Yes. Like saying, "Hell, *yes*, I'd vote for Biden, even if he had that creepy talk show host as VP: the situation is that serious, we've got to keep T from another term, and I'm that friggin' desperate".
I.e., that's the subtext.
On one of these threads a few days back, the phrase "Yellow Dog Democrat" was mentioned, ie. a southern white back in Jim Crow days, who would vote Democrat even if the candidate were a yellow dog.
Basically, the same idea. I'd actually suggest "Jerry Springer Democrat" as an update on the phrase, but that might give the impression that Springer is running for office again.
If Kamala Harris seems to be getting a free pass in the media, remember it's early days. She is in the "honeymoon" phase. And I'm sure the conservative media is lovingly honing their knives back stage.
Yeah, "yellow dog Democrat" occurred to me, but I wasn't sure of the usage. I think there's a "blue dog" something, too?
I think "Blue Dog Democrat" refers to conservative Democrats in the current era, when their views would be seen as running counter to the general leftward trend of the party.
Whereas Yellow Dogs, insofar as they evinced a belief in white-supremacy, were very much in keeping with the views promoted, or at least happily tolerated, by the overall party.
As for Springer, I think many of his episodes are about as authentic as WWE. Like, we're supposed to believe that a guy who goes on THAT particular show to hear some news from his girlfriend is then shocked to discover she wants to dump him?
The Electors are instructed to vote based on which candidate wins in that state ... I think that Nebraska is the only state that does the sensible thing -- awards electoral votes proportionally rather than *winner*take*all* ...
Nebraska and Maine are the only states that subdivide their electoral votes by Congressional District. Of course that means their electoral vote distribution is subject to the same kind of gerrymandering as their Congressional Districts. Whether this is more fair than a winner take all distribution is left to the reader.
I haven't seen any "she was a DA; she's beyond redemption" stuff, but whoever wrote that seems to have missed the fact that this downtrodden, oppressed person has already achieved some huge pinnacles of power and may soon be in one of the top positions in the entire world. This reminds me of the people who complain that the press "bullies" Trump. You can't bully someone who has more power than you. Harris is a U. S. Senator and he's still claiming she's being kept down and oppressed by meanies on the internet. As if.
Trump is claiming this? Citation please?
The present arrangement, which is left up to each state to decide, is simply odd IMHO ... If a POTUS candidate wins 51% of the popular vote in every large state -- California, New York, Texas, Florida, etc., (s)he gets ALL of the electoral votes from those states ...
The Electors are instructed to vote based on which candidate wins in that state ... I think that Nebraska is the only state that does the sensible thing -- awards electoral votes proportionally rather than *winner*take*all* ...
Nebraska and Maine are the only states that subdivide their electoral votes by Congressional District. Of course that means their electoral vote distribution is subject to the same kind of gerrymandering as their Congressional Districts. Whether this is more fair than a winner take all distribution is left to the reader.
The present arrangement, which is left up to each state to decide, is simply odd IMHO ... If a POTUS candidate wins 51% of the popular vote in every large state -- California, New York, Texas, Florida, etc., (s)he gets ALL of the electoral votes from those states ...
We had a lengthy discussion of the electoral college and its deficiencies on the Old Ship back in 2012. It's an eighteenth century anachronism that failed the fourth time it was tried (1800) and has already been revised once. The big problem isn't so much the winner-take-all system currently used by most states (though that is a problem), the big problem is the existence of the electoral college itself.
The Electors are instructed to vote based on which candidate wins in that state ... I think that Nebraska is the only state that does the sensible thing -- awards electoral votes proportionally rather than *winner*take*all* ...
Nebraska and Maine are the only states that subdivide their electoral votes by Congressional District. Of course that means their electoral vote distribution is subject to the same kind of gerrymandering as their Congressional Districts. Whether this is more fair than a winner take all distribution is left to the reader.
The present arrangement, which is left up to each state to decide, is simply odd IMHO ... If a POTUS candidate wins 51% of the popular vote in every large state -- California, New York, Texas, Florida, etc., (s)he gets ALL of the electoral votes from those states ...
We had a lengthy discussion of the electoral college and its deficiencies on the Old Ship back in 2012. It's an eighteenth century anachronism that failed the fourth time it was tried (1800) and has already been revised once. The big problem isn't so much the winner-take-all system currently used by most states (though that is a problem), the big problem is the existence of the electoral college itself.
The "Founders" distrusted the moods of the masses, so originally, e.g., US Senators were elected by state legislatures, and the POTUS was chosen by Electors ... The French Revolution ... the October Revolution ... etc. ... they had a point ..
