I like spaceman.

It's perhaps slightly worse. They are more than collaborators. They are legit reactionaries; they are pushing the GOP further right. It's a feedback loop but don't discount how bottom-up a lot of the pressures are. Fox News, the party elites, a lot of the money people had to be brought to heel, to bow to this long brewing pressure that is coming from this group of people. Because Mr and Mrs 60 Year Old Midwestern White America is often the stereotypical, archetypal image of what an American is, no one is comfortable with the story of inserting them into the role of hardcore militant political reactionary but that's exactly what they are.

ATC,

Cenk is indeed being tough there and I keep going back and forth between whether Manchin is doing well or weaseling.

I'm at 14:36 now and I think this question is pretty unfair of Cenk. The "large contributions" vs "small contributions" here breaks at $200 and technically it could be even lower. It's wherever the campaign itemizes donations and that's required above $200, but some do it for smaller amounts too and then those would show up as "large individual contributions". This is not where Koch dark money and the like shows up.

Ok, this no campaigning against other sitting Senators idea is making me sick.

I can't really make it through his health care "answers". That's more Manchin than I've ever seen before though so it was worth it for that.

I mean the principle debate of our day is whether the source of our political rancor is best thought of as economic, or racial, or generational. The reality is its all three. Economically comfortable older whites are marching in lockstep further and further to the right. All other political forces are a bit scattered but middle class and up whites over the age of 55 are largely unified, strident, they are dependable voters, and moving into more extremist positions and the GOP generational longmarch into populist authoritarianism is a testimony to that effect.

The left, the youth, the working class, even black and Latino voters have highly divergent and diverse views on social and economic policy and the Democratic Party's struggles are almost a testimony to that. Older whites are embracing oppositional culture and banding together into evermore strident reactionary positions and the GOP's decade long march into populist authoritarianism is a testament to that effect.

#DontBeEvil

Yeah, thought that was terrible. There are so many better self-serving arguments why Manchin should be left alone that don't require him to defend Republican incumbents that I suspect he actually believes what he said. He came across to me as undogmatic and centrist. He was pretty direct on the minimum wage question, but it's evident from other answers he has the Republican fear of moochers and free riders.

I don't think so. The views of "the left, the youth, the working class," and most young, middle-class-and-below Black or Latino voters were basically united around Bernie Sanders. It was the older generations, especially "middle class and up whites over the age of 55," by and large, who supported the Hillary machine. Also, let's not forget women. The same demographic divide shows up: Things break along generational lines--mom and grandma want Hillary; daughter's conflicted but probably votes for Bernie.

If you're not turning that clock back, if the next rounds of new technology play out like every single round of new technology ever has since c.1600, and just keeps winding that clock further (and there is absolutely no reason to imagine they wont)... you're aren't finding new ways to do shiz. All you are doing is collaborating.

The catastrophe is going to be wide spread ecological collapse. That could happen to people born before I die. However, a UBI would certainly be nice while riding the handcart to hell, I guess. To get out of the handcart to hell... as I mentioned, to do that we're going to have to get our feet dirty...

Source? Seems false based on below which shows Hillary with a slight lead among young non-whites, and Sanders solidly crushing among young whites.

https://today.yougov.com/news/2016/0...ratic-primary/

ETA: Found this, which shows a lead for Sanders for under 30 nonwhites.

http://www.npr.org/2016/03/28/472160...h-white-people

Do we get them dirty by enslaving some females in our weird Gorean fantasy land or what are you implying here?

The only question to ask Manchin is how his daughter became worth like 100 million or more. Ask it 10 times, 10 different ways. Ask what legislation he would introduce to prevent it.

I think it sinks him in 2018 if the attack ads are any good. Find a decent WV Dem to primary him and cross fingers.

All kinds of talk about Kushner maybe not having a security clearance, so I don't yet owe someone $20.

This is probably a prelude to a much longer discussion that I don't really have time to take part in (and perhaps has already taken place), but primarying Manchin seems like a losing play based on my admittedly rough understanding (you can assume "imo" in all of the following sentences). No other Democrat can currently win his state. He wins because many Republicans vote for him. Yes, he votes with Trump a lot, but he will vote with the Democrats on healthcare, and if his vote looks like it could tip the scale on an important issue, he will vote Dem or abstain.

Bad Dem > Alternative = Stone Lock Republican.

That would be foolish. Democrats should primary safe-seat Senators, not red-state Democrats like Manchin. Manchin is an incumbent, which gives him a big advantage in the general over even the best Democratic candidates that would run in his stead.

My thing with Manchin specifically relates to his daughter and her company. I think he's uniquely vulnerable and will get clocked. If he were just a crappy yellow dog Dem, I wouldn't say primary him, at least not in 2018. Then again, maybe he now has enough cash to run strong.

Given the Trumpening that happened in WV I wouldn't guarantee he wins the general.

Bernie beat Hillary by 16 points in WV. He got 125k votes and HRC got 87. On the Republican side Trump did get 157k, but he pretty much had the field to himself. Ted Cruz came in 2nd with 18k.

Maybe WV would surprise you and the best thing to do is not to sidle on up as close as you can get to the Republicans. I think I'd rather run as a far lefty in WV than in NY. I get that NY is a safe Dem spot and when the progressive candidate loses the primary you don't get an R in that seat, but you're not going to win.

There should be a club. I worry a little about him though.

Incumbency is, barring scandal, almost always a bigger advantage than ideology in the general. Anyway, Manchin has a proven ability to win statewide elections in WV, why would we ignore that in favor of a speculative theory about a political realignment in WV? Look at Jim Justice, a billionaire coal baron who ran on the Democratic line for governor in 2016 and won. What makes you think WV Democrats should move away from a proven method to succeed in a very tough state?

I could be wrong, but I think places like West Virginia are ready for something radically different and that could go either way.

widespread use of primary challenges is an excellent idea. Politicians respond to credible threats to losing their jobs, without those threats they are free to pursue their own interests. Like making <big donor> happy. Most seats are safe so primaries are the only way for the voters to cause internal party changes.

Dianne Feinstein (D, CA) is the prototype of who to primary. The more radical the challenger the better.

I wouldn't have taken you to be a fan. Well, as nice as that sounds to us... no. I was implying something else.

The wooden shoe, and the black cat, have a certain political kinda meaning. Check it out. FYI: my dog is named Sabo... after the famous black cat, Sabo-Tabby... who was in turn named after the shoes. If you like dogs, check out his Sabo-blog.

I suspect Manchin is vulnerable to a primary challenge - he is a fairly conservative Democrat and that probably makes him vulnerable to a primary challenge. But a successful challenger would now be a Democrat running for an open seat in a reddish-purple state - a much lower probability than an incumbent running for that seat.

Manchin's political theory that it's really important for Senatorial seats to be safe is a pretty good reason to primary him. I don't know if it's good enough, but it's pretty solid.

I just don't think the understanding that purple means centrist is very good. If that's the case New York, New Jersey, Connecticut are pretty purple. I think West Virginia is anti-centrist and would rather have Bernie Sanders than Hillary Clinton or Mitt Romney. New York might vote Bernie out of party loyalty, but I think they'd take Romney if they both ran as independents.

I'm skeptical that a Bernie-style candidate would be more successful in a general over what the Democrats currently do in WV. But my main argument is that even if I grant that, it still wouldn't be enough to match the advantage incumbency gives Manchin in the general. Incumbency is more powerful than ideology in the general, and in WV we don't have enough margin to give up that advantage.