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ArcticStones's avatar

Elections in Balochistan?

Although far too premature to talk about elections, this article points out that much-overlooked independence movements in Balochistan, a culturally-distinct region that spans Pakistan and Iran, may lead to the birth of a new country in the Middle East. (Or at least a region with greater autonomy.) Other than this fresh article by Memri and the BBC article from last January, I haven’t seen this mentioned much by the usual news media.

https://www.memri.org/reports/balochistan-two-steps-away-independence-pakistan-once-it-achieved-pakistan-will-collapse

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-68035478

Henrik's avatar

Huh, interesting. That would bode very poorly for the stability of both Iran and Pakistan but one doubts that either has the state capacity to do much about it

michaelflutist's avatar

Independence, let alone elections, are way premature to consider likely. Long-running insurgency. For what it's worth, I also wouldn't call that area part of the Middle East, but rather, Central Asia.

ArcticStones's avatar

You’re right on both counts. Admittedly, my headline was an attention-grabbing rhetorical device.

PS. On another (and possibly inadmissible) note: I find it strange that there is focus solely on the nuclear program of Iran, which does not yet have the bomb. While Pakistan, which is increasingly Islamistic, currently has an estimated 170 nuclear warheads!

Henrik's avatar

Especially since Pakistan has been to war in living memory with India, also a nuclear power.

Of course, part of that is the shadow of 1979 forever looming over Iran-US relations

ArcticStones's avatar

Perhaps even more so, the shadow of 1953: the CIA-instigated coup against Mohammad Mosaddegh, the democratically elected prime minister of Iran.

Paleo's avatar

I hope Ryan runs. Or at least someone stronger than Acton, who has no political experience.

bpfish's avatar

We need Ryan or someone with political skills. Ramaswamy is likely going to be incredibly weak in the general, assuming he doesn't quit at some point along the way.

sacman701's avatar

Acton might be a better foil to Vivek, a trustworthy doctor against a sketchy, obnoxious, insufferable tech bro. Ryan would be less risky but his profile is just 'career politician'.

Mike in MD's avatar

My concern about Acton is that the GOP might welcome the chance, with the support of the media, to turn the race into an endless relitigation of lockdowns and other COVID related measures (despite the fact that DeWine usually went along with Acton and was reelected anyway.) Though it’s quite possible that RFK Jr’s HHS makes her policies look much better by comparison.

One of our best assets in this race ironically may be the Trump administration and its performance, allowing Dems to paint Vivek (if nominated) as an Elon Musk wannabe whose goal is to wantonly and chaotically tear down government.

Avedee Eikew's avatar

Yeah on top of just being tied to the Trump Administration as a Republican and suck up he was supposed to lead DOGE with Musk so easy to tie him to all of the DOGE fuckups that hit Ohio.

Jonathan's avatar

I would go further and say every election in 2025 and 2026 is about the Trump administration

Jonathan's avatar

Ryan is better known

hilltopper's avatar

I'd love to see Ryan run for Gov and Brown run along side for Senate.

Anonymous's avatar

I think the reverse is more likely, three brutal races in four years is a lot to ask of Brown. Ryan is a lot younger and has been on the sidelines for the last two years so he'd hopefully have the energy to run nonstop for the next 42 months.

Jonathan's avatar

I disagree; I bet Brown is chomping at the bit; dude's track record of winning is impressive to say the least

Jonathan's avatar

Absolutely; Brown also on the same ticket up ballot

rayspace's avatar

Ryan lost in a pretty good year for Ds. Probably better to give Acton a shot as a fresh face.

James Trout's avatar

The English language Liberal Party Leadership Debate is tonight at 8 PM EST. You can watch it on Youtube here. The official decision on Trudeau's replacement will be made on 9 March. https://chefferie2025leadership.liberal.ca/debates/

ArcticStones's avatar

EUROPEANS ARE VOTING with their wallet

This January, Europeans purchased 37% more electric cars than last January. However, Elon Musk is not reaping any benefit from this. Quite the contrary! European Tesla sales were down 45% compared to January of 2024.

I have long contended that with every dollar we spend, we "vote" for the kind of society we want. Confronted with Elon Musk’s increasingly-belligerent embrace of Fascism, Europeans are doing precisely that!

Henrik's avatar

Bear in mind this is largely pre-salute.

Tesla has a variety of problems beyond just their CEO - their models have not been regularly refreshed, and the build quality and feature selection that was fine 5-6 years ago has now fallen behind most competitors. That segment is dominated by Hyundai and Rivian stateside but there are even more competitors in Europe

Then or course, Elon being Elon exacerbated all this by a magnitude

Marcus Graly's avatar

Tesla's colossal market valuation never made much sense. Essentially the bet is that they will control the large majority of the car market at some future time. There's nothing in their tech or business practices to really think that's especially likely. And Musk disengaging from the company to focus on being right-wing despot isn't helping.

