Rov_Scam
2hr ago
See my above comment. It's not about legislation, but constituent services.
Rov_Scam
2hr ago
The things businesses need from state legislators aren't necessarily things relating to legislation. Whenever you're dealing with red tape and need a department to take action on something, even if that action is uncontroversial, pressure from a legislator can be the difference between a permit application sitting on a bureaucrat's desk for six months to moving to the top of the to-do pile. I know from government employees that they will respond fairly quickly once a politician gets up their ass about something. A personal example, not state but Federal, is that a nonprofit I sit on the board of recently had its 501(c)(3) status revoked due to not filing annual disclosures. We had filed the disclosures, and the IRS hadn't sent a letter of revocation (we found out when someone tried to donate and it got flagged by Schwab). Trying to resolve the matter through the IRS Exempt Organizations hotline got us nowhere; when we submitted the proof that we had filed, we were supposed to get a decision in 30 days. After the 30 days was up, we got a letter requesting an additional 60 days. After that 60 days was up, we got a letter requesting another 60 days. All the while some serious grant money was being held up because of this, and my personal contacts at the IRS office in Pittsburgh were unable to do anything. After contacting the local rep's office we got in touch with their IRS liason, who was able to resolve the matter within a week. Going back to the state level, we now had to apply to solicit funds within the state, which is a much more complicated process than the IRS disclosure. At that point, with the clock ticking, we reached out to the state senator's office to ensure that the application would be reviewed quickly, and we were able to get our grant money. To be clear, the board of this organization is left-wing, but we operate in a heavily Republican area, and all our legislative contacts are Republicans who support our mission.
To contrast this, one of the board members has a second home in Colorado, which was for a time in Boebert's district. He was telling me about how some local water authority needs to meet with the rep once a year to get certain basic things. Boebert insisted on a conference call instead of the meeting, and it was clear after the first one that she was bored, not paying attention, and didn't understand what they needed. What was normally a straightforward process turned into a nightmare of dealing with various state and Federal agencies because Boebert was too lazy or stupid to make the requisite phone calls. I posted elsewhere about Camera Bartolotta, and, though I don't live in her district anymore, she's one of the few Republicans I've consistently supported because she's dedicated to basic constituent services. One of the things that concerns me about upstart politicians who are more focused on ideology than public service is that they're good at having a public profile but bad at doing basic things to help people.
Rov_Scam
3hr ago
I did a post back in May about the primaries in my area:
Camera Bartolotta has been representing the district since 2014, and she's always come across as a moderate who was good at constituent service. In 2024 she responded to Trump's comments about Hatians in Charleroi by saying that she was disheartened because they were constituents and taxpayers. This was enough to get her a vote of no confidence from the Washington County Republican Committee, which vote was later voided by the state committee as the rules prohibit them from disparaging a sitting officeholder. Al Buchtan seized on this by mounting a primary challenge based on her alleged disloyalty to Trump. Bartolotta decided to head this off at the pass by running a series of early attack ads questioning Buchtan's credentials and his own loyalty to Trump.
A total of 17,000 and change voted in the GOP primary; 15,00 and change voted in the Democratic primary. That they managed fewer that 15% more votes despite a 25 point registration advantage would be enough of a story, but the Democratic candidate was running unopposed.
The point of the post at the time was to suggest that Republicans in general weren't as enthused as Democrats, and that that might be a harbinger of impending doom, though it was hard to make the argument since Bartolotta had essentially run unopposed for a decade and there was no way of comparing turnout to prior races. The more interesting observation in terms of your post is that, as recently as May, moderate Republicans in state-level races felt the need to prove their loyalty to Trump. For Bartolotta's part, she soon found herself in a bitter general election challenge from an independent running on a platform of opposition to data centers. Bartolotta came through again by double digits, but the race should never have been close; if a locally-prominent Democrat led that kind of challenge then fine, but an independent single-issue candidate shouldn't be able to mount a competitive race against a popular incumbent.
