The 2020 General Election Thread II

[chipbennett]

In my opinion, this can be fixed with term limits

To me, that's treating the symptom rather than the underlying problem - and IMHO, it won't work any better than when the practice is used in medicine.

 

[OneBadV8]

To me, that's treating the symptom rather than the underlying problem - and IMHO, it won't work any better than when the practice is used in medicine.

What are your thoughts on preventing career politicians?

 

[Ingomike]

Direct election of senators needs to be re-visited. Long overdue to allow states to figure that out in other ways.

Very overdue...

 

[chipbennett]

The left is anything left of you Trumpers? That used to be called the middle.

Maybe you need to reboot your GPS.

"...you Trumpers"?

I don't recall ever referring to myself as a "Trumper". I welcome you being as hard on my opinions as you choose to be, but I expect better of you than blatant ad hominem.

Yes, I consider John Danforth and Christine Todd Whitman to be the left. They are at best, UniParty globalists. (Whitman has called Trump a "radical" and campaigned for Biden.) Carter Philips is an ACLU lawyer. Stuart Gerson is an (apparent) abortion supporter and NeverTrumper. Lowell Weicker is a NeverTrumper who participated in the Nixon hearings yet is on record stating that Nixon was a better president than Trump.

Yes, these are voices of the left.

Do better.

 

[Ingomike]

What are your thoughts on preventing career politicians?

I used to be a term limits guy, but no more. There are much bigger issues to deal with. If you can look at this from a different direction, with me, and think abut the ramifications.

I see several potential negative outcomes from term limits.

The biggest is if we term limit the representatives then only the bureaucrats and lobbyists will have significant tenure and experience. Our representatives would always be the least battle prepped to fight in the swamp.

If every election cycle a third or half the house was term limited the likelihood of bad legislation increases due to all the lame ducks that have no reason to worry about constituents at home.

The typical congressperson is reelected with 55% of the vote, a 55% approval, and many do better than that. However studies show that congress itself has a 6% approval, meaning that almost everyone hates everyone else's congressperson...

 

[chipbennett]

What are your thoughts on preventing career politicians?

Ultimately, you have to fix the voters. Fixing federal government overreach would also help. The problem is, it's a long game. It took the left 100 years to get where we are today, and it may take at least that long to reverse.

 

[OneBadV8]

Ultimately, you have to fix the voters. Fixing federal government overreach would also help. The problem is, it's a long game. It took the left 100 years to get where we are today, and it may take at least that long to reverse.

You say "the left" but it's really all politicians wanting to stay in power. I don't see the right wanting less power or control either.

I'd even be fine with something like, you can only serve in the senate 12 out of 24 years or something. Kind of how the Indiana Governor is limited to 8 of 12 years.

 

[OneBadV8]

"...you Trumpers"?

You did quote him and start in on "the left". It wasn't real clear from your post if you were talking about the left from the link that was shared, or from the person making the post.

I think being just a tad slower to accuse or point fingers would go a long way.

 

[Ingomike]

Well, the "crux" of it probably depends on who you ask. But, one distillation of it is that the constitution (and supporting statutes) tell the states to figure out their electoral process.

Let's say state A has a process that is otherwise constitutional - there are unconstitutional ways to do elections, but let's take those out of the equation because that would be for the state's residents to challenge.

State A has a legislative framework that State B doesn't like. SCOTUS does have original jurisdiction over claims between the states. That actually happens every so often - maybe once every 10 years or so AFAIK.

Your point about standing is absolutely right.

So, one unintended consequence could be that if states DO have standing to challenge the internal legislation of another state, that is a really bad can of worms to open.

Again, state-level election laws have a constitutional dimension. Like some other issues near and dear to our heart.

Why are we discussing hypotheticals when we have a real case in front of us. I have been asking for opinions on the real case in this forum for weeks and no one wants to discuss it. I am puzzled as to why?

As I understand it four states are alleged to have not followed the constitutionally prescribed procedures for setting the way electors are selected in their states. The 18 states are saying they did it by the rules and are thereby damaged by those that didn't.

What about this?

 

[T.Lex]

I think being just a tad slower to accuse or point fingers would go a long way.

Welcome to INGO. You must be new here.



[I've been waiting to use that joke on you.]

 

[OneBadV8]

Welcome to INGO. You must be new here.



[I've been waiting to use that joke on you.]

Just trying to keep everyone calm and civil

 

[Alpo]

"...you Trumpers"?

I don't recall ever referring to myself as a "Trumper". I welcome you being as hard on my opinions as you choose to be, but I expect better of you than blatant ad hominem.

Yes, I consider John Danforth and Christine Todd Whitman to be the left. They are at best, UniParty globalists. (Whitman has called Trump a "radical" and campaigned for Biden.) Carter Philips is an ACLU lawyer. Stuart Gerson is an (apparent) abortion supporter and NeverTrumper. Lowell Weicker is a NeverTrumper who participated in the Nixon hearings yet is on record stating that Nixon was a better president than Trump.

Yes, these are voices of the left.

Do better.

