With Biden, everyone really has to pay attenton to who he picks as his running mate. Right now, I can actually see that person being Andrew Cuomo or Hillary Clinton. Hillary Clinton is simply detestable among most voters (and she's a loser-- so there's bad optics on that alone), and Andrew Cuomo would get obliterated by the Trump campaign. The health industry in New York has taken hit after hit for years under his governing. He had the chance 5 years ago to stock up the hospitals with ventilators, and he didn't do it, for starters. You have Pence say that on the debate stage, and Cuomo is fucking done-zo.
And then there's Bernie. Well, if Bernie really IS staying in it to try to win it, then Trump doesn't have to do much to obliterate him. Bernie wasn't even there to vote on the COVID-19 relief bill a few days ago. The man is a snake oil salesman, and he can't even beat a flat-out senile Joe Biden. What chance does he have against Trump? Haha.
The interesting thing is that Biden has walked himself into a corner by declaring that his VP would be a female, especially in time when none of the current VP candidates are all that great. I also found it interesting that the VP announcement essentially was a moment when you could clearly differentiate the differences between the Liberals and the Progressives- the Liberals clapping like seals about
female representation, while the Progressives were pointing out that Sarah Palin was a VP choice too.
Bernie likely can't win, but I think he should at least make a stand for himself and his movement. IMO, to the Progressive movement, Biden presidency is probably going to be 'worse' than a Trump presidency in that the US's structural issues will be swept under the carpet of superficial 'niceness and compassionate government' and remain unaddressed.
If he doesn't pull it off, well we are all fucked anyway. The Stakes are pretty much that high. Its been a long time since we've had a crisis where the buy in is literally the future of the country, but this one is it I fear.
My concerns with a Biden/Dem Congress win are that the Democrats are:
1.) Looking for revenge in the pettiest manner possible;
2.) Looking to permanently cement their gains to create structural imbalances favoring Democrats, (i.e. ballot harvesting, mass amnesty, governing via judiciary, no voter ID, etc) - the stuff that permanently turned California Blue and turned Democrat-run cities into mini-fiefdoms;
3.) The US gets run via bureaucracy and consultants, resulting in
less accountability,
more make-work rules,
less privacy, &
more rigid, regulatory-captured institutions that can't respond to crises (i.e. the FDA)
4.) That the US will concede its battle against Chi-com authoritarian corporatism. Even if the US is flawed in practise, its founding ideals are 100% preferable to whatever vision China has for the world (likely a less free world rotating around the Middle Kingdom).
5.) The US gets embroiled in a permanent culture war and institutionalized equity. There will no longer be an 'American' identity- you instead get a whole bunch of labels designed to atomize your identity.
The next four years are fundamentally crucial in ensuring that the US gets away from the edge- it almost went over in 2016.
