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Right. This is boring, and therefore not fun to talk about. But it's extremely clear that there are substantial differences between the parties to the point tha

Right. This is boring, and therefore not fun to talk about. But it's extremely clear that there are substantial differences between the parties to the point that I don't know how to have a conversation with someone who wants to deny this, and talking about the No Surprises Act (for instance) won't lead to a flamewar, so you won't hear about it.

rayiner 4y ago
I don’t think OP is denying that there are differences between the parties. But the first two years of Biden’s administration was a win for the McConnell wing of the Republican Party. The only significant economic measure that was passed was covid relief, which republicans were for (because Trump did it) before they were against it. There were no tax hikes and no expanded social programs (apart from temporary expansion of the child tax credit). It’s hard to deny that the result of the current democratic strategy is not meaningfully different from what Mitch McConnell wants, whether it’s deliberate or not. And I do think it’s deliberate to a significant extent. The current Democratic coalition has a lot of people, especially in the donor base, that are basically socially liberal Republicans. If forced to choose between issues, they care more about legalized abortion than labor unions. Of course these folks avoid any acknowledgement that these goals are in conflict, but that’s obviously wrong. Politics is about assembling a coalition that can command a voting majority. Political capital is a finite resource. Obviously spending significant political capital on an issue like abortion—where about 1 out of 5 democrats disagrees with the rest of the party—will mean less political capital available for making the child tax credit permanent. It’s math.
- cycrutchfield 4y ago
  The current composition of the senate, 50-50, and the antiquated filibuster process, mean that the senate cannot do anything without bipartisan consensus. Not sure why you are railing about democrats that are secretly republicans when that is clearly not the issue.
  - rayiner 4y ago
    The current composition of the Senate is the product of a deliberate choice by socially liberal pro-business democrats (i.e. Rockefeller republicans) to prioritize social issues such as abortion and immigration over economic ones.
  - jmyeet 4y ago
    There is no constitutional basis for the filibuster. It's just a rule the Senate invented. And they can un-invent it. Whenever the new Congress forms, the Senate Majority Leader sets the rules for that Congress. This includes the number of seats on committees and so forth. What you have is Democrats who hide behind "institutions" as an excuse to do nothing and Republicans who quite literally will change the rules whenever it suits them. Examples include: 1. Firing the Senate parliamentarian when he blocked the Senate from advancing Bush tax cuts; 2. Deciding completely without basis that with 11 months left of Obama's term, it somehow wasn't proper to hold a hearing or a vote on Garland's nomination to the Supreme Court; and 3. Deciding that any nomination (not just judicial) couldn't be filibustered (Harry Reid had previously changed the rules to make Supreme Court nominations filibuster-proof). But what is the filibuster? Up until I believe the 1970s it was a process where a Senator who had the floor could refuse to yield and keep talking to block a vlote as long as they could keep standing. This is real "Mr Smith Goes to Washington" type stuff [1]. This Senate refused to change the rules on this so here we are. Two proposals have been made: 1. Eliminate the filibuster entirely. It's pretty much only ever used to block progress (eg by blocking civil rights legislation in the 1960s); or 2. Require a Senator to actually filibuster by going back to the old system of holding the floor and refusing to yield. Both of course failed. Why? Because the corporate interests that own Manchin and Sinema don't want that because that might allow some form of progress, all under the guise of institutionalism. But this is a post-facto justification. I guarantee you the second the next Republican president holds office and the Republicans hold a majority in the Senate, the filibuster is gone. The current rotating villains of the Democratic Party couldn't even bring themselves to bypass the filibuster to pass legislation to protect voting rights, which shouldn't even be controversial. But of course it is controversial because voting rights might endanger the red wave of voter suppression. None of this has to be the case. Schumer won't go nuclear on this either because Schumer represents the interests of Wall Street. [1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zPv0S1-ETdI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zPv0S1-ETdI
- colinmhayes 4y ago
  I really just think the issue is the senate. Look at all the bills that passed the house. They passed a bill that try’s to solve gerrymandering. They passed abortion legislation. They passed all the economic stuff Biden wanted, including his signature legislation universal pre k. But the senate needs 60 votes to pass anything other than a budget, which no one will ever have. I’m inclined to agree that the filibuster is mostly an excuse to not vote for things manchin and sinema wouldn’t vote for either way, but at that point it’s hard to say democrats have a majority in the senate.
  - dragonwriter 4y ago
    > But the senate needs 60 votes to pass anything other than a budget Incorrect. One of the other things it can do with a simple majority is alter or eliminate the 60 vote requirement.
    - colinmhayes 4y ago
      Right but it’s pretty clear that there isn’t a majority willing to do that.
      - rayiner 4y ago
        Being able to pass a budget with a bare majority is a lot of power! They could raise taxes and increase funding for existing programs with that power. You know, the stuff people vote in Democrats to do.
        colinmhayes 4y ago
        I mean they sort of did increase funding. They passed a 2 trillion dollar stimulus bill.
- enraged_camel 4y ago
  >> It’s hard to deny that the result of the current democratic strategy is not meaningfully different from what Mitch McConnell wants, whether it’s deliberate or not. The result you are talking about is not the result of Democratic strategy, but of Manchin’s (and to a lesser extent, Sinema’s) blocking of anything meaningful and impactful.
  - megaman821 4y ago
    This is unknowable. There could be 5 other Democrats that agree with Manchin but why voice it when Manchin can take the heat with no political consequences.
- glenstein 4y ago
  >I don’t think OP is denying that there are differences between the parties. I'm not sure we read the same comment then. Your own comment even circles back around to agreeing with the basic premise, so I'm confused as to why you're even disputing something that you're in fundamental agreement with. The parties are in disputably different, and electoral outcomes lead to massive differences in policy choices which are clear to anyone who's willing to bother to do the research. It takes a lot of finessing and hedging and caveats and broad meandering musings on political grand strategy to start to attempt to equate the political parties. The reason it requires that much work is because the parties are indeed different.

