We don't know what Gore or Bernie would have done once in office or how the world would have responded differently to those presidencies. We could be living great, it could have gone even worse, or more likely it could just be different.
That seems like a common trope recently. How am I both sides-ing this?
Edit: trope may not be the right term here. "Don't both sides it" is a baseless claim meant to shut down a discussion rather than refute, debate, or discuss it.
It could not have "gone even worse". Anti-competence regimes are a disaster. Destroying America's alliances, international relations, leadership, soft power, environment, leadership in renewable energy, and more are all disasters that will take decades to recover from if ever (I'm personally leading towards Pax Americana being over and never recovering).
Sure, I get that. But how does that allow us to know how the last 20ish years would have played out? And how does that let us know as a fact that it would have been better (that's where this thread started)?