Tea party favorite Michele Bachmann of Minnesota is throwing her hat into the ring for Republican Conference chairwoman, adding yet another candidate to what is already shaping up to be a free-for-all race for the No. 3 spot in the House Republican hierarchy.
Bachmann spokesman Sergio Gor said Tuesday that the congresswoman has been encouraged to run for the spot by some conservative members and is considering making a run.
“We have been contacted by some members about that. If the opportunity were to present itself, she would definitely consider it,” he said.
Bachmann is one of many strong-willed conservatives House Minority Leader John Boehner of Ohio will have to deal with if he takes leadership of a large Republican majority after election night. Bachmann, who founded the Tea Party Caucus, has made herself a spokeswoman for conservatives in Congress even though she’s been in the House for only two terms and holds no formal leadership position.
Well, the lame duck session will finally live up to its name. I expect zero action prior to January.
Florida was an almost total beating for the Dems, even though my local races turned out mostly the way I wanted them to. On the upside, the amendments turned out the way I wanted. Of note are amendments 5 and 6, which are meant to combat gerrymandering. This should make redistricting highly entertaining, as the GOP dominated legislature is sure to try to circumvent the new amendments to the constitution.
And with Pam Bondi and Rick Scott running things, there's no way to stop them!
Nah, the best thing they can do is try to fuck with the eventual legislation that defines the new rules for drawing districts. This, in turn, will open up the whole process to lawsuits, which will stall the redistricting process and draw attention to the shenanigans. Since it's in our constitution now, the state SC will be forced to rule against these attempts. Like I said, it should be fun to watch them make a go at it.
SteevLWhat can I do for you?Registered Userregular
edited November 2010
I got a little sad an hour or two ago when I read that Alex Sink conceded to Rick Scott. I kind of feel like how I did in 2004, although it doesn't feel as bad this time.
So I guess after the next two years of getting nothing accomplished the only question will be: who gets accused of being obstructionist jackasses in '12?
There's a pretty easy roadmap to blaming the Democrats.
Bills get introduced in the House. They either get killed by Democrats in the Senate or by a Presidential veto. GOP blames the Dems. Lather, rinse, repeat. That'll be the GOP gameplan for the next 2 years.
Modern Man on
Aetian Jupiter - 41 Gunslinger - The Old Republic
Rigorous Scholarship
So I guess after the next two years of getting nothing accomplished the only question will be: who gets accused of being obstructionist jackasses in '12?
There's a pretty easy roadmap to blaming the Democrats.
Bills get introduced in the House. They either get killed by Democrats in the Senate or by a Presidential veto. GOP blames the Dems. Lather, rinse, repeat. That'll be the GOP gameplan for the next 2 years.
So I guess after the next two years of getting nothing accomplished the only question will be: who gets accused of being obstructionist jackasses in '12?
There's a pretty easy roadmap to blaming the Democrats.
Bills get introduced in the House. They either get killed by Democrats in the Senate or by a Presidential veto. GOP blames the Dems. Lather, rinse, repeat. That'll be the GOP gameplan for the next 2 years.
It's all about messaging. Admittedly, Democrats suck at it. But if they can do, as mentioned earlier, characterize every GOP bill as screwing over America they might do okay.
Of course, reality will see the Democrats pussy-foot around the screeching howler monkey political party that is the GOP.
So I guess after the next two years of getting nothing accomplished the only question will be: who gets accused of being obstructionist jackasses in '12?
There's a pretty easy roadmap to blaming the Democrats.
Bills get introduced in the House. They either get killed by Democrats in the Senate or by a Presidential veto. GOP blames the Dems. Lather, rinse, repeat. That'll be the GOP gameplan for the next 2 years.
So I guess after the next two years of getting nothing accomplished the only question will be: who gets accused of being obstructionist jackasses in '12?
There's a pretty easy roadmap to blaming the Democrats.
Bills get introduced in the House. They either get killed by Democrats in the Senate or by a Presidential veto. GOP blames the Dems. Lather, rinse, repeat. That'll be the GOP gameplan for the next 2 years.
The dems could just filibuster everything
Democrats filibustering sometimes is obstructionist. Republicans filibustering everything is defending freedom from socialism.
So I guess after the next two years of getting nothing accomplished the only question will be: who gets accused of being obstructionist jackasses in '12?
There's a pretty easy roadmap to blaming the Democrats.
