Winning strategy 2018 and 2020 for the Democratic Party

2018 is going to be a pivotal year in American politics. The Governors which are elected this year will be able to veto gerrymandered maps following the 2020 census, meaning that the impact of this year will be felt for a minimum of a decade. Being able to take a slight majority in the Senate (getting back to the maximum of 60 seats of 2009-2010 is going to be impossible right now) is going to significantly reduce the power of Donald Trump, protecting America from his homophobic, sexist, racist, and inequality driving policies.

The most important elections this year are without a doubt the local city, county, and state level elections. 87 out of 99 State legislatures are up for election this year, either in full, or in part. Granted, there is a lot of gerrymandering nationwide, but with Trump’s approval rating and being accused of federal crimes by his top staff of his campaign team, it is going to be a very hard year for the Republicans. Every person who chooses to run as a Republican this year needs to answer for the President’s behavior, and why they choose to associate themselves with someone whose presidency is failing in a way we haven’t seen since Richard Nixon. This gives the Democrats a massive advantage.

But, merely running as the anti-Trump party won’t be enough, because once Trump is gone we will need to have something to show that we stand for, not just against. We can start by looking at issues the majority of Americans agree on, which I have already written about here.

Particular priorities the Democratic Party can take on which I think will help win elections and gain support are:

  • Improve the Affordable Care Act. Increase access to Medicaid, implement a Federal public option for health insurance. Make it so anyone can opt in for Medicaid or Medicare. Increase quality of Medicaid in many states by removing it from state government and make it run like Social Security Old Age Insurance where it doesn’t matter which state you live in.
  • Paid parental leave for the first 4 weeks of a child’s life for both parents and grandparents. Increase the existing tax credit for parental leave to 100% for all businesses and all income levels.
  • Implement the high speed train plan Obama proposed in 2009.
  • Significantly increase federal subsidies for local transit, and building light rail in major cities across America. Significant federal subsidies if free transit for riders is implemented.
  • Free community college tuition for everyone.
  • Fully subsidize tuition at every public college.
  • Significantly increase number of small business loans.
  • Dismantle our nuclear arsenal which wastes tens of billions of dollars per year.
  • Set a timeline to end our use of fossil fuels in transportation by 2030.
  • No new pipelines in the United States. Respect the treaties with Native American nations.
  • Implement a carbon tax which will increase at an exponential rate with no exemptions for any special interest group.
  • Have capital gains taxed as regular income. This should balance the budget.
  • Have tax rates be determined by an equation with 90% of households getting a negative income tax, and a top tax rate of 50%. Negative income tax for all households below $100,000 per year for a single person. Have adjustments for household size. Proposal available on my blog.
  • End the Home Mortgage Interest Deduction which inflates the cost of housing and has no justifiable reason for existing.
  • Implement a universal basic income to reduce income inequality.
  • Pardon all standing student loans, and pay back all interest which has already been paid since 2008.

I started to write this, and most of the tenants are already on two existing lists. They are on the official Democratic Party Platform for 2016, and  on my annual post about platforms which are based on majority support. Democrats  are winning the generic battle for Congress and Trump’s support cannot even reach 40%. The platform is not the issue, and should not see any major changes this year or in 2020, it is already a progressive platform.

The only area where Democrats are doing worse than the GOP is in strategy. The party needs to be more supportive of local candidates first of all, and give them as much support as possible across the country at every level. We need grassroots democracy, because all politics is local, and the greatest Presidents in history start out by being great leaders of their communities.

When it comes to tipping point states, here is a list of states by their electoral college votes sorted by the Cook Partisan Voting Index:

State Number to ratify Number of States Votes Number needed Vote in 2016 PVI Number of Votes Number needed
Hawaii 50 4 264 D 18 4 264
Vermont 14 3 261 D 15 7 261
California 31 55 206 D 12 62 206
Maryland 7 10 196 D 12 72 196
Massachusetts 6 11 185 D 12 83 185
New York 11 29 156 D 12 112 156
Rhode Island 13 4 152 D 10 116 152
Illinois 21 20 132 D 7 136 132
New Jersey 3 14 118 D 7 150 118
Washington 42 12 106 D 7 162 106
Connecticut 5 7 99 D 6 169 99
Delaware 1 3 R 6 172 96
Oregon 33 7 99 R 5 179 89
Maine 23 4 3 183 85
New Mexico 47 5 3 188 80
Colorado 38 9 1 197 71
Michigan 26 16 99 R 1 213 55
Minnesota 32 10 1 223 45
Nevada 36 6 1 229 39
Virginia 10 13 1 242 26
New Hampshire 9 4 D 0 246 22
Pennsylvania 2 20 99 D 0 266 2
Wisconsin 30 10 0 276 -8

You notice Ohio and Florida? Their votes are unnecessary for winning the Presidential election. We should still try our best to win their Governorships, because that is about 8 seats in the House we can pick up between them, and because we can. Getting more control over their state legislatures will be a really big change in terms of constitutional amendments, growing Democratic leadership for the 20s, and gaining a strong base. To get a constitutional majority to amend the constitution we will need 3/4 of the State legislatures, or 2/3 to call a convention. The states we would need to gain in order to do this on top of the states we need to win the Presidency (from the most conservative to least, again by PVI) would be Florida, Iowa, North Carolina, Ohio, Arizona, Georgia, Texas, Alaska, Indiana,Mississippi, Missouri, Louisiana, Montana, Kansas, and Alabama. In short, any amendment to the constitution will require bipartisan support.

Another bonus for the Presidential election is that Trump has a negative approval rating in every state I listed in the table above, as well as Iowa, Ohio, with North Carolina with a dead heat, given the Democrats a massive advantage to counter his incumbency advantage in 2020.

The biggest message for the Democrats this year, is go big or you will go home.  We need to campaign as much as possible, candidates need to get out and talk to people nationwide, listen to their concerns, have an attitude to solve problems and then next year to succeed in following through.

Governors

The absolute most important races this year are the Governor races in a handful of states. 6 states with very Democratic PVI scores are Vermont, Maryland, Massachusetts, Illinois, Maine, and New Mexico. We can pick up several of these states this year, and we also have a shot at getting Michigan, Nevada, New Hampshire, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania. If we pick up Governorships in every state which have a PVI which swings towards the Democrats we will have 22 states, by picking up 9 new states (yes, it is that bad). Some of the governors are more moderate and popular, Massachusetts and Maryland will be hard to pick up. This election is the Democrats to win as long as they don’t screw up.

Interstate Vote Compact and State Legislatures

The best way to guarantee majority rule in the 2020 election will be to have a majority of states sign onto the Interestate Vote Compact. This will likely be the first step in eliminating the Electoral College altogether.

The good news is when it comes to the Interstate Vote Compact, the 11 most Democratic states have already signed on. We only need the 12 other Democratic leaning states to sign on in order to have a majority in 2020, forcing Trump to win a plurality of the vote in order to win, which is going to be very difficult given the Mueller Investigation which continues to pick people off of his election team faster than he can hire people. Some of these states, Delaware, Oregon, New Mexico, Nevada, have Democratic majorities in both houses and haven’t signed the compact yet. If they sign it will add 21 votes to the compact bringing the total to 190 out of the 270 needed. The remaining states which have split legislatures are Maine and Colorado which both have 18 R-17 D in their Senates. New York has a 32-31 R split in their Senate, and we can pick up at least one Senator this year. We just need to pick up one Senator seat in each of these three states and the Governor of Maine (which we will likely get) in order to pick up three valuable Trifectas.

