I wouldn't necessarily begrudge you this interpretation because it's not hard to see how not passing a bill could well play to the Democrats' advantage. Having said that, two things come to mind that also argue against your interpretation. First, the House already passed the HEROES Act. If the Senate were to take it up and send it as is to the President who were hypothetically inclined to sign it, there's nothing Pelosi could do at that point to stop it. In other words, she's already surrendered any ability to stop the HEROES Act herself from becoming law at the moment, so I personally find it hard to believe that this is a case of her being all for show. Second, back in February with the terms of the impeachment trial still under negotiation (granted, McConnell still held the vast majority of cards), Pelosi allowed the Senate version of the USMCA to pass the House when that was arguably the strongest card she had to play in getting the Senate to capitulate on the issue of witnesses at the impeachment trial. To me, that suggests that she is not categorically against passing legislation that would mostly accrue to the benefit of the Republicans if she believes that it is indeed worthwhile legislation that does more good than harm.Garou said:She could have easily answered that herself, but didn't because she doesn't actually want to pass a bill until the Democrats get control of the Senate and the presidency.JeffBear07 said:
You also cite to Nancy Pelosi, which I assume is a reference to her interview with Wolf Blitzer yesterday. While I don't necessarily agree with the degree of aggressiveness she took, the substance of what she said was very arguably on point - that being that Blitzer didn't bother to ask the specifics were of what is in the Republicans' $1.8 trillion proposal that Pelosi objects to or why the Republicans have been sitting on her bill that has been passed since May.
SCOTUS CONFIRMATION HEARING
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Last: 3 yr ago by bearister
Won't go into tit-for tat but couple of counter-point:JeffBear07 said:What you're saying is not an entirely unfair analysis, but its flaw is in its reliance on the mutual acceptance of comity and good faith from both sides. I don't really want to get into a comprehensive discussion of tit for tat at this point unless that was your intent, but I struggle to see how you can argue that it wasn't very much the Republicans (at least with this current generation of congressmen) who first tossed aside any notions of good faith negotiation with Democrats while they were in the minority.calbear93 said:Your argument would be more convincing if the Democrats were not generally in favor or open to eliminating filibuster altogether in the Senate.JeffBear07 said:I see. So McConnell can break the system for judicial nominations, leading Reid to escalate tactics in order to restore some semblance of proper governmental function, and when McConnell predictably escalates further at first opportunity, the primary takeaway by conservatives is "haha IRONY"OdontoBear66 said:No. I was not rightly or wrongly even arguing McConnell's usage of the filibuster for years, and even commented that I am sorry it was lifted. My point was the irony of Reid being he who lifted it and the turnip has turned. Again, not that I like it, but....JeffBear07 said:I've seen this argument from conservative types like you before. Let me guess, you're actually trying to pretend here like McConnell's unprecedented judicial filibusters (what sycasey just said) never occurred, but once forced to acknowledge this, you're going to go back and say that this tit-for-tat all really started with what happened to Robert Bork's nomination in the 80's. Do I have that right?OdontoBear66 said:Reid opened the door in an hour of need. What goes around comes around.sycasey said:There is a long tit-for-tat escalation that got us to this point, but for SCOTUS nominees it is McConnell who removed the filibuster.OdontoBear66 said:I believe you can thank Senate Majority leader Reid in 2013 for that one. Didn't care for it then, don't care for it now. But sometimes what you spit out comes back to bite you in the b+tt.sycasey said:Filibuster for SCOTUS nominees doesn't exist anymoreGarou said:Yes, because the Republicans have never been able to obstruct things with a minority. Even within a minority of their own party stopping the rest of their party.sycasey said:That's not interesting either. Democrats are in the minority and can't stop it.Cool Ice said:What is interesting is how hard the Democrats didn't try to stop it That should tell you about how real their interest is in keeping her off the court (aka, none).sycasey said:There is nothing interesting about a foregone conclusion. Everyone knows the GOP is going to push this nomination through. The more interesting question will be what Democrats will do if and when they win back power.OdontoBear66 said:
Very interesting. It has gotten awful quiet here on this thread. I think the Dems are also not showing with questions, not using their time, possibly opting to vote tomorrow night as well. Just get it over. Getting handed your backside ain't much fun.
You guys are kinda funny. Legal scholars living on what the meaning of "is" is, but not reading simplistic stuff from a Subject A major at Cal.
And yes, unlike many of your conservative brethren on this site, I actually do think you're too smart to have made such a simplistic "Subject A" statement without consciously realizing the underlying context. But anything to avoid copping to ultimately being in support of a nihilistic political party I guess.
Whether it's electoral college, filibuster, blocking qualified judicial nominees, packing the courts, etc., politicians now are more interested in expediency and getting what they want when they want it as opposed to respecting the traditions, protecting the best interest of America for this generation and next, and respecting the safe guards that have protected the minority against the majority in our history.
And so us pretending that one party is worse than the other when it comes to cheap tricks or eliminating traditional protections is laughable. When it protects their interest, it's a sacred, time-honored tradition. If it gets in their way, then it's relic of a time past that is either racist or undemocratic.
None of this will change as long as politicians have to deal with primaries. The social media creates tribes, leading to only the extremes surviving primaries and culminating in no room for compromise between the parties or different bodies of the government.
Both parties are crap when it comes to these things. It's like blaming the media. The left is so horrified of the right saying the media is biased or apologist for the liberal politicians. But when liberal politicians like AOC or Pelosi get tough questions from even liberal media companies like CNN, what do they say? Fake news or journalists are apologist for the right.
https://www.newyorker.com/news/current/elizabeth-warren-against-the-filibuster
https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/politics/policy-2020/voting-changes/eliminate-senate-filibuster/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/07/31/senate-democrats-filibuster/
So no, I don't think it is laughable to suggest that one party is markedly worse "when it comes to cheap tricks or eliminating traditional protections." A cheap trick is blithely casting aside scores of qualified judicial nominees and a Supreme Court nominee without even bringing them up for a vote because you already don't "consent" to their perceived judicial philosophy. Eliminating traditional protections is getting rid of the filibuster for nominees to the highest court in the land who have the final say on numerous laws that directly impact people's lives and rights. As I expressed to OdontoBear66, what I do find a bit laughable is this notion that we can "both-sides" the two parties when it's clear that one side is proudly obstructionist to the intended good-faith function of government. Or I could just let Mitch McConnell tell you himself what he thinks of good-faith government function.
You're right that a huge problem with compromise nowadays is that way too many members of Congress nowadays fear a primary challenge from the more extreme end of their respective parties more than their actual hypothetical opponent in the general election. You know what the biggest driver of that is? Gerrymandered districts that stuff an overwhelming majority of voters of a particular political persuasion into one district through obscenely drawn district lines. Which party is by far the bigger offender in this practice? Republicans. What was the vote breakdown of the Rucho case at the Supreme Court last year that said politicians are free to gerrymander to their heart's content? 5-4. Who were the five who voted to approve gerrymandering as an acceptable political practice? Each of the five Republican-nominated justices. So tell me again which party has been more destructive to the current state of our politics?
You also bring up the media, which... honestly, I don't know how to really say this without it coming off condescending. The media issue is not a "both-sides" issue either. The right likes to blast the "mainstream media" for calling out conservative lies and Republican wrongdoing. Never does it seem to occur to the right that the "mainstream media" is basing their reporting on provable facts supported by evidence as it currently exists, only that it hurts their side so the media must be biased. The left blasts the media for its too-often attempts to "both-sides" every issue in a fruitless attempt to convince the right that the media indeed follows the facts as they bear out. Tell me, did you think it was proper for the oh-so-liberal New York Times to spend so much ink in 2016 on Hillary Clinton's emails while vaguely touching upon Donald Trump's calls for Russia to interfere in the election and any one of his foreign financial entanglements or obscene insults towards others?
You also cite to Nancy Pelosi, which I assume is a reference to her interview with Wolf Blitzer yesterday. While I don't necessarily agree with the degree of aggressiveness she took, the substance of what she said was very arguably on point - that being that Blitzer didn't bother to ask the specifics were of what is in the Republicans' $1.8 trillion proposal that Pelosi objects to or why the Republicans have been sitting on her bill that has been passed since May. If you didn't know anything about any of the stimulus negotiations over the past few months and only saw that interview, you would be left thinking that Republicans are the only ones who have come up with a stimulus bill and that $1.8 trillion is an incredible number that all goes to unemployed people and shuttered businesses. That is exactly how the Republicans want to frame the issue, and somehow it is always the Democrats who are expected to capitulate and be the adults who accept whatever the other side wants for the good of the people. Or, maybe you want to explain why NBC News (yes, that NBC News that Donald Trump and much of the right continuously blast for supposedly being too liberal ) today decided to reward Trump for running from the second debate by giving him a full hour at the exact same time as an already-scheduled town hall with Biden on a competing network to freely solipsize about how everything he has touched in politics has been the greatest thing in the history of the world of forever and how Biden and Obama and Clinton are the worst thing in the history of the world of forever. It's that level of media fudgery that Democrats complain about, not accusations of "fake news" (though I'd legitimately like to know who exactly you're thinking of on the left who has decried the media as fake news).
- Senate civility was thrown out the window with the Bork nomination.
- Gerrymandered districts do not explain the end of compromise in the Senate. The extremism and lack of civility in the Senate is more through tribal politics where political beliefs define identity, with the other side viewed as treasonous idiots.
- Wasn't talking about media. Was talking about how when media poses questions or criticizes, politicians from Trump, Pelosi to AOC claim the media is biased toward the other side and that the reporting is fake news.
While not a registered Democrat, this echoes exactly where I am at now as well. If Democrats can't find a spine and respond in kind, then I may well end up where Yogi is at already and just say burn the party down now and start over with the progressive wing of the party.OaktownBear said:OdontoBear66 said:I believe you can thank Senate Majority leader Reid in 2013 for that one. Didn't care for it then, don't care for it now. But sometimes what you spit out comes back to bite you in the b+tt.sycasey said:Filibuster for SCOTUS nominees doesn't exist anymoreGarou said:Yes, because the Republicans have never been able to obstruct things with a minority. Even within a minority of their own party stopping the rest of their party.sycasey said:That's not interesting either. Democrats are in the minority and can't stop it.Cool Ice said:What is interesting is how hard the Democrats didn't try to stop it That should tell you about how real their interest is in keeping her off the court (aka, none).sycasey said:There is nothing interesting about a foregone conclusion. Everyone knows the GOP is going to push this nomination through. The more interesting question will be what Democrats will do if and when they win back power.OdontoBear66 said:
Very interesting. It has gotten awful quiet here on this thread. I think the Dems are also not showing with questions, not using their time, possibly opting to vote tomorrow night as well. Just get it over. Getting handed your backside ain't much fun.
I also marvel at how many of the lawyers here feel that the judicial branch should be so politically charged whether it be by the opposition (current happenings) or packing the court (suggested in the future). Thought they would collectively revere the profession's sanctity a bit more.
I don't think the judicial confirmation process should be so political. Unfortunately the rules that prevented that were unwritten. Whoever you want to blame for that, fine, but it doesn't exist anymore. It is clear that no one is going to hold back. So don't pretend. I liked college football with the bowls when the bowls tried to create the best matchups. Then the bowls started picking teams based on money. So eff that, I'm not going to pretend people are being honorable. If people aren't honorable, people need to behave in an equivalent manner. So screw it. If the Democrats can get the votes to add 100 justices, do it and let AOC hand pick every one just to really tick off Republicans. Give DC and Puerto Rico statehood. Convince California to split into northern and southern. The Democrats are in a situation where they need to win the Vote by 3-5 points to win the Presidency and the House. They have to win the Senate by 5-7 points. That isn't an accident. The Republicans got the drop on them. They systematically worked up from the local level and took every advantage to redistrict and pass voting laws that help them while Democrats did nothing but march around making their voices heard instead of working the political process.
This isn't Mr Smith Goes to Washington no matter how much we want it to be. Win this damn election and take every advantage you can. Gerrymander every district you can. Because what the Republicans taught us is voters do not punish you on procedural issues, certainly not enough to counter the gains you grab. Call Willie Brown if they have forgotten how it is done.
The Supreme Court being apolitical has always been a fantasy anyway. Read up in Dred Scott if you want to see how the Court is a paragon of apolitical virtue.
As far as I'm concerned, if the Democrats win all three and they do not exact brutal vengeance, I'm not a Democrat any more.
You don't beat Slytherins with Hufflepuffs.
oak---this just in...you are not a traditional Democrat. you are a hard-core lefty-----a world of difference. I used to be a traditional Democrat. I left the party because it started to go bat **** crazy beginning around 1968. The bat-**** craziness has accelerated to the point that JFK, Adlai Stevenson, Harry Truman, Scoop Jackson and Hubert Humphrey could not be elected dog-catcher in the modern day Demo party. The party is now controlled by communists, socialists, marxists, and assorted anti-American types who despise this country . Communism never goes away. It always reappears . Even the current Pope has marxist tendencies. He was mentored by a communist growing up in his native country. Please see his recent, "Fratelli Tutti." reads like a college sociology textbook---Sad!!!!
While I believe you probably simply glossed over my original post in this thread to OdontoBear66, I just have to say that I knew exactly that Bork would be the standard go-to response. And to that, I say that one, there was kind of a huge reason (aka Watergate) not to accept Bork onto the highest court in the land, and two, it wasn't just Democrats who voted against Bork's nomination.calbear93 said:Won't go into tit-for tat but couple of counter-point:JeffBear07 said:What you're saying is not an entirely unfair analysis, but its flaw is in its reliance on the mutual acceptance of comity and good faith from both sides. I don't really want to get into a comprehensive discussion of tit for tat at this point unless that was your intent, but I struggle to see how you can argue that it wasn't very much the Republicans (at least with this current generation of congressmen) who first tossed aside any notions of good faith negotiation with Democrats while they were in the minority.calbear93 said:Your argument would be more convincing if the Democrats were not generally in favor or open to eliminating filibuster altogether in the Senate.JeffBear07 said:I see. So McConnell can break the system for judicial nominations, leading Reid to escalate tactics in order to restore some semblance of proper governmental function, and when McConnell predictably escalates further at first opportunity, the primary takeaway by conservatives is "haha IRONY"OdontoBear66 said:No. I was not rightly or wrongly even arguing McConnell's usage of the filibuster for years, and even commented that I am sorry it was lifted. My point was the irony of Reid being he who lifted it and the turnip has turned. Again, not that I like it, but....JeffBear07 said:I've seen this argument from conservative types like you before. Let me guess, you're actually trying to pretend here like McConnell's unprecedented judicial filibusters (what sycasey just said) never occurred, but once forced to acknowledge this, you're going to go back and say that this tit-for-tat all really started with what happened to Robert Bork's nomination in the 80's. Do I have that right?OdontoBear66 said:Reid opened the door in an hour of need. What goes around comes around.sycasey said:There is a long tit-for-tat escalation that got us to this point, but for SCOTUS nominees it is McConnell who removed the filibuster.OdontoBear66 said:I believe you can thank Senate Majority leader Reid in 2013 for that one. Didn't care for it then, don't care for it now. But sometimes what you spit out comes back to bite you in the b+tt.sycasey said:Filibuster for SCOTUS nominees doesn't exist anymoreGarou said:Yes, because the Republicans have never been able to obstruct things with a minority. Even within a minority of their own party stopping the rest of their party.sycasey said:That's not interesting either. Democrats are in the minority and can't stop it.Cool Ice said:What is interesting is how hard the Democrats didn't try to stop it That should tell you about how real their interest is in keeping her off the court (aka, none).sycasey said:There is nothing interesting about a foregone conclusion. Everyone knows the GOP is going to push this nomination through. The more interesting question will be what Democrats will do if and when they win back power.OdontoBear66 said:
Very interesting. It has gotten awful quiet here on this thread. I think the Dems are also not showing with questions, not using their time, possibly opting to vote tomorrow night as well. Just get it over. Getting handed your backside ain't much fun.
You guys are kinda funny. Legal scholars living on what the meaning of "is" is, but not reading simplistic stuff from a Subject A major at Cal.
And yes, unlike many of your conservative brethren on this site, I actually do think you're too smart to have made such a simplistic "Subject A" statement without consciously realizing the underlying context. But anything to avoid copping to ultimately being in support of a nihilistic political party I guess.
Whether it's electoral college, filibuster, blocking qualified judicial nominees, packing the courts, etc., politicians now are more interested in expediency and getting what they want when they want it as opposed to respecting the traditions, protecting the best interest of America for this generation and next, and respecting the safe guards that have protected the minority against the majority in our history.
And so us pretending that one party is worse than the other when it comes to cheap tricks or eliminating traditional protections is laughable. When it protects their interest, it's a sacred, time-honored tradition. If it gets in their way, then it's relic of a time past that is either racist or undemocratic.
None of this will change as long as politicians have to deal with primaries. The social media creates tribes, leading to only the extremes surviving primaries and culminating in no room for compromise between the parties or different bodies of the government.
Both parties are crap when it comes to these things. It's like blaming the media. The left is so horrified of the right saying the media is biased or apologist for the liberal politicians. But when liberal politicians like AOC or Pelosi get tough questions from even liberal media companies like CNN, what do they say? Fake news or journalists are apologist for the right.
https://www.newyorker.com/news/current/elizabeth-warren-against-the-filibuster
https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/politics/policy-2020/voting-changes/eliminate-senate-filibuster/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/07/31/senate-democrats-filibuster/
So no, I don't think it is laughable to suggest that one party is markedly worse "when it comes to cheap tricks or eliminating traditional protections." A cheap trick is blithely casting aside scores of qualified judicial nominees and a Supreme Court nominee without even bringing them up for a vote because you already don't "consent" to their perceived judicial philosophy. Eliminating traditional protections is getting rid of the filibuster for nominees to the highest court in the land who have the final say on numerous laws that directly impact people's lives and rights. As I expressed to OdontoBear66, what I do find a bit laughable is this notion that we can "both-sides" the two parties when it's clear that one side is proudly obstructionist to the intended good-faith function of government. Or I could just let Mitch McConnell tell you himself what he thinks of good-faith government function.
You're right that a huge problem with compromise nowadays is that way too many members of Congress nowadays fear a primary challenge from the more extreme end of their respective parties more than their actual hypothetical opponent in the general election. You know what the biggest driver of that is? Gerrymandered districts that stuff an overwhelming majority of voters of a particular political persuasion into one district through obscenely drawn district lines. Which party is by far the bigger offender in this practice? Republicans. What was the vote breakdown of the Rucho case at the Supreme Court last year that said politicians are free to gerrymander to their heart's content? 5-4. Who were the five who voted to approve gerrymandering as an acceptable political practice? Each of the five Republican-nominated justices. So tell me again which party has been more destructive to the current state of our politics?
You also bring up the media, which... honestly, I don't know how to really say this without it coming off condescending. The media issue is not a "both-sides" issue either. The right likes to blast the "mainstream media" for calling out conservative lies and Republican wrongdoing. Never does it seem to occur to the right that the "mainstream media" is basing their reporting on provable facts supported by evidence as it currently exists, only that it hurts their side so the media must be biased. The left blasts the media for its too-often attempts to "both-sides" every issue in a fruitless attempt to convince the right that the media indeed follows the facts as they bear out. Tell me, did you think it was proper for the oh-so-liberal New York Times to spend so much ink in 2016 on Hillary Clinton's emails while vaguely touching upon Donald Trump's calls for Russia to interfere in the election and any one of his foreign financial entanglements or obscene insults towards others?
You also cite to Nancy Pelosi, which I assume is a reference to her interview with Wolf Blitzer yesterday. While I don't necessarily agree with the degree of aggressiveness she took, the substance of what she said was very arguably on point - that being that Blitzer didn't bother to ask the specifics were of what is in the Republicans' $1.8 trillion proposal that Pelosi objects to or why the Republicans have been sitting on her bill that has been passed since May. If you didn't know anything about any of the stimulus negotiations over the past few months and only saw that interview, you would be left thinking that Republicans are the only ones who have come up with a stimulus bill and that $1.8 trillion is an incredible number that all goes to unemployed people and shuttered businesses. That is exactly how the Republicans want to frame the issue, and somehow it is always the Democrats who are expected to capitulate and be the adults who accept whatever the other side wants for the good of the people. Or, maybe you want to explain why NBC News (yes, that NBC News that Donald Trump and much of the right continuously blast for supposedly being too liberal ) today decided to reward Trump for running from the second debate by giving him a full hour at the exact same time as an already-scheduled town hall with Biden on a competing network to freely solipsize about how everything he has touched in politics has been the greatest thing in the history of the world of forever and how Biden and Obama and Clinton are the worst thing in the history of the world of forever. It's that level of media fudgery that Democrats complain about, not accusations of "fake news" (though I'd legitimately like to know who exactly you're thinking of on the left who has decried the media as fake news).
