US Politics: The sides have gotten… weird

[Maithanet]

12 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

Not exactly shocking, but also I don't understand her strategy at all - Sinema announces her retirement from the senate:

https://www.cnn.com/2024/03/05/politics/kyrsten-sinema-announces-retirement/index.html

I can only assume she desperately believed in some third way and grouping of people that didn't exist that would come to support her, or she's just that much into lobbyists. 

Yeah, we discussed this last month and nobody had a very compelling explanation for why Sinema has chosen the path she did.  But the writing has been on the wall for a while now that there was no path to victory for her in November.  I'm not surprised that she chose not to spend huge amounts of money, time and effort just to lose badly. 

[DireWolfSpirit]

What if it was Super Tuesday and the public just gave a big middle finger back and said WE DONT WANT ANY OF THESE SHITTY CANDIDATES

Eta: I'm most curious to see the percentage of elgibles who actually turnout 

Edited March 5 by DireWolfSpirit

[Kalbear]

Just now, DireWolfSpirit said:

What if it was Super Tuesday and the public just gave a big middle finger back and said WE DONT WANT ANY OF THESE SHITTY CANDIDATES

But a whole lot of people do want at least one of those shitty candidates. Because some people are kinda shitty, too. 

I guess if that's the kind of fantasy you want to have go for it. Some people like getting choked, some people fantasize about West Wing characters berating them as they jerk off to a Dune popcorn bucket. To each their own. 

[Mudguard]

3 minutes ago, DireWolfSpirit said:

What if it was Super Tuesday and the public just gave a big middle finger back and said WE DONT WANT ANY OF THESE SHITTY CANDIDATES

I'm leaving my choice for presidential candidate blank for the primary.  Doesn't matter right now anyway.  The US Senate race in CA is interesting though.

[DireWolfSpirit]

20 minutes ago, Mudguard said:

I'm leaving my choice for presidential candidate blank for the primary.  Doesn't matter right now anyway.  The US Senate race in CA is interesting though.

I kind of anticipate a historic low for turnout as pecentage of elgible voters.

[Kalbear]

1 minute ago, DireWolfSpirit said:

I kind of anticipate a historic low for turnout as pecentage of elgible voters.

I don't, and it's kind of silly to do so. Maybe a lower percentage for dems - after all, the candidate is basically decided, so it's pretty close to something like 1996 or 2012 - but so far turnout has been pretty decent. For example, NH broke records for turnout in a primary. Looking at Nevada their turnout was almost exactly the same % for the primary as it was for 2012. 

In any case predicting that it's going to be a low percentage is probably not the most insane thing, but then thinking that it's because everyone hates the candidates is just a fantasy. When both parties do not have competitive races in a primary turnout tends to be down, especially since spending is largely down. Biden has made a whole lot of money recently and has spent almost none of it because...why would he? There isn't a big GOTV effort right now for most states, unless there is some other major issue or race on the ballot. 

If you DID want to express your dissatisfaction with the candidates the best thing to do is to show up and vote uncommitted or coordinate a specific candidate that associates with that displeasure. Otherwise it will largely be dismissed, both by the parties and the media. 

[Mudguard]

9 minutes ago, DireWolfSpirit said:

I kind of anticipate a historic low for turnout as pecentage of elgible voters.

To be clear, I'm still voting.  I'm just leaving some sections blank.

[Centrist Simon Steele]

On 2/28/2024 at 1:59 AM, Ran said:

He also celebrated the death of three American servicemen in Jordan, associating their deaths with "ACAB" (i.e. the US military acts as the world's cops, and ACAB, so deaths of his fellow servicemen was a good thing.)

He fell down the left-wing rabbit hole and came out with a deeply warped sense of reality. We should be thankful he didn't get a gun and try to take other people with him, at least.

 

Lol, that's a left-wing rabbit-hole? I used to be in the military--the number of servicemembers I saw acting like sociopaths, excited to hurt and kill is only rivaled by U.S. cops. 

