Lessons for 2024 from the Primary

The 2020 primary election continues to be discussed on social media, and I personally believe this is a good thing. Joe Biden and the rest of his caucus seriously under performed in November, and we cannot afford to under perform again in 2024. We need to understand what really happened, and what needs to change in order to make certain that the Democratic nominee in 2024 will win the general election.

Lessons from the Primary

The Primary election was extremely crowded. Not only were there a lot of candidates, but many of them also had strong experience which made them viable. With one former Vice President, 3 sitting senators, and a former mayor of New York running at the same time, it is no surprise that no candidate was going to get a majority of the votes in such a crowded field.

First thing, the progressive vote was definitely split. Warren had the lead in the polls before the Iowa caucus, but after Iowa when Bernie outperformed her I believe a lot of would-be Warren voters voted for Bernie instead. This is a symptom of first past the post, and it means it is impossible to get an accurate measure of what people actually want from the polls. The best we can do are the ranked voting polls which FairVote did which in September and February. These two polls make it very clear that a lot of voters moved from Warren to Sanders after Sanders outperformed Warren in a couple of small states. The strategic move then is to move from the 3rd place candidate to the second place candidate. We need to sovle this problem by having all elections on a single day and have the vote be done with ranked choice voting.

Second thing, Bernie Sanders dropped out early. Warren dropped out on March 5th and Sanders dropped out on April 8th.

Results before Warren Dropped out
blue = progressive
red = Biden
light = plurality
dark = majority

Most of the country had not voted yet. No major swing states had voted yet, namely Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania the only state with a significant number of votes which Bwhich the nominee absolutely had to win in order to become President. No Democrat has won the Presidency without Michigan since 1940, Pennsylvania since 1948, or Wisconsin since 1968.

If we look again at the map after Warren dropped out, Bernie’s chances did not improve.

There were three crucial swing states which voted after Warren dropped out and before Bernie dropped out. Biden won all three of them. Bernie Sanders had won both Wisconsin and Michigan in the 2016 primary, and with Biden cleaning Bernie out of the upper Midwest with a clear majority, Bernie Sanders did not have a realistic path to victory, and this is when it was a two horse race.

Because of this fact that even without a spoiler Bernie Sanders was failing to get voters to vote for him, and his campaign was unable to convince Warren voters in Washington State to switch over to Bernie Sanders even after she dropped out, it was very clear to the Sanders campaign that the election was over. Washington was the only significant state which Biden did not win. No offense North Dakota, but you just don’t have enough votes to make a meaningful difference.

So, to all the people who say that Bernie Sanders would have won if Elizabeth Warren had only stayed in the kitchen, they are not just sexist, but completely incorrect. Bernie Sanders underperformed his 2016 performance even after Warren had dropped out. He failed to get a clear lead at any point  in the primary, and was in third place in the polls before Iowa. Instead of just sowing more division he decided to drop out, and endorsed Biden one month after Warren dropped. This was before New York, Pennsylvania, and Ohio even voted.

That has nothing to do with Senator Warren.

There are still deep divisions within the Democratic Party. There are still big questions regarding whether a ranked voting system and a single day for the election would have given Biden a victory. It is very clear from the available data that Biden would not have won in a landslide, and that makes it too close to call.

The Democratic Party needs to reform the primary system before 2024 to ensure that it can get an accurate measure of what Americans want. This is the only way to guarantee that they can get a popular candidate who not only will win the general election but also carry their success down ballot. The consequence of not doing this will at best be the lack of a trifecta in 2025, or at worst a repeat of 2016.

Let’s not repeat 2016.

Let’s have an election which is accurate.

After the clear lessons of the 2016 and 2020 elections, the Democratic Party needs to endorse FairVote and the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact. This will make a fair election.

The 2020 election in perspective

Short post for today, but the point is pretty simple.

The year started with a 33% drop in GDP.

An epidemic has killed over 300,000 Americans.

The President blocked medicine from coming into this country to reduce the severity of the epidemic.

The Senate blocked stimulus bills for Americans who had lost their jobs.

Unemployment (U-3) spiked at 14.7%, the highest level it has been since records begin in 1948.

Senate Republicans refused to cooperate with the House on providing much needed aid to American families.

The genius Republican campaign strategy culminated in their reservation of a small landscaping company in an industrial section of Philadelphia for Trump’s concession speech because they thought it was a 5 star hotel.

All of this happened and the Democrats still lost seats in the House and were unable to unseat Susan Collins.

Given economic Armageddon and the biggest global epidemic in over a century, the fact that the Democrats STILL failed to convince Americans to vote for them means there is something very, very wrong in their approach to politics and their strategy is not working.

Great Democratic Quotes

“The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.”

“My own sympathy has always been with the little fellow, the man without advantages.”

“Let every nation know whether it wishes us well or ill that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe to asure the survival and the success of liberty.”

“Very often a lack of jobs and money is not the cause of poverty, but the symptom. The cause may lie deeper — in our failure to give our fellow citizens a fair chance to develop their own capacities, in a lack of education and training, in a lack of medical care and housing, in a lack of decent communities in which to live and bring up their children.”

“Whether the borders that divide us are picket fences or national  boundaries, we are all neighbors in a global community.”

“We all do better when we work together. Our differences do matter, but our common humanity mattes more.”