- Senate civility was thrown out the window with the Bork nomination.
- Gerrymandered districts do not explain the end of compromise in the Senate. The extremism and lack of civility in the Senate is more through tribal politics where political beliefs define identity, with the other side viewed as treasonous idiots.
- Wasn't talking about media. Was talking about how when media poses questions or criticizes, politicians from Trump, Pelosi to AOC claim the media is biased toward the other side and that the reporting is fake news.
You're right, gerrymandering doesn't really explain the current tribalism in the Senate, and I won't pretend to have some deep, well-evidenced insight into why that is. I would propose, though, at least three potential factors for how the Senate has ended up the way it is. First is the increasing urban-rural divide between the states, which has helped lead to so many states becoming intractably red and thus their politicians more concerned about being primaried. Second is the media environment in which we currently live wherein a major "news" network is allowed to peddle unfounded BS as if it were fact to millions of under-educated individuals who then fuel the extremism that underlies the more rural states' drive deeper toward the right. And third, Republicans in particular have allowed themselves to be led by the nose by a craven, power-hungry turtle named Mitch McConnell whose political nihilism has seeped down throughout the Republican Senate ranks. I suppose you might argue that Harry Reid ruled the Democrats with an equally iron fist but I won't believe that you could argue that his approach to governance has been anything like McConnell's.
Are you saying that Ocasio-Cortez has in fact declared "fake news" at any of the media? That would actually be news to me, which is why I earlier asked who exactly you're referring to when you say that Democrats have called "fake news" when challenged by the media. Other than that, I simply reiterate my point that Republican complaints about the media and Democratic complaints about the media fundamentally differ in substance and adherence to reality.
Anarchistbear said:
It's only about the pursuit of power same as the last three years. McConnell did it and didn't pay a price for it; the reasons being nobody cares about the inner workings of the US Senate and Supreme Court nominees do not electrify people to vote. ( In retrospect Obama nominating someone he thought would appeal to Mitch was laughingly dumb; if he wanted electoral payback he should have nominated a black woman.)
The Democrats have talked about increasing court size but that will wind up in front of the voters being a major tampering with a third branch. They won't do it. Biden is a traditionalist and McConnell is a good friend of his. Ginsburg's death wish will have to wait. Maybe Breyer retires or one of the Repubs croaks.
Or maybe The Pelican Brief.
Nm
JeffBear07 said:While I believe you probably simply glossed over my original post in this thread to OdontoBear66, I just have to say that I knew exactly that Bork would be the standard go-to response. And to that, I say that one, there was kind of a huge reason (aka Watergate) not to accept Bork onto the highest court in the land, and two, it wasn't just Democrats who voted against Bork's nomination.calbear93 said:Won't go into tit-for tat but couple of counter-point:JeffBear07 said:What you're saying is not an entirely unfair analysis, but its flaw is in its reliance on the mutual acceptance of comity and good faith from both sides. I don't really want to get into a comprehensive discussion of tit for tat at this point unless that was your intent, but I struggle to see how you can argue that it wasn't very much the Republicans (at least with this current generation of congressmen) who first tossed aside any notions of good faith negotiation with Democrats while they were in the minority.calbear93 said:Your argument would be more convincing if the Democrats were not generally in favor or open to eliminating filibuster altogether in the Senate.JeffBear07 said:I see. So McConnell can break the system for judicial nominations, leading Reid to escalate tactics in order to restore some semblance of proper governmental function, and when McConnell predictably escalates further at first opportunity, the primary takeaway by conservatives is "haha IRONY"OdontoBear66 said:No. I was not rightly or wrongly even arguing McConnell's usage of the filibuster for years, and even commented that I am sorry it was lifted. My point was the irony of Reid being he who lifted it and the turnip has turned. Again, not that I like it, but....JeffBear07 said:I've seen this argument from conservative types like you before. Let me guess, you're actually trying to pretend here like McConnell's unprecedented judicial filibusters (what sycasey just said) never occurred, but once forced to acknowledge this, you're going to go back and say that this tit-for-tat all really started with what happened to Robert Bork's nomination in the 80's. Do I have that right?OdontoBear66 said:Reid opened the door in an hour of need. What goes around comes around.sycasey said:There is a long tit-for-tat escalation that got us to this point, but for SCOTUS nominees it is McConnell who removed the filibuster.OdontoBear66 said:I believe you can thank Senate Majority leader Reid in 2013 for that one. Didn't care for it then, don't care for it now. But sometimes what you spit out comes back to bite you in the b+tt.sycasey said:Filibuster for SCOTUS nominees doesn't exist anymoreGarou said:Yes, because the Republicans have never been able to obstruct things with a minority. Even within a minority of their own party stopping the rest of their party.sycasey said:That's not interesting either. Democrats are in the minority and can't stop it.Cool Ice said:What is interesting is how hard the Democrats didn't try to stop it That should tell you about how real their interest is in keeping her off the court (aka, none).sycasey said:There is nothing interesting about a foregone conclusion. Everyone knows the GOP is going to push this nomination through. The more interesting question will be what Democrats will do if and when they win back power.OdontoBear66 said:
Very interesting. It has gotten awful quiet here on this thread. I think the Dems are also not showing with questions, not using their time, possibly opting to vote tomorrow night as well. Just get it over. Getting handed your backside ain't much fun.
You guys are kinda funny. Legal scholars living on what the meaning of "is" is, but not reading simplistic stuff from a Subject A major at Cal.
And yes, unlike many of your conservative brethren on this site, I actually do think you're too smart to have made such a simplistic "Subject A" statement without consciously realizing the underlying context. But anything to avoid copping to ultimately being in support of a nihilistic political party I guess.
Whether it's electoral college, filibuster, blocking qualified judicial nominees, packing the courts, etc., politicians now are more interested in expediency and getting what they want when they want it as opposed to respecting the traditions, protecting the best interest of America for this generation and next, and respecting the safe guards that have protected the minority against the majority in our history.
And so us pretending that one party is worse than the other when it comes to cheap tricks or eliminating traditional protections is laughable. When it protects their interest, it's a sacred, time-honored tradition. If it gets in their way, then it's relic of a time past that is either racist or undemocratic.
None of this will change as long as politicians have to deal with primaries. The social media creates tribes, leading to only the extremes surviving primaries and culminating in no room for compromise between the parties or different bodies of the government.
Both parties are crap when it comes to these things. It's like blaming the media. The left is so horrified of the right saying the media is biased or apologist for the liberal politicians. But when liberal politicians like AOC or Pelosi get tough questions from even liberal media companies like CNN, what do they say? Fake news or journalists are apologist for the right.
https://www.newyorker.com/news/current/elizabeth-warren-against-the-filibuster
https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/politics/policy-2020/voting-changes/eliminate-senate-filibuster/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/07/31/senate-democrats-filibuster/
So no, I don't think it is laughable to suggest that one party is markedly worse "when it comes to cheap tricks or eliminating traditional protections." A cheap trick is blithely casting aside scores of qualified judicial nominees and a Supreme Court nominee without even bringing them up for a vote because you already don't "consent" to their perceived judicial philosophy. Eliminating traditional protections is getting rid of the filibuster for nominees to the highest court in the land who have the final say on numerous laws that directly impact people's lives and rights. As I expressed to OdontoBear66, what I do find a bit laughable is this notion that we can "both-sides" the two parties when it's clear that one side is proudly obstructionist to the intended good-faith function of government. Or I could just let Mitch McConnell tell you himself what he thinks of good-faith government function.
You're right that a huge problem with compromise nowadays is that way too many members of Congress nowadays fear a primary challenge from the more extreme end of their respective parties more than their actual hypothetical opponent in the general election. You know what the biggest driver of that is? Gerrymandered districts that stuff an overwhelming majority of voters of a particular political persuasion into one district through obscenely drawn district lines. Which party is by far the bigger offender in this practice? Republicans. What was the vote breakdown of the Rucho case at the Supreme Court last year that said politicians are free to gerrymander to their heart's content? 5-4. Who were the five who voted to approve gerrymandering as an acceptable political practice? Each of the five Republican-nominated justices. So tell me again which party has been more destructive to the current state of our politics?
You also bring up the media, which... honestly, I don't know how to really say this without it coming off condescending. The media issue is not a "both-sides" issue either. The right likes to blast the "mainstream media" for calling out conservative lies and Republican wrongdoing. Never does it seem to occur to the right that the "mainstream media" is basing their reporting on provable facts supported by evidence as it currently exists, only that it hurts their side so the media must be biased. The left blasts the media for its too-often attempts to "both-sides" every issue in a fruitless attempt to convince the right that the media indeed follows the facts as they bear out. Tell me, did you think it was proper for the oh-so-liberal New York Times to spend so much ink in 2016 on Hillary Clinton's emails while vaguely touching upon Donald Trump's calls for Russia to interfere in the election and any one of his foreign financial entanglements or obscene insults towards others?
You also cite to Nancy Pelosi, which I assume is a reference to her interview with Wolf Blitzer yesterday. While I don't necessarily agree with the degree of aggressiveness she took, the substance of what she said was very arguably on point - that being that Blitzer didn't bother to ask the specifics were of what is in the Republicans' $1.8 trillion proposal that Pelosi objects to or why the Republicans have been sitting on her bill that has been passed since May. If you didn't know anything about any of the stimulus negotiations over the past few months and only saw that interview, you would be left thinking that Republicans are the only ones who have come up with a stimulus bill and that $1.8 trillion is an incredible number that all goes to unemployed people and shuttered businesses. That is exactly how the Republicans want to frame the issue, and somehow it is always the Democrats who are expected to capitulate and be the adults who accept whatever the other side wants for the good of the people. Or, maybe you want to explain why NBC News (yes, that NBC News that Donald Trump and much of the right continuously blast for supposedly being too liberal ) today decided to reward Trump for running from the second debate by giving him a full hour at the exact same time as an already-scheduled town hall with Biden on a competing network to freely solipsize about how everything he has touched in politics has been the greatest thing in the history of the world of forever and how Biden and Obama and Clinton are the worst thing in the history of the world of forever. It's that level of media fudgery that Democrats complain about, not accusations of "fake news" (though I'd legitimately like to know who exactly you're thinking of on the left who has decried the media as fake news).
- Senate civility was thrown out the window with the Bork nomination.
- Gerrymandered districts do not explain the end of compromise in the Senate. The extremism and lack of civility in the Senate is more through tribal politics where political beliefs define identity, with the other side viewed as treasonous idiots.
- Wasn't talking about media. Was talking about how when media poses questions or criticizes, politicians from Trump, Pelosi to AOC claim the media is biased toward the other side and that the reporting is fake news.
And the Senate confirmed Reagan's next nominee anyway, so it wasn't about refusing all comers as McConnell did, it really was just about Bork. There is no real modern equivalence for McConnell's obstructionism during Obama's term. It was unprecedented.
Garou said:She could have easily answered that herself, but didn't because she doesn't actually want to pass a bill until the Democrats get control of the Senate and the presidency.JeffBear07 said:
You also cite to Nancy Pelosi, which I assume is a reference to her interview with Wolf Blitzer yesterday. While I don't necessarily agree with the degree of aggressiveness she took, the substance of what she said was very arguably on point - that being that Blitzer didn't bother to ask the specifics were of what is in the Republicans' $1.8 trillion proposal that Pelosi objects to or why the Republicans have been sitting on her bill that has been passed since May.
If this is her goal, then passing COVID relief bills out of the House is a weird way to go about it.
I suppose it would just be piling on at this point to also note that the Democrats had the Senate majority and it was an election year when Justice Kennedy, nominated by the very Republican Ronald Reagan, was confirmed.sycasey said:JeffBear07 said:While I believe you probably simply glossed over my original post in this thread to OdontoBear66, I just have to say that I knew exactly that Bork would be the standard go-to response. And to that, I say that one, there was kind of a huge reason (aka Watergate) not to accept Bork onto the highest court in the land, and two, it wasn't just Democrats who voted against Bork's nomination.calbear93 said:Won't go into tit-for tat but couple of counter-point:JeffBear07 said:What you're saying is not an entirely unfair analysis, but its flaw is in its reliance on the mutual acceptance of comity and good faith from both sides. I don't really want to get into a comprehensive discussion of tit for tat at this point unless that was your intent, but I struggle to see how you can argue that it wasn't very much the Republicans (at least with this current generation of congressmen) who first tossed aside any notions of good faith negotiation with Democrats while they were in the minority.calbear93 said:Your argument would be more convincing if the Democrats were not generally in favor or open to eliminating filibuster altogether in the Senate.JeffBear07 said:I see. So McConnell can break the system for judicial nominations, leading Reid to escalate tactics in order to restore some semblance of proper governmental function, and when McConnell predictably escalates further at first opportunity, the primary takeaway by conservatives is "haha IRONY"OdontoBear66 said:No. I was not rightly or wrongly even arguing McConnell's usage of the filibuster for years, and even commented that I am sorry it was lifted. My point was the irony of Reid being he who lifted it and the turnip has turned. Again, not that I like it, but....JeffBear07 said:I've seen this argument from conservative types like you before. Let me guess, you're actually trying to pretend here like McConnell's unprecedented judicial filibusters (what sycasey just said) never occurred, but once forced to acknowledge this, you're going to go back and say that this tit-for-tat all really started with what happened to Robert Bork's nomination in the 80's. Do I have that right?OdontoBear66 said:Reid opened the door in an hour of need. What goes around comes around.sycasey said:There is a long tit-for-tat escalation that got us to this point, but for SCOTUS nominees it is McConnell who removed the filibuster.OdontoBear66 said:I believe you can thank Senate Majority leader Reid in 2013 for that one. Didn't care for it then, don't care for it now. But sometimes what you spit out comes back to bite you in the b+tt.sycasey said:Filibuster for SCOTUS nominees doesn't exist anymoreGarou said:Yes, because the Republicans have never been able to obstruct things with a minority. Even within a minority of their own party stopping the rest of their party.sycasey said:That's not interesting either. Democrats are in the minority and can't stop it.Cool Ice said:What is interesting is how hard the Democrats didn't try to stop it That should tell you about how real their interest is in keeping her off the court (aka, none).sycasey said:There is nothing interesting about a foregone conclusion. Everyone knows the GOP is going to push this nomination through. The more interesting question will be what Democrats will do if and when they win back power.OdontoBear66 said:
Very interesting. It has gotten awful quiet here on this thread. I think the Dems are also not showing with questions, not using their time, possibly opting to vote tomorrow night as well. Just get it over. Getting handed your backside ain't much fun.
You guys are kinda funny. Legal scholars living on what the meaning of "is" is, but not reading simplistic stuff from a Subject A major at Cal.
And yes, unlike many of your conservative brethren on this site, I actually do think you're too smart to have made such a simplistic "Subject A" statement without consciously realizing the underlying context. But anything to avoid copping to ultimately being in support of a nihilistic political party I guess.
Whether it's electoral college, filibuster, blocking qualified judicial nominees, packing the courts, etc., politicians now are more interested in expediency and getting what they want when they want it as opposed to respecting the traditions, protecting the best interest of America for this generation and next, and respecting the safe guards that have protected the minority against the majority in our history.
And so us pretending that one party is worse than the other when it comes to cheap tricks or eliminating traditional protections is laughable. When it protects their interest, it's a sacred, time-honored tradition. If it gets in their way, then it's relic of a time past that is either racist or undemocratic.
None of this will change as long as politicians have to deal with primaries. The social media creates tribes, leading to only the extremes surviving primaries and culminating in no room for compromise between the parties or different bodies of the government.
Both parties are crap when it comes to these things. It's like blaming the media. The left is so horrified of the right saying the media is biased or apologist for the liberal politicians. But when liberal politicians like AOC or Pelosi get tough questions from even liberal media companies like CNN, what do they say? Fake news or journalists are apologist for the right.
https://www.newyorker.com/news/current/elizabeth-warren-against-the-filibuster
https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/politics/policy-2020/voting-changes/eliminate-senate-filibuster/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/07/31/senate-democrats-filibuster/
So no, I don't think it is laughable to suggest that one party is markedly worse "when it comes to cheap tricks or eliminating traditional protections." A cheap trick is blithely casting aside scores of qualified judicial nominees and a Supreme Court nominee without even bringing them up for a vote because you already don't "consent" to their perceived judicial philosophy. Eliminating traditional protections is getting rid of the filibuster for nominees to the highest court in the land who have the final say on numerous laws that directly impact people's lives and rights. As I expressed to OdontoBear66, what I do find a bit laughable is this notion that we can "both-sides" the two parties when it's clear that one side is proudly obstructionist to the intended good-faith function of government. Or I could just let Mitch McConnell tell you himself what he thinks of good-faith government function.
You're right that a huge problem with compromise nowadays is that way too many members of Congress nowadays fear a primary challenge from the more extreme end of their respective parties more than their actual hypothetical opponent in the general election. You know what the biggest driver of that is? Gerrymandered districts that stuff an overwhelming majority of voters of a particular political persuasion into one district through obscenely drawn district lines. Which party is by far the bigger offender in this practice? Republicans. What was the vote breakdown of the Rucho case at the Supreme Court last year that said politicians are free to gerrymander to their heart's content? 5-4. Who were the five who voted to approve gerrymandering as an acceptable political practice? Each of the five Republican-nominated justices. So tell me again which party has been more destructive to the current state of our politics?
You also bring up the media, which... honestly, I don't know how to really say this without it coming off condescending. The media issue is not a "both-sides" issue either. The right likes to blast the "mainstream media" for calling out conservative lies and Republican wrongdoing. Never does it seem to occur to the right that the "mainstream media" is basing their reporting on provable facts supported by evidence as it currently exists, only that it hurts their side so the media must be biased. The left blasts the media for its too-often attempts to "both-sides" every issue in a fruitless attempt to convince the right that the media indeed follows the facts as they bear out. Tell me, did you think it was proper for the oh-so-liberal New York Times to spend so much ink in 2016 on Hillary Clinton's emails while vaguely touching upon Donald Trump's calls for Russia to interfere in the election and any one of his foreign financial entanglements or obscene insults towards others?
You also cite to Nancy Pelosi, which I assume is a reference to her interview with Wolf Blitzer yesterday. While I don't necessarily agree with the degree of aggressiveness she took, the substance of what she said was very arguably on point - that being that Blitzer didn't bother to ask the specifics were of what is in the Republicans' $1.8 trillion proposal that Pelosi objects to or why the Republicans have been sitting on her bill that has been passed since May. If you didn't know anything about any of the stimulus negotiations over the past few months and only saw that interview, you would be left thinking that Republicans are the only ones who have come up with a stimulus bill and that $1.8 trillion is an incredible number that all goes to unemployed people and shuttered businesses. That is exactly how the Republicans want to frame the issue, and somehow it is always the Democrats who are expected to capitulate and be the adults who accept whatever the other side wants for the good of the people. Or, maybe you want to explain why NBC News (yes, that NBC News that Donald Trump and much of the right continuously blast for supposedly being too liberal ) today decided to reward Trump for running from the second debate by giving him a full hour at the exact same time as an already-scheduled town hall with Biden on a competing network to freely solipsize about how everything he has touched in politics has been the greatest thing in the history of the world of forever and how Biden and Obama and Clinton are the worst thing in the history of the world of forever. It's that level of media fudgery that Democrats complain about, not accusations of "fake news" (though I'd legitimately like to know who exactly you're thinking of on the left who has decried the media as fake news).
- Senate civility was thrown out the window with the Bork nomination.
- Gerrymandered districts do not explain the end of compromise in the Senate. The extremism and lack of civility in the Senate is more through tribal politics where political beliefs define identity, with the other side viewed as treasonous idiots.
- Wasn't talking about media. Was talking about how when media poses questions or criticizes, politicians from Trump, Pelosi to AOC claim the media is biased toward the other side and that the reporting is fake news.
