Actually a pretty nice summation.

You're not wrong about any of this. I just think you're underestimating the capabilities of the right wing to spin stuff, and immigration issues are way, way more important to the right than the left. I feel like giving the right wing their wall in exchange for anything immigration related will be spun by their side into a MAJOR win for Trump and more evidence of his fantastic deal making. The right wing gets their wall, and the left just gets some paperwork for people who were here anyways. Then by 2020 the only thing you'll hear is that Trump is a #WINNER who #WON against Pelosi and the dems and got the wall. And even though we all know that it was at best a tie and the wall will cost many billions more than the 5.7 he's asking for none of it matters. The right just doesn't operate in a place that any of us can call reality.

Trump is a cancer on the country and he has to go by any means necessary. And giving him his white whale is only going to ensure that his odds of being around again in 2020 are even higher. If they want the wall that bad, let them give up something that really means pain. Let them give up their guns or their judges, or their tax bill. Get them to really put their money where their mouth is.

Failing that, F*ck him.

Kendzior always scares the crap out of me

not sure if serious

she's louise mensch adjacent, i believe... so, you know, grains of salt and all. any russia focused stuff is pretty rife with patreon grifting for resistance libs. you gotta keep escalating the story and making it more dire.

Believe they call it a money shot.

I think a certain someone has.

It stinks!

What qualifications does she have? She’s making a pretty sensationalist implication here

If she's a grifter she's bad at the grifting part, all she has is a book that has nothing to do with russia/trump and a podcast I guess. The other grifters at least have a Russia book of some sort out by now.

Calling her Louise is pretty unfair, Louise says bat**** nonsense like the time she said something like the US Marshals in Congress were about to arrest Trump. Republicans want the shutdown (see every R blog out there regarding it), republicans want to purge the FBI ("OMG A FBI AGENT PREFERRED HILLARY OVER TRUMP A TOTAL OUTRAGE"), she definitely might well be wrong in her conclusions but where it's coming from is at least all out in the open. It does seem the election rigged stuff is too far but they clearly will try to cheat. Everyone's favorite "move the polling place out of town" sort of thing.

Trump is an obvious authoritarian, it was clearly a concern when he had every branch they'd just go straight there but that didn't seem to happen.

The biggest concern might well be the Census--given with the shutdown there's probably a lack of funds for the prep for it right now and then what happens in terms of "who gets counted?". It might not be malicious, just incompetence that gets them there.

What part of that is even controversial? That’s just **** Republicans have been openly saying on TV.

I definitely don't underestimate the capabilities of the right wing to spin stuff, or to put it another way, to get Fox News viewers riled up over whatever they want them riled up over... More on that in a minute.

I don't know that immigration issues are way, way more important to the right than the left. Would they rank the issue higher? Sure. Will it have more of an effect on voter turnout in the next election? Sure. But adding over 3 million new eligible voters that will likely go at least 2 to 1 for Dems is hugely important long-term. Getting Dreamers citizenship also has the added benefit of just being the right thing to do (I know we agree on this, just stating it anyway).

I think it's clear right now that there will be push back on this from, at a minimum, Coulter, Ingraham and Rush. Likely from Carlson, possibly from Hannity (though I think he's more likely to stick with 45 no matter what).

I agree that will be the messaging from pretty much the entire right by 2020, but I'm not sure it matters. Does it matter whether he's running on being a WINNER who WON against Pelosi and got the WALL, or on a WINNER who's going to WIN against Dems and get the WALL if you just give him four more years because we NEED this wall because the dirty immigrants are pouring over the border with their drugs and their rapists and their crimes?

I actually think he has a better chance driving his voters to the polls with the fear that they still need the wall than by bragging about getting it already. Then again, he'll find some other fear to get them whipped up into a frenzy over... So really, it doesn't matter. He's very good at whipping the right wing up over nonsense, and he'll do it one way or another.

We beat him by turning out our side, expanding the voter base, registering new voters, etc.

Agree

Disagree, as I laid out.

I have no problem adding more to the offer - maybe HR-1 would be a good addition. But I do think once you get outside of immigration on an immigration negotiation, you may get whacked by the media for playing partisan games.

I mean, **** him regardless. But extract everything you can from him that is morally right and a long-term benefit.

I mean, I am just SHOCKED to hear that the Republicans are trying to dismantle fair elections. What kind of Seth Abrams nonsense is this?

The “because” is a pretty severe implication. Republicans did all that **** in 2016 and 2018 and barely edged 2016 and got walloped by 9 points in 2018–and that was before the shutdown dropping favorability ratio by 7 points. If that “doesn’t concern them because they are gonna rig” that implies they have a way to overcome 15-20 point spreads beyond what they already did, which would have to be something drastic. That’s why OP said it was “scary” because he picked up on the implication that “we ain’t seen nothing yet”

This, and it's not just that they're saying it, it's how they're governing.

