MN State Senate and House Elections 2016

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MNdible
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Re: MN State Senate and House Elections 2016

Postby MNdible » November 9th, 2016, 2:19 pm

Or it's because we've ignored farmers and rural America for the past 4-8 years.
Ding ding ding. Dayton and Thissen have left the few remaining outstate DFLer's swinging in the wind. Shouldn't be any surprise that they're falling in elections.

jebr
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Re: MN State Senate and House Elections 2016

Postby jebr » November 9th, 2016, 2:38 pm

Conspiracy theory (since the right used a shit-ton of their own conspiracy theories to eff everything up): Russia hacked our election systems such that a tiny percentage of votes flipped all over the place—just enough to screw everything up, not not enough to make anyone look into it. There aren't going to be any paper recounts—if there were even paper trails to begin with—so there will be no detection of the tampering.
Since we're in the Minnesota thread: how could this have happened? We do use election counters, but as far as I'm aware they're all programmed via SD cards in the elections office, tested/audited, and then brought over to the polling place for election day. The machines themselves are not connected to the internet, and if I remember the talk from the Ramsey County Elections person correctly the machines that program them aren't even connected to a network.

(The talk is here: https://vimeo.com/183018354
but I watched it back in September so I don't remember everything. It's quite an interesting talk, though.)

I mean, it's possible, but it seems so outside the realm of possibility (and easy enough for someone to catch after-the-fact) that I don't think it happened, at least in Minnesota.

twincitizen
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Re: MN State Senate and House Elections 2016

Postby twincitizen » November 9th, 2016, 3:22 pm

So apparently the Senate is not 100% decided yet? Or did I misinterpret something on Twitter and they were just saying it was really, REALLY close? Looks like there will be two automatic recounts (in SD 14 and 44) but the GOP margins are big enough to hold (142 and 201 votes, respectively)

David Greene
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Re: MN State Senate and House Elections 2016

Postby David Greene » November 9th, 2016, 4:50 pm

The election was not rigged. That's just crazy talk. It was a massacre because the perception is that the DFL only cares about urban areas. And frankly, I can see why people in rural areas might believe that.

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Re: MN State Senate and House Elections 2016

Postby mister.shoes » November 9th, 2016, 5:07 pm

Obviously it wasn't rigged. We're all smarter than that. But somehow, the jackasses on the right have convinced a substantial portion of the electorate that climate change is phony, that the current POTUS is a secret Muslim from Africa, and that Hillary Clinton is somehow directly responsible for the death of any number of political opponents over the years. All of those (and more!) are every bit as absurd as suggesting Russia hacked our election, and yet...
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twincitizen
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Re: MN State Senate and House Elections 2016

Postby twincitizen » December 7th, 2016, 5:08 pm

Recount over. GOP will officially have a one seat majority in the MN Senate.
http://www.mprnews.org/story/2016/12/07 ... te-control

The loss in this St. Cloud district and Deb Calvert's loss in Terri Bonoff's old district are just embarrassing for the DFL. The loss of the Senate was entirely preventable in a year where Democrats picked up seats in Lakeville (Matt Little) and Eden Prairie (Steve Cwodzinski). How do you lose multiple suburban seats while simultaneously gaining other suburban seats for the first time in years?

Didier
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Re: MN State Senate and House Elections 2016

Postby Didier » February 22nd, 2017, 11:36 pm

For lack of a better thread:

I noticed the headlines today about "Tom Emmer Threatens To Cancel Town Hall If There Are Protests," as well as the obligatory outraged reaction from the left. Does anybody else see this outrage as misguided and generally unhelpful?

If your representative is actually holding a town hall, what's the point of disrupting it? Why not actually go and engage him earnestly instead of yelling and screaming? Maybe you can connect and make progress. Otherwise, a loud protest accomplishes only a "gotcha" moment for left-wing media that can be misconstrued into a "needlessly disruptive snowflakes" moment by right-wind media, and in the end the only result of the protest is that Tom Emmer now has cover for never holding town halls again.

But in addition to angry protests often being ineffective, for the left they are often more damaging than I think progressives realize. Millions of people march in solidarity on Day 1 against Trump. But did you hear what Madonna said? Milo Yiannopoulos is presenting absurdly extremist views that most conservatives wouldn't even agree with. But did you see the snowflakes who couldn't handle it and started setting fire to everything?

