Tom Sullivan, Hullabaloo: Back to Comfy Chairs
Why I keep saying the donkey is dead. The Democratic Party does not yet (a month after the election) have strong resistant leadership to face down the Trump juggernaut.
And Obama absolutely dare not be that leadership, which would enable the launching of a race conflict. If you think frustrating the Electoral College anointment of Trump is dangerous, actual Democratic Party resistance (Neera Tanden’s hyperbole notwithstanding) would bring down massive suppression and Obama leading the charge would be call forth incendiary actions from the paramilitary right.
But so far the choices for DNC chair are comfy, argues Tom Sullivan.
North Carolina Democrats will be electing a new state chair about the same time the national party elects a new leader for the DNC. Even in the face of what happened this week, there will be an inclination among party regulars of Jim Hunt vintage to back a safe choice, someone not too radical or confrontational, someone who won’t ruffle any feathers among establishment members or drive off regular donors — as if the party still has something left to lose.
Expect the same dynamic to play out in the race for DNC chair. Howard Dean was once the crazy radical who if elected DNC chair would ruin everything. Instead, he brought to the party a model for raising online millions from small-dollar donors and a 50-state plan that helped Democrats win in districts that had not had seen assistance from the DNC in years. Those helped turn 2006 into a big pickup year for Democrats and paved the way for Barack Obama’s win in 2008. Then Democrats went right back to their comfy chairs. Dean was out. Wasserman Schultz was in.
Do you see the aggressive new leadership that is needed to revive the donkey? I don’t; too many old hacks lasted too long in their positions. Especially in North Carolina if we are getting nostalgic about the Jim Hunt era.
Hardball in NC — ABC News N. Carolina GOP Strips Some of Democratic Governor’s Power
Expect this was a trial run for the national GOP next time they’re in a similar circumstance.
wow
Reduced governor’s appointees from 1500 to 300; all governor’s appointees now require consent of the (Republican majority) Senate.
The Board of Elections in every county changes from 3 members – 1 Democrat, 1 Republican, 1 of governor’s party – to 4 members – 2 Democrats, 2 Republicans.
The State Board of Elections and Ethics Board are combined.
And more…
Either get used to it…
Or…
Do something about it!!!
You think Schumer and Pelosi give a shit?
Really?
I don’t.
Time for a People’s Party.
AG
Those changes would need a Constitutional change approved by the voters in Illinois. Not that Illinois voters have any sense. The same people that keep pols in power for twenty-thirsty years support term limits! “Stop me before I vote again!”. When will they learn that if they don’t like Madigan/Cullerton they should stop voting reflexively for the Party not the man/woman?
Not that the (R)’s offer anything better. The (R) congressional candidate that I voted for who ran against DWS’ hand picked 3rd way stooge was widely considered an idiot be Republicans! But until we have more than two choices the rich will continue to dominate us. Term limits just means that Congressmen can only collect graft for two years so they have to rake it all in in four years, especially the last two. And without continuity who will select the candidates? G-S and the other bankers for sure.
The used to be appeals to “the Spirit of Democracy”. That sounds ludicrous in this political climate. But enough of the candidates believed enough of the time that their temporary accommodations would not corrupt the system that for quite a while the system worked well enough. Now, the candidates are stripping every last thing the can out of the process.
So, even crossing over and voting for a Republican more idiotic than a DWS-selected idiot Democrat didn’t solve the dilemma either?
No and I suspect this is a problem in most districts. That’s why half the people don’t vote. The MSM says they don’t care but I think the problem is that the choice is “none of the above”. I’m 71, I’ve voted in every election and I mean every election including non-partisan local primaries since I turned 21. But I think this election was my last. Nothing changes. Nothing ever changes. Nothing good ever comes. The best that happens is dodging a bullet. When I look back at good Presidents, I keep coming back to frigging Nixon! That’s the best the system offers? Time to hang it up.
Nope. They’ve got to get the firehoses going again…
Priorities USA positions itself as center of gravity for the left in the Trump era
Center of gravity = center of fundraising
Izzat it?
Yup.
Dassit, alright.
In a nutshell.
There’s money to be made and power to be assembled as the loyal opposition, too.
The questions always remain.
Loyal to whom?
and
Loyal to what?
Would you buy a used car from this person?
I wouldn’t.
Especially one so recently and so badly used.
