We are looking left while the right moves.

[Jakes Progress]

We are being distracted. By horse paste. By recalls. Even by things that really matter, like abortion rights, environment, peace, pandemic.

They are distractions because they take Democrats off the most important thing they need to be doing right now. Even if we pass the 3.5 billion, mandate vaccinations, and carbon limits. Even if we protect abortion rights and end all foreign conflicts. Even is we do everything else on our progressive wishlist - it won't matter.

If we don't expand the Supreme Court and reinstate all of the elements of the Voting Rights Act, anything we do will only be in effect for about 18 months. We don't have time to go in 50 difference directions regardless of how good those outcomes. If we don't keep the House and Senate in 2022, it will all go away.

During the Civil Rights struggles of the 60's and 70's, there was the excellent rallying cry "Eyes on the Prize". We don't have 6 months to do this. The legal battles will go on and on for too long to matter if we don't pass the laws and put them into effect now.

We need to stop celebrating wins that will be losses later and do the wins that matter.

[maxsolomon]

1. Do you have a Plan B?

Because Plan A is extremely unlikely. Expanding the Supreme Court is a years-long project.

The focus has to be on holding the House and expanding control of the Senate so that Blockhead Manchin can't single-handedly derail legislation.

You're correct about the noise level, though. Such is life in a GQP-shaped Mediascape.

[Jakes Progress]

4. Holding the House and Senate

requires the Voting Rights Act. Some states have already passed laws that allow state legislatures to throw our elected delegates and replace them with their own. Many more are headed that way. We have dealt with voter suppression I the past. Georgia overcame those illegal efforts by republicans. But we have not dealt with he scale of suppression and fraud going on now.

Yes, we have to vote. Yes, we have to get out the vote. But with he scale of cheating that republicans are working at, it doesn't historically look to be enough. I live in a red state that is turning purple. But with the laws that the republican state legislature has passed, we won't see the effect of that color change.

Before we spend any more energy in the House and Senate on any other issue, we have to push through tough voting protection laws. Then we need to bring suit against the states that are already gerrymandering and voter list purging and setting up militia poll watchers.

And there is no reason that expanding the Supreme Court should take years. It isn't a matter of amending the Constitution.

Manchin is a blockhead, but the legislation that he is threatening to block will be overturned anyway if we don't make sure we have sound elections.

[maxsolomon]

5. I'm not convinced holding both in this cycle "requires" the VRA.

Since i'm a cynic who doesn't believe the VRA will pass in this Congress, I sure hope I'm right.

[Jakes Progress]

6. Maybe I'm the cynic.

But I live in a state where the legislature has rewritten laws to make it almost impossible for Democrats to win. There are the usual restrictions and rules to make voting harder for working people. Then there are the arrangements that make voting in a rich white suburb or a rural cow town take 10 minutes versus the 8 hour waits in the the minority areas of towns.

If all that doesn't work, the legislature has given itself the power to toss out the elected delegates and replace them with a slate of their own choosing if they want to say that voter fraud took place.

I don't think I'm cynical because I think this will result in a Democrat Proof election.

The only reason we can't pass protections is because of the filibuster. Put the full court press on killing that and we can actually try to save the country.

[Marius25]

8. We're not getting the Voting Rights Act as long as

Manchin and Sinema refuse to get rid of the filibuster for at least that law.

[Jakes Progress]

10. I'm not sure that they want to be the ones who killed America.

Most republicans don't give a damn about America and its promise as long as they can profit. Their motto is "I got mine. Screw America".

I don't think the full weight has been administered to those two yet. Plus there are a few republicans that might want to be the John McCain of their generation. Only problem is we won't know until it is too late.

Let's see Manchin stand up to an audience of African Americans and tell them to stop being uppity. Let's see him tell them that he doesn't care about their right to vote. That he will be the vote that denies John Lewis's last wishes.

[Dustlawyer]

2. What I think matters more is dealing with the two root causes of most of our problems.

The first is the money in our politics. It says something that we rate our candidates by how much money (bribes taken) raised from campaign donors. Joe Manchin has raised millions from big oil and big pharma. Any wonder he is the one holding up the Biden/Democrats agenda? Why Democrats watered down their own tax bill to tax the wealthy? Why after Sandy Hook when over 90% of Americans wanted some gun control it did not happen?