Repealing the ACA polls ridiculously low? **** it, let's do it anyway.

Tax cut for the rich polls ridiculously low? **** it, let's do it anyway.

In the wake of Parkland, universal background checks poll ridiculously high? **** that, we're not doing it anyway.

Trump's at 35-40% approval, shutting down the government after every single Senate Republican voted for a clean CR? **** it, let's line up behind him anyway.

They are governing as a party that has no concern over being forced to win free and fair elections. Meanwhile, we've seen evidence in numerous states, notably Wisconsin and recently Utah, of them overriding the will of the people. Again, they act as if they have no concern over being forced to win free and fair elections.

So why not? Well, they have gerrymandering in their favor. They have voter suppression in their favor. They have shenanigans like sticking power cords and voting machines in a locked closet in their favor. They have moving polling places in their favor. They have the structure of the Senate and the Electoral College in their favor. They have done nothing to slow down Russian hacking in their favor.

If we had free and fair elections from sea to shining sea, what are the odds that Stacey Abrams would be governor of Georgia right now? 95%?

To assume that they won't push every one of those things every bit as far as they can between now and 2020 is laughably naive. They talk like a party that doesn't want free and fair elections, they govern like a party that doesn't have to deal with free and fair elections and they have a record of undermining free and fair elections. It's only going to get worse from here, the more they entrench their power.

It is 100% malicious. It's an extension of the above efforts.

Last gallup weekly poll (polled 1/10) was 1pt shy of record disapproval (60%) and 2pts shy of record low approval (35%). Expecting it to break records on the next one.

Ok but even with that Republicans got outvoted by 9 points in November and their approval has dropped since then—so the implication that they can overcome that is pretty intense. Yes, Hillary won the popular vote in 2016–but the margin was small enough that it was essentially all California, the other 49 states Trump won more votes collectively. In 2018 Dems got like 5-6 million more votes than Republicans in those same 49 states.

When Obama beat Romney he was 53/45 favorability, +8. Trump is 39/59, or -20. To say that Republicans “don’t care because they can make it up by rigging” is scary because that would take changing votes or canceling the election.

I think more likely is that if Trump can’t get the wall his base won’t turn out. Trump handlers goal is to make this an issue now, get enough movement on the wall to energize his base for 2020, and then do stuff that will be less toxic to independents in 2020 and hope everyone forgets about the shutdown by then. Combine that with the rigging we have already seen, and there’s your 2020 re-election strategy

The era of free and fair elections is long over. GOP has been working around the clock for more than 20 years on that front.

This is a shock to anyone?

The GOP will do anything to "govern" the way they want to. They even conspired with our nation's number one adversary to rig a presidential election for god's sake.

They gained seats in the Senate, so if they limit their losses to two in the Senate in 2020, nothing else matters - they can play defense and stop Democrats from getting any major policies through, while also blocking any SCOTUS appointments. Their structural advantage in the Senate allows them to implement a strategy where they just obstruct most of the time and get things through every now and then when they grab all three, which they should do way more often than Dems in the long run.

Also, the fact that they just lost a lot of seats in the House also means that the seats they currently hold are safer/redder/more Trumpian.

They're still drawing live with enhanced suppression in just a few states.

I don't think it would take quite that much, but let's put it this way:

1. We know our election system is extremely susceptible.

2. We know that they have used every edge they could gain, no matter how scummy.

Put those together, what do we conclude? This is a very big fear of mine... and they don't even have to do it themselves, they just have to avoid enacting any new security measures (news flash: they're not enacting any new security measures) and sit back and let Putin handle it.

I think he can just as effectively run on still needing the wall as having gotten the wall. His base just needs to believe he fought hard for it.

Some minor corrections: Obama was not +8 before he beat Romney. He was like +2. His approval rating jumped after he won. Trump is -16 now, not -20. Overall I agree that the current GOP/Trump unfavorability, if it held until November 2020, would make standard GOP riggage insufficient to win them the Presidency.

If trends continue Dems should cut into the Senate lead in 2020 and win Presidency, and retake Senate in 2022. 2022 map is bad for Republicans—should be 5-6 battleground Republican seats open and maaaaybe one battleground Dem seat open

All of this. That's what scares me. And Kendzior being compared to Mensch is LOL

Cuse, you're a very good writer and you lay out your points clearly and concisely...if you don't mind me asking, what is it you do for a living?

you're assuming no riggage and fair elections

He could pass for his own wax figure at Madame Toussaud's.

in 2 years more Trump voters will have died

in 4 even more