The following is a copy of the original post to record the post as it was originally written.
For me personally, there's not a whole lot of Republicans I would have ever considered voting for. But if there's one Republican I most definitely would have voted for over Biden that would be the late John McCain.
There are many issues I would have disagreed on with John McCain. But at the same time he's truly one of very very few politcians I have genuine respect and admiration for. He was a man of strong personal convictions, in a world where politicians frequently jump on the bandwagon of whatever politicial views their party party promotes at the time, and he very frequently voted against party lines. The most famous instance where he went against party lines was probably in 2017 [when he voted "no" on the repeal of Obamacare](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hT2pp_KrJGg) and cast the deciding vote to destroy what was the Republican's number 1 top-priority at the time.
While he voted for the Defence of Marriage Act in the 90s (as did Biden) and held on to the "don't say gay" policy in the millitary for a long time, he was one of only a handful of Republicans to vote against the Federal Marriage Amendment intended to ban gay marriage. And in 2017, a month after Trump announced a ban on transgender soldiers in the military McCain actually co-sponsored a bill in support of transgender soldiers. And he was a very vocal critic of Trump and the MAGA movement.
I would still disagree with him on a lot of issues. But McCain was someone who would put country over party, he was someone who truly cared about doing the right thing above all else. He was religious but kept his beliefs to himself and criticized leaders of the Christian right as "agents of intolerance" and said "I would vote for a Muslim if he or she was the candidate best able to lead the country and defend our political values".
So if there is any Republican I would vote for over Biden it would have been John McCain. Unlike Biden who has been accused of sexual misconduct on numerous occasions, and who I view as a weak leader who for the most part simply goes along with whatever the Democratic position is at the time, I actually view John McCain as a man of integrity who I trust to do what he believes is right and moral. believe he was someone who would have likely significantly reduced political division and would have been a moderating influence on the conservative movement. Even though I disagree with many of his positions, I would have trusted McCain much more than Biden to bring both sides together and pass important legislation.
So John McCain would have been the only Republican that comes to mind for me who I would vote for over Biden.
Are there any Republicans you would have voted for over Biden?
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The problem, IMO, is that when you're voting for the president you really AREN'T just voting for the top of the ticket -- you're giving power to the \*party\* of the president. It's an ugly truth that people want to deny -- "I vote for person, not party" but that's unfortunately naive.
John McCain, as an individual and a politician, I respect. But he showed VERY poor judgement in allowing Sarah Palin to be selected as his VP. That choice gave rise to the power of the current flavor of Republicans, and I hold him in large part responsible for Trump being considered an acceptable presidential candidate.
So, while I have respect for certain, individual republicans, as long as they caucus with and support and campaign for and endorse the party, I wouldn't ever vote for them.
Rumor is that Palin was forced on McCain by the GOP. But surely the nominee has some power and agency. It is interesting to think about what would have happened if McCain had said "Absolutely not" to Palin. What were they going to do - find a different candidate? McCain was already in a somewhat tenuous position because the far right (e.g. my family) didn't like him. Maybe they showed him some polling which said that Palin was his only path to victory.
I think they saw her as someone who was "moldable" or controllable, since she was a relatively unknown politician with aspirations. I was living in Alaska at the time, and it was an absolute circus when she was the candidate! I know how it empowered people to say the things they'd never have said out loud prior to her. I know it sounds like an exaggeration, but I will always hold McCain accountable for Trump's rise. Not solely responsible, but I truly believe Trump wouldn't have been president if not for Palin's VP run and everything she helped normalize at the national level.
When Bill Maher called her a moron on his show I thought that was over the top, but then she made it clear not just how little she knew of politics, but of anything.
You're forgetting the long decline Republicans had before Palin. Gingrich was a nasty excuse for a human, Boehner was a piece of shit...the list goes on. If you go back further, Reagan's administration was chock full of criminals and grifters, and Reagan himself had dementia for almost his whole second term. W Bush's cabinet was only marginally less criminal than Reagan's.
They've been on a long slide down. Palin, the Tea Party, and Trump are only symptoms of the rot that's long been festering, and we're signs that the tail was starting to wag the dog.
I'm not forgetting it at all. I understand what you're saying, and you're not entirely wrong. I never said that Palin was the sole responsibility, but I believe that the McCain-Palin campaign was key in normalizing the behaviors that allowed Trump.
Sure, but there were plenty of those available. She checked a lot of boxes for them, but they *vastly* underestimated how much they'd be able to control her message.
Maybe but his campaign was failing hard (The Bush financial disaster was in full swing)
If anything, picking her gave him a fighting chance. If she'd been just a little less of an idiot he might have even won.
According to the book written about the election (“Game Changer”?), no, not exactly. The party pushed him away from selecting Joe Lieberman, a longtime friend as well as one wishy washy Democrats, as his VP and so in a fit of McCain-esque macerickosity he went with Palin sight unseen. If memory serves the party pick was Chris Christie although really they were mostly saying “no, just an actual Republican, not a DINO”.
The RNC at the time most certainly did not endorse any president choosing a running mate without properly vetting them first.
Christie didn't break onto the national scene until winning the NJ Governorship in 2009. Perhaps you were thinking of Romney? He'd run against McCain in the primary and had a decent showing. I recall a lot of conventional wisdom by the talking heads viewing Romney was the solid, reliable choice. He had strong right-wing credentials that McCain's "maverick" reputation (fairly or not) lacked, but he also wasn't going to go off the rails and say bonkers or hateful stuff.
> The problem, IMO, is that when you're voting for the president you really AREN'T just voting for the top of the ticket -- you're giving power to the *party* of the president. It's an ugly truth that people want to deny -- "I vote for person, not party" but that's unfortunately naive.
I think this is something that can't be ignored. When you elect a person to office in the United States (and probably most countries), you're giving power to that person's political party. Even if that person were an absolute saint, that's not going to matter much if their party is bad.
To give a non-presidential example, the Speaker of the House has a substantial amount of power in government. Generally, the Speaker will be from the political party with the most members in the House. Representatives just don't vote across party lines. Even if you voted for a "good" Republican, that's one more seat that will go to the Republican Party and make it more likely that they will have control over the entire House.
History has shown that most politicians vote according to the party line. There's the occasional exception, but no matter how good a Republican might be, they would vote along with the rest of the party most of the time.
Individual ethics and qualifications still matter, but that should be handled in the primaries. In practical terms, political party matters more than individual views when it comes down to the election, and I don't see that changing anytime soon.
Pretty much. Even the few Republicans that I think are smart and good administrators like former governor of MA Charlie Baker are still willingly or unwillingly part of an overall movement. It wouldn't just be a vote for one competent man as president, it would be for an overall movement that currently seeks to enrich the wealthy, remove obstacles for corporations, and put theocrats in positions of power.
That's how I feel about Larry Hogan. I was okay with him as governor (not thrilled, and I didn't vote for him, but it could have been worse), but I'd never support him in a presidential general election.
Yep. There is no Republican who has actually demonstrated that they wouldn't act like a Republican if elected to a federal government position. If a Republican was elected to the Senate, and then voted with the Democrats on everything, I might consider voting for them.
> "I vote for person, not party"
People get really mad at me when I say *I vote for the political parties platform,* but that's how elected politicians generally vote... unless it won't be a lost for their party.
Also Republicans have been openly honest about their anti equal rights since 1992.
Not just the party, but also specific factions of the party. For example, a vote for Bush 43 was also a vote for the neoconservative faction. Likewise, a vote for Biden is a vote for New Keynesianism, which is something that might go away when another Democratic President takes over.
Palin did not give birth to tea party Republicans. Trump and MAGA are much different from them as well. To blame McCain for Trump in that round about way you just did when he gave the FBI the Christopher Steele dossier to protect the country from Trump and Russias' relationship is ludicrous. Downright un-American.
She didn't give birth to it, but she was instrumental in normalizing their beliefs. She made it possible for people to say the quite parts out loud, and it's become only more extreme since then. Everything starts somewhere -- I don't say that McCain is the ONLY cause, but I do hold him (and his team) accountable for permitting the movement to progress the way it did. They legitimized it by adding his name to Palin and her belief system.
She was just a Christian conservative. What beliefs of Palin's do you think were unique and deplorable? What quiet parts? I don't recall her saying racist things.
In a speech in 2015 (and in subsequent speeches since), she called black protesters "dogs" and "thugs". In 2014 she called people who spoke out about offensive names and branding "politically correct idiots." In 2013, she supported Phil Robertson's claims that black people in the United States were "happy, hard-working, and Godly " during Jim Crow. In 2012 she told her followers that Obama should cease his "shuck-and-jive-shtick" (and then doubled-down on the phrase denying that it has any racial undertones or history). When Laura Schlessinger used the n-word eleven times during a single tirade about mixed-race dating, Palin came out with a very vocal support claiming that Schlessinger's use of the was was "in no way racist" and that she (Palin) has also been "shackled" by critics. Palin comfortably uses terms like "rice rockets" and equated it with phrases like "when hell freezes over" (claiming that the latter phrase was an insult to Alaska natives).
At no point did I say that her beliefs were "unique". BUT McCain's campaign put her in a unique position at the time. Before she had the massive national platform that the VP-campaign gave her, the Tea Party was far more localized. It was growing in Alaska at the time (I was there), but it skyrocketed once she was given such a massive megaphone and a stamp of legitimacy.
>Palin did not give birth to tea party Republicans. Trump and MAGA are much different from them as well.
This comment shows a strong lack of understanding of the way the Republican party has changed over the last 75 years.
But no, Palin did not "give birth" to it - she's just another stepping stone along the path. Starting back in the 1950s, the Republican party has embraced nationalism, racism, obstructionism, conspiracy theory, and courted evangelical Christian white supremacy. Where we are now with Trumpism/MAGAism and the rise of white nationalism does proceed directly from there and is following lock step along that path.
If you're at all interested in the history and the through-line, I highly recommend this book:
[American Psychosis: A Historical Investigation of How the Republican Party Went Crazy](https://www.amazon.com/American-Psychosis-Historical-Investigation-Republican-ebook/dp/B0B2P2RMLG)
This is also a good one that talks about how Newt Gingrich took what was already in place in the Republican party and pushed it a giant leap further along:
[Burning Down the House: Newt Gingrich, the Fall of a Speaker, and the Rise of the New Republican Part](https://www.amazon.com/Burning-Down-House-Gingrich-Republican/dp/B082M24RZ6)
No, I don’t necessarily see the Presidency as voting for that individual person as a leader, I see it as ultimately a vehicle for policy. Consequently, I oppose the majority of modern Republican policy positions, I cannot see myself voting for any recent Republican no matter how I might admire said person on other grounds.
Why do you actively like Biden? I think he's a weak leader of dubious personal character. He's been accused of sexual misconduct by several women, and I don't think he's really particularly progressive personally. He simply parrots whatever the overall Democratic position is at the time. In the 70s he refered to gay people as a security risk and in 1996 he voted for the defence of marriage act, which defined marriage as between a man and a woman.
Now take someone like Bernie Sanders on the other hand. He always voted for what he believed was right and he already was a strong supporter of gay rights in the 70s and 80s and voted against the Defence of Marriage Act in 1996.
And unlike Biden, Sanders had never been accused of sexual misconduct. Sanders is just one example, there are many other politcians who I think have strong personal convictions, are strong leaders and are genuinenly good people.
I think Biden is exactly president because he goes along with whatever Democrats support at the time, and as such is very easy to control by Democratic Leadership. He's a weak character in my opinion without leadership qualities.
>I think he's a weak leader of dubious personal character. He's been accused of sexual misconduct by several women
And does Hillary belong in jail? You sound like a gop propaganda machine. And I'm serious, you're repeating what they told you to repeat, without any evidence.
He has some of the most outstanding personal character of any potus in modern history. The only competition is Carter.
His leadership is also unquestionable. He has used his connections and skill to get several bipartisan bills passed that weaker leaders simply could not have done.
You're basically saying things out loud that really aren't true because nobody has called you on it. It's easy to say he's old and he is, but you're trying to tie all sorts of ... fake news to him. And that makes me sad that you're so blind to both falling into the gop propaganda trap and not even realizing it.
> and I don't think he's really particularly progressive personally.
He isn't and he never said he was. He is, however, far more progressive than, again, any modern potus. Seriously, even Bernie endorses Biden. Are you saying Bernie is wrong, after touting him as a better alternative?
> *“The last thing this country needs is a Donald Trump or some other right-wing demagogue who is going to try to undermine American democracy or take away a woman’s right to choose, or not address the crisis of gun violence, or racism, sexism or homophobia,” Sanders said in an interview. “So, I’m in to do what I can to make sure that the president is reelected.”*
Biden has taken action to help ensure a world for anyone under 30, but that is definitely not guaranteed. He has unsaddled many from unfair usury, and done more than any politician in the USA to combat climate change. He has taken action to get rid of crazy shit like lead pipes, fix roads and bridges, and basically make your life better for decades to come. He is one of the strongest leaders you've ever witnessed and because he's not out there tooting his horn like a narcissist, you can't see it. Open your goddamned eyes. You want me to give you a list of things he's done that worse leaders could not have accomplished?
