Arizona Secretary of State Adrian Fontes being encouraged to primary Gov Katie Hobbs in two years. Seems to mainly be driven by immigrant activists and those who ostensibly blame Hobbs for losing more seats in the state legislature instead of obtaining a trifecta. They also say she has tacked too far right on immigration. They call her "weak politically".
In any case, Hobbs has now said she will fight against the deportations. I'm not necessarily pro Hobbs but a contested primary here could be disastrous. Her campaign for Governor last time was abysmally run so as long as she has a new team running it I don't see her doing overly poorly. The last Morning Consult poll in July had her at 52% approval.
If state level Democrats haven't figured out cohesion on immigration by now then I don't know what to tell them besides whatever Mark Kelly is, do that. Obviously the entire nation has moved to the center on immigration. I fear that these absolutist activists will try to keep the party on the far left on this issue.
Completely absurd in light of the results in Arizona a few weeks ago.
As a part time Arizonan, I disagree with your conclusion. Katie Hobbs is highly unpopular with Arizonans. She only won by 17,000 votes in 2022 against Kari Lake, and Hobbs is viewed as much more unpopular than when she ran.
As to what Kelly has done on immigration, he challenged Biden's position, as did almost every Democrat in Arizona.
I'm not ready to predict 2026, because we don't know the damage that a Trump administration is going to cause to Arizona, but his proposal on deportation and tariffs could be devastating to Arizona that is dependent on immigrants for agriculture, construction, and hospitality and it's industries are heavily import/export.
There is talk of Kimberly Yee, treasurer, running for governor. She is viewed as a normal Republican, and if she could get through a primary, I believe she would be hard to beat unless we have a blue tsunami.
As attitudes stand now, I'm not sure Hobbs would win against anybody, including a typical Arizona R loon, but 2026 is a long way out.
I'm not sure how a primary would benefit either Hobbs or Fontes and set them up for success in two years. Both would emerge broke and bloodied. Unless Hobbs is willing to step aside, as Gretchen Whitmer has famously said, "The train has left the station."
I think a variety of reasons. Hobbs is a decent administrator, but doesn't communicate well. I believe that was her biggest issue in 2022's election and why it was so close. Then there was an immigration issue in Arizona that got effectively pinned on Democrats. Arizona also has a significant unhoused problem that got tied to immigration, even though few in the homeless encampments are Latino. Crime has also been hyped even though statistically it's down. That being said, I was robbed at 4am in our backyard this summer with a knife to my throat, so I find it hard to say it's not a problem. If my standard poodle didn't take a chunk out of the guy's leg, I'm not sure how it would have ended.
I'm so sorry you had to deal with that. I'm glad you're still with us. I'd be curious to see what H2Hs look like in a year with Yee or other potential Republicans.
I’d say it’s just an article from Politico. They’re already getting bored and trying to find something for 2026. Nonsense chatter for the most part. Except! Fuck I’m getting sick of liberal activists. I love being one but a lot people need to stfu and focus on winning.
Am I at three “stfu” so far in this comment section so far? Christ. It’s as if Democrats think they can act like Republicans by bitching the loudest to get results. If only. Tell that to Christine O’Donnell and Sharon Angle. Relics who should always be remembered.
But are we confident in Underwood winning vs Krishnamoorthi? His fundraising says he’s going for it hard. But, come on. He’d be great but IL gonna do IL and the black woman is going to win. IL did it first and I bet they’ll want to do it again. And, when you wiki black US Senators, Carol Moseley Braun is 4th, Obama is 5th and bless his heart, Roland Burris is 6th.
From my experience living in Mpls and electing Muslims to Congress, it feels good doing it bc of the historical nature of it all. Not that Underwood needs to rely on symbolic votes like Omar does, but it helps.
Not direct at you but why O'Malley? He failed to get his Lt. Governor elected leaving Maryland with Hogan for eight years. His Presidential campaign in 16 went nowhere and I have no idea what he has been up to since? Wickler seems like the best of this group just because he did the best of the seven keeping the race within a point and believes in year-round organizing and party building.
Rep. Seth Moulton: “We’ve lost touch with the majority of Americans. Democrats have a habit of preaching down to people and telling them that if they don't 100% agree with our orthodox view, often defined by the far left, then they're just bad people, they're morally wrong. That’s not going to win us any elections.”
Moskowitz: “We have policy issues that are out of touch with the American people.”
Specific issue #1 is the refusal of many Democrats to acknowledge that inflation is a big problem, has not gotten better for most people, and hits lower-income people the hardest.
Harris didn't campaign on lowering prices for Americans. Her refusal to do that meant that Trump could easily trot out how prices were lower during his term, and Harris never had any answer to that.
It is naive to think that prices will go down to pre Covid levels. That is unfortunately not how inflation works. The only way to achieve that is through a massive recession which is even worse for many people. Fortunately, wages are increasing faster than inflation now and have almost caught up with the inflation bump. That is not to say that the problem is over for many Americans but average wage growth has caught up.
This is EXACTLY the "preaching down to people" that the Democrats mentioned above are talking about. It's completely absurd to constantly hear Democrats preaching that inflation is somehow OK just because of the nominal, negligible, and in many cases non-existent wage growth going on. Two weeks ago, the American people said loud and clear that no, it's not OK. The American people want lower prices, and Democrats need to stop spouting BS excuses for why we can't do that.
What Democrats don't understand is that wage growth doesn't make inflation better. Wage growth is something that every working American deserves, regardless of inflation. Wage growth should be happening even if inflation is literally zero.
My point is that wage growth does NOT make inflation OK, and Democrats need to stop claiming that it does. It just comes across as so incredibly tone-deaf.
even "historic" wage gains of 10-15% mean the people on the bottom are making $16.75 instead of $15..... meanwhile rent is up 200 bucks as month as are groceries...
Dems REALLY NEED to get it through their heads. Life for the bottom 30% is absurdly expensive and increasingly miserable...
Of course, actual out of pocket housing costs went up more for renters than for existing owner occupants, and OER increases for owner occupants were accompanied by massive increases in home equity. Renters are more likely to be working class than middle class. Working class folks are also more likely to have to pay for car repairs or rideshare or another used car at the bottom of the market where prices went up the most. Experience of inflation differs, so just because we usually use a common deflator for all incomes, and nominal incomes rose more as a percentage for the 40th percentile than the 80th (I assume) doesn’t necessarily mean real incomes actually rose more for lower incomes when comparing the actual disparate baskets of goods purchased at the various income levels.
The problem is that there really aren't any easy solutions to bring prices down. in the near future. We could have hit harder that Trump's policy of tariffs and mass deportations will make the issue worse.
Its more naive to think that it would have worked. Harris had no answer because there was no answer.
If Biden could have done something about it without pushing us into a recession, he surely would have.
So Biden and then Harris were stuck trying to basically paper over inflation and point to the robustness of the economy inflation aside. And that does sound like talking down, but its mostly just the best option for messaging.
Predictably it didnt work because well - inflation was a big deal to alot of people.
They failed to communicate with the people. Especially Biden, who should have been doing it all the way through.
I sound like a broken record, but I really believe lack of effective communication is the biggest problem Democrats have. Especially when they're in power. And it's rarely the "media's" fault. It's Democrats' lack of creativity and boldness. Or merely doing Politics 101.
Dear American people - we get it, prices are high. You all saved too much money (and frankly we probably printed too much) and now you are trying to spend it all at once.
But there is literally nothing we can do about it except on the very margins of a few products (and you will then spend the money you saved on those products raising the price of some other product), without you losing your job.
They cant do a Trump and say - trust us, we'll fix this - because well - why havent they? They are in charge.
The idea that messaging could have solved the problem despite the facts on the ground seems like just another way of talking down to people honestly.
If only Biden had brought more attention to how much is administration sucked at dealing with inflation, we would have won!
No, wrong. Comments like these just show how out of touch so many Democrats are. Frankly, inflation is still getting worse - just in the past few weeks, the price of a pound of 80% lean ground beef went up once again, from $3.99 to $4.49. It was $2.99 in 2019.
