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DeMarquis (4 Score & 7 Years Ago)
#176351: Feb 27th 2017 at 7:01:11 PM

Building off that link IF Wanderer provided regarding how progressives can reach out to conservative voters.

I agree with the overall desire, but I disagree with the approach described. First, there is a presumption that this effort will come from the Democratic party, which isn't necessarily so. But more importantly, I think the approach is too shallow, emphasizes style over substance, and borders on disengeniousness. For example:

"...I think Democrats could take power in a huge wave if they tilted to the middle on the symbolic issues, while exciting activists by campaigning for a robust welfare state. We're mixing up the conversations we need to have with one another, with the messages that we can use to win elections. We've been saying the quiet part loud, and it's killing us.

Run a beer-swilling, gun-toting Mid-westerner. Campaign against police militarization, rather than framing police brutality as a racial justice issue (though obviously it is one, and inside the Democratic party and the left we need to take this issue seriously). Don't assume poor rural voters will vote for the welfare state, communicate to them how it works for them (e.g. vouchers will eviscerate rural school districts). Complex triangulations like Obamacare or the TPP are too complicated for the average voter to understand, so consider simpler frames to explain them..."

Treating the voters as worthy only of propaganda and dumbing down the messages is how we got into this mess in the first place. First of all, in a tactical sense this wouldn't work because we cant possibly compete with the well financed and highly organized conservative propaganda machine. You don't fight highly polished lies with amateur lies, you fight it with the truth. Second, if you really believe that the average American voter wont respond to the real issues, then we might as well quite trying to mobilize a mass campaign and sign on to some benevolent dictator.

I happen to believe that we can reach conservative voters through an appeal to their self-interest, while emphasizing the rising tide that lifts all boats. Stimulus spending will create jobs for every community, including the WWC. Robust civil rights protect people of all religious faiths, Christian, Jew and Muslim alike. Legal immigration leads to economic growth, but something must be done about the illegal kind (not a wall, but something effective). We need to find a way to increase employment for those without a college degree that doesn't depend on part-time service jobs without benefits. And we need to clean up gov't corruption in the form of our broken electoral process. And above all, you stress the desirability of a unified, strong United States.

And they want BIG ideas, radical reforms, not the tweaking of policy that a centrist platform would represent. You dont appeal to flippable conservative voters by moving to the middle. You do it by making key elements of progressive policies seem appealing to a conservative.

I'm not saying that there is no room for symbolism and storytelling, because the truth can be told in the form of symbols and stories- in fact, it always has. But the best, most effective stories have always been based on a fundamental respect for the audience.

If you cant respect conservatives and their views, then you consign yourself to the fringe. There is no path toward progress that doesn't include winning elections, and there is no winning elections in this country by relying only on those who already agree with us.

@sgamer82: Regarding your article, the framework is biased to begin with. The ACA is fundamentally a health insurance bill. The strongest arguments in favor of it do not depend on "lives saved". Insurance doesn't save lives, doctors do. Insurance merely pays for the doctors. So the strongest arguments in favor of the ACA depend on the number of people who received insurance that didn't before (about 20 million), and were therefore able to afford care that they couldn't before.

Well, that occurred to me right off the bat. Then I started fact checking:

"The ACA, by contrast, is primarily an expansion of Medicaid; in recent years, the share of Americans with private insurance has declined." It's not true: " In the first quarter of 2016, the uninsured rate among all U.S. adults was 11.0%, down from 11.9% in the fourth quarter of 2015. This marks a record low since Gallup and Healthways began tracking the uninsured rate in 2008. The uninsured rate has declined 6.1 percentage points since the fourth quarter of 2013, which was right before the individual mandate provision of the Affordable Care Act took effect in early 2014 that required Americans to carry health insurance."

As you can see, comparing current uninsured rates to 2007 is very disingenuous, because the individual mandate didn't come into effect until 2013. It hasn't returned to pre-2008 levels because we are still recovering from the financial crisis, and the ACA still depends on private insurance that people have to buy. It isn't an expansion of Medicaid, as the article incorrectly states (although expansions of Medicaid did occur at the same time).

