The 30%

[[DHT]Osiris]

So I've been reflecting on the last week or two, regarding events that have taken place with the impeachment hearings and subsequent polling, and I've come to the conclusion that there's a ~30% of US voters that will simply never be swayed, by anything Trump does, at all. They'll either support him because they are okay with everything/like him, or because they simply hate Democrats so much they're willing to 'dance with the devil' as it were. As an aside, I don't think this is really much of a surprise to anyone that's been paying attention for the last 3 years. So that had me thinking, is there anything that 30% of Democrats will support, unwaveringly, no matter what evidence is presented to the contrary? I'm curious if any of our posters, including our most ardent D-haters, can identify?

The only one that jumps out at me is probably gun restrictions/removals (or potentially abolishment of the 2A). Another might be a little more amorphous, but the disconnect between 'city life' and 'country life', but that generally transcends political barriers.

Can anyone think of anything that generally democrats/liberals/whatever terminology should be used that maintain a 30% zealous acceptance regardless of any/all valid input to the contrary?

 

[hal2kilo]

So I've been reflecting on the last week or two, regarding events that have taken place with the impeachment hearings and subsequent polling, and I've come to the conclusion that there's a ~30% of US voters that will simply never be swayed, by anything Trump does, at all. They'll either support him because they are okay with everything/like him, or because they simply hate Democrats so much they're willing to 'dance with the devil' as it were. As an aside, I don't think this is really much of a surprise to anyone that's been paying attention for the last 3 years. So that had me thinking, is there anything that 30% of Democrats will support, unwaveringly, no matter what evidence is presented to the contrary? I'm curious if any of our posters, including our most ardent D-haters, can identify?

The only one that jumps out at me is probably gun restrictions/removals (or potentially abolishment of the 2A). Another might be a little more amorphous, but the disconnect between 'city life' and 'country life', but that generally transcends political barriers.

Can anyone think of anything that generally democrats/liberals/whatever terminology should be used that maintain a 30% zealous acceptance regardless of any/all valid input to the contrary?

There still idiots, like 25% of the Republican party, that still think Nixon was railroaded. Some people can never face reality.

 

[Bitek]

I wouldn't say Ds are immune, any human is susceptible to evil, but I can't think of a case where they are actively embracing corruption and moral rot.

 

[Jaskalas]

So that had me thinking, is there anything that 30% of Democrats will support, unwaveringly, no matter what evidence is presented to the contrary?

That a President shouldn't be impeached for being caught having an affair with a subordinate?

That sure as hell bent social norms, to not fire a manager for sexually exploiting a person under them. Or am I mistaken for how people typically react to that?

 

[[DHT]Osiris]

That a President shouldn't be impeached for being caught having an affair with a subordinate?

That sure as hell bent social norms, to not fire a manager for sexually exploiting a person under them. Or am I mistaken for how people typically react to that?

Well, I mean, he was impeached for lying to congress. Others may have their own opinion as to whether or not an affair with a subordinate was also impeachment-worthy but I don't remember that event being quite so 'frothy' (pardon the pun), although I was rather young at the time.

 

[soulcougher73]

Pro-choice?

 

[BonzaiDuck]

That a President shouldn't be impeached for being caught having an affair with a subordinate?

That sure as hell bent social norms, to not fire a manager for sexually exploiting a person under them. Or am I mistaken for how people typically react to that?

I remember watching the unfolding events throughout the Clinton presidency from its beginning.

This all occurred at a time when I was uncertain about my own political affiliation. During the Reagan/Bush years, I first gravitated in the GOP direction, then slowly pulled away from it as I had then arrived at a position in the civil service in which I was interacting with GOP political appointees and with just enough frequency that I began to conclude that I didn't like them as people, I didn't like their attitudes about things like justice in general and non-partisan commitment to the civil service in specific.