“Change will not come if we wait for some other person or some other time. We are the ones we’ve been waiting for. We are the change that we seek.”

“Nothing will fundamentally change.”

One of these is not like the others.

Build an Apache Server on Ubuntu

We are going to host two different websites on an Apache Server running Ubuntu.

Step 1, install packages

sudo apt-get install apache2

Step 2, create your conf files

Create two conf files in /etc/apache2/sites-available

Call them site1.conf and site2.conf

Create links using ln-s to both of those conf files in /etc/apache2/sites-enabled

sudo ln -s /etc/apache2/sites-available/site1.conf /etc/apache2/sites-enabled/.

sudo ln -s /etc/apache2/sites-available/site2.conf /etc/apache2/sites-enabled

Paste the following into site1.conf

<VirtualHost *:80>
DocumentRoot /var/www/html/site1.conf
ServerName site1.example.net
ServerAlias site1
ServerAdmin your_email@example.net
</VirtualHost *:80

And paste the following into site2.conf

<VirtualHost *:80>
DocumentRoot /var/www/html/site2.conf
ServerName site2.example.net
ServerAlias site2
ServerAdmin your_email@example.net
</VirtualHost *:80

Step 3, create your landing pages

Create two folders in your home directory. Call them site1 and site2

Inside each of them create a file called index.php

Paste the following into each of  those files:
<html>
<head>
<title>Site</title>
</head>
<body>
<h1>This is a site</h1>
</body>
</html>

Change these in any way you want.

Create a symbolic link to each of those folders in /var/www/html

Step 4, modify your hosts file

Add the following lines to the end of  your /etc/hosts file:
127.0.1.1 site1
127.0.2.1 site2

Step 5, enable your websites

Type the following command into your terminal:

sudo a2ensite site1.conf site2.conf

Eras of European History

This is meant to be a brief overview to help people fully understand the importance of our current political situation. I am focusing on all of Europe in this overview of history, from the Ural mountains to the ocean. The era before the Minoans is prehistory for Europe because there are no written records.

Early origins of European civilization (3500 BC – 800 BC)

The first civilization in Europe were the Minoans, who started to flourish around 3500 BC. They are probably the ancestors to the Greeks. The Phoenicians grew up in the Levant and colonized significant portions of the Mediterranean. The Mycenaean people appeared in 1600 BC. They are related but their relationship has not been established. The Greeks expanded until about 1100 BC when the Mycenaen empire fell for unknown reasons.

Expansion of Greek civilization (800 BC – 343 BC)

The Etruscans were the second city states to be established in what is now Europe around 900 BC in modern day Italy. Carthage (which was a descendant of Phoenicia) became a major power in the Mediterranean, controlling the south coast of the Mediterranean from modern day Benghazi to the Atlantic Ocean. The Etruscan civilization dominated northern Italy, and the Persians dominated modern day Turkey.

Expansion of Rome (343 BC – 27 BC)

This era is where the expansion of empires in Europe expands significantly. The beginning is the era of Alexander the Great, with his empire which made many innovations which the Romans would use at the end of this time period. Rome expanded across the Italian peninsula, with their first Spanish possessions in 218 BC. The Romans expanded first across the entire southern coast of the European peninsula (because Europe really is just a peninsula of Asia). By 146 BC Rome had conquered Carthage and had significant territory on the North Coast of Africa. The Gauls were conquered in 51 BC. In 32 BC Rome conquered Mauritania (modern day Algeria) and in 30 BC Egypt became conquered by Rome. By 29 BC the Mediterranean Sea was a Roman lake. In 27 BC Augustus established the Roman Empire.

Roman Empire (27 BC – 395 AD)

Rome expanded across Western Europe. In 18 BC they conquered the last Celtic holdout in Hispania, and were one of the three large empires during the period, along with the Parthians, and of course the Han dynasty. In 43 AD the Roman Invasion of Britain began. In 47 AD Rome conquered Thrace and the Mediterranean was a Roman Lake. Politically Rome maintained its size for 348 years until it was divided in 395 AD as a result of corruption, invasions by Germans, and other factors.

Divided Roman Empire (395 AD – 476 AD)

Rome was divided for 81 years, as subjugated peoples fought for independence. Britain was lost in 410, and in 476 the Western Roman Empire fell permanently.

Eastern Roman Empire, Germanic Kingdoms (476 AD – 711)

The Franks grew to become the dominant ethnic group in the West under the Franks. Celtic Kingdoms emerged in Britain. The Visigoths dominated Hispania. The Roman Empire maintained power over parts of the Italian peninsula, but Rome was not as powerful as it used to be.

There were many minor conflicts across the Frankish area during this time in the form of rebellions, and fighting between different Frankish kingdoms.

Islamic Hispania, Frankish North, divided England , Viking raids (711 – 928 AD)

Major Wars:

  • Reconquista (711-1492)

Islamic Hispania, England united, East Francia (928 AD – 963 AD)

In 928 AD England was united under Egbert. England would of course grow to be a global power. Reconquista continues

Caliphate of Cordoba, Holy Roman Empire formed (963 – 1066)

Hugh Capet became the King of France. His descendants would rule until 1793. Spain became fractured. In 1066 the Viking William of Normandy conquered England which significantly changed European politics.

Poland is formed.

Reconquista continues.

