obama tried to circumvent the current state of U.S. political division that finds the left LEFT OUT

It seems to me the current political divide is between big cities and the rest of America.



The problem for big cities (usually democrat strongholds) is the way our government is set up, it tends to give them no more power than a smaller town in rural America.

That being said do you remember this from obama?

Obama Administration Mandates Diversity In Suburbs

Under a sweeping new federal housing mandate, the Obama administration threatens to withhold funding for cities and counties that fail to remove local zoning laws and other potentially "discriminatory barriers" that restrict low-income housing in wealthy neighborhoods. More than 1,200 municipalities will be impacted by the highly contested rule, which the Housing and Urban Development Department put into effect Wednesday. The agency seeks to combat discrimination in affluent suburban areas, while also desegregating poor urban areas where it says too many minorities lack access to good schools and jobs. "A ZIP code should never determine a child's future," HUD Secretary Julian Castro said. The massive 377-page regulation requires local authorities to take "meaningful actions" to diversify neighborhoods. Municipalities that don't comply risk losing millions in federal grant money. Some could face federal housing-bias probes.

I don't know how thoroughly they implemented this strategy but it ( seems like election meddling to me) surely had an impact on this election.

Nobody talks about it.

Had it been successful it would be very effective in diluting red America to at least purple

So you found that single needle in the haystack?

Maybe no one is talking about it because trying isn´t enough when you are the leader of a country like USA. He had all the media power behind him, yet he backtracked on most of his promises.

Those are all rhetoric questions, the answer is always no:

Did he reduce military presence?
Did he close guantanamo?
Has he kept his promise about ObamaCare and keeping your doctor?

And these are just promises a foreigner remembers from reading in local foreign newspaper in europe.

a reply to: Aallanon

It seems to me that you have really bad takes. Remember this one?

originally posted by: Aallanon

Those democratic states where people are given free stuff just to vote dem, shouldn't run the country IMO.

and this:

originally posted by: theantediluvian
a reply to: Aallanon

Let's start with WalletHub's annual list of the Most Federally Dependent States for 2018's Top 10 and add in some data. (Govs,

1. New Mexico - (R) Gov. Susana Martinez, (D) both
2. Kentucky - (R) Gov. Matt Bevin, (R) both
3. Mississippi - (R) Gov. Phil Bryant, (R) both
4. Alabama - (R) Gov. Kay Ivey, (R) both
5. West Virginia - (R) Gov. Jim Justice, (R) both
6. South Carolina - (R) Gov. Henry McMaster, (R) both
7. Arizona - (R) Gov. Doug Ducey, (R) both
8. Alaska - (I) Gov. Bill Walker (an R before 2014), (R) both
9. Montana - (D) Gov. Steve Bullock, (R) both
10. Louisiana - (D) Gov. John Bel Edwards, (R) both

So there you go, of the top 10 most dependent on federal tax dollars, that's 7 Republican governors, 2 Democratic governors and 1 independent governor who used to a be a Republican. 9 out of 10 of the state legislatures are completely controlled by Republicans and 1 by Democrats, in a state with a Republican governor.

Should we do members of Congress too just for good measure? Funny how what you think is true is practically the reverse of reality.

The electoral college is an antiquated vestige, created at a time when there were 13 states and when the concern that one or two of them would dominate the federal government to the detriment of the rest was a thing. States had a lot more autonomy and there weren't a lot em. It was also a time when there were no presidential primaries — the first of those wouldn't happen for more than a century.

Is there another Western democracy where a candidate can win a majority of the vote and the other guy becomes the chief executive?

Republicans like it for an obvious reason. It's like Affirmative Action for the rural vote and rural votes tend to favor conservatives. It's like permanent gerrymandering in presidential elections. If not for the EC, Republicans would have only won 1 of the last 5 presidential elections.

The EC allows Republicans to believe that they're part of some sort of "silent majority" even when the Republican loses the popular vote and pretend that they have some sort of popular mandate. And it means in a state like mine, NJ, the 4th least dependent btw, my vote for president effectively counts as 1/3 of that of a person in a state like Wyoming. Why is that legit? There's no actual concern that some politician is going to give his home state some sort of unilateral control over the levers of government. Which brings me to another point which is that EC is so much less about states than it is parties which is not how it was envisioned either I'm sure.