Comments like these really make me understand why so many people, even some who don't like Trump, were too disgusted with Democrats and their aloofness on inflation to vote for Dems.
Is it you straight up expectation that prices will never rise again? Or that after a period of inflation they will return to what they were before? The level of inflation in this country dropped massively over the past year
Wages increased, particularly for the bottom brackets. These are just facts. I'm not talking about perceptions but reality!
And as for perceptions, Republican voters are suddenly "feeling good" about the economy – without the core reality shifting recently. In other words, this has everything to do with "the vibe economy".
To answer your second question, yes, prices should return to what they were after inflation. If a product doesn't change, then in the medium/long term there's no reason why the price should change. And in fact, in the long term, technological advances in production, distribution, and transportation should result in prices going down!
And like I said above, wage growth does NOT make inflation OK. Wage growth is earned, and to have all the effort of earning a higher wage be taken away by inflation is a terrible feeling!
Well it's an issue that will be going away so there's that. I mean i think the issue was unwinnable because yaknow there was a dem president for the last 4 year even though we all remember this stuff starting under Trump. I suppose dems could just lie and say we'll lower prices.
Democrats need to 100% say that we'll lower prices. And then, if we retake power, we should bully, threaten, and if necessary force CEOs to lower their prices.
Remember, like I said yesterday, Dems need to position the party in opposition to greedy billionaires and CEOs
Inflation is 2.5% though some items are above and some are below (ironically the inflation rate under Trump in 2028 before Covid was 2.4%). This is not talking down. This is trying to have a fact based foundation for a discussion so it doesn't become what you just heard on Tic Toc. Then we should understand the pain that many are feeling and think about solutions especially about the housing/rental prices. Also, we should point out that all of Trump's so-called financial policies will dramatically increase inflation.
The food is one thing, as is gas. What never gets talked about is housing and rents.... in many places shitbox studios going for $800/month are now north of $1200.... even historic wage growth won't help with that...
He wasn't "going after" Trans people, he was saying biological men should not compete against women. Being anti-trans and being fair to women are two different things. And he's not alone:
“I don’t want to discriminate against anybody, but I don’t think biological boys should be playing in girls’ sports,” Suozzi said
I got clobbered on all the transgender messaging in my district, and it was very painful,” said Rep. Vicente Gonzalez (D-Texas)
Writing off Moulton as "conservative guy who challenged Pelosi" is ridiculous. Moulton has a strong history of supporting LGBTQ rights but this issue is just common sense. We can protect the rights of Trans people to exist but don't need to sacrifice the rights of women to do it and I say this as a lesbian woman!
"Twice, once in 2022 and again in 2023, Moulton co-sponsored House Democrats’ Transgender Bill of Rights, which, among other protections, would guarantee trans student-athletes the right to participate on sports teams that match their gender identity. "
Anyone who is an illegal immigrant or trans in sports absolutist clearly didn't get the memo from a few weeks ago that the majority of America is in the center on these new culture issues. America has moved left on abortion but right on immigration and Trans women in female sports.
It's not like Democrats ran on this issue. But, as usual, Democrats failed to fight back. The Republicans won in 2004 by using gay marriage as a club. Democrats have three choices when they try to do this: Agree with the attacks, fight the attacks, or do nothing.
I'm not sure what your recommendation is here. Fight back (i.e. run on the issue). Agree with the attacks (and risk losing a base that was already less enthused?)
If it's not Trans they'll find something else or invent it. Of course they can't run on their policies of tax cuts for the wealthy and deregulation of big companies.
Laughable to think this election made a statement about sports of all things. There's a ton of articles by now seeking out Biden -> Trump voters, specifically asking them why they voted Republican, and it's simply inflation, inflation, housing prices, rent, insurance, the disruption of the past four years, feeling like things were better under Trump, that he said a lot of crazy things but didn't actually do them, things actually felt just fine under Trump and then went crazy under Biden, Trump's going to end inflation but keep job growth and income gains, etc., etc. But sure, let's pile on to trans people and blame them for all this. Great stuff, this is the recriminations and scapegoating I can always look forward to after we lose an election.
Anecdotal: Sunday, while having winter tires mounted on our car, I spoke to the two people in the waiting room about the election. A middle-aged woman was so alarmed that she was seriously investigating moving abroad. An elderly man said he, unenthused by either candidate, held his nose and voted for Trump. His reason? That Trump had promised to "stop the wars".
I'm not gonna wade into the trans issue in terms of a policy/civil rights debate, but I suspect you're wrong about it not swinging votes. Dave Chappelle's highly successful anti-trans stand-up shtick doesn't exist in a bubble insulated from electoral salience. It wouldn't be the first time that being at the tip of the spear on culture war issues cracked up the Democrats' coalition.
At the very least, the Democrats need to acknowledge they're on the wrong side of public opinion on this and update their messaging. They were winning the argument in the Roy Cooper era but once Republicans figured out a way to make it about children, they've been on offense and made considerable inroads. Pretending that they haven't and hoping people will be naturally co-opted by the gravity of civil rights acceptance might work, but it's risky.
The more serious reckoning needs to happen with illegal immigration and I won't pull punches on this. If the Democrats had to have their asses handed to them two weeks ago, I was hoping it would be unambiguously because of their unacceptable stewardship of immigration policy. The verdict wasn't definitive and Dems are interpreting it as giving them permission to stay the course on an asylum platform that is unequivocally batshit insane.
And honestly, that includes the reform plan pitched this spring which still allowed for 5,000 people PER DAY to manipulate the asylum process and cut in front of millions of people trying to immigrate legally. If anything, Democrats were lucky Trump sabotaged that bill because allowing 5,000 new asylum manipulators per day would not have stanched the deluge of crossings. The borders would be just as clogged now as they were a year ago and the issue would have been more front and center during the general election with people still as angry about the border in November as they were in February. The executive order Biden passed in lieu of the border reform bill did a lot more to cool down this issue than the reform bill would have.
Herein lies the risk for Democrats in the months to come. Trump will be carrying out deportations and, at least until there's tangible economic pain felt by consumers, these deportations will be broadly popular. If the Democrats choose to spend an inordinate amount of time in the next year outraged about sending illegal immigrants back home, they will have once again misread popular opinion badly and position themselves for another disappointing cycle.
Pretending that the Trump surge was entirely about inflation does nobody on our side any favors. It's not as if the demographics that surged to Trump this year did so out of this blue. 2024 wasn't 2016. The trend lines have been in motion for a few cycles now. We have a much bigger problem with American voters than the price of eggs being too high.
Yes she did; 80% of her ads in GA were on the economy and inflation. I keep hearing these alternative realities where Biden never held public speeches touting his Administration's accomplishments the past 2 years and Dems didn't campaign on the economy. All of that happened-ya'll will have to find a new boogeyman.
What Harris said in her ads didn't matter. The prices people saw in the supermarkets were what mattered.
In fact, those ads may have actually made Democrats seem even MORE tone-deaf. “The nerve of those Dems to claim the economy is great even when prices are still a lot higher!”
And it makes you wonder how Dems got away with this in 2022 when inflation had peaked. Seems like we got a lot of leeway for what was clearly a covid problem and then we waffled it by not acknowledging why it’s here to stay bc we said it’s actually gone. As much as people want to say inflation is lower bc technically it is, check your grocery bill.
I'm going to get a lot of flak for this, but there is a perception that the cultural/sexual pendulum has swung, way, way too far to the left. Many voters were responding to that as well.
Remember the flak Mark Udall got for being a one note Johnny on abortion rights? Looks like almost the whole party made that mistake this time. It’s an important subject, and a vote winner talked about the right way (which is different in different places). It’s not the only damn thing people care about.
Seth Moulton is the idiot who tried to stop Nancy Pelosi from being re-elected as House Speaker – without Moulton being able to recruit anyone to run against her. Had he challenged her himself, I suspect Moulton would have received two votes: his own and Jared Golden’s.
