2026 Mid-Term Elections

[Elixir]

The pont is in te elction Trump said he woulddo x,y,z described in details. Once in office he proceeded to do x,y,z.

Bullshit. He did all the stuff that was for himself - retribution campaigns mainly - but not one goddam thing for American citizens. No end of Ukraine war on day one, no dropping grocery prices or gas prices or overall inflation, no cessation of foreign military adventures/endless wars, no NOTHING but destruction of public property, rising costs, evisceration of our government, and HISTORICALLY EPIC FUCKING CORRUPTION AND GRIFT.

 

[Toni]

MAGAification certainly hurt the GOP brand. Why should Dems follow suit and DSAify?

Because they are proposing a lot of things most people want. Medicare for all for example, raising the minimum wage, and better rights for labor.

They are also proposing things like abolishing Senate and the Presidency, de facto open borders, and giving voting rights to non-citizens. These are all in the DSA platform.

Btw, M4A has become something of a mantra for many candidates. But it doesn't usually get defined. Sometimes it's used interchangeably with single payer, but Medicare itself is not a single payer program.

Can you please provide a link that shows that? Honestly, I can't find anything that says what you claim.

 

[Toni]

Polls show younger democrats are identify as socialist, but I doubt they know what it means. There have been long debates on te form over what socialism means. It has to be clearly defined by social democrats.

You are also showing that you do not understand what "socialism" means. Socialism, including  Democratic Socialism is a very different ideology than  Social Democracy.
In the rest of your post, you keep using "social democrat(s)" when you mean "democratic socialist(s)".

Mamdani is a radical ranter. A mini Trump.

I agree there. These two have a lot in common personality wise.

Social democrats are selling an idea, as democrats have been doing for decades and voters got tired of it. Especially blacks. At a black college graduation black students turned their backs to Biden as he spoke. He was relling them the left has done a lot for them and he needed their support. Begging.

Which college was that? What year?
This is especially weird because Democrats under Biden have been pro-black to a fault. Biden only considered black women for SCOTUS and for running mate. In 2024, he waited so long to withdraw that Kamala was assured nomination by default. He changed the primary calendar so that the heavily black South Carolina would go first, even though it's a bad idea for the Party. When so-called "affirmative action" was restricted by SCOTUS, he ranted that the court was not normal for doing that. And so on.

And exactly which other POTUS or candidates have ever had a black woman on their short list for USSC justice nominees?

Until quite recently, the only candidates ever considered were white and male. So then we had Sandra Day O'Connor and Clarence Thomas. And now, yes, we have more female justices but still none until Biden who was black and female. In 250 years.

 

[Derec]

Can you please provide a link that shows that? Honestly, I can't find anything that says what you claim.

DSA Program - Workers Deserve More

• Recognize the rights of the Palestinian people, including the right of return, the right to resist military occupation, and the right to self determination in a free Palestine with Jerusalem as its capital.
• Legalize migration, grant amnesty for all immigrants regardless of status, provide a path to citizenship for all permanent residents, and end visa caps and quotas.
• Extend full voting rights to all permanent U.S. residents
• Replace the President and Supreme Court with an executive and judiciary chosen by and subordinate to Congress.
• abolish the Senate
• Establish public ownership of the largest corporations and essential industries to ensure democratic control and accountability to the people.
• Enact aggressive wealth taxes on the richest individuals and corporations to spend on public goods and infrastructure.

 

[Toni]

I believe the DSA is expected to have at least 15 legislators up from 9. That is an impressive percentage increase but there are 213 seats in both chambers. So even if they hit 21, that is not 10%. Hardly enough to cause trouble unless the split between the major parties is close. Right now 30 % are Republican, so a DSA landslide seems unlikely to cause much disturbance in governance.

I disagree. Your analysis fails to account for fellow travelers, legislators and candidates on the left who sympathize with much or most of the DSA agenda, but are not members. To use a prominent non-NY example, Abdul El-Sayed from Michigan is on the left fringes but is not a DSA member.

The NY state legislature is already pretty left wing. Just look at cockamamie legislation like the bail deform they passed. And I don't see how increasing the number of DSA legislators will not lead to further shift of the legislature to the left.

Right now, a shift to the left of the legislature means that we're finally a tad to the left of Nazis, overall.

I for one welcome such a shift.

Surely you realize that what you think of left in the US is considered a bit right of center for much of the rest of the world?

 

[Derec]

And exactly which other POTUS or candidates have ever had a black woman on their short list for USSC justice nominees?

That does not justify Biden discriminating against everyone else. Especially when he did it for two high profile positions - and then Goodhair did the same for the Senate seat.