Henrik's avatar

I work in finance and this has been my position for years.

At this point TSLA is no less a meme stonk than GameStop. Unless you think rampant government corruption should be factored into its share price (a defensible position!) its absurd.

As we speak it’s down 8% today, the lowest it’s been since the election

David Nir's avatar

And market cap now under $1T....

Henrik's avatar

Now down 9% as of me writing, and close to breaking the $300 support level

Henrik's avatar

Also, since I hadn’t checked in months, but DJT (Trump Media) stock is down nearly 50% since the inauguration, not that that company actually produces anything of value

Burt Kloner's avatar

The S & P 500 is down 2.6% over last 5 days; TSLA is down 14.4% over the same period

Henrik's avatar

Exactly. It’s dramatically underperforming the market since 1/20

Toiler On the Sea's avatar

TBF I'd say even 5 years ago their cars were still fairly ahead of everyone else. But as you noted, that's no longer the case. As I've said, I think Musk simply doesn't care about Tesla anymore-he's running a government that's literally ripping out EV chargers from federal building parking lots!

He's all in on SpaceX, AI and Starlink now.

Henrik's avatar

His products there aren’t bad quality, granted. But Tesla is what pays for everything else so a dramatic reduction in its value quickly becomes a big problem for his ability to leverage his other endeavors

JanusIanitos's avatar

It's going to be a critical question for what the next dem admin does with respect to SpaceX. NASA doesn't own enough of its space programs anymore and that company is ahead in a lot of ways. But we cannot justify a dem run government providing more business to such a compromised, corrupt, authoritarian figure. We have four (and hopefully only four) years to figure out how to address that, among the multitude of other problems we'll need to deal with.

Jonathan's avatar

imo this is simplistic; the NASA decisions should be based solely on science (after Trump leaves office)

JanusIanitos's avatar

"Vote with your wallet" applies not to people only, but to society at large. The government has an enormous amount of impact on any market that it involves itself in, by simple virtue of the amount of money at its disposal. That money should be used to further our goals.

JanusIanitos's avatar

I think the insane and unreasonable market valuation was from a huge number of shareholders expecting them to corner a future market beyond car sales. If the self-driving promises were ever deliverable on a real time frame, that could have made sense. After that hype caught on and the stock never went back down, too many people investors were too technically ignorant (not insulting them; their job doesn't involve being technically knowledgeable) and too hopeful of holding onto the next Apple or whatever stock that dominates the profitability of a market through a combined hardware/software ecosystem lock-in.

Of course, those promises were all 100% bullshit. Anyone with the appropriate technical backgrounds could realize that quickly. The hardware wasn't sufficient, and only gets *less* sufficient with each new release. Any software for a safety critical scenario like self-driving will inherently need a lot of time to go from "pretty much there" to "there" — a classic engineering case where the last 5% of the work is >=50% of the work. And they still are a long way from even reaching that "pretty much there" point.

The lack of proper government oversight into his consistent lies as endless stock market manipulation is honestly insane. White collar crime from the rich has been met with a shrug for way too long.

Ben F.'s avatar

So, special elections today!

-Connecticut's 40th State House & 21st State Senate District

- Maine's 24th State House district

- Primaries for California's 36th State Senate & 32nd State Assembly District

In CT, the 21st is a flip opportunity (I recall reading somewhere that it's a Trump-Biden-Trump district, R+1 in 2024), but looking by past results it's ancestrally Republican. The 40th is very D leaning, should be a hold unless something goes very wrong.

Maine's 24th also should be a D hold.

I know nothing about the CA primaries.

James Trout's avatar

Don't forget the special election tonight in the 2nd District of the Nassau County Legislature. Olena Nicks is the Democratic candidate.

Jonathan's avatar

how's it look for us?..any idea?

David Nir's avatar

Yeah, per DRA, it was Trump +8, then Biden +4. Per us, it was Trump+0.5 last year.

bpfish's avatar

Have you guys posted your pres by CD numbers for 2024? Looks like there are placeholder links for it under the "Ultimate Data Guide" tab, but I don't see the data for 2024.

David Nir's avatar

Working on it! Trust me, you'll know when we do. :)

bpfish's avatar

Haha! Awesome. Appreciate you and the team for all your work!

Henrik's avatar

Good to know I’ve got something to watch besides the Bachelor with the wife tonight haha

Diogenes's avatar

Ron DeSantis's use of his wife to try to stay in power has a precedent. In 1967, George Wallace was term-limited as governor of Alabama, but he pushed his wife Lurleen into running for governor, despite the fact that she was dying of cancer. Lurleen Wallace won the election and died in office. I would not be surprised if Donald Trump tries a similar gambit in 2028 to skirt the 22nd Amendment - get one of his children to run for president and then rule behind the throne.

