2020 GE: Congratulations, President Joe Biden

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > 2020 GE: Congratulations, President Joe Biden

Who will you vote for in 2020? This poll is closed.
Biden	425	18.06%
Trump	105	4.46%
whoever the Green Party runs	307	13.05%
GOOGLE RON PAUL	151	6.42%
Bernie Sanders	346	14.70%
Stalin	246	10.45%
Satan	300	12.75%
Nobody	202	8.58%
Jess Scarane	110	4.67%
mystery man Brian Carroll of the American Solidarity Party	61	2.59%
Dick Nixon	100	4.25%
Total:	2089 votes

[Edit Poll (moderators only)]

awesmoe: Nov 30, 2005; Pillbug

Oh Snapple! posted:

Buddy their foreign policies are, in the grand scheme of things, gonna be pretty much entirely identical in terms of goals, means, and body count because there's only one playbook these ghouls go by.

the administration which withdrew from the iranian nuclear deal has the same means of pursuing nuclear disarmament as the administration which created it?

# ? Jun 22, 2020 02:54

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# ? Jun 10, 2024 16:17

Crows Turn Off: Jan 7, 2008

Condiv posted:

yeah, he'll use it as an excuse for why SS needs cutting

Has Biden expressed interest in cutting SS?

# ? Jun 22, 2020 03:20

Timeless Appeal: May 28, 2006

joepinetree posted:

In terms of foreign policy, siding with Bolton is never the right answer. Firing Bolton is one of the few good things Trump ever did.

To bolster this point--Bolton has a lot of legitimate complaints about Trump even if he himself is a huge piece of poo poo. But the reason Bolton was fired was over unwillingness to go to the table with the Taliban and Trump generally being wary about how war happy Bolton was. The Administration hasn't necessarily been doing a good job at the talks and Afghanistan is a cluster gently caress, but it is on principle at minimum reasonable position of Trump.

I just want to clarify because it's different than Sessions who sucks but was still fired for bad reasons.

# ? Jun 22, 2020 03:27

sexpig by night: Sep 8, 2011; by Azathoth

Crows Turn Off posted:

Has Biden expressed interest in cutting SS?

his literal entire career in washington, yes

# ? Jun 22, 2020 03:32

Wicked Them Beats: Apr 1, 2007; Moralists don't really *have* beliefs. Sometimes they stumble on one, like on a child's toy left on the carpet. The toy must be put away immediately. And the child reprimanded.

Crows Turn Off posted:

Has Biden expressed interest in cutting SS?

Only for his entire career and during his tenure as VP. But he hasn't called for it in this specific election therefore it's obviously impossible that he would ever do it, because politicians aren't allowed to enact policies that aren't on their website.

Edit: I will say it's possible that Biden has had a change of heart and learned from the debacle during the Obama admin that attacking Social Security will just turn left and right against you for little gain. But he is surrounded by advisors who are very concerned about America having a balanced budget or about making sure that policies are conducted in a "fiscally neutral" way, and these people are going to be eyeing Social Security as a way to make that happen without raising taxes. Not to mention the ghouls who are salivating at the prospect of their banking and financial industry buddies being able to gamble with that money risk-free with the government guaranteed to step in to cover any losses.

Wicked Them Beats fucked around with this message at 03:40 on Jun 22, 2020

# ? Jun 22, 2020 03:33

Excelzior: Jun 24, 2013

Crows Turn Off posted:

Has Biden expressed interest in cutting SS?

I believe you meant to ask "Has Biden expressed interest in cutting SS as part of his 2020 presidential campaign".

The reason this distinction is important, even in this thread about the election, is that Joe Biden's previous legislative efforts point one way

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9X3UiSvgle0

While his platform on joebiden.com indicates a completely different direction that, if taken at face value, proposes several measures to strengthen SS

quote:

III. PRESERVE AND STRENGTHEN SOCIAL SECURITY

Social Security is the bedrock of American retirement. Roughly 90% of retirement-age Americans receive Social Security benefits, and one-in-four rely on Social Security for all, or almost all, of their income. The program has not only ensured that middle-class workers can enjoy the sound and secure retirement they worked so hard for, it also lifted over 17 million older Americans out of poverty in 2017 alone.

The Biden Plan will protect Social Security for the millions of Americans who depend on the program. With Social Security�s Trust Fund already in deficit and expected to be exhausted in 2035, we urgently need action to make the program solvent and prevent cuts to American retirees.

But the Biden Plan doesn�t stop there. As president, Joe Biden will strengthen benefits for the most vulnerable older Americans � including widows and widowers, lifelong workers with low monthly benefits, and old-age beneficiaries who may have exhausted their other savings. Specifically, the Biden Plan will:

Put Social Security on a path to long-run solvency. The impending exhaustion of the Social Security Trust fund imperils American retirement as we know it. Waiting to act only jeopardizes the program further, and will make an eventual solution that much more difficult. The Biden Plan will put the program on a path to long-term solvency by asking Americans with especially high wages to pay the same taxes on those earnings that middle-class families pay.

Preserve the nature of Social Security. Social Security is one of our nation�s great public policy successes, in large part due to the fact that participation in the program is shared across almost all workers. Efforts to privatize the program � such as an approach suggested under the Bush Administration � will undermine the program�s solvency, while putting at risk individuals� income in retirement. Similarly, proposals to make the program �means-tested� � so that only low-income retirees workers receive benefits � jeopardizes the program�s universal nature and key role as the bedrock of American retirement. Ultimately, the success of Social Security is largely due to the fact that almost all Americans can rely on the program to make their retirement more secure.

