The General US Politics Thread

Suspicious.

Edited by Perseus on Nov 28th 2020 at 6:26:35 AM

Suspect/Suspicious. In Among Us is become commonly used shorthand due to having a limited time to discuss who the impostor may be.

Edited by sgamer82 on Nov 27th 2020 at 11:27:27 AM

Ah, thank you.

One thing I have been wondering about is why Georgia had one of the smallest polling errors. It certainly isn't consistent with the "shy Trump voters" theory but the socially disengaged voter theory doesn't fit that well either.

Incidentally, if it's true that socially disengaged people are more likely to support Trump it wouldn't be a totally new observation. I've seen - and posted to this thread - that turnout and Trump support have an U-shaped curve as very high turnout features infrequent voters who like Trump.

That's true, and I admit I've usually internalized that as "Trump will turnout more rural white voters than last time."

As for Georgia, maybe between the special election that Ossof first ran in and the 2018 midterms the pollsters just had more opportunities to refine their methodology for Georgia?

Yeah, I think this has been discussed before but there's an important distinction to be made here between democratic voters and democratic politicians.

The politicians need to get elected to help people, and even if it is true/justified, attacking the people of a red state on a moral level because they vote republican is not a winning strategy. It's also for this reason that even though we all know that Biden can't really unify the country in any meaningful way (anymore than any president can anytime soon), I don't blame him that much for paying lip service to it, as long as it's just lip service.

However, if you're a democratic voter, or really just any civilian who isn't worrying about getting elected, that is a different story. Like I said before, it's unrealistic to think that an overwhelming majority of Trump voters are dyed-in-the-wool qanon MAGA cultists. I'm sure many of them aren't doing it out of overt malice or resentment. And it's important to understand the nuances and diversity of Trump voters. Even beyond just the truth being important in and of itself, it will allow democrats to adjust their strategy accordingly.

But regardless of their reasons and what led them to that point, a vote for Trump is a vote for Trump and people have to accept that it comes with consequences.

And one of those consequences is that some people, especially those who have been harmed by Trump's policies, aren't gonna look favorably upon you for what you have done, and that's perfectly justifiable. Why should they just let bygones be bygones if a lot of those people aren't even willing to admit what they did wrong in the first place? That's not unity or healing, that's just a false peace based on a lie.

Edited by Draghinazzo on Nov 27th 2020 at 4:48:24 PM

It is literally I can spread bullshit faster than you can fact check and debunk it.

There's a particularly pithy line for that - "A lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is still putting on its shoes." CollegeHumor also had a spoof of how a Fake News site would actually operate, marginalizing the people that actually did research (until they revealed that all their "sources" were pulled from their ass) while pushing outrageous Click Bait headlines.

Edited by ironballs16 on Nov 27th 2020 at 2:52:21 PM

I feel that's an unhelpful attitude.

Trying to court Trump voters may actually waste chances to actually beat them at elections.

Trump had 4 years and 1 year of campaigning to show what kind of person he was.

Maybe a person okay with that can't be persuaded.

I think it's absolutely crucial that Biden pay lip service to bipartisanship and unifying the country. We've just had four years of a president who refused to do that, and the results aren't pretty.

Fact checkers also have to fight two things that are sadly too many people have apathy and reluctance to admit mistakes. If people don't care about facts, there goes all the works. If people don't want to admit that they are wrong and stick to the lies, there also goes all the works.

Heck, how many times you've seen genuine apology instead of "I'm sorry that you're offended/too sensitive" these days?

Pay lip service? Sure. Actual appeasement? Yeah, I don't think I am fine with that. Bipartisanship with the people who vote for the party that put children in cages and said party that do it is really hard.

Edited by SteamKnight on Nov 28th 2020 at 2:55:34 AM

Yes, that's why I said it's fine as long as it's just lip service. People care much more about the appearance of bipartisanship than actual bipartisanship.

The problem, as I see it, is similar to the exact same BS that was pulled with Obama - as summed up in this political cartoon, the stance was "If you move, I'll move" - only for the GOP to move further away when Obama attempted to meet them in the middle. How do you negotiate with those who have no interest in negotiating in good faith, and have continually proven themselves untrustworthy?

Edited by ironballs16 on Nov 27th 2020 at 3:00:17 PM

You don't. But you can make a show of attempting to do so while not truly compromising yourself. Hence, lip service.