AG
Amazing story out of Miami-Dade, which elected a large donor County Chair. It is not going to far to say he bought it, and will now be running for State Chair, though why anyone would want to be Chair of the FDP is beyond me.
So Steve Schale, who RAN the Obama campaigns in 2008 and 2012 then tweets:
“Following @MarcACaputo twitter feed about Miami Dem party elex is good reminder of why I haven’t been part of a local party org since 1999”
People wonder why the state parties are a mess. It’s because the stench from attending a party event requires multiple dry cleanings to get the stink out.
As a result maybe the smartest guy in Florida politics wants nothing to do with the State party.
And this is a very real problem seldom discussed The gap between the people who actually run the campaigns want nothing to do with the existing state organization.
Reported thatEllison backed Bittel for Miami-Dade chair. So much for the great progressive hope.
But the stench doesn’t stop at the county/state Dem level. Money (and long entrenched status quo individuals) buys power all the way up the ladder.
Bullard was the Sanders guy. Odd that Ellison supported him.
Solution?
Duh!!!
It can be done…
Anything can be done if you work hard enough at it.
And if you fail?
Support another party.
Start another party.
Whatever…
When a political party gets this rotten this low on the power scale? It’s through if no wholesale cleaning-out happens.
Through.
It is said that fish rots from the head. I used to work on fishing boats. ‘Tain’t so. Fish rot all over fairly quickly when they go. Bet on it.
AG
Interesting chart:
Note that it was in the second half of 2012 when Clinton’s favorable rating began dropping and unfavorable increasing. That leveled out by July 2013. Then in late 2014 her unfavorables began to increase (from a higher base level) and her favorables declined further but more slowly than her favorables. She was into a net negative position by Jan 2015 and that only got worse from there.
Don’t think it’s that hard to extrapolate what was driving both curves. (Or maybe Putin/Russia was actively engaged in defeating her years earlier than her team alleges.)
In retrospect the one large warning sign out of the convention was that her fav/unfav didn’t move. Pollster charts smooth too much volatility for my taste, but there really wasn’t much movement in those numbers IIRC.
I remember vaguely seeing them and thinking that wasn’t good, but the trial heat numbers looked good.
Fact of interest perhaps only to me: 2016 featured the 5th smallest popular vote change in US History.
The shift among those making under 30K and those making over 100K were each suggestive of re-alignment. But they effectively cancelled themselves out.
Since exit polling began this is the only time 5 point shifts in opposite directions among different income groups occured in the same election.
2020 may well be defined by which party is able hang on to the gains they made.
My point was that once Clinton began to be perceived as a possible 2016 presidential candidate, her favorables declined and unfavorables increased and she was already in negative territory before she began her campaign. That meant that she couldn’t afford any missteps or had to come up with something authentic to increase her favorables. Not having a job reduced the possibilities for the latter.
I wonder about all of that. Clinton outperformed down ballot candidates in most of the swing states. She ran ahead of Feingold in Wisconsin, McGinty in Pennsylvnia, Murphy in Florida and Hassan in New Hampshire and Ross in North Carolina.
So you are right, her unfavorables were the second highest in political history. But if it was all about her why did her numbers so closely track, though usually exceed the Democratic candidates in these states.
The reason that list interests me is because it suggests that 2016 was very much a replay of 2012. There were swings in battleground states to be sure – and you can argue the true measure of the race is there since that it where it was fully engaged. Certainly there was polling showing Romney beat her by 10, and Obama beating Trump by 10.
In the end, though, I am beginning to think the candidates mattered less than we think. The race started to close before Comey – republicans came home.
It wasn’t “about” Clinton, fladem…it was about the whole system. The DemRats ran a candidate that said she supported the system, one who was herself a perfect product of that system…a master insider, a boss bureaucrat.
The RatPubs ran a candidate who at least promised to reform that system, one who had never held office or functioned in it as any way except as a user.
The Rats won.
RatPubs or DemRats…DC rats would still have won. It was all about which lies were more believable. Trump ran as an outsider. Insiders were …quite correctly…considered liars by much of the country.
Trump won.
Duh.
Go figure.
I did, and I was right.
Now what?
RatPubs become the insiders and the Dems take the role of outsiders?
Sounds a lot like WWE to me…
Fake wrestling.
WHHHHEEEEEEE!!!
Or does a real wrestler come along and blow up the whole game?
We shall see, soon enough.
Won’t we.