England as a major power (1066-1238)

England had significant holdings in Europe from 1066 until 1837. Spain continued to be a hotbed of Islamic expansion. Catholic Kingdoms helped the Catholic Hispanic kingdoms fight the various Islamic Caliphates which came to power during this time period. England and France were often at war starting in 1213 during this period.

Major Wars:

  • Reconquista (711-1492)
  • Crusades (1095-1291)
  • Anglo-French War (1213-1214)

Mongols in the East to the Fall of Rome (1238-1460)

This period is marked by the Golden Horde dominating Eastern Europe. This is frequently called the High Middle Ages, a period of relative geopolitical stability in European history.

The 1200s saw the decline of the Byzantine Empire and the arrival of the Ottomans. The Mongols swept through Eastern Europe

By 1329 all of Europe was finally the possession of a state. The last area to be conquered was part of modern-day Lithuania by the Teutonic Knights and Lithuania.

The Black Death killed between 30% and 60% of Europe’s population from 1346-1353.

The Hundred Years War was the longest period of war during this time from 1337-1453 between the House of Plantagenet and House of Valois. As a consequence, England lost Aquitaine and abandoned their claims to the French throne.

In 1453 Constantinople was conquered by the Ottomans and in 1460 Mehmed II invaded Morea marking the end of the Roman Empire.

Major Wars:

  • Reconquista (711-1492)
  • Crusades (1095-1291)
  • Hundred Years’ War (1337-1453)

Reconquista ends and end of the Roman Empire to the discovery of the New World (1460-1492)

1492 marked the end of the Reconquista where Muslims were expelled from Hispania and Christopher Columbus landing in the Caribbean. This era is clearly distinct from the eras before and after it because the Roman Empire was over, but Colonization had not begun yet.

Colonization of the Americas (1492-1783)

The Golden Horde were defeated in 1502.

The 16th century saw multiple Italian Wars involving England, France, and the Holy Roman Empire. Aside from Spanish Netherlands coming and going, there were not very many significant changes to the map of Western Europe during this time period. In the Holy Roman Empire several large states increased in importance. Russia expanded across Siberia in this time period. The United Kingdom was formed in 1701 by the Acts of Union. Russia expanded in Eastern Europe.

Eastern Europe was dominated by the Ottomans, the Polish-Lithuanian commonwealth and the Ottoman Empire. Austria started to become more significant near the end of this period due to their unification with Hungary.

The Thirty Years War lead to an increase in Protestantism in Northern Europe.

The Independence of the United States heralded the beginning of revolutions which would rock Europe over the next 130 years. Austria expanded its power into Hungary and parts of modern Yugoslavia.

There were many wars in this era between  great houses vying for dominance over the peninsula.

Major Wars

  • First Italian War (1424-1498)
  • War of the league of Cambrai (1508-1516)
  • Italian War (1521-1526)
  • War of the league of Cognac (1528-1529)
  • Italian War (1542-1546)
  • Italian War (1551-1559)
  • Thirty Years’ War
  • Second Anglo-Dutch War
  • Nine Years’ War
  • The War of the Spanish Succession
  • War of the Quadruple Alliance
  • War of the Spanish Succession
  • Seven Years’ War
  • American Revolutionary War

End of Monarchy, Age of Nationalism (1783-1919)

The French monarch was the first to fall during the French Revolution. Napoleon ruled from 1799 to 1815. Poland was conquered by Russia. The United Kingdom lost its last continental holdings in Calais in 1837. Italy was unified in 1861. Germany was formed in 1871 as a Constitutional Monarchy. From 1871 to 1919 Eastern Europe was dominated by just 4 empires, Germany, Russia, Austria-Hungary, and the Ottoman Empire.

Major Wars

  • War of the French Revolution
  • Napoleonic Wars
  • World War I

Interwar era, rise of Communism, and World War II (1919-1945)

Most monarchies in Europe had been abolished at this time. The Soviet Union expanded in the East. Hitler had a goal of ruling the entire world and committed the Holocaust. World War II was the last war to be fought in Western Europe.

Major Wars

  • World War II

Cold War, rise of the European Community, Pax Europa (1945-1991)

This was the beginning of the longest era with no wars being fought between Western Europe in history. The European Community was formed in 1993.

Pax Europa, European Union (1991-Present)

The European Union was formed in 1993. The United Kingdom left the European Union in 2020. There has not been a war in Western Europe since the end of World War II.

This leads us to the current European map showing the interplay of the European Council, European Union, Schengen Treaty, and the Euro.

 

Red = European Council

Blue = European Council, European Union, Schengen Treaty, Eurozone

Teal = European Council, European Union, Schengen Treaty

Purple = European Council, European Union, Eurozone

Yellow = European Council, European Union

Green = European Council, Schengen Treaty

 

Conclusions

When looking at this chronology of historical events, a few things stand out to me personally:

  1. The current period of peace in Western Europe is without precedent. Every inch of territory in Europe is fully claimed by a sovereign state, as has been true for only the last 700 years. What is unique is this is the longest period of peace in European history. The anniversary of 75 years since the end of World War II is a very big deal. Never before has there been peace in Western Europe for as long as this current ongoing period of history. This is the longest period of peace for France since the Roman Empire.
  2. It is really easy to take a simplistic view of history. Seeing history in three main periods, Ancient, Medieval, and Modern simplifies history to a point which is barely useful. It also globalizes European History in a way which is not accurate for the rest of the world. 2000 BC is more different from 1 AD than today is. I like these categories of history for Western Europe because I believe it provides a deeper understanding of what was actually happening socially and culturally in that part of the world.
  3. The map of Europe in 500 AD has almost nothing in common with today’s borders.
  4. It is really easy to understate the importance of the Holy Roman Empire in the way we generally view  European history. Same goes for the Byzantine Empire.

