Obama has decimated the Democratic Party

[pbrower2a]

A century ago the Senate was effectively chosen by State legislatures and no better than those legislatures.  The Seventeenth Amendment made the Senate electable by the People of the States, thus ensuring that the Upper House was democratically elected. Now the State legislatures mostly have effective control of the content of the state delegations to the House of Representatives through control of the boundaries of districts.

The trick is to concede a few districts to the "wrong" Party and dilute the rest.  Republicans can thus ensure that small cities that might vote "wrong" are diluted in a rural hinterland that votes "right". If at the opportune time the State legislature goes one way it can entrench Congressional representatives of its choosing.

  

[Mehmentum]

A century ago the Senate was effectively chosen by State legislatures and no better than those legislatures.  The Seventeenth Amendment made the Senate electable by the People of the States, thus ensuring that the Upper House was democratically elected. Now the State legislatures mostly have effective control of the content of the state delegations to the House of Representatives through control of the boundaries of districts.

The trick is to concede a few districts to the "wrong" Party and dilute the rest.  Republicans can thus ensure that small cities that might vote "wrong" are diluted in a rural hinterland that votes "right". If at the opportune time the State legislature goes one way it can entrench Congressional representatives of its choosing. 

Even worse is that state legislatures get to chose the state level districts as well.  I.e. they can gerrymander themselves in place.  The only way Democrats have to break this cycle is to win Governorships.

States where the governor has veto power over redistricting, there are multiple districts to draw, and districts aren't drawn by commission:
2015: KY, LA
2016: MO, IN, WV, NH, UT, OR
2017: VA, NJ
2018: HI, NV, NM, CO, TX, OK, KS, NE, AR, IA, MN, IL, WI, TN, AL, GA, SC, OH, MI, PA, NY, MA, RI, ME

Color (not Atlas colors, sorry) is which party currently holds office, bolded states are what I think Democrats should focus on taking/holding. 

[smoltchanov]

The House is controlled by the R gerrymandering in the Deep South. Whereas at presidential level, and senate elections, dynamics are different, and Latino coalition is much more important in states like CO, NV & Pa where the senate map is a reflection of the presidential map, in 2016.

Term limits are up for GOP give in MI, FL, NV & NM; Dems are expected to win IL & MD in 2018, we will see the R gerrymandering in Deep South in House start to come to an end, by 2022.

I wish i could have a button to Ignore every S avatars.

S stands for "socialist"? Then - me too....

Thanks, I love you too.

Thanks a lot! And don't be too surprised: Russians, many of whom (including myself) has lived under real socialism,  either adore socialism (and even communism) or absolutely hate it. I belong to second group.

I momentarily forgot that you were Russian when I posted that; I guess that makes it slightly more understandable. Still, I'm a democratic socialist (who is basically a social democrat in practice) so don't expect any Stalinist revolutions from me (or OC for that matter, although I have no idea what his ideology is).

Anyway, the Democratic Party has not been "decimated" and neither has the Republican Party. The two-party system is sadly still alive and well.

Thanks for understanding! I have nothing against reasonable social democracy when country can afford it (but only in that case: see Greece, which tried to be it when it lacked proper resources). And i agree that there is no strong third party in sight. In fact, all circumstances being equal i would prefer a multiparty system like in most of the Europe. What i frequently (and loudly) object - a present day situation, where 35-40% of American population, which calls (and frequently, is) itself a "moderate" doesn't have real political representation: in the past more conservative wing (not neccessary racist, simply more conservative) of Democratic party and more liberal wing of Republican blended together in informal coalition and gave these people a voice and representation, but - no more, on peak of political polarization. If this tendency will continue - soon both parties will stand so far apart, that "hole in the middle" will be almost intolerable.

And, yes, i understand the need (and base) for more progressive party then present day Democratic party too. And some people (especially from the South and Appalachia) will, probably, argue, for another party - socially conservative, but economically populist and "redistributive" - and they may also be correct. But FPTP system makes that VERY difficult.

