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For every one of the coming takes that Republicans will be hypocrites to appoint and confirm a justice (which they will) They do not give a fuck. That’s not h

by tyre 6y ago

For every one of the coming takes that Republicans will be hypocrites to appoint and confirm a justice (which they will) They do not give a fuck. That’s not how they see power and it is why they have a far disproportionate share of power/representation than their support across the electorate. This is about power. In politics, nothing else matters.

mhh__ 6y ago
> They do not give a fuck Something that the Democrats need to realize is that they (especially Obama) assumed too much good faith in the congressional GOP. You can stick to your principles while doing it but, when you are against a party who now considers its last nominee (Romney) a radical BLM leftist, when they go low you need to be ready to kick them in the head.
- tyre 6y ago
  Precisely. There is a desire, specifically and especially on the left, to get so caught up in their principles that people believe it is the primary source of change. For example: What should be the first acts and priorities be of a democratic administration? Healthcare? Nope. Climate change? Nope. A federal holiday for election days? Yes. Passing legislation mandating mail-in ballots? Yes. That’s how you think about politics. About power. Lock in any advantage and expand it. Democrats have popular support for their policies but cannot for the life of them think strategically.
  - mhh__ 6y ago
    Being embarrassed about wanting to be in power is a perpetual problem for leftism (It's understandable - it involves saying yes to the institutions you probably want to reform). Consider Corbyn in the UK - Awful polling from day 1, doesn't help much with Brexit, loses 2 elections (One meh, one disaster) but the lessons learned is that they won the "argument" and it's all good?
    - nerdponx 6y ago
      To be fair, most American "left" politicians are hardly left, with the exception of Sanders and the handful of DSA-affiliated Congressmen. Although popular support for more-left policies seems to be forcing them (reluctantly) farther leftward.
    - nsajko 6y ago
      To be fair, it is hypothetically possible that Corbyn did the best he could have done, considering he was being terribly smeared, even vilified, by all the big media organizations in UK AFAIK.
      - mhh__ 6y ago
        Field a candidate with a riposte then. The Corbyn fans love to talk abut media smears but they neglect to mention that he never polled above 0% net approval in his entire term as leader. Starmer, his replacement, is a man of intellect, principle, and service to the public - he is already doing better than Corbyn ever did - i.e. the media who didn't like Corbyn were writing amicable praise of Sir Keir (the mail love a nickname) even when he was making a mockery of their man (Boris)
        flamble 6y ago
        The reason for that is that Starmer is a corporate stooge who doesn't present any threat to the merciless extraction of value from the working class. Of course they have no objection to the kind of competition which would have no adverse effect on their interests if it prevailed; their praise is evidence of Starner's complete lack of merit. The media besmirched Corbyn BECAUSE he was a decent man with the interests of the public at heart, which is unacceptable to the owners of the media apparatus.
        toyg 6y ago
        > Starmer is a corporate stooge Now, now. Starmer might not be a militant marxist, but he spent a good chunk of his life fighting for workers' rights in court. He also served faithfully in the shadow cabinet under Corbyn - are you saying that Corbyn chose a "corporate stooge" as his shadow minister, and on the hottest issue of the day at that (brexit)? One of Corbyn's lackings was that he was unable to make friends in his own party, to the point that half of his own rank & file literally sabotaged him at the last election. By calling good people all sorts of unwarranted names we're only going to see a repeat, and $deity knows this country deserves better than yet another Tory government.
  - wyldfire 6y ago
    Voting and gerrymandering are the metagame. We should pay people to vote, that would help turnout (up to about as much as it would ever get).
    - worker767424 6y ago
      Controversial view: no, we shouldn't. Have you see how stupid people are? How easily they're manipulated? How little they understand about how government works? Any you want politicians pandering to these people? If it weren't to the stigma of "literacy" tests and how the were historically used, I'd be fully in favor of "licensing" voters.
      - papeda 6y ago
        Paying people to vote is pretty out there. I think we should at least put election day on a weekend. Spread it over both days, even. This feels to me like a relatively easy small step that would really help make voting easier in a way that doesn't open itself up to voter fraud arguments (as far as I know).
        wyldfire 6y ago
        > Spread it over both days, even. Early voting (in several states already?) does a good job of this IMO.
      - malandrew 6y ago
        The literacy test that I took wasn't even controversial. Back in middle school my civics teacher actually had us take one of these literacy tests. While very few people in the class passed the test (I think just myself and one other person), anyone actually familiar with the text of the US Constitution should be able to pass it. Sadly almost no one in our class was familiar with the US Constitution. I'm totally okay with a test where the only document you need to study from is the US Constitution.
    - ransom1538 6y ago
      "We should pay people to vote" Reminds of me of 3rd grade when kids would make a christmas tree out of their scantron tests. That is what we need -- randomness added to voting.
  - toastal 6y ago
    Having more people able to vote in winner-takes-all elections in gerrymandered districts won't help as much as you'd like.
    - tyre 6y ago
      I am under no delusions about what I mentioned as panaceas. But in terms of direct action that democrats could pass in the first week (the bills exist already), those are my picks. Gerrymandering would take a constitutional amendment. Yes, it would help more, but that’s a moot point if the people we’re talking about can’t do it.
      - toastal 6y ago
        Sure. I was pointing out that there's up-and-down fundamental issues with the American voting system that would take a massive reform to fix as mere tweaks alone won't suffice. I think we'd agree on this.
    - AlanSE 6y ago
      The whole electoral college is non-intentional gerrymandering. The candidate with fewer votes has been winning since 2000, and winning with a wider and wider vote margin. A major political goal should be getting the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact done.
      - sanj 6y ago
        Obama won both elections in electoral votes and actual votes.
        AlanSE 6y ago
        Yes, and was very centrist. I don't think the changing media landscape can be disentangled from this, which is a trend happening for unrelated reasons. If the only thing happening was urban concentration, then the mathematical predicted response of politicians would be that the liberal part becomes political-center and the conservative part skews further right.
  - User23 6y ago
    Democrats’ policy of importing tens of millions of future reliable Democrat voters is some solid strategic thinking.