You have still not said for whom you will vote? Will you vote for Biden? Your attitude strikes me as very similar to the actions of one Phil Cleary in our 1999 referendum on becoming a republic. Rather than concentrate on this main issue, Cleary argued for a particular model on the choice of a president in any new republic. Little Johnny Howard, then the pro-monarchist prime minister seized on this dissension in the republican ranks and won his way. So over a minor point, we're still a monarchy.
I'm not familiar with Mr Cleary, or the details of his opinions, but I've met this argument frequently. It says "you and I are on the same side, but you're being a dick about this minor point, so we lost". Which might be true, or it might be that I don't think it's a minor point. It's entirely reasonable for someone to think that not all republican models are an improvement on the monarchy, that some Brexits are better than the EU, but other Brexits are worse than the EU, or whatever else.
Indeed, our shipmate @Alan Cresswell has frequently argued that the Brexit referendum was nonsense precisely because nobody knew what they were voting for. I don't think it's even remotely compulsory to prefer all Brexits over no Brexit, or to prefer remaining in the EU over every single possible Brexit.
To people who are that lost in prejudice, I doubt the taint ever really goes away. And they may not believe slavery was wrong at all, at least if *their own people* weren't slaves.
I've heard of people who are prejudiced against African Americans, but not (as much?) against Black people from Africa. As in coming across African tourists in the US, getting ready to be awful, finding out the people are from Africa, and sending them on their way.
I have an anecdote about this. When I lived in Chicago, there was in my church circle a lovely family from Nigeria, whom I'll call F. and A. (since those are their initials) (plus baby whose name I don't remember). F. was going to one of the seminaries. F. said he was walking down the street and three white guys came up and were hassling him and slapping his arms and stuff -- the kind of thing that often ends in a black person getting a beating. F. said, "Gentlemen, what have I done to you?" in his beautiful Nigerian lilt, and the white kids said, "Oh, our beef's not with you" (or some such) and walked off.
The "Founders" distrusted the moods of the masses, so originally, e.g., US Senators were elected by state legislatures, and the POTUS was chosen by Electors ... The French Revolution ... the October Revolution ... etc. ... they had a point ..
A couple points on this. First, the original structure of the electoral college was decided by the Committee of Eleven for Postponed Matters. As the name implies this was the group at the Constitutional Convention that handled the things about which the Framers had no clear notions. Some favored letting Congress select the president, others the state governments, still others (including James Madison) favored direct popular election of the president. The electoral college represents not the necessary outgrowth of some grand philosophical design but an ad hoc kludge thrown together to satisfy the political realities of the U.S. in the late 1780s and because no one could agree on anything else.
Second, the electoral college as it currently exists actually amplifies "the moods of the masses", using a winner-take-all system to present a façade of unanimity over what is often a closely divided state-level electorate.
Third, if the results are superior to the popular vote, as you suggest, why is the system used for literally no other American election? Don't state governors, federal congressional representatives, or mayors need to be insulated from "the moods of the masses" as well?
Fourth: Rutherford B. Hayes, Benjamin Harrison, George W. Bush, Donald Trump. These are the four presidents installed into office with not even a plurality of the popular vote*. These men are hardly a stirring endorsement of the superiority of the electoral college over "the moods of the masses", yet you're willing to argue that America had to be saved from the people's choice because Samuel Tilden, Grover Cleveland, Al Gore, and Hillary Clinton would have been so much worse. That seems like a difficult case to make, especially for those last two.
*Going back only as far as 1832, which is the first presidential election for which the popular vote is mostly known.
Not to forget that the founding fathers lived in a time where communication was slow and education was more rare. Oh yeah, and they were mostly happy with slavery and women not voting.
So...
Yeah, "yellow dog Democrat" occurred to me, but I wasn't sure of the usage. I think there's a "blue dog" something, too?
I think "Blue Dog Democrat" refers to conservative Democrats in the current era, when their views would be seen as running counter to the general leftward trend of the party.
“Blue dog” generally refers to fiscal conservatism.
Whereas Yellow Dogs, insofar as they evinced a belief in white-supremacy, were very much in keeping with the views promoted, or at least happily tolerated, by the overall party.
While “yellow dog” was certainly used by and about white supremacists in the (old) Democratic Party, its use was and is not limited to white supremacists. It has always referred to any Southern Democrat who is unwilling to vote for a Republican, and is still in common use in the South, often by state Democratic parties in semi-official ways, to mean a loyal or committed Democrat.
The English version is probably voting for a Donkey/Pig (I've heard both referenced) in a red/blue rosette, for parliamentary seats such as the one where I live, where it is guaranteed that the electorate will vote either Labour or Conservative depending on the local social make-up.
I'm pretty sure they did not say Indian, as there were two words, and I wouldn't have thought they meant First Nation by using Indian, but I suspect someone may have made an erroneous edit, believing they were putting something right. It'll be interesting to hear what is said from now on.
Definitely saying Indian this time.
