"Is The Democratic Party Becoming More Like The GOP?"

[_EAllusion]

The latter isn’t new with Trump. GWB tried to use the DOJ as a political tool to create a permanent Republican majority.

The variation of this under GWB was different and less extreme. The bigger scandal wasn't the Gonzalez purging, in my opinion, but using the DoJ to pipeline fundamentalist university grads from garbage law schools to get them sufficient experience to have credentials to take over the judicial system.

It's part of the pattern of ever-worsening willingness to break norms around good governance in order to further entrench power.

[_EAllusion]

I think they just want people willing to not leak and sabotage the incoming administration. A large majority of the left and many on this board want to deny the presidency to the man democratically elected any way they can because their liberal principles come first before democracy.

That is a line used to justify purging people insufficiently loyal to Trump, but I do think you know better. In any case, it does not ballpark Republican actions and rhetoric around the politicization of the DoJ and FBI spearheaded by Trump.

e.g. https://www.realclearpolitics.com/video ... purge.html

Loretta Lynch's two hour meeting with WJC to discuss covering up the Clinton private server scandal comes to mind.

That's the conspiracy theory version of events that isn't actually in record. What we have is a meeting that gives the appearance of impropriety. Which, as it happens, is far, far less consequential than systematically pushing out career civil servants at the FBI because Trump does not trust their personal loyalty to him above the rule of law.

[_Xenophon]

Excellent thoughts, RI, thanks for sharing. I think we are generally in agreement, especially on the "not as much front". Although the order of magnitude is much less I'm definitely interested in heading some trends I see off at the pass as I'm feeling more and more like there is less room in middle and it is a lot easier to worry about my own house first. A couple of points I think worth expanding on from your post:

One thing that I thought they put too much emphasis on is increased self-identification as "liberal."

I don't disagree that some of this is related to the previous negative connotations of this word being erased and progressives sort of "taking it back" allowing some that might previously have labeled themselves as moderates to come out as liberals. I don't think this is the whole story though, as a bit of a personal anecdote I'm involved with the Democrat Party within my area (a very small group) and I will say that the active members are more progressive than ever, especially as some of the older guard has either retired or passed away. I know it is a sample size of one but I suspect this is indicative of a larger trend. As has been noted here frequently, if only Millennials voted we would be Scandinavia already and I'm not really seeing those positions

What's been tested this year? The ACA is pretty mainstream, opposition to the tax cut bill was pretty mainstream. DACA is supported by Lindsay Graham and lots of other Republicans.

The ACA is pretty mainstream but there is a trend among basically all prominent Democrats right now to move to a "Medicare-for-All" solution and I've noticed that even those that question how that works within the party are finding less opportunity to voice their disagreement (honestly we could probably make a whole new OP on this alone). And although DACA is immensely popular, shutting down the government over it isn't/wasn't, it also didn't rank very highly in the public's priority list.

Again, this is a tough topic to argue for me as it is hard to worry about the smoke on our side when I can clearly see the dumpster fire on the other side but I think it is an important one. One of the hardest parts of this is that most of people that will reasonably discuss it are probably not the ones at the root of the issue. Case in point, I seem to recall you stating you were quite left of center RI but you are also a thoughtful well reasoned individual that can see a good argument/solution when it is presented. I'm finding that characteristic to be less common and it leads to this sort of partisan divide that I think breeds extremism.

[_Xenophon]

The problem here is twofold. 1) It would be a bad thing if the Democrats increasingly destroyed political norms to achieve political goals and 2) Given what Republicans are doing, it would be atrocious political strategy and irrational of Democrats not to respond by doing this.

This is part of why what the Republican party is doing is so bad.

It is certainly a conundrum and I'll claim no special insight into the solution.

Part of the problem I see in Democrats trying to emulate the disruptive political tactics is that they aren't all that good at them. Sure they can help facilitate a government shutdown but they didn't really have the gumption to stick with it (thankfully). I question whether half-way doing some of these moves is better than not stooping to that level at all.

[_Maksutov]

The new Republican Party is not conservative but Radical. The Democrats could claim that they are now the real conservatives--the ones wanting to hold on to the achievements of pluralistic society, science, etc. But then they would have to do more than just whine and mock, they would need to start creating institutions and take on the rural-urban divide.

Hey Mak, what kind of institutions are you talking about?

Organizations for educating and problem solving without resorting to the old identity-based coalitions. Howard Dean advocated this stuff years ago but he didn't have the charisma of a Bernie or the organization of a Hillary Clinton so he was ignored.

[_EAllusion]

Government shutdowns always thaw. I'm more interested in things like electioneering strategies that reduce Republican turnout. Democrats are helped right now from an image perspective in that many steps they could take to improve voter turnout for them are also the right thing to do for fair government. However, that's not everything and it doesn't have to be that way.

Democrats could do what Republicans do and just start ruthlessly reducing the number of polling locations in rural areas to make it more of a burden to vote while increasing them in urban areas. That alone is enough to swing elections at the margins.

To the extent Republicans do this, it's bad practice not to meet them with couterpunches. That's literally how you get President Trump.

[_Xenophon]

Democrats could do what Republicans do and just start ruthlessly reducing the number of polling locations in rural areas to make it more of a burden to vote while increasing them in urban areas. That alone is enough to swing elections at the margins.

To the extent Republicans do this, it's bad practice not to meet them with couterpunches. That's literally how you get President Trump.

