POTUS/General Election Thread 2020 + Aftermath

[Montmorency]

Essential resource on how long vote counts will take by state. Florida should mercifully give us a result Nov. 3 or 4, but a lot of states will take weeks to count all their ballots (some don't start until a week after E-day with their mail ballots!).
https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com...esults-timing/

As you can see, Pennsylvania will be rat central. Hopefully enough states flip to Biden that Republicans' (also hopefully ineffective) methods will be moot.

https://twitter.com/AmyEGardner/stat...79010915373058

Background RNC call on legal challenges and accusations that the GOP is making it harder to vote: "We don't like the construct of that narrative."

The US sanctions regime against Iran, such of it as was engaged post-JCPOA, is an illegitimate violation of a consensus international accord and a reckless act of aggression. Nevertheless, those sanctions are American law; Donald Trump has emphasized sanctions one of his central planks in prosecuting his 'successful' containment operation against our foe Iran. The obverse of his rhetoric being the alleged failure and appeasement of previous administrations in obtaining the advantages (of some capacity) he claims to have secured for America.

Nevertheless, Donald Trump took a request from Turkey's Erdogan to squelch federal investigation of the highly politically-connected Turkish state bank Halkbank, investigation over billions in sanctions-violating transfers into Iran. Trump of course had previously sold out our Kurdish partners in Syria to tender Turkish loving just a year ago. The only question is whether Trump has had his Turkish business interests in mind or whether there are more direct kickbacks.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/29/u...-halkbank.html

Weighting for how much we still don't know, the Trump administration has probably also distinguished itself by becoming the most licentiously-corrupt in American history.

With Lissu’s campaign on hold, and the opposition still negotiating about forging a united front, the next steps in this high-stakes vote are unclear. Some observers fear that a second term for Magufuli would further erode Tanzania’s democratic norms and institutions. Already, the speaker of the National Assembly, Chama Cha Mapinduzi’s Job Ndugai, has stated he will move to abolish presidential terms limits if Magufuli wins reelection.

Tanzania, once a beacon of stability and democratic aspirations in East Africa, has become increasingly autocratic since Magufuli was elected president in 2015. Nicknamed “the bulldozer” during his days as the minister of public works, Magufuli won support among Tanzanians by promising to nationalize the country’s mining sector and spur infrastructure projects. As president, he has been ruthless in his suppression of dissent.

...Magufuli portrays support for his economic agenda as a key part of Tanzania’s national identity. “Anyone who is critical of his resource nationalism approach is seen as anti-state [and] not patriotic enough,” Jacob told WPR. The ruling party uses similar tactics to tar its critics, including journalists.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

At a jubilant rally one recent evening in the town of Geita, in northwestern Tanzania, Tundu Lissu sang along to Bob Marley’s “One Love” as he looked out on the sun setting over a sea of cheering supporters. The opposition firebrand is running to replace incumbent President John Magufuli in a general election later this month; he has been on the campaign trail since late August, drawing massive crowds at each stop.

“Everywhere I’ve gone, I’ve looked people in the eye,” Lissu told World Politics Review in an interview. “Everywhere I’ve gone, people are so happy. It’s unbelievable, and it’s uplifting.” He returned home this summer after three years in exile, part of which was spent recovering after unidentified gunmen shot him 16 times in 2017, in what he suspects was an assassination attempt.

Last Friday, however, the National Electoral Commission suspended his campaign for seven days, accusing Lissu of using “seditious language” and violating election rules. It’s the latest blow to the opposition, with the Oct. 28 elections fast approaching.

Magufuli, of the ruling Chama Cha Mapinduzi party, appears determined to curtail his opponents’ ability to participate in a free and fair vote. Dozens of opposition hopefuls at the municipal and parliamentary level were disqualified from this year’s race by the National Electoral Commission in August, leaving the ruling party running unopposed in certain areas of the country.

“The harassment is continuous, it is meticulous, it is down to the smallest detail,” said Robert Amsterdam, a lawyer for Lissu, who also defends the popstar-turned-presidential-candidate Bobi Wine in Uganda.