It's more likely that editing software or even a human editor replaced Indian with Native American, and it was then changed back. First Nation is a Canadianism, and not often used elsewhere.
Yeah, "yellow dog Democrat" occurred to me, but I wasn't sure of the usage. I think there's a "blue dog" something, too?
I think "Blue Dog Democrat" refers to conservative Democrats in the current era, when their views would be seen as running counter to the general leftward trend of the party.
“Blue dog” generally refers to fiscal conservatism.
Whereas Yellow Dogs, insofar as they evinced a belief in white-supremacy, were very much in keeping with the views promoted, or at least happily tolerated, by the overall party.
While “yellow dog” was certainly used by and about white supremacists in the (old) Democratic Party, its use was and is not limited to white supremacists. It has always referred to any Southern Democrat who is unwilling to vote for a Republican, and is still in common use in the South, often by state Democratic parties in semi-official ways, to mean a loyal or committed Democrat.
So, just so I've got this clear...
If I'm a left-leaning 25-year old Black feminist in Alabama who will only ever vote Democrat because she thinks the Republicans are a bunch of bigots and racists, I can currently be referred to as a "Yellow Dog Democrat" without doing abuse to the term?
If so, interesting. Especially because my motivations for voting Democrat would pretty much be the same as someone sharing my worldview but living in San Francisco. Whereas the original usage of the phrase, or at least its connotations, strongly implied something particularly "white and southern" about the person's motives.
(Not that I'm doubting you, just that it's interesting the term survived the transitioning of the party from one ideological pole to another.)
To people who are that lost in prejudice, I doubt the taint ever really goes away. And they may not believe slavery was wrong at all, at least if *their own people* weren't slaves.
I've heard of people who are prejudiced against African Americans, but not (as much?) against Black people from Africa. As in coming across African tourists in the US, getting ready to be awful, finding out the people are from Africa, and sending them on their way.
I found out from some Caribbean teaching students at school that they do not get on well with any Africans they come across because the Africans see them as tainted by slavery. Which is a bit rich when they are West Africans from the nations which traded them.
And makes the story about the Nigerian interesting.
Yeah, "yellow dog Democrat" occurred to me, but I wasn't sure of the usage. I think there's a "blue dog" something, too?
I think "Blue Dog Democrat" refers to conservative Democrats in the current era, when their views would be seen as running counter to the general leftward trend of the party.
“Blue dog” generally refers to fiscal conservatism.
Whereas Yellow Dogs, insofar as they evinced a belief in white-supremacy, were very much in keeping with the views promoted, or at least happily tolerated, by the overall party.
While “yellow dog” was certainly used by and about white supremacists in the (old) Democratic Party, its use was and is not limited to white supremacists. It has always referred to any Southern Democrat who is unwilling to vote for a Republican, and is still in common use in the South, often by state Democratic parties in semi-official ways, to mean a loyal or committed Democrat.
So, just so I've got this clear...
If I'm a left-leaning 25-year old Black feminist in Alabama who will only ever vote Democrat because she thinks the Republicans are a bunch of bigots and racists, I can currently be referred to as a "Yellow Dog Democrat" without doing abuse to the term?
Yes, if you’re a loyal Democrat. That’s what term indicates, and I think always has indicated—loyalty to the Democratic Party. It’s just that the implications of that with regard to the party platform has shifted over the years. The term was never specifically about white supremacy, sfaik.
FWIW: In the Democratic Parties of some Southern states, titles like “the Yellow Dog Club” or “Yellow Dog Democrats” are used for giving levels, i.e., those who give at least $x.xx are members of the Yellow Dog Club. In at least some of those cases, the state Democratic Party is predominantly African American (though the leadership might not be).
Yeah, "yellow dog Democrat" occurred to me, but I wasn't sure of the usage. I think there's a "blue dog" something, too?
I think "Blue Dog Democrat" refers to conservative Democrats in the current era, when their views would be seen as running counter to the general leftward trend of the party.
“Blue dog” generally refers to fiscal conservatism.
Whereas Yellow Dogs, insofar as they evinced a belief in white-supremacy, were very much in keeping with the views promoted, or at least happily tolerated, by the overall party.
While “yellow dog” was certainly used by and about white supremacists in the (old) Democratic Party, its use was and is not limited to white supremacists. It has always referred to any Southern Democrat who is unwilling to vote for a Republican, and is still in common use in the South, often by state Democratic parties in semi-official ways, to mean a loyal or committed Democrat.
So, just so I've got this clear...
If I'm a left-leaning 25-year old Black feminist in Alabama who will only ever vote Democrat because she thinks the Republicans are a bunch of bigots and racists, I can currently be referred to as a "Yellow Dog Democrat" without doing abuse to the term?
