Your next 2020 Democratic presidential primary thread: Now we're serious

also climate action is foreign policy

https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2019/4/11/18306132/bernie-sanders-filibuster-budget-reconciliation-medicare-60-votes

article is from apr, and im sure most of yall already know, but sanders' work-around wrt to the senate is through budget reconciliation

We really need some senatorial candidates running on the platform of abolishing the Senate

That's a Republican position

It is? I've seen it most heavily espoused by people on the left for the last decade at least.

Based on the fact that they're going to acquit Trump, I'm taking the stance that the Republican Party only sees the Senate as a body of lapdogs for whomever our elected emperor is and not an independent legislative body with its own mission and powers.

article is from apr, and im sure most of yall already know, but sanders' work-around wrt to the senate is through budget reconciliation

this workaround requires Manchin's vote

I feel like a broken record

to change the tune: Sanders would unequivocally be better than Biden on foreign policy

President Sanders/Biden/Warren will issue executive orders like Trump and Obama do -- which will still have significant effect on on our lives.

this is true, but Sanders can't deliver on his signature goals (M4A, Green New Deal etc.) this way

right, article not intended to be a refutation of that particular pt (manchin sucks) xp

to change the tune: Sanders would unequivocally be better than Biden on foreign policy

― Οὖτις, Friday, January 31, 2020 8:57 PM (one minute ago)

otm

if we're looking at which candidate can generate enough base turnout now and in 2022 (when there's a bunch of vulnerable GOP seats up for grabs) i still think thats sanders

Let me get this straight: Shakey is advocating that we let Joe Manchin decide who the Dem nominee is?

This is dumb. I wouldn't let Joe Manchin decide which mine shaft to drop him down.

No one disagrees that you need Manchin and Jones’s votes. The issue is how to get them. The concern trolling about his ability to ‘handle’ them implies that a more hale fellow, well-met, could sweet talk him. That’s nonsense. He’s either on board or he’s willing to torpedo progressive legislation under any President - so what does it matter?

Or, as Doc Casino alluded, you buy him off with bad legislation. So, again, what’s the point of worrying about him? You can only make any given issue worse buying him off or letting him determine the agenda.

There’s some irony here because last week, post-Rogan, it was about whether Bernie would compromise on gender reassignment surgery if Manchin held up M4A on that front.

either those are very intentional misreadings of my posts or ... no, I have no other explanation

this is true, but Sanders can't deliver on his signature goals (M4A, Green New Deal etc.) this way

― Οὖτις, Friday, January 31, 2020

No one will deliver signature goals without the Senate is the point, therefore a lot of "Morning" Joe croakings about socialism amount to fear mongering the donor class.

Let me get this straight: Shakey is advocating that we let Joe Manchin decide who the Dem nominee is?

This is dumb. I wouldn't let Joe Manchin decide which mine shaft to drop him down.

― We're jumping on the road with @Nickelback this summer! (PBKR),

You're reading in bad faith on purpose, right?

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-01-31/sanders-rivals-biden-for-top-spot-nationally-campaign-update

fuck American politics, basically

this is not concern trolling, and I resent it being characterized as such.

I will entertain any and all theories about how Bernie will get Machin's vote to pass M4A though. If your overriding reason for voting for Bernie is healthcare, you have to wrestle with the mechanics of passing legislation. We all know Biden won't even try for M4A. But if Bernie can't deliver on his signature promise(s), that will make him (to a significant degree) an ineffective President. This dampens my enthusiasm for him, it's as simple as that. Being excited and acting like he's going to deliver on these things without considering *how* they will be done is weirdly myopic.

xps

If those are misreadings, then what is the argument? That you can (but Sanders would not) compromise on legislation to get him to pass it (and this is a good thing), or that there is a level of ass-kissing that would get Joe Manchin to pass M4A as proposed?

Let me get this straight: Shakey is advocating that we let Joe Manchin decide who the Dem nominee is?

