Since I'm lazy... Has anyone charted how often house seats flip parties compared to situations where a seat changes due to a primary challenge? Also looking for data on situations where the primary challenge results in a safe seat being lost because the challenger is just too loony for the general election.
Since I'm lazy... Has anyone charted how often house seats flip parties compared to situations where a seat changes due to a primary challenge? Also looking for data on situations where the primary challenge results in a safe seat being lost because the challenger is just too loony for the general election.
With house seats, if they flip parties it's mostly due to post-census Gerrymandering than any sorts of primary challenges or things like that. House seats in general are pretty much all Gerrymandered to hell and pretty much never flip. On the rare occasions where they do flip, it tends to be due to a poor job of Gerrymandering. For example, there was a case in Texas a while back where they basically moved a bunch of Democratic regions into a heavily Republican district while redistricting in order to attempt to gain another Republican seat by drowning out all the Democratic voters with those from the former Republican district. However, they miscalculated just what the Democratic demographics were and ended up losing that seat instead.
it's not so much poor Gerrymandering as much as they can't control what an area's population is going to look like 10 years later or completely control how a demographic is going to suddenly start voting, that happened in PA, where suddenly some republican area's started voting Democrat in 2006, but by 2012 after redistricting they lost most of those seats again.
Would it be safe to say that House seats are set during redistricting and the public voting part is just theatrics?
Basically, yes. I've seen exercises where you can swing the US House of Representatives something like 70 seats in either direction with fairly simple redistricting.
It's kind of ironic when you think about it. When Congress was first set up during the original Constitutional Convention, the idea was that the House of Representatives would be elected by direct popular vote and the Senate would be appointed by the local state legislatures. In the modern era, it's now more like the Senate is elected by direct popular vote and the House of Representatives is appointed by the state legislatures due to the side effects of Gerrymandering.
I was thinking Morgan Freeman but Nate Silver... Yeah... Sounds like seething he would say but it might also be too easy for people to fact check and figure out?
I was thinking Morgan Freeman but Nate Silver... Yeah... Sounds like seething he would say but it might also be too easy for people to fact check and figure out?
Not easy to prove a negative. This isn't something that will be on snopes.
So... What is there to stop Treasury from issuing trillions of new debt in this small window of "nonenforcement" the Republicans are offering?
The Treasury is limited to only spend money (or issue debt) on things already authorized by Congress. So basically they can issue debt to pay for things like Social Security, the VA, outstanding DoD bills, and so on, but they can't issue debt to purchase new solid gold toilet seats for the White House as Congress never approved their purchase (at least last time I checked the budget).
Understood. Is that limit only on current (bill due today) debt or all debt?
Example: Congress authorizes $X over the next three years. Can treasury use that to justify issuing $X debt or does it only justify raising 1/3 of $X (same amount spent each of those three years)?
Understood. Is that limit only on current (bill due today) debt or all debt?
Example: Congress authorizes $X over the next three years. Can treasury use that to justify issuing $X debt or does it only justify raising 1/3 of $X (same amount spent each of those three years)?
That's a good question, and I'm not sure. Plus, it gets mangled with the whole debt ceiling debacle, but I'll get to that later. Anyway, assuming there is no set timetable in the Congressional authorization of $X and there is no debt ceiling, then Treasury can issue up to $X of debt as it sees fit. Realistically, it's unlikely that Treasury would issue all $X of debt up front to cover the payments for that as, in practice, what usually happens is that Treasury waits until all the revenues have been taken in for a given year and then only issues enough debt, up to the debt ceiling, to make up for any shortfall. So while in theory, Treasury can issue all $X of debt at once (again, ignoring any debt ceilings), in practice it only issues $X/3 over the course of the three years as that's generally how it does its thing anyway.
Now, as far as how the debt ceiling plays into this, the 14th amendment states "The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned." Depending on how one interprets this clause, it's entirely possible that the debt ceiling is unconstitutional. Going back to your example, Congress, by authorizing $X in spending, has also automatically authorized the government to issue up to $X in debt in order to pay for said spending, otherwise they risk invalidating the public debt of the United States. Of course, there are alternate interpretations of this amendment as well, especially in light of Article I, Section 8 which states that only Congress has the power to issue debt, with Treasury simply being the agent authorized by Congress to exercise that power. This interpretation states that not issuing debt to cover the obligations of the United States is not the same as questioning the validity of that debt. Both sides have some respectable legal scholars arguing their case, so it basically would come down to what the courts say if this ever became an issue.
Correct me if I am wrong but a budget has not been passed in four years. Are budgets written in such a way that if a new one is not passed the old one remains in effect? Are there built in elements that allow more money to be spent on items every year than initially authorized?
If there is no budget how can there be all this spending? If congress does not pass a budget wouldn't the spending be unconstitutional?
It appears that the debt ceiling should not exist because congress is authorizing the expenditures of money in the first place.
There hasn't been a budget passed, but Congress has passed multiple "spending bills" in lieu of a budget. Basically, instead of passing one big bill that has the entire budget for an entire year all at one go, they've been saying "we need $X for defense, let's pass a bill now to do that," then later saying, "we need $Y for homeland security, let's pass a bill now to do that," and so on. Please note that the Constitution itself says nothing about having to set a budget, only that Congress has the power to authorize the spending of money by the government. Congress can basically decide what to spend and when to spend at any time it wants.
Your statement that the debt ceiling should not exist because Congress is authorizing the expenditures of money in the first place is actually shared by a fair number of Constitutional scholars, so it's not a new statement.
Comments
Example: Congress authorizes $X over the next three years. Can treasury use that to justify issuing $X debt or does it only justify raising 1/3 of $X (same amount spent each of those three years)?
Now, as far as how the debt ceiling plays into this, the 14th amendment states "The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned." Depending on how one interprets this clause, it's entirely possible that the debt ceiling is unconstitutional. Going back to your example, Congress, by authorizing $X in spending, has also automatically authorized the government to issue up to $X in debt in order to pay for said spending, otherwise they risk invalidating the public debt of the United States. Of course, there are alternate interpretations of this amendment as well, especially in light of Article I, Section 8 which states that only Congress has the power to issue debt, with Treasury simply being the agent authorized by Congress to exercise that power. This interpretation states that not issuing debt to cover the obligations of the United States is not the same as questioning the validity of that debt. Both sides have some respectable legal scholars arguing their case, so it basically would come down to what the courts say if this ever became an issue.
If there is no budget how can there be all this spending? If congress does not pass a budget wouldn't the spending be unconstitutional?
It appears that the debt ceiling should not exist because congress is authorizing the expenditures of money in the first place.
I don't know of any other country that has a debt ceiling.
Your statement that the debt ceiling should not exist because Congress is authorizing the expenditures of money in the first place is actually shared by a fair number of Constitutional scholars, so it's not a new statement.