Obama to announce executive order on immigration

[Skill and Chance]

I'm happy he is doing it, but he just ruined anything else happening you might like in his presidency, a fact you all know but won't admit. 

That assumes McConnell and Boehner would actually let Obama have any accomplishments. What did he get in return for reaching across the aisle in 2009-2010 again?

It's not them who you need to worry about, it's the one's who wouldn't have voted with those two.  Both are going to face big defections from both the right and left, and Obama could have capitalized on it, if he didn't do this.  Now he is just too toxic for rep's to touch him.

No, Obama could not have done it.  The elusive era of bipartisanship many fondly remember was back when we had three parties, Republicans, Democrats, and Southern Democrats.  To return to anything like that, we need to have a situation where we have three parties with two of them united under a common banner and comfortable with that fact.  Possibly in a decade or two we could have something like that again if the Tea Party Republicans and the Regular Republicans start to peacefully coexist instead of threatening each other in the primaries over the soul of the party.

I could see that world developing if the tea party fractures the next time Republicans have control.  Except it would probably be libertarian-infused mainline R's, perhaps led by Rand Paul, progressive Democrats and so-con R's, perhaps led by Huckabee.  But it would be the reverse of the mid 20th century.  Republicans formally control congress 75% of the time.  A center-left social agenda easily passes, but there will be a long stalemate on economic issues unless the mainline R's or progressive D's have a supermajority.

[Skill and Chance]

Amazingly, this is the most glaring example of what I have been saying about most of the so called reform bills, in that in a misguided attempt at a "fix" the problem will be worsened. Giving amnesty alone makes it worse by encouraging others to make the same choice (they got amnesty, all I have to do is get there and sooner or later I will too), giving it like this will blow up Congress and heighten animousity towards illegals and potentially move the until now favorable numbers nationwide with regards to support for a path to legalization/citizenship. We have already seen numbers showing opposition in places like IA and many of the midwest swing states even with all the support and promotion from both sides and the media.


I can tell you someone who is really not liking this at all, is Mary Landrieu.

Landrieu is doomed anyway.  So were Pryor, Begich, Braley, and Grimes if Dems were being honest with themselves in October.  By contrast, doing it in September could have easily put Udall and Crist over the line, saved the NV Assembly, NM House and CO Senate, and increased urban turnout in NC and VA enough to save Hagan and give Warner an Obama 2012 level win.

The only winning Dem who could plausibly have been sunk by this was Shaheen.  MN and MI might have gotten closer but the margin was too high for them to flip outright.  Obama severely miscalculated here by not realizing early enough that the Senate was lost.  Having 48 vs. 46 seats would help a great deal going into 2016.

Basically, all of the populist McCain Dems were already doomed and the close races that could have been saved were in diverse Dem leaning states.

[Skill and Chance]

Amazingly, this is the most glaring example of what I have been saying about most of the so called reform bills, in that in a misguided attempt at a "fix" the problem will be worsened. Giving amnesty alone makes it worse by encouraging others to make the same choice (they got amnesty, all I have to do is get there and sooner or later I will too), giving it like this will blow up Congress and heighten animousity towards illegals and potentially move the until now favorable numbers nationwide with regards to support for a path to legalization/citizenship. We have already seen numbers showing opposition in places like IA and many of the midwest swing states even with all the support and promotion from both sides and the media.


I can tell you someone who is really not liking this at all, is Mary Landrieu.

Landrieu is doomed anyway.  So were Pryor, Begich, Braley, and Grimes if Dems were being honest with themselves in October.  By contrast, doing it in September could have easily put Udall and Crist over the line, saved the NV Assembly, NM House and CO Senate, and increased urban turnout in NC and VA enough to save Hagan and give Warner an Obama 2012 level win.

The only winning Dem who could plausibly have been sunk by this was Shaheen.  MN and MI might have gotten closer but the margin was too high for them to flip outright.  Obama severely miscalculated here by not realizing early enough that the Senate was lost.  Having 48 vs. 46 seats would help a great deal going into 2016.

Basically, all of the populist McCain Dems were already doomed and the close races that could have been saved were in diverse Dem leaning states.

The problem is the polling is so overwhelming in opposition o the exeuctive approach. We tend to get so lazer focused on the Hispanic vote and that we begin to think they are the only demographic in a state like CO or NV. This was might point with Romney as to why he would have lost anyway, even in terms of getting more Hispanics more or less overall election. At some point it becomes like Udall with the Women's issues and that in chasing after that vote with such an attempt, if it comes at the expense of several points amongst indies and/or conservative dems and mayve even the Hispanics themselves who are somewhat more conservative leaning  but vote Democrat. The reaction to it could have easily made it worse then it ended up not better.

But the untold story is that it's actually the white vote that is looking completely inelastic now. For the past 3 cycles, it has been 60/38 R +/- 1%.  I don't know what it would take to offend the remaining 38%, but it probably goes far beyond anything Obama has proposed.  Meanwhile, the Hispanic vote fell from 73%D to 62%D and along with the Asian vote and a slight shift in the African-American vote, decided the outcome.

What I am saying is that Democrats can almost safely assume that their remaining white voters are their base and that there are hardly any indies left to flip.  Until that is disproved, focus on turnout first.  If Hillary has 65% approval and is leading her opponent 57/36 in the summer of 2020, then you can try to win back Appalachia.

[Skill and Chance]

...even Romney's 27% was the third or fourth best performance for any Republican in the last 50 years.

Yes but the 2 of the 3 below Romney were because Perot was splitting the vote and the other time was Ford when Latinos were only 1% of the vote. As for Asians, Romney is the all time worst.

GOP LATINO VOTE
Bush Jr (04) 44
Reagan (80) 37
Bush Jr (00) 35
Reagan (84) 34
McCain (08) 31
Bush Sr (88) 30
Romney (12) 27
Bush Sr. (92) 25 (Perot 15)
Dole (96) 21 (Perot 9)
Ford (76) 18

GOP ASIAN VOTE
Bush Sr (92) 55 (Perot 15)
Dole (96) 48 (Perot 8 )
Bush (04) 43
Bush (00) 41
McCain (08) 35
Romney (12) 26

So in terms of the two party vote, Mitt Romney is certainly the all time loser for both Latinos and Asians. In fact they were two of the only groups that swung away from the GOP between 08 and 12. I wonder why.

Yes, I don't trust pre-1980 polls of Hispanic voters.  The margin of error was just so high.  Maybe FDR/LBJ really did win 80-90% of them, but Republicans managed to win NM about half the time between 1920 and 1970.  That was the one place the Hispanic vote was relevant to statewide elections back then.