Thursday’s presidential debate debacle — widely regarded as a low point for President Joe Biden, who appeared feeble and sometimes confused — many Democratic elites and nonpartisan pundits are suggesting a break-the-glass-in-case-of-emergency move that resided on the margins of conventional political thought just a week ago: The incumbent president, they argue, should step aside in the interest of the country, and delegates should name his replacement at the upcoming Democratic National Convention.

Any move to replace Biden just four months before the election carries considerable risk. The party can ill afford to pass over its sitting vice president, Kamala Harris, who represents a core Democratic constituency as a Black woman — but Harris consistently underperforms in polling. And allowing delegates to make such a momentous decision, negating the will of millions of primary voters and turning a nomination process that has been the norm for decades upside-down, is surely a recipe for division and rancor.

But it’s not like we haven’t been here before. On March 31, 1968, Lyndon B. Johnson stunned the nation when he announced that he was pulling out of that year’s presidential election. The Democratic National Convention that followed several months later devolved into chaos and violence and left the party’s eventual nominee, Vice President Hubert Humphrey, hobbled at the start of the fall campaign season. He ultimately lost a painfully close election to Richard Nixon, in no small part because of the unruly convention in Chicago.

  • Jimmybander
    223 months ago
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    I’m so sick of hearing about Biden. How about point out any of the dozens of disgusting remarks and wants of the wanna-be dictator, cheetoh mcgee? It’s almost as if all media companies are owned by right wing capitalist wankers.

    • Diplomjodler
      133 months ago
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      3 months ago
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      Wait, that can’t possibly be the case. *checks notes*

      Oh shit.

    • 2484345508English
      93 months ago
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      Because Lemmy is flooded with Russian influence, and most of the news and comments are directed to Biden topics instead of Trump topics to keep the heat on the “right person”

      • OccamsTeapot
        63 months ago
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        Lemmy is flooded with Russian influence

        What do you mean by that? That people use “Russian” talking points or that there are literally bots/agitators directly from Russia trying to shape the narrative here?

          • OccamsTeapot
            43 months ago
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            Why would anyone pay someone to post on Lemmy? Not the biggest expense/exposure ratio, surely?

            • 2484345508English
              13 months ago
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              It’s not so much about posting, but influencing the direction of the conversation. Which can involve posting. There are plenty of groups who get paid to just talk shit online. I would be surprised if the US didn’t have a group too.

                • Zipitydew
                  03 months ago
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                  Lemmy’s developers are actual tankies. The original and a still large instance is Lemmy.ml. The ML meaning Marxist Leninist. The mods there are ridiculously ban heavy around questioning anything to do with BRICS nations. They even preemptively ban accounts who post outside of their instance if you say truthful things like NATO is a defensive alliance, Russia is the aggressor in Ukraine, or China is being imperialist themselves in SE Asia.

                  • OccamsTeapot
                    33 months ago
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                    The original and a still large instance is Lemmy.ml. The ML meaning Marxist Leninist.

                    Yeah I know, I subscribe to some communities there.

                    They even preemptively ban accounts who post outside of their instance if you say truthful things like NATO is a defensive alliance, Russia is the aggressor in Ukraine, or China is being imperialist themselves in SE Asia.

                    I will test this then! Russia is the aggressor in Ukraine and Putin is a cunt. Stalin was a monster. I’ll make similar comments over on ml at the next opportunity. (Edit let’s see how it goes https://lemmy.world/comment/11002066)

                    Just to be clear. I don’t doubt that there are normal people here who are pro Russia or are tankies. What I doubt is that real people are being paid money to “influence the conversation” on this relatively obscure platform. That’s all

          • OccamsTeapot
            03 months ago
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            Yeah I’m sure Putin’s top priority is infiltrating the Linux nerds and Trekkies in their natural habitat. Facebook? Nah. Reddit? Nyet. We need to go where the real action is.

      • soratoyuki
        53 months ago
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        Wanting a President that can string two coherent sentences together doesn’t make you a Russian bot.

        • 2484345508English
          63 months ago
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          That’s true, and so far none of the people running can.

          • goferking0
            53 months ago
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            Hence the reason for why people are calling for one to be replaced as it’s not a deal breaker for the other party