# So, Clearly, the Democrats Are Dead **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [November 3, 2010, 12:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-clearly-the-democrats-are-dead/559320 "2010-11-03T12:45:31Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Fotheringay-Phipps](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/d9b06d/32.png) [@Fotheringay-Phipps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fotheringay-Phipps)\ **Post date:** [November 3, 2010, 5:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-clearly-the-democrats-are-dead/559320/81 "2010-11-03T17:03:01Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > Because they had _their own_ bill in 1993. But that bill didn’t pass anyway. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [November 3, 2010, 5:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-clearly-the-democrats-are-dead/559320/82 "2010-11-03T17:03:20Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > **Bricker** , while I agree with you that statements like “The other party is dead!” are almost never true, I feel compelled to point out that there was significantly more basis for such a statement in 2008 than there is now. In 2008, the White House and both branches of Congress flipped to the same party, following gains by that same party in the previous election, whereas in this election, one house of congress flipped, following gains by the other party in the previous election. I see. So in 2000, or 2002, the Democrats died? Or 2004? Sorry the thread is ten, eight, or six years too late. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [November 3, 2010, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-clearly-the-democrats-are-dead/559320/83 "2010-11-03T17:09:16Z")
> [@Fotheringay-Phipps](#): > > But that bill didn’t pass anyway. It failed only because of the filibuster. > [@Fotheringay-Phipps](#): > > Speculation. That’s why I said “I don’t think.” And it’s no more speculative than anything else. > [@](#): > > Again, there’s no requirement that anyone be bipartisan. But if you want to do it, then that’s what it is. No, when the “principle” that your opposition stands for is “Do anything we possibly can to prevent the other side from passing any kind of legislation that might make them look good, regardless of what any of us might think of the merit of any particular policy involved” then bipartisanship doesn’t require accommodation of that principle. There was nothing principled about the Republican stance on the legislation. It had zero to do with their reasoned policy positions. It was purely strategic interest in preventing the Democrats from being able to claim a legislative victory of any kind. This is very much in contrast with the behaviour of Democrats during the Bush administration. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [November 3, 2010, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-clearly-the-democrats-are-dead/559320/84 "2010-11-03T17:09:49Z")
> [@Fotheringay-Phipps](#): > > But that bill didn’t pass anyway. Uh huh. And at that point, the debate on reforming health care in the US ended, for a few years at least. Where are you going with this? ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [November 3, 2010, 5:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-clearly-the-democrats-are-dead/559320/85 "2010-11-03T17:27:29Z")
Quoth **RNATB** : > [@](#): > > Chronos, it’s probably fair to say that the Senate would have flipped, but for some lucky electoral math (ie., there just weren’t enough seats “in play” for the Republicans to take over). That may be true, but it wasn’t luck: The reason there weren’t enough Senate seats in play was that 2006 and 2008 were good years for Democrats, which gets back to my other point. Quoth **Bricker** : > [@](#): > > I see. > > So in 2000, or 2002, the Democrats died? Or 2004? You misunderstand me. I do _not_ claim that the Republicans died in 2008 (obviously, they did not, or we wouldn’t be where we are now). I merely claim that, in 2008, there was better (though still inadequate) support for that claim than there is now. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [November 3, 2010, 5:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-clearly-the-democrats-are-dead/559320/86 "2010-11-03T17:30:11Z")
I think the Republicans are going to have some problems. This isn’t 1994 when the Republicans entered Congress with an agenda of things to do. The Republicans now have essentially based their platform on being the outsiders who weren’t part of the general problem of how Washington runs. But now they’re in charge of the House, which means they’re insiders once again. Will they be able to accomplish anything credible in the next two years? Or will the people that elected them in 2010 be disgusted with them in 2012 and figure they’re no better than the Democrats? ---
