Has Biden Lost His Mind?

[Derec]

I'm puzzled by Sander's rise,

His name is Sanders, not Sander.

I figured his health scare would doom his candidacy, but he's defying the odds.

I thought so too. He really bounced back from the heart attack.

My bet early on was for Warren to win, even recently she's excelled in debates, so I'm not sure I understand her fall either, but it appears to coincide with her publishing detailed plans for healthcare reform, which makes it even odder, considering this is the #1 issue to most voters.

Well those who are all-in on M4A already have Sanders and were not impressed by her waffling on the issue of ending private insurance. Those skeptical of M4A were not reassured by it either, plus they have plenty of other choices. Warren attempted a weird straddle between lanes plus a bunch of random wokeness, and she failed.

I expected the South to doom Sanders like it did in 2016, with black voters preferring the establishment candidate again, with deep ties to the local party machine, but recent polls show Sanders narrowing the gap in SC and even drawing level in NC. He's well ahead in CA, and narrowly ahead in TX, and emerged mostly unscathed from tonight's debate. Next Tuesday could see him with a daunting lead in the delegate count.

Unless the moderate lane winnows the remaining moderate candidates will screw each other, leaving plenty of delegates "on the table" due to 15% threshold. If the moderates unite behind a single candidate, most likely Biden or Bloomberg, they can still stop Bernie. Before Super Tuesday would be best, immediately after could work too.

I'm guessing here, but perhaps the AOC endorsement, more careful and wary coverage from the MSM, along with the obvious advantage of a crowded field, and a foil in Bloomberg (surely Sander's wet dream of an opponent) is moving the dial for him. Sanders is not Teflon himself, look at how he walked into that Cuba trap from 60 Minutes, but I'm thinking the issues he's running on are Teflon. How else to account for how his 6 opponents on stage with him for 2 hours tonight couldn't land a single knockout punch?

Well there are six of them for one. A one-on-one debate would be much more focused. I do not think AOC endorsement brought him much since they are very similar anyway in much of their politics.

 

[ZiprHead]

I'm puzzled by Sander's rise, I figured his health scare would doom his candidacy,

His Medicare for All plan is extremely popular, even amongst Republicans.

Welcome to the board, BTW.

 

[Xoxarle1]

I'm puzzled by Sander's rise, I figured his health scare would doom his candidacy,

His Medicare for All plan is extremely popular, even amongst Republicans.

Welcome to the board, BTW.

Thanks. Actually, I'm a returning prodigal, who had the good sense to lurk, listen and learn this past decade. I see it's mostly the same core now as before.

 

[PyramidHead]

I'm puzzled by Sander's rise, I figured his health scare would doom his candidacy,

His Medicare for All plan is extremely popular, even amongst Republicans.

Welcome to the board, BTW.

Thanks. Actually, I'm a returning prodigal, who had the good sense to lurk, listen and learn this past decade. I see it's mostly the same core now as before.

Welcome back! I'm a communist now

 

[Xoxarle1]

Thanks. Actually, I'm a returning prodigal, who had the good sense to lurk, listen and learn this past decade. I see it's mostly the same core now as before.

Welcome back! I'm a communist now

Aren't we all? Any of us upset about Amazon paying no taxes.

 

[PyramidHead]

Thanks. Actually, I'm a returning prodigal, who had the good sense to lurk, listen and learn this past decade. I see it's mostly the same core now as before.

Welcome back! I'm a communist now

Aren't we all? Any of us upset about Amazon paying no taxes.

The difference is that a communist wants Amazon to be expropriated and run by the dictatorship of the working class, not just for them to pay more taxes

 

[Elixir]

Aren't we all? Any of us upset about Amazon paying no taxes.

The difference is that a communist wants Amazon to be expropriated and run by the dictatorship of the working class, not just for them to pay more taxes

"dictatorship of the working class"

How does one become the dictator of the working class? Sounds like good work if you can get it...

 

[Don2 (Don1 Revised)]

"150 million people have been killed since 2007 when Bernie voted to exempt the gun manufacturers from liability."
-Joe Biden at last night's debate

Aside from the semantical arguments here about voting to exempt yadayadayada, the problem with this is that it is completely bonkers to claim.

150 million is around half the population of the US.

 

[PyramidHead]

Aren't we all? Any of us upset about Amazon paying no taxes.

The difference is that a communist wants Amazon to be expropriated and run by the dictatorship of the working class, not just for them to pay more taxes

"dictatorship of the working class"

How does one become the dictator of the working class? Sounds like good work if you can get it...

