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[whyamihere]

@aseitzwald

DNC will start sending more $$$ to state parties - 33% over 2016 levels and 100% increase over 2015.

Plus $10 mill in competitive grants.

wee

 

[Deleted member 231381]

We need more SC seats as well.

I wouldn't even care if it was required that they were 50/50 D/R SC seats. 9 is a ridiculously small amount for how powerful the SC is. One president shouldn't have the power to influence politics for 40+ years just because he got lucky someone died during his presidency.

On average, a justice is replaced every 1.77 years (the average tenure is 16 years and there are 9 justices). A presidential term is 4 years. Each president would on average receive slightly more than 2 opportunities to change a justice. Ergo, one presidential term does not have the power to influence politics for 40+ years.

The Supreme Court's right-leaning predominance is because over the last 37 years, there has been a Republican president for 21 and a Democrat for only 16, meaning Republicans had 56.7% of the potential years to influence nominations and Democrats had 43.3%. This matches very closely with the Supreme Court being 55.6% rightwing and 44.4% leftwing.

If you set the precedent of court stuffing, it will inevitably be used against you. It's one of the few norms of American politics that has held reasonably well, it would be a bad idea to change that.

 

[balladofwindfishes]

I'm not talking about court stuffing and I literally mentioned that in my post

Reagan is still directly influencing our government 10 years after he died and 30 years after he stopped being president. The civil rights of people shouldn't rest in the whims of Justice Kennedy, he holds too much power as the sole justice that can swing the majority of important cases.

 

[Deleted member 231381]

I'm not talking about court stuffing and I literally mentioned that in my post

It would be perceived as court stuffing if you were to increase the SC size since the incumbent party would also pick all those additional justices, even if that wasn't your motivating intention. There's no way around that.

 

[Diablos]

Still trying.

For fuck's sake...

 

[balladofwindfishes]

It would be perceived as court stuffing if you were to increase the SC size since the incumbent party would also pick all those additional justices, even if that wasn't your motivating intention. There's no way around that.

Let the other party pick half of them?

 

[Deleted member 231381]

Let the other party pick half of them?

Doesn't work. Say you have a 4-5 court. You increase it by 4, make it a 6-7 court. A 6-7 court is much more likely to flip than a 4-5 court, since there are an extra 2 opportunities for someone to die. If the opposing party had the 4-5 majority, they're still going to accuse you of stuffing. If you had the 4-5 majority, you're weakening your own position unnecessarily. You could try doing the latter, but your own party would eat you alive.

 

[pigeon]

We should definitely just stuff the court and it's absurd idiocy to suggest that we should respect SCOTUS norms when it's abundantly clear the Republicans do not.

 

[ShadowSwordmaster]

wee

That is a start.

 

[Deleted member 231381]

We should definitely just stuff the court and it's absurd idiocy to suggest that we should respect SCOTUS norms when it's abundantly clear the Republicans do not.

What's the point of having a court if both parties stuff it? It turns the judicial system into: the president of the day decides all issues of appeal; it's a blatant shattering of the rule of law insofar as it removes even the pretense of an independent judiciary. The answer to: the Republicans broke the nominating procedure is: make it so they can't do that, not: fuck it, who ever liked that Montesquieu chump.

 

[jtb]

Term limits > expanding the court imo

Make it twenty years or whatever. Lifetime appointments are absurd and, as proven by the Scalia/Garland fiasco, antithetical to the original purpose of insulating the court from political pressure and incentives

 

[pigeon]

What's the point of having a court if both parties stuff it? It turns the judicial system into: the president of the day decides all issues of appeal; it's a blatant shattering of the rule of law insofar as it removes even the pretense of an independent judiciary. The answer to: the Republicans broke the nominating procedure is: make it so they can't do that, not: fuck it, who ever liked that Montesquieu chump.

You're describing the situation that currently exists and warning that it should be avoided at all costs.

I agree!

Too late.

 

[whyamihere]

Wow. Didn't see this coming.

http://www.denverpost.com/2017/07/10/ed-perlmutter-drop-out-colorado-governors-race/

WASHINGTON — U.S. Rep. Ed Perlmutter plans to announce Tuesday that he will end his run for Colorado governor, just three months after the Arvada Democrat started it, according to two sources close to the campaign.