"if they don't 100% agree with our orthodox view, often defined by the far left, then they're just bad people, they're morally wrong. That’s not going to win us any elections.” I mean how many Republicans did Harris campaign with? I don't think this is the problem.
If only we had gotten attack ads of, “Harris campaigned with Liz Cheney, the biggest RINO of them all!” We would’ve won then. But, instead we got, “Harris thinks prisoners deserve tax funded sex change surgeries.”
She’s pro-prisoner trans rights?!?!? Come on now. Fucking dumb. Unless it’s 3 meals, a shower and an hour of recess per day, do not answer questions about the rights of prisoners.
Not a popular opinion, judging by the comments here, but I maintain my view that these comments from officials are a waste of time and counter-productive. All his comments (and similar from other officials) does is create infighting in the party.
Everyone and their dog is going to pop up and say that we need to change our policies to better align with *their* policies. Magically, agreeing with them is the one secret to winning elections — unfortunately, that magic permeates across the entire ideological spectrum, as everyone from the most centrist to the most progressive democrats, and all in between, are of this view.
Fighting over Moulton's or Sanders' or anyone else's comments is a waste of our time. It's a waste of their time to make the comment in the first place! There's no magical policy or ideological change that would have made Harris president with a trifecta. This was the most policy-bereft election of my entire life.
Agreed, it's all so very pointless. What did Republicans need to do to get back in after Obama's re-election? What did we have to do after Bush's? Why does anyone think we need to argue social issues to have a chance to win in 2028? Trump didn't do anything to fix his losing 2020 coalition, he just ran again and said things were better under him and worse now. But no, some Dems want to talk about women's sports now...the only thing we need to do is wait for people to get mad at Trump again, and run on broadly popular things that will address what people are mad about, and improve their lives.
I think you pointing out Moulton and Sander’s says everything about the political discourse the left is having. Both sides of our party are saying the same thing yet blaming each other for it.
What’s really dumb is we’re all focusing on why Dems lost instead of why Trump won. I think that’s the key here. We should be bigger assholes who are more forceful in getting our agenda done. Then we’d have more results to sell.
Time for Democrats to get the news media to point out that "Trump lacks a mandate from a majority of American voters". And to ask Trump and other Republican politicians: "Lacking a mandate from a majority of American voters, how will you work with Democrats to achieve compromise solutions that have broad support?"
By my estimation there's still at least 100,000 votes to count in NYC. So, that figure should go down further. We know that New York likes to take its time for no reason.
Thanks for this. Bc I was going to say more people should not equal more time bc they should have more staffers, then. The quantity should correlate across the board.
They just look so stupid every election at this point. If they were a swing state, both parties would’ve called an end to this nonsense by now.
They have majorities in both houses, the Supreme Court and the executive branch. Electoral history says there is no mandate given the margins but Democrats clearly were rejected in this election. Deluding ourselves by pretending Trump was a fluke again despite winning enough ON election night won't help us win future races.
It was not a mandate but it was a clear directional change. Period.
President Biden could have used his bully pulpit more effectively to name and shame the companies that exploited the Covid pandemic and the logistics crisis to massively increase their profit margins.
Moreover, Biden and Democrats could have highlighted data showing the percentage increases in CEO pay and compensation, contrasted with that of ordinary American workers. (Yes, for a president or top politician to do this would be "untraditional")
That would have placed the Biden Administration – and Democrats – squarely on the side of working families.
One more thing: Democrats could and should have enabled Medicare to negotiate ALL drugs, not just a very short list. (But, hey, the pharmaceutical industry and lobbyists are strong.)
Meanwhile, President Biden and Democrats could have published lists comparing American and European drug prices. That would have underscored how Americans are being fleeced by the price-gouging pharmaceutical industry. I have a really, really hard time seeing why Americans should have the questionable "privilege" of paying massively more for the same drugs.
We saw some dems attempt this very gently. I think if you have politicians or the government go after American companies aggressively I think that would turn off a lot of Americans. Idk it's a difficult thread to needle and ultimately i don't think it would have worked or been effective politically.
The obvious strategy is to concentrate on highlighting the most egregious examples. By underscoring that *most* companies are responsible and by avoiding a broad attack, you counteract the perception that you are anti-business.
But for the worst price-gougers you do it loudly, not gently!
The problem is our bark doesn’t have bite. It’d probably come off as whining while Trump comes off strong but he will fuck a company up. As pro-business as he truly is, he will make an example of someone. It’s the whole double standard where Dems rule with intelligence while the GOP rules with fear. We all know which one works better.
I firmly believe that billionaires and corporate CEOs *should* fear the government. That's the only way to prevent them from doing things that screw everybody else.
Mmmmhhhhhmmmm. That’s what makes Trump so troublesome bc he’ll cut corporate taxes while also saying to corporations, “If you fuck with me, I’ll cut you.” Dems are in quite a pickle with matching this energy. Overall, we aren’t assholes. And, we used to rely on unions for backing up our populist messaging and they increasingly don’t like us.
My dad got fed so much anti-green energy messaging in the “news” that matches up with auto union workers worrying about going too fast on electric cars. Then, it is also trans rights, which is a manufactured problem that we fall hook line and sinker for. Guilty as charged bc I also love arguing about something I know I’m right about. The GOP just ignores questions they’ll sound dumb answering and they pivot to something else they can win on. Dems could do that, too. Dems dont need to talk about prisoners getting sex change surgeries for crying out loud. It’s a gotcha question and we fall for it every time bc we just looooove being right. We don’t have to be wrong, we could just pivot like they do.
Agreed with all that. And at the same time, Biden should've worked to increase the supply of products so that companies would be forced to lower prices on them. And he should've required anyone importing goods into America to sell them at a lower price here (especially if most of the importer's products go to America, which I suspect is the case for a lot of importers). That would've given Biden a lot of leverage over them, if only he had chosen to use it.
Just so everyone knows, I won't be responding anymore in the economic policy thread that started at the top of the comments. This is because I'm doing this all on my phone, and the small screen makes it very difficult to keep track of long, back-and-forth conversations and threads. So I'm not ignoring anyone who responded to a comment of mine.
The fake news conspiracy nonsense has proliferated even towards the media now. As we speak now the media is falling hook line and sinker for the bullshit lies of the McCormick campaign crying wolf that certain counties in Pennsylvania were trying to defy the law and count "illegal" ballots. Let's be fully clear: there's nothing illegal about these ballots. They weren't cast by scary convicts or migrants, nor was there any cheating involved with their actual casting. They are only deemed "illegal" because they have incorrectly marked dates or lack signatures, which would make them by law potentially "invalid" but not illegal. The media once more continues to stoke the flames of paranoia and disappoint. Disgusting.
Any discussion of how many ballots they're talking about where this applies? And are they ballots that have already been tentatively counted or are they in limbo pending a court ruling?
JUDGES: Majority Leader is finally trying to pick up the pace on Senate confirmation of Biden’s judicial nominations. Yesterday alone, Schumer filed cloture on eight judges, which I believe is a new record for him. (I don’t understand why he wasn’t doing this far earlier.) As expected, Republicans were hitting the brakes, last night demanding roll-call votes on simple things such as moving back and forth between legislative and executive session – something that otherwise invariably gets done through unanimous consent.
EDIT: Today, just now, Republicans wasted more time by walking out and denying the Senate a quorum on the floor.
Elections have consequences. As of last Thursday, 14 November, there were 65 judicial vacancies. Any vacancies that Biden, Schumer and Durbin fail to fill, will be filled by Trump.
Me? No, I think there will be a massive power-grab to accommodate Trump and his autocratic impatience, and that the GOP will blow up a lot of written and unwritten Senate and House rules. But Blue Slips is not the only thing slowing down Biden’s nominations, although it does get the most focus...
As of last Thursday: "There are now 29 pending [judicial] nominees: 17 waiting for floor votes, 6 waiting to be reported out of the Senate Judiciary Committee, and 6 waiting for hearings."
But... Republicans have shown an ability to play the long game on a lot of these rules, especially with more establishment leadership in the senate. Which accurately describes Thune.