This is dumb. I wouldn't let Joe Manchin decide which mine shaft to drop him down.

― We're jumping on the road with @Nickelback this summer! (PBKR),

You're reading in bad faith on purpose, right?

― TikTok to the (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Friday, January 31, 2020 4:14 PM (one minute ago) bookmarkflaglink

I thought we were discussing choosing a nominee based on who will work best with Joe Manchin.

I will entertain any and all theories about how Bernie will get Machin's vote to pass M4A though.

How will Warren?
How will Biden get him to pass progressive legislation?

That is why it's concern trolling.

Warren will have him murdered

Because your core argument is actually "as long as Joe Manchin is a/the decisive vote, nothing good can happen" - so, yep, doesn't matter who the President is, does it?

If Warren has a plan for gulags, I'll switch camps.

there is a level of ass-kissing that would get Joe Manchin to pass M4A as proposed?

I suspect there might be - it probably involves a lot of bribery, essentially (eg throwing $$$ at coal miners) - but Bernie is already well on his way to burning that bridge, and shows no willingness to accommodate Manchin or respect him. In fact, he's done quite the opposite and actually threatened Manchin with going directly to the voters of West Virginia to undermine him (which is both a stupid thing to say in public *and* a really stupid tactic that would v likely backfire).

How will Warren?

Warren hasn't publicly feuded with Manchin afaik

How will Biden get him to pass progressive legislation?

he won't, because he won't even try. But he could probably get Manchin's vote on some kind of Obamacare v.2.0 using some malarkey.

great

isn’t there a chance the senate changes composition? in which case manchin isn’t this kingmaker figure?

Coolidge was the last Republican to have a filibuster-proof Senate Majority IIRC, it's weird how this is never one of the concerns for them.

if the dems can keep all their current seats (tough to keep AL) and win AZ, CO, ME and not lose seats to gubernatorial appointments, they have 50 plus the VP if they win the white house in 2020. so manchin's vote is not entirely necessary.

I suspect there might be - it probably involves a lot of bribery, essentially (eg throwing $$$ at coal miners) - but Bernie is already well on his way to burning that bridge

At coal mine owners, you mean. Which is different from the complaints that Sanders isn't back-slapping/friendly/too terse/too combative.

It's that he wouldn't agree to terrible things, but you think Warren and Biden would. Which basically puts us right back into the Clinton and Obama eras. Yay! So many good, lasting things come of it when Democrats compromise with themselves before even involving Republicans.

"as long as Joe Manchin is a/the decisive vote, nothing good can happen"

do you think this is true? and if not, why not?

- so, yep, doesn't matter who the President is, does it?

and if it is the case, why are you in the tank for Sanders, assuming that his failure on this signature issue is a foregone conclusion?

isn’t there a chance the senate changes composition? in which case manchin isn’t this kingmaker figure?

The Dems would have to both hold onto Jones' seat and pick up at least five other seats. I outlined a scenario above where the Dems pick up four, which seems at least in the realm of possibility if not entirely likely (ie, Maine, Colorado, Arizona, and Kansas).

xps

there's a good 5 or 6 vulnerable seats in 2022 though. if a progressive pres doesnt have the votes in 2021, i think they push hard on the midterms to get the senate they need to get their agenda passed.

although Bison has a point about the VP tiebreaker, so yeah 3-4 seats then to render Manchin irrelevant.

xps

that MA in poli sci finally paying off

push hard on the midterms to get the senate they need to get their agenda passed.

this is a long time out and hard to predict, but historically the President's party doesn't pick up Senate seats in the midterms, usually the opposite. And by the midterms a lot of political capital/momentum has been expended - if anything significant legislatively gets done, it's *always* in the first two years of a President's term.

do you think this is true? and if not, why not?

If it's true, then nothing matters anyway. You might as well just embrace nihilism and/or stop trying to compromise with Manchin and see what happens.

and if it is the case, why are you in the tank for Sanders, assuming that his failure on this signature issue is a foregone conclusion?

