NC-SEN 2020: Tar Heel Tillis

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Jeff Jackson officially out:

https://twitter.com/JoeBrunoWSOC9/status/1161680725525041153

Bad news

Maybe, but I don't think it's that big of a deal. Cal Cunningham seems like a fine candidate, and with Jackson finally making his intentions clear Cunningham's fund raising should improve significantly as donors stop waiting for the field to settle.

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Cunningham brought in more than $1 million in the 3rd quarter.  Not bad.

https://www.wfae.org/post/democratic-senate-candidate-cal-cunningham-raises-1m-third-quarter#stream/0

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Schumer is a joke.

On the other hand, Cunningham is doing just fine in the polls and he's finally starting to rake in the big bucks. The same can be said for Gideon and Greenfield. Just because you don't like a strategy doesn't mean it won't work.

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Schumer is a joke.

On the other hand, Cunningham is doing just fine in the polls and he's finally starting to rake in the big bucks. The same can be said for Gideon and Greenfield. Just because you don't like a strategy doesn't mean it won't work.

1 million isn’t good for a race that is allegedly top tier. John James raised 3 million in Michigan. Even Lindsey Graham’s opponent out-raised Cunningham.

Different circumstances for both. John James is a star on the right while Cunningham is at this point still a generic D. And people hate Graham with a passion that inspires wasted resources while most donors, even politically engaged ones, don't even know whom Tillis is.

[Heebie Jeebie]

Schumer is a joke.

On the other hand, Cunningham is doing just fine in the polls and he's finally starting to rake in the big bucks. The same can be said for Gideon and Greenfield. Just because you don't like a strategy doesn't mean it won't work.

$1 million is pretty pathetic for a state as big as NC when he’s the purported front runner. I don’t know what the hell Cunningham is doing with his time. The bright side for him of course is that Tillis is an incredibly weak incumbent as it is

Jeff Jackson didn't announce his decision to pass on the race until mid-August. Janet Cowell only just recently made it clear she's not running. People have been waiting for the field to settle before committing their money.  Now that all the big names are confirmed to be out of the running, Cunningham's fundraising should continue at a good pace.

[Heebie Jeebie]

Schumer is a joke.

On the other hand, Cunningham is doing just fine in the polls and he's finally starting to rake in the big bucks. The same can be said for Gideon and Greenfield. Just because you don't like a strategy doesn't mean it won't work.

Greenfield is neither doing fine in the polls nor raking in the big bucks.

Eh, it's relative. Iowa is probably not where Democrats want to burn resources anyway.

[Heebie Jeebie]

Schumer is a joke.

On the other hand, Cunningham is doing just fine in the polls and he's finally starting to rake in the big bucks. The same can be said for Gideon and Greenfield. Just because you don't like a strategy doesn't mean it won't work.

Lol, Elissa Slotkin raised more money and she is not running a statewide campaign, Cunningham and Greenfield seem to be pretty weak candidates, at least until now.

I don't think Cunningham is a "great" candidate or anything, but he's fine.  2020 will be a referendum on Trump specifically and Republicans more generally, so turnout will be high no matter what Cunningham does right now--he might as well spend his time gathering resources for a campaign blitz closer to election day.  Which is over a year away, by the way.  There's plenty of time for rallies and public appearances.  And on the money end, Tillis at last reporting, only had $4.4 million cash on hand, a huge chunk of which he's having to spend fighting off a primary challenge.  Cunningham is in the enviable position of being able to sit back and watch Tillis shell out millions to tie himself more closely to Trump--he's doing Democrats' work for them.  And I expect Cunningham's fundraising to only improve now that the Democratic field is settled.  I'll be very surprised if he hasn't raised at least $15 million by election day.

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This is the tamest “sexting” I’ve ever seen

https://twitter.com/treeaston/status/1312241898770358272

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Honestly, having the texts themselves as the illustration is probably the nicest thing the Observer could have done for Cunningham.  Who's going to read those and do anything but chuckle or roll their eyes?