ArcticStones's avatar

What a horrible but all-too-realistic prospect!

Reminiscent of Putin satisfying the limitations of Russian law by stepping aside, handing the Russian Presidency to Medvedev – with himself as Prime Minister. Naturally, Putin was still the real ruler.

Henrik's avatar

No doubt he’d love to anoint Don Jr his heir

Diogenes's avatar

I don't think he can countenance anyone as his heir, only his sock puppet.

David Nir's avatar

The Lurleen Wallace story is chilling:

"As was common at the time, the physician did not tell the news to Lurleen but to her husband, who insisted she remain unaware, and failed to seek appropriate care for her."

Diogenes's avatar

And apparently the campaign staff knew.

michaelflutist's avatar

Why did they want to hasten her death?

Diogenes's avatar

From what I have read, they were less concerned about Lurleen's health than about clinging to power.

Burt Kloner's avatar

I could think of a number of (despicable) reasons! (-:

ArcticStones's avatar

For some reason this brings to mind Newt Gingrich betraying and abandoning his wife as she was dying of cancer.

michaelflutist's avatar

Does the U.S. constitution allow someone ineligible to be elected President to run for VP? I wouldn't have thought so. Then again, the 14th Amendment should have made it illegal for Trump to run last year.

Diogenes's avatar

I would think that the Constitution's requirements for eligibility for president apply to the vice president as well. Just as both the president and vice president must be at least 35 years of age, both must abide by the 22nd Amendment.

michaelflutist's avatar

Thanks, but I think we'd really have to see specific evidence that the framers of the amendment limiting presidential terms didn't really fully mean it.

Guy Cohen's avatar

Does Trump not trust Vance as his heir?

Diogenes's avatar

No. Two weeks ago, Brett Baier asked him whether he considered Vance his "natural successor," and he replied: "No, but he's very capable,"

LiberalBuffalo's avatar

Virginia Gov

Spanberger 39%

Sears 24%

Trump Approval

59% Disapprove

37% Approve

Roanoke #C - 690 RV - 2/20

New York Gov

Hochul (inc): 46%

Lawler: 38%

Other: 10%

---

Undecided: 6%

——

NY Governor Dem Primary

Hochul: 52%

Delgado: 15%

Torres: 12%

——

Citizen Data for Unite NY | RVs | Feb. 10

Massachusetts Senate

Markey 35%

Baker 33%

YouGov #B - 700 A - 2/20

LiberalBuffalo's avatar

Ohio Gov

Acton 45%

Rammaswamy 44%

V. Ramaswamy: 48%

Tim Ryan: 42%

Public policy #B - 642 RV - 2/20 (Fpr Action)

Henrik's avatar

The Action v Ryan numbers are actually somewhat surprising to me

LiberalBuffalo's avatar

Not sure what questions they asked but it was polled for Actions campaign.

Mike in MD's avatar

Acton's? Amy Action sounds like the name of a superhero--though any Dem who wins a major statewide race in Ohio nowadays should probably qualify as that.

David Nir's avatar

The poll was for 314 Action, which hasn't endorsed her (yet) but did say kind things about her when she launched.

Toiler On the Sea's avatar

Oh JHC that Vivek-Ryan number os so depressing. How did Ohio turn into Missouri . . .

michaelflutist's avatar

How did Missouri turn into Missouri?

LiberalBuffalo's avatar

Massachusetts Gov

Healey (D): 44% - Shortsleeve (R): 12%

Healey (D): 44% - Evangelidis (R): 14%

Healey (D): 41% - Durant (R): 14%

Healey (D): 40% - Kennealy (R): 15%

Healey (D): 45% - Deaton (R): 25%

U. Mass/YouGov / Feb 20, 2025 / n=700

Kevin H.'s avatar

Baker ain't leaving the presidency of the NCAA to be a senator.

JanusIanitos's avatar

Baker wouldn't be able to win anyway.

We go through this song and dance every other cycle or so, an off-partisan governor gets hyped up as a senatorial candidate because they were popular. But a big part of why they were popular is that they were unable to push any of their party's agenda.

Barring a political disaster, Baker cannot win a senate race in Massachusetts. It's all hype with no substance, but people are going to talk about the possibility of it until at least the end of the 2030 cycle and probably through the 2032 cycle. Likewise, we're almost certainly not going to see a senator Beshear out of Kentucky.

Voters do not treat federal partisanship and local partisanship the same. They do not treat executive offices and legislative offices the same.

Jonathan's avatar

probably but Trump is losing popularity daily

Jonathan's avatar

lots of pissed off Federal government employees

Zero Cool's avatar

Yup! I would not want to be in Earle-Sears' shoes at this point.

