12-07-2017, 11:34 PM
(11-27-2017, 11:30 AM)David Horn Wrote:(11-26-2017, 03:51 PM)Warren Dew Wrote: That, and the fact that on average the four labeled points skew Republican by 4 points. That would have the Republicans losing the popular House vote by about 4 points, which given the Democrats' concentration in highly blue districts, would still have Republicans barely hanging on to the House.
Then there's the issue of taxation without adequate representation. Do you honestly think that the mostly BLUE urbanites will countenance greatly diminished representation while paying the lion's share of the nation's taxes? Both disparities have been growing in the last few decades. I'll wager that we aren't too far from the tipping point, where that issue will move to the center of the political stage.
Add to this any perception that the Republicans are using changes in tax laws to reward supporters and punish opponents. This is not the GOP of the Gerald Ford - Bob Michel era anymore; this is a rigidly-disciplined cadre party intent on ruining the other side. Whether it can get away with such will either determine what sort of America meets the most dangerous phase of this Crisis Era. Corrupt, dictatorial regimes fared badly in the last Crisis Era. That observation includes Stalin's Soviet Union, which survived only because it could sacrifice far more cannon fodder than Nazi Germany.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.