Until quite recently, the only candidates ever considered were white and male. So then we had Sandra Day O'Connor and Clarence Thomas. And now, yes, we have more female justices but still none until Biden who was black and female. In 250 years.

We also never had an Asian justice. Nor an atheist one. Why should black women have a guaranteed SCOTUS seat? I think jurists should be considered without regard to race or gender. Dismissing everybody who is not a black woman from consideration was morally wrong and politically foolish.

 

[Derec]

Right now, a shift to the left of the legislature means that we're finally a tad to the left of Nazis, overall.

We were talking about the NY state legislature which is already well to the left.

I for one welcome such a shift.

Of course you do. But then you claim you are not a leftist.

Surely you realize that what you think of left in the US is considered a bit right of center for much of the rest of the world?

No. You don't have for example German social democrats (the center-left party) talk about "seizing the means of production" like Mamdani and his Ilk.

 

[laughing dog]

I believe the DSA is expected to have at least 15 legislators up from 9. That is an impressive percentage increase but there are 213 seats in both chambers. So even if they hit 21, that is not 10%. Hardly enough to cause trouble unless the split between the major parties is close. Right now 30 % are Republican, so a DSA landslide seems unlikely to cause much disturbance in governance.

I disagree. Your analysis fails to account for fellow travelers, legislators and candidates on the left who sympathize with much or most of the DSA agenda, but are not members. To use a prominent non-NY example, Abdul El-Sayed from Michigan is on the left fringes but is not a DSA member.

Pure hand waving.

The NY state legislature is already pretty left wing. Just look at cockamamie legislation like the bail deform they passed. And I don't see how increasing the number of DSA legislators will not lead to further shift of the legislature to the left.

Fear shuts your eyes.

 

[laughing dog]

And exactly which other POTUS or candidates have ever had a black woman on their short list for USSC justice nominees?

That does not justify Biden discriminating against everyone else. Especially when he did it for two high profile positions - and then Goodhair did the same for the Senate seat.

Until quite recently, the only candidates ever considered were white and male. So then we had Sandra Day O'Connor and Clarence Thomas. And now, yes, we have more female justices but still none until Biden who was black and female. In 250 years.

We also never had an Asian justice. Nor an atheist one. Why should black women have a guaranteed SCOTUS seat? I think jurists should be considered without regard to race or gender. Dismissing everybody who is not a black woman from consideration was morally wrong and politically foolish.

There is no way for you to know whether any Supreme Court justice has been an atheist.

 

[Toni]

Right now, a shift to the left of the legislature means that we're finally a tad to the left of Nazis, overall.

We were talking about the NY state legislature which is already well to the left.

I for one welcome such a shift.

Of course you do. But then you claim you are not a leftist.

Surely you realize that what you think of left in the US is considered a bit right of center for much of the rest of the world?

No. You don't have for example German social democrats (the center-left party) talk about "seizing the means of production" like Mamdani and his Ilk.

Yes, I’m referring more to the US as a whole and frankly some of the suggestions are right of Nazi Germany.

 

[ZiprHead]

Can you please provide a link that shows that? Honestly, I can't find anything that says what you claim.

DSA Program - Workers Deserve More

• Recognize the rights of the Palestinian people, including the right of return, the right to resist military occupation, and the right to self determination in a free Palestine with Jerusalem as its capital.
• Legalize migration, grant amnesty for all immigrants regardless of status, provide a path to citizenship for all permanent residents, and end visa caps and quotas.
• Extend full voting rights to all permanent U.S. residents
• Replace the President and Supreme Court with an executive and judiciary chosen by and subordinate to Congress.
• abolish the Senate
• Establish public ownership of the largest corporations and essential industries to ensure democratic control and accountability to the people.
• Enact aggressive wealth taxes on the richest individuals and corporations to spend on public goods and infrastructure.

Oh, no!

The Trump administration has routinely acquired minority equity and ownership stakes in roughly 30 private U.S. companies—such as Intel, IBM, and U.S. Steel—by converting federal subsidies, grants, and incentives into state-backed investments under a national security portfolio approach. [1, 2, 3]

Major Corporate Stakes

• • Intel: Secured a prominent ~10% equity stake (valued with tens of billions in federal backing) tied to CHIPS Act subsidies. [1, 2]
  • U.S. Steel & Westinghouse: Took a "golden share" in U.S. Steel alongside an 8% stake in nuclear firm Westinghouse. [1]
  • Quantum Computing & Advanced Tech: Acquired stakes in 9 quantum computing firms (including IBM) and expanded with another batch of 7 semiconductor and AI startups via $874 million in Department of Commerce funding. [1, 2, 3, 4]
  • Critical Minerals: Negotiated positions in firms like MP Materials (7.5%) and Lithium Americas (5%) to secure supply chains away from China. [1, 2]

 

[Toni]

Polls show younger democrats are identify as socialist, but I doubt they know what it means. There have been long debates on te form over what socialism means. It has to be clearly defined by social democrats.

