US Politics: Ready, Set, Announce! Bookering the Odds

[DMC]

7 minutes ago, Varysblackfyre321 said:

Because she might want to continue to be Speaker or branch out into another political office in the future?

You realize she's agreed to retire by 2022 at the latest, right?

[The Anti-Targ]

1 hour ago, DMC said:

I don't think there's ever going to be a plan or set standard.  It's dealt with on an ad-hoc basis, as it should be since there's many factors involved in each individual case.  In this case, it's very hard to argue throwing Northam under the bus isn't the clear politically expedient option, no matter one's personal feelings.

Is it though?

To me it's more about sending a message to the right-wing attack machine that there line is where the left won't take the bait and sacrifice it's own at the same time as basically giving aid an comfort to the enemy by confirming that they can take down almost anyone from the left. This particular incident is a pretty minor infraction in the grand scheme of things, and yet the right still sees it has having enough meat to take the man down and easily manipulate the left.

In my view, the first reaction everyone on the left should have with a right-wing attack based on historical racist, sexist or other bigotted behavior is "What is the outcome this attack wants, and how do we make sure the right-wing attack machine doesn't get what it wants?" It's actually not about the unacceptability of the behavior itself and the consequences the person in question should face.

This is a political war, and as they say with war, winning is not about who's right, but about who's left. 

Not having plan to counter the right-wing attacks that you know will keep coming, is precisely why the right keeps landing their blows and why they keep attacking. The right's plan for left-wing personal attacks is defend, deny, dismiss, deflect and it seems to work more often than not. The left doesn't need to have the same plan, but it needs to have a plan.

[Varysblackfyre321]

18 minutes ago, DMC said:

You realize she's agreed to retire by 2022 at the latest, right?

A fair point I should acknowledge . At the moment all indication does  point to her leaving politics after her speakership is over. I concede this particular suggestion was flawed and thank you for pointing out why. I might as well said a prisoner might want to escape prison before he's released the next day.  

[DMC]

6 minutes ago, The Anti-Targ said:

To me it's more about sending a message to the right-wing attack machine that there line is where the left won't take the bait and sacrifice it's own at the same time as basically giving aid an comfort to the enemy by confirming that they can take down almost anyone from the left. This particular incident is a pretty minor infraction in the grand scheme of things, and yet the right still sees it has having enough meat to take the man down and easily manipulate the left.

To extend the metaphor, I really don't think this bait is attached to much of a hook.  Who's it really going to hurt?  Other than Northam's political career, nothing.

6 minutes ago, The Anti-Targ said:

In my view, the first reaction everyone on the left should have with a right-wing attack based on historical racist, sexist or other bigotted behavior is "What is the outcome this attack wants, and how do we make sure the right-wing attack machine doesn't get what it wants?"

I think the first reaction should be are these racist/sexist/bigoted accusations legitimate?  But that's just me.

6 minutes ago, The Anti-Targ said:

This is a political war, and as they say with war, winning is not about who's right, but about who's left. 

Again, you've yet to make any type of argument why this specific case hurts the left in this war.  The case for dumping him as a casualty of that war is much more politically compelling.

6 minutes ago, The Anti-Targ said:

Not having plan to counter the right-wing attacks that you know will keep coming, is precisely why the right keeps landing their blows and why they keep attacking.

I honestly don't know how you can even begin to have a set plan or protocol for every possible scandal that may arise among your officeholders and/or candidates.

[ThinkerX]

1 hour ago, Darth Richard II said:

One needs a heart to have a heart attack.

I remember near identical commentary on this site about SC Justice Scalia.

 

Trump is human - and he checks off so many boxes on the heart attack chart - age, height, weight, diet, no real exercise and so on - that responsible health professionals would be alarmed.

 

Given this, it becomes a legit question to ask how Trumps base reacts to the news.  Given that they are mired in a realm of conspiracy theories, I suspect the majority will loudly insist its an assassination and demand appropriate action - like summarily arresting Trumps political opponents for treason.