    - nerdponx 6y ago
      Until Trump does something zany and unexpected like abolishing ICE next month, and suddenly they all flip red. Edit: That said, I could think of much worse outcomes.
    - evan_ 6y ago
      If republicans don’t like that non-white people more frequently vote for democrats they could try courting their votes with their policies and actions rather than trying to kill/deport as many as possible
      - nerdponx 6y ago
        On the flipside, if Democrats didn't think they had a solid voter base in immigrants, they wouldn't give a shit about immigrants.
      - User23 6y ago
        That Democrats identified the Republican inability or unwillingness to either woo or eliminate the new voters only further argues in favor of their strategic acumen.
  - tasty_freeze 6y ago
    Gerrymandering is at the top of my list. Solve that problem and it is easier to attack the other problems.
    - tyre 6y ago
      That would take a constitutional amendment. The top three amendments (in my opinion) that the US needs most: - ending gerrymandering - taking money out of politics (federally financed elections) - forcing votes on nominees within a certain time period, otherwise they are assumed confirmed
  - nerdponx 6y ago
    Democrats have popular support for their policies but cannot for the life of them think strategically. You think they don't understand this stuff? Democrats have been deliberately "failing" to get shit done for 20 years. They keep holding out progressive and populist policies, tantalizingly close to enacting meaningful change -- but nope, somehow it always seems to be a matter of political strategy, badly run campaigns, and bad messaging that derails things. Surely the Republicans haven't somehow had the better political strategists for decades. They aren't always better funded and they aren't always better organized. And certainly they don't have access to some kind of magic politics potion that the Democrats lack. The only plausible scenario that I can see is that the Democratic party leadership has no interest in actually getting policy enacted, as long as they keep their cozy niche in power. Another 4 years of Trump will help them do very well in the 2022 midterms, and it will help keep their friends at the NYT, CNN, and MSNBC in business. It would also explain why they hated Sanders and the DSA candidates so much. Liberals (not to mention leftists) who actually wanted to take power at the national level and actually do something? That would fuck up the whole game. Basically you'd have to show me some actual evidence that Democratic party leadership actually wants to do anything other than campaign on a progressive platform and consistently almost-win. The whole thing seems worked to me.
    - bscphil 6y ago
      I don't think you need anything that conspiratorial, it's not that centrist Democrats really don't want to get anything done, it's just that they really are basically okay with the current neoliberal consensus.
      - shanhaiguan 6y ago
        What's the distinction?
        bscphil 6y ago
        Well, one is the claim that Democrats don't get anything done because they have a secret commitment to keep things the way they are so that voters have a reason to come back to the polls for them, and I'm saying maybe the reason is simply that Democrats are mostly fine with the way things are. Maybe your point is that this is a distinction without a difference, which I guess I'd mostly have to agree with.
- ALittleLight 6y ago
  I don't know about head kicks. I think you just need to be a political realist. The reality is that you need (edit: cooperation of the) Senate and Presidency to get a Justice nominated. Obama didn't have the Senate and didn't get his pick for Justice. Trump does, and will get his pick. The whole "Republicans are hypocrites" thing is true - but obviously so. Whatever was said about not doing it in election year was simply a political lie they felt they had to say to avoid the "We are doing this because we can" reality.
  - gdubs 6y ago
    Kennedy, Souter, and Thomas were all approved by a senate of an opposing party. Apparently you have to go back to the 1800s though to find a case where a Democratic president had a nominee appointed by a Republican Senate.
    - ALittleLight 6y ago
      You have to have the cooperation of the Senate I meant. Obviously, in cases where a President of one party has a nominee appointed by a Senate of another, the cooperation of the Senate was there.
    - 8note 6y ago
      Looking earlier than the 60s or so seems irrelevant for comparing the republicans and democrats
  - cmurf 6y ago
    Merrick Garland was recommended to Obama by Republican senator Orrin Hatch as a reasonable candidate, before the death of Scalia.
- ghufran_syed 6y ago
  Democrat senators Chuck Schumer and Harry Reid first introduced a filibuster for judicial nominees, and then ending the filibuster for judicial nominees when it was politically convenient for them. https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/04/mitch-mcconnell-charles-schumer-nuclear-option-judicial-filibuster-214991 https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/04/mitch-mcconn... Do you think that might have affected the ability of the current president to successfully appoint a supreme court justice now?
  - res0nat0r 6y ago
    No
  - gilrain 6y ago
    > Democrat Childish. Come on.
  - evan_ 6y ago
    Do you think the republicans would not have ended it for Kavanaugh?
    - cmurf 6y ago
      They did. Reid's cloture vote to end the filibuster applied to federal judges, not Supreme Court justices. Before the vote on Kavanaugh there was a cloture vote to end the filibuster.
      - evan_ 6y ago
        Oh well if he hasn’t done that surely the republicans would’ve sat on their hands this whole time
  - glenstein 6y ago
    There are so many unpacked assumptions and unevaluated arguments here it would take a book to work through them all. To give a short version - if you oppose a filibuster, then don't use it to prevent Merrick Garland from being on the court. Nothing about Schumer's position on the filibuster in 2002 can be used to argue that the trajectory of court appointments since then is a culmination of any logically consistent argument in response to it.
- zanny 6y ago
  Obama didn't assume anything. He was a senator for 12 years (federally for 4) and had plenty of experience by that point to know how partisan legislative bodies are and how members will die for their parties perceived glory. I don't believe for a second that in the aftermath of Clinton's impeachment & Gore's 500 vote loss in the state being governed by his opponents brother with tens of thousands of votes lost or miscounted that any prospective politician anywhere in the US would expect good faith from their opposition. He was a great orator and liked using that come together message as an attempted bait to push popular support in his favor, though. It was also a great excuse for pushing an extremely conservative healthcare bill through congress as if it were some major achievement for his more progressive supporters.
  - tyre 6y ago
    I agree on Obama. Biden played a large part as well. Remember that they got rid of a public option in negotiations to win Republicans over. And got zero Republican votes. Obama was many things, but he was not good at congressional politics. He saw himself as about the fray, and it showed.
    - chris11 6y ago
