The Virginia Society for the Preservation and Appreciation of High-Quality Posts

[DC Al Fine]

I could just as well say that all Clinton supporters aren't honest and trustworthy. It'd be just as hackish.

I don't know - I expect politicians to lie about things. I don't like it, but let's be real here. For Christians who say family values/morals are important to them, whether they go to church regularly or not, I kind of expect them to act that way, especially considering a lot of it ties into what they believe to be the word of God. You can say its all about that supreme court justice - I actually specifically mentioned that in one of those 2 posts as the typical excuse, but it doesn't excuse the fact that they traded a lot with that vote for that slice of power. And that is even assuming abortion is the defining reason. IIRC, Trump got even higher support among evangelicals than Bush43 and McCain, no? Surely it can't all be abortion, otherwise they'd probably never vote for most Democratic presidential candidates.

And again, they had choices other than Trump. I consider 31%+ way too high for a man like him. The way he treats people, the bullying, the harassment, the constant lying - he should have been nothing more than a marginal candidate if these people held the values they talk about more closely. Especially given how obvious and brazen Trump was about such behavior.

While Evangelicals clearly have a Trump problem, and while it's a shame that Evangelicals ultimately didn't flock to third party candidates, it's unfair to blame the voters for not opting out of the two major parties in a system so heavily favouring said parties.

A rough comparison can be made between white Evangelicals/Trump, and blacks with corrupt Democratic congressmen. Obviously there's a problem with corrupt congressmen, and far too many voters stick with the corrupt guy not matter what. However, what are their other options? A third party they barely know, which might be opposed to their interests (e.g. Libertarian), and a major party which they perceive to be actively antagonistic towards them.

In both cases, it's too bad when they vote for the corrupt jerk, but I understand their reasons and I'm certainly not going to condemn them for being insufficiently informed about fringe parties.

Lastly, this sort of attitude indicates a failure to take Evangelical concerns around abortion and religious liberty issues seriously. Even if you think our positions our wrong, try to see things from our point of view. If the Candidate A, wants to fund baby killers, and make you betray your conscience to be in the wedding business, you'll be willing to accept a lot of crap from Candidate B, and criticism about "family values" from Candidate A's supporters will ring hollow.

[DC Al Fine]

While this is all very amusing, and if this had to happen to anyone, Sanders is deserving of it, I have to take issue with all the red avatars who are defending it.

While it may be legal under current law, it should not be legal.

In this case, the consequences of the denial of service were pretty light, because there are plenty of other restaurants around that they could go to that will not refuse service. In a fairly similar way, actually, in the CO cake case, they could pretty easily go to another cakeshop.

Those sort of light consequences from being excluded from a single business in isolation, when there are plenty of alternatives, can be harmful to people, but this is not the real reason for having laws that businesses must provide service to all. The real reason is to cover against the possibility of coordinated or total exclusion from service by multiple businesses, or by all businesses offering a particular type of service within some specific area.


Consider Martin Luther King Jr in his heyday. Imagine that the civil rights act had already been passed, but it were legal for a business to deny service to someone if they "think that you are a HP." What would have happened to MLK? He would have been denied service to basically every restaurant in the south because they say "he is a HP."

Imagine another situation - someone is driving along in a remote rural area, maybe in the middle of the Nevada desert or in the middle of Alaska. They are running low on gas, and they come upon the only gas station (really, the only *anything*) in the area. However, the owner of the gas station refuses to serve them "because you are a HP," so they are out of gas and stranded. The owner of the gas station also refuses to sell bottled water, or to let the traveler drink from the drinking fountain, and the traveler has run out of the water that they brought with them from the previous town on the road. Anyway, so the stranded traveler has to call up someone to tow their car. But maybe they don't have a cell phone (or maybe this is in the time before cell phones were invented), maybe they do have a cell phone but there is no reception, or maybe their cell phone is not charged (and of course the gas station owner won't let them use electricity to charge it, and won't let them use the gas station's phone). If the traveler does manage to make a call, maybe the only towing company within reasonable range happens to be owned by the same guy, or by his cousin, and the gas station owner calls up his cousin and tells him to be sure not to send a tow truck. Or maybe the towing company just thinks that the traveler is a HP as well.

At a certain point, in order for the right to travel to mean anything in practice, businesses must provide service.