The surprise decision by the sixth-term lawmaker comes a few weeks after another Colorado Democrat, U.S. Rep. Jared Polis of Boulder, said he would join the race.

The entry of Polis put substantial pressure on Perlmutter — as Polis could pour a substantial amount of his personal wealth into his campaign while Perlmutter would have to compete for campaign funds with several other well-connected Democrats, including former state Treasurer Cary Kennedy and former state Sen. Mike Johnston.

Another potential factor is the possible entry of Lt. Gov. Donna Lynne into the race.

It was not immediately clear, however, if Perlmutter would try and keep his House seat in Colorado’s 7th Congressional District — as that race already has attracted candidates such as Democratic state Sens. Andy Kerr and Dominick Moreno, and state Rep. Brittany Pettersen.

 

[ShadowSwordmaster]

Wow. Didn't see this coming.

http://www.denverpost.com/2017/07/10/ed-perlmutter-drop-out-colorado-governors-race/

Interesting to hear.

 

[Bonen no Max'd]

What's the point of having a court if both parties stuff it? It turns the judicial system into: the president of the day decides all issues of appeal; it's a blatant shattering of the rule of law insofar as it removes even the pretense of an independent judiciary. The answer to: the Republicans broke the nominating procedure is: make it so they can't do that, not: fuck it, who ever liked that Montesquieu chump.

The UK only recently created its Supreme Court, didn't it? If you got along fine without one, I wouldn't mind giving them up.

Term limits > expanding the court imo

Make it twenty years or whatever. Lifetime appointments are absurd and, as proven by the Scalia/Garland fiasco, antithetical to the original purpose of insulating the court from political pressure and incentives

Wouldn't this require a constitutional amendment though?

 

[Ogodei]

What's the point of having a court if both parties stuff it? It turns the judicial system into: the president of the day decides all issues of appeal; it's a blatant shattering of the rule of law insofar as it removes even the pretense of an independent judiciary. The answer to: the Republicans broke the nominating procedure is: make it so they can't do that, not: fuck it, who ever liked that Montesquieu chump.

The problem is if the court gets militantly opposed to any sort of progress, then it's an issue between stuffing the court and sitting on your hands and saying "the courts have spoken" while the GOP gets every law they want and the Democrats get nothing.

Of course, this presages a darker future than what might actually occur, even if, say, RBG gets replaced by a Trump appointee.

The courts might not like being thrust into the role of just shutting down any legislation that the GOP disapproves of.

 

[jtb]

The UK only recently created its Supreme Court, didn't it? If you got along fine without one, I wouldn't mind giving them up.

Wouldn't this require a constitutional amendment though?

Probably. I don't know.

 

[Deleted member 231381]

You're describing the situation that currently exists and warning that it should be avoided at all costs.

I agree!

Too late.

This is dumb. You are being dumb.

The new norm is now: any Justice must receive the assent of both the President and the Senate. This is... not entirely terrible. It's less good than it was before, seeing as the Senate is typically less democratically representative than the Presidency, but it's wildly better than: the Supreme Court is entirely determined by the President of the day. Your response to 'things are somewhat worse now' is to say 'let's go full throttle and fuck my shit up fam'.

 

[ItWasMeantToBe19]

If you destroy the Supreme Court, the next GOP admin is banning Islam.

 

[balladofwindfishes]

Doesn't work. Say you have a 4-5 court. You increase it by 4, make it a 6-7 court. A 6-7 court is much more likely to flip than a 4-5 court, since there are an extra 2 opportunities for someone to die. If the opposing party had the 4-5 majority, they're still going to accuse you of stuffing. If you had the 4-5 majority, you're weakening your own position unnecessarily. You could try doing the latter, but your own party would eat you alive.

I was thinking of increasing it to like 29. That's roughly the size of the Ninth Circuit.

Just trying to avoid a Kennedy situation where one justice has a disproportional amount of influence than others.

 

[jtb]

This is dumb. You are being dumb.

The new norm is now: any Justice must receive the assent of both the President and the Senate. This is... not entirely terrible. It's less good than it was before, seeing as the Senate is typically less democratically representative than the Presidency, but it's wildly better than: the Supreme Court is entirely determined by the President of the day. Your response to 'things are somewhat worse now' is to say 'let's go full throttle and fuck my shit up fam'.

