Senator Corker spitting fire

Nice for him to spit hot fire - now, after everything is in the process of being destroyed.

How about - not voting for steaming garbage like Trumpcare (or Trump himself) - when it matters/ed?

Guys like Corker and Sasse, are willing to risk a mean tweet. But ultimately it's their vote that matters - and when Trump wants it, they surrender meekly.

 

Amazing how people's views change when they're no longer leveraged by lobbyists and money.

 

It really is.

McCain, close to death

Corker, about to retire.

Further evidence of how fraudulent the Republican party is.

 

Totally agree with you and not to get all Space Ghost on ya but the fraud does come from both sides. My parents used to talk to me about LBJ and how he was a dirty politician but he also got a lot of positive stuff done and in their own way, they respected him for it. As sad as it is, I expect corruption in politics. I just also expect some positive legislation to also transpire along with it. I've seen none with this administration or from Congress. It was one thing to be the party of No when they weren't the dominant political power. It's another thing to let legislation like CHIP fall through the cracks because of negligence or worse political Machiavellian games while playing Russian roulette with American kid's lives.

 

nothing more dangerous than someone with power and no concern for getting reelected by his constituents

not sure there is anything to be done about it, short of making it easier to recall them

 

I think you could see a higher than average amount of GOP congressmen that lose their primaries next march. They would be lame ducks for almost a year.

 

NOTHING more dangerous than someone with power that is expiring soon? You serious think that when an elected official is going to retire, about to die, or is in a "lame duck" term, they should be recalled more easier? I mean this as nicely as possible, WTF?

 

It will be interesting to see how both parties look for 2020. Will the Freedom Caucus split or the more moderate Republicans do it first? Will democrats splinter or become more cohesive?

 

no, I think in general any elected official should be easier to recall

not having to face their constituents just means they are more likely to do things that warrant recall (they might be more concerned with media treatment, or doing favors to help line up their next gig)

I prefer a politician who insincerely panders to his voters than one who sincerely defies the people that chose him to represent their views.

 

From the ashes springs new life.

 

Very true, in my opinion. I know several like that.

 

Do you prefer politicians who were quite literally elected by a gerrymandered minority of voters and then represent the most extreme views of that minority b/c of an extremist apparatus in that party's primary system? Asking for a friend. :-D

 

Not sure what you mean by minority of voters or extremist apparatus

A gerrymandered district still has the same number of voters, and is usually a relatively larger lopsided majority for the winner.

 

I misread part of your post.

Problem is they do not panders to voters but to $$$. The first thing most of them do is start raising money for the next election. When that's no longer the case, they may just do what they truly believe themselves or actually do good for their constituents instead of $$$. This is why Congress rating is horrible, seen as corrupt and people like the idea of term limits.

And while when you elect someone, you hope they represent you, you also want someone that is wise and humane enough to think above just one set of people (or interests) that sent them there. "Mob" behavior, "my team" group think, or people general idea of what they want aren't always legal, have some basic level of moral, in the interest of the whole nation, and looking out for generations to come.

There is also the problem of "their constituents". The folks that go out and vote are usually less than 50% of the eligible voting population. Do you really ignore the other greater than 50%? Once elected, do you panders to only the 45-48, or sometime as low as 30%? Do you work for ALL or only the one that actually did votes? Especially important is a set of folks that vote, do so out of negative ads and attacks. While a set of folks that don't vote, get tuned out or turned off due to the same set of negative ads and attack. I believe, unfortunately, you tend to have more "negative driven people" voting than not. People that tend to be driven more by fear and hate are the folks that tend to have ideas and positions that are more delusional based. So, I think leader should not just represent only the voters, but represent everyone in their district, even those that didn't votes, or those that were not able to votes.

And as B-bob pointed out, gerrymandered causes a misrepresentation of the whole. If you are about only voters, you are already misaligned at a regional level. Folks are split along unnatural lines purposely to suppress their voice and to give more power to those already in power. It's a mess up system. Continuing that path and stick to "only those votes" is supporting a purposeful misrepresentation of the regional voters (not even people) base. Someone that is about to retire is less likely to care about this purposeful misrepresentation to maintain their power.

 

Still the same moronic bs that a personal or family budget deficit is the same as the US government.

 

That sounds like an argument against term limits.

 

That misses the point about republican democracy. While politicians are elected to represent the people they aren't there to just blindly pander to their voters. The Framers were very wary of that and set up the system so that would limit just pandering to voters. As you probably know originally the government was far less responsive to voters since Senators weren't even directly elected.