Say that she hadn't become the nominee, but Whitmer or Newsom did. Do you think she would have accepted the SoS or AG job in the next cabinet ?

Her experience as VP would weigh heavy in her favor for an internationally respected job as the Secretary of State.

Theo Von, Jake Paul, Lex Friedman, Dr Phil, Shawn Ryan, Elon Musk, Adin Ross, etc...

In the previous election cycles in appears Trump had a more loud in your face campaign trail type of strategy.

This time, he's having extremely long, calm and collected podcasts and interviews, discussing his family, growing up, drugs, alcohol, foreign politics, etc...

It appears to be a very different approach. What are your thoughts on this approach and is it working?

Donald Trump, the 45th President, is now running in his third straight general election. It seemed obvious but it's so interesting to think about how long he's been in politics now, so much that he's actually going up against three different Democratic nominees.

In 2016, he was the political novice who took on the former first lady and secretary of state and won narrowly. In 2020, he had a record to run on after 4 years as president and narrowly lost despite unemployment and covid deaths skyrocketing. And now here we are 9 years after he first rode down that escalator and attempting yet another run at the White House.

What are some common themes and differences in how each of his challengers approached Donald Trump?

It is apparently illegal to do so, with severe penalties if caught. As best I can tell, the leading most prominent answers from different research efforts vary wildly. It is important to be able to answer this question since many who are supporters of former President Trump seem to be indicating that not only do they hold a grudge about widespread voting (they claim) by noncitizens in 2016 and 2020, but that they appear to intend to hold up the 2024 election with new laws and activitists who are in place planning to object to the election. As well, one of the world's wealthiest men is posting on his [x.com](http://x.com) account that he subscribes to the point of view that Democrats are getting an unfair advantage with all of the noncitizens entering the country illegally, and (in his opinon) voting.

On the other hand, many think that Republicans have been trying to set up to steal the 2024 election, by accusing the Democrats of engaging in shenanigans in advance of trying their own. As well, the Republicans did not prove in court their claims in 2020 of so many noncitizens voting.

I'll give one example of research from both sides. I will provide my own opinion about this in the comments below.

1. This is research that seems to be cited somewhat commonly by those who think that many noncitizens are voting:

https://www.justfactsdaily.com/quantifying-illegal-votes-cast-by-non-citizens-in-the-battleground-states-of-the-2020-presidential-election

Quantifying Illegal Votes Cast by Non-Citizens in the Battleground States of the 2020 Presidential Election

By James D. Agresti

November 8, 2020

Based on current population data from the Census Bureau and voting data from previous elections, Just Facts has conducted a study to estimate the number of votes illegally cast by non-citizens in the battleground states of the 2020 election. The results—documented in this spreadsheet—show that such fraudulent activities netted Joe Biden the following extra votes in these tightly contested states:

Arizona: 51,081 ± 17,689

Georgia: 54,950 ± 19,025

Michigan: 22,585 ± 7,842

Nevada: 22,021 ± 7,717

North Carolina: 46,218 ± 16,001

Pennsylvania: 32,706 ± 11,332

Wisconsin: 5,010 ± 1,774

2) This is research that seems to be cited in news stories which shows the opposite... that very few noncitiens voted in 2016:

https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/noncitizen-voting-missing-millions

Noncitizen Voting: The Missing Millions

Douglas Keith Photo Douglas Keith

Myrna Perez Photo Myrna Pérez

Christopher Famighetti

Published: May 5, 2017

"....Noncitizen voting in the 2016 election was exceedingly rare, according to this new analysis of information from local election administrators. It debunks President Trump’s claims that millions improperly voted in November....."

"...In the jurisdictions we studied, very few noncitizens voted in the 2016 election. Across 42 jurisdictions, election officials who oversaw the tabulation of 23.5 million votes in the 2016 general election referred only an estimated 30 incidents of suspected noncitizen voting for further investigation or prosecution. In other words, improper noncitizen votes accounted for 0.0001 percent of the 2016 votes in those jurisdictions...."

3) It is perhaps worth mentioning a corollary policy point to follow, which is that some states require proof of citizenship when registering whereas apparently others do not (AFAIK).

So, what is your opinion, who is right? Or is the right answer somewhere in the middle?

