Why Republicans will likely continue to control most/all levels of government

[Tartarus Sauce]

Didn't you hear about Democrat's full proof secret weapon?

What progressive agenda will Democrats be able to implement on the backs of Romney 2012 voters? Are these people going to re-elect their congressman who raised taxes to pay for universal healthcare? This is retarded.

Don't you understand? They're college educated and have $$$ so you know they're more likely to vote for the sophisticated and culturally refined bourgeoisie Democrats. I'm so proud to live in a Romney-Clinton district and county surrounded by my culturally progressive and fiscally conservative friends. I feel smugly superior in my social circle to all those backwater whites in Wississipi. I hope the Democrats run solely on a platform of balancing the federal budget and gender identity.

#SunbeltnotRustbelt

Democrats are gonna balance the budget? Its not Bill Clinton's party anymore. Gender Identity? LGBT is only 5% of the electorate.

They'd actually do a better job of it than Republicans at this point. They'll actually raise taxes for increased spending. The Trump wing and Congressional Republican wing are at loggerheads when it comes to spending, because Trump ran on a platform promising not to touch entitlements (not that he understands the bills he's been backing in Congress dramatically reduce them) which completely eschewed Republican orthodoxy while Congressional Republicans are still obsessing over tax cuts to the wealthy.

The end result is a party that will cut taxes at any cost while not reducing the overall spending.

[Tartarus Sauce]

I would love to see how you would try to win the House if you were in charge of the DCCC. Every race would be triaged before election year. VA-10 and CO-6 and CA-10 and CA-39 wouldn't be worth contesting

Democrats will not make big wins until the entire party is redefined and re-branded. This means people like Pelosi, Hoyer, Perez, Feinstein, etc... are thrown out. The Democratic party has no message, narrative, or principles and your average every day working joe looks at them like they're a bunch of bozos.

Until someone like FDR or Reagan come along....the Democrats will just continue on hapless and wandering aimlessly cooking up one empty platitude after another in an attempt to win over people who would only vote for them if the entire economy collapsed.

Instead of wasting time on the mythical unicorn of moderate voters...they should be working on ginning out younger voters who said, according to the last poll, that 70% would vote Dem in the midterm...instead its hapless Pelosi and Schumer paying clueless consulting firms to make up cheesy slogans

Am I disputing that??? I agree that Pelosi and Perez should go. Dems need someone like Moulton as Speaker.  That doesn't change any of what I said though about how targeting some Romney-Clinton districts is still essential to dems winning the House

It's essential yes, but its hard when your party is directionless and your average person sees no reason to vote Democrat.

There's very little energy in the Democratic party. People only vote Democrat if basically the country collapsed like it did under Bush otherwise they cant be bothered to do it. That shows you there are serious enthusiasm problems in this party

Have you not been paying attention recently? There's tons of energy ever since Trump's been elected.

Tons of energy in places that already vote Democrat. Dems have only 13 state legislatures and hating Trump will not cause the vast majority of them to flip

First of all, we're only 6 months in to his presidency and the next general elections for any level of government aren't until later this year in New Jersey and Virginia, so we've only had special elections so far. Of course nothing has flipped since then, but we've seen massive surges in multiple areas in the Democrat vote margins in both the House specials and state legislatures in areas where Democrats haven't generally been competitive. Trump has also been rocket fuel for Democratic recruiting and will only continue to be for as long as he is in office.

You're asserting that because Democrats have been unenthusiastic under Obama and were decimated under his watch that we are therefore not going to see any enthusiasm for the Democratic Party under Trump either because we don't have a message other than "we hate Trump". You forget that midterms are primarily a referendum against the party in power and how well "we hate Obama" worked for the Republicans. Not that I don't encourage Democrats to also work on better messaging for their platform, but making the midterms primarily be a referendum on Trump, if you look at the historical trend, is actually a fairly solid bet.

[Unapologetic Chinaperson]

Hating Bush was enough in 2006 and 2008. Not that lacking an alternate vision themselves would have increased their gains those years though

And therein lies the problem. It's always about running against someone that sucks. People vote values that transcend policy proposals and Democrats have no values other than empty platitudes that make people snicker hence why people only vote Democrat when things get really bad and even that's not enough anymore (remember how the shutdown was supposed to help Dems in 2014?).

If today's Democratic party existed in the 60s, the Civil Right's Act of 1964 would of been voluntary and Medicare would of been a voucher system. They never go all the way...its just this lukewarm complacency in every area.

And people complain of the Democrats being bad because of embracing "identity politics." Well if the Civil Rights Act wasn't identity politics, I don't know what is!

