Shared Political Power?

[autumnbaby9]

I'm open to any candidate, as long as their last name isn't Bush.

ITA

No More Bush's

 

[eclectics]

Do you really think that Rudy has a chance in the GOP primary? the man has not chance with the voters who control the GOP primary process

Not unless he flip flops big time on his support for abortion and gay rights, just to name a couple. We shall see.

 

[TheDoctor]

Not unless he flip flops big time on his support for abortion and gay rights, just to name a couple. We shall see.

You mean like what Mitt Romney is doing now? Poor Mitt has been caught in so many flip flops that it is not even funny.

 

[eclectics]

You mean like what Mitt Romney is doing now? Poor Mitt has been caught in so many flip flops that it is not even funny.

It's a shame a moderate Republican, like Gerry Ford, would never make it past the primary process today. I wonder if the recent election will start to change things.

 

[richiebaseball]

It's a shame a moderate Republican, like Gerry Ford, would never make it past the primary process today. I wonder if the recent election will start to change things.

Gerald Ford barely made it out of the 1976 primaries and that was as a sitting President. One can only hope the recent elections will change things but at least one person, Senator Evan Bayh, apparently didn't think so.

 

[eclectics]

Gerald Ford barely made it out of the 1976 primaries and that was as a sitting President. One can only hope the recent elections will change things but at least one person, Senator Evan Bayh, apparently didn't think so.

I don't think it was because of his moderate views. There were a lot of issues in 1976, the Nixon pardon not being the only one. Reagan was immensely popular and I think a lot of Republicans would have liked him even if his views weren't quite as conservative as they were. It was post 1980 that the right wing's influence started in earnest.

 

[TheDoctor]

A short while back John/Charade had to be informed as to how the House of Representatives works including the fact that the Majority Party controls everything (he was confused as to whether any Democrat consented to the three day work week). Well the just for this week, the republicans are going to get to expierence what the Democrats have felt like for the last 12 years while the Democrats enact a series of reforms and measures without allowing any debate from the republicans. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/01/AR2007010100784.html

As they prepare to take control of Congress this week and face up to campaign pledges to restore bipartisanship and openness, Democrats are planning to largely sideline Republicans from the first burst of lawmaking.

House Democrats intend to pass a raft of popular measures as part of their well-publicized plan for the first 100 hours. They include tightening ethics rules for lawmakers, raising the minimum wage, allowing more research on stem cells and cutting interest rates on student loans.

But instead of allowing Republicans to fully participate in deliberations, as promised after the Democratic victory in the Nov. 7 midterm elections, Democrats now say they will use House rules to prevent the opposition from offering alternative measures, assuring speedy passage of the bills and allowing their party to trumpet early victories.

Nancy Pelosi, the Californian who will become House speaker, and Steny H. Hoyer of Maryland, who will become majority leader, finalized the strategy over the holiday recess in a flurry of conference calls and meetings with other party leaders. A few Democrats, worried that the party would be criticized for reneging on an important pledge, argued unsuccessfully that they should grant the Republicans greater latitude when the Congress convenes on Thursday.

The episode illustrates the dilemma facing the new party in power. The Democrats must demonstrate that they can break legislative gridlock and govern after 12 years in the minority, while honoring their pledge to make the 110th Congress a civil era in which Democrats and Republicans work together to solve the nation's problems. Yet in attempting to pass laws key to their prospects for winning reelection and expanding their majority, the Democrats may have to resort to some of the same tough tactics Republicans used the past several years.

The use of the old House rules by the Democrats will hopefully be for a short time period but the GOP is going to get to see how little power the minority party has in the House.

 

[richiebaseball]

A short while back John/Charade had to be informed as to how the House of Representatives works including the fact that the Majority Party controls everything (he was confused as to whether any Democrat consented to the three day work week). Well the just for this week, the republicans are going to get to expierence what the Democrats have felt like for the last 12 years while the Democrats enact a series of reforms and measures without allowing any debate from the republicans. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/01/AR2007010100784.html The use of the old House rules by the Democrats will hopefully be for a short time period but the GOP is going to get to see how little power the minority party has in the House.

