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NEVERENDING ♾️ The NEVERENDING Political Discussion Thread

And, a bonus one from the County Next Door (@gtpeach and a couple of other folks may get this) - the Gwinnett Transit Referendum (which would pave the way (no pun intended) for MARTA expansion along the northeast corridor) is currently losing by about 1,750 votes. :mad:
I'm pretty sure that referendum was being considered when I was in school a thousand years ago. Or something similar. It's a shame they're dealing with the same stupid issues.
 
I'm pretty sure that referendum was being considered when I was in school a thousand years ago. Or something similar. It's a shame they're dealing with the same stupid issues.

The problem this time around is that the focal point was running the northeast/Gold line out to Norcross - the rest of the county (and it's a big county by Georgia standards) didn't get much beyond slightly better bus service in some areas.

Off-topic - I did get a chuckle out of your reaction to my Uga for President post. ;)
 
Here's an oddity in NC:
President: tRump (r)
Senate: Tillis (r)
Gov: Cooper (d)

The Lt. Gov. (r) was running against incumbent Cooper & lost.
 
My predictions:

Biden: Wisconsin, Arizona, Nevada
Trump: North Carolina, Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania.

"This is a fraud on the American public. This is an embarrassment to our country." You said it, Donnie.

Trump may shit on a gold toilet, but somehow he tapped into the belligerent, armchair quarterback, tough guy aspect of Rust Belt blue collar culture really, really well. Collectively, the lunchbucket crowd tends to have a lot of respect for combative, outspoken, tell-it-like-it-is anti-establishment politicians and leaders. (Cite: NYS Republican gubernatorial candidate Carl Paladino, who had cult-like support, and a solid majority of votes, in the traditionally Democratic Buffalo/Erie County area.) It's nothing new, and it doesn't matter whether the politician is a Democrat or Republican.

Blue collar culture in the Rust Belt has also been shifting, politically and culturally, over the past 30 years or so. It’s gone aggro, as an Australian might say. It grew a goatee, bought a black RAM 3500 with a Cummins DAYSUL, crew cab, long bed, and duallys, rolls coal on cyclists and Priuses, and tailgates you on the 90 or 94 even though you're doing 80 in the right lane, and the passing lane is clear. It wears t-shirts with angry, oddly specific I-was-born-in-October-don't-fuck-with-me-and-by-the-way-fuck-you screeds. Rear-wheel drive land barges and “classy” luxury coupes gave way to TRUUUUUCKS, bowling and firemen's olympics to guns and powersports, cottages on the lake to condos at Myrtle Beach, polka to bro country, and small starter houses in inner ring suburbs to 2,500 square foot tract mansions in distant exurbs where the local high school sports teams are proudly still named "The Fighting Redmen" or whatever.

View attachment 49557

I miss having a center right party in the United States. You know, so there's options aside from center left major party, far right major party, libertarian minor party, barefoot hippie minor party, lefty whackadoodle "People's Socialist Revolutionary Laborer" whatever minor parties, and paleoconservative lock-and-load minor parties.

If things turn out the way I think they're going to turn out, I really see the blue Northeastern states going their own way, in a sense. More like working towards a semi-autonomous "nation inside a nation" than seceding.
:mi: Surprise!!

lets go blue.jpg
 
We're still not sure about funding schools.
When I was in HS, we had grades 7-12 in one building and it was pretty cramped. The school folks put up a referendum for a tax hike to address the crowding, but it failed miserably. The school folks then decided we should go to school in split sessions, so for my grades 10-12 years, we went to school at 7:15AM to 12:30PM, and grades 7-9 went from 12:45PM to 5:50PM. Enough parents got annoyed with it that a referendum passed and classes went back to the normal 8:05 to 3:15PM schedule a couple years after I graduated.
 
The problem this time around is that the focal point was running the northeast/Gold line out to Norcross - the rest of the county (and it's a big county by Georgia standards) didn't get much beyond slightly better bus service in some areas.

