Random Politics

[mister d]

Live boy or dead girl. Moore didn't cross that threshold.

[brian]

Maybe the short version of what I'm trying to say is that the idea that this is proof that "there's no such thing as a swing voter" is obviously false since if that were true, Moore would be ahead by 20 points instead of 5 (or whatever the hell it really is).

Where I agree with Joe is that the Democrats shouldn't be tailoring their message or platform for the center, but making it a true progressive platform that speaks to things that matter to middle-class swing voters (like legitimate tax reform and health care reform)

[sancarlos]

Live boy or dead girl. Moore didn't cross that threshold.

Yeah, homosexuality is worse than pederasty to them (assuming it is hetero pederasty.) See Yiannopoulos, Milo. As long as Moore is a hetero baby-raper, he is gonna win his election.

[Avram]

He's gonna win. He was always going to win. Question is if he's seated. This could blow back on the GOP big time come next November.

If McCon nell tries to deny him his seat, I'll bet he sues McConnell claiming he is violating the constitutional rights of the voters of Alabama (whichever amendment allows for the direct election of senators

[brian]

He's gonna win. He was always going to win. Question is if he's seated. This could blow back on the GOP big time come next November.

If McCon nell tries to deny him his seat, I'll bet he sues McConnell claiming he is violating the constitutional rights of the voters of Alabama (whichever amendment allows for the direct election of senators

Congress has pretty wide legal latitude (granted by the Constitution) to expel members of Congress that not even a genius legal mind like Roy Moore (sarcasm intended) can probably get around.

[DaveInSeattle]

He's gonna win. He was always going to win. Question is if he's seated. This could blow back on the GOP big time come next November.

If McCon nell tries to deny him his seat, I'll bet he sues McConnell claiming he is violating the constitutional rights of the voters of Alabama (whichever amendment allows for the direct election of senators

I'll eat my hat if McConnell tries to do anything after Moore wins (which, sadly, I would guess that he will). He'll smile his shitty Yertle The Turtle smile, and say "well, guess the voters of Alabama have spoken".

Fuck them all....

[Steve of phpBB]

He'll smile his shitty Yertle The Turtle smile, and say "well, guess the voters of Alabama have spoken".

To be fair, that *was* the point of the 17th Amendment.

Republicans are clearly more likely to vote for the Republican, whether they like him or not.

If more Democrats were like that, I probably wouldn't have even thought about Donald Trump for the past several months.

[Pruitt]

I'll eat my hat if McConnell tries to do anything after Moore wins (which, sadly, I would guess that he will). He'll smile his shitty Yertle The Turtle smile, and say "well, guess the voters of Alabama have spoken".

Fuck them all....

I will eat 5 hats if he does so. I've said this before around here, but I grew up trying to be as cynical as humanly possible. The past 18 months have shown me that I was nowhere near cynical enough.

[sancarlos]

https://twitter.com/RVAwonk/status/936057645546557440

[Pruitt]

Kimmel vs. Roy Moore

[degenerasian]

He's gonna win. He was always going to win. Question is if he's seated. This could blow back on the GOP big time come next November.

Another lesson in this is that Republicans will always vote for the GOP candidate, no matter how awful he is. And it is utterly pointless for Democrats to seek to court support from "reasonable Republicans," because that group simply does not exist in any significant magnitude. The focus in 2018 and beyond needs to be on voter mobilization and fighting GOP suppression efforts. Any notion that Republican voters will abandon Trump in any meaningful way is a pipe dream.

I agree with that for the most part, but I don't think you can extrapolate this race to the entire nation no more than it was fair to do it for the special elections for the House in Georgia or Montana.

Moore is a reprehensible candidate for a bevy of reasons, but he's still running about 15 to maybe even 20 points shy of what a "normal" GOP candidate should look like in a state like Alabama, which tracks to how Democrats have performed in other special elections since January. There's obviously a lot of energy and momentum moving towards the left, but they have to pick and choose their battles as far as the national "platform".