Even campaign posters have been weaponized by the government, which recently enacted a new tax on posting promotional materials, making it too expensive for the opposition to print and share posters, placards and fliers. “A political party should not be subjected to paying taxes on posters,” said Zitto Kabwe, head of the opposition Alliance for Change and Transparency party, or ACT-Wazalendo. “Posters are a public service, where citizens get a chance to know the candidates.”

Kabwe’s party has not been spared in the recent crackdown. Three ACT-Wazalendo members were arrested last month, and while two have since been released, the party’s social media officer, Dotto Rangimoto, remains in police custody for allegedly committing cybercrimes. And according to Human Rights Watch, more than a dozen government critics have been arrested since mid-June.

Violence has also increased as elections draw closer. Police teargassed Lissu’s convoy as he traveled to a rally last week, firing chemicals into the crowd for some 15 minutes. And a disturbing video shared on social media shows people bleeding after apparently having been beaten with sticks in clashes with security forces.

Neither Magufuli’s office nor the electoral commission responded to emails from World Politics Review requesting comment on irregularities in the campaign process, and restrictions imposed on the opposition.

Undeterred by recent attacks, Lissu’s CHADEMA party and ACT-Wazalendo are currently in talks to unite behind Lissu ahead of Election Day. CHADEMA has already endorsed ACT-Wazalendo’s Seif Shariff Hamad, who is running for president of the semi-autonomous Zanzibar archipelago in a concurrent election. But authorities say these efforts could violate the rules. In a recent statement to the press, the deputy registrar for political parties, Sisty Nyahoza, said the law forbids political parties from forming coalitions this late in the election season.

The repressive environment also makes it difficult to hold the government accountable for its response to COVID-19. Since late April, Magufuli’s administration has not released any data about the spread of the coronavirus in Tanzania, maintaining that the country has rid itself of COVID-19 though prayer. It’s hard to challenge that official line for fear of retribution, and newspapers and television stations have been sanctioned for sharing warnings about the virus.

“I grew up in a fairly peaceful country,” said Mwanahamisi Singano, a Tanzanian women’s rights advocate. “I took that for granted,” she added. “Every time you feel this possibly won’t get worse, it gets worse.”

With fears of a rigged vote looming, U.S. Rep. Karen Bass, a Democrat from California, last week introduced a resolution in Congress calling for free and fair elections in Tanzania. “This is a critical moment in history and democratic backsliding must be called out wherever we see it,” she said in a statement. Sen. James Risch, an Idaho Republican who chairs the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, also condemned the suspension of Lissu’s campaign.

“I fear more police violence in the days and weeks ahead,” Lissu said. “The fear of violence in this election is much greater than in previous elections, and the reason is simple. We are winning. They know it and we know it.”

President Maga was reelected this week with 84% of the vote.




.....

Good thing the federal executive in the United States doesn't administer national elections, I - guess?

The same frustration with the state that Trump's tapped into could just as easily been tapped into by syndicalist leftists if the conditions were right.

"[I]f the conditions were right" is doing an unsupportable amount of work here. Mesoamerica could have colonized Europe if the conditions were right.

Many people who voted for Trump in 2016 liked Bernie as well, that only can be reconciled by understanding the policies were inconsequential, it was a movement to defer against the status quo and our system of state endorsed winners and losers.

Not really. Bernie Sanders is wildly unpopular among Trump's base, and to the extent some of his supporter's "like" him it was out of a sense of respect for his perceived probity. His policies have no traction among that set except perhaps as nice things we can't have because of all the spooks and spics. It would be an interesting thought experiment, if Sanders could do better as a Republican nationally than John Kasich, but I doubt even that. To be a Republican is to prioritize sexism, racism, grievance culture, and performative cruelty to an extent that precludes policy-driven pitches.

Now, after 4 years of indoctrination many probably stick with Trump because Clinton and Hunter Biden are eating babies in a pizza parlor somewhere in Ukraine... but depending on how the votes turn out it seems like a non-negligible portion of 2016 Trump voters are/have moved to Biden.

Will be interesting to see the analysis of turnout vs. persuasion post-election, though we should also keep in mind that both parties -more so Republicans - have undergone a sorting spurt under Trump, meaning they have permanently lost some fraction of their base (who therefore can no longer be counted as swing voters). We saw some of this in 2018, which appears to really have been spurred by the durable defection of white suburban moderates.