[Martell Spy]

Filibuster at serious risk as Sinema begins her Senate exit
While Democrats are more vocal about wanting to abolish the upper chamber's supermajority requirement, it could be in danger regardless of which party wins the Senate next year.

https://www.politico.com/live-updates/2024/03/05/congress/filibuster-in-deep-trouble-00145099

Quote

 

But if Rep. Ruben Gallego (D-Ariz.) wins his race, Democrats hold the Senate, Biden wins reelection and the party takes the House, another effort to scrap the supermajority threshold seems almost certain. Kari Lake, who is running against Gallego, praised Sinema on Tuesday for showing “courage” on the filibuster and insisted she would not vote to change it.

Sen. Jon Tester (D-Mont.), who may be the most conservative Democrat left in the Senate if he wins a tough reelection bid this fall, said he does not want to abolish the filibuster altogether but would like to make it harder for individual senators to stop bills: “A talking filibuster is not necessarily a bad thing.”

And Democratic leaders aren't shy about the fact that they still want "real changes in the Senate rules," as Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) put it.

"This is no longer a deliberative, legislative body,” he said. “We’ve got to change the current set of rules as they are now. I think the Senate is drifting into obscurity.”

 

 

[Kalbear]

Given that WV is almost certainly going to R I don't see what pickups Dems are going to get in 2024 to allow that; the best they can hope is -1, basically, and that includes Sinema's seat, and I don't see a 50-50 split giving them enough political power to kill the filibuster even if Harris is the tiebreaking vote. 

[ThinkerX]

Just a suspicion at this point, but I figure the Ds might flip two or three Senate seats this time around - seats that would normally be deemed safely red. Not so much because of the candidate's merits, but because the current republican officeholders are acting like worse jackasses than normal - and because Trump stole all the campaign money.

[Larry of the Lawn]

9 minutes ago, ThinkerX said:

Just a suspicion at this point, but I figure the Ds might flip two or three Senate seats this time around - seats that would normally be deemed safely red. Not so much because of the candidate's merits, but because the current republican officeholders are acting like worse jackasses than normal - and because Trump stole all the campaign money.

I hope you're right but it's a pretty shit year for flipping seats. 

[Makk]

I'm not from the US and I don't understand exactly who you can vote for and when you can vote for them. However I suspect that if people are intending to vote for Biden as president who would normally vote Republican, and are only voting that way because Truimp is deranged, then they are even more likely to vote Republican for the house and senate so Biden doesn't get too much power. 

[A Horse Named Stranger]

8 hours ago, ThinkerX said:

Just a suspicion at this point, but I figure the Ds might flip two or three Senate seats this time around - seats that would normally be deemed safely red. Not so much because of the candidate's merits, but because the current republican officeholders are acting like worse jackasses than normal - and because Trump stole all the campaign money.

Curious which seats you think Democrats could conceivably flip.

Manchin's WV is a write off for Democrats, they will lose this one.

Tester holding on to his seat in Montana will be really tough.

Brown will be facing a tough race in Ohio.

Baldwin is up for Reelection in Wisconsin.

Stabbenow is retiring, thus there's an open seat in Michigan (presumably Slotkin will be the D running).

Those four are presumably the four toughest races (in addition to Gallego in AZ, which will say a few words about it at the end of the post), and all five have incumbent Democrat Senators.

Next tier would be PA with Casey defending his seat. He should be safer than the other three. But that's one seat R will be gunning for.

The other seat in that bracket would be Rosen in Nevada, another D incumbent.

IMHO Democrats have pretty much maxed out what they could get in the Senate atm. They could flip Collins seat in Maine, but she's not up for reelection this year. But neither are the Democrats in Georgia (fortunately).

 

General note: Funny you are now talking about Sinema, had this discussion with the Orlando Oracle a couple of weeks ago. Also we sorta agreed Sinema can't be reasonably explained.