Yes, if you’re a loyal Democrat. That’s what term indicates, and I think always has indicated—loyalty to the Democratic Party. It’s just that the implications of that with regard to the party platform has shifted over the years. The term was never specifically about white supremacy, sfaik.
Well, maybe not technically about white supremacy, but let's face it, the category "People in 1950s Alabama who hate the Republicans" probably included a significant subheading of "People who hate the Republicans because of the Civil War and later efforts against white supremacy."
EDIT: Thanks for the further info on the term's use today.
Yeah, "yellow dog Democrat" occurred to me, but I wasn't sure of the usage. I think there's a "blue dog" something, too?
I think "Blue Dog Democrat" refers to conservative Democrats in the current era, when their views would be seen as running counter to the general leftward trend of the party.
“Blue dog” generally refers to fiscal conservatism.
Whereas Yellow Dogs, insofar as they evinced a belief in white-supremacy, were very much in keeping with the views promoted, or at least happily tolerated, by the overall party.
While “yellow dog” was certainly used by and about white supremacists in the (old) Democratic Party, its use was and is not limited to white supremacists. It has always referred to any Southern Democrat who is unwilling to vote for a Republican, and is still in common use in the South, often by state Democratic parties in semi-official ways, to mean a loyal or committed Democrat.
So, just so I've got this clear...
If I'm a left-leaning 25-year old Black feminist in Alabama who will only ever vote Democrat because she thinks the Republicans are a bunch of bigots and racists, I can currently be referred to as a "Yellow Dog Democrat" without doing abuse to the term?
Yes, if you’re a loyal Democrat. That’s what term indicates, and I think always has indicated—loyalty to the Democratic Party. It’s just that the implications of that with regard to the party platform has shifted over the years. The term was never specifically about white supremacy, sfaik.
Well, maybe not technically about white supremacy, but let's face it, the category "People in 1950s Alabama who hate the Republicans" probably included a significant subheading of "People who hate the Republicans because of the Civil War and later efforts against white supremacy."
Right, which is why I said specifically about white supremacy. That was part and parcel of loyalty to the party in many places in the South at one time, but since the term wasn’t specifically in reference to white supremacy but was broader, the term survived long after the ties between the Democratic Party in the South and white supremacy were gone.
Hey, speaking of Kamala Harris and white supremacy, the racist birther nonsense we had to endure for the whole of Obama's two terms is getting geared up for Ms. Harris. So far it's only confined to fringey outlets like . . . Newsweek? Don't worry, the editors later put in a note that this wasn't racist birtherism because . . . [ checks notes ] . . . the author used fancy legal terms for why the children of filthy immigrants can never be true Americans. Yeah, that's convincing.
For those who don't want to wade through Mr. Eastman's literary droppings he's arguing not just that Senator Harris isn't a natural born citizen, as is required of the vice president, but that she's not a citizen at all because her parents were immigrants and, though legal, did not have permanent residency at the time of Sen. Harris' birth.
They also added this update at the end:
The biographical note has been updated to include that Eastman ran for attorney general in the Republican primary in 2010; he was defeated by Cooley, who was then defeated by Harris.
The fact that Senator Harris took the attorney general job Mr. Eastman once wanted would seem to be relevant when assessing his authorial neutrality. It also seems like the kind of thing a publication like Newsweek wouldn't have to be prompted to include in his author's bio, but here we are.
she's not a citizen at all because her parents were immigrants and, though legal, did not have permanent residency at the time of Sen. Harris' birth.
Oh good - it's a return to that particular idiosyncratic reading of "subject to the jurisdiction thereof".
(For those playing along at home, the US Supreme Court ruled on this in 1898 in US vs Wong Kim Ark. Senator Harris qualification to be president on grounds of citizenship has 122 years of legal precedent.)
Gaaaa! I read the article; and, until I got to the part about KH getting the job Eastman wanted, I was willing to consider the 1% possibility that *maybe* Eastman was just a fuddy-duddy* about details of the Constitution. (Strict Constructionist???) I'm surprised he didn't go after her for being a woman, too.
Next to that article is a link to a counterpoint by the Prof. Volokh he mentioned. I noticed that Volokh seems to have made a point of quoting Justice Scalia's approval of Sir William Blackstone, before Volokh using Blackstone to make his point. Is Eastman a Scalia groupie? And/or a strict constructionist? (Or whatever Scalia was.)
BTW, it occurs to me that Newsweek's "hey, it's not racist" note could be interpreted as "hey, it's not 'cause he's racist (though he may be), but just that he's a sore loser".
You have still not said for whom you will vote? Will you vote for Biden? Your attitude strikes me as very similar to the actions of one Phil Cleary in our 1999 referendum on becoming a republic. Rather than concentrate on this main issue, Cleary argued for a particular model on the choice of a president in any new republic. Little Johnny Howard, then the pro-monarchist prime minister seized on this dissension in the republican ranks and won his way. So over a minor point, we're still a monarchy.