[smoltchanov]

A century ago the Senate was effectively chosen by State legislatures and no better than those legislatures.  The Seventeenth Amendment made the Senate electable by the People of the States, thus ensuring that the Upper House was democratically elected. Now the State legislatures mostly have effective control of the content of the state delegations to the House of Representatives through control of the boundaries of districts.

The trick is to concede a few districts to the "wrong" Party and dilute the rest.  Republicans can thus ensure that small cities that might vote "wrong" are diluted in a rural hinterland that votes "right". If at the opportune time the State legislature goes one way it can entrench Congressional representatives of its choosing.

Even worse is that state legislatures get to chose the state level districts as well.  I.e. they can gerrymander themselves in place.  The only way Democrats have to break this cycle is to win Governorships.

States where the governor has veto power over redistricting, there are multiple districts to draw, and districts aren't drawn by commission:
2015: KY, LA
2016: MO, IN, WV, NH, UT, OR
2017: VA, NJ
2018: HI, NV, NM, CO, TX, OK, KS, NE, AR, IA, MN, IL, WI, TN, AL, GA, SC, OH, MI, PA, NY, MA, RI, ME

Color (not Atlas colors, sorry) is which party currently holds office, bolded states are what I think Democrats should focus on taking/holding.  

Well, let's analyze:

KY: One word - Appalachiana. Where Democrats generally tanked recently. State party is one of the best, but even for it  it may become very difficult soon

MO: Democrats have little base besides 2 big cities. Republicans can override any veto AFAIK.

IN: Governor only. And even then Republicans may have votes to override.

WV: Even more Appalachian then KY. Same problems.

NH: sure, no problems (Democrats have rather good chances to win Legislature in 2016 and 2020)

VA: Yes. State simply grows slightly more blue statewide and reasonable chances to get a majority in state Senate sooner or later.

NJ: Surely possible

NV: Depends on candidates. One popular candidate (like Sandoval) can drastically change chances.

NM: Absolutely

CO: Depends.. Very polarized state, where numbers in Legislature and Governor percentages will be close for foreseeable future.

IA: Doubt. State seems slowly moving R. Very slowly, but - .. Only better quality of Democratic candidates (lesser number of idiots) saves..

MN: Possible. But mostly because of idiocy of most Republican candidates.

IL: Yes, but... Southern Illinois may swing heavily Republican.

WI: See MN...

OH: Governorship. Don't see Democrats getting majority in Legislature.

MI: Possible. The problem - Democratic votes too concentrated in Detroit, Ann Arbor and few other areas, so - Republicans have more room to maneuver in Legislature. But Governorship - sure. Even more so because it's likely that next Republican candidate will be much less sane then Snyder.

PA: The same. Especially - with seemingly non-controversial Governor. But Western (Appalachian) PA is swinging R.

MA: Baker is very popular and likely to remain so. But Democrats can override his veto if necessary. So - yes.

ME - Yes. But winning governorship in 2018 is critically important.
 

[muon2]

A century ago the Senate was effectively chosen by State legislatures and no better than those legislatures.  The Seventeenth Amendment made the Senate electable by the People of the States, thus ensuring that the Upper House was democratically elected. Now the State legislatures mostly have effective control of the content of the state delegations to the House of Representatives through control of the boundaries of districts.

The trick is to concede a few districts to the "wrong" Party and dilute the rest.  Republicans can thus ensure that small cities that might vote "wrong" are diluted in a rural hinterland that votes "right". If at the opportune time the State legislature goes one way it can entrench Congressional representatives of its choosing.

Even worse is that state legislatures get to chose the state level districts as well.  I.e. they can gerrymander themselves in place.  The only way Democrats have to break this cycle is to win Governorships.

States where the governor has veto power over redistricting, there are multiple districts to draw, and districts aren't drawn by commission:
2015: KY, LA
2016: MO, IN, WV, NH, UT, OR
2017: VA, NJ
2018: HI, NV, NM, CO, TX, OK, KS, NE, AR, IA, MN, IL, WI, TN, AL, GA, SC, OH, MI, PA, NY, MA, RI, ME

Color (not Atlas colors, sorry) is which party currently holds office, bolded states are what I think Democrats should focus on taking/holding.  