I suppose this period corresponded to a slow, delayed choice I made to "embrace class struggle" in the context of the wider world in which I lived, the myths we're made to believe -- for instance, the "non-existence" of class-struggle" and a wider assortment of revelations and realizations.

But I couldn't bring myself to embrace the Democratic Party. In '92, I voted for the Perot ticket. But I was "coming around slowly".

I noticed patterns in the news, arising with Whitewater and the Ken Starr investigations. Everything in headlines was being pushed aside by these attentions to the Clinton administration. The news backwater -- items that had been pushed to small articles in the back pages of national news -- included the preview of the Stone "JFK" film to congress, the empanelment of the ARRB reviewing and declassifying records of the national security apparatus, the revelations of those documents and the sudden publications frenzy arising from it, even including Hersh's book "The Dark Side of Camelot". But I didn't really focus my attention on this news-backwater until the unraveling story of Monica and the oral-office blow-job arose. Oddly, Congress vote to impeach Clinton occurred almost on the same day the Final Report of the ARRB was published and released. And it was Clinton, controverting the obstructions of Bush 41, who got the 92 Records Act back on track.

Yet, all along, I thought the Clinton impeachment was a farce. He "perjured himself" about getting his knob polished in the Oral Office. Uh-huh. Who doesn't lie to his wife about those sorts of indiscretions? Unfortunately, keeping it away from Hillary was synonymous with his public pronouncements. But, by 2000, I'd concluded that the Republican-led impeachment was a circus featuring a parade of elephants and a waste of time.

Now, we have a Pres who has as much as publicly begged a geopolitical adversary to hack an opponent's e-mails. He benefited from what I suspect as a double-double terror hoax that readily raised my suspicions of psy-war operations, and I concluded an origin of Russia after the FBI announced the IP address that originated them -- a year before the Obama administration released the findings of CIA and FBI about the Russians. It appears that everything he does attempts to weaken important institutions -- FBI, DOJ, the national security apparatus of CIA and DOD.

So there is plenty of reason -- in my opinion -- to do everything to legally remove him from office. I'd prefer impeachment to an election defeat, as a demonstration that Rule of Law prevails. But maybe the 30% refuse to learn anything from unfolding events. He's their star. He's their football team. And apparently, they think of this as some NFL game: "You lose -- we win!"

 

[[DHT]Osiris]

Pro-choice?

Might be one, hard to say that has 'evidence to the contrary' though, considering it's generally a personal/moral quandary more than objective reality (laws aside).

 

[Jhhnn]

That a President shouldn't be impeached for being caught having an affair with a subordinate?

That sure as hell bent social norms, to not fire a manager for sexually exploiting a person under them. Or am I mistaken for how people typically react to that?

Please. It's just as easy to paint Monica as a homewrecker. The whole thing was the kind of thing people could relate to & understand. Was it right? No. Was it enough to remove a very popular President the vast majority saw as doing a good job? No. The GOP held a majority in the Senate & couldn't get a majority to vote him out, let alone 2/3.

 

[dank69]

Nope. America is actively searching for literally any reason to hate Democrats at all times.

 

[VRAMdemon]

I have always thought, that Trump's *real* base - or his floor - is around 15-20%. By that I mean, it doesn't matter what happens to the economy, or what he does in office: they're going to show up and vote for the guy because God wants them to, or because it's important to stick it to the liberals, or because they want oligarchy - or maybe he's just their idea of a good luck charm. Whatever. The number of people who would vote for Trump under the absolute worst of circumstances is probably around 20%.

There's probably another 10-15% that would really, really like to vote for Trump, and they will unless they have a really good reason not to. The Mueller's investigation into collusion with Russia is not that reason. I'm not sure that the Impeachment/Ukraine quid pro quo is either. In both cases, some people in this softer tier of Trump support would acknowledge that the optics are bad, but they still don't have a reason not to vote for him on a personal level. This is really not much worse than say some of the most outrageous shit he says on twitter or at his pressers. Some people in this softer tier might find this distasteful, but their tax rates are still low, 401k is making money, they have jobs that they may not have had before, and he's giving the Dems hell.

