General Politics Discussion (IX) [ARCHIVED] • Page 906

but as many have pointed out, they aren’t even trying to pressure him on the things h mentioned.

and that’s failing to mention that the outcome of that is losing the government for a very long time. Republicans are being very strategic in capturing the government and then keeping it. People are sounding the alarms left and right, and instead of creating a pressure campaign and at least going after him the message will be “well ya gotta vote!”

we had record fucking turnout! We voted and got a tied legislature. I really don’t see that message working again.

 

A symbolic vote in vote-a-rama that hasn't had the entire pressure of the party concentrating on getting that specific thing passed because the leader of the party is pushing it as central to his agenda and presidency.

Party members are under much more pressure to support things their party leader is pushing and staking his presidency on, both internally and from external forces.

 

this is the second time in my life time that i can remember where democrats had a majority and still had their proposed legislation shot down by seemingly one person objecting. how many more times does it have to happen before you notice a pattern with them man

 

Via what method? What other pressures would you put on him? The best idea I've seen is threaten his daughter with investigations and, well....after the baby manchild shit he pulled this week because they mentioned his name in a memo, I'd assume that move would be bye bye senate majority, hello senate leader mcconnell.

 

no actually they are rather quite similar. both are significant impacts on peoples lives. I don’t feel qualified to say which is worse, it probably depends on the woman, but given the five are “increased homelessness and abortions” or “increased homelessness and no abortions” it’s not really a distinction that needs to be made — things are clearly worse with Republicans in power

 

And what exactly are the federal Dems doing to prevent or combat this?

They could pass a law codifying Roe. They have not and I would wager they will not.

They could call this court illegitimate and refuse to abide by any ruling.

If this is a five alarm fire (and it is) why aren’t the federal Dems acting like it?

Because keeping the status quo of pretending SCOTUS is an apolitical institution (in spite of all evidence to the contrary) is a part of the political project most federal Dems are committed to upholding.

“Vote for us and we will fight for your rights, but we will only fight within a very narrowly defined battlefield that is advantageous to our opponent” is not exactly a slam dunk refutation of the claim we only have one party.

 

Sorry I started this argument! To make up for it I have a great investment opportunity for you!

 

This is a real stretch man

 

"We only have one party" - in my view - is a rhetorical device akin to the overton window. To shake people into realizing that they deserve better. That what one party says they are for (but often does not do) and what one party says they won't do, is not how we should be expected to live. A boot to the status quo and trying to say "look, we can expect the people we vote for to do what we've asked in a democracy, if they don't, the answer isn't accept it and say better than the other guy, fine, it's to vote for the people that will do what we want." (For the slim moment some of us can vote.)

 

Fuck am I supposed to do when I show up to vote in my blue state and material progress gets ripped away from my community because of a senator in west virginia that I have no control over? Abolish the senate.

 

You're right, it's all part of a grand plan from the famously organized and united Democratic Party to always have that one guy stand in the way of things.

Or it's a combo of the nature of the Democratic party having a wider tent of voters that includes moderate neo-lib types that elect moderate neo-lib type politicians, especially in purple states, and the construction of the senate putting the Dem party at structural disadvantage where they ended up needing those politicians to have any type of majority in the senate, making it harder for progressive polices to get passed because you have to please those politicians to get their votes. Joe Liebermann is a classic example of a 90s era neo-lib Democrat that was getting elected at the time that he did. I'd ask why a solid blue state like Connecticut kept sending Leibermann back to office, but, that's what a lot of voters in solid blue states were sending to Washington for a solid 15-20 years.

That being said, you could definitely fault the Dems/Obama Admin for not just telling the Senate parliamentarian to shove it about the public option (though, to be fair, the extremism of the Republican Party wasn't' fully apparent yet and a lot of the turd moderate Dems in the senate at that point might have pulled their votes over such an "extreme" move by the VP)

 

Ugh my dad has COVID for the second time. First was only a month or two ago, very mild cold symptoms. But now he's feeling like crap, and only just got his booster on Sunday so there hasn't been much time for it to take effect

 

not buying this "but the republicans" shit one bit. They're the minority party, they're expected to oppose whatever Democrats propose. It's like when the GOP had control during Trump and they couldn't pass an ACA repeal. It wasn't "democrats fault" they couldn't do it, no one blamed Democrats for it not passing. It was republicans that couldn't get it passed when they had the majority to do it and their fault for not being able to get the entire party behind it. If democrats can't get shit done, it's their fault.

 

Wasn't about assigning blame, just pointing out that this example is a good one to show precisely why the parties aren't the same (and it works vice versa with the ACA repeal. One party is trying to get rid of it and the other is trying to improve it)

 

They can't pass a law codifying Roe. The senate would fillibuster is.

They can't refuse to abide by court rulings. That won't force Texas to allow abortions.

Stop being ridiculous.

 

when half the country is flooded as the other half is on fire, it will not matter that democrats are technically not as bad as republicans.

 

how is it a stretch?

Trump got to appoint three justices to the supreme court. Sure, one of them was a retring republican, who would not have retired if Hillary had won, but that is still two justices she would've gotten. Which would've been enough to have a 5-4 court. Which would've meant that all of these new anti-abortion laws instantly got smacked down instead of being allowed to continue.

So clearly, there is a significant difference between the parties.

 

I mean yeah. Which is part of why democrats need to do better.

But that doesn't mean people should actually be claiming the parties are the same. That is still a dangerous line of thinking that simply makes the problem worse.

 

I'm not interested in getting drawn in, I was just pointing out that it's a whack assertion that some people on the Internet conflating the two parties is why abortion rights are under threat

 

the problem is that the only way to get them to do anything is threatening to withhold your vote but at the same time it's not really viable to withhold your vote because republicans truly are fucking demons, and the democrats know it, which is why they continue to be awful.

 

No. Its not. Its just the truth.

If you don't like that, you probably shouldn't be conflating the two parties.

 

it's almost like a certain president with a supermajority just conveniently forgot about reproductive rights for some reason.

that reason, I assume, was to make it his legacy that he slapped his name on romney care, but bipartisanly.

 

Respectfully, what are you talking about