Hopefully this overview of European history will help the reader have a greater understanding of the magnitude of the current Pax Romana. The era of European history we live in is incredibly special, so hopefully with this understanding we can preserve the peace and see other parts of the world build the institutions and economic realities which allow people to prosper. Moving forward we can hopefully fight bigotry and hatred, and not go back to the mistakes of our ancestors, but learn from their successes.

I believe that understanding history give us the ability to gain that understanding to learn how to preserve what is special, notice which institutions, economic realities, and cultural norms are creating more prosperity, freedom, and peace. Once we understand where we once were we can then focus on what has and has not worked in the past and hopefully not make the same mistakes of the past.

Two types of election systems

There are only two types of elections systems currently in use:

  1. Party insiders decide
  2. Voters have the final say

Every election system can be categorized as one of the three.

Here is the proof:

Based off of Wikipedia’s list, there are 14 types of election systems they list as currently being used, with one being missed:

  • Plurality (in order to win, you don’t need a majority, just more valid votes than anyone else)
    • First past the post
    • Delegate
    • Appointment
    • Two-round system
    • Multiple non-transferable vote
    • Single non-transferable vote
    • Cumulative Voting
    • Party-list proportional representation
    • Majority bonus system
    • Mixed-Member Proportional
    • Parallel Voting
    • Borda Count
  • Majoritarian (You must have a majority of all valid votes, or in multiple member systems, at least 1/n of all votes where n is the number of valid votes)
    • Instant runoff voting
    • Single Transferable Vote

How do all of these election systems fit in to our two categories? Well, it’s quite simple really. Almost every system fits into the first bin. In order to have voters feel comfortable voting for you you need to have the endorsement of the party you are allied with, which is the signal voters need in most systems to know that the candidate has a chance of winning. Every non-majoritarian election system becomes a two party system given time with very few counter-examples which generally ends up with an old party becoming usurped by a new one. Most voters understand the spoiler effect enough that they know if they and enough people in their district vote for a minor party that they will likely get the candidate they like least. It doesn’t really matter if you are looking at a system where you look at voting by party or voting directly for the individual, you either are in the early stage, like Israel or Germany are right now, where there are a lot of parties creating and ending, but over time the number of parties will reduce and power will coalesce between two main parties. It took the United States over 100 years to reach the state we are in now, but I expect that someday a lot of minor parties which continue to not get sufficient representation in the Knesset in Israel or Bundestag in Germany will someday stop existing, and Israel and Germany will have two party systems unless if they change. Both Israel and Germany have seen the Prime Minister/Chancellor position always dominated by either their center-left or center-right parties over the last 60 years with only one exception each, Olmert who served for 3 years in Israel, and Walter Scheel who served for a total of 9 days in Germany. Despite being forced to form coalitions, their party list systems have not given true party diversity to their head of government. The United Kingdom saw Labour take over the left from the Liberal Party in the early 20th century, and in the latter half of the 20th century the Liberals became almost obsolete. After Tony Blair the Liberal Democrats became more prominent, but unless if Britain changes their election system again we will almost certainly see a two party system develop once again in the United Kingdom once Labour goes back to its platform from before Tony Blair.

Because of this whoever determines the leadership of the parties which have a chance of forming a government choose what happens in the next election cycle. The rules vary country to country and party to party, but ultimately, whoever determines party leadership of the two main parties in these countries will determine who become head of government in parliamentary systems.  If you are not in the process of nominating the leader of one of the two major parties, you have very limited input into who actually becomes your head of government.

When we move to a top two primary on the outside it looks like this opens up elections so that insiders are not the major ones pulling the strings and forming governments. In reality however it can quickly end up with one candidate on each side getting the financial support of a major party, and being able to out canvass, outspend, and outperform any third party candidate. Because of the spoiler effect people must vote strategically and it ends up reinforcing the two party system.

Ranked voting however breaks this mold which other election systems use. It allows third parties which can actually form a government grow up to be very powerful, like in Ireland, because people can vote their conscience without worrying about who  their neighbor is voting for. There are unfortunately very few places which use this voting system, but hopefully it will spread around the United States and that will allow candidates who don’t have the support of the party establishment but have popular support to have a chance of success. It also will prevent extremists like Trump (who did not win a majority of the vote in the 2016 primary) from getting elected since it blocks their benefit of a spoiler effect. This means that voters can safely vote for third party candidates without risking that their least favorite candidate can win, unlike any other voting system.

Please join FairVote and support ranked choice voting.

Progressives Strike Back

This article attempts to give significant historical context for the progressive movement today.

