Let's not be ridiculous here, he's had plenty of times where he's struggled to articulate. I agree it's insane to not vote for him, but these type of statements just give ammo to trump supporters to point to Biden supporters and say how clueless they are.

There’s a level of apathy that has been a part of American politics my entire life, the logic is that all politicians do is make promises that they never fulfill and anything said about or by a candidate really doesn’t matter, and it’s treated as an axiom.

Obamas years in office without the Hope and Change we all desperately wanted when he was first elected cemented this in the minds of my millennial peers and it was already pervasive in the older generations.

Not pinning it all on Biden here but his quote from 2020 “nothing will fundamentally change” is very much what i reckon the average American believes. Very few believe anything good or ill could happen here.

People who talk about politics and religion at work tend to get hated at best and fired at worst.

People who talk about politics and religion on social media risk getting lectures from relatives and losing friends.

So yeah, people do not talk about politics and religion in America a lot of the time.

Honestly, the only reason my mother-in-law and I have maintained a really good relationship over the decades is because we just don't talk about religion or politics. My wife and I are pretty much on the opposite side of the map from her on both. So we just don't talk about it rather than become enemies. Maybe that's not the right way to go about things, but it's saved a lot of stress where we don't need it.

In my experience, yes. Mainly because for as long as I’ve been alive, if you have a dissenting opinion people tend to get very heated.

Obviously we still have political protesters and things like that but nowadays things are so divided politically that it is typically a topic that you would avoid in everyday conversation. If you were to bring up anything political with your coworker at a get together after hours for example and you find that you are on opposite ends of the political spectrum it could make it very difficult to work together at best and potentially endanger you at worst.

American politeness? No

that and religion are no no's.

i googled it and found lots of treatises on the subject

It's more of a thing so you aren't constantly fighting with your family.

You used an conservative American political dog whistle when you mentioned identity politics and you're part of western hegemony as an Australian, so I would be a bad leftist if I let it be.

It's a dog whistle here because everyone has an identity that comes attached w perpetually unaddressed needs and the ruling class of people only considers their own identity to be the national discourse; establishing that other identities are little more than causes for division.

Is it? Or is it the fact that we have two terrible options?