The New American Politics thread

[Street Pharmacist]

Originally Posted by nik-

This has been brought up a few times in the media, and it sheds a pretty sinister light on the fact that Trump's stated policy towards Ukraine diverges greatly from the Republican standard.

At this point though I don't think it matters. Trump has the voter base he's going to have in the end. He's going to lose, but I really can't imagine what else could happen to cause him to lose those core fanatics and people who will vote red no matter what.

"I could stand in the middle of 5th Avenue and shoot somebody and I wouldn't lose voters," Trump said...

[Sidney Crosby's Hat]

Originally Posted by Street Pharmacist

"I could stand in the middle of 5th Avenue and shoot somebody and I wouldn't lose voters," Trump said...

Depends who he shoots, obviously!

[Red Ice Player]

Originally Posted by nik-

This has been brought up a few times in the media, and it sheds a pretty sinister light on the fact that Trump's stated policy towards Ukraine diverges greatly from the Republican standard.

At this point though I don't think it matters. Trump has the voter base he's going to have in the end. He's going to lose, but I really can't imagine what else could happen to cause him to lose those core fanatics and people who will vote red no matter what.

The exodus won't be from his core supporters, who are delusional. The Republican party just might have to disown him to have any chance of retaining control of the Senate. Even Congress might be in danger, though with gerrymandering it's probably still safely GOP.

[driveway]

A lot of his core supporters were very disappointed with his endorsement of Paul Ryan. These people hate "Establishement Republicans" or the "GOPe" as much if not more than Democrats or Liberals. They view any kind of compromise or even a whisper of anything other than obstinate antagonism to Obama as high treason.

Trump could start to lose their support by saying things like the following: "The media are, generally, pretty accurate." "John Boehner did a good job." Or "bi-partisan compromise is necessary and desirable."

Any comments like that and they'll declare that the "Uniparty" has gotten to Trump and America is doomed.

[Senator Clay Davis]

My favorite part of the Manafort story isn't the story itself, it's that Corey Lewandowski tweeted a link to the article. Even though he's (allegedly) still being paid by the Trump campaign, his hatred of Manafort supersedes that. And it leads to this awesome sequence of tweeting.

[Fozzie_DeBear]

Originally Posted by nik-

This has been brought up a few times in the media, and it sheds a pretty sinister light on the fact that Trump's stated policy towards Ukraine diverges greatly from the Republican standard.

At this point though I don't think it matters. Trump has the voter base he's going to have in the end. He's going to lose, but I really can't imagine what else could happen to cause him to lose those core fanatics and people who will vote red no matter what.

I'm getting increasingly concerned of the fallout from the Trump loss...especially if the disenfranchised don't get placated by 2020. We could see someone worse than Trump tap into a deeper and blacker well of angst.

[nik-]

I'm more worried about someone getting shot than who the Republicans put up in 2020. If they want to keep letting their process get hijacked by these people and then get dominated in the general, that's totally fine.

[Street Pharmacist]

Originally Posted by Fozzie_DeBear

I'm getting increasingly concerned of the fallout from the Trump loss...especially if the disenfranchised don't get placated by 2020. We could see someone worse than Trump tap into a deeper and blacker well of angst.

They're being increasingly marginalized. That can't win

[Senator Clay Davis]

The battle for the GOP's soul will happen after November. It'll be the Ted Cruz faction against the Paul Ryan/Mitt Romney faction. If the Cruz faction wins then yeah they will likely nominate a candidate as bad or worse in 2020. At the same time even if the Ryan/Romney faction wins, that candidate who will be "better" in 2020 will still agree with 80-90% of what Trump wants to do. So how much "better" is that really? Less outwardly #######-ish?

[nik-]

Paul Ryan is also a piece of ####.

[GGG]

Originally Posted by Fozzie_DeBear

I'm getting increasingly concerned of the fallout from the Trump loss...especially if the disenfranchised don't get placated by 2020. We could see someone worse than Trump tap into a deeper and blacker well of angst.

What % do you think is the disenfranchised?

If you look at Trumps 35% in the general a lot of that is still Scotus republicans who while may overlap the tea party, trumpers I still think they are a distinct group. Trumps probably got about 20-25% of Republican Party members which would likely be a fair representation of the disenfranchised right.

So I don't think they represent a group that can actually do anything. The rebuild of the republicans will probably include a close look at the nomination process, the winner take all states, closed or open primaries, super delegates to fix things. Essentially they will try to limit the influence of the small but vocal elements of their party.

Now what the Real Americans do as a result of this shift to the center I don't know but the establishment republicans will get a lot closer to the democrat model to build a firewall around the fringe.

[octothorp]

Originally Posted by GGG

What % do you think is the disenfranchised?

If you look at Trumps 35% in the general a lot of that is still Scotus republicans who while may overlap the tea party, trumpers I still think they are a distinct group. Trumps probably got about 20-25% of Republican Party members which would likely be a fair representation of the disenfranchised right.

So I don't think they represent a group that can actually do anything. The rebuild of the republicans will probably include a close look at the nomination process, the winner take all states, closed or open primaries, super delegates to fix things. Essentially they will try to limit the influence of the small but vocal elements of their party.

Now what the Real Americans do as a result of this shift to the center I don't know but the establishment republicans will get a lot closer to the democrat model to build a firewall around the fringe.