And of course the other purpose of the EC, making electors a stopgap against a highly motivated populist minority from installing some lunatic despot, has essentially been neutered, never used to any effect and if it were, that'd probably end in blood in the streets.

So yeah, to hell with the EC. I'm tired of paying more taxes and having less say.

Let the EC ever start favoring the Democrats (which is nearly impossible to imagine so perpetual baked in advantage for whichever is the conservative party) and watch how Republican opinions flip.

a reply to: theantediluvian

You are correct of course, thank you.

Why do you suppose big cities vote Democrat then?

a reply to: theantediluvian

I edit the post to clarify the point of the thread

I can tell you the method they use up here in Minnesota. It is called... importing Africans and injecting them into key points throughout the state.


I believe Minnesota is #2 in the placement of "refugees".

a reply to: chadderson

Thank you. Seems to fit obama's MO

Unless your on welfare and like being under the government eye, them democrats are your choice.. hey ! More free stuff

Federal grant money to states and local communities needs to be outlawed as it's used to strong arm control in state and local affairs.
It circumvents the constitution, and gives the fed Gov more power than it should have.
Lower federal income tax by 50% across the board and pay those taxes to your state.
Keep your money working at home and keep the federal Gov out of your business.

Highlighting the political affiliations now of states (cities) that have been changing since the 60s is a bit disingenuous, I think. It would be more accurate to provide the top 10 each year from, say, 1965 to date, along with the political affiliation of the governors for each of those top 10, each of those years.

Though I can see where it is politically expedient to focus just on the current status (results of decades of mismanagement).

Both major parties will likely be found to have relatively equal input into failed policy. I am just not interested enough to reasearch all that...just don’t like to see default finger pointing without applicable data points (and the underlying trending).

originally posted by: Aallanon
a reply to: theantediluvian

You are correct of course, thank you.

Why do you suppose big cities vote Democrat then?

Because the Democratic party is the progressive party and the Republican party is the conservative party. The real question you should be asking is why do people in rural areas tend to be more conservative while those in urban areas tend to be more progressive.

And to that question, there's no short and simple answer, you could fill a library with what's been written by sociologists, economists, etc.

originally posted by: theantediluvian
a reply to: Aallanon

It seems to me that you have really bad takes. Remember this one?

originally posted by: Aallanon

Those democratic states where people are given free stuff just to vote dem, shouldn't run the country IMO.

and this:

originally posted by: theantediluvian
a reply to: Aallanon

Let's start with WalletHub's annual list of the Most Federally Dependent States for 2018's Top 10 and add in some data. (Govs,

1. New Mexico - (R) Gov. Susana Martinez, (D) both
2. Kentucky - (R) Gov. Matt Bevin, (R) both
3. Mississippi - (R) Gov. Phil Bryant, (R) both
4. Alabama - (R) Gov. Kay Ivey, (R) both
5. West Virginia - (R) Gov. Jim Justice, (R) both
6. South Carolina - (R) Gov. Henry McMaster, (R) both
7. Arizona - (R) Gov. Doug Ducey, (R) both
8. Alaska - (I) Gov. Bill Walker (an R before 2014), (R) both
9. Montana - (D) Gov. Steve Bullock, (R) both
10. Louisiana - (D) Gov. John Bel Edwards, (R) both

So there you go, of the top 10 most dependent on federal tax dollars, that's 7 Republican governors, 2 Democratic governors and 1 independent governor who used to a be a Republican. 9 out of 10 of the state legislatures are completely controlled by Republicans and 1 by Democrats, in a state with a Republican governor.

Should we do members of Congress too just for good measure? Funny how what you think is true is practically the reverse of reality.

The electoral college is an antiquated vestige, created at a time when there were 13 states and when the concern that one or two of them would dominate the federal government to the detriment of the rest was a thing. States had a lot more autonomy and there weren't a lot em. It was also a time when there were no presidential primaries — the first of those wouldn't happen for more than a century.

Is there another Western democracy where a candidate can win a majority of the vote and the other guy becomes the chief executive?

Republicans like it for an obvious reason. It's like Affirmative Action for the rural vote and rural votes tend to favor conservatives. It's like permanent gerrymandering in presidential elections. If not for the EC, Republicans would have only won 1 of the last 5 presidential elections.