**Author:** ![Fotheringay-Phipps](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/d9b06d/32.png) [@Fotheringay-Phipps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fotheringay-Phipps)\ **Post date:** [November 3, 2010, 5:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-clearly-the-democrats-are-dead/559320/87 "2010-11-03T17:38:17Z")
> [@acsenray](#): > > No, when the “principle” that your opposition stands for is “Do anything we possibly can to prevent the other side from passing any kind of legislation that might make them look good, regardless of what any of us might think of the merit of any particular policy involved” then bipartisanship doesn’t require accommodation of that principle. You’re trying to prove that the opposition has this “principle” from the fact that they refused to compromise on HCR, but if they do in fact have other reasons for opposing HCR this falls flat. > [@](#): > > It was purely strategic interest in preventing the Democrats from being able to claim a legislative victory of any kind. This is very much in contrast with the behaviour of Democrats during the Bush administration. You see Democratic opposition to Bush proposals as being motivated by principles, possibly because you yourself share this opposition, so you don’t attribute it to political considerations. I don’t remember Democrats being particularly accomodating during the Bush years. And FWIW, it was widely reported that the renewed push to pass a HCR bill after the Scott Brown election gave them pause was mostly triggered by the notion that it would be disastrous politically for the Democrats to be seen as having failed on such a high profile initiative. You can’t take the politics out of a politician, whatever the party. > [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > Uh huh. And at that point, the debate on reforming health care in the US ended, for a few years at least. OK. But once it wasn’t going to pass anyway, why didn’t they take up the Chaffee bill? (more below) > [@](#): > > Where are you going with this? Actually I started off with an innocent question, not being familiar with the Republican proposal in 1993. But what I was wondering about was whether these bills were in fact as similar as is being claimed, or perhaps there were crucial differences. I’ve since read up a bit about the 1993 HCR effort [here](http://books.google.com/books?id=wGEsQ_fXA9AC&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false), and apparently back in 1993 there were too many competing versions of HCR for any one to get enough support (contrary to the assertion by acsenray that the bill was filibustered). Of greater significance is that the Republican bill failed, at least in part because it was not supported by most Republicans even at the time, and even some of those who supported it later backed off in the face of conservative opposition. (Apparently Bill Kristol played a key role here.) So the assertion that “Republicans” were willing to support a similar bill back in 1993, from which one might deduce that Republican opposition in 2010 is politically inspired, is an incorrect one. ---
**Author:** ![Fotheringay-Phipps](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/d9b06d/32.png) [@Fotheringay-Phipps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fotheringay-Phipps)\ **Post date:** [November 3, 2010, 5:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-clearly-the-democrats-are-dead/559320/88 "2010-11-03T17:44:32Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > The reason there weren’t enough Senate seats in play was that 2006 and 2008 were good years for Democrats, which gets back to my other point. One other reason was that only 37% of the seats were at stake, while in the House it was 100%. Can’t ignore that. (This was Silver’s point, in the above-referenced article.) ---
**Author:** ![furlibusea](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/aca169/32.png) [@furlibusea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/furlibusea)\ **Post date:** [November 3, 2010, 5:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-clearly-the-democrats-are-dead/559320/89 "2010-11-03T17:46:52Z")
> [@Blalron](#): > > They could try shutting down the government. They could say “we refuse to pass any budget until you sign the HCR repeal bill!” > > They just might be that desperate. A few years from now, when the HCR takes full effect, people are going to discover that they actually like it and that they were being lied to by the GOP. Since it netted 0 GOP votes, the GOP doesn’t get to take **any** credit for it passing and they’ll be villainized for opposing it. The Republicans will pull out all the stops to keep that from happening. I really think you are wrong on this. Remember all the anger about the stimulus bill, who signed it and who actually got blamed for it? The American public wasn’t paying attention and when they were told Obama did the stimulus bill they believed it. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [November 3, 2010, 5:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-clearly-the-democrats-are-dead/559320/90 "2010-11-03T17:50:25Z")
There _was_ no Republican bill. There was a Republican _proposal_. Of course, the truth was that the Republicans didn’t want to do anything about healthcare at all, just as they don’t want to do anything about it now (except for tort reform, which has little to do with reforming health care at all). There is no assertion that the Republicans were willing to support a similar bill. The assertion is that Republican leadership did propose a similar bill, and your cite notwithstanding, it was approved by the members of the Republican caucuses. Of course, the Republicans took over Congress immediately following the 1993 HCR debate, and it was no longer on the agenda at all. ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [November 3, 2010, 5:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-clearly-the-democrats-are-dead/559320/91 "2010-11-03T17:59:40Z")
When voters that voted Repub because of heathcare were questioned after voting, they were asked specifically which part health care they wanted to repeal. Each health care provision was enumerated, and overwhelmingly the voter said, no don’t get rid of that. They have some vague idea that the healthcare bill is evil, but in specifics they had nothing. Voters are easily led and stupid. ---
