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Trump Vs. The World?: The 2020 Election Thread


HawkbitAlpha

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So, it's now March 2020, and it's looking like our next election will be a standoff between Donald "Take Out Their Families" Trump and Joe "I Have No Empathy" Biden. Personally, I'd rather give the Green Party a boost than ever grace either of these two with a vote. What does everyone else say to that?

 

Spoiler

 EVERYTHING IN THIS SPOILER SHOWS THIS THREAD AS IT APPEARED DURING THE EARLY PRIMARY SEASON. THIS IS NO LONGER RELEVANT.

 

 

It's that time again - time again to start discussing the next presidential election!

In this cycle, as you probably know, the race is loaded. We broke the record number of candidates in one presidential election. So, instead of listing off every single candidate, we'll be listing off the ones who have at least some degree of relevancy in this thread.

First, we'll do the very major contenders in the race (red for Republicans, blue for Democrats)...

Spoiler

DONALD TRUMP

Head shot of Trump smiling in front of an American flag. He is wearing a dark blue suit jacket, white shirt, light blue necktie, and American flag lapel pin.

Position: President (2017-), real estate CEO, TV personality

Slogan: Keep America Great (2020), Make America Great Again (2016)

 

Somebody who really needs no introduction, Donald "The Cyber" Trump is our current Meme-in-Chief. Best known for things such as: A) somehow convincing half of the country to think a wall on the Mexican border is something we need, B) defying every rule we had for campaigning for President in 2015-2016, and C) being a Twitter madman.

 

ELIZABETH WARREN

Elizabeth Warren, official portrait, 114th Congress.jpg

Position: Senator from Massachusetts (2013-), Special Adviser for the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (2010-2011), law professor

Slogan: Dream Big, Fight Hard

 

This law professor-turned-Senator got her claim to political fame as the woman who pushed Obama to create the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau in 2010. A strong supporter of increased regulations on financial instutitions, Warren can be best described as a standard Democrat who favors an ideology of reformed capitalism.

 

 

BERNIE SANDERS

Image result for bernie sanders

Position: Senator from Vermont (2007-), Representative from Vermont's at-large district (1991-2007), Mayor of Burlington, VT (1981-1989)

Slogan: Not Me. Us. (2020), A Future to Believe In (2016)

 

Consistently polled as the most popular national politician in the US, and once named "the conscience of the US Senate" by Joe Biden, populist and self-described democratic socialist Bernie Sanders first became widely known for his run for the 2016 Democratic nomination against Hillary Clinton. He's back for 2020, and with a vengeance.

 

JOE BIDEN

Biden 2013.jpg

Position: Vice President (2009-2017), Senator from Delaware (1973-2009)

Slogan: Our Best Days Still Lie Ahead

 

Joe "Come Hell or High Water" Biden is the latest in a long list of gaffe-prone Vice Presidents who, at the same time, managed to be one of Obama's most important negotiators. He's a moderately conservative Democrat, previous two-time presidential candidate (1988 and 2008), and known loyal supporter of Amtrak.

If you're curious to see, here's a more stripped-down list of a few of the lesser candidates running:

Spoiler

KAMALA HARRIS

Senator Harris official senate portrait.jpg

Position: Senator from California (2017-), Attorney General of California (2011-2017), District Attorney of San Francisco (2004-2011)

 

PETE BUTTIGIEG

Pete Buttigieg by Gage Skidmore.jpg

Position: Mayor of South Bend, Indiana

 

ANDREW YANG (who I've done a different thread on)

Andrew Yang by Gage Skidmore.jpg

Position: Entrepeneur, founder of Venture for America

 

BETO O'ROURKE

Beto O'Rourke April 2019.jpg

Position: Representative from Texas's 16th district (2013-2019)

 

CORY BOOKER

Cory Booker, official portrait, 114th Congress.jpg

Position: Senator from New Jersey (2013-)

 

BILL DAUTERIVE

John Delaney 113th Congress official photo.jpg

Position: Army Sergeant, barber

 

So, who are y'all rooting for, if anyone? It's no secret that Bernie is my guy, and I'm willing to go to bat for that.

 

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I'm rooting for Jagmeet Singh. He's clearly the most qualified out of any of the candidates for our election, and it's time for a change from the centre-left Liberals and those centre-right Conservatives.

No more Grits, and definitely no more Tories. The Dippers WILL prevail.

 

Oh wait, wrong thread. I guess since I'm Canadian I don't really care for anyone else except Bernie and Warren.

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18 minutes ago, Doot Doot said:

I'm rooting for Jagmeet Singh. He's clearly the most qualified out of any of the candidates for our election, and it's time for a change from the centre-left Liberals and those centre-right Conservatives.

No more Grits, and definitely no more Tories. The Dippers WILL prevail.