I'm not familiar with Mr Cleary, or the details of his opinions, but I've met this argument frequently. It says "you and I are on the same side, but you're being a dick about this minor point, so we lost". Which might be true, or it might be that I don't think it's a minor point. It's entirely reasonable for someone to think that not all republican models are an improvement on the monarchy, that some Brexits are better than the EU, but other Brexits are worse than the EU, or whatever else.
Indeed, our shipmate @Alan Cresswell has frequently argued that the Brexit referendum was nonsense precisely because nobody knew what they were voting for. I don't think it's even remotely compulsory to prefer all Brexits over no Brexit, or to prefer remaining in the EU over every single possible Brexit.
I just want to add that I believe Phil Cleary, erstwhile player-coach of the Coburg Footy Club, distinguished ABC commentator on the VFA football on a Sunday afternoon (as it then was ), long-time campaigner against Domestic Violence and advocate for behavior change in blokes, is the very definition of a Great Australian. I choose to ignore his republican sentiments as a foible common to those of us with Irish heritage.
Just one more bit on Cleary. His greatness lay in his ordinariness, and still does. He was a typical sporty bloke and it took a huge tragedy in his family, but he has spent a lifetime talking to blokes about violence as a typical bloke. That sort of bloke, the local hero type, taking on an anti-violence message and spreading it far and wide is so important.
At this point, anyone who would be impressed by the logic in Newsweek is already the kind of person who would vote for a meth-addicted pedophile as long as he had an R next to his name(*).
I suppose this Birtherism 2 could bring out otherwise stay-at-homes on election day, though my impression is that the GOP base is already pretty worked up about things in general, so there aren't a lot of people for whom Harris' citizenship is going to be the pivotal factor determining their participation.
At this point, anyone who would be impressed by the logic in Newsweek is already the kind of person who would vote for a meth-addicted pedophile as long as he had an R next to his name(*).
.
Why didn't I think of that instead of Jerry Springer?
With Birther Redux, I really have to wonder what goes through the mind of Ben Carson, or Colin Powell or Condaleeza Rice or Bobby Jindal, should they attend certain functions, to recognise that the party they served still considers a person fair game if they're not fish-belly white. And what level of compartmentalisation, or abyssal shamelessness, goes on in the mind of the white person when engaging the above. At some level, are Carson, Powell, and Rice ever allowed to forget that they're descended from enslaved abductees? That Jindal is dark, but not like them?
How any POC can belong to the GOP in its current complexion beggars my imagination. In marxian vocabulary: false consciousness. And even that I find an inadequate explanation.
With Birther Redux, I really have to wonder what goes through the mind of Ben Carson, or Colin Powell or Condaleeza Rice or Bobby Jindal, should they attend certain functions, to recognise that the party they served still considers a person fair game if they're not fish-belly white. And what level of compartmentalisation, or abyssal shamelessness, goes on in the mind of the white person when engaging the above. At some level, are Carson, Powell, and Rice ever allowed to forget that they're descended from enslaved abductees? That Jindal is dark, but not like them?
How any POC can belong to the GOP in its current complexion beggars my imagination. In marxian vocabulary: false consciousness. And even that I find an inadequate explanation.
"I am X. I have achieved Y. Therefore being X is not a barrier to achieving Y."
How any POC can belong to the GOP in its current complexion beggars my imagination. In marxian vocabulary: false consciousness. And even that I find an inadequate explanation.
How any POC can belong to the GOP in its current complexion beggars my imagination. In marxian vocabulary: false consciousness. And even that I find an inadequate explanation.
Venality knows no racial bounds.
This has driven the left mad for centuries. Why do the workers vote to the right? Why are there anti-feminist women? But people don't follow linear logic.
At this point, anyone who would be impressed by the logic in Newsweek is already the kind of person who would vote for a meth-addicted pedophile as long as he had an R next to his name(*).
.
Why didn't I think of that instead of Jerry Springer?
Well, since you seem to approve, I should fess up and say its not original to me. Someone on another forum used it to describe the voting habits of right-wingers in my home province.
Though I believe that person said "heroin", not meth. I changed it because meth seems more like something associated with red-state USA.
This has driven the left mad for centuries. Why do the workers vote to the right? Why are there anti-feminist women? But people don't follow linear logic.
Because not everyone agrees that people who purport to be in favour of X are actually going to improve their lives, even if they're a member of group X? Because politics is multifaceted, and being in favour of rights for women is only one facet?
Plenty of anti-suffragist women were perfectly logical - they just began with very different premises than I begin with.
This has driven the left mad for centuries. Why do the workers vote to the right? Why are there anti-feminist women? But people don't follow linear logic.