And the Senate confirmed Reagan's next nominee anyway, so it wasn't about refusing all comers as McConnell did, it really was just about Bork. There is no real modern equivalence for McConnell's obstructionism during Obama's term. It was unprecedented.
sycasey said:JeffBear07 said:While I believe you probably simply glossed over my original post in this thread to OdontoBear66, I just have to say that I knew exactly that Bork would be the standard go-to response. And to that, I say that one, there was kind of a huge reason (aka Watergate) not to accept Bork onto the highest court in the land, and two, it wasn't just Democrats who voted against Bork's nomination.calbear93 said:Won't go into tit-for tat but couple of counter-point:JeffBear07 said:What you're saying is not an entirely unfair analysis, but its flaw is in its reliance on the mutual acceptance of comity and good faith from both sides. I don't really want to get into a comprehensive discussion of tit for tat at this point unless that was your intent, but I struggle to see how you can argue that it wasn't very much the Republicans (at least with this current generation of congressmen) who first tossed aside any notions of good faith negotiation with Democrats while they were in the minority.calbear93 said:Your argument would be more convincing if the Democrats were not generally in favor or open to eliminating filibuster altogether in the Senate.JeffBear07 said:I see. So McConnell can break the system for judicial nominations, leading Reid to escalate tactics in order to restore some semblance of proper governmental function, and when McConnell predictably escalates further at first opportunity, the primary takeaway by conservatives is "haha IRONY"OdontoBear66 said:No. I was not rightly or wrongly even arguing McConnell's usage of the filibuster for years, and even commented that I am sorry it was lifted. My point was the irony of Reid being he who lifted it and the turnip has turned. Again, not that I like it, but....JeffBear07 said:I've seen this argument from conservative types like you before. Let me guess, you're actually trying to pretend here like McConnell's unprecedented judicial filibusters (what sycasey just said) never occurred, but once forced to acknowledge this, you're going to go back and say that this tit-for-tat all really started with what happened to Robert Bork's nomination in the 80's. Do I have that right?OdontoBear66 said:Reid opened the door in an hour of need. What goes around comes around.sycasey said:There is a long tit-for-tat escalation that got us to this point, but for SCOTUS nominees it is McConnell who removed the filibuster.OdontoBear66 said:I believe you can thank Senate Majority leader Reid in 2013 for that one. Didn't care for it then, don't care for it now. But sometimes what you spit out comes back to bite you in the b+tt.sycasey said:Filibuster for SCOTUS nominees doesn't exist anymoreGarou said:Yes, because the Republicans have never been able to obstruct things with a minority. Even within a minority of their own party stopping the rest of their party.sycasey said:That's not interesting either. Democrats are in the minority and can't stop it.Cool Ice said:What is interesting is how hard the Democrats didn't try to stop it That should tell you about how real their interest is in keeping her off the court (aka, none).sycasey said:There is nothing interesting about a foregone conclusion. Everyone knows the GOP is going to push this nomination through. The more interesting question will be what Democrats will do if and when they win back power.OdontoBear66 said:
Very interesting. It has gotten awful quiet here on this thread. I think the Dems are also not showing with questions, not using their time, possibly opting to vote tomorrow night as well. Just get it over. Getting handed your backside ain't much fun.
You guys are kinda funny. Legal scholars living on what the meaning of "is" is, but not reading simplistic stuff from a Subject A major at Cal.
And yes, unlike many of your conservative brethren on this site, I actually do think you're too smart to have made such a simplistic "Subject A" statement without consciously realizing the underlying context. But anything to avoid copping to ultimately being in support of a nihilistic political party I guess.
Whether it's electoral college, filibuster, blocking qualified judicial nominees, packing the courts, etc., politicians now are more interested in expediency and getting what they want when they want it as opposed to respecting the traditions, protecting the best interest of America for this generation and next, and respecting the safe guards that have protected the minority against the majority in our history.
And so us pretending that one party is worse than the other when it comes to cheap tricks or eliminating traditional protections is laughable. When it protects their interest, it's a sacred, time-honored tradition. If it gets in their way, then it's relic of a time past that is either racist or undemocratic.
None of this will change as long as politicians have to deal with primaries. The social media creates tribes, leading to only the extremes surviving primaries and culminating in no room for compromise between the parties or different bodies of the government.
Both parties are crap when it comes to these things. It's like blaming the media. The left is so horrified of the right saying the media is biased or apologist for the liberal politicians. But when liberal politicians like AOC or Pelosi get tough questions from even liberal media companies like CNN, what do they say? Fake news or journalists are apologist for the right.
https://www.newyorker.com/news/current/elizabeth-warren-against-the-filibuster
https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/politics/policy-2020/voting-changes/eliminate-senate-filibuster/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/07/31/senate-democrats-filibuster/
So no, I don't think it is laughable to suggest that one party is markedly worse "when it comes to cheap tricks or eliminating traditional protections." A cheap trick is blithely casting aside scores of qualified judicial nominees and a Supreme Court nominee without even bringing them up for a vote because you already don't "consent" to their perceived judicial philosophy. Eliminating traditional protections is getting rid of the filibuster for nominees to the highest court in the land who have the final say on numerous laws that directly impact people's lives and rights. As I expressed to OdontoBear66, what I do find a bit laughable is this notion that we can "both-sides" the two parties when it's clear that one side is proudly obstructionist to the intended good-faith function of government. Or I could just let Mitch McConnell tell you himself what he thinks of good-faith government function.
You're right that a huge problem with compromise nowadays is that way too many members of Congress nowadays fear a primary challenge from the more extreme end of their respective parties more than their actual hypothetical opponent in the general election. You know what the biggest driver of that is? Gerrymandered districts that stuff an overwhelming majority of voters of a particular political persuasion into one district through obscenely drawn district lines. Which party is by far the bigger offender in this practice? Republicans. What was the vote breakdown of the Rucho case at the Supreme Court last year that said politicians are free to gerrymander to their heart's content? 5-4. Who were the five who voted to approve gerrymandering as an acceptable political practice? Each of the five Republican-nominated justices. So tell me again which party has been more destructive to the current state of our politics?
You also bring up the media, which... honestly, I don't know how to really say this without it coming off condescending. The media issue is not a "both-sides" issue either. The right likes to blast the "mainstream media" for calling out conservative lies and Republican wrongdoing. Never does it seem to occur to the right that the "mainstream media" is basing their reporting on provable facts supported by evidence as it currently exists, only that it hurts their side so the media must be biased. The left blasts the media for its too-often attempts to "both-sides" every issue in a fruitless attempt to convince the right that the media indeed follows the facts as they bear out. Tell me, did you think it was proper for the oh-so-liberal New York Times to spend so much ink in 2016 on Hillary Clinton's emails while vaguely touching upon Donald Trump's calls for Russia to interfere in the election and any one of his foreign financial entanglements or obscene insults towards others?
You also cite to Nancy Pelosi, which I assume is a reference to her interview with Wolf Blitzer yesterday. While I don't necessarily agree with the degree of aggressiveness she took, the substance of what she said was very arguably on point - that being that Blitzer didn't bother to ask the specifics were of what is in the Republicans' $1.8 trillion proposal that Pelosi objects to or why the Republicans have been sitting on her bill that has been passed since May. If you didn't know anything about any of the stimulus negotiations over the past few months and only saw that interview, you would be left thinking that Republicans are the only ones who have come up with a stimulus bill and that $1.8 trillion is an incredible number that all goes to unemployed people and shuttered businesses. That is exactly how the Republicans want to frame the issue, and somehow it is always the Democrats who are expected to capitulate and be the adults who accept whatever the other side wants for the good of the people. Or, maybe you want to explain why NBC News (yes, that NBC News that Donald Trump and much of the right continuously blast for supposedly being too liberal ) today decided to reward Trump for running from the second debate by giving him a full hour at the exact same time as an already-scheduled town hall with Biden on a competing network to freely solipsize about how everything he has touched in politics has been the greatest thing in the history of the world of forever and how Biden and Obama and Clinton are the worst thing in the history of the world of forever. It's that level of media fudgery that Democrats complain about, not accusations of "fake news" (though I'd legitimately like to know who exactly you're thinking of on the left who has decried the media as fake news).
- Senate civility was thrown out the window with the Bork nomination.
- Gerrymandered districts do not explain the end of compromise in the Senate. The extremism and lack of civility in the Senate is more through tribal politics where political beliefs define identity, with the other side viewed as treasonous idiots.
- Wasn't talking about media. Was talking about how when media poses questions or criticizes, politicians from Trump, Pelosi to AOC claim the media is biased toward the other side and that the reporting is fake news.
And the Senate confirmed Reagan's next nominee anyway, so it wasn't about refusing all comers as McConnell did, it really was just about Bork. There is no real modern equivalence for McConnell's obstructionism during Obama's term. It was unprecedented.
Was not promoting Bork as a good candidate. Kennedy was the better choice. Read what I wrote and not what you think I wrote. Prior to the harsh fighting in the Senate over Bork, the Senate was the gentle side of Congress where things like filibuster required parties to negotiate and compromise. The Bork nomination brought out infighting that seemed out of character at the time for the Senate.
Any chance you'll be intellectually honest at any point about this or will you just continue to pretend that that bill stuffed with Democratic pork was an honest attempt to get relief to the people who need it rather than the people who don't?sycasey said:Garou said:She could have easily answered that herself, but didn't because she doesn't actually want to pass a bill until the Democrats get control of the Senate and the presidency.JeffBear07 said:
You also cite to Nancy Pelosi, which I assume is a reference to her interview with Wolf Blitzer yesterday. While I don't necessarily agree with the degree of aggressiveness she took, the substance of what she said was very arguably on point - that being that Blitzer didn't bother to ask the specifics were of what is in the Republicans' $1.8 trillion proposal that Pelosi objects to or why the Republicans have been sitting on her bill that has been passed since May.
If this is her goal, then passing COVID relief bills out of the House is a weird way to go about it.
I already know the answer, but just wanted to point out how totally bullshyt you are on this and pretty much all examples of liberal hypocrisy.
"Yogi is right" - Oaktown Bear
JeffBear07 said:While I believe you probably simply glossed over my original post in this thread to OdontoBear66, I just have to say that I knew exactly that Bork would be the standard go-to response. And to that, I say that one, there was kind of a huge reason (aka Watergate) not to accept Bork onto the highest court in the land, and two, it wasn't just Democrats who voted against Bork's nomination.calbear93 said:Won't go into tit-for tat but couple of counter-point:JeffBear07 said:What you're saying is not an entirely unfair analysis, but its flaw is in its reliance on the mutual acceptance of comity and good faith from both sides. I don't really want to get into a comprehensive discussion of tit for tat at this point unless that was your intent, but I struggle to see how you can argue that it wasn't very much the Republicans (at least with this current generation of congressmen) who first tossed aside any notions of good faith negotiation with Democrats while they were in the minority.calbear93 said:Your argument would be more convincing if the Democrats were not generally in favor or open to eliminating filibuster altogether in the Senate.JeffBear07 said:I see. So McConnell can break the system for judicial nominations, leading Reid to escalate tactics in order to restore some semblance of proper governmental function, and when McConnell predictably escalates further at first opportunity, the primary takeaway by conservatives is "haha IRONY"OdontoBear66 said:No. I was not rightly or wrongly even arguing McConnell's usage of the filibuster for years, and even commented that I am sorry it was lifted. My point was the irony of Reid being he who lifted it and the turnip has turned. Again, not that I like it, but....JeffBear07 said:I've seen this argument from conservative types like you before. Let me guess, you're actually trying to pretend here like McConnell's unprecedented judicial filibusters (what sycasey just said) never occurred, but once forced to acknowledge this, you're going to go back and say that this tit-for-tat all really started with what happened to Robert Bork's nomination in the 80's. Do I have that right?OdontoBear66 said:Reid opened the door in an hour of need. What goes around comes around.sycasey said:There is a long tit-for-tat escalation that got us to this point, but for SCOTUS nominees it is McConnell who removed the filibuster.OdontoBear66 said:I believe you can thank Senate Majority leader Reid in 2013 for that one. Didn't care for it then, don't care for it now. But sometimes what you spit out comes back to bite you in the b+tt.sycasey said:Filibuster for SCOTUS nominees doesn't exist anymoreGarou said:Yes, because the Republicans have never been able to obstruct things with a minority. Even within a minority of their own party stopping the rest of their party.sycasey said:That's not interesting either. Democrats are in the minority and can't stop it.Cool Ice said:What is interesting is how hard the Democrats didn't try to stop it That should tell you about how real their interest is in keeping her off the court (aka, none).sycasey said:There is nothing interesting about a foregone conclusion. Everyone knows the GOP is going to push this nomination through. The more interesting question will be what Democrats will do if and when they win back power.OdontoBear66 said:
Very interesting. It has gotten awful quiet here on this thread. I think the Dems are also not showing with questions, not using their time, possibly opting to vote tomorrow night as well. Just get it over. Getting handed your backside ain't much fun.
You guys are kinda funny. Legal scholars living on what the meaning of "is" is, but not reading simplistic stuff from a Subject A major at Cal.
And yes, unlike many of your conservative brethren on this site, I actually do think you're too smart to have made such a simplistic "Subject A" statement without consciously realizing the underlying context. But anything to avoid copping to ultimately being in support of a nihilistic political party I guess.
Whether it's electoral college, filibuster, blocking qualified judicial nominees, packing the courts, etc., politicians now are more interested in expediency and getting what they want when they want it as opposed to respecting the traditions, protecting the best interest of America for this generation and next, and respecting the safe guards that have protected the minority against the majority in our history.
And so us pretending that one party is worse than the other when it comes to cheap tricks or eliminating traditional protections is laughable. When it protects their interest, it's a sacred, time-honored tradition. If it gets in their way, then it's relic of a time past that is either racist or undemocratic.
None of this will change as long as politicians have to deal with primaries. The social media creates tribes, leading to only the extremes surviving primaries and culminating in no room for compromise between the parties or different bodies of the government.
Both parties are crap when it comes to these things. It's like blaming the media. The left is so horrified of the right saying the media is biased or apologist for the liberal politicians. But when liberal politicians like AOC or Pelosi get tough questions from even liberal media companies like CNN, what do they say? Fake news or journalists are apologist for the right.
https://www.newyorker.com/news/current/elizabeth-warren-against-the-filibuster
https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/politics/policy-2020/voting-changes/eliminate-senate-filibuster/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/07/31/senate-democrats-filibuster/
So no, I don't think it is laughable to suggest that one party is markedly worse "when it comes to cheap tricks or eliminating traditional protections." A cheap trick is blithely casting aside scores of qualified judicial nominees and a Supreme Court nominee without even bringing them up for a vote because you already don't "consent" to their perceived judicial philosophy. Eliminating traditional protections is getting rid of the filibuster for nominees to the highest court in the land who have the final say on numerous laws that directly impact people's lives and rights. As I expressed to OdontoBear66, what I do find a bit laughable is this notion that we can "both-sides" the two parties when it's clear that one side is proudly obstructionist to the intended good-faith function of government. Or I could just let Mitch McConnell tell you himself what he thinks of good-faith government function.
You're right that a huge problem with compromise nowadays is that way too many members of Congress nowadays fear a primary challenge from the more extreme end of their respective parties more than their actual hypothetical opponent in the general election. You know what the biggest driver of that is? Gerrymandered districts that stuff an overwhelming majority of voters of a particular political persuasion into one district through obscenely drawn district lines. Which party is by far the bigger offender in this practice? Republicans. What was the vote breakdown of the Rucho case at the Supreme Court last year that said politicians are free to gerrymander to their heart's content? 5-4. Who were the five who voted to approve gerrymandering as an acceptable political practice? Each of the five Republican-nominated justices. So tell me again which party has been more destructive to the current state of our politics?
You also bring up the media, which... honestly, I don't know how to really say this without it coming off condescending. The media issue is not a "both-sides" issue either. The right likes to blast the "mainstream media" for calling out conservative lies and Republican wrongdoing. Never does it seem to occur to the right that the "mainstream media" is basing their reporting on provable facts supported by evidence as it currently exists, only that it hurts their side so the media must be biased. The left blasts the media for its too-often attempts to "both-sides" every issue in a fruitless attempt to convince the right that the media indeed follows the facts as they bear out. Tell me, did you think it was proper for the oh-so-liberal New York Times to spend so much ink in 2016 on Hillary Clinton's emails while vaguely touching upon Donald Trump's calls for Russia to interfere in the election and any one of his foreign financial entanglements or obscene insults towards others?
You also cite to Nancy Pelosi, which I assume is a reference to her interview with Wolf Blitzer yesterday. While I don't necessarily agree with the degree of aggressiveness she took, the substance of what she said was very arguably on point - that being that Blitzer didn't bother to ask the specifics were of what is in the Republicans' $1.8 trillion proposal that Pelosi objects to or why the Republicans have been sitting on her bill that has been passed since May. If you didn't know anything about any of the stimulus negotiations over the past few months and only saw that interview, you would be left thinking that Republicans are the only ones who have come up with a stimulus bill and that $1.8 trillion is an incredible number that all goes to unemployed people and shuttered businesses. That is exactly how the Republicans want to frame the issue, and somehow it is always the Democrats who are expected to capitulate and be the adults who accept whatever the other side wants for the good of the people. Or, maybe you want to explain why NBC News (yes, that NBC News that Donald Trump and much of the right continuously blast for supposedly being too liberal ) today decided to reward Trump for running from the second debate by giving him a full hour at the exact same time as an already-scheduled town hall with Biden on a competing network to freely solipsize about how everything he has touched in politics has been the greatest thing in the history of the world of forever and how Biden and Obama and Clinton are the worst thing in the history of the world of forever. It's that level of media fudgery that Democrats complain about, not accusations of "fake news" (though I'd legitimately like to know who exactly you're thinking of on the left who has decried the media as fake news).
- Senate civility was thrown out the window with the Bork nomination.
- Gerrymandered districts do not explain the end of compromise in the Senate. The extremism and lack of civility in the Senate is more through tribal politics where political beliefs define identity, with the other side viewed as treasonous idiots.
- Wasn't talking about media. Was talking about how when media poses questions or criticizes, politicians from Trump, Pelosi to AOC claim the media is biased toward the other side and that the reporting is fake news.
You're right, gerrymandering doesn't really explain the current tribalism in the Senate, and I won't pretend to have some deep, well-evidenced insight into why that is. I would propose, though, at least three potential factors for how the Senate has ended up the way it is. First is the increasing urban-rural divide between the states, which has helped lead to so many states becoming intractably red and thus their politicians more concerned about being primaried. Second is the media environment in which we currently live wherein a major "news" network is allowed to peddle unfounded BS as if it were fact to millions of under-educated individuals who then fuel the extremism that underlies the more rural states' drive deeper toward the right. And third, Republicans in particular have allowed themselves to be led by the nose by a craven, power-hungry turtle named Mitch McConnell whose political nihilism has seeped down throughout the Republican Senate ranks. I suppose you might argue that Harry Reid ruled the Democrats with an equally iron fist but I won't believe that you could argue that his approach to governance has been anything like McConnell's.
Are you saying that Ocasio-Cortez has in fact declared "fake news" at any of the media? That would actually be news to me, which is why I earlier asked who exactly you're referring to when you say that Democrats have called "fake news" when challenged by the media. Other than that, I simply reiterate my point that Republican complaints about the media and Democratic complaints about the media fundamentally differ in substance and adherence to reality.
You wrote quite a bit but yourpost seems to miss the point.
We were discussing civility in the Senate. All I wrote was that the decline of civility in the Senate is commonly understood to have started with the Bork nomination where the gentle side of the Senate was thrown out the window. Look it up. But you took that comment as some support for Bork. Trying to avoid writing pages with the false assumption that anyone is interested in reading someone else's essay.
Well, I don't like McConnell and I think i made myself clear on that point. And I also hated Reid who was a slimy liar (including knowingly spreading false claims about Romney and then bragging about it). I guess it depends on which side you are on. Character matters, and not just your political beliefs.