The legislature does not draw the maps in IA. They are drawn by an independent body according to statutory rules. The legislature is given an up or down vote on the plan (congressional and legislative) and if rejected can specify specific goals from statute that should be addressed then try again. Gerrymandering is not an issue there.

[pikachu]

NJ has a commission which typically has an incumbent protection gerrymander.

[Amenhotep Bakari-Sellers]

Obama or even Hilary wont win House back. But Hilary is a triangulator and will muscle in a boarder first security fense; as some sort of legal status for immigrants will be worked out with a guest worker program; as well as means testing medicare and Keystone Pipeline.

[Kingpoleon]

Oh please, if the Democratic Party is decaying than the Republican Party is already fossilized.

There's only one party most reasonable people under 35 are embarrassed to say they support.

Spoken like someone who lives in a sh*tty little bubble.

But... But... Republicans are the elitists?

[libertpaulian]

Remember in 2008 when everyone was saying that the Republicans were doomed?  They were saying it again after 2012.  After 2004 and 2010, everyone was saying that the Democrats were in deep trouble. Notice a pattern? Every time there's a wave election, people say the loosing party is doomed.

Calm down.

Yes, the Democrats do have problems at the state and local levels (and during midterm elections), but the defeatism I've been hearing for the past year is ridiculous.

 

The problem is that the Democrats aren't the party they used to be.  Back in the 90s (when I was growing up), pretty much every state was fair game for Democrats, not just the states on the West Coast, the Northeast, or Midwestern Rust Belt.  Even states like Louisiana, Georgia, and South Carolina could be won by Dems at the gubernatorial and state legislature level.  Hell, the South was Democrat TERRITORY!  It took over a century for North Carolina's legislature to go red, for example.  Nowadays, because the Democrats decided that saving the whales, taking away guns, and appealing to minority identity politics was more important than trying to make sure their white working class and lower middle class base continued to vote for them, they've lost the South and some of the Midwest.  They're now viewed as the party of the West Coast hedonists, Northeastern elitists, or Beltway snobs.

[Mehmentum]

Remember in 2008 when everyone was saying that the Republicans were doomed?  They were saying it again after 2012.  After 2004 and 2010, everyone was saying that the Democrats were in deep trouble. Notice a pattern? Every time there's a wave election, people say the loosing party is doomed.

Calm down.

Yes, the Democrats do have problems at the state and local levels (and during midterm elections), but the defeatism I've been hearing for the past year is ridiculous.

 

The problem is that the Democrats aren't the party they used to be.  Back in the 90s (when I was growing up), pretty much every state was fair game for Democrats, not just the states on the West Coast, the Northeast, or Midwestern Rust Belt.  Even states like Louisiana, Georgia, and South Carolina could be won by Dems at the gubernatorial and state legislature level.  Hell, the South was Democrat TERRITORY!  It took over a century for North Carolina's legislature to go red, for example.  Nowadays, because the Democrats decided that saving the whales, taking away guns, and appealing to minority identity politics was more important than trying to make sure their white working class and lower middle class base continued to vote for them, they've lost the South and some of the Midwest.  They're now viewed as the party of the West Coast hedonists, Northeastern elitists, or Beltway snobs.

You haven't actually refuted anything I said.  Democratic weakness in Republican states isn't the cause of the 2010 and 2014 landslides.  The appearance of weakness in those states is the result of those landslides.

If you only look at the 2010 and 2014 elections maps, your description is accurate, but look at 2012's Senate and Gubernatorial maps.  In the Senate, Democrats won Indiana, Missouri, North Dakota, Montana, and West Virginia, all of these are Republican states.  They also won Montana, Missouri, and West Virginia Governorships. 

