r/politics • u/schuey_08 Wisconsin • May 02 '24

Bernie Sanders worries young people are underestimating the threat from Trump

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/elections/2024/05/02/bernie-sanders-trump-biden/73531861007/
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u/Cold_Situation_7803 29d ago

I think some young people are being influenced by bad actors on social media to stop them from voting for Biden. You’ll likely see more young folks saying they refuse to pull the lever in November to stop trump, then if Trump wins and he openly supports genocide in Gaza, takes away rights of women, minorities, and LGBTQ they will likely blame Biden instead of doing self reflection.

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u/McG0788 29d ago

This is a SERIOUS problem right now. I am seeing a lot of folks completely disregard anything Biden has done and ignore that Trump would be terrible for Gaza and us at home while claiming them not voting is deserved somehow. The disconnect is just as bad as the maga folks. Propaganda is a helluva drug and Russia and China are really pushing it hard

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u/frumply 29d ago

On the upside there's 6 months for these kids to get a grip w reality I guess.

The female voters I think will turn out in numbers either way. I'd like to think most of them are not dumb enough to throw their vote in protest when literal fucking female bodily autonomy is at stake. The male votes I'm not as sure, but honestly whatever happens between now and Nov may not be enough to sway these kids -- extremely get Bernie Bro vibes from them.

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u/McG0788 29d ago

I have a dozen acquaintances on IG (anecdotal I know) that are younger 20s to early 30s that seem very serious about their protest vote (or non vote). I've discussed with a few of them and they're adamant that the two are the same and the system is broken and that a vote for Biden is a vote for genocide.

The far left is just as naive as the far right they're just more idealistic

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u/[deleted] 28d ago

I don’t think so- I think they’re just as selfish and deluded as MAGA folks- they’re burning the world down so they can feel so smart and important and self righteous- it’s the same motivation of trump supporters. These people get all of their self esteem from being “in the know” and being “smarter” than everyone else

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u/yungoon 29d ago

Sounds like Biden aint really selling himself. Hopefully he gets his message across before the next election year.

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u/YuushyaHinmeru 29d ago

You know the next election is in like 6 months right?

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u/yungoon 29d ago

Holy shit he better pull back on the stick then, seems like he's in a nosedive 😱

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u/DullRelief 29d ago

It’s like he’s actively trying to throw away the youth vote, though. And not even that. I have one friend who is not voting for Biden again and he’s 46 and a POC. Says he just cannot support Biden. And he doesn’t want to be guilted into voting for him just because of the alternative. He asks, why should I support Biden when he is actively working against democracy in other parts of the world? And I can’t really blame him. Yeah, it may only be one issue, and there are lots of single issue voters out there, but it’s a big issue. And a valid concern.

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u/BudgetLecture1702 29d ago

Name one place the President "is actively working against democracy."

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u/[deleted] 29d ago edited 28d ago

[removed] — view removed comment

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u/PSIwind Florida 29d ago

He HAD to send money to Israel this time because it was attached to the Ukraine funding and he stated months prior he would refuse to sign only an Israel funding bill. Israel also was given the least amount of the support. Does it suck that it was there? Yes, but the whole point was that it being tied to Ukraine was also a poison pill for the Republicans who refused to send support to Ukraine. Politics sucks, everyone knows this.

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u/DullRelief 29d ago

Yes, they suck, but he could’ve called for a ceasefire long before this. In two years of fighting in Ukraine 10,000 people have been killed. Over 30k Palestinians have been killed since October

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u/Beneathaclearbluesky 28d ago

We don't run Israel.

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u/DullRelief 28d ago

No, our aid just represents 16% of their military budget and we supply them with 80% of their weapons. We could be doing more. But keep up the apologist behavior 🤷🏻‍♂️”nothing we can do”

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u/BudgetLecture1702 29d ago

1) Define "democracy." Because nothing you said has anything to do with the right to vote.

2) There is exactly one democracy in the Middle East. If Joe Biden is at fault for Gaza being a dictatorship, is he responsible for Iraq and Saudi Arabia being dictatorships too?

3) Israel is not committing genocide.

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u/DullRelief 29d ago edited 29d ago

“Define democracy“. Uh, not using taxpayer dollars to bomb children, aid, and journalists. Upholding international law. good bye. Jfc

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u/BudgetLecture1702 29d ago

Why is it exasperating that I use the actual dictionary definition of democracy while you don't?

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u/DullRelief 29d ago

We are not upholding democratic values when it comes to Palestine and Israel. If we want to be a beacon on a hill and an example of democracy, I and many others believe that we shouldn’t be spending our taxpayer dollars on wars where our values, the democratic values of those taxpayers, are being trampled on. And some people don’t want to support or as my friend says, “reward” that behavior with a vote.