I think they should be focusing more on populist ideas like a higher minimum wage, health care reform including Medicaid For All and destroying the GOP tax plan (whether it passes or not) and even marijuana legalization. Trump and the Republicans will try to get them to take the bait on abortion, LGBTQ rights, immigration, etc but those battles have already been won for the most part (though not immigration) even if they try to chip away at them and drag it back into the debate.

A consistent and unified message from the party would be nice and it would be even better if someone would take the mantle to say -- "this is what we're fighting for" and not even mentioning Trump's name except when absolutely necessary. I think that would resonate with a lot of the people who for whatever reason do go back and forth between the Democrats and GOP.

Just wanted to echo this.

Not just minimum wage and health care. The Democrats have to decide, do they actually care about overall social issues, or just hate white rich people? If it's the former, make policy for everyone. How about an annual universal income. Everyone gets $15,000 a year rich or poor. That way if you achieve something, you don't raise yourself out of an income bracket where you will lose benefits. Same with Healthcare. As you mentioned above, universal healthcare for everyone, not medicaid just for the poor and as a person succeeds they raise themselves out of coverage.

And I think most importantly. Democrats need to take economic nationalism back. AMERICA FIRST is a left wing position. Protecting workers and unions. Anti free trade. Somehow Democrats became globalists and Trump/Bannon swooped in and took that space.

On immigration, the democrats need to support a path to citizenship. A real immigration policy. DACA is just a bandaid.

[tennbengal]

The Democrats have to decide, do they actually care about overall social issues, or just hate white rich people?

Oh for fuckssake.

Are you high?

[Gunpowder]

The Democrats are rich white people.

You think maintaining still historically low (at least within the past 100 years) tax rates is hating rich people?

[tennbengal]

The Democrats are rich white people.

You think maintaining still historically low (at least within the past 100 years) tax rates is hating rich people?

Big, if true.

I thought the Dems were all extras from Oliver. My bad.

[mister d]

Is Degen going to turn out to be a Russian bot and that's why DiS couldn't meet up with him?

[Pruitt]

Jimmy Kimmel is out of control.

(In the best way possible.)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_cont ... fyEhAc7K_I

[sancarlos]

https://twitter.com/crazzyintheusa/stat ... 5506942978

[Joe K]

https://twitter.com/nytimes/status/923021828444119040

“Well, we were about to leave millions of people without health care and reduce taxes on the highest earners, so we had to play it cautious on the whole Trump issue.”

Bump for Flake casting one of the deciding votes to pass the tax bill.

[mister d]

Wow really thought he was one of the good guys I guess you never know [shrug]

[EnochRoot]

Wow really thought he was one of the good guys I guess you never know [shrug]

He's just another fiscally (irresponsible) conservative Republican. Selfishness is ingrained at the molecular level.

[mister d]

He also knows his next job will pay 10x more than this one as long as he votes the right way here. The nobility angle is nonsense.

[EnochRoot]

He also knows his next job will pay 10x more than this one as long as he votes the right way here. The nobility angle is nonsense.

Yep. That too.

[Joe K]

Wow really thought he was one of the good guys I guess you never know [shrug]

He's just another fiscally (irresponsible) conservative Republican. Selfishness is ingrained at the molecular level.

Republicans do not care about fiscal responsibility. They just use it as a justification for attempts to cut Medicare and Social Security to transfer wealth to the rich. And Dems shouldn't buy into the GOP's utterly dishonest "fiscal responsibility" framework either, because it'll just bite them in the ass when the GOP uses the deficits created by their tax plan as a justification for slashing Social Security and Medicare.

[EnochRoot]

Well, you get the idea they're not to be confused with 'fiscal responsibility when they dismiss or act surprised at the responses of essentially every non-partisan economist in the free world regarding their tax plan.

