08-24-2020, 10:07 PM
(This post was last modified: 08-25-2020, 01:32 PM by Eric the Green.)
(08-24-2020, 09:53 PM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote:(08-24-2020, 07:15 PM)Eric the Green Wrote:(08-24-2020, 06:40 AM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote:(08-24-2020, 06:09 AM)Eric the Green Wrote: The pendulum in the USA swung right in 1980 and has never swung back. Your view on this is the polar opposite of the truth. Progress has been stalled for 40 years of Republican control.
True on the large scale, if you are talking Gilded Age, FDR through LBJ, Nixon through Trump. Less true if you look at the smaller swings of the see saw within the unraveling.
Of course if you are counting the small unraveling swings we have swung beyond the right into Never Never Land.
The left swings provided by the first years of Clinton and first year of Obama were swings to the center, and for the rest of the 40 years we were swinging ever-rightward leading to where we are, never never land.
It is just that depending on where and when you developed your worldview, you will place the center in a different place. The left, center, right labels get a bit crazy if you try to include too large a difference.
Certainly, it depends on your worldview. From the perspective of where we had been before 1980, and where Europe and other nations have moved since, the USA has moved well to the right since then. It is hard for many in America to see this, since although to me it seems like 1980 was yesterday that America was driven off track by a phony-macho charming actor, many don't remember a time when America was closer to the political center, and have gotten used to the idea that any government action to help the people is socialism like we saw in Venezuela and the Soviet Union. Classic Xer is the best example of this here. He is more typical of Americans that we'd like to admit, although now I think he's part of a 45% or so minority.
I myself will never accept that the USA post-1980 is the timeframe in which we should define right, left and center. The swing right that has held since then is simply illegitimate, and is WAY long overdue to be reversed and shoved into the ashcan of history. I am indeed a Boomer, and to me the 60s and 70s is indeed the real America, not the 1980s and since. It is not crazy at all to recognize the wrong right-turn we have made. And I do think we are going to see a reversal to one extent or another. It depends on who the candidates are, meaning who actually wins the White House, as well as on who wins Congress. So how far the swing left will go is up in the air. If Harris is the nominee in 2024, the Left will lose the election, the pendulum-swing will continue-- and will get more extreme between each term for a while.
The Biden Bump, such as it is, will likely reach its high point in the next few days, and then we'll see what Trump is able to pull off.
Poll %s updated to Aug.25.
National Biden +9.3
Arizona Biden +4.8
Colorado Biden +14.5
Florida Biden +5.9
Georgia Trump +0.3
Iowa Trump +0.6
Kansas Trump +8.2
Michigan Biden +8.0
Minnesota Biden +5.8
Missouri Trump +4.7
Montana Trump +8.3
Nevada Biden +7.9
New Hampshire Biden +9.3
North Carolina Biden +1.9
Ohio Trump +0.1
Pennsylvania Biden +6.3
South Carolina Trump +5.9
Texas Trump +1.0
Utah Trump +10.4
Virginia Biden +11.4
Wisconsin Biden +7.1
California Biden +32.6
https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/pol.../national/