this post was submitted on 08 Feb 2024
751 points (97.8% liked)

politics

19239 readers
2163 users here now

Welcome to the discussion of US Politics!

Rules:

  1. 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:

  1. 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.
  2. 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.
  3. 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.
  4. 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.
  5. 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 2 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] captainlezbian 134 points 10 months ago (7 children)

In two ways. They also killed the chances of further good deals. When they aren’t in power why would democrats ever want to negotiate with them

[–] [email protected] 86 points 10 months ago (3 children)

Because democrats are willing to do their jobs.

[–] Psychodelic 5 points 10 months ago (1 children)

And here I thought Democrats even participating in a BS, "bipartisan" bill that only served to validate the xenophobia being put forth by the opposing party was appalling and a clear example of the utter failure they represent.

Then again, illegals is common vernacular now, so what the fuck do I even know, really.

I've voted for Dems my entire life, but you'll never catch me saying they "do their jobs". The party embarrasses me at nearly every opportunity; any support I have for/give to the party is despite its leadership, not because of it.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 10 months ago

Willing, and capable are different. They are politicians after all.

[–] MotoAsh 1 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (3 children)

Rolling over for republicans is in their job description?!

... that explains a few things...

[–] [email protected] 27 points 10 months ago (1 children)

When politics function correctly, that is what they are supposed to do in order to get concessions on other important things. Compromise leaves everyone unsatisfied.

[–] MotoAsh 9 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Compromise is supposed to come with consessions from BOTH sides, not just handing one side everything they actually want after they make an unreasonable request...

That's capitulation, not negotiation.

[–] Vorticity 24 points 10 months ago (3 children)

That's what the democrats were trying to do. Republicans tied funding for Ukraine and some other things to tightening border security. The democrats called their bluff. They said "Here's a border security bill that does what you've been asking for now let's get this all done". Republicans' made surprised Pikachu face and said "We didn't want it this way! We want it done by OUR president so he gets credit!" So, even though the Democrats were giving the Republicans what they've been asking for in exchange for things the Democrats wanted, the Republicans said "no".

[–] [email protected] 5 points 10 months ago

Republicans never argue in good faith, and they always put power and politics over policy.

load more comments (2 replies)
[–] Clent 20 points 10 months ago (19 children)

No, but Republicans convincing you it is, is the primary requirement in a Republican's job description.

load more comments (19 replies)
[–] alilbee 13 points 10 months ago (2 children)

Oh yeah, they should do what the Republicans are doing and use a scorched earth, no compromise strategy! I mean, geez, look at all these huge legislative wins accomplished by this congress using this strategy. Maybe we can even have a cool purity-test driven speaker role, that's been working well for them! Anything else we should imitate that I'm forgetting? A demagogic, unrestrained president would definitely tie things up nicely.

Okay I'll stop being a sarcastic jerk now, but you get the point. This strategy from Republicans works wonders when it comes to obstructing and shutting things down, but you're never going to build anything with it. It's destructive at its core.

[–] TengoDosVacas 1 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Do you think its a bad strategy for taking action that the people actually want?

load more comments (1 replies)
[–] MotoAsh 0 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Notice how I am distinctly not asking for Democrats to become as obstructionist. I'm saying they should act like adults dealing with unreasonable people.

[–] alilbee 6 points 10 months ago (8 children)

If you act as if you have leverage you don't and refuse to engage with those who have power, your only choice is obstruction. This is what the Republicans are learning right this moment. Now, lucky for them, obstruction happens to coincide pretty well with their political objectives. For anything "constructive" though, they fail time and time again because none of them know how to compromise.

Politics is compromising with factions to achieve your goals. I loathe some of the things we have to compromise on, but these people exist and they will have representation in our government for as long as they do.

load more comments (8 replies)
[–] [email protected] 53 points 10 months ago (3 children)

The last time they had a majority (first mandate of Obama if I recall?) they tried to work with the Republicans in good faith and they got nowhere so fast that the public voted them out from dissatisfaction.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but that's how I remember it.