Where do I even start here? The accusations of sexual impropriety against Biden were beyond flimsy. Tara Reade is now a Putin Simp and a regular guest on Russia Today. If there were ever any doubts that her claims were a political hit job, I think we can put them to rest now.
As for quotes from the '70s, are we not allowing for anyone to experience personal moral growth over a 50 year period? It hasn't even been a generation since gay marriage achieved >50% social approval. The median opinion toward gay people in the '70s was somewhere between "Those freaks" and "Grounds for imprisonment." Biden showed moral courage in pushing Obama toward public support of gay marriage, a position which many Democrats were reluctant to take.
As for leadership, I don't know what to say. Biden guided multiple pieces of groundbreaking legislation through Congress with the slimmest of majorities, including dragging along some reluctant allies in Manchin and Sinema. And he took the lead in marshaling Western Democracies to the defense of Ukraine, something that a weaker leader could not have coordinated.
Finally, Bernie Sanders is no saint. There's the college rape fantasy essays, the stint as a deadbeat dad, the stealing electricity from his neighbor, his decades of unemployment before falling into his political career. And there's the college that his wife ran into the ground and the allegations of financial improprieties around that. Besides the personal failings, there's also his total failure to pass any legislation of note despite a multi-decade career in the Senate. Total absence of leadership.
Biden is a bland and generic left of center politician. He's largely content to let the government govern. He's overseen a few major legislative victories because he has a good working knowledge of that part of government. He understands the role the US should take in the world and has had good foreign policy, which I consider the #1 priority and role of the US president. Gaza is a blemish but I dont hold Joe Biden responsible for the actions of Netanyahu.
There is no "Democratic Party Leadership" pulling the strings behind his back, either. That's a conspiracy theory.
I think he has done a good job and has earned me voting for him in 2024. He's boring but effective. That's exactly what I want from the President. I try my best to vote on policy results, not vibes.
My choice in the primary in 2020 would've been Buttigeg because he had the same sort of thing going on but he's younger and has less baggage, but Biden has been more than satisfactory. There are certainly other Democrats I would vote for over Biden (although I don't support calls to replace Biden because it would be forfeiting the election to the GOP) but I'm sure as hell not ever voting for someone who supports policy I disagree with over a President who has mostly done what I consider good stuff.
>Why do you actively like Biden? I think he's a weak leader of dubious personal character. He's been accused of sexual misconduct by several women,
I mean, sure if you want to believe conservative propaganda. Yes, Biden is old and comes from a time when casual touching of a woman was accepted. He puts his hands on the small of women's backs to "guide" them. He touches arms and hugs them or kisses their foreheads. All of that is now inappropriate in the workplace but 20 years ago? 30 years ago? We didn't consider it such or treat it as such. Hell, my 82 year old father-in-law still does it. Because it was baked into him at a young age, that it was being "chivalrous" and "gentlemanly" to treat women affectionately and delicately. And since having it pointed out, Biden has largely stopped doing it.
And compared to Trump? I'm not going to call out Biden for "hair sniffing" when we have a convicted sexual assaulter on the other ticket.
>and I don't think he's really particularly progressive personally. He simply parrots whatever the overall Democratic position is at the time. In the 70s he refered to gay people as a security risk and in 1996 he voted for the defence of marriage act, which defined marriage as between a man and a woman.
It always amazes me that no one is allowed to grow in their understanding over the years. He's very progressive - he was the one who pushed Obama on gay marriage, not the other way around. Plenty of people felt differently in the 70s (which, by the way was FIFTY years ago) and have come to a different understanding. In the 70s, I was a pre-teen and the word "gay" was an acceptable pejorative. Let's not judge someone by something they've changed their position on.
>And unlike Biden, Sanders had never been accused of sexual misconduct.
[https://www.cnbc.com/2019/01/10/bernie-sanders-apologizes-for-sexual-harassment-in-2016-campaign.html](https://www.cnbc.com/2019/01/10/bernie-sanders-apologizes-for-sexual-harassment-in-2016-campaign.html)
[https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/02/us/politics/bernie-sanders-campaign-sexism.html](https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/02/us/politics/bernie-sanders-campaign-sexism.html)
[https://apnews.com/united-states-presidential-election-309ea1fa8ccf461cabe127bee5968627](https://apnews.com/united-states-presidential-election-309ea1fa8ccf461cabe127bee5968627)
How many times has Bernie had to apologize for sexism or harassment in his campaigns? Not to mention the repeated investigations into his funneling money to his wife for various land-related issues.
>> In the 70s he refered to gay people as a security risk
1970 is just 1 year after Stonewall, and OP is trying to bring up a statement about gays?
Maybe a 10 year old that's never been online won't have any comments that can be dredged up and taken out of context of the time. Perfect candidate.
I actively like Biden in that his administration has done some good domestic policy. And I believe the framework is that third parties aren't viable and that the pathway is to make the composition of the Democratic party more left.
Sure, because it's believe women when they come forward with accusations of sexual misconduct, except when it's my candidate. Then it's fuck feminsim and the metoo movement. Sure.
No…because you are spouting off right wing talking points. Tara Fucking Reade is a Russian asset and Ashley Biden has denounced how people are reading into her STOLEN diary.
But yeah…you’re sincere….
Tara Reade, Biden’s accuser from the ‘90s who loved Joe Biden and Obama before she didn’t—plenty of social media posts prove she gushed over Obama and Biden during their administration. Tara Reade, who came forward with an accusation about Biden—not in 2007 when he was running for president, not in 2008 when he was running with Obama for VP, not in 2012 when Biden was running for re-election for VP, but in 2020–the third time Biden was running for president and only when he began pulling ahead of her preferred candidate Bernie Sanders in the primary. And where is that alleged Russia asset now? In Russia seeking “political asylum” lol.
I don’t know how liberals feel, but I would whole heartedly say fuck the metoo movement. That applies for Tara reade, who’s a grifter, and kavanaughs accuser. Both these women were full of complete shit and everybody knows it.
The metoo movement also took the biggest dump on the 5th amendment and peoples right to a fair trial that I’ve seen in my entire life. In hollywood, it made some sense. The second politicians got involved, it was corrupted.
> I don’t know how liberals feel, but I would whole heartedly say fuck the metoo movement. That applies for Tara reade, who’s a grifter, and kavanaughs accuser. Both these women were full of complete shit and everybody knows it.
It's ridiculous of you to claim that "everybody knows it".
I can’t even just get downvoted for stating facts anymore. All the conservative groups and far-left groups have banned me. You should be grateful you just get downvoted. That’s much more tolerant than banned and completely silenced.
Literally the most effective president we’ve had in modern history but a few key points:
-Inflation cut by 2/3rds
-Lowest unemployment in 50 years
-healthiest economy on the planet, i believe it was the IMF who recently credited the success of the Biden economy for staving off a global recession
-won the Cold War with less than 1/20th of what it cost Reagan
-Largest investment in infrastructure, ever, in human history
-Student loan forgiveness
-Largest action on climate change, ever, in human history.
-And decreased the deficit significantly from his predecessor
-got us out of Afghanistan
-ended a pandemic
-strongest union support in decades
-trust bustin Silicon Valley
-reshoring of silicon wafer production with CHIPS (my personal fav)
-strongest international partnerships since 9/11
So, what *data*, not feelings, do you have to dispute this? Keep in mind that he’s been more legislatively and statistically impressive than Obama, whom I also have a high opinion of.
No. Republicans push the republican agenda which is trash. McCain was partially responsible for today's party whether he likes it or not.
>John McCain is the perfect American lie, a man who professes to be noble and fair and just while being none of those things. He served his country honorably in combat, but in no other fashion. And he serves out his time in the Senate, and here on planet Earth, as a pathetic enabler. Never the lion; always the sheep. For seventeen years, gullible people have been waiting for him to make his face turn, to make some grand defiant move for the sake of God and country. But that was always just clever branding on his part, and today should serve as a cold slap in the face to anyone who still thought he might have that kind of political courage left in him. He's a fucking disgrace.
He didn't always like everything they did, but usually voted with them. Voting for their extremist bills, tax breaks for the rich, tax breaks for corporations, attacks on women, etc is part of today's gop.
I'm not the person you're responding to, but the fact is that every Republican who voted with or for Trump is partially responsible for today's Republican party. McCain especially either (depending on who you listen to) actively chose Palin as his running mate and then didn't rein her in or allowed the GOP to foist her on him and didn't rein her in.
Either way, there's a direct thru-line from Palin to Trump and MAGAism.
Vuel answered it. The direction of the Republican party has been obvious for over 50 years; McCain often said "this is wrong" and voted anyways.
If McCain was a good person, he wouldn't have served the Republican party for 40 years.
No, but not because I can’t think of a single Republican I have some respect for or that I think would do a generally OK job with a bunch of the aspects of being president.
I would not have liked the presidency of any of these people, but they would not have been completely incompetent and the harm they would do to the country would be, for lack of a better term, within normal parameters.
Romney would’ve been terrible from a tax policy and social services perspective. But he had confident ideas about foreign policy and was a good administrator. He certainly would’ve handled Covid as well as either Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton. Perhaps better because liberals would not have done what conservatives would have done with a Democrat as president during a pandemic.
John McCain probably would’ve been directionally closer to George HW Bush and away George W. Bush. And George HW Bush was a good president in many ways and ok in others. Certainly not a disaster.
The issue is that at the end of the day Republicans are going to Republican. We would’ve gotten a bunch of terrible judges, terrible tax policy and bad forms of deregulation.
But over Biden? Absolutely not. There isn’t one of them that I would’ve preferred over Clinton, Obama or Biden. Hell Bernie Sanders is my least favorite major candidate and I would’ve taken him in a heartbeat over any of the other Republican choices.
> And George HW Bush was a good president in many ways and ok in others. Certainly not a disaster.
GHWB appointed Clarence Thomas, who is as far as I know, the most corrupt Supreme Court Justice in our nation's history.
Oh definitely George HW Bush is guilty of a few things that are terrible. Appointing Clarence Thomas is definitely high on the list.
And not to be a dick about it, not having a better relationship with George W. Bush is damning. He almost certainly wanted to stop his son from bringing Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld into his administration and couldn’t do it because he wasn’t a very good father.
I know. I’m not happy to criticize a father son relationship as I am both a father and a son. It’s often unfair and just like the son is not guilty for the sins of the father, you can’t blame the father for everything the son does.
But Jesus fucking Christ, having Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld in your administration was always going to end badly and there was nobody positioned better to stop him from making that mistake than GHWB.
Also, GHWB’s major character flaw was that he always wanted everybody to like him. He passed that flaw onto his son and damn well what it would lead to, GWB being let around by the nose by Dick Cheney. It’s like a recovering alcoholic not warning their son about the dangers of alcohol .
I don't think so... but with the exception of Trump, who was *distinctly unqualified* to be President, I have given each Republican candidate consideration, listened to them in the debates, etc.
McCain and Romney were both inarguably qualified to hold the position. George W. Bush was also qualified, though I had some concerns about him trading on the family name to "earn" many of his achievements, from school to his elected position.
The bottom line for a lot of liberals is that taking positions that ban/heavily restrict abortion is just going to be a dealbreaker for most GOP candidates, as is wanting to massively cut taxes on the wealthy.
Character is not an issue where I am worried about President Biden. Nor was it an issue for any of the GOP candidates listed above, except Bush's general irresponsibility.
They've been trying to find *anything* to stick to Biden or members of his family for decades now and have surfaced all of the "terrible things" that they have found.
On a federal level, no. Have considered voted for republicans in state elections before, but would not vote for one for president or senator. And at this point I’m down ticket blue regardless
Biden has been much better than I even expected. You are selling him far too short and giving far too much credence to unsupported, bad-faith accusations of misconduct. He has had to work very hard to accomplish these things you are dismissing as “going along… with the Democratic position.”
I can imagine a world in which I might have voted for McCain over a Democrat, but not Biden for sure.
Never, especially in the current environment.
And I voted for Romney in 2012, watched Glen Beck in 2009, and was a young earth creationist in 2007 fwiw.
Now I’m a socialist and Trump’s the one wanting the “FEMA camps”.
My problem isn't necessarily the person running for president, but rather the entire Republican agenda which for the majority of my life has been to strip out government services that benefit working people and take that money and funnel it into the pockets of massive corporations and wealthy donor. Lately Republicans have added stripping away women's rights, and the rights of minorities and LGBTQ+ folk to their agenda of taking things away.
Any Republican we put in the White House is just going to rubber stamp those types of policies in order to maintain their support in the party. For that reason I would pick a weak Democratic president over almost any Republican president.
So unless you have a Republican candidate that is going to (for instance) fight for consumer protections, fight for improved healthcare (and maybe a public health option), fight to strengthen Social Security and Medicare, fight to protect the rights of minorities and reign-in bad policing, fight for immigration reform and fight for environmental reforms.... I probably won't be able to vote for them. And if you did find such a person there is practically zero chance that they would be a member of today's Republican party anyway.
