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[RedKing]

Don't get too excited. Yes, the Republicans will be defending twice as many seats as the Democrats will in 2020, but look at where those seats are.
At a glance, I only see three that are potential flips: Corey Gardner in Colorado, Joni Ernst in Iowa, and Susan Collins in Maine. You're not gonna flip Oklahoma or Wyoming or Kentucky or Tennessee or Idaho.

Meanwhile, Jones in Alabama and Peters in Michigan are no sure lock for the Democrats.

Honestly, I'm pretty fucking pessimistic about the future right now. Given that it's the Democrats, I expect them to winnow down a field of exciting, young, progressive candidates and settle on yet another flawed rich white guy centrist, then wring their hands and cry "How could this have happened?" when Trump gets re-elected.

[RedKing]

It's also 2 years from now, and expecting everything to be the exact same as it is now is utterly asinine.

It's like expecting a red wave in 2018 because of Trump winning in 2016.

Point taken in some states, but most of the states where Republicans are on the ballot are NOT going to realign in two years without some massive demographic shifts.



Look at that map. Iowa, Colorado, Maine. Those are plausible. Every other state with red on it is a solid red state.
--Texas *might* be in play if they can find somebody solid to run against John Cornyn, but frankly Cornyn is more popular than Ted Cruz.
--Georgia, possibly, but given what just happened down there, I think we can safely assume that the nation of Georgia has cleaner elections than the state of Georgia.
--Eastern Kansas went blue the other night, but that's unlikely to be enough to unseat Pat Roberts.
--North Carolina proved that any talk of us being a "progressive South" state is bullshit. Thom Tillis will get re-elected, and I doubt the local Democrats even have anybody worth a damn to run against him.
--Arkansas seems to have retreated back into solid red territory
--Arizona is in the realm of possibility, but they need a strong candidate


Now, if you're talking the Presidential election, sure...things can change. But I've learned long ago not to have any faith that the national Democratic party can avoid punching itself in the dick, because I'll invariably be disappointed.

[Gentlefish]

I dunno about the rest of the states, but I"m going to do what I can in Idaho to get that democrat elected.

E: My lovely state representative Dan Foreman lost by 700-odd votes. I'm proud to say I was one of them. A man this angry should not represent the people.

These are the first vids I pulled, not sure of the quality but like. An angry man. (First link was TYT so I changed it)

[smjjames]

It's also 2 years from now, and expecting everything to be the exact same as it is now is utterly asinine.

It's like expecting a red wave in 2018 because of Trump winning in 2016.

Point taken in some states, but most of the states where Republicans are on the ballot are NOT going to realign in two years without some massive demographic shifts.



Look at that map. Iowa, Colorado, Maine. Those are plausible. Every other state with red on it is a solid red state.
--Texas *might* be in play if they can find somebody solid to run against John Cornyn, but frankly Cornyn is more popular than Ted Cruz.
--Georgia, possibly, but given what just happened down there, I think we can safely assume that the nation of Georgia has cleaner elections than the state of Georgia.
--Eastern Kansas went blue the other night, but that's unlikely to be enough to unseat Pat Roberts.
--North Carolina proved that any talk of us being a "progressive South" state is bullshit. Thom Tillis will get re-elected, and I doubt the local Democrats even have anybody worth a damn to run against him.
--Arkansas seems to have retreated back into solid red territory
--Arizona is in the realm of possibility, but they need a strong candidate


Now, if you're talking the Presidential election, sure...things can change. But I've learned long ago not to have any faith that the national Democratic party can avoid punching itself in the dick, because I'll invariably be disappointed.

This says Cruz is more popular than Cornyn, granted it was taken in the middle of election season, so, he'd get a boost from that. There's also an argument that if Beto O'Rourke had shifted towards center, he might have beaten Cruz, plus the fact that he didn't have as much of a ground game as he should have.

I suppose they could make a play for Mitch McConnells seat, but it's probably more likely that a Republican will unseat him, besides, they're going to fight tooth and nail to keep the majority leaders seat.

