Tankies be like, "if you think China ever does anything wrong ever, you're a CIA plant! Stupid anarkiddies!"

"Holodomor? I barely know her!"

yeah that's the bottom line

We're not arguing. I'm making points and you are ignoring them

Should Biden be the nominee? No

Is Biden a good choice? No

Does your vote matter with how the US carries out elections? No

Does it suck to vote against what you really really want to get something that's shitty but less shitty than how things currently are? Of course it does

Idealism is a luxury right now

Anyway Squish Squash, you're not even the furthest left person on the board. Most people here aren't saying "vote Biden" because they are liberal moderates who endorse him. They are saying so because one of two people will win the 2020 election, and even if neither choice is ideal, the outcome will have a tangible effect on the lives of real people. Voting for the lesser evil does not prevent you from pursuing long-term goals of more substantive change through leftist praxis. Politics isn't something that only happens every four years, and one can use elections to prevent the worst possible outcome while spending the 1,420 days between them fighting for better outcomes. That fight is only made much more difficult if the leader is worse than a neolib, but a fascist.

Saying you won't participate because "both options are bad" when one is demonstrably worse than the other says that you simply don't care about the surplus of people who will be harmed under the worse option who wouldn't be harmed under the less bad option. Why are those people's lives worth less than your wish not to feel like you're compromising? How can you tell trans people who have had Obama-era civil-rights protections removed by Trump that they will have to wait in line until every single progressive objective is met until you will be willing to help them have easier lives? Again, because those other objectives are only set back even further if the worse candidate wins, it only makes utilitarian sense to select the option that will mitigate the damage, while continuing to work outside the system to pursue other valuable objectives instead of only being willing to participate if and when you are offered a perfect political candidate who will fix everything for you.

Next up, we come to terms with the abundantly blatant fact that communication with the intellectually dishonest is both detrimental to the discussion and a waste of time.

(or do we)

that's it i'm not voting anymore

Why won’t you answer my question

Did you realize your position is indefensible so you won’t even bother or

I’m thinking maybe you don’t understand about how real people are affected by elections and are more concerned with coming off as morally superior on the internet

Hm

but also, that thing Squish Squash said in the quoted post for sure never happened

It definitely happened, Joey, you’re not very familiar with tankies I take it. Look up “cursed tankie opinions” on Facebook for examples of what they say.

@Eulogy,

I’m not sure why you think Biden needs my vote so badly in a state he is guaranteed to lose. You might have a point if I was living in a swing state.

ur dad is in a "swing state", iykwim

Biden is behind in your horrible state by 6.5% (Real Clear politics avg). Putting him only a few percentage points off with margin of error. Clinton polled ahead of Trump in several key states she lost to Trump.

Your vote matters. It only stops mattering when you throw it away

Don’t make me get D’Arcy.

I’m pretty certain I’ve said this but my vote is only “meaningless” because so many of you refuse to vote against the duopoly like I am. If everyone who thought Biden isn’t left wing enough voted Green in the general, that would be the end of neoliberalism in America. You are blaming me for the masses’ refusal to stop continuing a stupid, broken system. I don’t think you are familiar with Missouri if you think Biden has any chance here. Outside of St. Louis and Kansas City (and maybe a few other places) it’s a deep red state. You yourself said Biden isn’t even within the margin of error, so that’s hardly a compelling case of why I should vote for him.

"My vote is meaningless because nobody agrees with me" - Squish

via GIPHY

squish squash you are incredibly disingenuous. instead of actually answering what anyone is saying to you, you continuously move the goal posts from "my vote doesn't matter," to "Trump is not bad enough to make me vote for Biden," to "Biden is actually just as bad as Trump," to "well it's just my opinion man," and when you get called on the irrational nature of any of these beliefs, you switch to a different one in response. I'm not even sure you know what you yourself believe, but it's pretty obvious it's all about you.

You will never get a hundred million people to just suddenly vote in concert for something unfamiliar. That is absolute fucking fantasy. I hope for alternative parties, but it is literally impossible it will ever happen your way. It takes a long fucking time for shit to shift that dramatically, and the bottom line is you are in a very small minority for wanting that amount of change and wanting it that fast. Your attitude that it's just everyone else's fault for not being exactly like you is beyond immature and foolish. There's a reason that serious leftist politicians are not behaving like you want and are working to push the Democrats left from inside, and working to expand their ideological coalition by being cooperative and rhetorically persuasive to the public. It's because your way is straight up foolishness.

And furthermore, in regards to your self-obsession, you don't want to be condescended yet you speak to everyone here like they've never heard of socialism before. You aren't even the furthest left boarder here and I doubt you are truly further left than half the people who post in this community. You think your obstinance and ideological rigidity are some kind of badge of left purity, but it just makes you look either naive, or like you actually don't care about people's suffering that much and want to pat yourself on the back (I'm starting to think it's more the latter). You really do come off as a smartass college freshman guy in the middle of comparative ideologies who just read Marx two weeks ago and is lecturing some girl he's trying to impress.

