Among American political analysts, Ron Brownstein is better than average. But he can still be frustrating. When you start to write about the 2016 presidential election and respective prospects of the two major parties, you need to begin with the Electoral College. Yes, it is important that white people’s trust in government is down and that the Republicans are continuing to struggle to attract non-white voters. But, much more important is the Republican Party’s need to find a path to 270 Electoral College votes. So, for example, if you are going to posit that growing skepticism about government among whites is going to pose a problem for the eventual Democratic nominee, you ought to show how that might manifest itself. Which states that voted for Gore and Kerry and (especially) Barack Obama are likely to move over into the red column.
All things being equal, heavily white states like New Hampshire and Iowa would be good candidates for this. Are there any signs that those two states are moving against the Democrats? If so, why are the Democratic senate candidates in those two states consistently ahead in the polls?
Moreover, the radical rightward lurch of the Republican Party isn’t going to do them any favors in the multiethnic suburbs of Northern Virginia or Philadelphia. Their strident anti-immigration reform stance won’t help them win in Colorado or New Mexico or Nevada or Florida.
And, if Hillary Clinton is the Democrat’s nominee, her appeal among white working class voters will eat into the Republicans’ numbers in southeast Ohio, likely taking that state out of play.
The Democrats could lose Florida, Virginia and Ohio and still win by carrying all the rest of Obama’s 2012 haul. But let’s say that the Republicans don’t win Florida. In that case, the Democrats could lose Virginia, Ohio, New Hampshire, Iowa, Nevada, Colorado, and New Mexico and still win with 271 Electoral Votes.
So, what are the Republicans doing differently from 2008 and 2012 that will allow them to win Florida? Or Virginia? Or Colorado?
When you realize just how behind the eight-ball the Republicans are, you begin to realize how politically insane their current strategies are if they hope to win the presidency. It’s not enough to raise the general skepticism of government. They need to convince voters that they represent their values, and their brand of extreme social conservatism combined with their nativism and xenophobia just doesn’t resonate in the places they need to win.
But -do- they (as a party, not individuals) hope to win the presidency? If your agenda “NO! No no no, nonono!” and reinforcing the cycle in which your sabotage of the government supports your message of governmental dysfunction, what good is the oval office?
The ‘Green Lantern Theory’ actually works for them. They just need to maintain the willpower to believe lies and watch the country burn, and they’re in good shape. Not to win the presidency, but who cares about that, if the Democratic president can’t actually fix things? In some ways, that’s the perfect position for them: the most visible face of Big Government keeps making promises but things keep getting worse.
The President chooses nominees to fill all Federal Judiciary openings, including the Supreme Court. The Executive chooses the heads of all Federal Agencies.
I agree that today’s GOP absolutely wants to stop government from functioning on behalf of anyone except the upper class. However. there are plenty of absolutely crucial decisions which are not subject to Congressional oversight. Even those choices which do require Senate approval, such as the approval of Supreme Court Justices, are still much different when made by Democratic Presidents. Even radical Senate GOP opposition cannot stop everything a POTUS from the Democratic Party wants to do.
I wish the GOP could care less about who holds the Presidency. Unfortunately, that doesn’t appear to be true. They have now established that they are able and willing to raise a BILLION $ in campaign funds to support their candidate. This ability to swamp the electorate with misinformation will always give them a puncher’s chance, no matter how unpopular their platform is. I agree with BooMan, however: Republican nominees will continue to have an Electoral College problem as long as their platform espouses policies which repel growing electorate blocs.
Finally, it’s not true that nothing has been fixed during the Obama Presidency, or that things keep getting worse during his Presidency. Things are not getting better quickly enough for enough people, but we were headed straight for another Great Depression at the moment he took office. We are suffering through a deep, long recession, but we avoided 20-25% unemployment, we are steadily producing jobs, and our economy and public budgets have stabilized. Obama’s Administration has also executed MUCH better foreign and domestic policies than his predecessor.
Agree with most of your excellent comment here. Would add that if Republicans don’t take the White House they aren’t going to be able to get their war on. Yes, that’s so even if Hillary is the next Prez – she is far less of a warmonger than any member of the current crop of GOP prez candidates, except maybe Rand Paul who will never, ever, in a million years become President.
I wonder if being away from the war machines for a long period will return Republicans to their traditional isolationist stance, which would actually be an improvement.