And AOC and Omar have often accused the media of spreading false news. Not that difficult to look up. In fact Trump Jr even wrote that he knows how she feels.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2018/12/20/welcome-our-world-donald-trump-jr-backs-ocasio-cortezs-complaints-about-false-news/%3foutputType=amp
But if Bork was not a good candidate, why did the Republican administration nominate him in the first place? Did they not anticipate that there would be blowback over a nominee who many on both sides of the aisle did not find to be qualified to join SCOTUS? And to the extent that the resulting blowback was indeed what led to Senate civility being thrown out the window, is it not reasonable to conclude that it was the actions of a Republican administration that caused that? Assuming that's true and absent a more charitable interpretation, I don't see how to read your original evocation of Bork as anything other than confirmation that it was the Republicans who laid the original groundwork for the current state of comity (or lack thereof) in the Senate.calbear93 said:sycasey said:JeffBear07 said:While I believe you probably simply glossed over my original post in this thread to OdontoBear66, I just have to say that I knew exactly that Bork would be the standard go-to response. And to that, I say that one, there was kind of a huge reason (aka Watergate) not to accept Bork onto the highest court in the land, and two, it wasn't just Democrats who voted against Bork's nomination.calbear93 said:Won't go into tit-for tat but couple of counter-point:JeffBear07 said:What you're saying is not an entirely unfair analysis, but its flaw is in its reliance on the mutual acceptance of comity and good faith from both sides. I don't really want to get into a comprehensive discussion of tit for tat at this point unless that was your intent, but I struggle to see how you can argue that it wasn't very much the Republicans (at least with this current generation of congressmen) who first tossed aside any notions of good faith negotiation with Democrats while they were in the minority.calbear93 said:Your argument would be more convincing if the Democrats were not generally in favor or open to eliminating filibuster altogether in the Senate.JeffBear07 said:I see. So McConnell can break the system for judicial nominations, leading Reid to escalate tactics in order to restore some semblance of proper governmental function, and when McConnell predictably escalates further at first opportunity, the primary takeaway by conservatives is "haha IRONY"OdontoBear66 said:No. I was not rightly or wrongly even arguing McConnell's usage of the filibuster for years, and even commented that I am sorry it was lifted. My point was the irony of Reid being he who lifted it and the turnip has turned. Again, not that I like it, but....JeffBear07 said:I've seen this argument from conservative types like you before. Let me guess, you're actually trying to pretend here like McConnell's unprecedented judicial filibusters (what sycasey just said) never occurred, but once forced to acknowledge this, you're going to go back and say that this tit-for-tat all really started with what happened to Robert Bork's nomination in the 80's. Do I have that right?OdontoBear66 said:Reid opened the door in an hour of need. What goes around comes around.sycasey said:There is a long tit-for-tat escalation that got us to this point, but for SCOTUS nominees it is McConnell who removed the filibuster.OdontoBear66 said:I believe you can thank Senate Majority leader Reid in 2013 for that one. Didn't care for it then, don't care for it now. But sometimes what you spit out comes back to bite you in the b+tt.sycasey said:Filibuster for SCOTUS nominees doesn't exist anymoreGarou said:Yes, because the Republicans have never been able to obstruct things with a minority. Even within a minority of their own party stopping the rest of their party.sycasey said:That's not interesting either. Democrats are in the minority and can't stop it.Cool Ice said:What is interesting is how hard the Democrats didn't try to stop it That should tell you about how real their interest is in keeping her off the court (aka, none).sycasey said:There is nothing interesting about a foregone conclusion. Everyone knows the GOP is going to push this nomination through. The more interesting question will be what Democrats will do if and when they win back power.OdontoBear66 said:
Very interesting. It has gotten awful quiet here on this thread. I think the Dems are also not showing with questions, not using their time, possibly opting to vote tomorrow night as well. Just get it over. Getting handed your backside ain't much fun.
You guys are kinda funny. Legal scholars living on what the meaning of "is" is, but not reading simplistic stuff from a Subject A major at Cal.
And yes, unlike many of your conservative brethren on this site, I actually do think you're too smart to have made such a simplistic "Subject A" statement without consciously realizing the underlying context. But anything to avoid copping to ultimately being in support of a nihilistic political party I guess.
Whether it's electoral college, filibuster, blocking qualified judicial nominees, packing the courts, etc., politicians now are more interested in expediency and getting what they want when they want it as opposed to respecting the traditions, protecting the best interest of America for this generation and next, and respecting the safe guards that have protected the minority against the majority in our history.
And so us pretending that one party is worse than the other when it comes to cheap tricks or eliminating traditional protections is laughable. When it protects their interest, it's a sacred, time-honored tradition. If it gets in their way, then it's relic of a time past that is either racist or undemocratic.
None of this will change as long as politicians have to deal with primaries. The social media creates tribes, leading to only the extremes surviving primaries and culminating in no room for compromise between the parties or different bodies of the government.
Both parties are crap when it comes to these things. It's like blaming the media. The left is so horrified of the right saying the media is biased or apologist for the liberal politicians. But when liberal politicians like AOC or Pelosi get tough questions from even liberal media companies like CNN, what do they say? Fake news or journalists are apologist for the right.
https://www.newyorker.com/news/current/elizabeth-warren-against-the-filibuster
https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/politics/policy-2020/voting-changes/eliminate-senate-filibuster/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/07/31/senate-democrats-filibuster/
So no, I don't think it is laughable to suggest that one party is markedly worse "when it comes to cheap tricks or eliminating traditional protections." A cheap trick is blithely casting aside scores of qualified judicial nominees and a Supreme Court nominee without even bringing them up for a vote because you already don't "consent" to their perceived judicial philosophy. Eliminating traditional protections is getting rid of the filibuster for nominees to the highest court in the land who have the final say on numerous laws that directly impact people's lives and rights. As I expressed to OdontoBear66, what I do find a bit laughable is this notion that we can "both-sides" the two parties when it's clear that one side is proudly obstructionist to the intended good-faith function of government. Or I could just let Mitch McConnell tell you himself what he thinks of good-faith government function.
You're right that a huge problem with compromise nowadays is that way too many members of Congress nowadays fear a primary challenge from the more extreme end of their respective parties more than their actual hypothetical opponent in the general election. You know what the biggest driver of that is? Gerrymandered districts that stuff an overwhelming majority of voters of a particular political persuasion into one district through obscenely drawn district lines. Which party is by far the bigger offender in this practice? Republicans. What was the vote breakdown of the Rucho case at the Supreme Court last year that said politicians are free to gerrymander to their heart's content? 5-4. Who were the five who voted to approve gerrymandering as an acceptable political practice? Each of the five Republican-nominated justices. So tell me again which party has been more destructive to the current state of our politics?
You also bring up the media, which... honestly, I don't know how to really say this without it coming off condescending. The media issue is not a "both-sides" issue either. The right likes to blast the "mainstream media" for calling out conservative lies and Republican wrongdoing. Never does it seem to occur to the right that the "mainstream media" is basing their reporting on provable facts supported by evidence as it currently exists, only that it hurts their side so the media must be biased. The left blasts the media for its too-often attempts to "both-sides" every issue in a fruitless attempt to convince the right that the media indeed follows the facts as they bear out. Tell me, did you think it was proper for the oh-so-liberal New York Times to spend so much ink in 2016 on Hillary Clinton's emails while vaguely touching upon Donald Trump's calls for Russia to interfere in the election and any one of his foreign financial entanglements or obscene insults towards others?
You also cite to Nancy Pelosi, which I assume is a reference to her interview with Wolf Blitzer yesterday. While I don't necessarily agree with the degree of aggressiveness she took, the substance of what she said was very arguably on point - that being that Blitzer didn't bother to ask the specifics were of what is in the Republicans' $1.8 trillion proposal that Pelosi objects to or why the Republicans have been sitting on her bill that has been passed since May. If you didn't know anything about any of the stimulus negotiations over the past few months and only saw that interview, you would be left thinking that Republicans are the only ones who have come up with a stimulus bill and that $1.8 trillion is an incredible number that all goes to unemployed people and shuttered businesses. That is exactly how the Republicans want to frame the issue, and somehow it is always the Democrats who are expected to capitulate and be the adults who accept whatever the other side wants for the good of the people. Or, maybe you want to explain why NBC News (yes, that NBC News that Donald Trump and much of the right continuously blast for supposedly being too liberal ) today decided to reward Trump for running from the second debate by giving him a full hour at the exact same time as an already-scheduled town hall with Biden on a competing network to freely solipsize about how everything he has touched in politics has been the greatest thing in the history of the world of forever and how Biden and Obama and Clinton are the worst thing in the history of the world of forever. It's that level of media fudgery that Democrats complain about, not accusations of "fake news" (though I'd legitimately like to know who exactly you're thinking of on the left who has decried the media as fake news).
- Senate civility was thrown out the window with the Bork nomination.
- Gerrymandered districts do not explain the end of compromise in the Senate. The extremism and lack of civility in the Senate is more through tribal politics where political beliefs define identity, with the other side viewed as treasonous idiots.
- Wasn't talking about media. Was talking about how when media poses questions or criticizes, politicians from Trump, Pelosi to AOC claim the media is biased toward the other side and that the reporting is fake news.
And the Senate confirmed Reagan's next nominee anyway, so it wasn't about refusing all comers as McConnell did, it really was just about Bork. There is no real modern equivalence for McConnell's obstructionism during Obama's term. It was unprecedented.
Was not promoting Bork as a good candidate. Kennedy was the better choice. Read what I wrote and not what you think I wrote. Prior to the harsh fighting in the Senate over Bork, the Senate was the gentle side of Congress where things like filibuster required parties to negotiate and compromise. The Bork nomination brought out infighting that seemed out of character at the time for the Senate.
JeffBear07 said:But if Bork was not a good candidate, why did the Republican administration nominate him in the first place? Did they not anticipate that there would be blowback over a nominee who many on both sides of the aisle did not find to be qualified to join SCOTUS? And to the extent that the resulting blowback was indeed what led to Senate civility being thrown out the window, is it not reasonable to conclude that it was the actions of a Republican administration that caused that? Assuming that's true and absent a more charitable interpretation, I don't see how to read your original evocation of Bork as anything other than confirmation that it was the Republicans who laid the original groundwork for the current state of comity (or lack thereof) in the Senate.calbear93 said:sycasey said:JeffBear07 said:While I believe you probably simply glossed over my original post in this thread to OdontoBear66, I just have to say that I knew exactly that Bork would be the standard go-to response. And to that, I say that one, there was kind of a huge reason (aka Watergate) not to accept Bork onto the highest court in the land, and two, it wasn't just Democrats who voted against Bork's nomination.calbear93 said:Won't go into tit-for tat but couple of counter-point:JeffBear07 said:What you're saying is not an entirely unfair analysis, but its flaw is in its reliance on the mutual acceptance of comity and good faith from both sides. I don't really want to get into a comprehensive discussion of tit for tat at this point unless that was your intent, but I struggle to see how you can argue that it wasn't very much the Republicans (at least with this current generation of congressmen) who first tossed aside any notions of good faith negotiation with Democrats while they were in the minority.calbear93 said:Your argument would be more convincing if the Democrats were not generally in favor or open to eliminating filibuster altogether in the Senate.JeffBear07 said:I see. So McConnell can break the system for judicial nominations, leading Reid to escalate tactics in order to restore some semblance of proper governmental function, and when McConnell predictably escalates further at first opportunity, the primary takeaway by conservatives is "haha IRONY"OdontoBear66 said:No. I was not rightly or wrongly even arguing McConnell's usage of the filibuster for years, and even commented that I am sorry it was lifted. My point was the irony of Reid being he who lifted it and the turnip has turned. Again, not that I like it, but....JeffBear07 said:I've seen this argument from conservative types like you before. Let me guess, you're actually trying to pretend here like McConnell's unprecedented judicial filibusters (what sycasey just said) never occurred, but once forced to acknowledge this, you're going to go back and say that this tit-for-tat all really started with what happened to Robert Bork's nomination in the 80's. Do I have that right?OdontoBear66 said:Reid opened the door in an hour of need. What goes around comes around.sycasey said:There is a long tit-for-tat escalation that got us to this point, but for SCOTUS nominees it is McConnell who removed the filibuster.OdontoBear66 said:I believe you can thank Senate Majority leader Reid in 2013 for that one. Didn't care for it then, don't care for it now. But sometimes what you spit out comes back to bite you in the b+tt.sycasey said:Filibuster for SCOTUS nominees doesn't exist anymoreGarou said:Yes, because the Republicans have never been able to obstruct things with a minority. Even within a minority of their own party stopping the rest of their party.sycasey said:That's not interesting either. Democrats are in the minority and can't stop it.Cool Ice said:What is interesting is how hard the Democrats didn't try to stop it That should tell you about how real their interest is in keeping her off the court (aka, none).sycasey said:There is nothing interesting about a foregone conclusion. Everyone knows the GOP is going to push this nomination through. The more interesting question will be what Democrats will do if and when they win back power.OdontoBear66 said:
Very interesting. It has gotten awful quiet here on this thread. I think the Dems are also not showing with questions, not using their time, possibly opting to vote tomorrow night as well. Just get it over. Getting handed your backside ain't much fun.
You guys are kinda funny. Legal scholars living on what the meaning of "is" is, but not reading simplistic stuff from a Subject A major at Cal.
And yes, unlike many of your conservative brethren on this site, I actually do think you're too smart to have made such a simplistic "Subject A" statement without consciously realizing the underlying context. But anything to avoid copping to ultimately being in support of a nihilistic political party I guess.
Whether it's electoral college, filibuster, blocking qualified judicial nominees, packing the courts, etc., politicians now are more interested in expediency and getting what they want when they want it as opposed to respecting the traditions, protecting the best interest of America for this generation and next, and respecting the safe guards that have protected the minority against the majority in our history.
And so us pretending that one party is worse than the other when it comes to cheap tricks or eliminating traditional protections is laughable. When it protects their interest, it's a sacred, time-honored tradition. If it gets in their way, then it's relic of a time past that is either racist or undemocratic.
None of this will change as long as politicians have to deal with primaries. The social media creates tribes, leading to only the extremes surviving primaries and culminating in no room for compromise between the parties or different bodies of the government.
Both parties are crap when it comes to these things. It's like blaming the media. The left is so horrified of the right saying the media is biased or apologist for the liberal politicians. But when liberal politicians like AOC or Pelosi get tough questions from even liberal media companies like CNN, what do they say? Fake news or journalists are apologist for the right.
https://www.newyorker.com/news/current/elizabeth-warren-against-the-filibuster
https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/politics/policy-2020/voting-changes/eliminate-senate-filibuster/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/07/31/senate-democrats-filibuster/
So no, I don't think it is laughable to suggest that one party is markedly worse "when it comes to cheap tricks or eliminating traditional protections." A cheap trick is blithely casting aside scores of qualified judicial nominees and a Supreme Court nominee without even bringing them up for a vote because you already don't "consent" to their perceived judicial philosophy. Eliminating traditional protections is getting rid of the filibuster for nominees to the highest court in the land who have the final say on numerous laws that directly impact people's lives and rights. As I expressed to OdontoBear66, what I do find a bit laughable is this notion that we can "both-sides" the two parties when it's clear that one side is proudly obstructionist to the intended good-faith function of government. Or I could just let Mitch McConnell tell you himself what he thinks of good-faith government function.
You're right that a huge problem with compromise nowadays is that way too many members of Congress nowadays fear a primary challenge from the more extreme end of their respective parties more than their actual hypothetical opponent in the general election. You know what the biggest driver of that is? Gerrymandered districts that stuff an overwhelming majority of voters of a particular political persuasion into one district through obscenely drawn district lines. Which party is by far the bigger offender in this practice? Republicans. What was the vote breakdown of the Rucho case at the Supreme Court last year that said politicians are free to gerrymander to their heart's content? 5-4. Who were the five who voted to approve gerrymandering as an acceptable political practice? Each of the five Republican-nominated justices. So tell me again which party has been more destructive to the current state of our politics?
You also bring up the media, which... honestly, I don't know how to really say this without it coming off condescending. The media issue is not a "both-sides" issue either. The right likes to blast the "mainstream media" for calling out conservative lies and Republican wrongdoing. Never does it seem to occur to the right that the "mainstream media" is basing their reporting on provable facts supported by evidence as it currently exists, only that it hurts their side so the media must be biased. The left blasts the media for its too-often attempts to "both-sides" every issue in a fruitless attempt to convince the right that the media indeed follows the facts as they bear out. Tell me, did you think it was proper for the oh-so-liberal New York Times to spend so much ink in 2016 on Hillary Clinton's emails while vaguely touching upon Donald Trump's calls for Russia to interfere in the election and any one of his foreign financial entanglements or obscene insults towards others?
You also cite to Nancy Pelosi, which I assume is a reference to her interview with Wolf Blitzer yesterday. While I don't necessarily agree with the degree of aggressiveness she took, the substance of what she said was very arguably on point - that being that Blitzer didn't bother to ask the specifics were of what is in the Republicans' $1.8 trillion proposal that Pelosi objects to or why the Republicans have been sitting on her bill that has been passed since May. If you didn't know anything about any of the stimulus negotiations over the past few months and only saw that interview, you would be left thinking that Republicans are the only ones who have come up with a stimulus bill and that $1.8 trillion is an incredible number that all goes to unemployed people and shuttered businesses. That is exactly how the Republicans want to frame the issue, and somehow it is always the Democrats who are expected to capitulate and be the adults who accept whatever the other side wants for the good of the people. Or, maybe you want to explain why NBC News (yes, that NBC News that Donald Trump and much of the right continuously blast for supposedly being too liberal ) today decided to reward Trump for running from the second debate by giving him a full hour at the exact same time as an already-scheduled town hall with Biden on a competing network to freely solipsize about how everything he has touched in politics has been the greatest thing in the history of the world of forever and how Biden and Obama and Clinton are the worst thing in the history of the world of forever. It's that level of media fudgery that Democrats complain about, not accusations of "fake news" (though I'd legitimately like to know who exactly you're thinking of on the left who has decried the media as fake news).
- Senate civility was thrown out the window with the Bork nomination.
- Gerrymandered districts do not explain the end of compromise in the Senate. The extremism and lack of civility in the Senate is more through tribal politics where political beliefs define identity, with the other side viewed as treasonous idiots.
- Wasn't talking about media. Was talking about how when media poses questions or criticizes, politicians from Trump, Pelosi to AOC claim the media is biased toward the other side and that the reporting is fake news.
And the Senate confirmed Reagan's next nominee anyway, so it wasn't about refusing all comers as McConnell did, it really was just about Bork. There is no real modern equivalence for McConnell's obstructionism during Obama's term. It was unprecedented.
Was not promoting Bork as a good candidate. Kennedy was the better choice. Read what I wrote and not what you think I wrote. Prior to the harsh fighting in the Senate over Bork, the Senate was the gentle side of Congress where things like filibuster required parties to negotiate and compromise. The Bork nomination brought out infighting that seemed out of character at the time for the Senate.
First of all, I was barely out of middle school at the time, getting into fights and not caring about politics. So I cannot answer your question on why Bork was appointed by Reagan. But your question is a non-sequitur. The point was that the deterioration of civility in the previously civil Senate started with that nomination long time ago. It was not as a result of gerrymandering.
Garou said:Any chance you'll be intellectually honest at any point about this or will you just continue to pretend that that bill stuffed with Democratic pork was an honest attempt to get relief to the people who need it rather than the people who don't?sycasey said:Garou said:She could have easily answered that herself, but didn't because she doesn't actually want to pass a bill until the Democrats get control of the Senate and the presidency.JeffBear07 said:
You also cite to Nancy Pelosi, which I assume is a reference to her interview with Wolf Blitzer yesterday. While I don't necessarily agree with the degree of aggressiveness she took, the substance of what she said was very arguably on point - that being that Blitzer didn't bother to ask the specifics were of what is in the Republicans' $1.8 trillion proposal that Pelosi objects to or why the Republicans have been sitting on her bill that has been passed since May.
If this is her goal, then passing COVID relief bills out of the House is a weird way to go about it.
I already know the answer, but just wanted to point out how totally bullshyt you are on this and pretty much all examples of liberal hypocrisy.
Maybe you can explain to me how that bill (that is more generous than anything Republicans have offered) does not attempt to help the people. Not by linking to a Krystal Ball video, in your own words.
