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Herstory Begins Now posted:sinema's endgame does not seem to give a single gently caress about staying in the senate or other elected office I'm not a doctor (not even close) but the way she acts has to indicate some kind of sociopathy, right? She seems totally indifferent to everything but herself, and seemly is only there to obstruct.
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Jan 20, 2022 20:24
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Mellow Seas posted:If they do narrow down the reconciliation bill to just things Manchin likes and has openly stated he supports, he'll refuse to support it on the grounds that reconciliation undermines the sanctity of the filibuster, and it wasn't meant to pass social programs, and demand that everything is put up for a vote on individual bills, which will either all fail or Schumer won't even bother. Politics isn't a zero sum game though. Every Democrat victory is 1 second more of life before all of us and everything we love is scoured from the planet. Always knew this was a one way ticket.
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Jan 20, 2022 20:29
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Leon Trotsky 2012 posted:Manchin is still fairly popular in West Virginia. Sinema’s plan is chuckling vacantly like clown on LSD and then walking directly into the nearest closed door. Her bank account is already loaded with all the bribe cash she needs to survive on once she gets booted out of office… in another four years. Her job is done.
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Jan 20, 2022 20:36
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I don’t see Sinema getting a cushy lobbying job because then she’d have to care about a cause other than herself E: her post-Senate novel will be horrendous to read for all though Bellmaker fucked around with this message at 20:50 on Jan 20, 2022 |
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Jan 20, 2022 20:46
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Bellmaker posted:I don’t see Sinema getting a cushy lobbying job because then she’d have to care about a cause other than herself I don’t see her having value as a lobbyist because whose going to take her calls? Manchin? Anyone else?
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Jan 20, 2022 20:49
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Bellmaker posted:I don’t see Sinema getting a cushy lobbying job because then she’d have to care about a cause other than herself Which seems right up her alley
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Jan 20, 2022 20:49
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nine-gear crow posted:Sinema’s plan is chuckling vacantly like clown on LSD and then walking directly into the nearest closed door. Her bank account is already loaded with all the bribe cash she needs to survive on once she gets booted out of office… in another four years. Her job is done. Either she manages to get re-elected, or she leaves the Senate and takes some cushy job where she makes six figures doing nothing
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Jan 20, 2022 20:50
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Leon Trotsky 2012 posted:Multiple former members of her staff and former friends have said that she considers herself a future President and will be the one to unite all of the independents and people who don't vote because they hate all the partisan bickering. I've only seen that suggested a couple of times and nothing near that unanimous, though I also don't hugely doubt it. That said, who tf starts out a presidential run by going scorched earth on their own party. Her career as a dem is basically already done and there is a less than zero chance that the gop ever gives her the time of day for a presidential run nor with her basically zero favorability among dems is she even of much potential use as a third party spoiler candidate. It's possible that she actually is that dumb, and it does appear to be the case that she has a couple of advisors giving her staggeringly bad advice, but I'm not sold that it all adds up to sinema having serious presidential ambitions Herstory Begins Now fucked around with this message at 20:56 on Jan 20, 2022 |
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Jan 20, 2022 20:54
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The New York Times held a very extensive focus group with independent voters. A lot of it is what you would expect, but a lot of it is... woof. It is very long, but very interesting, weird, and informative at the same time. Summary: quote:How do independent voters feel about President Biden and America after his first year in office? Let’s put it this way: His weak approval ratings might go up if he pulled a Trump and just declared that America was moving on from the pandemic and he was going all in against inflation and high gas prices. Never mind about voting rights or avoiding another Jan. 6. It’s the economy, Joe. Transcript: quote:Frank Luntz: Give me a word or phrase to describe life in America today. quote:Frank Luntz: How many of you think that the level of crime is up in America today, versus a year ago? quote:Frank Luntz: Are any of you so concerned about what’s happening out there that you literally lose sleep at night over it? quote:Patrick Healy: OK. Kristine, could you speak to the economy, and Mark, democracy? quote:Frank Luntz: If you could speak to them, what would you tell the politicians that they don’t get about your life? quote:Frank Luntz: We’re going to do a word and phrase for the Democrats and word or phrase for the Republicans. Scott, give me a word or