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Culture War Roundup for the week of July 22, 2024

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What would there be for the Dems to gain for hiding Biden's death?

I'm reminded of the time when Kate Middleton went on an extended media hiatus and the odd behavior by the British royals around it led to a host of conspiracy theories, ranging from relatively benign "they're divorced" to the raving ones like "They've harvested her for organs to keep King Charles alive". Or when Putin was absent from publicity for some time in late 2022 and there was fervent speculation that he had died and there was a power struggle in Kremlin. In both cases the supposedly dead party eventually turned up and the speculators, well, at least didn't come out looking so good afterwards.

Of course it is entirely possibly that it does turn out that Biden has died or been seriously incapacitated by Covid, but again, why wouldn't they just come right out with it to get sympathy points and make Kamala's road to nomination even easier?

What would there be for the Dems to gain for hiding Biden's death?

His staff / family delegating power to their allies before the jig is up, perhaps?

If Biden is dead then the Democrats don’t have a tie breaker vote in the Senate until a new VP is confirmed.

You're right that it's irrational, but it's not unthinkable coming from a severely dysfunctional organisation where there are very strong incentives to lie.

What would there be for the Dems to gain for hiding Biden's death?

Who knows. Maybe they are so addicted to lying, it's so much their first and most natural impulse, that they do it even when it serves no purpose what so ever. This has been shown to be true for Hillary Clinton and all the made up stories she tells, Biden was a habitual liar his entire political career and it tanked his Presidential run in the 80's, Kamala has been caught plagiarizing stories and adopting them as her own. I was listening to Dan Carlin, one of the Supernova in the East episodes I think, and he mentions Roosevelt had a reputation as "a man who would never tell the truth when a lie would serve him just as well" or something to that effect.

It may be time to consider that most politicians are just congenital liars.

I think Kamala would rather campaign as an incumbent, even an unpopular one, rather than as a veep.

Possibly to prevent a new VP that might be forced upon her by the Congress, so she can run with whoever she wants?

Well sure but that doesn't affect the ticket, just the last few months of the current administration.

Kamala gets to appoint her own VP if Biden resigns/gets 25th Amendmented. It's subject to congressional approval but it's still her nomination.