[Montmorency]

It should honestly be already granted that Biden will win Florida and North Carolina. Given the following facts, and the speed and promptness with which NC and FL count votes, we should know the outcome there by the end of Nov. 3.
https://electproject.github.io/Early-Vote-2020G/FL.html

59% of Florida registered voters have already had their votes recorded.

Party Count Percent
Democrats 3,276,786 39.5
Republicans 3,160,735 38.1
Minor 112,131 1.4
No Party 1,744,463 21.0
TOTAL 8,294,115 100.0

Most unaffiliated voters can be expected to break for Biden, giving him a bare majority. Say, currently, a margin of 200K votes.

What about the remaining vote, especially the in-person E-Day vote that can be expected to lean overwhelmingly Trumpian?

The thing is, before then perhaps 65-70% of all registered Florida voters will have had their votes recorded by early or absentee ballot. The cohort from 59 to 70% will maintain roughly the present margins; after all, most of these are mail ballots that had been cast a while ago. 1.5 million requested mail ballots are still outstanding. In-person early voting in Florida - which has leaned Republican - ends tomorrow I believe. There are active 14 million registered voters in Florida.

If 1 million more mail ballots are counted by the end, and the current 15+ point lead for Democrats persists, that translates to at least 3.1 million Dem votes vs. 2.3 million Repub votes.

If there is a huge surge in in-person early voting on the last day, and the early vote rises to 4.5 million votes but maintains existing margins that are basically the reciprocal of mail vote margins, then that comes out to 1.9 million Dem votes vs. 2.5 Repub votes.

Total early vote margin, out of 9.8 million 2-party votes, of 5 million Dem vs. 4.8 million, a lead of 200K.

In other words, the Democratic lead in Florida will only remain static at worst, and could plausibly expand (if there is not in fact a surge in last-minute early voting), up to the point that in-person votes begin to come in on E-Day.

What about the remaining vote, especially the in-person E-Day vote that can be expected to lean overwhelmingly Trumpian?

So, if we're talking about 70% turnout before the first ballot is cast on E-Day... Florida tends to have high turnout as a battleground state, but there is almost certainly not going to be above 80% total turnout in Florida this cycle. At the VERY outside, 15% of registered voters will vote on E-Day, or as little as 5% (or even less). That translates roughly to:

9 to 10 million Democratic-leaning early votes. A Democratic margin of hundreds of thousands of votes.
0.5 to 2.25 million strongly-Republican E-Day votes.

It is technically possible for Trump to prevail, but one would have to stipulate the absolute highest E-Day turnout with the worst-case partisan ratio (e.g. 2-1 Republican lean). A median scenario of a million 55-43 Republican-lean votes on E-Day still leaves Biden with a healthy margin.

And remember, I'm not even being that optimistic on Biden's behalf because I'm only distributing unaffiliated voters as mild Dem-leans, when in all probability they may be overwhelmingly turning out for Dems. If that is the case then even the best case for Republicans on E-Day can't swamp Biden.


As for North Carolina:
https://vt.ncsbe.gov/RegStat/Results...10%2F31%2F2020
https://electproject.github.io/Early-Vote-2020G/NC.html

There are 7.34 million registered voters in NC. As in Florida, ~59% of RV have had their votes recorded (4.35 million).

Early voting in NC has ended, so the remainder will be mail ballot receipts in the following days. About half a million mail ballots remain outstanding.

Party Count Percent
Democrats 1,633,774 37.6
Republicans 1,378,537 31.7
Minor 22,611 0.5
No Party 1,310,505 30.2
TOTAL 4,345,427 100.0

So far in North Carolina, once again applying conservative Dem-lean ratios for unaffiliated voters, Biden will have an even larger lead than in Florida - by proportion. Say, 53-46, or 2.3 million vs. 2 million.

But North Carolina will take some time to count E-Day votes, though, and NC has an especially-long window for receiving late mail ballots. What then?

To have round numbers let's be optimistic and stipulate 440K of the outstanding mail ballots will be counted in the end, and that the same partisan ratio obtains. That would bring turnout in NC to 65% of RV.