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That’s where you’re wrong.  Sometimes they do, but there also have to be lines you’re not willing to cross.  Otherwise, you’ll end up with a morally bankrupt megalomaniacal monster like McConnell. Having principles is vital; the trick is knowing which you need to be willing to compromise and when you have to rigidly stick to them.

McConnell is bad because he's a conservative, not because he disregards norms.

Norms are only as good as the policies they let you pass.

I'd love if we had a Democratic McConnell, he'd get sh*t done.

Norms are important, but they must serve fair rules.  When they cease to, both must be reformed through the democratic process.  To be healthy, democracy must be responsive.

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Norms are a mean, not an end.

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That’s where you’re wrong.  Sometimes they do, but there also have to be lines you’re not willing to cross.  Otherwise, you’ll end up with a morally bankrupt megalomaniacal monster like McConnell. Having principles is vital; the trick is knowing which you need to be willing to compromise and when you have to rigidly stick to them.

McConnell is bad because he's a conservative, not because he disregards norms.

Norms are only as good as the policies they let you pass.

I'd love if we had a Democratic McConnell, he'd get sh*t done.

McConnell is bad for both reasons.  A Democratic McConnell would be a blight on our democracy.

A Democratic McConnell would be a dream. Imagine how much more effective and efficient Democrats would be in achieving our goals. I want our party leaders to fight hard for our priorities and that’s exactly what McConnell does for his party.

I don’t think a McConnel from any party is a good thing for America. They care more about gaining power and winning than doing what is right for the people. At least Schumer is a bit chiller than McConnel, and comes off as a nicer human overall, and same goes for Cunningham despite this whole incident.

Honestly, I disagree. The way McConnell has been doing things has worked so far the Republicans, (they’re the ones who are going to get 3 Supreme Court Justices after all) so why shouldn’t Democrats do the same? Being “nice” doesn’t get you anywhere or help you win anything. Trying to have the moral high ground and prove that you’re better than the other side is good and all but it doesn’t translate to success or political victory. If Democrats gave McConnell’s tactics a try, who knows, maybe we’ll start winning. And by the way, gaining power/winning and doing whats right for the people aren’t mutually exclusive nor is wanting to win a bad thing. If you want to enact policies that are good for and will help people, then you have to win, and you need actual power.

It's not about being "nice", it's about following the basic rules of democracy and making the country governable.

McConnell was just yukking it up on Hannity the other day about the fact that he got to fill 100 high-court seats because he spent two years preventing Obama from filling any of them.  Leaving court seats open for YEARS and preventing the president from filling them is breaking democracy and making the country ungovernable.  And McConnell had no reason for doing this other than partisan politics.  He would have held those seats open for six years had Harry Reid not abolished the filibuster for them.

Same goes for the Supreme Court.  When it looked like HRC was going to win, McConnell and his allies were talking about holding the Merrick Garland seat open for FOUR YEARS.  Blocking the president's constitutional responsibility to fill a Supreme Court seat and leaving the court with 8 members on a semi-permanent basis is breaking democracy and making the country ungovernable.  And McConnell had no reason for doing this other than partisan politics.

We can keep going, because McConnell does this time and time and time again.  The hallmark of Mitch McConnell's reign as minority leader was his abuse of the filibuster for literally everything.  He would filibuster even simple, nonpartisan, procedural legislation, just to break the wheels of democracy even more and stop Democrats from doing ANYTHING.  That's not how democracy is supposed to work.  That's not how the filibuster was supposed to work.  That's making the country ungovernable for the purpose of partisan politics.

Is America better when one party, really one man, just completely breaks it into a million pieces?  Is this just McConnell "doing what's best for his party" or being "strong" or "mean" or "playing to win"?  You can use that logic to justify literally any atrocity.  Cersei Lannister blowing up the Sept of Baelor is just her "not being nice", she's "playing to win" and "doing what's best for her party."  Pol Pot slaughtering millions of people was "not being nice" just "playing to win" and "doing what's best for his party."

