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The Republican party is in a death spiral... (1 Viewer)

He's gonna lose the popular vote by more than 5 million. The dems got 10 million more in the midterms. His path to electoral victory is narrow. 
The Democrats don't have anyone that has an agenda the American people in the heartland of this country can relate to, at least not yet.   

 
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Why is Mitch McConnell blocking election security bills? Good question.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.). (Susan Walsh/AP)

By Amber Phillips

July 30

As President Trump’s own FBI director warns that Russians are planning to try to undermine American democracy in the next presidential election, Republican lawmakers led by Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) are blocking bills aimed at blocking foreign hackers from states’ voting systems.

Why? Republicans have policy objections to the legislation, but it seems clear that politics is at the forefront of McConnell’s decision-making. Specifically, the politics of pleasing Trump.

Trump is so sensitive to findings that Russians tried to help him win in 2016 that a Cabinet secretary was warned against briefing him on it. He’s repeatedly sided with Russian President Vladimir Putin over his own intelligence community about whether Russians interfered. He’s said he might accept foreign help in his 2020 reelection. And last month, he made light of it all when he mock-scolded Putin in front of cameras. “Don’t meddle in the election,” he said, waving a finger and wearing a smile.

[Listen on Post Reports: ‘We’re having this political battle that effectively should be a nonpartisan issue.']

Trump jokes to Putin: 'Don't meddle in the election, please'

After being prompted by a reporter, President Trump told Russian President Vladimir Putin not to interfere in the 2020 election during the G-20 summit June 28. (Reuters)

That puts McConnell in a tough spot: Pass legislation, which election security experts say is needed, and risk sparking the president’s ire, or block the legislation — and risk increased Russia election interference and public ridicule.

McConnell has decided to stand by Trump. Purely politically speaking, it makes sense. Trump has the authority to make or break any other legislation McConnell might want passed before his own reelection campaign next year in a Trump-friendly state.

McConnell said he won’t move the legislation forward because the federal government is already working with states to address election interference and that passing more legislation would be too heavy-handed, since states run their own elections. Most, but not all, of his caucus agrees with his position.

The decision to back Trump over passing legislation that election security experts support has opened him up to some severe criticism. MSNBC host and former GOP congressman Joe Scarborough dubbed McConnell “Moscow Mitch” (which is trending on Twitter), and Washington Post columnist Dana Milbank accused McConnell of being a “Russian asset.” (On Monday, McConnell responded in a fiery speech on the Senate floor to that column, accusing Milbank and other critics of “modern-day McCarthyism.”)

[McConnell defends blocking election security bill, rejects criticism he is aiding Russia]

McConnell’s decision not to poke the president has earned him praise from Trump on Tuesday, who also helped McConnell fight back against some of the sharpest criticism against him.

“I think The Washington Post is a Russian asset by comparison,” Trump told reporters. “Mitch McConnell loves our country. He’s done a great job.”

Trump defends McConnell from ‘Russian asset’ charge

President Trump defended Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) after he was criticized of aiding Russia by blocking an election security bill. (Reuters)

And then Trump said something that underscored how closely intertwined are bipartisan concerns about Russian election interference with his own touchiness that his 2016 win wouldn’t have happened without Russia:

"Mitch McConnell is a man that knows less about Russia and Russian influence than even Donald Trump, and I know nothing,” he said.

Meaning: I didn’t know Russia was going to interfere in 2016, and neither did McConnell. So because we had nothing to do with it, there should be no reason to pass legislation trying to stop them from doing it again.

The problem with all this is that Trump’s own top intelligence officials say Russia is definitely trying to interfere in 2020 like it did in 2016. “The Russians are absolutely intent on trying to interfere with our elections,” FBI Director Christopher A. Wray testified to the Senate last week.

A bipartisan Senate report released last week found that Russians tried to hack into election systems in all 50 states in 2016. The report by former special counsel Robert S. Mueller III said the FBI believed that in 2018, Russians “successfully gain[ed] access to the network of at least one Florida county government.”

And Mueller, arguably the premier expert on how Russia interfered in the 2016 election after leading a nearly two-year investigation on it, warned in his testimony last week to Congress that Russians are trying to meddle again “as we sit” here.

Election security experts say that while there’s still time to strengthen states’ election systems before 2020, the political momentum may never be as strong as it is right now, after Mueller testified.

Congress recently approved $380 million to revamp election systems in states, but that’s not sufficient. It won’t, for example, fund machines in all 50 states that can leave paper trails of votes and conduct audits after the election to make sure every vote is counted and nothing was hacked.

