Embittered election postmortem (please let's just have this one thread to vent)

[SPC]

One good thing about this election that benefits all Americans is that conservative rich people, especially bankers, who were holding onto their money out of fear of the Democrats will likely be empowered to spend and invest even if nothing concrete as changed to the law. Republican wins like this DO historically inspire investor confidence and that will lead to a slow but eventual clearing of all the stimulus money banks have been hoarding.

Then all of the doomsayers about hyperinflation start to look slightly less crazy...

No. The overabundance of domestic oil and gas will deflate the cost of production across markets to counteract any inflationary investing.

So Obama is going to reverse course and approve Keystone XL and expand offshore drilling?

[I Will Not Be Wrong]

This was an awesome thread.  We must do this another time, say, in two years?

[King]

One good thing about this election that benefits all Americans is that conservative rich people, especially bankers, who were holding onto their money out of fear of the Democrats will likely be empowered to spend and invest even if nothing concrete as changed to the law. Republican wins like this DO historically inspire investor confidence and that will lead to a slow but eventual clearing of all the stimulus money banks have been hoarding.

Then all of the doomsayers about hyperinflation start to look slightly less crazy...

No. The overabundance of domestic oil and gas will deflate the cost of production across markets to counteract any inflationary investing.

So Obama is going to reverse course and approve Keystone XL and expand offshore drilling?

Perhaps, but Keystone XL has nothing to do with it.  Construction of it may cause serious deflation if we added Canadian oil production to the mix.

I don't know how much you pay attention to the market but oil and gas prices are collapsing even without KXL.  United States drillers in the Southwest are finding enough oil and gas through fracking to make the Canadian oil sands a luxury. Reserves are stock piling and even the Saudis are cutting prices.

Even T Boone Pickens is saying we need stop drilling for awhile (but we're not) http://www.cnbc.com/id/102152067

[Incipimus iterum]

Why are voter's so blind to the Republicans claims of them saying they are the party for the working class voter when they are the party of big money big buisness. im just stunned how blind people are especially in Idaho. For example sec of state we had a a republican who wanted to have a statewide fingerprint data base and wanted people to get there finger prints scanned before we vote yet they voted him in over a great person Holli Woodings who would have been a excellent sec of state for Idaho, and i know this is Idaho but she had a shot at winning.

[Cranberry]

I agree, but I will express my reaction when waking up and checking the results this morning more succinctly.

Completely the same as mine! I was going on msnbc.com, and the first headline I saw was "Republicans pick up North Carolina".....

[IceSpear]

This was an awesome thread.  We must do this another time, say, in two years?

I'm sure there will be a thread like this in two years...

[Ljube]

This was an awesome thread.  We must do this another time, say, in two years?

I'm sure there will be a thread like this in two years...

Let's hope the Dems start that one too.

[Deus Naturae]

I'm not getting the Brownback/Savonarola comparison...?

Also, you all are just silly. This election has nothing to do with some sort of pyscho cruel mindset among Americans or the "nature of American masculinity" whatever the Hell that means. The reason the GOP triumphed is extreme dissatisfaction with the status quo, which, correctly or incorrectly, is associated with Obama. Combine that with bad campaigning and midterm demographics and you get last night.

What's funny is that at the same time forum lefties are comparing American voters to neanderthals and bemoaning the idiocy of the electorate, they're also whining about how a majority of people actually do support their policies. Are you people proud of the fact that a nation of dumbs supports your policies?

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

I'm not getting the Brownback/Savonarola comparison...?

He was a religious-fanatical Asshole Of History (tm) whose name alliterates with 'slavering'. That's about it. I certainly don't think it's one of the more inspired phrases in that post.

Also, you all are just silly. This election has nothing to do with some sort of pyscho cruel mindset among Americans or the "nature of American masculinity" whatever the Hell that means. The reason the GOP triumphed is extreme dissatisfaction with the status quo, which, correctly or incorrectly, is associated with Obama. Combine that with bad campaigning and midterm demographics and you get last night.

What's funny is that at the same time forum lefties are comparing American voters to neanderthals and bemoaning the idiocy of the electorate, they're also whining about how a majority of people actually do support their policies. Are you people proud of the fact that a nation of dumbs supports your policies?

On further reflection, the issue isn't so much the fact that the opposition to Obama won as the fact that the opposition to Obama has the policies and ethos that the Republican Party has. It's the political and cultural environment that produced this as our 'center-right' party in the first place.

