Even if Biden was the empty husk you are afraid he is, which he isn't and you are being genuinely stupid for thinking he is, he also hasn't surrounded himself with radicals so your concern about that is also unfounded.

This post was edited by Thor123422 on Mar 27 2021 10:33pm

You are misunderstanding. Precedent is to allow these positions to expire (terms 1-3 years). There's no "normal turnover". Firing them for political purposes is completely unprecedented.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9410481/Texas-COVID-numbers-fall-17th-consecutive-day-following-reopening.html

“Neanderthal” state somehow avoids COVID uptick after lifting mask mandate

Putting the merits of what Biden did aside, it's kind of funny to me that the right is so short on material. "Boring old white president fires people on some government advisory board that 99.99% of Americans didn't even know existed". That just doesn't get the angry right-wing juices flowing.

This post was edited by IceMage on Mar 29 2021 05:20pm

yes cause florida and texas arent manipulating data at all.

So was storming the white house.

Oh please, cut the crap. We've just gone through 4 years of non-stop, 24/7 outrage by lefties and the media about everything Trump did and didnt do. Remember the "Trump overfed the kois" headline?

It's also quite ironic how you and your ilk downplay Biden's norm-defying behavior in this instance and excuse it with the argument that "the people dont care about this advisory board anyway" after you spent 4 years railing against Trump's norm-breaking behavior and "his hillbilly followers who dont care because they're too uneducated to realize how important norms and institutions are".

It's truly a sight to behold how the liberals and the nevertrumpers are exposing their glaring double standard since Biden took office.

There's a hundred Trump scandals that were covered for less than a day that are far worse than what Biden did here. The reality is that Trump managed to escape scrutiny for a lot of bad actions because he overloaded the system... the right-wing meme of the media hyperventilating over 2 scoops or the koi pond is disinformation. I just find it funny that Biden is such a milquetoast, boring figure that the right has to focus on issues like this. I'm not making the argument that "people don't care about this so it doesn't matter".

On the merits, which I didn't address in the post you quoted, I don't know what to make of it. There's some serious figures on this advisory board who were fired... there's also guys like Ken Cuccinelli. I don't know enough about it to have a strong opinion one way or the other... but for now I tend to give Biden the benefit of the doubt unless there's reason not to. Believe it or not, I did the same for Trump at the beginning of his presidency, although he quickly extinguished that good will.

This post was edited by IceMage on Mar 30 2021 08:20am

Whether you agree, disagree or are indifferent on the merits is irrelevant for the question of whether Biden broke norms with this move - the answer is yes, he definitely did. Considering the extremely high importance you always placed on respecting norms during the Trump years, I would not have thought that you would consider any kind of norm violation to be up for "the benefit of the doubt". You always came across as super rigid and stringent in your defense of norms and institutions... but perhaps I misinterpreted your stance.

Let's clarify something... are you opposed to what Biden did? If so, why? Are you simply opposing it because you think myself and others are being hypocritical?

This is childish thinking. Just because I care about norms, like a presidential candidate and president releasing his tax returns, or divesting himself from his businesses, or not owning a hotel right next to the White House where foreigners stay, or not firing Inspectors General who blew the whistle on his corrupt behavior, or not firing an FBI director because he won't close an investigation into you, or not acting like an angry teenage girl on Twitter, doesn't mean I view all norm-defying behavior equally. Not all broken norms should be thought of equally, and not all norm-breaking is bad. My guess is you would applaud an American president breaking the norm of American soldiers in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Syria. Trump broke a norm by appearing at the March For Life rally... and even though he's an evil man, I'd like for more presidents to break that norm. I was open to Trump meeting with the North Korean leader, even though it was norm-breaking. Sometimes shaking things up makes sense... but there's a lot of norms that are important, and make sense.

My guess is if Trump had done this so early in his administration, the reaction from his supporters would be "he's shaking things up... the foreign policy establishment has failed us".

If this board is part of the establishment, and Biden is part of the establishment, what's the big deal? Maybe he's trying to shake things up and get some fresh ideas from new people. It's not like this is some powerful part of the government... my guess is all they do is meet rarely and make some recommendations.