How many threads are you posting this on? Do you even realize this is the thread that shows your outright hypocrisy? Thanks for bumping it and all but are you this clueless in real life?

 

[Saxsoon]

How many threads are you posting this on? Do you even realize this is the thread that shows your outright hypocrisy? Thanks for bumping it and all but are you this clueless in real life?

Wait a minute. Did he just show us all that the Democrats went completely against what they promised us during the election.

 

[TheDoctor]

Wait a minute. Did he just show us all that the Democrats went completely against what they promised us during the election.

Not at all. The Democrats are simply not going to let the GOP side track the bills that are going to be passed in the first one hours of Democratic control. The GOP tipped its hand and the Democrats are not going to let the GOP play games. See
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/27/u...c51c2d834&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss This article notes that the GOP are planning to take advantage of any laxing of the rules by the Democrats to try and cause some problems.

But Republicans are hoping Democrats stick to their guns and allow the minority a stronger voice on legislation. The opposition leadership said it would take the opportunity to put forward initiatives that could be potentially troublesome for newly elected Democrats in Republican-leaning districts who within months will have to defend their hard-won seats.

“There are going to be days when we will offer alternatives in ways that are going to be very appealing to Democrats in districts the president carried just two years ago,” said Representative Roy Blunt of Missouri, who will be the second-ranking House Republican in the 110th Congress.

Republicans see the ability to force tough votes — which they avoided in the majority by stifling Democratic alternatives — as having two potential benefits: It can put vulnerable Democrats on record with positions that might not be popular at home, or it can fracture the untested Democratic majority. Mr. Blunt noted that even senior Democrats who served in Congress when Democrats held control had no experience dealing with a relatively thin, 16-seat majority that will not allow many lawmakers to avoid tough votes.

Democratic leaders said that in the spirit of a new beginning, they have every intention of allowing Republicans the kind of legislative opportunities that Republicans regularly denied Democrats. “Democracy is a risk,” said Representative Steny H. Hoyer of Maryland, the incoming majority leader. “And democracy is about alternatives

I hope that the Democrats do following through and give the GOP more rights and opportunities compared to how the GOP has treated the Democrats for the last 12 years.

 

[Saxsoon]

Not at all. The Democrats are simply not going to let the GOP side track the bills that are going to be passed in the first one hours of Democratic control. The GOP tipped its hand and the Democrats are not going to let the GOP play games. See
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/27/u...c51c2d834&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss This article notes that the GOP are planning to take advantage of any laxing of the rules by the Democrats to try and cause some problems. I hope that the Democrats do following through and give the GOP more rights and opportunities compared to how the GOP has treated the Democrats for the last 12 years.

Yet it sounds exactly like what the GOP did in power. I hope you are right, and hopefully sets the standard for future Congresses, regardless of who is in control.

 

[Galahad]

The depressing part is how little it actually matters.........

 

[TheDoctor]

This is amusing. Now that the GOP is out of power, members of the GOP Congressman are asking for a minority bill of rights to prevent the Democrats from treating the GOP the same way that the GOP treated the Democrats. http://www.tpmmuckraker.com/archives/002257.php This letter (you can see if you open the link) is amusing. As one blog notes

They don't mention their party's own strongarm tactics -- which is striking, given that since 2002 Cantor himself was a member of the House GOP leadership, which was known for ruthlessly engineering legislative victories. "[R]eveling in the power they have, [Republicans] are using techniques to jam bills through even when they don't have to . . . simply because they can," is how congressional expert Norman Ornstein characterized the GOP's screw-the-minority tactics from 1994 to the present, according to a 2004 Washington Post article.

Republicans "have taken every one of the techniques that Democrats employed when they were in the majority, and ratcheted them up to another level," said the American Enterprise Institute scholar.

An ironic case in point: When Pelosi made her proposal to protect Democrats in 2004, GOP House Speaker Dennis Hastert (IL) refused to entertain the idea, let alone reply to her correspondence.

