1. Statehood for Puerto Rico and DC: First of all, this should have happened ages ago and doesn’t even need to be related to this mess. That said: Fuck yeah, let’s make the Senate 47-53 to 60-44 in a two-year cycle.
2. Government shutdown: While I root for Team Government Should Function, might as well let everyone know that the pursestrings will be closed until further notice for everything we don’t like. That may have to include barring the Senate doors.
3. Adios, fillibuster: As soon as team blue has any majority it’s Na na na na … na na na na … hey hey hey … GOOOOOODBYYYYYEEEEE
4. Court packing: I want so many justices that the fucking fire marshal has to be called. I want them seating justices on Clarence Thomas’ lap (male justices of course; wouldn’t trust him with a woman for obvious reasons)
5. End the Electoral College: Gonna be tough to stop in the courts when the Dems hold a 43-6 advantage in the Supreme Court, no?
6. Republican-style gerrymandering: 2020 is a Census and redistricting year, so the Democrats should evaporate every Republican district in every state they can. Is there a new district in upstate New York shaped like a dragon that stretches from the Canadian border to the Bronx that’s now blue as shit? Hot fucking damn.
7. A well-regulated militia: Let’s make the Second Amendment stand for what it actually says and require registration in a national militia if you want to own a gun. Oh, and that’s public information. And you can be called up to fight national emergencies whenever deemed necessary. It’s a right and a responsibility!
8. Expand the House: We’ve had 438 for generations now. Buuuuuuump.
9. Gerrymander Texas: On first blush, the idea of splitting Texas into a bunch of states seems bad and wrong, but it could very easily turn 2 GOP senators and zero blue senators into 6-7 blue senators and 2-3 GOPers. And it may or may not be totally legal, but again, I point to the 37-person advantage now held in the Supreme Court.
10. Expand the IRS to look into churches who violate nonprofit laws: Talk politics from the pulpit, pay your pastor’s wife and pool boy a gazillion dollars, spend a few million on land buys … expect a tax bill next month. Keep crying, Osteen.
11. Let ’em know the bus is warming up.
12. White people are gonna be three-fifths of a person: Am I going too far? [montage of me thinking deeply on a walk in the woods, skipping rocks on a pond, and then late in the evening sitting by a campfire with a thousand-yard stare] … No, this feels about right.
13. Stop forgetting that political power can be used by people other than Republicans: Like seriously, could we just not compromise for once before the fight really begins? kthxbye!
So, 1 is never going to happen until Democrats get over the idea of granting Utah and Texas each a new district to “compensate” for PR and DC. Which means this will never happen because Democrats are pussies.
#2 is a good idea and can easily be done.
#3 was a stupid idea when they first started talking about it 16 years ago. It’s a permanent solution to a temporary problem and it still is. In fact #3 and #13 are inextricably connected which is how we got in this fucking mess in the first place. If anything, we need to bring the filibuster back to where it was before. Have you noticed how the Republicans have packed the federal courts with crazies over the past four years? That wouldn’t have happened if the filibuster was still in place.
#4 only has teeth if you can guarantee Biden will win AND a Democratic majority in the Senate. Short of that, it’s just an empty threat and Mitch knows it. Plus, let’s not forget #1, above.
Doesn’t ending the EC require a Constitutional Amendment? I don’t know so I’m asking.
#6. Sure. Fuck it. Let’s go.
#7 will get destroyed in those newly Republican packed federal courts.
#8 is a grand idea, but I refer you to #1.
#9 and #12 are cute and funny.
#10 will never happen because I refer you once again to #1.
Ultimately, the Democrats don’t have shit to threaten Mitch with because he knows damned well that they don’t have the spine to follow through, they certainly don’t have the lock-step unity of the Republicans and–most importantly–even if they did do a bunch of that shit, Mitch already got his permanent 6-3 majority on the Supreme Court. He doesn’t give a shit.
I think there would be a surprising amount of appetite for some real shit even from West Wing-brain Democrats if Trump and Mitch rammed a justice through weeks before getting smushed in an election and losing the legislature and the executive. I think – and this especially goes for the woe is me left – everyone is WILDLY underestimating how pissed off people are about Trump’s bullshit and how much hay could be made in the short term from that.
The tale of “they have time to find a Supreme Court justice but no time to help the country during a pandemic” is an ad that writes itself.
Don’t get me wrong. I would love it if the Democrats would actually grow some stones and channel their rage into drastic action. I’d love to see 1, 2, 4, 6 and 8 happen, but a big part of Biden’s campaign is Let’s Make Government Boring Again. They’re talking about restoring norms and returning to a time when politicians at least pretended to care about the rules. Which, at face value, I would agree with if Mitch wasn’t so bent on getting the seat filled. I seriously doubt, even after SCOTUS becomes a 6-3 psychopath majority for the next 50 years, that Joe, Nancy and Chuck could muster the courage to actually do any of that stuff.
The markets started going to shit the minute they realized that the SCOTUS seat is literally the only thing that will happen right now, and there is zero hope for any kind of additional relief package. Will Joe use that as campaign fodder? Well, he certainly hasn’t done it yet–at least not that I’ve seen or heard.
1. make the voting power of each senator depend on the number of people they represent. the vote of senators from ca get weighs 40m points. the vote of senators from wy weighs 600k points. each senator has one vote but that vote’s weight varies. add up the points bitches!
2. combine north and south dakota to dakota. the carolinas too. so when dc and pr are added the stars at the flag stay at 50. too costly to change the flag…
refining #1:
1. replace points with people.
2. since each state has 2 senators make the vote of each senator weigh half of the population of their state.
so, the vote of senators from ca get weighs 20m people. the vote of senators from wy weighs 300k people.
#4: pack the lower federal courts too. Any district packed with MAGAts get to have their district reduced to one rural zip code, and build them new courthouses out of empty containers in cow pens. The liberal judges can get reassigned. They can rule on the constitutionality of Old Farmer Johnson fucking his goat as much as they want.
Combine Vermont and New Hampshire, and fold Wyoming into Montana.
vermont won’t like this at all!
Especially if it meant the standard of living went down to NH levels. Seriously, driving from VT to NH is like traveling to two entirely separate worlds.