Make the US Politics Thread Great Again

But the lefties are just stroking it when they throw around terms like ‘totalitarian’, ‘fascism’ etc.

You’re right, but the party holds a lot of sway over who they support in the primaries and how they support them.

Media, local and national also hold a lot of influence on who the voting public gets to see and generally the news won’t hand the same level of free publicity to left wingers as they do to right wing nutters.

Nobody is owed their votes, and everyone is free to vote their own way. But those who voted Green in Arizona have to acknowledge that they (collectively) were responsible for a Republican getting in, because they chose to vote Green over Dem. Now, they may be happy that someone who will vote against environmental issues, for racist/sexist judges, no gun controls, etc. is in that seat for the next six years. In which case, all power to them, they got what they wanted.

But don’t pretend that they didn’t do that. They made a choice, and that is they preferred a Republican to win the seat and vote Green than take a lesser evil. Its their choice, their right, but now they must acknowledge that every vote that Senator makes is on them.

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I’ve got to admit, I don’t see the problem. Usually people are voting party over individual, and in this case his party now gets to replace him. Voting for him seems the logical thing to do if you want to be represented by a Republican candidate, even if he was dead.

Now, how someone can be a fundamentalist christian AND a brothel owner boggles my mind.

I don’t disagree that the party does have influence. But I do think if there was truly the demand for far left candidates in the past, they’d have been coming through the primaries more. There has been a swing left recently, and it is now showing in the primaries. However, I think there are a swathe of Dem voters who are still nearer the middle, and they are supporting middle candidates in the primaries more. I don’t think that is mostly the establishment issue.

Now, want to see an establishment #@%@%@ up? Nancy ■■■■■■ Pelosi on winning the house pushing bipartisanship . Why won’t her generation just give up on power, and recognise that there is a new political reality? The Republicans aren’t interested in bipartisanship unless it means Dems folding. Liberal voters are no longer interested in it. But she and her generation can’t get their heads out the 2000’s.

True 'boot. Trump didn’t cause millions of Americans to lose their decency. He just gave them explicit permission to come out into the open.

As for living in the US, you know my thoughts on that. Time to make a move.

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If you have 10min to waste:

In my not inconsiderable travels throughout that often beautiful but genuinely ■■■■■■ up place it was very common along the backroads and the freeways to have huge barn churches standing right next to very similar structures selling nothing but ■■■■ and sex. Nothing else, just those two big businesses. Especially in the south but most everywhere else I went too. For many it’s still the Wild West and they like it that way. Just with opioids now.

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I didn’t think he was, just that he had the support of them because he was their only choice at the time on the conservative side? (not that I agree with it, stupid people do stupid things).

Can the Dems get rid of Pelosi as House leader? Already talking about compromise which is what farked them last time. She’s so stale - get some fresh blood in there

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The GOP in Arizona kept the Libertarian Party off the ballot, basically they upped the requirement that the libertarians obtain a certain number of registered libertarians sign on for the ballot registration with an additional requirement that they also gained the signatures of an equal number of registered independents. As a consequence the Greens were the only third party on the ballot. So naturally ■■■■■■ of libertarians voted Green in protest. The Democrats could have helped stymie this if they had supported the libertarians being admitted to the ballot. If the libertarians had been on the ballot they might well have taken enough votes from the Republicans for the Democrats to take the Senate seat.

Though its not all gloom for Arizona libertarians.The state Supreme Court Justice Clint Bolick handily won his judicial retention election yesterday by a lopsided margin of 71 percent to 29 percent. Bolick a libertarian lawyer was appointed to the state Supreme Court by the Republican Gov. Doug Ducey. Under the terms of the Arizona constitution, a state Supreme Court justice must stand in a judicial retention election two years after being appointed to the bench, and then stand again every six years after that. https://reason.com/blog/2018/11/07/clint-bolick-arizonas-libertarian-suprem

Some of it is a hangover of State and Federal laws ( e.g Mann Act) dealing with immorality, under which it was OK to go to a brothel, but not to have affairs or cohabit - but multiple divorces acceptable.
There are still some residual provisions, including in Liberal States, involving a denial of access to some benefits to couples unless married. Friends of mine with a child who had lived together forever, had to get married before taking up a position in Chicago.

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You don’t reckon it might be on the turds that voted Republican?

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I found it interesting that the rural U.S almost universally vote Republican and that Democratic representation is mainly centered around the larger urban areas and coastal regions. Seems to me the Democrats are failing to get their message even heard or considered in the central U.S.

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From what I see, they generally don’t even try.

The reverse is also true, of course.

But even in the most central, low-population states, urban voters trend Dem and even in the most urbanised coastal, hipster states like California and Washington, rural areas trend Republican. I don’t think anyone’s not trying, I just think demography drives the political trends very rigidly over there.

There’s been a lot of self sorting over the past 20 years. Democratic voters have moved to the cities. This means traditionally competitive areas have become strongly partisan.

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Well clearly. But presumably they’re happy with that and the way the new Senator will vote. People who voted Green may not be so happy with a Republican winning and voting on their behalf.

On the point on poor messaging, an interesting article from before the election on how bad the senior Democratic leadership is on this issue. So that’s before Pelosi started talking bipartisanship.

Democrats Are So, So Bad at This

And this interesting post was written on another message board:

Freedom of speech, less of a nanny state (.08 BAC for example), stronger resistance to pc and sjw culture, much more hispanic food, many more hispanic women, lower cost of living, better location for overseas travel, greater variety of weather, world class snow fields, greater economic opportunity…

If the US or Trump are not your cup of tea, no problem. But the bolded bit? Gee whiz.

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