      Joe Lieberman killed the public option in Obamacare. He threatened to vote against the bill if a public option was included.
      - StanislavPetrov 6y ago
        You mean Joe Lieberman, who was Al Gore's choice for Vice President when he won the Democratic nomination for president in 2000, and went on to endorse Republican John McCain for president only 8 years later? The facts are that Democratic Senator Max Baucus, Chairmen of the Senate Finance Committee and Obama's pointman in the Senate who was responsible for writing the language of Obamacare (Romneycare) invited a cabal of insurance industry lobbyists into the negotiating room to write the bill and specifically excluded all single-payer advocates from the negotiating table. Its pure revisionist history to suggest that Obama and his minions did everything they could to push a public option (let alone single-payer or even a Medicare-for-all type provision). The facts are that Obama and the Democratic leadership caucus were determined to pass a bill that enshrined the predominance of the for-profit, employer-based health insurance industry. Obamacare (Romneycare) was designed from the beginning as an effort to preclude real, substantive change and improvements to our healthcare system by implementing some very minor improvements (such as the pre-existing conditions clause) and some cosmetic changes. This was abundantly clear to everyone who was paying close attention at the time and not getting their information from corporate news outlets. https://pnhp.org/news/max-baucus-should-not-be-deciding-health-care-for-america/ https://pnhp.org/news/max-baucus-should-not-be-deciding-heal...
- colordrops 6y ago
  This idea that either the Republicans or Democrats have faith or principles is absurd. The Democratic brand is one of principles and altruism, but their actions do not reflect this.
  - colinmhayes 6y ago
    Wrong. Democrats are principled to a fault.
    - nerdponx 6y ago
      It's getting hard not to believe that it's mostly a front.
      - mhh__ 6y ago
        In what way?
    - refurb 6y ago
      Oh, the old "the reason my party can't get anything done is because they are too principled".
      - colinmhayes 6y ago
        Everything is relative. Obviously politicians aren't principled in an absolute way. But democrats absolutely are more principled than republicans. They have failed to lie like republicans do. They don't gerrymander as effectively. They refuse to utilize fake news to energize their base like republicans do.
        colordrops 6y ago
        They did all of that during the primary against Bernie Sanders. They went so far as to call him a Russian plant. And the rigging of the Iowa caucus result reporting was unconscionable. They only reported districts that Sanders was not leading in, making it look like he lost. It took a week to report results districts he was popular in and he ended up winning the popular vote. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=nDO2kHGEoY0 https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=nDO2kHGEoY0
- anm89 6y ago
  Or maybe present a better alternative that gets people to vote for your side? Your party aggressively screwed over a candidate who could have energized the base and still would have captured 99.99% of the center in a trade for a principle-less barely coherent snooze fest of a human being who would toe the old party line and then you claim the only remedy is to play as dirty as the other side? Excuse me for not buying it. I voted for Obama but the democratic party is bordering on as repulsive as the republicans these days and this type of thinking is to blame.
  - mhh__ 6y ago
    Bernie? He lost to Hillary by almost 4 million votes, then lost to Biden by 9 million votes (The largest margin since 2004) - how is that motivating the base. He's a protectionist idealist who the republicans were dying to run against because they knew he'd be easier than Biden.
    - anm89 6y ago
      I'm not a Bernie supporter. Just pointing out that the party repeatedly screws itself over. Also just because a person loses a primary does not mean they are they weaker candidate in the general election. The math can easily go the other way.
- DuskStar 6y ago
  At the same time, from the Republican perspective... They won "fair and square", and then largely liberal-staffed agencies and other organizations delayed and resisted the implementation of Republican policies as much as possible. The other side wasn't playing fair, why should they?
ncallaway 6y ago
Then it's time to fight back. Make it absolutely clear to McConnell and Democratic leaders in the Senate that if McConnell fills this seat in an election year, then the Democrats must increase the size of the SCOTUS. McConnell needs to fear the reprisal more than he fears the delay. Because you're right, this is about power. Nothing else matters to them. So make them fear this.
- tyre 6y ago
  I can’t see Dems doing that. They don’t have the popular support for something like that, let alone the courage. What they should do is physically barricade the Capitol. I’m not really joking. It will come to that. My first guess of the most action they will take: Staging a walk-out of the vote.
  - sjg007 6y ago
    They will.
  - anonAndOn 6y ago
    I think we're about to see some of the more arcane rules of debate in the Senate take center stage: repeated quorum calls, filibuster, cloture, etc. I suspect this will not go down without a fight.
    - tyre 6y ago
      Filibuster was abolished for SCOTUS nominations. There was nothing procedurally that Democrats could have done to stop Kavanaugh. If there were, they would have. They cannot stop this nomination by traditional means.
  - stevehawk 6y ago
    A walkout? That wouldn't do anything. There's 53 sitting Republicans. That's enough to confirm a nomination.
- wyldfire 6y ago
  There's no reprisal that would intimidate him into not taking every opportunity to claim more power.
Igelau 6y ago
> This is about power. In politics, nothing else matters. Sounds about right. > the activities associated with the governance of a country or other area, especially the debate or conflict among individuals or parties having or hoping to achieve power.
martythemaniak 6y ago
They will 100% fill that seat before Jan 20th. The outcome of the election does not matter. Anyone who thinks otherwise really doesn't understand McConnell and the gang. They'll let Romney dissent, it'll be the impeachment vote v2. I saw some interviews with her, pretty amazing lady. Sad to see her go.
- tyre 6y ago
  Yes, she a wonderful human and a brilliant thinker and writer. He take on Roe is nuanced and thoughtful and no bullshit (she doesn’t love it.) I’m curious if they wait until after the election. Dangle it in front of their base as “we have to save this seat”. Or maybe it’s actually a dis-incentive for republican turnout because RBG dying was a strong selling point for next term. It will be interesting for sure. EDIT: I take that back. They will confirm before Election Day. They need a fifth judge for Trump to contest the election.
jamiequint 6y ago
Hillary won the popular vote by 1.1% and currently the Republicans hold a razor thin Senate majority and have been substantially outpaced by Democrats in the House, so I'm not really sure where you get the idea that there's a "far disproportionate share of power/representation". It seems pretty proportionate to me.
- basementcat 6y ago
