I’m not even going to TRY to list out all 435 House Races, but let’s keep the discussion on that here.

Google election results is showing:

220 R / 215 D with 218 needed for majority.

CA 13 - Flipped - R to D.
CA 45 - Flipped - R to D.
OR 5 - Flipped - R to D.

Currently, the makeup of the House is:

https://pressgallery.house.gov/member-data/party-breakdown

220 Republicans
212 Democrats
3 Vacancies

Rep. Mike Gallagher (R-WI) resigned effective 04/25/2024.

Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee (D-TX) died 07/19/2024.

Rep. Bill Pascrell (D-NJ) died 08/21/2024.

  • ToastedPlanetEnglish
    3·
    2 months ago

    And removing the filibuster will serve the christo-fascist agenda just as well as anything else.

    It takes one vote for the Republicans to remove the filibuster. If the Republicans gain the majority in the Senate, there is nothing the Democrats can do to stop them. It’s an honor system. The filibuster ties the hands of the pro-democracy majority. The christo-fascist minority is free to obstruct when they are out of power and free to remove it when they are in power. Which the Republicans will do, because fascists are bad-faith actors.

    You can try to hand-wave it away and act like I’m pointing this out for the “sound bites” (?), but it’s simply a fact.

    “They did it first!” is literally a sound bite for the press. The Republicans were always going to remove the filibuster to get Supreme Court nominations through. Blaming the Democrats based on what they did previously was a post hoc fallacy to justify their actions.

    Perhaps you should look around. Half the country fully supports those christo-fascists, and they seem a lot more armed, a lot more organized, a lot more politically entrenched, and a lot more strategic.

    FAAFO

    You’re right, they will probably remove the filibuster when they get in power, and you’ll get your wish.

    Wanting a functioning, majority rule democracy isn’t the same as a christo-fascist dictatorship. By getting rid of the filibuster under a Democrat controlled Senate we will, in theory, be able to utilize systemic change to solve existential crises such as climate change and redistribute wealth to fix wealth inequality.

    • abff08f4813c@j4vcdedmiokf56h3ho4t62mlku.srv.us
      2·
      2 months ago

      This is exactly why I like the 127 DC states plan so much, https://www.vox.com/2020/1/14/21063591/modest-proposal-to-save-american-democracy-pack-the-union-harvard-law-review

      Need to drop the filibuster to pass the required laws to implement it, but once that’s done, Dems have not only a permanent super majority in the Senate, but the required two thirds majority of House, Senate, and even States to pass constitutional amendments. So as soon as its removed, the filibuster can be re-enshrined via a constitutional amendment as a permanent fixture (preventing the GOP from taking advantage once they inevitably retake power).

      • ToastedPlanetEnglish
        1·
        2 months ago

        That’s a clever and funny strategy. And who knows we may end up wanting to do that or something similar. But what we need isn’t the certainty of a Democrat majority and a Republican minority, but majority rule.

        Creating lots of states out of DC would solve our current dilemma of Republican overrepresentation, but it would not solve minority rule. We need to reform the institutions of our society from the ground up. The House and Senate each need a thousand seats, and the president and Supreme Court need to be elected by popular vote to name a few. All of these are possible to change, assuming bicameral legislatures are worthwhile to keep. Even the Senate, but it requires every state to agree.

        • abff08f4813c@j4vcdedmiokf56h3ho4t62mlku.srv.us
          1·
          2 months ago

          Agreed, but does it require every state to agree? If enough constitutional amendments could be passed and ratified by a two thirds majority on all levels, then the Constitution could simply be amended to implement those changes (and the authors behind the paper for this proposal expect that this is exactly what will happen once the plan is executed successfully - rather than Dems abusing their power or DC enacting minority rule over the entire country, they’ll cooperate to design a better, fairer, and reformed system)

          • ToastedPlanetEnglish
            1·
            2 months ago

            does it require every state to agree?

            Yes. It’s baked into Article V which is about amendments. The last line is the relevant line.

            Article. V.

            The Congress, whenever two thirds of both Houses shall deem it necessary, shall propose Amendments to this Constitution, or, on the Application of the Legislatures of two thirds of the several States, shall call a Convention for proposing Amendments, which, in either Case, shall be valid to all Intents and Purposes, as Part of this Constitution, when ratified by the Legislatures of three fourths of the several States, or by Conventions in three fourths thereof, as the one or the other Mode of Ratification may be proposed by the Congress; Provided that no Amendment which may be made prior to the Year One thousand eight hundred and eight shall in any Manner affect the first and fourth Clauses in the Ninth Section of the first Article; and that no State, without its Consent, shall be deprived of its equal Suffrage in the Senate.

            I’m not a constitutional scholar, but presumably an amendment cannot self-reference the article that amendments are derived from. Otherwise, we could just amend Article V to remove the last line of text and then amend the Senate as much as we wanted with another.

            I could be wrong. Maybe the Founders were hoping that the future generations would notice this, but enough slave owners at the time wouldn’t and sign it.

          • abff08f4813c@j4vcdedmiokf56h3ho4t62mlku.srv.us
            1·
            2 months ago

            Hmm… I understand the that last line to mean that every State should have the same number of Senators in the Senate.

            But from https://law.stackexchange.com/questions/56523/can-the-us-senate-be-abolished-without-unanimous-consent-of-the-states it sounds like a workaround is simply to set that equal number to zero. Meanwhile there’s no prohibition on adding a new, third House to Congress - so maybe we reply the Senate with the House of of State Peers or something.

            Alas, it looks like we’re screwed now.