Much like the filibuster, the survival of blue slips depends heavily their recognition of how much that rule benefits them more than it benefits us. Do republican senators want to deal with a future dem president putting liberal district judges in their far right states that have had a consistently conservative district judge system for generations?
I'm guessing this is an overestimation on their part. Democrats not only managed to win in 3 red senate seats in 2018, but also West Virginia of all places no less. There's also the fact that 2026 will likely be a midterm referendum election year and Trump won't be on the ballot to bail their sorry butts. Granted the elections will now be vs incumbents and open in cases like Ohio, and perhaps even Iowa if Grassley falls ill, but we'll have to see.
The filibuster and blue slips are so different, though. The GOP will always want to elect their judges but do they need to bypass a filibuster? For their agenda, no. They have reconciliation and they can accomplish much of their work through that.
McConnell, and other GOP Senators are well aware that if they get rid of the filibuster, the floodgates are open and if the Dems get a trifecta, we’re doing all the things. The joint impediments are far lesser in their case because they don’t care to do much in the first place.
Mitchell said his analysis of the 45th District shows that there are about 13,000 ballots left to be counted in the district. He said ballots cast before election day had a 5.1% advantage for Democrats, in-person voting on election day had a Republican advantage of 15%, and votes counted after election day skewed blue by 18.5%.
That pattern is driven by young voters, Mitchell said, who “end up voting later than everyone else,” and tend to lean more liberal.
Mitchell said there are more than 4,600 ballots in the 45th District that weren’t counted initially because of clerical issues, including ballots that weren’t signed, or signed with a signature that didn’t match the voter information on file.
If the number of outstanding votes shown on NBC's county map is right, then it definitely matters. Their estimates shows 48,800 remaining votes just in the counties of Philadelphia, Bucks, Chester, Allegheny, Westmoreland, Erie, Lackawanna, Mercer, and Lycoming counties along with a spattering of thousands more in the remainder of counties. I'm not convinced they're right, but at least thus far, the estimated numbers haven't been too far off when counties like Montgomery and (just now) Delaware came in.
I hope you’re right. But it’s strange that NBC is showing an estimate of just 18,000 uncounted votes statewide in Pennsylvania. That said, that estimate has fluctuated wildly ever since Election Night, and with no obvious pattern.
Also really curious that NBC is showing a *higher* overall vote count than Pennsylvania’s SoS’ official election site is showing. They’ve certainly not been conspicuous when it comes to clarity or transparency.
I'm guessing that the confusion over number of ballots left to count is due to the issue of which can be counted. From what I have read, counties are following different rules and there is certain litigation--all over whether a ballot that arrived by election day can be counted when the date on the outside envelope is blank or erroneous. Dems say one can't take away a person's right to vote over minutia that cannot make any difference (the ballot arrived on time). R's say the law is the law. I recall the PA Supreme Court faced this issue but not the specifics. News stories say it specified that it was not deciding this particular issue.
Random question: Anyone know why Gaston County, NC moved 3 points to the left this year but Union County, NC moved a point to the right? If you'd asked me before the election, I would've guessed it would be the other way around, since Union, while still Republican, seemed to be trending Democratic while Gaston seemed to be more static. And I didn't think there was any influx of African-Americans into Gaston. Anyone know more about these two that might explain their differing trends this year?
Looks like more than 11,000 new votes came in from Alaska today there were Peltola-friendly. They dropped Begich's number down a point and Peltola up a point. It's now 48.5 Begich, 46.3 Peltola. Seems like it could help her in the ranked-choice tabulation.
Earlier today, The Downballot’s live tracker dropped Begich’s lead from 2.6% to 2.2%. When all is said and done, it would be magnificent if the media’s race calls for Begich and McCormick proved to be premature! Cherry on the pie would be Bohannan emerging as the victor over Miller-Meeks.
Ranked choice itself may survive, as the "no" on repeal finally moved ahead yesterday. It seems that the better Peltola does the better RCV does, but it's probably too soon to make a call.
217. Votes from Merced came in. SoS site has not changed the numbers on what is left in each county since the recent reports. Of course, for persons not closely involved (like me), even if you know how many votes are left in a county, you do not know how many are in CA-13. It has parts of five counties and not all of any of them.
Stanislaus County has 32K left to count and is about 30% in CA-13 so I'm guessing it may have about 10K left in CA-13. Per SoS site, it expects to post results by 6:00 tonight.
Today's numbers from L.A. : T 23 S 18, gain of five votes. OC big batch: T 1243 S 1036, gain of 207 votes. 207+5+102 (previous lead)= 314 current lead for Tran. That is indeed larger than Duarte's lead in CA-13, which is now 227 votes. We must have some stunning Stanislaus votes and satisfactory San Joaquin votes that were counted today. There is often a lag in the Unprocessed Ballot Status page. I am starting to believe that Duarte can be made into a one-term wonder.
Well, the good news is that was quick. Perhaps in future days there can be more comments from realistic and knowledgeable folks like skaje (and many others) and the entire day's discussion won't be so . . . well, quickly, uh, "read."
https://www.politico.com/news/2024/11/18/arizona-secretary-state-gubernatorial-primary-hobbs-00190254
Arizona Secretary of State Adrian Fontes being encouraged to primary Gov Katie Hobbs in two years. Seems to mainly be driven by immigrant activists and those who ostensibly blame Hobbs for losing more seats in the state legislature instead of obtaining a trifecta. They also say she has tacked too far right on immigration. They call her "weak politically".
In any case, Hobbs has now said she will fight against the deportations. I'm not necessarily pro Hobbs but a contested primary here could be disastrous. Her campaign for Governor last time was abysmally run so as long as she has a new team running it I don't see her doing overly poorly. The last Morning Consult poll in July had her at 52% approval.
If state level Democrats haven't figured out cohesion on immigration by now then I don't know what to tell them besides whatever Mark Kelly is, do that. Obviously the entire nation has moved to the center on immigration. I fear that these absolutist activists will try to keep the party on the far left on this issue.
Completely absurd in light of the results in Arizona a few weeks ago.
As a part time Arizonan, I disagree with your conclusion. Katie Hobbs is highly unpopular with Arizonans. She only won by 17,000 votes in 2022 against Kari Lake, and Hobbs is viewed as much more unpopular than when she ran.
As to what Kelly has done on immigration, he challenged Biden's position, as did almost every Democrat in Arizona.
I'm not ready to predict 2026, because we don't know the damage that a Trump administration is going to cause to Arizona, but his proposal on deportation and tariffs could be devastating to Arizona that is dependent on immigrants for agriculture, construction, and hospitality and it's industries are heavily import/export.
There is talk of Kimberly Yee, treasurer, running for governor. She is viewed as a normal Republican, and if she could get through a primary, I believe she would be hard to beat unless we have a blue tsunami.
As attitudes stand now, I'm not sure Hobbs would win against anybody, including a typical Arizona R loon, but 2026 is a long way out.
I'm not sure how a primary would benefit either Hobbs or Fontes and set them up for success in two years. Both would emerge broke and bloodied. Unless Hobbs is willing to step aside, as Gretchen Whitmer has famously said, "The train has left the station."
Any particular reasons Hobbs is highly unpopular?
I think a variety of reasons. Hobbs is a decent administrator, but doesn't communicate well. I believe that was her biggest issue in 2022's election and why it was so close. Then there was an immigration issue in Arizona that got effectively pinned on Democrats. Arizona also has a significant unhoused problem that got tied to immigration, even though few in the homeless encampments are Latino. Crime has also been hyped even though statistically it's down. That being said, I was robbed at 4am in our backyard this summer with a knife to my throat, so I find it hard to say it's not a problem. If my standard poodle didn't take a chunk out of the guy's leg, I'm not sure how it would have ended.
I'm so sorry you had to deal with that. I'm glad you're still with us. I'd be curious to see what H2Hs look like in a year with Yee or other potential Republicans.
Is there any actual evidence that she is unpopular? The few recent polls we had were at worst mixed.