Those are some pretty major false claims. Having found that, I dont think a detailed examination of the rest of the article is necessary, since we have debunked the basic claim of the article, which is that the success of the ACA has no empirical support. I can look at the rest of it if you want me to.

edited 27th Feb '17 7:21:35 PM by DeMarquis

I'm done trying to sound smart. "Clear" is the new smart.
sgamer82 Since: Jan, 2001
#176352: Feb 27th 2017 at 7:06:55 PM

[up][up] Thanks

edited 27th Feb '17 7:07:07 PM by sgamer82

MadSkillz Destroyer of Worlds Since: Mar, 2013 Relationship Status: I only want you gone
Destroyer of Worlds
#176353: Feb 27th 2017 at 7:16:39 PM

You still have yet to actually justify this with any sort of argument. You're taking it as given that anyone who donates to a politician automatically has that politician in their pocket. This discounts the idea that they donate to that politician because they like the policy positions that said politician already espouses, or that the politician happily accepts their money, promises to take their concerns under consideration, and then does whatever the hell they want anyway. If you want to accuse a politician of something, use their stated policy positions and their voting record to back up that assertion, or you're just trying to tarnish them by association.

Well I'm talking about a group of people not a specific politician. Going over everyone's records seems like something I'd be fine with doing if I had an enormous amount of free time.

Now I'd be happy to acknowledge that your scenario probably does happen a lot but it's not just one corporation giving to one politician usually. It's many. Some might line up and some might just use it to soften their stances for a bit of that corporate cash.

In any case, you need cash to run and frequently the one who spends the most wins.

And what ends up happening is if you don't do what your donors want, they end up funding your opponent in the next election.

I recommend people read Wolin on the inverted totalitarianism within the US.

Here's the Wikipedia version of it:

Inverted totalitarianism is a term coined by political philosopher Sheldon Wolin in 2003 to describe the emerging form of government of the United States. Wolin believed that the United States is increasingly turning into an illiberal democracy, and uses the term "inverted totalitarianism" to illustrate similarities and differences between the United States governmental system and totalitarian regimes such as Nazi Germany and the Stalinist Soviet Union. In Days of Destruction, Days of Revolt by Chris Hedges and Joe Sacco, inverted totalitarianism is described as a system where corporations have corrupted and subverted democracy and where economics trumps politics. In inverted totalitarianism, every natural resource and every living being is commodified and exploited to collapse as the citizenry is lulled and manipulated into surrendering their liberties and their participation in government through excess consumerism and sensationalism

Wolin holds that the United States has increasingly adopted totalitarian tendencies as a result of transformations undergone during the military mobilization required to fight the Axis powers in the 1940s, and the subsequent campaign to contain the Soviet Union during the Cold War.[2] In the quotation below, Wolin refers to the United States as "Superpower", to emphasize its current position as the only global superpower.

While the versions of totalitarianism represented by Nazism and Fascism consolidated power by suppressing liberal political practices that had sunk only shallow cultural roots, Superpower represents a drive towards totality that draws from the setting where liberalism and democracy have been established for more than two centuries. It is Nazism turned upside-down, “inverted totalitarianism.” While it is a system that aspires to totality, it is driven by an ideology of the cost-effective rather than of a “master race” (Herrenvolk), by the material rather than the “ideal.”[8]

According to Wolin, there are three main ways in which inverted totalitarianism is the inverted form of classical totalitarianism.

Whereas in Nazi Germany the state dominated economic actors, in inverted totalitarianism, corporations through political contributions and lobbying, dominate the United States, with the government acting as the servant of large corporations. This is considered "normal" rather than corrupt.

While the Nazi regime aimed at the constant political mobilization of the populace, with its Nuremberg rallies, Hitler Youth, and so on, inverted totalitarianism aims for the mass of the populace to be in a persistent state of political apathy. The only type of political activity expected or desired from the citizenry is voting. Low electoral turnouts are favorably received as an indication that the bulk of the populace has given up hope that the government will ever help them.

While the Nazis openly mocked democracy, the United States maintains the conceit that it is the model of democracy for the whole world. Wolin writes:

Inverted totalitarianism reverses things. It is all politics all of the time but a politics largely untempered by the political. Party squabbles are occasionally on public display, and there is a frantic and continuous politics among factions of the party, interest groups, competing corporate powers, and rival media concerns. And there is, of course, the culminating moment of national elections when the attention of the nation is required to make a choice of personalities rather than a choice between alternatives. What is absent is the political, the commitment to finding where the common good lies amidst the welter of well-financed, highly organized, single-minded interests rabidly seeking governmental favors and overwhelming the practices of representative government and public administration by a sea of cash.

Just look at who the big winners and losers of the past several decades are. It's certainly not the average person.

M84 Oh, bother. from Our little blue planet Since: Jun, 2010 Relationship Status: Chocolate!
Oh, bother.
#176354: Feb 27th 2017 at 7:18:42 PM

If I want a "conservative" news perspective that's actually not a load of crap, I go with Forbes.

