The allocation of the Senate grossly favors the Republicans, and until/unless the Democrats start picking up rural whites the Senate will remain in or near Republican hands for the foreseeable future. Ditching the filibuster probably wouldn't bother McConnell all that much, to be honest.

In regards to the minimum wage, if states like Alaska, Arizona, Florida, Missouri, and Arkansas can get their heads out of their asses and raise the minimum wage in their respective states, I think raising it nationally isn't an undoable task for this coming congress. The question is what that minimum wage will be, Obama admin wanted 10.10 an hour if I recall correctly but that feels too low for today. A lot of people suggest 15 an hour but will enough Republicans (if any) get behind that number? Also, would raising the federal minimum wage require 60 votes (Supermajority) or just 50 (with tie-breaker Kamala)? If just 50 votes are needed then the chances of raising the federal minimum wage are much easier to do for Biden's admin.

I disagree with this quite a bit.  Maybe the far right was the same, but our politics have become more polarized. 10 years ago, there was a pretty strong center wing of the Republican Party.   Remember, these political parties are supposed to be big tent parties, supporting a bunch of varied, but roughly aligned ideals.  That center has been pretty much demolished  by the tea party and trump.  There are still a few republicans that represent that center/moderate stance like murkowski, Collins, and Romney.  Flipping from representing the center in one party to representing the center in another party shouldn’t be that big of a deal.  The only reason to do so would be if ones political party gets so radicalized that the center is no longer supported... which is increasingly the case with republicans.  Flipping parties doesn’t mean they don’t have ideals, it just means they believe in compromise and focus on the middle ground.  Compromise is not a bad thing, we need to stop punishing politicians for doing it.  It’s pretty much the core problem with politics...

It’s pretty normal for the sitting president to lose party support in the house and senate though.  Hopefully, republicans learn their lesson and change.  If not, I hope they continue to lose support.

Obamacare was completely gutted to appease Republicans and get it through. It's not even close to what universal healthcare should be. There were more exemptions than inclusions in that bill and that's not how it works.

I don't really care which way the singular politicians lean when they all vote along party lines anyway. A moderate can pretend to be a moderate as long as he wants but he isn't a moderate when he votes for extremist policies.

It has also to do with your viewpoint. In my book denying people basic human rights and constantly voting to make workers' lives worse is extremist and exactly as bad as leading an insurrection, if not worse. Republicans have done this for decades. They have hated working class people for a long time and that did not change with an extremist uprising. It's just that they got a bit more overt in their extremism. Before that they were the same human trashbags fighting to make people's lives worse to benefit corporations and themselves.

Republicans have killed their own constituents in the millions for decades, it's just that those deaths weren't as newsworthy as a cop being beaten to death.

Tomorrow seems to be the appropriate time to close this thread. If you have anything left to say, now would be the time.

It's over!

In case people want to talk about the inauguration, might want to not close this tomorrow. Inauguration should mark the end of the 'election period' though, so it should definitely start the final countdown for this thread. That said, not a long of people talking in this thread anymore, so unless nothing changes, perhaps closing is in order.

I sort of feel like that would be just general US politics? People have been pretty much using that thread anyway for anything related to the transition.