US Politics Mega-Blog - Page 42

On October 12 2018 09:24 xDaunt wrote:
This story about the murdered Turkish journalist who is a US resident is fascinating. Apparently the Turks have recordings proving that the Saudis murdered and then dismembered the poor bastard. I'm curious as to how Trump is going respond. One thing to keep in mind is that the US is not as beholden to the Saudis now as it has been in the past due to our newfound energy independence. We certainly have stayed in the Saudi camp so far, but that may start to change.

WASHINGTON ― Senate Democrats just gave a huge gift to President Donald Trump: They agreed to expedite votes on 15 of his nominees to lifetime federal court seats because they wanted to go home.

Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) had lined up votes for all those district court nominees last week. Normally, Senate rules require up to 30 hours of waiting time for each nominee ― something Democrats typically take advantage of to delay action on confirming Trump judges. But Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (N.Y.) cut a deal with McConnell on Tuesday to bypass the wait times and let them all get through.

Why? So Democrats could get back to campaigning and focusing on winning re-election in November. The Senate is now out of session until next Tuesday.

Of the 15 nominees, six were confirmed by voice votes on Tuesday. Another one was confirmed on a recorded vote. The remaining eight will get quick votes next week.

It’s a major win for Trump and McConnell, whose No. 1 priority is filling up federal courts with conservative judges ― many of whom are incredibly anti-abortion, anti–LGBTQ rights and anti–voting rights. Trump has gotten 26 circuit court judges confirmed, more than any other president at this point in his term. Another way of putting it: 1 in 7 U.S. circuit court seats is now filled by a judge nominated by Trump.

On October 12 2018 11:43 xDaunt wrote:
Killing US green card holders is a bigger deal than killing Yemenis.

As for the Democrats, I’m not sure what you expect them to do. They can’t stop the nominations, and they just got their asses handed to them in the Kavanaugh fight. The last thing Democrats need to do is obstruct more judicial nominees before the election.

On October 12 2018 11:49 GreenHorizons wrote:


Objectively it isn't, but politically it sure is. It doesn't look like anything about our relationship is changing though.

Not just cave to Republicans. Make a deal where you get something in return. Or at least take the L standing up.

On October 12 2018 20:08 iamthedave wrote:


According to Danglars the Kavanaugh mess has re-energised Republicans, and it doesn't seem to have lit a spark under liberals. So what do you think's going to be the result of more obstructionism? Not much point of being a #Resistance if your resistance galvanises the #EvilEmpire and doesn't galvanise the people to support the Resistance.

Apathy and infighting are enormous problems on the left. And maybe in Congress, discipline, seeing as the Democrats seem to struggle to pull in the same direction where the GOP mostly doesn't (all of the problems they've had up to now have come after certain Republicans stated over and over 'if we vote now, I'll vote now' and then, shockingly, did).

So don't worry, you'll probably get that Republican win in 2020 that you want. Unless Bernie runs again and pulls a shocker, which would be immensely satisfying.

On October 12 2018 20:23 GreenHorizons wrote:


The half of the country that doesn't vote doesn't believe Democrats will fight anything other than theatrically like Kavanaugh. They need to actually fight (at least as hard as Republicans). I don't want a Republican win though. I'd much prefer Democrats get wise to how terribly their strategy of peeling Republicans off of Trump's base has been and instead focus on fights that energize their base.

But the problem is they don't want to pick those fights because they support things like Trump's obscene military budget so they can't draw contrasts other than on stupid things like decorum or things where Trump has a majority support and their messaging is awful.

I don't even expect anything more from the politicians at this point, I just can't wrap my head around how people are still buying into the Democratic party's line of BS. Best I can tell most of their voters don't even buy it but simply vote Democrat to protect themselves from Republicans being worse (which is all the Democrats have run on for years and is failing for obvious reasons).

On October 12 2018 20:23 GreenHorizons wrote:


The half of the country that doesn't vote doesn't believe Democrats will fight anything other than theatrically like Kavanaugh. They need to actually fight (at least as hard as Republicans). I don't want a Republican win though. I'd much prefer Democrats get wise to how terribly their strategy of peeling Republicans off of Trump's base has been and instead focus on fights that energize their base.