That's the real problem - whether it's real, systems-changing identity politics that results in real reform or turning our economic system right-side up, Democrats are unable and unwilling to do it! And that is why every other comment on Facebook is "DAE think the two parties are the same?"

[heatcharger]

Hating Bush was enough in 2006 and 2008. Not that lacking an alternate vision themselves would have increased their gains those years though

And therein lies the problem. It's always about running against someone that sucks. People vote values that transcend policy proposals and Democrats have no values other than empty platitudes that make people snicker hence why people only vote Democrat when things get really bad and even that's not enough anymore (remember how the shutdown was supposed to help Dems in 2014?).

If today's Democratic party existed in the 60s, the Civil Right's Act of 1964 would of been voluntary and Medicare would of been a voucher system. They never go all the way...its just this lukewarm complacency in every area.

Hating the opposition is why Republicans are where they are now. Who honestly thinks that the GOP is winning because of trickle down economics and "freedom"? Lol. The trick is ruthlessness. Why do you think Harry Reid, Claire McCaskill, Michael Bennet, Jon Tester and all them won in tough environemnts? Because they're savages and destroy their opponents. The public hardly cares about actual ideas, as 2016, 2012, and 2008 showed us. Or 2006, 2010, and 2014. Obama ran on a vague platform of change and hating Bush in 2008. He ran on demonizing Romney and rich people in 2012. Almost always, the winner is the one who demonizes their opponent. Which is why Dems might be better off going full fox News 24/7 on the GOP. They didn't really do that when Obama was in power, but they are now

Exactly. True Leftists would've hated how ruthless LBJ and his politics were. People like Mondale don't offer any serious electoral strategy that would win seats, although he represents a very small portion of the Democratic base anyway.

[Tartarus Sauce]

First of all, we're only 6 months in to his presidency and the next general elections for any level of government aren't until later this year in New Jersey and Virginia, so we've only had special elections so far. Of course nothing has flipped since then, but we've seen massive surges in multiple areas in the Democrat vote margins in both the House specials and state legislatures in areas where Democrats haven't generally been competitive. Trump has also been rocket fuel for Democratic recruiting and will only continue to be for as long as he is in office.

You're asserting that because Democrats have been unenthusiastic under Obama and were decimated under his watch that we are therefore not going to see any enthusiasm for the Democratic Party under Trump either because we don't have a message other than "we hate Trump". You forget that midterms are primarily a referendum against the party in power and how well "we hate Obama" worked for the Republicans. Not that I don't encourage Democrats to also work on better messaging for their platform, but making the midterms primarily be a referendum on Trump, if you look at the historical trend, is actually a fairly solid bet.

Obviously were going to pick up some house seats and maybe flip like 3 or 4 state legislatures but a wave cant happen without a bold vision and new leadership. Think of the two parties as brands...the GOP brand is very strong among their voters...they always come out to vote no matter what. They're like Apple in the sense that people would rather pay $2k for an Apple laptop when they could just get Lenovo for $300. The Democrats on the other hand dont have that...voting Democrat is like a chore for most people and part of that problem is the off-putting ideology of centrism that permeates among the party that inspires no sense of loyalty among its voter base.

I won't disagree that getting fresh faces in leadership would be a nice change of pace in rejuvenating the party's brand and that crafting bold visions acts as energy for voters and campaigns, but the idea that either is explicitly a prequisitie for a wave election is bogus. Resentment was the driving factor of the 2006 and 2010 waves, not leadership and vision, that came afterwards (for 2006 at least, neither kicked in for Republicans after 2010 as they just kept running off animosity).

And the whole "Republicans vote in midterms, Democrats don't" trope isn't a law of politics, just the law of the midterms under Obama. The real constant is that the party not in the White House almost always, with a few exceptions, overperforms in the midterms. I think you just lack patience with what you perceive as the party's pace of embracing progressive agendas and think this is what's holding them back, which is itself something I would dispute but that's a different argument entirely.

[Technocracy Timmy]

I would love to see how you would try to win the House if you were in charge of the DCCC. Every race would be triaged before election year.

Winning massively gerrymandered districts in the Midwest is apparently a better route to 218 in his mind, I guess.

And this is exactly why I'm so skeptical of the Democrats taking back the House in 2018. Too much gerrymandering and voter ID laws benefiting the GOP coupled with a hyperpartisan environment for the Democrats to flip 24 GOP held seats in my opinion.

Dems will do great in local and state level races in 2018 though since individual candidates can more succcesfully tailor themselves at the local and state level and not have to worry about their races becoming too nationalized.