Regarding civility in the Senate, I refer you to my post immediately preceding this one.calbear93 said:JeffBear07 said:While I believe you probably simply glossed over my original post in this thread to OdontoBear66, I just have to say that I knew exactly that Bork would be the standard go-to response. And to that, I say that one, there was kind of a huge reason (aka Watergate) not to accept Bork onto the highest court in the land, and two, it wasn't just Democrats who voted against Bork's nomination.calbear93 said:Won't go into tit-for tat but couple of counter-point:JeffBear07 said:What you're saying is not an entirely unfair analysis, but its flaw is in its reliance on the mutual acceptance of comity and good faith from both sides. I don't really want to get into a comprehensive discussion of tit for tat at this point unless that was your intent, but I struggle to see how you can argue that it wasn't very much the Republicans (at least with this current generation of congressmen) who first tossed aside any notions of good faith negotiation with Democrats while they were in the minority.calbear93 said:Your argument would be more convincing if the Democrats were not generally in favor or open to eliminating filibuster altogether in the Senate.JeffBear07 said:I see. So McConnell can break the system for judicial nominations, leading Reid to escalate tactics in order to restore some semblance of proper governmental function, and when McConnell predictably escalates further at first opportunity, the primary takeaway by conservatives is "haha IRONY"OdontoBear66 said:No. I was not rightly or wrongly even arguing McConnell's usage of the filibuster for years, and even commented that I am sorry it was lifted. My point was the irony of Reid being he who lifted it and the turnip has turned. Again, not that I like it, but....JeffBear07 said:I've seen this argument from conservative types like you before. Let me guess, you're actually trying to pretend here like McConnell's unprecedented judicial filibusters (what sycasey just said) never occurred, but once forced to acknowledge this, you're going to go back and say that this tit-for-tat all really started with what happened to Robert Bork's nomination in the 80's. Do I have that right?OdontoBear66 said:Reid opened the door in an hour of need. What goes around comes around.sycasey said:There is a long tit-for-tat escalation that got us to this point, but for SCOTUS nominees it is McConnell who removed the filibuster.OdontoBear66 said:I believe you can thank Senate Majority leader Reid in 2013 for that one. Didn't care for it then, don't care for it now. But sometimes what you spit out comes back to bite you in the b+tt.sycasey said:Filibuster for SCOTUS nominees doesn't exist anymoreGarou said:Yes, because the Republicans have never been able to obstruct things with a minority. Even within a minority of their own party stopping the rest of their party.sycasey said:That's not interesting either. Democrats are in the minority and can't stop it.Cool Ice said:What is interesting is how hard the Democrats didn't try to stop it That should tell you about how real their interest is in keeping her off the court (aka, none).sycasey said:There is nothing interesting about a foregone conclusion. Everyone knows the GOP is going to push this nomination through. The more interesting question will be what Democrats will do if and when they win back power.OdontoBear66 said:
Very interesting. It has gotten awful quiet here on this thread. I think the Dems are also not showing with questions, not using their time, possibly opting to vote tomorrow night as well. Just get it over. Getting handed your backside ain't much fun.
You guys are kinda funny. Legal scholars living on what the meaning of "is" is, but not reading simplistic stuff from a Subject A major at Cal.
And yes, unlike many of your conservative brethren on this site, I actually do think you're too smart to have made such a simplistic "Subject A" statement without consciously realizing the underlying context. But anything to avoid copping to ultimately being in support of a nihilistic political party I guess.
Whether it's electoral college, filibuster, blocking qualified judicial nominees, packing the courts, etc., politicians now are more interested in expediency and getting what they want when they want it as opposed to respecting the traditions, protecting the best interest of America for this generation and next, and respecting the safe guards that have protected the minority against the majority in our history.
And so us pretending that one party is worse than the other when it comes to cheap tricks or eliminating traditional protections is laughable. When it protects their interest, it's a sacred, time-honored tradition. If it gets in their way, then it's relic of a time past that is either racist or undemocratic.
None of this will change as long as politicians have to deal with primaries. The social media creates tribes, leading to only the extremes surviving primaries and culminating in no room for compromise between the parties or different bodies of the government.
Both parties are crap when it comes to these things. It's like blaming the media. The left is so horrified of the right saying the media is biased or apologist for the liberal politicians. But when liberal politicians like AOC or Pelosi get tough questions from even liberal media companies like CNN, what do they say? Fake news or journalists are apologist for the right.
https://www.newyorker.com/news/current/elizabeth-warren-against-the-filibuster
https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/politics/policy-2020/voting-changes/eliminate-senate-filibuster/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/07/31/senate-democrats-filibuster/
So no, I don't think it is laughable to suggest that one party is markedly worse "when it comes to cheap tricks or eliminating traditional protections." A cheap trick is blithely casting aside scores of qualified judicial nominees and a Supreme Court nominee without even bringing them up for a vote because you already don't "consent" to their perceived judicial philosophy. Eliminating traditional protections is getting rid of the filibuster for nominees to the highest court in the land who have the final say on numerous laws that directly impact people's lives and rights. As I expressed to OdontoBear66, what I do find a bit laughable is this notion that we can "both-sides" the two parties when it's clear that one side is proudly obstructionist to the intended good-faith function of government. Or I could just let Mitch McConnell tell you himself what he thinks of good-faith government function.
You're right that a huge problem with compromise nowadays is that way too many members of Congress nowadays fear a primary challenge from the more extreme end of their respective parties more than their actual hypothetical opponent in the general election. You know what the biggest driver of that is? Gerrymandered districts that stuff an overwhelming majority of voters of a particular political persuasion into one district through obscenely drawn district lines. Which party is by far the bigger offender in this practice? Republicans. What was the vote breakdown of the Rucho case at the Supreme Court last year that said politicians are free to gerrymander to their heart's content? 5-4. Who were the five who voted to approve gerrymandering as an acceptable political practice? Each of the five Republican-nominated justices. So tell me again which party has been more destructive to the current state of our politics?
You also bring up the media, which... honestly, I don't know how to really say this without it coming off condescending. The media issue is not a "both-sides" issue either. The right likes to blast the "mainstream media" for calling out conservative lies and Republican wrongdoing. Never does it seem to occur to the right that the "mainstream media" is basing their reporting on provable facts supported by evidence as it currently exists, only that it hurts their side so the media must be biased. The left blasts the media for its too-often attempts to "both-sides" every issue in a fruitless attempt to convince the right that the media indeed follows the facts as they bear out. Tell me, did you think it was proper for the oh-so-liberal New York Times to spend so much ink in 2016 on Hillary Clinton's emails while vaguely touching upon Donald Trump's calls for Russia to interfere in the election and any one of his foreign financial entanglements or obscene insults towards others?
You also cite to Nancy Pelosi, which I assume is a reference to her interview with Wolf Blitzer yesterday. While I don't necessarily agree with the degree of aggressiveness she took, the substance of what she said was very arguably on point - that being that Blitzer didn't bother to ask the specifics were of what is in the Republicans' $1.8 trillion proposal that Pelosi objects to or why the Republicans have been sitting on her bill that has been passed since May. If you didn't know anything about any of the stimulus negotiations over the past few months and only saw that interview, you would be left thinking that Republicans are the only ones who have come up with a stimulus bill and that $1.8 trillion is an incredible number that all goes to unemployed people and shuttered businesses. That is exactly how the Republicans want to frame the issue, and somehow it is always the Democrats who are expected to capitulate and be the adults who accept whatever the other side wants for the good of the people. Or, maybe you want to explain why NBC News (yes, that NBC News that Donald Trump and much of the right continuously blast for supposedly being too liberal ) today decided to reward Trump for running from the second debate by giving him a full hour at the exact same time as an already-scheduled town hall with Biden on a competing network to freely solipsize about how everything he has touched in politics has been the greatest thing in the history of the world of forever and how Biden and Obama and Clinton are the worst thing in the history of the world of forever. It's that level of media fudgery that Democrats complain about, not accusations of "fake news" (though I'd legitimately like to know who exactly you're thinking of on the left who has decried the media as fake news).
- Senate civility was thrown out the window with the Bork nomination.
- Gerrymandered districts do not explain the end of compromise in the Senate. The extremism and lack of civility in the Senate is more through tribal politics where political beliefs define identity, with the other side viewed as treasonous idiots.
- Wasn't talking about media. Was talking about how when media poses questions or criticizes, politicians from Trump, Pelosi to AOC claim the media is biased toward the other side and that the reporting is fake news.
You're right, gerrymandering doesn't really explain the current tribalism in the Senate, and I won't pretend to have some deep, well-evidenced insight into why that is. I would propose, though, at least three potential factors for how the Senate has ended up the way it is. First is the increasing urban-rural divide between the states, which has helped lead to so many states becoming intractably red and thus their politicians more concerned about being primaried. Second is the media environment in which we currently live wherein a major "news" network is allowed to peddle unfounded BS as if it were fact to millions of under-educated individuals who then fuel the extremism that underlies the more rural states' drive deeper toward the right. And third, Republicans in particular have allowed themselves to be led by the nose by a craven, power-hungry turtle named Mitch McConnell whose political nihilism has seeped down throughout the Republican Senate ranks. I suppose you might argue that Harry Reid ruled the Democrats with an equally iron fist but I won't believe that you could argue that his approach to governance has been anything like McConnell's.
Are you saying that Ocasio-Cortez has in fact declared "fake news" at any of the media? That would actually be news to me, which is why I earlier asked who exactly you're referring to when you say that Democrats have called "fake news" when challenged by the media. Other than that, I simply reiterate my point that Republican complaints about the media and Democratic complaints about the media fundamentally differ in substance and adherence to reality.
You wrote quite a bit but yourpost seems to miss the point.
We were discussing civility in the Senate. All I wrote was that the decline of civility in the Senate is commonly understood to have started with the Bork nomination where the gentle side of the Senate was thrown out the window. Look it up. But you took that comment as some support for Bork. Trying to avoid writing pages with the false assumption that anyone is interested in reading someone else's essay.
Well, I don't like McConnell and I think i made myself clear on that point. And I also hated Reid who was a slimy liar (including knowingly spreading false claims about Romney and then bragging about it). I guess it depends on which side you are on. Character matters, and not just your political beliefs.
And AOC and Omar have often accused the media of spreading false news. Not that difficult to look up. In fact Trump Jr even wrote that he knows how she feels.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2018/12/20/welcome-our-world-donald-trump-jr-backs-ocasio-cortezs-complaints-about-false-news/%3foutputType=amp
I'm ambivalent toward Reid. I lived in Nevada for a time while he was Majority Leader and didn't have strong feelings toward him either way. All I was doing in my second paragraph was proposing potential answers to your proposition that the Senate has turned tribal as well. That's great that you don't like McConnell; no one of any respectable mind should.
Re: AOC and Omar, I think you overlook my central point on the topic, which I realize I did not fully articulate. That point was that the right has virtually internalized the rallying cry "FAKE NEWS" to include any news that is unfavorable to them, no matter how true or how much evidence has already been provided. The example you provided from AOC is, I believe, fundamentally different insofar as AOC is challenging specific points being made in the Politico article. Could it later be proven that AOC did in fact endorse a challenger to Hakeem Jeffries? Sure, and if she does, I'll be sorely disappointed that someone I currently believe to be one of the most principled members of Congress is not all that different from the rest. That day has not yet come as far as I know, and again, this is still nothing on the scale of what Donald Trump and his sycophants have been blaring since 2016. And this all gets back to my earlier point which was that there is no intelligent way to equate and "both-sides" the ways that Republicans and Democrats have each approached comity and good faith behavior in Congress.
Edited to address your subsequent post:
My reference to gerrymandering was to draw the connection between your statement that primaries are leading to increased polarization in Congress and the actual gerrymandering that leads to more extreme candidates being elected in the general. Nothing in what you originally said presumed to only be talking about the Senate, and frankly I'm not sure why you would be trying to focus only on the Senate in terms of increased extremism instead of Congress as a whole.
JeffBear07 said:Regarding civility in the Senate, I refer you to my post immediately preceding this one.calbear93 said:JeffBear07 said:While I believe you probably simply glossed over my original post in this thread to OdontoBear66, I just have to say that I knew exactly that Bork would be the standard go-to response. And to that, I say that one, there was kind of a huge reason (aka Watergate) not to accept Bork onto the highest court in the land, and two, it wasn't just Democrats who voted against Bork's nomination.calbear93 said:Won't go into tit-for tat but couple of counter-point:JeffBear07 said:What you're saying is not an entirely unfair analysis, but its flaw is in its reliance on the mutual acceptance of comity and good faith from both sides. I don't really want to get into a comprehensive discussion of tit for tat at this point unless that was your intent, but I struggle to see how you can argue that it wasn't very much the Republicans (at least with this current generation of congressmen) who first tossed aside any notions of good faith negotiation with Democrats while they were in the minority.calbear93 said:Your argument would be more convincing if the Democrats were not generally in favor or open to eliminating filibuster altogether in the Senate.JeffBear07 said:I see. So McConnell can break the system for judicial nominations, leading Reid to escalate tactics in order to restore some semblance of proper governmental function, and when McConnell predictably escalates further at first opportunity, the primary takeaway by conservatives is "haha IRONY"OdontoBear66 said:No. I was not rightly or wrongly even arguing McConnell's usage of the filibuster for years, and even commented that I am sorry it was lifted. My point was the irony of Reid being he who lifted it and the turnip has turned. Again, not that I like it, but....JeffBear07 said:I've seen this argument from conservative types like you before. Let me guess, you're actually trying to pretend here like McConnell's unprecedented judicial filibusters (what sycasey just said) never occurred, but once forced to acknowledge this, you're going to go back and say that this tit-for-tat all really started with what happened to Robert Bork's nomination in the 80's. Do I have that right?OdontoBear66 said:Reid opened the door in an hour of need. What goes around comes around.sycasey said:There is a long tit-for-tat escalation that got us to this point, but for SCOTUS nominees it is McConnell who removed the filibuster.OdontoBear66 said:I believe you can thank Senate Majority leader Reid in 2013 for that one. Didn't care for it then, don't care for it now. But sometimes what you spit out comes back to bite you in the b+tt.sycasey said:Filibuster for SCOTUS nominees doesn't exist anymoreGarou said:Yes, because the Republicans have never been able to obstruct things with a minority. Even within a minority of their own party stopping the rest of their party.sycasey said:That's not interesting either. Democrats are in the minority and can't stop it.Cool Ice said:What is interesting is how hard the Democrats didn't try to stop it That should tell you about how real their interest is in keeping her off the court (aka, none).sycasey said:There is nothing interesting about a foregone conclusion. Everyone knows the GOP is going to push this nomination through. The more interesting question will be what Democrats will do if and when they win back power.OdontoBear66 said:
Very interesting. It has gotten awful quiet here on this thread. I think the Dems are also not showing with questions, not using their time, possibly opting to vote tomorrow night as well. Just get it over. Getting handed your backside ain't much fun.
You guys are kinda funny. Legal scholars living on what the meaning of "is" is, but not reading simplistic stuff from a Subject A major at Cal.
And yes, unlike many of your conservative brethren on this site, I actually do think you're too smart to have made such a simplistic "Subject A" statement without consciously realizing the underlying context. But anything to avoid copping to ultimately being in support of a nihilistic political party I guess.
Whether it's electoral college, filibuster, blocking qualified judicial nominees, packing the courts, etc., politicians now are more interested in expediency and getting what they want when they want it as opposed to respecting the traditions, protecting the best interest of America for this generation and next, and respecting the safe guards that have protected the minority against the majority in our history.
And so us pretending that one party is worse than the other when it comes to cheap tricks or eliminating traditional protections is laughable. When it protects their interest, it's a sacred, time-honored tradition. If it gets in their way, then it's relic of a time past that is either racist or undemocratic.
None of this will change as long as politicians have to deal with primaries. The social media creates tribes, leading to only the extremes surviving primaries and culminating in no room for compromise between the parties or different bodies of the government.
Both parties are crap when it comes to these things. It's like blaming the media. The left is so horrified of the right saying the media is biased or apologist for the liberal politicians. But when liberal politicians like AOC or Pelosi get tough questions from even liberal media companies like CNN, what do they say? Fake news or journalists are apologist for the right.
https://www.newyorker.com/news/current/elizabeth-warren-against-the-filibuster
https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/politics/policy-2020/voting-changes/eliminate-senate-filibuster/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/07/31/senate-democrats-filibuster/
So no, I don't think it is laughable to suggest that one party is markedly worse "when it comes to cheap tricks or eliminating traditional protections." A cheap trick is blithely casting aside scores of qualified judicial nominees and a Supreme Court nominee without even bringing them up for a vote because you already don't "consent" to their perceived judicial philosophy. Eliminating traditional protections is getting rid of the filibuster for nominees to the highest court in the land who have the final say on numerous laws that directly impact people's lives and rights. As I expressed to OdontoBear66, what I do find a bit laughable is this notion that we can "both-sides" the two parties when it's clear that one side is proudly obstructionist to the intended good-faith function of government. Or I could just let Mitch McConnell tell you himself what he thinks of good-faith government function.
You're right that a huge problem with compromise nowadays is that way too many members of Congress nowadays fear a primary challenge from the more extreme end of their respective parties more than their actual hypothetical opponent in the general election. You know what the biggest driver of that is? Gerrymandered districts that stuff an overwhelming majority of voters of a particular political persuasion into one district through obscenely drawn district lines. Which party is by far the bigger offender in this practice? Republicans. What was the vote breakdown of the Rucho case at the Supreme Court last year that said politicians are free to gerrymander to their heart's content? 5-4. Who were the five who voted to approve gerrymandering as an acceptable political practice? Each of the five Republican-nominated justices. So tell me again which party has been more destructive to the current state of our politics?
You also bring up the media, which... honestly, I don't know how to really say this without it coming off condescending. The media issue is not a "both-sides" issue either. The right likes to blast the "mainstream media" for calling out conservative lies and Republican wrongdoing. Never does it seem to occur to the right that the "mainstream media" is basing their reporting on provable facts supported by evidence as it currently exists, only that it hurts their side so the media must be biased. The left blasts the media for its too-often attempts to "both-sides" every issue in a fruitless attempt to convince the right that the media indeed follows the facts as they bear out. Tell me, did you think it was proper for the oh-so-liberal New York Times to spend so much ink in 2016 on Hillary Clinton's emails while vaguely touching upon Donald Trump's calls for Russia to interfere in the election and any one of his foreign financial entanglements or obscene insults towards others?
You also cite to Nancy Pelosi, which I assume is a reference to her interview with Wolf Blitzer yesterday. While I don't necessarily agree with the degree of aggressiveness she took, the substance of what she said was very arguably on point - that being that Blitzer didn't bother to ask the specifics were of what is in the Republicans' $1.8 trillion proposal that Pelosi objects to or why the Republicans have been sitting on her bill that has been passed since May. If you didn't know anything about any of the stimulus negotiations over the past few months and only saw that interview, you would be left thinking that Republicans are the only ones who have come up with a stimulus bill and that $1.8 trillion is an incredible number that all goes to unemployed people and shuttered businesses. That is exactly how the Republicans want to frame the issue, and somehow it is always the Democrats who are expected to capitulate and be the adults who accept whatever the other side wants for the good of the people. Or, maybe you want to explain why NBC News (yes, that NBC News that Donald Trump and much of the right continuously blast for supposedly being too liberal ) today decided to reward Trump for running from the second debate by giving him a full hour at the exact same time as an already-scheduled town hall with Biden on a competing network to freely solipsize about how everything he has touched in politics has been the greatest thing in the history of the world of forever and how Biden and Obama and Clinton are the worst thing in the history of the world of forever. It's that level of media fudgery that Democrats complain about, not accusations of "fake news" (though I'd legitimately like to know who exactly you're thinking of on the left who has decried the media as fake news).
- Senate civility was thrown out the window with the Bork nomination.
- Gerrymandered districts do not explain the end of compromise in the Senate. The extremism and lack of civility in the Senate is more through tribal politics where political beliefs define identity, with the other side viewed as treasonous idiots.
- Wasn't talking about media. Was talking about how when media poses questions or criticizes, politicians from Trump, Pelosi to AOC claim the media is biased toward the other side and that the reporting is fake news.
