are actually spreading misinformation. That they never intended on voting for Biden, or always intended on voting for Trump and trying to make it seem like Biden is losing his base.
IRL, most people I know, while not happy with Biden’s response acknowledge that Trump’s view is much much worse.
The only difference between them is language. Both have no problem with slaughtering women and children and we are seeing it now. Biden doesn’t care and is supplying the weapons, just like he didn’t care when Lebanon was invaded.
In public, Joe Biden tried to claim neutrality on the Israeli military campaign. In private, he was more enthusiastic about it than the Israeli prime minister.
[emphasis mine]
I voted for Biden in 2020. At this rate I’m not voting for him in 2024.
Psh, I’m voting for him. I’m doing a lot of other stuff to improve society in ways I think are important, but when it comes to my presidential vote, Biden is the lesser evil in a voting system that requires I take that into consideration.
Well yeah, I’m not just sitting here complaining to the internet either. I just don’t think the democrats are ever going to turn around and stop chasing the republicans if we blindly vote for them. If they let the republicans go further and further to the right without chasing them then the republican party dies as another party replaces them. If the democrats go further and further right leaving the left unserved then the same thing will happen to them. I happen to believe that we’ve reached that point. The democrats have been chasing the republicans since Reagan.
I think this is what people call accelerationism, meaning you want to crash the plane so it can be rebuilt.
I get it… It’s very frustrating to have to choose a candidate you’re not excited for, or worse. I’d ask you if you have any loved ones who require healthcare, or anyone who’s LGBT, or someone non white. They’re the people who are most at risk with the hate mongering that’s going on with that guy’s base.
The answer is almost certainly no.
No, it’s not accelerationist to just withhold your vote. Accelerationists are going to do things to bring about the anarchy state they think we need to rebuild properly. So stuff like attacking the power grid or attempting to start a race war (for white supremacist accelerationists). Not voting for someone and working to create a new political party is how the system is designed to be used.
I think they’ve started to turn around in the last decade or so, but not fast enough for my liking. They definitely were heading to the right for a good long while before that though, especially on economic issues.
Biden’s shut down of the unions; sign off on immigration policies that are harsher than Trump’s; protectionist gift to the donor class wrapped in climate change; and stance on Gaza and the protestors convinces me they aren’t. They talked a good game in 2020 but showed they understand how to play the game pretty much right away. They restored some rational stuff for COVID but other than that they ran to the right right away.
As long as you understand that not voting for Biden is 100% a vote for Trump (whether you cast a ballot or not) and you’re OK with that, then more power to you.
But I would ask, what do you think you’re achieving by not voting for him? If you voted for him in 2020 then you must hold personal ideals that at least semi-align with his, and you have to know that Trump’s are a complete 180 from them.
I’d also like to ask (since you imply you haven’t made up your mind) what Biden could do to change your mind?
Not rooting for the Eagles means you’re a Patriots fan 100%.
Stop gaslighting people.
It is more like the trolly problem, one is bad, the other is much worse. The difference is that whether you’re a fan of a football team or not it does not affect the outcome, but voting does affect the outcome albeit marginally.
The analogy isn’t about voting it’s about their vociferous defense of Biden and categorizing people as loyal or not. And the trolley problem likewise presents the problem as only having two tracks when history shows us that’s not true. There’s nearly infinite tracks. Including one where Biden comes around on Israel and wins the election.
You’re a moron. Thanks for fucking over the Country.
Sure buddy.
Loser.
Ahh I get it. So you’re 100% the person I was talking about in my first post.
Oh I’m arguing in bad faith because I called out your gaslighting? Conflating disillusioned voters with voters for the other team is a top tier propaganda technique meant to shore up base loyalty. And here you are executing it to a T.
How is it gaslighting? Gaslighting isn’t simply making (unfounded) accusations.
They’re trying to convince people they are something they are not. In this case, Trump supporters.
Or you know, at no point did you actually engage in discussion. You used a false equivalent and rhetoric. Which is pretty much the textbook definition of a bad faith argument.
Oh I don’t think it’s a false equivalence. You seem just about the same as the average sports ball fan to me, just with your political party. And I absolutely engaged in a conversation. You just didn’t merit a longer reply when your assertion was gaslighting. So stop doing that.
Username checks out.
I never promised pretty.
I hope people realize that that Witcher quote “If I’m to choose between one evil and another… I’d rather not choose at all.” was explicitly written to be wrong, and only served as a “Before” of a maturing character arc.
I don’t even remember that, was that from the books, games, or TV show? At any rate, no obviously I had no problem voting for him in 2020. In 2020 he wasn’t supporting the mass murder of civilians in Gaza and asylees in South/Central America. In 2020 he promised to do something to stop the red states from persecuting people. In 2020 we thought he’d have a sane plan for exiting Afghanistan and would bring our interpreters and civilian support out of the country, (Instead veterans had to go back over there and get them themselves in shit Hollywood’s going to make a movie about anytime now). In 2020 we thought he’d surge funding for the military mental health crisis. And so so much more.
Well put. The only principle we should be considering is saving as many lives as possible and preventing as much persecution as possible. Adherence to any principles which go against this simply shows those principles are not worth holding, not as absolutes at least.
Voting for the democrats isn’t saving lives though. The red states are just going ahead with massive civil rights violations anyways. If the democrats won’t step in to stop them then we don’t have a reason to vote for them anymore. The worst case scenario is already happening. It’s not in the future, it’s now.