Yeah, I think there will be a serious look at overhauling the RNC nomination process, but they need to do so in such a way that it doesn't look like they're trying to unduly affect the process. So introducing some type of superdelegates, I can't see. But definitely trying to get rid of the winner-take-all states seems defensible.

Trump was targeting low-propensity primary voters, so it will be interesting to see what happens during the next cycle. Does the RNC even try to keep these people engaged? Do they hope that those people forget about the primaries next time around and just turn out for the general?

I'm just going to put out there that I don't think it's a given that Trump doesn't run for the nomination again, no matter how humiliating this defeat is. I think he'll spend the next three years denying any interest, and then in about April 2019, he'll start putting out some 'maybe I should...' type tweets. And at that point, his own crazy motivations could make him take it further; I think he's more addicted to the attention than caring about defeat, and the lure of all that attention again might be too much for him to resist.

[Parallex]

Originally Posted by Senator Clay Davis

The battle for the GOP's soul will happen after November.

That's said after every election they don't win. There will be a battle but it won't be so much a public one. It'll be at the professional "process" level as they work to enact barriers to make it hard for non-professionals (like Trump) to compete with professionals

Originally Posted by Senator Clay Davis

It'll be the Ted Cruz faction against the Paul Ryan/Mitt Romney faction. If the Cruz faction wins then yeah they will likely nominate a candidate as bad or worse in 2020.

I think that would probably be the best outcome (long-term) for the GOP. Since Trump won the nomination many of them are still able to delude themselves into thinking that the issue is that the candidate isn't "conservative enough". The GOP isn't going anywhere at the executive level until they're able to reconcile themselves with the fact that their white conservative "base" no longer represents a winning coalition. They (The GOP) will always be conservative... but they really need to redefine what it means to be conservative because the ever more narrow brush they're using now doesn't seem capable of collecting 270 electoral college votes.

[killer_carlson]

Originally Posted by GGG

What % do you think is the disenfranchised?

If you look at Trumps 35% in the general a lot of that is still Scotus republicans who while may overlap the tea party, trumpers I still think they are a distinct group. Trumps probably got about 20-25% of Republican Party members which would likely be a fair representation of the disenfranchised right.

So I don't think they represent a group that can actually do anything. The rebuild of the republicans will probably include a close look at the nomination process, the winner take all states, closed or open primaries, super delegates to fix things. Essentially they will try to limit the influence of the small but vocal elements of their party.

Now what the Real Americans do as a result of this shift to the center I don't know but the establishment republicans will get a lot closer to the democrat model to build a firewall around the fringe.

I think that number is high. And I think it grows when you add the disenfranchised on the left as well. Half? Getting there.

Democrats need to start recognizing that the status quo doesn't work for a large percentage of Americans.

[Looch City]

Check this out guys:

Trump to propose political tests for immigrants
http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/trump-p...ants-1.3721288

Trump is also expected to propose creating a new, ideological test for admission to the country that would assess a candidate's stances on issues like religious freedom, gender equality and gay rights. Through questionnaires, searching social media, interviewing friends and family or other means, applicants would be vetted to see whether they support American values like tolerance and pluralism.

The candidate is also expected to call in the speech for declaring in explicit terms that, like during the Cold War, the nation is in an ideological conflict with radical Islam.

...is this real life? How about vetting that test against your own supporters first, I wonder how that would go!

[GGG]

Originally Posted by killer_carlson

I think that number is high. And I think it grows when you add the disenfranchised on the left as well. Half? Getting there.

Democrats need to start recognizing that the status quo doesn't work for a large percentage of Americans.

If the right could get passed the social issues you could have a disenfranchised party of the proletariat that could be a significant force. However the social wedge between the what the left would call racist misogynists and what the right would call immoral hethans prevents that from happening.

However I see a republican move to the left coming as a result, so that means the dems will have to go back further left as well. Once the Scotus issue isn't such a critical election issue The left can stay home / vote third party to pull the dems back to the left.

The issue on the left right now is that the Republicans have ceded so much ground in the middle that the Dems don't need to attract the left.

[CorsiHockeyLeague]

^I don't think that's an "issue"; it's a good thing. If the left can come back a bit to the centre we'll all be better off for it. If the GOP does so, that's good too, but I don't really expect that.

[Drak]

Hillary is roasting Donald pretty hard right now.

[jayswin]

Originally Posted by Iggy City

Check this out guys:

Trump to propose political tests for immigrants
http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/trump-p...ants-1.3721288

Trump is also expected to propose creating a new, ideological test for admission to the country that would assess a candidate's stances on issues like religious freedom, gender equality and gay rights. Through questionnaires, searching social media, interviewing friends and family or other means, applicants would be vetted to see whether they support American values like tolerance and pluralism.




...is this real life? How about vetting that test against your own supporters first, I wonder how that would go!

Hey, it's Thor's idea for Iceland from the "regressive left" thread!! Thor, you've got a supporter in Donald Trump

[John Doe]

Originally Posted by CorsiHockeyLeague

^I don't think that's an "issue"; it's a good thing. If the left can come back a bit to the centre we'll all be better off for it. If the GOP does so, that's good too, but I don't really expect that.

Why would the left do that?