Early Founding Fathers

The early founding fathers were a divided bunch, representing slave owners such as Washington, Jefferson, Madison, and Monroe, and abolitionists including Adams, Franklin, and Hamilton. The abolitionist founding fathers are the antecedents of the modern Progressive movement, not just favoring socially liberal causes which were championed by John Locke but also championing economically liberal ideas which were written by their contemporary Adam Smith. The beginning of economic reforms can be seen clearly by Alexander Hamilton who championed the formation of America’s first National Bank, taxing alcohol, and funding national infrastructure. These original planks of the platform have continued to be part of progressive thought in the United States ever since.

National Republican Party

In 1824 President John Quincy Adams formed a new party which championed significant infrastructure spending, access to college, a national bankruptcy law, national banking, and had an ambitious agenda which was ahead of his time. The National Republican Party grew into the opposition during President Jackson’s time in office. It evolved into the Whig Party during Jackson’s second term.

Whig Party

The Whig Party was a party which existed from 1833 to 1856 which advocated for policies including a national bank and building infrastructure. They were divided over the issue of slavery, and this ended up to be their downfall. William Henry Harrison, John Tyler, Zachary Taylor, and Millard Fillmore were members of the Whig Party. The only trifecta formed by the Whig Party was in 1841 when they accomplished the formation of a national bank and clear laws on bankruptcy.

Republican Party

The Republican Party was founded in 1854 by former Whigs and former Free Soilers who were opposed to the expansion of Slavery in to the West. Beyond slavery, economic reforms supported by the Republican Party included anti-trust reforms, infrastructure, national banking, and other economic reforms which can easily be traced as the precedents of reforms which were made during the early 20th century. President Theodore Roosevelt was the last progressive Republican President and he championed these economic policies with his reputation as a trust buster and economic reform, policies which live on with the progressive movement today.

Progressive Party

After President Taft was elected he turned the Republican Party into a much more conservative party. In response to this, President Roosevelt formed the Progressive Party to run in the 1912 Presidential election. This party included parts of the platform like campaign finance reform, trust-busting, workers rights, and other planks which can be found in the platforms of modern politicians like Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders. The Progressive movement joined the New Deal Coalition formed by President Roosevelt in the 1930s which adopted many of the Progressive Party’s main ideas.

New Deal

The current progressive movement traces itself back to the platform of Franklin Delano Roosevelt in 1932. Comparing policies across such a wide time span is of course difficult because a lot has changed over the last 90 years, but when it comes to economic policies, there is a very clear line of descent from President Roosevelt extending through the Great Society of LBJ down to the Obama Presidency to the present day. This line is most clear through economic policies, and when it comes to social policies the progressive wing of the Democratic Party has moved significantly farther left over the last 90 years as I am about to describe.

President Roosevelt of course pushed for many economic ideas which are strongly supported by the progressive wing today, with the FDIC, public works, and Social Security. President Truman continued this with the foundation of many home ownership programs. These economic policies are clearly reflected in the economic policies of President Obama and the economic platforms of Senators Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren.

During the 1960s we saw the continuation of massive progressive economic reforms including Medicare, Medicaid, food stamps, and more as part of President Johnson’s Great Society. During President Johnson’s term we saw the marriage of progressive economic policies with socially progressive policies into one platform which is very clearly connected with the policies of modern progressive candidates. This was the golden age of American progressivism, with massive progress being done for society.

The Great Hiatus

In 1968 President Johnson was resoundly defeated in the Presidential Primary and Hubert Humphrey was defeated by President Nixon. The main reason for this is the unpopularity of the Vietnam War, which is fairly complex in the scope of the global geopolitical situation era of the time. This point in history deserves an article of its own.

The last major victory for social progress of the previous era was Roe v. Wade in 1973.

The 1970s saw a great decline in the progressive movement, and in 1976 the standard bearer for the progressive movement was Senator Udall who was resoundly defeated by Governor Carter who then of course became President Carter. President Carter took a step back from the socially liberal policies of President Johnson by starting the NSA, and did not have any major accomplishments during his time in office. He faced a challenge from Ted Kennedy (representing the progressive wing) in the primary who he narrowly beat, and then was defeated by Governor Reagan.

The Reagan and first Bush administrations moved America’s culture significantly to the right on many issues. When 1992 came around the New Democrat Coalition’s candidate Bill Clinton won the election with no significant progressive competition and he of course became President. President Bill Clinton took a big step back from the progressive platform of his Democratic forebears by signing the Defense of Marriage Act, deregulating Wall Street, and intensifying the War on Drugs. President Bill Clinton also tried to pass health care reform during his first two years, but unfortunately that attempt failed.

Gore Defeated

The 2000 election was a massive blow to the Democratic Party of the United States. We saw a victory in the popular vote for Al Gore, a moderate New Democrat, while George W. Bush, a died in the wool neoconservative won the electoral college with 271 votes, only 2 more than was needed to prevent the results going to Congress. The 2000 Democratic Primary was an overwhelming landslide for Al Gore, and he almost won the presidency. Following his defeat, George Bush governed from as far right as it was possible to go in this country, slowly tightening the screws through his presidency to bring America into two new wars, a less progressive tax code, championing conservative social values, and signing the PATRIOT ACT into law less than 9 months after his inauguration, arguing that 9/11 gave the government the ability to  suspend Habeus Corpus. He appointed 2 justices to the Supreme Court, and his impact on our court system lasts to this day.

Americans grew fairly used to the increase in surveillance which hums in the background, the War on Terror continues to beat on 20 years later, and his economic policies widened the gap between the rich and the poor.