[Virginiá]

And the whole "Republicans vote in midterms, Democrats don't" trope isn't a law of politics, just the law of the midterms under Obama. The real constant is that the party not in the White House almost always, with a few exceptions, overperforms in the midterms.

I agree. Democrats can easily ride a backlash back to power, but the problem becomes whether they can keep it or not, and that is where I believe the actual messaging and policy stuff comes into play. Midterms are almost always referendums on the party in power, and the out party almost always overperforms. It's just how they work, particularly in our two party system - in order to toss out Republicans, they have to put in Democrats. Presidential elections are where you really want to try and float new ideas, because people are very focused on one person who can best sell the policies and narrative in question, as opposed to hundreds of Congresscritters running around like chickens with their heads cut off, all talking about somewhat different things.

[Dr. Arch]

I would love to see how you would try to win the House if you were in charge of the DCCC. Every race would be triaged before election year.

Winning massively gerrymandered districts in the Midwest is apparently a better route to 218 in his mind, I guess.

And this is exactly why I'm so skeptical of the Democrats taking back the House in 2018. Too much gerrymandering and voter ID laws benefiting the GOP coupled with a hyperpartisan environment for the Democrats to flip 24 GOP held seats in my opinion.

Dems will do great in local and state level races in 2018 though since individual candidates can more succcesfully tailor themselves at the local and state level and not have to worry about their races becoming too nationalized.

Democrats have a geography problem
Republicans' have a demographic problem

Both cancel out substantial gains and keep us forever gridlocked

Seems to be cancelling out just fine for Republicans. This country will be in the gutter by 2020 if they hold on to Congress in 2018, which I'm feeling is what will likely happen.

[Person Man]

I would love to see how you would try to win the House if you were in charge of the DCCC. Every race would be triaged before election year.

Winning massively gerrymandered districts in the Midwest is apparently a better route to 218 in his mind, I guess.

And this is exactly why I'm so skeptical of the Democrats taking back the House in 2018. Too much gerrymandering and voter ID laws benefiting the GOP coupled with a hyperpartisan environment for the Democrats to flip 24 GOP held seats in my opinion.

Dems will do great in local and state level races in 2018 though since individual candidates can more succcesfully tailor themselves at the local and state level and not have to worry about their races becoming too nationalized.

Democrats have a geography problem
Republicans' have a demographic problem

Both cancel out substantial gains and keep us forever gridlocked

There is more room for Democrats to grow as there are still more Republican big cities than D holdouts in white lower middle class and working poor neighborhoods.

[hopper]

Until a candidate comes along that completely rebrands what it means to be a Democrat...the GOP will continue to dominate. As long as centrist technocratic stiffs dominate the leadership of the Democrats...they are going to keep losing EVEN with demographic advantages

Its not all about ideology its about having policies that are gonna work for the average Joe.

It's really more complex than that. The problem with Democrats is that they keep thinking they have to  side with Republican ideas in order to get elected so they foresake their own liberalism. Instead, what they should be doing is taking control of the narrative and framing debates in a way that shows the positives of their own liberal policies instead of trying to co-op Republicans and ending up with some moderate position that neither excites their base nor makes the otherside vote for them.

That's not their problem is that the side with Republicans too much or watering down their own policies. That's like the hard-right people saying the Republicans aren't conservative enough.

[Technocracy Timmy]

I would love to see how you would try to win the House if you were in charge of the DCCC. Every race would be triaged before election year.

Winning massively gerrymandered districts in the Midwest is apparently a better route to 218 in his mind, I guess.

And this is exactly why I'm so skeptical of the Democrats taking back the House in 2018. Too much gerrymandering and voter ID laws benefiting the GOP coupled with a hyperpartisan environment for the Democrats to flip 24 GOP held seats in my opinion.

Dems will do great in local and state level races in 2018 though since individual candidates can more succcesfully tailor themselves at the local and state level and not have to worry about their races becoming too nationalized.

Democrats have a geography problem
Republicans' have a demographic problem

Both cancel out substantial gains and keep us forever gridlocked

There is more room for Democrats to grow as there are still more Republican big cities than D holdouts in white lower middle class and working poor neighborhoods.

Maybe. Jacksonville? Grand Rapids? Fort Worth? OKC? SLC?Phoenix? Atlanta? Houston? San Antonio? Those are all still areas where Dems can obviously grow, but don't underestimate GOP potential to tap into NE Philly, Macomb County, western Wisconsin (still can drop further for Dems), outstate MN (I doubt R's have maxed out yet), Maine, New Hampshire...

Obama-Trump and Romney-Clinton voters/areas show a potential to continue their current trends in 2018/2020 or snap back to their more ancestral identity. I don't know how much of either trend is set in stone to grow but we'll see.

