• Verdant Banana@lemmy.world
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    8 months ago

    how can anyone that age be competent

    not to be mean but the mind does age it does not magically stop because your name is Biden he has reached that age

    he told those rail workers they could not strike or they would lose retirement and shit

    he threatened them with their livelihoods fuck that old crony he promised to raise the minimum wage and fight for us workers

    he hasn’t quite the opposite

    Silent Genocide Joe and Prosecutor Kamala Harris are not America’s saviors neither is Trump

    just older people refusing to let a younger generation take the reins while cashing checks from the corporations same as Trump and making sure the younger people are disenfranchised enough to not to take a stand

    fucking sick either candidate get any support with the suffering and misery they have wrought

    • OpenStars@startrek.website
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      8 months ago

      Age: Yup, mostly.

      On the bright side, neither President would likely actually do much of anything personally, but rather act as a prop for whatever team they choose to actually accomplish things behind the scenes.

      And while I do worry about Biden’s age, I also worry about Trump’s too. What choices are we being offered there even? That ship has already sailed.

      To be fair to Biden, he did keep his promise to those railway workers, to stay with them to negotiate better terms. They lost the urgency to have it all done prior to the holiday season, but they gained his involvement and that might even have worked out better for them than if they had tried it alone? But I truly don’t know the details there, b/c while the news media splashed it up every single day when it was inflationary, they dropped it like a rock when he quietly got stuff done in the background.

      He has delivered on at least some of his promises to workers. He needs to do more ofc, but also, he has been working towards that goal - e.g. it was REALLY, SUPER, EXTREMELY difficult to have lowered gas prices, and the ethics of how it eventually got done are even more than a little shady but… he managed it? Not everyone drives a car ofc, but both those who need one to get to work and those who buy things at stores should be highly grateful to him, but instead they just want more.

      As they should - we all NEED more. And if elected again, he will work towards that, just as he has in the last four years. Though most of the lack of progress is due to Congressional bickering and in-fighting - did you know that the fiscal year for 2024 began back in fucking OCTOBER!? We are now in month number fucking SIX, almost ready to begin number seven, and we STILL do not have a budget for THIS YEAR!!! That is not the job of the President, that is solely on the feet of people like Matt Gaetz and Kevin McCarthy and now Mike Johnson. Speaking of, Trump will do even less for the working-man - he will CLAIM to do more, but he will ACTUALLY do less, just as he did before too, which is the largest part of what got us into this mess in the first place - e.g. with supply lines disrupted b/c of so very many truckers who flat-out died from COVID.

      It helps to read between the lines: a President CANNOT simply “raise the minimum wage” - that’s not within their job capabilities - he can only be receptive to and even outright PUSH Congress to do that. Which he sort has done but… see above.

      Silent Genocide Joe and Prosecutor Kamala Harris are not America’s saviors neither is Trump

      Abso-fucking-lutely. But we still have a choice what to do about it. Though one thing I agree with: Biden and Harris are NOT “the same” as Trump. Bad yes, but nowhere close to equally so. And “support” means different things depending on the context: imagine an abused spouse needing to divorce and get away - remaining there vs. leaving are both “bad” options, but one will result in a much better outcome, eventually, while the other may be suicide. It is not that they “want” to, they HAVE to, b/c the alternative is SO MUCH worse off. I feel your pain - I abso-fucking-lutely share it, but in a way, I suppose I “support” Biden too, as the lesser of two evils. (And even there, my main reservation is his advanced age, which as I mentioned earlier, what choice are we even being offered there at all, when his opponent is even older than him!?)

        • OpenStars@startrek.website
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          8 months ago

          Thank you for the correction. I keep forgetting b/c Trump is the one in diapers who can barely walk down a ramp, while Biden stumbles while walking up the stairs. Neither can control their tempers and both have slurred speech, though Biden can pull it together occasionally whereas Trump never seems to.

          For the job of President of the most militarily powerful nation on earth, they are both older than dirt, though as you pointed out, not equally so.