You are also showing that you do not understand what "socialism" means. Socialism, including  Democratic Socialism is a very different ideology than  Social Democracy.
In the rest of your post, you keep using "social democrat(s)" when you mean "democratic socialist(s)".

Mamdani is a radical ranter. A mini Trump.

I agree there. These two have a lot in common personality wise.

Social democrats are selling an idea, as democrats have been doing for decades and voters got tired of it. Especially blacks. At a black college graduation black students turned their backs to Biden as he spoke. He was relling them the left has done a lot for them and he needed their support. Begging.

Which college was that? What year?
This is especially weird because Democrats under Biden have been pro-black to a fault. Biden only considered black women for SCOTUS and for running mate. In 2024, he waited so long to withdraw that Kamala was assured nomination by default. He changed the primary calendar so that the heavily black South Carolina would go first, even though it's a bad idea for the Party. When so-called "affirmative action" was restricted by SCOTUS, he ranted that the court was not normal for doing that. And so on.

And exactly which other POTUS or candidates have ever had a black woman on their short list for USSC justice nominees?

Until quite recently, the only candidates ever considered were white and male. So then we had Sandra Day O'Connor and Clarence Thomas. And now, yes, we have more female justices but still none until Biden who was black and female. In 250 years.

Yeah, Derec, women have been banging our heads for decades now.

 

[bilby]

You are also showing that you do not understand what "socialism" means. Socialism, including

Democratic Socialism is a very different ideology than

Social Democracy.
In the rest of your post, you keep using "social democrat(s)" when you mean "democratic socialist(s)".

This here is the methodology by which the right wing has thrived.

It has become impossible to even talk about any alternative to neo-libertarian capitalism and economic rationalism, because any and all efforts to do so are immediately (and I suspect deliberately, and probably maliciously) turned into an endless and pointless debate about the minutiae of the dictionary definitions of the word "socialism" and all its variants.

I don't give a crap what it is called; We need to be a kinder society with protections for poor people, funded by increased taxation of those who have higher income.

We need a redistribution of wealth, from rich to poor, because the economic system we curreny have favours the concentration of wealth in a small number of hands, and that is bad for pretty much everyone and everything.

The best societies - the ones in which a citizen chosen at random is most likely to be leading a happy and productive life - recognise that there need to be inequalities of wealth, AND that there need to be controls to prevent those inequalities from becoming excessive.

What we actually see in almost any economic discussion, though, is more like:

"The best societies - the ones in which a citizen chosen at random is most likely to be leading a happy and productive life - recognise that there need to be inequalities of wealth, AND that ---NO SOCIALISM!!! --- NO SOCIALISM!!! there need to be --- YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND, THAT'S NOT WHAT 'SOCIALISM' EVEN MEANS!!! --- controls to prevent --- NO! WE MUST DISCUSS THE EXACT MEANING OF 'SOCIALISM' SO THAT YOU CAN SEE HOW WRONG IT IS!!!1!!ONE!!!"

We are not even allowed to discuss any alternative way of doing things.

The "S-word" is death to rational debate and discussion. And even if those who oppose modern capitalism are careful not to say it, you can be sure that the folks who love modern calitalism will introduce it and will refuse to stop spamming every debate with it, until their opponents give up and walk away. Thus "proving" that modern capitalism is the only option.

 

[bilby]

And now, yes, we have more female justices but still none until Biden who was black and female.

I am pretty sure he was neither.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

Can you please provide a link that shows that? Honestly, I can't find anything that says what you claim.

DSA Program - Workers Deserve More

• Recognize the rights of the Palestinian people, including the right of return, the right to resist military occupation, and the right to self determination in a free Palestine with Jerusalem as its capital.
• Legalize migration, grant amnesty for all immigrants regardless of status, provide a path to citizenship for all permanent residents, and end visa caps and quotas.
• Extend full voting rights to all permanent U.S. residents
• Replace the President and Supreme Court with an executive and judiciary chosen by and subordinate to Congress.
• abolish the Senate
• Establish public ownership of the largest corporations and essential industries to ensure democratic control and accountability to the people.
• Enact aggressive wealth taxes on the richest individuals and corporations to spend on public goods and infrastructure.

