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United Kingdom13775 Posts
On February 18 2017 03:22 Logo wrote:Show nested quote +On February 18 2017 03:21 LegalLord wrote: In mildly related science news: New Zealand is apparently its own continent now. So we finally have the 7 continents we were always told we had? (Well at least 6). It's being advertised as #8. Depends how you count the Americas, Eurasia, and India I guess.
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On February 18 2017 03:26 GreenHorizons wrote:Show nested quote +On February 18 2017 03:20 WolfintheSheep wrote:On February 18 2017 03:17 GreenHorizons wrote:On February 18 2017 03:15 Plansix wrote:On February 18 2017 03:03 GreenHorizons wrote: I feel like we're back to how stupid of a fight this is, let's just give Ellison the job and figure out wtf we're going to do with Democrats like Manchin.
EDIT: I sense I know where this conversation is heading, so I'd like to just get the argument of "well we'd rather him than a Republican" out of the way first.
What are some examples of something in the past 6 years where having Manchin, instead of a Republican, has made a substantive difference (actually changed an outcome)? Because if there aren't any of those, I feel that argument falls apart on it's face. This is not a compelling argument that there is a progressive candidate that can win that state. That man isn’t going away and neither are the voters who vote for him. But I support your plan of trying to primary him and any other democrat in the senate you disapprove of. Replace them all with Republicans if we can’t have progressives in there. I am excited to see the results. What's the point in having someone with a D next to their name if they aren't going to make a difference in winning anything for the D they claim? It's stupid moral victories like that, that's left the Democratic party unable to even fight Trump. No, the moral victory is running someone who will never win so you get to claim the moral high ground despite having no results to show for it. Better to have someone that will ally with your goals some of the time, than someone who will always oppose you. Not if you can't show me any evidence having that ally helped change any outcomes. Then at least the blame would go to the right party for their senator's failure to meet their expectations. Particularly when I can point to him cheering on Trump in "finalizing" a rule that will allow coal mining companies to further pollute the water, approving Sessions, and more in the past, as well as more to come I'm sure. Giving both Trump and that legislation a "bipartisan" stamp of approval it wouldn't have if he or the sitting senator was a Republican. Well it doesn't make much difference when the Democrats don't hold power in any of the branches of your government, so that's a rather moot point right now.
If they win the Senate by 10 or 20 seats, I'm sure we could go down the list then and find how many of those seats you feel are Democrats in name only.
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On February 18 2017 03:29 Plansix wrote:Show nested quote +On February 18 2017 03:22 Logo wrote:On February 18 2017 03:15 Plansix wrote:On February 18 2017 03:03 GreenHorizons wrote: I feel like we're back to how stupid of a fight this is, let's just give Ellison the job and figure out wtf we're going to do with Democrats like Manchin.
EDIT: I sense I know where this conversation is heading, so I'd like to just get the argument of "well we'd rather him than a Republican" out of the way first.
What are some examples of something in the past 6 years where having Manchin, instead of a Republican, has made a substantive difference (actually changed an outcome)? Because if there aren't any of those, I feel that argument falls apart on it's face. This is not a compelling argument that there is a progressive candidate that can win that state. That man isn’t going away and neither are the voters who vote for him. But I support your plan of trying to primary him and any other democrat in the senate you disapprove of. Replace them all with Republicans if we can’t have progressives in there. I am excited to see the results. This is a terrible attitude. You're taking a snarky dismissive attitude (dare I say elitist?) because someone has differing political ideologies and wants to try to make things better? But rather than address the shortcomings of those ideologies you just dismiss them as not being tactical. It comes off as a cheap way to dismiss any thoughts of change because we always have to focus on 'defeating the enemy'. On February 18 2017 03:21 LegalLord wrote: In mildly related science news: New Zealand is apparently its own continent now. So we finally have the 7 continents we were always told we had? I was completely wrong last time around, so I am willing to put my support behind ideas that I think are bad. If people think they can get a progressive senator in WV, I’m all about it. I don’t think it will work, but I was so very wrong last time around that I clearly shouldn’t make the final call. So lets give it a shot. But I’m not giving up my ability to say “I had a feeling that wasn’t going to work out,” next time around. And GH earns his snarky responses all on his own.
