Joe Biden drops out of 2024 race

[Uncle Fester]

Regardless of whether you voted for Labor, The Libs, or the Greens, at least we all have to make a choice and live by that. We, only get to vote for our local representatives. it is they who choose to lead their party. If their leader fails to win his seat, then they must select another leader. I'd suggest that, if the Westminster system were in force in America we might actually see a better quality politician than the two horse race that it currently is. I found that the media only seemed to report the negative campaign from both sides, so our view of the American Election may well be distorted and that there was, in fact, something positive from both sides.





I also believe in fairies at the bottom of the garden! As long as they don't "come out" whilst I'm around........

What I don't like about our system is that we don't get to choose our leader. Then again our PM's don't really have the power, which is better.

What I DO like are debates in the USA and I wish we had them here too. Everything is from the horses mouth and they don't know the questions in advance.


Tooth fairies were definitely real and had never disappointed in my childhood but unfortunately they seemed to have died out

[enf]

No, unlike the majority of the US voters and apparently some members here too, I don't believe a single word he says, you sure got that wrong.

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Ummm...no. You quote what you saw him talk about in your diatribe on what will happen....anyway, doesn't matter as we can't do anything about it.

The sky isn't going to fall in unless the Chinese decide to make that happen, and they probably could atm.

.............

Tooth fairies were definitely real and had never disappointed in my childhood but unfortunately they seemed to have died out

I think they are still around. It's my teeth that have died out....

[enf]

I see the useless Hollywood glitterati have stepped up the lefts blame game and finger pointing....George Clooney seems to be the target of their rage...



They just don't get it. The ordinary public didn't give damn who or what Clooney endorsed any more than any other self important celebrity. What they care about is feeding their families and the woke wave that these tools were pushing. Even some of the left saw it coming. Bernie Sanders for one.

And then theres these fools, again threatening to move out of the US....already renegging and I bet NONE actually do.

[fromaron]

Trump's mantra, which you are falling for, that the Democrats destroyed America is total BS.
Under Trump's last reign, cost of housing went up 27.5%, unemployment rose to 6.7%, consumer price index up 7.8% (although wages did grow 8.4%), trade deficit increased 36.3%, federal debt increased by US$7.2 trillion,
illegal immigration increased, yet the promised WALL was never built just a partial fence that you can cut through with a cordless angle grinder.
There is nothing great about these numbers:

Let's see. Last year of Trump "reign" was highlighted by the world economy collapsing under Covid threat. Even if you think that shouldn't have any effect on results we can check how US went under Biden or what is most important to people in US is how much their lives changed.
Biden numbers as per your trusted source of information as of April 2024:
Cost of housing went up 29%, unemployment dropped by 3.8%, consumer price index up 18.9%, wages dropped by 2.5%, trade deficit up 18.8%, federal debt held by public is up 26.9%. The comparison is not that great at all for Biden reign too assuming post covid saw a lot of world economies saw steady recovery. And you see how ordinary Americans reacted recently. You can pull any numbers sitting here and the most important point people in US don't give a damn about yours or mine opinion. They need to live there and decide their future for the next 4 years at least.

Nevertheless you honestly believe Trump that it was all Biden and the Democrats fault that the USA and many other parts of the World are suffering from inflation and a cost of living crisis? Why, simply because Trump said so, or do you have evidence for that claim?

Yes, did you look at the election results lately. That is the best evidence which matters to me. All other publications and fact checkers are all driven by one or another agenda or bias. Even the factcheck.org you are quoting was criticized for being left biased but that is a different story and I am not interested in arguing if this is true or not.

So what has the big bad Labor done here?

I don't think a lot of people here can keep insisting we live better than before and we can afford the same life style as in previous years. I think Labor mismanage economy. Do you need the evidence here or simple fact that every time Liberals come to power they have to rebuild the damaged economy and leave budget surplus for next Labor government to waste will be sufficient?

I also don't agree with everything Dutton says or does but at least his policy is more transparent to people and next year election will show what Australians want.

[wotnot]

...like storms in a teacup....so are the political squabbles of our lives ....[meanwhile, in the real world]...