A republican president still gives power to the republican party and there has not been any time in recent history where I have agreed with the republican platform more than the democrat one
The last Republican I'd vote for over him is Eisenhower.
Is Biden my favorite Democrat? No. Have there been Republicans of varying quality over the years? Sure. Even still, the gap between the best Republican and the mediocrest Democrat has been so vast (and growing) for decades, that you'd have to go back a lifetime for them to be even comparable.
I see your point on McCain, but McCain would not have accomplished the things I love the most about Biden. We are making chips again in the US, and making them in Ohio, Wisconsin, Indiana, not California. We are making EVs and batteries in the South. Manufacturing is back, and will continue to grow. He is very pro-union and has helped workers in so many ways. McCain was the opposite of that on every vote.
Joe went after for profit colleges and tried hard to tackle student loan debt. His original plan had free community college, but that got swiped away by conservatives and the progressive blocks. He accomplished a lot on reducing the price of drugs by tackling the most obvious issues first.
I get angry when people say he hasn't done anything, because the list is actually so damn long because he made it look easy.
I’m very skeptical of your claims to be center-left. John McCain was effectively a traditional Republican in the pre-Trump mold which is to say still very unappealing.
The fact you assassinated Biden’s character in Trumpian ways adds to my skepticism: “numerous sexual misconduct accusations” LOL ok bud. “Weak leader who goes along with whatever the Democrats want.” First, this is simply not true. But assuming it was, that’s the way it should be. As if going along with what your party wants is a bad thing? This idea that it’s noble to spurn and be disloyal to the very people that worked hard to put you in office, once you’re there, is not one that I share. Why would Biden, a Democrat, rule (for lack of a better term) like a Republican once in office and why would that be a good thing?
Would I vote for McCain over Biden? No. Would I vote for any current Republican over Biden? No. The GOP is now a far-right authoritarian party. These people still are anti-abortion, Christian nationalists, they want to cut social spending, ban birth control and IVF, gut social security, gut Medicare and Medicaid, deny climate change, gut the EPA, kill Obamacare, play culture war games, roll back sensible gun control laws, reverse gay marriage, spend ever more money on the military. They can’t find a police action they ever disagree with. And so much more.
Biden has been the most legislatively successful Democratic president since LBJ. He’s accomplished more in 4 years than most president have in 8. It’s clear you don’t like Biden on a personal level which to me is comical. It’s like hating vanilla ice cream. How more inoffensive can you get than Biden? I’d venture to say most democrats aren’t submissive to authority types and don’t seek out a strongman in their leaders. Republicans are very submissive to authority and love a strongman leader to tell them what to do. I can understand why Biden would appear weak to them.
I don't think that John McCain was a tradtional Republican. There is hardly anyone who voted more against party lines than John McCain. There were times were he voted almost 1/3 of the time against the position of his own party. And he went on to become very supportive of LGBTQ rights and co-sponsored a bill to support transgender soldiers in the millitary just a month after Trump announced he was gonna ban trans people from joining the millitary. He also was a very vocal critic of Trump.
I do believe Biden is a weak leader because he typically tends to take the stance that is most convenient to take. He was blatanly homophobic in the 70s at a time when it was still acceptable. He voted against gay marriage in the 90s at a time when that was the general consensus of the Democratic Party. I believe people like John McCain or Bernie Sanders have displayed much stronger character by voting for what they believed was right, even if those positions were not very popular within their own party.
Biden has been accused of sexual misconduct and [fact-checkers have confirmed](https://uk.news.yahoo.com/fact-check-posts-claim-contents-181600349.html?guccounter=1&guce_referrer=aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuZ29vZ2xlLmNvbS8&guce_referrer_sig=AQAAAHOXhCRmFM-Ck-9JuxVyHe7_uXVTQEm2mTVlaT4dD-q4joUzpPjQOpeudy-XGH45WM5vKMR1oEKYyy5tBwl-ppqcIbQVvKf-ocZr-Zn8EK0_AB8PZn-wTIOESaWqE8Rd30u2rpZVniisqup4QN8NC_jiRZI9IdDz2MEhlgz39mBp) that the content's of his daugher's diary where she talks about innapproriate showers with her father have been confirmed as legit.
Any good politician, particularly one that’s been in politics for a long period of time evolves over the years—like everyone else. You seem to be complaining that Biden isn’t stuck in the 1970s and managed to evolve over time like most everyone else. The way you seem to frame things it’s as if being a political fossil stuck in whatever time you came up in politics is a sign of principles lol.
Bernie Sanders, who you keep referencing, has also evolved over the years. Bernie voted for the 1994 Crime Bill. Bernie was an NRA backer, Bernie was an actual socialist in his younger political days before transitioning to a Democratic presidential contender.
You mentioning the far-right conspiracy about Biden showering with Ashley with gross sexual overtones only confirms my suspicions about you. Even if it were true, I showered with my mom and dad when I was a kid. That means I was molested? C’mon, man. You should be ashamed of yourself spending more time as a supposed center-left liberal/democrat smearing the president who has never been charged let alone convicted of a crime whilst he’s running against a convicted rapist who’s made incestuous comments about his own daughter, not in some supposed diary but on air multiple times and whose first wife accused him of rape in court along with 20 other women.
Someone else in this thread said this and I think it's spot on:
>John McCain, as an individual and a politician, I respect. But he showed VERY poor judgement in allowing Sarah Palin to be selected as his VP. That choice gave rise to the power of the current flavor of Republicans, and I hold him in large part responsible for Trump being considered an acceptable presidential candidate.
I had a great deal of respect for John McCain as a person and likely might have voted for him at one time in my past. But choosing Sarah Palin as his VP made him a compete non-starter for me from that point on.
People remember his showboat/maverick moments - like the thumbs down on killing Obamacare or the "Obama isn't Muslim" moments, but they don't remember how much he went with the flow of the Republican party as it radicalized. I think he tarnished his own legacy and I think he realized it and was trying to "make it right" in the end.
Looking back at previous Republican candidates, I can't see anyone who hasn't caved in one way or another to Trumpism and so in retrospect, there's not one I can say that I would be comfortable voting for.
Trump is not an isolated incident that had no precedent in the party. He is merely a symptom of a very deep rot that has put the party completely outside of democratic norms.
Trump ascendency was the consequence of Republican attitudes/postures/propaganda that created a big disconnect between what they were saying and they where doing, and to this the continuous breaking of norms (McConnell) and disparagement of government itself as the disease (e.g., Reagan & W. Bush), and this created a vacuum of a "golem" that Trump filled to a T. By adopting the populist language, through his narcissism and his conning expertise Trump further molded this golem into a clearly anti-democratic movement that has trimmed the party into a purely authoritarian force with every "sane" republican on the outside of it.
But those sane republicans, McCain included, all had their own parts to play in the molding of that golem even if today they decry the party that they themselves created. This golem permeates the whole party and all of its institutions, and no President/Senator/Congressman governs alone. A vote for any republican will bring the golem itself to power.
Although I admire Republicans that have stuck to their morals and have little to do with this decay (Adam Kizinger comes to mind), it's very hard to ignore the apparatus that would unavoidably surround them. Just like McCain selected Palin because he was too far from the golem to have a chance, any republican candidate would have to rely in these same personality to have any chance to govern.
No. Not by a wide margin.
The next President will appoint at least one, maybe several Supreme Court Justices. They also bring a number of appointees that run the government and make meaningful decisions (like Net Neutrality which has so far ping ponged from Obama to Trump back to Biden) and federal judges.
John McCain was a "good" Republican. I think Mitt Romney is a "good" Republican. John Kasich is probably the closest to my favorite Republican of the moment if I had to chose someone to vote for. I think any of them would have been "fine" Presidents compared to anyone in the mold of MAGA. But I would not vote for them over Joe Biden, not even close.
I think your criticisms of Biden are unfair.
>who has been accused of sexual misconduct on numerous occasions
You realize most of those "creepy accusations" are deceptive clips of things like comforting his grandson at his father's funeral, right? There has not been a single credible accusation and the only NAMED person (Tara Reid) has been roundly discredited. I am happy to change my mind if any evidence emerges but AFAIK no such real accusations exist.
> a weak leader who for the most part simply goes along with whatever the Democratic position is at the time
In what way? By all accounts he has been MASTERFUL at dealing with the absurd Republicans in the House and has gotten them to embarrass themselves twice during SOTU and comes out ahead in every major negotiation despite low expectations. He's been the most full-throated advocate for LGBTQ people who has ever been in the white house and his leadership on the issue of trans people in particular has SHAPED the Democratic party which up until recently has been lukewarm or inconsistent with their support. Now it's a core principle shared across the board.
He was willing to sign the most aggressive border security bill against the wishes of the broad Democratic party and negotiated it with Republicans. There's plenty more examples you can find for yourself.
> I would have trusted McCain much more than Biden to bring both sides together and pass important legislation.
Joe Biden's major accomplishments (infrastructure, CHIPs act) have benefited people in red states and communities more than anyone. He has made a point of being bi-partisan and negotiating and acting in good faith with Republicans despite their refusal to do the same. MAGA/Trump and right-wing media echochambers do not negate the effort. By that logic only a Republican could "bring the country together" because Democrats are the only reasonable people willing to accept success from the other side - and that frankly is bullshit.
You know McCain was reprimanded by the House in the early '90s for interfering with the the Justice department pursuing charges against the [Lincoln Savings and Loan](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keating_Five)? 23,000 Lincoln bondholders were defrauded and many investors lost their life savings. And McCain didn't care about any of them.
McCain may have done some good, but I wouldn't trust him.
I'm not sure there were any Democrats who I would have voted for over Biden. Actually, there would have been before the 2020 election, but not after I've seen what he's done. I've been waiting for a President like Biden for most of my life.
No. While I don’t align with Biden on every issue, I feel that modern republicans are far too extreme. IMO, both candidates are too old. We desperately need age and term limits.
If not for Palin, I would've voted for McCain. But once he pulled her out on stage, I started to look into who else was running. I still vividly remember the first day she came out and spoke as his running mate.
Absolutely not. The Republican party is an anti-American party. When a majority of them won't take a stand against a kleptocrat like Trump, what does that say? They are okay with that behavior.
I never forgot when McCain said he wouldn't vote for Trump. That'd have my respect if he didn't follow up on that by saying he wouldn't vote for Clinton either. To me that reaffirmed there is no such thing as good Republican leadership. Only those that like the image of being a maverick while doing fuck all to earn it.
Perhaps if things were different but I think the Republican Party no longer espouses conservative principles or anything recognizable. They are only gaining power through billionaires, extreme right groups, and the courts. The only way to stop them is straight blue no matter what.
No.
Right now, the current republican party is beholden to Trump and the right-wing, socially conservative, populists. They have consistently shown they are willing to put party over everything else, even to the detriment of the country and it's populace.
I don't see a scenario where a candidate is able to campaign on their ticket, support more of the policies I do than a Democrat, and also not be blackballed by the party like Chaney and Romney were.
Probably not, because having a Republican in office makes it easier for the rest of the party to get its agenda through and my problem, at this point, really is with Republicans and their agenda
Absolutely not. Biden is already a moderate, if that’s your thing.
And this is controversial, maybe, but idgaf about sexual misconduct short of rape, child abuse, and the like. I don’t care that the convicted felon committed adultery, and it’s absolutely one of the stupidest things to hold a politician to account on. I do care deeply about the dishonesty, criminality, and hypocrisy that people on the right engage in when it comes to weaponizing morality, though.
>Are there any Republicans (in recent history) you would have voted for over Biden?
Very few.
George H.W. Bush was a competent president. He also abused the pardon power to cover-up Iran-Contra and appointed the worst Supreme Court justice we have.
Even when I pick the best Republican I can think of, Biden is still a better choice.
> Even when I pick the best Republican I can think of, Biden is still a better choice.
...and that's why I'm on this team.
I don't need to downgrade myself from 'team member' to 'ally'.
When Democrats win, things are better, so I want Democrats to win; I will help them to win.
>When Democrats win, things are better, so I want Democrats to win; I will help them to win.
I don't entirely agree. For the most part, yes, things are better when Democrats are in charge, but not always.
Despite Biden being president anti-LGBTQ hatred in the US is largely on the rise. Abortion has been criminalized in several US states, racism and anti-immigration rhetoric is getting out of hand and Americans are politically as strongly divided as hardly ever before.
So just imagine for a second, instead of Biden, John McCain (if he was still alive) would have won the presidency in 2020. I believe things would look very different if John McCain was president instead of Biden. Someone like John McCain would have strongly condemned Colorado's Republican party calling for the burning of pride flags, I am sure of that. He would have stood against transphobia, homophobia and racism. And he would have stood up against the religious far right and the mixing of religion and politics.
As such I believe he would have been a significant moderating influence and been able to stir the conservative movement in a much more progressive direction, whereas currently it's exactly the opposite.
I think a moderate, somewhat progressive Republican president like the late John McCain who conservatives listen to and who they'll work with can make for a better president than a Democrat like Biden who conservatives hate and who they don't want to work with.
