Why America is moving Left

[hopper]

It's easy to point to Supreme Court rulings, especially on gun rights and money-as-speech, that show policy moving to the right; DW Nominate scores, which are an objective measure, clearly show that Republicans have moved to the right without any Democratic movement in any direction. It's easy to cherrypick to show that the country is moving left or right (gay rights is a very easy issue to argue left with), but I don't think there's a clear pattern of movement in any direction (I guess you could argue left socially, but right economically, but that might be my own bias sneaking through).

The Democrats held both chambers of Congress from 1981-1995: are you going to argue the country wasn't moving to the right during that time?

Democrats did not control the Senate from 1981-1987, but regardless, at that time, the Democratic party had a large conservative faction, and right-wing Republican Presidents were able to push their agendas through. Congress has been, partially since 2010 and totally since 2014, controlled by the opposition to the Obama Presidency, in a way that Reagan never experienced.

Well without Republican Votes Obama would not have gotten to negotiate TPP. Obama also got Republicans to budge on spending on this last "Omnibus Spending Bill". Well Obama is not as popular as Reagan was back in his heyday. Obama's approval ratings have been in the 40's for most of his presidency. Reagan's approval ratings were mostly over 50% his whole time in office except for 1981-1982 because of the economy and high inflation. Reagan's approval ratings did slip below 50% because of Iran Contra in 1986 as well. I do believe Reagan(1981-1982) and Obama(2009) are similar in that they came into office with a bad economy.

(Fixed because the lame duck period extends into the beginning of the year after the election.  - TF)

[hopper]

Dems are gonna win presidency and control Senate, in 2016; &1994, 2010 & 2014 was coming anyways, due 1994 Brady bill.

But, 2020 is coming for the GOP, and it is doubtful the GOP will pick up the type of Senate seats, in 2018, that will give them long term control. In a neutral yr, ND & IN are gone while Dems pick up NV. Keeping Dems in charge.

America is moving left and immigration reform & minimum wage increase adjusted to inflation will eventually have its day
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You better hope that America doesn't have a high inflation crisis than if you want a minimum wage increase adjusted to inflation. I don't think this proposal will happen even Dems know that minimum wage adjusted to inflation would be harmful to the economy if high inflation happened.