I’d say it’s just an article from Politico. They’re already getting bored and trying to find something for 2026. Nonsense chatter for the most part. Except! Fuck I’m getting sick of liberal activists. I love being one but a lot people need to stfu and focus on winning.
Am I at three “stfu” so far in this comment section so far? Christ. It’s as if Democrats think they can act like Republicans by bitching the loudest to get results. If only. Tell that to Christine O’Donnell and Sharon Angle. Relics who should always be remembered.
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/politics-news/dnc-chair-race-first-candidate-martin-omalley-rcna180629
Martin O'Malley officially in for DNC Chairman. Some takeaways:
. Seems to be broad consensus among all to keep a 50 state strategy.
. Wikler very much considering.
. Seems to be some mild consolidation around Minnesota Chair Ken Martin.
Annnnnd Rahm Emmanuel still considering but said to be 'tepid' because he wants to go for Senate or Gov if Durbin or Pritzker call it quits.
He can have Gov. Not Senate. That's for Underwood.
Can Rahm please just go away?
No. You forget that this is the shittiest timeline.
That’s a knee slapping stfu.
I wish but money talks, unfortunately.
Whose money, in this case?
Mmmhmmm.
1. The generic “money talk” attack against politicians is what the GOP says bc they’re stupid and can’t come up with much else. “Drain the swamp!”
2. Why assume money when it could be ego?
Underwood still has to wait on Durbin (and other primary foes after Durbin retires)
I like her chances in a primary and yes Durbin needs to hang it up and take his precious blue slips with him.
Agreed on Durbin. Girl, bye.
But are we confident in Underwood winning vs Krishnamoorthi? His fundraising says he’s going for it hard. But, come on. He’d be great but IL gonna do IL and the black woman is going to win. IL did it first and I bet they’ll want to do it again. And, when you wiki black US Senators, Carol Moseley Braun is 4th, Obama is 5th and bless his heart, Roland Burris is 6th.
From my experience living in Mpls and electing Muslims to Congress, it feels good doing it bc of the historical nature of it all. Not that Underwood needs to rely on symbolic votes like Omar does, but it helps.
Not direct at you but why O'Malley? He failed to get his Lt. Governor elected leaving Maryland with Hogan for eight years. His Presidential campaign in 16 went nowhere and I have no idea what he has been up to since? Wickler seems like the best of this group just because he did the best of the seven keeping the race within a point and believes in year-round organizing and party building.
Rahm can get bent. I don't want him anywhere near an elected position.
Rep. Seth Moulton: “We’ve lost touch with the majority of Americans. Democrats have a habit of preaching down to people and telling them that if they don't 100% agree with our orthodox view, often defined by the far left, then they're just bad people, they're morally wrong. That’s not going to win us any elections.”
Moskowitz: “We have policy issues that are out of touch with the American people.”
Sounds like a lot of projection going on with those two. I'd like to hear specific Democrats and specific issues.
Specific issue #1 is the refusal of many Democrats to acknowledge that inflation is a big problem, has not gotten better for most people, and hits lower-income people the hardest.
Harris didn't campaign on lowering prices for Americans. Her refusal to do that meant that Trump could easily trot out how prices were lower during his term, and Harris never had any answer to that.
It is naive to think that prices will go down to pre Covid levels. That is unfortunately not how inflation works. The only way to achieve that is through a massive recession which is even worse for many people. Fortunately, wages are increasing faster than inflation now and have almost caught up with the inflation bump. That is not to say that the problem is over for many Americans but average wage growth has caught up.
This is EXACTLY the "preaching down to people" that the Democrats mentioned above are talking about. It's completely absurd to constantly hear Democrats preaching that inflation is somehow OK just because of the nominal, negligible, and in many cases non-existent wage growth going on. Two weeks ago, the American people said loud and clear that no, it's not OK. The American people want lower prices, and Democrats need to stop spouting BS excuses for why we can't do that.
The wage growth was real - and in fact it was bigger for the working class than the middle class for quite a while now.
As for going forward - well its not our problem anymore. We get to sit back and say - "why havent you fixed this yet".
What Democrats don't understand is that wage growth doesn't make inflation better. Wage growth is something that every working American deserves, regardless of inflation. Wage growth should be happening even if inflation is literally zero.
My point is that wage growth does NOT make inflation OK, and Democrats need to stop claiming that it does. It just comes across as so incredibly tone-deaf.
even "historic" wage gains of 10-15% mean the people on the bottom are making $16.75 instead of $15..... meanwhile rent is up 200 bucks as month as are groceries...
Dems REALLY NEED to get it through their heads. Life for the bottom 30% is absurdly expensive and increasingly miserable...
Of course, actual out of pocket housing costs went up more for renters than for existing owner occupants, and OER increases for owner occupants were accompanied by massive increases in home equity. Renters are more likely to be working class than middle class. Working class folks are also more likely to have to pay for car repairs or rideshare or another used car at the bottom of the market where prices went up the most. Experience of inflation differs, so just because we usually use a common deflator for all incomes, and nominal incomes rose more as a percentage for the 40th percentile than the 80th (I assume) doesn’t necessarily mean real incomes actually rose more for lower incomes when comparing the actual disparate baskets of goods purchased at the various income levels.
The problem is that there really aren't any easy solutions to bring prices down. in the near future. We could have hit harder that Trump's policy of tariffs and mass deportations will make the issue worse.
No one said inflation was ok. What they said was that the conditions necessary to cause deflation are worse. Which is true.
Explaining that deflation is bad is not talking down to people.
It can be to someone experiencing inflation related stress. Imagine telling someone their stress would be even worse if they tried to fix it.
Its more naive to think that it would have worked. Harris had no answer because there was no answer.
If Biden could have done something about it without pushing us into a recession, he surely would have.
So Biden and then Harris were stuck trying to basically paper over inflation and point to the robustness of the economy inflation aside. And that does sound like talking down, but its mostly just the best option for messaging.
Predictably it didnt work because well - inflation was a big deal to alot of people.
They failed to communicate with the people. Especially Biden, who should have been doing it all the way through.
I sound like a broken record, but I really believe lack of effective communication is the biggest problem Democrats have. Especially when they're in power. And it's rarely the "media's" fault. It's Democrats' lack of creativity and boldness. Or merely doing Politics 101.
Dear American people - we get it, prices are high. You all saved too much money (and frankly we probably printed too much) and now you are trying to spend it all at once.
But there is literally nothing we can do about it except on the very margins of a few products (and you will then spend the money you saved on those products raising the price of some other product), without you losing your job.
They cant do a Trump and say - trust us, we'll fix this - because well - why havent they? They are in charge.
The idea that messaging could have solved the problem despite the facts on the ground seems like just another way of talking down to people honestly.
If only Biden had brought more attention to how much is administration sucked at dealing with inflation, we would have won!
I agree with that, but that's neither "preaching down to people" nor a policy issue that is "out of touch with the American people."
Inflation has absolutely gotten better for most people.
The problem is prices still went up by a lot before easing up. They didn't go back down to where they were pre-2021.
No, wrong. Comments like these just show how out of touch so many Democrats are. Frankly, inflation is still getting worse - just in the past few weeks, the price of a pound of 80% lean ground beef went up once again, from $3.99 to $4.49. It was $2.99 in 2019.
Comments like these really make me understand why so many people, even some who don't like Trump, were too disgusted with Democrats and their aloofness on inflation to vote for Dems.
Is it you straight up expectation that prices will never rise again? Or that after a period of inflation they will return to what they were before? The level of inflation in this country dropped massively over the past year
Wages increased, particularly for the bottom brackets. These are just facts. I'm not talking about perceptions but reality!
And as for perceptions, Republican voters are suddenly "feeling good" about the economy – without the core reality shifting recently. In other words, this has everything to do with "the vibe economy".
https://www.axios.com/2024/11/13/consumer-sentiment-republican-democrat-switch
To answer your second question, yes, prices should return to what they were after inflation. If a product doesn't change, then in the medium/long term there's no reason why the price should change. And in fact, in the long term, technological advances in production, distribution, and transportation should result in prices going down!