If we could get a few more moderate states to sign on to the Interstate Vote Compact that would go a long ways towards making it pass. This is unlikely because it is almost impossible that it will benefit the Republicans, but the reasoning is that it is better for Democracy because it makes the Presidential election a popular vote as opposed to the Electoral College.

The legislatures with the slimmest Republican majorities (by percentage in both houses) are:

  1. Virginia (48% D)
  2. Maine (47.6% D)
  3. Illinois (47% D)
  4. Minnesota (46% D)
  5. Nevada (42% D)
  6. Arizona (42.5% D)
  7. Alaska (42.5% D)
  8. Iowa (40.9% D)
  9. Mississippi (38.58% D) 
  10. Montana (38.5% D)

In order of number of seats we need to pick up in State Houses:

  1.  Virginia (1 seat)
  2. Arizona (5 seats)
  3. Maine (5 seats)
  4. Michigan (8 seats)
  5. Montana (9 seats)

In order of number of seats we need to pick up in the State Senates:

  1.  New York (1 seat) and TRIFECTA
  2. Colorado (1 seat) and TRIFECTA
  3. Maine (1 seat)
  4. Minnesota (1 seat)
  5. Virginia (1 seat)
  6. Arizona (2 seats)
  7. Nevada (2 seats)
  8. Wisconsin (3 seats)
  9. Alaska (4 seats)
  10. Iowa (5 seats)
  11. Florida (5 seats)
  12. Texas (5 seats)
  13. West Virginia (5 seats)
  14. South Carolina (5 seats)

I believe if we do this in the next 3 days, Democrats will win this week, and if we continue to push we can win a trifecta in 2020.

    State of the Global Economy, October 2018

    GE as predictor for the economy. The reason is that when companies want to grow they are going to go to a company like GE for the supplies they need while doing construction. This means that General Electric will be one of the first companies in America to feel the effects of the recession.

    This is also what happened in 2007-2008. General Electric’s stock crashed just prior to the Great Recession. The reason for this is because companies stopped doing new construction, and stopped ordering from GE. 12 months after GE tanked, the economy went into recession. This did not happen in 2000 because the stock market crash was isolated in tech stocks, it was not a systemic problem like we had in 2007-2008 with the housing bubble crash or the massive trade war which Donald Trump has started over the last 12 months.

    When Obama left office on 20 January 2017, we had a very healthy yield curve. Our yield curve is changing at one of the fastest rates in American history. Canada is not looking good, and neither is Mexico. I am fairly certain we will have a recession before the next Presidential election with everything I am reading.

    Japan right now has an extremely healthy yield curve. China is becoming steeper (which is good). India has a negative yield curve at the moment. Australia looks healthy. In Europe, Germany and France are both healthy, and the United Kingdom is about to feel the full brunt of Brexit with the uncertainty their stupidity has brought them. Labour and the Liberal Democrats have an opportunity to make the Tories irrelevant for the 2020s. There is no nice way to say it. Russia’s economy is unhealthy. On the bright side, it looks like Greece is finally starting to recover from Austerity. Norway looks fine.

    Indonesia doesn’t look good.

    I agree with the EIU that there will likely be a regime change in Venezuela within 2 years. Their yield curve is an absolute horror show.

    Colombia’s yield curve is steadily improving. Brazil is finally coming out of the darkness from the recession they had last year. Argentina is going to finish the recession they have been going through.

    Optimistic

    • China
    • Japan
    • Germany
    • France
    • Australia
    • Colombia
    • Brazil
    • Vietnam

    Confused

    • India

    Pessimistic

    • United States 
    • Russia
    • Canada
    • Mexico 

    Apocalyptic, the combination of political events and extremely negative bond yield curves make these countries look doomed in the short run.

    • United Kingdom
    • Venezuela
    • Argentina

    Finally, when reading these, it is good to take into account that China, the United States, India, Japan, Germany, and Russia account for over half of all global GDP. Only 7 countries, China, India, the United States, Indonesia, Brazil, Pakistan, and Nigeria contain half of the global population.

    The United States and United Kingdom are in very similar situations right now. Heavily isolationist policies by their governing Republican and Conservative Parties (yes, yes, I know Brexit was a referendum, but the people were misinformed on what it means) have led their countries to ruin. The Republican Party has stood by their President as he burns our trading relationships, and with their political trifecta they have led us to ruin. This is exactly what happened the last time they had a Trifecta, they were kicked out in 2006, at which point the housing bubble was imminently going to pop. GE crashed the next year. The Conservative Party has stood by “Brexit means Brexit” which has dissuaded investment in the United Kingdom with the needless uncertainty which is destroying their economy right now.

    When it comes to Canada and Mexico, I think they are responding to the policies of the United States government due to being so heavily intertwined economically. The recession will likely not be as bad as it will be here in the United States, but it is not going to be good.

    India is suffering high unemployment, which is nothing new, and corruption has been improving somewhat (they have improved their ease of doing business index) yet for some reason they have a negative bond yield curve, which is a change from a year ago. They have rather high inflation, but is below where it used to be. Be wary of India, but I see no reason for panic.

    Argentina has had a fairly severe recession and their government has adopted a pro-cyclical approach to their economic policy by instating austerity. Decades of poor economic mismanagement is catching up with them. It is very sad.

    But not nearly as sad and aggravating as how the criminal syndicate United Socialist Party under Maduro and Chavez has led Venezuela to ruin. They have trampled the human rights of their country, turned themselves into an oil state, mismanaged those funds (as is so fucking common) and now their economy is crashing, with little hope of recovery before a revolution or coup kills him. Hopefully it comes soon so that Venezuelans can recover from the travesty they have caused. The inflation and depression is Weimar Republic levels. Their yield curve reflects it. There is no good reason anything should have anything but disdain for what they have done to their country.

    There you have it. I don’t know if my theory about General Electric is correct or not, but given everything else it seems likely. There are some parts of the world with reason to be optimistic, others less so. Hopefully politicians will make decisions to improve overall wealth and health of nations, and that those who have not will get the punishment they deserve proportional to their crimes.

    Yield curves are available at www.investing.com

    Mueller needs to tells us what happened

    Inspired by:
    https://www.politico.com/story/2018/10/19/mueller-investigation-findings-914754

    There are two possibilities with the release of the Mueller probe:

    • either the Mueller Report does not include damning information on Donald Trump, hence would not effect the election and there is no reason to wait until afterwards,
    • The Mueller Report in its full context includes a smoking gun with proof of Russian influence in our election to the point of swinging the most important election in the second largest economy in the world, information which would impact the American people’s decision in November.

    What we know

    This is not opening a fraudulent congressional investigation days before the election which  is closed as soon as the target of the investigation loses.

    This is an investigation spanning over 30 years of very complex relationships between the President of the United States and the President of Russia, the evidence of which is undeniable.

    This is an investigation into whether a foreign power hacked into American elections in an attempt to swing the election in full.

    We know for a fact that the counties which Russia targeted in 2016 turned out to be pivotal for the Presidential election.