  65,853,514 to 62,984,828, about 2.1% https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2016_United_States_presidential_election https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2016_United_States_presidentia...
- zanny 6y ago
  Proportionality isn't one to one because half of Americans aren't republican and half aren't democrat. The problem is that polling data is absolutely awful at showing absolute support for the individual parties platforms and membership numbers are largely biased compared to what the electorate actually wants, but there are plenty of articles about GOP tactics to hold power from a minority bloc position.[1] I wish I bookmarked the statistics on this because they were eye opening to me, but 2016 polls were showing about 40% democrat to 35% republican leaning in the country. So if the public at large is 5% more blue than red, but Republicans hold near-even seats in government, thats a bias in their favor. And as this and many other articles show this isn't the product of random swings of popular support but structurally orchestrated power grabs meant to keep a minority party in power. [1] https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2018/12/gop-maneuvers-rule-minority-party/577948/ https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2018/12/gop-man... Edit: And to be fair the Senate isn't a democratic institution whatsoever to begin with. Its going to naturally lean red because there are many states with low urbanization and population that produce permanent seat Republican senators. Because the distribution of states has nothing to do with the distribution of people that lends the senate to be hugely incongruent with the actual ideological makeup of the populace at large.
- tyre 6y ago
  You look at the core beliefs of the Republican Party: Anti-Abortion: about or above sixty percent of Americans support legal abortions Climate change: two thirds of Americans view it as a top priority and that the benefits of action outweigh the costs Guns: sixty percent to two-thirds of Americans support stricter gun control. 90–92% support mandatory background checks Taxing Wealthy: again, sixty percent to two thirds support higher taxes on the wealthy. Those are the pillars. Those are the core propositions. Americans do not support them or not by a margin of 1.1%
tick_tock_tick 6y ago
That is revisionist history at best Harry Reid (D) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_Reid https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_Reid changed the rules and Congress have been fucked ever since.
- refurb 6y ago
  Why is this downvoted? Harry Reid literally eliminated the ability of the minority party to filibuster a presidential nominee.[1] So the Democrats are basically complaining that they can't stop a Trump nomination, but only because they changed the rules themselves. [1]https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/nov/21/harry-reid-senate-rules-republican-filibusters-nominations https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/nov/21/harry-reid-sen...
  - evan_ 6y ago
    You can’t possibly argue in good faith that the republicans would not have changed it anyway.
    - manquer 6y ago
      Perhaps not, however democrats should not complain when they set precedent knowing full well they will end up regretting it later.
    - refurb 6y ago
      OF course not. It's just ironic the Democrats themselves eliminated a rule that could have helped them now.
      - evan_ 6y ago
        It would not have helped them now because it would be gone
kenjackson 6y ago
Democrats need to be ready to use the Nuclear Option. It's still on the table. They should have someone right now getting in shape for it.
- Kranar 6y ago
  Can you explain what you mean? The nuclear option [1] is used by the majority party in the Senate to end a filibuster by the minority party. Democrats are the minority party in the Senate and hence have no such option available to them. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_option https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_option
  - vkou 6y ago
    The nuclear option is that the next time they win an election, they add 9 more supreme court seats.
lliamander 6y ago
Do not make the mistake of thinking the politicians who represent you are particularly principled people. The left has been talking about stacking the supreme court since Kavanaugh. Democratic senators played games with the filibuster. There are plenty of other examples of weaponizing politics that I could cite (from both sides). I would like to see Senate Republicans show some fair play and wait for after the election, though there is some wisdom in wanting to avoid the possibility of a split decision should this election go to the supreme court.
- couchand 6y ago
  Seems highly unlikely that John Roberts would let any decision on the election be that close. He's too much of an institutionalist to not find some way to bring along most, if not all, of the Justices. Given that, it's really quite preferable that the seat go unfilled, eliminating the possibility of a 5-4 decision with Roberts writing the dissent, a situation that really would spell doom for American democracy.
  - lliamander 6y ago
    I think that's pretty reasonable.
- athms 6y ago
  >The left has been talking about stacking the supreme court since Kavanaugh. Considering the court has had a Republican majority since 1989, I don't blame them.
  - lliamander 6y ago
    You don't think making the court an explicitly partisan institution by just stacking it whenever you are in power is going to be a bad idea? You don't think it will destroy the collegial attitude of the court that allowed Ginsburg and Scalia to be friends? You don't think Republicans will just do the same thing in response? Judging by the wikipedia page on judicial leanings[1], Roberts, Kavanaugh, and Gorusch are all fairly moderate, whereas Breyer, Kagan, and Sotomayor are (relatively) more ideological. Only Alito and Thomas are particularly conservative. And it's not like rulings have always been one-sided. I know plenty of conservatives have their gripes with Roberts. Democratic appointees even held all nine seats during the 40's, and Republicans didn't stack the court. [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ideological_leanings_of_United_States_Supreme_Court_justices https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ideological_leanings_of_United...
glial 6y ago
Legitimacy matters.
1024core 6y ago
> They do not give a fuck. Why would they? There are no consequences to bad behavior! Republicans push tax cuts through for the wealthy, leaving the country deeper in debt. So what do Democrats do when they get back in power? Let those cuts stand! Imagine, if, for every Republican shenanigan, their price to pay would be much higher than any potential gains. They would think twice about being assholes then. But as things stand, they suffer no consequences! So why would they ever change??
ekianjo 6y ago
> disproportionate share of power/representation than their support across the electorate. Both the democratic party and the republican party only represent a small fraction of the electorate, for your information. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/oct/25/american-political-parties-democrats-republicans-representation-survey https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/oct/25/american-pol... "As they go to the polls in a historic presidential election, more than six in 10 Americans say neither major political party represents their views any longer, a survey has found."