And like I said above, wage growth does NOT make inflation OK. Wage growth is earned, and to have all the effort of earning a higher wage be taken away by inflation is a terrible feeling!
Well it's an issue that will be going away so there's that. I mean i think the issue was unwinnable because yaknow there was a dem president for the last 4 year even though we all remember this stuff starting under Trump. I suppose dems could just lie and say we'll lower prices.
As I was saying yesterday, it"s apparently important for Dems to lie as much as possible because even our own partisans don't believe the truth
Democrats need to 100% say that we'll lower prices. And then, if we retake power, we should bully, threaten, and if necessary force CEOs to lower their prices.
Remember, like I said yesterday, Dems need to position the party in opposition to greedy billionaires and CEOs
Inflation is 2.5% though some items are above and some are below (ironically the inflation rate under Trump in 2028 before Covid was 2.4%). This is not talking down. This is trying to have a fact based foundation for a discussion so it doesn't become what you just heard on Tic Toc. Then we should understand the pain that many are feeling and think about solutions especially about the housing/rental prices. Also, we should point out that all of Trump's so-called financial policies will dramatically increase inflation.
The food is one thing, as is gas. What never gets talked about is housing and rents.... in many places shitbox studios going for $800/month are now north of $1200.... even historic wage growth won't help with that...
They're not talking about inflation, they're talking about culture war nonsense. Moulton was going after Trans last week
He wasn't "going after" Trans people, he was saying biological men should not compete against women. Being anti-trans and being fair to women are two different things. And he's not alone:
“I don’t want to discriminate against anybody, but I don’t think biological boys should be playing in girls’ sports,” Suozzi said
I got clobbered on all the transgender messaging in my district, and it was very painful,” said Rep. Vicente Gonzalez (D-Texas)
Writing off Moulton as "conservative guy who challenged Pelosi" is ridiculous. Moulton has a strong history of supporting LGBTQ rights but this issue is just common sense. We can protect the rights of Trans people to exist but don't need to sacrifice the rights of women to do it and I say this as a lesbian woman!
"Twice, once in 2022 and again in 2023, Moulton co-sponsored House Democrats’ Transgender Bill of Rights, which, among other protections, would guarantee trans student-athletes the right to participate on sports teams that match their gender identity. "
https://thehill.com/homenews/house/4996259-democratic-transgender-rights-election/
Anyone who is an illegal immigrant or trans in sports absolutist clearly didn't get the memo from a few weeks ago that the majority of America is in the center on these new culture issues. America has moved left on abortion but right on immigration and Trans women in female sports.
It's not like Democrats ran on this issue. But, as usual, Democrats failed to fight back. The Republicans won in 2004 by using gay marriage as a club. Democrats have three choices when they try to do this: Agree with the attacks, fight the attacks, or do nothing.
I'm not sure what your recommendation is here. Fight back (i.e. run on the issue). Agree with the attacks (and risk losing a base that was already less enthused?)
If it's not Trans they'll find something else or invent it. Of course they can't run on their policies of tax cuts for the wealthy and deregulation of big companies.
Laughable to think this election made a statement about sports of all things. There's a ton of articles by now seeking out Biden -> Trump voters, specifically asking them why they voted Republican, and it's simply inflation, inflation, housing prices, rent, insurance, the disruption of the past four years, feeling like things were better under Trump, that he said a lot of crazy things but didn't actually do them, things actually felt just fine under Trump and then went crazy under Biden, Trump's going to end inflation but keep job growth and income gains, etc., etc. But sure, let's pile on to trans people and blame them for all this. Great stuff, this is the recriminations and scapegoating I can always look forward to after we lose an election.
This is Christmas time for dems with grievances
Anecdotal: Sunday, while having winter tires mounted on our car, I spoke to the two people in the waiting room about the election. A middle-aged woman was so alarmed that she was seriously investigating moving abroad. An elderly man said he, unenthused by either candidate, held his nose and voted for Trump. His reason? That Trump had promised to "stop the wars".
I'm not gonna wade into the trans issue in terms of a policy/civil rights debate, but I suspect you're wrong about it not swinging votes. Dave Chappelle's highly successful anti-trans stand-up shtick doesn't exist in a bubble insulated from electoral salience. It wouldn't be the first time that being at the tip of the spear on culture war issues cracked up the Democrats' coalition.
At the very least, the Democrats need to acknowledge they're on the wrong side of public opinion on this and update their messaging. They were winning the argument in the Roy Cooper era but once Republicans figured out a way to make it about children, they've been on offense and made considerable inroads. Pretending that they haven't and hoping people will be naturally co-opted by the gravity of civil rights acceptance might work, but it's risky.
The more serious reckoning needs to happen with illegal immigration and I won't pull punches on this. If the Democrats had to have their asses handed to them two weeks ago, I was hoping it would be unambiguously because of their unacceptable stewardship of immigration policy. The verdict wasn't definitive and Dems are interpreting it as giving them permission to stay the course on an asylum platform that is unequivocally batshit insane.
And honestly, that includes the reform plan pitched this spring which still allowed for 5,000 people PER DAY to manipulate the asylum process and cut in front of millions of people trying to immigrate legally. If anything, Democrats were lucky Trump sabotaged that bill because allowing 5,000 new asylum manipulators per day would not have stanched the deluge of crossings. The borders would be just as clogged now as they were a year ago and the issue would have been more front and center during the general election with people still as angry about the border in November as they were in February. The executive order Biden passed in lieu of the border reform bill did a lot more to cool down this issue than the reform bill would have.
Herein lies the risk for Democrats in the months to come. Trump will be carrying out deportations and, at least until there's tangible economic pain felt by consumers, these deportations will be broadly popular. If the Democrats choose to spend an inordinate amount of time in the next year outraged about sending illegal immigrants back home, they will have once again misread popular opinion badly and position themselves for another disappointing cycle.
Pretending that the Trump surge was entirely about inflation does nobody on our side any favors. It's not as if the demographics that surged to Trump this year did so out of this blue. 2024 wasn't 2016. The trend lines have been in motion for a few cycles now. We have a much bigger problem with American voters than the price of eggs being too high.
Yes she did; 80% of her ads in GA were on the economy and inflation. I keep hearing these alternative realities where Biden never held public speeches touting his Administration's accomplishments the past 2 years and Dems didn't campaign on the economy. All of that happened-ya'll will have to find a new boogeyman.
What Harris said in her ads didn't matter. The prices people saw in the supermarkets were what mattered.
In fact, those ads may have actually made Democrats seem even MORE tone-deaf. “The nerve of those Dems to claim the economy is great even when prices are still a lot higher!”
And it makes you wonder how Dems got away with this in 2022 when inflation had peaked. Seems like we got a lot of leeway for what was clearly a covid problem and then we waffled it by not acknowledging why it’s here to stay bc we said it’s actually gone. As much as people want to say inflation is lower bc technically it is, check your grocery bill.
I'm going to get a lot of flak for this, but there is a perception that the cultural/sexual pendulum has swung, way, way too far to the left. Many voters were responding to that as well.
Remember the flak Mark Udall got for being a one note Johnny on abortion rights? Looks like almost the whole party made that mistake this time. It’s an important subject, and a vote winner talked about the right way (which is different in different places). It’s not the only damn thing people care about.
Specifics guys.
Moulton - Conservative guy thinks Dems are too liberal. News at 11. His challenge of Pelosi and run for President were also vaguely delusional.
He ran for president? Must have not been paying attention that week
It's still amazing how many candidates ran in the 2020 cycle and whose runs are now forgotten.
Seth Moulton is the idiot who tried to stop Nancy Pelosi from being re-elected as House Speaker – without Moulton being able to recruit anyone to run against her. Had he challenged her himself, I suspect Moulton would have received two votes: his own and Jared Golden’s.
"if they don't 100% agree with our orthodox view, often defined by the far left, then they're just bad people, they're morally wrong. That’s not going to win us any elections.” I mean how many Republicans did Harris campaign with? I don't think this is the problem.