[time for some game theory]

Isn't tit-for-tat the "correct" response in this case to the violation of the norm?

 

[RustyNails]

I'm curious who would win if a crab and a pigeon did have a fight in real life. I'm thinking a crab's claws would make short work of pigeon's tiny legs.

 

[balladofwindfishes]

When you keep pigeons as pets, they're entirely harmless because their beaks and talons are not hard enough to do anything. It's like a baby gumming you, except even less so, since their bite force is also bad.

 

[Aaron Strife]

Wow. Didn't see this coming.

http://www.denverpost.com/2017/07/10/ed-perlmutter-drop-out-colorado-governors-race/

I always figured the primary loser should go for Gardner's seat in 2020, this just makes that easier, and more feasible for Perlmutter to win as a sitting representative rather than an ex-representative who just lost a big primary.

Would Polis be the first openly gay governor?

Also, Colorado just needs one seat in their State Senate to flip and then Democrats have the trifecta, wee

 

[Bonen no Max'd]

Would Polis be the first openly gay governor?

Kate Brown

 

[whyamihere]

I always figured the primary loser should go for Gardner's seat in 2020, this just makes that easier, and more feasible for Perlmutter to win as a sitting representative rather than an ex-representative who just lost a big primary.

Would Polis be the first openly gay governor?

Also, Colorado just needs one seat in their State Senate to flip and then Democrats have the trifecta, wee

Nah, Kate Brown is bisexual. I guess he'd be the first openly gay man.

 

[lush]

What exactly is the actual reasoning for doing off camera white house briefings?

 

[pigeon]

This is dumb. You are being dumb.

The new norm is now: any Justice must receive the assent of both the President and the Senate. This is... not entirely terrible. It's less good than it was before, seeing as the Senate is typically less democratically representative than the Presidency, but it's wildly better than: the Supreme Court is entirely determined by the President of the day. Your response to 'things are somewhat worse now' is to say 'let's go full throttle and fuck my shit up fam'.

The GOP's demonstrated their willingness to violate long-held constitutional norms to achieve their goals.

The correct response to this is not to assume that whatever they settled on after violating the previous norm is now the new norm. There is no reason to believe that any norms are sacred.

Giving them the Sudetenland doesn't make for peace in our time.

 

[Grexeno]

pigeon's brilliant plan seems amazing until you realize the Republicans will inevitably control all three branches no matter what you do

and then it sucks

 

[Autodidact]

What exactly is the actual reasoning for doing off camera white house briefings?

1) They look like morons on tape.

2) Harder to deny a lie caught on video.

 

[Bonen no Max'd]

looking up this Polis guy and he seems pretty good

Polis opposed the Iraq War saying that, “The invasion of Iraq was a colossal mistake and I opposed the war from the very beginning. Bush's blunders, and the Democrats who gave him cover along the way, have left us without easy solutions for improving the situation.”[57] During a congressional trip to Iraq Polis praised the “Sons of Iraq” policy, which funds former military and police officials under Saddam Hussein to lay down their arms against coalition forces, patrol neighborhoods, and fight against other Sunni insurgents. In an op-ed, he wrote, “If we had started this policy sooner after the invasion, we no doubt could have prevented loss of life. As can be expected, some of them turn out to be corrupt and attack us anyway, but most seem to be helping to keep the order. The challenge is to bring them into the fold of the new Iraqi government and a proper chain of command structure.”[58]

Polis supports removing all troops from Afghanistan.[60] In 2010 Polis supported a failed resolution to withdraw all troops from Afghanistan within 30 days, saying that “I don't believe that this ongoing occupation is in our national interest,” and that, “I supported the initial action to oust the Taliban in Afghanistan, and that succeeded, The challenge we face now is a stateless menace.”[61]

Polis has been a vocal opponent of the PATRIOT ACT.

he kinda sucks on education but then there's this gem

Polis enjoys video games such as League of Legends, and his favorite champions include Maokai and Anivia.

he's got good taste

 

[Deleted member 231381]

The UK only recently created its Supreme Court, didn't it? If you got along fine without one, I wouldn't mind giving them up.

