tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-79695592024-03-07T03:55:19.363-05:00Honest GraftThe promise and puzzles of American politicsDavid A. Hopkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14492380330812580026noreply@blogger.comBlogger327125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7969559.post-62199425407388980542023-12-18T12:56:00.004-05:002023-12-18T12:56:32.302-05:00New Interview at The Signal on Biden's Polling Problems Amid a Changing and Disorienting WorldI recently spoke with Michael Bluhm of The Signal about Joe Biden's lagging poll numbers, the nation's long psychological pandemic hangover, and why the United States isn't as politically unique as Americans often think. Members of The Signal website can read our conversation <a href="https://www.thesgnl.com/2023/12/trump-biden-polling/">here</a>.<div><br /></div><div>Honest Graft has been on temporary hiatus due to a new and exciting book project, but will return in January 2024 to keep an eye on the upcoming presidential election and the rest of an eventful political scene. Stay tuned...we'll be back very soon!</div>David A. Hopkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14492380330812580026noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7969559.post-91980267811151798542023-06-23T12:41:00.000-04:002023-06-23T12:41:02.671-04:00New Interview at The Signal on the Generation Gap in American Politics<p> I recently spoke to Michael Bluhm at The Signal about the uniquely pro-Democratic skew of millennial and Gen-Z voters, and how this trend fits within larger demographic changes within the American population. An edited transcript of our conversation is <a href="https://www.thesgnl.com/2023/06/united-states-younger-generations-political-shift/">now available</a>.</p>David A. Hopkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14492380330812580026noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7969559.post-7152671226745270872023-05-08T13:51:00.002-04:002023-05-08T13:51:15.775-04:00Today in Bloomberg Opinion: The Debt Ceiling Crisis Can Be Averted Only by Muddling Through<p>As the federal government draws closer every day to an unprecedented crisis over the debt ceiling, it's become apparent that averting default will require Joe Biden and Kevin McCarthy to choose a messy solution over the allure of a symbolic partisan victory, as I argue today in my <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2023-05-08/debt-limit-standoff-biden-mccarthy-can-choose-compromise-or-humiliation">latest piece for Bloomberg Opinion</a>. (The article is also available via the <i><a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/energy/2023/05/08/debt-limit-standoff-biden-mccarthy-can-choose-compromise-or-humiliation/ad267bcc-ed98-11ed-b67d-a219ec5dfd30_story.html">Washington Post</a></i>.)</p>David A. Hopkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14492380330812580026noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7969559.post-14343555144328427742023-04-17T14:23:00.001-04:002023-04-17T14:23:07.058-04:00Today in Bloomberg Opinion: Republicans Blame the Schools For the Liberalism of the Young<p>The efforts of Republican politicians and conservative leaders to restrict material deemed ideologically unacceptable from public schools and libraries have attracted a great deal of attention recently. As I <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2023-04-16/republicans-won-t-win-back-the-youth-vote-with-a-culture-war?utm_source=website&utm_medium=share&utm_campaign=twitter">explain for Bloomberg Opinion</a>, the idea that these institutions have become machines of liberal indoctrination allows conservatives to explain why younger Americans are mostly left-of-center politically without holding their own movement responsible for its lack of appeal among rising generations. This piece is <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2023/04/16/republicans-won-t-win-back-the-youth-vote-with-a-culture-war/d9245026-dc51-11ed-a78e-9a7c2418b00c_story.html">also available via the <i>Washington Post</i></a>.</p>David A. Hopkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14492380330812580026noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7969559.post-44579156646084582862023-03-30T17:42:00.000-04:002023-03-30T17:42:00.435-04:00Today in Bloomberg Opinion: Opposition to Gun Control Is About Culture, Not Money<p>Democrats are fond of accusing their Republican opponents of doing the bidding of wealthy or corporate bankrollers, including on gun policy. Yet the power of the NRA and other gun control opponents has little to do with the money they spend on campaigns, instead reflecting the redefinition of gun ownership as a strong political identity. Most Americans may support additional restrictions on access to firearms, especially in the wake of a school shooting like this week's tragedy in Nashville. But there is no countervailing identity of "non-ownership" to motivate the other side of the debate, as I explain in <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2023/03/30/nashville-shooting-aftermath-why-the-gun-lobby-is-so-strong/69622302-cf23-11ed-8907-156f0390d081_story.html">today's column for Bloomberg Opinion</a>. (The piece is <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2023/03/30/nashville-shooting-aftermath-why-the-gun-lobby-is-so-strong/69622302-cf23-11ed-8907-156f0390d081_story.html">also available via the <i>Washington Post</i></a>.)