Joe Biden and Mitch McConnell struck up a friendship during their nearly quarter-century in the Senate together. Now in their 80s, the Democratic president and the Senate GOP leader appear to be giving political cover to each other as they fend off questions about their advanced age and health issues.

Notably, McConnell, R-Ky., 81, hasnā€™t joined Donald Trump, 77, and other Republicans who have attacked Bidenā€™s age, health and mental acuity as he seeks re-election.

And after McConnellā€™s second freeze-up last week, Biden was one of the first to call McConnell, telling reporters that his ā€œfriendā€ sounded like ā€œhis old selfā€ and that such episodes are a ā€œpart of his recoveryā€ from a fall and a concussion this year.

  • SpaceCowboy@lemmy.ca
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    1 year ago

    Democracy and populism are mutually exclusive?

    Especially when those in power have been in power for so long that they meddle in education funding to keep said voters dumb

    Improving education is indeed the solution to the problem. And itā€™s a thing that is more likely to happen than a law prohibiting those currently in power from running again.

    • Buddahriffic@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      IMO itā€™s useless talking about what laws or policies need to change to fix this because the people with the power to change it know that doing so will affect their ability to stay in power and just wonā€™t change it to their detriment. Itā€™s the same reason protesting wonā€™t ever fix the fundamental issues. The people currently at the top arenā€™t just going to hand their power away or cripple their ability to easily generate or access wealth. If it comes to it, theyā€™ll go to war before giving that up.

      • SpaceCowboy@lemmy.ca
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        1 year ago

        Then it follows that itā€™s also useless to even discuss such things on the internet. So why even bring up these topics if itā€™s impossible to change anything?

        Or are you just spending time posting on the internet in an attempt discourage others from trying to improve things?

        • Buddahriffic@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          Solving a problem requires understanding it. Iā€™m not trying to discourage improvement but want more people to see what I see about the nature of whatā€™s going on and how many of these flaws in the system arenā€™t seen that way by the people who pass the laws and make the policies.