What happened to the overwhelming vitriolic hatred of Democrats in 2012?  It certainly didn't seem to hurt the Democrats too much that year.  If the Democrats are so screwed, how could they have so overwhelmingly won an election only a few years ago?  The answer is, of course, that the Democrats aren't screwed.  They weren't screwed after 2004 or 2010 either.  And the Republicans weren't screwed after 2008 or 2012.

After all 4 of those elections, tons of people were spelling doom for the losing party.  And in literally every single one of those elections, the following election was a landslide in favor of the party who lost.

[Mehmentum]

Anyway, I actually did the math on this.  Did Obama decimate the Democratic party?

I decided to compare Clinton, Bush, and Obama's electoral performance, both on the ballot and down ballot.

What I did:
1.) Added up all the EVs the president won in their 2 elections, and divided by 1076 (the number of EVs up in those two elections.)

2.) Added up all the governorships each party won during the president's tenures (from their first election, to their last midterm election.) Divided by the total # of governor races.

3.) Did the same for Senate and House seats.

4.) Added these four numbers together.  Because of the way I divided, each of these four numbers has equal 'weight'.  I multiplied by 25 to express this number as a percentage.

Here are the results:

Clinton:
EVs: 749 (v. 327)
Governor: 40 (v. 62)
Senate: 66 (v. 73)
House: 879 (v. 856)

Electoral Score: 51.7% (v. 48.2%)

Bush:
EVs: 557 (v. 517)
Governor: 51 (v. 54)
Senate: 65 (v. 68)
House: 884 (v. 852)

Electoral Score: 50.0% (v. 49.9%)

Obama:
EVs: 697 (v. 379)
Governor: 41 (v. 61)
Senate: 68 (v. 71)
House: 839 (v. 901)

Electoral Score: 50.5% (v. 49.5%)

Analysis:
Obama and Clinton perform identically in Senate and Governor's races.  Its in the House where Obama really suffers.  Democrats in the House got slaughtered once they lost the House, while in the 90s Republicans mostly held narrow majorities.  This is likely because Democrats mostly controlled redistricting in 1990, while in 2010 Republicans were in control.

Bush does the worst mostly because of his razor thin electoral college margins.  If you discount EVs, he'd actually do best out of the three.

[tmthforu94]

I don't quite buy it. Bush's numbers look bad because of the last two elections - Republicans were able to quickly recover in 2010 and win most of what they lost back, then gained even more in 2014. Bush pissed people off, but I think Obama lost a large chunk of the old Democratic base (primarily in the south) that won't come back.

[Mehmentum]

I don't quite buy it. Bush's numbers look bad because of the last two elections - Republicans were able to quickly recover in 2010 and win most of what they lost back, then gained even more in 2014. Bush pissed people off, but I think Obama lost a large chunk of the old Democratic base (primarily in the south) that won't come back.

Bush's numbers don't include 2008, (and Clinton's don't include 2000).  Though it would make sense to count 2008 as part of Bush's performance.  I wanted to be able to compare the three administrations, and I didn't want to have to wait until 2016 to get Obama's final score.

Anyway, while Republicans won their seats back, its hard to justify crediting Bush with that.  Bush can't be credited with winning back seats in 2010, so it doesn't really make sense to give him leniency for losing the seats in the first place.

[Amenhotep Bakari-Sellers]

The GOP has dominated the lower chamber with the exception of the 2008 Stock Market crashes and 4 years and Dems have dominated presidency and won popular vote in 01. Where the Senate has stayed at parity dependency on Senate class.

Its hard to argue those numbers but Obama should have passed immigration reform in 2008. Just maybe immigrants would have saved either the 2014 midterm where Udall lost a very tight race

[Bojack Horseman]

In the event that Donald Trump wins, 2018 will be a repeat of 2006. The pendulum will start swinging back when Republicans get full federal control, and Democrats will start winning again. I don't believe the doomsday predictions where post-2010, people were screaming that the House would be Reoublican for decades to come. You just have to get rid of a president that half the country thinks is the anti-Christ.

