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Comment by GeneralMayhem | Hacker News Reader

Democrats have not had a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate since before Reagan, and they're constantly up against the asymmetry that breaking things is a lot easier than building them. The side that wants government not to work has a huge structural advantage in any argument (even apart from their structural electoral advantages thanks to letting empty fields carry as much weight as cities) since they "win" by default.

It only takes a few years or even months of Republican rule to install judges that will deem any regulations unconstitutional, to allow time-bounded authorizations to lapse, to fire large numbers of public servants who keep the administrative state running, or simply to use the bully pulpit to tarnish the reputation of federal bureaucracy so that individuals will refuse to interact with them. Building those institutions as credible, competent forces takes somewhere between years and lifetimes.

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>Democrats have not had a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate since before Reagan

Republicans have not had a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate since 1907.

That would only be a problem if Republicans had a legislative agenda. If all you want is to be able to break government, you need to be able to filibuster, not to be able to overcome one.

I hope you enjoy the next 40 years, becuae they will be the same as the last 40 years with people like you making the same excuses election after election.

What "making excuses"? The Republicans have literally stated over and over[1] that their goal is to make government not work and make Democrats look bad - not to make life better for their constituents.

Meanwhile the Democrats have to spend every term fixing the things the GOP broke, only for voters to reward them by saying "you didn't fix everything and this dude promises the magical tax fairy will build a wall and make Mexico pay for it" and restoring to power the party that breaks everything and raises the deficit.

Things are NOT the same with both parties, and discussing the systemic issues both with the electoral college, the Senate - a body so undemocratic that the Supreme Court has literally ruled it unconstitutional for any state to have a legislative body with membership based on land instead of population[2], as well as the fact that it's much easier and faster to tear things down than to build them up - is not "making excuses". It's trying to educate people, despite the fact that a significant chunk of them don't want to understand how things work, they want to act on feelings.

[1]: https://www.nationaljournal.com/member/magazine/top-gop-prio...

[2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reynolds_v._Sims

Here's the thing: the Dems will never be rewarded for restoring a shitty status-quo that is systematically eroded every few years. They need to embrace radical, popular change. Trump is a populist who understands that he can do all sorts of destructive, vile shit if he just promises the right people the right things.

>They need to embrace radical, popular change.

Which is, by design in the American system, not possible without strict control of the presidency, the House, and the Senate, and possibly the Supreme Court.

As long as voters continue to not vote for democrats for "not doing enough", the democrats will never be able to "do enough". That's inherent in the system! Republican voters meanwhile understand the concept of "I'm going to put them in charge and see what they end up doing", even if I disagree with the things they want and their methods, they understand democracy very well!

>Meanwhile the Democrats have to spend every term fixing the things the GOP broke

Like NAFTA.

When it comes to making people lives worse the democrats are just as capable as the republicans.

It's just that when it comes to helping people. Oh no. Woe is us we can't do anything with the presidency, and a super majority in every branch of government.

This happens once every 20 years.

But democratic cultists always come out of the wood work to explain why this is actually ~Reagans~ ~Bushs~ ~Bush2s~ Trumps fault.

In just 4 years of Biden the Democrats got infrastructure spending, the CHIPS act, inflation under control, unemployment down to levels not seen in decades, eliminated billions in student debt, capped insulin prices, allowed Medicare to negotiate lower prices for more drugs, had multiple years of job growth every month, cut child poverty rates in half (from 12% to 6%), passed rules guaranteeing overtime pay for more workers (later overturned by a Republican judge), supported rail unions in getting paid sick days, criminalized sexual harassment in the military, invested in clean drinking water through infrastructure upgrades, prosecuted antitrust, blocked harmful corporate mergers, and more - but please tell me how they do nothing and it's all the same.

The filibuster can be abolished at any time with a simple majority vote, because it's only a Senate rule, not part of the Constitution.

The truth is that neither Democrats nor Republicans want to solve the problems of the working class and the poor, because both parties are financed by the wealthy.

> filibuster-proof majority

They had 72 Days in 2009 to fix everything! Both parties are the same! /s

And all the while they had blue dog conservatives like Joe Lieberman and Ben Nelson handicapping the proceedings.

I've wondered for a while now: why don't the Democrats get their own agents elected as pseudo-Republicans?

The Republicans keep doing it... Lieberman, Nelson, Manchin, Sinema, et al.

The current Republican party is the product of a decades long effort to purify and drive out liberal elements. The Rockefeller Republicans are long gone. Romney is gone. Murowski and Collins can’t even be counted on to stand up for women’s issues.

The Democrats on the other hand are beholden to corporate interests which limits how far left they can go.

Romney?

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