POTUS 45.16 - If Never Forgotten, One Would ALWAYS Remember Something.

[Kepler]

Re: POTUS 45.16 - If Never Forgotten, One Would ALWAYS Remember Something.

Dems are correct on taxes for once. 1) No tax cuts for the rich, and 2) it has to be paid for. This basically gives cover to the Dems in vulnerable seats as most Americans actually agree with this and its clear and concise. Let Goopers tear themselves apart between bought and paid for corp types (Ryan) and nationalists (Bannon). I believe Schumer made that statement and I have to say the guy has surprised me so far in that he's been a far better Senate leader of the Dems than I ever expected.

Agreed on Schumer. He and Pelosi are both excellent tacticians. They don't have an overarching strategy but that is rarely driven by Congressional leadership -- it's either something that rises from the grassroots (Occupy, Bernie) or is injected by the presidential nominee (Obama's Hopey Change stuff).

We do need to give the voters something to get excited about. While the truth is there has to be a unified course change for the US across all policies, the political and psychological reality is that has to be embodied is a few high profile, easily understood policies. We have to stop the wall, but our banner can't just be "Stop the Wall!" It has to be something like "bring ALL Americans in from the cold and under the protection and also the responsibilities of citizenship." All the good people being roughed up by the ICE SS are going to make for plangent case studies and examples (and ads).

You and I disagree on whether we should stress economic justice -- I believe a return to the overall tax philosophy pre-JFK is the key driver of American economic growth, the health of the middle class, and the decimation of the 1% parasites, and I also believe it will resonate with most voters, even some who voted for Trump out of anger and powerlessness. But we can at least agree that an absolute "no" to tax cuts for the wealthy is the sine qua non.

Finally I'm going to make a lot of people unhappy by saying we should drop the litmus tests for reproductive rights and gun control. I am fully committed to strengthening both, but I prefer to have blue dog Dems in red states who vote with us sometimes than straight ticket Republicans. We get into trouble with the blue dogs only when we cater to them. My strategy is we allow non-socially-liberal candidates to run and win as Dems and we support them against any opposition from the right, but that's it. We don't horse trade with them, and we always try to primary them. But come the general we try to pick up and hold seats.

 

[ScoobyDoo]

Re: POTUS 45.16 - If Never Forgotten, One Would ALWAYS Remember Something.

The problem is the media is making Mitch a sympathetic figure now. He's not. I'll continue to enjoy Trump's destruction of the Turtle anyway.

 

[Drew S.]

Re: POTUS 45.16 - If Never Forgotten, One Would ALWAYS Remember Something.

Dems are correct on taxes for once. 1) No tax cuts for the rich, and 2) it has to be paid for. This basically gives cover to the Dems in vulnerable seats as most Americans actually agree with this and its clear and concise. Let Goopers tear themselves apart between bought and paid for corp types (Ryan) and nationalists (Bannon). I believe Schumer made that statement and I have to say the guy has surprised me so far in that he's been a far better Senate leader of the Dems than I ever expected.

I think Itch is worried because somebody's actually calling him out on being impotent when it comes to actually passing legislation. The lamestream media has been too lazy or afraid to since they keep pimping press releases from his campaign saying how he's a genius and never count him out and all that nonsense. There's zero he can do to avoid a Trump twitter onslaught however and its putting the ancient knuckledragger in an uncomfortable position.

As a conservative I thought Schumer's statement made a ton of sense. Why we would even consider lowering taxes on top brackets is completely beyond me, unless we have decided to give up on ever having a balanced budget. The most interesting thing in this for me is the deduction for state taxes. If that goes away it will be a big blow to CA, NY, MA, etc.

 

[FadeToBlack&Gold]

Re: POTUS 45.16 - If Never Forgotten, One Would ALWAYS Remember Something.

It's a weird world where Nikki Haley counts as a "wise old head."

(Reading between the lines, two of her UN aides quit because they opposed her policy of not being just a blowhard swinging d-ck on the world stage. Presumably she'll p-ss off Donnie Dumpster at some point.)

Nah, she's played it pretty cool to this point. She may not fully agree with Dump in some areas, but she's been a good foot soldier for him. I suspect she's got her sights on potentially being the veep half of the 2020 or 2024 GOP ticket.

 

[Drew S.]

