It was a comedy based on actual events leaked by a cabinet mole.
1 Like
365 x 7. Campaigns can only work where the message is in the ball park of what people are already inclined to believe. Dems have a tendency to really only start messaging once the campaign starts. In contrast, the Republicans started running against Clinton the day Obama was reelected.
It was not remotely a landslide. The patterns were consistent, and in a FPTP system that can create a large margin in the EC or in parliamentary seats, but where it counted and overall across the country it was a comparatively small margin. Dems have to take seriously what it means to have lost the blue wall, lost favour with previusly key demos, and lost the PV for only the second time since the 80s, but it is still a small margin, currently tracking to be the smallest since 2000.
It has been asked and answered multiple times before.
4 Likes
With the end of the election, I think it will soon be time to move all of this discussion into the US Politics thread. I donât think we will lock it just yet in order to allow for some continuity, but please start moving your responses over to:
6 Likes
The day that Clinton was first elected, you mean.
RW press in the UK is already hammering labour for absolutely anything and everything. Including stuff that the previous government were responsible for.
Some justified too but mostly garbage that paints a picture of incompetence. And itâs being lapped up. No matter how good they are as a government i dont think it will matter come the next election.
3 Likes
I havenât listened to the episode yet, but anyone who has tracked Ezra knows what he is going to say as difficulties building things in cities has been his primary policy interest for about 10 years and has a book coming out this spring about it. Just like Noahâs blog you posted (although Noahâs analysis is far less robust and far more willing to accept mythology into it if it fits his narrative) the day before, this is an area he was already focused on, demonstrating that it is an area that serious people on the left are acknowledging and trying to find solutions for. Covid migration and covid related high interests rates seem to have exacerbated the problem, but the problem predated those issues that really brought it into focus.
But as always, be very careful with any analysis that says âthis election was lost because of that thing Iâve been focusing on for yearsâ. Personally I think the argument being made is one that really stretches credulity. It is possible there are a series of reforms that can be made that work well enough to materially impact the specific quality of life issues that upset people enough in cities to help Trump win. But is that a realistic view of what policy can do? Good policy is still always imperfect. Always has trade offs and unanticipated consequences. Everyone points to the growth of housing in Austin as an example of how Texasâ approach is superior, but none of these people seem to recognize that only 150 miles there is a city that is the cautionary tale. Houston has built itself up over a couple of decades into the countryâs 4th biggest city (by pop), but these Laissez-faire attitudes to development mean they have built it into a city that simply cannot handle storm rains resulting in 4 separate â100 year floodsâ in 5 years. The ability of developers to essentially build anything they want anywhere they want, and the city/county then rushing to build new roads to connect it all means there just isnt where for the rain to go anymore. Addressing that is going to require they completely reevaluate how they build and undergo a planned and coordinated scale back.
It is possible we find the perfect goldilocks zone that allows us to quickly materially improve the life of people in cities with smart building regulations in a way that avoids all negative impacts? Maybe, but is it a realistic expectation? And if it is achieved, is it realistic to think people internalize that as âlocal dems are good and that reflects well on the political ideology of the party so I will vote for a completely different set of Dems who are required to make a completely different set of decisionsââŚand in enough people inclined to vote Dem who didnt in this election?
This whole argument strikes me far more as a case of people using the election to push the thing they want to see happen anyway. And I think what they are pushing is worthy in its own right even if it has no electoral consequences. But just as a counterpoint I would say the majority of things people in my city talk about as bringing down the quality of life are things caused by a LACK of planning and coordination our growthâŚunrestrained growth on already busy âstroadsâ, lack of strategy for urban dwellers to manage the impact of that with safe and connected pedestrian/cycling options or public transportation, loss of public spacesâŚ
4 Likes
I think it brings me back to the point about how elections are decided on overall vibes. In this case, even the post-mortems seem to be about peopleâs vibes and pet causes, rather than an actual rigorous post-mortem with an unbiased prior.
I think intuition is very important and valuable, but it also runs the risks of simply being biased.
3 Likes
The election was lost for myriad reasons. If a few people on here put their heads together, they could probably come up with 6-10 very good reasons. I hope the Democrats do the necessary work to understand that, and change what they are able to change to be ready to go again.
Politics is cyclical, and hopefully that will remain, as we are now at the start of another Trump cycle and unfortunately he holds all the levers of power and will be thinking dynasty and legacy.
I think the Democrats fought their fight according to the Marquess of Queensbury rules, but everything has moved on. The scale of misinformation and disinformation appears to me to be the toughest thing to grapple with, as until something is done about that, I donât know how it is possible to get your message out.
You could have a great candidate and great ideas and policies, but it will all be shouted down and wonât make headway with the public.
Someone needs to come up with a great strategy to counter this, or else the game has gone.
2 Likes
This biggest mistake a party can make is misreading an election win as a vote for them when it was in fact a vote against the other team. We have a storied history of people/parties doing that, overplaying on what was not actually a particularly popular platform and experiencing large and rapid push back. This is absolutely what Trump will do and is likely the best hope the Dems have of getting back some power quickly.
The problems will be they will likely misinterpret that as a mandate themselves, and there will be the questions of how fucked things have managed to get in that time already.
4 Likes
Maybe âclean sweepâ is the term I should have used.
1 Like
Yeah for sure. It gives the impression of being given a mandate, but the bigger issue with that is the press just always interpret any GOP win no matter how small as having been given a mandate to govern however they want. In contrast, no Dem win ever, no matter how big, is ever seen as them being given a mandate but instead as them being handed a responsibility to reach over the aisle to pacify the GOP and give them what they want for the sake of the country.
4 Likes
Is that Jester from Top Gun?
Fecking hell.
Bingo
Well you can not know the one while knowing the other, hopefully that makes sense. I only found out about the Obama because I tried searching for the ârecess appointmentsâ information, and knew it would be relevant to limit the posters that attack Trump on hysteria alone.
1 Like
So you read just far enough to confirm what you already wanted to believe so that it would allow you to reject answers you didnât want to hear, but not far enough to actually understand any of it.
Cool cool
6 Likes
Thatâs the tip of the paranoia iceberg, I expect much more hysteria will follow with ultimately none of it coming true. Itâs fascinating when you read stuff from the Demâs (in this case) saying you have to take Trump for his word, he will deport all illegalâs, and in the next sentence saying you cant take him for his words because he has told everyone its his last term.
Should the new administration leave things as they are? I have not read anywhere that things are currently working out well in the war, and that itâs close to being over. I would welcome a different approach that ends the war quickly, rather than worry about the individuals tasked to trying to end it. In the amusing universe that Steven Seagal (I understand its a joke) is selected and succeeds, is this not the preferable outcome?
He has not done so. Julia Ioffeâs comment is in relation to a recent statement of Trumpâs saying:
âI suspect I wonât be running again, unless you do something. Unless you say, âHeâs so good, we have to just figure it out.ââ
3 Likes
The article on Obama did not explain the ârecess appointmentsâ and that it was done because the appointment could be filibustered, which is why I asked the question. Hopefully I have now explained it enough for your satisfaction. My intention was not to disparage the work of Obama.
But he hasnât told everyone it is his last term. He has repeatedly floated the idea of how his first term didnât count and 2 terms isnât a real limit.
Yet again we are faced witht he question you repeatedly refuse to address - lets assume this is lies. Just like his hateful anti immigrant rhetoric with barbaric promises of what he was going to do to them was just campaign bantz - what is the justification for not treating that as a serious issue by itself?
1 Like