Democrats Have Momentum – Here's How They Could Lose It

https://www.rollingstone.com/politi...momentum-heres-how-they-could-lose-it-w514204

I'm not a Democrat but like most Americans it's been my belief that Congress does it's best work for Americans when both parties work together to come up with solutions. I may not agree with specific legislation that Congress creates based upon bipartisanship but I believe that America is better off when bipartisanship is the method Congress employs in creating the legislation for America.

A Gallup Poll from 2011 during the Obama Administration reflects the overall opinion of Americans that want bipartisanship solutions.

http://news.gallup.com/poll/145679/americans-strongly-desire-political-leaders-work-together.aspx

History also shows that the Congressional Approval Rating is highest when the two parties work together.

http://news.gallup.com/poll/1600/congress-public.aspx

During the 1980's when Reagan was working on his tax overhaul it was bipartisan legislation that took several years of Congressional hearings and input from both sides before it was passed and the Congressional Approval Rating was at over 40%. That dropped during the George GW Bush and early Clinton years but as Clinton worked with both sides of Congress to come up with legislation, including his tax agenda that created a surplus budget projection, the Congressional Approval rating soared to over 50%. There was the huge spike in the approval rating following 9/11 but then it's been going mostly down.

A short uptick from about 20% to almost 40% as Congress worked with President Obama to deal with the Recession in 2009 but following that, as Republicans assumed the "Oppose anything Obama" position in Congress, the approval rating declined to 9% around 2013 and only increase since then to about 30% in 2016 as the Obama economic growth after the Recession solidified driving up stock values and driving down unemployment to the lowest levels in decades.

Since the GOP took control of both houses of Congress and Trump was elected there has been zero interest in bipartisanship on the major GOP agenda issues and the Congressional Approval Rating has dropped from 30% at the end of the Obama Administration to just 13% today.

Behind closed doors the GOP excluded any Democrats from participation in it's plans to repeal and replace Obamacare and the vast majority of Americans opposed the legislation. Fortunately for the American People that legislation failed.

Behind closed doors the GOP excluded any Democrats from participating in the development of it's tax cuts for the wealthy and corporations and the vast majority of Americans oppose the legislation. Unfortunately for the American People that legislation will pass today in Congress and it will likely take decades before Congress can repair the damage to America by that legislation.

I've advocated bipartisanship in the past but the GOP clearly doesn't want bipartisanship in Congress. Perhaps it's time for the Democrats to play hardball with the Republicans and to simply demand fixes whenever it does have the votes necessary to make those demands.

After several stop-gap measures this year the final deadline is established. On December 22 the US government is going to run out of money and without the support of Democrats the GOP controlled government is going to begin to shut down.

Give me one good reason why the Democrats should provide a "bipartisan" solution to help the GOP keep the government running when the GOP has refused to even consider bipartisanship on health care and taxes?

As much as a government shutdown will hurt America the refusal of the GOP to even consider bipartisanship in Congress on it's major agenda items is causing far more harm to America. The Democrats should use their legislative power in the Senate to prevent the GOP from extending the debt ceiling until:

First - The GOP with bipartisan support from the Democrats must repeal the tax cuts being passed on a purely partisan basis. Screw the Republicans and make them eat crow for their nefarious passage of partisan tax legislation that's highly opposed by the American People.

Second - The GOP with bipartisan support from the Democrats must approve the bipartisan Dream Act of 2017 that was introduced in the Senate by Senators Lindsey Graham (R-SC), Dick Durbin (D-IL), Jeff Flake (R-AZ), and Chuck Schumer (D-NY) on July 20, 2017.

Third - The GOP with bipartisan support from the Democrats must approve legislation that protects the Mueller criminal investigation of the Russian intervention in the 2016 elections.

Fourth - The GOP with bipartisan support from the Democrats must amend the Jerusalem Embassy Relocation Act of 1995 to clarify that the status of Jerusalem can only be determined by a mutual agreement between Israel and the Palestinians.

Fifth - The GOP with bipartisan support from the Democrats in the Senate must revise the Senate Rules to restore the "cloture" requirements for presidential appellate judge appointments, all Supreme Court appointments, all cabinet level positions, and all department head appointments. This Senate Rule must also be protected by requiring cloture on any amendments to it.

Sixth - Fix Obamacare. It only requires some minor revisions and the majority of Americans today support Obamacare.