How long has Obama had us in Afghanistan?
Obama ran on creating a relatively short-term increase in troops in Afghanistan, which he planned to follow with a fairly sharp troop decrease. On that, on Iraq, and in response the other world events which have caused Republicans to taunt his manhood and decry our fall as a world power, Barack has kept his campaign promise to execute a much less belligerent foreign policy.
Where were we with President Bush? Where would we be now with President McCain?
“short term”? So why do I still hear news reports of our soldiers being killed in Afghanistan?
In Obama’s 2008 campaign, he ran on the promise to shift troops from Iraq to Afghanistan, with a sharp troop reduction to come later. He has kept his promise:
http://newsbcpcol.stb.s-msn.com/amnews/i/84/29c416179644d5a8807c82bc712f13/_h0_w628_m6_otrue_lfalse.
jpg
He has also taken a huge amount of criticism for refusing to do as the military-industrial complex has wanted. Fortunately, he has remained with the public on this, not the MIC.
Sorry. I’m not satisfied until the troop count is zero. I’d recommend bombing the country until it was a shit hole except it already is.
Riiiight.
Obama the Peacemaker
Riiiiiiight…
Read on.
Tomgram: Nick Turse, Secret Wars and Black Ops Blowback, January 16, 2014. (Emphases mine.)
All of this before the U.S. involvement in Ukrainian far right-wing politics and terror was general knowledge.
Obama was (
s)elected to be the front man for a different kind of war.Harder to pin the blame. Less photo ops, don’tcha know.
From this:
Remember? All of the triumphant pics of Baghdad ablaze during the initial phase of the Iraq war? (No closeups of the burning Iraqis, however. In bad taste, of course. Booman’s “polite society” in full bloom.)
To this.
And you swallow it all like obedient little children swallowing their media-supplied meds.
Disgusting.
AG
Arthur, I grapple with the realities of what we know, and what we don’t, about our secret missions. They have increased during Obama’s Presidency, and their lack of accountability creates a real threat to our democratic republic and a potential threat to our national security and interests. Yet, even within the supporting journalism you present in this post, there are problems with the truth.
Turse’s section on “Chances for Blowback” highlights Iraq’s transformation from an essentially Islamic radical-free nation to one which now has dangerously radical actors within its borders. However, this does not belong in a discussion on the blowback potential from Special Ops. That was created by conventional war, the type of war Obama has kept us out of. Why is this included? Is it because Turse feels the need to beef up this section because the evidence for chances of blowback are scarce?
It is true that evidence is made harder to discover by our lack of information about where our special forces are and what they are doing. I think Congress and the Judiciary should require our Presidents to reveal more about what their Administrations are doing. But I do not believe it is necessary for the public to know absolutely everything the Executive does in order for us to maintain our democracy and security.
In his chronicling of what he claims we do know, Turse discusses U.S. Special Ops executing trainings in Trinidad and Tobago and other countries which are not hotbeds. I fail to see the potential blowback from operations such as these. Presuming that Special Ops are formed and executed by all Administrations heedlessly and without considering the pros and cons of each operation seems incorrect. We have conducted many Special Ops which have delivered important victories and information. So, when Turse ends by proclaiming that there are Special Ops creating chances for blowback from 134 nations, that strikes me as highly misleading and inflammatory.
The fact that we are not conducting major conventional military operations under the Obama Presidency is a real improvement in our foreign policy. It provides major savings to our bloated military budget, kills, maims and destroys the lives of many fewer people, and presents fewer opportunities for this more notorious cause of blowback. If you were to grapple with these and other truths and realities, your critiques would gain more credibility. With your history of complete denial of these realities, you come off as an opportunistic right-wing crank. You wish to have us respond to the truth as you see it, yet you show zero interest in developing the ability to persuade. I fail to understand what you get out of cursing everyone at the Frog Pond.
Dark rum shortage.
Sheer bullshit.
These “Special Ops” wars create as many enemies as do any other kind of war. Murder is murder, centerfielddj, and as Chaucer said, “Murder will out. That we see day by day.”
You also write:
You fail to see this, eh?
Lemme see…where do you live?
Wherever.
How would your “blowback” filter work if a Special Ops team of some sort assassinated a close friend or family member?
Oh.
I forgot.
Amertican exceptionalism and all that.