Edited by Perseus on Nov 28th 2020 at 7:07:25 AM

The facts don't care about your feelings and fuck your feelings crowd, was never about facts and sure has a lot of feelings.

Including gems like I don't need evidence of voter fraud being shouted by Trumpanzes.

Outside of Ben Shapiro destroys strawmen, which holds up to zero scrutiny and Tucker Carlson, which legally argued that his show offers no factual commentary and used anyone how knows Carlson's reputation and has minimal amounts of skepticism would know he isn't telling the truth as a legal defense. The rest of the Pro-Trump media is on the levels of self parody to the point of making Poe's law irrelevant and risking making the Onion look like a fact based news site.

This is the bullshit that needs actual laws and legal actions against.

The Republicans sadly have a point even if it's a horrible one. Why negotiate when there isn't a need to do it? There is no consequences for their actions after all. The law either give them a free pass or soft-balling them. And their opposition blink when confronted or much more accurate unable to confront them their brazen attempt effectively due to their brazenness. So, if there is no need to negotiate, why do it? It's the same strategy that have been done by other nations with strongman authoritarian leader and it keep working. Why fix something that isn't broken?

Edited by SteamKnight on Nov 28th 2020 at 3:12:47 AM

Ben Shapiro is THE biggest anti-thesis to his own catchphrase.

Whenever somebody even dares to attempt to criticize Israel, his voice instantly goes into shriek-mode and he throws around accusations of antisemitism.

Edited by Forenperser on Nov 27th 2020 at 9:14:08 PM

The problem with writing off Trump voters is that the election was, in terms of the electoral college, pretty close, and that was at a moment when Trump was conspicuously failing to deal with a major national crisis.

So if we conclude that: 1) Trump voters are horrible people who can’t be convinced.

2) Anyone who voted third-party, or stayed home out of discontent with Biden’s centrism, is a “unicorn” who can’t be convinced.

Then what should the Democratic strategy for continuing to win elections after COVID be? Because they’re going to need more voters. Combating voter suppression is necessary, but I’m not confident that it’s sufficient as a straregy.

There needs to be some kind of assessment of 1) are there policies that would win the Dems more support from the left without seriously reducing their support from other groups?; 2) what kinds of Trump voters don’t actually believe all his bull and voted for him for other reasons?; and 3) is there any way for Democrats to appeal to some members of that second group without fundamentally compromising their principles?

Edited by Galadriel on Nov 27th 2020 at 3:19:59 PM

I believe with all my heart that Obama's attempt at bipartistanship laid the groundwork for Trump and weakened America's ability to resist it.

Yeah, the thing with democrats is that fundamentally, their job is a lot harder than the republicans. The republicans have an unfair advantage in the electoral college in that they can continue to appeal to a shrinking base with increasingly extreme rhetoric and still have a good chance of winning anyway. And when it comes to the senate it's getting harder and harder for democrats to have a majority.

The democrats on the other hand have a much more diverse coalition which means they need to juggle a lot of different interests and have a lot of potential strategies to gain the necessary votes to win, which can make it difficult to figure out what is the correct balancing act for any given election, local or national.

Then they should try to keep their base commited and start cracking down on Republican cheating.

One thing that needs to be done is push forward DC and Puerto Rican statehood for new Senators.

We also need to increase the work to register voters and engagement in rural states.

Native Americans and Black Americans engaged strongly this election and it showed dividends.

I also think it's important for democrats to have a stronger engagement with minority communities like asians, latin people, native americans, etc and show them that they care about them and their needs. You can't take it for granted that the xenophobia of the GOP will be enough to make them vote democrat.

Edited by Draghinazzo on Nov 27th 2020 at 5:37:17 PM

In the Atlantic interview I posted earlier Obama points out that there was some Republicans willing to work on a bipartisan basis to get things done. And they were all instantly vilified by the right wing media and thusly voted out of office. That taught Republican leaders that reaching across the aisle will get you punished. On the flip side, you had people like Sarah Palin running around shouting whatever lie came into her head and turning out bigger, more excited crowds than Mc Cain.

I admit to certain blindness. I had no idea Sarah Palin was anything other than a joke anywhere.

I get that you don't want bipartisanship on a personal level, but in politics, it is unavoidable.

Also, the alternative to bipartisanship would likely lead to a conservative revolt.