Is it better for a party to lose the presidency due to all the benefits that seem to come from it

Great Debates
1

Perhaps this is a grass is greener argument, but hear me out.

There are two parties, party A and B.

Party A wins the presidency. As a result the voters for party A become complacent and lazy while the voters for party B become energized and involved in civics.

Party B’s voters as a result are more likely to vote for party B not only for the federal legislature (both house and senate), but vote for party B for governorships, state legislatures and possibly even county or city government (not sure about that last part).

In the US, the right likes to make an issue of the fact that under Obama the democrats have lost about 1000+ seats in legislatures, but that is because the dems started from a very high point in 2009.

Hereis a map of state legislatures in 2009 after 8 years of Bush
Hereis a map of state legislatures in 2017 after 8 years of Obama

When Obama became president, the GOP won the legislature as well as many state governments, which they used to enact their agenda.

When Bush was president, the democrats won the majority of state legislatures (not sure if they did anything with them), as well as winning supermajorities in the federal legislature, at least for 2 years.

Obama gave us the tea party as well as a GOP controlled federal legislature.

Trump as president seems to be giving us a birth of a liberal civic movement. It has also propelled MSNBC to the #1 position in news.

Under Bush, the true liberal media was born (MSNBC with liberal commentators, daily kos, democratic underground, etc). Had bush not had 8 years, the democrats wouldn’t have had their supermajority in 2009-2010 that they used to pass various bills including the ACA.

Point is, does losing the presidency offer enough benefits to negate losing the office? it seems to energize the base, encourage media outlets that promote the minority party, and give the minority party control of federal congress as well as a majority of state governments.

Is it 2 steps forward, 2 steps back no matter which party you identify with?

2

I don’t know if there is a term for this line of thinking but it seems akin to a Broken Window Fallacy. It’s akin to saying, “It’s better to always win silver rather than win gold, because if you win gold, you might get complacent, whereas winning silver keeps you hungry.” Since the goal, in a certain sense, is to win gold, your constant winning of silver just means that you didn’t win gold, and the same with the presidency. At a certain level, winning the White House is a goal in and of itself.

It is indeed true, though, that having the White House doesn’t usually bode well for you in state-level and lower-level races, but no political party in their right mind would turn down a presidential victory in favor of Congressional/local “re-energizing”.

3

Yes but would you turn down the presidency if it meant:

Regaining control of the federal legislature (one or both branches)
Gaining control of dozens or more state legislatures and governorships
Your base devoting far more volunteer hours and money into electoral politics
The creation of media outlets that energize and organize your parties voters

It seems like it is kind of a trade off. It isn’t a silver vs. gold issue. It is more of a ‘do you want to gain in area A but lose in area B, or gain in area B but lose in area A’. How do you determine which one is more valuable?

4

Yeah it’s a tough choice but I still take the presidency.

It’s typically easier to get Congress to go along with an opposing-party president than to get an opposing-party president to go along with an opposing president. It takes 2/3 of both houses of Congress to override a veto, for instance, but only a stroke of a pen for a president to veto Congress.

5

It all depends on the timing of new supreme court vacancies. If you can tip the supreme court towards your side for an extended period, it is worth it to lose the legislature.

6

Except from now on, your party also has to win the Senate in order to get a Supreme Court nominee too.

7

Cycles aren’t guaranteed. It wasn’t that long ago that House Republicans spent forty years in the minority. For all we know, House Democrats may be headed down that road now. I think it’s always wiser to discount “structural” maxims about what’s supposed to happen, and just try to win everywhere.

8

After months of investigation no one here (or anywhere) can point to anything illegal Trump did. Sooner or later that could gain some traction. Might want to factor into the outcome -