    James Clapper, former Director of National Intelligence, claims “It stretches credulity to conclude that Russian activity didn’t swing voter decisions.”

    We know for a fact that the Russians changed voter rolls across America.

    Conclusion

    There are now two potential options of what happened 2 years ago:

    • The Russian government developed a long, deep, and complicated relationship with the Republican Candidate for President of the United States, swung voter decisions in key states, going through enormous expense and energy, but not to impact the election when they had a very clear preference.

    Or:

    • The Russian government successfully groomed an American multimillionaire, helped him become a billionaire, effectively targeted voters filling our social media feeds with lies masquerading as news stories in order to get a President who will do what they want.

    It think it is pretty obvious no one would ever go to the extent and lengths Russia went through. I believe the numerous national security advisors.

    I believe it is now Robert Mueller’s duty to his country with the immense amount of evidence he has done, to present it to the American people in time for us to make our decisions with full information proving (or, however unlikely, disproving) the immense suspicion millions of Americans like myself have that the Russian government did.

    This is not the same thing as opening a Kangaroo court days before a major historic election against one of the candidates, with absolutely no intention of finishing it. This is presenting the American people with facts which we can use to make our decisions so we can get the right people elected as governor, legislators, representatives, and senators in three weeks. The consequence of withholding important information from the election is itself a political ploy which protects those who have (possibly) deeply harmed the United States of America, keeping them in power. That would be unpatriotic to allow such criminals off the hook and let them stay in positions of power to do even more damage to our democracy. It is downright cruel to the People of the United States for us to keep having a government which does not represent us, and keep us in the dark when there are elected officials who have very likely harmed us. Information is one of the most valuable and important pieces in an election, as important as the way you count the ballots. More information (as long as it is accurate) is always better for democracy.

    We deserve to know.

    America needs to know the truth to protect ourselves.

    This is a the biggest national security issue of my life.

    Release the probe.

    Previous articles I have personally written:

    • https://stidmatt-views.blogspot.com/2018/09/why-putin-hates-obama.htm
    • https://medium.com/@matthewstidham/swing-counties-9e0444e8cece?fbclid=IwAR04vs5_9p-Dns2ntzms1HdyLdm8P7XVV3xD-9nfPbrlVjZoZWJUQ8TSUOw

    References:

    • https://www.wired.com/story/did-russia-affect-the-2016-election-its-now-undeniable/
    • http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2018/07/trump-putin-russia-collusion.html
    • https://www.vox.com/2018/5/31/17384444/james-clapper-trump-russia-mueller-2016-election?fbclid=IwAR1zTtpuihMsvLXu0H98Vtloeio0-bLpQELQbXOw1TJuVU8DAs4tbAPc7_I
    • https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/without-the-russians-trump-wouldnt-have-won/2018/07/24/f4c87894-8f6b-11e8-bcd5-9d911c784c38_story.html?fbclid=IwAR1s8RdqXur4z8Uk4wnXUujyVOylRpinB3RxiR-XpybqzjXcwIACKjncXfY&utm_term=.2ccf30b18888

    Random musings, week 3 of October 2018

    • Native Americans are being denied the vote in South Dakota
    • African Americans are being pulled off of buses on their way to vote
    • Elizabeth Warren announces her DNA test at the same time as Native Americans are being denied the right to vote.
    • Trump is under trial in New York State for tax evasion
    • There is a pending case in front of the Supreme Court to give the President the ability to pardon state level crimes
    • After racking up hundreds of billions of dollars in debt, the Republicans are now targeting Medicare and Medicaid.
    • The Mueller Probe is ongoing.
    • Ryan Zinke, Secretary of the Interior, is under investigation.
    • US banned visas for same-sex partners of diplomats
    • Hundreds of voting polls have been closed before the upcoming election, mostly targeting minorities. https://news.vice.com/en_us/article/kz58qx/how-the-gutting-of-the-voting-rights-act-led-to-closed-polls
    • Washington State Legislature is held by the Democrats by a thread, this election could significantly increase their advantage after record primaries with people voting for Democrats. Democrats have a 25-23-Sheldon majority in the Senate and a 50-48 majority in the House.
    • Republican Governors are up in Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Florida. They will be able to approve or veto redistricting maps which will impact their state legislatures and about 100 representatives in the US house from the 2022 to 2030 elections.
    • The Colorado Legislature is the closest legislature in America today, and half of the Senate is up for election in three weeks, and every seat in the House. Republicans have a 18-16-1 seat majority in the Senate right now. Democrats have a 36-29 majority in the House.
    • The US representative seat from Alaska is essentially a toss-up, among many other traditionally Republican seats.
    • The way we name our house districts is the way the French do it (State – #), Commonwealth countries and Germany call their districts by the name of their location (Abbotsford).

    Republican State governors projected to flip by Nate Silver:

    • Iowa
    • Michigan
    • Illinois
    • Maine
    • New Mexico

    Republican Governors in toss-up territory:

    • Nevada
    • Kansas
    • Wisconsin
    • Ohio
    • Florida
    • Georgia

    Every Democratic Governor is safe.

    This would mean that the governorships will be divided 50/50 with 25 governorships being held by each party. More Americans will be in Democratic states though, so more seats in the House during the 2020 redistricting will be signed or vetoed by a Democratic Governor. Having more favorable legislature maps for the Democrats will have impacts on every issue in America, and effect everybody’s lives.

    There is a lot going on. It is easy to get overwhelmed.

    But, when you get your ballot, remember to vote. That is how we are going to fix the problems this article starts with.

    Kavanaugh is a disgrace, and just the beginning

    I watched almost the entire Kavanaugh hearing today, and I am convinced that he is lying, and that Dr. Christine Blassey Ford is telling the truth. There is literally no way anyone would go through the hell that Dr. Ford went for, openly calling for an FBI investigation, in front of a Senate committee, knowing full and well that if she is lying she will be incarcerated. Kavanaugh is hoping that the Republican desire to get the first Conservative Supreme Court in a literal century will pave his way to the highest court in the land, just like Clarence Thomas, where he will take away the ability of people to get access to birth control.  On top of this, Senator Grassley is having a bad memory for time since the hearings only started on the 4th of September, he claimed that they have been going on for two months.

    On top of all of that, his behavior is abhorrent while Dr. Ford’s behavior was dignified. He faked cried his way through a Supreme Court nomination hearing, which was a disgrace to our democracy and an insult to our country. It was very clear that he feels entitled to a seat in the Supreme Court, because his party is in power and he can use it to reduce access to health care, reduce environmental regulations, end net neutrality, whittle away our 4th amendment protections, and reduce access to our legal protections to non-citizens.

    Brett Kavanaugh currently has not just one accusation but three coming against him. He has provided no reason to believe him, fake sobbing his way through his hearing like a little baby. If I had gone down the path to get my JD (which is something I have seriously considered multiple times) and my career landed me to be at a Senate hearing to be in the highest court of the land I would treat everyone with the utmost respect, and be as honest as truthful as possible. Judge Kavanaugh was neither. He acted like a child the whole time, lied to Senators, and if there is an FBI investigation, as there needs to be, and is found to have been lying is going to be in so much legal trouble that he will never coach girls volleyball again. This is as creepy as the head of Miss USA being accused of sexual assault by multiple women we know he had contact with. Sexual predators seek out such opportunities to rape children, as Brett Kavanaugh and Donald Trump do. It’s too obvious a coincidence to not point out.