It seems obvious now that a lot of Republicans were disillusioned with MAGA and stayed home for the primary, and that Bartolotta could have more easily trounced Buchtan had she stressed her moderate views and willingness to work across the aisle. The Trump ass-kissing turned off a lot of a lot of independents and Democrats who would have otherwise supported her, and created an opportunity for an out-of-nowhere independent challenger. She ended up winning both races by comfortable margins, but, needless to say, there was no discussion of Trump during the general, and things were a lot tenser than they had been in the past. The overall point I'm trying to make is that a lot of Republican politicians don't know where they stand regarding how much of their support derives from MAGA and to what extent their support of it is a liability. In 6 months Bartolotta went from concern that not toeing the MAGA line over an issue everyone will forget about in a year would cost her the nomination, to having to distance herself from Trump to win a district with a massive Republican advantage.
So who in the Senate is willing to take this kind of risk? MAGA may be on its deathbed as a national political force, but there are plenty of individual constituents out there who don't want it to die, and there are plenty of Republicans who rely on those constituents. There are plenty more Republicans who have glued their lips to Trump's ass and can't pry them away without alienating the only people who would conceivably vote for them. If Camera Bartolotta couldn't read the tea leaves in a district small enough that door-to-door campaigning is a key part of her strategy, how can someone like Katie Britt or Mike Crapo do the same for an entire state? Are the people in the party who want change going to express that at the primary polls in 2028, or will they simply stay home? If it's the former, then supporting an impeachment bid may be too little too late for those who hitched their wagons to Trump, and if it's the latter, then the only people showing up will be those who are already in the bag for MAGA.
The question thus becomes which Republican senators have an obvious incentive to back an impeachment bid. I said in another comment that I think that after two failed bids, the Democrats aren't going to risk another one that may backfire, and that they'd only go along with it if a sufficient number of Republicans were driving the bus. The current best case for Democrats is 57 Senate seats, which would require 9 Republicans to favor impeachment. That's assuming that Fetterman goes along with it, which isn't a guarantee, but we'll be making a lot of assumptions here. Murkowski and Paul are the two obvious ones, so we need 7 more. Hawley is a maybe, but Missouri wasn't involved in any elections this year and is pretty Red. Looking at states that saw flips, Jerry Moran is faceless enough that he might be able to pull it off, but he probably wouldn't be vocal enough about it to inspire confidence. Chuck Grassley predates Trump and probably isn't running again, so count him in. Ted Budd is in trouble but is too close to Trump to turn on him. Tim Scott should theoretically be on this list but has only grown closer to Trump as his career has gone on, even as he's criticized Trump at various times. Put him in the maybe pile. Ted Cruz is an interesting one because he's the kind of guy who might be willing to risk it if he thinks it increases his presidential odds. Everyone else is either in a state where it won't matter or won't be up for reelection until 2030 and thus have no reason to go out on a limb. By my count that's 7 of nine needed, and I don't see Grassley, Moran, or Scott actually pushing for this, so the odds of a Republican-led impeachment and removal are unlikely.
Rov_Scam
7hr ago
If they have a veto-proof majority there's no reason to get rid of the filibuster. It only makes sense if they have the presidency.
Rov_Scam
9hr ago
I wouldn't have phrased it that way, but it is a fair question and I'd be interested in knowing how you think the Republicans should have approached this midterm.
Rov_Scam
21hr ago
I'm not doubting that the shift in the Hispanic vote had an influence on the election, but you seem uninterested in why the Hispanic vote shifted so much from 2024. And while it was a big shift, preliminary data suggests that Talirico still got a lower share of the vote than Beto did in 2018. These shifts precisely suggest that there isn't some kind of ethnic spoils thing going on, especially since the Hispanic population in Texas hasn't increased that much since 2010, at which time nobody thought the state would ever be in play for Democrats.
Because gasoline prices should have roughly the same effect on voters regardless of race.