    • lutillian@sh.itjust.works
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      8 months ago

      I can’t disagree with the age argument, these dinosaurs need to step aside and let the world change.

      I do want to know what exactly Biden has genocided. The two groups in this world who are driving genocides are Putin’s and Netanyahu’s regimes. Biden has no control over them, and the only group that could enact a foreign policy to do anything here in the US is Congress. So if anyone is complicit in that, it’s our “Currently Genocidal by Inaction Congress.”

      I get it though, doesn’t roll as nicely off the tongue.

      [Edit: a poster below pointed out that my joke was bad and I should feel bad. ]

      Camilla was a poor choice at vp no matter how you swing it given the current progressive opinion on police.

      • Viking_Hippie@lemmy.world
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        8 months ago

        Biden has no control

        He could stop sending a new shipment of the very weapons used to commit genocide with every day and a half.

        It might not stop it immediately, but it would at least make it more difficult for Netanyahu’s fascist apartheid regime to keep blowing the shit out of innocent civilians if they have to look elsewhere for the bombs to do so with.

        Plus, there’s hardly any way to be more clearly an accomplice to war crimes than insisting on sending weapons to be used to commit war crimes regardless of congressional approval.

        • lutillian@sh.itjust.works
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          8 months ago

          Biden is legally obligated by treaty to provide Israel with arms. Not doing so would give those maniacs in the house actual reason to impeach

          • freshcow@lemmy.world
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            8 months ago

            I don’t find that argument compelling at all without more of a source. As if we haven’t already gone above and beyond in supplying arms and funding to Israel’s government. Why should a piece of paper compel the United States to continue to unconditionally fund a genocide?
            Let’s not forget, Biden has gone out of his way to bypass Congress to provide further weapons to Israel. And his administration has repeatedly vetoed any UN resolutions pertaining to the situation.

            • lutillian@sh.itjust.works
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              8 months ago

              Summary of our obligations from the state department https://www.state.gov/u-s-security-cooperation-with-israel/

              The two that apply here are that arms can be dispersed with only congressional notification and that we’re have multiple bilateral defense agreements with them.

              Hamas issued an attack on Israel which triggered the bilateral defense agreements and one way to remedy would be to deploy supplies to the region with congressional notification.

              Just imagine the damage to the region if we took bilateral defense to it’s logical conclusion and dispatched actual military aid.

              This is not Biden “going around Congress”. This is Congress explicitly granting permission in advance to do it as long as they are notified.

              (Worth noting I’ve never looked this deeply into this before so I’m learning about this clown fiesta as well. It goes pretty deep…)

            • OpenStars@startrek.website
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              8 months ago

              You can find the entire text of the treaty online btw. Google is enshittified now so I would not know how to search for it, but I do recall that I’ve seen it once:-).

              But in general that is simply how America works: Congress passes the laws, then the President enforces those. The line gets blurry when the President suggests things to Congress to pass, like a budget, but ultimately if Congress refuses, there is nothing he can do (his power lies in vetoing laws that are passed, but there is no corresponding veto to anti-block things that they refuse to pass; with only minor exceptions possible e.g. changing how he uses his own budget to change things within solely the federal government - which Israel is not a part of).

              This is to prevent a totalitarian regime from rising up, which the founding fathers seemed to fear more than just about anything, given how we started by kicking out the English King, and then we decided to build in protections to ensure that another local one could not rise up from within.

          • Viking_Hippie@lemmy.world
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            8 months ago

            First of all, no he isn’t. In fact, it’s illegal for the US government to supply arms that might be used in the commission of war crimes. In this case there’s not even any doubt.

            As for the GOP, they’ve already demonstrated that whether or not they try to impeach has nothing to do with reality. Even if they DID somehow manage to make impeachment stick by a one-vote majority, there’s literally no risk that 2/3 of the senate will vote to convict, so that’s not anything remotely resembling a valid excuse to keep contributing to a genocide either.