Riiiiight…
It does “happen here.” Just not in your neighborhood. Not yet, and the forces who do it are not “Special Ops,” they are:
SWAT cops. FBI. ICE. Homeland Security, CIA, Bl;ackwater (or whatever name they’re using now)…etc., etc., etc.
JFK, RFK, MLK Jr. and literally thousands of less famous victims. All have gone down, and all have left behind one or another form of “blowback.” Every time some nutcase w/a gun fires on innocent civilians in the U.S…that’s the eventual “blowback” of all of this shit.
You’re right in the line of fire, centerfielddj. You just don’t know it yet.
WTFU.
Before it’s too late.
You also write:
First of all…I am not “cursing” people, I am trying to help to lift the curse of media-produced blindness that has descended on the American people over the last 50+ years or so.
Secondly, not “everyone.” There are a number of people here who are trying to do the same work in different ways, especially Oui.
So it goes.
Slow but steady.
Later…
AG
I am trying to help to lift the curse of media-produced blindness that has descended on the American people…
Yes, because you’re the first person who’s ever read Noam Chomsky.
See, what’s comical about all your posturing is that you have no idea who you’re dealing with. You think you’re blowing minds here, when in fact you come off sounding like a teenager who just smoked pot for the first time and discovered that things aren’t always what they appear to be.
And you swallow it all like obedient little children swallowing their media-supplied meds.
I’m curious. What media are you referring to? Where do we obedient little children get our information about the world?
Shit.
You don’t even know when or how you are being fed your meds.
You think it’s “news.”
WTFU.
What do you read?
What TV do you watch? What radio?
Which websites do you frequent?
If the source is connected to corporate ownership, it is providing disinformation at a very high…and sometimes very subtle…level.
This is true from children’s shows right on through the news and what Hollywood will or will not produce as “entertainment.” Say something real in an effective manner and you are non-personed, one way or another.
One way for Ron Paul, another for Edward Snowden, yet another for Mos’ Def/Yasiin Bey.
WTFU.
Noam Chomsky in Counterpunch:
“…its basic workings are invisible.”
Truer, wiser words were never spoken.
WTFU.
AG
Well, I’ll give you one example. One thing I know about Ron Paul is that he’s a Confederate apologist, and where I learned that is from you. As far as all the information that proves how full of shit he is, I got that from history books. I also know that Ron Paul is the kind of racist who thinks the real racists are the people who keep calling him a racist. I learned that from you too.
Of course, you quoted these things in the rather odd belief that they prove he isn’t a racist, but that’s OK. As Malcolm X might say, I am for the truth, even if the person who tells it is so confused that he thinks he’s saying something else.
Original post said that with a Democratic President the republicans would not be able to start a war. I pointed out that with a Democratic President we still had war. AG’s Permagov in action. There are oil interests in Afghanistan so we go to war there independent of the President’s nominal Party affiliation. For the same reason we beg the oil executive Prez of Afghanistan to let us stay even as his troops turn their guns on ours.
Voice, maybe you didn’t get the news:
“Barack Obama formally ordered the Pentagon on Tuesday to make plans for a full pullout of American troops from Afghanistan by the end of the year, pointing to a way out of the conflict that is reminiscent of his end to the Iraq campaign.
While the Obama administration reiterated that it would prefer to maintain a residual military presence in Afghanistan, the Afghan president, Hamid Karzai, has refused to sign an accord that would pave the way for some US forces to remain. That has forced the administration to begin a contingency plan for a full departure after Nato formally ends hostilities in November.
A similar rebuke from the Iraqi government prompted all almost all US troops to leave there in 2011.”
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/feb/25/obama-pentagon-us-troops-withdrawal-afghanistan
In trying to read the levels of kabuki here, I suggest that the last quoted paragraph here should be given a large amount of consideration. With the Obama Administration’s Iraq action as a preface, claiming “…we beg the oil executive Prez of Afghanistan to let us stay” might be a poor description of what is actually happening.
Oh, yeah, and this was some inaccurate labeling:
“…so we go to war there independent of the President’s nominal Party affiliation.” Barack Obama did not make the decision for us to GO to war in Afghanistan.
Has Obama caused us to go to war in any country? Is his foreign policy vastly superior to any that would have been executed by McCain or Romney? He’s been not just better than the Crazy Party, he’s been a LOT better.
