(C) Daily Kos This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . Anything less than unequivocal support for President Biden for reelection helps Trump & GOP [1] ['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.'] Date: 2023-10-27 The stakes can not be greater. Our democracy is on the line. The claim that there is no difference between President Biden winning reelection and Donald Trump becoming president again is false. It's not only false generally, but it is false specifically in regards to the Israel Hamas conflict. Nobody is saying that no criticism of President Biden is allowed. However, it is imperative that such criticism be given while retaining perspective and context. Perspective means maintaining rational priorities and comparing President Biden to the Republican Party's nominee. It means even if you feel he did something really bad or failed to do something good that he should have, you remember all the good things he has done and all other issues and that the Republican Party's nominee would be worse on the issue. Context means remembering the history of this issue and realizing the importance of President Biding winning. Therefore, since we are in the reelection season, we should be careful and judicious with our words. . I understand that I/P generates intense emotions and feelings based upon real injustice and real suffering. People have every right to decry real injustice and there is no doubt that the Palestinians are suffering and many Palestinians have died in the past and many Palestinians are dying. That real suffering and the deaths of many Palestinians lead many progressives to become upset and speak out. That is a credit to these progressives. . What is less commendable is misrepresenting President Biden's speeches and stance and abandoning support for President Biden's reelection campaign. What's less commendable is LYING ABOUT PRESIDENT BIDEN when he has acted in order to minimize Palestinian civilian casualties. What's less commendable is EXPECTING THAT PRESIDENT BIDEN CAN WILL INTO EXISTENCE A WORLD THAT DOESN'T EXIST IN WHICH FEW PALESTINIANS DIE. It's IRRESPONSIBLE for us to do anything less than everything we can to help President Biden win reelection and defeat Donald Trump who is likely to be the Republican Party's nominee for president. If it's anybody else, that person almost certainly will have supported Donald Trump and stated that the 2020 presidential election was stolen and that the four Indictments with 91 felonies charged against Donald Trump were the result of a witch-hunt by a weaponized Department of Justice supposedly directed by Joe Biden. The Republican Party just nominated and voted for MAGA Mike Johnson to be speaker of the House of Representatives, a leader in the attempted coup, an author of the farcical Texas lawsuit. He is an opponent of democracy. Whoever they nominate to be their nominee for president will have pledged fealty to Donald Trump and either overtly have stated that the 2020 presidential election was stolen or hinted around it at the very least. . There were those who maintained that there was no difference between Secretary Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump. Many of us argued against this false claim pointing out that putting a self-centered bigoted republican with not only no experience in elected office, but no experience in government period was extremely dangerous. Then his sociopathic, malignant narcissism and extreme present hedonism came out. His minimization of COVID and opposition to the safety measures supported by the CDC led to hundreds of thousands of extra deaths. . Donald Trump attempted a coup. While pursuing that coup, he attempted to make the attorney general who heads the Department of Justice his own personal attorney and, thereby, put himself above the law. 139 of 211 House Republicans, nearly 3/4 of them ​​​​​​ voted against counting electoral college votes for the states which both had already certified their election results and also provided the margin of victory. Every single Republican Party presidential candidate who has any chance at all of winning their nomination has pledged to support Donald Trump if he is the nominee. Seventy percent of republican voters believe the 2020 presidential election was stolen ​​​​​. 70% of Republicans say election wasn’t ‘free and fair’ despite no evidence of fraud – study 78% of Republicans who alleged unfairness said mail-in ballots spurred fraud, while 72% believed ballot tampering occurred . . Even today, 70 percent of republican voters believe that the 2020 presidential election was stolen . Most Republicans still falsely believe Trump’s stolen election claims. Here are some reasons why. In poll after poll, about 70% of Republicans say they don’t think Joe Biden is the legitimate winner of the 2020 election. . . . Again, August of 2023, 70 percent of republican voters believe the 2020 presidential election was stolen . CNN Poll: Percentage of Republicans who think Biden’s 2020 win was illegitimate ticks back up near 70% Jennifer Agiesta and , CNN Byand Ariel Edwards-Levy , CNN Updated 10:18 AM EDT, Thu August 3, 2023 . Donald Trump has not lost the support of republican voters after the Indictments . Every republican presidential candidate who has any chance of winning the