Try to be a man
19July 2024
The Talmud states (Pirkei Avot, Chapter 2, verse 5):
וּבְמָקוֹם שֶׁאֵין אֲנָשִׁים, הִשְׁתַּדֵּל לִהְיוֹת אִישׁ
In a place where there are no men, strive to be a man.
What does this mean? When nobody else takes the initiative and assumes responsibility, we should do so ourselves (obviously, this applies to women too).
Let’s think responsibly and rationally about the 2024 election:
Donald J. Trump is a clear and present danger to the continuation of American democracy. His campaign is based on the lie that he won the 2020 election. He has repeatedly indicated he will not accept the results of any election he loses. He has regularly threatened to use his power as President to attack his enemies. He has called to terminate the Constitution. He cares only about himself, not the American people. Thus, Trump is potentially America’s Hitler, transforming a stable democracy into chaos and authoritarian rule.
President Biden has done a great job as President. Historians have ranked his Presidency as #14 out of 45, above Wilson, Reagan, Grant and Monroe. Trump was ranked dead last, far at the bottom below Harrison, Pierce, Johnson and Buchanan. Biden has helped create a miracle economy that is much stronger than other Western countries. Inflation has been reduced to 3% and is largely attributed to corporate greed or greedflation, which Biden is correcting by attacking anti-competitive behavior.
The polls show that the Presidential race is a tossup. Today, 538/ABC has Biden with a 50% chance of winning compared to 50% for Trump. So the Biden-Harris team can win if we work hard enough.
We now have 110 days of freedom until the November 5, 2024 election. I recommend that we stop obsessing about polls and instead work as hard as possible to promote the Biden-Harris team. It’s easy to talk about their great accomplishments and the great dangers of Trump’s Project 2025 and authoritarian rule. Talking to people is important because, amazingly to me, many people rely on social media for their news, which is often biased, incorrect and too simplistic to be useful. It is also important to elect Democrats at the state and local levels to prevent the election sabotage that Trump attempted in 2020 and is planning to expand on in 2024.
I try to ignore all the stories about whether Biden will or should continue or not. It’s more important to get the pro-democracy, pro-Democratic Party message to voters than to agonize over things beyond our control. In addition, we need to combat the historical tendency of Democrats to engage in self-destructive behavior. We should avoid the mistakes we made in 2016 when many of us didn't work hard for or vote for Hillary Clinton because we didn't like her, even though she was the better candidate. Life is about tradeoffs - we must make the best choices we can at the time, even if we don’t have a perfect choice. We need to support candidates in the pro-democracy, Democratic Party.
Will the pro-democracy forces prevail on November 5? I don’t know, but I do know that we need to work as hard as we can to make this happen.
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