Seventh - Pass the Social Security 2100 Act that fixes the funding problems for Social Security for the rest of the century.

The GOP's rejection of bipartisanship is far more harmful than a government shutdown and it appears the only way that bipartisanship will occur is if the government is shut down until the GOP is forced to be bipartisan in all of it's actions.

Democrats need to draw the same line in the sand that the Republicans have already drawn. Do what's best for America with bipartisanship or the GOP can take responsibility for the government running out of money.

 

No thanks, the less liberal input there is the better off America is, regardless of what 'polls' might say. The approval ratings polls do not necessarily reflect what you are saying anyway. Only that at times Congress was more or less popular without any regard to factors outside of Congressional makeup. The highest spike on the graph was around 9/11, and Congressional makeup had little to do with it...

 

It isn't that democrats are fooled in bipartisanship...but the only way they get congress is by winning in red states. They can't do that without running on bipartisanship.

 

They cant do that unless somehow people come to their sense and end partisan gerrymandering.

 

Jones didn't win Alabama by promising Medicare for all...

 

I think the blue dog thing is going away for a while, at least until the hyper-partisanship dies down significantly. I don't see Democrats flipping the House for at least a decade, and their Senate prospects really aren't that good either...

I know you folks beat Moore, but that was completely different than a full calendar of races in which no one seat can grab enough interest in headlines to sway it one way or another through the media as Moore's race...

 

Jones won Alabama because Moore was a POS. Not because Jones was a demagogic partisan.

 

We're aware the GOP has a gerrymandered majority. Hence why we need to disband the GOP/Dems and relegate them to open info super pacs and have no party listed for anyone running for office.

 

Great Post !!! No doubt the Congress will flip in 2018. The Trend is there after Virginia and Alabama.

It will escalate now that this Wealth Shift Bill has passed !

 

Democrats refuse to work with the GOP, they didn't under Obama and they won't now.

Name us one thing they are willing to compromise with the GOP on or is this thread only about the GOP compromising as I suspect it is.

And the creator of this thread saying he isn't a democrat is full of it.

 

Any time the Republicans capitulate and compromise with the Democrats I end up losing more of my freedom, liberties and money.

 

LOL! Democrats have momentum......downhill.

 

it is small momentum, the democrats are playing a losing hand. the rich have spoken which party they prefer, and with the economy goes the votes.

the real economy, not the one on paper.

 

Too late.

Already gone.

 

They'd be willing to work with Republicans on opening the borders, taxing us into poverty, and ruining the country.

 

Yes you can. Look at local candidates like Lee Carter who ran very far left campaigns in Trump voting districs and won.

 

No momentum - except downhill as stated above - and not a current event.

 

Yes, and Bernie was HUGELY popular running on a social democrat platform even with the Clintonists/DP/MSM working to destroy him.

One of the biggest lies of the massively corrupt "one party masquerading as two" system is that we're constantly told that we must move farther right.

We're so far right now Reagan looks like Lenin.

 

We absolutely will not compromise with this administration in power or with these right wing wackos in control of both houses. The moderates in that party are already gone. The ones that are left simply cannot offer us anything we want and keep their base happy, and we have no incentive to give them anything unless we get something we really want. We have learned from the GOP that the tactics that work to win control, is simply to stall, obstruct, and point to the ruling party as the party that cannot solve problems. Because they are not getting any of our imput to mitigate their worst impulses, they are overreaching on issue after issue.

For blue dogs, they have to sound sympathetic with the rhetoric of the right while they vote 'no' on big votes for process issues for austerity reasons etc, and maybe vote yes on less substantial issues at times when the measure would pass anyway to cover their asses. When Schumer and Pelosi give it the nod, that they can afford to have a few dissenters.... throw them the bone.

 

you have things backwards

 

And you didn't work with them when you controlled everything, and you still didn't work with them when they took the House.

 

Nope, I have it correct.

 

Exactly.

I would like to hear of one compromise the democrats have offered republicans since, say, 2010 when they offered to extend the Bush tax cuts for an extension of unemployment benefits.

That was the last time they reached across the aisle.

 

You've got to explain the far right thing. We are further up the y axis toward authoritarian, but economically we have moved left toward central control.

 

And they didn't work with us when we controlled everything, and that is why they took the house. We learned.