I’ll catch downvotes for this, but every incumbent president has a primary that is abbreviated and dominated by the incumbent. Biden is no different than Obama, Bush, etc. That said, you can and should still be critical of the DNC not hosting a full primary when Harris was tapped out.
That’s not an accident though, the party is choosing to shut out new candidates. I think it’s always wrong to do, because it puts even more power over our elections into the hands of billionaires.
Yes. The party chooses to “shut out new candidates” in the sense that the vast majority of potential candidates choose not to run. In large part because the incumbency is either a massive strength or an albatross hanging around everyone’s neck.
And considering primaries tend to come down more to attacking the candidate themselves (since the viable candidates tend to have platforms not too dissimilar from one another with the expectation that the final platform is an amalgam of the front runners anyway), it mostly just serves to provide weaknesses for the other party to exploit.
A biden who had chosen to stand down would have been a very different story. There were definitely arguments for it at the time much as there were arguments against it (the biden years were really good for the country and most of the horrors of it would have been there under any other president). But people are stupid and decided that the local kroger jacking up the prices meant the world was ending and so forth.
The DNC removed delegates for an entire state during the primary, they argued in court in 2016 they didn’t have to respect the voters as a private company. They’ve been actively suppressing democracy in primaries ever since Obama skipped the line.
They removed the delegates of New Hampshire, because New Hampshire didn’t follow the rules. New Hampshire thought it was entitled to vote first even though it was clearly another state’s turn to vote first.
Here in California, we haven’t had a presidential democratic primary since 2016, and he wasn’t running then. Please explain how he won, when the DNC cancelled the 2020 primary before we even got to vote, and never had a 2024 primary?
Maybe you didn’t see the presidential primary on your ballot? If not you should have gotten another ballot, because millions of other Californians voted in the presidential primary.
And Sanders wasn’t running in 2024. He is not required to run in order to hold a primary.
There wasn’t a presidential primary in 2024, I thought we were talking about 2020, when there was one that the DNC called early because of the pandemic. As far as I can tell there wasn’t a primary in CA in 2020 because despite being on the register, and signed up for mail in voting, I never got a ballot. Didn’t follow up due to pandemic.
If those are 2024 vote totals, then they were made up, because we didn’t have a presidential primary. I got that ballot.
Ah, we’re onto the moving of the goalposts! At least we’re admitting/agreeing that the primary did, in fact, take place.
It’s right there in the Wikipedia link:
Senator Bernie Sanders won the highly desired primary, which bore the most delegates of the entire primary cycle by far, improving on his polling average by 3% and winning 36% of the vote and 225 delegates.[1] Former vice president Joe Biden, however, aided by among others the endorsements of Pete Buttigieg and Amy Klobuchar, also had a much stronger second-place finish than expected and took 28% of the vote and 172 delegates
Further down in the same link
The 415 pledged delegates to the 2020 Democratic National Convention were allocated proportionally on the basis of the results of the primary.
And then if we go and look over here at how the delegates voted for the convention, we can see that Bernie received all those pledged delegates’ votes and a few more. Some mixture of superdelegates and delegates who were pledged to some other candidate who dropped out, but Biden picked up more of those. Now, before you treat that as an “Aha! See! They cheated Bernie!” I’ll remind you that Bernie dropped out in April and the delegates voted 4 months later in August. So even though he dropped out he still received more delegate votes than his popular vote in the primary warranted him. And you might be interested to know pretty much no candidate ever has won the general election after a contested convention, so the smart play for the general was for the I pledged and superdelegates to present a united front in support of the nominee.
pretty much no candidate ever has won the general election after a contested convention, so the smart play for the general was for the I pledged and superdelegates to present a united front in support of the nominee.
and give a big “fuck you” to anyone who wanted meaningful change.
As you just said in another comment, you opted out of electing a political party preference, which is the same thing as opting out of voting in the primaries.
This is a decision you made, don’t misrepresent it. I don’t complain when I can’t see in a dark room because I didn’t want to turn the light on.
Are you a registered Democrat? Afaik, for all those primaries you claim that didn’t happen, you had to be registered as a party member to actually vote in them. I specifically re-registered as Democrat from independent to vote for Bernie in all of them.
Honestly, I hadn’t even heard of primaries until the 2016 election, let alone that you needed to register as a party member to participate (came as a surprise to me since I went in person and had to fill out a new voter registration thing). My civics classes were absolute garbage in school. I didn’t learn shit.
Both shams when we know that the DNC picks their favorite from day one and works with the media to form their narrative. 90% of voters are just looking to be told who to vote for.
Look no further than Kamala. Right up until 21 July, when Biden was facing calls to resign by rank and file Dems every day, we were getting puff piece after puff piece that “Biden still polls better than Kamala Harris,” “Biden is still the best possible candidate.” Well, Biden eventually caved and literally overnight Harris became not only the real best chance, but actually was looking really good. Nothing about her changed. None of her policies changed overnight. The only thing that changed was that she was now the status quo choice and therefore “safe” for the MSM to endorse.
“Forced out.” welcome to a primary, Biden. Functional parties have them.
Biden won his primary.
A sham primary in which the DNC shut out new candidates, refused to have debates, and then coronated a new candidate anyway.
I’ll catch downvotes for this, but every incumbent president has a primary that is abbreviated and dominated by the incumbent. Biden is no different than Obama, Bush, etc. That said, you can and should still be critical of the DNC not hosting a full primary when Harris was tapped out.
That’s not an accident though, the party is choosing to shut out new candidates. I think it’s always wrong to do, because it puts even more power over our elections into the hands of billionaires.
Yes. The party chooses to “shut out new candidates” in the sense that the vast majority of potential candidates choose not to run. In large part because the incumbency is either a massive strength or an albatross hanging around everyone’s neck.
