DC could be a state as soon as 2021. PR too maybe.

...so what does this mean?

Republicans Sens. Mike Lee and Tom Cotton voted against the bill, while Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin voted in favor.

lol manchin

How does the filibuster work? You're allowed to fillibuster after the vote is already taken? Or was a non-binding roll call vote taken and then they filibustered after that?

instead of going through the whole rigmarole of actually filibustering, it's now assumed that everything will be filibustered so if they want to vote for anything they start out by voting to end any potential filibuster of the bill at hand.

So the 51-47 vote was on ending debate for the bill and not on the bill itself?

The filibuster is on borrowed time anyway. The next time either party controls all 3 branches, but lacks 60 votes in the senate and has an important piece of legislation they want to pass they will insta-get rid of it.

And of course the opposition party will whine and complain but when they get back into the majority, they won't revert the rule. If Mitch McConnell is so opposed to getting rid of the 60 vote measure for stuff then why didn't he reinstate it for judges and other things?

Romney voting yes on the Dem plan

It appears so, they couldn't even get their wall funding bill to an actual vote, lol.

Dem bill looking like it has a better chance but will probably also fail:

Nope. In a fair election Dems would be tying or taking the senate in 2020 and courting a supermajority in 2022 based on current trajectory. (Based on current Trump popularity imo)

In 2020:
>50%: hold all but Alabama, take Arizona, Colorado, Maine
50%>x>25%: Alabama holds (experts somehow have this as a tossup as of right now), take Iowa, GA, Alaska, NC

Rest are super unlikely even if there’s a wave election. In a wave election getting a 52/48 advantage wouldn’t be crazy

2022:
>50%: hold all, including AZ/CO/NH/NV; take NC (Burr retiring)/PA/WI (Johnson retiring)
50>x>25%: take GA/FL/OH/IA/AK

Outside shot at Missouri as well

That would put an expectation of 58/42 Dem after 2022 in a “fair” world with a Dem wave, with enough variance to make a supermajority a possibility.

We don’t live in that world, so my assumptions of taking senate in 2022 is based on current levels of Republican ****ery

They need 60 right?

That puts them at 51 with Collins/Romney/Gardner/Murkowski crossing lines
Edit: if Isakson and Lamar switch that’s 53. Still very short

If 2020 ends up being a similar wave election to 2018 then Dems have a good shot at winning all 3. Turnout in presidential years is always higher among Democratic voters.

The correlation with temperature records in Australia is uncanny.

So both fail and it won’t be opened temporarily which seems like a decent outcome in terms of increasing pressure on republicans to pass a longer-term clean resolution.

Republicans voted unanimously for a clean resolution in December and now all but 6 voted against that exact same bill after the government is now greatly harming 800k+ people and the economy, with no reasoning other than taking the knee for a Trump.


It seems like public opinion should increase its blame for trump and republicans and reduce it for Democrats until it hits just the trumpian base.

So pressure should only increase to pass a clean CR and stop taking the government hostage.


The problem is that Trump just simply does not care about people, so the people caught up as hostages will continue to be hurt, which is another actual crisis.

It’s going to take those 800k protesting en masse by the majority calling in and refusing to work for free before there is enough pressure on trump and republicans to reopen the government.

Michael Bennet absolutely unloaded on Ted Cruz on the senate floor, I suck at embedding but it was pretty good.

Why would current trends continue after Trump is out of office?

The economy will tank soon due to all of Trump's dump ****. The Democrats will win big in 2020 but not get filibuster proof majority or maybe not even majority in the senate. They will spend 2 years trying to patch things up while being constantly thwarted by McConnell only to find themselves blamed for the mess, find their base not turning out in the next midterm, and find a bunch of idiot independents who again decide they want 'change' from political status quo and will vote in small government tea party 2.0 austerity or something even dumber.

this is the trend that is actually likely to continue.

Both bills failing in the Senate is best possible result out of that for Democrats. Passing the old bill 10 times through the House and having a Senate vote on it once is enough. They don't need to turn into the Republicans voting to repeal ACA 150 times. They need to start sticking to a message that the time for short term fixes has passed. The American people don't want this fixed for 3 weeks only to happen again. Businesses don't want the uncertainty, it's bad for government workers or even the function of departments who might need to make long term contracts and undertake projects.

Video is posted in the shutdown thread

Ponied by Dominic?

That's hot fire

WAAAAAAAY too optimistic. It's a midterm, likely with a Democratic president.

2018 was our best shot at taking the senate for several cycles, and it didn't happen.

Democrats who voted for GOP proposal:

West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin

Republicans who voted against GOP proposal:

Arkansas Sen. Tom Cotton
Utah Sen. Mike Lee

Republicans who voted for Democratic proposal:

Tennessee Sen. Lamar Alexander
Maine Sen. Susan Collins
Colorado Sen. Cory Gardner
Georgia Sen. Johnny Isakson
Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski
Utah Sen. Mitt Romney

Lamar Alexander? That old jizz bucket grew a conscience?