So far the parties have actually been close to evenly-matched in in-person early votes (which, again, has ended), so the Dems' current margin is entirely by virtue of the mail vote. Likely more than 3/5 of all mail ballots have been Dem votes, a staggering number. If we add 440K mail votes to the current totals, that would add roughly 280K Dem vs. 160K Repub votes, expanding the margin to more than 400K Dem votes. That would be a more than 8-point lead for Dems, 53 or 54% to 45%.

Such a lead would be even more difficult to overcome than in Florida. We can also grant turbocharged turnout for NC compared to baseline, so let's say that there will be 75% total turnout, going from 65 to 75 on E-Day. That means, say, 750K votes on E-Day, in-person. But we could go wild and distribute 66% of those votes to Republicans and that would only add 500K votes for Repubs compared to 225K for Dems, reducing the Dem lead by 275K. That would still be over a 100K lead for Biden in North Carolina!


Note, also, that in both these states the early vote alone will have reached or exceeded the total 2016 vote. Maybe... maybe when people vote, Republicans lose?

[a completely inoffensive name]

"[I]f the conditions were right" is doing an unsupportable amount of work here. Mesoamerica could have colonized Europe if the conditions were right.

It's not that far off. Left wing tankies and to a lesser extent progressives like to indulge in false victimhood and conspiracy theories just as much as the right. The only difference is that at this point in time, the right had better media penetration online at the right time. Look up Bannon's attempt at being a Hollywood writer before politics, if only Sci-fi had just paid him for a shit script for a b-movie the culture would have been so much different. Even 4-chan at one point was more leftist than not back during the Bush years.

Not really. Bernie Sanders is wildly unpopular among Trump's base, and to the extent some of his supporter's "like" him it was out of a sense of respect for his perceived probity. His policies have no traction among that set except perhaps as nice things we can't have because of all the spooks and spics. It would be an interesting thought experiment, if Sanders could do better as a Republican nationally than John Kasich, but I doubt even that. To be a Republican is to prioritize sexism, racism, grievance culture, and performative cruelty to an extent that precludes policy-driven pitches.

Nah, the sexism, racism, grievance culture only came about because Trump won in 2016 and Bernie bowed out, leaving no voice on the left that spoke to these people's frustrations.
If what you are saying is true, Trump should have been the landside winner in the primaries because he said these things out loud...but he wasn't he only got like 30-40% and plurality rules carried him across the finish line. Now he has 90%+ support because the rest have now taken the cues from the chosen leader and have become very comfortable in the new fascistic culture.

You seem to think people (Republicans) are simply racist and sexist to begin with and eagerly hop into bed with Trump because he is a reflection of them. The truth is most were frustrated, struggling, working class and middle class people who were taught by the Republican Party to hate and to vilify and to dehumanize. You can't tell me that dozens of districts went Obama 2012 to Trump 2016 because the racist residents simply had not found their idol until Trump to channel their hateful energy. Wouldn't these racists have fought tooth and nail to prevent Obama from winning in the first place?

It's a much sadder story than you write, and I feel like I have to push back on you hard on this because dehumanizing Trump voters as the hopelessly deplorable is a good way to get a permanently rebellious and violent faction.

Will be interesting to see the analysis of turnout vs. persuasion post-election, though we should also keep in mind that both parties -more so Republicans - have undergone a sorting spurt under Trump, meaning they have permanently lost some fraction of their base (who therefore can no longer be counted as swing voters). We saw some of this in 2018, which appears to really have been spurred by the durable defection of white suburban moderates.

The Dems still have some sorting to go, which the tricky thing to be scared of once Nancy retires... The tent is too big for Dems. unless the Republican Party apparatus itself crumbles along with its institutional and organizational structure we could have a Lib Dem situation pulling crucial votes away from the centrists and giving minority-majority rule back to the GOP.

If the GOP really does collapse into a regional party, we could have a short era of good feelings again. Although history rhymes and we would still be postponing the inevitable split between the centrists and the progressives.