Dictatorship doesn't mean just one person, it means the entire working class oppressing the capitalist class (via the organs of political power, such as the state apparatus and a representative party). As opposed to how it is under capitalism, where the dictatorship of the capitalist class is leveraged against the working class. The modern-day meaning of "dictatorship" to entail "one guy makes all the decisions" is a recent invention and not what Marx or any socialist/communist state has ever implemented.

 

[ZiprHead]

I'm puzzled by Sander's rise, I figured his health scare would doom his candidacy,

His Medicare for All plan is extremely popular, even amongst Republicans.

Welcome to the board, BTW.

Thanks. Actually, I'm a returning prodigal, who had the good sense to lurk, listen and learn this past decade. I see it's mostly the same core now as before.

I thought your handle sounded familiar.

 

[ZiprHead]

"150 million people have been killed since 2007 when Bernie voted to exempt the gun manufacturers from liability."
-Joe Biden at last night's debate

Aside from the semantical arguments here about voting to exempt yadayadayada, the problem with this is that it is completely bonkers to claim.

150 million is around half the population of the US.

Yeah, it's 150,000. And unless the weapon was defective, I don't see how a firearms manufacturer can be held responsible. That doesn't make it right to be illegal to take out a lawsuit against them. Each case should be examined individually.

 

[Don2 (Don1 Revised)]

"150 million people have been killed since 2007 when Bernie voted to exempt the gun manufacturers from liability."
-Joe Biden at last night's debate

Aside from the semantical arguments here about voting to exempt yadayadayada, the problem with this is that it is completely bonkers to claim.

150 million is around half the population of the US.

Yeah, it's 150,000. And unless the weapon was defective, I don't see how a firearms manufacturer can be held responsible. That doesn't make it right to be illegal to take out a lawsuit against them. Each case should be examined individually.

I tend to agree, but I really want to focus on Biden losing his mind here. I mean, a person can slip up and then correct themselves because they have recognition they misspoke...but when they have no recognition and in the context of all the other crazy things he's said, I feel embarrassed for him.

 

[laughing dog]

"150 million people have been killed since 2007 when Bernie voted to exempt the gun manufacturers from liability."
-Joe Biden at last night's debate

Aside from the semantical arguments here about voting to exempt yadayadayada, the problem with this is that it is completely bonkers to claim.

150 million is around half the population of the US.

Yeah, it's 150,000. And unless the weapon was defective, I don't see how a firearms manufacturer can be held responsible. That doesn't make it right to be illegal to take out a lawsuit against them. Each case should be examined individually.

I tend to agree, but I really want to focus on Biden losing his mind here. I mean, a person can slip up and then correct themselves because they have recognition they misspoke...but when they have no recognition and in the context of all the other crazy things he's said, I feel embarrassed for him.

It goes deeper than that. One wonders about the basis for decision-making. Are these simply verbal gaffes that will not affect his decision-making on these issues or are will they influence his decision-making about policy? And even if these type of gaffes are nothing more than verbal slip-ups, they give the appearance of a loss of mental acuity which will influence the public reaction and acceptance of his decisions.

Look at President Trump and his policy decisions. Even if there were some sound underlying rationale for some of them, his utterances make it difficult to accept that they are driven and based on a rational thought process.

 

[Xoxarle1]

Given the hothouse of the debate stage and the stakes last night, its not surprising that some candidates spray the occasional wrong stastistic about. I found Biden's demeanor more interesting. He was revved up on almost every answer. During the debate someone tweeted that Biden was shouting more than Sanders. Its' almost as if he was trying to personally inject the kind of energy his campaign has stood accused of lacking.

The SC polls are showing a clear lead for Biden now. Will be interesting to see whether he emerges as the clear 2nd to Sanders after March 3, and if so, to what extend the other candidates are prepared to coalesce around him as the alternate.

 

[southernhybrid]

I'm not sure we can believe most anything we see on some of these videos. My husband used to be a Twitter fanatic until he realized it was making him nuts. He said that it's common for Twitter to take down videos that are fake. Just sayin'. I don't think Biden is nuts. He like all of the old white men are past their presidential prime, but Trump hasn't wanted to run against Biden and his toadies are at least partly to blame for some of these images of Biden.

https://www.newsweek.com/fake-biden-campaign-website-being-run-secretly-trump-campaign-operative-report-1446693

fake Joe Biden campaign website is being run by an operative on President Donald Trump's 2020 re-election campaign, according to a new report Saturday.

The New York Times tracked down the owner of a site with the URL JoeBiden.info, a "parody" campaign website featuring out-of-context quotes from the former vice president and leading 2020 Democratic candidate. The site also includes GIFs of him touching women in ways that others alleged made them uncomfortable.

