politics

19120 readers

2582 users here now

Welcome to the discussion of US Politics!

Rules:

Post only links to articles, Title must fairly describe link contents. If your title differs from the site’s, it should only be to add context or be more descriptive. Do not post entire articles in the body or in the comments.

Links must be to the original source, not an aggregator like Google Amp, MSN, or Yahoo.

Example:

Articles must be relevant to politics. Links must be to quality and original content. Articles should be worth reading. Clickbait, stub articles, and rehosted or stolen content are not allowed. Check your source for Reliability and Bias here.
Be civil, No violations of TOS. It’s OK to say the subject of an article is behaving like a (pejorative, pejorative). It’s NOT OK to say another USER is (pejorative). Strong language is fine, just not directed at other members. Engage in good-faith and with respect! This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban.
No memes, trolling, or low-effort comments. Reposts, misinformation, off-topic, trolling, or offensive. Similarly, if you see posts along these lines, do not engage. Report them, block them, and live a happier life than they do. We see too many slapfights that boil down to "Mom! He's bugging me!" and "I'm not touching you!" Going forward, slapfights will result in removed comments and temp bans to cool off.
Vote based on comment quality, not agreement. This community aims to foster discussion; please reward people for putting effort into articulating their viewpoint, even if you disagree with it.
No hate speech, slurs, celebrating death, advocating violence, or abusive language. This will result in a ban. Usernames containing racist, or inappropriate slurs will be banned without warning

We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.

All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.

That's all the rules!

Civic Links

• Register To Vote

• Citizenship Resource Center

• Congressional Awards Program

• Federal Government Agencies

• Library of Congress Legislative Resources

• The White House

• U.S. House of Representatives

• U.S. Senate

Partnered Communities:

• News

• World News

• Business News

• Political Discussion

• Ask Politics

• Military News

• Global Politics

• Moderate Politics

• Progressive Politics

• UK Politics

• Canadian Politics

• Australian Politics

• New Zealand Politics

founded 1 year ago

MODERATORS

[email protected]

975

Trump aides alarmed he's 'just golfing all day and stewing' as election slips away: WaPo (www.rawstory.com)

submitted 3 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

217 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Factually, that's what he did during his time in office as well. I'm not sure what they thought had changed.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments

[–] [email protected] 14 points 2 months ago

This is what they actually learned.

1968, 1980, 1984: They learned that turning off moderate voters by putting too progressive of a candidate can lose you an election hard (McGovern, Carter, Mondale).
1992: They learned that a strong third party candidate can cannibalise voters from a weak or ineffectual major party, much like Perot took votes from the Republican Party when Bush-41 went back on his 'no new taxes' pledge.
2000: They learned that trying to placate moderates by picking a more moderate candidate costs them the election as surely as placating progressives with an ultra-progressive candidate does, just by thinner margins.
2008: They learned that hate for Republicans is far more effective of a strategy than building coalitions...
2010: ...but they learned that Progressives turn into fair-weather friends when they don't get exactly what they want.
2012: But that Republican hate is still useful....
2014: ...and our fair-weather friends are still useful to Team Red.
2016: We relearned the lesson we should have learned in 2000 by placating moderates and running a dynasty.
2020: But that Republican hate is still useful!

We barely averted Biden as the Moderate Placator in 2024, running on the fear and hate of the Republican Party to make an otherwise moderate in Kamala Harris our standard-bearer, but if she keeps up with the talks about price controls, we MIGHT just find out if the lessons of 1968, 1980, and 1984 still apply.

And Jackie's Fridge is right. In an election split 51 (Left) and 49 (Right), if you can convince 3 Left-Leaning voters to vote Third Party, you have convinced them to throw away their votes and assure all 51 voters on the Left get what they DON'T want while the Conservatives win on a 49/48/3 split. Unless and until you use a voting system that allows those 3 votes to NOT give the win to the 48 voters, voting third party is just helping the major party most opposed to your platform win. And if you need any evidence of how this screws up Leftists, look no further than our northern neighbour, Canada, specifically Ontario, where vote-splitting between the two major Left-Wing parties (Liberal, New Democratic Party) lets the Conservative party run the show.