If only we had gotten attack ads of, “Harris campaigned with Liz Cheney, the biggest RINO of them all!” We would’ve won then. But, instead we got, “Harris thinks prisoners deserve tax funded sex change surgeries.”
She’s pro-prisoner trans rights?!?!? Come on now. Fucking dumb. Unless it’s 3 meals, a shower and an hour of recess per day, do not answer questions about the rights of prisoners.
Not a popular opinion, judging by the comments here, but I maintain my view that these comments from officials are a waste of time and counter-productive. All his comments (and similar from other officials) does is create infighting in the party.
Everyone and their dog is going to pop up and say that we need to change our policies to better align with *their* policies. Magically, agreeing with them is the one secret to winning elections — unfortunately, that magic permeates across the entire ideological spectrum, as everyone from the most centrist to the most progressive democrats, and all in between, are of this view.
Fighting over Moulton's or Sanders' or anyone else's comments is a waste of our time. It's a waste of their time to make the comment in the first place! There's no magical policy or ideological change that would have made Harris president with a trifecta. This was the most policy-bereft election of my entire life.
Agreed, it's all so very pointless. What did Republicans need to do to get back in after Obama's re-election? What did we have to do after Bush's? Why does anyone think we need to argue social issues to have a chance to win in 2028? Trump didn't do anything to fix his losing 2020 coalition, he just ran again and said things were better under him and worse now. But no, some Dems want to talk about women's sports now...the only thing we need to do is wait for people to get mad at Trump again, and run on broadly popular things that will address what people are mad about, and improve their lives.
I think you pointing out Moulton and Sander’s says everything about the political discourse the left is having. Both sides of our party are saying the same thing yet blaming each other for it.
What’s really dumb is we’re all focusing on why Dems lost instead of why Trump won. I think that’s the key here. We should be bigger assholes who are more forceful in getting our agenda done. Then we’d have more results to sell.
Trump at 49.9%, doesn't change anything but at least a majority didn't vote for that diphit
Changes nothing, but it does matter. At least to me.
Time for Democrats to get the news media to point out that "Trump lacks a mandate from a majority of American voters". And to ask Trump and other Republican politicians: "Lacking a mandate from a majority of American voters, how will you work with Democrats to achieve compromise solutions that have broad support?"
By my estimation there's still at least 100,000 votes to count in NYC. So, that figure should go down further. We know that New York likes to take its time for no reason.
I expect NYC to discover a whole bunch of uncounted ballots in February or March next year. Wouldn't be the first time that's happened.
I'm still trying to figure out why it's taking 3 weeks to count California votes.
That I can understand. They have tons and tons of mail-in ballots. New York doesn't have that amount or percentage.
That and they do a lot of verification on each one. Apparently CA law has pretty strict rules on this, which is why it's so time consuming.
Thanks for this. Bc I was going to say more people should not equal more time bc they should have more staffers, then. The quantity should correlate across the board.
They just look so stupid every election at this point. If they were a swing state, both parties would’ve called an end to this nonsense by now.
They have majorities in both houses, the Supreme Court and the executive branch. Electoral history says there is no mandate given the margins but Democrats clearly were rejected in this election. Deluding ourselves by pretending Trump was a fluke again despite winning enough ON election night won't help us win future races.
It was not a mandate but it was a clear directional change. Period.
I clearly said it doesn't change anything
The truth doesn't matter. All that matters is "the story", and the story is that Trump won big.
INFLATION AND MESSAGING:
President Biden could have used his bully pulpit more effectively to name and shame the companies that exploited the Covid pandemic and the logistics crisis to massively increase their profit margins.
Moreover, Biden and Democrats could have highlighted data showing the percentage increases in CEO pay and compensation, contrasted with that of ordinary American workers. (Yes, for a president or top politician to do this would be "untraditional")
That would have placed the Biden Administration – and Democrats – squarely on the side of working families.
One more thing: Democrats could and should have enabled Medicare to negotiate ALL drugs, not just a very short list. (But, hey, the pharmaceutical industry and lobbyists are strong.)
Meanwhile, President Biden and Democrats could have published lists comparing American and European drug prices. That would have underscored how Americans are being fleeced by the price-gouging pharmaceutical industry. I have a really, really hard time seeing why Americans should have the questionable "privilege" of paying massively more for the same drugs.
We saw some dems attempt this very gently. I think if you have politicians or the government go after American companies aggressively I think that would turn off a lot of Americans. Idk it's a difficult thread to needle and ultimately i don't think it would have worked or been effective politically.
The obvious strategy is to concentrate on highlighting the most egregious examples. By underscoring that *most* companies are responsible and by avoiding a broad attack, you counteract the perception that you are anti-business.
But for the worst price-gougers you do it loudly, not gently!
Disagree, especially if those companies are the same ones that have just dramatically increased their prices.
The problem is our bark doesn’t have bite. It’d probably come off as whining while Trump comes off strong but he will fuck a company up. As pro-business as he truly is, he will make an example of someone. It’s the whole double standard where Dems rule with intelligence while the GOP rules with fear. We all know which one works better.
Democrats could do something about that.
I firmly believe that billionaires and corporate CEOs *should* fear the government. That's the only way to prevent them from doing things that screw everybody else.
Mmmmhhhhhmmmm. That’s what makes Trump so troublesome bc he’ll cut corporate taxes while also saying to corporations, “If you fuck with me, I’ll cut you.” Dems are in quite a pickle with matching this energy. Overall, we aren’t assholes. And, we used to rely on unions for backing up our populist messaging and they increasingly don’t like us.
My dad got fed so much anti-green energy messaging in the “news” that matches up with auto union workers worrying about going too fast on electric cars. Then, it is also trans rights, which is a manufactured problem that we fall hook line and sinker for. Guilty as charged bc I also love arguing about something I know I’m right about. The GOP just ignores questions they’ll sound dumb answering and they pivot to something else they can win on. Dems could do that, too. Dems dont need to talk about prisoners getting sex change surgeries for crying out loud. It’s a gotcha question and we fall for it every time bc we just looooove being right. We don’t have to be wrong, we could just pivot like they do.
Oh shit, I didn’t even see the giant thread below about trans issues being too big a topic this election. Let’s go dive into that.
Answering such absurd gotcha questions are the equivalent of denying you’re a pig-fucker. Yes, you may be right, but the damage is done.
Agreed with all that. And at the same time, Biden should've worked to increase the supply of products so that companies would be forced to lower prices on them. And he should've required anyone importing goods into America to sell them at a lower price here (especially if most of the importer's products go to America, which I suspect is the case for a lot of importers). That would've given Biden a lot of leverage over them, if only he had chosen to use it.
Just so everyone knows, I won't be responding anymore in the economic policy thread that started at the top of the comments. This is because I'm doing this all on my phone, and the small screen makes it very difficult to keep track of long, back-and-forth conversations and threads. So I'm not ignoring anyone who responded to a comment of mine.
What are you referencing? Did it get hidden?
The big long thread above that originated with Gina Mann's comment about Moulton and Moskowitz.
Thank you for responding. I should have let it be.
You had the right idea.
The fake news conspiracy nonsense has proliferated even towards the media now. As we speak now the media is falling hook line and sinker for the bullshit lies of the McCormick campaign crying wolf that certain counties in Pennsylvania were trying to defy the law and count "illegal" ballots. Let's be fully clear: there's nothing illegal about these ballots. They weren't cast by scary convicts or migrants, nor was there any cheating involved with their actual casting. They are only deemed "illegal" because they have incorrectly marked dates or lack signatures, which would make them by law potentially "invalid" but not illegal. The media once more continues to stoke the flames of paranoia and disappoint. Disgusting.
Stop watching for profit news media. They can all go out of business for all i care.
Any discussion of how many ballots they're talking about where this applies? And are they ballots that have already been tentatively counted or are they in limbo pending a court ruling?