by tyre 6y ago

mhh__ 6y ago

> They do not give a fuck Something that the Democrats need to realize is that they (especially Obama) assumed too much good faith in the congressional GOP. You can stick to your principles while doing it but, when you are against a party who now considers its last nominee (Romney) a radical BLM leftist, when they go low you need to be ready to kick them in the head.

tyre 6y ago
Precisely. There is a desire, specifically and especially on the left, to get so caught up in their principles that people believe it is the primary source of change. For example: What should be the first acts and priorities be of a democratic administration? Healthcare? Nope. Climate change? Nope. A federal holiday for election days? Yes. Passing legislation mandating mail-in ballots? Yes. That’s how you think about politics. About power. Lock in any advantage and expand it. Democrats have popular support for their policies but cannot for the life of them think strategically.
- mhh__ 6y ago
  Being embarrassed about wanting to be in power is a perpetual problem for leftism (It's understandable - it involves saying yes to the institutions you probably want to reform). Consider Corbyn in the UK - Awful polling from day 1, doesn't help much with Brexit, loses 2 elections (One meh, one disaster) but the lessons learned is that they won the "argument" and it's all good?
  - nerdponx 6y ago
    To be fair, most American "left" politicians are hardly left, with the exception of Sanders and the handful of DSA-affiliated Congressmen. Although popular support for more-left policies seems to be forcing them (reluctantly) farther leftward.
  - nsajko 6y ago
    To be fair, it is hypothetically possible that Corbyn did the best he could have done, considering he was being terribly smeared, even vilified, by all the big media organizations in UK AFAIK.
    - mhh__ 6y ago
      Field a candidate with a riposte then. The Corbyn fans love to talk abut media smears but they neglect to mention that he never polled above 0% net approval in his entire term as leader. Starmer, his replacement, is a man of intellect, principle, and service to the public - he is already doing better than Corbyn ever did - i.e. the media who didn't like Corbyn were writing amicable praise of Sir Keir (the mail love a nickname) even when he was making a mockery of their man (Boris)
      - flamble 6y ago
        The reason for that is that Starmer is a corporate stooge who doesn't present any threat to the merciless extraction of value from the working class. Of course they have no objection to the kind of competition which would have no adverse effect on their interests if it prevailed; their praise is evidence of Starner's complete lack of merit. The media besmirched Corbyn BECAUSE he was a decent man with the interests of the public at heart, which is unacceptable to the owners of the media apparatus.
        toyg 6y ago
        > Starmer is a corporate stooge Now, now. Starmer might not be a militant marxist, but he spent a good chunk of his life fighting for workers' rights in court. He also served faithfully in the shadow cabinet under Corbyn - are you saying that Corbyn chose a "corporate stooge" as his shadow minister, and on the hottest issue of the day at that (brexit)? One of Corbyn's lackings was that he was unable to make friends in his own party, to the point that half of his own rank & file literally sabotaged him at the last election. By calling good people all sorts of unwarranted names we're only going to see a repeat, and $deity knows this country deserves better than yet another Tory government.
- wyldfire 6y ago
  Voting and gerrymandering are the metagame. We should pay people to vote, that would help turnout (up to about as much as it would ever get).
  - worker767424 6y ago
    Controversial view: no, we shouldn't. Have you see how stupid people are? How easily they're manipulated? How little they understand about how government works? Any you want politicians pandering to these people? If it weren't to the stigma of "literacy" tests and how the were historically used, I'd be fully in favor of "licensing" voters.
    - papeda 6y ago
      Paying people to vote is pretty out there. I think we should at least put election day on a weekend. Spread it over both days, even. This feels to me like a relatively easy small step that would really help make voting easier in a way that doesn't open itself up to voter fraud arguments (as far as I know).
      - wyldfire 6y ago
        > Spread it over both days, even. Early voting (in several states already?) does a good job of this IMO.
    - malandrew 6y ago
      The literacy test that I took wasn't even controversial. Back in middle school my civics teacher actually had us take one of these literacy tests. While very few people in the class passed the test (I think just myself and one other person), anyone actually familiar with the text of the US Constitution should be able to pass it. Sadly almost no one in our class was familiar with the US Constitution. I'm totally okay with a test where the only document you need to study from is the US Constitution.
  - ransom1538 6y ago
    "We should pay people to vote" Reminds of me of 3rd grade when kids would make a christmas tree out of their scantron tests. That is what we need -- randomness added to voting.
- toastal 6y ago
  Having more people able to vote in winner-takes-all elections in gerrymandered districts won't help as much as you'd like.
  - tyre 6y ago
    I am under no delusions about what I mentioned as panaceas. But in terms of direct action that democrats could pass in the first week (the bills exist already), those are my picks. Gerrymandering would take a constitutional amendment. Yes, it would help more, but that’s a moot point if the people we’re talking about can’t do it.
    - toastal 6y ago
      Sure. I was pointing out that there's up-and-down fundamental issues with the American voting system that would take a massive reform to fix as mere tweaks alone won't suffice. I think we'd agree on this.
  - AlanSE 6y ago
    The whole electoral college is non-intentional gerrymandering. The candidate with fewer votes has been winning since 2000, and winning with a wider and wider vote margin. A major political goal should be getting the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact done.
    - sanj 6y ago
      Obama won both elections in electoral votes and actual votes.
      - AlanSE 6y ago
        Yes, and was very centrist. I don't think the changing media landscape can be disentangled from this, which is a trend happening for unrelated reasons. If the only thing happening was urban concentration, then the mathematical predicted response of politicians would be that the liberal part becomes political-center and the conservative part skews further right.
- User23 6y ago
  Democrats’ policy of importing tens of millions of future reliable Democrat voters is some solid strategic thinking.
  - nerdponx 6y ago
    Until Trump does something zany and unexpected like abolishing ICE next month, and suddenly they all flip red. Edit: That said, I could think of much worse outcomes.
  - evan_ 6y ago
    If republicans don’t like that non-white people more frequently vote for democrats they could try courting their votes with their policies and actions rather than trying to kill/deport as many as possible
    - nerdponx 6y ago
      On the flipside, if Democrats didn't think they had a solid voter base in immigrants, they wouldn't give a shit about immigrants.
    - User23 6y ago
      That Democrats identified the Republican inability or unwillingness to either woo or eliminate the new voters only further argues in favor of their strategic acumen.
- tasty_freeze 6y ago
  Gerrymandering is at the top of my list. Solve that problem and it is easier to attack the other problems.
  - tyre 6y ago
    That would take a constitutional amendment. The top three amendments (in my opinion) that the US needs most: - ending gerrymandering - taking money out of politics (federally financed elections) - forcing votes on nominees within a certain time period, otherwise they are assumed confirmed
- nerdponx 6y ago
  Democrats have popular support for their policies but cannot for the life of them think strategically. You think they don't understand this stuff? Democrats have been deliberately "failing" to get shit done for 20 years. They keep holding out progressive and populist policies, tantalizingly close to enacting meaningful change -- but nope, somehow it always seems to be a matter of political strategy, badly run campaigns, and bad messaging that derails things. Surely the Republicans haven't somehow had the better political strategists for decades. They aren't always better funded and they aren't always better organized. And certainly they don't have access to some kind of magic politics potion that the Democrats lack. The only plausible scenario that I can see is that the Democratic party leadership has no interest in actually getting policy enacted, as long as they keep their cozy niche in power. Another 4 years of Trump will help them do very well in the 2022 midterms, and it will help keep their friends at the NYT, CNN, and MSNBC in business. It would also explain why they hated Sanders and the DSA candidates so much. Liberals (not to mention leftists) who actually wanted to take power at the national level and actually do something? That would fuck up the whole game. Basically you'd have to show me some actual evidence that Democratic party leadership actually wants to do anything other than campaign on a progressive platform and consistently almost-win. The whole thing seems worked to me.
