US Politics Mega-thread - Page 4579

“People don’t want to be in a coalition with the devil,” says the source, speaking about Dick Cheney. They say a Harris staffer responded that it was not the staff’s role to challenge the campaign’s decisions.

A Democratic strategist says they warned key Harris surrogates and top-level officials at the Democratic National Committee that campaigning with Liz Cheney — and making the campaign’s closing argument about how many Republicans were supporting Harris — was highly unlikely to motivate any new swing voters, and risked dissuading already-despondent, infrequent Democratic voters who had supported Biden in 2020. The strategist says they also attempted to have big donors and battleground state party chairs convey the same argument to the Harris campaign.

On November 09 2024 16:48 zeo wrote:
The way Arizona, Nevada and California count votes defies all logic and reason. Its Saturday, the election was on Tuesday

On November 09 2024 14:10 Zambrah wrote:


https://www.science.org/content/article/new-un-climate-report-offers-bleak-emissions-forecast



I dunno, I see things like this, passages like,



and ask myself, "are Democrats any good at doing making deep, fast change?" And then some sort of comedy sfx happens out in the universe and faint laughter rings out.

https://academic.oup.com/bioscience/advance-article/doi/10.1093/biosci/biae087/7808595



Yeah, we're doing great.

Side note, its the longest stretch without rain my area has ever recorded! Also, its fucking 80 degrees in November. I look forward to seeing the end of having four regular seasons in the DMV. Record high temps, record low rain, I look forward to breaking these records in the near future!

On November 09 2024 13:41 Zambrah wrote:


No, getting something back that we already had is not what I consider moving forward. Climate change action has been wildly inadequate, we're already past the point where any small steps there mean anything, another net nothing. Housing costs have gone down? Where? Every indication I've seen are that prices continue to be extremely bullshit. Childcare is still wildly unaffordable. Unions are still weak, didn't Biden literally sign a bill blocking a strike?

Pitiful.

This is nonsense, Democrats win on turnout, your swing voter strategy is trash. Garbage. Awful. The same tired, ineffective crap Democrats have been plying.

Turnout. Turnout. Turnout.

Playing footsies with people widely considered somewhere between awful people and fuckin' war criminals by your base is idiotic strategy, whoever you court from the "moderates" you lose by depressing your base. This election wasn't lost because of swing voters, it was lost because Democrats are the definition of ineffective milquetoast worthlessness.

People like you will "vote blue no matter who," people who need to be motivated and spoken to are the working classes, the people who might otherwise vote but are too depressed by the state of their lives and their options that they simply don't bother waking up early to vote, don't bother spending that energy. The people who ostensibly agree with you politically but are disaffected.

Give people reason to be hopeful, and no, Democrats are in no position to rely on their cheap words, Democrats have to actually make big meaningful change, or at least appear to be using all possible levers of governmental power to do so.

Senate Parliamentarian? Go fuck yourself! Republicans want to get judges through Congress? Not on our watch! Pull a Mitch McConnell. Do whatever it takes, because Republicans, fascistic fucking Republicans, are.



Trump had no real message and it reached noone special, he simply has a motivated base that always turns out. This is the truth of Republicans, they could put literal Adolf Hitler up there and their base would justify themselves in whatever way in voting for literal Adolf Hitler. This election's outcome had little to do what anything Republicans did and everything to do with Democrat turnout.



People who work hard miserable jobs are not paying attention to every little thing that Joe Biden is accomplishing. People have to feel change to appreciate change, if the change is so minimal that they can't feel it then it might as well not be happening for a significant chunk of people.

You just have absolutely no idea about how so many working class americans are, you are the out of touch coastal elite type that Republicans have demonized, you and so many people defining Democrat strategy are just clueless, wondering to yourselves why arent the masses reading Joe Biden's policy documents, why arent they doing X or Y to inform themselves.

Because theyre spending all day on their feet, being berated by customers, they go home worrying about paying their bills, trying to figure out if they can afford to just grab something quick to eat instead of having to spend the time and effort cooking, they are tired, they do not have the energy to go home and read policy documents, to keep track of politicians. These things are a luxury for this class of person.

If you want them to get out and vote and care and put their limited mental and physical energy into your electoral politics, then you have to give them enough motivation to do so.

On November 09 2024 21:40 Gahlo wrote:


I swear this happens every election.

On November 09 2024 23:23 Dante08 wrote:
https://vt.tiktok.com/ZSjA1PBoF/

Interesting video, according to it turnout actually increased in most swing states for both republicans and dems. Where Harris lost votes was in deep blue states where democrats sat out but republicans actually voted in these blue states.

On November 09 2024 23:46 GreenHorizons wrote:

Help me understand how you think reproductive rights have been moving slightly in your ideal direction since 2008?

On November 09 2024 23:35 KT_Elwood wrote:
It would be the perfect time to reform the election system to be totally based on popular vote since it would be more fair, and actually (R) can benefit from it if you throw in enough hatred.

On November 10 2024 00:31 GreenHorizons wrote:
Part of the point Zambrah was trying to impress on you was that people wanting progress on reproductive rights that cast their first vote for Obama haven't seen this supposed "moving slightly in my ideal direction". They've seen those rights diminished to less than what their moms had.

Another example: Are there more or less slaves imprisoned in Harris' home state since she got into politics?

On November 10 2024 01:11 WombaT wrote:

Politics is as much emotion as it is details. Arguably the former much more so.

You’re a consistent, details-driven bloke in a world where often that doesn’t matter. It’s broadly the place I would preferably reside.

I learned many moons ago that I had to just concede that in politics specifically, ultimately my details weren’t all that impactful.

I took an elective specifically in the history and political structures of the European Union as an undergrad. I made my own simplified breakdowns of various things for the sake of various internet arguments around Brexit.

It didn’t work. I couldn’t convince people of shit even if I was inarguably correct. I recall one guy saying that they don’t want an EU army, and that was there reason.

Well, economic and political integration have a way lower threshold than security. If you would want to hypothetically make an EU army you need the EU parliament to vote for it. You also need every state, unanimously to vote in favour. You also need referenda in every single EU state, also unanimous.

The rest of Europe could want it, our Parliament could want it and we’d still have a veto in a popular.

Of people who expressed fears over being dragged into an EU Army that I encountered. Not 50%, not even 10%, 0%. Didn’t convince a single person. See, I’m 100% correct here in the mechanics of it, but folks would just respond ‘well the EU finds a way to do what it wants anyway’. I showed examples where this was actually proven not to be the case, also didn’t work.

As Zambrah said, perhaps Harris’ policies are solid, but many people are too busy scraping out a living, or perhaps intellectually incapable of sitting down and perusing them and being enthused. Intellectually incapable doesn’t mean stupid either. Someone may have great moral intuitions, but not be an expert in macroeconomics

I don’t think you need an extreme shift either. You need a more likeable candidate, you need a more simple, resonant messaging. You could almost maintain the policies themselves, most of which I thought were decent.

I keep bringing clone Obama out of storage. But it is for a reason.

Clone Obama could run on that platform policy wise and win. Versus what he actually delivered, actually it didn’t always nail what progressives wanted, but the aspiration and perception that he’d consider you was there. There was a wee slogan that landed

I just feel that the emotional messaging was all wrong. If you don’t nail it you’re gonna have a hard time.