nomination supports Trump and attacks attempts to hold him legally accountable for the serious crimes that he committed even after the Indictments were unsealed. Only TWO of the 10 House Republicans who voted for Donald Trump's impeachment are still in Congress . . The point of this is clear. Even if Donald Trump is not the Republican Party's nominee for president in 2024, the Republican Party is set up to pressure any Republican president to not allow a peaceful transfer of power in the next presidential election and nobody who is not an avowed opponent of democracy and justice can win the Republican Party's nomination for president. Therefore, if the Republican Party's nominee for president wins the 2024 presidential election, then we will lose our democracy. . Anybody who is on the left side of the political spectrum and doesn't support President Biden is helping the Republican Party eradicate our democracy. No matter how disappointed you are in some policy of President Biden, you will need to have a real democracy to achieve your policy goal. Enabling the eradication of our democracy will mean that you will NEVER achieve your policy goal. . Now, regarding how upset you are with President Biden that he has not been able to prevent Palestinian civilian casualties, you should be realistic. Is it realistic to believe that any president could nearly eliminate Palestinian civilian casualties in this Israel Hamas conflict after the terrorist attack by Hamas? Of course, it isn't. The Israel / Palestinian issue has a long and complex issue and undoubtedly and unfortunately Israel has committed wrong and immoral acts and made morally wrong decisions. President Biden has a lot more experience in diplomacy at this level than we do and while he could not and can't eliminate all Palestinian civilian casualties, he has taken the steps he could to reduce Palestinian civilian casualties as much as any president could. . . Here is the quote from President Biden in context . The Hamas-run Health Ministry in Gaza raised the death toll in Israeli strikes since Oct. 7 to more than 6,500 people. Its figures could not be independently verified, and Mr. Biden cautioned that they are likely inaccurate, saying, “I have no confidence in the number that the Palestinians are using.” More than 1,400 people were killed in the Hamas-led terror attack in southern Israel on Oct. 7. . It reads a little different in context, doesn't it. Now, those who identify as, "We are Hamas" may believe anything that the terrorist organization says, but the rest of us might not. The number originated from Hamas and it hasn't been independently verified. So, it's no wonder that President Biden doesn't have confidence in their number. Hamas' GOAL was to kill, hurt, terrorize, rape, and take hostage civilians. That's what they intended and wanted to do. It was their goal. . Hamas hides behind Palestinian civilians after committing this terrorist attack. Israel's GOAL is to eradicate Hamas' capacity to commit such attacks. If they can accomplish that goal without any Palestinian civilian casualties because Hamas stopped hiding behind the Palestinian civilians, then they would do that. Unfortunately, because of the acts of Hamas, this isn't possible. Hamas chose to hide behind the Palestinians. Hamas initiated this conflict with their terrorist attack on October 7th. Hamas doesn't recognize the right of Israel to exist. Allowing Hamas to continue to have the ability to commit these types of terrorist attacks isn't an option. In committing these attacks, Hamas is reducing the chances of a two state solution, not increasing them. It's important to keep all of this in mind. . At the same time, Israel should try to minimize Palestinian civilian casualties while accomplishing their reasonable goal of attempting to eradicate the ability of Hamas to continue to commit these terrorist attacks. Based upon what I have read, I believe that a large ground attack and an occupation of Gaza is a serious mistake. I don't believe that such a decision would help anybody 😕😞. Both President Biden and Former President Obama have spoken out against a decision to commit to a large scale ground assault with urban house to house warfare followed by an occupation. Ultimately, Prime Minister Netanyahu is a free agent and we can't force him to make the right moral and ethical and military and political decisions. . Now, you may feel that President Biden is endorsing whatever immoral acts Prime Minister Netanyahu chooses to commit. But this is not actually true. . Here is one of many instances in which President Biden has cautioned Israel against an immoral mistake: . . Biden Warns Israel Not to Occupy Gaza While the president has stood strongly behind Israel since Hamas attacked, he said on “60 Minutes” that a new occupation of Gaza would “be a big mistake.” President Biden warned Israel in an interview aired on Sunday not to reoccupy Gaza, his first significant public effort to restrain America’s ally in the wake of the Hamas assault that killed more than 1,300 people, including at least 29 Americans. Mr. Biden has offered staunch support for Israel since the Oct. 7 attack and refused to criticize Israel for its retaliatory siege of Gaza, the coastal enclave controlled by Hamas, even as U.N. officials have warned of a