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Culture War Roundup for the week of August 26, 2024

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I've yet to see anyone commit that they won't. It's worth noting that term limits is a popular and moderate-sounding proposal, and the no kings act has the advantage of being against an unpopular, and extreme-sounding SCOTUS decision.

In the Senate, Manchin and Sinema were the only ones who cared about the filibuster. They'll be gone.

The list of D-affiliated senators who did not cosponsor the No Kings Act are: Senator Sinema, Senator Bennett, Senator Murphy, Senator Ossoff, Senator Tester, Senator Cortez Masto, Senator Rosen, Senator Hassan, Senator Menendez, Senator Brown, Senator Fetterman, Senator Warner, Senator Kaine, Senator Cantwell, and Senator Manchin.

The most likely set of seat changes, should the democrats win the senate, are Sinema->Gallego, Cardin->Alsobrooks, Stabenow->Slotkin, Manchin->Justice, Butler->Schiff, Carper->Rochester, Menendez->Kim.

That means they would still need to convince all of: Bennett, Murphy, Ossoff, Tester, Cortez Masto, Rosen, Hassan, Brown, Fetterman, Warner, Kaine, Cantwell, Gallego, Alsobrooks, Slotkin, Schiff, Rochester, and Kim. 18 Senators. Schiff's literally running on court packing. Alsobrooks spoke in favor of the Biden "reforms." Kim and Rochester are members of the house progressive caucus, as was Gallego before he had to pretend to be moderate, so moderation should not be our expectation. Slotkin's said she'd be open to term limits. So that's all the new members.

If anyone votes it down, I think it would be one of the current members. These are not as strong, as evidence, but Cantwell, Rosen, and Cortez Masto all cosponsored a bill to propose a constitutional amendment saying that Presidents have no immunity for actions, and generally applicable laws should be ordinarily read as applying to Presidents. Most of the rest supported ethics code things, but I don't really think that's weighty evidence.

Senator Whitehouse recently said that the "reforms" would in all likelihood be bundled in a package containing everything else they really want (e.g. making abortion legal everywhere), so that they only have to bypass a filibuster once. He says that would have "spectacular tailwinds," and that they'd be "virtually certain." It's possible that he's lying or wrong, but I'd expect he'd understand the environment better than I would.