"In its approximate century of substantive existence, democracy has been an idea whose time seemed to have come. It has been a mechanism for mediating competing interests, helping form them as political parties playing by “the rules of the game,” while producing a largely equitable system for political organisation.


Yet, democracy is now in decline. There are fewer democracies, fewer people live in democracies, and most established democracies have veered towards more authoritarian responses. The world passed its democratic highwater mark in 2012. This decline may be permanent.
Just 24 countries are “full democracies,” with just eight percent of the world’s population. Including “flawed democracies,” that number increases to 72. Such “flawed democracies” includes the United States, Poland, South Africa, and Botswana. People in 95 countries live under “hybrid” or authoritarian regimes.


Democratic countries have also become less democratic, reflecting increasing levels of autocracy, political populism, the personalisation of political power, restrictions on free speech, and other forms of democratic “backsliding.” This trend began in 2006, with around three-quarters of all democratic countries undergoing degrees of democratic deterioration by 2021."

...sounds about right to me ... citing: internationalaffairs.org.au

[Uncle Fester]

I don't think a lot of people here can keep insisting we live better than before and we can afford the same life style as in previous years. I think Labor mismanage economy. Do you need the evidence here or simple fact that every time Liberals come to power they have to rebuild the damaged economy and leave budget surplus for next Labor government to waste will be sufficient?

.

That is simply not true. The last Liberal government left huge debt and the last Labor budgets have been in black for the first time since many years.
This to a point where I question if the Albo regime is even a Labor party at all, where rather being proud of their numbers they should spend it in housing and other measures that could help with cost of living ...oh no I forgot, the Liberals won't let them, nor the extremist Greens.

It is a misconception that we can't afford the same lifestyle as in the past years. Many surely can
I would go out on a limb and simply say from my observations that 40% maybe even 50% here in Australia can still comfortably afford their lifestyle, those who own their own home for example.
For those who do not, it has become a disaster. Long term housing speculation is pretty much the core of all our problems and neither side is willing to abandon the generous tax measures that keep rewarding realestate speculators who keep driving up the prices of old existing housing also encouraged by the agents as well.

It is also incorrect that our economy is mismanaged or suffering. The big corporates are reaping record profits. I know this because I am invested in some of them.
Economy is not managed by politicians, the big companies mange the politicians, it is called lobbing of which Australia is leading.

Then there are the reserve banks that are seen to be the source of all evil, and this is world wide, do indeed have a major impact on the economy but should not listen to any political party at all.
However I do not trust them. The inflation is well within the target and the downwards trend has been showing for quite some time now but it seems they are holding back until the next election to lower the rates so that Dutton can reap the rewards when they finally drop them.
General rule of rate variations is that it takes 6 months for the market to respond and this downward trend has passed that.

[enf]

Celebrities having meltdowns and whining again......................not one left last time...



Hmmmm....I wonder how it will work out this time....

[Al Bundy]

Their problem is twofold, they are so full of shit that nobody believes them anyway, and what makes them think any other country would want them…

[Au_radio]

Their problem is twofold, they are so full of shit that nobody believes them anyway, and what makes them think any other country would want them…

Trump actually won the election, yes Trump daddy is your US President now, you are the minority.

[Al Bundy]

Trump actually won the election, yes Trump daddy is your US President now, you are the minority.

what the hell are you waffling on about?

[Uncle Fester]

Celebrities having meltdowns and whining again......................not one left last time...



Hmmmm....I wonder how it will work out this time....

I don't know about any celebrities but it might be very wise for the following (former) politicians to move to a country that has no extradition agreement with the USA:




"some of Trump’s closest advisers — have warned ominously that he’s far more likely to follow through in a second term"

This makes sense to me after many on the list came after him even though they could not succeed.

Will get interesting at least and what the world will think if he really arrests Biden and Harris for unproven treason. Punishment for treason in the USA also includes the the death penalty.

[enf]

I don't know about any celebrities but it might be very wise for the following (former) politicians to move to a country that has no extradition agreement with the USA:




"some of Trump’s closest advisers — have warned ominously that he’s far more likely to follow through in a second term"

This makes sense to me after many on the list came after him even though they could not succeed.