It's really only some specific races that actually sickened me enough that I felt the need to make that post, namely the four reelections of incumbent Republican governors to which I referred, the North Carolina Senate race, and the undue closeness of the New Hampshire and Virginia Senate races. Everything else was understandable, albeit upsetting.

[H. Ross Peron]

Nathan's post is really quite excellent and about sums up the current situation in this country. Scott and Brownback (!) got re-elected. With the exception of Pennsylvania, not a single one of the Rust Belt state Republican governors (Walker, Kasich, Snyder) lost despite their anti-labour records. Even Shumlin's election came down to the wire and considering the third-place candidate in Vermont was Libertarian, quite possibly would have lost had that candidate not run. Is the American citizenry so malleable that the only difference in their vote is whether the Republican candidate makes a gaffe with regards to abortion?

If there be a silver lining to this, its that there's a firm progressive majority on most political issues.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

If there be a silver lining to this, its that there's a firm progressive majority on most political issues.

Even that's not much consolation if nothing can be done to translate that into policy.

[jd1433]

One good thing about this election that benefits all Americans is that conservative rich people, especially bankers, who were holding onto their money out of fear of the Democrats will likely be empowered to spend and invest even if nothing concrete as changed to the law. Republican wins like this DO historically inspire investor confidence and that will lead to a slow but eventual clearing of all the stimulus money banks have been hoarding.

Banking/Finance doesn't quite work that way although not bad.

-All securities have to be owned by someone. If I invest by buying securities from someone else than they have to sell those securities to me. Granted this simplistically ignores new offerings, but still...

-Banks are always salivating to lend. They're not deploying their substantial cash reserves not out of fear, but instead because:
1) The implementation of Basel III capital ratios make bank capital expensive and bank liquidity (cash/deposits/etc.) cheap. By looking only at the latter and concluding they're holding that money back by choice misses a bigger picture of what is happening.
2) The financial world sees limited available opportunities for profitable lower risk lending because there is limited capacity for additional debt out there and those that do have capacity don't have that high of a demand for it.


Don't forget the 4 C's of credit: Character (Credit histories are only slowly improving), capacity (indebtedness/incomes are only slowly improving so the market sees limited capacity for debt), collateral (most collateral out there is already encumbered), Capital (reserves replenishing slowly).

[jd1433]

Jesus do I really have to cheer up some of the apocalyptic ones?


Come on guys... real GOP legislation can't pass at the federal level without 60 senators and a presidency following this election. Real Dem legislation couldn't pass before the election without owning the House and 60 senators.


Every single piece of legislation since Jimmy Carter ***was negotiated*** between the parties with exception of Obamacare (60 seat senate majority), Federal Stimulus (60 seat senate majority) and budget/ways and means between the years of 1993-94, 2003-2006, and 2009-2010 because they can't be filibustered.


Nothing meaningful has really changed at the federal level other some stuff around the edges, a tiny change in leverage during negotiations, and a bit more movement for the GOP to the highly coveted Federal Trifecta that includes a 60 seat senate majority that probably wont ever materialize any time soon (the 60 senate seats at least).

[IceSpear]

I'm not getting the Brownback/Savonarola comparison...?

Also, you all are just silly. This election has nothing to do with some sort of pyscho cruel mindset among Americans or the "nature of American masculinity" whatever the Hell that means. The reason the GOP triumphed is extreme dissatisfaction with the status quo, which, correctly or incorrectly, is associated with Obama. Combine that with bad campaigning and midterm demographics and you get last night.

What's funny is that at the same time forum lefties are comparing American voters to neanderthals and bemoaning the idiocy of the electorate, they're also whining about how a majority of people actually do support their policies. Are you people proud of the fact that a nation of dumbs supports your policies?

I sincerely hope your sig is parody.

[The Vorlon]

Republicans won 75% of the white vote tonight. That pretty much sums it up.

I will ask you a serious question, and I hope you will give it a serious bit of thought before you reply.

A very strong majority of white people regard the government and the democrats as their enemy.

Indeed if you are white, married, have a family income over $75,000 and are employed in the private sector there is an 85% chance you will vote Republican.

The above group is a huge swath of America, and this swath actively is fearful of the Democrats.

Why? and do you think you should do something to change it?

Whites going 75/25 for the GOP is just as critical a polarizing issue as Blacks going 90/10 for the Dems.

[Mr. Reactionary]

“I can’t believe Nixon won. I don’t know anyone who voted for him.”