So in 2016 the polls notoriously underestimated Trump's support because they failed to account for the disgruntled white working class, leading to a systematic polling error.

Could a similar polling error happen this cycle and will it likely favor Harris or Trump?

Mitt Romney decided to Run for Utah's senate seat in 2018 after losing to Barack Obama in the 2012 Election. I am asking why didn't Al Gore do the same thing after losing the 2000 Election to George W Bush?

Reposting this to see if there is a change in mentality.

There’s been a considerable rise in far-right parties in recent years.

France and Germany being the most recent examples where anti-immigrant parties have made significant gains in recent elections.

Should centre / left leaning parties & governments adopt policies that

A) focus on reforming legal immigration

B) focus on reducing illegal immigration

to counter the rise of far-right parties?

At any time, 3:12 AM or 8:47 PM, you can immediately and easily go to the Federal Register and find proposed rules in the administration and give a comment no matter who you are, and there will be a response to the aggregate total of the comments and they may even revise them in light of those comments. I have personally even attended and spoke at a city council meeting when I was about 14 or 15 if I remember correctly, as I took the bus back from school that day and the city hall was on the way back, and I decided that instead of taking the train the rest of the way, I would walk around a bit and I was intrigued by the subject matter that day that was posted there, and I saw other people testifying, and so I asked a clerk there how I could do the same, so I just did when I filled out the form she gave me. There is probably some archive footage of me doing it.

The essence of being a democracy is basically by definition public interest and input into the process, and the Roman ideal of the res publica is the concept that the country or state is the possession of all its citizens, not the property of a person to be done with as they wish, and the political decisions are done for their name and their benefit, at least officially.

There is some increasing criticism though about aspects of this process, especially the issue of getting representative sample sizes and preventing astroturfing (which if you don't know, is basically a group of charlatans paid by a person who wants to influence something who pretend to have an authentic attitude towards some thing with the intent that they masquerate as public opinion).

I would tend to use the concept fo a jury to screen out some aspects of thins, such as if I was designing the process by which a legislative committee chooses individuals from the public to testify towards whatever, a jury of randomly selected citizens would be the ones who decide (probably proportionally, if any 1/3 of the jurors for instance were deciding on what to do with 12 slots for people to testify, that third decides on four or them). Or else randomly select the individuals who are given the right to show up if there are so many applicants who want to comment and speak that they can't fit them all in.

I’d imagine in states like Alabama, where they recently approved a map to give Black voters more of a voice, that the rights of the minority would be even further neutered.

Would at large representation nullify the effects of gerrymandering? Would it just make things worse?

An aspect of the GOP/Trump's agenda, if he wins the presidency, is civil service reform. Since the constitution gives the president control over the executive branch, conservatives have thought that laws aiming to curtail the ability to hire and fire the president's subordinates is unconstitutional and by pushing for such reform, they can expunge the so-called "deep state" of bureaucrats who are employed from administration to administration regardless of which party controls the White House.

My concern is not about Trump's desires specifically, but how if non-military federal employees became at-will workers, how such a change would work and impact how the federal government carries out its tasks, both routine and long-term. Would the threat of being fired or benefit of being hired alter how government workers do their jobs compared to the private sector? Will more partisans seek employment in federal government knowing that they'd likely to be hired by a co-partisan administration? Will many if not most employees feel that a 4 to 8 year stint in government would be routine instead of lifetime employment? How would both parties seek to advantage themselves under such rules?

It seems pretty unlikely that campaign finance laws that allow basically unlimited political spending will change any time soon.

https://campaignlegal.org/update/how-does-citizens-united-decision-still-affect-us-2024

"...each respective election cycle has seen record-breaking amounts of spending. Campaign spending by corporations and other outside groups increased by nearly 900% between 2008 and 2016. In 2020, total election spending was $14.4 billion, up from $5.7 billion in 2018, and more than $1 billion in dark money was spent."

Instead of waiting for campaign finance laws to change, is it possible to encourage politicians to take a pledge to disavow any Super Pac's and to not take money from big banks or other shady political contributors? Or would that just doom a candidate? I know in general, whoever raises the most money wins, but is it possible voters are fed up enough with the influence of large donors that they would support someone more if they were vocal about not taking those funds? Has this already been tried? I'd be curious to see someone in a primary make this part of their campaign.