Patrick Mauldin is a digital media specialist who worked on messaging for Trump's 2016 campaign and, according to the Times, has been working on the president's re-election campaign. Along with his brother, Mauldin runs Vici Media Group, a Republican consulting firm based in Austin, Texas. Mauldin acknowledged to the paper his role in creating the website, which he has used to spread disparaging and sometimes misleading content about Biden.

Visitors to the fake campaign site are greeted with a warm, grinning portrait of Biden with his arms crossed, standing in front of the American flag. Adjacent to the image is a block of text headed by a "Biden2020" logo, though one that does not resemble the Biden campaign's official design. Those unfamiliar with the Biden campaign might not know, for instance, that Biden's actual campaign logo consists of the word "Biden" stacked on top of the word "President."

My suggestion to all of you is to stop getting news from non news sites. Stop believing the shit and videos that you see on Twitter, FB etc. Read real journalism from an assortment of places, not the junk that gets their news from less than credible sources, or steals the stories from places like the NYTimes. We live in a time when we must be extremely skeptical of the things we read, and hear on what claim to be sources of news. Vote for whoever you want, but don't denigrate a candidate based on some poor source that may be Trumpeter, a foreign troll or some jerk who likes drama.

 

[Don2 (Don1 Revised)]

Washington Post on Biden's saying he is running for Senate:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/vide...ae0319-146f-4ecd-a6ff-4f43e18aee1d_video.html

Fact Check on the 150 million claim:

Biden flubbed a talking point on gun homicides that he’s used before. When he gets it right, Biden says 150,000 people have been murdered with guns since 2007.

Numbers from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention tracking homicides by firearm between 2007 and 2018, the most recent year with available data, support his claim.

Biden misspoke during the debate when he said that 150 million people have been killed since 2007, a campaign spokesman told us. But Biden’s claim needs further explanation.

 

[Derec]

Yeah, it's 150,000. And unless the weapon was defective, I don't see how a firearms manufacturer can be held responsible.

I agree.

That doesn't make it right to be illegal to take out a lawsuit against them. Each case should be examined individually.

I disagree. Juries in US are highly unpredictable. I wish there was a comprehensive reform of US tort system to make it more predictable and eliminate weird US-specific things like punitive damages (which are really lottery making few lucky plaintiffs and their lawyers incredibly rich).

But the reason firearms industry is specially protected is because nobody is seriously proposing Ford Motor Company be sued if somebody deliberately mows people down with an Expedition or suing Novo Nordisk because somebody used an insulin overdose as a murder weapon a la Memento. But people are seriously proposing that gun makes should be sued if their products are used to commit a crime.

 

[Derec]

In other 'Biden said what?' news:

Another Biden gaffe: Campaign admits his tale of arrest while visiting Nelson Mandela is false

"This day, 30 years ago, Nelson Mandela walked out of prison and entered into discussions about apartheid. I had the great honor of meeting him. I had the great honor of being arrested with our UN ambassador on the streets of Soweto trying to get to see him on Robben Island," Biden claimed during an event in Columbia, South Carolina, on Feb. 11. This anecdote was puzzling from the outset, since Robben Island, where Mandela was imprisoned at the time, is more than 700 miles from Soweto.
"After he [Mandela] got free and became president, he came to Washington and came to my office. He threw his arms around me and said, 'I want to say thank you.' I said, 'What are you thanking me for, Mr. President?' He said: 'You tried to see me. You got arrested trying to see me,'" Biden claimed.

The claim, which is reminiscent of former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's false claim during the 2008 campaign that she arrived in Bosnia "under sniper fire" as first lady, quickly fell apart under scrutiny.

Biden's very own version of snipergate. Smh.

 

[Derec]

Dictatorship doesn't mean just one person, it means the entire working class oppressing the capitalist class (via the organs of political power, such as the state apparatus and a representative party). As opposed to how it is under capitalism, where the dictatorship of the capitalist class is leveraged against the working class.

It worked out great in Soviet Russia!

The modern-day meaning of "dictatorship" to entail "one guy makes all the decisions" is a recent invention and

Actually the original meaning of "dictator" entailed one guy making the decisions. However, the original meaning of dictator also entailed him being appointed during an emergency and holding that power for no more than six months. A dictatorship is the perversion of that original idea of dictator as a sort of emergency manager.

not what Marx or any socialist/communist state has ever implemented.

I guess Stalin was just a figment of all our imaginations then.

 

[Don2 (Don1 Revised)]

Derec, Biden definiteley tells tall tales, but it's only relevant to thread if you think it's delusional. Do you think he lied or honestly believed it?