Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) endorsed Rep. Justin Amash’s (I-MI) decision to leave the Republican Party on Thursday.
This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at https://talkingpointsmemo.com/?p=1233341
This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at https://talkingpointsmemo.com/?p=1233341
IMO the only way to stop the death spiral and NOT maintain the status quo is to completely crush the Republican Party. The number of elected republicans who are worth saving is very close to nil.
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Pelosi’s veto power over House actions is only a tiny fraction as evil as McConnell’s veto power over the Senate, but it is still evil. Time to end the dictatorial power of House and Senate leaders.
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Whatever this is, it is unsustainable and tied in very much (too much) with money, corruption and willful ignorance
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Well, we already have the “blue dogs” in our Party. Maybe AOC wants to start a progressive version called the “green dogs” that will push for strong action on climate, the environment, economic justice, sensible standards for border protection, DACA, and, of course, impeachment. One senses she’s getting a bit frustrated with the snail-like pace of change in Washington.
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Politics is a team sport, but you can go to bat with the other side. That’s how it is supposed to work:
In 2018, three vulnerable House Rs (Curbelo, Hurd and Denton, two of 'em lost) tried to force the House to vote on immigration bills. Most of the yacking focused on arcane procedures, missing the essential point: Self-government requires majority rule.
If they had gotten their vote and Ds stuck together , only 22 Republicans needed to defect to have passed the bills. Conservatives bristled, much the way folks misconstrue AOC’s very junior, not-exactly-leading a faction role here. Consider that much of Ronald Reagan’s first-term success came from a handful of Democrats who voted with a nearly unanimous Republican Party. A key budget vote in 1981 had all 190 Republicans making a majority with 63 of 245 House Democrats.
The most important parallel is the 1964 vote to kill Jim Crow. Contemporary conservatives like to brag that a higher percentage of Republicans than Democrats voted for the Civil Rights Act. This is true, but it misapplies history. If Democrats had run the House in 1964 the way Republicans ran it in 2018, there would never have been a vote on the Civil Rights Act, and the U.S. would be a lesser country.
Most folks (including Josh) get the “Hastert rule” wrong, as if it’s unusual that “the majority of the majority” must back legislation for it to pass. That’s nonsense.
For one thing, it isn’t a rule but an unevenly observed custom. For another, it’s how pretty much every voting organization works. No disciplined partisan majority governs by consistently relying on the partisan minority. If you govern with less than half of your side and nearly all of their side, there is something wrong with your side.
What determined the success of civil rights in 1964 was that a majority of the Democratic caucus joined 138 Republicans to kill Jim Crow. Those 152 Democrats outvoted 96 of their own partisan majority to create a national majority—which is exactly what James Madison invented the House of Representatives to do.
Creating even the possibility that a minority of Rs could be part of the legislating majority without partisan control of the House would be good for America.
AOC is onto an important strategy here, which Ds ought to heed – Americans elect representatives to Congress to do a job, That requires tough votes.
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Though it’s McConnell running things in the Senate, considering who’s the current chief executive, it’s wise to have power in the hands of three people, as opposed to just one.
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No, there really aren’t a significant number of “Blue Dogs” left in the House. I expect AOC would like to lead a faction of Ds – call 'em “green dogs” if you like – but you’re confused what blue dogs mean. AOC ain’t remotely like 'em.
The Blue Dogs were Democrats elected from essentially Republican districts. Here’s a clue: without Ds from essentially Republican districts, Democrats do not and cannot have a majority of the House.
So for a generation, give or take, Blue Dogs were Ds that their partisan leadership sought to protect, for a very good reason: they are the key to the majority. They pretty much all lost in 1994 and 2010.
Arguably, there is a new crop of “Blue Dogs” in the new D majority established in 2018. But there is no evidence they are like the originals.
AOC isn’t like that. She got 15,897 votes in a primary – in a district that went 76% for Obama in '08, 81% in 2012, and 77% for Clinton in 2016.
Suffice to note that her marginal value to preserving a Democratic majority is… unproven.
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And the third was endorsed by Beto the Gasbag.
Yes. Obliterate them utterly and go Dick Cheney on the stragglers.
They are not an opposition party they are an anti-democracy movement. At least the Democrats agree to be bound by the rules and the law.
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Here’s the question, then: How?
There are now 235 Democrats in the House, and 198 Republicans. (Focus on the House, just to keep it clear.) What’s the best legislative strategy – forcing votes that the Ds win 235 to 198? That way every R running for re-election gets pretty much every R vote back home – where, after all, Rs are a majority: that’s how they got there.