Provide a higher benefit for the oldest Americans. At advanced ages, Americans become more vulnerable to exhausting their savings, sometimes falling into poverty and living a life of hardship. The Biden Plan will provide the oldest beneficiaries � those who have been receiving retirement benefits for at least 20 years � with a higher monthly check to help protect retirees from the pain of dwindling retirement savings.

Implement a true minimum benefit for lifelong workers. No one who has worked for decades and paid into Social Security should have to spend their retirement in poverty. The Biden Plan will revolutionize the Social Security�s minimum benefit, which has deteriorated over time to the point of being entirely ineffective. Under the Biden Plan, workers who spent 30 years working will get a benefit of at least 125% of the poverty level.

Protect widows and widowers from steep cuts in benefits. For many couples, the death of a spouse means that Social Security benefits will be cut in half � putting pressure on the surviving spouse who still needs to make the mortgage payment and handle other bills. The Biden Plan will allow surviving spouse to keep a higher share of the benefits. This will make an appreciable difference in the finances of older Americans, especially women (who live longer on average than men), raising the monthly payment by about 20% for affected beneficiaries.

Eliminate penalties for teachers and other public-sector workers. Current rules penalize teachers and other public sector workers who either switch jobs or who have earned retirement benefits from various sources. The Biden Plan would eliminate these penalties by ensuring that teachers not eligible for Social Security will begin receiving benefits sooner � rather than the current ten-year period for many teachers. The Biden Plan will also get rid of the benefit cuts for workers and surviving beneficiaries who happen to be covered by both Social Security and another pension. These workers deserve the benefits they earned.

A number of posters will not believe that Joe Biden underwent such a drastic political about-face.

# ? Jun 22, 2020 03:37

FilthyImp: Sep 30, 2002; Anime Deviant

Excelzior posted:

A number of posters will not believe that Joe Biden underwent such a drastic political about-face.

And the most likely course of action will be "Well gosh darn you know this was the plan when we were riding high but we've got a 5 trillion dollar deficit to fix and by golly we're all going to have to sacrifice. If we raise the retirement age to 76, and make some Common Sense choices, then we can keep some social security maybe!"

# ? Jun 22, 2020 03:52

Ytlaya: Nov 13, 2005

Gabriel S. posted:

...
I agree that the whole "trickle down economics" theory is largely bullshit but at the same I would still suspect that investors putting their money into companies is going to increase employment. If this isn't true, then please show me how that isn't true.

The fundamental reason why trickle-down economics (which this is) is wrong is that the wealthy, whether individuals or businesses, almost always just pocket extra money you give them. This is because they respond to demand, not supply. Giving them money doesn't increase the number of customers they have, and if they're paying a corporate tax they're at least somewhat profitable, so if they wanted to expand they would do it regardless.

Excelzior posted:

A number of posters will not believe that Joe Biden underwent such a drastic political about-face.

The main reason not to trust these things is that it's trivially easy to "pretend to try" to pass a bill. If I were in the Democrats' situation and wanted to sell people on the idea that I was willing to expand social security (or any notably progressive/left policy), I would claim to support it and then just half-rear end attempting to pass the bill (basically what Obama did with the public option). It's easy to just put the blame on one or two Democratic senators (if you even need to do that - it's even easier if Republicans hold enough seats to prevent it passing). All they need is some sort of plausible deniability, at least in the eyes of the sort of person who trusted them in the first place.

I actually don't think it's impossible for some minor improvement to social security to happen; that's a small enough scale change that it's plausible for the Democratic Party to support it (and it doesn't run too strongly into conflict with any key Democratic stakeholders). But I definitely don't think it makes any sense to seriously consider the possibility prior to Biden being elected. It's downright foolish trust a candidate/campaign full of people who have a history of being on the wrong side of these issues.

# ? Jun 22, 2020 04:51

Goatse James Bond: Mar 28, 2010; If you see me posting please remind me that I have Charlie Work in the reports forum to do instead

VitalSigns posted:

Biden is not keeping corporate taxes low to signal his embrace of Modern Monetary Theory. He's a deficit scold who uses it as a cudgel constantly to argue against spending money

Sure - in that facet I wasn't arguing it as something we can reasonably expect Biden to think, as much as I'd like that. I was instead trying to impact the discourse on these here forums on a subtopic I consider pretty important, because it's inextricably linked to both government spending as a whole and the unhealthy bad stupid ways spending and taxation are currently conceptualized. If we can murder forever the federal "but how are we going to pay for it????" then I'd be real super happy.

How are u posted:

I'm pretty sure Bolton is trolling Trump because he hates the man, not voting Biden because he expects his bloodlust to be sated. Either way, fine by me. I'll gladly take Biden's foreign policy over the catastrophe that has been 3 years of Trump.

yeah i don't particularly care who Bolton votes for / endorses except insofar as it makes our toddler president mad

optimally (assuming Bolton does wind up supporting Biden) Biden says "lol go gently caress yourself and take your stupid mustache with you" a la Tulsi Gabbard re David Duke, but if he just ignores Bolton then who cares

# ? Jun 22, 2020 04:54

Wicked Them Beats: Apr 1, 2007; Moralists don't really *have* beliefs. Sometimes they stumble on one, like on a child's toy left on the carpet. The toy must be put away immediately. And the child reprimanded.