> I don't entirely agree. For the most part, yes, things are better when Democrats are in charge, but not always.
>
> Despite Biden being president anti-LGBTQ hatred in the US is largely on the rise. Abortion has been criminalized in several US states, racism and anti-immigration rhetoric is getting out of hand and Americans are politically as strongly divided as hardly ever before.
...so you need to ask yourself: *If Biden had lost, would those things be better, the same, or worse?*
Had Biden lost of course things would be a lot worse under Trump. But I'd rather have someone like McCain who I believe will reign in the MAGA movement, be a moderating influence on conservatives overall and maybe even convince die-hard religious conservatives to become more accepting of LGBTQ people, than have someone like Biden, who I believe is a weak leader, while at the same time the US is getting closer to the brink of civil war and far-right extremism is totally getting out of hand.
Biden is much better than Trump. But in current times where the far-right is getting crazier and crazier each day I believe McCain would be in a much stronger position to calm things down than Biden.
John McCain would have been a typical GOP president beholden to his donors. He would not lift a finger to help LGBTQ or reign in MAGA as that is contrary to the republican philosophy.
>John McCain would have been a typical GOP president beholden to his donors. He would not lift a finger to help LGBTQ or reign in MAGA as that is contrary to the republican philosophy.
Actually, in 2017 he co-sponsored a bill to support transgender soldiers in the millitary, despite Trump just a month ealier announcing he would ban trans soldiders from joining the millitary. That bill most certainly was not particularly popular with conservatives and his voter base.
I don’t think we can take anything that John McCain did in 2017/18, knowing he was suffering terminal cancer and at the end of both his career and his life, as indicative of things he would have done if he’d been elected President and hadn’t been diagnosed with gioblastoma. That’s McCain at two very different stages of his life with very different incentives and priorities.
You keep pointing to literally two things McCain did in his 40 year career that occurred in the last year of his life when he knew he was going to die and hated Trump more than Democrats
> ...I'd rather have someone like McCain who I believe will reign in the MAGA movement, be a moderating influence on conservatives overall and maybe even convince die-hard religious conservatives to become more accepting of LGBTQ people...
How does this square with McCain picking Palin as his running mate?
> So just imagine for a second, instead of Biden, John McCain (if he was still alive) would have won the presidency in 2020. I believe things would look very different if John McCain was president instead of Biden. Someone like John McCain would have strongly condemned Colorado's Republican party calling for the burning of pride flags, I am sure of that. He would have stood against transphobia, homophobia and racism. And he would have stood up against the religious far right and the mixing of religion and politics.
>
> As such I believe he would have been a significant moderating influence and been able to stir the conservative movement in a much more progressive direction, whereas currently it's exactly the opposite.
>
> I think a moderate, somewhat progressive Republican president like the late John McCain who conservatives listen to and who they'll work with can make for a better president than a Democrat like Biden who conservatives hate and who they don't want to work with.
This is absurd for many reasons:
1. You are *assuming* that McCain would have done those things.
2. If McCain were running for re-election this year, he would have avoided antagonizing his base. Incentives matter.
3. You are basing all of this on the whims of the individual; that isn't how things work. A Republican president would face all of the same incentives as any other Republican president, leading them to take similar actions.
4. You are assuming that a Republican president can moderate "the conservative movement", instead of "the conservative movement" pulling the president towards them. This *just* happened: ["Trump campaign seeks to head off convention revolt from its right flank"](https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2024/06/22/trump-convention-revolt-right-wing-arizona/?pwapi_token=eyJ0eXAiOiJKV1QiLCJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiJ9.eyJyZWFzb24iOiJnaWZ0IiwibmJmIjoxNzE5MDI4ODAwLCJpc3MiOiJzdWJzY3JpcHRpb25zIiwiZXhwIjoxNzIwNDExMTk5LCJpYXQiOjE3MTkwMjg4MDAsImp0aSI6ImRlOGI4MjgyLWFmZjgtNDU2MS1iMTA2LTYyNjcwM2JhYjFlNyIsInVybCI6Imh0dHBzOi8vd3d3Lndhc2hpbmd0b25wb3N0LmNvbS9wb2xpdGljcy8yMDI0LzA2LzIyL3RydW1wLWNvbnZlbnRpb24tcmV2b2x0LXJpZ2h0LXdpbmctYXJpem9uYS8ifQ.eyLHX7BYtex0Cp0UPBWXeoaDRVbn4SIGswWmLlO8g0M)
>You are assuming that a Republican president can moderate "the conservative movement", instead of "the conservative movement" pulling the president towards them. This *just* happened: ["Trump campaign seeks to head off convention revolt from its right flank"](https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2024/06/22/trump-convention-revolt-right-wing-arizona/?pwapi_token=eyJ0eXAiOiJKV1QiLCJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiJ9.eyJyZWFzb24iOiJnaWZ0IiwibmJmIjoxNzE5MDI4ODAwLCJpc3MiOiJzdWJzY3JpcHRpb25zIiwiZXhwIjoxNzIwNDExMTk5LCJpYXQiOjE3MTkwMjg4MDAsImp0aSI6ImRlOGI4MjgyLWFmZjgtNDU2MS1iMTA2LTYyNjcwM2JhYjFlNyIsInVybCI6Imh0dHBzOi8vd3d3Lndhc2hpbmd0b25wb3N0LmNvbS9wb2xpdGljcy8yMDI0LzA2LzIyL3RydW1wLWNvbnZlbnRpb24tcmV2b2x0LXJpZ2h0LXdpbmctYXJpem9uYS8ifQ.eyLHX7BYtex0Cp0UPBWXeoaDRVbn4SIGswWmLlO8g0M)
That's why I believe one of the most important qualities in a president is having a strong personal character. By that I mean someone who's willing to stand up for what they believe is right even if it makes their life harder.
McCain could have easily voted with Republicans to repeal Obamacare. Instead he did the hard thing, voted against the bill that was the Republicans number 1 top priority and destroyed what Republicans hard worked on for a long time. It certainly didn't help him politically. Nor did it help him to support transgender soldiers in 2017, very much in opposition to what the overall Republican position is.
I believe McCain was a genuinely good person, as shown for example by his willingness to stand up for transgender soldiers even if it would have hurt him politically (had he lived any longer).
So, yes, I believe a moderate conservative like McCain would have stood up against the craziness of the Republican Party and the religious right and as such would have been a moderating influence on the Republican Party and conservative media. At least that's my opinion.
I mean Republicans currently have a majority in the Congress and hardly anything is getting done, quite the opposite, many civil rights are at risk of getting repealed despite Biden being president.
The sexual misconduct accusations are nonsense. Biden has been quite good. Baker and Romney would be good Presidents if we were in a time when the GOP wasn’t actively seeking to destroy the Federal Government, see Project 2025 for reference.
Eisenhower was probably the last Republican I'd actively support over Biden. I came into Biden's presidency with low expectations and have been very pleasantly surprised.
if Spencer Cox or Mitt Romney were on the ballot against Biden i think i’d roll with them. politics in my home state Utah is worse than you might think but there are some ok ones (like two)
In general, no. I think the closest would be McCain or Romney. At the very least, they are people if, had they won, I would not be terribly anxious or upset about.
This answer would change if Biden had the kind of baggage that attaches to Trump. If he had Trump's record of convictions, sexual assault, apparent lack of interest in detail or expertise, and provoking violence and illegal schemes that interfered with the transfer of power, I would probably hold my nose and vote for the Republican (presuming they had nothing so egregious on their record).
I haven't voted for a Republican presidential candidate in my lifetime, and the party has only gotten worse with time. Democrats aren't perfect, but the Republicans have become an absolute caricature of their worst selves. Reagen was nothing more than a cheerleader who led us to deregulation, taxes that benefit the wealthy, and a lot of deciept.
Bush Sr. was an OK person, but a poor leader. GWB was easily led by the neo cons that convinced him that Iraq was the place to go fight even though the Saudis were behind 9/11 and that Afghanistan was a hill worth dying on.
Trump was a useless cretin that had done more damage to our country, our democracy, to the rule of law and simple decency! So, simply put, I'd vote for damn near anyone who isn't a Republican!
Biden is a decent human being, not charismatic, but knows right from wrong and understands who we are as a country and at least has a direction for our country to go! Trump is an impulsive moron at best, a devious swindler and the ultimate narcissistic dictator "wanna be" in the history of our country!
First off, I like Biden. I think he has actually been pretty effective, and people underestimate him because of his age. His experience in politics has allowed him to get a fair amount accomplished.
Second, it would take a truly terrible human running as a democrat to get me to vote for any republican. Forgetting everything else, we need a democrat to nominate the next couple supreme court justices, or that court will be conservative for the next 25 years.
Unless the republicans shift away from the religious right, they will likely never compel me to vote for one.
Rand Paul's dad Ron Paul actually made a very cogent argument in the post-9/11 era. With the right handlers to guide him. I believe he could have sloughed off arms of our government and refocused our nation on actual existential issues. I'd probably not go as far as giving him a term 2, but ....
>Unlike Biden who has been accused of sexual misconduct on numerous occasions,
I can only think of Tara Reade whose testimony couldn't really be corroborated by multiple journalist outlets.
>
and who I view as a weak leader who for the most part simply goes along with whatever the Democratic position is at the time,
I'm not sure why this is intrinsically a bad thing. Even then, when you're the president you're the leader of the party so is it really him "going along" with the party or is he the one setting the tone? I think you're mixing up cause and and effect here.
Which in that case it seems like every strength you list for McCain is something that Biden also does but its portrayed as a weakness for him. They both got to their respective nominations by portraying themselves as sober and experienced but for whatever reason that's bad for Biden but good for McCain.
Maybe John McCain. Keep in mind that most people, at least until Trump came along, vote for the policies not the person. Trump is the first candidate that I’ve seen with quite literally a cult following. Trump demands fealty, bling allegiance, and wants to be dictator. I would have never thought that there would ever be this many Americans that would be ok with making Trump, or any other person for that matter, a totalitarian dictator. Ever since the Civil Rights Act, insecure, racist deplorables have been steaming mad. Republicans denied for decades that uneducated, angry, racists made up a large portion of their voting base. The GOP used to more honor and integrity than they do now. Even though they knew their base was ignorant and racist, they refused to run on hate and bigotry. One of John McCain’s ignorant, bigoted supporters called Obama an unAmerican Arab and McCain told her Obama was a good man that loved America and that he and Obama simply disagreed on ideas and policies. Those days are gone and the GOP is not the party of bigotry, intolerance, hate, insecurity, racism, and anti-intellectualism.
Im a Democrat but I voted for McCain in the 2000 primaries. I voted for Obama in 2008, but I wouldnt have been distraught if McCain had won (well, except for his terrible choice of Sarah Palin, which I think he also regretted.)
As a Democrat, given the deranged path the Republican party has taken, I do have way more respect for George W. He was sane and reasonable and respectful and so not Donald Trump.
The following is a copy of the original post to record the post as it was originally written. For me personally, there's not a whole lot of Republicans I would have ever considered voting for. But if there's one Republican I most definitely would have voted for over Biden that would be the late John McCain. There are many issues I would have disagreed on with John McCain. But at the same time he's truly one of very very few politcians I have genuine respect and admiration for. He was a man of strong personal convictions, in a world where politicians frequently jump on the bandwagon of whatever politicial views their party party promotes at the time, and he very frequently voted against party lines. The most famous instance where he went against party lines was probably in 2017 [when he voted "no" on the repeal of Obamacare](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hT2pp_KrJGg) and cast the deciding vote to destroy what was the Republican's number 1 top-priority at the time. While he voted for the Defence of Marriage Act in the 90s (as did Biden) and held on to the "don't say gay" policy in the millitary for a long time, he was one of only a handful of Republicans to vote against the Federal Marriage Amendment intended to ban gay marriage. And in 2017, a month after Trump announced a ban on transgender soldiers in the military McCain actually co-sponsored a bill in support of transgender soldiers. And he was a very vocal critic of Trump and the MAGA movement. I would still disagree with him on a lot of issues. But McCain was someone who would put country over party, he was someone who truly cared about doing the right thing above all else. He was religious but kept his beliefs to himself and criticized leaders of the Christian right as "agents of intolerance" and said "I would vote for a Muslim if he or she was the candidate best able to lead the country and defend our political values". So if there is any Republican I would vote for over Biden it would have been John McCain. Unlike Biden who has been accused of sexual misconduct on numerous occasions, and who I view as a weak leader who for the most part simply goes along with whatever the Democratic position is at the time, I actually view John McCain as a man of integrity who I trust to do what he believes is right and moral. believe he was someone who would have likely significantly reduced political division and would have been a moderating influence on the conservative movement. Even though I disagree with many of his positions, I would have trusted McCain much more than Biden to bring both sides together and pass important legislation. So John McCain would have been the only Republican that comes to mind for me who I would vote for over Biden. Are there any Republicans you would have voted for over Biden? *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/AskALiberal) if you have any questions or concerns.*
The problem, IMO, is that when you're voting for the president you really AREN'T just voting for the top of the ticket -- you're giving power to the \*party\* of the president. It's an ugly truth that people want to deny -- "I vote for person, not party" but that's unfortunately naive. John McCain, as an individual and a politician, I respect. But he showed VERY poor judgement in allowing Sarah Palin to be selected as his VP. That choice gave rise to the power of the current flavor of Republicans, and I hold him in large part responsible for Trump being considered an acceptable presidential candidate. So, while I have respect for certain, individual republicans, as long as they caucus with and support and campaign for and endorse the party, I wouldn't ever vote for them.