You're right, gerrymandering doesn't really explain the current tribalism in the Senate, and I won't pretend to have some deep, well-evidenced insight into why that is. I would propose, though, at least three potential factors for how the Senate has ended up the way it is. First is the increasing urban-rural divide between the states, which has helped lead to so many states becoming intractably red and thus their politicians more concerned about being primaried. Second is the media environment in which we currently live wherein a major "news" network is allowed to peddle unfounded BS as if it were fact to millions of under-educated individuals who then fuel the extremism that underlies the more rural states' drive deeper toward the right. And third, Republicans in particular have allowed themselves to be led by the nose by a craven, power-hungry turtle named Mitch McConnell whose political nihilism has seeped down throughout the Republican Senate ranks. I suppose you might argue that Harry Reid ruled the Democrats with an equally iron fist but I won't believe that you could argue that his approach to governance has been anything like McConnell's.
Are you saying that Ocasio-Cortez has in fact declared "fake news" at any of the media? That would actually be news to me, which is why I earlier asked who exactly you're referring to when you say that Democrats have called "fake news" when challenged by the media. Other than that, I simply reiterate my point that Republican complaints about the media and Democratic complaints about the media fundamentally differ in substance and adherence to reality.
You wrote quite a bit but yourpost seems to miss the point.
We were discussing civility in the Senate. All I wrote was that the decline of civility in the Senate is commonly understood to have started with the Bork nomination where the gentle side of the Senate was thrown out the window. Look it up. But you took that comment as some support for Bork. Trying to avoid writing pages with the false assumption that anyone is interested in reading someone else's essay.
Well, I don't like McConnell and I think i made myself clear on that point. And I also hated Reid who was a slimy liar (including knowingly spreading false claims about Romney and then bragging about it). I guess it depends on which side you are on. Character matters, and not just your political beliefs.
And AOC and Omar have often accused the media of spreading false news. Not that difficult to look up. In fact Trump Jr even wrote that he knows how she feels.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2018/12/20/welcome-our-world-donald-trump-jr-backs-ocasio-cortezs-complaints-about-false-news/%3foutputType=amp
I'm ambivalent toward Reid. I lived in Nevada for a time while he was Majority Leader and didn't have strong feelings toward him either way. All I was doing in my second paragraph was proposing potential answers to your proposition that the Senate has turned tribal as well. That's great that you don't like McConnell; no one of any respectable mind should.
Re: AOC and Omar, I think you overlook my central point on the topic, which I realize I did not fully articulate. That point was that the right has virtually internalized the rallying cry "FAKE NEWS" to include any news that is unfavorable to them, no matter how true or how much evidence has already been provided. The example you provided from AOC is, I believe, fundamentally different insofar as AOC is challenging specific points being made in the Politico article. Could it later be proven that AOC did in fact endorse a challenger to Hakeem Jeffries? Sure, and if she does, I'll be sorely disappointed that someone I currently believe to be one of the most principled members of Congress is not all that different from the rest. That day has not yet come as far as I know, and again, this is still nothing on the scale of what Donald Trump and his sycophants have been blaring since 2016. And this all gets back to my earlier point which was that there is no intelligent way to equate and "both-sides" the ways that Republicans and Democrats have each approached comity and good faith behavior in Congress.
Sorry, but not inspired by "we're bad but not as bad as the other side." Liberals decry fake news when the media publishes unfavorable articles but, since they don't do it as often as Trump, Democrats are good and Republicans are bad. Pelosi tells CNN that CNN is an apologist for Trump because she got tough questions but shame on those Republicans for crying "fake news" even more. To hell with principle, but the left violates the principles less often so the left is good and the right is bad. Same with throwing out safe guards or lying. Reid can throw out filibuster for judicial appointment and most Democrats (other than Biden) want to throw out filibuster overall but how dare the right throw out filibuster for Supreme Court nomination. McConnell was evil (he was) for not considering Obama's nomination on election year, but the Senate should not consider Trump's nomination until after the election. Neither party stands on principle, and I couldn't care less who does it more. Don't mistake my vote for Biden as some delusion that the left is morally superior. Trump is just exceptionally destructive.
Amen, HTP, Amen!helltopay1 said:
oak---this just in...you are not a traditional Democrat. you are a hard-core lefty-----a world of difference. I used to be a traditional Democrat. I left the party because it started to go bat **** crazy beginning around 1968. The bat-**** craziness has accelerated to the point that JFK, Adlai Stevenson, Harry Truman, Scoop Jackson and Hubert Humphrey could not be elected dog-catcher in the modern day Demo party. The party is now controlled by communists, socialists, marxists, and assorted anti-American types who despise this country . Communism never goes away. It always reappears . Even the current Pope has marxist tendencies. He was mentored by a communist growing up in his native country. Please see his recent, "Fratelli Tutti." reads like a college sociology textbook---Sad!!!!
Mazie for Prez. She'd win the West Coast, New England and Hawaii even though she appears to be quite stupid. What a country!!
JeffBear07 said:Regarding civility in the Senate, I refer you to my post immediately preceding this one.calbear93 said:JeffBear07 said:While I believe you probably simply glossed over my original post in this thread to OdontoBear66, I just have to say that I knew exactly that Bork would be the standard go-to response. And to that, I say that one, there was kind of a huge reason (aka Watergate) not to accept Bork onto the highest court in the land, and two, it wasn't just Democrats who voted against Bork's nomination.calbear93 said:Won't go into tit-for tat but couple of counter-point:JeffBear07 said:What you're saying is not an entirely unfair analysis, but its flaw is in its reliance on the mutual acceptance of comity and good faith from both sides. I don't really want to get into a comprehensive discussion of tit for tat at this point unless that was your intent, but I struggle to see how you can argue that it wasn't very much the Republicans (at least with this current generation of congressmen) who first tossed aside any notions of good faith negotiation with Democrats while they were in the minority.calbear93 said:Your argument would be more convincing if the Democrats were not generally in favor or open to eliminating filibuster altogether in the Senate.JeffBear07 said:I see. So McConnell can break the system for judicial nominations, leading Reid to escalate tactics in order to restore some semblance of proper governmental function, and when McConnell predictably escalates further at first opportunity, the primary takeaway by conservatives is "haha IRONY"OdontoBear66 said:No. I was not rightly or wrongly even arguing McConnell's usage of the filibuster for years, and even commented that I am sorry it was lifted. My point was the irony of Reid being he who lifted it and the turnip has turned. Again, not that I like it, but....JeffBear07 said:I've seen this argument from conservative types like you before. Let me guess, you're actually trying to pretend here like McConnell's unprecedented judicial filibusters (what sycasey just said) never occurred, but once forced to acknowledge this, you're going to go back and say that this tit-for-tat all really started with what happened to Robert Bork's nomination in the 80's. Do I have that right?OdontoBear66 said:Reid opened the door in an hour of need. What goes around comes around.sycasey said:There is a long tit-for-tat escalation that got us to this point, but for SCOTUS nominees it is McConnell who removed the filibuster.OdontoBear66 said:I believe you can thank Senate Majority leader Reid in 2013 for that one. Didn't care for it then, don't care for it now. But sometimes what you spit out comes back to bite you in the b+tt.sycasey said:Filibuster for SCOTUS nominees doesn't exist anymoreGarou said:Yes, because the Republicans have never been able to obstruct things with a minority. Even within a minority of their own party stopping the rest of their party.sycasey said:That's not interesting either. Democrats are in the minority and can't stop it.Cool Ice said:What is interesting is how hard the Democrats didn't try to stop it That should tell you about how real their interest is in keeping her off the court (aka, none).sycasey said:There is nothing interesting about a foregone conclusion. Everyone knows the GOP is going to push this nomination through. The more interesting question will be what Democrats will do if and when they win back power.OdontoBear66 said:
Very interesting. It has gotten awful quiet here on this thread. I think the Dems are also not showing with questions, not using their time, possibly opting to vote tomorrow night as well. Just get it over. Getting handed your backside ain't much fun.
You guys are kinda funny. Legal scholars living on what the meaning of "is" is, but not reading simplistic stuff from a Subject A major at Cal.
And yes, unlike many of your conservative brethren on this site, I actually do think you're too smart to have made such a simplistic "Subject A" statement without consciously realizing the underlying context. But anything to avoid copping to ultimately being in support of a nihilistic political party I guess.
Whether it's electoral college, filibuster, blocking qualified judicial nominees, packing the courts, etc., politicians now are more interested in expediency and getting what they want when they want it as opposed to respecting the traditions, protecting the best interest of America for this generation and next, and respecting the safe guards that have protected the minority against the majority in our history.
And so us pretending that one party is worse than the other when it comes to cheap tricks or eliminating traditional protections is laughable. When it protects their interest, it's a sacred, time-honored tradition. If it gets in their way, then it's relic of a time past that is either racist or undemocratic.
None of this will change as long as politicians have to deal with primaries. The social media creates tribes, leading to only the extremes surviving primaries and culminating in no room for compromise between the parties or different bodies of the government.
Both parties are crap when it comes to these things. It's like blaming the media. The left is so horrified of the right saying the media is biased or apologist for the liberal politicians. But when liberal politicians like AOC or Pelosi get tough questions from even liberal media companies like CNN, what do they say? Fake news or journalists are apologist for the right.
https://www.newyorker.com/news/current/elizabeth-warren-against-the-filibuster
https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/politics/policy-2020/voting-changes/eliminate-senate-filibuster/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/07/31/senate-democrats-filibuster/
So no, I don't think it is laughable to suggest that one party is markedly worse "when it comes to cheap tricks or eliminating traditional protections." A cheap trick is blithely casting aside scores of qualified judicial nominees and a Supreme Court nominee without even bringing them up for a vote because you already don't "consent" to their perceived judicial philosophy. Eliminating traditional protections is getting rid of the filibuster for nominees to the highest court in the land who have the final say on numerous laws that directly impact people's lives and rights. As I expressed to OdontoBear66, what I do find a bit laughable is this notion that we can "both-sides" the two parties when it's clear that one side is proudly obstructionist to the intended good-faith function of government. Or I could just let Mitch McConnell tell you himself what he thinks of good-faith government function.
You're right that a huge problem with compromise nowadays is that way too many members of Congress nowadays fear a primary challenge from the more extreme end of their respective parties more than their actual hypothetical opponent in the general election. You know what the biggest driver of that is? Gerrymandered districts that stuff an overwhelming majority of voters of a particular political persuasion into one district through obscenely drawn district lines. Which party is by far the bigger offender in this practice? Republicans. What was the vote breakdown of the Rucho case at the Supreme Court last year that said politicians are free to gerrymander to their heart's content? 5-4. Who were the five who voted to approve gerrymandering as an acceptable political practice? Each of the five Republican-nominated justices. So tell me again which party has been more destructive to the current state of our politics?
You also bring up the media, which... honestly, I don't know how to really say this without it coming off condescending. The media issue is not a "both-sides" issue either. The right likes to blast the "mainstream media" for calling out conservative lies and Republican wrongdoing. Never does it seem to occur to the right that the "mainstream media" is basing their reporting on provable facts supported by evidence as it currently exists, only that it hurts their side so the media must be biased. The left blasts the media for its too-often attempts to "both-sides" every issue in a fruitless attempt to convince the right that the media indeed follows the facts as they bear out. Tell me, did you think it was proper for the oh-so-liberal New York Times to spend so much ink in 2016 on Hillary Clinton's emails while vaguely touching upon Donald Trump's calls for Russia to interfere in the election and any one of his foreign financial entanglements or obscene insults towards others?
You also cite to Nancy Pelosi, which I assume is a reference to her interview with Wolf Blitzer yesterday. While I don't necessarily agree with the degree of aggressiveness she took, the substance of what she said was very arguably on point - that being that Blitzer didn't bother to ask the specifics were of what is in the Republicans' $1.8 trillion proposal that Pelosi objects to or why the Republicans have been sitting on her bill that has been passed since May. If you didn't know anything about any of the stimulus negotiations over the past few months and only saw that interview, you would be left thinking that Republicans are the only ones who have come up with a stimulus bill and that $1.8 trillion is an incredible number that all goes to unemployed people and shuttered businesses. That is exactly how the Republicans want to frame the issue, and somehow it is always the Democrats who are expected to capitulate and be the adults who accept whatever the other side wants for the good of the people. Or, maybe you want to explain why NBC News (yes, that NBC News that Donald Trump and much of the right continuously blast for supposedly being too liberal ) today decided to reward Trump for running from the second debate by giving him a full hour at the exact same time as an already-scheduled town hall with Biden on a competing network to freely solipsize about how everything he has touched in politics has been the greatest thing in the history of the world of forever and how Biden and Obama and Clinton are the worst thing in the history of the world of forever. It's that level of media fudgery that Democrats complain about, not accusations of "fake news" (though I'd legitimately like to know who exactly you're thinking of on the left who has decried the media as fake news).
- Senate civility was thrown out the window with the Bork nomination.
- Gerrymandered districts do not explain the end of compromise in the Senate. The extremism and lack of civility in the Senate is more through tribal politics where political beliefs define identity, with the other side viewed as treasonous idiots.
- Wasn't talking about media. Was talking about how when media poses questions or criticizes, politicians from Trump, Pelosi to AOC claim the media is biased toward the other side and that the reporting is fake news.
You're right, gerrymandering doesn't really explain the current tribalism in the Senate, and I won't pretend to have some deep, well-evidenced insight into why that is. I would propose, though, at least three potential factors for how the Senate has ended up the way it is. First is the increasing urban-rural divide between the states, which has helped lead to so many states becoming intractably red and thus their politicians more concerned about being primaried. Second is the media environment in which we currently live wherein a major "news" network is allowed to peddle unfounded BS as if it were fact to millions of under-educated individuals who then fuel the extremism that underlies the more rural states' drive deeper toward the right. And third, Republicans in particular have allowed themselves to be led by the nose by a craven, power-hungry turtle named Mitch McConnell whose political nihilism has seeped down throughout the Republican Senate ranks. I suppose you might argue that Harry Reid ruled the Democrats with an equally iron fist but I won't believe that you could argue that his approach to governance has been anything like McConnell's.
Are you saying that Ocasio-Cortez has in fact declared "fake news" at any of the media? That would actually be news to me, which is why I earlier asked who exactly you're referring to when you say that Democrats have called "fake news" when challenged by the media. Other than that, I simply reiterate my point that Republican complaints about the media and Democratic complaints about the media fundamentally differ in substance and adherence to reality.
You wrote quite a bit but yourpost seems to miss the point.
We were discussing civility in the Senate. All I wrote was that the decline of civility in the Senate is commonly understood to have started with the Bork nomination where the gentle side of the Senate was thrown out the window. Look it up. But you took that comment as some support for Bork. Trying to avoid writing pages with the false assumption that anyone is interested in reading someone else's essay.
Well, I don't like McConnell and I think i made myself clear on that point. And I also hated Reid who was a slimy liar (including knowingly spreading false claims about Romney and then bragging about it). I guess it depends on which side you are on. Character matters, and not just your political beliefs.
And AOC and Omar have often accused the media of spreading false news. Not that difficult to look up. In fact Trump Jr even wrote that he knows how she feels.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2018/12/20/welcome-our-world-donald-trump-jr-backs-ocasio-cortezs-complaints-about-false-news/%3foutputType=amp
I'm ambivalent toward Reid. I lived in Nevada for a time while he was Majority Leader and didn't have strong feelings toward him either way. All I was doing in my second paragraph was proposing potential answers to your proposition that the Senate has turned tribal as well. That's great that you don't like McConnell; no one of any respectable mind should.
Re: AOC and Omar, I think you overlook my central point on the topic, which I realize I did not fully articulate. That point was that the right has virtually internalized the rallying cry "FAKE NEWS" to include any news that is unfavorable to them, no matter how true or how much evidence has already been provided. The example you provided from AOC is, I believe, fundamentally different insofar as AOC is challenging specific points being made in the Politico article. Could it later be proven that AOC did in fact endorse a challenger to Hakeem Jeffries? Sure, and if she does, I'll be sorely disappointed that someone I currently believe to be one of the most principled members of Congress is not all that different from the rest. That day has not yet come as far as I know, and again, this is still nothing on the scale of what Donald Trump and his sycophants have been blaring since 2016. And this all gets back to my earlier point which was that there is no intelligent way to equate and "both-sides" the ways that Republicans and Democrats have each approached comity and good faith behavior in Congress.
Edited to address your subsequent post:
My reference to gerrymandering was to draw the connection between your statement that primaries are leading to increased polarization in Congress and the actual gerrymandering that leads to more extreme candidates being elected in the general. Nothing in what you originally said presumed to only be talking about the Senate, and frankly I'm not sure why you would be trying to focus only on the Senate in terms of increased extremism instead of Congress as a whole.
You placed the main blame for the tribalism and end of civility on gerrymandering by the Republicans. My point was that the deterioration started in the Senate as early as the Bork nomination and the Senate is not impacted by gerrymandering. As such, I am disproving your argument that gerrymandering the reason for the end of civility. The main reason is social media and constant feeding of opinions of *******s (including here and including me and you) cause people to ignore the fact that the vilification of people on the other side is not proven true by the people they actually know in real life. That leads to identifying themselves primarily by political affiliation and drawing battle lines by whether one identifies as liberal or conservative. With those battle lines, during the primaries, the extremist will often win. And now that we got rid of civility even in the senate, we are only going to have discord and lack of compromise, with majority bullying the minority.
Respectfully then, I guess we're at an impasse. While I agree with you to the extent that one side shouldn't simply rest on its laurels as the "relatively better" side, I ardently disagree that it is not actively deleterious to be equating both sides when one side is clearly doing it worse. That is exactly how the Overton window gets shifted and how increasingly extreme ideas become incrementally more mainstream.calbear93 said:JeffBear07 said:Regarding civility in the Senate, I refer you to my post immediately preceding this one.calbear93 said:JeffBear07 said:While I believe you probably simply glossed over my original post in this thread to OdontoBear66, I just have to say that I knew exactly that Bork would be the standard go-to response. And to that, I say that one, there was kind of a huge reason (aka Watergate) not to accept Bork onto the highest court in the land, and two, it wasn't just Democrats who voted against Bork's nomination.calbear93 said:Won't go into tit-for tat but couple of counter-point:JeffBear07 said:What you're saying is not an entirely unfair analysis, but its flaw is in its reliance on the mutual acceptance of comity and good faith from both sides. I don't really want to get into a comprehensive discussion of tit for tat at this point unless that was your intent, but I struggle to see how you can argue that it wasn't very much the Republicans (at least with this current generation of congressmen) who first tossed aside any notions of good faith negotiation with Democrats while they were in the minority.calbear93 said:Your argument would be more convincing if the Democrats were not generally in favor or open to eliminating filibuster altogether in the Senate.JeffBear07 said:I see. So McConnell can break the system for judicial nominations, leading Reid to escalate tactics in order to restore some semblance of proper governmental function, and when McConnell predictably escalates further at first opportunity, the primary takeaway by conservatives is "haha IRONY"OdontoBear66 said:No. I was not rightly or wrongly even arguing McConnell's usage of the filibuster for years, and even commented that I am sorry it was lifted. My point was the irony of Reid being he who lifted it and the turnip has turned. Again, not that I like it, but....JeffBear07 said:I've seen this argument from conservative types like you before. Let me guess, you're actually trying to pretend here like McConnell's unprecedented judicial filibusters (what sycasey just said) never occurred, but once forced to acknowledge this, you're going to go back and say that this tit-for-tat all really started with what happened to Robert Bork's nomination in the 80's. Do I have that right?OdontoBear66 said:Reid opened the door in an hour of need. What goes around comes around.sycasey said:There is a long tit-for-tat escalation that got us to this point, but for SCOTUS nominees it is McConnell who removed the filibuster.OdontoBear66 said:I believe you can thank Senate Majority leader Reid in 2013 for that one. Didn't care for it then, don't care for it now. But sometimes what you spit out comes back to bite you in the b+tt.sycasey said:Filibuster for SCOTUS nominees doesn't exist anymoreGarou said:Yes, because the Republicans have never been able to obstruct things with a minority. Even within a minority of their own party stopping the rest of their party.sycasey said:That's not interesting either. Democrats are in the minority and can't stop it.Cool Ice said:What is interesting is how hard the Democrats didn't try to stop it That should tell you about how real their interest is in keeping her off the court (aka, none).sycasey said:There is nothing interesting about a foregone conclusion. Everyone knows the GOP is going to push this nomination through. The more interesting question will be what Democrats will do if and when they win back power.OdontoBear66 said:
Very interesting. It has gotten awful quiet here on this thread. I think the Dems are also not showing with questions, not using their time, possibly opting to vote tomorrow night as well. Just get it over. Getting handed your backside ain't much fun.
