These candidates are really the only challengers to Biden in the primaries. All of their campaigns are extremely long shots (but not impossible in my opinion- if we decided we liked them more than Biden they could win). Let’s all have a civilized discussion/debate over them. Let’s try to not focus too heavy on their perceived inability to beat Biden but focus on them as actual candidates.

my take

MW: I recently watched an interview with Marianne Williamson who I’d never heard of before (I’m sure there’s a reason media doesn’t cover her). She really impressed me with her views, especially on neoliberalism. She heavily reminds me of Bernie and isn’t running just for the sake of it or as a protest like some other long shot candidates do. In my opinion she deserves everyone’s vote in the primaries, at least. She is also very talented at oration.

CW: I’ll be honest, I know very little about him and need to do more research.

RFK JR: He’s literally a clown. He’s a nepo baby and all his views are inconsistent, harmful, and crackpot. He has no shot at winning.

    •  alyaza [they/she]   ( @alyaza@beehaw.org ) English
      16•10 months ago

      has more ideologically in common with Republicans than Democrats

      not only that but his favorability with Republicans is substantially higher than that of Democrats. guy’s probably running in the wrong primary and if he didn’t have a handful of “too liberal” takes he’d be getting a VP call come 2024 convention season

  •  yessikg   ( @yessikg@lemmy.blahaj.zone ) English
    11•10 months ago

    MW: Is an anti-vaxxer woo-woo person, so no thanks. CW: Nothing to wrong with him in a vaccum but all he’s going to do is take away votes from Biden. RFK JR: conspiracy theorist and generally a POS, hard pass

      •  realitista   ( @realitista@lemm.ee ) 
        1•10 months ago

        Just read this about CW

        Westerners safe from bombardment like long-shot third-party presidential candidate Cornel West continue to accommodate Russia. In a July 13 interview with CNN’s Kaitlan Collins, West called Russia’s invasion “criminal” but insisted it was “provoked by the expansion of NATO” and is a “proxy war between the American Empire and the Russian Federation,” adding Neville Chamberlain-esque icing on the appeasement cake by proposing Ukrainian territorial concessions to Russia.

        So that’s enough for me to lose any interest I had in him.

        Source

            •  TokenBoomer   ( @TokenBoomer@beehaw.org ) 
              2•10 months ago

              Not necessarily. Maybe Crimea. Russia has their military navy there. They only have 2 facing Europe/NATO .Asking them to give that up may be too much. If Mexico joined BRICS and China started placing weapons there, ya think America would be happy. That’s what is going on in Ukraine. I’m not defending Russia or Putin. I just understand that there’s a lot of geopoliticking going on that we aren’t privy to. If you were Russia, would you want NATO on your border. You can be against NATO and Putin. Not everything has to be a false dichotomy.

              •  realitista   ( @realitista@lemm.ee ) 
                1•10 months ago

                What’s going on there is more similar to if Mexico invaded Texas, Louisiana, and Oklahoma. And you are saying, “eh, just let 'em have Texas. They used to own it anyway. And they deserve it since the USA aligned with Canada”.

                Giving Russia Ukraine essentially means that Ukraine will never be able to effectively export anything again since Russia will exert total control over the Black Sea. That means that Ukraine’s main economic means of survival, the produce and export of grain will become impossible.

                Does Ukraine not get to decide what treaties and organizations they join? Or does Russia get de-facto control over everything it’s neighbors do? If we allow Russia to invade and annex any country they want, how long before we are dealing with the invasion of another country such as Moldova or even the Baltics or Poland?

                It’s quite clear that they want their borders to extend to the Carpathians to make them more defensible with their shrinking population. Do we just allow this? Then they will need to expand south and East to close the gaps there from the lost USSR as well. And at that point, why stop?

                So, just to reiterate, we need to allow Russia to invade and destroy whichever country it wants so that it can “feel more comfortable” by owning that country’s land? Is that a fair assessment of your position?

                And then I suppose we need to let China do this too, right? And then when we are down to 3 superpowers running everything, we can just duke it out for who’s the final winner in one big war?

                What you are recommending is called “appeasement”. It was tried in very much the same way with Germany by Neville Chamberlain in the late 1930’s in the country where I live, Czechia in an area called The Sudetenland, under extremely similar circumstances as you describe today. It wasn’t very effective to say the least.

                So I must say, it’s a very interesting plan you’ve got.

                •  TokenBoomer   ( @TokenBoomer@beehaw.org ) 
                  2•10 months ago

                  Watched the interview again. Still agree with West. You are prioritizing land over lives. Should Russia have invaded. No. But here we are, and people are dying, homes lost. The alternative is to play this out. Where everyone loses, but America and NATO. If that’s the goal. Proceed. You want Russia to retreat and concede. Would NATO do that? The solution is concessions. Is it optimal? No. But again, the alternative is death and destruction.