“Experts have said if we want to do everything we need to do to harden our election systems in all 50 states,” said Ned Price, a former national security spokesman under the Obama administration. “ ... [T]hen it will require much more than $380 million, and it will require it soon, because these upgrades take time, and the clock is ticking.”

The legislation that House Democrats (and one Republican, Rep. Brian Mast of Florida) passed recently and that McConnell is blocking in the Senate does “some basic things” to protect U.S. elections, said Suzanne Spaulding, who was an undersecretary at the Department of Homeland Security under President Barack Obama. The package of bills tries to address disinformation campaigns on social media and ties some $600 million in funding for new election systems in the states to requirements that they upgrade their equipment to make sure they are less hackable.

“That’s important to make sure our elections are secure,” she said, “but what’s critically important is we have a way of assuring the public that their vote was counted as cast.”

McConnell says it’s his detractors who are playing politics. “I’m not going to let Democrats and their water carriers in the media use Russia’s attack on our democracy as a Trojan horse for partisan wish list items that would not actually make our elections any safer,” he said Tuesday.

That clock Price mentioned is ticking. And McConnell, backed by Trump, is willing to wait it out.

 2.3k Comments

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Amber Phillips writes about politics for The Fix. She was previously the one-woman D.C. bureau for the Las Vegas Sun and has reported from Boston and Taiwan. Follow 

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The Democrats don't have anyone that has an agenda the American people in the heartland of this country can relate to, at least not yet.   
The Republicans don't have anyone that has an agenda that the whole of America can relate to. It's shameful what the Republican "leaders" are doing to the Heartland of this country.

 
The Democrats don't have anyone that has an agenda the American people in the heartland of this country can relate to, at least not yet.   
Dems don’t need to win over all of the heartland, just swing States with blue tendencies like Michigan, Wisconsin. My personal guess is he’s lost a lot of traction in Michigan. People around here who loudly supported him in 2016, usually don’t want to talk about him anymore and I know some who in confidence said they felt embarrassed by their vote or that they liked him mostly just because it riled people up and they liked the attention and antagonizing people. They now admit it was a bad joke. Even a year ago I saw Trump signs when I would go a walk around town. This summer, I haven’t seen any. 

 
The Democrats don't have anyone that has an agenda the American people in the heartland of this country can relate to, at least not yet.   
The Democrats are too focused on trying to give free healthcare to non citizens to worry about the American people.

 
The Democrats don't have anyone that has an agenda the American people in the heartland of this country can relate to, at least not yet.   


The Republicans don't have anyone that has an agenda that the whole of America can relate to. It's shameful what the Republican "leaders" are doing to the Heartland of this country.


The Democrats are too focused on trying to give free healthcare to non citizens to worry about the American people.
I agree with all of this 

 
I think Democrats would be smart to keep it simple:

- return a level of class and respect to the office 

- re-establish strong relationships with our Western allies 

- focus on the economy, settle our trade disputes

- settle the border through improved security, establish paths to citizenship and treat people with dignity while keeping the borders safe 

- tackle healthcare costs 

 
 settle the border through improved security, establish paths to citizenship and treat people with dignity while keeping the borders safe 

 tackle healthcare costs 
These would seem to be social and industry-defining things that will take twenty or so years to get right. I'm not so sure that they're under the rubric of "simple."

 
The only agenda that the heartland cares about is saving farms, which any Democrat can do by ending the trade war.
You are out of touch with middle America.
:lol:

Middle America has a pretty low tolerance for immoral narcissists who are pathological liars. Trump needs to win 2 out of Michigan/Wisconsin/Minnesota/Iowa and he's significantly underwater in all 4 of those states right now. Middle America sees through his act.

 
That's not what ilov80s said. At all. He said to do simple things like solve the border crisis and health care. Sorry to burst bubbles, but that ain't simple.
He didn't say solve...he said what they should do which is talk about those thkngs and keep their message simple.  I don't think his post was meant to say that solving those things would be easy.  Sorry to burst your bubble.

 
He didn't say solve...he said what they should do which is talk about those thkngs and keep their message simple.  I don't think his post was meant to say that solving those things would be easy.  Sorry to burst your bubble.
Reading comprehension down? Read it again.

 
We all saw the hands go up. We will believe our own eyes. 
Why would he call that lies?  I didn't watch it, but I'll take your word for it if you did watch it.  I've noticed more deflection in this forum when those don't have a good response.  It seems to be strategy in this forum. 

 
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How many times must we have the same conversation before you understand the question didn't include the word free?

The link has been posted over and over again showing the trump spin on this to be false
Explain it to me then since I didn't watch it.  He said all their hands went up when asked the question regarding healthcare for the undocumented.  What part of that is the lie?  ....and please respond directly with no deflection. 