[Kalbear]

It also depends heavily on the stakes. I'm fine with spending political capital to fight for, say, first term Obama, or Clinton in 2016. But Northam is already a lame-duck governor with a Lt. Governor who is ALSO Democratic. Northam wasn't particularly beloved by the party or by the outside world (and in fact, National dems preferred Periello). He's not up and coming. He's basically as useful as he could be, and now his usefulness is effectively over.

Sending a signal that dems are the party of equality is more valuable than defending his soon-to-be-done career. 

[Larry of the Lawn]

1 hour ago, Varysblackfyre321 said:

Because she might want to continue to be Speaker or branch out into another political office in the future and she is less likely to be seen as appropriate if her popularity slides down enough?  Because the whole shutdown doesn't appear to have  dealt significant long-term damage to Trump? Because Trump may be willingly to offer temporary protections to dreamers again. I see these as adequate reasons for Peloshhi to be more willingly to compromise Honestly, I dont see anyone as having have won. Trump's wall only only ever appealed to his most die hard supporters who will never stop supporting him wall or no wall. however despite polls  Pelosi has shown however regardless of the actual polls she's not giving Trump a cent for his wall. 

 I assume you're an intelligent fellow who knows accusing your opponent of probably being a troll or simply stupid isn't productive. Let's try to be civil here.  My argument is "this story of Biden expressing negative views of a policy meant to help in integration(something a lot of African see as good thing) could hurt his popularity among African-Americans."  Do you agree with the views Biden stated on bussing? Honestly, I'd be surprised if Biden himself still holds such views.

I agree with his statements in that bussing shouldn't be forced on black communities without their consent.  The article you linked and the one it sited lump him in with Jesse Helms and Byrd, but then mention the context of the quote, and his reason for how he voted.  I don't think it's as problematic as the sensationalist angle in the article you linked.  It's not like there's a picture of him in black face.  

Additionally, this has been in the open for a long time.  I can't see black communities feeling blind sided with this- if it was going to be a stumbling block for Biden, why wasn't it a problem when Obama chose him as a running mate?  Or anytime in his career?  This is just some run of the mill political speculation that you're treating as some kind of 'gotcha' moment for Biden, which it isn't, and I think he's a long shot at best as the 2020 Dem nominee anyway, so why even be surprised no one commented on this meaningless non story?  

Considered with the common knowledge of Pelosi's political career being in its concluding period (and her age, and Biden's age), the two most obvious conclusions about your post are that either you are just posting shit without understanding it or trolling everybody.  

Eta: also Trump maybe offering shit he already took away for a temporary period is fucking meaningless.  Pelosi is negotiating from a position of strength here, as proven by Trump caving.  Why would she do anything differently?  

[Kalbear]

23 minutes ago, Triskele said:

How serious are these allegations against Fairfax though?  What a crazy situation.  Northam was made even more useless by the fact that Dem world was so ready to just see Fairfax get in there.  

Without knowing jack about that situation beyond headlines as of right now I would suspect that Dems will have a much harder time with this situation.  Kick Franken out due to a no tolerance policy but don't apply it here?  

Knowing more about the situation makes it a bit more confusing but also less likely that it should be immediately jumped on. The accuser is anonymous, there have been no contemporaneous reports from either side, and there's no evidence. Franken had multiple women come forward with photographic evidence. Fairfax doesn't have that at all. 

[Larry of the Lawn]

The timing is suspect, but of course this allegation against Fairfax should be investigated.  Fairfax seemed to imply Northam may be the one that leaked the allegation against him, seems more like whoever found the yearbook photo found this as well and figured they'd cloud the waters.  Hopefully the alleged sexual assault can be confirmed or proven false asap, but definitely a mess.  But as Kal said I don't think with what we know right now it rises to the level of Franken (obviously if true it's much worse) because there is one source.  If we get sone kind of Christine-Blassey Ford testimony against Fairfax, he should resign too. 

[Gertrude]

7 minutes ago, Triskele said:

Without knowing jack about that situation beyond headlines as of right now I would suspect that Dems will have a much harder time with this situation.  Kick Franken out due to a no tolerance policy but don't apply it here?  