phrase to describe the Democrats. quote:Frank Luntz: I’m going to ask you this question, because I’m trying to understand you. You sound like you’re independent because you reject both political parties. Not that you like them both and you want to choose between both but, actually, you’re rejecters. Kristine, do I have it right? quote:Frank Luntz: And what about 2020? quote:Patrick Healy: We’re going to turn now to President Biden and want to talk about his first year in office. Can I get a word or phrase that describes President Biden? quote:Frank Luntz: Has Biden exceeded your expectations or fallen short? And explain why. quote:Frank Luntz: Would you prefer a Republican Congress or a Democratic Congress, knowing that you voted for Trump and for Obama, knowing that you are ticket splitters. How many of you say the Democrats? quote:Patrick Healy: Let me get a show of hands. Are you confident that President Biden and his team can get Covid under control during his term in office? quote:Frank Luntz: I’m going to give you five different issues: Covid, inflation, immigration, crime or voting rights. If you had to pick just one of those that concerns, frightens, bothers you the most — again, Covid, inflation, immigration, crime, voting rights — how many of you say Covid is No. 1? quote:Patrick Healy: A show of hands — are you confident that President Biden and the Democrats have a plan to improve the economy, to deal with inflation? quote:Patrick Healy: How many of you’d like to see Trump run again in 2024? quote:Frank Luntz: OK. I’m Joe Biden. You get a chance to tell me one thing, and you have only 10 seconds to do it. What would you tell me? quote:Frank Luntz: I always do this. Anything you want to ask Patrick? I’ll let two of you. He does not know I’m going to do this. He’s got to go on the spot. https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/20/opinion/biden-independent-voters.html?referringSource=articleShare Leon Trotsky 2012 fucked around with this message at 21:00 on Jan 20, 2022 |
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Jan 20, 2022 20:57
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Do you actually believe that the democratic party is not incompetent enough to ever field Sinema as a presidential candidate? She might be galaxy brain
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Jan 20, 2022 20:58
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Dubar posted:Do you actually believe that the democratic party is not incompetent enough to ever field Sinema as a presidential candidate? She might be galaxy brain yes and i would encourage you to bet me money on this point
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Jan 20, 2022 20:59
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quote:Frank Luntz: If there is an election for president tomorrow and the candidates were Joe Biden, the Democrat; Donald Trump, the Republican; and Joe Manchin, the independent, who would you choose? Congratulations future president-elect Joe Manchin, I guess.
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Jan 20, 2022 21:00
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 Lobbyists don't have to work very hard for their money if they're former members of Congress; they mainly take their former colleagues out to drinks & dinner on their dime, just like other sugar daddies do.There's a reason it's an attractive calling for retired reps & senators; it's even less arduous than the half-year or w/e that Congress works, and usually for far more money. nine-gear crow posted:Sinema’s plan is chuckling vacantly like clown on LSD and then walking directly into the nearest closed door. Her bank account is already loaded with all the bribe cash she needs to survive on once she gets booted out of office… in another four years. Her job is done. Wait; what? Are you under the impression that she's able to transfer campaign contributions to her personal bank accounts? Or that lobbyists are secretly bribing her for as much money as they're openly giving Bob Menendez & Chuck Schumer? Some of this rhetoric is as mind-numbing as the old liberal conspiracy theories that Trig Palin wasn't birthed by Sarah, but was secretly her daughter's son. eta: Bellmaker posted:I don’t see Sinema getting a cushy lobbying job because then she’d have to care about a cause other than herself lol yes, the known caring qualities of former members of Congress pimping on behalf of our fine upstanding corporate overlords. Willa Rogers fucked around with this message at 21:04 on Jan 20, 2022 |
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Jan 20, 2022 21:01
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Dubar posted:Do you actually believe that the democratic party is not incompetent enough to ever field Sinema as a presidential candidate? She might be galaxy brain Sinema is probably Dunning-Kruger stupid enough to try and run for president, but literally no one is going to vote for her. Not even herself, probably.
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Jan 20, 2022 21:02
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FlamingLiberal posted:Basically this This is exactly what being a former member of Congress-turned-lobbyist is--only it's seven figures as often as not. eta: Probably six figures as a rule, although bennies & work for family members could enhance it. Willa Rogers fucked around with this message at 21:16 on Jan 20, 2022 |
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Jan 20, 2022 21:07
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quote:Frank Luntz: Who’s saying that things are better than they are? quote:Patrick Healy: Kristine, have you and your husband found jobs? Did you find jobs pretty quick?