I can't help to think that they've started rushing this bill through both houses (replete with barely legible, hand-written edits in the margins of the document), holding a vote at what, 1:30 AM EST on a Saturday morning...To basically get Trump to sign this into law and then begin rewriting their own version of events (they'll soon become the champions of impeachment). He'll have served his purpose, and there'll no longer be any use for the man.

[brian]

History is not written in real time, but it's possible Trump could doom the GOP to irrelevance for a decade or more when it is all said and done.

https://twitter.com/geoffgarin/status/9 ... 5396133891

[sancarlos]

I'll believe it when that happens in November. I saw two different Republican senators' posts on Facebook touting the new tax deal as a tax cut - saying, "watch your withholding go down on your paycheck". Which assumes that their constituents don't think about the fact that they are losing important tax deductions that more than offset a slight change in their tax rates. And, frankly, that kind of bullshit usually works on people.

[mister d]

Its clever. Get a little bit more upfront, lose a multiple of that in the refund and assume people are too dumb or lazy to do the math.

[brian]

I'll believe it when that happens in November. I saw two different Republican senators' posts on Facebook touting the new tax deal as a tax cut - saying, "watch your withholding go down on your paycheck". Which assumes that their constituents don't think about the fact that they are losing important tax deductions that more than offset a slight change in their tax rates. And, frankly, that kind of bullshit usually works on people.

I don't know. There's obviously lot of stupid people, but this still polled worse than the Clinton and Bush tax RAISES. I'm a little dubious that:

a) it's going to have a real appreciable affect on the withholding schedules to the point where people have any real additional money to spend.
b) even if it does, it still won't bite the GOP in the ass harder come 2020 when Joe Moron sit down to do his taxes in April 2019 and realizes that the GOP robbed Peter to pay Paul and his typical $2,000 tax refund turned into him owing the IRS $1,000.

I don't know that there's much the GOP can do to really turn the tide their favor in 2018. Even a "normal" president would probably result in the Democrats winning a bunch of seats back in the House -- that's just how it goes. If any one of a number of things don't go well - the deficit starts to balloon, unemployment starts ticking up, the stock market turns into a bear market, it's going to take a really bad off-year election into bloodbath territory for the GOP. And there's no reason to think they have any kind of ability to right that ship in any meaningful way before 2020.

[Ryan]

According to the chart, the last time the GOP was this unpopular relative to Democrats was...6 months before they were tied again.

[The Sybian]

I'll believe it when that happens in November. I saw two different Republican senators' posts on Facebook touting the new tax deal as a tax cut - saying, "watch your withholding go down on your paycheck". Which assumes that their constituents don't think about the fact that they are losing important tax deductions that more than offset a slight change in their tax rates. And, frankly, that kind of bullshit usually works on people.

I've seen several Senators and pundits say the same thing, "people will notice when their paycheck is higher." I saw a tax calculator pop up in my FB feed. An outspoken Liberal friend was tagged by a presumably Conservative friend. Basically, it tells everyone their tax savings based solely on the lower brackets, with no accounting for deductions removed. The overwhelming majority of comments were thrilled people saying, "see, the media lied, I will save $400!" The few comments that pointed out that the calculator didn't account for deductions most people will no longer be able to take were not well received. A lot of comments to the effect of, "good, I'm sick of funding your student loans/childcare/healthcare/mortgage..." If these people people are paying income tax, I assume they have deductions they are losing, too, which will be much more than the paltry reduction they get.

Once again, a large number of people are conditioned to believe anything against their narrative is "fake news," and they will refuse to hear anything else.

[sancarlos]

https://twitter.com/MarkHarrisNYC/statu ... 9883286528

[Steve of phpBB]

https://twitter.com/MarkHarrisNYC/status/937787659883286528

It fun to poke at sanctimonious holier-than-thou conservatives for voting for a pedophile, but I really hope liberals don't actually believe this stuff.

If so, they need to grow the fuck up. An election isn't about affirming someone as a person. It's about choosing someone for an office. And in the general election, it's about whether the office goes to one candidate or the candidate from the other party. So if Alabama were voting for a high-school teacher, Moore would be in appropriate. But as a Senator?

