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Comment by HaZeust | Hacker News Reader

I am, admittedly, very glad that Biden stuck to his word in 2020 that he will be a single-term incumbent president for the last 4 years... I just wish the DNC kept their word on bolstering a more compelling candidate within that timeframe as well.

They had 3 1/2 years to bolster the reputation of Kamala, and largely sidelined her after using her as a play for minority vote. Now they're (likely) running her in a remaining timespan of a little over 3 months left before election -- after no one has thought of her since the last election. This isn't good.

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I wouldn't frame "he was campaigning and only pulled out when it became clear everyone was against him" as "he stuck to his word that he will be a single term president". Sticking to his word would've been never campaigning to begin with.

No, you're completely right; I still have a bone to pick with Biden for waiting this long and doing almost no favors for his VP's image over the period of his term. But, he still fulfilled an old promise by technicality, and I'm not one to cut corners for giving credit.

Kamala looks unelectable. She had to quit the nomination race in 2020 even before primaries.

This is really misunderstanding how that works. The 2020 field at that point was wide open, no one candidate was looking dominant. She absolutely "could" have stayed in with a real shot at winning, which was true for basically all of them. She got out because (1) staying in costs money and fundraising in a wide-open primary is extremely hard and (2) she judged[1] that she'd have a better path to the presidency by positioning herself as an obvious VP candidate via playing kingmaker with her political capital and identity markers. Which is exactly how it played out.

[1] Correctly, with near-prescient precision!

With all their talk of campaign finance reform, it is not clear to me why the DNC does not finance their most valid primary candidates? Why make them jump through hoops and raise money to stay in the race between the primary elections?

So you want the DNC to pick the president instead of the primary voters?

No. I want the DNC to provide some basic money all valid candidates (say those who get above certain percent of votes) so that they can spend their time making their case to the primary voters, instead of trying to raise money.

In the end, it is the primary voters who will pick the candidate who will run for presidency.

"Sen. Kamala Harris drops out of 2020 presidential race": [0]

"Following that debate, her polling numbers dropped to the single digits — and never really recovered.

Amid those problems, Harris' campaign reorganized — laying off some staffers in early states to focus its resources and attention on Iowa.

The latest RealClearPolitics average of recent polling showed Harris with just 3.4 percent support nationally, and just 3.3 percent and 2.7 percent backing in the early-voting states of Iowa and New Hampshire, respectively."

[0]: https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2020-election/sen-kamala-ha...

> She absolutely "could" have stayed in with a real shot at winning, which was true for basically all of them.

This was true for three of them: Sanders, Biden and Buttigieg; but if Buttigieg stayed in, it was looking like at the time that he and Biden both would have lost to Sanders. I remember my last act as a registered member of the Democratic Party was going to be to vote for the candidate who had the best shot at beating Sanders in my State specifically thus denying him some delegates, and I was having a difficult time up until nearly the last minute figuring out who that was going to be up until Buttigieg made the decision extremely easy by removing himself from the race.

Harris didn’t even make it to the starting line. Her campaign simply ran out of money in December before the Iowa Caucus.

I wouldn’t say Biden stuck to his word. He fully intended to run, until people (rightfully) objected. I’m glad he ultimately backed down and stepped down. But this whole process would have been easier to nominate a real candidate if he would have stuck to his word from the beginning. He still deserves the blame for that, even if his most recent actions were correct.

You're right, I'm all for that share of blame. But world was still kept by technicality, and I'm going to give it credit.

It’s not good. It’s great.

Alright, let's see if 3 months is enough time to bolster a new candidate. I hope, for our sake, you're right.

It will be an interesting case study but I think there is a chance that the short runway will allow her to maintain some semblance of high energy. Basically, if you thought American elections were too drawn out, here is your opportunity to be proven right.

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