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Jan 20, 2022 21:20
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Leon Trotsky 2012 posted:The New York Times held a very extensive focus group with independent voters. A lot of it is what you would expect, but a lot of it is... woof. Thanks for posting this. It was a really interesting read. I find it interesting that progressives view Biden as not doing anything while independents see him as doing too much. Reading these things is also a good reminder (for myself at least) that my leanings towards more progressive action is not necessarily indicative of the population as a whole. I would like to see someone do a focus group on a more diverse group of respondents, though. Instead of a group of independents, I think it would be interesting to see responses from a wide range of people, politically speaking. I honestly think we'd see much more damning comments from a focus group of progressives than the independents. Velocity Raptor fucked around with this message at 21:26 on Jan 20, 2022 |
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Jan 20, 2022 21:21
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quote:Frank Luntz, a longtime strategist for Republican candidates, who led the discussion, Oh word?
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Jan 20, 2022 21:31
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Love those voters who voted for Obama and trump. Very representative.
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Jan 20, 2022 21:36
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^^^ I mean, that was the point of the focus group.Velocity Raptor posted:Thanks for posting this. It was a really interesting read. I find it interesting that progressives view Biden as not doing anything while independents see him as doing too much. It wasn't just that the voters were self-ID'd indy voters; they were specifically voters who had voted for both Obama & Trump at some point: quote:The focus group was made up of people who had voted at least once for President Barack Obama and at least once for President Donald Trump. Willa Rogers fucked around with this message at 21:40 on Jan 20, 2022 |
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Jan 20, 2022 21:38
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I can't imagine how much effort you'd have to go into to find a group full of Ken Bones who are willing to sit in on your focus group, but it's certainly not small. But worth it, if you're a piece of poo poo.
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Jan 20, 2022 21:39
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Velocity Raptor posted:Thanks for posting this. It was a really interesting read. I find it interesting that progressives view Biden as not doing anything while independents see him as doing too much. Yeah it's an interesting read though I always take these things with grains of salt. Not because I think the responses are coming from idiots but because humans just generally suck at properly identifying the cause of our problems. You can definitely see commonality in the problems people are experiencing or perceiving others of having while also having very different answers on the solutions. There is a very obvious theme of them all being uncertain, scared, and feeling unprovided for by those who promise to provide. Are some of their ideas dumb as gently caress? Yeah but honestly it's asking a lot for them to be able to perfectly identify their problems and land on an answer that's not dumb. We're an animal who's into deciding our leaders based on height, we're not great at this poo poo. Gumball Gumption fucked around with this message at 21:45 on Jan 20, 2022 |
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Jan 20, 2022 21:41
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People don't like to hear about the bad stuff. We don't talk about Bruno. Just like Carter, in time of uncertainty people want someone to lie to them and make them feel good. That's how you get the lady in that group who is like "I just want covid to be over and i'm mad about Fauci." I mean instead of lying to people you could actually do good things but that doesn't seem to be what the government is capable of doing right now.
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Jan 20, 2022 21:54
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Like if your goal is to find people with weird and inconsistent opinions I can't think of a better way to do it than Obama to trump voters. So they're engaged enough to vote and probably pay mild attention to politics. But have some very odd things going on in their brain. It was interesting to read and I'm glad it was posted. But I wouldn't draw any hand conclusions off of that piece.
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Jan 20, 2022 22:00
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Leon Trotsky 2012 posted:The New York Times held a very extensive focus group with independent voters. A lot of it is what you would expect, but a lot of it is... woof. Wow, a focus group of Trump voters led by a Republican strategist found that Americans want to open everything up, and think that Democrats have become too progressive? Stop the loving presses, gotta put this on the front page. This poo poo is worse than Cletus Safaris.
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Jan 20, 2022 22:01
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that duck posted:Wow, a focus group of Trump voters led by a Republican strategist found that Americans want to open everything up, and think that Democrats have become too progressive? Stop the loving presses, gotta put this on the front page. Yeah that was my point. Gee I'm shocked that this group of people who have voted for Trump before are mad at a visible woman(not that Psaki isn't awful), mad at journalism, and mad at the pandemic for harshing their mellow. Good thing Luntz is a fair and impartial entity with no vested interest.
