JaneAusten

I’m really interested in what’s happening there and if you have a good legit source you can suggest I’d love to read it. Its my ignorance I know but why couldn’t they still do a 4 party alliance . They should meet with the social democrats right? What good does not meeting do?

Ok I misunderstood. Europe is filed with parliamentary systems. That’s not who the United States is. And it can be just as if not more fragile than ours.

Who exactly is a populist in Europe and they have parliamentary systems which are a heck of a lot different than what we have. Populist? I'd call Sherrod Brown a real populist versus Sanders and Brown has actually gotten legislation passed. I'll vote for Andrew Gillum, Beto O'Rourke, Stacy Abrams, Amy Klobacher, Sherrod Brown. I'd list a hundred people before Sanders. They need a new GOP savior now that Nikki Haley the fraud is gone.

The ridiculous part is the media going crazy asking who the GOP stars are now that Beto and Gillum lost. Beto raised 70 million dollars from grassroots donors. Are these idiots really thinking Beto should retire and go knit. No one asked Bernie to retire after he lost the primary and I'd venture to guess the Texas election was a heck of a lot more rigged than the 2016 presidential primary was. And I am not comparing the 2 by any means, but Abe Lincoln lost his senate race to Stephen Douglas. What do we think would have happened if he retired and went off to knit for the rest of his life.

I live in Illinois and in Cook County. I worked to help on Lauren Underwood's campaign and in one of the Cook County Commissioner races, but this IMO is the most gratifying. DuPage County a traditional GOP stronghold and suburban Chicago county, just elected democrats across the county. The County board for example had a slate of all women candidates on the democratic side. https://www.dailyherald.com/news/20181107/democratic-women-make-unprecedented-gains-in-dupage-county These are the areas we are being told to start rebuilding from the ground up and it's happening in DuPage. And while I hate to say it, JB Pritzker running as our governor and winning in Illinois has been a factor. His influx of money into his own campaign and his help with some of the other statewide candidates and congressional candidates, freed up money to help the state and county races. A democratic woman, Terra Costa Howard, won her state assembly seat over the GOP house floor rep, Peter Breen. Not an upset other than the fact Breen has been established in house leadership for years. But she had money and her commercials the past 2 weeks all over the local stations(radio and TV) have been nonstop.

The voting rights issue if you think about it is completely contradictory to what prison is alleged to do, reform. (we know it doesn't). People who serve their time should be allowed to vote again. And I'd love to see a breakdown of the 13,000 felons Rick Scott restored voting rights to in Florida. The good news is that this referendum passed with 65% of the vote(they needed 60%). So it was a bipartisan initiative. As to progressive policies, Healthcare and Medicaid expansion should be considered bipartisan but it's not. The fact that these referendums are passing all over the country in red states(so are minimum wage increases by the way) should tell people something. When you don't inflict red or blue ideology into it, you get a sense of what people really want. And most want progressive policies IMO, transparency, and fiscal responsibility.

Jon Ralston explained this. Most republicans would have had to really stretch for vote for him when he was still alive and likely would not have but since he's dead, they know that a republican will be appointed in his place. That was the strategy I guess that was used in Nevada by the state GOP to get GOP voters to vote for for the dead pimp.

Thanks for posting . Lord the damn whining from some progressives is pathetic. Beto for example lost yes but his running helped some important downballot wins. Gillum lost, but Florida restored voting rights to 1.4 million felons. The list goes on. And this

Thanks I knew about the payday stuff but I have been disconnected from the MSM and press for the past couple of weeks intentionally for the most part. I didn't know about this caravan BS from her. Yeah she deserved to go. Democrats or activists I should say have gone the smart route in some cases with Minimum Wage increases and Medicaid expansion. I see both Arkansas and Missouri voted for min wage increases yesterday. And Missouri legalizing medical marijuana use and Michigan recreational use. There are plenty of issues democrats can run with or insert into their platform to be universally popular. And have any state public servants in legislature talked about expanding Medicaid? Mo chose not to - seems like a popular issue even in red states.

I think healthcare is a good starting point but they need a policy to agree on. The bipartisan popularity of Medicaid expansion shows that ALL Americans want affordable healthcare and perhaps even governmental control. It's now been voted to move forward in states like Idaho, Utah, and Nebraska. Impartial redistricting is also popular and bipartisan. I know it's a hornets nest in some areas for democrats. I'm wasn't keen on seeing a republican control redistricting in Illinois and thank goodness that won't happen, But I also hate the idea of our own state gerrymandered for democrats. But I want to see a few more republican states move this forward also. It won on the ballot in Michigan last night. Legalizing marijuana. Get with it. Most Americans want this. And it can be packaged as part of criminal justice reform/ Money out of politics. Beto lost but look what he did for fundraising. (his race also propelled downballot democrats to victory in Texas). AND TAXCUTS for the middle class, while restoring the tax breaks the 1% got. That is not unpopular with anyone other than the 1% I think they should build their platform on all the things Trump promised that sounded good - better healthcare, protecting social security, medicare, Medicaid, infrastructure, and push these issues. And get a decent bipartisan immigration plan passed that includes strong border security with NO WALL. I mean seriously there has to be one democrat who can sell this.