Re: POTUS 45.16 - If Never Forgotten, One Would ALWAYS Remember Something.

Agreed on Schumer. He and Pelosi are both excellent tacticians. They don't have an overarching strategy but that is rarely driven by Congressional leadership -- it's either something that rises from the grassroots (Occupy, Bernie) or is injected by the presidential nominee (Obama's Hopey Change stuff).

We do need to give the voters something to get excited about. While the truth is there has to be a unified course change for the US across all policies, the political and psychological reality is that has to be embodied is a few high profile, easily understood policies. We have to stop the wall, but our banner can't just be "Stop the Wall!" It has to be something like "bring ALL Americans in from the cold and under the protection and also the responsibilities of citizenship." All the good people being roughed up by the ICE SS are going to make for plangent case studies and examples (and ads).

You and I disagree on whether we should stress economic justice -- I believe a return to the overall tax philosophy pre-JFK is the key driver of American economic growth, the health of the middle class, and the decimation of the 1% parasites, and I also believe it will resonate with most voters, even some who voted for Trump out of anger and powerlessness. But we can at least agree that an absolute "no" to tax cuts for the wealthy is the sine qua non.

Finally I'm going to make a lot of people unhappy by saying we should drop the litmus tests for reproductive rights and gun control. I am fully committed to strengthening both, but I prefer to have blue dog Dems in red states who vote with us sometimes than straight ticket Republicans. We get into trouble with the blue dogs only when we cater to them. My strategy is we allow non-socially-liberal candidates to run and win as Dems and we support them against any opposition from the right, but that's it. We don't horse trade with them, and we always try to primary them. But come the general we try to pick up and hold seats.

I've said this quite a few times, but I think you would attract a lot of people if you dropped the gun control nonsense. All the dems have to do is take the position that it should be decided at state level. Except for the hardcore Bloomberg types I think it would more or less satisfy most people. The ironic thing is that I don't think many dems really know or care that much about the issue, other than its one of their positions.

 

[alfablue]

Re: POTUS 45.16 - If Never Forgotten, One Would ALWAYS Remember Something.

I've said this quite a few times, but I think you would attract a lot of people if you dropped the gun control nonsense. All the dems have to do is take the position that it should be decided at state level. Except for the hardcore Bloomberg types I think it would more or less satisfy most people. The ironic thing is that I don't think many dems really know or care that much about the issue, other than its one of their positions.

That goes both ways.

There are a ton of candidates that are probably like minded, except for the lack of NRA support.

You can't expect people who want gun control to drop it, without equally telling people who want to eliminate all gun control to drop it, too.

The exact same can be said about abortion.

 

[ScoobyDoo]

Re: POTUS 45.16 - If Never Forgotten, One Would ALWAYS Remember Something.

As a conservative I thought Schumer's statement made a ton of sense. Why we would even consider lowering taxes on top brackets is completely beyond me, unless we have decided to give up on ever having a balanced budget. The most interesting thing in this for me is the deduction for state taxes. If that goes away it will be a big blow to CA, NY, MA, etc.

Yeah, but conservative's in office need their tax breaks for their donors. They don't care about the deficit or the debt unless it's money for Democratic Party initiatives. Like welfare, social security, medicare, medicaid, infrastructure, etc.

 

[dave122793]

Re: POTUS 45.16 - If Never Forgotten, One Would ALWAYS Remember Something.

That goes both ways.

There are a ton of candidates that are probably like minded, except for the lack of NRA support.

You can't expect people who want gun control to drop it, without equally telling people who want to eliminate all gun control to drop it, too.

The exact same can be said about abortion.

It's a nonsensical statement anyway. Why would you expect people just to "drop" an issue that kills thousands of innocent Americans every year? Let's just drop the talk about terrorism and ISIS since they kill far less Americans than other Americans do .

 

[Kepler]

Re: POTUS 45.16 - If Never Forgotten, One Would ALWAYS Remember Something.

I've said this quite a few times, but I think you would attract a lot of people if you dropped the gun control nonsense.

As I've said quite a few times, gun control makes perfect sense in the cities and zero sense in the country. God bless rustic gun gropers -- give them all the guns. Near as I can tell they wind up shooting themselves, their kids, and each other which improves the species.