I don't know anything beyond headlines either, but I do know how he responded. Northam's response was a joke and so badly handled I have no qualms about people asking for him to step down. Aside from the actual photo and it's implications, his response made it clear that he was, or easily could have been in that photo - AND he volunteered the MJ blackface story. If he could have addressed it in a credibly remorseful, apologetic tone and had a strong record to show he had changed, I'd be content to leave him be. The photo is particularly visceral, however, so understand why others would not be OK with it.

Fairfax has strongly denied there is any truth to the accusations against him. TBH, I don't even know what they are aside from vague sexual assault. If he didn't do it, then this is exactly what you should do. Sadly, it also seems to be the standard R playbook (deny, deny, deny) so it rewards people for denying everything. It comes down to credibility and it's a gut call. 

Keith Ellison weathered an accusation against him and won his race. Gabbard has made a genuine seeming apology for her comments and has a record to back up her evolution. The Franken situation was an anomaly in many ways. It was so early in the metoo movement that it had to be addressed and I think people jumped the gun. Yes, the initial photo was cringe and couldn't be defended, but it wasn't in the league of assault that many people tried to paint it, IMO.

 I usually come down on the side of letting the people make the decision. Looking at Roy Moore, I disagreed with people saying that if he were elected, he should be censured. The people would have voted for him for knowing full well who he was and were fine with that. The party should speak out against members who they don't think represent their party's views. The RNC and DNC have the power to pressure their candidates, and are within their rights to do so. Can they kick someone out of a party? If not, they can at least withhold support and publicly denounce them. Steve King was not censured, but he was taken off of committees (like he did anything anyway) and he's being pressured out, but people voted for him knowing that his voice would be speaking for them and were ok with it. 

[S John]

Tough situation all around.  The Dems try to hold their people to a certain standard, which I do appreciate, but the Rs don’t care about the standard.  They - and their voters - care about winning and getting their way and if it takes a despicable person to cast a vote that they like, they do not give a fuck about anything else.  It’s the result that matters.  So many Rs could give a shit about what Trump does as long as he packs the courts with hard righties and signs conservative legislation.  This is how you end up with Evangelicals able to support a guy like Trump, to them he’s obviously an imperfect man (and who isn’t anyway?) but more importantly he’s an instrument of God.

It’s no surprise that the right are figuring out that they can turn the Democrats own standards against them.  I would like to see a high moral standard in my politicians.  I also want to fucking win.  To be honest I do not give a shit what someone did 35 years ago as long as that thing wasn’t rape or murder if they’ve managed to be a stand up member of society since then and are standing up for the things I want to see stood up for.   People can change drastically over time.  Even from age 20-30, or 24-35 you can see drastically different iterations of the same individual.  I really don’t approve of the notion that people can’t have done things that they regret in life and overcome them and move on.  It just feels like if you fuck up (or fucked up 10, 20, 30 years ago) you are expected to go find a hole to crawl into and die.  I don’t think that is how society should work.

Further, politicians are not my personal friends.  I’m not inviting them over for dinner.  I just want them to advocate in my interests and vote for the shit I’d like to see.  If they commit a crime, lock them up like anybody else.  If they’ve committed a non criminal offense now or in the past, beat them at the ballot box if we don’t like them.  Primary them, if need be.  I just don’t know how anyone makes it through a lifetime without  doing some shit that they regret and would hate to be made public, and I don’t think people’s worst moments from decades ago should be the standard by which they are judged in the present.  It’s a major distraction and really only adds up to political theater.

[Altherion]

4 hours ago, The Anti-Targ said:

What I meant by that was, in particular with the progressive / left eating their own, that you don't call for people on your own side to resign over social indiscretions committed decades in the past.

Why not? Of course, most of the time each party tries not to hand power over to the other (e.g. Democrats pushing Joe Manchin to resign would probably result in Republicans picking up a Senate seat), but when the replacement is from the same side as the replaced, this amounts to an internal power struggle.

Of course, people who have studied history and noticed that practically everything we do today is now recorded in one way or another might argue that weaponizing the distant past is quite likely to eventually come around to bite the people who are currently profiting from it, but this ship has sailed.