You may try to dismiss this as implausible. But while it is the extreme case, it is not very dissimilar from the sort of situation faced by blacks traveling in the Jim Crow South, when they would be refused service at all/basically all restaurants, hotels, etc.

The traveler may not be being discriminated against because of an inherent characteristic (e.g. race, gender, whatever), but they still have the right to travel.

At a certain point, when enough businesses refuse service, practical life becomes impossible or severely constrained.

And that's not OK.

I think that in modern times, we have become far enough removed from the possibility of coordinated exclusion from service and total or near-total exclusion from service that we tend not to consider it, since it doesn't generally apply in practice. These are isolated cases, not the rule.

But isolated cases are not the real reason for having laws requiring businesses to provide service.

[DC Al Fine]

Some good old fashioned analysis of Swedish municipal politics from Marbury:

With the parliamentary elections not being the only elections were having in 13 days, I thought I'd post some municipal polls as well.

Starting off in my now former home, Novus has conducted a poll of the municipal election in Umeå, the largest city in northern Sweden.
Let's just say that the city didn't get the nickname "Red Umeå" for no reason. One might be tempted to see this as Jonas Sjöstedt-effect, given that Umeå is the home of the Left Party leader, but it's quite possible that it has more to do with local issues. From 2010 to 2014 the Social Democrats and Left held a majority on the council together, but in 2014 they went their separate ways and S formed a majority together with the Greens and the four Alliance parties. The Left has had a pretty benefitial position, being the biggest opposition party and was thus able to oppose unpopular policies like cuts to preschools and elderly care or the sale of 1600 municipal-owned flats (including student housing) to a Norwegian venture capitalist.

Also, given the new 3% threshold the three smallest parties would fail to get any seats according to this poll. Meaning that with the exit of the Worker's Party, Umeå won't have any trotskyists on its city council for the first time since 1998. 'Tis truly the end of an era.

Novus poll, Umeå municipal election
Social Democrats: 31.6% (-5.2)
Left: 18.8% (+5.7)
Moderate: 15.4% (-0.9)
Centre: 8.4% (+2.5)
Liberals: 7.5% (+1.4)
Sweden Democrats: 6.3% (+3.1)
Greens: 5.7% (-1.7)
Worker’s: 2.1% (-0.6)
Christian Democrats: 2.0% (-1.9)
Feminist Initiative: 1.2% (-2.7)

Meanwhile in my new home, Gothenburg, things are even weirder. Pretty much the entire political spectrum has been turned on its head by populist parties founded in opposition to the controversial railyway project Västlänken (the West Link) and the congestion charge implemented as part of an agreement in 2009 with the government to partially fund the West Link (and other parts of the West Swedish package, including new bridges and road tunnels), alongside money coming from the national budget.
The latest populist party, the Democrats, led and founded by former Moderate Martin Wannholt who was joined by a few Social Democrats and Greens who all had the common denominator of being held back from advancement in their own parties, currently looks like it's leading in the polls. However as the party didn't run in the 2014 election it has to both pay for ballots and be responsible for distributing them to the various polling places around the city, which could depress its numbers somewhat since it's likely they won't be able to get ballots to every polling station. Sure, people can write in the party if it's ballots aren't there, but there's a pretty good chance that some just wouldn't bother with that and just go for another party instead.

Sifo poll, Gothenburg municipal election
Democrats: 18.9% (new party)
Moderate: 16.7% (-5.6)
Left: 14.6% (+5.2)
Social Democrats: 14.2% (-8.2)
Sweden Democrats: 9.9% (+2.9)
Liberals: 6.8% (-1.3)
Greens: 5.6% (-5.1)
Centre: 4.2% (+2.0)
Feminist Initiative: 3.2% (-0.8 )
Vägvalet (Road Choice): 2.2% (-2.7)
Christian Democrats: 2.0% (-2.0)

Pro-West Link (Left, S+V+MP+FI): 37.6%
Pro-West Link (Right, M+L+C+KD): 29.7%
Anti-West Link (D+SD+VV): 31.0%

Also, since the last election Gothenburg has merged its four constituencies used for municipal elections into one city-wide constituency, meaning that the threshold is at 2% rather than 3, and VV and KD would therefore get in (if only barely) if these numbers were replicated on election day. A bare majority consisting of the Democrats, Moderates, Liberals, Centre, Road Choice and Christian Democrats would technically be possible under such circumstances. However considering that the Democrats raison d'etre is their opposition to the West Link, the question is how hell such a majority would solve the West Link issue when construction has already started and it's part of deal to get government funding for other important projects which are less controversial and desperately needed. So chaos it is, then.

