Quo Vadis, Democrats?

[Razgovory]

https://www.newsweek.com/how-blue-states-came-represent-inequality-red-states-middle-class-opinion-1703951 

https://www.axios.com/2018/06/05/income-inequality-blue-red-districts

Cause it is?

[DGuller]

Speaking of one state currently run by a Democrat, my own state of New Jersey, the governor race leans Democrat, but frankly not enough to breathe easy.  If the Democrat candidate loses, it would be a double whammy:  the idea of a backlash against Trump would be proven to be overly optimistic, and of course the reason would be that she's on the moderate side.  I'm having a sick feeling that it would be a much closer run than polls or Polymarket predict.

[Jacob]

If the Democrat candidate loses, it would be a double whammy:  the idea of a backlash against Trump would be proven to be overly optimistic, and of course the reason would be that she's on the moderate side.

I just want to make sure I understand your intended tone here - is your concern that if she loses (or it gets too close) it will genuinely prove that the Democrats will have to go further left (and away from the moderate side) which you are not happy with because you prefer the Democrats to be moderate; or is your concern that it will convince too many Democrats to go further left when you believe that a more moderate line is the winning strategy?

(and to be clear, I don't have much of an opinion on this subject either way)

[DGuller]

If the Democrat candidate loses, it would be a double whammy:  the idea of a backlash against Trump would be proven to be overly optimistic, and of course the reason would be that she's on the moderate side.

I just want to make sure I understand your intended tone here - is your concern that if she loses (or it gets too close) it will genuinely prove that the Democrats will have to go further left (and away from the moderate side) which you are not happy with because you prefer the Democrats to be moderate; or is your concern that it will convince too many Democrats to go further left when you believe that a more moderate line is the winning strategy?

(and to be clear, I don't have much of an opinion on this subject either way)

The latter.  I know moderation seems like a losing strategy for Democrats, but that was only because the hard left wasn't even in the game to show everyone how much harder they would lose.  The hard left does have influence, though, even if it isn't through winning elections, and that influence causes backlash and resentment.

[mongers]

At this point bodies in the street, dead peaceful pro-democracy protestors, might be the only thing that'll start the process of saving the USA from the proto-fascists now in power?

My reasoning, the current power-grab by the far-right (maga) isn't meeting much opposition and the supreme court is a willing accomplice.

So if nothing changes increasing numbers of Americans are going to 'wake up' over the next couple of years and realised they now live in a fascist state and they can't now do anything about it.
 
If however, large numbers of Americans vote with their feet and protest against these power-grabs, both on a national and local level, there's a very good chance the 'authorities' and their willing foot-soldiers will start beating or killing them.

If a large enough number are killed, then maybe, just maybe many will come to their senses and public opinion will turn against trumpism and put the turmpist decisively on the backfoot?

Though if that doesn't happen, then maybe America is better off with that starting a civil war and that being the chance to save the republic?

Otherwise it'll be 20-30 years of this maga bullshit to be endured by all.

[Oexmelin]

It will be longer than 20-30 years. Democracy is a fragile thing, a flash in the history of humankind.

[crazy canuck]

It will be longer than 20-30 years. Democracy is a fragile thing, a flash in the history of humankind.

Yes.  As just one example the USSC is busy undoing decades of legal precedent to enable the MAGA agenda.

Just today:

The Supreme Court on Monday allowed President Trump to fire a leader of the Federal Trade Commission, setting up a court battle over a 90-year-old limit on executive power over independent agencies.

In an emergency order, a divided court announced that it would allow President Trump, for now, to fire Rebecca Kelly Slaughter, a F.T.C. commissioner, and that it would hear argument in the case in December, a signal that a majority of the court is ready to revisit a landmark precedent limiting presidential authority.

Mr. Trump had fired Ms. Slaughter and Alvaro Bedoya, two Democratic members of the F.T.C., in March. The federal agency, which enforces consumer protection and antitrust laws, typically has five commissioners — three from the president's party and two from the opposing party.

[Jacob]

The latter.  I know moderation seems like a losing strategy for Democrats, but that was only because the hard left wasn't even in the game to show everyone how much harder they would lose.  The hard left does have influence, though, even if it isn't through winning elections, and that influence causes backlash and resentment.

Gotcha, thanks for the clarification.

[The Minsky Moment]

https://www.newsweek.com/how-blue-states-came-represent-inequality-red-states-middle-class-opinion-1703951 

https://www.axios.com/2018/06/05/income-inequality-blue-red-districts

Cause it is?

Try fitting a line through that Axios chart - can't get a good linear fit. Basically it's a flat line until you get all the way to the left, and then it curls up.

So what does that tell you?  What we already knew - big cities have higher Gini and big cities vote blue
High points on the chart are:  Philly (PA-2), Lower Manhattan+Brooklyn (NY-10), South Miami (FL-27), Chicago (Il-7). Highest red district: TX-07 (Houston)

Why do cities have high Ginis?  Because they don't residentially sort by class.  Very rich and very poor live near each other.  Compare say to a typical suburb where there can be effective class redlining.  Expensive school districts (with higher property tax) keep out the poor and even the regular middle classes, who get pushed out into less affluent burbs.