I think Beto did a great job and it showed democrats can be competitive as did Gillum in Fl and Abrams in Ga. My biggest complaint with both is the laziness of the party. Dems need to come in a build the ground game in both states. And they better start now. What is the deal with McCaskill. My brother who lives in St. Louis area has been down on McCaskill but he as a republican said he would reluctantly vote for her.(He voted Kander in 2016 also). I am a huge Jason Kander fan and was hoping he might run for state office there again or try again for the senate. I know his PTSD issues forced him out of the mayoral race in KC. But why is McCaskill so hated?

Dan Lipinski easily won his district by 75% in Il3. But a literal Nazi got 25%. Let that sink in.

Guys I have worked the past few months canvassing, phonebanking, helping fundraise for Underwood. She's not my rep but is an AMAZING candidate and I will tell you if democrats can put up candidates like her the future is positive. 32 years old and a future star IMO And Illinois did its job as has Iowa, both flipping 2 congressional districts.

i'm actually salivating over Jerry Nadler being the chair of the House Judiciary Committee also.

I ve been super busy volunteering in recent weeks moreso than I planned. The horrible events over the past couple of weeks have led me and a couple of my friends to up our volunteer efforts here in Illinois. The shooting last weekend was a real tipping point. I was at a vigil on Sunday and outpouring of emotion, I can’t even describe it. And to those of you such as @Vee who have direct ties, I can’t even imagine how you must feel. I hope you know that so many out there share your sorrow and outrage. I hope you are all tuning out of the cable news outlets. I have for the past few months, and it doesn’t change what’s happening in the country but it does help you focus more directly on channeling that anger, outrage, fear, sorrow more positively I believe. Frankly I will never say anyone is asking for it. But CNN is frankly the worst. They put the worst people on. And hosts for example like Chris Cuomo feign a pretext of fairness while not putting on people with genuine arguments and positions but corporate shills who get paid to be outrageous. Most of them don’t even come across as genuine. It’s like a an op-Ed writer in The NY Times writing a column supporting the Saudis based on the nobility of the relationship with the US only to find out they are a lobbyist for the Saudis. CNN is more disingenuous than Fox because IMO Fox has no pretense and even o.n Fox you have Shep Smith and Chris Wallace who can be fair. And Chris is right. MSNBC has their own issues, and paid shills, but they do or did talk about other things when I was watching months back. Jeff Zucker is just a lazy hack who frankly likely doesn’t care if any of the staff at CNN gets hurt as long as it means more ratings. It’s sick.

This is the woman who is the GOP's great hope. God help us all. https://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/nikki-haley-almost-started-a-nuclear-war/

Its going to be someone in an office like Debbie Wasserman Schultz where they do not have super secret service protection.

The media needs to stop this f'in both sides narrative. I realize Steve Scalise was seriously shot and that was abhorrent but it's the president that is fueling this - NO ONE ELSE. Will they ever get off their lazy asses and talking points and call this out. Our press and media is failing this country miserably.

So reading that Tom Bonier timeline, a couple more things. Early absentee ballot voting in some states is only available to certain populations(seniors, military personnel). Funny how none of us hear about that. And while I do hear more reporting on the voter suppression, I hear nothing about the violent right events. Startling considering the murders over the past 2 years have been primarily from white supremacist/KKK/Nazi's - Charlottesville, the 2 indian men murdered in that Kansas bar by a white man, the 2 men on the train in Portland Or who were defending those 2 young muslim women and the 2 men were murdered, and I won't include Las Vegas shooting or the school shootings.

The medias doing the jobs of the GOP time and time again. Ignore the reports and vote. And interested they have these stats yet 3 of those states have no party affiliation designation Oh well just vote vote vote.

One piece of good news

Max it’s good to see you back here. A conservative who can speak to policy versus hyperbole i will challenge you on Maine. I’d call it more independent than republican. And it’s been that way. Olympia Snowe was a Republican Senator from this state, very popular, who was regularly vnamed one of the top 5 senators in congress because she was known for reaching across the aisle. She decided not to run in 2012 because she had gotten disgusted with the overly partisan Washington and particularly her party. As you can see Susan Collins is no Olympia Snowe or Margaret Chase Smith, another admirable GOP Senator from MAine. And LePage both times with around 38 percent of the vote, both elections with an independent spoiler. And by the way Angus King the other Senator is an independent not a republican.

Threatened him? GMAB. Schumer is a willing accomplice. That's pretty obvious at this point. He's gotten a lot himself out of this presidency and it was his aggressive push that helped move the administration towards moving the embassy to Jerusalem. I'm not a Greenwald fan, but damn he's right, the senate agrees on far more than they disagree on including the monstrous military giveaways.