Finally in Stockholm, things are looking somewhat more calm. The leftwing parties are going against historical trends by being stronger in Stockholm than the rest of the country (though not due to any strong performance from the Social Democrats), while if this result were to be replicated on election day the Moderates would get their worst municipal election result in 48 years in the nation's capital. Stockholm still has multiple constituencies, so the threshold is at 3%, but if the Feminist Initiative, Christian Democrats or both got slightly more on election day it could either mean a continued Red-Green-Pink majority or a slightly larger Alliance in a council with a Red-Green(-Pink) plurality.

Novus poll, Stockholm municipal election
Moderate: 22.1% (-5.1)
Social Democrats: 21.7% (-0.3)
Left: 13.1% (+4.2)
Greens: 11.1% (-3.2)
Liberals: 9.0% (+0.7)
Sweden Democrats: 8.3% (+3.1)
Centre: 7.3% (+2.6)
Feminist Initiative: 2.9% (-1.7)
Christian Democrats: 2.8% (-0.5)

I currently don't have any numbers for Malmö.

[DC Al Fine]

Anti-death penalty. I admit in principle that it can be used justly, but I don't see it happening in modern America, outside of some truly extraordinary circumstances.

As for the pro-life thing, I get irritated when people try to equate the death penalty with abortion. Other than killing, they have next to nothing in common.

Since they both involve killing, they have a lot in common. It is disingenuous to say you are pro-life if you support murder which is what you do if you are pro capital punishment or pro war.
If you are pro death penalty, what if a woman is pregnant? Is it right to spare her life? Do you think that any pregnant women are killed in war? It is, therefore, logically inconsistent to call yourself "pro-life" and support capital punishment for pregnant women or war if there's any possibility that a pregnant woman could result from civilian casualties, which inevitably occurs during war.

I think part of the issue here is one of language: the phrase "pro-life", because it is a political slogan rather than a rigorous description has a certain degree of vagueness to it. Indeed, based on the meaning of the words alone, being "pro-life" could be defined as vegetarianism. In a similar vein, "pro-choice" could be defined as referring to the choice of incandescent and fluorescent light bulbs (or practically any topic for that matter). But that's not how language works. Both phrases clearly, and specifically, refer to abortion.

This carries with it some important distinctions between different types of killing that are clearly relevant to both its moral and legal ramifications. Not all killing is the same. There is a real distinction between willfully killing an innocent person on your own volition and between killing someone in a war and between killing someone as a sentenced execution. War, if it is just, is in defense of yourself or of other people. That's of course not to say we've always waged only just wars, merely that it is another question with its own set of complicated moral issues and clearly distinguishable from abortion or capital punishment.

As for the other point, when was the last time the US executed a pregnant woman? I think the course of action here is obvious for a pro-life death penalty supporter (not that I even support the death penalty but the logic remains): wait until after she gives birth before executing her. Yes, that means that child will grow up without a mother, but so would any other child whose mother is executed.

If supporting either the death penalty or war, in principle, in your opinion precludes being pro-life due to the fact that pregnant women may be killed (which is very unlikely with the death penalty anyways but I digress), then so do a wide range of other things from planes to trains to automobiles (all of which have killed pregnant women before).

[DC Al Fine]

Someone could probably do this better, but here's my crack at WA:

As I understand it, there have been three main periods in Washington's economic development, simplified to natural resources, defense and aviation, and tech. The state's early economy was based around timber, mining, and agriculture/aquaculture. Basically from statehood in 1889 up until WWI, the state voted like many Mountain West states (mostly Republican) with a touch of prairie populism east of the Cascades and western Progressivism throughout. Between WWI and WWII, the timber resources of the western part of the state encouraged the creation of a number of military bases around the Puget Sound to serve as shipyards and, later, air bases. The proximity of these bases to the Pacific Theater of WWII made them quite important in the 1930s and 1940s. The growing military connection helped the nascent aviation industry. Combined with a number of federal hydroelectric projects along the Columbia River in the 1930s, the state took a sharp turn to the Democratic Party from the Depression through the 1970s; the state relied heavily on federal funding and defense contracts, which came steadily during the Korean and Vietnam Wars. The numerous shipyards and timber companies also spurred a large growth in union membership at this time as well.