Complicated. The final court of appeal in the United Kingdom used to be to make an appeal to the monarch as the divine arbitre of justice, and this appeal was heard in the presence of the peers of the realm, who provided advice to the monarch. Over time, this 'advice' became binding, and the role of the peers became increasingly codified, and ultimately the court of appeal ended up being the House of Lords, the upper chamber of Parliament.

Given that many of the Lords had a) no legal experience and b) were all Conservative landowning aristocracy, this produced some really rubbish arbitrations, so the Liberals created the position of Lords of Appeal in Ordinary, a life peerage, to provide guidance to the Lords. It was firstly opposed by the Conservatives at first, but when Labour started coming to power, they decided that hey, all these Liberal appointees were at least better than Labour ones and started very scrupulously following the instruction of the Law Lords. By precedent, it came to be that only Law Lords voted on legal appeals. At the same time, the judiciary began to operate largely independently of the government, since the judiciary was filled with Liberals and the government no longer really represented either, and both Labour and the Conservatives were sort of content to let that happen as a detente.

By the end, the House of Lords was pretty much the American Supreme Court in all but name - a fixed number of Law Lords with complete legal authority as a collective body acting as the final court of appeal. This looks like a case of convergent evolution - two entirely different histories produced very similar bodies.

The difference was that the Law Lords were immensely less politicised than the Supreme Court, partly for the history set out above, partly because the Liberal sense of independence got entrenched at an institutional level, partly because the House of Lords didn't dare act too politically because there was a large popular movement in favour of it being outright abolished and it survived by appearing to fulfil a neutral/ceremonial function (sort of the same reason the monarchy survived, and also in an exceptionally apolitical manner), and finally partly because the UK's Parliament is so clearly dominant in constitutional proceedings that it's not like there's any huge advantage to holding the Supreme Court anyway.

Eventually, Blair's administration introduced legislation to formally divide the judicial part of the HoL from the legislative part, but this was a change in shape more than a change in form, the sort of polishing off of something that developed of its own court. The Prime Minister still technically can pick who ends up on the Supreme Court, but it's been a long, long time since they did anything else than just take the advice of the independent committee.

I don't know how you'd replicate that in an American context, since much of the difference depends on variant historical dynamics. You can't exactly disempower the American constitution no matter how much it sucks, nor can you have the same kind of deeply entrenched historical neutrality with respect to the final court of appeal that only emerged due to rather specific circumstances. But it's not right to say that the UK only recently had a supreme court in anything other than the most literal sense, and the fact it functions so well because of the fact it is as far removed from politics as possible is something that should be mimicked, not abandoned. There's few things the UK really does well in these sorts of constitutional/political discussions, but the legal system really is one of them (well, really I should say 'England & Wales', since Scotland and Northern Ireland have totally different legal systems, which suck, but that's a story for another day).

 

[whyamihere]

I Went To The Website Of Every Candidate Running For Governor Of Colorado And Here's What I Learned:

This is the worst campaign website I've ever seen. Ever. http://www.billisrunning.com/. Also that URL omg.

The worst Republican site is easily https://www.barlockforgovernor.com/. "Stephen Barlock, Denver co-chair of President Donald Trump's Campaign in Colorado", so, duh. But look at it, it's so bad.

The worst Democrat is easily http://lewgaiter.com/. Literally a part of his website:

Bridging the Divide
So many things unite us, let's bridge the things that divide us.
Rural/Urban
Political/Ideological
Economic – Rich/Poor

https://www.noelforcolorado.com/ uses the same font as Hillary's campaign and I am fucking TRIGGERED.

http://www.polisforcolorado.com/ is fine?, but the font is hideous. The fuck is this?

http://votejoannesilva.com/ doesn't understand how to wrap text around pictures. Sad!

Overall, http://www.vic4gov.com/ was the best. I am clearly trying to not work!

 

[Ignatz Mouse]

[time for some game theory]

Isn't tit-for-tat the "correct" response in this case to the violation of the norm?

Yes.

Of course, these are more complex situations that the simple game-theory scenarios.

 

[Deleted member 231381]

The GOP's demonstrated their willingness to violate long-held constitutional norms to achieve their goals.

The correct response to this is not to assume that whatever they settled on after violating the previous norm is now the new norm. There is no reason to believe that any norms are sacred.