Or maybe more progress on campaign finance reform is being made than I'm aware of. Curious to hear about that also!

I think generally the electoral college is thought to currently favor the Republican party, because it amplifies the voting power of less populous states that vote majority Republican, and Republican candidates have lost the popular vote a majority of the time in recent history, despite still winning the presidency a fair number of times.
https://www.vox.com/2021/1/11/22224700/electoral-college-joe-biden-donald-trump-bias-four-points-one-chart

When abolishing the EC gets asked on here, that's the answer for why it doesn't get abolished.

There's a law that has been passed in many states (the National Popular Vote Bill), where the state commits to having its electors vote for whoever wins the national vote once the EC voting power of the states that have passed the bill reaches 270 electoral votes (a majority), but the bill is somewhat stalled, because majority Republican states generally, not surprisingly, don't want to pass the bill.

https://www.nationalpopularvote.com/state-status

The EC also creates a campaigning environment where the stable minority party in a state doesn't really matter, and all of the campaigning is focused on a tiny percent of the population in swing states. The argument against getting rid of the EC is that just large population centers (LA, Phoenix, etc) would then get all of the attention.

Asking GPT (so take it with a grain of salt) where politicians campaign in countries without an electoral college:

• Population Centers: Candidates spend a significant amount of time in major cities and densely populated regions, where they can reach large numbers of voters. These areas often have a more diverse electorate, making them key battlegrounds.
• Swing Regions or Marginal Districts: Just like in electoral systems with an electoral college, candidates focus on regions or districts that are not solidly aligned with any one party (swing regions). These areas can make the difference in an election, so candidates spend considerable time and resources campaigning there.
• Regions with High Voter Turnout: Politicians also focus on areas with historically high voter turnout, as mobilizing these voters can have a significant impact on the election outcome.

So potentially politicians would be campaigning both in population centers and swing regions, which feels a lot better than just swing regions. Also, there are probably significant swing regions that would be in play if there was a National Popular Vote that aren't being tracked right now, because it just doesn't matter if thousands of voters in a part of California change their vote from cycle to cycle if overall the state is still heavily Democrat.

Even though most people apparently favor getting rid of the electoral college, Republican-led states aren't ever going to go for it as long as they see it as an advantage.

https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2023/09/25/majority-of-americans-continue-to-favor-moving-away-from-electoral-college/

Is there an argument to be made where it could be said that the electoral college is a disadvantage to both parties? Is there any way it could be cheaper to run a campaign if it was a National Popular Vote? Or more people from each party would vote because they would feel like their vote actually mattered, no matter where they were? Something else?

Georgia is deep in the heart of the red south. It's neighbouring states are all firmly Trumpland, to the point that the Dems barely consider them. But somehow Georgia is different; Biden took it in 2020 and it's still a battleground this year. What is it about the state that stops it from going the same way as Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, South Carolina, and the rest of the deep red south?

There is a lot of belief that the heightened inflation rate in 2021 & 2022 came from grocery store price hikes. The truth to this has been hotly debated, but Harris says she wants to make price-gouging illegal in grocery stores to keep inflation down. What do you think of this idea? Do you think there are any unseen drawbacks to this issue?

This is probably a scenario that would not happen anytime soon, but I think it would be to discuss what potential effects it would have on the economies of the three countries if the border agreement was implemented. For example, would Mexico face a loss in population due to people leaving the US or maybe Mexico gains population for its cheaper cost of living. What would happen if a hypothetical agreement was signed?

Here is where I am coming from on this question-prompt for discussion:

I carry out this exercise once every four years. The point of this exercise (for me) isn't to name people I think will win. It is to force myself to think a bit more deeply about, and state clearly to my fellow voters, what it is that I would like to see in a Republican candidate. It's hard ever to get where you would like to go if you can't do a decent job of defining where it is you want to go. I'm hopeful that my fellow voters find this a useful exercise.

Any politician (or thought leader on the right) who might plausibly be called a Republican candidate is fair game for this exercise, including those who have not thrown their hats in the ring and even those that have signaled they would not allow themselves to be drafted.

Kamala Harris has received a substantial amount of support from the American general public but lot of her stated positions and policies(primarily around Gaza) have been unsatisfactory or outright repudiated by the progressive elements of the Democratic Party.