The second is the same big donors are also the big media advertisers. They use their ad money as leverage to either kill stories or get the media to spew propaganda to manipulate Americans to do or believe how they want them to.

The McDonalds coffee case is a prime example. That case was tried in open court. The evidence was all there and yet it was reported as if the victim got a windfall verdict from a run away jury in a frivolous case. This case was then used to fuel severe tort reform which took away the right to redress for harm caused to individuals in all types of personal injury cases. It put arbitrary and very low caps on damages such as in Texas where if a drunk doctor killed your wife in surgery the cap would be $250,000. Out of that comes attorneys fees and cost of litigation. That would eat up almost the whole award as expert fees on those cases are very high. The attorney advances those expenses but doesn’t get them back if they lose. It is too big of a gamble so it is almost impossible to find an attorney for your med meal case now.

We will not solve the countries growing number of problems until and unless we address these two root causes. So far everyone is fighting the symptoms, immigration, environment, criminal justice reform and on and on. We need to wake up and fight smart. All of these problems will be much easier to solve without the undue influence caused by these two root causes. As it is we have a shadow government pulling the strings of politicians and our media to get everything they want. That is why they pay little to no taxes, don’t ever get indicted, much less convicted, and are making record profits while the rest of us barely get by.

[Jakes Progress]

3. Both of those problems are only addressed

if we do the other two first. You cannot address what you call root causes without a Supreme Court that is not run by the GOP. And you won't pass anything that will begin to address money and corporate control if you don't have the House and the Senate. If you pass measures now to control money, those measures will be trashed in 18 months. Without the Voting Rights Act, states will appoint their own delegates (already law in a few states and growing) to replace the elected delegates. Sure, we can bring charges, but up against the GOP Supreme Court we won't win.

All this must be addressed, but if we allow the voter suppression, intimidation at the polls, and state houses that will void Democratic votes, we will not be able to address anything. The VRA is the first and most urgent priority. This is not life as it used to be.

[Efilroft Sul]

7. This is a smart board. I don't know why people can't see the vital importance of voter protections.

We can win free and fair elections, but fair has been taken off the table and the GOP busboys will soon gather up the free part.

If we don't stop the Republicans' tactics at the state level, we're sunk.

[Jakes Progress]

9. Lots of shiny distractions.

Everyone has their pet projects. And they are all important. That's why it is easy to dangle the hope of getting your progressive dream passed in front of you and make you forget that passing it now won't matter. Passing it when the republicans and their crooked court can't just swat it away.

[GoodRaisin]

11. I've had this concern for a while, and, agree it feels like being on the edge of

losing the war, unless we can get past the filibuster problem. Obviously we don’t have 10 republican votes for the voting rights. I also don’t think we can “kill” the filibuster at this time. My hope is that behind the scenes there is negotiation taking place to change the filibuster rule in some way for the voting rights to have a simple majority vote on it. Then, if we somehow hold the House and increase our majority in the Senate in 2022, so we don’t need Manchin and Sinema, then kill the filibuster and increase the Court.

Also obvious, time to do this is running short. So, have to get going, Very soon.

[Jakes Progress]

12. Yes. Running short on time.

I don't think that we can just give up and hope. Instead of Congress just thinking that we can't get a filibuster change, maybe they should fight as hard for that as they want us to fight our state election laws ourselves. Comfortable for them to have us to blame for them not getting it done.

As I said. Our chances of defeating republicans for the Senate and House are getting smaller with every "law" that the republicans use to limit voting and purge rolls. Without a way to challenge those "laws" before the election - not after - we are in a dire way. Many here just blow off such concerns as "hair on fire" worry warts. They can't imagine that republicans can win. You know the way trump could never beat Hillary. I hope to be proven a bothersome Cassandra. But I wish Democrats were more active and concerned about this. Instead they seem to be content to party and celebrate wins that will be turned to losses so easily in 18 months.