    He will have far more to worry about whether he will be able to coach girls going through puberty again if he is found to be lying.

    To make it clear, not everyone who coaches child sports is a predator, the coaches I had in soccer were really good people who really taught us and have absolutely no criminal records. But then there is that small subsection of people who spend a lot of time around minors like Brett Kavanaugh and Donald Trump who are absolutely creepy.

    This leads us to the political question, what should the Republican party do? They have three choices, none of which look appealing:

    1. Keep going through with the Kavanaugh appointment, try to get him on the court. Two things can happen in this circumstance:
      1.  If all of the Republicans vote for him, he will be appointed under current rules by a very slim majority, and they will have packed the court. Voters will know that and they will punish the party in November more than we already will. They will be punished severely and have trouble getting Congress and the Presidency in the future.
      2. If just two Republicans defect, who will most likely be Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski, then Kavanaugh will not be confirmed. They will need to select a new nominee and go through the entire procedure again. They have 98 days until the new Congress is inaugurated, and inaugurating a SCOTUS judge in late December does not look good at all. They will need to have everyone on board, or lose their opportunity. If they lose two seats in the Senate this November, the Republican loses its opportunity for an appointment for the foreseeable future.
    2. Go through with the FBI Investigation, and they find that Kavanaugh is guilty or not.
      1. If Kavanaugh is guilty he will be arrested, be a convicted felon for both rape and lying to a Senate committee. He will never see the light of day again. It’s the end of October and they don’t have time to thoroughly vet a nominee to the highest court in the land.
      2. If Kavanaugh is found innocent (which I think is highly unlikely) than his nomination goes through. But, given the logic above, this is almost certainly not going to happen.
    3. Decide that Kavanaugh is too politically toxic and President Trump appoints his next choice. The appointee is approved in late November or early December, assuming there are no more scandals, and they get their best choice. There is an 80%+ probability voters will have already voted in a Democratic House at this point in time.

    The best option for the Republicans is to just dump Kavanaugh, let the FBI go do their investigation on him because he is still on the DC Circuit, and appoint the next choice of Donald Trump. Trump looks really bad for appointing a rapist, and his credibility is reduced to basically nothing. This is at the same time as the Mueller Investigation continues to arrest members of his campaign staff for collusion with the Russian Government, and lying to the FBI. The Mueller Investigation will likely find strong evidence that Trump himself has been involved in this, and given the number of people on his staff who have been found guilty of serious crimes, their is no way Trump had absolutely nothing to do with all of the corruption which has been exposed already. A President undergoing an FBI investigation being found guilty nominating a Supreme Court Justice doesn’t look good for the Republican Party. It is also likely that Mueller will find evidence of Republican members of Congress involved in the ongoing corruption as well. This gives them two choices:

    1. Defend Trump. They are obstructing justice and everyone but the most ardent Fox News viewer is completely furious at what is happening to our country. They punish them severely at the polls.
    2. Do nothing. The American people see this is as implicity collusion with Trump, see above. They are brutally punished by voters in 2020 for collusion. Mueller starts investigating key members of Congress for collusion and likely finds evidence.
    3. Impeach Trump. Trump becomes the first President in American history to be impeached and convicted, he leaves office, is thrown in jail and Mike Pence becomes President. If Mike Pence is found guilty in the Mueller Probe as well, which is most probable than it goes to the Speaker of the House.
      1. If the impeachment is done before 3 January 2019 the most incompetent little prep school kid to ever sit as Speaker of the House Paul Ryan becomes President. He will be as effective a President as he is Speaker and embarrasses his party. It is highly unlikely that
      2. If the impeachment is done after 3 January 2019 there is a greater than 80% probability according to Five Thirty Eight right now, than Nancy Pelosi becomes the first female President of the United States of America.

    The Kavanaugh pick was one of the most foolish decisions the Republican Party has chosen, and will likely be the final straw. With no fewer than 3 people accusing him of raping them in the past, this is going to significantly hurt their credibility in the eyes of millions of Americans. With the ongoing Special Council Investigation

    Case docket:

    • https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Telecom_Ass%27n_v._FCC_(2016)
    • https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Jones
    • EPA v. EME Homer City Generation, L.P. (2014)
    • https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kiyemba_v._Bush
    •  

    References:

    • https://www.govtrack.us/congress/members/report-cards/2017/senate/ideology 
    • https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special_Counsel_investigation_(2017%E2%80%93present)

    This is a lot to take in, here is a brief timeline on how we got here regarding how Kavanaugh got to this point and the ongoing Mueller investigation:
    Timeline:

    • 7 November 2000: President Al Gore wins the popular vote.
    • 12 December 2000: Bush v Gore is decided, ending the Florida Recount, awarding Governor George W. Bush the Presidency.
    • 20 January 2000: President George W. Bush takes office.
    • 6 June 2003: Brett Kavanaugh became the White House Staff Secretary under President George W. Bush.
    • 30 May 2006: Judge Brett Kavanaugh is appointed by President George W. Bush as a Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.
    • 4 November 2008: Senator Barack Obama is elected President of the United States.
    • 6 August 2009: Sonia Sotomayor replaces David Souter on the Supreme Court.
    • 6 August 2010: Elena Kagan replaces John Paul Stevens on the Supreme Court.
    • 2 November 2010: Republicans win control of the House, first time since 2004.
    • 6 November 2012: President Barack Obama is re-elected as President.
    • 4 November 2014: Republicans win control of the Senate, first time since 2004.
    • 23 March 2015: Ted Cruz declares his candidacy, first Republican to do so.
    • 26 June 2015: Donald Trump declares his candidacy
    • 1 February 2016: First primary
    • 13 February 2016: Antonin Scalia dies, opening the possibility of a solid liberal Supreme Court majority. Speaker Paul Ryan and Majority Leader Mitch McConnell promise to not approve any appointee of President Obama.
    • 16 March 2016: President Obama appoints Judge Merrick Garland to fill Justice Scalia’s seat.
    • 3 May 2016: Trump becomes Presidential nominee of the Republican Party.
    • 8 November 2016: Trump wins the electoral college, Clinton wins the popular vote. The first Republican Trifecta since the 2004 election is formed.
    • 3 January 2017: Congress starts its current session, a 52 seat majority in the Senate, and a 241 seat majority in the House. With one Supreme Court vacancy and over 100 Federal court vacancies this is one of the most potentially powerful congresses in history.
    • 20 January 2017: Trump is inaugurated as President
    • 31 January 2017: Trump nominates Neil Gorsuch to fill Justice Scalia’s seat.
    • 7 April 2017: Neil Gorsuch is approved by the Senate.
    • 17 May 2017: The Special Counsel Investigation begins
    • 5 October 2017: George Papadopolus pleads guilty to false statements.
    • 27 October 2017: Rick Gates is found guilty in conspiracy against the United States.
    • 1 December 2017: Michael Flynn pled guilty for making false statements.
    • February 2018: 13 Russian citizens and 3 Russian entities are indicted by Bob Mueller.
    • 2 February 2018: Richard Pinedo pled guilty to identity fraud.
    • 16 February 2018: Alex van der Zwann pled guilty to making false statements to the FBI
    • 16 February 2018: Numerous Russians and are found to have committed Conspiracy to Defraud the United States.
    • 8 June 2018: Konstantin Kilimnik is indicted by Mueller. 
    • 21 June 2018: Justice Anthony Kennedy announces his retirement, putting SCOTUS at a 4-4 split between liberal and conservative judges.
    • 9 July 2018: Brett Kavanaugh is appointed to the Supreme Court, his appointment would be the first solid Conservative Supreme Court in 100 years. 
    • 13 July 2018: Fancy Bear from GRU are indicted for hacking the Democratic National Committee.
    • 31 July 2018: Justice Anthony Kennedy’s retirement comes into effect.
    • August 2018: Manafort was found guilt on eight felony counts by the Special Council Investigation. Flynn pleaded guilty to making false statements to the FBI. Rick Gates, Alex van der Zwann
    • 4 September 2018: Senate Judiciary Committee starts its hearings. 
    • 14 September 2018: Paul Manafort pled guilty in conspiracy against the United States.
    • 16 September 2018: Dr. Christine Blasey Ford accused Kavanaugh of raping her in high school.
    • 23 September 2018: Deborah Ramirez accused Brett Kavanaugh of sexual misconduct.
    • 26 September 2018: Julie Swetnick accused Mark Judge and Kavanaugh of committing gang rape against her.
    • 27 September 2018: Brett Kavanaugh and Dr. Ford have a hearing with the Senate Judiciary Committee.