In the 2004 presidential primary Howard Dean carried the banner of the progressive movement and failed to win even a million votes. He was the first significant progressive Presidential candidate in 16 years.

Obama’s trifecta

On January 20, 2009, President Barack Obama became the President of the United States. He won a great deal because of his book Audacity of Hope , where he clearly lays out his agenda which included the need for health care reform, support for civil unions, how he is opposed to torture, the need to tax wealthy Americans at a higher rate than middle class Americans, and other items which placed him towards the left wing of the party. He proposed bills on all of these major issues as soon as he got into office, and there he faced significant opposition from his own party on his proposals. All were either significantly whittled down or blocked completely, making a victory in 2010 less likely due to reduced enthusiasm from within the Democratic Party.

In 2012 Obama faced reelection, and 51% of Americans supported gay marriage. On May 9, President Obama announced how he supported same sex marriage. In February 2015 gay marriage was sitting at 63% approval according to CNN. Obama significantly moved America to the left on gay marriage through his court appointments and public statements.

When it comes to health care, Americans have had positive views on the government expanding access to health care for the past 20 years. There was a drop during Obama’s presidency (probably due to the incessant comparison of the Affordable Care Act to the Soviet Union by Fox News) but over the last 3 years we have seen that public support for government being involved in health care has risen back up to historical levels. Medicare For All already had 2/3 approval when Obama was elected President. Despite such overwhelming support, the Democrats in Congress still killed the public option.

It seems to me that President Obama moved America to the left on social issues and brought back a lot of the reforms of President Franklin D. Roosevelt which had been killed b y President Clinton with the Dodd Frank Act, which is a monumental shift in the Democratic Party moving back to its mid century roots.

It is difficult to know how the health care polling would be different if the Affordable Care Act hadn’t been so significantly amended by Congress.

What is even more interesting is that even though Obama campaigned on breaking mass surveillance he failed to defend the Fourth Amendment once he was in office. This involved enforcing the laws which were put onto the books by his predecessor, not the implementation of new laws which continue to clearly violate the 4th Amendment day after day.

So, when we are trying to understand what was facing the Obama presidency, there were numerous challenges. The era of Social Security having a surplus was coming to a close, and that needed to be dealt with. The Federal deficit was large, and he entered during a massive economic crisis. When he was unable to close the Guantanamo Bay Detention Camp, one of the most flagrant violations of the US Constitution, it became very clear that the moderate Democrats who controlled congress were not focused on social issues at that point in time. By the time the economy recovered and our social issue compass was moving forward to the point where there might have been enough public pressure to end mass surveillance, the Republicans had both houses of Congress and any chance of making a significant amendment to the PATRIOT ACT was not possible. Any amendment to a major bill which would have at least required the NSA to get a court approved warrant before a search of someone’s personal property was not possible. Obama could have made a stance on this, but he chose not to. Mass surveillance and drone strikes were probably his two biggest failures looking back from the perspective of the 2020s.

President Obama is one of the most consequential and fascinating Presidents in American history. The way in which he moved America forward on issues such as gay marriage and economic reforms are extremely significant, as well as the issues which took a back burner during his presidency such as unwarranted wire tapping and drone strikes.

But one thing is for sure, President Obama was the most progressive President for 40 years and he opened the door for the progressive movement to see a massive resurgence in the mid-2010s due to his work where he moved the Overton Window towards justice.

Progressive resurgence

The 2016 election saw the rise of Bernie Sanders as a candidate. He managed to win a large number of states which would end up voting for Hillary Clinton in the general election, although he came up significantly short when it came to the popular vote. This was the best performance for an unabashedly progressive Presidential candidate in a primary since 1964 when LBJ won after signing the Civil Rights Act. He received 13 million votes.

The 2020 election built off the ground work which Bernie Sanders made in the 2016 election. There were two progressive candidates this time, Senators Elizabeth Warren and Senator Bernie Sanders. Together they won 12 million votes. Vice President Biden beat them with 19 million votes.

While progressives were defeated in the primary they saw significant gains in congress relative to the New Democrat Caucus in the House. While many New Democrats lost seats, no progressives lost seats in the 2020 election for the House of Representatives.

What happens next remains to be seen. Since Obama was President the views of Americans have moved left on social issues significantly, and there are growing calls for health care reform. Opinion polling implies that the progressive platform is now the more popular vision for America’s future. As we tackle problems such as climate change, immigrant rights, mass surveillance, economic inequality, and others, the question going forward is whether Progressives will become the largest caucus among Democrats in 2022 and take the Senate. If Progressives do this right, we could become the dominant vision in the Democratic Party again.

We live in a world more interconnected than ever before with trade, which means that as countries become ever more interdependent on each other that large wars like we saw during the Cold War are unlikely to happen again. Without a Vietnam War type situation, the probability of a backlash against a Progressive Democratic President becomes increasingly unlikely.

The marriage of social liberalism with economic liberalism is now very strong in the Democratic Party, and is only showing signs of becoming stronger as time goes on.

By running experienced activists with good heads on their shoulders and a solid campaign strategy everywhere we can, I believe that is very possible that the progressive movement could become the dominant vision within the Democratic Party in the next 3 years.