Because not everyone agrees that people who purport to be in favour of X are actually going to improve their lives, even if they're a member of group X? Because politics is multifaceted, and being in favour of rights for women is only one facet?
Plenty of anti-suffragist women were perfectly logical - they just began with very different premises than I begin with.
Yes, my tea was ready, so I cut it short. There are indeed different premises, and different pathways from them, but there is in any case no requirement to be logical about politics.
Trump seems willing to jump on this bandwagon, albeit in his typical "some people say / just asking questions" cowardly way. I'm not sure who the reporter is who asked him that question, but I'd guess she's from OANN (the folks who try to out-Fox Fox) since she described Kamala Harris as an "anchor baby".
[..]she described Kamala Harris as an "anchor baby".
Sigh. There is, functionally, almost no such thing as an "anchor baby". Your child being a US citizen doesn't render you immune from deportation, and whilst US citizens can petition for their family members to be granted green cards (permanent residency), they can't do so whilst they are children.
Senator Harris's parents met and married whilst they were graduate students at UC Berkeley. Both her parents had full working careers in the US; her father still lives. I don't know when they acquired permanent residency, but it is completely clear just from looking at the timescale involved that they must have become US permanent residents (presumably through one of the employment categories) long before their daughter reached adulthood.
Maybe someone should sneak this on his teleprompter: "Some people say Baron is not a real citizen because Melania wasn't a citizen when he was born. Shouldn't I take a paternity test to make sure both his parents aren't illegals? Just asking the question. People want to know."
(Not really, I've always felt sorry for the poor child.)
I don't think Trump knows what he's reading half the time, but you can always tell when he goes off script and leaves his speech writers behind. It's usually at the end of a speech and what he says contradicts most of what went before.
I'm all for leaving Barron Trump completely out of any political discussion. Poor kid already has the dad from Hell. We should let him live his life as privately as possible.
Just one more bit on Cleary. His greatness lay in his ordinariness, and still does. He was a typical sporty bloke and it took a huge tragedy in his family, but he has spent a lifetime talking to blokes about violence as a typical bloke. That sort of bloke, the local hero type, taking on an anti-violence message and spreading it far and wide is so important.
And he climber into be with little Johnny Howard on the republican referendum.
Just one more bit on Cleary. His greatness lay in his ordinariness, and still does. He was a typical sporty bloke and it took a huge tragedy in his family, but he has spent a lifetime talking to blokes about violence as a typical bloke. That sort of bloke, the local hero type, taking on an anti-violence message and spreading it far and wide is so important.
And he climber into be with little Johnny Howard on the republican referendum.
The Trump campaign is throwing mud at Kamala Harris to see what might stick. It’s all about cementing the support base. Birther redux is just a part of that. As is anti feminist rhetoric.
I saw a CNN report suggesting that currently the Electoral College gives Trump a 4% bias compared with the popular vote. In crude terms he could lose the popular vote by 5 million votes and still win in the Electoral College. Nobody should count chickens. Mind you, in the same report, on the basis of current State polls Biden was forecast to win over 350 Electoral College votes.
Comments
On one of these threads a few days back, the phrase "Yellow Dog Democrat" was mentioned, ie. a southern white back in Jim Crow days, who would vote Democrat even if the candidate were a yellow dog.
Basically, the same idea. I'd actually suggest "Jerry Springer Democrat" as an update on the phrase, but that might give the impression that Springer is running for office again.
Given the...messy...topics Jerry Springer's show covers, imagine what all the back and forth would be like if he ran for president?
:shudder:
(For anyone who's unfamiliar and wants context, do a search on "Jerry Springer show". Scan the topics of the episodes...if you dare. *Possibly* NSFW.)
I think "Blue Dog Democrat" refers to conservative Democrats in the current era, when their views would be seen as running counter to the general leftward trend of the party.
Whereas Yellow Dogs, insofar as they evinced a belief in white-supremacy, were very much in keeping with the views promoted, or at least happily tolerated, by the overall party.
As for Springer, I think many of his episodes are about as authentic as WWE. Like, we're supposed to believe that a guy who goes on THAT particular show to hear some news from his girlfriend is then shocked to discover she wants to dump him?
The present arrangement, which is left up to each state to decide, is simply odd IMHO ... If a POTUS candidate wins 51% of the popular vote in every large state -- California, New York, Texas, Florida, etc., (s)he gets ALL of the electoral votes from those states ...
We had a lengthy discussion of the electoral college and its deficiencies on the Old Ship back in 2012. It's an eighteenth century anachronism that failed the fourth time it was tried (1800) and has already been revised once. The big problem isn't so much the winner-take-all system currently used by most states (though that is a problem), the big problem is the existence of the electoral college itself.
The "Founders" distrusted the moods of the masses, so originally, e.g., US Senators were elected by state legislatures, and the POTUS was chosen by Electors ... The French Revolution ... the October Revolution ... etc. ... they had a point ..