Bills get introduced in the House. They either get killed by Democrats in the Senate or by a Presidential veto. GOP blames the Dems. Lather, rinse, repeat. That'll be the GOP gameplan for the next 2 years.
The dems could just filibuster everything
That's what I see happening. Or they could pass their own version of the bill and kill it in the conference committee or when the compromise bill comes back (because no one cares at that point).
So, are they serious about repealing the healthcare stuff, all the GOP talking heads on the news this morning were talking about that. Or is that just dick waving?
how could they possibly do it?
They can't. The House will pass the repeal bill, but the Senate never will, nor would Obama ever sign it if the Senate somehow did.
Like the deficit, fixing entitlements, and the wars, this is an issue that they'll gin up for votes without actually doing anything. Mark my words, in two years they'll still be running on repealing the bill without ever having accomplished anything.
Thread title should reflect the our new reality. Like,
"111th Congress, let's get our Hearing ears on"
"Politics '10-'12: the end times are upon us".
Anyway, Murkoski is winning? That's cool.
There's going to be a long, long, drag-out process before she actually "wins."
First they need to read the Write-In ballots and make sure enough of them are filled in correctly (No mispellings, oval is filled in) and that they're not for Kermit the Frog or something. Then there's going to be litigation over that Write-In list issue, then we'll probably need to wait for the absintee ballots to be counted, then Miller will probably demand a recount.
This will be a Cluster Q. Fuck.
This is going to make the Ted Stevens/Mark Begich race look easy in comparison.
So I guess after the next two years of getting nothing accomplished the only question will be: who gets accused of being obstructionist jackasses in '12?
There's a pretty easy roadmap to blaming the Democrats.
Bills get introduced in the House. They either get killed by Democrats in the Senate or by a Presidential veto. GOP blames the Dems. Lather, rinse, repeat. That'll be the GOP gameplan for the next 2 years.
The dems could just filibuster everything
I guess they could, if they wanted to play right into the GOP narrative.
Modern Man on
Aetian Jupiter - 41 Gunslinger - The Old Republic
Rigorous Scholarship
I think Miller and Murkowski are going to insist on that themselves. Even if the spoilage/non-Murkowski write-in votes are a high enough fraction that it becomes clear that she can't win, or low enough that he can't, they'll fight to the bitter end.
So I guess after the next two years of getting nothing accomplished the only question will be: who gets accused of being obstructionist jackasses in '12?
There's a pretty easy roadmap to blaming the Democrats.
Bills get introduced in the House. They either get killed by Democrats in the Senate or by a Presidential veto. GOP blames the Dems. Lather, rinse, repeat. That'll be the GOP gameplan for the next 2 years.
The dems could just filibuster everything
I guess they could, if they wanted to play right into the GOP narrative.
They could filibuster everything and still not hit the number of filibusters the GOP did over the last two years, so the GOP should be careful there.
Of course, its' the Dems, they suck at message so you are probably right.
So I guess after the next two years of getting nothing accomplished the only question will be: who gets accused of being obstructionist jackasses in '12?
There's a pretty easy roadmap to blaming the Democrats.
Bills get introduced in the House. They either get killed by Democrats in the Senate or by a Presidential veto. GOP blames the Dems. Lather, rinse, repeat. That'll be the GOP gameplan for the next 2 years.
The dems could just filibuster everything
I guess they could, if they wanted to play right into the GOP narrative.
They could filibuster everything and still not hit the number of filibusters the GOP did over the last two years, so the GOP should be careful there.
Of course, its' the Dems, they suck at message so you are probably right.
Nobody cares what happened in the past, except us dorky political junkies on the internet. All people will care about is that Democrats are filibustering the "Put American Back to Work" bill. The GOP will hammer the point over and over again, and the Dems will either have to fold or dig in their heels and give the GOP more ammunition come 2012.
And the 2012 election will be a refendum on Obama's job performance, not Congress'. If we've still got high unemployment and low economic growth, people will blame the President, not some relatively obscure Republicans in Congress.
Modern Man on
Aetian Jupiter - 41 Gunslinger - The Old Republic
Rigorous Scholarship
So I guess after the next two years of getting nothing accomplished the only question will be: who gets accused of being obstructionist jackasses in '12?
There's a pretty easy roadmap to blaming the Democrats.
Bills get introduced in the House. They either get killed by Democrats in the Senate or by a Presidential veto. GOP blames the Dems. Lather, rinse, repeat. That'll be the GOP gameplan for the next 2 years.