This will allow us to essentially eliminate the Electoral College through the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact which will essentially guarantee that a modern Republican candidate will not be able to win. The Republican Party will lose a few elections and then need to restructure themselves and stop emphasizing far right viewpoints.

The main election over the next decade will then be the Democratic Primary, and if that translates into gains in the Senate and House, we can lead America into prosperity which will hopefully reduce the number of Americans who are attracted to simple answers which won’t work from extremist ideologies to solve their problems.

This will allow us to strengthen the social safety net, increase civil liberties and fight racism.

The Progressive movement has been with the United States since the beginning and will likely remain a major force in American politics for a long time to come. Every time we have married progressive economic reforms (government subsidized infrastructure, a strong national bank, economic opportunity) with progressive social issues we have dominated the American landscape.

Every time we have divorced social and economic reforms we have done relatively poorly.

We did this to various levels in the 1860s, 1960s, and 2010s. If we do this again over the next decade we are going to once again dominate American politics, and make America a more prosperous and freer country again.

Pass legislation, win the presidency

Here is a plan on how Progressive Democrats can win the Presidency in 2024. I am talking about the Warren wing of the Progressive caucus, given how most of Bernie Sanders’ closest allies got absolutely destroyed this year.

The first thing we need to do is make sure that we win more seats in the 2022 primary than the New Democrat coalition. If we end up winning this then we can remove Nancy Pelosi as speaker, given how she was a major obstacle to Obama’s health care, infrastructure, civil rights, and education proposals in 2009 and 2010. We elect a progressive to the position of Speaker of the House and win a majority in the Senate.

The next step is the filibuster must be fully removed from the rules of the Senate. The rules will now be similar to the following:  A simple majority is all that needs to be required in both houses to move to the previous question. If one representative or senator makes a motion to move to the previous question, and the motion is seconded, then there is a simple majority up or down vote to vote on passage. If that vote succeeds, then the vote will be taken and that vote is final. This will block Republican obstruction in both chambers.

Check.

The next step is that Progressive Democrats need to propose a set of legislation with 6 bills dealing with education, health care, climate change, infrastructure, taxation, and police brutality. The climate change bill will also deal with inequality because it will include an exemption free carbon tax and we can use the double dividend to fight income inequality. The taxation bill will also deal with income inequality.

These 6 bills will land on Biden’s desk, and he has no choice but to sign all 6 of them. If he vetoes any one of them then Kamala Harris will never be president and Biden will be the last New Democrat President in American History. The Progressive who succeeds him will do everything Biden chose not to do, become as notable as FDR or LBJ, and irreversibly change American political culture. If Biden signs the bills then he has irreversibly pushed the Democratic Party back to where it was in the 1960s and New Deal era, and effectively neutered his caucus by breaking every promise that New Democrats have made since the 1970s.

Either way, the New Democrat Coalition is going to permanently lose power, and Progressive Democrats will dominate the next 20 years of American politics.

Mate.

The Lincoln Project

Let’s take a quick look at the Lincoln Project, this one will be quick.

All data is from OpenSecrets and Ballotpedia.

In the 2020 cycle the Lincoln Project raised about $8 million. That’s it.

Biden for President raised $937.67 million, over 100 times the total amount raised by the Lincoln Project.

The Lincoln Project spent $1.3 million in Maine attacking Susan Collins. Sara Gideon raised $64 million.

The Lincoln Project was not a significant force in this election in terms of the money they raised.

It’s time to stop talking about them.

Consequences of Corporate Consolidation

In 2018 Wendover Productions made a video on YouTube where he discussed the issue facing airlines where they are not being able to get enough pilots, so they are cancelling routes.

There are a few reasons for this. The cost of training is absurdly high, the starting wages are very low, and the good routes are usually dominated by the pilots who are near the end of their career.

Since it can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars of training and then you will likely make only about $30,000 a year at the beginning of your career as a pilot, airlines are having difficulty to get enough pilots to fly for them, so they are closing profitable routes.

At first this sounds crazy, but in reality it is exactly what economics predicts. The United States has seen a massive consolidation of airlines as is known by many. In 2019 American Airlines (the largest in the country) had more passengers than the total on Alaska Airlines, JetBlue Airways, Spirit Airlines, Frontier Airlines, Allegiant Air, Hawaiian Airlines, and Sun Country Airlines. The entire industry in the United States is dominated by American Airlines, Delta Air Lines, Southwest Airlines, and United Airlines. This consolidation of airlines into a small number means that they can charge more for each flight they serve, and do not offer as many options as there would be if there were more major airlines in the country. If we take a major airport like Seattle,  you can fly to Chicago on 6 different airlines, you can fly to New York on 3 different airlines, but if you want to fly directly to Miami, you can only fly on American Airlines. This gives immense power to American Airlines who does charge monopoly prices for this Seattle-Miami route, just like any monopoly in the world. This means there are fewer flights, and if another airline were to try to take advantage of this monopoly pricing, American would be able to significantly reduce their prices and force the other airline out of business. This is why getting out of our current situation with monopoly pricing is going to be so difficult.

Part of this is also because the United States has laws about how foreign airlines are not allowed to fly domestic flights in the United States. But even more than this, even the route to London has only 3 year round flights, despite being a major hub, and Frankfurt has only two flights on either Condor or Lufthansa.