rayiner 4y ago

I don’t think OP is denying that there are differences between the parties. But the first two years of Biden’s administration was a win for the McConnell wing of the Republican Party. The only significant economic measure that was passed was covid relief, which republicans were for (because Trump did it) before they were against it. There were no tax hikes and no expanded social programs (apart from temporary expansion of the child tax credit). It’s hard to deny that the result of the current democratic strategy is not meaningfully different from what Mitch McConnell wants, whether it’s deliberate or not. And I do think it’s deliberate to a significant extent. The current Democratic coalition has a lot of people, especially in the donor base, that are basically socially liberal Republicans. If forced to choose between issues, they care more about legalized abortion than labor unions. Of course these folks avoid any acknowledgement that these goals are in conflict, but that’s obviously wrong. Politics is about assembling a coalition that can command a voting majority. Political capital is a finite resource. Obviously spending significant political capital on an issue like abortion—where about 1 out of 5 democrats disagrees with the rest of the party—will mean less political capital available for making the child tax credit permanent. It’s math.

cycrutchfield 4y ago
The current composition of the senate, 50-50, and the antiquated filibuster process, mean that the senate cannot do anything without bipartisan consensus. Not sure why you are railing about democrats that are secretly republicans when that is clearly not the issue.
- rayiner 4y ago
  The current composition of the Senate is the product of a deliberate choice by socially liberal pro-business democrats (i.e. Rockefeller republicans) to prioritize social issues such as abortion and immigration over economic ones.
- jmyeet 4y ago
  There is no constitutional basis for the filibuster. It's just a rule the Senate invented. And they can un-invent it. Whenever the new Congress forms, the Senate Majority Leader sets the rules for that Congress. This includes the number of seats on committees and so forth. What you have is Democrats who hide behind "institutions" as an excuse to do nothing and Republicans who quite literally will change the rules whenever it suits them. Examples include: 1. Firing the Senate parliamentarian when he blocked the Senate from advancing Bush tax cuts; 2. Deciding completely without basis that with 11 months left of Obama's term, it somehow wasn't proper to hold a hearing or a vote on Garland's nomination to the Supreme Court; and 3. Deciding that any nomination (not just judicial) couldn't be filibustered (Harry Reid had previously changed the rules to make Supreme Court nominations filibuster-proof). But what is the filibuster? Up until I believe the 1970s it was a process where a Senator who had the floor could refuse to yield and keep talking to block a vlote as long as they could keep standing. This is real "Mr Smith Goes to Washington" type stuff [1]. This Senate refused to change the rules on this so here we are. Two proposals have been made: 1. Eliminate the filibuster entirely. It's pretty much only ever used to block progress (eg by blocking civil rights legislation in the 1960s); or 2. Require a Senator to actually filibuster by going back to the old system of holding the floor and refusing to yield. Both of course failed. Why? Because the corporate interests that own Manchin and Sinema don't want that because that might allow some form of progress, all under the guise of institutionalism. But this is a post-facto justification. I guarantee you the second the next Republican president holds office and the Republicans hold a majority in the Senate, the filibuster is gone. The current rotating villains of the Democratic Party couldn't even bring themselves to bypass the filibuster to pass legislation to protect voting rights, which shouldn't even be controversial. But of course it is controversial because voting rights might endanger the red wave of voter suppression. None of this has to be the case. Schumer won't go nuclear on this either because Schumer represents the interests of Wall Street. [1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zPv0S1-ETdI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zPv0S1-ETdI
colinmhayes 4y ago
I really just think the issue is the senate. Look at all the bills that passed the house. They passed a bill that try’s to solve gerrymandering. They passed abortion legislation. They passed all the economic stuff Biden wanted, including his signature legislation universal pre k. But the senate needs 60 votes to pass anything other than a budget, which no one will ever have. I’m inclined to agree that the filibuster is mostly an excuse to not vote for things manchin and sinema wouldn’t vote for either way, but at that point it’s hard to say democrats have a majority in the senate.
- dragonwriter 4y ago
  > But the senate needs 60 votes to pass anything other than a budget Incorrect. One of the other things it can do with a simple majority is alter or eliminate the 60 vote requirement.
  - colinmhayes 4y ago
    Right but it’s pretty clear that there isn’t a majority willing to do that.
    - rayiner 4y ago
      Being able to pass a budget with a bare majority is a lot of power! They could raise taxes and increase funding for existing programs with that power. You know, the stuff people vote in Democrats to do.
      - colinmhayes 4y ago
        I mean they sort of did increase funding. They passed a 2 trillion dollar stimulus bill.
enraged_camel 4y ago
>> It’s hard to deny that the result of the current democratic strategy is not meaningfully different from what Mitch McConnell wants, whether it’s deliberate or not. The result you are talking about is not the result of Democratic strategy, but of Manchin’s (and to a lesser extent, Sinema’s) blocking of anything meaningful and impactful.
- megaman821 4y ago
  This is unknowable. There could be 5 other Democrats that agree with Manchin but why voice it when Manchin can take the heat with no political consequences.
glenstein 4y ago
>I don’t think OP is denying that there are differences between the parties. I'm not sure we read the same comment then. Your own comment even circles back around to agreeing with the basic premise, so I'm confused as to why you're even disputing something that you're in fundamental agreement with. The parties are in disputably different, and electoral outcomes lead to massive differences in policy choices which are clear to anyone who's willing to bother to do the research. It takes a lot of finessing and hedging and caveats and broad meandering musings on political grand strategy to start to attempt to equate the political parties. The reason it requires that much work is because the parties are indeed different.