The difference between the 20-25% who will support him no matter what and that second 15% is that for that softer tier of Trump voters, results matter. Their lives matter. Their welfare matters. And they, like most other voters, will want to hold someone accountable. Now some within this softer tier - I call them the "mealy mouthed middle" - those who are closer along the spectrum to those diehards - will stick with the president through an awful lot. But as you get further away from his core, there will be lines of demarcation.

It's very possible that Trump has already screwed himself beyond repair with that very small percentage of independents and centrists who frequently switch between parties - I think he's lost them for good, and this will have an impact in places like Pennsylvania, and perhaps Michigan and Ohio, too. But for Trump's real support to crack, the only thing that'll do it is the economy. And even if they bail on Trump, they won't necessarily vote for a Democrat. You'd probably just have a very bad turnout. Republicans in GOP-controlled states may try to compensate for that by putting conservative ballot initiatives, but that will only go so far. If and when Trump tanks, he'll tank hard, and so will his party. It's just a question of when and how that'll happen, and more importantly, how much damage will be sustained by then.

 

[fskimospy]

I doubt it and frankly the gun example isn't a good one considering the empirical evidence available agrees with Democrats that gun laws should be stricter.

 

[Denly]

Not just US, there are ~30% of population everywhere that will always for their right or far right party while the rest of the 70% vote situation to situation and it split the vote and put the conservative in power rather it deserved or not.

 

[BonzaiDuck]

Assume as fact that Putin and his Kremlin are dead-set on proving American democracy a farce.

If the prospects for history itself require a counter to the Kremlin's demonstration, then a two-term Trump presidency will mean a defeat for the ideas we champion and promote -- a disastrous defeat, which will resonate throughout all history despite anyone's effort to phony up history itself.

This goes way beyond ideological agendas of either side. The implications are enormous, and GOP spokespersons are making light of it to an equally colossal degree.

So -- choose. The gradual end of America as we've known it for the last 70 to 100 years, or the end of the GOP's political clout over some much shorter term of a few election cycles.

But if two or three episodes in recent history are a small statistical sample -- Nixon and Watergate, Reagan and Iran-Contra, the trivial impeachment of Clinton and now Trump's bald-faced departure from all sane norms -- I offer a cause as to why this nonsense comes mostly from one side.

If you exalt human weakness (self-interest and greed) as a virtue, the devil will always find warmth under your own blanket. That is, there is a basic flaw in the underlying premise of GOP values.

 

[GodisanAtheist]

To answer the OP's question: I am sure there is a core of "liberal authoritarians" (ignore the contradiction in terms, we're not dealing with sharpies here) that would embrace the curtailment of civil liberties of certain groups of people if they felt those people did not align with their world view (redistribution of wealth, forced nationalization of private assets, etc) but I have my doubts that the number would approach 30%.

That a President shouldn't be impeached for being caught having an affair with a subordinate?

That sure as hell bent social norms, to not fire a manager for sexually exploiting a person under them. Or am I mistaken for how people typically react to that?

- To be fair, there was a lot of "soul searching" in the dem party and reassessment of supporting a President in these circumstances after the recent "Me Too" thing, to the extent that Dems turned around and kicked out a strong liberal senator for some staged pictures and a kiss from well before he was a senator without much of an actual hearing on the issue.

At the very least, I wouldn't say its an issue that Dems are intractable on.

It will be interesting to see how support for DT holds up over time.

 

[Jhhnn]

Assume as fact that Putin and his Kremlin are dead-set on proving American democracy a farce.

If the prospects for history itself require a counter to the Kremlin's demonstration, then a two-term Trump presidency will mean a defeat for the ideas we champion and promote -- a disastrous defeat, which will resonate throughout all history despite anyone's effort to phony up history itself.