[Montmorency]

Nah, the sexism, racism, grievance culture only came about because Trump won in 2016 and Bernie bowed out, leaving no voice on the left that spoke to these people's frustrations.
If what you are saying is true, Trump should have been the landside winner in the primaries because he said these things out loud...but he wasn't he only got like 30-40% and plurality rules carried him across the finish line. Now he has 90%+ support because the rest have now taken the cues from the chosen leader and have become very comfortable in the new fascistic culture.

You seem to think people (Republicans) are simply racist and sexist to begin with and eagerly hop into bed with Trump because he is a reflection of them. The truth is most were frustrated, struggling, working class and middle class people who were taught by the Republican Party to hate and to vilify and to dehumanize. You can't tell me that dozens of districts went Obama 2012 to Trump 2016 because the racist residents simply had not found their idol until Trump to channel their hateful energy. Wouldn't these racists have fought tooth and nail to prevent Obama from winning in the first place?

It's a much sadder story than you write, and I feel like I have to push back on you hard on this because dehumanizing Trump voters as the hopelessly deplorable is a good way to get a permanently rebellious and violent faction.

I'm sorry, that's all just wrong. Republican pols and voters disliked Trump insofar as they genuinely feared:

1. He would govern to the left in some ways, e.g. anti-corporate. (The 2016 electorate perceived Trump as more moderate than Clinton!!!)
2. He would not support the GOP infrastructure and judicial project.
3. He would lose.

Once all of that was proven mistaken Republicans rapidly gave Trump 85+% approval through thick and thin.

Your first sentence especially is totally unsupported and detached what we know of historical context.

Studies have repeatedly demonstrated the economic ideology or status have no correlation with Trump support (well, other than conservative economic ideology), but sexist and racist attitudes and cultural anxiety are almost a perfect correlation.

The narrative you're echoing was popular in 2017 but it's been categorically discredited.

The Obama-Trump demographic, who constitute a few million voters, ranked especially high on polls of racist and sexist and xenophobic attitudes - much higher than Romney-Clinton voters for example. We've discussed some of these results over the years on the Org. These voters were more comfortable with Obama when race and immigration had less salience (relatively speaking) as national issues, white Christian dominance was yet stronger, a superlatively-unpopular outgoing 2-term Republican incumbent was presiding over a Great Recession and failed War on Terror, Obama had not yet been thoroughly vilified in RWNJ media, and Fox News wasn't quite so brute-force about its agenda. I will grant you that at least in theory this small sliver of the electorate would have been more receptive to Sanders than other conservatives/"populists" in theory, but even there I am not aware of polling that supports such a theory.

The Dems still have some sorting to go, which the tricky thing to be scared of once Nancy retires... The tent is too big for Dems. unless the Republican Party apparatus itself crumbles along with its institutional and organizational structure we could have a Lib Dem situation pulling crucial votes away from the centrists and giving minority-majority rule back to the GOP.

Not at all. The electoral infrastructure and culture of the country cannot support such a third party. The conservative Dems and never-Trump Republicans will do what they have always done, which is try to influence the party from within. They've tended to have great success with this approach.

If the GOP really does collapse into a regional party, we could have a short era of good feelings again. Although history rhymes and we would still be postponing the inevitable split between the centrists and the progressives.

The GOP cannot collapse into a regional party because there are tens of millions of people responsive to their brand of plutocratic fascism, for one reason or another, spread rather evenly throughout the country. And most of them are very deep in the cult, whether that means QAnon or one of a million other delusions.

[a completely inoffensive name]

1. He would govern to the left in some ways, e.g. anti-corporate. (The 2016 electorate perceived Trump as more moderate than Clinton!!!)
2. He would not support the GOP infrastructure and judicial project.

No one had any idea how he would govern besides trying to kick out the Mexicans. With that being the baseline for people, if BUILD THE WALL didn't get the xenophobes all enthusiastic for him early on why the sudden popularity shift. So not only are Republicans really racist, but they are also that lazy about their racism? "I really hate this ethnicity and I love the guy who promises to remove them, but he doesn't look like he will win, so I guess I won't bother trying."

Also, did anyone really think McConnell was not going to drive his judicial project?!?! That Trump wasn't going to just rubber stamp Mitch's picks?

Obama had not yet been thoroughly vilified in RWNJ media, and Fox News wasn't quite so brute-force about its agenda.