Who actually obstructs legislation has so little to do with who gets blamed for it. Generally the uninformed public tends to blame whichever party controls the White House, so if for some unthinkable reason 2012 gives us Democratic majorities in the House and Senate and President Sarah "wait I'm supposed to do this for FOUR years?!?!" Palin, the Democrats could filibuster everything and blame it on the Republicans and it would probably work.
Anyways, nobody cares about obstructionism. If the Republicans make a serious push for privatizing Social Security, the Democrats could "obstruct" it all day and not lose a single vote over it. Obstructionism has never been a particularly biting accusation, and considering how technical the actual definitions of what you do or don't oppose can be its one voters are not likely to ever start caring about.
2012 will probably be a minor victory for Democrats, 2010 didn't see significant defections of Obama supporters, just significantly lower turnout (as always, midterms are for the 60+ crowd and the young only vote when there's a president on the ballot). I doubt the Democrats will retake the House, I imagine a slightly stronger Senate majority. Could depend on the economy, if the inevitable mortgage nightmare reaches critical mass politics could get really weird / interesting for a short while.
Generally I'm more of the "elections follow semi-predictable models based on economic activity" mindset, but for whatever percentage you want to assign to candidate skill, Sarah Palin is going to be a fun disaster to watch. While the Tea Party is still a questionable entity for the GOP (some obvious benefits, some obvious drawbacks), Palin has provided perhaps the most compelling argument to date that candidate skill and proper campaigning can win or lose you an election. There's a slightly disingenuous but still slightly convincing (and remarkably entertaining) notion floating around that Sarah Palin has cost the Republicans the Senate, and its unlikely they'll have another shot at it before 2014.
Other than Palin, I'm interested to see what 2012 has in store for initiatives. Conservatives have done a pretty good job of using initiatives to enact portions of their agenda regardless of government control, its only a matter of time before the real action is initiatives and the politicians are mostly there for show.
Don't just hate on the youth vote. Hate on the campaigns who didn't spend much time going after the youth vote this cycle. Whole self fulfilling prophecy thing I was babbling about in the last thread.
Makes me so angry. Democrats, you just passed a ton of things that meaningfully affect the youth vote (parental insurance, student loan reform, credit card reform); maybe you should mention them?
enlightenedbum on
Self-righteousness is incompatible with coalition building.
Don't just hate on the youth vote. Hate on the campaigns who didn't spend much time going after the youth vote this cycle. Whole self fulfilling prophecy thing I was babbling about in the last thread.
Makes me so angry. Democrats, you just passed a ton of things that meaningfully affect the youth vote (parental insurance, student loan reform, credit card reform); maybe you should mention them?
Nah, we're just gonna run away from our accomplishments as fast as we can. The Democratic way!
So I guess after the next two years of getting nothing accomplished the only question will be: who gets accused of being obstructionist jackasses in '12?
There's a pretty easy roadmap to blaming the Democrats.
Bills get introduced in the House. They either get killed by Democrats in the Senate or by a Presidential veto. GOP blames the Dems. Lather, rinse, repeat. That'll be the GOP gameplan for the next 2 years.
The dems could just filibuster everything
I guess they could, if they wanted to play right into the GOP narrative.
They could filibuster everything and still not hit the number of filibusters the GOP did over the last two years, so the GOP should be careful there.
Of course, its' the Dems, they suck at message so you are probably right.
Nobody cares what happened in the past, except us dorky political junkies on the internet. All people will care about is that Democrats are filibustering the "Put American Back to Work" bill. The GOP will hammer the point over and over again, and the Dems will either have to fold or dig in their heels and give the GOP more ammunition come 2012.
And the 2012 election will be a refendum on Obama's job performance, not Congress'. If we've still got high unemployment and low economic growth, people will blame the President, not some relatively obscure Republicans in Congress.
Problem being that the bill has to make it to the floor to be filibustered. The Senate already has hundreds of bills its currently ignoring from the House. What's more likely is that the House will pass a bill and demand that the Senate adopt it without changes, the Senate will ignore them and make its own version, and then the conference committee will fall apart because the House Republicans can't be seen compromising on anything. Thus the narrative you mention won't really happen that way, and because they like controversy, the media will happily report the strife. It won't even get to the filibuster stage, and if it does, it will be the Republicans doing the filibustering.