You guys are kinda funny. Legal scholars living on what the meaning of "is" is, but not reading simplistic stuff from a Subject A major at Cal.
And yes, unlike many of your conservative brethren on this site, I actually do think you're too smart to have made such a simplistic "Subject A" statement without consciously realizing the underlying context. But anything to avoid copping to ultimately being in support of a nihilistic political party I guess.
Whether it's electoral college, filibuster, blocking qualified judicial nominees, packing the courts, etc., politicians now are more interested in expediency and getting what they want when they want it as opposed to respecting the traditions, protecting the best interest of America for this generation and next, and respecting the safe guards that have protected the minority against the majority in our history.
And so us pretending that one party is worse than the other when it comes to cheap tricks or eliminating traditional protections is laughable. When it protects their interest, it's a sacred, time-honored tradition. If it gets in their way, then it's relic of a time past that is either racist or undemocratic.
None of this will change as long as politicians have to deal with primaries. The social media creates tribes, leading to only the extremes surviving primaries and culminating in no room for compromise between the parties or different bodies of the government.
Both parties are crap when it comes to these things. It's like blaming the media. The left is so horrified of the right saying the media is biased or apologist for the liberal politicians. But when liberal politicians like AOC or Pelosi get tough questions from even liberal media companies like CNN, what do they say? Fake news or journalists are apologist for the right.
https://www.newyorker.com/news/current/elizabeth-warren-against-the-filibuster
https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/politics/policy-2020/voting-changes/eliminate-senate-filibuster/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/07/31/senate-democrats-filibuster/
So no, I don't think it is laughable to suggest that one party is markedly worse "when it comes to cheap tricks or eliminating traditional protections." A cheap trick is blithely casting aside scores of qualified judicial nominees and a Supreme Court nominee without even bringing them up for a vote because you already don't "consent" to their perceived judicial philosophy. Eliminating traditional protections is getting rid of the filibuster for nominees to the highest court in the land who have the final say on numerous laws that directly impact people's lives and rights. As I expressed to OdontoBear66, what I do find a bit laughable is this notion that we can "both-sides" the two parties when it's clear that one side is proudly obstructionist to the intended good-faith function of government. Or I could just let Mitch McConnell tell you himself what he thinks of good-faith government function.
You're right that a huge problem with compromise nowadays is that way too many members of Congress nowadays fear a primary challenge from the more extreme end of their respective parties more than their actual hypothetical opponent in the general election. You know what the biggest driver of that is? Gerrymandered districts that stuff an overwhelming majority of voters of a particular political persuasion into one district through obscenely drawn district lines. Which party is by far the bigger offender in this practice? Republicans. What was the vote breakdown of the Rucho case at the Supreme Court last year that said politicians are free to gerrymander to their heart's content? 5-4. Who were the five who voted to approve gerrymandering as an acceptable political practice? Each of the five Republican-nominated justices. So tell me again which party has been more destructive to the current state of our politics?
You also bring up the media, which... honestly, I don't know how to really say this without it coming off condescending. The media issue is not a "both-sides" issue either. The right likes to blast the "mainstream media" for calling out conservative lies and Republican wrongdoing. Never does it seem to occur to the right that the "mainstream media" is basing their reporting on provable facts supported by evidence as it currently exists, only that it hurts their side so the media must be biased. The left blasts the media for its too-often attempts to "both-sides" every issue in a fruitless attempt to convince the right that the media indeed follows the facts as they bear out. Tell me, did you think it was proper for the oh-so-liberal New York Times to spend so much ink in 2016 on Hillary Clinton's emails while vaguely touching upon Donald Trump's calls for Russia to interfere in the election and any one of his foreign financial entanglements or obscene insults towards others?
You also cite to Nancy Pelosi, which I assume is a reference to her interview with Wolf Blitzer yesterday. While I don't necessarily agree with the degree of aggressiveness she took, the substance of what she said was very arguably on point - that being that Blitzer didn't bother to ask the specifics were of what is in the Republicans' $1.8 trillion proposal that Pelosi objects to or why the Republicans have been sitting on her bill that has been passed since May. If you didn't know anything about any of the stimulus negotiations over the past few months and only saw that interview, you would be left thinking that Republicans are the only ones who have come up with a stimulus bill and that $1.8 trillion is an incredible number that all goes to unemployed people and shuttered businesses. That is exactly how the Republicans want to frame the issue, and somehow it is always the Democrats who are expected to capitulate and be the adults who accept whatever the other side wants for the good of the people. Or, maybe you want to explain why NBC News (yes, that NBC News that Donald Trump and much of the right continuously blast for supposedly being too liberal ) today decided to reward Trump for running from the second debate by giving him a full hour at the exact same time as an already-scheduled town hall with Biden on a competing network to freely solipsize about how everything he has touched in politics has been the greatest thing in the history of the world of forever and how Biden and Obama and Clinton are the worst thing in the history of the world of forever. It's that level of media fudgery that Democrats complain about, not accusations of "fake news" (though I'd legitimately like to know who exactly you're thinking of on the left who has decried the media as fake news).
- Senate civility was thrown out the window with the Bork nomination.
- Gerrymandered districts do not explain the end of compromise in the Senate. The extremism and lack of civility in the Senate is more through tribal politics where political beliefs define identity, with the other side viewed as treasonous idiots.
- Wasn't talking about media. Was talking about how when media poses questions or criticizes, politicians from Trump, Pelosi to AOC claim the media is biased toward the other side and that the reporting is fake news.
You're right, gerrymandering doesn't really explain the current tribalism in the Senate, and I won't pretend to have some deep, well-evidenced insight into why that is. I would propose, though, at least three potential factors for how the Senate has ended up the way it is. First is the increasing urban-rural divide between the states, which has helped lead to so many states becoming intractably red and thus their politicians more concerned about being primaried. Second is the media environment in which we currently live wherein a major "news" network is allowed to peddle unfounded BS as if it were fact to millions of under-educated individuals who then fuel the extremism that underlies the more rural states' drive deeper toward the right. And third, Republicans in particular have allowed themselves to be led by the nose by a craven, power-hungry turtle named Mitch McConnell whose political nihilism has seeped down throughout the Republican Senate ranks. I suppose you might argue that Harry Reid ruled the Democrats with an equally iron fist but I won't believe that you could argue that his approach to governance has been anything like McConnell's.
Are you saying that Ocasio-Cortez has in fact declared "fake news" at any of the media? That would actually be news to me, which is why I earlier asked who exactly you're referring to when you say that Democrats have called "fake news" when challenged by the media. Other than that, I simply reiterate my point that Republican complaints about the media and Democratic complaints about the media fundamentally differ in substance and adherence to reality.
You wrote quite a bit but yourpost seems to miss the point.
We were discussing civility in the Senate. All I wrote was that the decline of civility in the Senate is commonly understood to have started with the Bork nomination where the gentle side of the Senate was thrown out the window. Look it up. But you took that comment as some support for Bork. Trying to avoid writing pages with the false assumption that anyone is interested in reading someone else's essay.
Well, I don't like McConnell and I think i made myself clear on that point. And I also hated Reid who was a slimy liar (including knowingly spreading false claims about Romney and then bragging about it). I guess it depends on which side you are on. Character matters, and not just your political beliefs.
And AOC and Omar have often accused the media of spreading false news. Not that difficult to look up. In fact Trump Jr even wrote that he knows how she feels.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2018/12/20/welcome-our-world-donald-trump-jr-backs-ocasio-cortezs-complaints-about-false-news/%3foutputType=amp
I'm ambivalent toward Reid. I lived in Nevada for a time while he was Majority Leader and didn't have strong feelings toward him either way. All I was doing in my second paragraph was proposing potential answers to your proposition that the Senate has turned tribal as well. That's great that you don't like McConnell; no one of any respectable mind should.
Re: AOC and Omar, I think you overlook my central point on the topic, which I realize I did not fully articulate. That point was that the right has virtually internalized the rallying cry "FAKE NEWS" to include any news that is unfavorable to them, no matter how true or how much evidence has already been provided. The example you provided from AOC is, I believe, fundamentally different insofar as AOC is challenging specific points being made in the Politico article. Could it later be proven that AOC did in fact endorse a challenger to Hakeem Jeffries? Sure, and if she does, I'll be sorely disappointed that someone I currently believe to be one of the most principled members of Congress is not all that different from the rest. That day has not yet come as far as I know, and again, this is still nothing on the scale of what Donald Trump and his sycophants have been blaring since 2016. And this all gets back to my earlier point which was that there is no intelligent way to equate and "both-sides" the ways that Republicans and Democrats have each approached comity and good faith behavior in Congress.
Sorry, but not inspired by "we're bad but not as bad as the other side." Liberals decry fake news when the media publishes unfavorable articles but, since they don't do it as often as Trump, Democrats are good and Republicans are bad. Pelosi tells CNN that CNN is an apologist for Trump because she got tough questions but shame on those Republicans for crying "fake news" even more. To hell with principle, but the left violates the principles less often so the left is good and the right is bad. Same with throwing out safe guards or lying. Reid can throw out filibuster for judicial appointment and most Democrats (other than Biden) want to throw out filibuster overall but how dare the right throw out filibuster for Supreme Court nomination. McConnell was evil (he was) for not considering Obama's nomination on election year, but the Senate should not consider Trump's nomination until after the election. Neither party stands on principle, and I couldn't care less who does it more. Don't mistake my vote for Biden as some delusion that the left is morally superior. Trump is just exceptionally destructive.
Just to tie up this loose end, I think you're probably right that social media and our current tendencies toward forums that at least nominally agree with ours are bigger causes of tribalism nowadays than gerrymandering, though I still believe the latter is a sizable factor.calbear93 said:JeffBear07 said:Regarding civility in the Senate, I refer you to my post immediately preceding this one.calbear93 said:JeffBear07 said:While I believe you probably simply glossed over my original post in this thread to OdontoBear66, I just have to say that I knew exactly that Bork would be the standard go-to response. And to that, I say that one, there was kind of a huge reason (aka Watergate) not to accept Bork onto the highest court in the land, and two, it wasn't just Democrats who voted against Bork's nomination.calbear93 said:Won't go into tit-for tat but couple of counter-point:JeffBear07 said:What you're saying is not an entirely unfair analysis, but its flaw is in its reliance on the mutual acceptance of comity and good faith from both sides. I don't really want to get into a comprehensive discussion of tit for tat at this point unless that was your intent, but I struggle to see how you can argue that it wasn't very much the Republicans (at least with this current generation of congressmen) who first tossed aside any notions of good faith negotiation with Democrats while they were in the minority.calbear93 said:Your argument would be more convincing if the Democrats were not generally in favor or open to eliminating filibuster altogether in the Senate.JeffBear07 said:I see. So McConnell can break the system for judicial nominations, leading Reid to escalate tactics in order to restore some semblance of proper governmental function, and when McConnell predictably escalates further at first opportunity, the primary takeaway by conservatives is "haha IRONY"OdontoBear66 said:No. I was not rightly or wrongly even arguing McConnell's usage of the filibuster for years, and even commented that I am sorry it was lifted. My point was the irony of Reid being he who lifted it and the turnip has turned. Again, not that I like it, but....JeffBear07 said:I've seen this argument from conservative types like you before. Let me guess, you're actually trying to pretend here like McConnell's unprecedented judicial filibusters (what sycasey just said) never occurred, but once forced to acknowledge this, you're going to go back and say that this tit-for-tat all really started with what happened to Robert Bork's nomination in the 80's. Do I have that right?OdontoBear66 said:Reid opened the door in an hour of need. What goes around comes around.sycasey said:There is a long tit-for-tat escalation that got us to this point, but for SCOTUS nominees it is McConnell who removed the filibuster.OdontoBear66 said:I believe you can thank Senate Majority leader Reid in 2013 for that one. Didn't care for it then, don't care for it now. But sometimes what you spit out comes back to bite you in the b+tt.sycasey said:Filibuster for SCOTUS nominees doesn't exist anymoreGarou said:Yes, because the Republicans have never been able to obstruct things with a minority. Even within a minority of their own party stopping the rest of their party.sycasey said:That's not interesting either. Democrats are in the minority and can't stop it.Cool Ice said:What is interesting is how hard the Democrats didn't try to stop it That should tell you about how real their interest is in keeping her off the court (aka, none).sycasey said:There is nothing interesting about a foregone conclusion. Everyone knows the GOP is going to push this nomination through. The more interesting question will be what Democrats will do if and when they win back power.OdontoBear66 said:
Very interesting. It has gotten awful quiet here on this thread. I think the Dems are also not showing with questions, not using their time, possibly opting to vote tomorrow night as well. Just get it over. Getting handed your backside ain't much fun.
You guys are kinda funny. Legal scholars living on what the meaning of "is" is, but not reading simplistic stuff from a Subject A major at Cal.
And yes, unlike many of your conservative brethren on this site, I actually do think you're too smart to have made such a simplistic "Subject A" statement without consciously realizing the underlying context. But anything to avoid copping to ultimately being in support of a nihilistic political party I guess.
Whether it's electoral college, filibuster, blocking qualified judicial nominees, packing the courts, etc., politicians now are more interested in expediency and getting what they want when they want it as opposed to respecting the traditions, protecting the best interest of America for this generation and next, and respecting the safe guards that have protected the minority against the majority in our history.
And so us pretending that one party is worse than the other when it comes to cheap tricks or eliminating traditional protections is laughable. When it protects their interest, it's a sacred, time-honored tradition. If it gets in their way, then it's relic of a time past that is either racist or undemocratic.
None of this will change as long as politicians have to deal with primaries. The social media creates tribes, leading to only the extremes surviving primaries and culminating in no room for compromise between the parties or different bodies of the government.
Both parties are crap when it comes to these things. It's like blaming the media. The left is so horrified of the right saying the media is biased or apologist for the liberal politicians. But when liberal politicians like AOC or Pelosi get tough questions from even liberal media companies like CNN, what do they say? Fake news or journalists are apologist for the right.
https://www.newyorker.com/news/current/elizabeth-warren-against-the-filibuster
https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/politics/policy-2020/voting-changes/eliminate-senate-filibuster/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/07/31/senate-democrats-filibuster/
So no, I don't think it is laughable to suggest that one party is markedly worse "when it comes to cheap tricks or eliminating traditional protections." A cheap trick is blithely casting aside scores of qualified judicial nominees and a Supreme Court nominee without even bringing them up for a vote because you already don't "consent" to their perceived judicial philosophy. Eliminating traditional protections is getting rid of the filibuster for nominees to the highest court in the land who have the final say on numerous laws that directly impact people's lives and rights. As I expressed to OdontoBear66, what I do find a bit laughable is this notion that we can "both-sides" the two parties when it's clear that one side is proudly obstructionist to the intended good-faith function of government. Or I could just let Mitch McConnell tell you himself what he thinks of good-faith government function.
You're right that a huge problem with compromise nowadays is that way too many members of Congress nowadays fear a primary challenge from the more extreme end of their respective parties more than their actual hypothetical opponent in the general election. You know what the biggest driver of that is? Gerrymandered districts that stuff an overwhelming majority of voters of a particular political persuasion into one district through obscenely drawn district lines. Which party is by far the bigger offender in this practice? Republicans. What was the vote breakdown of the Rucho case at the Supreme Court last year that said politicians are free to gerrymander to their heart's content? 5-4. Who were the five who voted to approve gerrymandering as an acceptable political practice? Each of the five Republican-nominated justices. So tell me again which party has been more destructive to the current state of our politics?
You also bring up the media, which... honestly, I don't know how to really say this without it coming off condescending. The media issue is not a "both-sides" issue either. The right likes to blast the "mainstream media" for calling out conservative lies and Republican wrongdoing. Never does it seem to occur to the right that the "mainstream media" is basing their reporting on provable facts supported by evidence as it currently exists, only that it hurts their side so the media must be biased. The left blasts the media for its too-often attempts to "both-sides" every issue in a fruitless attempt to convince the right that the media indeed follows the facts as they bear out. Tell me, did you think it was proper for the oh-so-liberal New York Times to spend so much ink in 2016 on Hillary Clinton's emails while vaguely touching upon Donald Trump's calls for Russia to interfere in the election and any one of his foreign financial entanglements or obscene insults towards others?
You also cite to Nancy Pelosi, which I assume is a reference to her interview with Wolf Blitzer yesterday. While I don't necessarily agree with the degree of aggressiveness she took, the substance of what she said was very arguably on point - that being that Blitzer didn't bother to ask the specifics were of what is in the Republicans' $1.8 trillion proposal that Pelosi objects to or why the Republicans have been sitting on her bill that has been passed since May. If you didn't know anything about any of the stimulus negotiations over the past few months and only saw that interview, you would be left thinking that Republicans are the only ones who have come up with a stimulus bill and that $1.8 trillion is an incredible number that all goes to unemployed people and shuttered businesses. That is exactly how the Republicans want to frame the issue, and somehow it is always the Democrats who are expected to capitulate and be the adults who accept whatever the other side wants for the good of the people. Or, maybe you want to explain why NBC News (yes, that NBC News that Donald Trump and much of the right continuously blast for supposedly being too liberal ) today decided to reward Trump for running from the second debate by giving him a full hour at the exact same time as an already-scheduled town hall with Biden on a competing network to freely solipsize about how everything he has touched in politics has been the greatest thing in the history of the world of forever and how Biden and Obama and Clinton are the worst thing in the history of the world of forever. It's that level of media fudgery that Democrats complain about, not accusations of "fake news" (though I'd legitimately like to know who exactly you're thinking of on the left who has decried the media as fake news).
- Senate civility was thrown out the window with the Bork nomination.
- Gerrymandered districts do not explain the end of compromise in the Senate. The extremism and lack of civility in the Senate is more through tribal politics where political beliefs define identity, with the other side viewed as treasonous idiots.
- Wasn't talking about media. Was talking about how when media poses questions or criticizes, politicians from Trump, Pelosi to AOC claim the media is biased toward the other side and that the reporting is fake news.
You're right, gerrymandering doesn't really explain the current tribalism in the Senate, and I won't pretend to have some deep, well-evidenced insight into why that is. I would propose, though, at least three potential factors for how the Senate has ended up the way it is. First is the increasing urban-rural divide between the states, which has helped lead to so many states becoming intractably red and thus their politicians more concerned about being primaried. Second is the media environment in which we currently live wherein a major "news" network is allowed to peddle unfounded BS as if it were fact to millions of under-educated individuals who then fuel the extremism that underlies the more rural states' drive deeper toward the right. And third, Republicans in particular have allowed themselves to be led by the nose by a craven, power-hungry turtle named Mitch McConnell whose political nihilism has seeped down throughout the Republican Senate ranks. I suppose you might argue that Harry Reid ruled the Democrats with an equally iron fist but I won't believe that you could argue that his approach to governance has been anything like McConnell's.
Are you saying that Ocasio-Cortez has in fact declared "fake news" at any of the media? That would actually be news to me, which is why I earlier asked who exactly you're referring to when you say that Democrats have called "fake news" when challenged by the media. Other than that, I simply reiterate my point that Republican complaints about the media and Democratic complaints about the media fundamentally differ in substance and adherence to reality.
You wrote quite a bit but yourpost seems to miss the point.
We were discussing civility in the Senate. All I wrote was that the decline of civility in the Senate is commonly understood to have started with the Bork nomination where the gentle side of the Senate was thrown out the window. Look it up. But you took that comment as some support for Bork. Trying to avoid writing pages with the false assumption that anyone is interested in reading someone else's essay.
Well, I don't like McConnell and I think i made myself clear on that point. And I also hated Reid who was a slimy liar (including knowingly spreading false claims about Romney and then bragging about it). I guess it depends on which side you are on. Character matters, and not just your political beliefs.
And AOC and Omar have often accused the media of spreading false news. Not that difficult to look up. In fact Trump Jr even wrote that he knows how she feels.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2018/12/20/welcome-our-world-donald-trump-jr-backs-ocasio-cortezs-complaints-about-false-news/%3foutputType=amp
I'm ambivalent toward Reid. I lived in Nevada for a time while he was Majority Leader and didn't have strong feelings toward him either way. All I was doing in my second paragraph was proposing potential answers to your proposition that the Senate has turned tribal as well. That's great that you don't like McConnell; no one of any respectable mind should.
