All purpose news and politics thread part VI: This Is Not The Time For Posing

[Tami]

You say that as if AOC has cratered or failed when she just got re-elected as a sophomore and her endorsements had general success.



What's with the past tense? She is still in Congress.

"She was a rising star before making it to Congress" As in, her name was becoming well known even before she was elected. She didn't earn it during her time in Congress, she brought it with her to congress already. Not that she isn't doing well now.

I'm not saying that she isn't talented, she has great potential and her second two years should cement that.

It would have been easier on her if she was quietly elected then made a name for herself while in Congress gradually.

[worstblogever]

She is 31.

I was referring to when she was first elected. Also, 31 is still one of the youngest people in Congress, period.

[babyblob]

I was referring to when she was first elected. Also, 31 is still one of the youngest people in Congress, period.

Far enough. I was just being an ass lol

[godisawesome]

Some of AOC’s intra-party antagonists likely also think of her as having a dangerous ceiling for the policies she represents - plenty of moderates likely view her as a product of a blue area in blue state that could only really work in select regions of the country, and would instead be poison if brought up in other regions.

But that’s also a product of the GOP trying to make her a new boogeyman, likely because they recognize she’s got the charisma and dedication to be a powerful force if she builds up momentum, and thus they have tried tarring her with every bigoted invective they can the second she showed up.

[Revolutionary_Jack]

It would have been easier on her if she was quietly elected then made a name for herself while in Congress gradually.

I don't know you understand what political campaigns entail. Nobody gets elected "quietly". In a competitive House race against an established major Dem, AOC had to be a political star simply to last.

I was referring to when she was first elected. Also, 31 is still one of the youngest people in Congress, period.

She was 27-28 when she beat Crowley in the primary. She was the youngest elected congressional leader.

I'll also note my statements are less extreme than your claim that a party that likely kept the Senate is on death row.

Explain to me how did 5 million people, each, voted for Biden in Texas and Florida, and show me comparative gains for the Republicans in CA and NYS. The Dems throughout this election did far better in red states than GOP did in blue states, and that's not even up for debate. The Republicans lost 2 Red States, and Arizona has 2 Blue Senators in the Senate.

The Republicans have continued to prove they are not a real mass party but a minority oligarchy. And a party like that ought to consider itself on death row. I should think that as a Republican you would prefer the Reagan era mandate rather than what it can eke out now.

It doesn't matter if a senator wins by five percent or thirty-five percent; it's still going to be one Senator. Likewise, it doesn't matter if a Democrats wins California's electoral votes by ten percent or 40 percent; it's the same number of electoral votes.

So the people who they represent who voted for don't matter? Because a party is supposed to represent both the people that voted for them, and the people who didn't. That's how it works. As a Republican in a blue state, as I think you mentioned once, you should be able to understand this concept. 5 million Texans and 5 million Floridians are Democrat voters and they'll still be Texans and Floridians after this election.

[babyblob]

Explain to me how did 5 million people, each, voted for Biden in Texas and Florida, and show me comparative gains for the Republicans in CA and NYS. The Dems throughout this election did far better in red states than GOP did in blue states, and that's not even up for debate. The Republicans lost 2 Red States, and Arizona has 2 Blue Senators in the Senate.

This is how I dont understand why people still say this was not a downfall for the GOP. Yes the Gop gained in the house. Is it enough to matter? No. Even if they hold the Senate it wont be much. I hear talk about how many new people voted for Trump. But a huge number of New people voted for Biden Who will end up crushing Trump in the popular vote an EC. Wont even be close. And if I hear one more Republican tell me how much better Trump did with black people I will go nuts. look at GA. How well did he do over all with the Black vote. Just stop!2022 Midterms? We dont know how they will turn out. It may do well for The GOP because those new Dem voters who turned out to beat Trump may not come out for a couple Senate races. But basing the fact the GOP is not hurting based on some maybe do well 2022 talk is pointless. They are hurting now. Thre thing is the Dems cant drop the ball now that they have it.

[Malvolio]

There were a lot of people who voted Democrat this year who had never voted before. There were also a lot of people who voted Republican who never voted before. The ease of early voting and absentee ballots is what brought out a lot of first time voters.

[DrNewGod]

... I've argued before that the effects of gerrymandering are greatly exaggerated...

In what region of the US do you live?

[Revolutionary_Jack]

There were a lot of people who voted Democrat this year who had never voted before. There were also a lot of people who voted Republican who never voted before. The ease of early voting and absentee ballots is what brought out a lot of first time voters.

