The Political Process: From Senator to President?

The Political Process:

The Political Process: From School Committee Member to State Representative

The Political Process: From State Senate to U.S. Senator

The Political Process: From Senator to President?

The Political Process: From the Presidency to Retirement

In the following election (2050), I decided to single-handedly flip the Senate. I wasn't up for reelection, and even if I was, my seat was safe. Campaigns are effortlessly simple. The Political Process allocates 40 hours per week. The player assigns the hours to different activities; writing laws, knocking on doors, giving speeches, sitting for interviews, attending rallies, fundraising, and traveling.

Door knocking, speeches, and interviews increase the player's Name Recognition. Once a player has reached 100% Name Recognition these activities have no effect. Name Recognition never decreases. Rallies increase Voter Enthusiasm which presumably convinces voters to turn out and voter. Fundraising brings in money. The higher the player's position, the more money they make. As a senator, you earn millions a year.

In 2050 I checked for competitive Senate races, and handed out cash. To donate to a candidate, the player must endorse them. Once endorsed, you can donate an unlimited amount of money. A player can also host rallies for an endorsed candidate, as long as they are at least one position lower.

With my help Democrats flipped Senate seats in Texas, Georgia, and New Hampshire. Democrats also reclaimed the House with 222 seats.

With a united Democratic Congress I reintroduced SNAP, and reduced the Social Security age from 75 to 71. Republican President Dick Chase vetoed both. There is no chance of overturning a veto, so I ceased writing legislation.

I was upset. I'd won the Senate for Democrats. The House was ours too. But a Republican President who'd only won with 47% of the popular vote was standing in the way of overwhelming majority opinion. The very next week the Democratic primary for president began. I knew what I had to do. I'd blown through all my cash to win the Senate for Democrats, but despite my monetary disadvantage I entered.

The Political Process slowly introduces complexity (not that it ever felt too complex). Each rung up the ladder adds additional campaign and legislative opportunities. I'd been a School Board Member, State Rep, State Senator, US Rep for nine turns, House Majority Leader, and a U.S. Senator. The Democratic Primary felt like a leap in comparison.

In all previous races the player only campaigned to one voting block; your town, your district, or your state. Now there were fifty states. To conduct a rally the player has to travel to a state. That takes time. If you've made it to the Senate, you have enough money to hire staff. In The Political Process the player hires one star staff, and then pays to improve them to three stars. Each campaign the player must rehire their staff. Even at the highest level, staff are incredibly cheap, while some abilities save you money. Each staff gives a passive benefit, like increased fundraising, or bonus time.

The primary, and the presidential election, display a map of the United States, along with general information about how each state feels about the player's policy positions.

The main mode of campaigning is ads. It costs no time, just money. Instead of wasting time on travel, I spent all of it fundraising. I spent the mountains of cash buying ads. Unlike previous races, where the player buys ads that affect their entire voting population, now the player must choose which states to display their ads. Ads can be targeted at a general topic like Tax Policy, or at a specific one of the roughly seventy-five individual policies mentioned earlier. And the player can write attack ads using the same tools. Every politician's positions are posted on their profile page. I reviewed their policies, searching for unpopular positions to attack.

Hand in hand with attack ads are polls. The player pays an insignificant amount for polls that detail the Name Recognition, Approval Rating, Voter Intention, Policy Support, Voter Enthusiasm, Voter Priorities, and Voter Opinions of any particular state.

I knew, for the primary, I had to prioritize states by checking the polls repeatedly. You can't campaign in every state.

The initial primary of Iowa included ten candidates. Chase Rivas, a businessman with no political experience, won this chaotic competition. Six candidates remained for New Hampshire and Nevada. I won the first, and Jenny Steele, a Senator from Hawaii won the latter. Only five candidates remained for South Carolina (won by Chase). On Super Tuesday, only Chase, Jenny, and I remained. Aside from spending liberally in NH, CA, GA, NC, VA, NY, MN, MA, CO, and FL, I had also focused on endorsements. To earn an endorsement, the player looks at the list of possible endorsers. The list shows how much each possible endorser agrees with the player. It is unclear if this agreement is based on policy, or if it uses other factors like Political Points, Name Recognition, or incumbency. If the endorser agrees enough with the player, the player spends five hours to accept the endorsement. If the endorser doesn't agree enough, the player can offer them a cabinet position to earn their endorsement. That's how Gertrude Leonard, the Governor of New York, ended up as my Vice President nominee.