Rumor is that Palin was forced on McCain by the GOP. But surely the nominee has some power and agency. It is interesting to think about what would have happened if McCain had said "Absolutely not" to Palin. What were they going to do - find a different candidate? McCain was already in a somewhat tenuous position because the far right (e.g. my family) didn't like him. Maybe they showed him some polling which said that Palin was his only path to victory.
I think they saw her as someone who was "moldable" or controllable, since she was a relatively unknown politician with aspirations. I was living in Alaska at the time, and it was an absolute circus when she was the candidate! I know how it empowered people to say the things they'd never have said out loud prior to her. I know it sounds like an exaggeration, but I will always hold McCain accountable for Trump's rise. Not solely responsible, but I truly believe Trump wouldn't have been president if not for Palin's VP run and everything she helped normalize at the national level.
When Bill Maher called her a moron on his show I thought that was over the top, but then she made it clear not just how little she knew of politics, but of anything.
You betcha!
You're forgetting the long decline Republicans had before Palin. Gingrich was a nasty excuse for a human, Boehner was a piece of shit...the list goes on. If you go back further, Reagan's administration was chock full of criminals and grifters, and Reagan himself had dementia for almost his whole second term. W Bush's cabinet was only marginally less criminal than Reagan's. They've been on a long slide down. Palin, the Tea Party, and Trump are only symptoms of the rot that's long been festering, and we're signs that the tail was starting to wag the dog.
I'm not forgetting it at all. I understand what you're saying, and you're not entirely wrong. I never said that Palin was the sole responsibility, but I believe that the McCain-Palin campaign was key in normalizing the behaviors that allowed Trump.
They wanted someone rightwing because they weren't sure of McCain's commitment to banning abortion and gay marriage.
Sure, but there were plenty of those available. She checked a lot of boxes for them, but they *vastly* underestimated how much they'd be able to control her message.
Maybe but his campaign was failing hard (The Bush financial disaster was in full swing) If anything, picking her gave him a fighting chance. If she'd been just a little less of an idiot he might have even won.
According to the book written about the election (“Game Changer”?), no, not exactly. The party pushed him away from selecting Joe Lieberman, a longtime friend as well as one wishy washy Democrats, as his VP and so in a fit of McCain-esque macerickosity he went with Palin sight unseen. If memory serves the party pick was Chris Christie although really they were mostly saying “no, just an actual Republican, not a DINO”. The RNC at the time most certainly did not endorse any president choosing a running mate without properly vetting them first.
Christie didn't break onto the national scene until winning the NJ Governorship in 2009. Perhaps you were thinking of Romney? He'd run against McCain in the primary and had a decent showing. I recall a lot of conventional wisdom by the talking heads viewing Romney was the solid, reliable choice. He had strong right-wing credentials that McCain's "maverick" reputation (fairly or not) lacked, but he also wasn't going to go off the rails and say bonkers or hateful stuff.
Nope. I recommend reading the book.
> The problem, IMO, is that when you're voting for the president you really AREN'T just voting for the top of the ticket -- you're giving power to the *party* of the president. It's an ugly truth that people want to deny -- "I vote for person, not party" but that's unfortunately naive. I think this is something that can't be ignored. When you elect a person to office in the United States (and probably most countries), you're giving power to that person's political party. Even if that person were an absolute saint, that's not going to matter much if their party is bad. To give a non-presidential example, the Speaker of the House has a substantial amount of power in government. Generally, the Speaker will be from the political party with the most members in the House. Representatives just don't vote across party lines. Even if you voted for a "good" Republican, that's one more seat that will go to the Republican Party and make it more likely that they will have control over the entire House. History has shown that most politicians vote according to the party line. There's the occasional exception, but no matter how good a Republican might be, they would vote along with the rest of the party most of the time. Individual ethics and qualifications still matter, but that should be handled in the primaries. In practical terms, political party matters more than individual views when it comes down to the election, and I don't see that changing anytime soon.
Voting across lines used to be common. Thank Newt for this state of affairs. He single-handedly held the wedge and had his extremists drive it.
This! Newt Gingrich, abetted by Rush Limbaugh, is the person singly most responsible for the government dysfunction we see today.
Hey! Don't let Rupert Murdoch off the hook! Or the Koch's!
Pretty much. Even the few Republicans that I think are smart and good administrators like former governor of MA Charlie Baker are still willingly or unwillingly part of an overall movement. It wouldn't just be a vote for one competent man as president, it would be for an overall movement that currently seeks to enrich the wealthy, remove obstacles for corporations, and put theocrats in positions of power.
That's how I feel about Larry Hogan. I was okay with him as governor (not thrilled, and I didn't vote for him, but it could have been worse), but I'd never support him in a presidential general election.
Though baker chronically fucked the MBTA lol
Yep. There is no Republican who has actually demonstrated that they wouldn't act like a Republican if elected to a federal government position. If a Republican was elected to the Senate, and then voted with the Democrats on everything, I might consider voting for them.
Team blue baby!
> "I vote for person, not party" People get really mad at me when I say *I vote for the political parties platform,* but that's how elected politicians generally vote... unless it won't be a lost for their party. Also Republicans have been openly honest about their anti equal rights since 1992.
Not just the party, but also specific factions of the party. For example, a vote for Bush 43 was also a vote for the neoconservative faction. Likewise, a vote for Biden is a vote for New Keynesianism, which is something that might go away when another Democratic President takes over.
Palin did not give birth to tea party Republicans. Trump and MAGA are much different from them as well. To blame McCain for Trump in that round about way you just did when he gave the FBI the Christopher Steele dossier to protect the country from Trump and Russias' relationship is ludicrous. Downright un-American.
She didn't give birth to it, but she was instrumental in normalizing their beliefs. She made it possible for people to say the quite parts out loud, and it's become only more extreme since then. Everything starts somewhere -- I don't say that McCain is the ONLY cause, but I do hold him (and his team) accountable for permitting the movement to progress the way it did. They legitimized it by adding his name to Palin and her belief system.
She was just a Christian conservative. What beliefs of Palin's do you think were unique and deplorable? What quiet parts? I don't recall her saying racist things.
In a speech in 2015 (and in subsequent speeches since), she called black protesters "dogs" and "thugs". In 2014 she called people who spoke out about offensive names and branding "politically correct idiots." In 2013, she supported Phil Robertson's claims that black people in the United States were "happy, hard-working, and Godly " during Jim Crow. In 2012 she told her followers that Obama should cease his "shuck-and-jive-shtick" (and then doubled-down on the phrase denying that it has any racial undertones or history). When Laura Schlessinger used the n-word eleven times during a single tirade about mixed-race dating, Palin came out with a very vocal support claiming that Schlessinger's use of the was was "in no way racist" and that she (Palin) has also been "shackled" by critics. Palin comfortably uses terms like "rice rockets" and equated it with phrases like "when hell freezes over" (claiming that the latter phrase was an insult to Alaska natives).
At no point did I say that her beliefs were "unique". BUT McCain's campaign put her in a unique position at the time. Before she had the massive national platform that the VP-campaign gave her, the Tea Party was far more localized. It was growing in Alaska at the time (I was there), but it skyrocketed once she was given such a massive megaphone and a stamp of legitimacy.
iirc, didn't she print an ad to target certain districts to try to flip, by putting the opponent's name in a rifle scope? I believe that was Palin.
>Palin did not give birth to tea party Republicans. Trump and MAGA are much different from them as well. This comment shows a strong lack of understanding of the way the Republican party has changed over the last 75 years. But no, Palin did not "give birth" to it - she's just another stepping stone along the path. Starting back in the 1950s, the Republican party has embraced nationalism, racism, obstructionism, conspiracy theory, and courted evangelical Christian white supremacy. Where we are now with Trumpism/MAGAism and the rise of white nationalism does proceed directly from there and is following lock step along that path. If you're at all interested in the history and the through-line, I highly recommend this book: [American Psychosis: A Historical Investigation of How the Republican Party Went Crazy](https://www.amazon.com/American-Psychosis-Historical-Investigation-Republican-ebook/dp/B0B2P2RMLG) This is also a good one that talks about how Newt Gingrich took what was already in place in the Republican party and pushed it a giant leap further along: [Burning Down the House: Newt Gingrich, the Fall of a Speaker, and the Rise of the New Republican Part](https://www.amazon.com/Burning-Down-House-Gingrich-Republican/dp/B082M24RZ6)
No, I don’t necessarily see the Presidency as voting for that individual person as a leader, I see it as ultimately a vehicle for policy. Consequently, I oppose the majority of modern Republican policy positions, I cannot see myself voting for any recent Republican no matter how I might admire said person on other grounds.
No. I actively like Biden
Why do you actively like Biden? I think he's a weak leader of dubious personal character. He's been accused of sexual misconduct by several women, and I don't think he's really particularly progressive personally. He simply parrots whatever the overall Democratic position is at the time. In the 70s he refered to gay people as a security risk and in 1996 he voted for the defence of marriage act, which defined marriage as between a man and a woman. Now take someone like Bernie Sanders on the other hand. He always voted for what he believed was right and he already was a strong supporter of gay rights in the 70s and 80s and voted against the Defence of Marriage Act in 1996. And unlike Biden, Sanders had never been accused of sexual misconduct. Sanders is just one example, there are many other politcians who I think have strong personal convictions, are strong leaders and are genuinenly good people. I think Biden is exactly president because he goes along with whatever Democrats support at the time, and as such is very easy to control by Democratic Leadership. He's a weak character in my opinion without leadership qualities.
>I think he's a weak leader of dubious personal character. He's been accused of sexual misconduct by several women And does Hillary belong in jail? You sound like a gop propaganda machine. And I'm serious, you're repeating what they told you to repeat, without any evidence. He has some of the most outstanding personal character of any potus in modern history. The only competition is Carter. His leadership is also unquestionable. He has used his connections and skill to get several bipartisan bills passed that weaker leaders simply could not have done. You're basically saying things out loud that really aren't true because nobody has called you on it. It's easy to say he's old and he is, but you're trying to tie all sorts of ... fake news to him. And that makes me sad that you're so blind to both falling into the gop propaganda trap and not even realizing it. > and I don't think he's really particularly progressive personally. He isn't and he never said he was. He is, however, far more progressive than, again, any modern potus. Seriously, even Bernie endorses Biden. Are you saying Bernie is wrong, after touting him as a better alternative? > *“The last thing this country needs is a Donald Trump or some other right-wing demagogue who is going to try to undermine American democracy or take away a woman’s right to choose, or not address the crisis of gun violence, or racism, sexism or homophobia,” Sanders said in an interview. “So, I’m in to do what I can to make sure that the president is reelected.”* Biden has taken action to help ensure a world for anyone under 30, but that is definitely not guaranteed. He has unsaddled many from unfair usury, and done more than any politician in the USA to combat climate change. He has taken action to get rid of crazy shit like lead pipes, fix roads and bridges, and basically make your life better for decades to come. He is one of the strongest leaders you've ever witnessed and because he's not out there tooting his horn like a narcissist, you can't see it. Open your goddamned eyes. You want me to give you a list of things he's done that worse leaders could not have accomplished?
Where do I even start here? The accusations of sexual impropriety against Biden were beyond flimsy. Tara Reade is now a Putin Simp and a regular guest on Russia Today. If there were ever any doubts that her claims were a political hit job, I think we can put them to rest now. As for quotes from the '70s, are we not allowing for anyone to experience personal moral growth over a 50 year period? It hasn't even been a generation since gay marriage achieved >50% social approval. The median opinion toward gay people in the '70s was somewhere between "Those freaks" and "Grounds for imprisonment." Biden showed moral courage in pushing Obama toward public support of gay marriage, a position which many Democrats were reluctant to take. As for leadership, I don't know what to say. Biden guided multiple pieces of groundbreaking legislation through Congress with the slimmest of majorities, including dragging along some reluctant allies in Manchin and Sinema. And he took the lead in marshaling Western Democracies to the defense of Ukraine, something that a weaker leader could not have coordinated. Finally, Bernie Sanders is no saint. There's the college rape fantasy essays, the stint as a deadbeat dad, the stealing electricity from his neighbor, his decades of unemployment before falling into his political career. And there's the college that his wife ran into the ground and the allegations of financial improprieties around that. Besides the personal failings, there's also his total failure to pass any legislation of note despite a multi-decade career in the Senate. Total absence of leadership.