Bro, come on... in 2012???

Not at all. The electoral infrastructure and culture of the country cannot support such a third party. The conservative Dems and never-Trump Republicans will do what they have always done, which is try to influence the party from within. They've tended to have great success with this approach.

Well given the recent electoral success of the Lib Dems, it doesn't really seem like the UK can support a third party as well, but so it goes.
Whether or not the progressives are ready or able to split, a Dem majority leader that isn't as shrewd as Pelosi at bringing everyone together is at risk of having them split off. Again, they are just vulnerable to the same delusions as the Trump guys (BLOCKING THE FUCKING ROAD FOR THE THIRD STRAIGHT WEEK WITH THEIR TRUCKS IN MY CITY) who think for whatever reason that the momentum is on their side and will carry them forward. I'm not saying conserv. Dems would switch to a third party btw since that seems to be what you are replying to...

The GOP cannot collapse into a regional party because there are tens of millions of people responsive to their brand of plutocratic fascism, for one reason or another, spread rather evenly throughout the country. And most of them are very deep in the cult, whether that means QAnon or one of a million other delusions.

Bet you $100 a proper UBI that dramatically decreases inequality will make all these fascists suddenly a lot more friendly to their neighbors.

[Hooahguy]

Bet you $100 a proper UBI that dramatically decreases inequality will make all these fascists suddenly a lot more friendly to their neighbors.

Yeah sorry I just don't believe this at all. Racists and fascists aren't confined to any one particular socioeconomic group and waving a bunch of money in their faces won't make them go away, they will just take the money and try to get others booted off it.

[a completely inoffensive name]

Yeah sorry I just don't believe this at all. Racists and fascists aren't confined to any one particular socioeconomic group and waving a bunch of money in their faces won't make them go away, they will just take the money and try to get others booted off it.

I just don't believe the idea that 40% of the country are inherently racist. People think they are getting screwed over and its an easy narrative to say "those people are screwing you over" than trying to explain how globalized markets work.

[Seamus Fermanagh]

I just don't believe the idea that 40% of the country are inherently racist. People think they are getting screwed over and its an easy narrative to say "those people are screwing you over" than trying to explain how globalized markets work.

This is, ultimately, the factor that most empowers institutional racism. Few of those whose actions empower the system that is are racist in inclination or thought. They support the police and the concept of law and order (while often blind to the cultural mores of those police and the economic holdovers of overt racism that place so many of our 'minority' persons in positions where police confrontation is more frequent), they want their kids to go to good schools (while not really thinking about the fact that they have grouped themselves into enclaves of people who look and sound the same because of the psychological comfort thereof), etc.

The Aryan Nation types are very few and have publicly labeled themselves -- thanks for that as it makes them easier to keep track of -- and the vast bulk of those who support institutional racism (which includes, by the way, any number of those persons who are targeted by this implicit system of restraints and control) are not at all racist themselves. They are simply content with the system as it is and do not question that the system itself has enacted itself in a manner that is functionally racist.

We can spot the "Bull" Connors types readily enough, it is the vast mass of kindly people hidden by 'Foucault's mirror' who do not accurately see their own reflections in the images before their eyes.

[Montmorency]

No one had any idea how he would govern besides trying to kick out the Mexicans. With that being the baseline for people, if BUILD THE WALL didn't get the xenophobes all enthusiastic for him early on why the sudden popularity shift. So not only are Republicans really racist, but they are also that lazy about their racism? "I really hate this ethnicity and I love the guy who promises to remove them, but he doesn't look like he will win, so I guess I won't bother trying."

Yes, no one knew. I'm talking about common narratives that many Republicans in the base and in elected office held.

Moreover, it's easy to believe that the Republicans for whom racism, sexism ,and grievance were more salient - compared to plutocratic economics or abortion etc. - were the early adopters.

Indeed, Trump increased his support with economically-conservative people in 2016 who otherwise disliked the Republican Party for being anti-abortion and hyper-religious (they perceived Trump as the opposite). In that case it should be easy to see how parts of the Evangelical Christian base would have been hesitant about this Trump character at first.