[Mr. Reactionary]

Jesus Christ this thread. The arrogance, narcissism and general delusion of the majority of the posters in this thread (many of whom manage to be perfectly reasonable most of the time) is just... staggering. I mean, throwing around terms like 'morally indefensible', an 'ideology that is an affront to man and God' (paraphrasing), 'the neanderthal age', 'evil', 'morally depraved'. What planet are you living on? An election has come and gone and the Republican party have taken a narrow majority in the Senate. So what? The world still turns, the Sun still shines, the birds still sing. Instead you'd think that Sauron had been reunited with the One Ring, judging by the comments here.

Thank you for this. I'm always amused by those who claim that anyone who disagrees with them on policy is a stupid evil doodoo head racist knuckle-dragging teabagger mouth breather, but then are surprised when the same people don't vote with them afterwards.

R: "Maybe we should balance the budget."
D: "YOU WANT TO STARVE POOR BLACK CHILDREN! ABORTION!"

So now we have a system where both Team R and Team D do this. When both sides play dirty, it continues the cycle. The cycle only works if both teams are in on the fix.

[Knives]

Republicans won 75% of the white vote tonight. That pretty much sums it up.

I will ask you a serious question, and I hope you will give it a serious bit of thought before you reply.

A very strong majority of white people regard the government and the democrats as their enemy.

Indeed if you are white, married, have a family income over $75,000 and are employed in the private sector there is an 85% chance you will vote Republican.

The above group is a huge swath of America, and this swath actively is fearful of the Democrats.

Why? and do you think you should do something to change it?

Whites going 75/25 for the GOP is just as critical a polarizing issue as Blacks going 90/10 for the Dems.

This just isn't true, you only described the ones who actually vote. There are so many people in the US that just don't vote.

[Flake]

Wow, this thread is certainly something I haven't seen before on this website.

Of course Democrats lost this election, we lost badly, we lost 7 (up to 9 depending on Alaska and Louisiana) Senate seats mostly in the South and in the West, we lost the Governorship battles in every competitive race (with the exception of Colorado, bless you Hickenlooper) and in some strong Democratic states (Massachusetts, Maryland).

I don't think any of us predicted the Republicans would have such a wonderful night, not even Talleyrand. Nobody thought the Republicans would gain Governorships (let alone three of them), nobody thought this new congress would be the most Republican since the 1920's, nobody thought that this election would be worse than 2010. And it was.

This election is very frustrating for us lefties, and especially those who thought Democrats would outperform their poll numbers like every other election since Obama's election, but in reality every poll oversampled Democrats, hell, we nearly lost in Virginia!

The problem with this thread is that so many of you are predicting it is the end of the Democratic Party, that Americans are idiots, but what really happened is that we didn't turn out our base.

The 2014 electorate had strange demographics, the racial composition was similar to 2004 totals, but the % per racial group was essentially unchanged (except for Asians, but maybe it is a reversal to normal, pre-Obama levels). The problem with these demographics is that we lost the white vote 60-40, and that cannot be the case in an election where 75% of the electorate was white.

I feel that it's unlikely Democrats will gain among whites in future years, so we need to turn out the Obama coalition every single election. It'll be hard, and Democrats need to change their voter outreach programs all across the country, where we need to excite young people, non-white people, and women to turn out and vote. We can't rely on dixiecrat support anymore, we weren't able now, we won't be able to in 2016, not ever.

What this election provides us is a unique opportunity. We have a clean slate, anybody with baggage has lost (except for those people New Yorkers keep electing) and we have to rebuild state parties where the Democrats have received nothing but thrashings in 2010 and 2014, states like Ohio, Florida, Nevada, and Iowa. We have a unique chance, when 2016 rolls around, to elect candidates that can excite the base and win statewide. People like that, like Patrick Murphy (won with 60% of the vote) and Gwen Graham (51% of the vote) are rising stars in the Florida Democratic Party, and can help us win future statewide elections.

The Democratic Party is not going away, the United States is not "voting against it's future", rather, we did not turn out our own voters. They never even voted for their future. Staggering statistics, like in California, where 40% of likely voters didn't even know Brown was running for re-election, that is where a lot of our problems are. We pay no attention to safe seats, and look what happens. We lost Maryland, we lost Illinois, our highest vote % was 58, in California.

We can't just ignore these states, states with high non-white populations, states where we can find national candidates. The Obama campaigns had excellent ground game, motivating voters and leading to two electoral college landslides. In the past few years, we could win elections with that alone. Unfortunately, the Republicans are now matching (or in some cases, exceeding) our ground game in these states. Our statewide candidates continue to do the same thing over and over. They say some bs like "Obamacare needs to be changed" and continue to say they are a moderate who'd work with both sides (when everybody already knows they're a liberal) while completely ignoring winning progressive issues like medicare/medicaid expansion and universal background checks that excite the base and please moderates. Some even run one issue campaigns (Mark Uterus) and those campaigns are desperate and dividing, something we cannot afford right now.