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Jan 20, 2022 22:05
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For better or worse, people like that are electorally important. Only about 12% of voters are true swing voters, but Biden won by 5% in 2020 and smaller margins in individual states, so if you are losing the bulk of that 12%, then that is a problem. It's also one of those situations where it is hard to get non-political people to give detailed assessments about politics, but non-political people are also the majority of voters and it's a lot more informative to dig deeper into peoples' beliefs than to just have them answer "Yes" or "No" on a poll. It's hard to get people to verbalize their issues and their perceived sources of them, so it's interesting to just let people free flow about their beliefs. They don't have to be smart, correct, or even coherent. But, it is interesting to just get it from the horse's mouth without a filter. Leon Trotsky 2012 fucked around with this message at 22:09 on Jan 20, 2022 |
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Jan 20, 2022 22:07
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Mellow Seas posted:Can we just drop the pretense of Democrats actually having a governing majority that "they" are failing to take advantage of? Sinema and Manchin are just openly working with Republicans to sink Biden's presidency; they're barely even trying to hide it. We can mock Democrats for having a majority that they aren't using, or we can mock Democrats because every time good policy is on the table, more of them out themselves as moderates/conservatives to oppose it. Which would you prefer? Between the House and Senate, at least 19 Democrats have acted against the stated agenda of the party. This is not a "only Sinema and Manchin" problem.
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Jan 20, 2022 22:12
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Leon Trotsky 2012 posted:They don't have to be smart, correct, or even coherent. But, it is interesting to just get it from the horse's mouth without a filter. There's still filters. You have a GOP strategist asking the questions, filtering who gets in the group, and steering conversation. Less filtered maybe. True swing voters are also a small group, non-voters are a much larger one. It seems like maybe one should look into what they interested in rather than chasing the opinions of a tiny fraction of voters, especially if you're only winning by tiny fractions? Especially since this tiny fraction is, by definition, unreliable.
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Jan 20, 2022 22:17
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I didn't see any leading questions from Luntz. You might be able to fault him for his panel selections, but in order to be taken seriously by mainstream news outlets, he has to hew to the standards for conducting focus groups. And I'm not sure some of the participants' weird-rear end answers were much more bizarre than some of the posting in this forum that I've seen taken seriously. The vast majority of voters aren't that knowledgeable about civics or politics, which is why some people think campaign contributions will be funneled into a politician's retirement, or that the concept of rotating villains is a conspiracy theory on par with Q-anon, or that the advance child tax credit was a money give-away that has nothing to do with tax liability. Even I, on the rare occasion, have been duly corrected for a faulty assumption.  * I went back & saw that the NYT described him as Republican strategist in the piece. Faulty assumption corrected thru strikeout! Willa Rogers fucked around with this message at 23:32 on Jan 20, 2022 |
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Jan 20, 2022 22:44
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I think focusing on a specific subset of self-identified moderates is gunning for a specific type of person. As for leading, I realize he's not doing a ton of that, but here's a good example: quote:Frank Luntz: Has Biden exceeded your expectations or fallen short? And explain why. That's an intentionally polarizing wording. A better way is "how do you feel about Biden vs your expectations of him" or something similar, but it's instead "did he do better or worse" not offering actual moderate option, while talking to a group of "moderates". But my bigger issue is the group it's pullled from Though I do agree the vast majority of the public does not pay even remotely as much attention to politics as most of the posters in this thread has some contradictory beliefs because of that.
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Jan 20, 2022 22:51
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Jaxyon posted:There's still filters. You have a GOP strategist asking the questions, filtering who gets in the group, and steering conversation. To be fair this focus group is saying pretty much the same thing we are seeing in polls right now. Economy bad, crime bad, COVID over, Democrats too socialist/spending too much money.