[S John]

2 minutes ago, Altherion said:

 

Of course, people who have studied history and noticed that practically everything we do today is now recorded in one way or another might argue that weaponizing the distant past is quite likely to eventually come around to bite the people who are currently profiting from it, but this ship has sailed.

What’s going to happen is that very little will actually matter becuase in a decade or two we will be overloaded with the dumb Facebook posts of politicians from when they were 19.  

Social media, the prevalence of texting (ie a record of your private conversations) will make this so much worse as time goes on and there will be enough dirt on anybody and everybody that only the truly unscrupulous assholes would even dare to stick their neck out to run for dog catcher.  There will be untold numbers of moral, capable people who won’t want anything to do with it.  Already at this point now probably.  I think that as with many criminal matters there ought to be an agreed upon statute of limitations on non-criminal dumbassery.  

[Rippounet]

3 hours ago, S John said:

It’s no surprise that the right are figuring out that they can turn the Democrats own standards against them. 

Pretty much what I said when the accusations against Kavanaugh first came out (and we had very little information about them).

OTOH

3 hours ago, S John said:

People can change drastically over time.  Even from age 20-30, or 24-35 you can see drastically different iterations of the same individual.  I really don’t approve of the notion that people can’t have done things that they regret in life and overcome them and move on.  It just feels like if you fuck up (or fucked up 10, 20, 30 years ago) you are expected to go find a hole to crawl into and die.  I don’t think that is how society should work.

There's a huge spectrum between "being a bit of a douche when young" and "committing rape and murder."

Therein lies the problem in my eyes. Like, I wouldn't care if a politician had experimented with various drugs in their youth. But being the school drug dealer? Hmmm, I'd probably have a problem with that. But how can you tell the difference, decades after the facts?
The same goes for a lot of things. A guy jokingly touching a girl inappropriately while drunk at a party (à-la-Franken)? That could've been me. Assault or rape? Not a fucking chance. But again, how do you tell the difference, decades later?

I guess one key difference is how the people themselves react. No one magically forgets who they were as a teenager. Not even with tons of booze involved. Admitting you were young and stupid, and that you did bad stuff goes a long way. Kavanaugh's holier-than-thou righteous-anger otoh was what ended up showing the world he wasn't the man for the job.

3 hours ago, S John said:

Social media, the prevalence of texting (ie a record of your private conversations) will make this so much worse as time goes on and there will be enough dirt on anybody and everybody that only the truly unscrupulous assholes would even dare to stick their neck out to run for dog catcher. There will be untold numbers of moral, capable people who won’t want anything to do with it.  Already at this point now probably.  I think that as with many criminal matters there ought to be an agreed upon statute of limitations on non-criminal dumbassery.  

This is 100% true imho.
Though I'll add that there are also untold number of younger people already who have been taught to be very careful about what they post online.
My generation was one of the first on the internet. We posted a lot of potentially incriminating things online. It took me and several of my friends years to learn.
Meanwhile, my cousins who are in their twenties have *nothing* dangerous online. One of them posts pictures of horses, and the other one advertises film festivals. One of them doesn't even have pictures of her showing up on google.

[Fragile Bird]

The Washington Post had investigated the sexual assault allegation against Fairfax some time ago and could not find any evidence that it was true. They checked with people who had worked with him in the past and found no stories about him being a harasser or offensive to women. The sad fact is, for the most part, a guy who harasses women does it all the time. There were quite a few stories about Franken, about where he put his hands and stuff he said. And Trump has a ton of complaints about him, life-long. Look at the other guys in the Me Too stories. With no other evidence of misconduct, WAPO chose not to report the harassment allegation when it first came to their attention.

[OldGimletEye]

18 hours ago, Lollygag said:

snip

A few things here:
1. Even if somebody were moderate in the sense of preferred policy positions, I’d hope they wouldn't be so foolish to believe they should be moderate in the way they deal with the current Republican Party. As noted by people like Norm Ornstein the Republican Party has simply lost their mind.  There is no reason to think they will deal in good faith. And if you start out as a moderate on policy and try to negotiate with party that wants to go even further to the right, you’re likely to end up making policy that is well to the right.