This has been happening throughout the era of Trump, and it's really undermining the left's ability to get it's message across. I remember checking Breitbart last summer after Trump's quick fundraising stop in Minneapolis. The Star Tribune focused on the people protesting very legitimate issues. Here's the lede from Breitbart's story: "Progressive activists attacked Donald Trump’s motorcade and supporters in Minneapolis late Friday night, but the local media downplayed the unprecedented attack against an American presidential candidate."

Yes, I get that loud protests are sometimes necessary. And yes, I understand that in a big political movement its nearly impossible to silence all of the "bad apples." But so much of this is self-inflicted. Like, what the hell is wrong with Madonna? Without her dumbass comment about blowing up the White House, there was almost nothing for the right-wing media to latch on to from the women's march. Same goes with these town halls. Tom Emmer, for all of his colorful past, has been surprisingly civil as a congressman. We're not at the point where hi-jacking a town hall is necessary.

Instead, you can get your message across by having lots of people show up to support a common cause. Or you can get your message across by creating a human moment, like when a lifelong Republican who had been saved by Obamacare confronted Paul Ryan at a CNN town hall. But getting a video on Occupy Democrats showing the back of a head screaming at Tom Emmer in his last town hall for the foreseeable future typically won't effect change.

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Re: MN State Senate and House Elections 2016

Postby Didier » February 22nd, 2017, 11:44 pm

I should point out that ultimately there were no protests, and per the Star Tribune report it appeared to have been an effective event.

http://www.startribune.com/crowds-gathe ... 414551853/

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Re: MN State Senate and House Elections 2016

Postby EOst » February 22nd, 2017, 11:55 pm

But getting a video on Occupy Democrats showing the back of a head screaming at Tom Emmer in his last town hall for the foreseeable future typically won't effect change.
Sure worked in 2010.

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Re: MN State Senate and House Elections 2016

Postby VAStationDude » February 23rd, 2017, 7:24 am

No one who is persuadable knows about Madonna or anarchists in Berkeley. The current president admitted to committing sexual assault on tape. Even if people knew what Madonna said they wouldn't care.

Republicans campaigned on recent individual health insurance premium increases and repealing Obamacare. The current president has promised health care would become more affordable and cover more people. Republicans in Congress are proposing eliminating the 3.8% investment income tax that paid for the aca, rolling back the Medicaid expansion and cutting Medicaid available to the very poor. The replacement plan is tax credits. Some people in Congress are dead set against making the credits refundable so there would be no help available to people who actually need it. My point is Republicans are monsters who will take healthcare from millionaires in favor of the idle rich.

People are understandably pissed. If there's anything to learn from the last eight years it's that over promising on health care back fires and that opposition works. Republicans fought a relatively popular Barack Obama on everything and attacked the most unpopular part of Obamacare relentlessly. Imo, it wasn't fair but it worked well for the gop. The current president is unstable and incompetent. Oppose him. The response thus far has been civil and has Republicans running scared. Emmer is the only Minnesota Republican House member holding a town hall. Lewis and Paulson know what they're doing and know it's unpopular that's why they're hiding.

Democrats will lose if they pearl clutch and concern themselves what fans of the current president think is fair or not.

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Re: MN State Senate and House Elections 2016

Postby VAStationDude » February 23rd, 2017, 7:39 am

Ps Tom Emmer went to a speech in Foley about sharia law taking over the land so fuck him.

kirby96
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Re: MN State Senate and House Elections 2016

Postby kirby96 » February 23rd, 2017, 9:49 am

People are understandably pissed. If there's anything to learn from the last eight years it's that over promising on health care back fires and that opposition works.
I think this is absolutely correct. I am pretty certain the fierce opposition will lead to a strong reaction against Trump & Republicans (maybe not at the national level in 2018 due to the senate seats in play and house gerrymandering, but in the states and highly probably in the 2020 national election).

The problem is, where does that leave us in the long term? The country is breaking down along 'identity' lines. Ultimately, I think the root cause of all our turmoil is unease about the future (income inequality, globalization, automation, etc.) and in such situations people have a tendency to go tribal. Suddenly we have the latest identity group, working class whites, who have voted largely as a bloc and have given us Trump. With the benefit of hindsight, this is completely unsurprising.