You should try to account for the fact that Trump massively increased his popularity with Republicans after he won, and conclusively after his first year (that he spent shaking a stick on the world stage and going after Muslims and the ACA, while approving of a highly regressive tax reform).

Also, did anyone really think McConnell was not going to drive his judicial project?!?! That Trump wasn't going to just rubber stamp Mitch's picks?

Yes. This was much discussed among Republicans at the time. People thought of Trump as a libertine Democrat infiltrator!

Bro, come on... in 2012???

If you have had any familiarity with Fox News in 2012, in 2016, and since, or with its viewers across those times, then you will know what I'm talking about. They've gone from mere propaganda mill for Republicans to Radio Rwanda.

Well given the recent electoral success of the Lib Dems, it doesn't really seem like the UK can support a third party as well, but so it goes.

I don't understand what you're saying here.

Bet you $100 a proper UBI that dramatically decreases inequality will make all these fascists suddenly a lot more friendly to their neighbors.

I'm going to take what you're saying and take it in another direction. I could be convinced that, if the Democrats were to break Congressional deadlock in 2021 and start aggressively passing a whole raft of reforms without giving a , and could keep winning elections and maintain or accelerate the pace of reform for a couple cycles, then the more apathetic elements of the Right would get with the program. They would see Dems as more proactive and "winners," so even if they find it difficult to stomach the social consensus among the Dem base they would drift away from the gravity of the far-right wingnut camp. Maybe they would become swing voters, in large enough numbers as to permanently damage the national prospects of the GOP and leave it as an increasingly-violent and unhinged fringe party (like it has become on the West Coast). But that's a different argument than saying that economic inequality reduction would somehow pacify the modal right-winger.

I just don't believe the idea that 40% of the country are inherently racist. People think they are getting screwed over and its an easy narrative to say "those people are screwing you over" than trying to explain how globalized markets work.

There is more evidence for one proposition than for the other.

[a completely inoffensive name]

I don't understand what you're saying here.

The Lib Dems haven't been doing well since that coalition with the Cons. I think they only have like a dozen seats in the commons (when I first started watching UK politics they had like 60 something with Clegg) and for the most part are not trusted anymore by their base. Yet, they are still around. Well, I guess they were the only party that came out and said they would reverse Brexit, so maybe there is a role for them?

You should try to account for the fact that Trump massively increased his popularity with Republicans after he won, and conclusively after his first year (that he spent shaking a stick on the world stage and going after Muslims and the ACA, while approving of a highly regressive tax reform).

My accounting is that his actions were normalized and his rhetoric was adopted by mainstream conservative media. Republicans more or less were brainwashed, just like they were brainwashed about Obama. It happened after the election because as you say, many within the party distrusted him and were denouncing him all the way to election day. Once he won, then his voice became the voice inside GOP voters head.

If I recall correctly, on election day Trump's performance on total voter counts relative to Romney wasn't even that good. It seems to me that most Republicans simply did not care for him but once he won and became the leader, the propaganda machine became pro-trump and quickly turned them. I mean, we have talked about the data that shows GOP voters literally 180 flipping on many policies once Trump came into office, from bombing syria to the state of the economy. Average voters are not concerned with the judges, they (except for the single issue voters by definition) not concerned with policies. They operate on feelings, even the economy is just a feeling. No one ever actually checks the 401k and sees the facts that stocks are not doing better under Trump than with Obama: https://www.cnn.com/interactive/2019...ent/index.html

I'm going to take what you're saying and take it in another direction. I could be convinced that, if the Democrats were to break Congressional deadlock in 2021 and start aggressively passing a whole raft of reforms without giving a , and could keep winning elections and maintain or accelerate the pace of reform for a couple cycles, then the more apathetic elements of the Right would get with the program. They would see Dems as more proactive and "winners," so even if they find it difficult to stomach the social consensus among the Dem base they would drift away from the gravity of the far-right wingnut camp. Maybe they would become swing voters, in large enough numbers as to permanently damage the national prospects of the GOP and leave it as an increasingly-violent and unhinged fringe party (like it has become on the West Coast). But that's a different argument than saying that economic inequality reduction would somehow pacify the modal right-winger.