Personally I might be more moderate than the Jacobin Mag crowd. But, when it comes to delivering a swift kick in the butt to the Republican Party, I’m right with them.

2. Somebody does though need to make the case for more left wing policies or ideas or at least push back when so called centrist make questionable assertions about policy. In short a lot of “centrist” just do:

[Current Left Wing Position + Current Right Wing Position] / 2 = Reasonable Centrist Position

If the current left wing position always lurches to the right just to please the “sensible” ears of many centrist, the actual policies that end up getting made, may end up being to the right of Attila the Hun.

When somebody like Bloomberg just randomly asserts that single payer will “bankrupt the country” or tries invoke the specter of Venezuela, Krugman and others that pay attention to healthcare policy are right to call him on it. Something like single payer might challenge some centrist notions of what is reasonable policy, but there are good to reasons to think that single payer (depending on implementation of course) could work much better than our current system, which is a mess. Of course there may be other ways, beside single payer, to make our healthcare system better and more equitable, but the point here is just saying single payer should be ruled out a priori as a nutball idea is pretty much garbage.

Also take something like the government negotiating drug prices. To the “reasonable centrist” like Bloomberg that might seem extremely radical, or heaven forbid even “socialist”. But there are strong reasons to think the government controlling drug prices could improve welfare. Basic economic theory, that you’d find in a first year microeconomics course, teaches that monopolist get returns higher than what is necessary for them to employ the factors of production. Such returns are often called rents and they are usually considered inefficient. And our system of giving patents to drug companies pretty much means that many drug companies act as monopolist. Now if you are the sort that believes that patents are necessary to get drug companies to innovate, I guess that is fine and all, but what you are essentially saying is that the idea of a purely competitive market for drugs really never existed or is not possible. And people like Rand Paul running around saying "what if the healthcare market were a free market" are pretty much living in a dream world.

Or take the “reasonable centrist” position on the national debt. All reasonable centrist know that being 21 trillion dollars in debt is really, really scary. Except but for continuing rising healthcare cost in the United States it really isn’t. If you do some basic debt math,  and If you take current nominal GDP growth at about 4% and current deficits at about 5% (which is about 1% higher than what it was 2018) per year, then the debt/GDP would eventually converge to about %125, which really isn’t all that scary of a number, particularly where interest rates are likely be low over the next several decades.

3. Now here is where I’ll change lanes a bit, and hopefully not cause @DMC to have to jam his breaks as this is more his area or lane, but I think what this poll largely shows is something that has been known for awhile, which is that Americans often like Republicans on big picture stuff or general rhetoric like “freedom” and “the free market”, but when it comes to specific policy ideas, they like Democrat's ideas better.

In that poll, that Todd cited, I’d note also:

http://www.people-press.org/2019/01/24/publics-2019-priorities-economy-health-care-education-and-security-all-near-top-of-list/

Quote

“As economic and security concerns have become less prominent, the domestic issues of reducing health care costs (69% top priority) and improving the educational system (68%) now rank among the top tier of public priorities. About two-thirds also say that taking steps to make the Social Security (67%) and Medicare (67%) systems financially sound are top priorities for the country.”

These are seemingly traditional Democratic issues.

Also,

Quote

Just 48% say reducing the deficit should be a top priority for the president and Congress this year. Concern over the budget deficit is much less widespread than it was during Barack Obama’s administration. In 2013, 72% of the public – including 81% of Republicans and 65% of Democrats – said reducing the deficit should be a top priority.

Which makes questionable the whole idea that “fiscal conservatism” is gonna be the hottest new trend and that if you’re not board with it, you’re probably just some square old fogey that still uses an eight track and just can’t with the “Pepsi Generation.”

And,

Quote

When it comes to the environment, Democrats are 43 percentage points more likely than Republicans to say protecting the environment should be a top priority (74% vs. 31%) and 46 points more likely to call global climate change a top priority (67% vs. 21%).