Oh. I guess those news stories about Afghan trainees killing their US trainers are all fakes.
We are not down to zero troops overseas. Our foreign policy is not perfect. That’s real.
Yet, in whole it has vastly improved since 2009. Yet, Obama has successfully extricated us from the major troop commitments we held when he took office. Yet, he has kept his campaign promises in this area. That’s real too.
Let’s not talk past each other.
And have traffic on this board fall to zero?
When you realize just how behind the eight-ball the Republicans are, you begin to realize how politically insane their current strategies are if they hope to win the presidency.
Which means the “Ready for Hillary” crew better be putting their talents to use getting Democrats elected to the House and Senate in ’14. Because with out Democrats regaining the House by ’16, getting Hillary elected, if that’s what happens, will not amount to much. And might result in what ever Democrat becoming President in ’16 being a one-term’er.
This.
If Ohio, Michigan, Florida, North Carolina and Wisconsin make it impossible for Democrats to win back the House with voter suppression and gerrymandering, Hillary’s going to have a really short ride.
And in 2020, if we give state legislatures and governor’s mansions to the GOP like we did in 2010, we’ll be screwed for another decade.
I feel obliged to post something about PermaGov here, as AG isn’t around.
Bet on it.
I think you’re underestimating the passionate attachment to legalized dope, electronic privacy, and drone-free skies that the average resident of Megis, Athens, and Washington Counties.
Don’t have time to read the article, but is there any mention of one of the main reasons white people are losing faith in the government? You know, the fact that there is a black man in the WH?
Run a white person and a lot of the white angst against democrats will go away.
And if the republicans insist on putting people on the ballot that everyone knows wants to kill Social Security ::Cough Ryan Cough:: and that angst will REALLY go away.
And the republicans WILL put a person on the ballot that everyone knows wants to kill SSS. It’s who they are.
.
BTW, that article is a piece of hack trash. Nothing more than ‘both sides do it’ crap, with most of the words discussing Clinton problems and how ineffective they will be, with an ending commenting on Cruz and Ryan nascent efforts on urban poverty.
REALLY? The Cruz and Ryan ‘efforts’ are that we should cut taxes for the rich! Is the author an idiot?
What a hack.
.
The problem with the all-white people strategy has always been that white people are not a monolithic bloc. And in fact things have reached the point where the Republicans can no longer appeal to their core of white supporters without alienating all other white people.
Then again, I’m not even sure that I’m white myself anymore. I’m European, but then Jorge Ramos is just as European as I am, only he’s not quite white somehow because he’s Mexican. But then I have to wonder where that leaves me. Non-Latinos are typically referred to as Anglo, but then I’m no more Anglo than I am Latino. One thing I do have in common with Latinos, though, is that all my ancestors were non-English speaking Catholics. And that right there means nativism isn’t for me.
“Non-Latinos are typically referred to as Anglo, but then I’m no more Anglo than I am Latino. One thing I do have in common with Latinos, though, is that all my ancestors were non-English speaking Catholics. “
Same with me and I carry a West African gene marker but I don’t know where it came from.
If your party doesn’t believe in government then it isn’t really interested in winning the POTUS any more than it is in governing. What is important is holding just enough power to keep government from doing anything. Or at least anything that will infringe of some folks god given right to have and use guns, hate who and what they want and generally be left alone and apart from the mongrel hoards.
They don’t need thinking competent candidates. Just warm bodies who can win their gerrymandered seats and keep the base angry.
In fact having a democrats in the White House helps because they have a foil to blame for why things are so fucked and as evidence that government is the cause of all evil. That fills a lot of pockets with donations too.
Andrew, what you’re describing here is a mirror image of what BooMan has repeatedly noted as a flaw with the POV of many liberal activists. Positioning your movement as eternal insurgents mistrustful of and/or opposed to governance makes it more difficult to get the broader electorate to trust you with the job of governing. Expressing nonstop complaints about the way your supported candidates govern makes it harder yet.
The modern conservative movement does want the power to govern, though. In order to gain that power, they want to remake the electorate, rather than be made to remake their policy positions and emphases. This is why, for example, they will not be able to stop blabbing on about Voter ID laws, even though it will continue to lose them wide blocs of voters. The essential illegitimacy of people who vote for Democrats and gain support from the Democratic party platform is an essential part of the modern conservative worldview.