    This is only a timeline of the Special Counsel Investigation and how the Supreme Court got to this point. I’ve left out the legislative activity and economic changes which have happened in this time period.

    Dizzy yet?

    It’s just getting started.

    Why Putin hates Obama

    Introduction and rankings

    No relationship of world leaders of the 21st century reaches the sheer scale of the animosity and importance between President Vladimir Putin and President Barack Obama. The reasons are vast, Putin has cultivated a cult of personality over the last 18 years and used religion to cement his power, Obama on the other hand was raised Unitarian Universalist and goes to a liberal Christian church, mentioning God in his speeches from time to time, but keeps his faith very personal. Putin has overseen a gross reduction of rights for LGBT people in Russia while Obama decided to stop defending the Defense of Marriage Act in court and overturned Don’t Ask Don’t Tell. The Supreme Court Justices he appointed decided that gay marriage would be the law of the land.

    Russia and the United States are very different political cultures. My favorite index for ranking democracies is the Democracy Index because it has the most variables which are calculated from a wide variety of experts around the world. When it comes to the Democracy Index, America under Obama started at 8.22/10, and ended in 2016 with a score of 7.98/10. The main reason for this decline is Functioning of Government and Political Participation. I suspect this mostly has to do with Congress who refused to work with Obama on even the most fundamental and basic of all duties such as passing a budget. The image this sent the American people hurt our nation dearly, and the Republicans will hopefully pay this year for their behavior. Russia on the other hand has a score of 3.17/10, scoring poorly on every metric. America is ranked as a flawed democracy (which is from 6-8) and Russia is ranked as Authoritarian. We can get back up to a full democracy, but is going to take hard work.

    Political experts in the United States are generally fairly certain that our votes are counted accurately. Political experts in Russia know the system is rigged. This is reflected in our Democracy Index scores.

    Importance compared to other major International Relations

    The relationship between the United States and Russia matters a lot, America has the second largest economy in the world (behind China due to the growth of their economy), and Russia has the 6th largest. The three between us are India, Japan, and Germany. China is our 3rd largest trading partner, India is a military ally of the United States, a member of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue, Japan is a Major Non-NATO ally, and Germany is a member of NATO.

    During the Obama administration, both China and the United States worked hard to keep our relationship friendly despite major disputes and ideological differences. China has even cooperated with the United States some on North Korea, though not as much as we would like. Despite the United States officially once recognizing the Republic of China as the rightful government of all of China the People’s Republic of China and the United States are as friendly as possible. This is while China has an authoritarian rating with the Democracy Index and is ranked 176/180 on the Freedom of the Press Index, which keeps us from being closer. China also maintains fairly friendly relations with Russia. The American-Chinese relationship is exceedingly complex, and deserves an article of its own.

    Russia is the largest country the United States has major diplomatic challenges with.

    Differences in human rights in detail

    When it comes to human rights this is where the differences between the United States come into full focus. The United States has some real challenges with the spying on Americans and our allies without their knowledge under the PATRIOT ACT, police brutality, and racism, which Russia has as well. But still, when a journalist is arrested in America it makes headlines, and in Russia it is practically normal. America is ranked as a satisfactory situation under the Press Freedom Index, Russia is ranked as a difficult situation. I can write publicly on Twitter that I think Trump is a total traitor who deserves to be arrested. His own staff while being in court can openly say that Trump told them to do illegal things, and that is not why they will be in jail for the rest of their lives, it will be because they actually did such things. It also significantly degrades Trump’s legitimacy and political power. This never happens in Russia. The case of Edward Snowden is unusual, particularly that he fled the country. Chelsea Manning was pardoned for a crime of releasing classified documents by the same administration which prosecuted her. America is very different from Russia. Obama is the polar opposite of Putin.

    When it comes to gay rights, America’s highest court legalized gay marriage nationwide while gay men in Chechnya are being slaughtered.

    There are prison camps in Russia where North Koreans are held, and the United States has the largest prison population in the world. This is probably the biggest similarity between the United States and Russia. This is however differs wildly state by state, ranging from less than 200 per 100,000 inhabitants in Maine to over 900 per 100,000 in Louisiana. This is partly due to Federalism. This again deserves a series of articles by itself, it is a huge, wildly complex, and important topic.

    There is one other index which I find comes close to the diversity of the Democracy Index, and that is the Social Progress Index. This also measures across a wide variety of factors and then averages them all together (with weighting) to get a clearer picture of how every country in the world is doing compared to every other. The USA does fairly well as the 18th country in the world with a score of 86.43 out of 100. We fall the most when it comes to the Tolerance and Inclusion dimension (which should surprise no one), and our Health and Wellness score is 75/100 (which again, should surprise no one). Russia is ranked 67th in the world, with a score of 67.17 out of 100. They are worst at personal rights and tolerance and inclusion. Both the USA and Russia do best at nutrition and access to basic medical care. This also is not surprising given the massive food surplus in the world today.

    The important difference between the Social Progress Index and Democracy Index is that they are focusing on measuring different things. The Democracy Index is focused only on the freedom of the people, it is not based on economic data at all. Social Progress Index takes into account freedom, but also general material well being.

    With such large differences between our human rights across most metrics it is no wonder the United States and Russia have a strained relationship.

    Foreign Relationships

    When President Obama was in office, he had a foreign policy which was focused on expanding American influence in the world, building relationships with former adversaries, and building strong trading relationships to reduce the probability of war in the future. He and Secretary Clinton traveled to almost every country in the world.

    Secretary Clinton Travel Map 
    President Obama Travel Map

    War on Terror

    Iraq was one of the most important relationships of his presidency since we were in a vicious war in the beginning of his term. He gave Iraq strict deadlines in which to get their country functional upon entering office, which allowed us to significantly draw down our presence there, and forcing the government to be more responsible than they were in the 2000s. It is still one of the most corrupt countries in the world, and the rise of ISIS has put the country under an immense amount of pressure. We still have troops in Iraq and until there is significant nation building in the country that is unlikely to change.