</p>David A. Hopkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14492380330812580026noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7969559.post-64322913945368885942023-03-11T11:58:00.003-05:002023-03-11T11:58:18.881-05:00Today in Bloomberg Opinion: The Parties Are Still Polarized on Economics Even Though the Class Divide Is Fading<p> It used to be easy to explain the relationship between the voting constituency of each party and the positions its politicians took in policy debates: Democrats are the party of the poor and favor big, redistributive government, while Republicans are the party of the rich and favor small, business-friendly government. But even though economic class is no longer a reliable guide to how Americans vote, party leaders remain committed to very different policy goals and visions—foreshadowing a bitter debate over the federal budget this year, as I <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2023-03-11/biden-budget-reflects-old-battle-lines-between-democrats-and-gop">explain today in Bloomberg Opinion</a>. (The piece is <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2023/03/11/biden-budget-reflects-old-battle-lines-between-democrats-and-gop/a37fd370-c011-11ed-9350-7c5fccd598ad_story.html">also available via the <i>Washington Post</i></a>.)</p>David A. Hopkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14492380330812580026noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7969559.post-87186247932825105202023-03-03T14:32:00.003-05:002023-03-03T14:32:54.053-05:00Today in Bloomberg Opinion: Whatever Happened to the New Democrats?<p> Simon Rosenberg, one of the most prominent operators within the New Democrats of the 1980s and 1990s, has announced the closing of his organization NDN (formerly the New Democrat Network) and <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2023/02/democratic-strategist-simon-rosenberg-ndn-new-democratic-network/673182/">proclaimed the end</a> of the era of the New Democrats. I wrote today about what the New Dems' rise and fall can tell us about how parties adapt to changing political times for <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2023-03-03/joe-biden-has-no-need-for-bill-clinton-s-democratic-party">Bloomberg Opinion</a> (reprinted by the <i><a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/how-democrats-got-away-from-third-way-politics/2023/03/03/b7ba6936-b9c2-11ed-b0df-8ca14de679ad_story.html">Washington Post</a></i>).</p>David A. Hopkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14492380330812580026noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7969559.post-6150799587121403912023-02-14T12:48:00.002-05:002023-02-14T12:48:11.317-05:00Today in Bloomberg Opinion: Why the Two Parties Talk So Differently About Education<p> In <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2023-02-14/campaign-2024-why-republicans-and-democrats-disagree-about-schools">today's piece for Bloomberg Opinion</a>, I explain why Democrats tend to view education as an economic issue, while Republicans have come to treat it as a cultural issue. This difference between the parties reflects two distinct perceptions of class conflict in America: is education a way for the economically disadvantaged to find opportunity, or is it a system by which cultural elites impose their values on regular Americans? The column is <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/why-americas-schools-are-getting-more-political/2023/02/14/e82a5874-ac66-11ed-b0ba-9f4244c6e5da_story.html">also available in the <i>Washington Post</i></a>.</p>David A. Hopkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14492380330812580026noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7969559.post-61511132814353637672023-02-09T12:36:00.002-05:002023-02-09T12:36:52.253-05:00Honest Graft on the "Congress, Two Beers In" Podcast<p> I had a great time the other day chatting with Josh Huder of Georgetown University on the "Congress, Two Beers In" podcast sponsored by Georgetown's Government Affairs Institute. We discussed Republicans, Democrats, Biden, Trump, Congress, policy, and media as we tried to figure out the current status of American party politics and where things might go from here. The episode is available at <a href="https://gai.georgetown.edu/congress-two-beers-in-podcast/">this link</a> or can be found on podcast apps by searching for the Government Affairs Institute.