US Politics Mega-thread - Page 7940

On June 26 2017 11:43 Nyxisto wrote:
The Democrats don't have one message, they're more of a coalition of groups whereas the Republican party presents an ideological platform. The democratic message wasn't bad, it just didn't mobilise the voters who way too often are concerned with fighting each other.

This is even true on this internet board. 80% of the thread is Greenhorizon debating some Clinton voter why Clinton sucked even six months after Clinton lost the election. It's not exactly surprising that this kind of incoherence makes you lose an election.

On June 26 2017 12:11 TheTenthDoc wrote:
"Middle class" doesn't really mean anything anyway. Most of the people who receive large subsidies for their insurance plans through the ACA probably consider themselves middle class.

I do feel like lately it's being used as shorthand for "working-aged to middle-aged white males in purple states (often without college degrees)" though, considering they're pretty much the demographic that was pivotal in Clinton losing the White House and the group with whom her message flopped with the most.

Edit: Incidentally, I think a lot of the Democratic rhetoric about "resurrecting the middle class" is a major problem in this respect. It basically tells all those people "no, you're actually poor." Nobody wants to be told they're poor, regardless of whether it's Clinton, Sanders, or Obama.

On June 26 2017 12:47 xwoGworwaTsx wrote:
That's the thing about politics. You need to educate the citizens

On June 26 2017 09:58 GreenHorizons wrote:


This is why Democrats cheered on the Republicans for passing their anti-Healthcare plan. They think the reason they lost 1000+ seats is because people forgot how terrible Republicans were.

Spoiler alert: We all know, half the voting public still thinks they are less bad than Democrats.

This is like a rerun of Hillary wanting a public option and suggesting it was Republicans that prevented her, then when Democrats are in the position to say "F Republicans we can get the public option the overwhelming majority of our party has wanted for decades" turned out huge Democrat majorities wasn't even enough to pass something Democrats have allegedly wanted for generations.

All that's to say we could give Democrats 60 seats and they still couldn't pass shit, they suck at everything except ensuring the status quo is "better than the alternative". Actually having people advocate for the slow erosion of progress we made over the last 100 years, because it's better than a more rapid erosion. Eliminating from the realm of possibility refusing to support the people benefiting from exploiting us. Like, F that.

On June 26 2017 12:49 Buckyman wrote:


That explains why Republicans have been pushing school choice lately.

On June 26 2017 12:55 KwarK wrote:

I'm honestly unsure if this is a cynical barb about how Republican school choice policies have systematically denied a generation of Americans a decent education (creating their own future voters) or if you don't know that "school choice" typically results in the privatization of education, areas left without good schools and teachers, and tax dollars flowing to corporations through a voucher system.

On June 26 2017 11:41 Slaughter wrote:


Well he did lose by a considerable margin in the vote count. A tiny shift would have swung it the other way. I dunno if the Dems need a major change or just tweaks in how they target their messaging.

On June 26 2017 15:21 GreenHorizons wrote:


The fundamental problem I have with this perspective is that it resigns us to embracing that ~47% of people aren't participating in our democracy. If it weren't for third parties we'd probably already have a majority of Americans giving up on democracy.

On June 26 2017 15:47 Slaughter wrote:


When was the last time we had super high participation in elections? I mean it is pretty embarrassing and it just gets worse as you go down to state and local level.

On June 26 2017 22:10 Plansix wrote:
If you look at the rise and fall of voter turn out, you can see that it spikes around the time of crisis and dips when times of prosperity. The 1990s were the peak baby boomer years, when that entire population was dumping productivity into the economy. Post WW2 had a pretty consistent 60% turn out rate, which alludes to a high level of civil engagement. But even that pales in comparison to the 1860 election, with its staggering 80% turn out(though the number of people eligible to vote was lower, and we were not on the 5 day work week).

The mother of Philando Castile, a black motorist shot by a suburban Minneapolis police officer a year ago, agreed to a $2.995 million settlement with the city of St. Anthony, lawyers announced Monday.

Valerie Castile will be paid with insurance funds, and "no taxpayer monies" will be involved, according to a statement issued by the city and the family's lawyers.

On June 26 2017 23:25 convention wrote:

I also wonder if it was just easier to vote then? Were elections on weekdays that aren't national holidays? Did people have to wait a couple hours at one of the few voting stations? It's pretty hard to excite people to vote when they have to take time off work to commute an appreciable distance to wait in line to cast a vote, where the single vote won't be a deciding vote anyway.

It's strange to blame people for not voting when the laws are designed to make it a challenge to vote.

In practical terms, this means that §2(c) may not be en-forced against foreign nationals who have a credible claim of a bona fide relationship with a person or entity in theUnited States. All other foreign nationals are subject to the provisions of EO–2.