Giving them the Sudetenland doesn't make for peace in our time.

So: yes, the Republicans might break the norm of not court-stuffing. But they might not. If the Democrats break the norm, the Republicans definitely do. Logic says don't break the court-stuffing norm, since there's then a non-zero chance the Republicans don't break it, and if they do break it, you can break it back anyway and all you've lost by not going first is one Presidential termsworth of Supreme Court rulings going your way, which is only four years.

 

[Crocodile]

Congressional Elections are More National, Partisan, and Responsive than Ever Before

TLDR

• House is getting more and more nationalized
• Senate is getting more nationlaized but not to the degree of House
• Wave elections are becoming more and more common
• Incumbency advantage is decreasing over time
• Incumbent Party has been doing worse and worse over time
• President's Approval rating has big influence on national election results.

pigeon's brilliant plan seems amazing until you realize the Republicans will inevitably control all three branches no matter what you do

and then it sucks

I'm not taking any sides in this conversation but even if Dems do nothing and GOP gains another trifecta, why do we expect them to not start breaking norms anyway?

 

[Autodidact]

Congressional Elections are More National, Partisan, and Responsive than Ever Before

TLDR

• House is getting more and more nationalized
• Senate is getting more nationlaized but not to the degree of House
• Wave elections are becoming more and more common
• Incumbency advantage is decreasing over time
• Incumbent Party has been doing worse and worse over time
• President's Approval rating has big influence on national election results.

All of these points seem to foreshadow a Democratic wave.

 

[Deleted member 231381]

[time for some game theory]

Isn't tit-for-tat the "correct" response in this case to the violation of the norm?

It is, but this isn't tit-for-tat, it's fuckopalypse-for-tat. The norm that pigeon is proposing to violate protects the American political system from a *much* bigger political danger than the norm the Republicans just violated now. Filibustering a nominee is peanuts compared to court-stuffing.

The tit-for-tat response is for Democrats to filibuster Republican nominees, which I'm perfectly okay with.

 

[Holmes]

Nah, Kate Brown is bisexual. I guess he'd be the first openly gay man.

What's his face from NJ was the first gay man but Polis would be the first openly gay man elected.

RIP Michaud :/

 

[Autodidact]

What's his face from NJ was the first gay man but Polis would be the first openly gay man elected.

RIP Michaud :/

He lost partly because the left in Maine should be winning elections but can't get its shit together. As I said earlier, they need not to repeat their mistakes in 2018, even if Collins runs.

 

[B-Dubs]

He lost partly because the left in Maine should be winning elections but can't get its shit together. As I said earlier, they need not to repeat their mistakes in 2018, even if Collins runs.

The issue in Maine seems to be the majority of the vote is split between the Dem and the Independent candidates.

 

[Cesare Borgia]

wee

good news

 

[whyamihere]

The issue in Maine seems to be the majority of the vote is split between the Dem and the Independent candidates.

Hahahahahahahahaha the 2014 spoiler

http://bangordailynews.com/2017/05/...ndependents-to-run-for-the-maine-legislature/

Two-time independent gubernatorial candidate Eliot Cutler continues to play a key role in charting the future of Maine’s non-party movement.

Next year will bring a key election for independents in the state: Mainers passed a first-in-the-nation system of ranked-choice voting in 2016 and while it’s stuck in the state’s high court over constitutional questions, it may give non-party candidates a lift in future elections.

Under such a system, Cutler would likely have been elected over Gov. Paul LePage in 2010, when he narrowly lost to the Republican. But he then finished a distant third behind LePage and Democrat Mike Michaud in 2014 and went to work on a University of Maine system project to merge law, business and public policy schools.

Alumni from Cutler’s campaigns — including Kyle Bailey, his 2014 finance director — were behind the ranked-choice voting effort. In February, Bailey started Maine Independents, a new political action committee with a stated mission of supporting “political reform.”

Cutler said he’ll be involved in recruiting legislative candidates under that banner. He called it “a refuge from the parties” that would create a community for unenrolled candidates that doesn’t exist now.

“If we succeed in recruiting a lot of independent candidates to run in competitive districts,” he said, “you’re creating not just competitive races in those districts, you’re creating a ‘there’ there.”