            • lutillian@sh.itjust.works
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              8 months ago

              He actually is in the case that the initial arms shipment was sent, Israel was attacked by Hamas and he had to respond by sending aid. He has gone on record stating that the current war crimes Israel has been committing raise question of the legality of providing further support.

              Obviously still remains to be seen if anything will actually come of that though. Words are cheap.

              • Viking_Hippie@lemmy.world
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                8 months ago

                He has gone on record stating that the current war crimes Israel has been committing raise question of the legality of providing further support.

                While continuing to send the weapons anyway, as much as he possibly can without congressional approval.

                His public pretense at being a moderating influence means less than nothing as long as he keeps being an active supplier of the genocide.

                • lutillian@sh.itjust.works
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                  8 months ago

                  There’s no congressional approval needed as he is driven by treaty to provide arms, if anything he is compelled by Congress to send arms as long as Israel is at war as a US ally due to NATO.

                  He’s trying to make the argument that Israel committing genocide with those arms is reason to withdraw support, unfortunately the US government moves at a glacial pace on it’s best day to the point that the US military is actually somehow faster. Given the number of Democrats that do support Israel, its entirely realistic that he could get successfully impeached if he failed to comply.

                  Anyway… Thanks for the civil debate but work is starting so I need to go, I’ll read your next message bit I probably won’t have time to reply.

            • OpenStars@startrek.website
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              8 months ago

              there’s literally no risk that 2/3 of the senate will vote to convict

              I dunno about that - Democrats are not “the same” as Republicans (some might have some ounce of integrity? wow that gave me a laugh, but still…), then too there is his own legacy to consider, and his own personal code of ethics. Look, I know, genocide, but still there is a distinction between content vs. process. And the latter it turns out, especially at a level of power that high up, is pretty damn important. The next President could use that same identical power for a far lesser ideal, and so on it goes and before you know it we have a King, not a President. This is the same reason why guilty people go free, so as to attempt to avoid putting innocent people into jail (I know, sometimes that happens too, unfortunately, but the goal should always be to minimize that).

              Anyway, long story short: Repubs can huff & puff & try to blow the Dems house down all day long - and that pack of lies is on them - but what Biden chooses to do, is on him. And he is choosing to do this by the books. Which I kinda respect. If only the American people were not so divided - where half the nation wants to increase the military aid we are sending to Israel!! - then he + Congress could act swiftly. But we are divided so… instead we will not. Though keep in mind that if Trump comes to power, he + Congress will send more aid to Israel - and there’s a not-insignificant chance that we may send more aid to Russia too (you read that right, not just stop sending aid to Ukraine but join with the aggressor there!). Yes, it can always get worse:-(.

              I still think Biden should do more. Though I have to admit that I am not knowledgeable enough to know what else he possibly could do.

          • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
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            8 months ago

            First of all, his name is Herzog. Secondly, it isn’t his regime because he is only nominally in charge due to the president of Israel having limited powers.

            Are you under the impression that Israel’s president is like the U.S. president?

            Israel has a parliamentary system. The prime minister has supreme executive power. The prime minister of Israel is Benjamin Netanyahu.

            • lutillian@sh.itjust.works
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              8 months ago

              That’s actually sorta that joke, the US president is roughly as capable of commiting genocide as the president of Israel.

              As for misspelling his name… Thanks Google? I’ll fix it.

              Which the joke was probably not well delivered as it would probably have flown over that other guys head anyway…

              • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
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                8 months ago

                Then it’s not a good joke since the U.S. president is the commander-in-chief of the U.S. Armed Forces, meaning that a U.S. president could absolutely commit genocide. And has done so many times with indigenous Americans.

      • rayyy@lemmy.world
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        8 months ago

        I can’t disagree with the age argument, these dinosaurs need to step aside and let the world change.

        There’s a whale of a lot of wisdom and experience younger, less experienced folks can learn from those “dinosaurs”.

        • Honytawk@lemmy.zip
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          8 months ago

          Sure, but there is also a lot of updated knowledge those dinosaurs could lean from the “less experienced” folks.

          Especially when it comes from science, sociology, technology, and plenty more.