humanitarian crisis there. But in the new interview, he cautioned against a full-scale occupation of Gaza. “I think it’d be a big mistake,” Mr. Biden told “60 Minutes” on CBS in a conversation taped on Thursday and aired on Sunday night. “Look, what happened in Gaza, in my view, is Hamas and the extreme elements of Hamas don’t represent all the Palestinian people. And I think that it would be a mistake for Israel to occupy Gaza again.” But “taking out the extremists” there, he added, “is a necessary requirement.” One chyron says, "U.S. advises Israel to delay ground offensive" The title of an AP article is, "US advises Israel that delay in ground offensive could allow release of more hostages" . President Biden is worried about Palestinian civilians . . . President Biden warned Israel not to be consumed by rage and a desire for revenge and repeat our mistakes . But I caution this: While you feel that rage, don’t be consumed by it,” he said. “After 9/11, we were enraged in the United States. And while we sought justice and got justice, we also made mistakes.” . . President Biden's administration has warned Israel that they need to follow the laws of war and the rule of law . U.S. officials privately warn Israel to show restraint in retaliating against Hamas senior Biden administration officials are warning their Israeli counterparts to show restraint and avoid mass civilian casualties and a humanitarian disaster that could turn world opinion against the Jewish state, according to two current and one former U.S. official. In meetings in Israel, U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin conveyed to Israeli leaders that it’s important to observe international rules of warfare. What he didn't say in his speech, but NBC News later confirmed , is that Biden also urged the Israeli leader to take pains to minimize Palestinian casualties. . . President Biden stated that Palestinian civilians should not suffer for Hamas' terrorist attack . .Civilians are not to blame and should not suffer for Hamas’s horrific terrorism,” Biden said in a press release. The group with Mika Brzezinski and . . . As I wrote elsewhere . For some time, I have written that I suspected that part of President Biden's strategy in being so supportive publicly of Israel was to give him room and space to warn or even criticize Netanyahu in private. I had not read anything from the media suggesting this. It was my own read on the situation. Therefore, Prime Minister Netanyahu may feel like he has nothing to lose. He may feel that a major military conflict could lead Israeli citizens to back him as it becomes 'rally around the leader ' time. Consequently, I feel like if President Biden had not made the moves he did, then Netanyahu was likely to raze Gaza to the ground, to completely destroy it. However, that is likely to result in mass Palestinian civilian casualties. That likely would have caused the military conflict to widen. . However, by as journalists and experts below say, President Biden's forthright support for Israel and even being the first US president to visit Israel during a military conflict earned him support from and credibility with Israeli citizens. Equally important for this plan to work is an insistence that Israel abide by the Geneva convention, the rules of war, the rule of law, and prioritize avoiding mass Palestinian civilian casualties. This was crucial because President Biden backing away from Israel could not be seen to be out of the blue. . senior Biden aides tell me that because the president has been so forthright with his support for Israel, going to Tel-Aviv, delivering speech after speech here in the United States backing the Israeli cause, he's bought some currency there and that Israel may be more inclined to listen to him , that they feel like he's bought in with him and therefore, they are more willing to listen to his message of take it slow. Be patient. Do the right thing. " Richard Haas, " Joe Biden is the most popular man in Israel, much more so than Netanyahu. " . There are a number of other warnings that President Biden has given to Israel. These are just a few. When you consider the information above and the bad character and immoral actions of Donald Trump who is fundamentally a bad person and President Biden who is fundamentally a good but imperfect man who has done a lot of good during his term, it becomes apparent that it is a terrible mistake for a left leaning registered voter to not vote for President Biden's reelection and do everything they can to help him win reelection. . When President Biden took the oath of office, we had a pandemic not under control, we had just suffered an insurrection, and the unemployment rate was 6.3%. President Biden picked the most diverse cabinet in our history, ended the war in Afghanistan, got out allies united in support for Ukraine by sharing based upon our intelligence what Putin was going to say and do, expanded NATO, added a great justice to the Supreme Court, passed a lot of good legislation including the first gun safety legislation in thirty years, the American Rescue Plan, the Respect for Marriage Act, the CHIPS Act, the Science Act, the PACT Act, the bipartisan infrastructure legislation, and the Inflation Reduction act. Economically, the GDP grew at a rate of 4.9% last quarter, we