Here we go, the first Presidential debate between Biden and Trump begins at 9 PM Eastern/6 PM Pacific.
How to watch it:
https://www.cnn.com/2024/06/25/politics/how-to-watch-cnn-debate/index.html
"The CNN Presidential Debate will air live on CNN, CNN International and CNN en Español, and via streaming on Max for subscribers and without a cable login on CNN.com. CNN will make the debate available to simulcast on additional broadcast and cable news networks.
You can also follow CNN’s live debate coverage on CNN.com, which will include analysis and fact checking."
"According to parameters set by CNN in May, all participating debaters had to appear on a sufficient number of state ballots to reach the 270 electoral vote threshold to win the presidency and receive at least 15% in four separate national polls of registered or likely voters that meet CNN’s standards for reporting.
Polls that meet those standards are those sponsored by CNN, ABC News, CBS News, Fox News, Marquette University Law School, Monmouth University, NBC News, The New York Times/Siena College, NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist College, Quinnipiac University, The Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post."
Edit And that’s it! Thanks for watching everyone!
tl;dw:
Consensus is Trump didn’t so much as beat Biden as Biden beat himself.
The real loser is CNN who failed to fact check anyone, and there were obvious fact checks on both sides.
I have absolutely zero issues with lefties. Hell, I am one.
I do have an issue with the tankie dumbfucks who will STILL talk about “Genocide Joe” when we have video evidence of trump saying he outright wants the Palestinians eradicated and thinks Biden is too soft on them.
But also: The average person didn’t watch that debate. Or they ducked out in horror when Biden came out sounding like death. They are going to be listening to what influencers say. Some of those influencers are people with incredibly smart teams behind them who focus on the issues and social justice (e.g. John Oliver). Others literally go to the bathroom while playing the work of others and then shit on said work while claiming to be a leftist.
And others still are “that friend who is really political” who is mostly parroting what other influencers have said.
John Oliver is off until July 21st. 24 days from now. :(
Oh, I get that one. Might lose me some brownie points with some of my fellow communists, but I think they overestimate their own influence and overly moralise the questions when they talk about Biden. Personally, I think the important thing is moving towards communism by making organisation of the working people possible, and that will be forced much more into the underground under another Trump presidency. To me, the one question on my mind is: How can this situation be further used for empowering an eventual revolutionary change, ultimately, it is about power.
As a bonus point: I do think Biden winning might bait the fascists into doing something stupid, like armed revolts which they are certainly not ready for yet, potentially weakening them further, and moving some moderates into openly antifascist organisations.
Looks at instance Yup, that explains it
If your only goal is accelerationism with the misguided view that you’ll benefit from the violent revolution: Go back to playing Call of Duty and let the adults discuss politics.
Yeah yeah, heard it all, haha, dae larper revolution lefties playing teenage boy shooters? Okay, I am sleep-deprived, and I am just genuinely concerned about the state of the world, so yeah, I will write out my position a bit more clearer, well, I will try to, because it is not accelerationism.
So, to assume you are arguing in good faith, even with the ad hominem:
Do you think it’s completely impossible that fascist groups might react with violent actions when Biden or another Democrat wins? I think it is very much a possibility, they are deluded and armed. And they would be trounced, they don’t have the proper support and organisation. It would indeed weaken them.
My goal is not accelerationism, accelerationism is a silly concept to begin with. If so, I would support Trump. But that’s the kind of BS some communist groups did in the 30s “Oh yeah, as soon as the mask of capital falls of its face and Hitler gets elected, people will revolt!”. Nope, as soon as the mask of humanity slips from capital, it kills you. Dead. And uses your hair and teeth as resources. I’m German (and before any arguments come about me keeping out of debating US politics: your politics influences the world, so while I won’t be able to vote, I will have a voice in it). I’ve seen Auschwitz, I’ve read the debates that were held in the 30s. I’ve studied how the center-right thought they could outmaneouver and control Hitler and use him to get rid of those pesky socialists and social democrats. Hell, the NSDAP never even won a proper majority, power was handed to them.