      • NoIWontPickAName@kbin.earth
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        8 months ago

        That might work if it weren’t for the fact that Biden bypassed congress twice to sell Israel weapons.

        Until he completely stops sending them weapons and vetoing UN resolutions then he is just as guilty as the people dropping the bombs

    • Paragone@sh.itjust.works
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      8 months ago

      I used to think like that, sorta.

      Read Kegan & Lahey’s “Immunity to Change” book, on people’s unconscious-mind’s mechanism for fighting-off growing-up.

      Then let it percolate in your mind for a few decades, while you watch humankind’s process.

      I’d now make a law requiring that the top people be Kegan5 unconscious-mind-development ( he calls 3, 4, & 5 something like “socially-based sentience”, rooted in needing to feel liked, “self-authoring” mind, which I call Bulling-BOSS mode, it’s an obnoxious mode male-culture values because it’s so “alpha”.

      Youtube’s Wranglerstar & Veritasium are both poster-people for it, 1 in working-class Kegan4 the other in middle/upper-middle-class Kegan4, & both displaying Kegan4’s obnoxiousness.

      I spent most of my adult life in it, and wish I could just retroactively slice most of my life from Universe.

      “systems-of-systems” mode is Kegan5. )

      it’s consistent that if you field a Kegan3 person to be your negotiation-representative, and the other side fields a Kegan4, you’re run-over.

      If you field a Kegan5 & they field a Kegan4, you’re run-over.

      IF they field a Kegan4, THEN you need equal/opposite bullying, in order that the zero-sum-game not beat your side to shit.

      However, IF they have the uprightness to field a Kegan5 & you can too, THEN Win-Win becomes possible.

      Young-adults, Kegan3’s ( the Kegan3 stage can continue for the entire rest of a person’s life, from post-adolescence to 100yo or more, but it is mentally/psychically a young-adult stage ), cannot accept that evil is real, the way someone mentally-older can.


      Kegan3’s are in the absorbing experience into their unconscious-mind, stage.

      Kegan4’s are in the pushing meaning out of their unconscious, “authoring” themselves through that unconscious-pushing-out process stage.

      Kegan5’s are in the this is true for them, that is true for these other people, the-other is true for me, and this is how it all fits together stage.

      I’d not permit any naive Kegan3’s to rule any major operation, nor permit any zero-sum-game-“validity” Kegan4’s to rule anything important.

      That book gives people the means of converting fighting-off-growing-up to actually-successfully-growing-up, and so it is worth many life-years or life-decades, to many.


      Nobody in the whole world has any reason to accept that my values have any validity in them, though, that is true.

      All who hold that there is no understanding which should be prerequisite to authority, well they all outnumber me, don’t they?

      shrug

      This I’ve found tests to be true, however.


      ( bonus point:

      it has been published that the DreamTeam formation is a team-of-7, with 2 who match the Kegan5 mental-development, 2 who match the Kegan4 mental-development, & 3 who match the Kegan3 mental-development.

      The Kegan4’s bursting with ideas, but not understanding all the systems-of-systems gotchas, means the team is more likely to be able to innovate,

      the Kegan5’s, if they can do it without demolishing the Kegan4’s morale, can ask questions to corner the Kegan4’s into considering all sorts of things they hadn’t, so they prevent lots of stupid mistakes,

      & the Kegan3’s are the “glue” which holds the team coherent & harmonious.

      I’m mixing multiple sources together, but they really were identifying the same thing, only each was doing-so without some of the other pieces.

      New Scientist had an article on The Dream Team, years ago, Chris McGoff’s book “The Primes” is part of it, the Kegan & Lahey book is part of it, some HBR stuff as well, perhaps some stuff from the managers-of-programmers books, what’s her name, Roth? can’t remember…

      fit it together, though, and it fits properly: there is a balance which produces working momentum, instead of institutional-mentality, and that working momentum is based on the substance of the minds of the people in the team, and ignoring the unconscious-mind-development stage … is ignoring the BIG part of each person’s iceberg.

      : )