    In regards to Afghanistan, the war still has not ended as of 2018. President Obama significantly reduced the number of American troops in Afghanistan, but we have a continued presence. Afghanistan needs significant nation building, with institutions such as education since their literacy rate is only 38.2%, the government needs to make it easier to do business in the country, and the presence of Islamic radicals in Helmand province is an ongoing threat. Afghanistan has all of the factors to increase the probability of terrorism which need to be targeted. President Obama succeeded in taking out Osama bin Laden, but many pieces of nation building still need to occur.

    The War on Terror is not going to end any time soon.

    Middle East and Iran

    The Middle East was a major source of tension between President Obama and Putin. With the growing Arab Spring, the possibility of Syria moving towards a democratic government would have removed Russia’s only Mediterranean military port, significantly reducing Russian influence in the region, leaving America with strong allies in practically every other country on the coast. This was unacceptable to Putin’s realpolitik policy, and instead of trying to keep Syria as an ally under a change of dictatorship made the decision to support Assad as much as possible for as long as possible. We ended up then with a proxy war against the three great powers of the Middle East. One is the United States of course, who supports the rebels, Putin of course supports Assad, and Saudi Arabian plutocrats support ISIS according to a memo sent by Secretary Clinton to President Obama.  The war continue to move on, and this will be continued in the section on Trump’s Presidency.

    Iran is the other major conflict between Putin and Obama in the Islamic World. After the Shah was overthrown in 1979, the United States had very poor relations with the Iranian government until the zenith of President Obama’s term. After years of economic isolation from two the of the world’s largest economies, the President and the European Union went to Iran to get them to accept international nuclear inspectors and stop building a nuclear bomb. This deal succeeded, Iran signed, and sanctions were lifted. This was a major blow to both Saudi Arabia and to Russia. Iran and Syria had been Russia’s two major allies in the region after the fall of Saddam Hussein (who had support of the Soviets for decades) and they had both been isolated from the United States. Bringing them both to a place where they can cooperate with both Russia and the United States would mean that Russia wouldn’t be their sole military partner.

    Losing both allies in the Middle East would have made Russian military power in the region diminish significantly. While the United States has a mixed record on our alliances, we have major democracies like Canada, all of the European Union, Japan, South Korea, Australia, etc. etc., we also have allies like Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Israel, and more with problematic human rights accords, who maintain power through force.

    Russia has no such allies. There is no country in the world which has a strong democracy and a strong economy which has a military alliance with Russia. In this way, the closest alliances of both countries mirror that of their closest partner. America’s most important alliances are all democracies, Russia’s are all dictatorships, and the list is short. The list of countries which have significantly closer relations to Russia than the United States are Belarus, Syria, Iran, Kazakhstan, North Korea, and Uzbekistan. None of these countries are full democracies, and are all seriously corrupt. They all maintain power by crushing all dissent with an iron fist. This strategy does work in the short term, because Russia has military alliances with all of them, but they survive by keeping the people down. As soon as the people of these countries have a voice, it usually ends up like a deja vu from 1989-1991 once again, and they choose to not be friendly with their former overlord.

    For Putin this has a major historical and geographical dimension. Despite having a low GDP per capita, and no good port access, Russia was one of two dominant powers in the world for half of the 20th century. After the people got a voice across Eastern Europe that is no longer the case. The crash has been incredible, and Putin is seeing his iron fist policy merely push countries further into the European Union. Ironically, the growth of the European Union might not have been so fast in the 2000s if Putin hadn’t scared them all away. But Realpolitik is the only lens which he can see the world through. He fully believes there cannot be mutual gains. On top of this problem, Russia has a terrible economy based on natural resources despite having a highly educated population. Despite a literacy rate of almost 100%, Russia is a lower middle income country with their only good port being Vladivostok, a rather small city as far from the capital as possible on the Sea of Japan. Murmansk is iced in for half the year, ships from St. Petersburg has to go through Danish (NATO) waters to go anywhere, and Sochi is not very small and any ships have to go through the Strait of Hormuz (NATO) to get to the Mediterranean, where almost every country on the northern shore is once again a member of NATO. Watching the former colonies of his country ally themselves with the United States and choose to not be allied with Russia at all is a sign of the further fall of Russia into geopolitical obscurity.

    Obama’s making peace with Iran, further projecting American geopolitical influence right into the heart of what used to be solid Russian territory is a throwback to the end of the USSR when Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan countered the Soviet expansion with the Mujahideen (Taliban), which was the beginning of the end for Communism. Losing not just all of Eastern Europe but also their only two allies in the Middle East, with no prospects for new alliances anywhere in the world makes Putin scared. This is the main reason he retaliated in 2015-2016.

    Europe

    President Obama had high approval ratings in Western Europe for his entire presidency. He supported the European Union, and worked on building the TTIP with the European Union. The TTIP was complicated in a lot of different ways, and is worth another article. I personally feel like the TTIP wasn’t a true Free Trade Agreement and was more about extending copyright and patent terms in the European Union to be the length they are in the United States, among other problems. The European Union was a major partner in the Iran agreement, and Obama supported the accession to the European Union of numerous Eastern European states.
    President Obama refused to criticize Britain for leaving the European Union, but instead stated they will both remain close partners of the United States for a long time to come.
    The closeness of President Obama and the European Union is most clearly shown with the Iran nuclear deal, which is probably his most important foreign policy achievement.
    This is the biggest reason I believe Putin hated Obama out of everything else. Putin is a nationalist and sees Eastern Europe as solely part of the Russian sphere of influence. Under the Bush and Obama administrations, Russian influence in Eastern Europe has waned significantly as the majority of the population in country after country vote to join the European Union. The only countries in Eastern Europe which are not member states of the European Union or currently in the membership process are Kosovo, Ukraine, Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, and Russia. Belarus is a member of Russia’s Union State, and have been under the dictator Lukashenko since 1994. If Ukraine had succeeded in joining the European Union, the Russian sphere of influence would have collapsed. In response to the seemingly unavoidable collapse of the Soviet sphere of influence Putin invaded Ukraine, and bolstered the brutal regime of Assad.
    But here is where Putin has been sowing the seeds of his own destruction, just as communism did: as soon as the people of any country Russia has had a strong alliance with get a voice, they always choose to move towards the American sphere of influence. American influence is strong not because we are holding a gun to the heads of our allies, but because we have strong relationships beyond military. We trade with our partners in every type of good, we have cultural exchanges for students, we help build most of our allies with institutions which grow their economies. The Marshall Plan worked because it built Europe up, giving them all strong democracies which have stood the test of time. Yes, we have strong military alliances, but when a country decides they don’t want to participate in a war we have started, we don’t cut them out. That is why the 21st century is the second American century in a row. President Obama made this a guarantee by building our relationships in Europe to be the strongest the world has ever known.

    East Asia

    While maintaining close relations with the European Union, President Obama also moved what he called America’s “pivot to Asia”. This included increasing economic and military ties with almost every country in the region. This is yet one more region of the world where economies gained increased access to one of the largest economies in the world, further cornering the Russian sphere in Putin’s eyes.