Mitch is committing atrocity after atrocity against American democracy.  We all collectively suffer, both in the short-term and in the long-term, for his short-term personal political gain.  When historians in a hundred years look back on this period in American history, they won't say "Oh what Mitch did was good because it got his party more power."  They'll say "for a decade or more, America was in 100% gridlock, because the Republican Senate leader had a philosophy of breaking the entire country for political gain."

So much wrong with this.  Just to tackle the bolded parts:
Democratically elected Senators not acquiescing to the opposition's judicial nominations is not "breaking democracy"--it's democracy itself!
Senate Republicans had a constitutional responsibility to advise and provide or deny consent to the president's SCOTUS nominee, a responsibility they duly exercised.  The Senate is still an equal branch of government, isn't it?
What you call "abusing the filibuster," I call operating within the rules everybody agreed to.  If Democrats don't like those rules, there's a simple democratic solution--vote to change them. 

[Heebie Jeebie]

So much wrong with this.  Just to tackle the bolded parts:
Democratically elected Senators not acquiescing to the opposition's judicial nominations is not "breaking democracy"--it's democracy itself!
Senate Republicans had a constitutional responsibility to advise and provide or deny consent to the president's SCOTUS nominee, a responsibility they duly exercised.  The Senate is still an equal branch of government, isn't it?
What you call "abusing the filibuster," I call operating within the rules everybody agreed to.  If Democrats don't like those rules, there's a simple democratic solution--vote to change them. 

At this point I'm pretty sure you're trolling, but just to be clear, there was nothing policy-based about any of McConnell's objections.  He wasn't refusing to acquiesce to Obama's nominee because he disagreed with the nominee -- quite the contrary, Merrick Garland was who Republicans WANTED Obama to pick! -- he was blocking the nominee purely because he didn't want to let Obama do his job.  No other reason.  That's not democracy.  That's not "advise and consent."  That's not governing.  That's not politics.  That's simply saying "if we can't run the country, no one can, even if they agree with us."

The definition of abuse according to Merriam Webster is "improper or excessive use or treatment."  The purpose of the filibuster was as an extreme option to block extremely objectionable legislation.  For most of the Senate's history you had to physically stand and talk for as long as you wanted to prevent passage of the bill.  Thus you had "successful filibusters" and "failed filibusters."  Clearly, using the filibuster on EVERY PIECE OF LEGISLATION, for no other reason than to prevent the opposition party from governing at all, meets the definition of "improper or excessive use."

I'm not trolling.  I'm serious.  And what you're saying is a bunch of nonsense.  If Republicans wanted Garland, he'd be on the Court right now instead of Gorsuch or Kavanaugh.  But obviously Republicans didn't want Garland or any liberal on the Court (duh!).  A couple of Senators floated his name as a boneheaded rhetorical move prior to his nomination, but...come on--do I really have to explain how political rhetoric works?  Also, the filibuster was historically used to block civil rights legislation--which I guess you could call "extremely objectionable" if you want.  In any case, the rules governing the filibuster's use have changed frequently throughout the years (cloture introduced in 1917, threshold lowered to three-fifths in 1975, etc.), and they can change again:  the majority just needs to do it if they want.  But to expect elected representatives to voluntarily handicap themselves with unofficial, informal constraints...that's insane.  It would be like the Heat expecting the Lakers to give up their time-outs and pass on taking free throws.  Those aren't the rules!

[Heebie Jeebie]

So much wrong with this.  Just to tackle the bolded parts:
Democratically elected Senators not acquiescing to the opposition's judicial nominations is not "breaking democracy"--it's democracy itself!
Senate Republicans had a constitutional responsibility to advise and provide or deny consent to the president's SCOTUS nominee, a responsibility they duly exercised.  The Senate is still an equal branch of government, isn't it?
What you call "abusing the filibuster," I call operating within the rules everybody agreed to.  If Democrats don't like those rules, there's a simple democratic solution--vote to change them. 

