Biden Is A Bad Bet
By: Montag Faber
Tags: Politics, 2020 Presidential Race, Joe Biden, Bernie Sanders, Donald Trump

The Biden campaign was built for the blind follower. The ones that want to play it safe even though they know it is likely to fail. They don’t want to be blamed if things don’t work out. They do what the pundit tells them is the right move without verifying any of their blathering talking points. The ones that are currently comfortable, but they just don’t like Donald Trump. They have nothing to lose, because their lives aren’t negatively affected by the policies of presidencies that favor the higher tax brackets. For them it is not a matter of life and death. It is the mere inconvenience of hearing Trump say or do something stupid from time to time, it is the hope that their self-perceived civility prevails in favor of the institution. Maybe it is fear, fear of another four years of the current administration. Biden appears to be the front-runner, he appears to poll okay, so why is he such a bad bet to win the General Election?

I remember when the race to the 2020 nomination began and Biden popped up as the front runner. It was always so unbelievable that is was just more so confusing. The man’s time had clearly come and gone, but one last political Hail Mary into a declining sunset and here we are. He is still the front runner. As a mental exercise, please just do me a favor and for one moment imagine Biden on the debate stage with Trump. Do you really think this will go well for him? The Democratic Party seems to forget what made Donald Trump such an appealing candidate to people in the first place, and why more people than you think actually don’t mind his presidency so far, even if they give him an unfavorable rating. There is a reason why a candidate like Joe Biden isn’t going to get the independent vote, the youth vote, or the rural vote to take down Trump. There is no energy there, there is no excitement, there is no character, there is no movement. Remember, this is ultimately decided by the Electoral College, it is a winner take all in each state, and Biden’s entire campaign is that he isn’t the Donald. The elite donor, corporate class may love Biden, but they love Trump even more. He is making them money, do they really want to change that? Despite how much you may detest Trump, do you really think everyone does? When you look at Joe’s record, especially before the Obama years, is it actually any better, if not worse than what we know we are getting with Trump?

How are the downtrodden to know that they are worse off? They have known nothing but getting screwed over and lied to by politicians since the beginning of time. Whether we like it or not they see Trump’s transparency as a strength. For he is what he is, whatever you think that is. Trump is held to a different standard. He was a reality TV personality, his past is easily dismissed as it all happened in a different realm. Biden was voted in to represent the interests of people, and his track record doesn’t speak very positively of that. Donald will effectively be able to run to the left of him on a variety of important issues. Biden pushed for the Iraq War, while Trump ran on opposing it, even if he actually didn’t. Joe voted for NAFTA, while Donald renogotiated, and changed it in an effort to boost domestic farm trade. Don’t even get me started on the Hunter Biden scandal, you really want to continue that conversation? You really want to sit and argue about his very real problem with the unwanted sniffing and touching of young girls, and women?

Obama chose Joe to appease the older white vote. While Obama used his charm to deliver a seemingly progressive agenda in a cordial manner, he was able to ease white-suburban fear by adding a conservative Democrat to the ticket, assuring them he wouldn’t stray too far to the left. You put Joe as the front runner and we are basically saying we are okay with pushing a Republican agenda as long as it’s not Trump doing it. Joe himself said he would consider a Republican VP. Sure, this can be viewed as reaching across the aisle but after four years of demonizing the Republican Party this is your move? I’m not even going to start in on the “gaffes”, the clear mental decline of Joe Biden. There are too many examples to cite, the absent-mindedness, the confusion, the flat-out saying the wrong thing. At least Trump knows how to insult someone, because ‘dog-faced pony soldier’ isn’t going to win you the rap battle. Trump also twists up words in mini-coked up convulsions, that’s why we are supposed to run someone that can actually speak coherently against him. That is not what we get with Biden.

I am not a fan of our 45th president, but I will say that compared to modern President’s he isn’t all that different. Statistically he is on par with the past as far as executive orders, golf trips, veto’s and dumb decisions. He says dumb stuff, and I’ll admit, sometimes even funny stuff, because he can’t help but speak his mind. The Democratic Party wants to paint him as a buffoon, but then they turn around and act as if he is some grand strategist that speaks in reverse psychological riddles. He follows the Republican policy agenda, and while he votes in favor of wealthy and corporate interests, he at least isn’t owned by these interests. He is scandalous and most definitely corrupt, but he doesn’t even really lie about it because it is so obvious. There doesn’t appear to be any shady back-room deals, because it is all par-for-the-course when it comes to white-collar corruption. We are so numb to it that it hardly even matters. His acts of war aren’t any more extreme than Obama’s. His immigration policies are not that much different than Obama’s. Did Trump start ICE? Did Trump start droning civilians? Did Trump bail out the banks that destroyed our economy? The big problem is that he isn’t Presidential, therefore the media picks him apart. His outspoken anger appeals to rural whites, and therefore the white nationalist trolls have got his back. This is what makes his tenacious online following, a real, and dangerous threat, that in order to vote out we will have to face. Even if Trump is beaten, do you think they are going away? They will continue to seethe, and boil over, and we need a campaign that can truly oppose that. The meme wars continue to become real life. Do you really think Biden can win that war? I don’t see it happening.