[–] ultranaut 25 points 10 months ago

It was a one person majority in the Senate that only lasted for a brief amount of time and was gone once healthcare reform ate up all of the time before Ted Kennedy died. They basically took what Mitt Romney had done at the state level and applied it federally, which is what Republicans claimed to want before they decided to call it Obamacare and pretend they didn't help craft it.

[–] [email protected] 20 points 10 months ago

The health care bill contained a series of things that are broadly popular when they were laid out individually. Package them together and call it "Obamacare" in the media and it was suddenly unpopular.

Tea Party astroturfing can't be understated, either. The GOP grabbed back power at just the right time to be able to gerrymander districts and then keep them gerrymandered up until now. We're only beginning to erode that back.

[–] dhork 17 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Because you need 60 votes to do anything in the Senate.

[–] [email protected] 25 points 10 months ago (2 children)

Only until the instant the Senate takes a simple majority vote to lower it to 50.

While the Senate has historically been a useful bulwark for pushing back against the creeping fascism of the GOP, it's also a matter of fact that it is an antidemocratic institution that in the longer term we're better off minimizing or eliminating. It's the House of Lords and we do not need a House of Lords in the modern era.

Though I would like to see proper reapportionment in the House of Reps first, including adding significantly more members.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 10 months ago (2 children)

While the Senate has historically been a useful bulwark for pushing back against the creeping fascism of the GOP

Has it?

load more comments (2 replies)
[–] [email protected] 1 points 10 months ago

But muh states rights!

[–] [email protected] 13 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Because corporate dems are basically republicans. Our whole political system is right of center. With a few outliers.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 10 months ago

I commented this a while back, and I believe it wholeheartedly -
The current U.S. system is set up so that only two political parties can exist. In a perfect world, they would be rational, and represent differing facets of the voters values/goals. But in addition to not having a perfect world, through manipulation, degradation of the laws, and just human error/unintended consequences, we’ve wound up with a system where the two parties in power are largely funded by corporations, or those who have the resources to create PACs and launder their money into politics, and those groups represent roughly the same values and political goals.

So the political ‘game’ now is to acquire money to campaign (so you can get the votes) by appeasing the donors while appearing to do things that attract voters, because voting has not quite been manipulated to the point where money equals votes, yet. (Save for gerrymandering, which renders the voting ‘problem’ moot.)

I now believe politics is largely theatrical, and the media, also controlled by the interests that fund the political campaigns of politicians that do their bidding, works very hard to keep folks divided and arguing, rather than facing the real problem of their systemic disempowerment.

I am increasingly disillusioned that a solution to this problem is possible.

But anyway - I guess I’m saying I agree with you.

[–] xenomor 10 points 10 months ago (5 children)

Have you ever listened to Democrats? The leadership keeps saying that they believe we need a strong Republican Party for some reason.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 10 months ago (2 children)

Imagine the soundbites if they said they wanted to destroy the opposition party.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 10 months ago (1 children)

GOP talking heads say the same thing all the time

[–] [email protected] 3 points 10 months ago

The difference between the GOP base and the Dem base.

[–] Daft_ish 3 points 10 months ago (1 children)

The GOP had a sign that said "we are domestic terrorists." Can we stop caring what these radicalized disruptors think? Anyone who claims to be a moderate at this point is not welcome in my house none the less would I want to be on the same side as them.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 10 months ago

Lol, it's not the GOP base that the soundbite would be used against. It's the dem base, the people who open the new york times homepage on the way to do their wordle every morning that would see the headline 'DEMS SAY GOP DESTRUCTION AT HAND, "TOTAL ONE PARTY DOMINATION IF WE PLAY OUR CARDS RIGHT" ' that would gasp and be so rattled they forgot the word for Sunday in their Spanish Duolingo lesson.

[–] agitatedpotato 2 points 10 months ago

They say this because their lobbyists want nothing to change and if the Republicans are too weak, Democrats may actually have to make peoples lives better or the whole charade falls apart.

load more comments (3 replies)
[–] Ensign_Crab 6 points 10 months ago

why would democrats ever want to negotiate with them

For the sheer joy of capitulation.