Gallego will (probably) win the AZ seat (going by the polls but it's still very early and so and so forth). But that's not an easy race either, and also one where the Democrats are defending a vulnerable seat.

 

Edited March 6 by A Horse Named Stranger

[ThinkerX]

1 hour ago, A Horse Named Stranger said:

Curious which seats you think Democrats could conceivably flip.

Manchin's WV is a write off for Democrats, they will lose this one.

Tester holding on to his seat in Montana will be really tough.

Brown will be facing a tough race in Ohio.

Baldwin is up for Reelection in Wisconsin.

Stabbenow is retiring, thus there's an open seat in Michigan (presumably Slotkin will be the D running).

Those four are presumably the four toughest races (in addition to Gallego in AZ, which will say a few words about it at the end of the post), and all five have incumbent Democrat Senators.

Next tier would be PA with Casey defending his seat. He should be safer than the other three. But that's one seat R will be gunning for.

The other seat in that bracket would be Rosen in Nevada, another D incumbent.

IMHO Democrats have pretty much maxed out what they could get in the Senate atm. They could flip Collins seat in Maine, but she's not up for reelection this year. But neither are the Democrats in Georgia (fortunately).

 

General note: Funny you are now talking about Sinema, had this discussion with the Orlando Oracle a couple of weeks ago. Also we sorta agreed Sinema can't be reasonably explained.

Gallego will (probably) win the AZ seat (going by the polls but it's still very early and so and so forth). But that's not an easy race either, and also one where the Democrats are defending a vulnerable seat.

 

Florida and Texas. 

[A Horse Named Stranger]

14 minutes ago, ThinkerX said:

Florida and Texas. 

I admire your optimism.

Lyin' Ted losing his seat? Maybe. But I don't see it. Would be the first time since 1988 that Democrats win a Senate race there.

As for Senator Lex 'Medifraud' Luther in Florida. It's Florida. It's Florida. I mean, Flo-ri-da. Putting aside the shift to the right in that state and the Republican party apparatus, you have to consider the real consequences of Democrats flipping that seat. I couldn't troll DMC that much anymore about him being in Florida (ok, I still would, but it wouldn't come as natural (ok another lie, but nevermind)). So please, think of DMC here.

 

[Larry of the Lawn]

26 minutes ago, ThinkerX said:

Florida and Texas. 

 

You'd have a difficult time finding two bigger shitbags than Cruz and Scott, and while they both won with barely 50% in 2018, that was a huge Dem turnout midterm year.

 

[A Horse Named Stranger]

In other non-news.

Haley dropped dead, or out of the GOP primary.

Utterly irrelevant either way.

[Martell Spy]

Key Trump ally tells top UK journalist to ‘fuck off’
Question about “Jewish space lasers” triggers spat between outspoken politician Marjorie Taylor Greene and Emily Maitlis.

https://www.politico.eu/article/donald-trump-ally-marjorie-taylor-greene-emily-maitlis-journalist-fuck-off/

Quote

 

“Tell us about Jewish space lasers,” Maitlis pushed, referring to a since-deleted Facebook post Greene wrote in November 2018 in which she said she believed California’s wildfires may have been caused by space lasers that were connected to the Rothschilds. The Rothschild family has featured heavily in antisemitic tropes for over a century.

The comment tipped Greene over the edge.

Pointing a finger at Maitlis, she said: “Why don’t you go talk about Jewish space lasers and why don’t you go fuck off?”

 

 

[Ran]

13 hours ago, Centrist Simon Steele said:

Lol, that's a left-wing rabbit-hole? I used to be in the military--the number of servicemembers I saw acting like sociopaths, excited to hurt and kill is only rivaled by U.S. cops. 

So you're fine with someone celebrating the deaths of these individuals on the basis that they were perhaps sociopaths?

And if you died in service, would it be all right for people to assume in all likelihood that you were a sociopath and celebrate your death?

If you say yes, yes, that's a left-wing rabbit hole, and you're down in it too.

Edited March 6 by Ran