A minimum 10% of Trump voters were Obama 2012 voters and he still only got 46% of the GE so...

[hopper]

Didn't you hear about Democrat's full proof secret weapon?

What progressive agenda will Democrats be able to implement on the backs of Romney 2012 voters? Are these people going to re-elect their congressman who raised taxes to pay for universal healthcare? This is retarded.

Don't you understand? They're college educated and have $$$ so you know they're more likely to vote for the sophisticated and culturally refined bourgeoisie Democrats. I'm so proud to live in a Romney-Clinton district and county surrounded by my culturally progressive and fiscally conservative friends. I feel smugly superior in my social circle to all those backwater whites in Wississipi. I hope the Democrats run solely on a platform of balancing the federal budget and gender identity.

#SunbeltnotRustbelt

Democrats are gonna balance the budget? Its not Bill Clinton's party anymore. Gender Identity? LGBT is only 5% of the electorate.

They'd actually do a better job of it than Republicans at this point. They'll actually raise taxes for increased spending. The Trump wing and Congressional Republican wing are at loggerheads when it comes to spending, because Trump ran on a platform promising not to touch entitlements (not that he understands the bills he's been backing in Congress dramatically reduce them) which completely eschewed Republican orthodoxy while Congressional Republicans are still obsessing over tax cuts to the wealthy.

The end result is a party that will cut taxes at any cost while not reducing the overall spending.

Yeah Dems will increase taxes but not decrease spending. Republicans will cut spending and will cut taxes which they are wrong on. There is no room in the budget for a tax cut.  

[hopper]

I would love to see how you would try to win the House if you were in charge of the DCCC. Every race would be triaged before election year. VA-10 and CO-6 and CA-10 and CA-39 wouldn't be worth contesting

Democrats will not make big wins until the entire party is redefined and re-branded. This means people like Pelosi, Hoyer, Perez, Feinstein, etc... are thrown out. The Democratic party has no message, narrative, or principles and your average every day working joe looks at them like they're a bunch of bozos.

Until someone like FDR or Reagan come along....the Democrats will just continue on hapless and wandering aimlessly cooking up one empty platitude after another in an attempt to win over people who would only vote for them if the entire economy collapsed.

Instead of wasting time on the mythical unicorn of moderate voters...they should be working on ginning out younger voters who said, according to the last poll, that 70% would vote Dem in the midterm...instead its hapless Pelosi and Schumer paying clueless consulting firms to make up cheesy slogans

I agree with most of your post except for "mythical unicorn of moderate voters". As for the Dems needing an FDR or Reagan they need somebody slightly to the left of Bill Clinton.

[Deblano]

Didn't you hear about Democrat's full proof secret weapon?

....why are they so stupid?

They are sooooooo freaking stupid.

Trump is gonna win in 2020 because they are so stupid.

[Person Man]

I would love to see how you would try to win the House if you were in charge of the DCCC. Every race would be triaged before election year.

Winning massively gerrymandered districts in the Midwest is apparently a better route to 218 in his mind, I guess.

And this is exactly why I'm so skeptical of the Democrats taking back the House in 2018. Too much gerrymandering and voter ID laws benefiting the GOP coupled with a hyperpartisan environment for the Democrats to flip 24 GOP held seats in my opinion.

Dems will do great in local and state level races in 2018 though since individual candidates can more succcesfully tailor themselves at the local and state level and not have to worry about their races becoming too nationalized.

Democrats have a geography problem
Republicans' have a demographic problem

Both cancel out substantial gains and keep us forever gridlocked

There is more room for Democrats to grow as there are still more Republican big cities than D holdouts in white lower middle class and working poor neighborhoods.

Maybe. Jacksonville? Grand Rapids? Fort Worth? OKC? SLC?Phoenix? Atlanta? Houston? San Antonio? Those are all still areas where Dems can obviously grow, but don't underestimate GOP potential to tap into NE Philly, Macomb County, western Wisconsin (still can drop further for Dems), outstate MN (I doubt R's have maxed out yet), Maine, New Hampshire...

Obama-Trump and Romney-Clinton voters/areas show a potential to continue their current trends in 2018/2020 or snap back to their more ancestral identity. I don't know how much of either trend is set in stone to grow but we'll see.

A minimum 10% of Trump voters were Obama 2012 voters and he still only got 46% of the GE so...

Maybe there is potential for the Dems to win big but maybe they need to leave the 90s behind?

[Devout Centrist]

Lmao has everyone forgotten 2005 already? That was wayyy worse.