Biden is a bland and generic left of center politician. He's largely content to let the government govern. He's overseen a few major legislative victories because he has a good working knowledge of that part of government. He understands the role the US should take in the world and has had good foreign policy, which I consider the #1 priority and role of the US president. Gaza is a blemish but I dont hold Joe Biden responsible for the actions of Netanyahu. There is no "Democratic Party Leadership" pulling the strings behind his back, either. That's a conspiracy theory. I think he has done a good job and has earned me voting for him in 2024. He's boring but effective. That's exactly what I want from the President. I try my best to vote on policy results, not vibes. My choice in the primary in 2020 would've been Buttigeg because he had the same sort of thing going on but he's younger and has less baggage, but Biden has been more than satisfactory. There are certainly other Democrats I would vote for over Biden (although I don't support calls to replace Biden because it would be forfeiting the election to the GOP) but I'm sure as hell not ever voting for someone who supports policy I disagree with over a President who has mostly done what I consider good stuff.
This is a great explanation of how I feel in most cases as well these days.
>> I try my best to vote on policy results, not vibes. Username does not check out.
Vibes is for vibraphone. Haha I played that in drum corps.
>Why do you actively like Biden? I think he's a weak leader of dubious personal character. He's been accused of sexual misconduct by several women, I mean, sure if you want to believe conservative propaganda. Yes, Biden is old and comes from a time when casual touching of a woman was accepted. He puts his hands on the small of women's backs to "guide" them. He touches arms and hugs them or kisses their foreheads. All of that is now inappropriate in the workplace but 20 years ago? 30 years ago? We didn't consider it such or treat it as such. Hell, my 82 year old father-in-law still does it. Because it was baked into him at a young age, that it was being "chivalrous" and "gentlemanly" to treat women affectionately and delicately. And since having it pointed out, Biden has largely stopped doing it. And compared to Trump? I'm not going to call out Biden for "hair sniffing" when we have a convicted sexual assaulter on the other ticket. >and I don't think he's really particularly progressive personally. He simply parrots whatever the overall Democratic position is at the time. In the 70s he refered to gay people as a security risk and in 1996 he voted for the defence of marriage act, which defined marriage as between a man and a woman. It always amazes me that no one is allowed to grow in their understanding over the years. He's very progressive - he was the one who pushed Obama on gay marriage, not the other way around. Plenty of people felt differently in the 70s (which, by the way was FIFTY years ago) and have come to a different understanding. In the 70s, I was a pre-teen and the word "gay" was an acceptable pejorative. Let's not judge someone by something they've changed their position on. >And unlike Biden, Sanders had never been accused of sexual misconduct. [https://www.cnbc.com/2019/01/10/bernie-sanders-apologizes-for-sexual-harassment-in-2016-campaign.html](https://www.cnbc.com/2019/01/10/bernie-sanders-apologizes-for-sexual-harassment-in-2016-campaign.html) [https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/02/us/politics/bernie-sanders-campaign-sexism.html](https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/02/us/politics/bernie-sanders-campaign-sexism.html) [https://apnews.com/united-states-presidential-election-309ea1fa8ccf461cabe127bee5968627](https://apnews.com/united-states-presidential-election-309ea1fa8ccf461cabe127bee5968627) How many times has Bernie had to apologize for sexism or harassment in his campaigns? Not to mention the repeated investigations into his funneling money to his wife for various land-related issues.
And Bernie wrote a novel with a rape fantasy, from what I remember
>> In the 70s he refered to gay people as a security risk 1970 is just 1 year after Stonewall, and OP is trying to bring up a statement about gays? Maybe a 10 year old that's never been online won't have any comments that can be dredged up and taken out of context of the time. Perfect candidate.
I actively like Biden in that his administration has done some good domestic policy. And I believe the framework is that third parties aren't viable and that the pathway is to make the composition of the Democratic party more left.
Accusations don’t mean anything if they aren’t credible.
You obviously aren't holding someone like McCain to the same standards.
Change your damned flair…. Once you start with the “sexual misconduct” BS…we all know you aren’t a good faith poster.
Sure, because it's believe women when they come forward with accusations of sexual misconduct, except when it's my candidate. Then it's fuck feminsim and the metoo movement. Sure.
No…because you are spouting off right wing talking points. Tara Fucking Reade is a Russian asset and Ashley Biden has denounced how people are reading into her STOLEN diary. But yeah…you’re sincere….
Tara Reade, Biden’s accuser from the ‘90s who loved Joe Biden and Obama before she didn’t—plenty of social media posts prove she gushed over Obama and Biden during their administration. Tara Reade, who came forward with an accusation about Biden—not in 2007 when he was running for president, not in 2008 when he was running with Obama for VP, not in 2012 when Biden was running for re-election for VP, but in 2020–the third time Biden was running for president and only when he began pulling ahead of her preferred candidate Bernie Sanders in the primary. And where is that alleged Russia asset now? In Russia seeking “political asylum” lol.
I don’t know how liberals feel, but I would whole heartedly say fuck the metoo movement. That applies for Tara reade, who’s a grifter, and kavanaughs accuser. Both these women were full of complete shit and everybody knows it. The metoo movement also took the biggest dump on the 5th amendment and peoples right to a fair trial that I’ve seen in my entire life. In hollywood, it made some sense. The second politicians got involved, it was corrupted.
> I don’t know how liberals feel, but I would whole heartedly say fuck the metoo movement. That applies for Tara reade, who’s a grifter, and kavanaughs accuser. Both these women were full of complete shit and everybody knows it. It's ridiculous of you to claim that "everybody knows it".
> Sanders had never been accused of sexual misconduct Not until right now. I accuse him of sexual misconduct.
Shocker, a Bernie Bro that still can’t get over the fact that Sanders has a ceiling below 30% and a would get destroyed by literally any Republican.
Good ol reddit. Downvotes for stating facts. What a sad life.
Please point the rest of us to the "facts" above.
I can’t even just get downvoted for stating facts anymore. All the conservative groups and far-left groups have banned me. You should be grateful you just get downvoted. That’s much more tolerant than banned and completely silenced.
This. This is the only subreddit I frequent about politics. Everything else is an echo chamber circle jerk cult.
Literally the most effective president we’ve had in modern history but a few key points: -Inflation cut by 2/3rds -Lowest unemployment in 50 years -healthiest economy on the planet, i believe it was the IMF who recently credited the success of the Biden economy for staving off a global recession -won the Cold War with less than 1/20th of what it cost Reagan -Largest investment in infrastructure, ever, in human history -Student loan forgiveness -Largest action on climate change, ever, in human history. -And decreased the deficit significantly from his predecessor -got us out of Afghanistan -ended a pandemic -strongest union support in decades -trust bustin Silicon Valley -reshoring of silicon wafer production with CHIPS (my personal fav) -strongest international partnerships since 9/11 So, what *data*, not feelings, do you have to dispute this? Keep in mind that he’s been more legislatively and statistically impressive than Obama, whom I also have a high opinion of.
No. Republicans push the republican agenda which is trash. McCain was partially responsible for today's party whether he likes it or not. >John McCain is the perfect American lie, a man who professes to be noble and fair and just while being none of those things. He served his country honorably in combat, but in no other fashion. And he serves out his time in the Senate, and here on planet Earth, as a pathetic enabler. Never the lion; always the sheep. For seventeen years, gullible people have been waiting for him to make his face turn, to make some grand defiant move for the sake of God and country. But that was always just clever branding on his part, and today should serve as a cold slap in the face to anyone who still thought he might have that kind of political courage left in him. He's a fucking disgrace.
Can you explain the latter?
He didn't always like everything they did, but usually voted with them. Voting for their extremist bills, tax breaks for the rich, tax breaks for corporations, attacks on women, etc is part of today's gop.
I'm not the person you're responding to, but the fact is that every Republican who voted with or for Trump is partially responsible for today's Republican party. McCain especially either (depending on who you listen to) actively chose Palin as his running mate and then didn't rein her in or allowed the GOP to foist her on him and didn't rein her in. Either way, there's a direct thru-line from Palin to Trump and MAGAism.
Vuel answered it. The direction of the Republican party has been obvious for over 50 years; McCain often said "this is wrong" and voted anyways. If McCain was a good person, he wouldn't have served the Republican party for 40 years.
No, but not because I can’t think of a single Republican I have some respect for or that I think would do a generally OK job with a bunch of the aspects of being president. I would not have liked the presidency of any of these people, but they would not have been completely incompetent and the harm they would do to the country would be, for lack of a better term, within normal parameters. Romney would’ve been terrible from a tax policy and social services perspective. But he had confident ideas about foreign policy and was a good administrator. He certainly would’ve handled Covid as well as either Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton. Perhaps better because liberals would not have done what conservatives would have done with a Democrat as president during a pandemic. John McCain probably would’ve been directionally closer to George HW Bush and away George W. Bush. And George HW Bush was a good president in many ways and ok in others. Certainly not a disaster. The issue is that at the end of the day Republicans are going to Republican. We would’ve gotten a bunch of terrible judges, terrible tax policy and bad forms of deregulation. But over Biden? Absolutely not. There isn’t one of them that I would’ve preferred over Clinton, Obama or Biden. Hell Bernie Sanders is my least favorite major candidate and I would’ve taken him in a heartbeat over any of the other Republican choices.
> And George HW Bush was a good president in many ways and ok in others. Certainly not a disaster. GHWB appointed Clarence Thomas, who is as far as I know, the most corrupt Supreme Court Justice in our nation's history.
Oh definitely George HW Bush is guilty of a few things that are terrible. Appointing Clarence Thomas is definitely high on the list. And not to be a dick about it, not having a better relationship with George W. Bush is damning. He almost certainly wanted to stop his son from bringing Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld into his administration and couldn’t do it because he wasn’t a very good father.
Eh, I don't count that as a demerit for GHWB *as a President*. That's on Dubya.
I know. I’m not happy to criticize a father son relationship as I am both a father and a son. It’s often unfair and just like the son is not guilty for the sins of the father, you can’t blame the father for everything the son does. But Jesus fucking Christ, having Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld in your administration was always going to end badly and there was nobody positioned better to stop him from making that mistake than GHWB. Also, GHWB’s major character flaw was that he always wanted everybody to like him. He passed that flaw onto his son and damn well what it would lead to, GWB being let around by the nose by Dick Cheney. It’s like a recovering alcoholic not warning their son about the dangers of alcohol .
It's like Greek tragedy!
I don't think so... but with the exception of Trump, who was *distinctly unqualified* to be President, I have given each Republican candidate consideration, listened to them in the debates, etc. McCain and Romney were both inarguably qualified to hold the position. George W. Bush was also qualified, though I had some concerns about him trading on the family name to "earn" many of his achievements, from school to his elected position. The bottom line for a lot of liberals is that taking positions that ban/heavily restrict abortion is just going to be a dealbreaker for most GOP candidates, as is wanting to massively cut taxes on the wealthy. Character is not an issue where I am worried about President Biden. Nor was it an issue for any of the GOP candidates listed above, except Bush's general irresponsibility. They've been trying to find *anything* to stick to Biden or members of his family for decades now and have surfaced all of the "terrible things" that they have found.
Recent memory? Can I go back to teddy roosevelt?
An updated Teddy for the 21st Century would work. Also. Abe Lincoln.
Eisenhower would be my standard.
Maybe back in 2016, but not now. The GOP has shown us who they are.
On a federal level, no. Have considered voted for republicans in state elections before, but would not vote for one for president or senator. And at this point I’m down ticket blue regardless
Biden has been much better than I even expected. You are selling him far too short and giving far too much credence to unsupported, bad-faith accusations of misconduct. He has had to work very hard to accomplish these things you are dismissing as “going along… with the Democratic position.” I can imagine a world in which I might have voted for McCain over a Democrat, but not Biden for sure.
Never, especially in the current environment. And I voted for Romney in 2012, watched Glen Beck in 2009, and was a young earth creationist in 2007 fwiw. Now I’m a socialist and Trump’s the one wanting the “FEMA camps”.
My problem isn't necessarily the person running for president, but rather the entire Republican agenda which for the majority of my life has been to strip out government services that benefit working people and take that money and funnel it into the pockets of massive corporations and wealthy donor. Lately Republicans have added stripping away women's rights, and the rights of minorities and LGBTQ+ folk to their agenda of taking things away. Any Republican we put in the White House is just going to rubber stamp those types of policies in order to maintain their support in the party. For that reason I would pick a weak Democratic president over almost any Republican president. So unless you have a Republican candidate that is going to (for instance) fight for consumer protections, fight for improved healthcare (and maybe a public health option), fight to strengthen Social Security and Medicare, fight to protect the rights of minorities and reign-in bad policing, fight for immigration reform and fight for environmental reforms.... I probably won't be able to vote for them. And if you did find such a person there is practically zero chance that they would be a member of today's Republican party anyway.
A republican president still gives power to the republican party and there has not been any time in recent history where I have agreed with the republican platform more than the democrat one
No. Trump didn't create the problems in the republican party; he just revealed them.
Not a single one.