AG
Fake wrestling, fake elections? Trump is playing only when he knows he will win?
Could be.
That’s what many “winners” do, after all.
AG
You’re overlooking standard variables in the senate races that you cited.
There was also the confounding variable in 2016 with two stronger than usual presidential candidates.
For example, Connecticut
POTUS
Clinton: 897,572 (54.4%)
Trump: 673,215 (40.9%)
Johnson: 48,676 (2.96)
Stein: 22,841 (1.39%)
Total votes cast: 1,644,920
Senate
Blumenthal (inc): 1,008,714 (63.1%)
Carter: 552,621 (34.6%)
Total votes cast: 1,596,276
Blumenthal not only got more votes than Clinton but also more than the combined total for Clinton, Johnson, and Stein. And 48,000 people that voted in the presidential race, skipped the senate race.
In IL and NH, the GOP incumbent Senators received more votes than Trump did. Hassan received more votes than Clinton. In IL, more people voted in the Senate race than in the presidential race. But the LIB/GRN votes in the Senate race were more than in the presidential race. Duckworth didn’t do as well as Clinton and incumbent Kirk did better than Trump.
Might be worth taking a closer look at each of the Senate races because the dynamics in all of them differed somewhat and therefore, citing Clinton’s better performance than some D Senate candidates is too superficial.
Why is it superficial?
If her personal unpopularity was such a significant issue you would expect to see down ballot candidates exceed her performance significantly.
And they just don’t significantly. In NH at the top of the ticket there were 7,000 write-ins. But that and the undervotes in NH split almost perfectly evenly. Clinton’s margin was bigger than Hassan’s.
Which brings me back to my original point: I am unclear how much Clinton’s unfavorables mattered. The evidence in PA and WI is ambiguous at best.
I would also note her unfavorables were static while her performance in trial heats was not.
NH 2016
Clinton: 46.83%
Hassan: 47.98%
I checked the numbers before posting my comment and don’t much appreciate having to recheck it when someone else erroneously claims that I was wrong.
Incumbency for a down ballot race (and the overall standing of the incumbent and results of the prior senate race as well) can’t be dismissed. Generally, the R and D presidential winning candidate in a state gets more votes than the down ballot candidates of the same party. Thus, saying that in some states Clinton received more votes than a senate proves that she was a strong candidate is invalid.
Nor is it valid to assert that in instances where an incumbent senator received somewhat more votes (or percentage) than the presidential candidate of his/her party was a weak presidential candidate.
Presidential coattails — if all the variables are included — are less common than assumed. No evidence that any positive or negative coattails were operative in this election. Sheesh — Nixon won a personal landslide in ’72 and the GOP lost two senate seats and only gained twelve house seats (reducing the Democratic majority from 255 to 242). Only once since the 1992 election have Democrat held as many or more than 242 house seats (’08 election) and been the minority party for all of four years in the past twenty-two years.
Margin is the difference between candidates. You are citing their total. That is not what my post refers. I do not appreciate your confusion of those two things, and your implication that I was not citing numbers accurately. I note you left out the total of the GOP candidates.
You cited only the totals of the candidates when I clearly referred to the margins.
Clinton total: 348, 521
Trump total: 345, 789
Margin 2,732
Senate
Hassan: 354, 238
Ayotte: 353, 525
Margin: 713
You are wrong. Period. Clinton’s margin was larger than Hassan’s in absolute and in percentage terms.
The undervotes and the third party votes split almost perfectly.
Nothing in my previous post was inaccurate in the slightest.
You owe me an apology.
I cite margins, percentages, and actual votes depending upon what perspective, analysis, or comparison I’m making. Doing just the margin thing is how you got a 10 point margin for Clinton. Margins alone don’t reveal how many people voted FOR a candidate, FOR the party of the candidate, and AGAINST the opponent. Actual number of votes offers some clues as to the answer. Relevant when the question is how strong or weak a candidate was.
Seriously, claiming that Clinton was a strong candidate because her margin was slightly larger than Hassan’s and ignoring that Hassan received more votes than Clinton and Hassan was running against the incumbent Ayotte while Clinton was running against a very scary bozo doesn’t cut it IMHO.
If you remember, there were always a lot of undecideds/third party voters in the polls. Where her unfavorables did was put a hard ceiling on her support. It was always shaky to me that she’d pick up a lot of the undecideds. Rightly or wrongly, she was disliked by a large amount of the population. Some of it I’m sure was transferred over from Bill. But it was what it was and the campaign didn’t deal with it very well.