So if the claim is that big cities *create* inequality or that "Democrat policies" do so, a lot more evidence is going to required to support that claim.  The Axios chart doesn't cut it.

IMO a stronger claim would be to reverse the direction of causation: that big cities with high Ginis vote Democrat because the working class in the cities can see more closely and first-hand the shenanigans the super rich get up to.  You could call it say, the Mamdani Effect.  That gives you the exact same correlation . . .

[Jacob]

It will be longer than 20-30 years. Democracy is a fragile thing, a flash in the history of humankind.

Yeah, I don't think we have a benchmark to be honest. Has a proper Western democracy fallen to authoritarianism due to internal politics (as opposed to invasion)?

If there are any history nerds on this forum I'd be interested in hearing their takes. Obviously there are a whole bunch of no-true-Scotsman fallacy potential here, but even so I think it'd be instructive to compare the similarities and points of distinction.  I'd also be interested in looking at any democracies that slid into authoritarianism more or less on their own, and then turned back into liberal democracies.

[Admiral Yi]

If however, large numbers of Americans vote with their feet and protest against these power-grabs, both on a national and local level, there's a very good chance the 'authorities' and their willing foot-soldiers will start beating or killing them.

I"ve seen a clip of a cop beating a protestor who was fighting them.  A bunch more protestors punching cops and getting punched back is not going to do anything.

[Syt]

https://www.newsweek.com/how-blue-states-came-represent-inequality-red-states-middle-class-opinion-1703951 

https://www.axios.com/2018/06/05/income-inequality-blue-red-districts

Cause it is?

Try fitting a line through that Axios chart - can't get a good linear fit. Basically it's a flat line until you get all the way to the left, and then it curls up.

So what does that tell you?  What we already knew - big cities have higher Gini and big cities vote blue
High points on the chart are:  Philly (PA-2), Lower Manhattan+Brooklyn (NY-10), South Miami (FL-27), Chicago (Il-7). Highest red district: TX-07 (Houston)

Why do cities have high Ginis?  Because they don't residentially sort by class.  Very rich and very poor live near each other.  Compare say to a typical suburb where there can be effective class redlining.  Expensive school districts (with higher property tax) keep out the poor and even the regular middle classes, who get pushed out into less affluent burbs.

So if the claim is that big cities *create* inequality or that "Democrat policies" do so, a lot more evidence is going to required to support that claim.  The Axios chart doesn't cut it.

IMO a stronger claim would be to reverse the direction of causation: that big cities with high Ginis vote Democrat because the working class in the cities can see more closely and first-hand the shenanigans the super rich get up to.  You could call it say, the Mamdani Effect.  That gives you the exact same correlation . . .

Would it make sense to correlate Gini and median income? Because you could have everyone earn 1$ per month in an area and there would be no income inequality. Or you could have all income millionaires and billionaires but distributed in a way that Gini goes off the chart.

[Admiral Yi]

IMO a stronger claim would be to reverse the direction of causation: that big cities with high Ginis vote Democrat because the working class in the cities can see more closely and first-hand the shenanigans the super rich get up to.  You could call it say, the Mamdani Effect.  That gives you the exact same correlation . . .

Or alternatively they can see first hand all the nice things rich people can buy and envy them.

[Zoupa]

Maybe all the nice things will trickle down to them.

[Razgovory]

https://www.newsweek.com/how-blue-states-came-represent-inequality-red-states-middle-class-opinion-1703951 

https://www.axios.com/2018/06/05/income-inequality-blue-red-districts

Cause it is?

Try fitting a line through that Axios chart - can't get a good linear fit. Basically it's a flat line until you get all the way to the left, and then it curls up.

So what does that tell you?  What we already knew - big cities have higher Gini and big cities vote blue
High points on the chart are:  Philly (PA-2), Lower Manhattan+Brooklyn (NY-10), South Miami (FL-27), Chicago (Il-7). Highest red district: TX-07 (Houston)

Why do cities have high Ginis?  Because they don't residentially sort by class.  Very rich and very poor live near each other.  Compare say to a typical suburb where there can be effective class redlining.  Expensive school districts (with higher property tax) keep out the poor and even the regular middle classes, who get pushed out into less affluent burbs.

So if the claim is that big cities *create* inequality or that "Democrat policies" do so, a lot more evidence is going to required to support that claim.  The Axios chart doesn't cut it.

IMO a stronger claim would be to reverse the direction of causation: that big cities with high Ginis vote Democrat because the working class in the cities can see more closely and first-hand the shenanigans the super rich get up to.  You could call it say, the Mamdani Effect.  That gives you the exact same correlation . . .

Do the wealthy and the poor go to the same schools in New York?  In small Jefferson city they do.  There was only one public high school, so the wealthiest and the poorest all went to the same school (there was a much smaller Catholic Highschool, but that was mostly for Catholics).  I don't think Congressional District Jefferson City was in was sorted by class.  The entire town was just one district.  The City I live in now, Columbia has two districts, but that is dilute the voting power of a University town, not to separate the people based on class.  The people inside Columbia and the people living in the rural area outside of Columbia don't differ that much in wealth.

I wonder if the reason that of greater inequality in these areas is because the affluent people in these cities just don't pay their servants very well.