This is driving me nuts because it was this attitude that led to Trump being elected. Republicans were way more mature and sophisticated about the election than Democrats were. And so Republicans who didn't like Trump voted for Trump, and lots of Democrats who didn't like Clinton didn't vote for Clinton. And so Trump became President and Clinton did not.

Everyone who didn't vote for Clinton voted for Trump to be president. They voted for Justice Gorsuch, and anti-Muslim hate videos, and repeal of the CFPB rule allowing customers to sue banks, and the tax bill the Republicans just passed. So I figured, okay, they've clearly learned their lesson. But what I read on Twitter makes me fear they have not.

(Sorry, this rant has been building up since the CFPB rule was repealed and the tax cut bill just made me really crabby.)

[mister d]

Am I reading your argument right to say if the roles were reversed, where Jones was the credibly accused pedophile and Moore had the comparatively spotless background, the DNC and voters should still fully support the pedophile and not doing so would be a sign or weakness and/or immaturity?

[Pruitt]

https://twitter.com/MarkHarrisNYC/status/937787659883286528

It fun to poke at sanctimonious holier-than-thou conservatives for voting for a pedophile, but I really hope liberals don't actually believe this stuff.

If so, they need to grow the fuck up. An election isn't about affirming someone as a person. It's about choosing someone for an office. And in the general election, it's about whether the office goes to one candidate or the candidate from the other party. So if Alabama were voting for a high-school teacher, Moore would be in appropriate. But as a Senator?

I'll quote Joe K from the Trump thread. It fits here as well...

Not to defend Pence or anyone else, but I think a lot of the hypocrisy can be explained by just how singularly focused on abortion many evangelical voters are. Although my parents have always voted Democratic, many members of the church I attended growing up truly viewed abortion as an issue that supersedes everything. I'm not exaggerating to say that they viewed it as a moral crisis tantamount to a genocide. If you have that mentality, it's not so hard to view Trumpism as the "lesser evil," especially when you consider how he's remaking the judiciary.

This kind of belief will lead to any amount of moral gymnastics and refusing to believe - or ultimately care about - credible accusations about a man's behaviour.

[Steve of phpBB]

Am I reading your argument right to say if the roles were reversed, where Jones was the credibly accused pedophile and Moore had the comparatively spotless background, the DNC and voters should still fully support the pedophile and not doing so would be a sign or weakness and/or immaturity?

If the accusations were against Jones, then he wouldn't have a chance of winning, so the Dems could probably justify a moral stand.

But if supporting Jones meant he had a shot at winning, then answer is yes. The Senate is close to 50-50, the other branches of government are controlled by the Republican party, the alternative is Roy Moore as a Senator, and the Republicans are batshit crazy and doing everything they can to pack the courts, hurt millions of people, protect Trump's corruption, etc..

To me, it's not about Jones or Moore. It's about the 800,000 DACA recipients, and the Muslims, and the blacks being shot by police, and people who will lose their access to health care.

Maybe not doing so wouldn't be a sign of weakness or immaturity. If someone were to say, "My vote will make millions of people's lives harder, but it is worth it because I want to send a message against sexual abuse," then perhaps that isn't immature or weak. But it does seem short-sighted.

[The Sybian]

It's about choosing someone for an office. And in the general election, it's about whether the office goes to one candidate or the candidate from the other party. So if Alabama were voting for a high-school teacher, Moore would be in appropriate. But as a Senator?

I get your argument, and don't completely disagree, but this line bothered me. Preying on underage girls does make someone unfit for Senate, especially since he used his position as a prosecutor to molest a vulnerable child in the courthouse for her custody hearing. Then you look at his long history as a Judge, refusing to obey Supreme Court rulings and Orders from higher courts, and his steadfastness in putting his religious beliefs above the law. Roy Moore is supremely unfit for the Senate by any metric. The guy is batshit crazy.