 

[ScoobyDoo]

Re: POTUS 45.16 - If Never Forgotten, One Would ALWAYS Remember Something.

As I've said quite a few times, gun control makes perfect sense in the cities and zero sense in the country. God bless rustic gun gropers -- give them all the guns. Near as I can tell they wind up shooting themselves, their kids, and each other which improves the species.

Natural Selection for the win.

 

[St. Clown]

Re: POTUS 45.16 - If Never Forgotten, One Would ALWAYS Remember Something.

Heh. Girlfriend's dad was kind enough to explain to me that he owns 100 guns at the moment, and had just purchased five more earlier that week. Subtle.

 

[Kepler]

Re: POTUS 45.16 - If Never Forgotten, One Would ALWAYS Remember Something.

Natural Selection for the win.

I used to worry we'd lose these girls. After a decade of living out in the sticks, no, it turns out country girls are actually these girls. The girls you see on the teevee playing cute country girls are all from Los Angeles and New York City.

 

[Kepler]

Re: POTUS 45.16 - If Never Forgotten, One Would ALWAYS Remember Something.

Heh. Girlfriend's dad was kind enough to explain to me that he owns 100 guns at the moment, and had just purchased five more earlier that week. Subtle.

Relative with 100 guns: genetic red flag.

 

[St. Clown]

Re: POTUS 45.16 - If Never Forgotten, One Would ALWAYS Remember Something.

Relative with 100 guns: genetic red flag.

Most of them are pre-1900 collector weapons, not to be fired.

 

[bronconick]

Re: POTUS 45.16 - If Never Forgotten, One Would ALWAYS Remember Something.

Trump can attack Turtle all he wants, the senators aren't going to replace him.

 

[Drew S.]

Relative with 100 guns: genetic red flag.

I think it's a huge turn on. Imagine the inheritance!

 

[Kepler]

Re: POTUS 45.16 - If Never Forgotten, One Would ALWAYS Remember Something.

I think it's a huge turn on. Imagine the inheritance!

In general, the more guns the less the ability to pay for them. The inheritance is probably an underwater mortgage, 20+ years of yellowing NRA publications, and an enormous cache of interracial gay porn jpgs.

 

[St. Clown]

Re: POTUS 45.16 - If Never Forgotten, One Would ALWAYS Remember Something.

Do they have to be jpgs?

 

[Rover]

Re: POTUS 45.16 - If Never Forgotten, One Would ALWAYS Remember Something.

A few thoughts:

1) I know its popular in Trump circles to say that he'll pay for massive tax cuts by getting rid of mortgage interest deduction, which would presumably screw people in blue states. If the Republicans do this I'll eat my hat. Most wealthy GOP donors live in states like NY and CA in private enclaves and gated communities (one of the Koch's is in NY for example). There is little chance the GOP enacts any tax hikes on the rich even if its to pay for other tax hikes on the rich. A precedent would have been set and that's not going to fly.

2) Regarding Itch, Scoobs is right in that the guy inexplicably but much like Paul Ryan gets gold-plated national media coverage even in though in terms of doing the traditional function of his job (legislating) he's a fuk up. Has he ever gotten anything enacted? I can think of no partisan or bipartisan bills that have his name or effort behind them and he's been in the Senate for like 30 years. Is he going anywhere in the Senate? No, but Trump is actually focusing real scrutiny on the guy that the media is too afraid to do and I doubt Itch is liking it much.

3) For Dems, I completely disagree with dropping reproductive rights as a campaign issue. Maybe when Republicans start taking that away women will wake up more and start voting Dem as I think the problem is people have gotten lazy and expect the courts to solve that problem for them, which by and large they have although that rests on the health of 2 80+ year old SCOTUS justices (Kennedy, RBG). That's not to say that pro-lifers aren't welcome into the party if that's their personal preference. Just that the party collectively will not push a pro-life agenda. I also think Dems would be better served by pressing anti-choice Goopers to define their views. There's a lot of Todd Akin's out there who think rape victims don't get pregnant unless they enjoy it, but they skate by because nobody presses them on their exact views.

 

[Kepler]

Re: POTUS 45.16 - If Never Forgotten, One Would ALWAYS Remember Something.

Getting rid of the mortgage interest deduction would be instant and total suicide. Nobody who voted for that would survive re-election.