2020 Democratic Primary

[Innula Zenovka]

The article you posted may have covered this, but when there is a transition from one president to the next, every outgoing department trains the incoming department. So, Obama's staffers dutifully scheduled this training and had materials prepared and...Trump's people, the few he had ready to fill positions, didn't show up for training. No clue if they ever did receive training.

I figured that when the next president comes in, he may have to have Obama's people do the training.

That's what worries me.

The article makes it frighteningly clear how much damage Trump has done to the US professional, non-partisan, civil service over the last three years, by either leaving key posts unfilled or appointing as "acting" whatevers, thus avoiding congressional scrutiny, people whose most apparent qualification for the post is that he likes and trusts them.

This, combined with the White House's continuing attempts to interfere with, and politicise, the important and non-political work of civil service departments, has apparently led to large numbers of experienced and highly qualified career professionals leaving the service, and not being replaced.

Whoever succeeds him as president and his cabinet (his, because I hope it will be President Sanders or President Biden) will have a huge task on their hands simply recruiting people to get the civil service functioning again, which they'll have to do in order to implement any sort of important policy initiatives, I would have thought.

 

[Free]

 

[Anya Ristow]

Hilary Rosen whitesplains MLK to Nina Turner on CNN today.

 

[Salome]

Whoever succeeds him as president and his cabinet (his, because I hope it will be President Sanders or President Biden) will have a huge task on their hands simply recruiting people to get the civil service functioning again, which they'll have to do in order to implement any sort of important policy initiatives, I would have thought.

I really hope the Biden people make this a key part of their pitch because it’s crucially important. The vast numbers of experienced lifelong public servants we’ve lost under Trump cannot be exaggerated. It’s not going to matter if we pass any version of UHC or other policies if there aren’t infrastructures and people to staff and support them. Biden, for all his faults, has the connections, networks, relationships, and work ethic to walk in on day one and start repairing the damage. Sanders has few allies, horrible managerial behaviors, and runs a shitty, dysfunctional organization.

 

[Salome]

>> Here are a few things you should know about him.

1. He likes to wear gay red sunglasses. I mean, REALLY likes to wear them.

Yeah, whatever happened to those dapper young nazis the bothsidesism media was so enamored with a few years back?

 

[CronoCloud Creeggan]

Hopefully something like this:


When I read some online news-magazine article about one of them with his haircut being called "fashy", I thought it was instagram-speak for "fashionable" only to find out it was a "cutesy-fied" version of "fascist". You can guess my reaction to such articles talking about dapper nazi's saying they don't want violence they just want "white separatism" or whatever. We don't say nice things about Nazi's, we punch them, as shown in that video. Make Captain America proud.
And if you don't want to physically punch a Nazi, being opposed to violence, stand right in front of them and confront them and challenge them on the Un-American Nazi-ness and say "I can do this all day."

 

[Anya Ristow]

I've been waiting to hear what he has to say about super tuesday.

And here it is.

 

[danielravennest]

So it seems to me that, as a logical precursor to implementing any kind of health care reform, President Sanders is going to have to fill very many senior civil service posts in the affected departments, at the same time he's similarly trying to carry out similar repairs to damage done to many other key departments (Justice and State, certainly) and he'll also need to allow new officials time to get to know their departments and to begin to rebuild the staff's confidence and morale, which Trump has done so much to destroy.

The US federal government has two levels of staff. The vast majority (3.3 million) are civil service and active military, and are protected by various laws from political meddling. A small number (~4.000) at the top are "political appointees", of whom ~1,200 require confirmation by the Senate. Those are the ones who any new president has to fill if they don't like the person carried over from the previous administration. Filling those political posts with people who will carry out their policies is how they put their stamp on such a vast organization. A given department or agency will normally provide briefings for the incoming appointees during the 2.5 months between Election Day and Inauguration Day.

There is an office among the White House staff dedicated to filling those political appointee positions. A new president brings in their own people to run this office, and normally starts compiling lists of people to offer positions a few months before election day. The permanent people in the staffing office handle the routine tasks like background checks. Trump failed badly at the pre-election preparation, and brought in cronies to fill a lot of the White House offices, so they never filled a lot of the positions that needed filling. The ones that did get filled were often big campaign donors or completely unqualified. That's one reason Trump has been so ineffectual as president - he doesn't know how to run a big organization.

 

[Salome]

Biden Outperforming Sanders In Counties With Lower Incomes, More Voters Of Color

An NPR analysis of 1,200 counties across five key demographics offers a first look at how a diverse swath of the country is voting so far in the Democratic presidential primary race.

t.co

 

[Brenda Archer]

A politician has been recently shot in Arizona before, we’re very lucky this didn’t happen to Sanders at the rally.

For a mainstream news organization to compare his supporters to “brown shirts” and other Nazis is really unforgivable no matter what they do. Surely there are other choices of words.

And it’s not as if anybody can control an anonymous online mob. The most anyone could do is hold the blue checkmark people to account, and their own in-person organization.

We’re going to get four more years of Trump because the presumably progressive 1% are still in the 1% and I doubt they care. They don’t sound like people who understand what the hard Right is and/or feel threatened by it. Life is good for them.