I'd take plenty of told ya so's and snark if it meant people would make that admission and legitimately give this a shot. I'd like if they sold it as hard as they sold Hillary (particularly the ones that made the "I don't think she's that great, but it CAN'T be TRUMP?!?" case), but I'd settle for not trying to rally behind people like Manchin.
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I’ll take the devil I know most of the time, to be honest. Especially when on the ropes. But if it can be done, get it done.
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On February 18 2017 03:37 Plansix wrote: I’ll take the devil I know most of the time, to be honest. Especially when on the ropes. But if it can be done, get it done.
Given my little knowledge about WV, my understanding of how Manchin wins that seat is basically that the D next to his name give him all of the non-R votes, and he cleaves off enough R's from the ones that actually listen to what he says (basically what the Republicans of the state want).
A progressive candidate trades R's that will vote D if he says the right things (supports Trump), for people who don't vote R or D reliably but want real change to some specifics like healthcare, a safe and equitable work place, safe water, etc... I don't expect a senator from WV to be leading the charge on racial inequality, but I do expect them to at least be able to sell the stuff that will actually improve their constituents quality of life in a sustainable way.
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From my brief review, it looks like he has been involved in WV politics since 1984. He been a local rep., state senator, governor and finally senator. I think your reasoning might be a little reductive, because he has been challenged in a number of primaries and won.
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If the West Virginia Democratic party supports Manchin, then he deserves to be a WV Senator with a (D) next to his name. If he's orchestrating sinister machinations to shut down all other Democrats that run for his seat, that's another thing, but as far as I know he just wins the primaries because WV people, even Democrats, like guns and don't like abortion and see environmental regulation destroying their way of life.
(if he's only winning the primary because of Republicans crossing over, they should probably close the primary...wait...do we want open or closed primaries now? I'm so confused these days)
If people think more WV Democrats would like them than Manchin, it's perfectly reasonable for them to try to run of course.
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fwiw manchin and toomey had a pretty good gun bill after sandy hook. it loosened regulations but did strengthen background checks. too bad.
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There is no doubt that he could have a better voting record. Almost any other democrat would be better for the party in that seat. But that isn’t the issue. The issue is can you get another democrat in that seat over him? Is that possible and what would it take? And if the party as a whole pushes for that, what do you do if its backfires?
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In mildly related news, McCaskill is apparently worried about being primaried due to the tea party-like enthusiasm of the left.
"I am for sure gonna run," McCaskill said on "The Mark Reardon Show" on KMOX Newsradio 1120. "And I may have a primary because there is, in our party now, some of the same kind of enthusiasm at the base that the Republican party had with the Tea Party. We are seeing that same--and many of those people are very impatient with me because they don't think I'm pure. For example, they think I should be voting against all of Trump's nominees and of course I'm judging each nominee on its own merit."
http://www.cnn.com/2017/02/17/politics/kfile-mccaskill-on-2018/
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United Kingdom13775 Posts
Everything I've heard about her suggests to me that she is a vulnerable candidate who won on the back of her opponent making the stupid "legitimate rape" comment. A primary challenge would not surprise me.
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On February 18 2017 05:22 Nevuk wrote:In mildly related news, McCaskill is apparently worried about being primaried due to the tea party-like enthusiasm of the left. Show nested quote +"I am for sure gonna run," McCaskill said on "The Mark Reardon Show" on KMOX Newsradio 1120. "And I may have a primary because there is, in our party now, some of the same kind of enthusiasm at the base that the Republican party had with the Tea Party. We are seeing that same--and many of those people are very impatient with me because they don't think I'm pure. For example, they think I should be voting against all of Trump's nominees and of course I'm judging each nominee on its own merit."
http://www.cnn.com/2017/02/17/politics/kfile-mccaskill-on-2018/
A lot of people confuse integrity with purity. Or perhaps it's not a confusion but a tactic. Either way, it has little to do with which Trump nominees you choose to confirm or not.
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United Kingdom13775 Posts
Scott Pruit is le confirmed to lead the EPA. Two Democrats voted for him, one Republican against. 52-46.
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On February 18 2017 05:38 LegalLord wrote: Scott Pruit is le confirmed to lead the EPA. Two Democrats voted for him, one Republican against. 52-46.