[Nyvin]

A century ago the Senate was effectively chosen by State legislatures and no better than those legislatures.  The Seventeenth Amendment made the Senate electable by the People of the States, thus ensuring that the Upper House was democratically elected. Now the State legislatures mostly have effective control of the content of the state delegations to the House of Representatives through control of the boundaries of districts.

The trick is to concede a few districts to the "wrong" Party and dilute the rest.  Republicans can thus ensure that small cities that might vote "wrong" are diluted in a rural hinterland that votes "right". If at the opportune time the State legislature goes one way it can entrench Congressional representatives of its choosing.

Even worse is that state legislatures get to chose the state level districts as well.  I.e. they can gerrymander themselves in place.  The only way Democrats have to break this cycle is to win Governorships.

States where the governor has veto power over redistricting, there are multiple districts to draw, and districts aren't drawn by commission:
2015: KY, LA
2016: MO, IN, WV, NH, UT, OR
2017: VA, NJ
2018: HI, NV, NM, CO, TX, OK, KS, NE, AR, IA, MN, IL, WI, TN, AL, GA, SC, OH, MI, PA, NY, MA, RI, ME

Color (not Atlas colors, sorry) is which party currently holds office, bolded states are what I think Democrats should focus on taking/holding.  

Well, let's analyze:

KY: One word - Appalachiana. Where Democrats generally tanked recently. State party is one of the best, but even for it  it may become very difficult soon

MO: Democrats have little base besides 2 big cities. Republicans can override any veto AFAIK.

IN: Governor only. And even then Republicans may have votes to override.

WV: Even more Appalachian then KY. Same problems.

NH: sure, no problems (Democrats have rather good chances to win Legislature in 2016 and 2020)

VA: Yes. State simply grows slightly more blue statewide and reasonable chances to get a majority in state Senate sooner or later.

NJ: Surely possible

NV: Depends on candidates. One popular candidate (like Sandoval) can drastically change chances.

NM: Absolutely

CO: Depends.. Very polarized state, where numbers in Legislature and Governor percentages will be close for foreseeable future.

IA: Doubt. State seems slowly moving R. Very slowly, but - .. Only better quality of Democratic candidates (lesser number of idiots) saves..

MN: Possible. But mostly because of idiocy of most Republican candidates.

IL: Yes, but... Southern Illinois may swing heavily Republican.

WI: See MN...

OH: Governorship. Don't see Democrats getting majority in Legislature.

MI: Possible. The problem - Democratic votes too concentrated in Detroit, Ann Arbor and few other areas, so - Republicans have more room to maneuver in Legislature. But Governorship - sure. Even more so because it's likely that next Republican candidate will be much less sane then Snyder.

PA: The same. Especially - with seemingly non-controversial Governor. But Western (Appalachian) PA is swinging R.

MA: Baker is very popular and likely to remain so. But Democrats can override his veto if necessary. So - yes.

ME - Yes. But winning governorship in 2018 is critically important.
 

Mention all the places trending R but don't mention any one place trending D...yeah okay balanced.

[smoltchanov]

^ I mentioned exactly the states that were chosen by previous poster, and gave my estimates of Democratic perspectives there. But if you wish so much - i don't see anywhere a states trending D at such avalanche rate as, for example, Arkansas or West Virginia trended R in last years. In most of the "blueing" states the process is extremely slow (Arizona, North Carolina, Florida and so on) and caused not by popularity of party's platform, but by demographic changes. And that happens really slowly.

[Torie]

Under NY law now, any map that one party does not like requires a two thirds vote, so any map will either be a non partisan map of the sort a court would draw, or will draw, or a bi-partisan gerrymander, so there will not be much change from the current map, that was drawn by a court (for Congressional districts). The Assembly is a Dem gerrymander, and the state senate a Pub gerrymander, and either than regime will continue, or again be a non partisan map, in which event, the Dems will lose seats in the Assembly (but still control it), and take control of the State Senate. The law removes the threat for the Pubs that everything would be a Dem gerrymander if it loses control of the State Senate (a real possibility), and fails to win the governorship (more likely than not). So the Pubs have avoided the pit of despair, and the fate of Massachusetts Pubs.