Democrats must run on Democratic accomplishments, which is really saying Democrats need to run on Obamacare and point out all the good it's done in people's lives. The only reason that this program is remotely unpopular is the extensive campaign the Republicans have put with making this program (which they proposed in the 90's) as negatively viewed as possible. Democrats need to show people that this program has done some real good in the community, and we need to expand the program, if anything.

Democrats lost this election because it's very important to turn out their base, and the base didn't come. The base wasn't contacted. We just assumed the base would turn out, when the Obama campaign made sure they pledged to vote. Democrats need to run on winning progressive causes, we need to run on medicare expansion and actually do something about it. Democrats now have the opportunity to grow their party in fresh soil, and they must not repeat the same mistakes of this year's elections.

R: "Maybe we should balance the budget."
D: "YOU WANT TO STARVE POOR BLACK CHILDREN! ABORTION!"

We cannot try to appeal to conservatives like this anymore, we can win without their support, and win comfortably, but we need to turn out our base, not treat them like we already have their vote.

Now we get to move on to 2016, which is likely to be a very favorable election with Presidential year turnout, and with the Clinton machine (she will be the nominee, it's an unavoidable fact, and it's not like other Democrats would be any different from her) we can win the Presidency and the Senate. We can move onto 2018 and bring some strong candidates onto the table, we can run our rising stars and in the mean time, invest into our infrastructure in (not atlas) blue and purple states. We saw that in Georgia, where, although there was a national tsunami, we kept those races to 2012 presidential levels. 2016 and 2020 are both Presidential years, and the Republicans in those races will be very vulnerable, Burr, Ernst, Johnson, etc. I am confident we can win the Senate, some Governorships and the Presidency, and the next few cycles will see some very exciting races, and it's something we can all look forward to.

wow this was a long post

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

LOLWUT!?  The GOP does not consist of "perfectly nice people", Cassius...I think that's what Nathan and I are trying to say here.  It's surprising that you were the one to come up with the obligatory "moderate-hero-everyone-chill-post-election" soliloquy, but it doesn't mean I can't dissect it for the BS that it is.  

Speaking of dissecting BS...

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While it is clear that Republicans have sought some minor changes that have the effect of making it slightly more difficult for Democratic-leaning voters to vote, there certainly is noting to indicate race was a reason for them. Furthermore, the change that Democrats get their underwear all twisted up about, voter ID, has a negligible effect on turnout and rather than decrying it in a way calculated to alienate non-base voters, the Democrats should instead have been pushing means to ensure everyone has a picture ID.  We no longer live in a society where one can be a functioning member of the economy without one.

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This is the one of your charges with the least BS.  But even here you ascribe too great an emphasis on this motivation.  Sadly, there are those who actually do disbelieve that climate change is being caused by human actions.  Also there are those who quite reasonably want to deal with change in the most economic manner, and that might well be by dealing with the effects as they happen rather than trying to prevent them from happening in the first place.

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You seem to be taking as a given that government is supposed to be involved in the economy and that government is the only possible solution to the problems you are concerned with.  Personally I agree with you, but not because of any sense of morality, but because it is good for the overall economy and thus benefits all of us, both rich and poor, when the government does such things.  But in a truly moral society, we wouldn't need the government to do any of this.  Alas, our society is not as moral as we would like it to be.

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Why should a minimum wage job get anyone out of poverty?  It should be enough to allow one to survive, but out of poverty?  That's economic nonsense.  Unless one defines the poverty level as being just enough to keep from starving or freezing to death, then we can never eliminate poverty.  It just simply is not mathematically possible to have everyone be above average.

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Huh?  If you think that the leaders of the religious right don't actually believe what they are peddling, you are deluded.

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While I find a number of the policies they advocate to be short-sighted and/or stupid, they aren't immoral, any more than I can point to any Democratic polices that are immoral.

[Ljube]

-Denying climate change because it is good for the profit margins of your donors is morally depraved and reprehensible

This is the one of your charges with the least BS.  But even here you ascribe too great an emphasis on this motivation.  Sadly, there are those who actually do disbelieve that climate change is being caused by human actions.  Also there are those who quite reasonably want to deal with change in the most economic manner, and that might well be by dealing with the effects as they happen rather than trying to prevent them from happening in the first place.

