This is getting into some wild political theory here, but it is plausible. A third party called No Labels, has been in the works for some time. It’s funded by some large scale donors and helmed by some politicians who have been around for a while, including Joe Lieberman and Larry Hogan. The idea, apparently, is that the two-party system isn’t what it should be. The reality is that third parties tend to bleed off votes from Democrats and that could indeed be catastrophic. Intelligencer:
No Labels insists it will only go through with a campaign if it is going to win. No Labels swears up and down it will not run a spoiler campaign. “I just wanted to emphasize on the spoiler question: I would not be involved if I thought in any account that we would do something to spoil the election in favor of Donald Trump. That’s just not going to happen,” said Benjamin Chavis Jr., an adviser to the group. “We have very tight guardrails around this effort,” promises Ryan Clancy, a senior adviser.
But can anybody trust that the group’s “guardrails,” which seem to be a proprietary secret, would actually work? The Post provides several reasons to doubt it.
First, while it puts itself forward as an advocate of moderation and bipartisanship, No Labels refuses to concede that Joe Biden is an example of either. No Labels describes its protocampaign as a contingency operation against an extreme candidate by either party, and Joe Lieberman, one of the politicians associated with the group, refused to tell the Post whether a Biden campaign qualifies as the sort of contingency that would operationalize a No Labels campaign.
Indeed, the No Labels website specifically describes itself as an “insurance policy against a Trump-Biden rematch.” Larry Hogan, another No Labels figure, says, “The vast majority of people in America are not happy with the direction of the country and they don’t want to see either Joe Biden or Donald Trump as president.”
Biden may not be everybody’s cup of tea, but he has worked productively with Republicans to sign a surprisingly broad array of bipartisan legislation. His main partisan domestic initiative was essentially written by Joe Manchin, who is also involved with No Labels. It seems bizarre to create a group dedicated to promoting moderate, bipartisan legislation as a protest against a president who has actually accomplished those very goals.
No Labels has been called “a political doomsday device” and it certainly sounds that way. I don’t know if we’ll have to deal with this idiocy come 2024. I just point it out, the way the astronomers point out the asteroids that periodically approach the earth and heaven forfend they should hit us.
Secret republicans pretending ‘bipartisanship’.
Why would they think anyone would trust them?
For real change, progress, and progressive policies that improve ordinary peoples lives and increase fairness, the answer is vote Democratic.
Rumor has it, that Joe Manchin will be their candidate. So they are not interested in providing a “moderate” alternative, but rather a conservative one. The problem with their reasoning is that Manchin is not well-liked anywhere. He can’t win reelection in West Virginia and has little appeal for Democrats nationally. So I’m not worried about this stupid plan.
I.may vomit. Manchin is a noxious boil on the butt of America. Trump is leprosy
I enjoy watching the party of sedition and perverts eat themselves….
From the looks of things, fascism is being chased out of town. Time for the pitchforks….
Joe Lieberman. That tells me all I need to know. As in NOTHING good or honest about this effort. For younger folks out there Lieberman gave Bush 43 and the GOP oxygen during the 2000 recount by STABBING Al Gore in the back. There was a moment as Lieberman waffled during an interview when Ron Klain said ole Joe had just declared for the 2004 race. Lieberman would descend into full turncoat mode. I would trust that piece of shit any further than I could throw him and while once upon a time I actually could have tossed him a ways from me. I’m no longer that young, large and physically stronger than average guy. With my disability if I tried to pick up Lieberman I’d fall over and bouncing off him would wind up further away from where I started than he would! Maybe, just maybe this group truly doesn’t want Trump back in the WH. But to oh so piously claim they don’t want to play spoiler, and that they only want to ensure a moderate (their version – not that of the average voter) wins in 2024 is total BULLSHIT!
SPOILER is exactly what they are intending to be. And were I to encounter or be able to engage in a live exchange with any of them I’d call them motherfucking goddamned LIARS! Lieberman in particular surely hoped President Biden would be his version of “moderate” as in give in to the GOP’s demands far more often than not. To protect rich people and brush off anything progressive that might help this country and the world better meet the future. But while he’s made compromises (as damned near any President must) Biden has turned out to have an eye on a future that offers more opportunity for more people, and his finger on the pulse of the electorate which has never been as socially conservative in my lifetime as the GOP insists it is. Lieberman and his cronies assumed they could get Biden to blow off progressives and Biden has given them a seat at the table and even tried to meet some of their concerns.
So for Lieberman and his group that means Biden’s gotta go. If that takes running a spoiler campaign then by god that’s what they are going to do. Even if it means a “lite” version of Trump or DeSantis in the WH to try and complete the job Trump didn’t fully accomplish – tearing apart the institutions that keep this country slowly (too slowly) moving towards the ideals set forth by the founders.
Fuck Joe LIEberman and fuck his friends.
Need to ask No Labels folks (and media) over and over: so is it great to keep Democrats (especially progressives) from office and let a death cult of Nazi loving fools keep and stay in power or gain power… to rule. Sorta like South Africa. Not that one side keeps taking voting rights away and the other side violently protects (egads). One side does the election fraud (wonder who . NC meadows or a village in Florida?). One side pushes tax cuts for 1% and the rest of rich wannabes are struggling mad, kinda like since Raygun, Shrub and Dolt 45. Don’t even talk about guns (thanks Shrub): and one side offers “crap”… actually they offer nada… but continued death and misery & a flooded USA with ar15s (that Ukraine could use). Already long, but to cut the marrow of the bone: no labels can fu&k all the way off. They can join some certain both sides msm and really take their silver all the way to hell. Bless their (sorry ass) hearts.
Too bad the ‘know nothing’ party has come and gone.
The Know Nothing party still exists. It’s called MAGA now. Remember when the GOP used to call itself the silent or moral majority? MTG, Bobblehead, et al are anything but silent or moral.
They’re so sure they can win Massachusetts!
If you can think of a more effective way to keep voters in the dark than demonizing “labels,” I would be interested to hear it.
Another bunch of fucking idiots on parade. America never tires of them.
That’s the problem. Joe Biden has done a record setting agenda. He’s crashed through te norms. Even on the midterms all the republicans could eke out is a tie. Nobody knows what to do so you are down to in case of emergency break glass. If it wasn’t for manchin and that queen Joe Biden would have nailed more in two years than any president in eight. And all these people are sitting around crying that they didn’t get what they wanted. Well the dumbass morons blocked it just own the libs. Now that is the height of stupidity to shoot your own foot to own to other side. I’ve seen stupid in my time. And then the clowns are going around crying about something they did to themselves.
‘Bipartisan’ – “We make the decisions and you have to agree with us irrespective”.