And considering primaries tend to come down more to attacking the candidate themselves (since the viable candidates tend to have platforms not too dissimilar from one another with the expectation that the final platform is an amalgam of the front runners anyway), it mostly just serves to provide weaknesses for the other party to exploit.
A biden who had chosen to stand down would have been a very different story. There were definitely arguments for it at the time much as there were arguments against it (the biden years were really good for the country and most of the horrors of it would have been there under any other president). But people are stupid and decided that the local kroger jacking up the prices meant the world was ending and so forth.
If the DNC couldn’t stop Marianne Williamson from running against Biden, then they couldn’t stop anyone.
And the DNC doesn’t run debates, they are generally run by the media networks.
The DNC removed delegates for an entire state during the primary, they argued in court in 2016 they didn’t have to respect the voters as a private company. They’ve been actively suppressing democracy in primaries ever since Obama skipped the line.
They removed the delegates of New Hampshire, because New Hampshire didn’t follow the rules. New Hampshire thought it was entitled to vote first even though it was clearly another state’s turn to vote first.
Eventually the DNC ended up reinstating the NH delegates.
You can’t seriously consider what he won to be a legitimate primary.
People were free to choose from a list of candidates. That’s equally “legitimate” as most primaries.
Here in California, we haven’t had a presidential democratic primary since 2016, and he wasn’t running then. Please explain how he won, when the DNC cancelled the 2020 primary before we even got to vote, and never had a 2024 primary?
There was a California primary in 2024.
Other candidates included
I was signed up for mail in voting, and never got a primary ballot in 2020. Got one in 2024 but of course there wasn’t a presidential primary option.
Also how many votes did Bernie get, cause we had tons of Bernie voters here in 2016 and 2020
Maybe you didn’t see the presidential primary on your ballot? If not you should have gotten another ballot, because millions of other Californians voted in the presidential primary.
And Sanders wasn’t running in 2024. He is not required to run in order to hold a primary.
There wasn’t a presidential primary in 2024, I thought we were talking about 2020, when there was one that the DNC called early because of the pandemic. As far as I can tell there wasn’t a primary in CA in 2020 because despite being on the register, and signed up for mail in voting, I never got a ballot. Didn’t follow up due to pandemic.
If those are 2024 vote totals, then they were made up, because we didn’t have a presidential primary. I got that ballot.
I don’t know what you’re talking about. I already linked the results of the 2024 California primary.
And of course there was also a California primary in 2020. Not only that, Sanders won.
If the California 2020 primary was cancelled then why are there results reported? (Spoiler, Bernie won it)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_California_Democratic_presidential_primary
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2020-primary-elections/california-results/
https://www.cnn.com/election/2020/primaries-caucuses/state/california
who did the california delegates go to?
Ah, we’re onto the moving of the goalposts! At least we’re admitting/agreeing that the primary did, in fact, take place.
It’s right there in the Wikipedia link:
Further down in the same link
And then if we go and look over here at how the delegates voted for the convention, we can see that Bernie received all those pledged delegates’ votes and a few more. Some mixture of superdelegates and delegates who were pledged to some other candidate who dropped out, but Biden picked up more of those. Now, before you treat that as an “Aha! See! They cheated Bernie!” I’ll remind you that Bernie dropped out in April and the delegates voted 4 months later in August. So even though he dropped out he still received more delegate votes than his popular vote in the primary warranted him. And you might be interested to know pretty much no candidate ever has won the general election after a contested convention, so the smart play for the general was for the I pledged and superdelegates to present a united front in support of the nominee.
and give a big “fuck you” to anyone who wanted meaningful change.
But there was a primary. Correct?
Not that I can tell. Especially since none of those names are Sanders, and despite being signed up, I wasn’t allowed to vote.
As you just said in another comment, you opted out of electing a political party preference, which is the same thing as opting out of voting in the primaries.
This is a decision you made, don’t misrepresent it. I don’t complain when I can’t see in a dark room because I didn’t want to turn the light on.
Are you a registered Democrat? Afaik, for all those primaries you claim that didn’t happen, you had to be registered as a party member to actually vote in them. I specifically re-registered as Democrat from independent to vote for Bernie in all of them.
I’mma be honest: I was going to ask that same question but figured nobody could be THAT stupid.
Kudos for justifiably having even less faith in humanity than I do.
Honestly, I hadn’t even heard of primaries until the 2016 election, let alone that you needed to register as a party member to participate (came as a surprise to me since I went in person and had to fill out a new voter registration thing). My civics classes were absolute garbage in school. I didn’t learn shit.
No. My religion prevents me from joining a political party.
So you chose not to participate in the primary.
I mean that’s obviously a lie. There’s documentation that proves primaries were held. I voted in mine.
Some of them were held. Ours was cancelled and they called it for Biden because of the pandemic. And again, what primary in 2024?
The one my wife and I voted in.
What are even talking about? I voted by mail in both 2020 and 2024 primaries, in California.
2020 Primary:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_Democratic_Party_presidential_primaries
2024 Primary:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2024_Democratic_Party_presidential_primaries
Both shams when we know that the DNC picks their favorite from day one and works with the media to form their narrative. 90% of voters are just looking to be told who to vote for.
Look no further than Kamala. Right up until 21 July, when Biden was facing calls to resign by rank and file Dems every day, we were getting puff piece after puff piece that “Biden still polls better than Kamala Harris,” “Biden is still the best possible candidate.” Well, Biden eventually caved and literally overnight Harris became not only the real best chance, but actually was looking really good. Nothing about her changed. None of her policies changed overnight. The only thing that changed was that she was now the status quo choice and therefore “safe” for the MSM to endorse.
Biden still beat Trump while Harris didn’t.
Maybe he would have the second time too just because he’s white and male.