</p>David A. Hopkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14492380330812580026noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7969559.post-85286497812996541992023-02-03T10:56:00.003-05:002023-02-03T10:56:33.446-05:00Today in Bloomberg Opinion: Biden's Had Success with Congress, But He's No LBJ<p>Some Democrats, justifiably happy with the legislative productivity of the 2021–2022 session of Congress, have gotten a little carried away lately when describing its supposed transformational importance. In today's <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2023-02-03/biden-s-legislative-record-is-impressive-but-he-s-no-obama">column for Bloomberg Opinion</a>, I draw on data showing that the last Congress was not historically exceptional in its lawmaking acoomplishments, and suggest that Biden's perceived achievements were made possible by the previous success of Barack Obama in enacting major health care reform in 2010. The piece is also available on the <i><a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/bidens-successes-were-made-possible-by-obama/2023/02/03/176e0b92-a3c2-11ed-8b47-9863fda8e494_story.html">Washington Post</a></i> site.</p>David A. Hopkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14492380330812580026noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7969559.post-72672099467595741132023-01-23T14:10:00.004-05:002023-01-23T14:10:54.395-05:00Today in Bloomberg Opinion: Why Are Democrats More United? The Voters Did It<p>The Democratic Party is more unified these days than it was in the past—and is certainly less openly divided than the Republicans, who just took five days to select a Speaker of the House. The main reason for this newfound internal harmony is the evolving behavior of the American electorate: the moderate/conservative dissident bloc of Democrats representing rural constituencies has mostly disappeared from office, replaced by more ideologically orthodox Democrats from the suburbs. This change has made party leaders' job easier and has eased the chronic factionalism that is now more evident on the Republican side of the aisle, as I explain further in my <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2023-01-23/democrats-are-now-united-and-it-s-likely-to-last">latest column for Bloomberg Opinion</a>.</p>David A. Hopkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14492380330812580026noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7969559.post-16146306408787225432023-01-09T16:17:00.001-05:002023-01-09T16:17:02.563-05:00Today in Bloomberg Opinion: What the Freedom Caucus Gets Right About the GOP<p>The extended process of electing a House speaker last week put Republicans' internal divisions on public display. Democrats and leadership-aligned Republicans had ample opportunity to attack or mock the band of holdouts, many affiliated with the House Freedom Caucus, who prevented Kevin McCarthy from becoming speaker until the 15th round of balloting. But for all their grandstanding, the holdouts have a point about how Republicans fail to deliver on their government-cutting promises—which portends more conflict ahead, as I explain in <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2023-01-09/house-republican-rebels-have-a-point-about-smaller-government?srnd=opinion-politics-and-policy">today's column for Bloomberg Opinion</a>.</p>David A. Hopkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14492380330812580026noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7969559.post-149779621885790082022-12-27T11:52:00.005-05:002022-12-27T11:52:36.244-05:00Today in Bloomberg Opinion: Most Voters Are Partisans, But Independents Were Decisive in 2022<p>Sifting through the evidence from the 2022 election reveals that Democrats' better-than-expected performance didn't reflect a turnout advantage over Republicans, but instead resulted from a historically unusual success among independent voters. Although it's fashionable to view the American public as divided into two implacable partisan sides, the remaining slice of persuadable voters can easily prove decisive in a highly competitive electoral environment, as I discuss further in <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2022-12-27/independent-voters-do-exist-and-they-re-more-important-than-ever">today's piece for Bloomberg Opinion</a>.</p>David A. Hopkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14492380330812580026noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7969559.post-15323514306591208872022-12-11T12:38:00.002-05:002022-12-11T12:38:37.950-05:00Today in Blooomberg Opinion: Let's Stop Messing with the Voting Rules<p> Georgia's Senate runoff was resolved much earlier this year than it was last time, when it wasn't held until January. But this change reflected how often the rules that govern our elections are changed and changed again as the party in charge seeks a crude strategic advantage. And in this case, it didn't even gain that advantage—the Georgia Republicans who moved up the runoff date to cut down on early voting lost on Tuesday, just as they did in the 2021 runoff. In my <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2022-12-10/georgia-s-senate-election-offers-both-parties-one-important-lesson?utm_content=politics&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter&utm_campaign=socialflow-organic&cmpid%3D=socialflow-twitter-politics">latest piece for Bloomberg Opinion</a>, I pine for the day when both parties accept a stable set of rules and focus on the much nobler task of persuading and mobilizing voters.