With the current technology level, there is zero chance we can do anything to prevent the climate change from happening. Therefore, the only rational response is to deal with the effects of it.

The environmental fanatics call anybody who tries to talk that way a "climate change denier".

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

-Denying climate change because it is good for the profit margins of your donors is morally depraved and reprehensible

This is the one of your charges with the least BS.  But even here you ascribe too great an emphasis on this motivation.  Sadly, there are those who actually do disbelieve that climate change is being caused by human actions.  Also there are those who quite reasonably want to deal with change in the most economic manner, and that might well be by dealing with the effects as they happen rather than trying to prevent them from happening in the first place.

There is zero chance we can do anything with this technology level to prevent the climate change from happening. Therefore, the only rational response is to deal with the effects of it.

The environmental fanatics call anybody who tries to talk that way a "climate change denier".

Who says we're stuck with our current technology level?

[Ljube]

-Denying climate change because it is good for the profit margins of your donors is morally depraved and reprehensible

This is the one of your charges with the least BS.  But even here you ascribe too great an emphasis on this motivation.  Sadly, there are those who actually do disbelieve that climate change is being caused by human actions.  Also there are those who quite reasonably want to deal with change in the most economic manner, and that might well be by dealing with the effects as they happen rather than trying to prevent them from happening in the first place.

There is zero chance we can do anything with this technology level to prevent the climate change from happening. Therefore, the only rational response is to deal with the effects of it.

The environmental fanatics call anybody who tries to talk that way a "climate change denier".

Who says we're stuck with our current technology level?

We aren't. But there's no logic in doing anything with this current level. We can do a lot with the technology level some 50 years from now.

Edit: I rephrased my previous post for better understanding.

[traininthedistance]

-Denying climate change because it is good for the profit margins of your donors is morally depraved and reprehensible

This is the one of your charges with the least BS.  But even here you ascribe too great an emphasis on this motivation.  Sadly, there are those who actually do disbelieve that climate change is being caused by human actions.  Also there are those who quite reasonably want to deal with change in the most economic manner, and that might well be by dealing with the effects as they happen rather than trying to prevent them from happening in the first place.

There is zero chance we can do anything with this technology level to prevent the climate change from happening. Therefore, the only rational response is to deal with the effects of it.

The environmental fanatics call anybody who tries to talk that way a "climate change denier".

Who says we're stuck with our current technology level?

We aren't. But there's no logic in doing anything with this current level. We can do a lot with the technology level some 50 years from now.

Oh, FFS.  There is plenty we can do with the current level– note how solar has become cheaper than coal– and that is even before taking into account the massive and continually ignored costs associated with inaction.  We can't afford to wait- and that's even before you un-naive your analyses and take other unchecked environmental externalities into account.

Can we do more in the future?  Sure, I hope so, we're even more f**ked otherwise.  But even that requires a dedicated R&D push, which itself requires action and a shifting of resources now.  "Let's pretend like nothing is wrong because science will magically make things better!" while forgetting that making things better in the future requires investment now is short-sighted and circular reasoning of the very worst kind.

[Ljube]

-Denying climate change because it is good for the profit margins of your donors is morally depraved and reprehensible

This is the one of your charges with the least BS.  But even here you ascribe too great an emphasis on this motivation.  Sadly, there are those who actually do disbelieve that climate change is being caused by human actions.  Also there are those who quite reasonably want to deal with change in the most economic manner, and that might well be by dealing with the effects as they happen rather than trying to prevent them from happening in the first place.

There is zero chance we can do anything with this technology level to prevent the climate change from happening. Therefore, the only rational response is to deal with the effects of it.

The environmental fanatics call anybody who tries to talk that way a "climate change denier".

Who says we're stuck with our current technology level?

We aren't. But there's no logic in doing anything with this current level. We can do a lot with the technology level some 50 years from now.

Oh, FFS.  There is plenty we can do with the current level– note how solar has become cheaper than coal– and that is even before taking into account the massive and continually ignored costs associated with inaction.  We can't afford to wait- and that's even before you un-naive your analyses and take other unchecked environmental externalities into account.

Can we do more in the future?  Sure, I hope so, we're even more f**ked otherwise.  But even that requires a dedicated R&D push, which itself requires action and a shifting of resources now.  "Let's pretend like nothing is wrong because science will magically make things better!" while forgetting that making things better in the future requires investment now is short-sighted and circular reasoning of the very worst kind.

In other words, coal makes us sick?


OK, this is just a joke.

But, seriously, any action we do today is an infinitesimal action with huge costs compared to the action we can do with a smaller effort and much larger benefits 50 years from now.