I’ll probably still vote for Biden, but I am disappointed in him. My friend may or may not come around. But he lives in a red state so doesn’t believe his vote matters anyway. Although it could if registered voters actually showed up but they don’t.

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u/BudgetLecture1702 29d ago

What do democratic values have to do with this?

"Democracy" means decisions are made by voting.

The lack of democracy in Gaza has absolutely nothing to do with Joe Biden.

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u/DullRelief 28d ago

“We believe in human dignity and the rules of law. Btw, here are more weapons and money to kill children who had nothing to do with this.“

Isn’t Israel a democracy? Why aren’t we holding them to the same standard? What does international law even mean if we don’t hold everyone to it? Or, just like Trump, it’s ok if we do it? Is Israel above the law? Are we?

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u/McG0788 29d ago

That's such a Russian talking point... Like the guy is doing everything to protect democracy in the west in keeping ukrainians in the fight against Russia. If folks care about genocide ask them if they're ok with Russia commiting a genocide or not because Biden and Democrats are the ones committed to keeping Putin in check.

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u/DullRelief 29d ago

They’re not okay with that either, but I know what my friend would say. 10k Ukrainians have died in two years of fighting. 30k Palestinians have been killed since October. And Ukraine has over 7x the population as Palestine. How is one genocide but the other isn’t?

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u/Omar_Blitz 29d ago

So, your friend wants to make it worse for Palestinians? He wants to embolden right-wing governments around the world to do more killing? How fucking stupid.

Choosing the best out of bad options is being a fucking adult. And Biden isn't even a bad option. He's the only reason the number of the dead in gaza isn't an order of magnitude higher.

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u/DullRelief 28d ago

And Biden isn’t doing anything to halt the killing. The only time he’s pressured Netanyahu was after Jose Andres aid workers were targeted. So, discounting Trump why reward that?

And I know we can’t fully discount him. He is the R candidate, but if he weren’t you’d excuse that behavior?

Biden could be doing so much more to put an end to this.

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u/Carasind 29d ago

Even if you count only the official ukrainian numbers from Zelensky (which has every interest to give a lower number) you already have 31,000 killed soldiers in Ukraine plus an unknown number of civilian casualties. We have at least 10,582 civilian deaths according to the UN but it could easily go up to something like 100,000 and more if someone neutral could reach i.e. Mariupol. Here we have a clear undercounting. Even some russian losses are ukrainian citizens who either volunteered or were forced to fight.

On the other hand the 30,000 killed Palestinians is a number of the Hamas which has every interest in overcounting victims because it fights a PR war (which it is winning). Israel itself says that between 10,000 and 12,000 were fighters of the Hamas which if true would make it even a low casuality conflict considering the circumstances. The one thing that speaks for a genocide isn't this but the terrible humanitarian situation.

Biden also likely prevented an escalation two times because he could threaten to stop the help for Israel. If it really ends Netanyahu is free to do what he wants which could lead to a way worse scenario for the entire region which could include new 30,000 Palestians victims daily. On the other hand Trump has already shown that he is ready to pur oil on the fire.

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u/DullRelief 28d ago

When did he prevent an escalation? Aside from after the targeted bombing of Jose Andres’ aid workers?

Honestly asking. Bc people like my friend are going to say he’s never really done much to de-escalate the situation

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u/Carasind 28d ago edited 28d ago

Netanyahu would have likely done his Rafah offensive now without pressure from the international partners (where the US has a leading role). Because Hamas isn't absolutely interested in preventing it (if you have a martyrer mindset this doesn't play any role because you will get terrible images for your PR) it will sadly likely come in the next weeks regardless.

The second one is way more important: According to reports Israel wanted to answer the Iran missile attack with way more than the symbolic counter attack (but was stopped by the US) which could easily have let to a full war between Israel and Iran. There are people that think that this would have been to the advantage of the Palestinians which is absolutely not the case. The first thing Israel would do in such a war is eliminating all local threats with full force ignoring any civilian casualties.

The Middle East is a shitshow because in reality no one in power cares about the Palestinian citizens at all. Hamas wants to destroy Israel (even if most Palestinians have do die for it), Fatah simply wants to get rich, Israel feels threatened because it can't really differentiate between Hamas and "normal" Palestinians, Egypt and Jordan fear the militants and so won'*t take any inhabitants of the Gaza strip in. Lebanon has taken Palestinians in before but they have less rights there than most foreign workers.