The real divide - and it isn't left/ right or religion

It seems to have less impact at the national level and where candidates are well known and the media gives them a lot of coverage for free. The lesser known house races? I’d guess something like a 42/58 “safe” seat in a midterm election is going to provide a high ROI where some concentrated organizing and funding could sneak in a few flips.

The important question is “Do candidates think that spending has an impact?”

If they do, then they spend time and energy raising funds. If “big” donors are a significant share of their funding, then those donors will get face time and a chance to push their priorities. Even if the candidate makes no promises, the constant interaction with people who can make big contributions changes elected officials ideas of what is “reasonable” policy.

If candidates think that money doesn’t matter, they don’t spend time on fund raising and they aren’t subject to this effect.

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The important thing is getting the message out, swaying the opinions of swayable voters, and convincing the base to actually show up and vote.

There are ways to do that inexpensively (which Krasnov seems to excel at) and ways that require lots and lots of money.

Spending lots and lots of money isn’t going to generate success if the other side has mastered the inexpensive (or at least not-visibly-expensive) game.

We need pull funding so people stop going to college, mandate that tax dollars be sent to religious schools to indoctrinate youth, and have uneducated religious young adults crank out babies to save the country:

Oh, the irony: both authors have PhDs. :roll_eyes:

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Yep. These rich guys think someone else’s families should become uneducated baby factories.

PhD Divinity?

Guys I’m doing my best over here

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:baby_symbol: :baby_symbol: :baby_symbol: :baby_symbol:

us
saluting_face

Prior to Heritage, Greene was at the University of Arkansas, where he served as Distinguished Professor and Chair of the Department of Education Reform, which he founded and led for 16 years. Greene received his bachelor’s degree in History from Tufts University and earned his PhD in Government from Harvard University.

Burke holds a bachelor’s degree in Politics from Hollins University in Roanoke, VA, and a master of teaching degree in Foreign Language Education from the University of Virginia. She earned her PhD in Education Policy from George Mason University, where she examined the intersection of education choice and institutional theory.

This is almost exactly the main plot of The Handmaid’s Tale. Basically, birth rates are decreasing and (to keep it short) women are forbidden from education or reading, indoctrinated into religious fundamentalism, and turned into breeding stock for the Christian Nationalists.

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if you think there should be more babies, be like Elon and have more.

though maybe more subsidies for child care would help. It’s ridiculous you can deduct loads of stuff but child care has a superlow deduction limit.

That’s because women should be staying home with the kids /s

I think this is actually the point though

But the way our tax code is set up it’s at least gender neutral

But there are definitely incentives to have someone stay home in a two parent household and my theory is this is not entirely by accident.

Still, if the government wants people to have kids, they should focus on the main current barrier which is child care the first few years before pre-K. And an incentive for a parent to stay home is maybe not as important as an incentive to have kids in the first place

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