Pretty bizarre that anyone would oppose Puzder but not Pruitt.
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Puzder just ran into vetting issues. He had a bunch of problems that had nothing to do with his views of the office or the job.
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I would have thought that Pruitt having his pockets stuffed with fossil fuel company money would count as vetting issues.
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Not for the GOP for the couple Democratic senators who are crossing party lines. All of these people are getting approved unless the vetting shows they beat their wife like 30 times and hired illegal immigrants.
Holding up these nominations doesn’t stop Trump or anything. Cabinet positions are going to get filled.
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On February 18 2017 02:56 farvacola wrote:Show nested quote +On February 18 2017 02:47 Nebuchad wrote:On February 18 2017 02:34 farvacola wrote:On February 18 2017 02:30 Nebuchad wrote: Okay so we have one side who thinks it's not very important which one goes through, something like 55-45, and one side who thinks it's very important which one goes through. So since we're equal in this partnership, you're going to account for how important it's for the other side and choose the person who they think is important, right?
Right? It'd be a mistake to let anyone carry the standard for 45 or 55 percent of interested Democrats. GH convincing you that millions of people would consider Perez "forced" on them is him doing good politics more than it is an accurate representation of where folks actually fall on the issue. Either will still provide for the realignment that needs to happen imo. GH convincing me? You might want to spend some time on progressive internet. There are places where even Ellison is viewed as too much of a corporate democrat, but at least he has a decent amount of the support; literally no one is okay with Perez in these circles. I'm not really interested in hand-wavey attempts at using gesticulating towards particular communities to anchor shorthand characterizations of left, more left, and most left. Yes, there are places where literally everyone thinks like GH, but given my unwillingness to get into the mud of figuring out exactly what proportion of the potentially voting public said places represent, you'll have to forgive me for disagreeing with the idea that obstinacy on the part of an ill-determined sub-constituency should control the outcome of a major party decision.
GH represents a very unique and not common sub-sect of a larger population, though. As an example, there are a lot of people who didn't wanna vote for Clinton, and chose Bernie, but they also would have voted for Biden in the general election. It is important to realize that while the democratic party may never convince GH, there are still people half way between GH and moderate who also decided to tell Clinton to shove it. Clinton was a very, very hard sale.
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United Kingdom13775 Posts
On February 18 2017 06:30 Mohdoo wrote:Show nested quote +On February 18 2017 02:56 farvacola wrote:On February 18 2017 02:47 Nebuchad wrote:On February 18 2017 02:34 farvacola wrote:On February 18 2017 02:30 Nebuchad wrote: Okay so we have one side who thinks it's not very important which one goes through, something like 55-45, and one side who thinks it's very important which one goes through. So since we're equal in this partnership, you're going to account for how important it's for the other side and choose the person who they think is important, right?
Right? It'd be a mistake to let anyone carry the standard for 45 or 55 percent of interested Democrats. GH convincing you that millions of people would consider Perez "forced" on them is him doing good politics more than it is an accurate representation of where folks actually fall on the issue. Either will still provide for the realignment that needs to happen imo. GH convincing me? You might want to spend some time on progressive internet. There are places where even Ellison is viewed as too much of a corporate democrat, but at least he has a decent amount of the support; literally no one is okay with Perez in these circles. I'm not really interested in hand-wavey attempts at using gesticulating towards particular communities to anchor shorthand characterizations of left, more left, and most left. Yes, there are places where literally everyone thinks like GH, but given my unwillingness to get into the mud of figuring out exactly what proportion of the potentially voting public said places represent, you'll have to forgive me for disagreeing with the idea that obstinacy on the part of an ill-determined sub-constituency should control the outcome of a major party decision. GH represents a very unique and not common sub-sect of a larger population, though. As an example, there are a lot of people who didn't wanna vote for Clinton, and chose Bernie, but they also would have voted for Biden in the general election. It is important to realize that while the democratic party may never convince GH, there are still people half way between GH and moderate who also decided to tell Clinton to shove it. Clinton was a very, very hard sale. GH seems like a garden variety pure blooded American leftist. I know many who speak a lot like he does about issues and that's what I'd describe them as.
Insert another "electable" comment here.
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