But the problem is they don't want to pick those fights because they support things like Trump's obscene military budget so they can't draw contrasts other than on stupid things like decorum or things where Trump has a majority support and their messaging is awful.

I don't even expect anything more from the politicians at this point, I just can't wrap my head around how people are still buying into the Democratic party's line of BS. Best I can tell most of their voters don't even buy it but simply vote Democrat to protect themselves from Republicans being worse (which is all the Democrats have run on for years and is failing for obvious reasons).

On October 12 2018 20:40 Mercy13 wrote:


Do you have a source for that bolded line? I think that generally people who don't vote just aren't paying attention to politics.

Also give Democrats some credit. They managed to hold the line on ACA repeal, and made a real fight out of the tax bill and Kavanaugh nomination. Elections have consequences, and without more Democrats in Congress their ability to obstruct bad legislation is limited.

Out of curiosity if Democrats manage to retake the House, what would you like them to spend their energy on? Personally I think that impeaching Trump and/or Kavanaugh would be a disaster for them politically (though doing either is supportable on the merits). I'd also be interested in hearings on the rampant corruption in the administration, but again I don't think the electorate really cares about that.

Tens of millions of registered voters did not cast a ballot in the 2016 presidential election, and the share who cited a “dislike of the candidates or campaign issues” as their main reason for not participating reached a new high of 25%, according to a Pew Research Center analysis of new Census Bureau data.

While a dislike of the candidates or issues was the most frequently cited reason for not voting, other top reasons included a lack of interest or a feeling that their vote wouldn’t make a difference (15%)

being too busy or having a conflicting schedule (14%), having an illness or disability (12%) and being out of town or away from home (8%).

On October 12 2018 21:26 iamthedave wrote:


You're sending mixed messages here. The Democrats fought on Kavanaugh, this is undeniable. What could they do in that instance that they didn't? They aren't the party in power, if Republicans want to pass stuff, there's really not much the Democrats can do. It's like if they fight but fail they didn't fight hard enough, and don't fight because they don't want to publically fail they should have fought and failed, but either way the result is deciding that they're worthless and not putting up a fight.

A Bernie win would probably change the Democrat outlook. A big reason for why they don't do what you're suggesting is the idea that those ideas will never win nationally. I believe Danglars has voiced that exact problem in the past.

Also your personal cynicism about Obama seems to be rewriting history. People 100% believed in Obama and voted for him for that reason, not because he was 'not a Republican', and his entire campaign was about the idea that you can do things... which admittedly he mostly didn't get done for various reasons.

The Clinton campaign was very cynical, yes. And that cynicism rewarded the nation with Trump, through one means or another.

The majority of voters are motivated by contempt for the opposite party’s nominee, not love for their own candidate, according to a new survey.

A Reuters/Ipsos online poll finds that 46% of voters who would support Clinton in a head-to-head matchup against Trump say they are primarily backing her because they don’t want to see the business mogul become President, compared to 43% who say they agree with most of Clinton’s political positions.

On October 12 2018 22:00 GreenHorizons wrote:


Well,



I suppose technically it's ~40% of the ~47% that didn't vote, but that's a presidential year.

But...



www.pewresearch.org

That 34% is basically saying the same thing, save the truly sick and disabled. Though that's still a matter of shitty voting laws that have long had bipartisan support preventing people from voting.

The ACA enshrined insurance profits into law, of course they fought to keep it. Hilary also fought to kill any conversation about universal healthcare despite her being remarkably unpopular while Medicare for All is one of the most popular bipartisan (among the electorate) supported ideas out there but mysteriously is dead in the water with the people that allegedly represent those people.

Add it to the list of gun control, campaign finance reform, and breaking up the big banks that despite wide bipartisan support miraculously can't get anywhere in congress. What do they all have in common? Big money lobbying groups paying our politicians to tell us to shove it in a way that manages to get them reelected 90%+ of the time.

