Democrats: the “less unpopular” party
Democrats: the “less unpopular” party
No economic news today (Nov. 16). I hope to put up an updated Coronavirus Dashboard (hint: it’s pretty unremittingly awful) later.
In the meantime, I wanted to add a postscript to yesterday’s post about the Democrats’ problem obtaining a durable electoral majority.
It occurred to me after I put up yesterday’s piece is that the essence of what I wanted to say in response to the meme that “Democrats have won 7 of the last 8 popular votes” is that, while Democrats may be “more popular than” the GOP, on an absolute scale the truthful statement is this:
“Democrats are *less UNpopular* than the GOP.”
Here’s why. If you average the popular votes that the two parties have gotten beginning with 1996 you get the following:
The simple fact is that in the past 6 elections going back 24 years more people have voted *against* the Democratic nominee than have voted for the nominee. In other words, in an absolute sense, the Democratic nominees have been *unpopular,* if by the slightest of margins. There’s simply no way to build a durable electoral majority on that basis.
The path forward is to embrace, and pass, some simple economic fixes (like raising the minimum wage and ending the abuse of salaries, in addition to making affordable healthcare universal) that materially improve – and are *seen* to materially improve – average Americans’ lives, while allowing for some flexibility on issues that people perceive as ones of morality (and hence are hard to compromise about) in such a way that nobody’s ox gets gored too much.
Michigan Republicans Backtrack After Refusing to Certify Election Results
NY Times – November 17
DETROIT — Republican members of a key Michigan elections board refused on Tuesday to certify Detroit’s election results in a nakedly partisan effort to hold up Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s victory over President Trump — only to reverse themselves after an outcry from the city’s voters and state officials.
The initial deadlock and pressure-packed turnaround capped a chaotic day of repeated Republican misfires in the party’s attempt to undermine the election results. Republicans lost a case before the Pennsylvania Supreme Court and faced a skeptical reception in a separate hearing in federal court in Pennsylvania, and an audit in Georgia confirmed there was no foul play with voting machines.
The Republican gambit in Detroit was among the starkest examples of how previously routine aspects of the nation’s voting system have been tainted by Mr. Trump’s effort to challenge his defeat, and he appeared to revel in the night’s chaos with celebratory tweets attacking Detroit even after the deadlock ended. …
In Georgia, a Republican Feud With Trump at the Center
NY Times – November 17
ATLANTA — There is no worse time for Georgia Republicans to be engulfed in a civil war. Their presidential candidate just narrowly lost the state, which has long been a conservative safe space, while two competitive runoff races are looming in January that could determine control of the U.S. Senate — and the direction of the country for the first part of this decade.
And yet the war has come, full of double-crossing, internecine accusations of lying and incompetence, and a bitter cleavage into factions over the question of how much fealty should be shown to President Trump — and the extent to which Republicans should amplify his false argument that the election in this fast-changing Southern state was stolen from him.
Republicans in Georgia and elsewhere are now faced with a stark choice. They can stick by Mr. Trump and his rash claims of fraud, and risk alienating moderate voters who may have had their fill of Trumpism — including the thousands who helped turn Georgia blue this month. Or they can break with Mr. Trump, invite his wrath and risk throwing the political equivalent of a wet blanket on conservative turnout for the Senate runoffs in January. …
Georgia’s secretary of state, Brad Raffensperger, has defended the integrity of the election and said he faces pressure from some Republicans to consider ways that ballots could be disqualified. …
The acrimony has burst past state lines and involved Mr. Trump and one of his staunchest allies, Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina. Mr. Trump called Mr. Raffensperger a “RINO,” or Republican in Name Only, while continuing to make false claims about voting integrity in Georgia; along the way he tossed a few barbs at the state’s Republican governor, Brian Kemp, Mr. Trump’s ally and sometime-scapegoat.
And Mr. Raffensperger told The Washington Post on Monday that Mr. Graham had asked him about ways that ballots could potentially be disqualified, which the secretary of state portrayed as pressure to look harder for evidence of fraud. (Mr. Graham called that assertion “ridiculous.”) …
Giuliani the ‘Gift That Keeps on Grifting’
NY Times – November 18
This week, it was reported that Rudy Giuliani had asked to be paid $20,000 a day for his work managing President Trump’s court challenges to his loss in the election. That would have made Giuliani among the most highly compensated lawyers anywhere, even as Mr. Trump’s lawsuits fail one after another.
“Wow, he’s the gift that keeps on grifting, isn’t he?” Jimmy Kimmel joked Tuesday night.
“Rudy Giuliani denied asking for that much. He said Trump told him they’d ‘work it out at the end.’ That’s a good strategy. That usually goes well. Whether it be a contractor, a porn star or the I.R.S., Donald Trump always pays his debts!” — JIMMY KIMMEL …
Says more about Fox TV News being on in every restaurant, McDonald’s, coffee shop, … across the America, especially in the west and mid west.
Lindsey Graham’s long-shot mission to unravel the election results
NY Times via @BostonGlobe – November 18
In 2016, Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., praised the integrity of the nation’s elections system, criticizing claims by Donald Trump that the vote was “rigged.”
“Like most Americans, I have confidence in our democracy and our election system,” Graham said in a statement on Twitter. “If he loses, it will not be because the system is ‘rigged’ but because he failed as a candidate.”
What a difference four years makes.
Graham, who has transformed during that time to become one of Trump’s most loyal allies, now seems determined to reverse the election’s outcome on the president’s behalf. On Friday, he phoned Brad Raffensperger, the secretary of state of Georgia and a fellow Republican, wondering about the possibility of a slight tinkering with the state’s elections outcome. …
NDD,
“…The path forward is to embrace, and pass, some simple economic fixes (like raising the minimum wage and ending the abuse of salaries, in addition to making affordable healthcare universal) that materially improve – and are *seen* to materially improve – average Americans’ lives, while allowing for some flexibility on issues that people perceive as ones of morality (and hence are hard to compromise about) in such a way that nobody’s ox gets gored too much.”
[Perfect. As succinctly expressed as it should be obvious. We can only wait and see what happens. Joe’s platform was reassuring, yet it still must be passed leaving the US Senate as still a major obstacle.]
Hmm.. trouble is for me electing the least unpopular popular politician is the right thing to do. Never lise your skepticism. Politicians lije police and armies are necessary evils. Australia, where I come from, has a preferential voting system. I like to say that means they elect the least unpopular candidate, FPTP elects the most popular even if the majority of voters hate him.
FPTP voting insures political polarization. A state can have either political moderation or polarization. Polarization keeps the private campaign financing rolling in, provides engaging press material, and insures the greatest spoils for political victors. What’s not to love?
The voter in California has lost interest after dealing with initiatives and local issues on the ballot. Critical issues appear as initiatives or propositions, party affiliation does not count there.
Even for House reps, often a stance affecting the local economy outweighs party affiliation.