One can only assume that McHenry, Cantor and Price are hoping for a more sympathetic audience with Pelosi than the one she received then.

For the AEI to characterize the GOP strongarm tactics this way is amazing.

 

[Chloe'sMom]

I voted for shared power.

Based on how our government operates today the politicians have forgotten they have a job to do, and not just rubber stamp what their party wants. I would have been fine with a completely republican or completely democratic power - but the truth is the republicans didn't hold Bush responsible for his actions, and the democrats wouldn't have done it either if there had been a democrat in office. They are all to worried about themselves and to hell with what those positions truly stand for. Hence why I voted against every office where the candidate had already served. Time for fresh blood, time for the positions to mean something again.

~Amanda

 

[EltonJohn]

Should Republicans or Democrats control the White House and both Houses of Congress or should that power be shared?

I picked other. We should have more than two major political parties in this country. We should have a variety of parties running the government.

 

[TheDoctor]

Quite a bit early but a bit of good news for those truly believing in shared power.http://news.yahoo.com/s/rasmussen/20061229/pl_rasmussen/edwardsgiuliani20061229

If Rudy is going to have a chance to get the GOP nomination, it would be a good idea not to leave the 140+ page briefing book with his exact plans for the campaign including all plans for fundraising in a hotel conference room to be picked up by the press. http://www.nydailynews.com/front/story/485008p-408347c.html

It's clearly laid out in 140 pages of printed text, handwriting and spreadsheets: The top-secret plan for Rudy Giuliani's bid for the White House.

The remarkably detailed dossier sets out the budgets, schedules and fund-raising plans that will underpin the former New York mayor's presidential campaign - as well as his aides' worries that personal and political baggage could scuttle his run.

At the center of his efforts: a massive fund-raising push to bring in at least $100 million this year, with a scramble for at least $25 million in the next three months alone.

The loss of the battle plan is a remarkable breach in the high-stakes game of presidential politics and a potentially disastrous blunder for Giuliani in the early stages of his campaign.

The document was obtained by the Daily News from a source sympathetic to one of Giuliani's rivals for the White House. The source said it was left behind in one of the cities Giuliani visited as he campaigned for dozens of Republican candidates in the weeks leading up to the November 2006 elections.

 

[richiebaseball]

blah, blah, blah

Your lips are moving doc, but that's all that's coming out.

 

[shirleyb]

We should give up the idiotic notion of parties. It's just a way of trying to wrap up a person's entire belief system in one little term. It's dumbing down choices:

"Oh, you're a Republican -- then you believe _____, _____, and ____."
Uh, maybe half of those things.
"How can you agree with ____? You call yourself a Democrat!"
No, I call myself a thinking person.

Neither party serves the people anymore. Both parties exist simply to perpetuate themselves. Sadly, a politician who doesn't align himself with one of the parties has no chance of election and -- if he is elected -- no chance of effecting any change whatsoever. A lone politician who doesn't "play the game" has no power.

ITA!!! I think I am Libertarian about many things, as I think the less governmetn gets done, the better for all of us!

 

[TheDoctor]

Your lips are moving doc, but that's all that's coming out.

I guess that you were not serious about Rudy. I do not blame you. The leaked election plan contained the following.

One page cites the explicit concern that he might "drop out of [the] race" as a consequence of his potentially "insurmountable" personal and political vulnerabilities.

On the same page is a list of the candidate's central problems in bullet-point form: his private sector business; disgraced former aide Bernard Kerik; his third wife, Judith Nathan Giuliani; "social issues," on which is he is more liberal than most Republicans, and his former wife Donna Hanover.

It will be interesting to see how far Rudy gets.

 

[richiebaseball]

I guess that you were not serious about Rudy. I do not blame you. The leaked election plan contained the following. It will be interesting to see how far Rudy gets.

Yep, he's busted. His secret plan? He wants to raise a boatload of cash and is concerned about personal and political baggage. Now that his secret is out, he might as well call it quits.