I'm not familiar with Mr Cleary, or the details of his opinions, but I've met this argument frequently. It says "you and I are on the same side, but you're being a dick about this minor point, so we lost". Which might be true, or it might be that I don't think it's a minor point. It's entirely reasonable for someone to think that not all republican models are an improvement on the monarchy, that some Brexits are better than the EU, but other Brexits are worse than the EU, or whatever else.
Indeed, our shipmate @Alan Cresswell has frequently argued that the Brexit referendum was nonsense precisely because nobody knew what they were voting for. I don't think it's even remotely compulsory to prefer all Brexits over no Brexit, or to prefer remaining in the EU over every single possible Brexit.
I have an anecdote about this. When I lived in Chicago, there was in my church circle a lovely family from Nigeria, whom I'll call F. and A. (since those are their initials) (plus baby whose name I don't remember). F. was going to one of the seminaries. F. said he was walking down the street and three white guys came up and were hassling him and slapping his arms and stuff -- the kind of thing that often ends in a black person getting a beating. F. said, "Gentlemen, what have I done to you?" in his beautiful Nigerian lilt, and the white kids said, "Oh, our beef's not with you" (or some such) and walked off.
A couple points on this. First, the original structure of the electoral college was decided by the Committee of Eleven for Postponed Matters. As the name implies this was the group at the Constitutional Convention that handled the things about which the Framers had no clear notions. Some favored letting Congress select the president, others the state governments, still others (including James Madison) favored direct popular election of the president. The electoral college represents not the necessary outgrowth of some grand philosophical design but an ad hoc kludge thrown together to satisfy the political realities of the U.S. in the late 1780s and because no one could agree on anything else.
Second, the electoral college as it currently exists actually amplifies "the moods of the masses", using a winner-take-all system to present a façade of unanimity over what is often a closely divided state-level electorate.
Third, if the results are superior to the popular vote, as you suggest, why is the system used for literally no other American election? Don't state governors, federal congressional representatives, or mayors need to be insulated from "the moods of the masses" as well?
Fourth: Rutherford B. Hayes, Benjamin Harrison, George W. Bush, Donald Trump. These are the four presidents installed into office with not even a plurality of the popular vote*. These men are hardly a stirring endorsement of the superiority of the electoral college over "the moods of the masses", yet you're willing to argue that America had to be saved from the people's choice because Samuel Tilden, Grover Cleveland, Al Gore, and Hillary Clinton would have been so much worse. That seems like a difficult case to make, especially for those last two.
*Going back only as far as 1832, which is the first presidential election for which the popular vote is mostly known.
So...
While “yellow dog” was certainly used by and about white supremacists in the (old) Democratic Party, its use was and is not limited to white supremacists. It has always referred to any Southern Democrat who is unwilling to vote for a Republican, and is still in common use in the South, often by state Democratic parties in semi-official ways, to mean a loyal or committed Democrat.
It's more likely that editing software or even a human editor replaced Indian with Native American, and it was then changed back. First Nation is a Canadianism, and not often used elsewhere.
So, just so I've got this clear...
If I'm a left-leaning 25-year old Black feminist in Alabama who will only ever vote Democrat because she thinks the Republicans are a bunch of bigots and racists, I can currently be referred to as a "Yellow Dog Democrat" without doing abuse to the term?
If so, interesting. Especially because my motivations for voting Democrat would pretty much be the same as someone sharing my worldview but living in San Francisco. Whereas the original usage of the phrase, or at least its connotations, strongly implied something particularly "white and southern" about the person's motives.
(Not that I'm doubting you, just that it's interesting the term survived the transitioning of the party from one ideological pole to another.)
I found out from some Caribbean teaching students at school that they do not get on well with any Africans they come across because the Africans see them as tainted by slavery. Which is a bit rich when they are West Africans from the nations which traded them.
And makes the story about the Nigerian interesting.
FWIW: In the Democratic Parties of some Southern states, titles like “the Yellow Dog Club” or “Yellow Dog Democrats” are used for giving levels, i.e., those who give at least $x.xx are members of the Yellow Dog Club. In at least some of those cases, the state Democratic Party is predominantly African American (though the leadership might not be).
Well, maybe not technically about white supremacy, but let's face it, the category "People in 1950s Alabama who hate the Republicans" probably included a significant subheading of "People who hate the Republicans because of the Civil War and later efforts against white supremacy."
EDIT: Thanks for the further info on the term's use today.
For those who don't want to wade through Mr. Eastman's literary droppings he's arguing not just that Senator Harris isn't a natural born citizen, as is required of the vice president, but that she's not a citizen at all because her parents were immigrants and, though legal, did not have permanent residency at the time of Sen. Harris' birth.
