US Politics 2018

[Jubal]

Well, the Trump train rattles on towards the midterms. So what's coming up in 2018, and what's the current situation?

• Trump is really really unpopular, his popularity is generally sitting at under 40%, and he's the lowest president on record for this point in his term.
• The "midterm" elections are coming up, electing 1/3 of the Senate seats and all of the House of Representatives. The Republicans control both houses at the moment: the Democrats are hoping to take advantage of Trump's unpopularity to retake one or both of these.
• The Dems have got a big voting lead. 538 estimates a 7.3% lead, RCP a 7.9% lead, according to aggregations of recent polls.
• The election maps are really skewed to Republicans. The Democrats, despite a big lead in ballot polls, need like a 6-7 point lead to have a decent chance of taking back the House of Representatives. There've been a significant bunch of Republican retiring, and the Democrats are reportedly doing very well at recruiting candidates, but even with their current 7% or so lead there's really not much margin for error at all.
• The senate is even harder for Democrats. The 1/3 of the Senate seats that are up, meanwhile, are those last elected in 2012, a good Democrat year, so Democrats have some really difficult races where they've got to hold onto Senate seats in states that Trump won. Indiana, Missouri, West Virginia, North Dakota could all be under serious threat, and Ohio, Wisconsin, and Florida also have some potential for Republican gains. To win the Senate back, they've got to hold this bunch of seats in Trump territory and win two more to get the chamber to 51-49 in their favour (50-50 it stays with the Republicans, as the Vice-president gets to cast tie breaker votes). Nevada is the Dems' best bet for a gain; Arizona is their other best chance, though it's rarely elected Democrats statewide. The outlier shots for Dem pickups are Texas, which is a very long shot though they have a decent candidate and Ted Cruz isn't that popular, and Tennessee, which is heavily Republican but where popular former Democrat governor Phil Bredesden is running for the Democrats.
• There are fights on foreign policy and immigration coming up. Trump's new protectionist tariffs are designed to protect US manufacturing but might lead to higher prices for consumers and a weaker economy overall, and may drive a wedge through the parties as both Dems and Republicans are split between protectionist and free trade policies. There's also immigration, on which the Dems and some Republicans want a deal to protect DACA recipients (people who were brought to the US as babies, mostly only speak English/are completely part of US society, but are at risk of deportation because they were technically born abroad). Trump has vacillated on the issue, though, and the House of Representatives includes a lot of Republican anti-immigration hardliners who will work to block any deal.
• The economy's doing pretty well. It's growing fairly healthily, which Trump and the Republicans will be hoping will form a lifeline for them in the coming months. By and large Trump doesn't seem to be getting the credit for this - which makes logical sense, because basically none of his economic measures have really kicked in yet, but actually quite unusual since presidents usually get credit/blame for what happens in their term even if their predecessor's policies are responsible. The GOP's big hope is that voters will start to credit them for a continually growing economy, shaving Dems' lead down enough for them to hold both houses in November.

I think that's the basics. Buckle up, hope for no nuclear war with China, and let's see what happens next...

[Bautistaz]

I would like to know if you can improve my knowledge or solve my doubts?

[comrade_general]

Lol US politics wouldn't be the best place to start with that you silly bot boi.

[Jubal]

Polls seem to be tightening down towards about a 4% Dem lead, which probably wouldn't be enough to retake the house - but actually there's a split between a few pollsters who think the lead is 1-3 percent, and a few who think it's 8-11 percent. Which cluster is right, who knows. Interestingly, the Dem lead dropping isn't mostly because the Republican vote has improved - it's a little better, but mainly the Dem vote is dropping off into undecideds. That said, most people probably still aren't very engaged with the whole process, so it'll be hard to really start getting the shape of turnout/swing voters in polls until maybe August/Sept.

[comrade_general]

Whoa I used to dislike Kanye but he legit seems woke.

[Pentagathus]

I hear he's a fan of Thomas Sowell. Pretty damn woke.

[comrade_general]

It's been a while since I listened to a presidential talk, or the news in general. Totally agree with free and fair trade, and NK, and the failures of our past leaders. Not so sure about letting Russia back in. They're just too nefarious.
The CNN bit was hilarious, and so like them to try and imply something like an alliance shift in the middle of a peace negotiation.
But yeah, well done, I like his business attitude, he's not pandering to anyone, and he feels to genuinely want to help make us and the world a more free and prosperous place. I just don't get the lingering and unseething hate.

[Jubal]

"Free and fair trade" would be great if that was what Trump was doing. What he's actually doing is starting a trade war, chucking a load of tariffs on imports and provoking a load of retaliatory tariffs on US exports. Which makes trade less free, and less fair, and everyone poorer. His words just don't match what he's actually doing here. I'm not sure I can think of anything he's particularly done that's helped make the world more free and prosperous; this tariff war is definitely hitting the prosperity bit, and his administration's increasingly harsh border and blanket travel ban measures make it less free as well. Like, if you want to be world renowned for freedom, not separating detained children from their families would be a nice start I think.

And yeah - Russia was kicked out of the group after invading and occupying a large chunk of a neighbouring country (Crimea, taken from Ukraine), and they still haven't left yet...

[comrade_general]

Of course you would see it that way you're on the side who's benefiting from us lol. He said there would be retaliation. We're the ones being taken advantage of. We give everyone else a taste of their own medicine and then maybe they will see that we've been in an unfair deal for years and that it's time to make a new deal for the benefit everyone.

[Jubal]

We're the ones being taken advantage of.

OK, please point to the details of current trading policy between the US and the EU, or the US and Canada, or the US and Mexico, that specifically unfairly disbenefit the USA. Because as far as I'm aware there aren't any and this is complete bollocks that Trump is pushing to make up for the fact that he doesn't actually have a decent economic plan and blaming the rest of the world is easier than actually doing anything to benefit US workers. You don't even have a deep trade deal with the EU, all that's there is a a reduction in goods tariffs which serves to level the playing field, it's not our fault if EU manufacturers are making stuff that US folk want to buy. But if you want to try and prove me wrong, then be my guest, the floor is yours and I'm happy to listen and be proven wrong if the evidence is there.

[comrade_general]

OK, please point to the details of current trading policy between the US and the EU, or the US and Canada, or the US and Mexico, that specifically unfairly benefit the USA.

I can't. Nothing unfairly benefits the USA. Everyone else benefits from us.

Get your hand out of our piggybank

Funny that you would only mention those countries anyway, which are small potatoes tbh. The bigger problems are with China etc.

[Jubal]

Sorry, disbenefit, as you know I meant. Edited to clarify.

But the arguments he's having at this G7 aren't primarily with China, and it's not China that he just slapped a load of new tariffs on... like, none of the other G7 countries would be upset if Trump wanted to negotiate a response to e.g. Chinese steel dumping which IS an unfair trade practice and dealing with it isn't anti free trade. Slapping tariffs on produce from NAFTA and EU countries, on the other hand, is directly making trade less free, and he's just done it in a big way.

[comrade_general]

Start small, get everyone on the same page, then go after the big dudes as a team.

[Jubal]

But we were on the same page. The only person on a different page is Trump, and if he wants to get everyone onto his page he's going to have to explain exactly what was unfair about how trade in the NAFTA/EU area worked beforehand that necessitates aggressive trade actions that are going to make everyone poorer. Which he hasn't, and as far as I can tell that's because it wasn't.

[comrade_general]

Right, well that's his job not mine. Can't expect me to explain the nuances.