Democrats taking power would be mostly worthless as they will do even less than protect insurance profits like they did during the Obama administration.

But yes impeachment talk is, and has been for a long time, worthless.

On October 13 2018 00:43 Mercy13 wrote:


You said "The half of the country that doesn't vote doesn't believe Democrats will fight anything other than theatrically like Kavanaugh."

A lot of the people who don't vote would vote Republican, and a I'm willing to bet a large percentage of this non-voting group is pretty ignorant about even basic policy issues. Ignorance and apathy prevents these people from voting, not a belief that Democrats won't fight for anything.

As a sidenote, the reason Medicare-for-all has polled well is because Democrats haven't widely supported it. Once it becomes a partisan issue the right wing media is going to kick into gear, and soon rank and file Republicans are going to start comparing it to slavery or death panels or something.

Most people decide what policies to support based upon what their tribal allies in Congress advocate. They don't evaluate policies on merit. I want Democrats to run on Medicare-for-all but I don't think it will get them many votes.

On October 13 2018 00:43 iamthedave wrote:
GH, do you really think Obama 'duped' the voters? Like he campaigned never intending to follow through? Is it not far more likely that he was sincere but found his ideals increasingly hard to actually put into practice once he was in power? Let's not forget 'my goal is to make sure Obama is a one-term President'.

Trump's had trouble getting his agenda through while he has control of everything, same as Obama did,

On October 13 2018 00:54 xDaunt wrote:
It probably is about time to reevaluate what constitutes the Democrat base. Democrat politics have evolved to the point where the Democrats are advocating for what is basically a confederation of minority groups. To the extent that there is a unifying core, it is one defined by victimology and a desire to destroy and replace long-held social norms. This is why I scoff at the oft-repeated refrain that the GOP has become the party of radicals. The GOP isn't looking to change anything fundamental about American society. The Democrats are. And in their radical zeal, they are willing to do it by any means necessary, which you can see at all levels of the Left, public and private. Just look at the ANTIFA antics across the country, or big tech systematically deplatforming conservative/right wing voices while ignoring even more flagrant violations of "codes of conduct" from other view points. This radicalism is reflected in the Democrat leadership. This week, Hillary announced that "you cannot be civil" with the GOP because it "wants to destroy what you stand for, what you care about." And then there's the whole Kavanaugh thing.

So yeah, I generally agree with LegalLord that the Democrats are appealing to their base. And I think that they are doing it to their own detriment, not to mention the detriment of the country.

On October 13 2018 01:01 GreenHorizons wrote:


I would say the worst parts/desires of their base much like Trump, but otherwise I think it's a fair point. LL's anyway, ANTIFA and Democrats are not allies lol.

I find it slightly amusing you try to link the radical left with Democrats, they are two distinct groups. If anything Democrats have resisted any functional shift left at every possible opportunity.

On October 13 2018 01:14 xDaunt wrote:

It's pretty easy to make that link. Tactically, ANTIFA is the mob, and Democrats are becoming the party of the mob. Where was Democrat civility during the Kavanaugh proceeedings? And like I pointed out, both ANTIFA and Democrats seek to overturn the established order. They only differ regarding how far the revolution should go.

On October 13 2018 00:52 GreenHorizons wrote:


If you thought I literally meant that half the country doesn't vote specifically because they don't think Democrats fight I'm sorry for the confusion.

I was making the point that politicians in general don't give a shit about them and they don't give a shit about politicians.

Yeah they said the same thing about Bernie, it's crap. What you're really saying is that Democrats are so trash at messaging it's a legitimate excuse for not trying, since they'd lose anyway



Yes and also yes.

On October 13 2018 02:30 iamthedave wrote:


Is that going to be your opinion of Bernie Sanders if he gets into power and gets almost nothing done?

I mean, it's highly likely he wouldn't be able to change much. Especially if the Senate is GOP controlled. I think it's safe to say Mitch is going to stonewall Bernie at least as hard if not harder than he did Obama. Obama was at least not a dirty commie.