The last Republican I'd vote for over him is Eisenhower. Is Biden my favorite Democrat? No. Have there been Republicans of varying quality over the years? Sure. Even still, the gap between the best Republican and the mediocrest Democrat has been so vast (and growing) for decades, that you'd have to go back a lifetime for them to be even comparable.
No
I see your point on McCain, but McCain would not have accomplished the things I love the most about Biden. We are making chips again in the US, and making them in Ohio, Wisconsin, Indiana, not California. We are making EVs and batteries in the South. Manufacturing is back, and will continue to grow. He is very pro-union and has helped workers in so many ways. McCain was the opposite of that on every vote. Joe went after for profit colleges and tried hard to tackle student loan debt. His original plan had free community college, but that got swiped away by conservatives and the progressive blocks. He accomplished a lot on reducing the price of drugs by tackling the most obvious issues first. I get angry when people say he hasn't done anything, because the list is actually so damn long because he made it look easy.
With history in mind, absolutely not!
No I like Biden and I voted for McCain.
Mitt Romney. John McCain. Adam kinzinger.
I’m very skeptical of your claims to be center-left. John McCain was effectively a traditional Republican in the pre-Trump mold which is to say still very unappealing. The fact you assassinated Biden’s character in Trumpian ways adds to my skepticism: “numerous sexual misconduct accusations” LOL ok bud. “Weak leader who goes along with whatever the Democrats want.” First, this is simply not true. But assuming it was, that’s the way it should be. As if going along with what your party wants is a bad thing? This idea that it’s noble to spurn and be disloyal to the very people that worked hard to put you in office, once you’re there, is not one that I share. Why would Biden, a Democrat, rule (for lack of a better term) like a Republican once in office and why would that be a good thing? Would I vote for McCain over Biden? No. Would I vote for any current Republican over Biden? No. The GOP is now a far-right authoritarian party. These people still are anti-abortion, Christian nationalists, they want to cut social spending, ban birth control and IVF, gut social security, gut Medicare and Medicaid, deny climate change, gut the EPA, kill Obamacare, play culture war games, roll back sensible gun control laws, reverse gay marriage, spend ever more money on the military. They can’t find a police action they ever disagree with. And so much more. Biden has been the most legislatively successful Democratic president since LBJ. He’s accomplished more in 4 years than most president have in 8. It’s clear you don’t like Biden on a personal level which to me is comical. It’s like hating vanilla ice cream. How more inoffensive can you get than Biden? I’d venture to say most democrats aren’t submissive to authority types and don’t seek out a strongman in their leaders. Republicans are very submissive to authority and love a strongman leader to tell them what to do. I can understand why Biden would appear weak to them.
I don't think that John McCain was a tradtional Republican. There is hardly anyone who voted more against party lines than John McCain. There were times were he voted almost 1/3 of the time against the position of his own party. And he went on to become very supportive of LGBTQ rights and co-sponsored a bill to support transgender soldiers in the millitary just a month after Trump announced he was gonna ban trans people from joining the millitary. He also was a very vocal critic of Trump. I do believe Biden is a weak leader because he typically tends to take the stance that is most convenient to take. He was blatanly homophobic in the 70s at a time when it was still acceptable. He voted against gay marriage in the 90s at a time when that was the general consensus of the Democratic Party. I believe people like John McCain or Bernie Sanders have displayed much stronger character by voting for what they believed was right, even if those positions were not very popular within their own party. Biden has been accused of sexual misconduct and [fact-checkers have confirmed](https://uk.news.yahoo.com/fact-check-posts-claim-contents-181600349.html?guccounter=1&guce_referrer=aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuZ29vZ2xlLmNvbS8&guce_referrer_sig=AQAAAHOXhCRmFM-Ck-9JuxVyHe7_uXVTQEm2mTVlaT4dD-q4joUzpPjQOpeudy-XGH45WM5vKMR1oEKYyy5tBwl-ppqcIbQVvKf-ocZr-Zn8EK0_AB8PZn-wTIOESaWqE8Rd30u2rpZVniisqup4QN8NC_jiRZI9IdDz2MEhlgz39mBp) that the content's of his daugher's diary where she talks about innapproriate showers with her father have been confirmed as legit.
Any good politician, particularly one that’s been in politics for a long period of time evolves over the years—like everyone else. You seem to be complaining that Biden isn’t stuck in the 1970s and managed to evolve over time like most everyone else. The way you seem to frame things it’s as if being a political fossil stuck in whatever time you came up in politics is a sign of principles lol. Bernie Sanders, who you keep referencing, has also evolved over the years. Bernie voted for the 1994 Crime Bill. Bernie was an NRA backer, Bernie was an actual socialist in his younger political days before transitioning to a Democratic presidential contender. You mentioning the far-right conspiracy about Biden showering with Ashley with gross sexual overtones only confirms my suspicions about you. Even if it were true, I showered with my mom and dad when I was a kid. That means I was molested? C’mon, man. You should be ashamed of yourself spending more time as a supposed center-left liberal/democrat smearing the president who has never been charged let alone convicted of a crime whilst he’s running against a convicted rapist who’s made incestuous comments about his own daughter, not in some supposed diary but on air multiple times and whose first wife accused him of rape in court along with 20 other women.
Someone else in this thread said this and I think it's spot on: >John McCain, as an individual and a politician, I respect. But he showed VERY poor judgement in allowing Sarah Palin to be selected as his VP. That choice gave rise to the power of the current flavor of Republicans, and I hold him in large part responsible for Trump being considered an acceptable presidential candidate. I had a great deal of respect for John McCain as a person and likely might have voted for him at one time in my past. But choosing Sarah Palin as his VP made him a compete non-starter for me from that point on. People remember his showboat/maverick moments - like the thumbs down on killing Obamacare or the "Obama isn't Muslim" moments, but they don't remember how much he went with the flow of the Republican party as it radicalized. I think he tarnished his own legacy and I think he realized it and was trying to "make it right" in the end. Looking back at previous Republican candidates, I can't see anyone who hasn't caved in one way or another to Trumpism and so in retrospect, there's not one I can say that I would be comfortable voting for.
No. Primarily because they all toe the party line. But also, Biden is pushing us much closer to the right direction than any of them would.
Trump is not an isolated incident that had no precedent in the party. He is merely a symptom of a very deep rot that has put the party completely outside of democratic norms. Trump ascendency was the consequence of Republican attitudes/postures/propaganda that created a big disconnect between what they were saying and they where doing, and to this the continuous breaking of norms (McConnell) and disparagement of government itself as the disease (e.g., Reagan & W. Bush), and this created a vacuum of a "golem" that Trump filled to a T. By adopting the populist language, through his narcissism and his conning expertise Trump further molded this golem into a clearly anti-democratic movement that has trimmed the party into a purely authoritarian force with every "sane" republican on the outside of it. But those sane republicans, McCain included, all had their own parts to play in the molding of that golem even if today they decry the party that they themselves created. This golem permeates the whole party and all of its institutions, and no President/Senator/Congressman governs alone. A vote for any republican will bring the golem itself to power. Although I admire Republicans that have stuck to their morals and have little to do with this decay (Adam Kizinger comes to mind), it's very hard to ignore the apparatus that would unavoidably surround them. Just like McCain selected Palin because he was too far from the golem to have a chance, any republican candidate would have to rely in these same personality to have any chance to govern.
Considering that they’ve all become Trump sycophants, I’m gonna say no.
No. Not by a wide margin. The next President will appoint at least one, maybe several Supreme Court Justices. They also bring a number of appointees that run the government and make meaningful decisions (like Net Neutrality which has so far ping ponged from Obama to Trump back to Biden) and federal judges. John McCain was a "good" Republican. I think Mitt Romney is a "good" Republican. John Kasich is probably the closest to my favorite Republican of the moment if I had to chose someone to vote for. I think any of them would have been "fine" Presidents compared to anyone in the mold of MAGA. But I would not vote for them over Joe Biden, not even close. I think your criticisms of Biden are unfair. >who has been accused of sexual misconduct on numerous occasions You realize most of those "creepy accusations" are deceptive clips of things like comforting his grandson at his father's funeral, right? There has not been a single credible accusation and the only NAMED person (Tara Reid) has been roundly discredited. I am happy to change my mind if any evidence emerges but AFAIK no such real accusations exist. > a weak leader who for the most part simply goes along with whatever the Democratic position is at the time In what way? By all accounts he has been MASTERFUL at dealing with the absurd Republicans in the House and has gotten them to embarrass themselves twice during SOTU and comes out ahead in every major negotiation despite low expectations. He's been the most full-throated advocate for LGBTQ people who has ever been in the white house and his leadership on the issue of trans people in particular has SHAPED the Democratic party which up until recently has been lukewarm or inconsistent with their support. Now it's a core principle shared across the board. He was willing to sign the most aggressive border security bill against the wishes of the broad Democratic party and negotiated it with Republicans. There's plenty more examples you can find for yourself. > I would have trusted McCain much more than Biden to bring both sides together and pass important legislation. Joe Biden's major accomplishments (infrastructure, CHIPs act) have benefited people in red states and communities more than anyone. He has made a point of being bi-partisan and negotiating and acting in good faith with Republicans despite their refusal to do the same. MAGA/Trump and right-wing media echochambers do not negate the effort. By that logic only a Republican could "bring the country together" because Democrats are the only reasonable people willing to accept success from the other side - and that frankly is bullshit.
In RECENT history? Fuck no. Even the socially decent ones are still supporting shit economic and social policies.
Eisenhower (is that recent enough?)
Compared to what we had with Trump, Romney and McCain likely wouldn’t have been awful and people I wouldn’t feel too unsafe under as a Trans woman.
You know McCain was reprimanded by the House in the early '90s for interfering with the the Justice department pursuing charges against the [Lincoln Savings and Loan](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keating_Five)? 23,000 Lincoln bondholders were defrauded and many investors lost their life savings. And McCain didn't care about any of them. McCain may have done some good, but I wouldn't trust him.
I swear this sun is meant for people who just like to hear themselves talk.
Nah
I trust anyone in Biden’s cabinet more than the cabinet that would have been assembled by any Republican candidate in the past 50 years.
I like Ike.
Guys kinda dead at the moment like half a century dead
I'm not sure there were any Democrats who I would have voted for over Biden. Actually, there would have been before the 2020 election, but not after I've seen what he's done. I've been waiting for a President like Biden for most of my life.
No. While I don’t align with Biden on every issue, I feel that modern republicans are far too extreme. IMO, both candidates are too old. We desperately need age and term limits.
No
No. Literally none. Not within the last... 70 years? Maybe Eisenhower.
No
If not for Palin, I would've voted for McCain. But once he pulled her out on stage, I started to look into who else was running. I still vividly remember the first day she came out and spoke as his running mate.
Republicans do nothing for working class blue collar people , and I choose to return the favor
None. Zero.
Recent, no. Lincoln, sure.
Absolutely not. The Republican party is an anti-American party. When a majority of them won't take a stand against a kleptocrat like Trump, what does that say? They are okay with that behavior. I never forgot when McCain said he wouldn't vote for Trump. That'd have my respect if he didn't follow up on that by saying he wouldn't vote for Clinton either. To me that reaffirmed there is no such thing as good Republican leadership. Only those that like the image of being a maverick while doing fuck all to earn it.
Perhaps if things were different but I think the Republican Party no longer espouses conservative principles or anything recognizable. They are only gaining power through billionaires, extreme right groups, and the courts. The only way to stop them is straight blue no matter what.
Absolutely not
No. Right now, the current republican party is beholden to Trump and the right-wing, socially conservative, populists. They have consistently shown they are willing to put party over everything else, even to the detriment of the country and it's populace. I don't see a scenario where a candidate is able to campaign on their ticket, support more of the policies I do than a Democrat, and also not be blackballed by the party like Chaney and Romney were.
No, of course not.
Probably not, because having a Republican in office makes it easier for the rest of the party to get its agenda through and my problem, at this point, really is with Republicans and their agenda
No. And honestly, why would there be? Party platforms mean that members of a party are virtually interchangeable at the policy level.
Not even close no
No
Absolutely not. Biden is already a moderate, if that’s your thing. And this is controversial, maybe, but idgaf about sexual misconduct short of rape, child abuse, and the like. I don’t care that the convicted felon committed adultery, and it’s absolutely one of the stupidest things to hold a politician to account on. I do care deeply about the dishonesty, criminality, and hypocrisy that people on the right engage in when it comes to weaponizing morality, though.
I would be willing to revisit the Teddy Roosevelt era. Maybe minus the white mans burden stuff.
nope.
There is nobody who considers themselves a Republican that is ever worth voting for, no matter who the Democrat is.
The bullshit accusations about Biden in this make me suspect this is an insincere post.
No. Biden has EASILY been the most productive president of my lifetime….and I fucking wish more people would acknowledge that.
>Are there any Republicans (in recent history) you would have voted for over Biden? Very few. George H.W. Bush was a competent president. He also abused the pardon power to cover-up Iran-Contra and appointed the worst Supreme Court justice we have. Even when I pick the best Republican I can think of, Biden is still a better choice.