    Americas

    There is only one country in the Americas which Russia has a strong alliance with which is not at complete risk from internal problems, and that is Cuba. The travel ban of the United States only pushed Cuba closer into Russia’s grip and prevented the people from having the necessary tools to gain things such as a free press which they had lacked. American tourism and tourism to the United States is probably the biggest foreign policy tool the United States has, because when intellectual Americans travel around the world we can talk about the truth of what it is like in the United States, increasing American power abroad. Eliminating the travel ban was going to push Cuba back in to America’s sphere of influence and doom the communist government in the long term if that had been allowed to continue. Given the brutality of Castro, it is highly unlikely that the Cuban people would freely choose to go back to the Russian sphere of influence.

    Magnitsky Act

    On top of everything else, President Obama signed the Magnitsky Act with bipartisan approval. Sergei Magnitsky had been investigating corruption in Russia for over a few years and had been arrested, being (definitely wrongly) accused of committing fraud himself. He was beaten in the prison he was being held in while he suffered from cancer, for which he received no treatment. He died in 2009. Bill Browder went to Congress to get support and convinced Senators John McCain (R – AZ) and Benjamin Cardin (D – MD) to cosponsor it, after which it passed easily.

    Putin’s response

    Perhaps the most amazing thing of all, is that after the very successful foreign policy of President Barack Obama, the next candidate would be his Secretary of State, who fostered strong relationships with over 100 countries across the world, building strong economic and military ties with as many as possible. It was known by about 2015 that she would run, and Putin knew that if President Clinton served her term that it would just mean stronger alliances for America, and Russian influence at the point of a gun would decline. More travel between the US and Cuba, closer ties with the EU, the Balkan states, Ukraine, and the Caucuses. Perhaps worse of all is if America had been able to bring peace between the Armenians, Turks, and Azeri governments that would give America political dominance in the Caucuses. To make matters worse, American sanctions in response to Russian persecution of journalists with the Magnitsky Act
    Putin saw the writing on the wall and he recruited the richest American billionaire who he had close ties with, the reality TV star Donald Trump. At least one meeting is known about, which he had on 9 June 2016 with Natalia Veselnitskaya with his top campaign staff. It is hard to believe it is the only one which occured given his long standing business relations which stretch all the way back since 1986 with the Kremlin and Russian Plutocrats. Trump is very malleable, and by using advertising on Facebook and Google, which are fairly apolitical organizations and really just give people what they want to see, was able to get Donald Trump to become the Republican nominee and narrowly win the Electoral College through election manipulation. I suspect the corruption between the Republican Party and United Russia goes far deeper, though I have no proof yet. Getting voter disenfranchisement laws and manipulating the vote in key states in the Midwest worked and got his man into the White House.
    Everything Trump has done thus far has been to increase Russian influence. He insults our allies to weaken our bonds, threatens NAFTA which binds us to our neighbors, and is working to stop American military support of Western Europe. The European Union could probably win a war against Russia given their superior economy and larger population, but with the United States as well the war would be over within a year with an absolute victory over Moscow and the overthrowing of the Russian government. American influence turns a fair fight into a slaughter.
    By reducing our commitment to investing in renewable energy it further weakens the European Union who are dependent on Russia for natural gas which is what fuels the Russian economy. An oil future is a Putin future. Removing us from the Paris Agreement further achieves this aim.
    Stoking the fire of our relationship with Palestine puts Israel at risk, threatening American influence in the Middle East, and is done so haphazardly to not make any new friends.
    The trade war with China leaves China with only Russia, ending their standing as the middle power between Russia and the United States. All which needs to happen now is a revamping of the military alliance of China and Russia and Russia is back on the world stage as a major player, South Korea is crushed and Japan has no chance in a Russo-Chinese invasion in revenge for the Rape of Nanking and Invasion of Manchuria. American influence in East Asia would be gone with the invasion of Taiwan in such an incident.
    As soon as Trump became President he ended the tough talk on taking out ISIS by ending American support of Syria’s rebels, giving Putin control over Syria.
    His ending of the Nuclear Accord of Iran thrusts Iran back into the Russian sphere of influence. A Russo-Iranian military alliance will project power into Iraq, reversing the oil war Bush started.
    I’m not quite sure how his deal with North Korea benefits Russia, that might be the one thing he has done which actually does benefit the United States.
    In conclusion, so many of Trump’s actions play right into the hands of Vladimir Putin, while one of these actions would not be enough to make me suspect that Trump is a pawn of Vladimir Putin the combination of his decisions regarding China, Israel/Palestine, Syria, and all of Europe all serve to increase Russian influence in those regions to the detriment of America and the people who live there. On top of this, there is proof that Russia bought online ads to support Trump and we know for a fact that high ranking Russian officials were in Trump Tower before the election.
    This is too much to be a coincidence. I have absolutely no doubt that Trump was hired by Putin to undo all of the gains President Obama made to increase American diplomatic power which Trump has been doing for almost 2 years now.
    Trump must be removed as soon as possible. A lot of people will die if he is not impeached.

    References

    Wish list 2019

    We are possibly going to see the largest Democratic landslide in the Washington State legislature since 1940 this year, as a response to Donald Trump and the general liberaliation of America. If Democrats do as well in the General as they did in the Primary, we will win between 66 and 68 seats out of 98 in the House of Representatives, and have a about 30 seats out of 49 seats in the Senate. This is going to give us the chance to make real substantial change in Washington State for the forseeable future. Here are my key issues I hope we will see:

    1. Abolish the death penalty
    2. Replace the Sales and B&O taxes completely with a combination of a progressive income tax and a carbon tax modeled after I-732. Fund the Working Families Tax Credit. Sales and B&O are regressive, and carbon taxes need to be raised to wean us off of fossil fuels as efficiently and quickly as possible. The carbon tax will be more progressive than the tax proposed by the alliance if modeled after the one I fought for in 2016.
    3. Fully fund K-12 education.
    4. Reduce college tuition as much as possible.
    5. Get on schedule to have state employees salaries get back to being on par with private sector employees over the next 10 years after the 14 year long pay cut (which they erroneously call a pay freeze) which lasted from 2000 to 2014. Over the next 10 years give state employees back the 30% of their pay which is missing due to the pay cuts. People shouldn’t need to choose between a competitive salary and public service.
    6. Ensure everyone in our state has access to health care. There are multiple ways to do this, Germany, France, Canada, and the UK all achieve this and do it in different ways. But it needs to happen.
    7. Implement ranked voting.
    8. Upgrade AMTRAK Cascades to high speed rail, expand MAX to Vantucky, and speed up the ST3 timetable. This will reduce congestion and emissions.
    9. Get us on track to be carbon neutral by implementing tax advantages for businesses which provide either hydrogen for fuel cells or electric car charging stations. Larger benefits for superchargers. This can be done most efficiently through an income tax.
    It is now up to our legislators to succeed in doing the right thing.

    Make Seattle for people

    So, in the City of Seattle, Pike’s Place Market is one of the most famous tourist spots in the state, and there are constantly cars driving down this narrow brick road, far too many for the space. On top of this, transit in the city costs $2.50 each way, and charges $0.25 for transfers, costing more during peak times, and when you do drive down in that area there is absolutely no parking, and cars don’t move anyways due to traffic. Want to get a bus pass? You will have to ride the bus at least 40 times in a calendar month for it to be worth it. It is valid for that calendar month, and you get no discount if you buy it after the first of the month. If you take the bus during peak transit times it charges your balance on top of the $104 you already spent to get a monthly bus pass. February is the same cost as October. It always expires at the end of the month.