This problem is obviously bigger than just the United States. There are three Airlines Alliances which exist in the world, Star Alliance, SkyTeam, and OneWorld. These airlines codeshare on international routes so if you were to fly from Seattle to Amsterdam you would fly on a codeshare between Delta and KLM. Most small countries will only have one major airline as well, which will belong to one of these major alliances. The United States, Spain, Russia, and China are the only exceptions to this rule. This lack of competition reduces the number of flights available and makes travel more expensive. The airlines naturally will pocket this cash, and before this epidemic were generally profitable.

All of this leads to fewer flights available overall, which while this is better for the environment, leads to fewer flights available for people in smaller cities. Here in Bellingham, Washington, only Alaska Airlines flies to Seattle, and only Allegiant flies anywhere else outside of Washington State. In Medford, Oregon (near where my great grandparents lived) only Seattle and Los Angeles have any competition. In larger cities like Kansas City, there are only two airlines operating between there and Seattle, Minneapolis, or New York. This makes flying less accessible to people with limited means, reduces the amount of options.

This is by any definition a very clear market failure.

So, what are solutions?

For myself, when I look at flying being more expensive, I have two battles pulling in me, it makes it more expensive to fly so we have fewer people flying overall, but we also see a benefit to the environment with fewer plans flying. My personal desire is to see accessibility for people to travel in ways which are efficient, preferably better for the environment, provide a high quality of service, provide a lot of service, and are at a good price for consumers.

In economics, we find that we first have to determine the nature of the market. For this we see that on the supply side we have a limited number of runways in each city, limited airspace between any two city pairs, and ideally those runways will be allocated in a way which maximizes the number of people who are able to use those services so we don’t run empty planes.

One of the first things any student of economics will study is information theory, which is fundamental to all economics. The information which needs to be determined in order to find the price and quantity of people who will consider flying at any given price is the goal of many economists who are employed by transportation companies who build models to determine the ticket price. The goal of the average consumer is obviously to spend as little as possible to safely get to their destination in as little time as possible. The goal of the company is obviously to maximize their profit. With fewer airlines in the marketplace, the total amount of information the market is going to respond to will be smaller, which hurts America’s GDP by reducing the amount of people who are traveling.

With routes which go between major cities which have several airlines competing for customers there will be lower prices. The reason for this is because those airlines are trying to maximize their profit, but if one raised their price too far, their plane would run empty and they would end up making less money than they would with a higher price.

If I look for a flight from Seattle to Chicago, there are a lot of different airlines which are competing to get me there, so the price for a four day trip starting on December 17th will currently run for $177. I am about as far away from Monterrey, Mexico as I am from Chicago, and Monterrey is also a city of considerable size with a good sized airport. There are fewer airlines offering flights to Monterrey from the United States, and even including transfers the least expensive flight right now is for $518 for the same 4 day trip. The reason is simple, Alaska, Spirit, United, American, Delta, and Southwest all compete for the flight to Chicago, whereas only United and American are competing for flights to Monterrey. This is one example where we can clearly see competition lowering prices. These prices stay pretty stable regardless of which season you look for prices according to Google Flights.

If there were more airlines in the market, there would be more airlines looking to edge out another, but with only a handful of major airlines, airlines have no incentive to do this. It is also far  too easy for one company to respect another companies turf, and extremely difficult for regulators to prove collusion if collusion exists.

The answer then is to have more entrants to the market. Most flights in the United States are fairly short (under 600 km last I checked) which means that a flight from Seattle to Medford is about the average length of a flight in the United States. Most flights then are competitive with high speed rail, and if America were to build a high speed rail network, which airlines could not compete with in terms of the waiting time in airports, then that will force airlines to serve more long haul routes and save oil for the majority of routes in the United States.

This also hints at another consequence of corporate consolidation. America’s interurban railroads are (with the exception of the Northeast Corridor) all privately owned. The consequence of this is that the private railroad is not acting on behalf of the country but instead for the interests of their own pocket books and stock holders. They also do not upgrade their lines as much as other countries, meaning anyone who has traveled in the United States knows that we have far more single tracked railroads than any other developed country. This makes it so the United States does not provide the same level of rail service as most other developed countries, limiting the ability for mobility within the United States. Given that railroads are a natural monopoly, and the only reasonable competitor to large airlines, there are very few solutions to solve the corporate consolidation in America’s transportation sector.

One option would be for the government to break up the existing airlines companies under anti-trust lawsuits. Having 10 or 20 airlines would make it far easier for at least one airline to cheat if some try to form a cartel, making a cartel far less powerful. The other option is (assuming there will never be a large number of railroads between two cities) is to nationalize the railroads and treat them like our highways. Then having AMTRAK increase service will provide a reasonably fast, efficient, inexpensive way to travel on trips of up to 500 km which would provide direct competition to a large number of existing flights. We could allow private railroad companies to compete with AMTRAK as well which would both increase the amount of people being able to travel in the United States and provide further downward pressure on price.

This solution will also solve the original problem I proposed in this post. With more airlines competing in the United States they would be forced to increase the salaries of pilots, or another airline will hire the pilots instead. This will end the shortage of pilots in a very short amount of time.

This is how we can end the pilot shortage, increase the availability of travel in America, reduce prices for traveling, and make a more prosperous economy.

References:

https://www.propublica.org/article/airline-consolidation-democratic-lobbying-antitrust