Off-topic - I did get a chuckle out of your reaction to my Uga for President post. ;)

So it failed because people wanted MORE transit than the referendum was for? That's actually kind of a nice progression versus the reasons those kinds of referendums failed when I was in town! Although, it may not have been expansion into Gwinnett County that was in question when I was there - it may have been Cobb County? I can't remember.
 
When I was in HS, we had grades 7-12 in one building and it was pretty cramped. The school folks put up a referendum for a tax hike to address the crowding, but it failed miserably. The school folks then decided we should go to school in split sessions, so for my grades 10-12 years, we went to school at 7:15AM to 12:30PM, and grades 7-9 went from 12:45PM to 5:50PM. Enough parents got annoyed with it that a referendum passed and classes went back to the normal 8:05 to 3:15PM schedule a couple years after I graduated.

Did you go to the same HS I did back in the late 70s?

Same schedule as my 4 years in high school, but only 9th graders in the afternoon with 10-12 in the morning.
 
Looking at our county clerk's website, it appears that two of our D U.S. Congresswomen who came into office during the "Blue Wave" in 2018 (Haley Stevens and Elissa Slotkin) are going to lose their re-election bids.

I'm not entirely surprised, given what I know about the demographics of their districts but I would like to see them stick around in things longer, especially Slotkin.

One important caveat: I cannot seem to find how many absentee/mail-in ballots are still being counted in these districts so things could theoretically still change.

Edit: It looks like Slotkin is probably going to win. Her district stretches much further East, into some more blue areas, than I realized it did. Stevens race is still pretty up in the air and there are a lot more outstanding ballots in the Wayne County portion of her district.
 
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If things turn out the way I think they're going to turn out, I really see the blue Northeastern states going their own way, in a sense. More like working towards a semi-autonomous "nation inside a nation" than seceding.

Yes to the Northeast States of America, please. What we have now is not working. Doesn't have to be Civil War-style national divorce, which would be immensely bloody and probably turn into Bosnia, but more like "I'm going to have my own friends and hobbies and only talk to you when it comes to bills and the kids".
 
Turnout locally was 67% and 60% of Republicans pulled a straight ticket compared with 40% of Democrats.
 
When I was in HS, we had grades 7-12 in one building and it was pretty cramped. The school folks put up a referendum for a tax hike to address the crowding, but it failed miserably. The school folks then decided we should go to school in split sessions, so for my grades 10-12 years, we went to school at 7:15AM to 12:30PM, and grades 7-9 went from 12:45PM to 5:50PM. Enough parents got annoyed with it that a referendum passed and classes went back to the normal 8:05 to 3:15PM schedule a couple years after I graduated.
Our school problem is just straight up funding. We never had the highest funding levels across the nation, but let's say we were doing okay. So when the big recession hit the legislature took as much money as they could from education and never reinstated that funding so we're scraping to pay for anything. It doesn't help that we now divert a lot of the funding to charter schools. We are just fighting to beat Alabama on being the least educated state.
 
Trust me South Carolina is right there too. The schools are so bad in general. I am not a believe in just throwing money at something and that solves all problems but it's a huge issue here. I don't pay a dime in taxes toward the operating expenses of the public school system. Only non-residential and rental properties pay that portion of the tax. It's crazy. Now they will have a ballot initiative for some capital campaign and if that passes I'll have to pay for that. But the overall formula is just nuts. And because so many don't trust the public schools to do a good enough job for their kids we have tons of private schools. Which impacts housing affordability because on top of a mortgage a lot of parents are paying anywhere from $3-800 a month for private school tuition.
 
It's just a popularity contest now. We do not vote in the most qualified candidates anymore. Two examples:

AL - Tommy Tuberville, the former Auburn football coach just beat the Senate incumbent.
NC - Madison Cawthorne, a 25 year old who was in a bad car wreck in 2017 and has never had a professional job (although he says he's a real estate investor) just beat Moe Davis, a retired U.S. Air Force colonel, attorney, educator, politician, and former administrative law judge.
 