Feingold was thrown out before. Once the voters reject you, it’s hard to come back to the same job.
Or even a different job. Nixon lost out on the CA governor’s job in ’62, but Feinstein lost for Gov in ’90 and won for Sen in ’92. Rematches (Sen-Gov-POTUS)are rare enough that the historical data doesn’t tell us much about expected outcomes. Less rare in House races and the odds may be somewhat better there. Maybe Feingold should have tried for Gov in ’14. Six years between running for office after a loss is a long time, particularly if those years put the candidate well into a senior age bracket. In 2010 Strickland only lost the gov race by 2 points but going for the senate this year at age 75 resulted in a 21 point loss. (In ’68 Nixon was only 55 years old.)
It’s a mixed bag as to whether or not voters respect politicians willing to quickly get back in the saddle after a loss or even two losses. Partisans in both parties seem to favor such candidates more than the general electorate does.
Wisconsin voters showed they don’t like to be called wrong with the recall vote. Yes, Feingold should have run for Governor or angled for a cabinet job or whatever.
Along the track of recent comments, perhaps some new face should have run.
You and your readers might be interested in this piece…
Democrats have relied on a “demographics-is-destiny” approach that seeks to take advantage of increasing urbanization, increasing racial diversity, and increasing education levels for party growth while moving away from traditional constituencies like rural and white blue-collar voters. One goal of this plan has been to turn dynamically changing states like Texas, Mississippi, North Carolina, and Georgia into blue states in short fashion. But the hemorrhaging of blue-collar white voters keeps pushing the timeframe back. (iow, we are creating poors faster than they are dying off.)
http://www.dailyyonder.com/analysis-giving-up-on-rural-is-not-a-winning-political-strategy/2016/12/2
1/16862/
Would have been nice if the writer had properly used “Democratic” instead of “Democrat” which is a rightwing slur. Forced me to check on whether the site is a GOP/rightwing front.
While that Trump bus roaming around the hinterland and playing free barbecue pop-up restaurant sounds clever, it’s also not exactly legal. But since Trump wasn’t busted for this, Democrats may be tempted to borrow this trick (except they’ll serve free argula salad with a lecture on low-cal healthy eating and based on the picture in the article that’s something most of the folks need but would hate).
What I think keeps getting missed is that what drove reduced urban voter turnout is the same thing that very slightly increased non-urban votes for Trump. Open presidential seat election cycles favor an impulse for change. The worse the incumbent administration is, the stronger that impulse. So, 2008 isn’t a good baseline year to compare with the 2016 results. The preexisting dynamic was more similar to that of 1988 and 2000. Dukakis failed to convert on “change.” As VP the task for Gore was more difficult and he ran far behind GWB until his rhetoric shifted into change territory. (And he incurred the wrath of Bill Clinton and the Clintonites for doing so and who to this day refuse to acknowledge that if the majority had wanted a third Bill Clinton term, GWB would never have led in the polls.)
Sometimes votes change on minor things. When dukakis said he wouldn’t want to kill the man who raped his wife, I decided to not vote for him. Either he was a liar or a total wimp. If he had said, “Of course, I would want to ill him, but giving in to that urge would be wrong”, I would have voted for him. I discounted Willie Horton. Unless you are going to have no parole at all, such things will happen. Systems aren’t perfect.
IIRC, he never apologized for the error, either. Possibly he did and the media didn’t report it.
Another graphic presentation:
Gabe Uhr response tweet
Glenn adds:
But a much easier option than dealing with the freaking chart highlighting that the collapse didn’t begin in 2016. And that it happened under the leadership of a President that some have up there with or above Lincoln and FDR.
Yoiu write:
“… a President that some have up there with or above Lincoln and FDR.”
Yeah.
I guess…
Well…some have Reagan and Nixon up there too. I suppose it depends on which “somes” are doing the ratings.
I will say this for Obama. He got out relatively unscathed.
A teflon liberal.
Slipped right by every tough problem.
As Chicago activist Adolph Reed Jr. said of Obama way back in 1996″…a smooth Harvard lawyer with impeccable do-good credentials and vacuous-to-repressive neoliberal politics”
Yup.
Eight years in a prison he voluntarily entered.
Finally paroled.
Now he collects the swag.
A lifetime of it.
Watch.
AG