THERE WILL PROBABLY ONLY BE RANKED CHOICE VOTING IN FEDERAL RACES YOU FOOL

 

[Basileus777]

If we allocate the member delegations from each state as multi-member districts for the whole state done proportional to state votes, that might be better than simply adding more House members.

Adding more house members is actually possible though, turning state delegations proportional needs the states to do it themselves or a constitutional amendment.

 

[Aaron Strife]

Weird, Perlmutter's not running for re-election either. Maybe keeping his powder dry for a 2020 run against Gardner? Hope there's not a family issue or something like that.

 

[whyamihere]

Doesn't the SCOTUS kind of hate multi-member districts?

 

[Emerson]

The solution should not be to pack the court nor introduce term limits but to officially codify the procedures that were unofficially followed previously.

 

[Joe Shlabotnik]

The solution should not be to pack the court nor introduce term limits but to officially codify the procedures that were unofficially followed previously.

This, the lesson to be learned from the past decade or so is that "norms", "comity" and gentlemen's agreements are a dumb foundation for a functioning government.

 

[whyamihere]

Also:

Monday, Jul 10, 2017 · 3:13:29 PM PDT · Stephen Wolf
2Q Fundraising:

• ND-Sen: Heidi Heitkamp (D-inc): $1.3 million raised, $3 million cash-on-hand

• OH-Sen: Sherrod Brown (D-inc): $2.6 million raised, $6.7 million cash-on-hand

• CO-Gov: Doug Robinson (R): $208,000 raised (in two months), $57,000 self-funded, $175,000 cash-on-hand

• CT-Gov: Kevin Lembo (D): $143,000 raised (in nine weeks)

• GA-Gov: Casey Cagle (R) $2.7 million raised, $2.5 million cash-on-hand; Hunter Hill (R): $1 million raised; Stacey Abrams (D): $540,000 raised, $220,000 cash-on-hand

• MA-Gov: Charlie Baker (R-inc): $1.8 million raised (in the first half of 2017), $6 million cash-on-hand

• SC-Gov: Henry McMaster (R-inc): $800,000 raised; Catherine Templeton (R): $751,000 raised, $1.3 million cash-on-hand
• KS-03: Kevin Yoder (R-inc): $470,000 raised, $1.1 million cash-on-hand
• NE-02: Kara Eastman (D): $30,000 (since late May)

• NY-19: Antonio Delgado (D): $350,000 raised

https://ndxplains.com/2017/07/10/heitkamp-raised-1-3-million-second-quarter/

U.S. Senator Heidi Heitkamp raised over $1.3 million in the second quarter of 2017 according to a spokesperson. The second quarter fundraising exceeds the amount any other North Dakota Senator has raised in the same quarter of an off year. This leaves Heitkamp with $3 million cash on hand and no declared opponent should she decide to run for reelection.

fucking icon

Self funding a campaign is likely why the NRSC initially went to State Senator Tom Campbell following Cramer's missteps. Campbell is a wealthy farmer who's farm has received millions in federal payments and is ambitious to run for higher office. Any office will do according to Campbell himself. However, the word in some circles is the NRSC has started to walk away from Campbell for undisclosed reasons.

I'm guessing the NRSC is beginning to get a little nervous about North Dakota. Affiliated groups have hired a tracker to follow Heitkamp through the Senate hallways which violates a ”bipartisan truce" according to Roll Call. My understanding is only Heitkamp has a tracker inside the Senate hallways following her as she works.

Here is the kicker: Heitkamp hasn't announced she is running for reelection either. But you don't raise record-setting amounts of cash in an off year unless you have serious intent on retaining your seat. I think it would be wise for the Senator just to come out and publicly state what many of us believe as inevitable. What's the wait? She's raised the cash; she polled at 60% favorability in the state earlier this year, all that is missing is a statement saying, ”I'm Heidi Heitkamp, and I'd be honored to continue to serve you in the U.S. Senate."

FUCKING ICON

 

[Deleted member 231381]

Doesn't the SCOTUS kind of hate multi-member districts?

No? MM districts are ruled out by ordinary statute, not constitutional law. However, they'll never be feasible in American, since they have to be adopted on a state-by-state basis and red states will never adopt them. AV (ranked choice) is, very sadly, the best that is realistically on offer.