Theres also one or two Dem senators who could potentially be vulnerable (looks like Illinois and Michigan according to the polls), but really, the Democrats are going to be playing largely offense while Republicans are going to have to defend a lot of seats.

[RedKing]

Yes, but they're easy to defend (mostly). I'm not even sure the GOP has to run ads in Wyoming, for instance.

If you wanna make 'em sweat, make them have to defend seats in purple, high-population states, preferably with a decentralized population so there are multiple expensive media markets and they have to burn a lot of money. Florida, Georgia, Texas -- those were the tough ones for them to defend.

Wyoming, Oklahoma, Idaho? You run a few ads in the one main city in the state. The hinterlands will vote Republican without even having to try.

I know I'm probably being unnecessarily pessimistic just because of my mood today. But I don't see 2020 as any kind of golden opportunity for Democrats in the Senate. IMHO, they should focus on holding their own, making picking off the low-hanging fruit in IA/CO/ME, and expanding their reach in the House. Oh, and winning the goddamn White House. 

[McTraveller]

I feel this thread has veered too much to "we have got to make sure party X wins" instead of the more laudable "we have got to make sure reputable people win."  There's an implicit statement that party affiliation guarantees reputability, which I find wearisome.

Just saying it's party A against party B without any qualification does nothing but make things more divisive and tribal.  Heck, I voted for people in three different parties on my ballot - because I care about the people, not about the party.

Regarding shootings and such - I still maintain that the public is focused on the wrong thing there. I  feel that the media uses those events to sensationalize gun violence, when the root issue is we need to address the mental health issues and social stress situations that drive people to violence.  Yes maybe if violence wasn't so damned accessible we'd have less committed violence, but don't we want peaceful minds, not just peaceful actions? Or has it gone so far that we really do just want peaceful actions even if people are tormented souls?

[Doomblade187]

Well, it's easier to limit handgun sales than fix our mental health apparatus.

[Gentlefish]

The issue with "We have got to make sure reputable people win" over "party x has to win" is that most of the Republican party has shown themselves, time and again, to be inherently disreputable, at least on the federal level.

The fact that senate voting is happening along party lines and that Republicans are taking a hardline regressivist stance on most, if not all items, is the issue here.

I have no problems with conservatives. Progressive paces should be held in check. But there's no room for backsliding. Things were objectively not better in the '60, where most of the current senators were young adults.

If a new conservative party rises to take the Republican's place, even if it's the Democrats and a new progressive party emerges, I'll be happy. But the Republican leadership needs to be bodychecked out of congress.

[Trekkin]

Regarding shootings and such - I still maintain that the public is focused on the wrong thing there. I  feel that the media uses those events to sensationalize gun violence, when the root issue is we need to address the mental health issues and social stress situations that drive people to violence.  Yes maybe if violence wasn't so damned accessible we'd have less committed violence, but don't we want peaceful minds, not just peaceful actions? Or has it gone so far that we really do just want peaceful actions even if people are tormented souls?

We don't need to pick gun control or mental health. We can do both, so that even if someone becomes dangerously violent we have a better chance of getting them under control and getting them help before people end up dead -- or, at the worst, so they can kill fewer people. Guns are just an obvious, concrete thing to control, and a partial solution today saves more lives than a better solution eventually.

[Folly]

Heck, I voted for people in three different parties on my ballot - because I care about the people, not about the party.

The party is a reflection of the people within it, and vice versa.

Regarding shootings and such - I still maintain that the public is focused on the wrong thing there. I  feel that the media uses those events to sensationalize gun violence, when the root issue is we need to address the mental health issues and social stress situations that drive people to violence.  Yes maybe if violence wasn't so damned accessible we'd have less committed violence, but don't we want peaceful minds, not just peaceful actions? Or has it gone so far that we really do just want peaceful actions even if people are tormented souls?