Will get interesting at least and what the world will think if he really arrests Biden and Harris for unproven treason. Punishment for treason in the USA also includes the the death penalty.

If I give credence to this paranoia for a bit, wouldn't Obama and Biden be immune as ex presidents?

[lsemmens]

Trump will have to tread carefully, if he accuses Biden and Harris of treason, (those charges might - I repeat, might- but unlikely) stick. He, too, might end up with the same charges and I'd bet those charges will stick!

[admin]

That is simply not true. The last Liberal government left huge debt and the last Labor budgets have been in black for the first time since many years.

Most people that can count know Labor's ability to leave debts.

When John Howard took government, he inherited about 96 million in debt, a lot of money at the time. We paid that debt off over Howard's reign and when Rudd took government in 2007, he took over a government with ZERO debt and about 60 million in the future fund.

What Labor then did was send us in to a debt trail that will never be repaid. Rudd and Gillard's spending is well known, Pink Batts (and about 5 dead installing them), School Halls and other great schemes which all involved borrowing money to spend on schemes that were supposed to "stimulate" the economy were a disaster. As to the Liberal's "huge" debt, how big do you think Labor's would have been if they were in government during covid ?

Labor cannot manage money, never have been able to and never will. You only have to look at old Anthony Elbowgreasy, every week he is announcing something with millions of dollars of borrowed money to try and get people to vote for him.

By the way, Putin did indeed congratulate Trump.

I did have to have a giggle at your statement about his win, "Death sentence of democracy" and wonder if you know what democracy actually is ? Trump's win was a great example of democracy, people free to vote for the candidate they want.

[admin]

Trump actually won the election, yes Trump daddy is your US President now, you are the minority.

The Democrats certainly have a lot of work to do. If the Republicans work at it, there are several other states that could easily go Red next time.

I have had a good look at how people voted and it's pretty simple......the rich and elite in major cities vote for the Democrats because it is the party of the rich and shameless. How expensive things are don't matter to them, they couldn't care if Milk was a dollar a litre or 10 dollars a litre. They don't have to deal with all the illegal migrants (unless they want a below minimum wage housekeeper) and I could only laugh as Harris and her team paraded celebrity after celebrity on stage to tell everyone to vote for her. A seriously bad move.

So what other reasons are there that Harris lost ? I think the fact that she is a very poor politician has a lot to do with it. Biden chose her for 3 reasons. One, she is a woman. Two, she is not white. Three, she is not very bright or capable.

She has done nothing in her time as VP. She was given only one job, fix the border problem. How did that go ? She slept her way to the top, getting plum appointments while screwing the mayor of San Francisco (who is now 90...there is a great bit of video where she is with him and someone asks if she is his daughter) and never really doing the hard yards.

When the Democrats decided to knife Biden, he was upset but knew exactly how to get them back. He almost immediately endorsed Harris as his replacement, meaning that there would be no vote on his replacement. Biden knew she would lose and lose badly. And he was right. Old Joe isn't stupid, you aren't in politics that long and not learn a few tricks.

[Uncle Fester]

I did have to have a giggle at your statement about his win, "Death sentence of democracy" and wonder if you know what democracy actually is ? Trump's win was a great example of democracy, people free to vote for the candidate they want.

It is not really funny.
Hitler emerged from a democracy and that democracy had a similar flaw as the US one:
The leader was given too much power.

Up to now the US presidents have not misused that power to the extent that the democracy would collapse like the Weimar Republic did.
However what Trump has in mind points strongly in that direction.
Once he has replaced all government positions and even military leaders with his "MAGA" crowd, Marshal Law could be very much on the table.

As for Biden's replacement, almost everybody in the Democratic party endorsed Harris practically on the same day, except for Obama and Pelosi and IIRC two others.
Nobody else in the Democratic party seemed to want the position and have a vote.
There was such a rush that it appears Obama had to agree even if he might have had legitimate concerns.
Biden's revenge, if we want to stay with your conspiracies, could have been that 'Trash" statement but he has misspoken so many times in the past it is hard to be sure if that was on purpose.

[wotnot]

....join sideshow alley...

[Uncle Fester]

"Idiocracy was not meant be a tutorial"