US Politics: Getting Rid of the Senate

[YoungGriff89]

Moving back to more politic-y politics, I guess, it looks like the Southern Democrat legislator is about to go extinct.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/05/upshot/demise-of-the-southern-democrat-is-now-nearly-compete.html?partner=rss&emc=rss&_r=0

And hardly a year ago we were talking about the very real potential of a permanent Democratic majority due to the shutdown stunt, but we learn nothing as Americans. We get to have another one soon I'll bet. Wonder how the Republicans will spin this one.

EDIT: Very real is strong wording, but it was discussed.

[1918me]

And hardly a year ago we were talking about the very real potential of a permanent Democratic majority due to the shutdown stunt, but we learn nothing as Americans. We get to have another one soon I'll bet. Wonder how the Republicans will spin this one.

EDIT: Very real is strong wording, but it was discussed.

I have a friend who, during the midst of last year's shutdown, said something along the lines of, "I'm not partisan, but there's no way I'm voting Republican after this," and he doesn't. We need more voters like him.

[TrackerNeil]

And hardly a year ago we were talking about the very real potential of a permanent Democratic majority due to the shutdown stunt, but we learn nothing as Americans. We get to have another one soon I'll bet. Wonder how the Republicans will spin this one.

Pundits are always reading way more into the results of a scandal or election than is wise. The elections of 2008, they said, proved that the GOP was doomed to linger as a minority party forever, then in 2010 they proclaimed that the Republicans were back! In 2012, the GOP was once again a party of dunces, and in 2014...well, you know the story. It's crazy. Most elections are determined by structural factors like presidential approval and perceptions of the economy, and not stunts or "messaging" or any of that other stuff. It's not sexy, but the fact is most people, when they vote, vote for their party. Period.

[Ramsay Gimp]

What I find odd is that the health industry is treated as a single monolithic entity. Sure, a cure for cancer would mean many would lose money. The ones who figured out the cure would rake it in though. It's like saying there would never be an alternative to the CD player since the tech industry would lose too much money from that happening....

A quote about betting on the stupidity of the American voter comes to mind

I just argued this with my uncle recently, as my grandpa (his dad) had just died from cancer. So of course he was looking for someone to blame and was spouting this cure-conspiracy nonsense.

[Ramsay Gimp]

Pundits are always reading way more into the results of a scandal or election than is wise.

Well, their jobs depend on it. The real reasons for electoral shifts, as you explained, are rather boring to everyone except poli-sci majors. Talking heads need people to keep tuning in, so every election becomes a crushing victory or defeat for the two sides, or grand statement about the future of the country.

[Suttree]

On a totally different front, it sounds like The New Republic is going through a huge shakeup, and it is almost to a T the issue that happened on the last episode of The Newsroom for what it's worth.

Chris Hayes who was like a founding member of Facebook or something bought it a year or two ago, and stuff has come to a head with him and Franklin Foer, the longtime editor.

Two of my favorite political writers, Jonathan Chait and Andrew Sullivan, both lament a bit. Here's Chait. Here's Sullivan.

Sad day for journalism. Whatever your politics they did some damn fine reporting.

[TrackerNeil]

But it does seem unusual for there to have been such big swings from 2008 to 2010 to 2012 to 2014.

Are the trends of who votes GOP and who votes Dem solidifying in a way that exacerbates the trend of the turnout issue for POTUS years versus non-POTUS years? Is it the congruence with the Great Recession which has just created some anti-whomever-is-in-power dynamic? Some combination thereof?

I think the Great Recession accounts for a good deal of that. Voters usually blame a bad economy on the party in power, and in 2010 the economy was pretty bad and the Democratic Party was at the helm. Losses were big in 2010, yes, but then the Democrats had picked up a good many seats in two consecutive elections (2006 and 2008) that were going to be difficult for them to hold in any political/economic climate.

[Fez]

Losses were big in 2010, yes, but then the Democrats had picked up a good many seats in two consecutive elections (2006 and 2008) that were going to be difficult for them to hold in any political/economic climate.