**Author:** ![Fotheringay-Phipps](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/d9b06d/32.png) [@Fotheringay-Phipps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fotheringay-Phipps)\ **Post date:** [November 3, 2010, 6:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-clearly-the-democrats-are-dead/559320/92 "2010-11-03T18:00:01Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > Of course, the truth was that the Republicans didn’t want to do anything about healthcare at all, just as they don’t want to do anything about it now (except for tort reform, which has little to do with reforming health care at all). > > There is no assertion that the Republicans were willing to support a similar bill. Such an assertion was made in this thread, in an attempt to prove that Republican opposition in 2010 must therefore have been entirely based on political considerations (and that the Democrats were therefore not lacking in bipartisanship in failing to negotiate with the Republicans). ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [November 3, 2010, 6:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-clearly-the-democrats-are-dead/559320/93 "2010-11-03T18:05:38Z")
> [@](#): > > I really think you are wrong on this. Remember all the anger about the stimulus bill, who signed it and who actually got blamed for it? The American public wasn’t paying attention and when they were told Obama did the stimulus bill they believed it. Obama did sign the stimulus bill. You’re thinking of the bailout. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [November 3, 2010, 6:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-clearly-the-democrats-are-dead/559320/94 "2010-11-03T18:05:58Z")
But they’re not _saying_ that. They said, “we are fully apprised of the need for reform”, and proposed a bunch of them in general terms. They just refused to go along with the reforms proposed by the Democrats. ---
**Author:** ![godix](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/278dde/32.png) [@godix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/godix)\ **Post date:** [November 3, 2010, 6:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-clearly-the-democrats-are-dead/559320/95 "2010-11-03T18:17:50Z")
> [@acsenray](#): > > That’s a ridiculous standard. Bipartisanship is based on the assumption that there is an openness to compromise. Pretty much everything was compromised in the health care bill. The failure of the Republicans to agree to anything was not a sign of failure on the part of Democrats to exercise bipartisanship I want to kill ever retard in the country. Now I’m open to negotiation with you on the specific method to do that, if you prefer gassing them rather than shooting them in the head then we can compromise. I’m willing to reach my hand out to you in the spirit of bipartisanship, as long as the end goal is that the retards are dead. However, if you refuse to cooperate with me on killing the retards, that doesn’t mean I wasn’t being bi-partisan. It means you’re nothing but a worthless obstructionist. After all, the principle of bipartisanship doesn’t require me to abandon my goal of killing retards. Alternatively, perhaps the fact that I’m not willing to compromise at all in a goal that I know full well my opposition doesn’t support just might mean I’m not really being bipartisan. And, perhaps, once the voters bitchslap me because they disagree with what I did then the turning around and whining “but I compromised, we agreed to bomb Special Olympics instead of shooting retards in the head” isn’t an argument that carries a whole lot of weight. ---
**Author:** ![An\_Arky](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/87869e/32.png) [@An\_Arky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/An_Arky)\ **Post date:** [November 3, 2010, 6:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-clearly-the-democrats-are-dead/559320/96 "2010-11-03T18:51:14Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > What the hell is a yellow dog Democrat? > [@acsenray](#): > > He’d vote for the Democrat, even if they nominated a yellow dog. > > Traditionally, it was used to describe Solid South conservative Democrats, in the pre-civil rights era. > > The South was essentially single-party, with the real contest being in the Democratic primary. In the general election, the nominated Democrat always won. > > “Yellow-dog Democrat” is the basis for the modern term “blue-dog Democrat,” which is a very conservative, usually Southern, Democrat, who often votes with the Republicans. > [@Jas09](#): > > Originally it was a Southern Democrat that would never vote GOP because of Lincoln. > > Now it’s pretty much someone who always votes for the Dems but is actually rather conservative. Sorry I didn’t make it clear; I’m just a loyal Democratic Party supporter, no Civil War or conservatism involved, though I am a Southerner. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [November 3, 2010, 7:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-clearly-the-democrats-are-dead/559320/97 "2010-11-03T19:34:50Z")
> [@gonzomax](#): > > When voters that voted Repub because of heathcare were questioned after voting, they were asked specifically which part health care they wanted to repeal. Each health care provision was enumerated, and overwhelmingly the voter said, no don’t get rid of that. They have some vague idea that the healthcare bill is evil, but in specifics they had nothing. Voters are easily led and stupid. So it’s important to get as many of them as possible registered and voting. ---
**Author:** ![Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bosda_di_chi_of_tricor/32/16845_2.png) [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)\ **Post date:** [November 3, 2010, 7:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-clearly-the-democrats-are-dead/559320/98 "2010-11-03T19:40:16Z")
How big a turnout was there? ---