The point is there are more Dems in Red states than there are GOP in Blue states. And nationally more Dems than GOP by a huge glorious margin.

Only a fool would would want to be in the position of the GOP in 2020 than that of the Dems in 2020.

[Gray Lensman]

In what region of the US do you live?

Mets lives in or near NYC IIRC.

[KNIGHT OF THE LAKE]

The 2020 Election as more data comes in, is in fact proving that 2016 very much was a fluke.

Sheesh. Guys it's not Day 2 of Election Week anymore. Our narratives need to advance a bit.

2016 always a fluke. Trump won off the rust belt off razor thin margins.

[KNIGHT OF THE LAKE]

Some of AOC’s intra-party antagonists likely also think of her as having a dangerous ceiling for the policies she represents - plenty of moderates likely view her as a product of a blue area in blue state that could only really work in select regions of the country, and would instead be poison if brought up in other regions.

But that’s also a product of the GOP trying to make her a new boogeyman, likely because they recognize she’s got the charisma and dedication to be a powerful force if she builds up momentum, and thus they have tried tarring her with every bigoted invective they can the second she showed up.

It's a mixed bag. The GOP is good at labeling, but it's really the candidates that run from the labels that get hurt from it. The moderates lost their seats

[Kaitou D. Kid]

You can do both.



I like reading the World Socialist Website (which is basically so leftist that it's against anyone even slightest bit left to it, treating Jacobin the same way it treats the Democrat party). They point out that Jacobin has published articles attacking the Lockdown, and also saying that the Gretchen Whitmer plot was some exaggeration.

https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/202.../jaco-o22.html

The Jacobin ought to be treated carefully. Not that I am saying that what it does is wrong or invalid of course.

I think the stuff in the Jacobin article that isn't talked about is Biden challenging Reagan on apartheid, and other progressive stuff he did. His work overseeing Obama's stimulus which helped out of the Great Recession and directed funds to Green Energy. The bad stuff ought to be balanced with the good. As for criticisms about the ACA and so on...that's valid but it can't be denied that the ACA we got still helped a great many people in America and black and brown communities in particular. Maybe Obama was too timid and comfortable with neoliberal oligarchs and so on, but a lot of right wing seem to hate it.

Here's something y'all need to understand. Obama was so hated that the right-wing turned to a supervillain like Donald Trump, but no supervillain will come for Bernie Sanders, or for that matter AOC. At least not yet.



Robert Caro said of Lyndon B. Johnson, "There's an old saying: 'All power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.' The more I've learned, the less I believe it. Power doesn't always corrupt. What power always does is reveal. When a guy gets into a position where he doesn't have to worry anymore, then you see what he wanted to do all along."

Ultimately we will know what Biden is and what kind of person he is in the next four years, just as we learned who Obama was in his 8 years. Obama was the one behind drone bombings but also killed Bin Laden, Obama was the one who ran anti-immigration policies, but he also did the Cuban Thaw and passed the Iran Nuclear Deal. Obama refused to send ground troops in Syria and drag America into another Iraq when shove came to push.

Putting aside 1) the fact that this author seems to think that independent media outlets like Jacobin are a monolith, and 2) the severe logical errors in his work (like the fact he fails to distinguish between fascist vigilantes and not fascists who control the political system+the police when making his bizzare accusation that Jacobin thinks grizzlies are a bigger threat to demcoratic rights than fascists)....I am very familiar with Ben Burgis' work. I've been watching him since he was a co-host on The Michael Brooks Show and he is, to my knowledge, one of the strongest voices on the Left. If someone wants to claim he isn't a trustworthy source or that he makes poor arguments...all I can say is good luck to whomever tries to make that case.

The main point is that no change happens without a strong grassroots movement to ensure it happens. This isn't a controversial or new point that hasn't been made. Biden isn't an imperfect friend, he is an enemy - even if being nowhere near as big of an enemy as Trump. The public simply being bystanders and not putting pressure on him to pass progressive policies for the next 4 years is bordeline suicidal and risks giving the White House in 2024 to an even worse Trump (again, not a controversial or new point - reputable intellectuals and congresspersons like AOC have said the same).

If the Obama years were so good then they wouldn't have ended with Trump. The examples you brought up aren't insignificant, but they are not fundamental either. Without a movement to put pressure on him, Biden like Obama will still adhere to a broken healthcare system (Obamacare was a right-wing reform from the 90's), rampant systemic racism & inequality, underfunds and cuts to federal programs, bare-minimum action on climate change (which in-itself is a form of climate denialism), a continuation of neoliberalism (the main cause of Fascism), and to attempts to hold back progressive policies and change.

