“What’s going to happen in this next election? I’m terrified about what could possibly happen, because our leaders matter. Who we select, who speaks for us, who holds that bully pulpit, it affects us in ways sometimes I think people take for granted,” Obama told Jay Shetty on his podcast “On Purpose.”

“The fact that people think that government — ‘eh, does it really even do anything?’ — and I’m like ‘Oh my God, does government do everything for us, and we cannot take this democracy for granted.’ And I worry sometimes that we do. Those are the things that keep me up,” she said.

“The bars are different for people in life. That I’ve learned,” she said.

Without naming Trump, she continued: “Other people can be indicted a bunch of times and still run for office. Black men can’t. You just learn to be good. And in the end, you benefit from that extra resilience.”

  • chitak166@lemmy.world
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    10 months ago

    If the democrats ran just about anybody but Joe, they’d be a shoe-in.

    Brace yourselves for Trump 2.0, everyone. The Clinton lineage must go on!

    • dangblingus@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      10 months ago

      He was popular enough to beat Trump the 1st go round, why would people not vote for him now when the alternative is 4 more years of god knows what fresh hell?

      • TheDannysaur@lemmy.world
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        10 months ago

        Because Trump’s approval numbers are higher than Biden’s.

        To be clear, I don’t support Trump at all but we have to look at cold hard facts. Biden does not look like a great candidate right now at a macro scale. Democrats have a real problem of loving to self-hate, and they end up skewering their own candidate. The prevailing opinion amongst my friends is “well Biden didn’t do anything”. Personally I find that to be untrue, but that’s the narrative.

        The real key is that Democrats lose when voter turnout falls. Biden is not an exciting candidate, and for some people it is an ordeal to vote, and they may not do it for Biden. A lot of people forget this… It’s not that Trump would get more votes, it’s that Biden will get less.

        Democrats are formulating a perfect way to fumble this to Trump, and I’m terrified.

        • Sanity_in_Moderation@lemmy.world
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          10 months ago

          The campaign hasn’t started yet. Right now, it’s a one sided conversation. And the polls are all based on people who answer unknown numbers and land lines. It’s a built in selection bias.

          Every single election both large and small since 2020 has been heavily skewed to the left. I’m not saying don’t worry, but dont despair. And work on convincing your friends. That’s the single best thing you could possibly do.

    • AA5B@lemmy.world
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      10 months ago

      It’s never going to be that easy. I’m sure each of us can find a candidate we like better but a successful run is more than that:

      • fund raising - to some extent whoever raises the most money wins, and I’m pretty sure President Biden has
      • name recognition - is everyone familiar with your favorite candidate? You really can’t beat the familiarity of someone who is already President
      • middle of the road enough to attract many different voters, especially those independents sitting in the middle
      • has beaten Trump before

      While I think the President is doing a great job, I’d prefer someone more progressive. However that might alienate more voters than it would attract. I will not risk another trumptastrophe by insisting on more Progressiveness over electable, “progressive enough” and not insane

      The age thing does bother me, but I can only dream of doing that well at that age.

      We should focus on VP. We want someone in the wings and we want them to build name recognition, and that hasn’t worked for the current VP

      • Bonskreeskreeskree@lemmy.world
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        10 months ago

        So after this, if trump loses and runs again, you’ll be ok with continuing to support candidates you don’t fully align with just to stop the boogie man? What about once trump is gone and the Republicans have some new piece of shit boogieman in the running? What will it take for you to be comfortable voting with the people that you most closely align with?

        • AA5B@lemmy.world
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          10 months ago

          I never understood this absolutism. I’ll vote for the candidate closest to my views every time, and have voted for third party candidates in the past. But it’s ridiculous to vote based on only one issue

        • nymwit@lemm.ee
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          10 months ago

          I don’t disagree with your logic in general, but Trump isn’t a boogeyman. A boogeyman isn’t real. A boogeyman can’t hurt you. We all saw how Trump ran things. It’s not an imagined threat.

          What would it take to be comfortable voting FOR someone and not AGAINST the other one? Easy: ranked choice voting.