As the defense and aviation sectors grew, so did the population of the Puget Sound area. By the 1960s and into the 1970s, the Seattle and Tacoma suburbs grew steadily. Most of the buildings you'll find in the Seattle metro area are from this period. Many California residents moved up around and immediately after the Vietnam War, either as members of the military or as a way of "escaping" back to nature. The suburban character of the Snohomish-King-Pierce corridor and military bases in Kitsap, Island, and Pierce pushed the state more toward Reagan in the 1980s, but the Democratic unionized timber and manufacturing areas in SW Washington balanced the state for a while and led to a narrow Dukakis victory in 1988.

Starting around 1990, the Cold War ended and the timber industry faced increasing obstacles from environmental/endangered species lawsuits and legislation. The children of the 1970s migrations in the core Seattle metro had grown up quite left-wing and less pro-military than their parents, pushing the state toward the Dems for much of the 1990s and 2000s. This generation was much more introverted than their parents, launching the grunge movement and early tech industry. As the timber and manufacturing sectors declined like much of the rest of the country, SW Washington began to drift rightward while the declining significance of defense and aviation pushed suburban Seattle more to the left.

Since 2010, the tech industry has boomed in core King County, leading to in-migration from across the country and around the world. King, Snohomish, and Pierce have again swelled in population, primarily from young, left-wing voters. The Olympic Peninsula finally discarded its union-driven Democratic nature in 2016, leaving only pockets of hippy-generation retirees and rich folk voting to the left west of the Sound.

East of the Cascades, the agricultural nature of the region has kept it Republican since the 1950s, save for a few tourist/seasonal destinations, college towns, and pockets of Hispanic migrant farm workers. Nuclear power played a large role in the development of south-central WA during the 1940s, with the Hanford Nuclear Site drawing many to the Tri-Cities area. The Tri-Cities has continued to grow of late, with a large influx of retirees attracted to the warm weather, low cost of living, no income tax, and Columbia River access. Hispanic migration, especially to Pasco, has also increased, but the area retains a strong Republican character.

Spokane peaked in importance in the 1900s and 1910s as a major rail hub, shipping the agricultural, timber, and mining products of eastern WA and northern ID eastward. There were also military installations built near the city, which helped grow the population through the end of WWII. Spokane stagnated for most of the middle part of the 20th century. The city began to grow again in the 1990s, thanks to migration from conservative Californians seeking lower costs of living and minimal taxes, and a growth in tech-related manufacturing in service of west-side companies. The many hospitals of Spokane became a major economic player as retirees moved to the area, and the healthcare industry remains a major player in the local economy, especially with the recent opening of a major medical school. Of all things, the success of the Gonzaga University college basketball team has helped to turn the image of the city around, and parts of the city have experienced heavy gentrification in recent years. The city remains primarily working class, however, and very white for a city of its size, leading to far more of a Republican lean than other cities of comparable size.

[DC Al Fine]

@MATTROSE94

This thread is for actual quality efforts.
If you want to memorialize your favourite OC posts the appropriate thread is this: https://talkelections.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=368396.0

Ahem

[DC Al Fine]

Del Taichi recently made the point that:

Biden will not approach anywhere near 60% in Cobb or North Fulton, even though these counties are both becoming increasingly diverse (South Cobb is essentially an extension of West Atlanta/Douglas, it's over 60% Black.)  He may break 60% in Gwinnett only because it's the poorest, most downscale of Atlanta's northern suburban counties.  There really aren't these Romney-Clinton voters you obsess over as much as there are Romney-Clinton places.  

Also:  how come when talking about Georgia's suburban Romney-Clinton counties no one seems to give any love to South Atlanta's Henry County (even though it's the most Democratic of any of them)?  Might it have something to do with it only being 55% White and 36% college-educated?  Doesn't quite fit your narrative I guess, hmm?