This goes way beyond ideological agendas of either side. The implications are enormous, and GOP spokespersons are making light of it to an equally colossal degree.

So -- choose. The gradual end of America as we've known it for the last 70 to 100 years, or the end of the GOP's political clout over some much shorter term of a few election cycles.

But if two or three episodes in recent history are a small statistical sample -- Nixon and Watergate, Reagan and Iran-Contra, the trivial impeachment of Clinton and now Trump's bald-faced departure from all sane norms -- I offer a cause as to why this nonsense comes mostly from one side.

If you exalt human weakness (self-interest and greed) as a virtue, the devil will always find warmth under your own blanket. That is, there is a basic flaw in the underlying premise of GOP values.

The Russians have what the GOP leadership wants, a corrupt Lootocracy & a sham democracy. It's all incompatible with broad middle class prosperity.

 

[senseamp]

These people are going to lose everything to automation and be transformed into government dependents. Then we can talk.

 

[pmv]

That a President shouldn't be impeached for being caught having an affair with a subordinate?

That sure as hell bent social norms, to not fire a manager for sexually exploiting a person under them. Or am I mistaken for how people typically react to that?

Do you have any figures for how frequently that sort of behaviour - a married boss having an affair with a very junior (and much younger) employee - in that era, resulted in the manager being fired? That's not entirely a rhetorical question, I genuinely wonder. It does seem as if much worse, was in fact going on quite a lot back then. So you have me wondering what the 'social norms' actually were.

I didn't think much of Clinton back then, and I still don't. The triangulating bomber of pharmaceutical factories got away with a lot thanks to personal charm and the ghastlyness of the Republicans.

I am also very suspicious that he did far worse things sexually than the Lewinski business. But I do wonder if maybe you _are_ mistaken, in terms of what generally happened in the real world till fairly recently. The Bill Clinton era was not liberal feminism's finest hour. But that was then, we've got much bigger problems now.

 

[compuwiz1]

Where is a citation for the 30%? Democrats don't see the problems they have going into the 2020 election and they are not all because Trump is anything good, but because the Democratic field of candidates is so bad. Like it or not, Trump is presiding over some pretty good statistics:

Lowest Black and Hispanic unemployment rates in decades.
Low overall unemployment rate
The stock market and 401k performance
And here is a big one....black voters are leaving in droves. Latest Rasmussen and Emerson polls show Trump support at over 30%. I know some of you hate her, but people like Candace Owens' messages are working. She is right. What have the Democrats done for blacks lately, except court them during an election, then forget about them after? The narrative of Republican = racist is just not true. All these "woke" whitey libs out there trying to say otherwise is not working any more.

 

[fskimospy]

Where is a citation for the 30%? Democrats don't see the problems they have going into the 2020 election and they are not all because Trump is anything good, but because the Democratic field of candidates is so bad. Like it or not, Trump is presiding over some pretty good statistics:

Yes, this is the same conservative argument every time, that they don't want to vote for the corrupt criminal but evil liberals made them.

Lowest Black and Hispanic unemployment rates in decades.
Low overall unemployment rate
The stock market and 401k performance
And here is a big one....black voters are leaving in droves. Latest Rasmussen and Emerson polls show Trump support at over 30%. I know some of you hate her, but people like Candace Owens' messages are working. She is right. What have the Democrats done for blacks lately, except court them during an election, then forget about them after? The narrative of Republican = racist is just not true. All these "woke" whitey libs out there trying to say otherwise is not working any more.

If you believe Trump's support among black and hispanic voters is around 30% you are living in a fantasy world. To show you just what a fantasy world you are living in, Rasmussen predicted the Republicans would win the house vote by 1 point in 2018. They lost by 9. ie: Rasmussen was off by TEN POINTS, which is basically worse than throwing darts at a dartboard. Rasmussen has crafted its polling now as an exercise to make Republicans feel better about themselves. I am very open to making a bet with you that Trump does not get 30% of the black/hispanic vote in 2020. In fact, I'll even spot you the 10 point general Rasmussen 'conservative feelings error' and say he doesn't get 20%. Let me know!

