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| L'état c'est moi |
Day Five, in the week without you-know who.
There is one political force so big, so newsworthy, and so central to current politics that every other political actor is working in response to him. His tweets create defenders and opponents and serve as breaking news for the media.
This week is an experiment: to see if there is life without that central source of light, heat, and gravity. He is the modern Sun King. He imagines himself the one indispensable man, the person who embodies the Nation. And because he has the self confidence to think that--and the office of president--the media and other politicians accept that premise. They have to.
I have turned off the sun.
A website attempts to map the terrain of the ideology of Representatives and Senators.
Every now and then it is good to get a reality-fix, a way to set and adjust the calibrations. Source: www.govtrack.us
Here is the direct link to the chart for Representatives and Senators: https://www.govtrack.us/congress/members/current
It is just one source, but it is non-government, non-partisan and it attempts to put people on a scale so one can measure them against other Representatives and Senators.
Yesterday I posted the chart from this source for Greg Walden, my congressman, the Chair of the Energy and Commerce committee that was in charge of writing the Trumpcare bill. Walden had not been a particularly conservative congressman, when compared to his Republican colleagues, as this chart confirms. A Democrat who wants to challenge Walden can point to his presumed change from bi-partisanship, but not for having a longstanding "too conservative" voting record. Such a charge would not be accurate, nor plausible. This chart points to a narrative tack that a challenger would likely need to take: Walden used to be pretty reasonable but he changed. And his situation did change. He became a Chairman of a powerful committee in the middle of the healthcare debate. His responsibilities grew, from representing his District to marshaling the votes to repeal Obamacare. A Democrat can argue that he lost his soul to power and ambition.
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| Greg Walden's Score |
For comparison, here below is the chart for Elizabeth Warren. Voters have some sense that she might be the most ideologically and stylistically liberal US Senator. There is evidence for that. People eager to see her a presidential frontrunner need to consider this chart. If ones view is that we need a strongly liberal spokesperson, then Warren may be the right choice. But a president needs to create a coalition of the whole country. Perhaps it means something that in state after state people elect to the Senate people less liberal than she is.
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| Elizabeth Warren's Score |
Elizabeth Warren scores as more liberal than Bernie Sanders. Sanders shows as more conservative than Warren and the other Massachusetts Senator, Markey.
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| Bernie Sanders Score |
Who is that Senator just to the left of Sanders, jammed in between the two Massachusetts Senators, the second most liberal member of the Senate? Oregon's Jeff Merkley. Facebook and other commentary among liberal progressive environmentalists often cite Jeff Merkley. Some find him acceptable, some a little weaker than they would like on progressive and environmental purity. Protesters picketed my home when he had an event here, unhappy that the was supporting a fellow Democrat in his Senate race in 2016. Their goal was to push him leftward. Local climate groups openly see this as the best leverage they have over representatives. "Hold their feet to the fire". Republicans are hopeless, they recognize, but Democrats are moveable because they will lose to a Republican if too many Democratic voters spill off to a Green Party candidate. It is a high risk strategy, a kind of game of chicken, because it makes Merkley more vulnerable to a Republican who presents himself as a reasonable moderate, of the kind that just won statewide office as Secretary of State. The strategy is to make the Democrat as environmental as possible, under threat of losing to the Republican. And sometimes the Democrat has to lose, just to keep the threat plausible. Every Democrat remembers the lesson of Al Gore losing Florida and the White House, with Ralph Nader getting many more votes than the margin of victory.
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| Jeff Merkley Score |
Ron Wyden is widely condemned within environmental and progressive Facebook discussions. He is called a miserable sellout, a traitor, a conservative no better than Republicans. He scores very high for leadership but is just left of the center-point of national Democrats. Wyden is loved--and condemned--for being a moderate Democrat, and the chart confirms the general sense of Wyden's politics. Wyden wins easy victories over Republicans statewide, and even carries the 2nd Congressional District. Wyden's electability in the rural and agricultural eastern and southern Oregon district shows that voters there do in fact vote for Democrats. Wyden wins there; Merkley loses there. Democrats considering challenging Greg Walden can take hope and take instruction, if they choose to. But there is a wrinkle in the calculation: Wyden scares off strong Republican opposition; Walden is strong Republican opposition.
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| Ron Wyden's Score |
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| Trudging |
A Democratic candidate for Congress needs to catch a spark of enthusiasm and desire for change that is unnecessary for Wyden. Wyden is the continuity-candidate. A Democrats hoping to unseat Walden needs to inspire and focus the desire for change. The Democrat needs to embody some kind of surprise or sparkle. Greg Walden has grabbed the niche of the quiet, no drama guy--now interrupted by the drama surrounding his Town Halls. The challenger needs to excite people. Indivisible may handle the heavy lifting job of making people see Walden in a new light of disappointment. But the Democrat needs to stand for something interesting.
Walden is communicating in his Town Halls. Life in Congress, just now anyway, is a long, hard slog. He cannot help communicating that. He is trying to sell a miserable, dishonest product (Trumpcare) to a skeptical audience--misery for a salesman. But this sets the stage for the Democrat. "Greg, you had your turn. Time to go. Take a rest."
1 comment:
"Walden vs. Who???"
The UpCloze T_ _ _ p free zone week shows how removing the centre of gravity destabilizes, and that removing a chaotic force does not necessarily return equilibrium. I find the T blackout affirms that the chances of unseating Walden based on just the politics of his district are miniscule. When Democrats narrowly retook the house in the 2006 midterms, the gains did not reflect solid red districts turning blue. The gains were in swing districts or where the Republican had retired or been embroiled in a scandal, or district lines had been redrawn. When Republicans sweepingly took back the House in the 2010 midterms, most of the Democrats who had won first time seats in 2006 and 2008 were removed.
None of the electoral history of the 2006, 2008, 2010, 2012 or 2014 midterms provides any data suggesting that scandal-free Walden in his stable solid red district can be unseated in 2018 based on in-district politics. Without the T-factor, discussion of a Walden loss is rudderless. The Upclose T blackout removes a chaotic factor of discussion but reinforces that the red centre of gravity is totally stable otherwise. Only T can destabilize Walden's seat.
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