  - bscphil 6y ago
    I don't think you need anything that conspiratorial, it's not that centrist Democrats really don't want to get anything done, it's just that they really are basically okay with the current neoliberal consensus.
    - shanhaiguan 6y ago
      What's the distinction?
      - bscphil 6y ago
        Well, one is the claim that Democrats don't get anything done because they have a secret commitment to keep things the way they are so that voters have a reason to come back to the polls for them, and I'm saying maybe the reason is simply that Democrats are mostly fine with the way things are. Maybe your point is that this is a distinction without a difference, which I guess I'd mostly have to agree with.
ALittleLight 6y ago
I don't know about head kicks. I think you just need to be a political realist. The reality is that you need (edit: cooperation of the) Senate and Presidency to get a Justice nominated. Obama didn't have the Senate and didn't get his pick for Justice. Trump does, and will get his pick. The whole "Republicans are hypocrites" thing is true - but obviously so. Whatever was said about not doing it in election year was simply a political lie they felt they had to say to avoid the "We are doing this because we can" reality.
- gdubs 6y ago
  Kennedy, Souter, and Thomas were all approved by a senate of an opposing party. Apparently you have to go back to the 1800s though to find a case where a Democratic president had a nominee appointed by a Republican Senate.
  - ALittleLight 6y ago
    You have to have the cooperation of the Senate I meant. Obviously, in cases where a President of one party has a nominee appointed by a Senate of another, the cooperation of the Senate was there.
  - 8note 6y ago
    Looking earlier than the 60s or so seems irrelevant for comparing the republicans and democrats
- cmurf 6y ago
  Merrick Garland was recommended to Obama by Republican senator Orrin Hatch as a reasonable candidate, before the death of Scalia.
ghufran_syed 6y ago
Democrat senators Chuck Schumer and Harry Reid first introduced a filibuster for judicial nominees, and then ending the filibuster for judicial nominees when it was politically convenient for them. https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/04/mitch-mcconnell-charles-schumer-nuclear-option-judicial-filibuster-214991 https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/04/mitch-mcconn... Do you think that might have affected the ability of the current president to successfully appoint a supreme court justice now?
- res0nat0r 6y ago
  No
- gilrain 6y ago
  > Democrat Childish. Come on.
- evan_ 6y ago
  Do you think the republicans would not have ended it for Kavanaugh?
  - cmurf 6y ago
    They did. Reid's cloture vote to end the filibuster applied to federal judges, not Supreme Court justices. Before the vote on Kavanaugh there was a cloture vote to end the filibuster.
    - evan_ 6y ago
      Oh well if he hasn’t done that surely the republicans would’ve sat on their hands this whole time
- glenstein 6y ago
  There are so many unpacked assumptions and unevaluated arguments here it would take a book to work through them all. To give a short version - if you oppose a filibuster, then don't use it to prevent Merrick Garland from being on the court. Nothing about Schumer's position on the filibuster in 2002 can be used to argue that the trajectory of court appointments since then is a culmination of any logically consistent argument in response to it.
zanny 6y ago
Obama didn't assume anything. He was a senator for 12 years (federally for 4) and had plenty of experience by that point to know how partisan legislative bodies are and how members will die for their parties perceived glory. I don't believe for a second that in the aftermath of Clinton's impeachment & Gore's 500 vote loss in the state being governed by his opponents brother with tens of thousands of votes lost or miscounted that any prospective politician anywhere in the US would expect good faith from their opposition. He was a great orator and liked using that come together message as an attempted bait to push popular support in his favor, though. It was also a great excuse for pushing an extremely conservative healthcare bill through congress as if it were some major achievement for his more progressive supporters.
- tyre 6y ago
  I agree on Obama. Biden played a large part as well. Remember that they got rid of a public option in negotiations to win Republicans over. And got zero Republican votes. Obama was many things, but he was not good at congressional politics. He saw himself as about the fray, and it showed.
  - chris11 6y ago
    Joe Lieberman killed the public option in Obamacare. He threatened to vote against the bill if a public option was included.
    - StanislavPetrov 6y ago
      You mean Joe Lieberman, who was Al Gore's choice for Vice President when he won the Democratic nomination for president in 2000, and went on to endorse Republican John McCain for president only 8 years later? The facts are that Democratic Senator Max Baucus, Chairmen of the Senate Finance Committee and Obama's pointman in the Senate who was responsible for writing the language of Obamacare (Romneycare) invited a cabal of insurance industry lobbyists into the negotiating room to write the bill and specifically excluded all single-payer advocates from the negotiating table. Its pure revisionist history to suggest that Obama and his minions did everything they could to push a public option (let alone single-payer or even a Medicare-for-all type provision). The facts are that Obama and the Democratic leadership caucus were determined to pass a bill that enshrined the predominance of the for-profit, employer-based health insurance industry. Obamacare (Romneycare) was designed from the beginning as an effort to preclude real, substantive change and improvements to our healthcare system by implementing some very minor improvements (such as the pre-existing conditions clause) and some cosmetic changes. This was abundantly clear to everyone who was paying close attention at the time and not getting their information from corporate news outlets. https://pnhp.org/news/max-baucus-should-not-be-deciding-health-care-for-america/ https://pnhp.org/news/max-baucus-should-not-be-deciding-heal...
colordrops 6y ago
This idea that either the Republicans or Democrats have faith or principles is absurd. The Democratic brand is one of principles and altruism, but their actions do not reflect this.
- colinmhayes 6y ago
  Wrong. Democrats are principled to a fault.
  - nerdponx 6y ago
    It's getting hard not to believe that it's mostly a front.
    - mhh__ 6y ago
      In what way?
  - refurb 6y ago
    Oh, the old "the reason my party can't get anything done is because they are too principled".
    - colinmhayes 6y ago
      Everything is relative. Obviously politicians aren't principled in an absolute way. But democrats absolutely are more principled than republicans. They have failed to lie like republicans do. They don't gerrymander as effectively. They refuse to utilize fake news to energize their base like republicans do.
      - colordrops 6y ago
        They did all of that during the primary against Bernie Sanders. They went so far as to call him a Russian plant. And the rigging of the Iowa caucus result reporting was unconscionable. They only reported districts that Sanders was not leading in, making it look like he lost. It took a week to report results districts he was popular in and he ended up winning the popular vote. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=nDO2kHGEoY0 https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=nDO2kHGEoY0
anm89 6y ago
Or maybe present a better alternative that gets people to vote for your side? Your party aggressively screwed over a candidate who could have energized the base and still would have captured 99.99% of the center in a trade for a principle-less barely coherent snooze fest of a human being who would toe the old party line and then you claim the only remedy is to play as dirty as the other side? Excuse me for not buying it. I voted for Obama but the democratic party is bordering on as repulsive as the republicans these days and this type of thinking is to blame.
- mhh__ 6y ago
  Bernie? He lost to Hillary by almost 4 million votes, then lost to Biden by 9 million votes (The largest margin since 2004) - how is that motivating the base. He's a protectionist idealist who the republicans were dying to run against because they knew he'd be easier than Biden.
  - anm89 6y ago
    I'm not a Bernie supporter. Just pointing out that the party repeatedly screws itself over. Also just because a person loses a primary does not mean they are they weaker candidate in the general election. The math can easily go the other way.
DuskStar 6y ago
At the same time, from the Republican perspective... They won "fair and square", and then largely liberal-staffed agencies and other organizations delayed and resisted the implementation of Republican policies as much as possible. The other side wasn't playing fair, why should they?