Bolton clarified that he's not voting for either so Biden won't have to respond.

# ? Jun 22, 2020 04:56

The Glumslinger: Sep 24, 2008; Coach Nagy, you want me to throw to WHAT side of the field?; Hair Elf

https://twitter.com/JoeBiden/status/1274910217508196352

Oh my god, gently caress off

# ? Jun 22, 2020 05:59

Roland Jones: Aug 18, 2011; by Nyc_Tattoo

Speaking of Biden and foreign policy:

https://twitter.com/axios/status/1274830757593300997

Edit: Whoops, meant to link Biden's retweet, but the post above mine already took care of that.

Roland Jones fucked around with this message at 20:05 on Jun 22, 2020

# ? Jun 22, 2020 06:00

Nonsense: Jan 26, 2007

Joe Biden after 8 years of massive disinterest in the region outside of regime change continues to be only interested in regime change, this is wrong and the war mongerers in the party can and must be crushed.

https://twitter.com/CompositeGNFNR/status/1274917281374576640?s=20

These people are liars.

Nonsense fucked around with this message at 06:22 on Jun 22, 2020

# ? Jun 22, 2020 06:20

joepinetree: Apr 5, 2012

Well, if there's one area that Obama-Biden was far more competent than Trump was in successful Latin American coups. Maduro's went nowhere and Morales' was a mess. But Honduras, Paraguay and Brazil went unnoticed by most Americans, despite the results literally showing up at the American doorstep.

# ? Jun 22, 2020 06:27

Goatse James Bond: Mar 28, 2010; If you see me posting please remind me that I have Charlie Work in the reports forum to do instead

joepinetree posted:

Well, if there's one area that Obama-Biden was far more competent than Trump was in successful Latin American coups. Maduro's went nowhere and Morales' was a mess. But Honduras, Paraguay and Brazil went unnoticed by most Americans, despite the results literally showing up at the American doorstep.

I'm not particularly up on the details of Paraguay, but based on current information it doesn't seem to me that Honduras would have gone particularly differently under the Trump administration - the coup itself seems to have been entirely locally initiated and executed and Trump would have had no problem at all with selling/giving weapons and equipment to the regime, particularly if Defense asked him to. I guess maybe he would have been less adept at maneuvering with the UAS, but they were integral in justifying Morales' removal in a much more proactive way than the didn't-intervene-or-impose-sanctions that let the Honduran coup get its feet under it.

I don't quite remember US involvement in or around Lula's removal so it's possible something came out about that.

edit phoneposting and it's 1am but the acronym i meant might be OAS

Goatse James Bond fucked around with this message at 07:12 on Jun 22, 2020

# ? Jun 22, 2020 07:03

joepinetree: Apr 5, 2012

GreyjoyBastard posted:

I'm not particularly up on the details of Paraguay, but based on current information it doesn't seem to me that Honduras would have gone particularly differently under the Trump administration - the coup itself seems to have been entirely locally initiated and executed and Trump would have had no problem at all with selling/giving weapons and equipment to the regime, particularly if Defense asked him to. I guess maybe he would have been less adept at maneuvering with the UAS, but they were integral in justifying Morales' removal in a much more proactive way than the didn't-intervene-or-impose-sanctions that let the Honduran coup get its feet under it.

I don't quite remember US involvement in or around Lula's removal so it's possible something came out about that.

Brazil had managed to get most of Latin America on Zelaya's side and the OAS was on the verge of condemning the coup when Hillary intervened. And then Lanny Davis became a consultant for the coup government.

Lula wasn't removed. Dilma was. Lula was arrested and prevented from running in 2018 when he was leading the polls. At this point there's no real question that the Obama admin was behind the "corruption" investigations that at this point is clear to everyone that it was politically motivated to get the workers party out of power. Likewise there's no doubt that Obama's admin was in touch and eagerly supporting the group that impeached Dilma.

Which points to their competence. Lula had 86% popularity and through a long and never ending corruption probe pushed by Washington Dilma was impeached and Lula prevented from running.

# ? Jun 22, 2020 07:52

V. Illych L.: Apr 11, 2008; ASK ME ABOUT LUMBER

coups never get anywhere if there's no appetite for them from local powerful factions, which is why maduro's still around - the PSUV have managed, for all their faults, to get the military and police on-board and to mostly balance out the far-right militias with their own armed population. morales managed to get a loyal military but neglected the police, and zelaya did neither.

what uncle sam provides in these cases is diplomatic backing and safe spaces to the golpistas - effectively, they can vet everyone involved so there's no danger of government infiltration, which makes plotting to overthrow the government much safer and easier. there are always strong local interests involved in the overthrow of left-wing regimes; but it's incredibly naive to imagine that american imperialism hasn't been involved when there's a coup in latin america. it's very likely that such an 'unlicensed' coup would be condemned as a matter of maintaining the hold over the region - can't allow people to topple governments on their own initiative, after all

# ? Jun 22, 2020 09:22

Condiv: May 7, 2008; Sorry to undo the effort of paying a domestic abuser $10 to own this poster, but I am going to lose my dang mind if I keep seeing multiple posters who appear to be Baloogan.

