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Did Harry Reid Hurt the Democrats?

Did Harry Reid Hurt the Democrats in the Midterm Election?

  • Total voters
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X Factor said:
Ah, I see, there's just no such thing as an extreme liberal. :mrgreen:
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No they exist, they don't nearly have the same power as extreme conservatives though when it comes to agenda setting. The Democratic approach to governance is much more pragmatic...hence lack of government shutdowns in a Democratic controlled Congress, lack of revolts by factions in the House.

Judging by your sig, I'd say pretty different. I mean that sincerely. We no doubt view capitalism very differently.
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Probably not nearly as much as you think, but if so...it's not as if my views are shared with the people in control of the party. It's the Timothy Geithner and Larry Summers that mold the thinking when it comes to Democratic economic policies. It's big money that mega corporations that control the ear of the politicians.
 
Hamster Buddha said:
Very much. Bottom line I would bet that you think the government can be more help than the private sector to the economy. Exit polls show this divide clearly where only 20% of Dems think "Government is doing too many things better left to businesses and individuals" whereas 20% of Reps believe "Government should do more to solve problems".
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Well why don't you list some specifics? What should the government get out of?
 
CanadaJohn said:
I may be a contrarian here - it is "debate" politics after all - but I think Harry Reid helped Democrats rather than hurt them. There's no question that most if not all on the right have a particularly visceral almost hatred of Harry Reid and his leadership style, but I think Democrats in the Senate fully supported Reid's handling of the legislative agenda and his refusal to bring matters to the floor for a vote unless a strong majority of Democrat Senators supported them. Reid protected both Democrat Senators and the President by not forcing them to go on record as opposed to the President or opposed to initiatives their constituents may have supported. He provided them cover and took all the heat himself.
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However that did not help the democrats on election night. That is one of the biggest reasons the democrats lost the Senate. What Reid did was not how congress or representative government is supposed to work.
 
ObamacareFail said:
However that did not help the democrats on election night. That is one of the biggest reasons the democrats lost the Senate. What Reid did was not how congress or representative government is supposed to work.
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I don't disagree it was a factor, but not a negative factor with Democrats. It may have energized more on the right and got out more Republican voters, but that doesn't necessarily mean Democrats didn't support Reid both in the Senate and in the general left leaning public. I'd say that Obama and his administration were far more the deciding factor and Reid actually helped protect both Obama and Senate Democrats with the false narrative about Republican obstructionists.
 
X Factor said:
To add to the ever expanding list of threads about yesterday's elections, I was watching MSNBC last night (what can I say? It's fun watching Chris Matthews on a night like that) and one of the commentators said that Harry Reid's leadership in the Senate actually hurt Dems running for office by not even letting legislation he didn't like come to a vote, no Democrat could really show their independence from Obama and/or the Democrat party. I thought that made some sense.

Do you agree that Reid did more damage to his party than good.

Give me a sec to attach the poll.
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I would tend to think that the effect Reid had on the outcome was negligible at best. People simply don't watch that closely what goes on except those very into politics, and even then I don't think many where swayed by that. Slow recovery, distrust of congress, ebola, ISIS, immigration, those are what people where thinking about when they voted.
 
CanadaJohn said:
I don't disagree it was a factor, but not a negative factor with Democrats. It may have energized more on the right and got out more Republican voters, but that doesn't necessarily mean Democrats didn't support Reid both in the Senate and in the general left leaning public. I'd say that Obama and his administration were far more the deciding factor and Reid actually helped protect both Obama and Senate Democrats with the false narrative about Republican obstructionists.
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The democrats on the hard left did continue to support Harry Reid. The moderates did not as the majority of those bills that Reid tabled had bipartisan support. In the long run, Reid's actions devastated the democrat party.
 
ObamacareFail said:
The democrats on the hard left did continue to support Harry Reid. The moderates did not as the majority of those bills that Reid tabled had bipartisan support. In the long run, Reid's actions devastated the democrat party.
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You can show the exit polling to support that claim?
 
Hamster Buddha said:
Very much. Bottom line I would bet that you think the government can be more help than the private sector to the economy. Exit polls show this divide clearly where only 20% of Dems think "Government is doing too many things better left to businesses and individuals" whereas 20% of Reps believe "Government should do more to solve problems".
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That last question is just bizarre. If government isn't solving problems, what the hell good is it?
 
The question in this OP is first-grade politics.
I expected at least a high school level of political science when I joined DP.

McConnell is giving an excellent news conference right now and he is very intelligent.
I expect him to try and whip EVERY Senator and Congressperson in line .

Beaudreaux said:
Short answer - yes.

Long answer - hell yes.

However, we have our version of Reid, in the form of Ted Cruz, who is rumored to be eying a leadership position. That scares me.
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Harry Reid is Obama's yes man.

The Senate has been a reflection of the Obama White House for almost seven years now, incompetent.