At this point I'm pretty sure you're trolling, but just to be clear, there was nothing policy-based about any of McConnell's objections.  He wasn't refusing to acquiesce to Obama's nominee because he disagreed with the nominee -- quite the contrary, Merrick Garland was who Republicans WANTED Obama to pick! -- he was blocking the nominee purely because he didn't want to let Obama do his job.  No other reason.  That's not democracy.  That's not "advise and consent."  That's not governing.  That's not politics.  That's simply saying "if we can't run the country, no one can, even if they agree with us."

The definition of abuse according to Merriam Webster is "improper or excessive use or treatment."  The purpose of the filibuster was as an extreme option to block extremely objectionable legislation.  For most of the Senate's history you had to physically stand and talk for as long as you wanted to prevent passage of the bill.  Thus you had "successful filibusters" and "failed filibusters."  Clearly, using the filibuster on EVERY PIECE OF LEGISLATION, for no other reason than to prevent the opposition party from governing at all, meets the definition of "improper or excessive use."

I'm not trolling.  I'm serious.  And what you're saying is a bunch of nonsense.  If Republicans wanted Garland, he'd be on the Court right now instead of Gorsuch or Kavanaugh.  But obviously Republicans didn't want Garland or any liberal on the Court (duh!).  A couple of Senators floated his name as a boneheaded rhetorical move prior to his nomination, but...come on--do I really have to explain how political rhetoric works?  Also, the filibuster was historically used to block civil rights legislation--which I guess you could call "extremely objectionable" if you want.  In any case, the rules governing the filibuster's use have changed frequently throughout the years (cloture introduced in 1917, threshold lowered to three-fifths in 1975, etc.), and they can change again:  the majority just needs to do it if they want.  But to expect elected representatives to voluntarily handicap themselves with unofficial, informal constraints...that's insane.  It would be like the Heat expecting the Lakers to give up their time-outs and pass on taking free throws.  Those aren't the rules!

OK, then let me be as serious as you.  If the sole purpose of McConnell and the Republican Party is to break all the levers of government and prevent anything from happening ever, and that is indeed what the voters and the American people want, and that's how politics is supposed to work, why have a Senate at all?  Why shouldn't Mitch just pull a Cersei Lannister and blow the entire thing up?  That would be a much more effective and efficient way of preventing any legislation from passing or any judges from being confirmed.

The answer, of course, is that the purpose of the Senate is to be a deliberative body where issues are brought forth, both sides present their case, and a compromise is reached, typically with the side that has more power getting more of what they want.  That's the way the Senate functioned for hundreds of years.  Under Mitch McConnell, it's become "LOL we're not going to compromise, we're not even going to debate, in fact we're not even going to have hearings.  We're just going to shut the entire thing down until we get back in charge."  Why bother keeping the Senate open and keeping up the charade of an institution if Mitch's goal is for it to not do anything?

Senate Republicans' purpose is to pass Republican legislation and confirm Republican judges, and to oppose Democratic legislation and reject Democratic judges.  This is how party politics works in every other major democracy on the planet, and I don't understand why we should expect the US Senate to operate differently. 

It might have made sense to expect the Senate to be a deliberative body pursuing compromise back when the parties were themselves unorganized and ideologically diverse.  When it was hard to tell a Northern Republican from a Southern Democrat or vice versa, sure, you could expect to hash things out in negotiation.  Under those circumstances, any party's mandate was ambiguous at best and there was common ground to work upon.  But things just aren't like that anymore.  Now, people know what they're getting when they vote Republican or Democratic, and a responsive system of government should try to give the voters what they voted for.

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Dems can't play the Mitch playbook due to the large structural biases in the Senate. Not to mention the GOP base is much more lockstep than the Dem's.

A liberal Roy Moore running in Massachusetts would not get anywhere near 48%.

Despite the structural disadvantages, Democrats still win control about half the time.  Also, Democrats can ameliorate those disadvantages pretty easily if they choose to by adding states to the union.  The anti-Democratic bias of our system isn't an unchanging, universal law of nature--it's a choice Democrats make.  I think they should make different choices.