This problem doesn't go away simply by rejecting Trump and Republicans. Since the focus of the Trump protests and his likely ultimate rejection is (rightly) on the impacts his policies have on the 'non-working class white' identities, this will just piss them off more, and even with Boomers dying off, there are a lot of them. For example, there are far more non-hispanic white people below the poverty line in this country than there are black people (17.8MM vs. 10.0MM - US Census data 2015). I realize that Democratic policies are 'better' for them, but they have for better or worse decided that Democrats don't represent them.

I see a pinball effect that I am worried doesn't end until the pinball is bouncing so wildly it breaks through the glass and things get really ugly. I'm very discouraged about the future, as I don't think anyone currently has proposals to deal with that structural unease about the future that would appeal to a sufficiently broad cross-section of the electorate.

Didier
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Re: MN State Senate and House Elections 2016

Postby Didier » February 23rd, 2017, 9:56 am

I think you're missing the point, VA Station Dude. It's not that Emmer is on the right side of the issues; it's that hijacking a town hall and making a scene doesn't accomplish anything, and arguably makes things worse.

And I just think you're wrong about the prism in which people view current events. The Democrats need to win more people over, and the very small minority of "protestors" doing stupid things feeds into a narrative that is very harmful to the Dems.

To put this another way: Hillary Clinton just lost an election to Donald Trump.

EOst
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Re: MN State Senate and House Elections 2016

Postby EOst » February 23rd, 2017, 10:49 am

To put this another way: Hillary Clinton just lost an election to Donald Trump.
...with three million more votes.

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Re: MN State Senate and House Elections 2016

Postby David Greene » February 23rd, 2017, 10:51 am

I think you're missing the point, VA Station Dude. It's not that Emmer is on the right side of the issues; it's that hijacking a town hall and making a scene doesn't accomplish anything, and arguably makes things worse.
It worked very well for the Tea Party.

I for one am heartened that liberals are finally getting riled up.

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Re: MN State Senate and House Elections 2016

Postby VAStationDude » February 23rd, 2017, 11:02 am

I'm pretty pessimistic. We have big problems like automation that will cause massive suffering and possible social breakdown. The problem is we're not operating in a era of consensus policy making. New deal and great society advancements were not born out of progressive super majorities in Congress. The Democratic party of those eras had liberals and conservatives who largely got behind the president's agenda. FDR was boosted politically by the great depression. Johnson had the Kennedy assassination and the early stages of the Vietnam War helping his agenda. Movement Conservatism wasn't really a thing back then. Today parties are ideological. Any kind of progressive consensus is a long shot and democrats are at a disadvantage because of how the Senate is composed.

Maybe the current president will fail badly enough without killing too many people and the dems will get a crack at progressive governance in 2021.

kirby96
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Re: MN State Senate and House Elections 2016

Postby kirby96 » February 23rd, 2017, 11:17 am



It worked very well for the Tea Party.

Yes it did. I guess my feeling is that we are in a pretty discouraging spot when the strategy is to see who can out Tea-Party each other...

Didier
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Re: MN State Senate and House Elections 2016

Postby Didier » February 23rd, 2017, 11:19 am

To put this another way: Hillary Clinton just lost an election to Donald Trump.
...with three million more votes.
It's way more nuanced than that, though. The margins were padded heavily by a few states, whereas several reliably Democratic states flipped to Republican, which is what really matters in a presidential election. And then the state house results speak for themselves.

The Democrats should have every advantage right now demographically, and of course gerrymandering is part of the problem. But right now both sides are playing to their partisan bases, and since the left (in my opinion, obviously) has the better arguments, I'd rather see those arguments see the light of day rather than get lost like they are now.

I mean, isn't it obvious now that the Republicans have no good answer for health care reform? They're being exposed by the people who go to the town halls and share their real stories, not by the disrupters that the right is (somehow) easily writing off as "paid by George Soros."

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Tiller
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Re: MN State Senate and House Elections 2016

Postby Tiller » February 23rd, 2017, 12:19 pm

To put this another way: Hillary Clinton just lost an election to Donald Trump.
...with three million more votes.
Well those votes sure as hell weren't in Minnesota, and (to Didier) the activist/protesting wing of the Democratic party isn't what was on the ticket in 2016 that lost in the strategically-important [upper] Midwest.


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