What I would try to convince you is that unbroken cycles of Democratic rule would produce policies of wealth transfer from the top to the bottom and the middle. Without the typical Republican sabotage of everything good that government does, such benefits would cool off many right wingers who live and breath Q-anon crap cause they are mad about their lives.

[Montmorency]

I don't understand what you're saying here.

The Lib Dems haven't been doing well since that coalition with the Cons. I think they only have like a dozen seats in the commons (when I first started watching UK politics they had like 60 something with Clegg) and for the most part are not trusted anymore by their base. Yet, they are still around. Well, I guess they were the only party that came out and said they would reverse Brexit, so maybe there is a role for them?

I mean, what are you suggesting about third parties in America with reference to LibDems?

My accounting is that his actions were normalized and his rhetoric was adopted by mainstream conservative media. Republicans more or less were brainwashed, just like they were brainwashed about Obama. It happened after the election because as you say, many within the party distrusted him and were denouncing him all the way to election day. Once he won, then his voice became the voice inside GOP voters head.

But this is a pretty notable development. Why did this happen?

If I recall correctly, on election day Trump's performance on total voter counts relative to Romney wasn't even that good. It seems to me that most Republicans simply did not care for him but once he won and became the leader, the propaganda machine became pro-trump and quickly turned them. I mean, we have talked about the data that shows GOP voters literally 180 flipping on many policies once Trump came into office, from bombing syria to the state of the economy. Average voters are not concerned with the judges, they (except for the single issue voters by definition) not concerned with policies.

Republican elites have been concerned with judges for 60 years, and it's trickled down to voters as polling shows. Republican voters very commonly cite "judges" as one of those single issues. This is changing under Trump in that Dems have come to see the courts as more salient than before.

But look at the three reservations I listed above. That the Republican base abandoned those reservations is not a function of propaganda per se, it's something objectively the case! Trump did win, he did govern as an orthodox Republican, with the exception that he was even more racist and sexist and lawless. The clear explanation is that the base loved the novel features, which were not the propaganda (though the propaganda did grow more intense and dangerous as I say) but the relative oversupply of bad behavior.

In other words, Republicans came to worship Trump because he reflected their truest long-standing values (of which there is plenty of independent corroboration over the years).

Why is Trump durably more popular with the Republican base than most other Republican politicians or the generic Republican? Because he's an open white male supremacist who triggers the libs. That's what it comes down to.

Thus the one factor I did fail to mention is that the confluence of all the above - grievance, cruelty, racism, sexism - is the thrill and desire to see the hated liberals and subgroups humiliated and punished. That's what they love Trump as man and president for, perhaps above all.

But again, the racism and sexism and cruelty and grievance are essential to that. The loyalty can't arise without those underlying factors. Republicans and their media were loyal to Bush the so-called "compassionate conservative," but not like this. It's not simply the case that Republicans have no underlying values or beliefs while being very easily tribally-manipulated. It's more the exact reverse in fact, that because they have these attributes and values they are more prone to embracing authoritarianism and especially to authoritarianism in the Trumpist cast.

The "economic anxiety" argument is simply discredited in this day and age.

What I would try to convince you is that unbroken cycles of Democratic rule would produce policies of wealth transfer from the top to the bottom and the middle. Without the typical Republican sabotage of everything good that government does, such benefits would cool off many right wingers who live and breath Q-anon crap cause they are mad about their lives.

Listen, naturally we have a shared goal in reducing inequality and we want to pursue it regardless for many reasons. If we become a premier social democracy, well-governed and respected, and that happens to convince the third+ of Republicans who have economically-interventionist beliefs to not be fascists, fantastic! Their deactivation would help create a virtuous cycle of permanent Left majorities, if only by blocking support from the GOP and any insurrectionist tendencies it may adopt, as opposed to directly persuading converts to vote for leftists. But there's little basis to predicate inequality reduction as a means to influencing Republicans, and even less of one to imagine that trying one more time to make an affirmative policy case to them before the act will acutely change their behavior or mindset.

Republicans are not economically anxious, as surveys repeatedly find, they are culturally anxious. Republicans are not mad about their lives, they're mad about other people's lives. That's who you have to be to be a Republican.*

*Besides pure upward redistribution