They could, and maybe this is why I'm too squeamish to be a politician, but I would resist this. Isn't the better fight in trying to undo the damage Republicans have done, not in trying to inflict further damage? I understand that relaxing voting laws, allowing ex-felons to vote and others policies might be seen as a similar tactic but I'm much more comfortable with expanding voting rights than restricting them. I'm probably just being naïve but if both sides resort to constricting the vote in order to win then I'm pretty sure we already lost as a nation

[_EAllusion]

Democrats could do what Republicans do and just start ruthlessly reducing the number of polling locations in rural areas to make it more of a burden to vote while increasing them in urban areas. That alone is enough to swing elections at the margins.

To the extent Republicans do this, it's bad practice not to meet them with couterpunches. That's literally how you get President Trump.

They could, and maybe this is why I'm too squeamish to be a politician, but I would resist this. Isn't the better fight in trying to undo the damage Republicans have done, not in trying to inflict further damage? I understand that relaxing voting laws, allowing ex-felons to vote and others policies might be seen as a similar tactic but I'm much more comfortable with expanding voting rights than restricting them. I'm probably just being naïve but if both sides resort to constricting the vote in order to win then I'm pretty sure we already lost as a nation

So far that strategy has only netted them further tightening of the noose. I think it is neccesary to participate in an arms race until both sides agree to a peaceful compromise. Otherwise your just allowing the country to become North Carolina or Wisconsin.

You mentioned that Democrats are bad at this. They aren't though. It's that they don't do it because their branding and media positioning prevents them from really getting in the mud to the same extent. But that's gradually changing and the left flank is pushing in that direction because they are tired of being rolled by Republicans unbound.

[_Xenophon]

I may very well be wrong on this but I'm just skeptical that it is a long term positive for the country if Democrats "get in the mud" here. We got Trump for a lot of different reasons than just these questionable tactics. Sure they played their part but you know as well as anyone that this could have broken differently over a thousand variables.

I get that my particular rules of engagement hamstring Democrats but it seems to me to be an ideal worth fighting over. I'm not even saying they have to ignore every new precedent Republicans have set, I'm all in favor of them feeding them their own medicine on a Supreme Court nomination late in Trump's term. All I'm trying to suggest is that if we have to get to the point where we are trying to restrict voting as well, I see that as a total failure.

[_EAllusion]

I may very well be wrong on this but I'm just skeptical that it is a long term positive for the country if Democrats "get in the mud" here. We got Trump for a lot of different reasons than just these questionable tactics. Sure they played their part but you know as well as anyone that this could have broken differently over a thousand variables.

I get that my particular rules of engagement hamstring Democrats but it seems to me to be an ideal worth fighting over. I'm not even saying they have to ignore every new precedent Republicans have set, I'm all in favor of them feeding them their own medicine on a Supreme Court nomination late in Trump's term. All I'm trying to suggest is that if we have to get to the point where we are trying to restrict voting as well, I see that as a total failure.

Reading the last paragraph, I don't think we are all that far apart. My comments are coming from a strategic perspective. I think it might help to have specific examples of what we are talking about.

During the Obama admin, Republicans significantly escalated an already ongoing trend of gumming up the the confirmation process for judicial appointments when they were the minority party in the Senate. When they took the majority after the 2014 election, they effectively ground it to a halt all the way up to the Supreme Court. There are four possible government scenarios for the judicial appointment process:

Undivided Democratic Control.
Divided Democratic/Republican control with Republicans controlling the confirmation process.
Divided Democratic/Republican control with Democrats controlling the confirmation process.
Undivided Republican control.

Democrats can only get their nominees on the bench when they have undivided control based on Republican willingness to use parliamentary power to stop them otherwise. If Democrats do not return the favor, then Republicans can get nominees on the bench both when they have undivided control and when they have the presidency. The net effect of this would be an inexorable disproportionate number of Republican appointees making it to the bench. It's just math. Either Democrats roll over and concede a branch of government or they also engage in these tactics. Doing so is the only way they'll be able to force a compromise, possibly through Constitutional changes. This is the price of destroying norms.

Likewise, under the Trump admin, we've seen a significant increase in willingness to nominate people with either dubious qualifications and/or questionable temperament to the bench because those nominees have a good combination of young age for a lifetime appointment and likelihood of serving Republican/conservative partisan interests from the bench. Republican Senators have, with few exceptions, green-lighted this with parliamentary bloc voting. If Democrats don't also do this, then overtime you will see a gradual takeover of the courts by partisan hacks from one side. That's what happens when you appoint people who will serve longer and with more political fidelity than the other guys. Nobody wants less qualified partisan hacks coming from both sides, but what can you do when one party isn't willing to play ball the nice way?

Then take a plan like this that's been floated out there:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions ... be396af4c3

If Republicans were to do that, Democrats either concede a branch of government to what effectively is a hostile takeover or they fight back with the tools they have when they have them, which likely means courtpacking the second they get the votes to do it. In fact, it wouldn't be a bad idea for Democrats to try and pack the Supreme Court to make up for Gorsuch if they were fortunate enough to sweep power in 2020 on the backs of a recession.

You can take these issues of breaking norms one by one and I think you'll find this pattern emerges again and again. If Trump succeeds in purging career civil servants at the FBI in favor of those who would harass Democrats while protecting Republicans like he so clearly wants to, the only thing you can do to remedy that situation is counterpurge at the first available oppurtunity. Otherwise, you're guaranteeing Democrat control of any government body will be Benghazi'ed until it is no more. It's conceding power through inaction.