Kepler
Cornell Big Red
Re: The Power of SCOTUS VIII redux: IX is being blocked by the Senate.
If they keep it up they'll salivate at Romney's numbers.
(1) Latinos have been gaining 1.5% electoral power in every 4-year cycle. There is no reason to think that will change. In 2036 the electorate will look like this.
(2) Diversity of EV has lagged behind the popular vote due to the winner take all system in states. But as whites fall from majority to plurality that "built in gerrymander" will disappear. In some states whites will become an outright minority and playing to them on strictly racial issues will flip and become a net loss. At that point whites in those states will experience what minorities have throughout all American history: they will start losing when there is discrimination.
(3) Typically a party in free fall expands its outreach, but there are systemic forces within the GOP that could slow or even prevent this. The entire support system of GOP politics -- media, pundits, vendors, special interest groups -- actually perform better when the party is not in power. The resentment and paranoia ginned up against a sitting Democratic government is turned directly into money. For another, gerrymandering and the electorate self-segregation have protected most tenured House members and now, with state migration, even Senate members from the risk of losing a seat due to extreme misalignment with the national electorate. That will continue until 2020, with a few members around the edges getting picked off but most being safe. The frog will boil more slowly than it ought to. Of course...
(4) ... 2020 is a Census year on-cycle, so assuming Hillary is elected if her first term is anything except for a genuine disaster (not an Echo Chamber disaster) and the above trends continue this is where the holiday should end for the GOP. Assuming a normal on-cycle turnout combined with the gradual heat death of the GOP, in 2020 Democrats should be able to make deep incursions into federal, state and local legislatures, all setting up the redrawing of districts after the census.
tl; dr: Usually we can't extrapolate because parties are sensitive to electoral change and course correct. But the GOP hasn't and may not. They may have pushed so far into extremism that they have in actuality become a white nationalist party. If that's the case, they will stall at 45% or even decline further.
At some point, the branch will snap. But instead of a gradual 45, 43, 41... decline where the writing is painfully obvious and the donors recapture the party and force change, we may instead see a change like 45, 45, 44, 44, 34 where almost everyone on board is unaffected and the spreading rot is hidden until the first plank goes and then the ship immediately sinks.
If they keep it up they'll salivate at Romney's numbers.
(1) Latinos have been gaining 1.5% electoral power in every 4-year cycle. There is no reason to think that will change. In 2036 the electorate will look like this.
(2) Diversity of EV has lagged behind the popular vote due to the winner take all system in states. But as whites fall from majority to plurality that "built in gerrymander" will disappear. In some states whites will become an outright minority and playing to them on strictly racial issues will flip and become a net loss. At that point whites in those states will experience what minorities have throughout all American history: they will start losing when there is discrimination.
(3) Typically a party in free fall expands its outreach, but there are systemic forces within the GOP that could slow or even prevent this. The entire support system of GOP politics -- media, pundits, vendors, special interest groups -- actually perform better when the party is not in power. The resentment and paranoia ginned up against a sitting Democratic government is turned directly into money. For another, gerrymandering and the electorate self-segregation have protected most tenured House members and now, with state migration, even Senate members from the risk of losing a seat due to extreme misalignment with the national electorate. That will continue until 2020, with a few members around the edges getting picked off but most being safe. The frog will boil more slowly than it ought to. Of course...
(4) ... 2020 is a Census year on-cycle, so assuming Hillary is elected if her first term is anything except for a genuine disaster (not an Echo Chamber disaster) and the above trends continue this is where the holiday should end for the GOP. Assuming a normal on-cycle turnout combined with the gradual heat death of the GOP, in 2020 Democrats should be able to make deep incursions into federal, state and local legislatures, all setting up the redrawing of districts after the census.
tl; dr: Usually we can't extrapolate because parties are sensitive to electoral change and course correct. But the GOP hasn't and may not. They may have pushed so far into extremism that they have in actuality become a white nationalist party. If that's the case, they will stall at 45% or even decline further.
At some point, the branch will snap. But instead of a gradual 45, 43, 41... decline where the writing is painfully obvious and the donors recapture the party and force change, we may instead see a change like 45, 45, 44, 44, 34 where almost everyone on board is unaffected and the spreading rot is hidden until the first plank goes and then the ship immediately sinks.
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I've had 16 years of **** because of Bush and the inability of Obama being able to do what he needed to do. All they need is their Gerrmandered House to hold and it will continue another 8 years under Clinton. By then I'll be so close to retirement it won't matter anymore.