That explains the federal seats, but not the state ones. The southern legislatures that the Democrats lost, like Alabama, were just that realignment finally coming to close. But the other legislatures, like Maine, New Hampshire, Wisconsin, etc. those have to be chalked up to either the political climate or that the presidential/mid-term trend we've been witnessing is a real thing in its own right.

[Suttree]

More encouraging news on the jobs front.

Employers added 321,000 jobs in November, a very healthy showing that echoes other positive economic data recently and bodes well for the crucial holiday retail season underway.

The unemployment rate remained unchanged from last month at 5.8 percent, the Labor Department said Friday.

Government statisticians also revised upward the number of jobs added in September and October by 44,000, another good sign. Significantly, average hourly earnings surged 0.4 percent in November, twice what economists had been expecting and a sign the healthier economy is finally translating into wage gains for ordinary workers. Over the last 12 months, however, earnings are up only 2.1 percent.

Wall Street had been expecting payrolls to grow by 230,000 in November, with the unemployment rate remaining unchanged. November’s gain was the largest monthly jump in payrolls in nearly three years.

[OnionAhaiReborn]

TNR's neoliberal politics catch up with it, neoliberal writers displeased.

[lokisnow]

Moving back to more politic-y politics, I guess, it looks like the Southern Democrat legislator is about to go extinct.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/05/upshot/demise-of-the-southern-democrat-is-now-nearly-compete.html?partner=rss&emc=rss&_r=0

Worth noting, red states have 56 senate seats.

That is different from the senate seats republicans currently hold, but the 28 states that always vote red in the last four presidential elections have 56 senate seats.

The trend line for contested non incumbent seats over the last 12 years has been for those open senate seats to revert to the seat of the presidential party they've voted for the last four presidential elections. As this solidifies over the next eighteen years fewer and fewer senate seats will be contestable, and the rare occurrence of holding a senate seat in an opposing party state will become the most valuable coin of the senate chamber.

For the most part, republicans have been siezing and flipping red state senate seats much more aggressively than democrats have, democrats didn't even bother with susan collins, who if she were a democrat running in Arkansas would have been as savagely challenged as republicans did Mark Pryor (a senator with Collins levels of popularity, so high that he wasn't even challenged by republicans the prior cycle) Democrats haven't gone feral in attacking popular opposing party incumbents in their states. Yet. but they will, there isn't any other choice, republicans have built up a base of senate seats that are uncontestable (by virtue of being always red presidential states) in the mid to upper forties. Democrats have not focused on doing the same, and are in the mid to upper thirties in their uncontestable senate seats.

The result is that democrats are either going to have some exceptional senate years over the next eighteen years as they flip seats like Maine permanently into their column, or they're going to suffer badly because republicans have moved the battleground to only be on neutral or democrat turf. since democrats didn't bother to try in 2014 after convincing themselves there was no way to win because of the fundamentals (creating a virtuous cycle for republicans that self reinforced into catastrophe) I imagine we're probably looking a republican senate until January 2021, but it's doubtful we'll get a democrat senate until after the 2024 or 2028 elections.

[OnionAhaiReborn]

I don't see how you get to that conclusion. It sounds like this was much more about journalism and tech and whether or not it was OK to use horrific headlines as click-bait and stuff.

No argument that there's a neoliberal bent at TNR.

I'm saying the horrific headlines as click-bait and infotainment aggregation stuff is all the yield of capitalism, the market at work, where the neoliberal policy trend has led. I admit it's not actually the case that the policy positions TNR has staked out have caused the current state of affairs, that was flippant. But I do see some general irony.

Worth noting, red states have 56 senate seats.

That is different from the senate seats republicans currently hold, but the 28 states that always vote red in the last four presidential elections have 56 senate seats.

I share some of your concerns, and I want to get rid of the Senate, but there are not 28 states that always vote Republican in the last four elections. Romney won 24, McCain won only 22.

[Fez]

The result is that democrats are either going to have some exceptional senate years over the next eighteen years as they flip seats like Maine permanently into their column, or they're going to suffer badly because republicans have moved the battleground to only be on neutral or democrat turf. since democrats didn't bother to try in 2014 after convincing themselves there was no way to win because of the fundamentals (creating a virtuous cycle for republicans that self reinforced into catastrophe) I imagine we're probably looking a republican senate until January 2021, but it's doubtful we'll get a democrat senate until after the 2024 or 2028 elections.