ncallaway 6y ago

Then it's time to fight back. Make it absolutely clear to McConnell and Democratic leaders in the Senate that if McConnell fills this seat in an election year, then the Democrats must increase the size of the SCOTUS. McConnell needs to fear the reprisal more than he fears the delay. Because you're right, this is about power. Nothing else matters to them. So make them fear this.

tyre 6y ago
I can’t see Dems doing that. They don’t have the popular support for something like that, let alone the courage. What they should do is physically barricade the Capitol. I’m not really joking. It will come to that. My first guess of the most action they will take: Staging a walk-out of the vote.
- sjg007 6y ago
  They will.
- anonAndOn 6y ago
  I think we're about to see some of the more arcane rules of debate in the Senate take center stage: repeated quorum calls, filibuster, cloture, etc. I suspect this will not go down without a fight.
  - tyre 6y ago
    Filibuster was abolished for SCOTUS nominations. There was nothing procedurally that Democrats could have done to stop Kavanaugh. If there were, they would have. They cannot stop this nomination by traditional means.
- stevehawk 6y ago
  A walkout? That wouldn't do anything. There's 53 sitting Republicans. That's enough to confirm a nomination.
wyldfire 6y ago
There's no reprisal that would intimidate him into not taking every opportunity to claim more power.

Igelau 6y ago

> This is about power. In politics, nothing else matters. Sounds about right. > the activities associated with the governance of a country or other area, especially the debate or conflict among individuals or parties having or hoping to achieve power.

martythemaniak 6y ago

They will 100% fill that seat before Jan 20th. The outcome of the election does not matter. Anyone who thinks otherwise really doesn't understand McConnell and the gang. They'll let Romney dissent, it'll be the impeachment vote v2. I saw some interviews with her, pretty amazing lady. Sad to see her go.

tyre 6y ago
Yes, she a wonderful human and a brilliant thinker and writer. He take on Roe is nuanced and thoughtful and no bullshit (she doesn’t love it.) I’m curious if they wait until after the election. Dangle it in front of their base as “we have to save this seat”. Or maybe it’s actually a dis-incentive for republican turnout because RBG dying was a strong selling point for next term. It will be interesting for sure. EDIT: I take that back. They will confirm before Election Day. They need a fifth judge for Trump to contest the election.