I'm more interested in the argument than the signatories. I would assume that any lawyer in opposition to the Texas complaint would find some merit here. But, if the signatories affect your opinion, then yes, I'd say that politics is coloring your view of things in this matter.

ps. I have no idea what the direct election of senators is doing in this thread, but it is INGO.


pps. I'm cool.

 

[T.Lex]

I'm more interested in the argument than the signatories. I would assume that any lawyer in opposition to the Texas complaint would find some merit here. But, if the signatories color your opinion, then yes, I'd say that politics is coloring your view of things in this matter.

ps. I have no idea what the direct election of senators and other detritus are doing in this thread, but it is INGO.

Actually, the direct election of senators is the reason for the runoff in GA. If the original constitutional paradigm applied, I think we'd already know because the GA governor would've appointed the senator - at least the one up for re-election. The vacant seat might've been a party caucus? It would take some research on what framework GA had before the 17A. And, while I'm intellectually curious about that, it isn't THAT interesting for me to do that research.

 

[jamil]

Yeah. That is the crux of it. Another republican, such as GW, wouldn't make the presidency about himself. Hopefully, they would not have tweeted such ridiculous junk. And, they would have still accomplished much of what Trump has done that is important. But, it wouldn't have been a revolving door for the staff. Other countries wouldn't have been called ****holes. etc etc

We've had a cult of personality since 2008. I'm tired of it. Give me a president who recognizes that he serves the citizenry over gameshow hosts and transformational Hawaiians.

Ya, someday we might get one of those unicorns. Someday. Maybe CM might know someone like that who could run.

 

[Alpo]

Oh. We are on the Georgia runoffs? OK. I stand corrected.

I'm still upset with the latest shenanigans out of Texas.

As a result, I've eliminated every CW song in my playlist that has any artist from Texas in it.

 

[jamil]

Oh. We are on the Georgia runoffs? OK. I stand corrected.

I'm still upset with the latest shenanigans out of Texas.

As a result, I've eliminated every CW song in my playlist that has any artist from Texas in it.

What is it that Texas is trying to do that you consider “shenanigans”? Seems like if they can make their case then it’s something closer to the right thing happening, if you consider the right thing happening justice. If they can’t make the case, then the outcome of that is also justice. I don’t begrudge their day in court.

 

[indyblue]

Oh. We are on the Georgia runoffs? OK. I stand corrected.

I'm still upset with the latest shenanigans out of Texas.

As a result, I've eliminated every CW song in my playlist that has any artist from Texas in it.

Awww, come on. Who doesn't love them some Stevie Ray Vaughn (ok, not technically CW)?

 

[BugI02]

A vote for those people named, not for a Democrat. They aren’t ALL on board with those ideas. You can’t say fair enough and then use a wider brush to paint all of them again

I find this sort of worldview to be counterproductive, seemingly a form of triangulation. I identify the people mentioned by indyblue (in the post you responded to) as supportive of policies that are bad for me and bad for my country. That they do not support the exact same set of ill thought out policies does not make the policies they support any less of a proper subset of the set of policies that are bad for the country

The idea that no one is totally bad IMO is a dangerous conceit, the form of relativism that taken to the extremes could be used to excuse both the antifa terrorist and the aryan nations one, the BLM adherent and the christian identity one. It is a trivial truth that, if one can set absolute extremes on any sort of spectrum, that virtually everyone except perhaps Lucifer and Christ would fall somewhere in between. This is not the same as saying that someone is 'in the middle'. That would imply being more or less equidistant from those extremes, which is far less common. That AOC, Talib, Omar, Biden, Schumer and Sanders cluster quite close to the 'bad for me, bad for America' end of that spectrum should mean that they are actually classified as bfm/bfA rather than given some overly broad benefit of the doubt. I liken rejection of their agenda to self defense. I should not have to wait until they are actually executing an attempt to harm my family and I before I can judge them as a threat

If you set the criteria for truth broadly enough, you can certainly say the truth lies somewhere between one extreme and the other, but it is also quite possible to see whether any given person's truth lies uncomfortably close to one end or the other. Doubt about whether someone intends to be an enemy has very little influence on whether they are an enemy. Whether a millennial really intends to bring about the destruction of the country through socialist policies has little effect on the reach of their decision to vote for those policies, the same caveat holds true for INGO Biden fans relative to the 2A

 

[Ingomike]

Oh. We are on the Georgia runoffs? OK. I stand corrected.

I'm still upset with the latest shenanigans out of Texas.

As a result, I've eliminated every CW song in my playlist that has any artist from Texas in it.

Tennesee joined, are you eliminating them too. Not much country music left after that...

 

[Alpo]

What is it that Texas is trying to do that you consider “shenanigans”? Seems like if they can make their case then it’s something closer to the right thing happening, if you consider the right thing happening justice. If they can’t make the case, then the outcome of that is also justice. I don’t begrudge their day in court.

Anything post-election is suspect. Why aren't many of the red states who modified their procedures for the pandemic included as well? Do you think only those states with close election results represent a purely legal view, or an opportunistic unprincipled attack on blue voters?

Perhaps we should file against Texas for limiting dropoff locations for mail-in ballots. Texas did all it possibly could to suppress the vote. It shows in the results. (you want to argue that one?)