    Some people say we should ban cars in Pike’s Place, and the reason the Department of Transportation gives is that it’s a deeply rooted Seattle ritual, and if we question why cars are allowed in this highly congested area, other parts of the city will be put into question.

    So I’m just going to say it, cars should be banned between Battery and Yesler on 1st, 2nd, and 3rd Avenues. Bell Street Park should be pedestrian only, and taking any form of mass transit in the City of Seattle should be FREE. Also, increase the parking tax.

    Bring back ARPA

    I just learned this. DARPA was originally known as ARPA when it was founded in 1958 at the request of President Eisenhower. The D stands for defense, it was added in 1972 by Richard Nixon.

    America was investing not just because it had military applications, we were investing because it improved society, because it made us a better country, because there are real tangible social benefits to living in an advanced society with opportunity for all. It’s entire purpose was to advance the frontier of science with high-risk projects across all fields. This is when ARPANET was invented.

    What this means is that the Internet was not invented solely for the military, it was invented for the sake of science, discovery, opportunity, economic growth, and more. Military wasn’t the main focus. This is the America we were for a short period of time, this is the America we will be again.

    The 1960s were also the period of time with the highest economic growth in American history.

    In 1973 DARPA was dedicated to only programs with short-term benefits directly meant for the military. Our GDP growth has never been as high as the 1960s since then.

    2018 elections

    The US Senate is a dire tossup this year, and the House will almost certainly go Red, but this is the last time the Democrats can pick up enough Governorships to have a majority of Governorships in the country and they will also have veto power over redistricting plans for Congress and their State Legislatures for over 10 years from now. This is where money and votes can make a gigantic impact this year, the impact of which will be directly felt until 2030. Simply being able to veto gerrymandered maps will make a gigantic impact for a generation to come. This November will determine the outcome.

    There are no fewer than 8 easy Governor pickups for @TheDemocrats this November. This is our last chance to get a majority of Governorships until 2022. Go #VoteBlue2018! Governors have the ability to veto unfair redistricting maps. Get Democratic Governors this year, get the House of Representatives and numerous legislature pickups in 2022. Otherwise, we might not get control of Congress again in the next decade. The two most important easy pickups this year are in Michigan and Wisconsin, so we can pick up a bunch of seats there. Florida and Ohio are both toss ups, which together send 43 Representatives to Congress, almost 10% of the House. Between Michigan, Wisconsin, Florida, and Ohio, the winners of these blue/purple states will sign off on the redistricting of 65 seats of the House of Representatives, 15% of Congress. #VoteBlue2018

    The 8 states Democrats can fairly easily get the Governor’s mansion are Illinois, Iowa, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Mexico, Vermont, and Wisconsin.

    Potential New Democratic Governorships

    If Democrats win this year in these 8 states, we will have a very good shot at taking the House of Representatives and several state legislatures in 2022. The Democratic Party is likely to take a majority of the vote in every House election until the Republican Party becomes less extreme, given how the Democrats have a stance far more in line with most Americans on almost every issue.

    We will break Republican Trifectas in Iowa, Wisconsin, Michigan, New Hampshire, and if we get lucky and win both toss ups we will break the trifectas of both Ohio and Florida. We will gain trifectas in Illinois by gaining the governorship.

    Broken Republican Trifectas

    We must pick up two seats in the Colorado State Senate this year in order to gain a Trifecta.

    We need to pick up one seat in the Connecticut State Senate in order to gain a Trifecta.

    We need 6 seats in the Iowa State Senate and 10 seats in the Iowa State House of Representatives, along with the governorship to make a Trifecta. It will not be easy, but it is doable.

    We could take a trifecta in Maine by flipping one seat in the State Senate. Gaining the governorship as well (which is likely) will make a Democratic Trifecta.

    We can gain the Minnesota Senate this year by taking one seat. The House will be more difficult where there is a 77-56 Republican lead.

    We can gain a Trifecta in Nevada by maintaining both houses and taking the Governorship.

    New Hampshire will need 4 pickups out of a 24 seat Senate, and 43 pickups in the House out of a 400 seat chamber.

    Gaining the governorship of New Mexico will deliver a Trifecta.

    We need to gain the Senate in New York, only one seat flipping will deliver a Democratic Trifecta.

    Maintaining the Governorship of Pennsylvania will allow us to gain a trifecta in 2022 by having fair legislative maps.

    Republicans have a 2 seat majority in both chambers in Virginia. We could make a Democratic Trifecta in Virginia this year.

    We MUST maintain our majority in Washington State.

    We could potentially gain the Wisconsin State Senate, we only need to pick up two more seats to accomplish that. Gaining the Governorship as well will mean that in 2022 we only need to pick up the State Assembly to gain a Trifecta.

    If we succeed in this, the map of trifectas in 2019 will look like this, dark colors are currently held, light colors are pickups from gaining governorships and legislatures.

    Potential new Trifecta Map

    These 10 new Democratic Trifectas and 2 new Republican Trifectas which are fairly easy to get will have a direct effect on 90 House districts for the Democrats and 19 House districts for the Republicans. 74 House Districts will be put in a position where they will now need to have some agreement between both parties as opposed to one party unilaterally choosing the boundaries for legislative and congressional districts, which usually ends up hurting the other party significantly. These numbers will of course change slightly because of the new 2020 Census, but they won’t change too significantly.

    Takeaway message:

    The big message of this post is that yes, the Federal Government is going to stay in the hands of the Republicans. We might be able to barely break the Trifecta by getting a one seat majority in the Senate, but this is going to be very difficult. The big battle this year is in the states. Democrats can make huge substantial gains in Colorado, Connecticut, Florida, Iowa, Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Mexico, New York, Pennsylvania, Vermont, Virginia, and Wisconsin. The biggest state we must defend is Washington State, because the trifecta hangs by a thread. The outcomes of the elections in these 16 states will have massive implications for the outcomes of elections for the next 20 years. This is where people who have money to donate need to be putting their money, this is where people who wish to volunteer need to put their time. This is a huge battle this year for the soul of America, let’s hope that the side of equality, opportunity, and freedom wins.

    On top of this, there are elections going on in cities and counties across America right now. Vote in your local elections, because that is where great leaders begin.

    Remember also that in 1994 a 33 year old man was elected to the State Senate in the South Side of Chicago. he served for 10 years and then became the Senator for Illinois in the 2004 election (his second run for Congress), and in 2008 Barack Obama became the President of the United States.

    Your State legislature is the major source for Federal politicians, and your governor and other state executives ultimately determines how the elections of your state are run (along with the Federal Courts, but those cases can be delayed by 5 years or more.). They determine if polling places are easy to get to, if you have mail in voting, how long polls are open, whether your state uses ranked voting or first past the post, and the outcomes of these elections determine massively important issues regarding our health care, education, infrastructure, net neutrality, access to natural areas, environment, and many many more issues. All of this is at stake in November. Every part of this matters.

    Remember to vote.