The EC allows Republicans to believe that they're part of some sort of "silent majority" even when the Republican loses the popular vote and pretend that they have some sort of popular mandate. And it means in a state like mine, NJ, the 4th least dependent btw, my vote for president effectively counts as 1/3 of that of a person in a state like Wyoming. Why is that legit? There's no actual concern that some politician is going to give his home state some sort of unilateral control over the levers of government. Which brings me to another point which is that EC is so much less about states than it is parties which is not how it was envisioned either I'm sure.

And of course the other purpose of the EC, making electors a stopgap against a highly motivated populist minority from installing some lunatic despot, has essentially been neutered, never used to any effect and if it were, that'd probably end in blood in the streets.

So yeah, to hell with the EC. I'm tired of paying more taxes and having less say.

Let the EC ever start favoring the Democrats (which is nearly impossible to imagine so perpetual baked in advantage for whichever is the conservative party) and watch how Republican opinions flip.

Now, do state funds to cities.

a reply to: Aallanon

I remember that policy. I didn’t like it when it was first announced and I still don’t like it. I thought it was an incredibly heavy handed policy. I honestly don’t know if it ever went into effect though. I kinda doubt it.

a reply to: theantediluvian

~sigh~

Clearly, the so-called red states are far more likely overall to vote for a Republican presidential candidate than his Democratic counterpart when compared to the supposed blue states. But look at New Mexico, West Virginia, New Hampshire, Nevada, and Colorado. New Mexico, Virginia, and New Hampshire have been evenly split on presidential candidates since 1980. Nevada and Colorado voted for both Bush 43 wins, and Colorado even went Republican during the 1996 Clinton landslide.

At the senatorial level, how can you call North Dakota, Louisiana, and West Virginia "red states" when their voting record is overwhelmingly Democratic over the past three decades? Even South Dakota and New Mexico fail the "red state" test. West Virginia hasn't had a Republican senator since before 1960!

On the other side of the aisle, New Hampshire -- supposedly a blue state -- has only elected a single Democratic senator (the currently serving Jeanne Shaheen) since 1980. Minnesota and Colorado also fail the blue state designation based on who they have put in the Senate over this timeframe.

In the House of Representatives, it is absurd to characterize Mississippi, West Virginia, North Dakota, and South Dakota as red states when they have elected more Democrats than Republicans since 1980. North Dakota and West Virginia's choices for the House of Representatives are dominantly blue.

Similarly, New Hampshire and Delaware have elected predominantly Republicans in the House, and somehow they are blue states? Colorado and Nevada also don't pass the blue state test, and as recently as the 111th Congress, five of Colorado's seven representatives were Republican.

The gubernatorial comparison also strikes a blow to any "red state welfare" claims. There is no significant general difference in the overall red versus blue character of these states' governors. South Dakota hasn't had a Democratic governor in over 35 years, whereas Kentucky has only had one Republican governor since 1971. California's governors have been dominantly Republican for many decades, as have those of Illinois, Minnesota, Connecticut, and New Jersey.

You are quoting numbers liberals juggled around to reach a conclusion. Junk science.

For political gain, of course.

The Myth of Red State Welfare

originally posted by: caterpillage
Federal grant money to states and local communities needs to be outlawed as it's used to strong arm control in state and local affairs.
It circumvents the constitution, and gives the fed Gov more power than it should have.
Lower federal income tax by 50% across the board and pay those taxes to your state.
Keep your money working at home and keep the federal Gov out of your business.

I have never found a cartoon Elvis as attractive as when I read this post.

a reply to: theantediluvian

The sweet and simple answer to me is societal.

Rural communities and people tend to be more self-sufficient, relying less on their government than themselves and their neighbors.

Urban people, by necessity, tend to rely more on city, federal and state governments.

Not like you are growing your own food, fixing your own road, etc.

So the needs in an urban environment for basic necessities HAS to be provided by others up the political food chain.

Rural people? They see government as an encroachment on how they have always survived by urban people who can't even feed themselves.

In fact, their food supply is made by rural people who have been in business a long time making money feeding them.

Self-sufficiency is the key there.

An opinion, as always.