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Edited by Mrph1 on Nov 30th 2023 at 11:03:59 AM
Obama's gridlock problems started in his second term, when the GOP became fully committed to their current strategy, which is honestly a winning one in our system.
I wouldn't be surprised, were Clinton to win but the GOP to retain the senate if the Supreme Court gradually dwindled down to three or so justices over the course of her time in office.
edited 13th May '16 2:27:35 PM by CaptainCapsase
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Exactly. Clinton has a proven track record and a large number of political allies; if anyone can accomplish things in this environment, she can. Sanders would be too likely to flail against the stone wall of Congress and get nothing done.
Actually, they started in 2010 when the midterm elections were forfeited by Democrats. Realistically, he had only two years to enact his major agenda items.
edited 13th May '16 2:28:01 PM by Fighteer
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"Obama transgender edict incites the right
: The new front in the culture war is getting heavy artillery thrown at by both the White House and the opponents.
Trump: My tax rate is 'none of your business'
: I am surprised that I am tempted to agree.
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She's either going to cave in and bend over backwards to the GOP on economic policy, or have the exact same net result as Sanders with no revolution.
The GOP's current strategy is more or less unbeatable if you're playing their game, they will happily prevent the government from functioning until it collapses if that's what it takes to get their way:
edited 13th May '16 2:42:14 PM by CaptainCapsase
Is it a winning strategy? The GOP has burned through all the goodwill they have with their voter base. So much so that Trump, who is effectively an Independent agent, has completely dominated their primaries and hijacked their party.
Everyone is tired of their shit. If it wasn't for gerrymandering they'd lose the House and the Senate for sure.
edited 13th May '16 2:32:55 PM by LeGarcon
Oh really when?A bit oversimplifying, Garcon. Trump has hijacked the presidential primaries but the GOP has prevented any implosions in the congressional primaries ... so far.
Also, incumbency advantage is the biggest obstacle Democrats have to overcome in their bid for the Senate.
"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard Feynman![]()
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The story of Presidential candidates releasing their tax returns began with Gerald Ford, in response to Nixon's infamous tax evasion scandal wherein he was forced to cough up his returns, indicating that he had underpaid by over 400K over several years. Not often known: his famous "I am not a crook" speech was in response to that scandal, not Watergate.
Downticket, it's looking surprisingly like business as usual in the GOP. Trump's candidacy has had no observable effect on national primaries. Democrats are certain to run against Trump all across the spectrum, but how successful they will be has yet to be determined.
edited 13th May '16 2:32:07 PM by Fighteer
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"In the short term, sure, but there's a reason the GOP's freaking out about their ability to keep control of Congress right now. Senator Grassley, the Republican leading the blockade against Obama's Supreme Court Justice, has outright admitted that he knows he's committing political suicide and has all but begged his constituents to do everything in their power to keep him in office.
My Tumblr. Currently side-by-side liveblogging Digimon Adventure, sub vs dub.@Garcon: The relatively extreme polarization of American politics is why it's possible for them to create this gridlock, and obstructing things just makes that polarization worse when people get angry about the government's failure to act, especially when the democrats hold the presidency which is by far the most visible part of the apparatus. It's a feedback loop that has in many cases been the death knell of other presidential democracies. Or at least a sign of a major crisis; you saw a similar pattern leading up to the civil war. People hate congress, but very few people hate their own congresspeople.
In fact, given polls are starting to look a bit less favorable for Clinton, I'm a little worried we might be looking at that impending crisis right now.
If the GOP retains control of the senate, soon enough the general public will get bored about the state of the supreme court, and they'll be free to keep it up until they either lose the senate or get into power.
edited 13th May '16 2:44:43 PM by CaptainCapsase
@Fighteer: Hey if Clinton remains as progressive as she has been when running against Sanders and doesn't move back to the center, then all the more power to her!
However, as far as Bernie's 'political revolution,' all that amounts to is minimizing the power of the Republican Party in Congress for as long as it takes to convince them to actually start compromising with Democrats again. One of the recurring problems Democrats have and Republicans do not is getting people to show up for midterm elections. Given how left-leaning the current population of the United States is, the Democrats should be leading the nation right now even if it isn't as left-leaning as it should be because of compromises. However, the Republicans control the House and has a weak grip on the Senate, while the Democrats control the Presidency, and the Supreme Court is in a literal Tie State. Both the Presidency and the Senate need to be won by the Democrats, so that Republican power ends up limited to just the House.
Wizard Needs Food BadlyThat's a problem in all the West. The mainstream left party shifts rightwards to neoliberalism and loses elections by virtue of its voters staying home in disgust. Meanwhile the right have like 30% of voters on their side, but they ALWAYS VOTE, AND ALWAYS TO THE SAME PARTY.
Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.Yeah I'm not sure why people are having a hard time seeing the unspoken bit of "we need a political revolution", it's "we need a political revolution [so that we get enough people voting Democrat that the Republicans loose control of the House]"
And honestly considering how bad Democrat leadership has been about fighting down ticket races some kind of internal revolution might not be a bad idea on that front, but that's not what people are calling for here, it's a revolution against the Republicans.
“And the Bunny nails it!” ~ Gabrael “If the UN can get through a day without everyone strangling everyone else so can we.” ~ CyranPeople have been calling for Debbie Wassermann Schultz (current DNC chair) to be sacked because aside from generally being a jerk and predatory loan industry prostitute apparently she's seen to be a major reason for the Democrat's midterm election incompetence.
"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard FeynmanYes. The current DNC is committed to "Presidential Party"ism. Focusing on the Presidency, and ignoring statehouses and less likely congressional seats, to focus on more White House grabbing.
As to Hillary, I will gladly shut my mouth the moment she starts proving through action that she means every word of her progressive platform and it wasn't just grabbing for votes in the Primary.
This is why Obamacare was such a madhouse construction. The Democrats might of had a House Supermajority, but they didn't have a Senate one until the last few months before the 2010 Midterms.
Trump Campaign Could Use New Donations to Pay Donald Trump $36M for Loan
An affinity fraud candidate for an affinity fraud party.
edited 13th May '16 3:54:13 PM by PotatoesRock
The trouble is that when they "do their job" without cameras, people get killed, by them.
Perhaps we are better off with them not showing up at all, than them showing up and committing murder and manslaughter.
Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.Police are given special authority by government to protect and serve. They should be held to a higher standard than normal citizens because they have that special authority. So long as they wear that badge, they represent all who wear that badge.
Wizard Needs Food BadlyPolice Cameras have actually proven to be pretty useful for the police. Many people who would otherwise pull a Police Brutality Gambit stop once they realize that they've been video-taped.
edited 13th May '16 4:46:34 PM by Protagonist506
Leviticus 19:34It's not even a significant amount of police that appear to be objecting to the whole camera thing. It provides documentation when they need it instead of relying on "he said, she said" because machines can't interpret things, only show what happened.
@Septimus: can we please refrain from calling anyone a prostitute?

You keep advocating for a "political revolution", such as the one led by Sanders, but that simply cannot produce enough transformation in the current system to dislodge the gridlock. The impression given is that Democrats are too beholden to the system to be trusted to run it.
edited 13th May '16 2:21:41 PM by Fighteer
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"