I agree politics isn’t ever particularly nice. I strongly disagree that this is “tit-for-tat.” This is an unprecedented expansion of partisan efforts. Even the worst previous efforts said, in effect, “I won, so let me choose my own people in the executive branch.” This says, “You won, so let’s make sure you don’t get to choose your own people in the branch that you won.” Instead of cementing the voter’s decision, it undercuts it dramatically.
(Remember that the GOP maintains their strong control of the legislature largely through gerrymandering).
If someone shoves your shoulder, and you machine-gun them down twelve years later, that’s not tit-for-tat.
Of course not. Would you see a problem if the party names were reversed? :dubious:
An odd statement from one who has expressed so much indignation throughout this campaign at the immorality of anything a Democrat does, factual or not.
Outside of the Triangle, and certain portions of Charlotte, North Carolina is solidly Republican, now. Most North Carolinians will applaud the efforts of the Republicans to neuter the new Governor; he’s only elected because he was the opponent to the Governor who allowed the I-77 expansion to be a toll road. The reality of what non-urbanite North Carolinians believe in is seen quite clearly in the politics of your southern neighbor, where the Democrat is an endangered species, mostly because the state of South Carolina doesn’t have enough people living in urban areas or around institutions of higher learning.
2017 will be more of the same, assuming that the elections currently ordered by the federal judge are actually held (I predict they will not be; that’s a pretty far step as remedies go). The super-majority might be ended (a good thing in any state), but Republicans will still hold the legislature, and I wouldn’t be shocked if Roy Cooper ends up being another one-term governor (though God alone knows what 2020 will bring, given who our President-elect is).
That’s ridiculous. What’s legal and what’s fair are completely separate things. Something can be fair and illegal, or unfair and legal, or fair and legal, or unfair and illegal.
For an uncontroversial example, it’s legal for me to cheat at card games. Doesn’t make it fair. It’s illegal (technically) for me to mispronounce the name of my state in any official capacity–that’s not really fair.
Or, to be more controversial, it’s legal to discriminate against minorities in many situations, but it doesn’t make it fair.
Our legal nitpickery expert has already spoken. Rumor has it that Santa has upgraded his list status, he’ll still get coal in his stocking but it will be clean coal. Santa grades on the curve.
With respect, your partisanship is making you resort to hyperbole in your characterization of the actions being taken. There are far worse things they could do, even constitutionally, to neuter the governor. For example, they really could try a court-packing scheme, which amazingly is authorized by the state’s constitution. The changes being made are substantial, but not “machine-gun them down” substantial. Keep some perspective, please.
FTR, part of the bill was giving McCrory the one-time power to recommend someone to fill a vacancy on this commission. The woman he gave it to has nothing special to recommend her, except that it’s a nice little plum to give to a staffer.
Is there anyone who will defend this as good governance?
I was looking earlier for stats on what percentage of the vote Republicans got. Turns out it’s 56%, a solid number. In a 50-seat house, you’d expect them to have 28 of the seats.
They’ve gerrymandered their way to 35.
This is going to be very hard to undo, of course–but our path is cut out for us. Rest of the country, please keep paying attention to NC. We need your help down here.
My apologies; I should not have said you were delusional.
I should have said: “I think you are seriously over-estimating the chances that North Carolinians will have sufficient political unhappiness about these actions to vote much differently in 2017 than they did in 2016.”
ETA: I should add that I’m not defending what is happening; I personally find it quite sad and if it were happening in my state, I’d be upset. I’m simply pointing out that it’s not the terrible cataclysm of subverting democracy that some are making it out to be, based on prior politics in the state in question.
North Carolina’s political history is a lot more complex than South Carolina’s. In 2010 (and maybe 2012, I’m having trouble finding stats), Republicans won despite receiving a minority of the vote. Since then, they’ve won the popular vote a couple times, but won outsized representation due to gerrymandering. We just elected a Democratic governor, and your speculation as to why he won is frankly bizarre; I never heard the I-77 issue raised by supporters or detractors. It was a minor issue in state politics at best. Your claim that “most North Carolinians will applaud” this effort is even stranger: given that 54% of voters voted Republican, and not all of them will support this overreach, and less than a rounding error of Democrats will support it, you’ve got a long way to get to “most North Carolinians.”
I don’t think these actions alone will lead to substantially different votes. I think that it may be one issue that’s discussed prior to the 2017 elections, if Democrats keep it alive. If you misunderstood me as saying something stronger, I encourage a change in how you read posts such that future misunderstandings of this nature may be avoided.
There’s a pretty big irony in your blaming me for exaggerating the perils of this event, blaming me by exaggerating what I’m saying. Neither I nor anyone called it a terrible cataclysm of subverting democracy; that’s your hyperbole, and you should back off of it. Instead, I (and former Republican governor Jim Martin) called it unprecedented, and I and he are correct.
I do agree that the timing and motivation is shady. However, balance of power issues between legislature and executive can be changed and often should be changed. Although I tend to prefer a more powerful legislature and a weaker executive.
If you don’t think saying that what is happening now is the functional equivalent of “machine-gun them down twelve years later” is similar to my statement about subverting democracy, I think you need to rethink your hyperbole.
Further, your whole contribution to the thread has not been one of “Oh, look, they’re going a bit over the top here in North Carolina, how quaint.” Rather, it’s quite obvious from what you’ve said that you think they are completely out of line. Have I not gotten that right? My point is that, they may be out of line, but what they are doing is not so far out of line, compared to past occurrences, that it deserves being treated like some huge assault on the people of North Carolina. Will you agree with that assessment? If not, what about what they are doing now is worse than the effort of the Democrats to neuter the whole office of Governor and hand much of its function to the Lt. Gov.?
You, apparently, don’t read the Charlotte Observer, then. The I-77 toll road has been a BIG issue here, especially in the highly Republican enclaves along the northbound stretch of that road from Charlotte (Iredell County, for example). See, for example, this story: Tolls – and HB2 – became roadblocks for Pat McCrory And don’t dismiss this as a simply “local” issue; remember that Pat McCrory did well in Mecklenburg County in 2012, winning it, and won very big in Iredell County, etc.
My assertion about “most North Carolinians” was intended to discuss the people who are not located in the urban areas; it should have been “most non-urban North Carolinians.” You know, the ones who soundly defeated Hillary Clinton in the state, and who have elected a significantly partisan legislature (yes, the super-majority is the result of gerrymandering, but I do not believe that the legislature would be at all close to 50-50 absent that effort).
Cite? If districts were assigned at utter random (e.g. final digits of the SocSec Number, as some have suggested) — or if the D/R split were homogeneous geographically — the party with 56% would get all 50 seats. “Fair districting” is ill-defined, but I think their expectation would always be significantly more then 28 seats.
This is not to dispute that the GOP has gerrymandered the districts. They would be as incapable of NOT gerrymandering as a scorpion is incapable of NOT stinging.
Gerrymandering is what politicians do. Do you know how long it took Republicans to take control of state legislatures? Till like, 2010 in many southern states! North Carolina has been utterly dominated by the Democratic Party until 2010, so of course Republicans gave Democrats a taste of their own medicine and gerrymandered.
“Awful Republican behavior”? :eek: Are recent events finally the reductio ad absurdem needed to waken us to the fact that the post-decency GOP is no longer even the Party of Bush the Bungler or Ronald “I am the problem” Reagan, let alone the Party of Mitt Romney or Bush the Competent?