Supposed to shoot for the moon, but I'm having trouble seeing how undoing the Senate is helping much. That would require a state convention (because the Senate isn't abolishing itself), with 2/3 of the state legislatures. I get the Senate is the weak acid of the Legislative Branch that helps reregulate sanity into the political system and is much harder to radicalize which would present a roadblock in the 'let's rearrange everything plan', but if you have 2/3s of the state legislatures, you've got to be close to having control of the US Senate. Replacing the President and SCOTUS is a bit like the Articles of Confederation, which didn't hold up too well.

Seeing a good chunk of this requires major constitutional revisions, which are near impossible to make, in order to enact the rest of it, I'm not losing sleep over this. Just noting it seems completely unpragmatic, is incompatible with our countries set up, and doesn't do the math too well.

Of course, the GOP's math has been quite crap as advertised (though designed to do what it has actually been doing) and they've been steering the US towards insolvency to defang the Federal Government for decades.

So again, Derec is worried about the stuff that almost certainly isn't going to happen than what has actually happened.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

And exactly which other POTUS or candidates have ever had a black woman on their short list for USSC justice nominees?

That does not justify Biden discriminating against everyone else. Especially when he did it for two high profile positions - and then Goodhair did the same for the Senate seat.

Until quite recently, the only candidates ever considered were white and male. So then we had Sandra Day O'Connor and Clarence Thomas. And now, yes, we have more female justices but still none until Biden who was black and female. In 250 years.

We also never had an Asian justice. Nor an atheist one. Why should black women have a guaranteed SCOTUS seat?

Pretty certain Justice Jackson is only a single person, not an anthropomorphic conceptualization of all black women.

I think jurists should be considered without regard to race or gender. Dismissing everybody who is not a black woman from consideration was morally wrong and politically foolish.

It really would only be morally an issue if the intent was to discriminate against white, Hispanics, Asians, etc... to keep them intentionally off of the bench. Justice Jackson became only the second black person to sit on the SCOTUS bench, over 3 decades after Justice Thomas got his seat, roughly 3 decades after the Civil Rights Act was passed.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

Critical primary in Michigan, maybe? It is hard to tell if Trump's numbers are going to trash the GOP in November, so it might not even matter. But I wanted to share this thing on el-Sayed.

I come at this from a place of principle. I will not treat money spent to Israel differently than I treat money spent to Egypt, right? I don't think we should be sending money to either. Egypt is the second biggest recipient of foreign military aid. If you'd like to start there, we can start there.

I don't want to see my tax dollars being used to put a chokehold on the Egyptian people by a military dictatorship, which is what happens in Egypt. Similarly, I don't want my money used in apartheid and genocide. I want my money used to provide classes for kids and good schools and health care here in Michigan. So they are making themselves one of the most important players in our politics.

I find this statement extremely troubling, because it appears to be made, at best, in a bubble. He is correct, we give a boatload of cash to the Egyptian military. There is a reason for that. That money is buying something, has been buying something for decades since President Carter.

I'm uncomfortable with how AIPAC is becoming a lance for some people. Yes, PACs suck, but Israel isn't a part of the United States. And AIPAC isn't what is impacting social security funding, access to medical care, affordable housing. So why in the fuck is it even coming up? And most importantly, the US isn't waging a whatever you want to call it with Iran because of AIPAC. That was Trump... and his enablers who are trying to get the cover for the Project 2025 stuff through.

 

[Toni]

And exactly which other POTUS or candidates have ever had a black woman on their short list for USSC justice nominees?

That does not justify Biden discriminating against everyone else. Especially when he did it for two high profile positions - and then Goodhair did the same for the Senate seat.

Until quite recently, the only candidates ever considered were white and male. So then we had Sandra Day O'Connor and Clarence Thomas. And now, yes, we have more female justices but still none until Biden who was black and female. In 250 years.

We also never had an Asian justice. Nor an atheist one. Why should black women have a guaranteed SCOTUS seat? I think jurists should be considered without regard to race or gender. Dismissing everybody who is not a black woman from consideration was morally wrong and politically foolish.

Why should black women not have a seat on the USSC?

Why should there be any religious test? AFAIK, there is none.

 

[Patooka]

Why should black women not have a seat on the USSC?

Because every black person in an important role is a DEI pick. Duh.

 

[Derec]

Why should black women not have a seat on the USSC?

They should not have a guaranteed seat on SCOTUS. Why do you think they should?

Why should there be any religious test? AFAIK, there is none.

There shouldn't. There should not be a racial or gender test either. And yet Biden instituted one.

Because every black person in an important role is a DEI pick. Duh.

Since Biden excluded everyone who is not a black woman from consideration, in this case she was definitely a DEI pick. How could you even argue otherwise?