With love,
a mod

https://twitter.com/JoeBiden/status/1274899809791508480

glad to see the dems saber rattling again

# ? Jun 22, 2020 09:23

V. Illych L.: Apr 11, 2008; ASK ME ABOUT LUMBER

if you have any notion left of american foreign policy being a positive force in the world, snuff it out. we're living in a world built by and around the american empire and it's completely broken

america has funded, and continues to fund, terrorism and anti-democratic tendencies in the name of the empire. its support for the israeli apartheid regime and the murderous saudi monarchy does not waver. it, more than anything, is the reason why the socialist tendencies that survive tend to be insular and paranoid

the american empire can only function for its own enrichment - this is what the more ideological neoconservatives never understood, the empire isn't an engine for nation-building, it's an engine for representing the american bourgeoisie. the invasion of iraq could only be mishandled in private interest, because that's what the empire is built to do! it *cannot* be used for the betterment of mankind or whatever, and a lot of people sort of intuitively get this which is why the american left tends to be isolationist.

# ? Jun 22, 2020 09:33

Condiv: May 7, 2008; Sorry to undo the effort of paying a domestic abuser $10 to own this poster, but I am going to lose my dang mind if I keep seeing multiple posters who appear to be Baloogan.

With love,
a mod

howie hawkins just won the green party's primary

https://twitter.com/thehill/status/1274853378506534912?s=20

while biden is pushing for war with china, hawkins wants us to bring iran back to the table:

quote:

We demand the US honor its treaty obligations and restore the Intermediate Nuclear Force treaty and the Iran nuclear deal, that the US take its nuclear weapons off hair-trigger alert, adopt a No First Use policy, and unilaterally disarm to a minimum credible nuclear deterrent. The US should then follow up with urgent negotiations for complete global nuclear disarmament as provided for in the 1970 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and demanded by the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons.

# ? Jun 22, 2020 10:30

sexpig by night: Sep 8, 2011; by Azathoth

Condiv posted:

howie hawkins just won the green party's primary

https://twitter.com/thehill/status/1274853378506534912?s=20

while biden is pushing for war with china, hawkins wants us to bring iran back to the table:

as much as I detest having to support a grown rear end man named 'Howie' I'm sold on his actual platform.

# ? Jun 22, 2020 13:29

the_steve: Nov 9, 2005; We're always hiring!

sexpig by night posted:

as much as I detest having to support a grown rear end man named 'Howie' I'm sold on his actual platform.

Yeah.
I was fully prepared to just write in Bernie as a protest vote when the GE rolled around, but then between reading on these threads about how write-ins are largely ignored, and a friend of mine pointing out Howie's platform to me a few months ago, I'm sold on Green.

# ? Jun 22, 2020 13:36

HootTheOwl: May 13, 2012; Hootin and shootin

sexpig by night posted:

as much as I detest having to support a grown rear end man named 'Howie' I'm sold on his actual platform.

Eh, it's not perfect but the libs are right: Gotta compromise, vote strategically, ect.

# ? Jun 22, 2020 13:36

Marxalot: Dec 24, 2008; Appropriator of
Dan Crenshaw's Eyepatch

The Glumslinger posted:

https://twitter.com/JoeBiden/status/1274910217508196352

Oh my god, gently caress off

Land war in Venezuela is back on the menu!

# ? Jun 22, 2020 13:37

ManBoyChef: Aug 1, 2019; Deadbeat Dad

HootTheOwl posted:

Eh, it's not perfect but the libs are right: Gotta compromise, vote strategically, ect.

yeah. Im def voting howie. How can you vote for Biden when his history speaks for itself?

# ? Jun 22, 2020 14:06

VitalSigns: Sep 3, 2011

Democrats: if you don't vote for Joe Biden you're helping Trump kill countless POC

Also the Democrats: :qq:

why isn't Trump bombing more POC!?!? :cry:

# ? Jun 22, 2020 14:49

double nine: Aug 8, 2013

how much of USA saber rattling re: south america is because argentina is doing another round of debt ~~default~~ restructuring and not wanting it to spread?

# ? Jun 22, 2020 14:50

punishedkissinger: Sep 20, 2017

Condiv posted:

https://twitter.com/JoeBiden/status/1274899809791508480

glad to see the dems saber rattling again

Are the dems intentionally trying to frame this election as a choice between revving up the imperial death machine and allowing America to collapse?

# ? Jun 22, 2020 14:58

Feldegast42: Oct 29, 2011; COMMENCE THE RITE OF SHITPOSTING

punishedkissinger posted:

Are the dems intentionally trying to frame this election as a choice between revving up the imperial death machine and allowing America to collapse?

Probably, given that the neoconservatives have their claws into them. If Biden wins we will probably be launching a campaign into Venezuela and Iran within 12 months

# ? Jun 22, 2020 15:20

the_steve: Nov 9, 2005; We're always hiring!

Nothing distracts from the shittiness at home like a big sexy war somewhere else.

# ? Jun 22, 2020 15:29

tagesschau: Sep 1, 2006; Guten Abend, meine Damen und Herren.

I wonder if Trump is warming to Maduro because he wasn't re-elected but remained in office anyway.

# ? Jun 22, 2020 15:58

Feldegast42: Oct 29, 2011; COMMENCE THE RITE OF SHITPOSTING

the_steve posted:

Nothing distracts from the shittiness at home like a big sexy war somewhere else.