All people will care about is that Democrats are filibustering the "Put American Back to Work" bill. The GOP will hammer the point over and over again, and the Dems will either have to fold or dig in their heels and give the GOP more ammunition come 2012.
Actually if by "people" you mean "average voter who doesn't follow politics" most of them don't even know what a filibuster is. Obstructionism doesn't matter for elections. Its just a word that is supposed to be an insult and is kind of randomly thrown around, which I find surprising given how toothless it is as an insult.
So I guess after the next two years of getting nothing accomplished the only question will be: who gets accused of being obstructionist jackasses in '12?
There's a pretty easy roadmap to blaming the Democrats.
Bills get introduced in the House. They either get killed by Democrats in the Senate or by a Presidential veto. GOP blames the Dems. Lather, rinse, repeat. That'll be the GOP gameplan for the next 2 years.
The dems could just filibuster everything
I guess they could, if they wanted to play right into the GOP narrative.
They could filibuster everything and still not hit the number of filibusters the GOP did over the last two years, so the GOP should be careful there.
Of course, its' the Dems, they suck at message so you are probably right.
Nobody cares what happened in the past, except us dorky political junkies on the internet. All people will care about is that Democrats are filibustering the "Put American Back to Work" bill. The GOP will hammer the point over and over again, and the Dems will either have to fold or dig in their heels and give the GOP more ammunition come 2012.
And the 2012 election will be a refendum on Obama's job performance, not Congress'. If we've still got high unemployment and low economic growth, people will blame the President, not some relatively obscure Republicans in Congress.
Problem being that the bill has to make it to the floor to be filibustered. The Senate already has hundreds of bills its currently ignoring from the House. What's more likely is that the House will pass a bill and demand that the Senate adopt it without changes, the Senate will ignore them and make its own version, and then the conference committee will fall apart because the House Republicans can't be seen compromising on anything. Thus the narrative you mention won't really happen that way, and because they like controversy, the media will happily report the strife. It won't even get to the filibuster stage, and if it does, it will be the Republicans doing the filibustering.
just like it hurt the republicans filibustering in 2009 and 2010
There's a slightly disingenuous but still slightly convincing (and remarkably entertaining) notion floating around that Sarah Palin has cost the Republicans the Senate, and its unlikely they'll have another shot at it before 2014.
The 2012 Senate map for Democrats sucks almost as much as the 2016 map we just generated does for Republicans. Webb, Brown of Ohio, McCaskill, Cantwell given how close Rossi keeps coming to winning, Tester, Casey Jr., Stabenow if unemployment doesn't improve a lot. Basically, most of the seats we took, plus a few longer-time incumbents. Of course, we'd take Brown of Massachusetts and have a decent shot at Collins depending on how the tea party fares by her primary. I honestly wouldn't be surprised if Obama won, and we lost the Senate and retook the House.
So I guess after the next two years of getting nothing accomplished the only question will be: who gets accused of being obstructionist jackasses in '12?
There's a pretty easy roadmap to blaming the Democrats.
Bills get introduced in the House. They either get killed by Democrats in the Senate or by a Presidential veto. GOP blames the Dems. Lather, rinse, repeat. That'll be the GOP gameplan for the next 2 years.
The dems could just filibuster everything
I guess they could, if they wanted to play right into the GOP narrative.
They could filibuster everything and still not hit the number of filibusters the GOP did over the last two years, so the GOP should be careful there.
Of course, its' the Dems, they suck at message so you are probably right.
Nobody cares what happened in the past, except us dorky political junkies on the internet. All people will care about is that Democrats are filibustering the "Put American Back to Work" bill. The GOP will hammer the point over and over again, and the Dems will either have to fold or dig in their heels and give the GOP more ammunition come 2012.
And the 2012 election will be a refendum on Obama's job performance, not Congress'. If we've still got high unemployment and low economic growth, people will blame the President, not some relatively obscure Republicans in Congress.
Problem being that the bill has to make it to the floor to be filibustered. The Senate already has hundreds of bills its currently ignoring from the House. What's more likely is that the House will pass a bill and demand that the Senate adopt it without changes, the Senate will ignore them and make its own version, and then the conference committee will fall apart because the House Republicans can't be seen compromising on anything. Thus the narrative you mention won't really happen that way, and because they like controversy, the media will happily report the strife. It won't even get to the filibuster stage, and if it does, it will be the Republicans doing the filibustering.
just like it hurt the republicans filibustering in 2009 and 2010
Expectations are somewhat higher now that they've got the House, so Senate gridlock actually hurts them now. We'll know the way things will play out once we get to the first bit of "must pass" legislation.