Henrik's avatar

Apparently the GOP is trying to find somebody to run in the primary (Dave LaRock has mooted it) because her campaign so far sucks

Zero Cool's avatar

Earle-Sears isn’t anything other than a Trump stooge and she’s not even showing any kind of real independence on this.

Zero Cool's avatar

The VA-GOV race looks like Likely Democrat this point with the numbers as wide as they are here.

Paleo's avatar

Like those job approval numbers

ArcticStones's avatar

BUDGET VOTE

Electing Democrats helps only if they show up! Today, Democrats have a serious attendance problem in the House, which is unintentionally making things easier for Speaker Mike Johnson – although probably not easy enough.

– For the first vote today: Five Dems absent, two absent Republicans.

– For the Budget Rule Vote: Four Dems are absent, only one Republican.

(I don’t have the names of who is missing.)

ArcticStones's avatar

EDIT: Apparently the missing Democrats include Kevin Mullin (CA-15, medical), Raúl Grijalva (AZ-07, medical), Brittany Pettersen (CO-07, maternity), Frederica Wilson (FL-24, unknown reaon).

Paleo's avatar

Maybe Hakeem Jeffries is making another book tour appearance.

ArcticStones's avatar

Credit where credit is due: Rep. Brittany Pettersen is now there for the budget vote just a month after having a baby.

michaelflutist's avatar

Why did Governor Lamont nominate a Republican for a judgeship?

Jonathan's avatar

opens up a winnable seat(not directly answering your question)

michaelflutist's avatar

No, not at all. I don't think he needs more turnover in the Legislature.

Tigercourse's avatar

NY-17 - based on the info in the digest, I'm not sure that someone associated with the MTA or someone from the very southern tip of the district is the best candidate. As they said, still very early.

Paleo's avatar

Odds are Lawler will run for governor so it should be an open seat.

Tigercourse's avatar

If it looks like we're going to be heading into a typical midterm environment I could see him giving that a second thought and just trying to hold onto the position he has. Also, isn't it 6 years in the house where you start to be eligible for a retirement benefit?

Burt Kloner's avatar

Is there any realistic chance Dems can flip gaetz' seat given all the tumul in DC?

JanusIanitos's avatar

Very unlikely at present, but it's always worth making a modest effort in case some late breaking events push it over the edge. I wouldn't have called AL-Sen all that likely in 2017 either, but with some extraordinary circumstances it worked out in our favor.

Avedee Eikew's avatar

FL-06 would be a better target at least Volusia and Flagler counties voted for Obama in 2008 while FL-01 willingly voted for Gatez despite everything we know about him. Stefanik's seat would probably be a better target then both though her seat would also be a long long long shot.

Zero Cool's avatar

R+19 district in Florida with a nearly 70% white population.

That about sums it up!

Guy Cohen's avatar

Barring any surprises Rs should hold all the house specials easily. Only one with a slight chance at an upset is Stefanik’s.

Zero Cool's avatar

Makes sense.

Stefanik’s district in NY is a much different kind of district and has a R+9 rating last I checked.

ArcticStones's avatar

So, to win her seat, "all" we have to do is achieve German-level turnout of Democrats in Stefanik’s district: 83.5%.

Surely we can’t be any worse than the Germans, right? /s

Justin Gibson's avatar

GA-01: Far-right Christian Nationalist and Stew Peters acolyte Kandiss Taylor, who hosts Jesus, Guns, and Babies on The Stew Peters Network, will be running for Congress in 2026 in Georgia on the GOP ticket. Taylor’s announcement came on the Stephen Bannon-hosted War Room this morning.

https://www.peoplefor.org/rightwingwatch/christian-nationalist-conspiracy-theorist-kandiss-taylor-running-congress

Henrik's avatar

I bet Buddy Carter is just jazzed with this news after how much he’s brown-nosed the Trump admin this last month

ArcticStones's avatar

I don’t believe it! The budget has just passed the House, 217–215. Speaker Mike Johnson flipped every No vote except Massie. Burchett abstained.

https://nitter.poast.org/JakeSherman/status/1894558496688951792#m

JanusIanitos's avatar

I'm not surprised at all. Republicans typically fall in line eventually and this is their honeymoon period where they haven't devolved into as much infighting yet.

James Trout's avatar

Sean Faircloth (D-ME) has won the ME-24 House Election with more than 71 per cent of the vote!

MPC's avatar

Why is Politico continuing to kiss RDS’ feet? They did two glowing puff pieces on him prior to the 2024 primaries. He and his wife need to GTFO of FL politics after 2026.

Will there be enough white Rs who will swallow their racism and vote for Uncle Byron?

michaelflutist's avatar

Isn't Politico generally more right-wing than not?

MPC's avatar

Yeah they are. They used to be pretty good about coverage until they were purchased by that German RW billionaire.

michaelflutist's avatar

So I think that answers your question above.