 

Oh wait, wrong thread. I guess since I'm Canadian I don't really care for anyone else except Bernie and Warren.

As for me, I still voting for Justin Trudeau even tho i don't have much choice for  this year.

Ooops, wrong thread. I guess i'm with sbl as well.

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3 hours ago, HawkbitAlpha said:

What for though? I'm genuinely curious.

*shrugs* I just think she has good ideas and I like her personality

now I’ll shut up because I don’t want to be crushed in a political debate ?

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7 hours ago, Happy Halseyween said:

*shrugs* I just think she has good ideas and I like her personality

Well, to some degree, that's true, but ultimately, Liz's platform is just a very watered down take on Bernie's. Plus, she's completely absent on foreign policy, where presidents have their most direct influence.

(If you're curious to know more about this, I might do a separate post on it.)

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So, about that thing above: Kyle Kulinski did a video laying out some very clear reasons why we should support Bernie over Warren. For this thread, I'm gonna take what he said there, and put it below with some changes.

@Happy Halseyween Hope this helps.

Spoiler

This is specifically for people who fancy themselves social democrats or democratic socialists. Let's make it clear upfront: to Warren supporters, I've got nothing against you, and nothing against her. But when you're picking a candidate, the three most important things are: A) their proposed policies (what do they want to do?), B) their record (what have they done?), and C) their strategy (how will they do what they want to?). On top of this, you can throw in other basic things like honesty.

 

#1: Warren voted for Ben Carson for Secretary of Housing and Urban Development. Only after colossal pushback from her own supporters did she flip and vote against Ben Carson in the second round of votes. Still, even supporting Carson for HUD in the first round is incredibly concerning in terms of judgement, if more recent knowledge is anything to go by. You'll have a hard time ever finding bizarre, out-of-left-field horrible calls like this coming from Bernie.

#2: Bernie wants to eliminate all $81bil in medical debt. Warren doesn't.

#3: Bernie also has a plan to cancel all $1.6 trillion in student loan debt. Warren's student loan debt plan, on the other hand, is means-tested, and doesn't apply for everyone. (This is something Warren does a lot, and she inherits one of Obama's worst flaws in this regard: concede upfront on a given policy, and then get even less done in the end.)

#4: Warren voted for Trump's incredibly bloated military budgets and their increases. You'd think the logical position would be "hell no, I'm not giving the manchild-in-chief that is Donald Trump an even bigger military budget than he asked for!", but apparently not. On the other hand, Bernie didn't.

#5: Warren has taken money from the military-industrial complex, and done favors for them. There's been extensive reporting done on how she's done favors for Raytheon, which is headquartered in Massachusetts. Bernie, on the other hand, doesn't take MIC money, and doesn't do them favors.

#6: Warren flip-flopped multiple times on Medicare for All until very recently, and Bernie never has. In that clip, she treats the various faux-M4A proposals the Democrats have thrown out as all the same. That's factually wrong, and 90% of the healthcare plans proposed by other Democrats are headfakes, attempts to protect the healthcare industry. Even the healthcare plan she released has no mention of a single-payer model, which is what M4A is, and uses the famous weasel words of "access to healthcare."

#7: Warren has openly admitted that she would take corporate money in the general election, and then had to flip on that recently. Bernie never has. That's the "run to the left in the primary, pivot to the center in the general" strategy taken to a whole new level. It's a serious deal-breaker, because she admits that taking big money is an act of corruption, and then says she'll do it anyway.

#8: In the same vein, Warren entered the race in the first place by transferring big money from her Senate re-election campaign to her presidential campaign.

#9: Warren didn't endorse Bernie in 2016. Not only that, but when asked whether or not the 2016 primary was rigged, she said at first that it was rigged, then flipped on that answer afterwards.

#10: Warren fully embraces the language of bipartisanship, as opposed to class struggle. She has, for example, made "a spirited defense of Joe Manchin" with TYT. That's a sign that she won't put pressure on him to implement a progressive agenda. It's Obama all over again. As for Bernie? He plans to use the president's power of the bully pulpit against his opponents, use executive orders to great effect, and even support primary challengers against anti-progressive Dems.

 

Now, let's be clear about something: if you actually do ideologically align heavily with standard Democrats, then okay, Warren is probably your candidate. But if you really believe in implementing progressive priorities, there's no option. It's Bernie Sanders.

This also isn't to say that Warren isn't better than the other presidential candidates, because she still is better than most of them. She has more economic bona fides than most Democrats. Even still, that doesn't put her anywhere near Bernie's league.

 

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Yeah I'll probably end up voting for Bernie. Honestly though I'll just vote for whatever Democrat gets nominated because as much as I have mixed/negative thoughts on a lot of them (Biden, Gabbard, Williamson, and Harris come to mind), I'd vote for any of them over Trump in a heartbeat.

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