JUDGES: Majority Leader is finally trying to pick up the pace on Senate confirmation of Biden’s judicial nominations. Yesterday alone, Schumer filed cloture on eight judges, which I believe is a new record for him. (I don’t understand why he wasn’t doing this far earlier.) As expected, Republicans were hitting the brakes, last night demanding roll-call votes on simple things such as moving back and forth between legislative and executive session – something that otherwise invariably gets done through unanimous consent.
EDIT: Today, just now, Republicans wasted more time by walking out and denying the Senate a quorum on the floor.
Elections have consequences. As of last Thursday, 14 November, there were 65 judicial vacancies. Any vacancies that Biden, Schumer and Durbin fail to fill, will be filled by Trump.
And don't forget Lauren McFerran's renomination as head of the NLRB.
You think republicans will respect blue slips?
Me? No, I think there will be a massive power-grab to accommodate Trump and his autocratic impatience, and that the GOP will blow up a lot of written and unwritten Senate and House rules. But Blue Slips is not the only thing slowing down Biden’s nominations, although it does get the most focus...
As of last Thursday: "There are now 29 pending [judicial] nominees: 17 waiting for floor votes, 6 waiting to be reported out of the Senate Judiciary Committee, and 6 waiting for hearings."
https://www.acslaw.org/on-the-bench-week-of-november-14/
I fear this is likely to be right.
But... Republicans have shown an ability to play the long game on a lot of these rules, especially with more establishment leadership in the senate. Which accurately describes Thune.
Much like the filibuster, the survival of blue slips depends heavily their recognition of how much that rule benefits them more than it benefits us. Do republican senators want to deal with a future dem president putting liberal district judges in their far right states that have had a consistently conservative district judge system for generations?
Unless they feel like we can't win back the senate anytime soon considering were pretty much out of red state senators.
Very well could be their calculus. We will see.
Would be a very risky move on their part.
I'm guessing this is an overestimation on their part. Democrats not only managed to win in 3 red senate seats in 2018, but also West Virginia of all places no less. There's also the fact that 2026 will likely be a midterm referendum election year and Trump won't be on the ballot to bail their sorry butts. Granted the elections will now be vs incumbents and open in cases like Ohio, and perhaps even Iowa if Grassley falls ill, but we'll have to see.
Winning WV, OH and MT in 2018 doesn’t seem like much of an argument considering what happened to them in 2024.
The filibuster and blue slips are so different, though. The GOP will always want to elect their judges but do they need to bypass a filibuster? For their agenda, no. They have reconciliation and they can accomplish much of their work through that.
McConnell, and other GOP Senators are well aware that if they get rid of the filibuster, the floodgates are open and if the Dems get a trifecta, we’re doing all the things. The joint impediments are far lesser in their case because they don’t care to do much in the first place.
CA 45
Mitchell said his analysis of the 45th District shows that there are about 13,000 ballots left to be counted in the district. He said ballots cast before election day had a 5.1% advantage for Democrats, in-person voting on election day had a Republican advantage of 15%, and votes counted after election day skewed blue by 18.5%.
That pattern is driven by young voters, Mitchell said, who “end up voting later than everyone else,” and tend to lean more liberal.
Mitchell said there are more than 4,600 ballots in the 45th District that weren’t counted initially because of clerical issues, including ballots that weren’t signed, or signed with a signature that didn’t match the voter information on file.
https://www.latimes.com/politics/story/2024-11-19/michelle-steel-derek-tran-ca45-congressional-race-votes-close
RHODE ISLAND. US Sen Jack Reed (D), 75, tells WPRI he plans to seek reelection next year.
Ughhhhhhhhhh. Nothing against him specifically but ffs, just retire. Go away and get us someone new who makes us look good.
A big batch of votes were counted from Delaware County that appear to have gone 2,074-992 for Casey. McCormick's margin now down to 16,374.
Any chance that it matters? And, yes, I know that a recount is scheduled. I also wonder when completion of the initial count is scheduled.
If the number of outstanding votes shown on NBC's county map is right, then it definitely matters. Their estimates shows 48,800 remaining votes just in the counties of Philadelphia, Bucks, Chester, Allegheny, Westmoreland, Erie, Lackawanna, Mercer, and Lycoming counties along with a spattering of thousands more in the remainder of counties. I'm not convinced they're right, but at least thus far, the estimated numbers haven't been too far off when counties like Montgomery and (just now) Delaware came in.
I hope you’re right. But it’s strange that NBC is showing an estimate of just 18,000 uncounted votes statewide in Pennsylvania. That said, that estimate has fluctuated wildly ever since Election Night, and with no obvious pattern.
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2024-elections/pennsylvania-senate-results
If, by some miracle, Senator Bob Casey does eke out a win, there’s going to be a serious meltdown in the McCormick Campaign and in the MAGA camp.
Agreed. The numbers don't match. Which is why I have some doubt about the county numbers.
Also really curious that NBC is showing a *higher* overall vote count than Pennsylvania’s SoS’ official election site is showing. They’ve certainly not been conspicuous when it comes to clarity or transparency.
https://www.electionreturns.pa.gov/General/VoteByMethod?officeId=2&districtId=1&ElectionID=105&ElectionType=G&IsActive=1&isRetention=0
I'm guessing that the confusion over number of ballots left to count is due to the issue of which can be counted. From what I have read, counties are following different rules and there is certain litigation--all over whether a ballot that arrived by election day can be counted when the date on the outside envelope is blank or erroneous. Dems say one can't take away a person's right to vote over minutia that cannot make any difference (the ballot arrived on time). R's say the law is the law. I recall the PA Supreme Court faced this issue but not the specifics. News stories say it specified that it was not deciding this particular issue.
Random question: Anyone know why Gaston County, NC moved 3 points to the left this year but Union County, NC moved a point to the right? If you'd asked me before the election, I would've guessed it would be the other way around, since Union, while still Republican, seemed to be trending Democratic while Gaston seemed to be more static. And I didn't think there was any influx of African-Americans into Gaston. Anyone know more about these two that might explain their differing trends this year?
Looks like more than 11,000 new votes came in from Alaska today there were Peltola-friendly. They dropped Begich's number down a point and Peltola up a point. It's now 48.5 Begich, 46.3 Peltola. Seems like it could help her in the ranked-choice tabulation.
Earlier today, The Downballot’s live tracker dropped Begich’s lead from 2.6% to 2.2%. When all is said and done, it would be magnificent if the media’s race calls for Begich and McCormick proved to be premature! Cherry on the pie would be Bohannan emerging as the victor over Miller-Meeks.
Well, a man can dream...
https://www.the-downballot.com/p/the-downballots-live-results-tracker
Ranked choice itself may survive, as the "no" on repeal finally moved ahead yesterday. It seems that the better Peltola does the better RCV does, but it's probably too soon to make a call.
CA-13: Votes from Stanislaus County came in and Gray has cut Duarte's lead to 1,564.
It's down to 200 votes. Anyone know what's left?
217. Votes from Merced came in. SoS site has not changed the numbers on what is left in each county since the recent reports. Of course, for persons not closely involved (like me), even if you know how many votes are left in a county, you do not know how many are in CA-13. It has parts of five counties and not all of any of them.
Merced County is entirely in CA-13.
You're right. My mistake.
Stanislaus County has 32K left to count and is about 30% in CA-13 so I'm guessing it may have about 10K left in CA-13. Per SoS site, it expects to post results by 6:00 tonight.
CA 45: Tran’s lead now 314. Bigger than Duarte’s.
Today's numbers from L.A. : T 23 S 18, gain of five votes. OC big batch: T 1243 S 1036, gain of 207 votes. 207+5+102 (previous lead)= 314 current lead for Tran. That is indeed larger than Duarte's lead in CA-13, which is now 227 votes. We must have some stunning Stanislaus votes and satisfactory San Joaquin votes that were counted today. There is often a lag in the Unprocessed Ballot Status page. I am starting to believe that Duarte can be made into a one-term wonder.
Well, the good news is that was quick. Perhaps in future days there can be more comments from realistic and knowledgeable folks like skaje (and many others) and the entire day's discussion won't be so . . . well, quickly, uh, "read."