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The Democratic Strategist

Political Strategy for a Permanent Democratic Majority

Political Strategy Notes

If you thought outright partisan political hackery was beneath the dignity of the chief justice of the United States Supreme Court, you would be wrong.
Geoffrey Skelley, Political Analyst at Larry J. Sabato’s Crystal Ball crunches the numbers and concludes. “…Unlike the proposal to award electoral votes by congressional district — a plan that the Crystal Ball’s Alan Abramowitz found would have elected Mitt Romney in 2012 even though President Obama won the national popular vote by about 5 million votes — a proportional allocation system, used nationally, might track more closely to the national vote than the current system.” Scant comfort, that. Why not direct popular election?
Also at Crystal Ball, Kyle Kondik argues that the South Dakota and West Virginia Senate races are the ones to watch in assessing whether or not Dems can hold the senate in 2014. If these races are polling close a month or two before election day, then Dems have a good chance of holding their Senate majority.
Matthew Dowd’s argument here that Dem 2016 front-runners are a little long-in-the-tooth compared to the GOP presidential field lacks demographic analysis of the 2016 electorate.
Good to see that a coalition has turned the heat on VA Gov. McDonnell to restore voting rights of at least some ex-felons who have served their time. Felon disenfranchisement is one of the more effective methods of politically-motivated voter suppression. But making Republicans defend it on camera for those who have served their time is a good way to expose the petty partisanship and moral equivocation of GOP office-holders.
Anyone still harboring doubts that the Bush-Cheney administration was the worst ever, should watch this CSPAN video featuring Linda J. Bilmes, author of “The Three Trillion Dollar War: The True Cost of the Iraq Conflict.” Bilmes now projects the actual cost to hit $5 trill when all the bills are finally paid.
This story has another disturbing statistic, “less than five minutes” — the length of time it took to massacre 20 children and six adults at Sandy Hook Elementary School, which should haunt the hearts those who opposed the ban on assault weapons and hopefully encourage them to do the right thing next time.
Karthick Ramakrishnan, author of four books on immigration, race and politics, has a L.A. Times op-ed explaining why the U.S. Supreme Court could create a major mess if they decide in Lepak vs. City of Irving that it’s ok not to count non-citizens in drawing political districts.
I nominate “angry at Washington” (and it’s equally-mindless kin, “blame Washington” and “disappointed/unhappy with Washington”) to be the lamest, most vapid false equivalency meme parroted by journalists and pollsters since the dawn of The Republic. IMHO, those who promote it merit placement in one or more of three categories — stupid, lazy or corrupt.
If there is a better ‘toon than this one about the High Court’s DOMA deliberations, I’d like to see it.

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