I just look at the global net profit rate over the course of one and a half centuries (spoilers: it’s falling, with the only major times it is rising rapidly after destructive wars - almost like there is something to Marx’s theories of capital consolidation and the pressure it creates. The stagnation only slowed for a while, because the profit crisis of the late 70s was mitigated by neoliberal politics - i.e. class warfare), look at how economical consolidation happened before WWI (the economy was enormously globalised through Colonialism, and trusts or even outright monopolies across industries, with integrated production/logistics/distribution in single companies - think Walmart and Amazon as the closest analogues today), look at how Germany looked in the 30s. I look at ever more desperate venture capital adventures to find avenues of profitability for all the stagnant dead capital that has accumulated, like “Big Data” or now “AI”. I look at the statistics and projected models for the future - I think a lot of people just completely underestimate what kind of a complex shitshow climate change will create. It’s even beyond economics, the material reality of nature is changing under our feet, we have been changing it. There will be death. There will be wars. There will be chaos. I won’t be able to change that, you won’t be, at best, we can mitigate it. That is what the logic of growth and capitalism has given us.
I don’t believe in accelerationism because it is nonsense. No one has to accelerate this shit. Capitalism does its job to reach its logical conclusion fine on its own. It’s also delusional - what, me, some German commie autist who just happened to have the misfortune of having philosophy and history as a hyperfocus is going to influence politics towards anything? Politics follows material reality, with idealism only influencing it insofar as it is itself a material force, in a dialectical, reciprocal exchange with material reality. All I can do at this moment is play Cassandra and argue my position, trying to do my best to support those that are building real-life connections and organisations, within the limits of what this body and brain can do - support unions, neighbourhood groups for mutual aid, educational groups, community defence groups, antifacist groups - and yes, even the Democrats, because I do think, again, that it will be good to have a Democrat in office in this historical moment, even though it, as you may have guessed, it’s very much a lesser evil to me, that I view rather cynically, to give people as much time as possible to organise without extremer persecution, before that one will happen eventually - and maybe weaken reactionary forces by getting them to be stupid, they are good at that.
Now, I don’t write this to convince you. Not to convince many people reading it. In my experience, my positions are usually too radical for centrists, too critical of Marxism-Leninism for the tankies (hell, I think the Soviet Union had, essentially, and in a Marxist analysis, a capitalist economy - even Stalin acknowledged the rule of value still being in effect in “The Economic Problems of the Soviet Union”), too Marxist for the anarchists. And reactionaries, well, I am already looking into what to do if AfD wins over here in a few more years/decades. Not a guarantee, thank god, but that it is even a real possibility in fucking Germany is chilling and just hammering home what the current historical moment and current reaction to the changes in economical and material realities are, globally.
So I am writing this to at least make someone, somewhere think. Take a step back. For one moment, forget that there are teams, and I am on the “enemy” team. Do you think the status quo is tenable? Do you think moderate politics will survive the next decades? Not because of some larping agitators you think are destroying them, like with accelerationism (again - as if some accelerationists are influential enough to do anything there at this historical moment), but simply because capitalism has always had crises, they have had horrible consequences in the past, and this one comes with a huge climate catastrophe on top. Do you think it’s people like me, somehow fantasising about violent revolution like some CoD game as you seem to imply, that push for violence - or do you at least acknowledge the possibility that violence will simply happen due to material and socioeconomic changes, globally? Revolutions are not pushed by agitators and propagandists, they are pushed by the price of bread. And agitators and propagandists can only try to structure the way a revolution plays out. And that is why I think we will have to prepare for that reality, and eventually doing away with the system and mode of production that led us to this point - as it really is not the only option, no matter how much ideology has presented it as that.
Doubt a lot of people will read the wall of text, and feel free to downvote and criticise me for the instance I cose (back when it was afaik the only one, but admittedly, it fit my politics at least somewhat as well), but this time, you can at least attack my character on the point of my actual positions, maybe call them delusional or something - or surprise me and develop your own positions dialectically against mine, I have no absolute guarantee I am right, so proper critique is welcome - while maybe some tankie might call out how I am a liberal reactionary. But keep this wall of sleep deprived autism-energy monologue at least somewhere in the back of your mind, as one option to analyse what will be coming up in the future.