Like many mechanics of The Political Process, I don't know how this mechanic affects political outcomes. Endorsements seemed to do very little. I had at least ten times the endorsement power of Chase and Jenny combined. With the huge amount of endorsements, I thought I'd do ok on Super Tuesday. Chase won 19 of the 24 states. Jenny won 5 of the 24. Leaving me, 0 of the 25. Fortunately the Democratic party uses a proportional system. As long as a candidate crosses the 15% threshold in a state, they earn a proportional share of the delegates. The delegates after Super Tuesday were 1093 for Chase, 955 for Jenny, and 783 for Aldo Abbey.

I decided to stay in. Why not? Then Jenny dropped out. And she endorsed me!

I started winning race after race. But I wasn't winning by large margins. The question was, could I keep winning and overcome the Chase's delegate lead? Of the remaining 24 races, I won 22 and tied 1. Chase only won Wisconsin. Chase never conceded. The final delegate count: Chase Rivas, 2,162. Aldo Abbey, 2,232. The Political Process doesn't include a convention. The winner is the politician remaining in the primary with the most votes. Jenny Steele's 955 delegates, and Benson's 28 delegates didn't matter. I only had 42% of the total delegates, but I was the Democratic party's presidential nominee.

One thing I learned during the primary was the effectiveness of polls. A player can pay different amounts for three polls of increasing accuracy. Even the most accurate polls aren't prohibitively expensive with the fundraising prowess of a Senator, but you don't need them. The cheapest polls are precisely accurate. They predicted the outcome of every state of the upcoming Presidential Election.

I'd like to credit my ability (and inability) to write this article by saying that The Political Process has a mixture of excellent and terrible archives and menus. For instance, I should be able to click on the portrait (or name) of any politician and access their page, but I can't. There is a search bar, but once a politician retires, their data is erased. You spend a lot of money. Most money is spent by dragging a dial on a bar. But it would be easier if you could type in a number. Oddly, sometimes you can. And sometimes you can't. The visual effect of The Political Process is simple, but very functional. And finally, the game, while it forgets a politician's details, retains a superb archive of all data related to past elections and metrics of the state of the country.

For the 2052 presidential election I challenged incumbent Dick Chase. I hadn't wanted to run for president in 2052. I assumed incumbency would offer an insurmountable advantage. But Chase had repeatedly stymied my legislative proposals, vetoing every one. The Presidential election uses the same tools as the presidential primary, except you only need to focus on a limited number of states. In 2048, Chase had won narrowly, losing the popular vote, and only earning 270 electoral votes.

I conducted polls every five weeks on the relevant states, and spent money in AZ, CO, FL, GA, IA, MI, MN, NC, NH, NM, NV, OH, PA, and WI. The final result?

I won every state the polls predicted. With 89.5 million votes, to Chase's 80 million, I took AZ and MI from his previous victory, to end with 294 electoral votes. Democrats held the Senate, with 51, and claimed a narrow House (220 to 215). We began feverishly passing laws. Unlike the Massachusetts state government, computer controlled politicians propose plenty of bills in the Federal government, but as the head of the party the first unified Democratic government since 2027 (25 years!) I went crazy proposing bills.

The President is allowed to propose bills. So with control of the House, Senate, and Presidency we passed:

A $6.00 per ton carbon tax

Universal background gun checks

Universal School breakfast

After school tutors

Student welfare communities

Reinstate SNAP

Free Community College

Increased funding for foster care families from 60% to 100%

and

Comprehensive professional development for teachers

I vetoed some appropriations bills, but the House and Senate voted 100% for them. Don't waste your time trying to change appropriations bills. The computer always changes them back and passes them unanimously.

On the other hand, The Political Process asks the President each year for their preferred budget. Unlike in real life, where Congress ignores the president, in game Congress is incredibly deferential. In the budget legislation the president can rewrite the tax code, adjust funding for the social safety net, and even implement Universal Healthcare.

So I changed the six tax brackets;

1: 10% to 5.7%

2) 16.5% to 10.6%

3: 27% to 25.8%

4: 30% to 34%

5: 36% to 42%

6: 40% to 49%

And passed Medicare for All.

Congress approved my changes.

The final part IV to follow.