Re: AOC and Omar, I think you overlook my central point on the topic, which I realize I did not fully articulate. That point was that the right has virtually internalized the rallying cry "FAKE NEWS" to include any news that is unfavorable to them, no matter how true or how much evidence has already been provided. The example you provided from AOC is, I believe, fundamentally different insofar as AOC is challenging specific points being made in the Politico article. Could it later be proven that AOC did in fact endorse a challenger to Hakeem Jeffries? Sure, and if she does, I'll be sorely disappointed that someone I currently believe to be one of the most principled members of Congress is not all that different from the rest. That day has not yet come as far as I know, and again, this is still nothing on the scale of what Donald Trump and his sycophants have been blaring since 2016. And this all gets back to my earlier point which was that there is no intelligent way to equate and "both-sides" the ways that Republicans and Democrats have each approached comity and good faith behavior in Congress.
Edited to address your subsequent post:
My reference to gerrymandering was to draw the connection between your statement that primaries are leading to increased polarization in Congress and the actual gerrymandering that leads to more extreme candidates being elected in the general. Nothing in what you originally said presumed to only be talking about the Senate, and frankly I'm not sure why you would be trying to focus only on the Senate in terms of increased extremism instead of Congress as a whole.
You placed the main blame for the tribalism and end of civility on gerrymandering by the Republicans. My point was that the deterioration started in the Senate as early as the Bork nomination and the Senate is not impacted by gerrymandering. As such, I am disproving your argument that gerrymandering the reason for the end of civility. The main reason is social media and constant feeding of opinions of *******s (including here and including me and you) cause people to ignore the fact that the vilification of people on the other side is not proven true by the people they actually know in real life. That leads to identifying themselves primarily by political affiliation and drawing battle lines by whether one identifies as liberal or conservative. With those battle lines, during the primaries, the extremist will often win. And now that we got rid of civility even in the senate, we are only going to have discord and lack of compromise, with majority bullying the minority.
calbear93 said:Won't go into tit-for tat but couple of counter-point:JeffBear07 said:What you're saying is not an entirely unfair analysis, but its flaw is in its reliance on the mutual acceptance of comity and good faith from both sides. I don't really want to get into a comprehensive discussion of tit for tat at this point unless that was your intent, but I struggle to see how you can argue that it wasn't very much the Republicans (at least with this current generation of congressmen) who first tossed aside any notions of good faith negotiation with Democrats while they were in the minority.calbear93 said:Your argument would be more convincing if the Democrats were not generally in favor or open to eliminating filibuster altogether in the Senate.JeffBear07 said:I see. So McConnell can break the system for judicial nominations, leading Reid to escalate tactics in order to restore some semblance of proper governmental function, and when McConnell predictably escalates further at first opportunity, the primary takeaway by conservatives is "haha IRONY"OdontoBear66 said:No. I was not rightly or wrongly even arguing McConnell's usage of the filibuster for years, and even commented that I am sorry it was lifted. My point was the irony of Reid being he who lifted it and the turnip has turned. Again, not that I like it, but....JeffBear07 said:I've seen this argument from conservative types like you before. Let me guess, you're actually trying to pretend here like McConnell's unprecedented judicial filibusters (what sycasey just said) never occurred, but once forced to acknowledge this, you're going to go back and say that this tit-for-tat all really started with what happened to Robert Bork's nomination in the 80's. Do I have that right?OdontoBear66 said:Reid opened the door in an hour of need. What goes around comes around.sycasey said:There is a long tit-for-tat escalation that got us to this point, but for SCOTUS nominees it is McConnell who removed the filibuster.OdontoBear66 said:I believe you can thank Senate Majority leader Reid in 2013 for that one. Didn't care for it then, don't care for it now. But sometimes what you spit out comes back to bite you in the b+tt.sycasey said:Filibuster for SCOTUS nominees doesn't exist anymoreGarou said:Yes, because the Republicans have never been able to obstruct things with a minority. Even within a minority of their own party stopping the rest of their party.sycasey said:That's not interesting either. Democrats are in the minority and can't stop it.Cool Ice said:What is interesting is how hard the Democrats didn't try to stop it That should tell you about how real their interest is in keeping her off the court (aka, none).sycasey said:There is nothing interesting about a foregone conclusion. Everyone knows the GOP is going to push this nomination through. The more interesting question will be what Democrats will do if and when they win back power.OdontoBear66 said:
Very interesting. It has gotten awful quiet here on this thread. I think the Dems are also not showing with questions, not using their time, possibly opting to vote tomorrow night as well. Just get it over. Getting handed your backside ain't much fun.
You guys are kinda funny. Legal scholars living on what the meaning of "is" is, but not reading simplistic stuff from a Subject A major at Cal.
And yes, unlike many of your conservative brethren on this site, I actually do think you're too smart to have made such a simplistic "Subject A" statement without consciously realizing the underlying context. But anything to avoid copping to ultimately being in support of a nihilistic political party I guess.
Whether it's electoral college, filibuster, blocking qualified judicial nominees, packing the courts, etc., politicians now are more interested in expediency and getting what they want when they want it as opposed to respecting the traditions, protecting the best interest of America for this generation and next, and respecting the safe guards that have protected the minority against the majority in our history.
And so us pretending that one party is worse than the other when it comes to cheap tricks or eliminating traditional protections is laughable. When it protects their interest, it's a sacred, time-honored tradition. If it gets in their way, then it's relic of a time past that is either racist or undemocratic.
None of this will change as long as politicians have to deal with primaries. The social media creates tribes, leading to only the extremes surviving primaries and culminating in no room for compromise between the parties or different bodies of the government.
Both parties are crap when it comes to these things. It's like blaming the media. The left is so horrified of the right saying the media is biased or apologist for the liberal politicians. But when liberal politicians like AOC or Pelosi get tough questions from even liberal media companies like CNN, what do they say? Fake news or journalists are apologist for the right.
https://www.newyorker.com/news/current/elizabeth-warren-against-the-filibuster
https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/politics/policy-2020/voting-changes/eliminate-senate-filibuster/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/07/31/senate-democrats-filibuster/
So no, I don't think it is laughable to suggest that one party is markedly worse "when it comes to cheap tricks or eliminating traditional protections." A cheap trick is blithely casting aside scores of qualified judicial nominees and a Supreme Court nominee without even bringing them up for a vote because you already don't "consent" to their perceived judicial philosophy. Eliminating traditional protections is getting rid of the filibuster for nominees to the highest court in the land who have the final say on numerous laws that directly impact people's lives and rights. As I expressed to OdontoBear66, what I do find a bit laughable is this notion that we can "both-sides" the two parties when it's clear that one side is proudly obstructionist to the intended good-faith function of government. Or I could just let Mitch McConnell tell you himself what he thinks of good-faith government function.
You're right that a huge problem with compromise nowadays is that way too many members of Congress nowadays fear a primary challenge from the more extreme end of their respective parties more than their actual hypothetical opponent in the general election. You know what the biggest driver of that is? Gerrymandered districts that stuff an overwhelming majority of voters of a particular political persuasion into one district through obscenely drawn district lines. Which party is by far the bigger offender in this practice? Republicans. What was the vote breakdown of the Rucho case at the Supreme Court last year that said politicians are free to gerrymander to their heart's content? 5-4. Who were the five who voted to approve gerrymandering as an acceptable political practice? Each of the five Republican-nominated justices. So tell me again which party has been more destructive to the current state of our politics?
You also bring up the media, which... honestly, I don't know how to really say this without it coming off condescending. The media issue is not a "both-sides" issue either. The right likes to blast the "mainstream media" for calling out conservative lies and Republican wrongdoing. Never does it seem to occur to the right that the "mainstream media" is basing their reporting on provable facts supported by evidence as it currently exists, only that it hurts their side so the media must be biased. The left blasts the media for its too-often attempts to "both-sides" every issue in a fruitless attempt to convince the right that the media indeed follows the facts as they bear out. Tell me, did you think it was proper for the oh-so-liberal New York Times to spend so much ink in 2016 on Hillary Clinton's emails while vaguely touching upon Donald Trump's calls for Russia to interfere in the election and any one of his foreign financial entanglements or obscene insults towards others?
You also cite to Nancy Pelosi, which I assume is a reference to her interview with Wolf Blitzer yesterday. While I don't necessarily agree with the degree of aggressiveness she took, the substance of what she said was very arguably on point - that being that Blitzer didn't bother to ask the specifics were of what is in the Republicans' $1.8 trillion proposal that Pelosi objects to or why the Republicans have been sitting on her bill that has been passed since May. If you didn't know anything about any of the stimulus negotiations over the past few months and only saw that interview, you would be left thinking that Republicans are the only ones who have come up with a stimulus bill and that $1.8 trillion is an incredible number that all goes to unemployed people and shuttered businesses. That is exactly how the Republicans want to frame the issue, and somehow it is always the Democrats who are expected to capitulate and be the adults who accept whatever the other side wants for the good of the people. Or, maybe you want to explain why NBC News (yes, that NBC News that Donald Trump and much of the right continuously blast for supposedly being too liberal ) today decided to reward Trump for running from the second debate by giving him a full hour at the exact same time as an already-scheduled town hall with Biden on a competing network to freely solipsize about how everything he has touched in politics has been the greatest thing in the history of the world of forever and how Biden and Obama and Clinton are the worst thing in the history of the world of forever. It's that level of media fudgery that Democrats complain about, not accusations of "fake news" (though I'd legitimately like to know who exactly you're thinking of on the left who has decried the media as fake news).
- Senate civility was thrown out the window with the Bork nomination.
- Gerrymandered districts do not explain the end of compromise in the Senate. The extremism and lack of civility in the Senate is more through tribal politics where political beliefs define identity, with the other side viewed as treasonous idiots.
- Wasn't talking about media. Was talking about how when media poses questions or criticizes, politicians from Trump, Pelosi to AOC claim the media is biased toward the other side and that the reporting is fake news.
Civility was thrown out the window when Reagan nominated a Watergate criminal to the Supreme Court. Civility was restored when the Democratic Senate, after taking a stand against a completely unreasonable political appointment, promptly reverted to normal procedure by confirming Reagan's next appointment.
helltopay1 said:
oak---this just in...you are not a traditional Democrat. you are a hard-core lefty-----a world of difference. I used to be a traditional Democrat. I left the party because it started to go bat **** crazy beginning around 1968. The bat-**** craziness has accelerated to the point that JFK, Adlai Stevenson, Harry Truman, Scoop Jackson and Hubert Humphrey could not be elected dog-catcher in the modern day Demo party. The party is now controlled by communists, socialists, marxists, and assorted anti-American types who despise this country . Communism never goes away. It always reappears . Even the current Pope has marxist tendencies. He was mentored by a communist growing up in his native country. Please see his recent, "Fratelli Tutti." reads like a college sociology textbook---Sad!!!!
Keep fighting the Cold War my friend. No one under 70 cares anymore
When you see the House pass a naked bill with no strings attached, you'll know that they're serious about helping people. But you will never see them pass a bill without lifting their precious SALT cap restrictions for their rich friends because that's what they actually care about.sycasey said:Garou said:Any chance you'll be intellectually honest at any point about this or will you just continue to pretend that that bill stuffed with Democratic pork was an honest attempt to get relief to the people who need it rather than the people who don't?sycasey said:Garou said:She could have easily answered that herself, but didn't because she doesn't actually want to pass a bill until the Democrats get control of the Senate and the presidency.JeffBear07 said:
You also cite to Nancy Pelosi, which I assume is a reference to her interview with Wolf Blitzer yesterday. While I don't necessarily agree with the degree of aggressiveness she took, the substance of what she said was very arguably on point - that being that Blitzer didn't bother to ask the specifics were of what is in the Republicans' $1.8 trillion proposal that Pelosi objects to or why the Republicans have been sitting on her bill that has been passed since May.
If this is her goal, then passing COVID relief bills out of the House is a weird way to go about it.
I already know the answer, but just wanted to point out how totally bullshyt you are on this and pretty much all examples of liberal hypocrisy.
Maybe you can explain to me how that bill (that is more generous than anything Republicans have offered) does not attempt to help the people. Not by linking to a Krystal Ball video, in your own words.
"Yogi is right" - Oaktown Bear
Garou said:When you see the House pass a naked bill with no strings attached, you'll know that they're serious about helping people. But you will never see them pass a bill without lifting their precious SALT cap restrictions for their rich friends because that's what they actually care about.sycasey said:Garou said:Any chance you'll be intellectually honest at any point about this or will you just continue to pretend that that bill stuffed with Democratic pork was an honest attempt to get relief to the people who need it rather than the people who don't?sycasey said:Garou said:She could have easily answered that herself, but didn't because she doesn't actually want to pass a bill until the Democrats get control of the Senate and the presidency.JeffBear07 said:
You also cite to Nancy Pelosi, which I assume is a reference to her interview with Wolf Blitzer yesterday. While I don't necessarily agree with the degree of aggressiveness she took, the substance of what she said was very arguably on point - that being that Blitzer didn't bother to ask the specifics were of what is in the Republicans' $1.8 trillion proposal that Pelosi objects to or why the Republicans have been sitting on her bill that has been passed since May.
If this is her goal, then passing COVID relief bills out of the House is a weird way to go about it.
I already know the answer, but just wanted to point out how totally bullshyt you are on this and pretty much all examples of liberal hypocrisy.
Maybe you can explain to me how that bill (that is more generous than anything Republicans have offered) does not attempt to help the people. Not by linking to a Krystal Ball video, in your own words.
So the SALT thing is the only string? Or are their others? You said it was stuffed with pork.
Does either the White House or Senate proposal come closer to meeting your standards?
https://appropriations.house.gov/sites/democrats.appropriations.house.gov/files/Updated%20Heroes%20Act%20Summary.pdfsycasey said:Garou said:When you see the House pass a naked bill with no strings attached, you'll know that they're serious about helping people. But you will never see them pass a bill without lifting their precious SALT cap restrictions for their rich friends because that's what they actually care about.sycasey said:Garou said:Any chance you'll be intellectually honest at any point about this or will you just continue to pretend that that bill stuffed with Democratic pork was an honest attempt to get relief to the people who need it rather than the people who don't?sycasey said:Garou said:She could have easily answered that herself, but didn't because she doesn't actually want to pass a bill until the Democrats get control of the Senate and the presidency.JeffBear07 said:
You also cite to Nancy Pelosi, which I assume is a reference to her interview with Wolf Blitzer yesterday. While I don't necessarily agree with the degree of aggressiveness she took, the substance of what she said was very arguably on point - that being that Blitzer didn't bother to ask the specifics were of what is in the Republicans' $1.8 trillion proposal that Pelosi objects to or why the Republicans have been sitting on her bill that has been passed since May.
If this is her goal, then passing COVID relief bills out of the House is a weird way to go about it.
I already know the answer, but just wanted to point out how totally bullshyt you are on this and pretty much all examples of liberal hypocrisy.
Maybe you can explain to me how that bill (that is more generous than anything Republicans have offered) does not attempt to help the people. Not by linking to a Krystal Ball video, in your own words.
So the SALT thing is the only string? Or are their others? You said it was stuffed with pork.
Does either the White House or Senate proposal come closer to meeting your standards?
"Yogi is right" - Oaktown Bear
You need to update your rant. In the year 2020, republicans like you probably refer to dog-catchers as "unelected bureaucrats." I can't say for sure, but I would be surprised if JFK could have been elected as a dog-catcher when you were a child either.helltopay1 said:
oak---this just in...you are not a traditional Democrat. you are a hard-core lefty-----a world of difference. I used to be a traditional Democrat. I left the party because it started to go bat **** crazy beginning around 1968. The bat-**** craziness has accelerated to the point that JFK, Adlai Stevenson, Harry Truman, Scoop Jackson and Hubert Humphrey could not be elected dog-catcher in the modern day Demo party. The party is now controlled by communists, socialists, marxists, and assorted anti-American types who despise this country . Communism never goes away. It always reappears . Even the current Pope has marxist tendencies. He was mentored by a communist growing up in his native country. Please see his recent, "Fratelli Tutti." reads like a college sociology textbook---Sad!!!!
I know modern-day Republicans worship Reagan, but if we're being honest I think we would all acknowledge that Reagan couldn't be elected chief bloodletter in the modern day Republican party!
Garou said:https://appropriations.house.gov/sites/democrats.appropriations.house.gov/files/Updated%20Heroes%20Act%20Summary.pdfsycasey said:Garou said:When you see the House pass a naked bill with no strings attached, you'll know that they're serious about helping people. But you will never see them pass a bill without lifting their precious SALT cap restrictions for their rich friends because that's what they actually care about.sycasey said:Garou said:Any chance you'll be intellectually honest at any point about this or will you just continue to pretend that that bill stuffed with Democratic pork was an honest attempt to get relief to the people who need it rather than the people who don't?sycasey said:Garou said:She could have easily answered that herself, but didn't because she doesn't actually want to pass a bill until the Democrats get control of the Senate and the presidency.JeffBear07 said:
You also cite to Nancy Pelosi, which I assume is a reference to her interview with Wolf Blitzer yesterday. While I don't necessarily agree with the degree of aggressiveness she took, the substance of what she said was very arguably on point - that being that Blitzer didn't bother to ask the specifics were of what is in the Republicans' $1.8 trillion proposal that Pelosi objects to or why the Republicans have been sitting on her bill that has been passed since May.
If this is her goal, then passing COVID relief bills out of the House is a weird way to go about it.
I already know the answer, but just wanted to point out how totally bullshyt you are on this and pretty much all examples of liberal hypocrisy.
Maybe you can explain to me how that bill (that is more generous than anything Republicans have offered) does not attempt to help the people. Not by linking to a Krystal Ball video, in your own words.
So the SALT thing is the only string? Or are their others? You said it was stuffed with pork.
Does either the White House or Senate proposal come closer to meeting your standards?
Not an answer. Tell me what else you find objectionable about the bill. And do you like the Republican plans better?
Bullshyt it's not an answer. There's all kinds of non-COVID relief stuff listed in there.sycasey said:Garou said:https://appropriations.house.gov/sites/democrats.appropriations.house.gov/files/Updated%20Heroes%20Act%20Summary.pdfsycasey said:Garou said:When you see the House pass a naked bill with no strings attached, you'll know that they're serious about helping people. But you will never see them pass a bill without lifting their precious SALT cap restrictions for their rich friends because that's what they actually care about.sycasey said:Garou said:Any chance you'll be intellectually honest at any point about this or will you just continue to pretend that that bill stuffed with Democratic pork was an honest attempt to get relief to the people who need it rather than the people who don't?sycasey said:Garou said:She could have easily answered that herself, but didn't because she doesn't actually want to pass a bill until the Democrats get control of the Senate and the presidency.JeffBear07 said:
You also cite to Nancy Pelosi, which I assume is a reference to her interview with Wolf Blitzer yesterday. While I don't necessarily agree with the degree of aggressiveness she took, the substance of what she said was very arguably on point - that being that Blitzer didn't bother to ask the specifics were of what is in the Republicans' $1.8 trillion proposal that Pelosi objects to or why the Republicans have been sitting on her bill that has been passed since May.
If this is her goal, then passing COVID relief bills out of the House is a weird way to go about it.
I already know the answer, but just wanted to point out how totally bullshyt you are on this and pretty much all examples of liberal hypocrisy.
Maybe you can explain to me how that bill (that is more generous than anything Republicans have offered) does not attempt to help the people. Not by linking to a Krystal Ball video, in your own words.
So the SALT thing is the only string? Or are their others? You said it was stuffed with pork.
Does either the White House or Senate proposal come closer to meeting your standards?
Not an answer. Tell me what else you find objectionable about the bill. And do you like the Republican plans better?
Additionally, projected budget shortfalls for state and local governments over the next three years are roughly $555 bilion.
https://www.cbpp.org/research/state-budget-and-tax/states-continue-to-face-large-shortfalls-due-to-covid-19-effects
The revised HEROES Act wants to give state and local governments $636 billion THIS year when the projected 2020 budget shortfall is way lower than that. Hmmm. Wonder what pet Democratic pork projects that would go fund?
"Yogi is right" - Oaktown Bear
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