Naturally, minority voters are the base of the Democratic party, particularly in southern metros like Atlanta. However, it is interesting to consider whether the county map of these big metro areas is shifting because of the white vote or the suburbanization of minorities. It's also interesting to address whether or not we should talk about shifts in the political landscape of North Fulton and Cobb in the same way we talk about shifts in Douglass and Henry.

This raises three questions:

1. How much of the 2008-2016 swing in big metro areas comes from increased minority populations and how much comes from whites flipping parties?

2. If whites are flipping parties in big metro areas, is this swing concentrated in favored quarters (like the North Atlanta suburbs) or can you see it in more downscale parts of the metro as well?

3. Regardless of swings between elections, do white voters in favored quarters consistently vote left of white voters in other parts of metro areas?

To answer these, I decided to dig into DRA data for four major metro areas with well-defined favored quarters: Dallas-Fort Worth (North Dallas/Collin/Southeast Denton), Houston (West Houston/Energy Corridor/North Fort Bend), Atlanta (North Fulton/North DeKalb/East Cobb/Forsyth), and Chicago (Streeterville to the North Shore). If I wanted to add more data, I would also take a look at Philadelphia, Seattle, and Washington. In each of these four metro areas, I determined the white vote in the 2008 election and the 2016 election in both the favored quarter and the rest of the metro area. This is what I got:

Dallas-Fort Worth
White vote, 2008, favored quarter: R+58
White vote, 2008, rest of metro: R+66
White vote, 2016, favored quarter: R+30
White vote, 2016, rest of metro: R+52

Houston
White vote, 2008, favored quarter: R+66
White vote, 2008, rest of metro: R+80
White vote, 2016, favored quarter: R+34
White vote, 2016, rest of metro: R+80

Atlanta
White vote, 2008, favored quarter: R+34
White vote, 2008, rest of metro: R+36
White vote, 2016, favored quarter: R+8
White vote, 2016, rest of metro: R+30

Chicago
White vote, 2008, favored quarter: D+48
White vote, 2008, rest of metro: D+22
White vote, 2016, favored quarter: D+60
White vote, 2016, rest of metro: D+14

After you get past the topline numbers (North Atlanta whites are probably going to vote for Biden even though sunbelt whites are absurdly conservative--~80% of Houston whites voting for McCain--wtf!), you notice a very consistent pattern: favored quarter whites ALWAYS vote left of the rest of the metro, metropolitan whites really did swing towards Hillary Clinton, and these swings have mostly happened in favored quarters. In 2008, the average favored quarter white voter was 13 points left of the rest of the metro, while in 2016, the average favored quarter white voter was 34 points left of the rest of the metro.

Metro-by-metro, white swings (2008-2016) were:

Dallas-Fort Worth
Favored quarter whites: D+28
Rest of metro whites: D+14
Relative swing of favored quarter: D+14

Houston
Favored quarter whites: D+32
Rest of metro whites: D+0 (!)
Relative swing of favored quarter: D+32

Atlanta
Favored quarter whites: D+25
Rest of metro whites: D+7
Relative swing of favored quarter: D+18

Chicago
Favored quarter whites: D+12
Rest of metro whites: R+8
Relative swing of favored quarter: D+20

What's the big takeaway?

First, there's massive internal variation in the white vote across big metro areas. Second, less upscale Romney-Clinton areas (like Henry County, GA) are moving left overwhelmingly because of the suburbanization of minorities. However, upscale wedges of metros (like the GA-400 corridor) are mostly moving left because of shifts in the white vote (some combination of the mythical Romney-Clinton voters, generational turnover, and coastal transplants). If these trends continue into the 2020s, we should be unsurprised by favored quarter counties like Collin, TX or Orange, CA voting to the left of non-favored quarter counties like Tarrant, TX or San Bernardino, CA.

So to address the original Del Taichi quote that prompted all this, North Atlanta is a Romney-Clinton place driven by Romney-Clinton voters while Henry, GA is a Romney-Clinton place driven by demographic change.

Hopefully you all find this interesting. I hope to update this after the 2020 election.

Blairite with an examination of whether Romney-Clinton areas are driven by rich whites moving left or demographic change.

[DC Al Fine]

FYI this is what a high quality post actually looks like. Not some lazy three sentence snark.

[DC Al Fine]

Short snappy posts are not what this thread is for. F**k off please.

Yeah this thread is for effort posts, not mediocre one-liners.