Correct, but some races have lower average incomes than others and thus feel the pinch more. Some voters aren't ideologically inflexible and are open to voting for candidates of different parties. You seem to believe we can group people into demographic buckets and make assumptions about how they'll vote. Democrats did this back in the 2000s with their "Demographics is Destiny" argument, and you see how well that went. Republicans thought they'd have a permanent presidential majority with the electoral vote expected to shift to Texas from California, but now it looks like they'll have to actually win Texas and not take it for granted. Things change, people change, and you can't just assume that they'll stay the same. If your goal is to ensure a conservative majority by keeping out immigrants, it doesn't work like that. If Democrats think that allowing more immigration will allow them a permanent majority, it doesn't work like that. If things ever start to head in that direction there will just be a realignment. There are certain economically depressed white areas around Pittsburgh that 25 years ago you'd be nuts to think would ever consider voting Republican, but now they're prime Trump country. It's the nature of the beast.
Rov_Scam
23hr ago
Democrats are going to be much more cautious about impeaching Trump as it backfired in the past. The only way I see them moving forward with it would be the unlikely scenario where Republicans are driving the train where they demand it, and these demands continue long enough that enough Senators are on the record long enough and adamant enough that by the time they get to vote for removal there's nothing left to lose. The reason I think this is unlikely is that most of the vulnerable Republicans are already out, and, as @2rafa said, there's enough residual support in the party that it's risky going against him. You can already see this in comments by Ron DeSantis and others, who will blame anyone and everyone for the blowout except Trump himself. DeSantis, in particular, was cautious about blaming the loss on the Iran War without pointing out that Trump was in the driver's seat for that. In MAGA-world, Trump can't fail, he can only be failed. So if the ICE stuff turned people off it was because Kristi Noem handled it badly, if the Iran War was a mistake it was Hesgeth and Rubio's mistake, if tariffs were a bad idea then it was Howard Lutnick's idea, etc.
Rov_Scam
1d ago
Dude, that wasn't a calculation. It was an arbitrary number somewhere in the ballpark of your $5–$10/week estimate. But beyond that I'm not sure what point you're trying to make. I thought it was some kind of explanation of why the Republicans lost so badly. If the only explanation you can come up with is that everybody else should have the same opinions as you, even when those opinions run contrary to core constitutional principles, then I don't know what to tell you.
Rov_Scam
1d ago
You're making the same mistake that Republicans (well, Trump at least) did on the campaign trail where you handwave away voter concerns. "Well, I did some calculations and the increased prices as a result of my policies are only costing the average family $514.64 per year. You should be able to afford that." isn't a good message. Inflation is 100 basis points more than when Biden left office. Biden telling the American public that inflation was transitory and that no government response was necessary was bad politics. Trump telling the American public that cost of living isn't even an issue and, by the way, look at how great this gold-covered ballroom you'll never attend an event at is is even worse politics.
The big swing in Texas was Hispanic voters. I think the takeaway is once you have immigrants you can’t keep out more of them in a Democracy. Your only choice is fascism or figuring out how to run ethnic politics.
Those were the same Hispanic voters who propelled trump to a 14-point win in Texas in 2024. For years, Democrats assumed that they owned the Hispanic vote (which was always a curious position since they loved George W. Bush) and got owned themselves when they took the vote for granted. Then the Republicans made huge Hispanic gains and immediately pissed them away by assuming the same, even going so far as to redistrict based on this shift. The takeaway here is that Hispanic voters are ultimately like any other voters and will respond to the same things that other voters respond to. And this only considers Texas; it doesn't explain similar leftward shifts in Kansas, Iowa, Ohio, Mississippi, and other places with much smaller Hispanic populations.
Rov_Scam
1d ago
You or I could also say that, but it doesn't really get us anywhere, since neither of us are anybody. The race isn't going to be about who can recite generic party lines into a microphone. There has to be a reason why he, Ron DeSantis, should be president over someone equally as capable of holding generic opinions, and the reasons that existed in the past are no longer relevant.
Rov_Scam
1d ago
Average US gasoline price in October 2006 was $2.32/gallon, or about $3.87 in today's money. Accounting for fuel economy is harder to do, but I would caution that while economy has improved as far as specific cars are concerned, the market has shifted toward less economical vehicles. In 2006, passenger cars accounted for 11 of the top 20 best-selling vehicles in the US. In 2026, they accounted for 4, and that's giving the Tesla Model Y credit for having infinite fuel economy despite being an SUV. The modal American appears to have replaced a sedan that gets 25 mpg with an SUV that gets 25 mpg. But this is all pointless because nobody is comparing gas prices now with what they were 20 years ago. Fuel economy was about the same one year ago as it is now, and gas was significantly cheaper. Hell, if you look at the 2024 election, it was over a dollar a gallon cheaper. People notice when it costs an extra $20 to fill the tank, and it's not exactly an occasional purchase.
