• kescusay@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    I am cautiously optimistic about this.

    First, the reasons not to be:

    • The Kennedy name might conceivably attract some confused Democratic votes.
    • His spoiler candidacy will obviously be targeted at Biden supporters and intended to siphon them away.

    But I’m still cautiously optimistic because:

    • We already have a well-known guy with the last name “Kennedy” in the Senate: This absolute tool, a Louisiana Republican and all-around douchebag that Democrats universally despise. So name recognition effects may be blunted a bit.
    • RFK’s poll numbers in the Democratic primary as a hypothetical alternative to Biden have stayed consistently 45-50 points below Biden. Most Democrats aren’t going to jump ship to a hopeless independent candidacy and cede the race to Trump.
    • RFK is immensely popular… with deranged wingnuts who still believe the COVID vaccines have microchips in them and are the sign of the Beast. These people weren’t gonna vote Biden in the first place, and there might be enough of them in the Republican party for RFK’s candidacy to be a Trump spoiler instead.

    I’m going to be paying really close attention to see which side he siphons from more, but like I said… I’m cautiously optimistic RFK will have a more damaging effect on Trump than on Biden.

    If Trump goes after him hard, I’ll take that as confirmation that Trump is worried about that.

    • NegativeInf@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      Can we convince the Q people that he’s the other dead Kennedy they are waiting for in disguise?

      • kescusay@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        That’s it! JFK is secretly immortal! He faked his own death and assumed the identity of his son! The real RFK is off investigating pizzeria basements to rescue children on behalf of his father!

        Rejoice, Q! Your savior has actually already emerged! Vote RFK to support the true Trump, not the holographic impostor he’s been replaced with, and the Great Awakening will arrive with the Storm and… fuck, I can’t keep this up.

        • some_guy@lemmy.sdf.org
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          1 year ago

          I got you.

          The Great Awakening is upon us. The lizard-people will be exposed. All our enemies will be rounded up and sent to gitmo. All the people who laughed at you for believing “ridiculous” things will realize that you are super smart and apologize. We will be vindicated.

          Oh, wait. Not rejoice Q. Rejoice Anons! RFK Jr is actually JFK, but better. He will become president and Trump will become God-Emperor of the world. Those Iraqi Dinars that you invested in will finally make you super rich! No more babies will ever be eaten by democrats and the cabal shall be no more.

          Ok, I’m tapping out.

    • Neato@kbin.social
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      1 year ago

      Old, confused Democrats? He’s not really leftist at all. Everything I’ve heard about him makes me feel like he’s a Republican.

        • themeatbridge@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          Conservativism isn’t a set of policies or ideologies, it’s the notion that you are good so therefore whatever you want is also good. It is narcissism wraped in a flimsy coat of stoic resistance to change. The facade falls away the very moment any conservative is affected personally by any particular issue.

          Pick any ostensibly conservative issue, and you’ll find conservatives flipping on that issue whenever it is convenient. And that’s not because all conservatives are hypocrites, it’s because all conservatives believe that they, as individuals, are the final arbiters of right and wrong. They believe that they can determine what is good and what is evil with absolute certainty at any level of nuance.

          That’s why they will oppose abortion rights, and then have their own abortions without a hint of self-awareness. That’s how they can spin yarns of their hardworking immigrant parents or surviving with the help of social safety nets, and then pull up the ladder behind them for the next generation. It’s how fiscal conservatives increase spending and raise taxes for most people while decrying spending on critical infrastructure and foreign aid.

          That’s why a nutjob like RFK Jr. sounds like a conservative, even though he wouldn’t use the term to describe himself. The man doesn’t have principles, he has a list of conspiracy theories that he uses to drum up attention.

          • No1RivenFucker@sh.itjust.works
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            1 year ago

            Conservativism isn’t a set of policies or ideologies, it’s the notion that you are good so therefore whatever you want is also good.

            Glad to know I can just dismiss you as intentionally ignorant from the start

              • Billiam@lemmy.world
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                1 year ago

                Cutting taxes, removing regulation and oversight of the private sector, revoking civil rights for “others”, disenfranchisement, white ethnonationalism mixed with Christofascism, enforcement of social hierarchies with white rich men at the top, suicide via global climate change…

                So you see, you’re wrong. Conservatives have plenty of policy they’re consistent about.

              • SuckMyWang@lemmy.world
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                1 year ago

                I’m trying to not get on either side because I felt meatbridge made some well reasoned points. I do tend to lean with no1riven on the hypocrisy of suggesting conservatives think the are good therefore they are right. I’ve observed people on the left with the same hyper charged conviction so I don’t see how it’s a strong point.

              • No1RivenFucker@sh.itjust.works
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                1 year ago

                Lmao why would I bother answering a Democrat troll like you? You’ll just dismiss anything offhand with flimsy excuses like you always do.

    • Ertebolle@kbin.social
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      1 year ago

      Single-issue anti-vaxxer voters might trust him more than they trust Trump. (and none of them were going to vote for Biden anyway, so probably at worst a wash for Biden)

      • Odelay42@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        This is my dad. He doesn’t like trump but still suffers from all kinds of other anti-progrsssive brainwashing.

        He thinks RFK is a brave outsider.

        He also voted for Perot, so take that for what it’s worth.

    • betwixthewires@lemmy.basedcount.com
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      1 year ago

      Well, the D’s know the name of the game is beat Trump, that’s how biden got nominated, nobody actually liked him. They’ll vote for Biden no matter what just to make sure Trump doesn’t win.

      The target demographic for this guy are Trump independents, that is, the people that won him the election in the rust belt in 2016, people who lean Democrat but were sick of the politicians and their constant bullshitting. So it’s likely RFK is a way to spoil Trump, not the D’s.

    • flossdaily@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      Morons.

      “But aren’t all the morons already voting for Trump?” I hear you say.

      No. There are always more morons.

    • dhork@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      He will vote for himself, and his mother is still around and will probably vote for him.

      So I am expecting him to get exactly 2 votes.

        • Zippy@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          I think it might be hard to predict exactly but I I am bit with you. Those right leaning independents that don’t like Trump are quite unlikely to vote for him regardless. But that known name may put Biden as their second choice.

    • Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      Democrats who don’t think Biden is far enough to the right. They’ll still blame progressives if Biden loses to Trump, though.

  • mateomaui@reddthat.com
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    1 year ago

    It’s the only move he has, he’d never get the Dem nomination. Too many see right through his conspiracy nonsense.

    • Ertebolle@kbin.social
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      1 year ago

      41 percent of Democrats have an at least somewhat favorable view of Kennedy

      Yeah, no. I’d guess that only a single-digit % of Democrats - mostly Extremely Online ones - have any idea who he is; this is a survey where they pressed for lukewarm responses from mostly-uninformed voters and then pretended that it actually reflected public opinion in a meaningful way.

  • Random Dent@lemmy.ml
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    1 year ago

    These debates are going to be wild. Trump and Kennedy just screaming gibberish at each other while Biden stands between them with the quietly desperate look of a pensioner trying to remember his PIN number at the supermarket checkout.

    Fucking hell.

  • 👍Maximum Derek👍@discuss.tchncs.de
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    1 year ago

    We need to make this guy the poster child for ranked choice voting. With it he’d only be wasting donor money, not endangering our future as a spoiler candidate.

  • The Snark Urge@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    The only “both sides” I entertain is the fact that both sides have a glutton’s appetite for bad nominees.