The General US Politics Thread

Lincoln Project attack ad, condemning Trump for retweeting a white power chant vid, on the same day that Mississippi finally took the battle standard of the Army of Northern Virginia off their state flag.

They go on to endorse Biden and ask for donations.

Edited by Rationalinsanity on Jul 1st 2020 at 1:14:03 PM

Politics is the skilled use of blunt objects.

What worries me is the people who haven't learned from the Obama administration that Republicans will automatically obstruct any and all Democratic initiatives when they have an ounce of power. Which is catastrophic when we have to deal with healthcare reform, Climate Change, and pandemic recovery.

The filibuster stops any hope of progress, which is bad in the best of times, made worse when we have Climate Change barreling down on us and a pandemic ravaging us.

We cannot afford to do nothing, Republicans taking the Senate and pushing the things they push anyway is a far lesser threat to that. Keeping the filibuster is not rational, it is spectacularly hyper-myopic.

Edited by Fourthspartan56 on Jul 1st 2020 at 9:17:09 AM

"Sandwiches are probably easier to fix than the actual problems" -Hylarn

My opinion on the filibuster has always been the senate is inherently unequal representation so the idea that you need a supermajority to get things done is something that appeals to me. However I do agree it's been overused to the point that nothing gets done. My idea for fixing this is keep the filibuster but limit the number of times you can use it. There would have to be kinks worked out, but I think it could work.

You can only write so much in your forum signature. It's not fair that I want to write a piece of writing yet it will cut me off in the mid

More importantly, the filibuster hasn't been used in recent memory to stop any bad legislation from going through. Most notably, the attempts to repeal Obamacare failed even after the GOP controlled the House, Senate, and Presidency, because they failed to gain 50 votes to pass it in the Senate, not because the failed to get the 60 they would have needed to overturn a filibuster.

This is the real reason McConnell hasn't gotten rid of the filibuster — he hasn't needed to, there wasn't any legislation he wanted to pass that had more than 50 votes but less than 60 votes. You'll notice that he had no problem with scrapping the filibuster against SCOTUS appointments when he needed that to ram through Trump's appointee.

Which is a smart play on his part that I think the Democrats would be wise to follow. Don't scrap the filibuster just to make a point. Force the GOP to obstruct something, then scrap it if you have to in order to pass it.

Edited by NativeJovian on Jul 1st 2020 at 12:32:08 PM

Really from Jupiter, but not an alien.

I'm not sure I understand your position, you approve that it's unequal representation?

"Sandwiches are probably easier to fix than the actual problems" -Hylarn

Losing the filibuster would produce a dramatic shift in the way the United States runs. It would push us away from the current system, where change (both good and bad) is slow, hard to come by, and major shifts in how our country operates are few and far between. Instead, we'll enter a system where change (both good and bad) happens swiftly and frequently, as laws can be passed the instant a majority party has all their team onboard without ever needing to hash it out with the other.

It's a frightening proposition, as it would be another nail in the coffin of bipartisanship and further divide the country, and because it could potentially result in social and political changes at a pace that will give people whiplash. And once you uncork that genie from its bottle, it would be very difficult to put it back in.

That being said, as someone who has been very wary about eliminating the filibuster in the past, I think the events of 2020 have made clear that rapid whiplash-inducing change is necessary. When you get right down to it, nobody being able to do anything session after session is a Conservative victory. Massive sweeping alterations at a rapid pace is a Liberal victory. These are the foundations of Conservative and Liberal philosophy.

The filibuster is a tool of Conservative ideology, and that's why Mitch likes it so much. It's a rule designed to force Congress to sit still, do nothing, and allow the status quo to persist as it is today. Our country and, indeed, our planet cannot afford any more years of doing nothing.

So, uh, I guess I'm changing my vote to "nuke the filibuster".

Edited by TobiasDrake on Jul 1st 2020 at 10:44:31 AM

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I do not approve of the unequal representation. However getting rid of that would be in my mind much harder than reforming the filibuster.

You can only write so much in your forum signature. It's not fair that I want to write a piece of writing yet it will cut me off in the mid

Though, adding a blue state or two in the process of the filibuster removal could only help.

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Would it be an option to lower the requirement if the filibuster? Place it somewhere between a simple and super-majority?

Technically yes, but once you change it you’ve rather opened Pandora’s box, if the republicans get 52 seats at some point but the threshold was set at 55 they’ll find it pretty easy to justify lowering it again. Plus we’d feel real stupid changing the rules to say 55 (if say Dems get 55 senate seats after November) and then being screwed for several years after loosing 1 seat in 2022.

There are plenty of different ways to nuke though, one could require senators to actually filibuster instead of just threatening and blocking automatically, one could widen the reconciliation loophole so that it works for situations democrats want, one could simply change things to need a majority, one could limit to number of filibusters a session, there are a number of options.

Do we have any specific on proposed filibuster changes? Or is it just all bill requiring a majority?

"And the Bunny nails it!" ~ Gabrael "If the UN can get through a day without everyone strangling everyone else so can we." ~ Cyran

I've heard Sen. Merkley say that he's been floating a whole bunch of different proposals to Senate Democrats, with no details so far (still searching). It looks like Manchin is moving towards a weak "maybe", which is big 'cause he voted against the nuclear option in 2013. I'm also hearing Feinstein and King are still noes, Kaine is now a soft yes.

