Not here, but I've seen a lot of people chiming in who seem torn up/devastated that Biden dropped out. If they're as convinced that we're all screwed now as I was convinced that we were screwed with Biden staying in I can understand their feelings. I just hope that I've assessed the situation better than they have. I, like you, found a bit of hope today.
I’m on pretty much the same page. I felt like we were being forced into suicide-pact that involved sleepwalking into fascism, and now it feels like someone’s actually at the wheel and steering away from that possibility.
What happened yesterday is precisely what I mean - the goal here isn’t for any specific Democratic nominee (i.e. Biden) to win; the goal is to stop the fucking fascists. That’s what the situation calls for, and it feels like we’re doing that now. I understand that a lot of people feel locked into the process, but drastic contexts sometimes call for drastic measures, and this is that. It’s very similar to how Macron and his party kneecapped their own political chances to stop National Front from winning a plurality or outright majority in the Assemblée nationale. It was the right call, and it worked. And I’m fairly optimistic that this candidate pivot is going to work, too.
It’s not perfect, and it’s not a guarantee. Nothing in politics is. But I feel a good bit better about our chances than I did two days ago.
History though has not ever shown a late replacement candidate winning any big election, so I can understand the panic.
I am afraid the democrats chances dropped with Biden pulling out.
People spent the entire year defending that his brain certainly wasn't diseased enough for him to drop out and it's totally the right move to keep him cause at least he's barely conscious. Give time, we gotta at least wait for the weekend to end for the new programming directives to kick in.
The right is in a panic and pushing this "questionable legality" and "it's too late to change their candidate" nonsense. They are publicly running on the issues of banning abortion, putting tariffs on everything coming into the country, and mass deportation of "illegals" that are taking "Hispanic, Black, and union" jobs at record rates. That last part of which I don't know how the media hasn't called it out for being overtly racist and complete bullshit. Yet they let it slide at the debate, because they were all racing to write about Biden, and then again at the RNC.
All of that fuck Biden merchandise that is still in stores is going to be mega discounted. I love the idea that someone bought a flag and mounted it to their truck and now the shop won't accept it as a return.
It warms the cockles of my heart to imagine how much anti-Biden merchandise is now utterly useless to its owner.
A few right-wing sources have been saying that there would be legal challenges to replacing Biden on the ticket, but it's mostly just bluster and bunk. Some corners if Biden-world picked these arguments up as an excuse to keep him on the ticket, so they gained some traction, but there's not much to them.
Yesterday was… very interesting, for sure, but I absolutely understood that taking a day to let things shake out a bit was probably a good idea. I admit I was speculating wildly with a couple of my friend groups, but it was just that - speculation. I pretty much ignored all the pundits and major news outlets predicting chaos and catastrophe as a result of his withdraw (which, if I’m honest, is the same lens I usually view their predictions with) and I’m quite happy I did. Major media outlets are just clickbait competitions at this point, and yesterday was simply a chance for them to print some money.
I'm not panicking, nor do I believe that there's no recovering from it, but I suspect that the probability of a Trump presidency increased because we're no longer fielding the incumbent. The Dems definitely have time to prove me wrong, though, and I hope they do.