I don’t think the country is “doomed” but we’ve got four more years of poverty, racism, private prisons, international instability, and the continuing destruction of our agriculture.

I don’t think sleepy Biden is up to the kind of fight that’s coming. Is anybody going to make it clear he needs to start surrounding himself with a good advisory team now and start proposing some detailed ideas that differentiate him from a Republican?

It’s great he’s got the “establishment” reputation but that’s not going to mean all that much outside of the states with a strong Dem establishment.

The lack of a strong Dem ground game in so many states is a kind of concession.

 

[Beebo Brink]

Biden Outperforming Sanders In Counties With Lower Incomes, More Voters Of Color

An NPR analysis of 1,200 counties across five key demographics offers a first look at how a diverse swath of the country is voting so far in the Democratic presidential primary race.

t.co

Makes me wonder if a "revolution" is simply too much of a risk for people who are living on the edge. For people who are doing better financially, but not where they want to be, there may be a greater tolerance for taking a risk that could improve their situation.

 

[Brenda Archer]

Biden Outperforming Sanders In Counties With Lower Incomes, More Voters Of Color

An NPR analysis of 1,200 counties across five key demographics offers a first look at how a diverse swath of the country is voting so far in the Democratic presidential primary race.

t.co

This doesn’t mean a whole lot unless they break it out by region. It’s obvious the Bernie support in CA and NV included working class people. Meanwhile, AZ is potentially a swing state but our Dems are the same as CA and NV, disproportionately young and Latino.

 

[Brenda Archer]

Makes me wonder if a "revolution" is simply too much of a risk for people who are living on the edge. For people who are doing better financially, but not where they want to be, there may be a greater tolerance for taking a risk that could improve their situation.

That’s not at all what I’m hearing from people on the ground. A very large number of voters are healthcare voters. This was obvious in the KY governor race, for example.

Older people are lower income but they also refuse to believe anyone is coming for Medicare in spite of the right wing constantly saying that’s what they want to do. Is Biden really going to stick up for Medicare and Social Security? He’s been willing to compromise.

 

[Beebo Brink]

I don’t think think sleepy Biden is up to the kind of fight that’s coming. Is anybody going to make it clear he needs to start surrounding himself with a good advisory team now and start proposing some detailed ideas that differentiate him from a Republican?

After seeing Biden sweep through states where he didn't even have a ground game, I'm beginning to think none of your concerns are pertinent for this election cycle. Biden is not Trump, he's been part of a presidential administration that people remember with great nostalgia, and he's not a scary leftist.

I think huge numbers of people -- Democrat and Republican -- just want a reasonable replacement for Trump, someone safe. After the last four years of Trump, bland has remarkable appeal.

 

[Beebo Brink]

That’s not at all what I’m hearing from people on the ground. A very large number of voters are healthcare voters. This was obvious in the KY governor race, for example.

Older people are lower income but they also refuse to believe anyone is coming for Medicare in spite of the right wing constantly saying that’s what they want to do. Is Biden really going to stick up for Medicare and Social Security? He’s been willing to compromise.

The whole point is that by your logic Sanders should be winning, but the fact is that he's not mobilizing huge numbers of people to vote for him, they're voting against him. YOU perceive him as the answer to their concerns, but apparently a lot of people don't think Sanders is the solution; they see him as a threat.

 

[Brenda Archer]

After seeing Biden sweep through states where he didn't even have a ground game, I'm beginning to think none of your concerns are pertinent for this election cycle. Biden is not Trump, he's been part of a presidential administration that people remember with great nostalgia, and he's not a scary leftist.

I think huge numbers of people -- Democrat and Republican -- just want a reasonable replacement for Trump, someone safe. After the last four years of Trump, bland has remarkable appeal.

If they think business as usual is “safe” they either don’t understand how the world has changed, or they don’t believe they are the ones who will pay the price.

If we get Biden and don’t also flip the Senate, we will be right where we are now, minority rule, escalating deficits and the loss of the judiciary. It’s going to take more than illusionary security seeking to fix the mess.

 

[Brenda Archer]

The whole point is that by your logic Sanders should be winning, but the fact is that he's not mobilizing huge numbers of people to vote for him, they're voting against him. YOU perceive him as the answer to their concerns, but apparently a lot of people don't think Sanders is the solution; they see him as a threat.

I think a lot of people get their opinions from TV and are programmed to react to the word “socialist.”

 

[Brenda Archer]

The whole point is that by your logic Sanders should be winning, but the fact is that he's not mobilizing huge numbers of people to vote for him, they're voting against him. YOU perceive him as the answer to their concerns, but apparently a lot of people don't think Sanders is the solution; they see him as a threat.

And, it’s not just “my” logic, there are clearly enough left wing voters who are healthcare voters. There’s no reason to make this about me personally.

 

[Salome]

I think a lot of people get their opinions from TV and are programmed to react to the word “socialist.”

Ya got me. I don’t like Bernie because I’m afraid of socialism and I do my learn’un from the TV.

 

[Salome]

Is Biden really going to stick up for Medicare and Social Security? He’s been willing to compromise.

jfc. Are you really falling for this Bernie fourth quarter hail mary scaremongering?