have had the lowest rate of inflation and the greatest GDP growth among G7 nations, the rate of core inflation is 2.4% which is near normal which is just above two percent, more than 800,000 manufacturing jobs have been created, inflation went down twelve straight months in a row since last July, almost 14 million jobs have been created, the unemployment rate has been below four percent for the longest continuous period of time in FIFTY years, and the unemployment rate is 3.8%. . . President Biden has clearly earned reelection. Again, it's incredibly likely that Donald Trump is the Republican Party's nominee for president in 2024 and he can serve as president even in prison. Either President Biden wins reelection or Donald Trump does. In the unlikely event that Donald Trump somehow isn't their nominee, the person who is their nominee will have pledged to support him if he was their nominee and called the efforts to hold him accountable for his serious crimes a "witch hunt" or a result of the "weaponization" of the legal system and the Department of Justice. As I wrote above, you must consider where the Republican Party is as a whole and what they will demand if their nominee wins the 2024 presidential election. . The point of this is clear. Even if Donald Trump is not the Republican Party's nominee for president in 2024, the Republican Party is set up to pressure any Republican president to not allow a peaceful transfer of power in the next presidential election and nobody who is not an avowed opponent of democracy and justice can win the Republican Party's nomination for president. Therefore, if the Republican Party's nominee for president wins the 2024 presidential election, then we will lose our democracy. . . This diary makes clear the evil character and evil actions of Donald Trump . . The affairs . President Donald Trump’s time in the spotlight has consistently been dogged by reports of extramarital affairs and accusations of sexual assault . His confession on the Hollywood Access tape that he liked to commit sexual assault . He got an early start in making his bigotry manifest . He called for the execution of the Exonerated Five even after DNA evidence proved they were innocent . Donald Trump's ugly history of bigotry . Wikipedia reveals the 'Racial views of Donald Trump ' . . German Lopez wrote an excellent summary of Trump's racism for Vox . . The AP explains the NY AG Letitia James lawsuit against Trump Organization . . Politico lays out the four Indictments and 91 felony charges . The January sixth Indictment . The 'Advice of Counsel' Defense cannot be sustained . . The Georgia RICO indictment . The Classified Documents Indictment . The Campaign Finance Violation Indictment . . The choice to vote or not to vote and the choice for whom you vote is a moral act and choice. If a registered voter chooses not to vote, they are complicit in Trump's crimes and fascism and have made an immoral decision. Voters are free agents. Voters are moral beings. No presidential candidate is perfect. You may have a different political view than President Biden on some certain issue, but others will agree with President Biden on that particular issue but disagree with President Biden on another issue. You may disagree with President Biden's campaign strategy or Secretary Clinton's campaign strategy, but other Democrats may agree with their campaign strategy and the numbers may not support your belief. For example, polling shows that the candidate campaigning at a certain place helps the candidate a little for a few weeks, but that bump will go away in a couple of weeks. We don't know what would have happened in an alternative world. I am convinced that the principals, the candidate themselves, try their best to win their election. I am less convinced that those who criticize them tried their best to help the Democratic Party's nominee for president win the presidential election. . . 62 % of Republican primary voters support Donald Trump. Either President Biden or Donald Trump will win the 2024 presidential election in all probability. No matter how upset you are about any one issue whether it is because of Palestinian civilian casualties or some other issue, it is likely that President Biden is doing better on that issue than you give him credit for and Donald Trump would be far worse and it is undeniable that a choice to not fully support President Biden in his reelection bid is an immoral choice because of how evil Donald Trump is and the existential threat that he or whomever the Republicans nominate and the evil things he has done. . President Biden is an imperfect, but good man who has a strong record to run on and the alternative of letting Donald Trump or whoever they nominate win the 2024 presidential election is unthinkable. . . [END] --- [1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/10/27/2201911/-Anything-less-than-unequivocal-support-for-President-Biden-for-reelection-helps-Trump-GOP?pm_campaign=front_page&pm_source=more_community&pm_medium=web Published and (C) by Daily Kos Content appears here under this condition or license: Site content may be used for any purpose without permission unless otherwise specified. via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds: gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/dailykos/