The one exception is COVID, which he will very likely take seriously even without anyone putting pressure on him. But that has more to do with the fact that the business community was severely hurt by COVID too. That was the same reason why some in the business community eventually started being against apartheid and why the Democrats responded to the '08 crash the way they did - it wasn't just a concern for everyday people, it was primarily because those things started to no longer be economically viable.

Point is, don't just sit around for 4 years and hope that Biden brings real change. You and everyone else have to essentially bully him into doing it.

[Mister Mets]

This is how I dont understand why people still say this was not a downfall for the GOP. Yes the Gop gained in the house. Is it enough to matter? No. Even if they hold the Senate it wont be much. I hear talk about how many new people voted for Trump. But a huge number of New people voted for Biden Who will end up crushing Trump in the popular vote an EC. Wont even be close. And if I hear one more Republican tell me how much better Trump did with black people I will go nuts. look at GA. How well did he do over all with the Black vote. Just stop!2022 Midterms? We dont know how they will turn out. It may do well for The GOP because those new Dem voters who turned out to beat Trump may not come out for a couple Senate races. But basing the fact the GOP is not hurting based on some maybe do well 2022 talk is pointless. They are hurting now. Thre thing is the Dems cant drop the ball now that they have it.

The gains of the GOP in the House matter for two reasons. First, it makes it harder for Democrats to pass party line votes. If a bill is too liberal, it's not even going to get a majority in the House, which will embarrass the party. It also makes it easier for Republicans to win the next time around, since there will be less Democratic incumbents (and more Republican incumbents.)

Senate control is down to two races in Georgia, where conservative candidates got more votes in the first round, and where Republicans have a history of winning runoffs. That will also be a useful test for Democratic turnout in meaningful elections when Trump isn't on the ballot. Maybe they'll do awesome and the party will get a narrow majority. We'll see in January.

I don't know you understand what political campaigns entail. Nobody gets elected "quietly". In a competitive House race against an established major Dem, AOC had to be a political star simply to last.

She was 27-28 when she beat Crowley in the primary. She was the youngest elected congressional leader.

There are 435 members of Congress. Many got elected making less of a splash than AOC.

To be fair, it is difficult to avoid publicity when beating a member of party leadership.

Explain to me how did 5 million people, each, voted for Biden in Texas and Florida, and show me comparative gains for the Republicans in CA and NYS. The Dems throughout this election did far better in red states than GOP did in blue states, and that's not even up for debate. The Republicans lost 2 Red States, and Arizona has 2 Blue Senators in the Senate.

The Republicans have continued to prove they are not a real mass party but a minority oligarchy. And a party like that ought to consider itself on death row. I should think that as a Republican you would prefer the Reagan era mandate rather than what it can eke out now.

I would prefer a Reagan era mandate. But narrow wins are still wins.

Republicans lost this election with a terrible presidential candidate.

But it's still competitive.

The difference in Georgia and Arizona is less than half a percent, and the difference in Pennsylvania is less than one percent, with Democrats nominating a local boy. The difference in Wisconsin is less than one percent.

A better result in the electoral college in 2024 seems plausible. If Republicans nominate someone who doesn't have a video in which they're bragging about grabbing women by the pussy, and Democrats nominate someone who won her first statewide election in California by less than one percent, it might be enough to flip the key swing states from Republicans to Democrats by at least one percent.

So the people who they represent who voted for don't matter? Because a party is supposed to represent both the people that voted for them, and the people who didn't. That's how it works. As a Republican in a blue state, as I think you mentioned once, you should be able to understand this concept. 5 million Texans and 5 million Floridians are Democrat voters and they'll still be Texans and Floridians after this election.

They matter as human beings, but not to the cold equations of electoral math.

"She was a rising star before making it to Congress" As in, her name was becoming well known even before she was elected. She didn't earn it during her time in Congress, she brought it with her to congress already. Not that she isn't doing well now.

I'm not saying that she isn't talented, she has great potential and her second two years should cement that.

It would have been easier on her if she was quietly elected then made a name for herself while in Congress gradually.

She became a rising star by taking out a member of the Democratic party leadership. And she has supported primary challengers. So that's also going to alienate people.

There have been prominent members of Congress who quickly get party support. On the Republican side, you can look at Dan Crenshaw. For Democrats, you could look at Lucy McGrath of Georgia.

AOC is going on a different path.

[Mister Mets]

In what region of the US do you live?

I'm in Queens.

