Thread by @hilzoy

Let's get real about this. Joe Biden should not run for President. If his advisors aren't saying so, he should get new ones.

It's obvious that now, in the midst of #MeToo, is not the time to run for the Democratic nomination if you happened to run the Anita Hill hearing.

https://twitter.com/KFILE/status/1082090922966421505

2/ Some backgrounders on that, based on a very cursory Google search:

washingtonpost.com/news/retropoli…

washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/maga…

3/ It's also pretty well known that he sponsored and voted for the 1994 crime bill. @jbouie has a good rundown of his record on criminal justice here.

slate.com/news-and-polit…

@jbouie 4/ But did you know that Biden not only voted for, not only sponsored, but *partially wrote* the bill that gave us the crack/cocaine sentencing disparity?

Well, he did.

@jbouie 5/ Wonkier related point: did you know that he also sponsored and helped to write the 1984 bill that greatly expanded civil forfeiture (otherwise known as: police taking your property even if you're never convicted of a crime, and using the proceeds to fund their departments.)

6/ Seriously: so long as the police think your property represents the proceed of a crime, they can just take it. (WHAT WOULD GROVER NORQUIST SAY?)

That's Biden.

7/ If you think that it would be a great idea to nominate the single Democratic Senator who was arguably most responsible for mass incarceration that disproportionately affects African-Americans, militarized policing and the expansion of the carceral state, he's your guy.

8/ Why anyone thinks that would be a winning formula now, of all times, is a mystery.

9/ And then there's the 2005 bankruptcy bill. It had many, many bad features, but I want to highlight just one: this was the bill that made it impossible to discharge student loans made by for profit entities during bankruptcy.

10/ It was already impossible to discharge loans made by government and non-profits, absent great hardship, but this was the bill that said: if you take out a student loan from e.g. a bank, and you then declare bankruptcy, that student loan will not be wiped out.

11/ Does anyone think that now is a good time to run someone who helped make student loans a much worse problem than they were before?

If so, get professional help.

12/ Plus, being a Senator from Delaware, he's always looked out for credit card companies and the like.

If you think that now is a great time to run someone who has been cozy with big finance, again, seek professional help.

13/ He's vulnerable on sexual harassment, mass incarceration, and debt, especially student debt.

And he helped write the bill that gave us the crack/cocaine disparity.

That's a record designed to be problematic for women, people of color, millennials, and, really, most Dems.

14/ This particular moment might have been designed to be wrong for Joe Biden.

And yet, somehow, he seems to think that he alone can save us.

He should think harder.

/Fin.