</p>David A. Hopkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14492380330812580026noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7969559.post-38909435244893169062022-12-03T11:05:00.002-05:002022-12-03T11:05:37.465-05:00Today in Bloomberg Opinion: Voter Turnout Was High Again in 2022<p>Voter turnout in the 2018 midterms reached 50 percent of eligible citizens, a modern record. This year, it stayed nearly as high (47 percent), indicating that the voter surge last time was more than simply a "Trump effect." I consider what the rise in turnout says about today's American politics in my <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2022-12-03/2022-voter-turnout-was-almost-a-record-is-it-a-new-trend">latest piece for <i>Bloomberg Opinion</i></a>. </p>David A. Hopkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14492380330812580026noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7969559.post-86321055659694119332022-11-26T11:31:00.003-05:002022-11-26T11:31:42.758-05:00Today in Bloomberg Opinion: Trump's Critics Call Him Unelectable. Will Voters Listen?<p>The disappointing results of the 2022 midterms have awakened concerns among some Republicans about their party's occasional tendency to nominate weak candidates in key races. Some of these party leaders now fear that another Trump nomination in 2024 will drag down their party once again—but <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2022-11-26/to-defeat-trump-stop-calling-him-a-loser">as I observe in <i>Bloomberg Opinion</i> today</a>, Republican voters aren't nearly as accustomed as Democrats to accept that a tradeoff exists between electability and other party goals.</p>David A. Hopkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14492380330812580026noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7969559.post-15871320416316088922022-11-13T14:20:00.005-05:002022-11-13T14:20:56.228-05:00Today in Bloomberg Opinion: Bad Candidates Were Only Part of the GOP's Problem<p> The Republican Party's unexpectedly disappointing performance in the 2022 midterm elections has inspired some finger-pointing at its flawed slate of Senate nominees in key states (and the former president whose endorsement helped these candidates gain nomination). But as I argue in a <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2022-11-12/midterm-elections-republicans-problems-run-deeper-than-candidate-quality">new piece for <i>Bloomberg Opinion</i></a>, candidate quality was not the only reason why the GOP underperformed last week. The results are consistent with a larger party image problem that extended beyond a few unappealing candidates.</p>David A. Hopkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14492380330812580026noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7969559.post-42195329482055043532022-11-07T11:03:00.008-05:002022-11-07T11:03:45.088-05:00Today in Bloomberg Opinion: We Know More About Our Candidates Than We Ever Did Before—But It Matters Less<p>One of the main story lines of the 2022 election has been the question of whether the Republicans have squandered a favorable general climate by choosing a weak set of specific nominees. In my <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2022-11-07/midterm-elections-which-matters-more-candidate-or-party">final pre-election piece for Bloomberg Opinion</a>, I explain that while the proliferation of information makes it easier than ever to learn about the qualities—including the foibles—of individual candidates, the power of partisanship is so strong these days that these considerations mean much less than they once did.</p>David A. Hopkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14492380330812580026noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7969559.post-40941136207133140152022-10-31T11:40:00.006-04:002022-10-31T11:40:50.440-04:00Today in Bloomberg Opinion: Puncturing the Hype Around Debates<p>With all the increasing attention that debates are getting as our politics becomes nationalized and social media-driven, their actual substantive value to citizens remains dubious. In my <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2022-10-30/midterms-2022-debates-were-far-fewer-this-year-and-that-s-fine">latest column for <i>Bloomberg Opinion</i></a>, I lament the way debates are covered in the media and conclude that we're actually much better off if elections <i>aren't</i> decided on the basis of candidates' debate performances.