 
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Why would he call that lies?  I didn't watch it, but I'll take your word for it if you did watch it.  I've noticed more deflection in this forum when those don't have a good response.  It seems to be strategy in this forum. 
Because the question they raised their hand to wasn't giving free healthcare.  Probably best not to take the word of someone who has been corrected on this multiple times but still posts inaccurate information.

 
Because the question they raised their hand to wasn't giving free healthcare.  Probably best not to take the word of someone who has been corrected on this multiple times but still posts inaccurate information.
I didn't watch it and just want to know the truth.  What did they raise their hands to if it wasn't providing free healthcare to the undocumented?

 
I didn't watch it and just want to know the truth.  What did they raise their hands to if it wasn't providing free healthcare to the undocumented?
The quote of the question has been posted multiple tomes and an explanation in the link above.

 
The Democrats don't have anyone that has an agenda the American people in the heartland of this country can relate to, at least not yet.   
What presidential candidate, an actual nominee, has had the heartland as the front and center of their campaign? Is it fair to say WJ Bryan was the last? The heartland is like the old nationalist wing of the GOP, something that has been appeased but never put first. I don't know if it will ever happen considering that cities and suburbs have been driving America's economy for more than a hundred years.

My only thought on this, coming from a state that has a big city in constant tension with a largely rural remainder is the whole question is whether a candidate opens markets for agriculture or do they restrict it?

In terms of social issues, my feeling is that the heartland is primarily interested in the character of the candidate.

Let those two things be your lodestars.

 
We all saw the hands go up. We will believe our own eyes. 
Why would he call that lies?  I didn't watch it, but I'll take your word for it if you did watch it.  I've noticed more deflection in this forum when those don't have a good response.  It seems to be strategy in this forum. 
All that really matters here is that the Democratic candidate will clarify their stance long before they get into a debate with Trump, and this issue will have no effect on the general election. If Trump even tries to bring it up, the Democrat will just deflect it with a hearty "Fake News!"

You guys are reflexively shaking each others' hands like a Zigerion simulation capped at 5% processing.

 
The Democrats are too focused on trying to give free healthcare to non citizens to worry about the American people.
Fake. Since the health care for non citizens is part of their plan for healthcare for Americans. 

 
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Perhaps but if that’s the mindset, we won’t ever get anything large accomplished again and we are screwed.
I agree that both sides need to agree to get something done, but then the question becomes, at least to me, is whether or not the compromise is a workable compromise with a net benefit to society rather than a piece of legislation that only benefits certain interests on both sides.

The cynic in me says that any agreement will lean more towards the latter; that it'll be a hodge-podge of things gifted to those close to congress (donors and PACs) and will leave the people who most need it out in the cold. That's my concern.

 
How does grouping them together with American citizens makes it all better?  Did I miss something?
Hypothetically if all Americans are covered one way or the other, and just say they got 'free' public health care, you would seriously argue that someone who is not an American citizen who arrived at a doctor's office or at a hospital should be turned away?

 
How does grouping them together with American citizens makes it all better?  Did I miss something?
He said Democrats were more focused on giving free health care for non citizens over carrying about Americans. How could that be true if they were being included in a health plan for American Citizens as well. 

 
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Hypothetically if all Americans are covered one way or the other, and just say they got 'free' public health care, you would seriously argue that someone who is not an American citizen who arrived at a doctor's office or at a hospital should be turned away?
No, probably not.  What should happen is treat them, then report them to ICE and let the courts determine if they should be here or not.

 
Look at the town in Mississippi where ICE just raided factories. Republican state, Republican county, Republican town, and it depends on these low cost laborers to do this lousy job but everyone in town and in the state knows they're there. And then everyone in Mississippi gets free health care. But do we really think these Republicans would turn away these laborers at the hospital door? Hell no, they'll just pick up the tab for their health care just like they winwinkwink about their being there in the first place.

 
No, probably not.  What should happen is treat them, then report them to ICE and let the courts determine if they should be here or not.
Exactly. "Heartland" values would be to care for people decently. But keep in mind these people aren't being reported to ICE by the same hypothetical community in the first place.

 
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How many times must we have the same conversation before you understand the question didn't include the word free?

The link has been posted over and over again showing the trump spin on this to be “mostly false”

https://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2019/aug/01/donald-trump/fact-checking-trump-ad-democrats-health-care-immig/
The “Trump spin.”  :lmao:  Can’t you guys just admit this was one of the biggest political blunders in history and move on?

 
Okay, and who pays for that?
Because our immigration loop holes made this possible, we as a nation will need to bite the bullet and treat them, but that doesn't mean we can't turn them over to ICE and let the courts decide whether they deserve to stay in the country.

 

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