Quote:Legend has it that after leveling Carthage in the Third Punic War, Roman army generals ordered that the city’s fields be sown with salt so that they’d lie fallow for years, Roman generals not being particularly well known for their benevolence in victory.


Many Republicans think Donald Trump’s nomination is doing roughly the same thing to their party: destroying any chance for growth it once had and leaving the GOP to wither and die on Trump vineyard vines.


“My general sense, looking at this election, is that what we’re witnessing here is the end of something much more than the beginning of something,” Yuval Levin, editor of the conservative policy journal National Affairs, told me recently...




http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-end-of-a-republican-party/

(07-18-2016, 08:42 PM)Dan Wrote: http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-end-of-a-republican-party/

Quote:Legend has it that after leveling Carthage in the Third Punic War, Roman army generals ordered that the city’s fields be sown with salt so that they’d lie fallow for years, Roman generals not being particularly well known for their benevolence in victory.


Many Republicans think Donald Trump’s nomination is doing roughly the same thing to their party: destroying any chance for growth it once had and leaving the GOP to wither and die on Trump vineyard vines.


“My general sense, looking at this election, is that what we’re witnessing here is the end of something much more than the beginning of something,” Yuval Levin, editor of the conservative policy journal National Affairs, told me recently...




http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-end-of-a-republican-party/

(07-21-2016, 07:23 AM)Anthony Wrote: But is the Democratic Party really in any better shape?

True, thanks to the hardhat takeover of the Republicans via Trump, they are no longer a threat - but the anti-neoliberal stalwarts are a threat, and are increasingly singing Bad Moon Rising:

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/michael-moore-says-trump-is-913121

(07-21-2016, 11:26 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: Could it be that Americans are so fed up with this system during a 4T that they will do what needs to be done, and become parliamentarians? With the other reforms along with it?

Enact a parliamentary system
Introduce proportional representation of parties in congress
Establish ranked-choice voting so your second choice counts
End gerrymandering
Take money out of politics

(07-21-2016, 11:26 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: Could it be that Americans are so fed up with this system during a 4T that they will do what needs to be done, and become parliamentarians? With the other reforms along with it?

Enact a parliamentary system
Introduce proportional representation of parties in congress
Establish ranked-choice voting so your second choice counts
End gerrymandering
Take money out of politics

Quote:GOP strategist Nicole Wallace reacted to Donald Trump’s ominous speech at Republican National Convention by declaring that her party was dead.
Wallace, who served on Sen. John McCain’s 2008 campaign, spoke candidly as Trump wrapped up his acceptance of the Republican nomination for president and embraced his family on the stage Thursday night.
“You know, listening to this, I was struck by two things that I always believed during my two decades in the Republican politics,” she explained to NBC’s Lester Holt. “One, the voters always get it right. And two, the Republican Party that I worked for for two decades died in this room tonight.”
“We are now represented as a party by a man who believes in protectionism, isolationism and nativism,” Wallace continued. “And those are the forces that George W. Bush and, I belive, John McCain were most worried about during their times as the leaders of the Republican Party.”
NBC’s Chuck Todd was stunned: “You believe the party died tonight?”
“Well, the voters picked this guy, this is where the Republican Party is now,” Wallace replied. “They now are attracted to those forces of isolationism and protectionism.”
“But the party I was part of for two decades is dead.”

Quote:Never mind the message of making America "one again" — conservatives weredrastically split following Donald Trump's acceptance of the Republican nomination Thursday night. On CNN, things ignited when Ana Navarro stood up to Trump supporter Jeffrey Lord and former Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski.
"I'm embarrassed of my party. He sounded like a fearmonger. This is not Republicanism," Navarro said.
"Wow. Wow," Lord said over her, shaking his head.



"If you think anything that man said tonight is going to solve this crisis, you heard a different speech," she continued, raising her voice even more.
The argument continued:

Quote:[/url]

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Adrian Carrasquillo 

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Jeffrey Lord says to @ananavarro and @VanJones68 enough w/ identity politics

Navarro: That's easy to say as a white man.
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(07-22-2016, 06:50 AM)Odin Wrote:

(07-21-2016, 11:26 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: Could it be that Americans are so fed up with this system during a 4T that they will do what needs to be done, and become parliamentarians? With the other reforms along with it?

Enact a parliamentary system
Introduce proportional representation of parties in congress
Establish ranked-choice voting so your second choice counts
End gerrymandering
Take money out of politics

I oppose Proportional Representation because people just have to vote for the party and have no power to chose who the actual individual representing them is. It would make the hold of the party bosses even stronger than it is now. I do like ranked-choice voting, though.

(07-22-2016, 03:41 AM)pbrower2a Wrote: American and British occupiers practically dictated what sort of Constitutional order would arise in western Germany, in Italy, and even in France after World War II -- Constitutions that would more rigidly thwart totalitarian tendencies.

Quote:It's more likely that the two parties will morph into new entities, shedding and adding new members until an equilibrium occurs. I don't have the foggiest what that will be, but it won't mimic the European parties because we aren't operationally parliamentarians. I do know that neither party is really functional, but the first to reform successfully will have the upper hand for a decade at least.

(07-23-2016, 10:14 AM)Anthony 58 Wrote:

Quote:It's more likely that the two parties will morph into new entities, shedding and adding new members until an equilibrium occurs. I don't have the foggiest what that will be, but it won't mimic the European parties because we aren't operationally parliamentarians. I do know that neither party is really functional, but the first to reform successfully will have the upper hand for a decade at least.

I of course maintain that this process is already well under way, with the Republicans moving away from conservatism and toward national liberalism (or even National Socialism!), and the Democrats abandoning left-liberalism in favor of neoliberalism.

(07-23-2016, 12:28 PM)Eric the Green Wrote:

(07-23-2016, 10:14 AM)Anthony Wrote:

Quote:It's more likely that the two parties will morph into new entities, shedding and adding new members until an equilibrium occurs.  I don't have the foggiest what that will be, but it won't mimic the European parties because we aren't operationally parliamentarians.  I do know that neither party is really functional, but the first to reform successfully will have the upper hand for a decade at least.

I of course maintain that this process is already well under way, with the Republicans moving away from conservatism and toward national liberalism (or even National Socialism!), and the Democrats abandoning left-liberalism in favor of neoliberalism.

Only if you discount the great important of the Sanders campaign. Bernie got more votes than The Donald, and he may push the Democrats AND the neo-liberal Democratic president's wife to the Left and most-specifically AWAY from neo-liberalism.

Quote:Trump is a mixed bag who departs from some Republican neo-liberal shibboliths, but he's also neo-liberal to the max in his embrace of supply-side, trickle-down economics, including trashing the climate, and promises to stifle any reform of the "rigged system" of crony capitalism (which he says he's the only one who can fix because he's a crony capitalist) by appointing more Scalias to the Supreme Court. Citizens United guarantees no reform as long as it's the law.

(07-23-2016, 03:46 PM)Anthony 58 Wrote: Supply-side, trickle-down economics - like slamming on the door on immigration to create labor shortages that will send low-end wages into the ionosphere - then the semi-skilled demand a raise to maintain a differential, and after they get it, the highly skilled do the same - banning the outsourcing of jobs, and slapping tariffs on foreign-made goods?

Trump is a complete demand-sider - and an ardent advocate of trickle-up economics.

Quote:There is no immigration today, so only deportation will work for the Malthusian strategy. Even so, population increase has always been a pro-growth strategy that works.

John Dingell 

✔@JohnDingell

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