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Jan 20, 2022 22:51
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Jaxyon posted:I think focusing on a specific subset of self-identified moderates is gunning for a specific type of person. This seems to be a trend across most public opinion polls. I've run into a few of them myself (YouGov stands out specifically) and there's no real accounting for diverse responses outside of "i'm liberal/independent/right and my opinion on joe biden is X". Some of the clarification questions try ("try") to granulate it further with "if you are independent, do you lean more liberal or more conservative", which creates outliers like "i'm a liberal leaning independent that thinks joe biden is doing a poo poo job on the economy, covid, and foreign policy". there's a function of "leftism" being colloquially included in "liberalism" too as though leftism is just an extreme branch of liberalism when the two are really as similar on economic issues as liberals and conservatives are on culture war issues
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Jan 20, 2022 22:56
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I would add that Healy's questions seemed quote:Patrick Healy: Let me get a show of hands. Are you confident that President Biden and his team can get Covid under control during his term in office? Now, to most dnd'ers, Healy's questions--and even his answers to Julia--seem like cold, objective truths. Yet having the Opinion editor of the NYT state his convictions while trying to suss out voters' feelings & motives flies in the face of every principle for facilitating focus groups. Willa Rogers fucked around with this message at 23:03 on Jan 20, 2022 |
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Jan 20, 2022 22:57
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Jaxyon posted:I think focusing on a specific subset of self-identified moderates is gunning for a specific type of person. No, the way Luntz phrased it was correct: He was offering a choice between dualities, without implying that either choice was pejorative, or leading to an expected answer. eta to explain further, since this used to be my jam: When Healy asks if participants are "confident that President Biden" can do something, he's (however subconsciously) directing the response to be affirmative. Luntz, otoh, likely would ask something more neutral like "Are you confident or not confident that Pres. Biden" can do something, without placing a value judgment based on the expected response. Willa Rogers fucked around with this message at 23:09 on Jan 20, 2022 |
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Jan 20, 2022 23:01
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Willa Rogers posted:Now, to most dnd'ers, Healy's questions--and even his answers to Julia--seem like cold, objective truths. Yet having the Opinion editor of the NYT state his convictions while trying to suss out voters' feelings & motives flies in the face of every principle for facilitating focus groups. dnd is not a hivemind, knock it off.
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Jan 20, 2022 23:11
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CommieGIR posted:dnd is not a hivemind, knock it off. I think you misunderstood me; I was pointing out that the assumptions we take for granted (all of us, libs & lefties, and the NYT Opinion editor) are not how serious focus groups are conducted. To us they may seem--and be!--bedrock, objective truths but that's not the purpose of conducting focus groups; it's actually to suss out the weirder stuff a lot of the time.
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Jan 20, 2022 23:16
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Bishyaler posted:We can mock Democrats for having a majority that they aren't using, or we can mock Democrats because every time good policy is on the table, more of them out themselves as moderates/conservatives to oppose it. Which would you prefer? Between the House and Senate, at least 19 Democrats have acted against the stated agenda of the party. This is not a "only Sinema and Manchin" problem. I just don't understand this thought process at all. Why "mock" anyone? It is you who is overly fixated on party labels. The fact that 50 people in the Senate have a "D" next to their name does not mean that there is a governing coalition. So your solution is to just give up on forming one? To blame all the people who tried for the actions of those who did not? And then we wonder why politicians find it so politically advantageous to stand in the way of anything and everything. You say 19 Democrats acted against the stated agenda of the party. Well, that means at least 256 worked towards making the country better. And your reaction to this situation is to mock them and cheer as they lose seats to the party where nobody ever does anything good, ever. Mellow Seas fucked around with this message at 23:23 on Jan 20, 2022 |
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Jan 20, 2022 23:21
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Mellow Seas posted:I mean, yeah, I guess the gaffe is that it implies that "African Americans" are not a subset of "Americans"; there wouldn't really be any problem with the sentence if you added the word "overall" at the end. It's reminiscent of Biden's "poor kids are just as smart as white kids". McConnell is precisely nine months older than Joe Biden so he's gonna have his moments too. The gaffe is that all poor kids are black and also implying that poor black children don't/can't qualify as "regular kids", since only white children are "regular" and drawing a weird comparison like that.
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Jan 20, 2022 23:23
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BiggerBoat posted:The gaffe is that all poor kids are black and also implying that poor black children don't/can't qualify as "regular kids", since only white children are "regular" and drawing a weird comparison like that. Yeah I remember and I get it, that was Biden's gaffe, and yeah it was a total gaffe. McConnell's is maybe less superficially embarrassing, but he also made it in the process of justifying antidemocratic voter restrictions, as opposed to whatever vague point about education Biden was trying to make. e: We should also keep in mind that "black people vote at the same rate as white people" is going to be a very effective argument that they are not treated unfairly in the electoral process, even if it's bullshit. It appears to a non-political person to be "logical", like "you need an ID to go to an R-rated movie" is.
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Jan 20, 2022 23:25
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