As the Russians, French, and Germans would tell you, starting a big rear end war to distract from problems at home has never ever gone wrong

# ? Jun 22, 2020 16:03

Condiv: May 7, 2008; Sorry to undo the effort of paying a domestic abuser $10 to own this poster, but I am going to lose my dang mind if I keep seeing multiple posters who appear to be Baloogan.

With love,
a mod

tagesschau posted:

I wonder if Trump is warming to Maduro because he wasn't re-elected but remained in office anyway.

maduro was re-elected though :confused:

# ? Jun 22, 2020 16:20

OctaMurk: Jun 21, 2013

Condiv posted:

https://twitter.com/JoeBiden/status/1274899809791508480

glad to see the dems saber rattling again

china is literally exterminating people in xinjiang and annihilating all vestiges of their culture. it is pretty bad and deserves to be sanctioned at the minimum.

# ? Jun 22, 2020 16:29

Cpt_Obvious: Jun 18, 2007

OctaMurk posted:

china is literally exterminating people in xinjiang and annihilating all vestiges of their culture. it is pretty bad and deserves to be sanctioned at the minimum.

Better yet, we should impose punitive tariffs!

# ? Jun 22, 2020 16:30

Condiv: May 7, 2008; Sorry to undo the effort of paying a domestic abuser $10 to own this poster, but I am going to lose my dang mind if I keep seeing multiple posters who appear to be Baloogan.

With love,
a mod

OctaMurk posted:

china is literally exterminating people in xinjiang and annihilating all vestiges of their culture. it is pretty bad and deserves to be sanctioned at the minimum.

having seen the sanctions dems approve of (like venezuela), i'm not sure that sanctions on china will help anything at all. i'm pretty firmly in the "the US cannot be trusted to fix anything" camp when it comes to US intervention nowadays

Condiv fucked around with this message at 16:47 on Jun 22, 2020

# ? Jun 22, 2020 16:45

VitalSigns: Sep 3, 2011

Condiv posted:

maduro was re-elected though

not if you count the votes of corporations, which are people

# ? Jun 22, 2020 16:46

Helsing: Aug 23, 2003; DON'T POST IN THE ELECTION THREAD UNLESS YOU JOE BIDEN

Sorry for dumping off another brick of text here.

Cpt_Obvious posted:

This is a very long and very good post. I would especially like to point out one particular passage and ask a question

Was this prediction made in 1948? Because that is some serious psychic energy there.

The formalization of the median voter theorem was set forth in Anthony Downs' 1957 book "An Economic Theory of Democracy" but earlier authors trying to apply an economic framework to collective decision making had laid most of the groundwork already. It is important to emphasize though that the book I'm quoting from seeks to refute the idea behind the median voter theorem. While there are historical periods where it does seem to offer a plausible explanation of electoral outcomes in America there are a number of conceptual and empirical problems with the model and most of 'Democracy For Realists' (a name which is rather misleading since the only government they really look at is the 20th century American federal government) is dedicated to exploring the failures of the median voter theorem, which is itself simply the most sophisticated version of what they term the 'folk theory of Democracy', which is more or less the version you're encouraged to believe in during high school civics. You know, the version where democracy is about representing the 'will of the people' and all that.

quote:

My one major quibble would be the difference between what politicians claim to believe, and the policies they enact. The end result of this reasoning is that political parties would necessarily enact policies that reflect the most common, middle of the road public opinion. However, they do not. For example, raising taxes on the wealthy, mandatory background checks for firearms, and comprehensive justice reforms are all extremely popular policy issues throughout the political spectrum, but party makes meaningful attempts to address.

In fact, it seems that political parties will claim to represent public opinion, but then act contrary to that opinion when it benefits the wealthy; which is always.

The book engage with this in a fair amount of detail. In fact the first half or more of the book is effectively just an ever expanding discussion that starts out describing the basic 'folk theory' of democracy and which then surveys, in rough historical order, the various enhancements and revisions of this theory that have occurred during the 20th century. As survey research and empirical studies cast doubt on the original versions of the theory by revealing how uninformed, mercurial and generally apolitical the average voter is, political scientists and others developed various modifications or elaborations of the theory in order to justify the idea that popular sovereignty was the driving force behind American government. The 'spatial theory' outlined in the post you're quoting from is one such attempt: it uses economic modeling to imagine that, assuming certain assumptions hold, then voters with specific and clearly ordered preferences choosing between two parties ought to produce a system in which both parties converge on the desires of the 'median voter'.

In the following section they detail how the predictions of this theory hold up in practice:

Achen, Christopher H., and Larry M. Bartels. Democracy for Realists: Why Elections Do Not Produce Responsive Government. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2016. p. 45-49 posted:

As we have seen, U.S. presidential elections in the post� World War II
era� and especially the landslide defeats suff ered by Barry Goldwater in 1964
and George McGovern in 1972� seemed to comport rather well with the
predictions of the spatial theory. However, more systematic research on U.S.
presidential elections has suggested that Goldwater and McGovern�s losses
had less to do with their issue positions than with election- year economic
conditions; ideological �extremism� probably cost them just a few percent-
age points of the popular vote (Bartels and Zaller 2001; Cohen and Zaller
2012). More generally, the impact of candidates� policy stands on election
outcomes� at least over the range of policy stands observed in modern pres-
idential elections� seems to be quite modest. As Zaller (2012, 616) put it,
�the penalty for extremism, if real, is not large.�

Th e broad analysis of U.S. public policy in Robert Erikson, Michael
MacKuen, and James Stimson�s Th e Macro Polity (2002, 303� 311) similarly
underlines the failure of issue voting to discipline politicians in the manner
suggested by the spatial theory of elections. Erikson, MacKuen, and Stimson
measured the ideological tenor of policy activity in each branch of Congress
and the White House over more than 40 years. Th ey found that policy out-
comes shift ed substantially when partisan control shift ed from Democrats to
Republicans or from Republicans to Democrats. Th e public�s �policy mood�
(Erikson, MacKuen, and Stimson 2002, 194� 205) also infl uenced policy
regardless of which party was in control, but that eff ect was small by com-
parison. For example, the estimated impact on White House policy activity
of moving from the most conservative �policy mood� recorded in four de-
cades to the most liberal �policy mood� was only about one- third as large
as the estimated impact of replacing a typical Republican president with a
typical Democrat. Th e estimated eff ects of partisan control on congressional
policy activity were even larger. Th e implication is that citizens aff ect public
policy� insofar as they aff ect it at all� almost entirely by voting out one par-
tisan team and replacing it with another.

If the election of a Republican or Democratic president itself provided
a reliable signal of the public�s �policy mood,� the resulting swing to right
or left in policy outcomes might be characterized as a refl ection of �major-
ity rule� (though not in the sense suggested by the median voter theorem).
Th e authors of Th e Macro Polity argued that presidential election outcomes
are strongly aff ected by the public�s �policy mood� (Erikson, MacKuen, and
Stimson 2002, chap. 7). However, their statistical analyses required delicate
controls for the prevailing balance of partisan loyalties in the electorate and
the (inferred) ideological positions of the competing candidates. Subsequent
analyses have found the apparent impact of �policy mood� evaporating once
election- year economic conditions are taken into account (Cohen and Zaller
2012, table 3). Meanwhile, scholars attempting to forecast presidential elec-
tion outcomes (e.g., Abramowitz 2012; Erikson and Wlezien 2012; Hibbs
2012) have generally been content to ignore �policy mood,� issue preferences,
and ideology� a telling indication that these factors are of relatively little
importance in determining who wins.

Studies of Congress likewise fi nd that the policy preferences of citizens in
a given state or district are only modestly predictive of election outcomes�
and that Democrats and Republicans routinely take very diff erent stands
once they are elected, even when they represent states or districts with very
similar political views. Both of these points are clear in fi gure 2.1, which re-
lates the overall roll call voting record of each member of the House of Rep-
resentatives in the 112th Congress (2011� 2013)21 to the policy preferences
of his or her constituents.22 (Republican members are denoted by diamonds
and Democrats by circles.) District preferences are measured using a 12- item
scale including liberal- conservative self- identifi cation, beliefs about climate
change, and support for the Aff ordable Care Act, domestic spending, the Iraq
War, gays in the military, gun control, affi rmative action, environmental pro-
tection, defense spending, a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants, and
abortion.23 Th e scale runs from 0 (most liberal) to 100 (most conservative),
but the range of district averages is much narrower, from 24.5 to 59.0.

Th e most liberal congressional districts in the country, at the far left of
fi gure 2.1, invariably elected Democrats to the House in 2010. (Th ese were
overwhelmingly urban and mostly majority- minority districts.) At the oppo-
site extreme, the most conservative districts almost all elected Republicans.
However, for districts in the broad middle of the political spectrum, election
outcomes were a rather unreliable refl ection of citizens� policy preferences.

Moderately liberal districts (in the second quartile of the national distribu-
tion) elected Republicans 46% of the time, while moderately conservative
districts (in the third quartile) elected Democrats 25% of the time.24
Th e modest correlation between constituents� preferences and election
outcomes implies substantial variation in representation, given the gulf in
roll call voting behavior between Republicans and Democrats representing
similar districts in fi gure 2.1. Nor is it the case that representatives won elec-
tion in what looked like uncongenial districts by catering closely to citizens�
preferences at the expense of their own (or their parties�) convictions. Th e
dotted lines in fi gure 2.1 summarize the separate linear relationships between
the conservatism of each party�s representatives and their constituents� pref-
erences. Within each party, there is a modest positive relationship between
constituents� preferences and House members� roll call votes. However, the
magnitudes of those relationships are dwarfed by the distance between the
two lines, which represents the expected diff erence in conservatism between
Republican and Democratic members representing districts with identical
public opinion.

Clearly, Republican and Democratic members of Congress representing
constituents with similar preferences behaved in very diff erent ways. Whether
these diff erences were produced by diff erences in the representatives� personal
ideological convictions or party pressures or other factors is, for our purposes
here, irrelevant. Th e key point is that representatives� voting behavior was
not strongly constrained by their constituents� views.25 Elections do not force
successful candidates to refl ect the policy preferences of the median voter, as
Downsian logic implies.

Th e pattern of partisan polarization evident in fi gure 2.1 is not a fl uke
attributable to a particular congressional session or opinion survey.26 Indeed,
a historical analysis of every Congress going back to the 1870s (using presi-
dential election returns as proxies for constituents� preferences) suggests that
similar diff erences in expected roll call voting patterns between Republicans
and Democrats representing similar constituencies have been fairly common
in the past 140 years (Bartels, Clinton, and Geer forthcoming).27

In later decades the failures of that particular model lead political scientists who wanted to rescue the core ideas behind the folk theory of democracy to develop 'retrospective' models of voting. These models dispense with the idea that voters are making a detailed study of politicians or even necessarily know anything about politics. Instead retrospective voting just requires that voters have some rough sense of whether their lives are better or worse.