Bernie Sanders campaign and following are the complete antithesis of Donald Trump. The populist components of both may seem similar, but in content and message they couldn’t be more different. To many Millenials, Gen Z’ers, and the generations above that still hold to their more youthful hope-filled intent, the Sanders campaign has been a catalyst of a chance at fundamental change. They see this as political warfare against the MAGA, they are truly fighting for the rights, lives, and welfare of all people. This is why the “Bernie Bro” narrative exists, you give millions of passionate people a megaphone into the abyss of Twitter and some less than savory characters are bound to show themselves. That narrative in and of itself is just a media driven narrative anyways. ALL candidates campaigns have what some may call “toxic supporters”, because if you take a random poll of even just ten people on the street, a couple of them will probably be jerks. Yet, it is a complete 180 from the last 4-years, a candidate they believe will actually “drain the swamp”, and stay true to the quest of left leaning ideals, or at the very least actually try. This is why you want the “Bernie Bros” on your side. They will fight for you, not go ‘yeah I guess I could take one or the other’. They are passionate enough to match the strength of the online MAGA forces. You know why? Because MAGA speaks to the self-perceived disenfranchised. Whether the person truly is or not, they feel there is something that is missing that this presidency is giving them. It is the same attractant as the Sanders campaign, it reaches the disenfranchised and motivates them to believe in something for themselves. This is why it is a threat to MAGA, it peels back the onion to say this is why you’re angry, it gives a positive alternative to the same appeal. Saying Sanders is like Trump, is like saying Darth Vader is like Yoda, simply because they both use the force. The correlation is independent.

Yet, the Democrats have learned nothing from 2016. They push their safe bet on the people. Middle class suburbia thinks well the TV says he’s the choice, so they assume that’s what everyone is going to choose. This isn’t how it works. This is why people have no faith. There are obviously a huge amount of people that the political system has failed, that they feel make no difference, they seek out truth in alternative media, a voice of reason among the corporate drones overpaid by the oligarchs to smile and read their script. By not giving the people the complete opposite of Trump that still appeals with populist methodology, you risk the vote by making it about getting rid of Donald Trump, and not about the actual structural change that the majority needs. We need healthcare for everyone, we need a fair shot at a higher education for everyone, we need a more economically equal starting point for all people, we need our industry to move into the future in a way that creates millions of jobs, we need to pursue the switch to green energy and environmental saving policy, and we need corporations and their CEO’s to be held accountable, we need them to be stopped from pursuing the profit-over-people model. Success should be fruitful from what you provide to society, not what you withhold from it. Trump isn’t the problem, the Democratic party refuses to learn that a lot of voters aren’t mad at what Trump is actually doing. Everything is going well for those already in a good economic position, some of them are just mad because it is Donald Trump doing it.

What people need to realize about Bernie Sanders’ agenda is that it isn’t some scary, collapse-the-economy, communist conspiracy. Everyone wants to point at other countries and tell us what didn’t work for them, or how these ideas aren’t exactly the way they are doing it. All I have to say is that we are supposed to be the richest country, we are supposed to be developed, advanced, and an example for the rest of the world. If we aren’t striving to fix the flaws in our own system, if we aren’t striving to make America better, then how will we survive? How can we claim to be the best? If you don’t understand what Democratic Socialism is, please stop getting caught up in buzzwords and simply Google it for yourself. Check out the DSA website and get a good understanding before trying to call it Communism, because you make yourself just look uninformed. There are plenty of resources out there to calm your Cold War concerns. The Bernie agenda is that we can do better, and no you aren’t going to be taxed to hell for it. Check out his tax plan for yourself and see how it would effect you. We can pool our resources for the betterment of everyone’s lives. We can unify as the world leader in innovation and equality once again. The world watches our dissent into madness, like family watching a relative become an addict, but the addiction is money and power. We can spend billions upon billions to send soldiers overseas, but we can’t seem to find the money to fix our own infrastructure? At this point we are just asking for Dystopia.

If Sanders is elected and he isn’t able to realize his policies, then you get your moderate action, but don’t start at the compromise. When you ask for a raise do you start with the minimum amount you’re willing to take? Luckily, if he is able to realize his policies there are plenty of recent economic analysis and studies that show that these ideas would be drastically better than our current situation, and better for our economy going forward. If he isn’t the nominee then you get your Joe Biden, industry boosted corporate candidate that can see if just enough people hate Donald Trump that they will replace him for the next maybe slightly better thing? If that’s the case, then all I’ve got left to say is best of luck in your future endeavors Democrats, because Biden is a bad bet, and I won’t take it.