**Author:** ![CJJ](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ecc23a/32.png) [@CJJ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CJJ)\ **Post date:** [November 3, 2010, 7:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-clearly-the-democrats-are-dead/559320/99 "2010-11-03T19:55:12Z")
> [@Fotheringay-Phipps](#): > > You see Democratic opposition to Bush proposals as being motivated by principles, possibly because you yourself share this opposition, so you don’t attribute it to political considerations. I don’t remember Democrats being particularly accomodating during the Bush years. Really? You dont remember No Child Left Behind, the USA Patriot Act, Sarbanes-Oxley, McCain-Feingold, or the Bankruptcy Reform Act? You don’t recall the formation of the Senate’s “Gang of 14” in May 2005, which compromised the ability of the Democrats to mount a successful filibuster against judicial nominees in exchange for Republicans not invoking the “nuclear option” of limiting Senate rules on the filibuster? You didn’t notice any trends related to [this chart](http://www.senate.gov/pagelayout/reference/cloture_motions/clotureCounts.htm), showing how cloture motions/votes have more than doubled since Republicans moved into the Senate minority in 2006? The truth is, the Democrats participated in the legislative process when they were in the minority. Of course they opposed the Republicans, but whetehr you agree with them or not the legislative accomplishments above show that they worked with their counterparts across the aisle to achieve compromises. The Republicans haven’t; they used their smaller minority to simply gum up the works for brazen political gain. ---
**Author:** ![foolsguinea](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foolsguinea/32/14751_2.png) [@foolsguinea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/foolsguinea)\ **Post date:** [November 3, 2010, 8:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-clearly-the-democrats-are-dead/559320/100 "2010-11-03T20:13:18Z")
> [@Chessic\_Sense](#): > > This election is just another confirmation of [selectorate theory](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Selectorate_theory). The key point in all of politics is to get reelected. Nothing else is really important on a big enough scale. So we will continue to get behavior geared toward winning over the selectorate and not toward improving the country. Thankfully, those two things often overlap in a democracy. Unfortunately, health care insurance isn’t one of those things. Unfortunately, you appear to be right. > [@](#): > > Maybe with a divided government, we can get some good legislation through and limit the bullshit. We have had a divided Congress already. The Blue Dogs are not progressives; they are as much the enemy as the GOP. The left was in minority these last four years, no matter what you have heard. > [@Bricker](#): > > There are many people against the “Obamacare,” initiative. > > But only a fool would pretend that this means monolithic opposition to the idea of universal health care; indeed, most people support that basic idea. (I don’t, admittedly, but I recognize I’m in the minority). For the most part, this has been a victory of rhetoric over substance: some people “oppose” the bill because it didn’t go far enough; others because they don’t actually understand what it does and, if asked about its individual components, claim to favor them. > > And of course some people actually understand the bill and don’t like it, period. This is quite astute of you. > [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > The Patient Protection & Affordable Care Act was modeled on the [Health Equity and Access Reform Today Act of 1993](http://www.kaiserhealthnews.org/Stories/2010/February/23/GOP-1993-health-reform-bill.aspx), the Republican alternative to the Clinton HCR plan, and the [Act Providing Access to Affordable, Quality, Accountable Health Care](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massachusetts_health_care_reform#Background), the Massachussetts individual mandate plan- a bipartisan effort championed by Mitt Romney. > > If you really didn’t know this you probably aren’t qualified to comment on the topic. I’m sure, however, that you did know and are being obtuse, for whatever reason. Well, Romney was against UHC before he was for it, & now he’s against it again. And the 1993 “GOP plan” was an alternative the GOP floated in response to Hillary Clinton’s plan, not to pass but look like they had an alternative–neither was passed for whatever reason & they never revisited it. The hard right wing has been hung up on Individual Health Savings Accounts since that time. > [@Lemur866](#): > > I think Republicans severely underestimate how much people hate their health insurance. It’s confusing, arbitrary, opaque, tedious, wasteful, and expensive. Many Democrats do as well. > [@](#): > > Health care billing is a fucking nightmare in this country. I’m about as close to a free market ideologue as you can find. But I’d still prefer a single payer system to the crapfest we have now, because our current system is utterly broken and unreformable. > > Sorry to go off on a rant, but Republican pledges to preserve the health insurance status quo–that is, “Repeal Obamacare!”–set my teeth on edge. Mine too. I think an independent “single-payer or bust” movement that lobs curses at both parties might have legs at this point. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-clearly-the-democrats-are-dead/559320.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-clearly-the-democrats-are-dead/559320.md?page=6)