Friday Open Thread [5.8.15]

Friday Open Thread [5.8.15]

2 Comments
Dylan Byers: “On Nov. 8, 2016, Clinton will start — start — with a minimum 247 of the 270 electoral votes she needs to win. If you give her Colorado and Virginia — which many political strategists would, given the Hispanic population in one and the rising influence of the northern-centered population in the other — she’ll start with 269. That means Clinton doesn’t need Ohio or Florida. She just needs one small state like Iowa, Nevada or New Hampshire to put her over the edge. And because she’s got a boatload of money and no viable primary challenger, she’ll have plenty of time and resources to lock up at least one of those states.” “In order to shift the map, the Republican nominee would have to find a way to win Colorado and/or Virginia. That means winning over Hispanics, which will be a difficult task for a nominee who has spent a months-long primary trying to win over the conservative grass roots. It also means winning over enough members of Virginia’s white working class to counter the more populated liberal-urban centers in the north. Not impossible, of course, but hard.”
You Keep Using That Word, I Do Not Think It Means What You Think It Means

You Keep Using That Word, I Do Not Think It Means What You Think It Means

13 Comments
Populism. That's the word and that's the word in the title of a piece that appeared in The Atlantic this week authored by Governor Jack Markell, called, Americans Need Jobs, Not Populism. In fairness, he may not have provided the title to this thing. But it is less an argument against populism than it is an argument for working class and middle class people to sit down and shut up about the very real squeeze we find ourselves in. It is an argument for his own political philosophy -- privileging businesses over the people who are the consumers for these businesses -- a philosophy that certainly wasn't on display (IMO) when he first campaigned for Governor. In this, the Governor wants you to know that it is globalization that is the root of today's economic issues. Which couldn't be more wrong.
Markell Continues the Social Progressive Dance

Markell Continues the Social Progressive Dance

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He is a curious mix, our Governor. Later on today I shall have my tome-like response to Governor Markell's thesis on Third Way Politics in the Atlantic last week. The Governor's third way politics is unique. He champions progressive policies on the social level (if you exclude education and marijuana from that definition) to hide the fact that he is no progressive economically or educationally. Anti-Discrimination law, Civil Unions, Marriage Equality, and now the repeal of the Death Penalty.