Rov_Scam
1d ago
It's not so much about them remembering it as it is him not having anything to run on. You said it yourself, what's he going to run on, his COVID policy?
Rov_Scam
1d ago
He had his shot and didn't follow through. His entire schtick was that he was a fighter, and he wisely kept his distance from Trump throughout 21 and 22. But when he entered the race, he refused to go after Trump, even though Trump had no problem going after him. Maybe voters will forget how spineless he looked four years prior, but I think he lost his chance.
Rov_Scam
4d ago
Calling it an ad is a bit of a stretch, since it evidently never aired on television, or indeed anywhere other than social media posts. Anyway, this was posted on the 23, the NYT evidently had an article about it last Monday, and this is the first time I'm hearing of it, and I'm following the elections somewhat closely. My guess is that this is completely irrelevant and will have no effect on the election. Six million views sounds like a lot, until you realize that most of those views probably don't come from Michigan voters, and they're heavily concentrated among people who are following political commentators on Twitter, who presumably aren't among the category of people whose voting decisions aren't going to be changed by an ad run at the last minute.
Rov_Scam
4d ago
The guy he's interviewing is clearly an idiot. I can't find much information other than that his name is Jess, not Jeff, and he's some kind of ceramic artist from South Dakota who claims to live on a farm but apparently lives in the suburbs. Anyway, the other thing Tucker clipped from this interview is the guy claiming that the CIA paid Jackson Pollock large amounts of money to make "art" that was terrible for the express purpose of fucking with the Soviets, who wouldn't understand it. There seems to be some kind of agreement on Tucker's part that the abandonment of all the aspects of traditional painting that the Russians supposedly valued is indicative of American decadence blah blah blah, complete with pro-Russian undertones and blaming drug overdoses on bad art.
Aside from the entire premise being ridiculous, it evidences a complete lack of understanding of art history, which probably makes the opposite point that Tucker (and by extension his target audience) would intend. The Russians would not be shocked by something like Pollock, least of which because there was an entire Russian tradition of avant-garde art, the most notable proponent of which was Vasily Kandinsky. This mostly dates from the beginning of the twentieth century, but it was suppressed following the Bolshevik revolution for being "bourgeois". Abstract art did not appear suddenly in the late 40s, but developed for a half-century prior to that, longer when you consider that movements like Impressionism were considered abstract at the time relative to traditional court painting. The Soviets not only knew about this, but consciously rejected it. The emergence of an artist like Pollock would have proven the Communist point about the decadence of capitalism, but is this the point that a conservative like Carlson wants to make?
Rov_Scam
9d ago
I don’t see why White Europeans should be governed by a corrupt commie because a bunch of negros voted for it.
You'd prefer being ruled by a corrupt commie whom nobody voted for?
Rov_Scam
9d ago
I mean, if they have to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant had the required mental state and there is plausible evidence in the record that he didn't, the defendant is going to have a pretty good chance of being acquitted.
Proof beyond a reasonable doubt doesn't require direct evidence. If the jury hears that Irving cut him off, he tailgated the guy for a period of time, pulled up alongside him, and fired a gun into his car, they can infer from the circumstances that he intended to hit him. Romero can argue otherwise, but the jury doesn't have to believe him. If Romero did make that argument, then yes, the prosecution could counter that it was depraved indifference murder because if firing a gun into a moving vehicle on a busy highway doesn't create a grave risk of death, then it's hard to argue what does, but the defense isn't going to make that argument for precisely that reason.
The point isn't that if he had done more to "sell" the war than people would have been sold on it or wouldn't have blamed him so much for its effects. The point is that if he had sought congressional approval it would have been clear how unpopular the idea was and he wouldn't have pursued it.
More options
Context Copy link