Liberal politicians and their supporters are un-American. This has been their view for decades. I often think these days about this portion of the testimony given to a public Senate hearing on Watergate by John Mitchell, Nixon’s first Attorney General and Re-Election campaign chair:
“Mitchell admitted under oath that in 1972 he knew about the subsequent Watergate cover-up — the high level administration effort to thwart the investigation of the break-in — and said nothing about it to then-President Nixon, “so he could go on through the campaign without being involved.”
When chastised for placing the “expediency” of Nixon’s election above his own responsibility to inform the president about what was happening, Mitchell responded, “In my mind, the reelection of Richard Nixon, compared to what was on the other side, was so important that I put it in exactly that context.”
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/national/longterm/watergate/stories/mitchobit.htm
The chief law enforcement officer of the United States decided that his President’s political opponents were so illegitimate that breaking the law to prevent them from gaining power was not only acceptable, but deeply patriotic.
That’s some sick, dangerous shit right there.
I think it is likely certain that for those voting on the right they want their candidate to win. And I think at the state and local level the state and local leaders want to win. It fits with their ideology of home rule and local control and it helps reduce government role in more of day to day life like supposedly keeping down property taxes. See Christy killing a hugely needed and job producing tunnel project. Voter ID laws help with that.
But if they were truly interested in winning national office they would be more concerned about getting to 270 and broadening their base and actually passing legislation into law in congress
Falling in line with their Unifying Theory that all liberals are illegitimate in one way or another, conservatives believe Real Americans overwhelmingly support their preferred policies and candidates, and those voters who have been getting Obama over the 270 threshold are non-citizens, impersonating other voters- fraudulent in general. That’s how conservatives can make themselves believe that they don’t have to change their positions in order to get to 270 Electoral College votes if you only counted the Real American votes.
What can get fascinating when you read wingnut website comment threads is that you will find all sorts of conservatives who will just openly write “If you can’t get ID today, you’re too lazy or stupid to vote anyway.” That’s where the mask comes off and their illegal agenda is revealed. That’s also where they reveal that they are completely ignorant of what the poor, infirm and younger voters go through in their daily lives. That ignorance is, of course, willful. People who support Democratic Party-supported candidates and platform issues need to be non-personed, and so they are.
Hell, there’s an active belief right here that all governments are illegitimate in one way or another, and that takes the liberals out, along with the conservatives.
There’s your Unifying Theory that Unifies All Unifying Theories.
You describe the likely average voter on the (far) right. I agree. They aren’t the ones leading the party though and those folks seem to have no interest in counting to 270. They are too busy counting contributions and I suspect they think they will get richer staying in the national minority.
The megawealthy who finance the increasingly megaexpensive Presidential campaigns and their parallel PACs will get sick of losing election after election. The grifting consultants will become unable to milk the plutocrats if they offer only failure.
At some point someone has to tell the Big Money Boys they can’t continue to link arms with the religious fundamentalists and expect to win the Presidency. Forcing their candidates to take their economic policies from “Atlas Shrugged”, their women’s rights platform from “The Handmaiden’s Tale” and their homeland security program from “Robocop” does not provide a realistic path to the White House.
Is she the only Democrat who has “appeal among white working class voters” and can “eat into the Republicans’ numbers in southeast Ohio, likely taking that state out of play” or might there be other Democrats from, say, Delaware by way of Scranton, who may have some “appeal among white working class voters” and could also “eat into the Republicans’ numbers in southeast Ohio, likely taking that state out of play” maybe?
Biden. Delaware. Credit cards and corporate headquarters.
Sheesh.
We went over all of this at DKos last time Biden ran.
Not acceptable.
I’m voting for August Bebel. He’s dead. He’s a real socialist. And he’s not even American, so he’s freed from the imperialist taint.
Or Jean Jaurès. I can’t decide.
My point is simply that any of a couple dozen Democrats could achieve the same results that are being attributed exclusively to a potential Clinton run, Biden just being the most obvious example.
Yeah. Hillary is famous for being famous. She hasn’t announced and neither has anyone else. So naturally she’s got a lock. She always has a lock.
I thought you were voting for Debs? Has he already disappointed you?
American. Therefore complicit.
It’s axiomatic.
when you’re right, you’re right
How could I be so blind?