And, a bonus one from the County Next Door (@gtpeach and a couple of other folks may get this) - the Gwinnett Transit Referendum (which would pave the way (no pun intended) for MARTA expansion along the northeast corridor) is currently losing by about 1,750 votes. :mad:
Damn. Expanding MARTA rail up to Dunwoody and Alpharetta seems like a natural.

Here in New York's wine country, NY-23 voted to keep Tom Reed (R), with 61% of the overall vote. His challenger, Tracy Mitrano (D), got 70% of the vote in my county. Kind of what everybody expected.

For POTUS votes that my county counted so far, Biden/Harris (D) 69.9%, Trump/Pence (R) 27.5%, Hawkins/Walker (420G) 0.8%, Jorgensen/Cohen (L) 0.7%, Pierce/Ballard 0.3%.

:mi: Surprise!!
Keeping my fingers crossed ...
 
We're now arguing over sharpies being used on a ballot not getting counted. The funny part, county election guy says it's actually the preferred method.
 
Damn. Expanding MARTA rail up to Dunwoody and Alpharetta seems like a natural.

You're think of the north (central) Red line, which already extends past Dunwoody into Sandy Springs, and further expansion north into Roswell and Alpharetta would be in areas already within MARTA's service area. Yesterday's referendum was to add Gwinnett County (northeast expansion of the Gold line to Norcross) into their service area.
 
270 to 268... that is absolutely crazy, if it finishes how it is looking. Unless Biden gets some strong support in PA, he may win without it.

This election has really been something.
 
We're now arguing over sharpies being used on a ballot not getting counted. The funny part, county election guy says it's actually the preferred method.

When I voted (absentee!), I used the same kind of black magic marker that polling stations in New York use, and made sure to color within the lines. I was more careful with this ballot than with the Scantron sheets for my SAT and ACT. I wasn't about to take chances on my ballot being rejected because I used some oddball ink that's invisible to the scanners, or because a ballot checker was having a bad day.
 
Ours is a connect the arrow kind of ballot. Kind of like this. I don't know how they count it, but all you need to do is draw a line to connect the dots. Not to confusing.

1604522859067.png
 
Hey Michigan, figure out your stuff so we can move on or we'll take more of your delegates with the Census redistricting.
- Arizona
 
Ours is a connect the arrow kind of ballot. Kind of like this. I don't know how they count it, but all you need to do is draw a line to connect the dots. Not to confusing.

View attachment 49561

That's what they used to have in Maryland. I liked it. It was simple, you feed the ballot into a machine and it read the arrows and there was a physical copy for a recount if necessary. But these companies that make voting machines lobby the hell out out of state delegates and get awarded contracts to provide new machine. Drives me crazy.
 
So each day is like Christmas, with new surprises and presents!

Today, it looks like both Georgia and Pennsylvania may go to Biden, but Arizona may go to Trump.

If Biden gets Pennsylvania it is over. The demographic and data people are like Gods right now on Twitter. They all have like 2000% more followers.
 
Also, I would like to know who actually looks at Rudy Giuliani and thinks, "Man, this guy is really good at his job, and clearly is someone I should listen to!".

Everything I have watched about him and his lawsuits just makes him look really, really crazy. Even if he has a point (which I am not sure he can even articulate), I am just lost in his inability to talk to people like a normal human. This guy used to be very good at speaking to people 20 years ago. Now it is just like me yelling at an infomercial, "WHY WOULD I BUY THAT, WHEN I CAN MAKE IT MYSELF? HOW IS THAT HELPING ME? THIS IS FRAUD!"
 
These headlines & articles -

GOP consultant: 'Revenge of John McCain' plaguing Trump​


'John McCain's Last Laugh': Cindy McCain Under Fire From Trump Supporters for Arizona Flipping

Trump reportedly didn't spend much time in Arizona because he doesn't like traveling west

 
In Detroit, at the convention center formerly known as Cobo Hall, the AV are being counted.
In a nearby county, the GOP sent out a call to attend this event because they felt it was unfair, they're being locked out, they can't see the ballots from 6' away, etc.

Needless to say the local media are covering the event. This is a photographer from a TV station bringing in some equipment.