This is what we talk about when we say you guys live in a bubble. Those numbers are ludicrous - how could any rational person believe them?

 

[compuwiz1]

I must have hit a nerve. I'm absolutely not questioning what I believe will happen in 2020. Dems have good reason to be insecure right now. The results will be revealed in less than a year. What will the Democrats do, if because of the candidates they ran, we have a red slaughter? Won't be able to complain about the electoral college this time... Meanwhile Bloomberg is getting ready to burn around 46 million dollars in ads. ( Mikey might wanna do something better with that dough.)
Gonna throw continued temper tantrums, worse than when they couldn't accept losing the 2016 election? Will they declare civil war? It'll be a huge setback.

 

[fskimospy]

I must have hit a nerve. I'm absolutely not questioning what I believe will happen in 2020. Dems have good reason to be insecure right now. The results will be revealed in less than a year. What will the Democrats do, if because of the candidates they ran, we have a red slaughter? Won't be able to complain about the electoral college this time...
Gonna throw continued temper tantrums, worse than when they couldn't accept losing the 2016 election? Will they declare civil war? It'll be a huge setback.

So to be clear you think Rasmussen's claim of 30% black and Hispanic support for Trump is reasonably accurate?

 

[fskimospy]

I wonder what compuwiz1 thought was going to happen the day before the 2018 midterms.

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Democrats are unable to get a feel for how this election is going to turn out, much like in 2016. The polls will once again indicate one thing, while the electorate does another. Conservatives are not very vocal, as they've learned to play their cards close to the vest, lest they get attacked at every turn. Again, we have a silent group, whom I fully expect to surge on election day.

Only mental morons are going to vote for people who campaigned on raising our taxes. Only mental morons would not recognize that unemployment among women is the lowest it's been since the early 1960's and that Black and Hispanic unemployment are at historic lows. Democrats I've talked to are concerned about the Latino vote this time around. Lots of Black people are waking up and see the positive things this administration has done for them. Democrat's policies will reduce our GDP, increase regulations again, lower employment, increase our taxes and make our border less secure. There is a quiet, strong numbered electorate out there that doesn't want those things to happen. What is going to happen on Tuesday, November 6th, is going to shock some people. I will not be one of them.

That is my prediction. In the event I'm wrong, I will take it like a grownup. I won't be stomping my feet, cursing, breaking things, burning things, or attacking my fellows. There will always be another election, been though a lot of them in my lifetime.

Oh, the exact same prediction of increasing black and Hispanic support for Republicans. lol. He has learned nothing.

 

[[DHT]Osiris]

I wonder what compuwiz1 thought was going to happen the day before the 2018 midterms.

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Oh, the exact same prediction of increasing black and Hispanic support for Republicans. lol. He has learned nothing.

Well, he got one thing on the nose, he won't be attacking his fellows

 

[Bitek]

Where is a citation for the 30%? Democrats don't see the problems they have going into the 2020 election and they are not all because Trump is anything good, but because the Democratic field of candidates is so bad. Like it or not, Trump is presiding over some pretty good statistics:

Lowest Black and Hispanic unemployment rates in decades.
Low overall unemployment rate
The stock market and 401k performance
And here is a big one....black voters are leaving in droves. Latest Rasmussen and Emerson polls show Trump support at over 30%. I know some of you hate her, but people like Candace Owens' messages are working. She is right. What have the Democrats done for blacks lately, except court them during an election, then forget about them after? The narrative of Republican = racist is just not true. All these "woke" whitey libs out there trying to say otherwise is not working any more.

At least you are honest you only care about money.

Not that Trump has anything to do with the "stats" you mentioned, other to slow them down from their trendline.