</p>David A. Hopkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14492380330812580026noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7969559.post-62952730419329582532022-10-21T10:15:00.001-04:002022-10-21T10:15:19.333-04:00What a Republican Congressional Majority Might Do: An Interview with The SignalIn an extended interview, I <a href="https://www.thesgnl.com/2022/10/us-midterms-republican-party-david-hopkins/">spoke with Graham Vyse of The Signal</a> about what to expect from a hypothetical Republican congressional majority next year. It's likely to be an eventful Congress; as I observed in the interview, "The last time there was both a Democratic House and a Republican president in the United States, the president was impeached twice. The last time there was a Republican House and a Democratic president, the Republican speaker got run out of town by his own party."David A. Hopkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14492380330812580026noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7969559.post-75616860888740987862022-10-20T12:53:00.005-04:002022-10-20T12:53:53.967-04:00Today in Bloomberg Opinion: Republicans and Corporate America Split on Culture, Ally on Economics<p>In <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2022-10-20/are-republicans-and-big-business-headed-for-a-breakup">today's column for <i>Bloomberg Opinion</i></a>, I investigate the Republican Party's proclaimed "divorce" from big business. Corporate America and the populist Trump-era GOP have indeed found themselves on opposite sides of the culture war. But they still have much to agree on when it comes to economic policy, so their relationship looks more like a strained marriage than a permanent split.</p>David A. Hopkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14492380330812580026noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7969559.post-12252447143303852442022-10-11T14:24:00.005-04:002022-10-11T14:26:17.095-04:00As Biden's New Drug Policy Shows, When It Comes to Legalization It's the Political Leaders Who Are Being Led<div><span style="font-family: inherit;">President Biden announced on Thursday that he would issue pardons to Americans with federal marijuana possession convictions, while encouraging governors to do the same for the much greater number of citizens convicted of similar offenses at the state level. Biden also revealed that his administration would begin the process of reviewing whether marijuana should be classified by the federal government as a dangerous Schedule I drug. While the president cannot fully legalize marijuana possession or sale without congressional approval, Biden’s actions represent a clear gesture of support for ending the enforcement of laws prohibiting its use.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">For anyone who is old enough to remember the aggressiveness of the government’s anti-drug campaigns in the 1980s and 1990s, the prospect of federal marijuana decriminalization is a notable milestone. And the fact that Biden is the president overseeing this policy change seems even more remarkable. Although he was a young left-of-center adult during the 1960s, the teetotaling Biden has never exhibited any whiff of the counterculture, and his record in the Senate—especially while chairing the Judiciary Committee between 1987 and 1995—was marked by repeated support for toughening federal penalties for drug-related crimes.<br /></span><o:p><span style="font-family: inherit;"> <br /></span></o:p><span style="font-family: inherit;">But by changing his mind about cannabis policy, Biden is merely following a path already traveled by many of his fellow Americans. In 1990, only 16 percent of respondents to the University of Chicago’s <a href="https://gssdataexplorer.norc.org/trends" style="color: #954f72;">General Social Survey</a> favored the legalization of marijuana. By 2018, the most recent year with available data, the share of supporters had risen to 61 percent. The rate of increase was even higher among Democrats: from 17 percent in 1990 to 69 percent just 28 years later.<br /></span><o:p><span style="font-family: inherit;"> <br /></span></o:p><span style="font-family: inherit;">It’s rare for public opinion to swing so dramatically on any political issue. But drug legalization is an especially unusual case because American citizens started rethinking their beliefs well before their elected representatives did. Even today, political leaders still seem to be lagging behind the rapidly shifting attitudes of their constituents.<br /></span><o:p><span style="font-family: inherit;"> <br /></span></o:p><span style="font-family: inherit;">Political scientists have traditionally emphasized the role of political elites in shaping the views of ordinary citizens. On many issues, most Democrats and Republicans in the mass public accept the positions advocated by the leaders of their favored party. For example, the share of Republican voters who saw free trade agreements as a “good thing for the U.S.” dropped from 56 percent in 2015 to 36 percent two years later, according to the <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2017/04/25/support-for-free-trade-agreements-rebounds-modestly-but-wide-partisan-differences-remain/" style="color: #954f72;">Pew Research Center</a>, reflecting the sudden shift in messaging from the top of their party once Donald Trump, a vocal critic of free trade, assumed leadership of the GOP.