 
Kanye probably got more votes than Trump in Vermont, and more than Biden in Oklahoma.

Seriously, check out a county level voting map. Oklahoma is solid red. Same thing with West Virginia. Even Utah, Wyoming, and Kansas have some blue counties.
 
Seriously, check out a county level voting map. Oklahoma is solid red. Same thing with West Virginia. Even Utah, Wyoming, and Kansas have some blue counties.
BLUE
Indiana -
Lake - Northwest corner is a adjacent to Chicago
Tippecanoe - Purdue University
Monroe - Bloomington & IU
Marion - Indianapolis

Kentucky -
Jefferson - Louisville
Fayette - Lexington & UK

Illinois -
Chicago metro vs rest of state
Champaign - University of Illinois
 
Kanye probably got more votes than Trump in Vermont, and more than Biden in Oklahoma.

Seriously, check out a county level voting map. Oklahoma is solid red. Same thing with West Virginia. Even Utah, Wyoming, and Kansas have some blue counties.
Naw, Kanye only got like 1250 votes in VT DJT got almost 10x that. The big story here is how the state went mostly blue for LT gov and almost all-red for the incumbent R gov.
 
Vermont votes for the person - they have inconsistencies like this all the time
It's a lot of pretty liberal people pulling the lever for an R despite everything that comes with that party after the last 4 years. Scott's been the anti-Trump though, and has done an incredible job with COVID. His opponent (Zuckerman) wasn't terribly compelling and basically carried downtown Burlington and nothing else.

I do think that especially once the person is an incumbent governor, Vermont votes the person. Most governors in VT get to be governor as long as they want to and do a good-enough job. Those who can read the handwriting on the wall decide gracefully not to run again before they get voted out (a'la Shumlin after the failure of his universal health care plan).
 
So it looks like Nevada is a win for Biden, which means Fox News, one of the few outlets that hasn't taken back their Arizona call, may be the first to call the win for Biden.

What an election...
 
Georgia has been tending towards purple for the last few years, but it isn't in play for the 2020 Presidential election. It's a combination of the national Dem party settling on Biden and the current Georgia Dem leadership not wanting to accept that there are registered voters in the state that don't reside in metro Atlanta.

So... we now have Georgia in the Biden camp, with Pennsylvania going that way this AM.

So when will the first news agency call it? My guess is this weekend. Biden gets Nevada, Arizona, Pennsylvania, and Georgia. Trump gets NC.

306-232. Exact numbers Trump won 2016 with.
 
Decision desk calls Biden for the win in Pennsylvania and says he is the next President.
 
A$$HAT of the hour award goes to

Steve Bannon​


Twitter permanently suspends Steve Bannon account after talk of beheading​

 
So... we now have Georgia in the Biden camp, with Pennsylvania going that way this AM.

So when will the first news agency call it? My guess is this weekend. Biden gets Nevada, Arizona, Pennsylvania, and Georgia. Trump gets NC.

306-232. Exact numbers Trump won 2016 with.


I will guess at least one if not the majority call it tonight, even without AZ, GA, or NV, a projected win in PA should bring Biden to 273.
 
NJ went for Biden as expected, Booker handily won re-election to the Senate. Party flip-flopper Jeff VanDrew will hang on to his House seat.

NJ voted to legalize MARY JANE after the legislature couldn't get it done. Now they have to. I sincerely hope that expungement and exoneration is on the table for those with convictions with personal quantities.

I believe Biden will hang on tight for a win. The unsung heroes are the thousands of elections workers that are working round the clock counting all the ballots. This part of our democracy has held steady. I anticipate there will be some recounts and court actions but I do not believe it will tilt in Cheetolini's favor.

45 is walking around the White House unhinged. He's going to go fucknuts crazy between now and inauguration day.
 
45 is walking around the White House unhinged. He's going to go fucknuts crazy between now and inauguration day.

I wonder how horrible he'll try to make his lame duck session and whether or not he'll receive any substantial pushback from the Senate who might want to start distancing themselves from him now that they've likely maintained their majority and don't want to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory before the run-offs in Georgia.
 
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