I think she did a poor job of saying what she brought to the table. I understand not wanting to throwJoe under the bus, but opening some daylight on policy would have given her a chance to deflect the affordability problems the last months of Biden had, for example.

First, you can cut that shit right out with your leading question of "was she worse than Trump." That isn't how a large portion of the electorate acts, thinks, and believes. Some vote on utilitarian ethics. Some vote on respect for persons. You can't just whine, stamp your feet, and pretend that utilitarianism is the only way to vote. You're trying to hand waive away an branch of moral philosophy that has centuries of scholarly work behind it. If you view voting as simply an either/or choice, sure, Kamala was the only choice. If you view voting as an endorsement of candidate, then it's perfectly valid to not vote for a candidate simply because you consider their actions to be morally abominable. The other guy being worse doesn't change that.

She abandoned Palestinian Americans. The strongest defense of trans people she could offer "she would follow the law." She cozied up with the Cheneys and offered no real policies that would move the needle on wealth inequality. And she couldn't even offer a robust plan on how to protect abortion rights. And she gaslit everyone on the economy, telling people to believe the inflation figures and not their own lying eyes.

And before you claim that utilitarianism is the only valid voting philosophy, realize that is not how our own government behaves. We've literally vaporized millions of innocent civilians over the decades. The justification has always been, "well, they supported the evil regime and their evil actions." Yet every dictator has come to power on the backs of people who thought they were the lesser evil. Hell, almost every Republican thinks Trump is a monster, but they vote for him because they consider him the lesser evil. I'm sure we incinerated thousands of Iraqis who voted for Saddam because he was the lesser evil on the ballot.

Vote how you want. If you view voting as a utilitarian exercise, so be it. But part of living in a democracy is recognizing that other people can have different belief systems and ways of life. Your way is not the only way. You believe that the ends always justify the means. Others recognize that as a road to Hell.

In your opinion. An opinion you're no more willing to budge on than the leftist is willing to compromise their position that any further concession to the right is tantamount to endorsing their atrocities. That someone willing to "reach across the aisle" at this point is doing little more than consenting to crimes committed in their name. The leftist and the liberal are standing equally on their beliefs and their principles, and both are just as unwilling to compromise. Can you truly say either one is more responsible for dividing the opposition to the fascists than the other? If you truly believe that voting for anyone but Trump is worth whatever price it takes, then you also believe there's no harm in endorsing a more left leaning candidate no? Unless you truly believe more Democrats are willing to permit crimes against humanity than there are leftists willing to find an acceptable compromise. If that's the case, the United States of America has already fallen too far to save.

But when it comes to the general, the most milquetoast corporatist democrat is better than right-wing outright fascism.

Only if you only care about the short term. And then short term thinking is what has got us to this point.