Or should the D majority create votes that force 10, 50, or a hundred Rs to vote with the D majority? They have constituents, yanno – deprive them of the protection party-line votes provide, and they become a whole lot more vulnerable cuz R policies suck.
Now, make it real: legislative votes that get 100 Rs in this House will probably lose 50 or so Ds. (Alter the legislative math, adjust up or down per a genuine whip count on specific issues, the strategy principles remain the same.)
Isn’t that worth it, to pick up, say, 25 more Ds in what are now R districts?
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Yeah, like we let them have how many amendments to the Affordable Care Act, so we had how many vote for it in the end? Oh, yeah…
I do agree with the spirit of your comment, and in normal times would agree with your strategy but these are not normal time, nor are the Republicans functioning as a normal political party. The only thing I can see affecting them now is a massive loss based on massive Dem/Independent turnout in the next election. (and not that “Independt” is now code for "Republicans with at least a smidgen of shame currently hiding out in the Democratic Party hoping this is all over soon…')
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The ACA isn’t a particularly effective legislative vehicle for dividing Republicans.
Appropriations bills, on the other hand…
You do point to an obvious flaw – it isn’t legislative tactics or strategy, it’s simple competence. People have forgotten how to legislate: it’s a skill like parallel parking or baking bread.
I’ve seen bipartisan legislation achieved in the following simple way: the D running the committee tells the leading R – I’m gonna write a bill. It’s not gonna be the bill you’d write, cuz I have the gavel and you don’t. But I want your vote – so I’m gonna let you write a whole section of the bill. (which of course varies by the issue) The deal is simple – I know you won’t vote for the bill if I go too far – but you know I can go a lot further than you would, cuz I have the gavel. But I’m serious – you can write a whole chunk of the bill, so long as you vote for final passage.
The instant you decide you can’t do that, I’m gonna yank the whole section you wrote.
It works.
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Again, agree is spirit but it specifically didn’t work with the ACA - they were allowed massive changes, but then not a one voted for it. I don’t know the rules about canceling a vote while it’s underway, but once they started reneging, they should have pulled it, offered up a version without the changes and said “try harder next time”.
And this is why, despite all the current hand wringing over how she picked on poor Joe, I’m still for Kamala Harris. We’re past the point where we want somebody who’ll get along with Republicans. We need to hand them a timeout and she’s the only one selling us that sauce. Imagine McConnell and/or Donnie being schooled - By A Girl!!!
I’ve donated, and will donate more, to see that movie (and not because I’m mean or vindictive, but because they’ve reached the point that it’s the only way to get through to them…)
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I showed you how it worked. Study the ACA process, and you’ll realize I’m describing something different – and generically: I deliberately didn’t mention the issue, to illuminate the technique.
I doubt you’re doing it on purpose, but you really should notice that you’re missing my point, most likely because it’s never occurred to you to think outside the box you’re in (which has cost us many more elections than it’s won).
It’s a pretty basic question: do we beat more Rs by helping them polarize and unite?
Or do we win more elections by dividing the other side?
Harris is actually a pretty good example at the moment: she whacked Biden, who was clearly caught on his back foot. (We’re not gonna beat Trump with Grandpa Simpson.)
But she also publicly endorsed mandatory busing … in 2019. She’s backtracking as fast as she can, but along with the lockstep stoooopid immigration positions all 296 Democratic candidates have taken, we’ve practically reelected Trump already.
I cited real examples of success – the 1981 vote that created Reaganomics, the 1964 vote that killed Jim Crow; and a very specific legislative technique.
So, I’m curious: why is your response to insist the best examples are first, the ACA fiasco, and then, Kamala Harris all but guaranteeing she will lose in 2020?
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I want to see us take all the state legislatures we can and we have made inroads. Texas made big inroads in the midterms.
Then we gerrymander them out of existence, just like they tried to do to us. And we start using the rules the way they do - to kill them dead instead of the other way round like it’s been since about o, the 80s. Certainly since 2000.
It’s not impossible or even that difficult IF we get ruthless like they did.
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Respectfully, I disagree with your conclusion, based on the evidence.
As for my “being in a box”, you wrote:
It’s a pretty basic question: do we beat more Rs by helping them polarize and unite?
Or do we win more elections by dividing the other side?
Well, having abandoned the former technique, the Republicans have won more with the later technique (aided in significant part by a number of folks who’ve participated willingly in that division), even though they’ve been a minority for the past couple of decades).
So I’m voting for revving up the base instead of building bridges to folks who are willing to set up concentration camps for kids. Once they’ve learned that sort of thing has consequences, we can talk about restoring comity…
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Comity is a cowardly word in this environment.
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The actual story is that he said it, not that she endorses it.
The world doesnt revolve around AOC.
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