Disgusted, but not surprised
DeMarquis (4 Score & 7 Years Ago)
#176355: Feb 27th 2017 at 7:22:10 PM

The Economist.

I'm done trying to sound smart. "Clear" is the new smart.
Elle Since: Jan, 2001
#176356: Feb 27th 2017 at 7:31:08 PM

The Economist is hard to quantify on the left-right scale, partly because they're British and partly because of the extremes of the Right shifting. It's safest to call them pro-business. They endorsed Obama and Clinton and are way left of our Right.

They are pretty good though.

edited 27th Feb '17 7:31:27 PM by Elle

M84 Oh, bother. from Our little blue planet Since: Jun, 2010 Relationship Status: Chocolate!
Oh, bother.
#176357: Feb 27th 2017 at 7:32:26 PM

And the Wall Street Journal is owned by Rupert Murdoch, so fuck that.

Disgusted, but not surprised
Krieger22 Causing freakouts over sourcing since 2018 from Malaysia Since: Mar, 2014 Relationship Status: I'm in love with my car
Causing freakouts over sourcing since 2018
#176358: Feb 27th 2017 at 7:35:26 PM

[up][up][up][up][up]And Then What?

All you have done with this and the talk of Californian secession is "let's upend the system, toss the populace into a fire and hope the masses that survive think of you as a liberator and not a butcher". You didn't even bother bringing up Citizens United v FEC. For all the talk of "getting money out of politics" I've seen from Berners since Election Day, not once has it been mentioned.

[up][up]The Economist is classically liberal - it leans conservative for fiscal matters, but is liberal socially.

[up]Just stay clear of the editorials - the rest is solid.

I have disagreed with her a lot, but comparing her to republicans and propagandists of dictatorships is really low. - An idiot
Elle Since: Jan, 2001
#176359: Feb 27th 2017 at 7:37:10 PM

@M84: To the best of my knowledge they have not turned into Fox News in spite of that. Granted, it's fair to avoid giving them money on that basis.

Newscorp also bought National Geographic and while there was concearn at the time I haven't heard of that concern resulting in any problems yet.

edited 27th Feb '17 7:39:00 PM by Elle

Bat178 Since: May, 2011
#176360: Feb 27th 2017 at 7:38:47 PM

The White House has proposed to slash the EPA's budget by a quarter and lay off 3000 workers: http://www.politico.com/story/2017/02/epa-environment-trump-budget-235466. So much for American job creation...

Krieger22 Causing freakouts over sourcing since 2018 from Malaysia Since: Mar, 2014 Relationship Status: I'm in love with my car
Causing freakouts over sourcing since 2018
#176361: Feb 27th 2017 at 7:42:28 PM

[up][up]The non-editorial sections of the WSJ are too important to the professional sector of the US for it to be addled with the worldview of Fox News.

The National Geographic magazine hasn't changed at all. National Geographic TV, on the other hand, has had its quality drop like a stone, but then that can be said of pretty much every science-based TV channel.

I have disagreed with her a lot, but comparing her to republicans and propagandists of dictatorships is really low. - An idiot
MadSkillz Destroyer of Worlds Since: Mar, 2013 Relationship Status: I only want you gone
Destroyer of Worlds
#176362: Feb 27th 2017 at 7:42:30 PM

All you have done with this and the talk of Californian secession

Californian secession is a joke. I only report on it for fun since I'm a Californian and I can see how high tensions are here. I disavow it for several reasons not least of which is having a crazy right wing neighbor next to me with nukes that sees the state as its rightful property.

is "let's upend the system, toss the populace into a fire and hope the masses that survive think of you as a liberator and not a butcher".

Whoa, whoa. Where did I say that? I'm no accelerationist nor am I Bernie or Buster. I voted for Hillary.

You didn't even bother bringing up Citizens United v FEC. For all the talk of "getting money out of politics" I've seen from Berners since Election Day, not once has it been mentioned.

Well, yeah, this one of many steps we have to do. It isn't going to happen under Trump though.

edited 27th Feb '17 8:05:36 PM by MadSkillz

CenturyEye Tell Me, Have You Seen the Yellow Sign? from I don't know where the Yith sent me this time... Since: Jan, 2017 Relationship Status: Having tea with Cthulhu
Tell Me, Have You Seen the Yellow Sign?
#176363: Feb 27th 2017 at 7:49:16 PM

[up][up][up]Would Canada and Mexico be willing to give us environmental aid (and who knows what else) in four years? That or we recall every American in the peace corp to work at home...