The short-sightedness is more troublesome than the selfishness. It's the reason we're never going to fix a lot of long-term problems, nor will we be the number one economy.
The myopic selfishness of people is really troublesome.
Welcome to democracy. People vote what they consider to be their own interests. As long as you have a system involving human beings, that will happen.
I know, and that can be incredibly depressing. As idiotic as people are, and how bad it currently seems, it's not really any different then it ever has been.
The short-sightedness is more troublesome than the selfishness. It's the reason we're never going to fix a lot of long-term problems, nor will we be the number one economy.
This is the sort of thing that Democrats need to fix on in messaging.
"You know what? We used to be a great country. Our infrastructure used to be one the world looked to with awe. Our educational systems were used as examples world-wide. But short-sighted greed has hurt us deeply. We are no longer asking ourselves 'What can we do for our country,' but instead, 'How can I get mine?' Our country has problems, and it needs solutions, and it needs sacrifices."
The short-sightedness is more troublesome than the selfishness. It's the reason we're never going to fix a lot of long-term problems, nor will we be the number one economy.
This is the sort of thing that Democrats need to fix on in messaging.
"You know what? We used to be a great country. Our infrastructure used to be one the world looked to with awe. Our educational systems were used as examples world-wide. But short-sighted greed has hurt us deeply. We are no longer asking ourselves 'What can we do for our country,' but instead, 'How can I get mine?' Our country has problems, and it needs solutions, and it needs sacrifices."
And I can counter that with a much easier to digest soundbite:
"Democrats want to raise your taxes."
Maybe add something about pork projects, the bridge to nowhere or whatever.
Modern Man on
Aetian Jupiter - 41 Gunslinger - The Old Republic
Rigorous Scholarship
Posts
Nah, the best thing they can do is try to fuck with the eventual legislation that defines the new rules for drawing districts. This, in turn, will open up the whole process to lawsuits, which will stall the redistricting process and draw attention to the shenanigans. Since it's in our constitution now, the state SC will be forced to rule against these attempts. Like I said, it should be fun to watch them make a go at it.
My Backloggery
Bills get introduced in the House. They either get killed by Democrats in the Senate or by a Presidential veto. GOP blames the Dems. Lather, rinse, repeat. That'll be the GOP gameplan for the next 2 years.
Rigorous Scholarship
The dems could just filibuster everything
It's all about messaging. Admittedly, Democrats suck at it. But if they can do, as mentioned earlier, characterize every GOP bill as screwing over America they might do okay.
Of course, reality will see the Democrats pussy-foot around the screeching howler monkey political party that is the GOP.
Oh God, that's a funny one.
Dude, its the dems.
Democrats filibustering sometimes is obstructionist. Republicans filibustering everything is defending freedom from socialism.
That's what I see happening. Or they could pass their own version of the bill and kill it in the conference committee or when the compromise bill comes back (because no one cares at that point).
Like the deficit, fixing entitlements, and the wars, this is an issue that they'll gin up for votes without actually doing anything. Mark my words, in two years they'll still be running on repealing the bill without ever having accomplished anything.
PSN/Steam/NNID: SyphonBlue | BNet: SyphonBlue#1126
There's going to be a long, long, drag-out process before she actually "wins."
First they need to read the Write-In ballots and make sure enough of them are filled in correctly (No mispellings, oval is filled in) and that they're not for Kermit the Frog or something. Then there's going to be litigation over that Write-In list issue, then we'll probably need to wait for the absintee ballots to be counted, then Miller will probably demand a recount.
This will be a Cluster Q. Fuck.
This is going to make the Ted Stevens/Mark Begich race look easy in comparison.
Rigorous Scholarship
They could filibuster everything and still not hit the number of filibusters the GOP did over the last two years, so the GOP should be careful there.
Of course, its' the Dems, they suck at message so you are probably right.
God yes, particularly Kaine.
And the 2012 election will be a refendum on Obama's job performance, not Congress'. If we've still got high unemployment and low economic growth, people will blame the President, not some relatively obscure Republicans in Congress.
Rigorous Scholarship
I've done it! I've come up with the Democrats' winning 2010 message! Keychains! I'm fucking brilliant!