Achen, Christopher H., and Larry M. Bartels. Democracy for Realists: Why Elections Do Not Produce Responsive Government. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2016. p. 91-92 posted:

Th e key insight of this alternative theory of democracy was that voters
could exert substantial control over their leaders, despite knowing little about
the details of public policy, simply by assessing the performance of incumbent
offi cials, rewarding success and punishing failure. In one of the fi rst and most
infl uential formulations of this perspective, V. O. Key (1966, 61) portrayed
�the electorate in its great, and perhaps principal, role as an appraiser of past
events, past performance, and past actions. It judges retrospectively; it com-
mands prospectively only insofar as it expresses either approval or disapproval
of that which has happened before.�

Th is retrospective theory of political accountability seems to provide a com-
pelling way to think about the relationship between leaders and citizens in
democratic political systems. Empirically, it accounts for fl uctuations in the
electoral fortunes of incumbent leaders and parties much more successfully
than any spatial theory of issue voting. Moreover, it rescues political leaders
from their fate as hapless automatons �converging� on the policy preferences
of the median voter in the spatial theory� or, perhaps more realistically, as
demagogues pretending to cater to the garbled voice of the people. In Key�s
words (1958, 590), �the most acute ear attuned to the voice of the people
can sense only the vaguest guidance for innovation to cope with the ques-
tions that must be met day by day as an Administration governs. Th e effi -
cacy of self- government thus depends on party and governmental leadership
with the initiative and imagination necessary to meet the public problems
that develop and with the courage to assume the political risks involved.� Th e
retrospective theory gives political leadership its due, leaving initiative in the
hands of elected offi cials to further voters� well- being by any feasible and le-
gitimate means at their disposal.

Th e normative appeal of the retrospective theory stems in no small part
from the fact that it seems to save voters from the charge that they are too
uninformed or too disengaged to play a meaningful role in the democratic
process. For example, Morris Fiorina (1981, 5) argued that retrospective vot-
ers �need not know the precise economic or foreign policies of the incumbent
administration in order to see or feel the results of those policies. . . . In order
to ascertain whether the incumbents have performed poorly or well, citizens
need only calculate the changes in their own welfare. If jobs have been lost
in a recession, something is wrong. If sons have died in foreign rice paddies,
something is wrong. If thugs make neighborhoods unsafe, something is
wrong. If polluters foul food, water, or air, something is wrong.� By dispens-
ing with the unrealistic notion that ordinary citizens vote on the basis of de-
tailed preferences regarding every issue that might conceivably come before
their future leaders, the theory of retrospective voting made the rather bleak
portrait of poorly informed, habitual political behavior provided by the sur-
vey researchers of the 1950s and 1960s, if not quite irrelevant, at least not fa-
tal. Voters need only monitor their own and their fellow citizens� day- to- day
experiences and well- being.

Now the book does actually come out in limited and heavily qualified support of this idea, as the authors find evidence that voters do punish or reward incumbent politicians based on changes in their welfare (this discussion comes later in the book). However, the authors find that voters are extremely myopic - their voting seems to be almost entirely based on how their welfare changes in the last few months before the election. Voters also seemingly reward or punish incumbents for 'acts of God' that no politician could control - the authors reference studies that, for instance, seem to show voters punishing incumbent politicians for a rise in shark attacks and other random natural events that in no rational way could be said to reflect the actual performance of the person in office.

Another factor here that they discuss is that blame and credit are socially constructed and heavily mediated by factors such as the media, which is itself hardly a neutral force in all of this. So even insofar as voters do seek to rationally evaluate the record of a politician they work within very particular discursive environment:

ibid, p. 138-140 posted:

The Social Construction of Blame

Th us far we have written of retrospective voting as if hardship itself created
electoral backlash. Like many other scholars, we have deemphasized the vot-
ers� interpretation of their plight, as if it had little causal importance. In fact,
however, we believe that voters� attributions of blame are oft en crucial in their
decisions to punish incumbents. Positive or negative events that voters them-
selves would recognize as politically irrelevant, such as the outcomes of local
college football games, may also infl uence voting behavior through subcon-
scious eff ects on voters� moods (Healy, Malhotra, and Mo 2010). But sub-
stantial punishment at the polls is likely to be grounded in a belief, however
farfetched, that the government is somehow responsible for the voters� pain.

It is easy to overlook the need for social interpretation of hard times, since
suggestions about their meaning are typically mass- produced. Political and
ideological entrepreneurs have an incentive to construct explanations and
solutions, oft en self- serving, for people�s hardships. Amplifi ed by the mass
media, these ideas may increase or decrease the likelihood that citizens will at-
tribute responsibility for social problems to the government (Iyengar 1991).
In garden- variety economic recessions, the accepted stories about blame are
familiar, and the process of generating common understandings occurs so
smoothly and easily that its importance may go unnoticed. Natural disasters,
by contrast, create deeper and unfamiliar hardships, which lead to uncer-
tainty and even fear. Th e old complacent assumptions are shown to be mis-
taken, and a search begins for new explanations that will avoid a repetition of
the disaster (Cantril 1958, chap. 1; Birkland 1997). People are ready to listen.