Nothing more needs to be said.
 
No more than republican senators not allowing anything to pass hurt their party. Sooner or later, the total combined uselessness of the senate will have to cost every incumbent. Only then will they work together.

From here on though i expect the dems will shift their focus to the clintons and mention obama sparingly.
 
annata said:
yep, yep.. voters want something besides permanent gridlock..
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so why would they vote for republicans then, who can't even agree to allow educational debt refinancing?
 
X Factor said:
Which both sides do. What I find interesting is how often Republican voters and conservatives are told we cannot win unless we put up our more "moderate" or less conservative candidates, yet, even after last night, nobody really calls on Democrats to be more "moderate" or less liberal. That's not any kind of criticism, it's just something I noticed.
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It's because few dems are liberal to begin with. It's very much a centrist/populist party and has been since at least the start of bill clinton (i'm not familiar with before that).
 
DifferentDrummr said:
Not enough to make a difference. Too much voter apathy this year.

Like most midterms, this was the time for cranky old white Americans to show that they don't like that uppity Obama or the taste of their Metamucil.
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Yeah probably like 10% voter turnout, and the repubs taking a majority (not super majority so who cares) is supposed to reflect on harry reid? Only to the extent he (and every other politician) didn't galvanize the other 90% of voters to show up
 
Perhaps a bit, but I think it's more acceptable that the perception of the President did the most damage.
 
DifferentDrummr said:
Governments that never solve any problems collapse.
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Our government was specifically designed to make it difficult to "solve problems," and it's probably the oldest on the planet.
 
DifferentDrummr said:
That last question is just bizarre. If government isn't solving problems, what the hell good is it?
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Gunking up the works. You have to understand the sheer size of the government. Ask ten different groups how much the US has spent this year and you'll get nine different answers. When you have that level of confusion and inconsistency, despite the fact that I think the government has good intentions, it blows up. It's like trying to turn on a dime in a Battleship. I mean look at the whole Obamacare website. I very much doubt anyone in the government wanted that to be the flop out of the gate that it ended up being. And it took what, 100 million dollars to fix? That **** happens in the Private Sector... that never happen, someone come up saying that's the plan, their fired. And who's bright idea was it to contract it out to like twenty different companies?

iliveonramen said:
Well why don't you list some specifics? What should the government get out of?
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The real question is what shouldn't the government get out of? I don't mean to be coy but really, when you talk to someone like me who is what I refer to as a "moderate libertarian". What I mean is that, I'll make no bones of it, the private sector would do whatever government does, but better and more efficient. We've seen this many times now with services like highway management, sewage, water treatment, and all these basic functions handled beautifully. There's many cases of neighborhoods that can't rely on police having to higher private security to handle to job. The reason is very simple after all, if an outfit doesn't perform up to snuff, then fire them. You can't really fire the government, specifically the bureaucracy.

However, I do believe there are some things that while the government wouldn't do it as efficiently, I'm fine with government doing it. For instance, I'm not for privatizing social security, not because I don't think it can't be done (money wise it's the best move) but because I accept that is something people just can't accept. But more importantly, and I think similarly with the Military, there are somethings that ultimately we want full control as the people, and by extension the government. Though I will say with the Military, we need to rethink our role in the world, at least so far as our military budget which is greater than the next I think eight or nine nations combined depending on when the number is counted.

A lot of what I would get rid of is the extraneous fat around the government and refocus. I'd phase out the Education department since it's clear it's not helping, I'd re focus the EPA to handling clean water and clear air and get them off of this Green crap being two that I can think of off the top of my head.
 
chromium said:
Yeah probably like 10% voter turnout, and the repubs taking a majority (not super majority so who cares) is supposed to reflect on harry reid? Only to the extent he (and every other politician) didn't galvanize the other 90% of voters to show up
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You honestly think the way the polls were showing that even if they showed up, it of made a difference?
 
DifferentDrummr said:
And yet it has solved hundreds, if not thousands, over the course of its history.
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And created even more. Hell just look at the VA Scandal. be better off just breaking up the VA, splitting the money into vouchers that the vets could use at real hospitals. He is right though.
 
X Factor said:
To add to the ever expanding list of threads about yesterday's elections, I was watching MSNBC last night (what can I say? It's fun watching Chris Matthews on a night like that) and one of the commentators said that Harry Reid's leadership in the Senate actually hurt Dems running for office by not even letting legislation he didn't like come to a vote, no Democrat could really show their independence from Obama and/or the Democrat party. I thought that made some sense.

Do you agree that Reid did more damage to his party than good.

Give me a sec to attach the poll.
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Yes. His refusal to compromise on the PPACA when Obama wanted to do so crippled Obama's ability to lead and polarized the legislature so badly that there was not much Obama could do to save his Presidency from being a trivial pursuit question 50 years from now.
 
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