At this point you are just polluting the board with nonsense. Get off fucking facebook and go do something that will actually help bring about better policy.

this thread is literally like Hurin's Last Stand. Squishy against all you bitches!!

^ are those the infamous "tankies" ?

RBG, I’m not going to waste my time reading that rant when I already know what you’re going to say. I’ll point out that I have been consistent in saying I refuse to vote for Biden because:

•Electing Biden does nothing to address the things that led to Trump. It actually returns us to them and will likely lead to a smarter more competent Trump.
•I worry about him starting new conflicts and/or wars.
•Biden will do nothing to address the main issues of American society. He’s just someone who makes it possible for people like you to pretend like things are great while you eat brunch.
•The more we accept candidates like Biden, the more the establishment will see no reason not to keep running them.

I feel like these are all legitimate reasons but I always point out that your criticism is all irrelevant due to the state I live in rendering any vote for Biden pointless.

*what about the fucking judicial appointments that will affect people’s lives for literal decades*

You can say he won’t do enough and I agree but “he will do nothing to help anyone” is demonstrably and obviously false.

•What about Biden’s record makes you think he will appoint judges who aren’t right wing pieces of shit?

•Biden has the same chance of winning Missouri as Howie Hawkins does so stop screaming at me for picking the one who doesn’t want poor people to die.

jesus christ

yes they won't be socialists but have you seen who trump put in

these people are in there for LIFE

your best argument is that your vote doesn't count so good to stick with that one

of course as i said before, only one party wants to make it where your vote does count

maybe if you think voting for Biden excuses you from taking any other action, AND you are a person who would have engaged in leftist direct action anyway

voting for Biden could be problematic, but isn't that basically nobody

invincible ignorance

"well there you go Biden is prez, guess we're no longer needed"

-The DSA

you know what trump is going to say to squish squash when he wins missouri by one vote?

"tankies"

He was the first major dem politician to support gay marriage and reversed his position on the Hyde amendment.

But uh, even if I didn’t know for certain (I do), we know who Trump has appointed already.

Just admit that you don’t actually give a fuck about people who are actually in trouble, ok?

And whatever you’re in Missouri but your poisonous attitude contributes to people in Pennsylvania Wisconsin and Michigan and Texas and North Carolina and Ohio and Florida feeling the same way.

I probably agree with you on policy in every way. I don’t want to spout cliches. But four more years of this will do irreparable harm to a lot of people. Biden isn’t going to fix everything. But the idea that his win would result in a worse Trump is completely unfounded and, frankly, very dumb.

We currently are dealing with a lawsuit to repeal the ACA that the party in power supports. ?????

The ACA isn’t perfect by any means but if it’s repealed people will literally die when they wouldn’t otherwise. This isn’t hard.

"ISIS is making a tremendous amount of money because they have certain oil camps, certain areas of oil that they took away . . . They have some in Syria, some in Iraq. I would bomb the shit out of 'em. I would just bomb those suckers. That’s right. I’d blow up the pipes . . . I’d blow up every single inch. There would be nothing left. And you know what, you’ll get Exxon to come in there and in two months, you ever see these guys, how good they are, the great oil companies? They will rebuild that sucker, brand new, it will be beautiful."
- Donald Trump, 2015



What if Biden starts some brand new wars, though? He may.

Here’s where I will bitch about Obama claiming we didn’t need an individual mandate when Hillary knew it was necessary

Ok done with that complaint for now.

And you know what, I will apologize for hurling personal insults because that doesn’t help anything. But this administration has been even worse than I feared. We cannot do it again.

"I see again the forest fires are starting . . . They’re starting again in California. I said, you gotta clean your floors, you gotta clean your forests — there are many, many years of leaves and broken trees and they’re like, like, so flammable, you touch them and it goes up . . . Maybe we’re just going to have to make them pay for it because they don’t listen to us."
- President Trump on Thursday

What if Biden lacks the creativity to end the California wildfires with solutions such as a leaf-raking program?

Do you think I’m going around telling people in those states to vote Green? Who am I “poisoning”? People on a Smashing Pumpkins message board? I haven’t encountered anyone who remotely agrees with me outside of **** and she still said she’s voting Biden, so I’m really not sure who you think I’m convincing not to vote for him.

It just strikes me that it’s a cancer that spreads. If you’re keeping this to yourself other than on here, then fine. We disagree but I think ideas like yours are legitimately dangerous. Again, I’m sorry for insulting you because I’m sure we agree on everything. It’s just frustrating, for both of us I know.

We’re fucked forever and I really do think it’s important to try to make us less fucked if at all possible? I understand your point that Missouri is probably a lost cause, but I think it would be more helpful to try to do whatever you could to defeat this absolute monster.