Look with century eyes... With our backs to the arch And the wreck of our kind We will stare straight ahead For the rest of our lives
Bat178 Since: May, 2011
#176364: Feb 27th 2017 at 7:54:19 PM

[up] Mexico, probably not any time soon after this president. Canada... maybe.

edited 27th Feb '17 7:55:06 PM by Bat178

kkhohoho (4 Score & 7 Years Ago)
#176365: Feb 27th 2017 at 7:57:04 PM

[up]x5 VOTER 1: So just what were you voting for anyway?

VOTER 2: Eh, job loss, bigotry, and general incompetence in all levels of Government. Not that I knew that's what I was voting for at the time.

VOTER 1: ...You're an idiot either way, you know that right?

VOTER 2: Yeeup.

edited 27th Feb '17 7:57:30 PM by kkhohoho

MadSkillz Destroyer of Worlds Since: Mar, 2013 Relationship Status: I only want you gone
Krieger22 Causing freakouts over sourcing since 2018 from Malaysia Since: Mar, 2014 Relationship Status: I'm in love with my car
Causing freakouts over sourcing since 2018
#176367: Feb 27th 2017 at 8:00:13 PM

[up][up][up][up][up]Then make it clear that you're quoting people that think the whole system of democracy in the US is fundamentally broken and beyond repair. None of those people (who weren't even active in politics before, much less educated in it) managed to achieve anything this election cycle except fulfill the prerequisites for the scenarios they try to "warn" others of, as if they were some preacher promising eternal damnation should their flock stray.

A New Mexico bill that would automatically register new voters when they got a driver's license has died in the committee stage.

Two Democrats joined with Republicans to kill a bill that would have automatically registered all eligible adults as voters when they obtain a New Mexico driver’s license.

Rep. Debbie Rodella, D-Española, questioned whether the bill was necessary when the Motor Vehicle Division can already offer eligible adults the chance to register to vote.

Republicans on Thursday evening moved to table the bill in the House Local Government, Elections, Land Grants and Cultural Affairs Committee. Rodella and a newly elected Democrat, Rep. Daymon Ely of Corrales, sided with Republicans to stop the proposal on a 5-2 vote.

Sponsored by Rep. Patricia Roybal Caballero, D-Albuquerque, House Bill 28 had won backing from the secretary of state and good government groups such as the League of Women Voters.

Six other states have recently adopted similar programs, and voting rights advocates say automatic voter registration leads to a simpler, more inclusive election process.

They didn’t sway Rodella.

“People should choose for themselves whether they want to participate in the process or not,” she said.

Roybal Caballero said that the process would still allow voters to opt out while ensuring voter registration records are more accurate. And legislative staff wrote in an analysis that the system Roybal Caballero proposed could be more efficient for state driver’s license offices because they would uniformly register everyone who is eligible.

But in an analysis of the bill, the Taxation and Revenue Department raised concerns that a breakdown in the process could leave some voters listed as unaffiliated when they might prefer to register with a party, potentially excluding them from participating in primary elections.

I have disagreed with her a lot, but comparing her to republicans and propagandists of dictatorships is really low. - An idiot
DingoWalley1 Asgore Adopts Noelle Since: Feb, 2014 Relationship Status: Can't buy me love
Asgore Adopts Noelle
#176368: Feb 27th 2017 at 8:07:57 PM

[up][up] It wouldn't surprise me if it's true; even the Nazi's had Universal Healthcare (to Pureblood Germans and "Desirables" only, though).

And if the rumors of Trump wanting Universal Healthcare, only for Paul Ryan to shoot it down, are true as well, then literally only Tea Party Republicans don't want any Government 'intrusion' into our mess that is Health Services. When even Neo-Fascists want to create Universal Healthcare, or just even maintain Obamacare, then you've gotta know, politically, you're screwed up.

edited 27th Feb '17 8:08:32 PM by DingoWalley1

Wildcard Since: Jun, 2012
#176369: Feb 27th 2017 at 8:32:54 PM

"If you cant respect conservatives and their views, then you consign yourself to the fringe. There is no path toward progress that doesn't include winning elections, and there is no winning elections in this country by relying only on those who already agree with us."

...and yet Trump. Didn't bother to appeal to anyone but white rich people who are bigots, yet he had a good slogan so he won, and some people who weren't rich and white bought into his bull but he didn't even target it to them.