I was listening to Hacks on Taps and the scuttlebutt around Biden's VP choice is that Harris is the current favorite with Warren as the runner-up. Harris is much more favored, but much to the surprise of the guest host who was reporting on this Biden and Warren get along better than he thought they did and she already fills out all the experience prerequisites Biden is looking for.

"What a century this week has been." - Seung Min Kim

I imagine that Biden is under heavy pressure from some in the party not to pick Warren, out of a fear that she’s run for President after him and pull the party to the left.

"And the Bunny nails it!" ~ Gabrael "If the UN can get through a day without everyone strangling everyone else so can we." ~ Cyran

Per the article I posted a few days ago, Coons is now a "maybe". Which is a big deal for the same reason as Manchin's maybe.

It looks like we're seeing a shift, which isn't too surprising, considering what's at stake they would have to be idiots to not at least consider it.

That's almost certainly part of it, another issue would be her age and race. She's a decade younger than Biden but that doesn't make her young, which is a problem when you want a VP for an already old President. It's an insurmountable problem but it exists.

And racially choosing a woman of color is definitely much stronger these days considering the protests, but that too isn't insurmountable.

Edited by Fourthspartan56 on Jul 1st 2020 at 11:27:03 AM

"Sandwiches are probably easier to fix than the actual problems" -Hylarn

The race thing is unclear, older voters of colour are already heavily behind Biden, while younger ones seem to care more about having someone ideologically on the left of the party then someone of colour.

There’s a reason the poll of potential VP picks found Warren bringing in more new black supported than Harris.

"And the Bunny nails it!" ~ Gabrael "If the UN can get through a day without everyone strangling everyone else so can we." ~ Cyran

Indeed, but I wasn't thinking of it from the perspective of the voters but rather the process that they're choosing candidates. If they feel that a woman of color is necessary, which at least Klobuchar does, then that would impact the process.

Warren polling well with young African-American voters is true, and an effective rebuttal, but ultimately orthogonal to what the leaders want.

"Sandwiches are probably easier to fix than the actual problems" -Hylarn

It’s not clear if Klobuchar and people like her view a women of colour as necessary as much as they view Warren as a choice that would harm them politically, 538 did an article on how a lot of the VP talking points are basically just cover to enable advocation for the ideological self-interest of certain party factions.

"And the Bunny nails it!" ~ Gabrael "If the UN can get through a day without everyone strangling everyone else so can we." ~ Cyran

I support Harris over Warren. There's nothing Warren could do as VP she wouldn't get done as Senator and I think Harris should be President after Biden.

Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.

I'm honestly rather skeptical of this take. Like I mentioned in my last post, when was the last time that a filibuster actually stopped anything important? The only thing I can think of is Obama appointing his SCOTUS judge, and the filibuster for that already got nuked (by Republicans, after they used it to block him, so the Democrats couldn't do the same thing to them).

Really from Jupiter, but not an alien.

Senate cloture votes. The first has a bill outlawing abortion which was halted by a failed cloture vote and another defunding sanctuary cities. This is at first glance.

"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard Feynman

That.

Failure to pass bills isn't something that gets heavily sensationalized because "Nothing is happening; life continues as normal" doesn't make great headlines. So the filibuster working out successfully (for either party) isn't something you hear about very often. But that doesn't mean it's not happening.

Parties needing a super-majority to pass legislation is the status quo. Things only become newsworthy when they break from the status quo, like Republicans finding a way to try and shenanigans ACA-repeal around the filibuster.

Edited by TobiasDrake on Jul 1st 2020 at 12:57:18 PM

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It happens all the time. For example, the ACA was going to have a public option until Liberman threatened to withdraw his support. That situation would never happen if the filibuster didn't exist.

Filibuster in practice means that you need sixty votes to pass Senate legislation, without it 51 would be enough. That would have a massive effect on the ease of passing legislation, for the better.

"Sandwiches are probably easier to fix than the actual problems" -Hylarn

50 if the majority party also holds the White House. A 50/50 split means the Vice President acts as tiebreaker.

Edited by TobiasDrake on Jul 1st 2020 at 1:15:42 PM

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Touche.

"Sandwiches are probably easier to fix than the actual problems" -Hylarn

Without the filibuster, a majority party can effectively use the Senate as an assembly line for partisan legislature. Hold vote, majority passes, next bill. Hold vote, majority passes, next bill. Hold vote, majority passes, next bill. As long as your party's all in agreement with it, there isn't even need for a debate because unless the majority party has defectors, the minority doesn't have a voice at all.

This has both perks and drawbacks. Though, again, at this point, I think the benefits outweigh the risks especially if we can get a couple new states installed while we're at it.

EDIT: That said, there are perks for a minority party without a filibuster too. Getting legislation passed as a minority party means you need defectors from the majority. With the filibuster in place, you need a fairly insurmountable number of defectors. Without the filibuster, it will take a much more reasonable amount of convincing.

So dropping the filibuster helps the minority pass legislation just as much as it helps the majority.

Edited by TobiasDrake on Jul 1st 2020 at 1:20:29 PM

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