How do you prove or disprove this?
Do you not understand how our system of government works? Or do you just want some sort of left-leaning fascism? Admittedly, Bernie would make a great benevolent dictator… but that’s exactly the kind of thing that bites you in the ass eventually.
The president has more power than you think he does. Trump reminded us of that. And it’s simple to prove. What has he done to stop Abbot and DeSantis? He has how many federal law enforcement officers? And he hasn’t just arrested the Texas national guardsmen operating illegally on the border? Hell he could just call them to federal duty and send them to an ammo dump in Alaska.
If nothing else you’ve demonstrated your complete ignorance of how our political system works in this country. Well done!
Look up title 10 orders. The president is the commander in chief. If he won’t pull those guardsmen out of there it’s because he doesn’t mind what they’ve done.
The pure fucking irony of you saying that when everything I just suggested is based in existing law and precedent.
LOL. You are clearly ignorant of the practical implications of such things and more generally of how politics works in real terms.
Every action a president takes either gains or loses political capital. The president does not operate in a vacuum… indeed our entire system of government is designed to have checks and balances and specifically to keep the authority of a president confined.
I must say, you have such an incredibly simplistic view of this… it’s quite stunning. You literally sound like a MAGAt, begging for authoritarian control.
So now we’re moving the goal posts. It’s political capital and not political system.
I agree, what he spends his capital on shows what he cares about. Good thing there’s not some black hole of a situation he’s just dumping capital into right now…
You are not going to get Arab-Americans to vote for Biden, forget it. You want us to carry water for someone slaughtering us while grinning. I voted for him in 2020 and that will be the last time I ever vote Democratic, the first time was for John Kerry in 2004. Voting Republican is of course not an option, it is third party from now on though I am making arrangements to leave the country. I am paying taxes to give myself PTSD watching Arabs get slaughtered with my tax money. I know most people don’t have the means to leave the US, but I do.
Biden could have stopped this genocide from day one, not only he didn’t but he continues to supply the weapons and political cover for Israel to continue massacring women and children. There’s enough Arab-Americans to swing the election one way or another. Biden and the Democratic Party will have to earn our votes rather than extract them from us by scaring us with Trump.
It’s your right to vote 3rd party, but doing so makes it only more likely that Trump will take office and ruin not just Palestine but the ability for Arab Americans and possibly every foreign born, and possibly non-white person in general, to live in the US. In our current political system, third parties count for nothing, it’s a wasted vote. I’m not thrilled by Biden either but voting for president has to be strategic.
How could have Biden stopped it on day one? Really. Tell us.
By not sending weapons, by withholding financial aid, by not justifying the crimes and by not vetoing the U.N. ceasefire vote multiple times. Reagan and Bush Sr. were able to do so. No surprise that Thurmond-loving Biden is to their right somehow.
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3rd party vote just goes to Cheato Mussolini
He won in 2016 despite me voting for Clinton. In 2020 I thought Biden couldn’t be worse, but I got a genocide. In 2024 I’m voting for someone I like for a change. Clinton too is never getting a vote from after she posted this. Cheering and justifying a genocide is where I part ways with the Democratic Party.
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wrong generalization bro , it’s actually muslim americans
You are funny. Arab Americans and Muslim Americans do overlap and both care deeply about Palestine, but are still two different groups. Most Arabs in the US are actually Christian, and the news article I linked to mentioned Arab Americans.
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You are not on the left.
Being pro-palestine is not the definition of the left, the truth is things would only be worse for Palestine if Trump is elected, and in exchange for this punishment of the Dems the potential losses are immense and not just for Palestine. Being pro-palestine is very popular among the far right as well, and they are cheering for Trump just the same as you have been implicitly.
Liberalism and the Democratic Party are on the right. Joe Biden was friends with Strom Thurmond. Joe Biden demonized “busing” and other programs to integrate schools. Joe Biden cheered the slaughter of women in children in Lebanon in 1982. Biden is basically Trump but with more eloquence. Their actions are the same. Palestinians are getting slaughtered right now, protestors are getting beaten up and jailed right now. Trump is just the boogeyman Democrats use to get their voters to stop demanding anything.
Obama gave people hope. Then Biden ran a very progressive campaign after Hillary lost a normal campaign. Our principles were always in play. Nothing has changed, Biden still has to earn votes and nothing Trump said is different from what Biden is doing. He’s just saying it out loud. For the record Israel just bombed a known refugee tent camp and this is what other countries are saying. This is what the White House said. Either Biden is a joke that keeps getting played by Netanyahu or Biden thinks we’re a joke. Either way is not going to win him votes. And his entire job is to win votes by representing the people. I doubt the kids being denied their college degrees care much whose in white house when the police stormed their protest encampment.
You have to be in a position to not be affected by Republican policies to think that. Really to be single-minded about one issue, no matter how valid in itself, while ignoring everything else that affects so many so badly.
You may think you get virtue points for this but what you are showing is just how incredibly privileged and selfish you are.
I’m not doing it for “points”. The entire idea that this is some child’s game is the problem. People are already dying in massive numbers, here and abroad. Democrats want to just continue the status quo, while the republicans keep changing the status quo.
It’s precisely that you can’t wrap your head around the fact that this is NOT a child’s game where you get to personally pick - for everyone else - the one issue that matters to you this week that is the problem.
If that’s true then why do we have elections at all?