It's your argument that Manchin will block anything good, not mine.

I’d rather fail to legislate good things than successfully legislate bad things.

of the vulnerable Senate seats this time around I would say only Gardner looks like a foregone conclusion - Maine, Kansas and Arizona are going to be very tough/close. It's entirely possible we get a Dem president with a divided congress, in which case nothing much is going to happen legislatively.

No, I don't. Executive orders, the bully pulpit, etc. - there are ways to govern that aren't kow-towing to the worst possible member of your party.

here, let me put my broken record back on - YOU CAN'T PASS M4A THAT WAY

push hard on the midterms to get the senate they need to get their agenda passed.

this is a long time out and hard to predict, but historically the President's party doesn't pick up Senate seats in the midterms, usually the opposite. And by the midterms a lot of political capital/momentum has been expended - if anything significant legislatively gets done, it's *always* in the first two years of a President's term.

― Οὖτις, Friday, January 31, 2020 3:35 PM (sixteen seconds ago) bookmarkflaglink

this is true but this is also typically a function of a pissed off opposition party rallying against the president's key initiatives. if, say, sanders is in office in 2021 with 49 dems in the senate and he's as stymied as we think he could be, wouldn't this be a rallying point for dem voters? to say, "we are so close to getting m4a, gnd, etc, we just need to take back the senate and it's ours in 2022"

here, let me put my broken record back on - YOU CAN'T PASS M4A THAT WAY

Your broken record is actually YOU CAN'T PASS M4A AT ALL. So Biden, Sanders, Warren, in your book it doesn't matter - because Manchin controls the keys to the castle.

Whatever passes through Diamond Joe backslapping Manchin and other the other grandees of our worst constitutional institution probably wouldn’t be M4A

it's a good angle, but yeah who knows

the after-effects of Trump derangement syndrome are hard to predict

xp

milo how do you envision Bernie passing M4A

Your broken record is actually YOU CAN'T PASS M4A AT ALL.

again, this is a deliberate misreading of what I said upthread. I specifically noted that maybe Warren could accomplish it, because she hasn't already made an enemy out of Manchin.

Pareene:

Elizabeth Warren is the candidate whose foreign policy language most superficially resembles Sanders’s: She, too, promises to do good, or at least fewer evil, things with American power. But on this subject, even more than on others, personnel is policy: Her team is made up of the sort of people who have been in charge and would be in charge in any other conventional Democratic administration. CNN’s recent look at her foreign policy beliefs described her campaign as attracting “a number of career diplomats who say Washington, as one adviser described it, is in urgent need of a ‘substantial rethink’ of how it conducts foreign policy.” But the people assigned to do the rethink are largely the ones who did the first think. Nearly every participant at that CAP event could slide seamlessly into a Warren administration.

Her top foreign policy aide, Sasha Baker, is a “former deputy chief of staff to ex-Secretary of Defense Ash Carter.” Another adviser is Ilan Goldenberg, “former chief of staff to the Special Envoy for Israeli-Palestinian Negotiations in the Obama State Department.” And Jarrett Blanc, “former coordinator for the Iran nuclear implementation at the State Department and acting special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan under President Barack Obama.”

https://newrepublic.com/article/156374/democratic-hawks-declare-war-bernie-sanders

ie, fear of Obamaism in a Warren admin appears justified

Good afternoon!

xxxp - Don't know! Never said I did.

What I do know is that "he can't get it passed because he won't tongue Joe Manchin's butthole" is bullshit, either you can force Manchin on board or you can't. Might as well give it the old college try.

I also know that if we don't try to pass good things, regardless of Joe Manchin's satisfaction, we're doomed - and Sanders (and Warren) propose those good things, which is more than can be said of any Democratic contenders in my lifetime. So fuck it, let's be legends. Let's try to pass some watered down social democracy and if it fails because of Democrats then bring on the Giant Meteor 2024 because our future is going to be worse than fiery annihilation.

Don't know! Never said I did.

the defense rests