Yeah, but the more the public sees it the harder they hate it. They're not really responding well to traditional incentives, but they're also trying their damndest to hide this thing as long as possible prior to voting. There's probably a reason for that.
If we try to fillibuster something they care about, they'll kill it. But McConnell doesn't want to actually have to do it because the House is insane and will force votes on shit they don't want to touch.
There's nothing they don't want to touch. The House could reinstate slavery and McConnell would find an excuse to vote on it.
It's hard to have evidence for something that doesn't exist.
Yup. Like, people don't get just how arbitrary house/senate rules are. They're not spelled out in the constitution.
I want results. Not theatre.
Shit, I never thought about this! DOOOOOOMED!
I think nothing demonstrates this better than Corbyn's campaign. Dude started out wildly unpopular but rallied thanks to a great campaign and party platform. Were some of his promises unfeasible? Absolutely. But I think part of the problem with Hillary's campaign was that many of her proposals were tailor-made for Congressional compromise and stretching the extent of her executive power - great for actually enacting them into law, hard to rally the troops around.
You can do that in plenty of ways (see: Gillibrand's strategic voting) that aren't ineffectual time wasters that result in McConnell waving a magic wand and ignoring you anyway.
I mean, the dark takeaway from polling trends and American history is that you're only playing on the margins. The Dems have the winds at their back because it's an RRR and this is what happens in these situations.
There's been the general idea of workhorses and showhorses. While there's a benefit in raising the national profile of select 'showhorses', maybe it's more like people are only interested in visuals and theater and not in the background maneuvering which is no less essential to the process.
This. You fight like hell either way, bc at the very least it helps message why the GOP plan sucks.
I read Franken's book last week -- in it he refers to Lindsay Graham as one of the smartest people in the Senate, IIRC.
Yup. To fire Trump, Trump has to fire Rosenstein, then get either a DoJ underling to fire him or get a replacement appointed who will do it.
Trump's admin has not appointed many people. This is likely going to be much harder and uglier than it looks if they choose to do it.
kirblar said:
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/p...es-if-obamacare-repeal-passes/article/2621457
Something Hillary Clinton failed to understand, for the record. Or at least understand the importance of, which ultimately hurt her in the primary.
It was kind of funny. The chapter on Ted Cruz was amusing. There are some good Harry Reid moments. He was very frank about how totally unhelpful Obama was to his first election fight.
Somehow I doubt most voters care about arcane procedural moves that will amount to effectively nothing. (see: Mnuchin/Price.) This is not about "showing" people, this is about a large number of people being absolutely delusional about the fact that they don't have power. You should not be taking every opportunity possible to do political theatre, otherwise, it becomes impossible to take you seriously!
Sure, but when you're talking about an election that was lost by 70,000 votes spread across the Midwest, "playing the margins" is the difference between President Trump and President Clinton.