jamiequint 6y ago

Hillary won the popular vote by 1.1% and currently the Republicans hold a razor thin Senate majority and have been substantially outpaced by Democrats in the House, so I'm not really sure where you get the idea that there's a "far disproportionate share of power/representation". It seems pretty proportionate to me.

basementcat 6y ago
65,853,514 to 62,984,828, about 2.1% https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2016_United_States_presidential_election https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2016_United_States_presidentia...
zanny 6y ago
Proportionality isn't one to one because half of Americans aren't republican and half aren't democrat. The problem is that polling data is absolutely awful at showing absolute support for the individual parties platforms and membership numbers are largely biased compared to what the electorate actually wants, but there are plenty of articles about GOP tactics to hold power from a minority bloc position.[1] I wish I bookmarked the statistics on this because they were eye opening to me, but 2016 polls were showing about 40% democrat to 35% republican leaning in the country. So if the public at large is 5% more blue than red, but Republicans hold near-even seats in government, thats a bias in their favor. And as this and many other articles show this isn't the product of random swings of popular support but structurally orchestrated power grabs meant to keep a minority party in power. [1] https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2018/12/gop-maneuvers-rule-minority-party/577948/ https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2018/12/gop-man... Edit: And to be fair the Senate isn't a democratic institution whatsoever to begin with. Its going to naturally lean red because there are many states with low urbanization and population that produce permanent seat Republican senators. Because the distribution of states has nothing to do with the distribution of people that lends the senate to be hugely incongruent with the actual ideological makeup of the populace at large.
tyre 6y ago
You look at the core beliefs of the Republican Party: Anti-Abortion: about or above sixty percent of Americans support legal abortions Climate change: two thirds of Americans view it as a top priority and that the benefits of action outweigh the costs Guns: sixty percent to two-thirds of Americans support stricter gun control. 90–92% support mandatory background checks Taxing Wealthy: again, sixty percent to two thirds support higher taxes on the wealthy. Those are the pillars. Those are the core propositions. Americans do not support them or not by a margin of 1.1%

tick_tock_tick 6y ago

That is revisionist history at best Harry Reid (D) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_Reid https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_Reid changed the rules and Congress have been fucked ever since.

refurb 6y ago
Why is this downvoted? Harry Reid literally eliminated the ability of the minority party to filibuster a presidential nominee.[1] So the Democrats are basically complaining that they can't stop a Trump nomination, but only because they changed the rules themselves. [1]https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/nov/21/harry-reid-senate-rules-republican-filibusters-nominations https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/nov/21/harry-reid-sen...
- evan_ 6y ago
  You can’t possibly argue in good faith that the republicans would not have changed it anyway.
  - manquer 6y ago
    Perhaps not, however democrats should not complain when they set precedent knowing full well they will end up regretting it later.
  - refurb 6y ago
    OF course not. It's just ironic the Democrats themselves eliminated a rule that could have helped them now.
    - evan_ 6y ago
      It would not have helped them now because it would be gone

kenjackson 6y ago

Democrats need to be ready to use the Nuclear Option. It's still on the table. They should have someone right now getting in shape for it.

Kranar 6y ago
Can you explain what you mean? The nuclear option [1] is used by the majority party in the Senate to end a filibuster by the minority party. Democrats are the minority party in the Senate and hence have no such option available to them. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_option https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_option
- vkou 6y ago
  The nuclear option is that the next time they win an election, they add 9 more supreme court seats.

lliamander 6y ago

Do not make the mistake of thinking the politicians who represent you are particularly principled people. The left has been talking about stacking the supreme court since Kavanaugh. Democratic senators played games with the filibuster. There are plenty of other examples of weaponizing politics that I could cite (from both sides). I would like to see Senate Republicans show some fair play and wait for after the election, though there is some wisdom in wanting to avoid the possibility of a split decision should this election go to the supreme court.

couchand 6y ago
Seems highly unlikely that John Roberts would let any decision on the election be that close. He's too much of an institutionalist to not find some way to bring along most, if not all, of the Justices. Given that, it's really quite preferable that the seat go unfilled, eliminating the possibility of a 5-4 decision with Roberts writing the dissent, a situation that really would spell doom for American democracy.
- lliamander 6y ago
  I think that's pretty reasonable.
athms 6y ago
>The left has been talking about stacking the supreme court since Kavanaugh. Considering the court has had a Republican majority since 1989, I don't blame them.
- lliamander 6y ago
  You don't think making the court an explicitly partisan institution by just stacking it whenever you are in power is going to be a bad idea? You don't think it will destroy the collegial attitude of the court that allowed Ginsburg and Scalia to be friends? You don't think Republicans will just do the same thing in response? Judging by the wikipedia page on judicial leanings[1], Roberts, Kavanaugh, and Gorusch are all fairly moderate, whereas Breyer, Kagan, and Sotomayor are (relatively) more ideological. Only Alito and Thomas are particularly conservative. And it's not like rulings have always been one-sided. I know plenty of conservatives have their gripes with Roberts. Democratic appointees even held all nine seats during the 40's, and Republicans didn't stack the court. [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ideological_leanings_of_United_States_Supreme_Court_justices https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ideological_leanings_of_United...

glial 6y ago

Legitimacy matters.

1024core 6y ago

> They do not give a fuck. Why would they? There are no consequences to bad behavior! Republicans push tax cuts through for the wealthy, leaving the country deeper in debt. So what do Democrats do when they get back in power? Let those cuts stand! Imagine, if, for every Republican shenanigan, their price to pay would be much higher than any potential gains. They would think twice about being assholes then. But as things stand, they suffer no consequences! So why would they ever change??

ekianjo 6y ago

> disproportionate share of power/representation than their support across the electorate. Both the democratic party and the republican party only represent a small fraction of the electorate, for your information. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/oct/25/american-political-parties-democrats-republicans-representation-survey https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/oct/25/american-pol... "As they go to the polls in a historic presidential election, more than six in 10 Americans say neither major political party represents their views any longer, a survey has found."