Aft er disasters, the more popular attributions of blame and proposals for
reform oft en come from widely trusted sources and appeal in a clear, simple
way to broadly shared values, though not necessarily those that intellectual
elites rely on for their political judgments. As Hadley Cantril (1941, 67) put
it, �Th ere are short- cut rationalizations which fi re the imagination and spread
because they somehow express the dissatisfactions from which people have
been suff ering and at the same time imply a new direction and purpose.� If a
single nutty or dangerous vision comes to be suffi ciently widely shared, dem-
agogues may be able to ride it to power.

Elite culture is usually (though not always) less susceptible to nutty or
dangerous visions. It may even play some role in discouraging the most ig-
norant or vicious attributions of blame. But popular culture is never entirely
under the control of the respectable. A variety of unconventional interpreta-
tions and nostrums may be available, and under the right circumstances de-
viant doctrines may attract considerable popular acceptance. Some medieval
towns blamed the plague on Jews, prostitutes, beggars, or foreign agents
(Herlihy 1997, 65� 67). Some New Jersey residents in 1916 thought that
German U- boats might have induced the sharks to attack (Fernicola 2001,
166� 170). Some Americans in the grip of the Spanish Infl uenza pandemic
two years later feared that �plague germs were inserted into aspirin made by
the German drug company Bayer� (Kolata 1999, 3).

Diff erent sectors of the population, immersed in distinct subcultures, may
fi nd diff erent explanations appealing. Ideological commitments may color
the plausibility of alternative explanations, as with the Federalists� and Re-
publicans� competing accounts of the yellow fever epidemic of 1793. Phy-
sicians �divided bitterly over the cause of the epidemic,� with Republicans
generally attributing it to poor sanitation, climatic conditions, and the un-
healthy location of Philadelphia, while Federalists blamed disembarking ref-
ugees from Haiti; in fact, �both sides were right� (Pernick 1972, 562� 563).
If available interpretations are suffi ciently contested, and if incumbents can
exploit competing explanations to exonerate themselves and blame others,
they may sometimes escape blame altogether (McGraw 1991; Arceneaux and
Stein 2006).

In other cases, blame may fail not because there are too many available
interpretations of disaster but because there are too few. In 1874, for exam-
ple, locust swarms devastated large swaths of western Nebraska and adjacent
states. By fall, many farmers literally faced starvation. Th e Army had cloth-
ing and food supplies stored in the area, but refused to distribute the clothes
until several weeks aft er the fall election, and did not give out food until the
following February (Lockwood 2004, 80� 84). Nonetheless, the incumbent
Republicans sailed to victory in Nebraska in 1874, and repeated plagues of
locusts throughout the mid- 1870s did not notably dent their popularity in
either gubernatorial or presidential elections (Nebraska Legislative Reference
Bureau 1918, 436� 506). Th e voters did not punish. Th e simplest explanation
is probably that in the thinly populated farming areas of Nebraska at that
time, communication was poor and no shared interpretation of the disaster
emerged. A strong ethic of self- reliance also militated against expecting assis-
tance from the government (Lockwood 2004, 38� 39). And, perhaps most
important, the Populists were not well organized until a decade later and did
not mount a serious campaign for governor until 1890. At that point, farmers
suddenly had a credible explanation for their troubles and a target for their
frustrations� and punishment began.

The general argument of the book is that existing theories of democracy do not recognize the crucial role of social identity in constructing political attitudes and that as a result political scientists and journalists heavily underrate the extent to which politics is a matter of organized competition between social groups rather than a contest to win over millions of individual minds. In their assessment elections are mostly a matter of turnout rather than persuasion and people's political attitudes are largely based on their identification with a larger group.

As I was saying before I do not present all this as though it is the definitive account of democratic politics. The authors have their limitations and biases and are very reliant on particular examples and assumptions, some of which are even on display in the section I just quoted. Nevertheless I think the topics and research covered by the book are very interesting and make for a provocative starting point for a discussion about contemporary politics. I also think the book is obviously relevant for some of the common discussions taking place on these forums nowadays as they engage with questions of why voters support particular candidates. As I was saying a few days ago this research can also help explain how in many cases politicians do end up playing a significant role in telling their supporters what to believe: often times the political parties ends up influencing its grassroots supporters rather than the other way around.

I can maybe touch on this more later but this invites an alternative perspective on political parties in which they may be constrained to some degree by popular sentiments but where their primary motivation comes from the interests who control the party. Vote seeking behavior is pursued to the extent necessary to achieve the party's goals but policy is driven by the interests who control the party.

# ? Jun 22, 2020 16:51

sexpig by night: Sep 8, 2011; by Azathoth

OctaMurk posted:

china is literally exterminating people in xinjiang and annihilating all vestiges of their culture. it is pretty bad and deserves to be sanctioned at the minimum.

yea I'm sure if we deprive common people medicine and building materials and poo poo that'll stop the government abuse.

# ? Jun 22, 2020 17:06

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# ? Jun 10, 2024 16:17

punishedkissinger: Sep 20, 2017

sexpig by night posted:

yea I'm sure if we deprive common people medicine and building materials and poo poo that'll stop the government abuse.

I'm loving the reversal from skewering Trump for "Trade wars are easy to win" to "Look, we are morally obligated to limit trade with China"

# ? Jun 22, 2020 17:08

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