They also added this update at the end:
The fact that Senator Harris took the attorney general job Mr. Eastman once wanted would seem to be relevant when assessing his authorial neutrality. It also seems like the kind of thing a publication like Newsweek wouldn't have to be prompted to include in his author's bio, but here we are.
Oh good - it's a return to that particular idiosyncratic reading of "subject to the jurisdiction thereof".
(For those playing along at home, the US Supreme Court ruled on this in 1898 in US vs Wong Kim Ark. Senator Harris qualification to be president on grounds of citizenship has 122 years of legal precedent.)
Gaaaa! I read the article; and, until I got to the part about KH getting the job Eastman wanted, I was willing to consider the 1% possibility that *maybe* Eastman was just a fuddy-duddy* about details of the Constitution. (Strict Constructionist???) I'm surprised he didn't go after her for being a woman, too.
Next to that article is a link to a counterpoint by the Prof. Volokh he mentioned. I noticed that Volokh seems to have made a point of quoting Justice Scalia's approval of Sir William Blackstone, before Volokh using Blackstone to make his point. Is Eastman a Scalia groupie? And/or a strict constructionist? (Or whatever Scalia was.)
BTW, it occurs to me that Newsweek's "hey, it's not racist" note could be interpreted as "hey, it's not 'cause he's racist (though he may be), but just that he's a sore loser".
*Legal term.
The note I mentioned was the one at the beginning of Eastman's article, combined with the addition to the biographical note.
I just read the much-longer "Editor's Note" article, and it doesn't appear to suggest Eastman is a sore loser.
I just want to add that I believe Phil Cleary, erstwhile player-coach of the Coburg Footy Club, distinguished ABC commentator on the VFA football on a Sunday afternoon (as it then was
Good for him.
At this point, anyone who would be impressed by the logic in Newsweek is already the kind of person who would vote for a meth-addicted pedophile as long as he had an R next to his name(*).
I suppose this Birtherism 2 could bring out otherwise stay-at-homes on election day, though my impression is that the GOP base is already pretty worked up about things in general, so there aren't a lot of people for whom Harris' citizenship is going to be the pivotal factor determining their participation.
(*) To update the whole Yellow Dog thing.
How any POC can belong to the GOP in its current complexion beggars my imagination. In marxian vocabulary: false consciousness. And even that I find an inadequate explanation.
Venality knows no racial bounds.
This has driven the left mad for centuries. Why do the workers vote to the right? Why are there anti-feminist women? But people don't follow linear logic.
Well, since you seem to approve, I should fess up and say its not original to me. Someone on another forum used it to describe the voting habits of right-wingers in my home province.
Though I believe that person said "heroin", not meth. I changed it because meth seems more like something associated with red-state USA.
Because not everyone agrees that people who purport to be in favour of X are actually going to improve their lives, even if they're a member of group X? Because politics is multifaceted, and being in favour of rights for women is only one facet?
Plenty of anti-suffragist women were perfectly logical - they just began with very different premises than I begin with.
Biden, is that you?
Yes, my tea was ready, so I cut it short. There are indeed different premises, and different pathways from them, but there is in any case no requirement to be logical about politics.
Sigh. There is, functionally, almost no such thing as an "anchor baby". Your child being a US citizen doesn't render you immune from deportation, and whilst US citizens can petition for their family members to be granted green cards (permanent residency), they can't do so whilst they are children.
Senator Harris's parents met and married whilst they were graduate students at UC Berkeley. Both her parents had full working careers in the US; her father still lives. I don't know when they acquired permanent residency, but it is completely clear just from looking at the timescale involved that they must have become US permanent residents (presumably through one of the employment categories) long before their daughter reached adulthood.
Maybe someone should sneak this on his teleprompter: "Some people say Baron is not a real citizen because Melania wasn't a citizen when he was born. Shouldn't I take a paternity test to make sure both his parents aren't illegals? Just asking the question. People want to know."
(Not really, I've always felt sorry for the poor child.)
I don't think Trump knows what he's reading half the time, but you can always tell when he goes off script and leaves his speech writers behind. It's usually at the end of a speech and what he says contradicts most of what went before.
And he climber into be with little Johnny Howard on the republican referendum.
Australian dialect? Rogue spellcheck?
Spot on - posted too early in the morning is the best excuse I can come up with.
I saw a CNN report suggesting that currently the Electoral College gives Trump a 4% bias compared with the popular vote. In crude terms he could lose the popular vote by 5 million votes and still win in the Electoral College. Nobody should count chickens. Mind you, in the same report, on the basis of current State polls Biden was forecast to win over 350 Electoral College votes.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?feature=youtu.be&v=B3_QS9tUpdE
Could you perhaps offer a little more clue about the contents?
get trump out above all else, good explainer on leftist vs liberal in this political climate.