Whoever is loud,has a good slogan, and gives people outrageous campaign promises can win, that is all America wants in an elected official right now.

edited 27th Feb '17 8:33:22 PM by Wildcard

Bat178 Since: May, 2011
#176370: Feb 27th 2017 at 8:38:05 PM

[up] He also cheated via Russia and voter suppression, and still just barely won regardless due to the Electoral College being garbage.

edited 27th Feb '17 8:39:10 PM by Bat178

CenturyEye Tell Me, Have You Seen the Yellow Sign? from I don't know where the Yith sent me this time... Since: Jan, 2017 Relationship Status: Having tea with Cthulhu
Tell Me, Have You Seen the Yellow Sign?
#176371: Feb 27th 2017 at 8:38:53 PM

[up][up]That's overly cynical (I hope). This election was more like Chernobyl. No one thing would caused the disaster, but a series of problems exacerbated by gross negligence from management (and the public itself) finally culminated...

Butterfly 2007, this certainly doesn't happen. The youth vote turns out instead of staying home. Same. Schools actually taught civics, ethics, social issues, and history. Secretary Clinton ran in 2008 rather than 2016. (Whatever the right had for campaign then and whatever you think of her as a candidate, anyone could have beaten the Republican following President Bush.) Brexit goes the other way. The Republicans not splitting their field between 16 candidates. Never Trumpers actually putting action to words and turning out their bases for the Dems. The media actually focus on Trump's utter unfitness rather than keeping the horserace going till the last minute. Secretary Clinton not trying to flip the freakin' South. What he said ([up]). And so much more.

edited 27th Feb '17 8:42:57 PM by CenturyEye

Look with century eyes... With our backs to the arch And the wreck of our kind We will stare straight ahead For the rest of our lives
Wildcard Since: Jun, 2012
#176372: Feb 27th 2017 at 8:48:12 PM

@Century Eye: Oh I know about other factors, but, the fact that he even had a chance by appealing to that one voter base proves my point I believe. If even 1000000 Americans were willing to vote for him then yes a huge amount of us are fine with a TV president, someone who looks good on TV and you recognize from a reality show=good government holder.

So if that's all it takes, we need to focus on slogans and chants more. Cause so many people care about those.

@Bannon not wanting to change healthcare: Maybe next time people will remember which party wanted them to "work harder" while suffering and which gave them healthcare.

I'm actually a little bit optimistic now, maybe former republicans will finally see who they voted for, own up to their mistakes, and accept "Told ya so" when faced with reality. But we are still going to need a slogan and an "entertaining" runner.

Final Edit: Wondering if Trump won't win if major muslim terrorist attacks don't happen in the US from now until 2020. He will undoubtedly win if he can get the masses hyped up against Muslims and immigrants again.

[down]Of course Trump would.

edited 27th Feb '17 9:23:21 PM by Wildcard

Zendervai Since: Oct, 2009
#176373: Feb 27th 2017 at 9:09:42 PM

Ignoring, of course, the insane amount of domestic terrorism.

Krieger22 Causing freakouts over sourcing since 2018 from Malaysia Since: Mar, 2014 Relationship Status: I'm in love with my car
Causing freakouts over sourcing since 2018
#176374: Feb 27th 2017 at 9:27:26 PM

[up][up]The slogan alone wasn't it - the narrative the GOP pushes of a nation under siege contributed a lot. You only need one man to break the siege and make America "Great Again", they claimed.

Meanwhile in the blue camp, a demographic previously uninterested in politics began repeating every GOP attack on the Democrat candidate because they didn't get their way every step of the way. The GOP created the narrative that their opponent was corrupt, and they ate it up without a second of doubt.

Controlling the narrative is something that the Democrats must harness for the next elections, but the saying is that Republicans fall in line, while Democrats fall in love. That needs to be decisively broken for the Democrats to have a fighting chance.

I have disagreed with her a lot, but comparing her to republicans and propagandists of dictatorships is really low. - An idiot
Ingonyama Since: Jan, 2001
#176375: Feb 27th 2017 at 9:33:07 PM

That incident with the French scholar reminds me of an article I read linked from Twitter, involving a woman who attended conferences in England (I believe they were tech conferences, but not sure), and simply because she was accepting pay for speaking there, she was detained and mistreated in a cold customs room before being forced to leave the country. She's said she's never coming back. (This was right around Brexit.)

In other hate crime news: San Francisco’s Market Street reopened after bomb threat to Anti-Defamation League.

Apparently it was part of a whole series of bomb threats made against various Jewish organizations in 17 states.


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