[degenerasian]

https://twitter.com/MarkHarrisNYC/status/937787659883286528

It fun to poke at sanctimonious holier-than-thou conservatives for voting for a pedophile, but I really hope liberals don't actually believe this stuff.

If so, they need to grow the fuck up. An election isn't about affirming someone as a person. It's about choosing someone for an office. And in the general election, it's about whether the office goes to one candidate or the candidate from the other party. So if Alabama were voting for a high-school teacher, Moore would be in appropriate. But as a Senator?

This is driving me nuts because it was this attitude that led to Trump being elected. Republicans were way more mature and sophisticated about the election than Democrats were. And so Republicans who didn't like Trump voted for Trump, and lots of Democrats who didn't like Clinton didn't vote for Clinton. And so Trump became President and Clinton did not.

Everyone who didn't vote for Clinton voted for Trump to be president. They voted for Justice Gorsuch, and anti-Muslim hate videos, and repeal of the CFPB rule allowing customers to sue banks, and the tax bill the Republicans just passed. So I figured, okay, they've clearly learned their lesson. But what I read on Twitter makes me fear they have not.

(Sorry, this rant has been building up since the CFPB rule was repealed and the tax cut bill just made me really crabby.)

You are bang on. Republicans have a cause and a vision, as ludicrous as it may seem to be to us.
Abortion is an issue. Guns are an issue. Taxes are an issue. Racism is an issue. Republicans have many hills to die on. They have many clear reasons not to vote for the other side. And it's not really based on who the President is as a person.

What hills to the Democrats have to die on? What is their raison d'etre? It's sort of all over the place. Maybe that is the definition of Liberalism, to be open-minded and explore new ideas. That is great but when it comes to winning elections, that's not a clear position.

[A_B]

https://twitter.com/MarkHarrisNYC/status/937787659883286528

It fun to poke at sanctimonious holier-than-thou conservatives for voting for a pedophile, but I really hope liberals don't actually believe this stuff.

If so, they need to grow the fuck up. An election isn't about affirming someone as a person. It's about choosing someone for an office. And in the general election, it's about whether the office goes to one candidate or the candidate from the other party. So if Alabama were voting for a high-school teacher, Moore would be in appropriate. But as a Senator?

This is driving me nuts because it was this attitude that led to Trump being elected. Republicans were way more mature and sophisticated about the election than Democrats were. And so Republicans who didn't like Trump voted for Trump, and lots of Democrats who didn't like Clinton didn't vote for Clinton. And so Trump became President and Clinton did not.

Everyone who didn't vote for Clinton voted for Trump to be president. They voted for Justice Gorsuch, and anti-Muslim hate videos, and repeal of the CFPB rule allowing customers to sue banks, and the tax bill the Republicans just passed. So I figured, okay, they've clearly learned their lesson. But what I read on Twitter makes me fear they have not.

(Sorry, this rant has been building up since the CFPB rule was repealed and the tax cut bill just made me really crabby.)

I've said it before and I will likely have to say it again but kindly fuck off.

[Steve of phpBB]

It's about choosing someone for an office. And in the general election, it's about whether the office goes to one candidate or the candidate from the other party. So if Alabama were voting for a high-school teacher, Moore would be in appropriate. But as a Senator?

I get your argument, and don't completely disagree, but this line bothered me. Preying on underage girls does make someone unfit for Senate, especially since he used his position as a prosecutor to molest a vulnerable child in the courthouse for her custody hearing....

I agree the guy is unfit for the Senate because he's batshit crazy and disregards the law and is a hateful bigot. But the child molestation allegations from the 1970s or 1980s don't really sway me, because I don't think electing him as a Senator would lead to him molesting more teenaged girls. (If it did, that would matter to me.)

[mister d]

What if there was credible evidence a Dem candidate raped a dozen women back in the 70s? Same logic; odds are he's done raping so you hold your nose and support him because we need Senate seats?