I don't think that conditioning people to exclusively embody behavior which is considered socially acceptable should be something we encourage. Diverse and unique personalities are what make humanity wonderful, and that includes those of us who are passionate and erratic.
The answer is not teaching people what they should do, but limiting what they can do.

[Telgin]

I don't disagree about mental health being as important as gun control, but I've yet to see anyone really clarify what addressing mental health issues means.  Maybe some politician somewhere has, but I've never seen it.  From experience, I also suspect that any candidate pushing mental health instead of guns is also the kind of candidate that thinks we need less government and we should defund any kind of health programs because something something socialism.

In seriousness though, while I have come to greatly dislike almost every Republican politician I know, I actually did research all of the candidates I voted for during the midterms and did indeed vote for both Democrats and Republicans, and not just because some were unopposed.  What was infuriating is that it was very hard to get any serious information on many of them since this is South Carolina where political platforms don't really matter.  The one Republican I specifically remember voting for had a website talking about improving the state government's digital presence and emphasized technological improvements instead of just whining about Obamacare.  I can respect that and I voted for him over his Democratic counterpart who didn't have a coherent platform.

[McTraveller]

We don't need to pick gun control or mental health. We can do both, so that even if someone becomes dangerously violent we have a better chance of getting them under control and getting them help before people end up dead -- or, at the worst, so they can kill fewer people. Guns are just an obvious, concrete thing to control, and a partial solution today saves more lives than a better solution eventually.

Yes, that was kind of my point - but almost nobody realizes there are deeper issues than just "muh gunz!"

I think people forget that governments' ideal purpose is to help people live in harmony (with each other and the environment), and instead it has turned into how to get people to do what you want (or at least pay for it).

The answer is not teaching people what they should do, but limiting what they can do.

I feel like I'm misunderstanding what you wrote there.  It reads like it is better to cage people up to prevent them from doing things instead of teaching them how to self regulate to socially acceptable behavior.

[Kagus]

I think people forget that governments' ideal purpose is to help people live in harmony (with each other and the environment), and instead it has turned into how to get people to do what you want (or at least pay for it).

This is the ideal governing body. You may not like it, but this is what peak bureaucracy looks like.

[RedKing]

We don't need to pick gun control or mental health. We can do both, so that even if someone becomes dangerously violent we have a better chance of getting them under control and getting them help before people end up dead -- or, at the worst, so they can kill fewer people. Guns are just an obvious, concrete thing to control, and a partial solution today saves more lives than a better solution eventually.

Yes, that was kind of my point - but almost nobody realizes there are deeper issues than just "muh gunz!"

I think people forget that governments' ideal purpose is to help people live in harmony (with each other and the environment), and instead it has turned into how to get people to do what you want (or at least pay for it).

Probably because this is not an ideal world, an ideal government, or least of all, an ideal population.

And while we spend more years navel-gazing about the root causes of violence and how "really, society is to blame", how many more people need to die?
Another 15,000? 30,000? 100,000?

At what point do we, as a nation, say "Ok, this shit is fucked up, let's REALLY fix this"?
You'd have thought maybe it was when a bunch of elementary school kids died, but you'd be wrong.
You'd have thought maybe it was when Congress itself was in the crosshairs, but you'd be wrong.
You'd have thought maybe it was when one guy could kill 58 people and wound nearly a thousand. But you'd be wrong.

Like I said, I give up. We're all just fucking carnival ducks, waiting our turn.

[WealthyRadish]

Spoiler: Erhm, more dogpiling I guess (click to show/hide)

I think people forget that governments' ideal purpose is to help people live in harmony (with each other and the environment), and instead it has turned into how to get people to do what you want (or at least pay for it).

I wouldn't go this far toward saying the ideal purpose of government is social harmony. On my more cynical mornings it seems that the purpose of government over the last ~5,000 years has been the enforcement of property rights and almost nothing else, and it's only been in the last ~200 years that people have attempted to apply its power to something else. Appeals to "harmony" at least to me sound an awful lot like "status quo."