 

And Matt Ygesias notes,

https://www.vox.com/2019/2/4/18210370/warren-wealth-tax-poll

Quote

Americans are open to the idea of hiking the top marginal income tax rate back up to 70 percent, as Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) has suggested, and are positively enthusiastic about Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s proposal to institute a wealth tax on large fortunes, according to a new poll from Morning Consult.

Their survey finds that higher marginal tax rates are favored by 45 percent of the public over 32 percent who say it’s a bad idea, while the wealth tax scores a crushing 60-21 victory that includes majority support from Republicans.

 

[Varysblackfyre321]

5 hours ago, S John said:

It’s no surprise that the right are figuring out that they can turn the Democrats own standards against them.  I would like to see a high moral standard in my politicians.  I also want to fucking win.  To be honest I do not give a shit what someone did 35 years ago as long as that thing wasn’t rape or murder if they’ve managed to be a stand up member of society since then and are standing up for the things I want to see stood up for.   People can change drastically over time.  Even from age 20-30, or 24-35 you can see drastically different iterations of the same individual.  I really don’t approve of the notion that people can’t have done things that they regret in life and overcome them and move on.  It just feels like if you fuck up (or fucked up 10, 20, 30 years ago) you are expected to go find a hole to crawl into and die.  I don’t think that is how society should work.

If Northam was honest I could understand defending him. I would have still thought he should have reasighned even if he didn’t come out and try to say he didn’t really wear black face or Klan robes. But at least I could see why he might be worth some redemption in the future. But he wasn’t honest and he decided to not own up to his mistake. Him staying on is quite frankly selfish on his part. Any possible sympathy I could have harbored for the man dissipated once I heard his defense, Is he as racist as he was decades ago? I’m guessing probably not. But at this point he is nothing but a liability for democrats. So yes, Zthe party is right to turn on him. And I think you’re giving the current Democratic Party a little too much credit in terms of holding true to their ideals.  

[mormont]

6 hours ago, S John said:

It’s no surprise that the right are figuring out that they can turn the Democrats own standards against them.  

The idea that this is something the are just figuring out is, well, daft. They've been doing it as a standard part of their playbooks for decades. It's nothing new: it's the furthest thing I can imagine from being new. 

In the case of Northam, there's an unpleasant undertone of implying that wearing blackface just isn't a big deal, or that it wasn't in 1984 and so should be excused now. To believe or concede that would be not only a moral mistake but a strategic mistake. The Democratic party is a coalition of interests. Minorities are too often being taken for granted as part of that coalition. To treat the Northam situation as yet another exciting opportunity for black Democrats to 'take one for the team', when it really isn't necessary, is crass and insensitive. 

ETA - on another note, is anyone else won over by Schultz's noble stand for the rights of billionaires 'people of means'? He's really striking a chord here. 

https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/howard-schultz-billionaire-alternative_us_5c58fd3fe4b087104756dafb

[Varysblackfyre321]

25 minutes ago, mormont said:

To treat the Northam situation as yet another exciting opportunity for black Democrats to 'take one for the team', when it really isn't necessary, is crass and insensitive. 

Absolutely true. Democrats can’t act though the  groups that make up their base are always going to be beholden to them no matter. There are limits. Wearing Black face is certainly something that goes well past those limits.

[Martell Spy]

Today’s Threats to Global Democracy Are Coming From Democracies Themselves

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2019/02/freedom-house-democracy.html

Quote

The report contains a particularly scathing section about the United States, which did not see a change in score this year but has been on a downward trend for about eight years. In other words, Donald Trump may be more the symptom than the cause of America’s democratic decline, although the report faults him for “straining our core values and testing the stability of our constitutional system” with his “attacks on essential institutions and traditions including the separation of powers, a free press, an independent judiciary, the impartial delivery of justice, safeguards against corruption, and most disturbingly, the legitimacy of elections.” The U.S. score on the report is now significantly below that of democratic peers like Canada, Britain, Germany, and Japan and is more in line with countries like Belize, Croatia, Greece, and Mongolia.