PSN/Steam/NNID: SyphonBlue | BNet: SyphonBlue#1126
Who actually obstructs legislation has so little to do with who gets blamed for it. Generally the uninformed public tends to blame whichever party controls the White House, so if for some unthinkable reason 2012 gives us Democratic majorities in the House and Senate and President Sarah "wait I'm supposed to do this for FOUR years?!?!" Palin, the Democrats could filibuster everything and blame it on the Republicans and it would probably work.
Anyways, nobody cares about obstructionism. If the Republicans make a serious push for privatizing Social Security, the Democrats could "obstruct" it all day and not lose a single vote over it. Obstructionism has never been a particularly biting accusation, and considering how technical the actual definitions of what you do or don't oppose can be its one voters are not likely to ever start caring about.
2012 will probably be a minor victory for Democrats, 2010 didn't see significant defections of Obama supporters, just significantly lower turnout (as always, midterms are for the 60+ crowd and the young only vote when there's a president on the ballot). I doubt the Democrats will retake the House, I imagine a slightly stronger Senate majority. Could depend on the economy, if the inevitable mortgage nightmare reaches critical mass politics could get really weird / interesting for a short while.
Generally I'm more of the "elections follow semi-predictable models based on economic activity" mindset, but for whatever percentage you want to assign to candidate skill, Sarah Palin is going to be a fun disaster to watch. While the Tea Party is still a questionable entity for the GOP (some obvious benefits, some obvious drawbacks), Palin has provided perhaps the most compelling argument to date that candidate skill and proper campaigning can win or lose you an election. There's a slightly disingenuous but still slightly convincing (and remarkably entertaining) notion floating around that Sarah Palin has cost the Republicans the Senate, and its unlikely they'll have another shot at it before 2014.
Other than Palin, I'm interested to see what 2012 has in store for initiatives. Conservatives have done a pretty good job of using initiatives to enact portions of their agenda regardless of government control, its only a matter of time before the real action is initiatives and the politicians are mostly there for show.
Makes me so angry. Democrats, you just passed a ton of things that meaningfully affect the youth vote (parental insurance, student loan reform, credit card reform); maybe you should mention them?
Nah, we're just gonna run away from our accomplishments as fast as we can. The Democratic way!
PSN/Steam/NNID: SyphonBlue | BNet: SyphonBlue#1126
Problem being that the bill has to make it to the floor to be filibustered. The Senate already has hundreds of bills its currently ignoring from the House. What's more likely is that the House will pass a bill and demand that the Senate adopt it without changes, the Senate will ignore them and make its own version, and then the conference committee will fall apart because the House Republicans can't be seen compromising on anything. Thus the narrative you mention won't really happen that way, and because they like controversy, the media will happily report the strife. It won't even get to the filibuster stage, and if it does, it will be the Republicans doing the filibustering.
Actually if by "people" you mean "average voter who doesn't follow politics" most of them don't even know what a filibuster is. Obstructionism doesn't matter for elections. Its just a word that is supposed to be an insult and is kind of randomly thrown around, which I find surprising given how toothless it is as an insult.
just like it hurt the republicans filibustering in 2009 and 2010
PSN/Steam/NNID: SyphonBlue | BNet: SyphonBlue#1126
Teacher in class "How many of you voted"
Out of 156 students in the lecture hall only 20 raised their hands
"Oh shit. You should be ashamed of yourselves."
Expectations are somewhat higher now that they've got the House, so Senate gridlock actually hurts them now. We'll know the way things will play out once we get to the first bit of "must pass" legislation.
Rigorous Scholarship
He's a Gen X-er. I'd be more surprised if he wasn't.
I know, and that can be incredibly depressing. As idiotic as people are, and how bad it currently seems, it's not really any different then it ever has been.
Ugh. I'm glad the prof said they should be ashamed. Hopefully this wasn't a poli sci class.
This is the sort of thing that Democrats need to fix on in messaging.
"You know what? We used to be a great country. Our infrastructure used to be one the world looked to with awe. Our educational systems were used as examples world-wide. But short-sighted greed has hurt us deeply. We are no longer asking ourselves 'What can we do for our country,' but instead, 'How can I get mine?' Our country has problems, and it needs solutions, and it needs sacrifices."
"Democrats want to raise your taxes."
Maybe add something about pork projects, the bridge to nowhere or whatever.
Rigorous Scholarship