<br /></span><o:p><span style="font-family: inherit;"> <br /></span></o:p><span style="font-family: inherit;">But the rise in support for legal marijuana can’t be explained that way. It began in the 1990s, well before gaining the endorsement of prominent politicians in either party. Advocates of legalization initially found much more success in enacting state-level reforms using the citizen initiative process, which put their proposals directly before voters, than they did by persuading their elected representatives to approve changes in state law. Seven of the first eight states to legalize cannabis for medical purposes (starting with California in 1996), and 12 of the first 14 states to approve recreational use (starting with Colorado and Washington in 2012), <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_cannabis_laws_in_the_United_States#Medical_cannabis_begins_%E2%80%93_1996" style="color: #954f72;">did so</a> via ballot proposition.<br /></span><o:p><span style="font-family: inherit;"> <br /></span></o:p><span style="font-family: inherit;">On this issue, Americans didn’t simply listen to their party’s most prominent figures. Decreased national crime rates since the 1980s, newfound skepticism of the theory that marijuana acts as a “gateway drug” to more dangerous substances, and growing media promotion of its medical benefits have convinced voters to support legalization over the reluctance or outright opposition of most political leaders. International trade and other complicated, remote topics might ordinarily prompt citizens to exercise deference to the judgment of professional politicians. But drug legalization seems like an easy issue to understand and relate to personal experience, which makes voters more secure in making up their own minds.<br /></span><o:p><span style="font-family: inherit;"> <br /></span></o:p><span style="font-family: inherit;">Biden is clearly hoping to increase voter enthusiasm among young Democrats and liberal independents by announcing his policy change a month before the midterm elections. But after waiting as long as he did, Biden’s timing risks becoming anti-climactic. Most supporters already live in states where marijuana is either fully legal or permitted in practice, and even the Republican opposition doesn’t seem motivated to put up much of a public fight over an issue on which popular sentiment has steadily moved leftward. Sometimes in politics, our so-called leaders discover that they’re the ones who are being led to someplace new.</span></div>David A. Hopkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14492380330812580026noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7969559.post-63896006755365413682022-09-30T22:07:00.002-04:002022-09-30T22:07:24.717-04:00Today in Bloomberg Opinion: Trying to Nationalize a Nationalized Election<p>Kevin McCarthy and the House Republican leadership recently released their "Commitment to America," the latest in a series of successors to Newt Gingrich's 1994 Contract with America<a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2022-09-30/republican-commitment-to-america-is-more-redundant-than-misguided">. Today in Bloomberg Opinion, I argue</a> that the minority parties engaging in this strategy are making two flawed assumptions: that voters will care (or even know) about these manifestos, and that they will help nationalize the election. Because today's congressional elections are already nationalized, these policy plans are mostly an exercise in redundancy.</p>David A. Hopkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14492380330812580026noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7969559.post-75768960024554693202022-09-26T13:56:00.000-04:002022-09-26T13:56:04.327-04:00Today in Bloomberg Opinion: Another "Year of the Woman" in the 2022 Elections<p>The number of women running for Congress and governor spiked upward in 2018 among Democrats, and then rose again in 2020 within both parties as Republican leaders responded by recruiting their own slate of female candidates. It remains high in 2022, even though the original cause of this surge—the presidency of Donald Trump—no longer exists. For <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2022-09-26/campaign-2022-more-democrats-and-republicans-are-candidates">Bloomberg Opinion this week</a>, I consider whether an enduring rise in the number of office-seeking women will turn out to be an important legacy of Trump's election, and identify two reasons why it may well rise even higher in 2024.</p>David A. Hopkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14492380330812580026noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7969559.post-57398158615128331712022-09-19T12:47:00.003-04:002022-10-20T12:47:14.230-04:00Today in Bloomberg Opinion: Why the Democrats' Policy Accomplishments Don't Necessarily Help Them Win This Year<p>In my <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2022-09-18/campaign-2022-biden-achievements-may-not-matter-much-to-voters">newest piece for Bloomberg Opinion</a>, I explain that Democrats should not expect to be rewarded by voters for their recent policy accomplishments this fall, as voters have historically turned against the ruling party in midterm elections regardless of—and sometimes because of—its legislative productivity. For Joe Biden, the political payoff from policy changes like the climate change bill and the student debt forgiveness plan is more likely to arrive when he asks his fellow Democrats to nominate him a second time in 2024.</p>David A. Hopkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14492380330812580026noreply@blogger.com