Except the Senate isn't all up for re-election at once. Democrats are very likely to take the Senate back in 2016. Republicans will probably have a 54-46 majority going into it. There are no Democrats up for re-election in red states. There are seven Republicans up for re-election in states Obama won both times, two Republicans up in states Obama won once, and two up in the Dakotas, which (along with Montana) are states that Democrats routinely win senate races in.

If that's a wave election for Democrats, they'll have 57-43 majority going into the 2018 election. In the 2018 election, there is one Republican up in a state Obama won both times, four Democrats in states McCain/Romney won (though two are Montana and N. Dakota), and two in states Obama won once. There are also let's say three swing state Democrats (Florida, Ohio, and Wisconsin). If its a Republican wave, they could have a 52-48 majority.

Then, in the 2020 election, there are no Democrats in McCain/Romney states, but there are three Republicans in states Obama won twice (one is Maine, but Collins is likely to retire by then I think), and one in state Obama won once. Just winning those, with Presidential turnout, and Democrats will have a 52-48 majority. If its a Democratic wave, there may be a couple other seats in play, if they are open seats.

And by 2022, that's far enough in the future that's its impossible to know how things will stand anyway. Even if this "big sort" you hypothesis were to come true, it'll be at least a decade before it settles into place.

[Maithanet]

I share some of your concerns, and I want to get rid of the Senate, but there are not 28 states that always vote Republican in the last four elections. Romney won 24, McCain won only 22.

Yeah, I find this pessimism going way too far. If the overall political tides are good in 2016, there's every reason to think that Democrats will retake the Senate. Republicans are probably going to have 54 seats, and they are going to be defending seats in IA, WI, IL, OH, PA, NH, NC, and FL. A strong presidential candidate, could win all of those states - Obama went 8/8 in 2008, 7/8 in 2012. Picking up 5 seats wouldn't be easy, but it isn't some crazy "if only we can win in Georgia" longshot.

Although if Democrats can't pull it off in 2016, 2018 is a very tough map for them.

[lokisnow]

I'm saying the horrific headlines as click-bait and infotainment aggregation stuff is all the yield of capitalism, the market at work, where the neoliberal policy trend has led. I admit it's not actually the case that the policy positions TNR has staked out have caused the current state of affairs, that was flippant. But I do see some general irony.

I share some of your concerns, and I want to get rid of the Senate, but there are not 28 states that always vote Republican in the last four elections. Romney won 24, McCain won only 22.

Sunovabitch that's a bloody stupid mistake I made there.

I do think a big sort is underway though, and it is more significant in state legislatures.

And since fundamentals now say that 2016 favors republican for the presidency by over a point we know the dems will not bother to try in 2016 either because of terror of fundamentals. On the other hand early fundamentals are good for dems in the senate, so it may be a split election. President walker and a fifty fifty senate seems very likely to me.

Dems need to stop pretending the Yankees have won every world series (because their fundamentals are so good) and try to fucking win instead of giving up years before the contest takes place.

[OnionAhaiReborn]

I'm pretty sure Hillary Clinton is going to try in 2016.

[Wee baby Shamus]

I'm pretty sure Hillary Clinton is going to try in 2016.

I really hope she does run in 2016.

If she does that practically guarantees a Republican win whoever the nominee is.

[Shryke]

I really hope she does run in 2016.

If she does that practically guarantees a Republican win whoever the nominee is.

This opinion is hilariously out of sync with reality.

[Trebla]

I really hope she does run in 2016.

If she does that practically guarantees a Republican win whoever the nominee is.

Right, because whomever gets through the red meat GOP primary will be somebody independents will vote for.

[Shryke]

That explains the federal seats, but not the state ones. The southern legislatures that the Democrats lost, like Alabama, were just that realignment finally coming to close. But the other legislatures, like Maine, New Hampshire, Wisconsin, etc. those have to be chalked up to either the political climate or that the presidential/mid-term trend we've been witnessing is a real thing in its own right.

Democratic Party demographics don't really vote in midterms.