But here's what I've written about gerrymandering (copied and pasted from older posts)...

Geography is a much bigger issue than gerrymandering.

It's generally agreed that congressional districts should be geographically contiguous, and that when possible communities should not be divided within congressional districts. With geographic sorting, people have come to live near those who agree with them politically. Rural Arkansas will be very conservative. Harlem will be a safe Democratic seat.

The sorting benefits Republicans. Liberals are more likely to live in areas where their candidate gets more of the vote, or in small enclaves within conservative regions (ie- college towns in Nebraska.) John Sides and Eric McGhee of the Post argued that the post 2010-redistricting (when Republicans gained control of numerous states) didn't actually help them with any net house seats in 2012.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/...e/?arc404=true

The consensus among political scientists after the 2010 redistricting was that Republicans were making defensive changes, so that it would be tougher for Democrats to take back the House, but the cost was that there would be less seats in play. The goal was to keep incumbents in office rather than to expand the map. So, Republicans having a larger majority after the 2014 eleciton than at any point since the Hoover administration went against that claim, since the changes were allegedly made to have less districts in play rather than more.





Democrats might be able to use gerrymandering to correct for geographic sorting, but it's different from suggesting that the Republican advantage is due to unfair tactics.

Many political scientists think the net effect of gerrymandering on the US House is negligible, for a variety of reasons (Republican gerrymanders in red and purple states are offset by Democratic gerrymanders in blue states, advantage of incumbency after wave elections with midterm electorates, Democratic voters are sorted in ways that result in inefficient voting power with a geographic representation system.)

https://www.npr.org/sections/itsallp...-hold-on-house
https://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytime...ghts-act/?_r=0

A more liberal estimate gave the Republicans a seven seat gain due to gerrymandering.

https://www.motherjones.com/kevin-dr...r-republicans/
Another estimate gave the Republicans 1-2 seats.

http://www-personal.umich.edu/~jowei/gerrymandering.pdf



Gerrymandering might not resolve that many issues, given the effects of geographic sorting (urban areas will remain very Democratic, Republicans will keep doing well in rural/ suburban regions.)

Recently, Democrats have admitted their role in gerrymandering when they can get away with it.

http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/mar...601-story.html

Politically, it's a smart move for Democrats who want to end gerrymandering to focus on a time when their party were the bad guys in order to get more bipartisan support for efforts to bring it to an end, but a shift to nonpartisan boards might not help. Hell, the natural advantage Republicans have with geographic sorting could mean that the main hope Democrats have for more representatives in legislatures is gerrymandering in their favor.




It's still an open question about how much the gerrymander helps Republicans. There have been quite a few times when this board where gerrymandering was blamed for Republican domination in the electoral college or the Senate. Much analysis of how many seats Republicans gained in the House because of gerrymandering determined that it came down to a handful of seats.

538 determined that in 2017 that if we were to switch from borders determined by state legislatures to borders determined by an algorithm which preferred compactness, and adhering to existing county/ district lines, Republicans would lost an expected two seats.

https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com...tricting-maps/

Republicans were able to win big in the House and state legislatures in 2010, before the gerrymander. They got their asses kicked in 2018, under the gerrymandered map.

It's also not agreed what it means to unf*** the gerrymander. I've asked before how legislative boundaries should be determined, and there's very little discussion about what the criteria should be (Should we go for more swing districts? Should we go for preserving existing communities?) The main response is to get an independent commission, but there's little consideration about what criteria they should be judged by, to make sure that any independent commissions are a backdoor for partisans to gerrymander with a veneer of respectability. There can be havoc with an unelected group interpreting vague statutes, especially when reasonable people may want different outcomes and not realize there's any debate about what the final map should like. One person might want to keep communities of interest together, while another might want to increase the number of swing seats, and another might want to have the composition in the legislature reflect the outcome of the vote. Obviously partisans want to maximize their own vote, although that gets complicated as district populations change.

Republicans have an advantage from geographic sorting, so Democrats need gerrymandering more than Republicans do.

Last year, when the Democrats took control of the Virginia legislature, the majority of them suddenly decided that they weren't interested in an independent commission any more. In the end, nine Democrats in the legislature joined the Republicans in making sure the legislature doesn't control redistricting, which was something the entire Democratic party had been campaigning on when the party was in the minority.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/28/o...ering-law.html

I wrote a post two years ago considering the available options.

https://community.cbr.com/showthread...er#post3720119




While looking this up, I did find a post in 2016 where I endorsed the Wyoming rule for US House apportionment.

https://community.cbr.com/showthread...ng#post1718832