Trump Thread

[Montmorency]

Did Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer just trick Trump into having a "Trump shutdown"???

Anyway, another piece on the GOP going fashy, but what caught my attention was a comment:

I live in a state with 1-party rule. Complete, lock stock and barrel, north to south, 1-party rule.

I live in California.

Two reasons mitigate the authoritarian tendency that I can think of – removal of gerrymandering as a means of voter control, and removal of mandatory R vs D fall elections. Come election time, I have a choice between 2 people within (typically) the same party, the top two vote getters in the primary. With policy differences that matter. I must research the candidates to understand their platforms, while with R vs D it would be a party line. The polarization is gone, the cookie cutter reflexivity to party line is gone. Town halls and open offices are held more frequently. If you are disconnected from your constituents, you will lose as the other guy is no longer ideologically the opposite. It no longer pays to be extreme.

The key difference is a fundamental respect for voting rights and transparency. I am free to vote for whomever in the primary, and the differences between the two candidates in the fall are the differences that matter to my district, not to a political party. I get a text saying when my absentee ballot is counted. My representative didn’t get to influence my district boundaries. My vote is respected.

In a way, California has gone back to the basics, the initial idea of America, where there were no political parties.

@ACIN