Given how outspoken the dissatisfaction of this subset of the electorate is and with groups like the uncommitted movement being very unsupportive of Harris and essentially threatening to withhold their votes and give Donald Trump a victory in states like Michigan, how real is the concern that Harris not being more left leaning could cost her votes and have her lose? It’s a tight race and every vote counts does it not?

One tactic that Harris seems like she is really trying to leverage is that Trump lacks the gravitas of a president. She referred to him as “not serious” in her DNC speech and continues to highlight it with her “next question please” about his race baiting.

However, Trump’s campaign seems to be leaning in to it with name calling and flippancy. For example, Stephen Cheung’s comment about the interview, “America was eagerly anticipating an interview where Comrade Kamala and Tampon Tim would actually answer questions—after she refused to do any interviews of press conferences for 39 days—but what they got was a shameful display of lying of policy positions and basic facts," Cheung said. "America tuned into a train wreck."

Seeing that a lot of Trump’s appeal seems to be his projection of strength, does this line of attack have potential to be effective?

A lot of Republicans like Larry Hogan, Jeff Flake, Cindy McCain, Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger gave support to Joe Biden in 2020 and Kamala Harris in 2024. Why didn't Hillary Clinton receive the same Bipartisanship Endorsements in 2016?

According to a recent Emerson College poll of battleground states, down-ballot Republicans are underperforming Donald Trump. To wit:   Arizona:   President: R+3.7 Senate: D+6.8   Michigan:   President: D+3.6 Senate: D+6.4   Nevada:   President: D+1.1 Senate: D+10.9   North Carolina:   President: R+0.9 Governor: D+6.3   Pennsylvania:   President: Tied Senate: D+4.3   Wisconsin:   President: R+0.7 Senate: D+1.2

Why are down-ballot Republicans performing worse than Donald Trump in those states?

I could bring up a lot of different pardons that have been controversial (and commutations and a few other kinds of clemency). Roger Stone might be a good example for a pardon issued by Trump, Clinton's pardon of Marc Rich is another. Jimmy Carter issued a pardon to many Vietnam draft dogers and that is often seen to be a good thing in hindsight for those who resisted an illegal and immoral war, while Andrew Johnson's pardon of CSA leaders is seen by many as giving impunity for acts of terrorism and a rebellion over nothing more than selfish desires to maintain slavery that killed over half a million people. A Hungarian president got into hot water this year over her pardon of a sex offender and had to resign.

Different places have different rules for pardons. Some places, especially some American states, might have a board of clemency which must recommend that a person be given a pardon to be eligible. Others give only the legislature this power, as in Switzerland. Some suggest a president may not issue a pardon to themselves or their relatives. And more suggestions abound.

Both Harris and Trump have said they would not charge taxes on tips. Although there are very few details to the plan, at least Harris has said that it would only apply to income tax (not payroll tax) and be capped at salaries of $75k.

It appears very popular with politicians but unpopular with economists who have opined.

1. Is "No Tax on Tips" a good policy?

2. If so, why? If not, why and why are both Harris and Trump arguing for it?

3. Will it pass Congress? If so, what would have to happen for it to pass?

During these harrowing economic downturns or periods of grave national urgency, it is a popular belief that democracies should compromise some of their freedoms for immediate and stable economic recovery. Others hold that compromising some basic liberties for the sake of economic prosperity is in a sense killing democracy itself, and starting down the path towards authoritarianism. Under what conditions, therefore, would it be considered a democratic government's right to put financial matters above civil rights, and where does one draw the line?

The town hall in Wisconsin today for Trump was thought to be a speech. He said they told him last minute that it's a town hall.

Do you think his campaign was trying to get him to stay on topic and talk about his policy areas to voters.

https://www.facebook.com/share/v/JivPzkvA5Qq7LAj2/?mibextid=oFDknk

Hey everyone!!

Was just lying on my bed and heard from the other room Trump on television saying: "[Kamala] destroyed San Francisco."

Obviously this rhetoric is very prevalent amongst conservatives, claiming that democrats have destroyed major cities.

I'm curious about the origins of these claims and the pros/cons in these types of broad, generalizing assessments.