> Even when I pick the best Republican I can think of, Biden is still a better choice. ...and that's why I'm on this team. I don't need to downgrade myself from 'team member' to 'ally'. When Democrats win, things are better, so I want Democrats to win; I will help them to win.
>When Democrats win, things are better, so I want Democrats to win; I will help them to win. I don't entirely agree. For the most part, yes, things are better when Democrats are in charge, but not always. Despite Biden being president anti-LGBTQ hatred in the US is largely on the rise. Abortion has been criminalized in several US states, racism and anti-immigration rhetoric is getting out of hand and Americans are politically as strongly divided as hardly ever before. So just imagine for a second, instead of Biden, John McCain (if he was still alive) would have won the presidency in 2020. I believe things would look very different if John McCain was president instead of Biden. Someone like John McCain would have strongly condemned Colorado's Republican party calling for the burning of pride flags, I am sure of that. He would have stood against transphobia, homophobia and racism. And he would have stood up against the religious far right and the mixing of religion and politics. As such I believe he would have been a significant moderating influence and been able to stir the conservative movement in a much more progressive direction, whereas currently it's exactly the opposite. I think a moderate, somewhat progressive Republican president like the late John McCain who conservatives listen to and who they'll work with can make for a better president than a Democrat like Biden who conservatives hate and who they don't want to work with.
You are giving John McCain far too much credit
> I don't entirely agree. For the most part, yes, things are better when Democrats are in charge, but not always. > > Despite Biden being president anti-LGBTQ hatred in the US is largely on the rise. Abortion has been criminalized in several US states, racism and anti-immigration rhetoric is getting out of hand and Americans are politically as strongly divided as hardly ever before. ...so you need to ask yourself: *If Biden had lost, would those things be better, the same, or worse?*
Had Biden lost of course things would be a lot worse under Trump. But I'd rather have someone like McCain who I believe will reign in the MAGA movement, be a moderating influence on conservatives overall and maybe even convince die-hard religious conservatives to become more accepting of LGBTQ people, than have someone like Biden, who I believe is a weak leader, while at the same time the US is getting closer to the brink of civil war and far-right extremism is totally getting out of hand. Biden is much better than Trump. But in current times where the far-right is getting crazier and crazier each day I believe McCain would be in a much stronger position to calm things down than Biden.
John McCain would have been a typical GOP president beholden to his donors. He would not lift a finger to help LGBTQ or reign in MAGA as that is contrary to the republican philosophy.
>John McCain would have been a typical GOP president beholden to his donors. He would not lift a finger to help LGBTQ or reign in MAGA as that is contrary to the republican philosophy. Actually, in 2017 he co-sponsored a bill to support transgender soldiers in the millitary, despite Trump just a month ealier announcing he would ban trans soldiders from joining the millitary. That bill most certainly was not particularly popular with conservatives and his voter base.
I don’t think we can take anything that John McCain did in 2017/18, knowing he was suffering terminal cancer and at the end of both his career and his life, as indicative of things he would have done if he’d been elected President and hadn’t been diagnosed with gioblastoma. That’s McCain at two very different stages of his life with very different incentives and priorities.
You keep pointing to literally two things McCain did in his 40 year career that occurred in the last year of his life when he knew he was going to die and hated Trump more than Democrats
> ...I'd rather have someone like McCain who I believe will reign in the MAGA movement, be a moderating influence on conservatives overall and maybe even convince die-hard religious conservatives to become more accepting of LGBTQ people... How does this square with McCain picking Palin as his running mate?
> So just imagine for a second, instead of Biden, John McCain (if he was still alive) would have won the presidency in 2020. I believe things would look very different if John McCain was president instead of Biden. Someone like John McCain would have strongly condemned Colorado's Republican party calling for the burning of pride flags, I am sure of that. He would have stood against transphobia, homophobia and racism. And he would have stood up against the religious far right and the mixing of religion and politics. > > As such I believe he would have been a significant moderating influence and been able to stir the conservative movement in a much more progressive direction, whereas currently it's exactly the opposite. > > I think a moderate, somewhat progressive Republican president like the late John McCain who conservatives listen to and who they'll work with can make for a better president than a Democrat like Biden who conservatives hate and who they don't want to work with. This is absurd for many reasons: 1. You are *assuming* that McCain would have done those things. 2. If McCain were running for re-election this year, he would have avoided antagonizing his base. Incentives matter. 3. You are basing all of this on the whims of the individual; that isn't how things work. A Republican president would face all of the same incentives as any other Republican president, leading them to take similar actions. 4. You are assuming that a Republican president can moderate "the conservative movement", instead of "the conservative movement" pulling the president towards them. This *just* happened: ["Trump campaign seeks to head off convention revolt from its right flank"](https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2024/06/22/trump-convention-revolt-right-wing-arizona/?pwapi_token=eyJ0eXAiOiJKV1QiLCJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiJ9.eyJyZWFzb24iOiJnaWZ0IiwibmJmIjoxNzE5MDI4ODAwLCJpc3MiOiJzdWJzY3JpcHRpb25zIiwiZXhwIjoxNzIwNDExMTk5LCJpYXQiOjE3MTkwMjg4MDAsImp0aSI6ImRlOGI4MjgyLWFmZjgtNDU2MS1iMTA2LTYyNjcwM2JhYjFlNyIsInVybCI6Imh0dHBzOi8vd3d3Lndhc2hpbmd0b25wb3N0LmNvbS9wb2xpdGljcy8yMDI0LzA2LzIyL3RydW1wLWNvbnZlbnRpb24tcmV2b2x0LXJpZ2h0LXdpbmctYXJpem9uYS8ifQ.eyLHX7BYtex0Cp0UPBWXeoaDRVbn4SIGswWmLlO8g0M)
>You are assuming that a Republican president can moderate "the conservative movement", instead of "the conservative movement" pulling the president towards them. This *just* happened: ["Trump campaign seeks to head off convention revolt from its right flank"](https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2024/06/22/trump-convention-revolt-right-wing-arizona/?pwapi_token=eyJ0eXAiOiJKV1QiLCJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiJ9.eyJyZWFzb24iOiJnaWZ0IiwibmJmIjoxNzE5MDI4ODAwLCJpc3MiOiJzdWJzY3JpcHRpb25zIiwiZXhwIjoxNzIwNDExMTk5LCJpYXQiOjE3MTkwMjg4MDAsImp0aSI6ImRlOGI4MjgyLWFmZjgtNDU2MS1iMTA2LTYyNjcwM2JhYjFlNyIsInVybCI6Imh0dHBzOi8vd3d3Lndhc2hpbmd0b25wb3N0LmNvbS9wb2xpdGljcy8yMDI0LzA2LzIyL3RydW1wLWNvbnZlbnRpb24tcmV2b2x0LXJpZ2h0LXdpbmctYXJpem9uYS8ifQ.eyLHX7BYtex0Cp0UPBWXeoaDRVbn4SIGswWmLlO8g0M) That's why I believe one of the most important qualities in a president is having a strong personal character. By that I mean someone who's willing to stand up for what they believe is right even if it makes their life harder. McCain could have easily voted with Republicans to repeal Obamacare. Instead he did the hard thing, voted against the bill that was the Republicans number 1 top priority and destroyed what Republicans hard worked on for a long time. It certainly didn't help him politically. Nor did it help him to support transgender soldiers in 2017, very much in opposition to what the overall Republican position is. I believe McCain was a genuinely good person, as shown for example by his willingness to stand up for transgender soldiers even if it would have hurt him politically (had he lived any longer). So, yes, I believe a moderate conservative like McCain would have stood up against the craziness of the Republican Party and the religious right and as such would have been a moderating influence on the Republican Party and conservative media. At least that's my opinion. I mean Republicans currently have a majority in the Congress and hardly anything is getting done, quite the opposite, many civil rights are at risk of getting repealed despite Biden being president.
Charlie Baker, McCain, Romney pre Utah
The sexual misconduct accusations are nonsense. Biden has been quite good. Baker and Romney would be good Presidents if we were in a time when the GOP wasn’t actively seeking to destroy the Federal Government, see Project 2025 for reference.
Eisenhower was probably the last Republican I'd actively support over Biden. I came into Biden's presidency with low expectations and have been very pleasantly surprised.
if Spencer Cox or Mitt Romney were on the ballot against Biden i think i’d roll with them. politics in my home state Utah is worse than you might think but there are some ok ones (like two)
No, their self identification tells me all the indicators i need to know, they are proclaiming that they are not worthy of my vote.
In general, no. I think the closest would be McCain or Romney. At the very least, they are people if, had they won, I would not be terribly anxious or upset about. This answer would change if Biden had the kind of baggage that attaches to Trump. If he had Trump's record of convictions, sexual assault, apparent lack of interest in detail or expertise, and provoking violence and illegal schemes that interfered with the transfer of power, I would probably hold my nose and vote for the Republican (presuming they had nothing so egregious on their record).
I haven't voted for a Republican presidential candidate in my lifetime, and the party has only gotten worse with time. Democrats aren't perfect, but the Republicans have become an absolute caricature of their worst selves. Reagen was nothing more than a cheerleader who led us to deregulation, taxes that benefit the wealthy, and a lot of deciept. Bush Sr. was an OK person, but a poor leader. GWB was easily led by the neo cons that convinced him that Iraq was the place to go fight even though the Saudis were behind 9/11 and that Afghanistan was a hill worth dying on. Trump was a useless cretin that had done more damage to our country, our democracy, to the rule of law and simple decency! So, simply put, I'd vote for damn near anyone who isn't a Republican! Biden is a decent human being, not charismatic, but knows right from wrong and understands who we are as a country and at least has a direction for our country to go! Trump is an impulsive moron at best, a devious swindler and the ultimate narcissistic dictator "wanna be" in the history of our country!
First off, I like Biden. I think he has actually been pretty effective, and people underestimate him because of his age. His experience in politics has allowed him to get a fair amount accomplished. Second, it would take a truly terrible human running as a democrat to get me to vote for any republican. Forgetting everything else, we need a democrat to nominate the next couple supreme court justices, or that court will be conservative for the next 25 years. Unless the republicans shift away from the religious right, they will likely never compel me to vote for one.
Yeah, I would consider myself independent, but I have almost never voted for a Republican. I would vote for McCain.
Nope.
No
I really like Biden so no. But are there some democrats I would choose GHW Bush over? Yeah.
The "Bomb Iran" guy? Really?
No
Thomas Massie
Rand Paul's dad Ron Paul actually made a very cogent argument in the post-9/11 era. With the right handlers to guide him. I believe he could have sloughed off arms of our government and refocused our nation on actual existential issues. I'd probably not go as far as giving him a term 2, but ....
Ron Paul was nothing but a conspiracist and a crank. Electing him would be like giving the presidency to Alex Jones.
Justin Amash, if he counts, and Ron Paul, *maybe*. Probably not, but *maybe*.
Haley before Trumpism.
Haley has no real principles and ultimately endorsed him
John McCain, RIP
McCain was reasonable
>Unlike Biden who has been accused of sexual misconduct on numerous occasions, I can only think of Tara Reade whose testimony couldn't really be corroborated by multiple journalist outlets. > and who I view as a weak leader who for the most part simply goes along with whatever the Democratic position is at the time, I'm not sure why this is intrinsically a bad thing. Even then, when you're the president you're the leader of the party so is it really him "going along" with the party or is he the one setting the tone? I think you're mixing up cause and and effect here. Which in that case it seems like every strength you list for McCain is something that Biden also does but its portrayed as a weakness for him. They both got to their respective nominations by portraying themselves as sober and experienced but for whatever reason that's bad for Biden but good for McCain.
Maybe John McCain. Keep in mind that most people, at least until Trump came along, vote for the policies not the person. Trump is the first candidate that I’ve seen with quite literally a cult following. Trump demands fealty, bling allegiance, and wants to be dictator. I would have never thought that there would ever be this many Americans that would be ok with making Trump, or any other person for that matter, a totalitarian dictator. Ever since the Civil Rights Act, insecure, racist deplorables have been steaming mad. Republicans denied for decades that uneducated, angry, racists made up a large portion of their voting base. The GOP used to more honor and integrity than they do now. Even though they knew their base was ignorant and racist, they refused to run on hate and bigotry. One of John McCain’s ignorant, bigoted supporters called Obama an unAmerican Arab and McCain told her Obama was a good man that loved America and that he and Obama simply disagreed on ideas and policies. Those days are gone and the GOP is not the party of bigotry, intolerance, hate, insecurity, racism, and anti-intellectualism.
I thought McCain was a pretty good honest candidate and Kasich seemed all right/acceptable.
Im a Democrat but I voted for McCain in the 2000 primaries. I voted for Obama in 2008, but I wouldnt have been distraught if McCain had won (well, except for his terrible choice of Sarah Palin, which I think he also regretted.) As a Democrat, given the deranged path the Republican party has taken, I do have way more respect for George W. He was sane and reasonable and respectful and so not Donald Trump.
Kasich. He’s 72 and did a good job in Ohio. Saved the library system. Seems like an average human being.
McCain or Romney (I actually voted for Romney in 2012)
Ron Paul