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

 

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

After three terms in the MA State House, I jumped to the State Senate in 2028. Competition is easiest for open seats, as I'll explain later. I beat Tim Kettle (D) 47,898 to 28,283 to represent MA-33. Despite my inexperience I became the Environmental committee chair. 

 

I wrote bills to:

Increase the carbon tax from $4 to $5; S 40-0, H 159-1, Gov ✓

Fund after school tutors; S 30-10, H 152-8, Gov ✓

and

Fund renewable energy; C 1-13 (that one vote is me)

I didn't have the undivided support of my party to pass any legislation. But during my time in Massachusetts I wrote 90% of the bills. The support for policy change existed, but the computer lacked the initiative.

After only one year in the State Senate, a United States House seat opened up. I beat Merv Wheelock (D) by 151,000 to 62,000 for MA-8. In 2030, Democrats, and Independents who caucused with Democrats, were the minority party in the House of Representatives. There is nothing to do while in the minority. Almost no one crosses the aisle to support bills from the other party. Instead I voted against Republican bills to:

Cut eligibility for rural rent assistance,

Reduce school grants to low income students,

and

Change Social Security eligibility from 67 to 69

I don't understand how Republicans, who represent rural communities and the elderly, can survive passing these policies. Yet win they did, sort of.

During the 2032 election, I (Aldo Abbey) won 281,204 to 121,364 against E. Ruff (D). I watched in astonishment as Republican Nick Keen lost the presidential election to Democrat Liam Marino, 70 million votes to 78 million. Just kidding. Despite losing by eight million votes, the Republican won the election with 274 Electoral votes.

This was a common theme. If you want to win The Political Process play as aa Republican. They have a colossal political advantage, despite passing unpopular legislation. The Republican party never won the popular vote for the House, Senate, or Presidency, yet regularly won more seats than Democrats.

After the 2032 election I switched parties. I realized I was playing on Easy mode, and wanted to play on Normal (the hardest difficulty). The difference is astounding. On Easy, I easily won elections in Democratic Massachusetts. It was a simple task as a Democratic aligned Independent to hoover up 60% of the vote. But when I switched to Normal, polls showed I dropped like a stone to 40% or 45% of the vote. Clearly The Political Process implements a partisan voting system. On Normal mode Democratic voters vote for Democrats, not Democratic leaning Independents. Switching to Democrat solved the problem. As a Democrat I won the 2034 election with 72% of the vote against my Republican and Independent opponents.

But before I did that Republicans eliminated SNAP and the Medicare Expansion.

After the 2034 election the House was 224 D – 211 R, and the Senate; 48 D – 52 R.

 

With Democrats controlling the House I proposed the following legislation:

Reinstate SNAP; H 223-212, Senate Committee (R) denies hearing

Create Universal PreK; H 251-184, Senate Committee (R) denies hearing

Rewrite Tax Code. The National Tax code includes six brackets and a corporate rate.

My proposal looked like this:

1: 10% to 7%

2: 16% to 14%

3: 27% to 25%

4: 30% to 40%

5: 36% to 48%

6: 40% to 65%

Corporate 23% to 25%

The total revenue remained the same.

Results: H 249-186, S 52-48, President Veto

 

One of the real world limits in the Senate are the Senate's convoluted and arcane rules. In the United States today, a majority of laws require 60 votes to pass. That has nothing to do with the Constitution. It makes the already difficult process of writing bold changes unimaginable. Fortunately, The Political Process does not include these Senate rules. But a veto, like in real life, is nearly impossible to overcome.

In The Political Process politicians vote solely on their political position. Maybe they are pressured by the Political Points of other politicians. I'm not certain about that. I know my Political Points alter the votes of Democrats. I don't know if computer controlled politicians effect other computer controlled politicians. Beyond the passive collection of Political Points there isn't anything the player can do to influence another politician's vote. There is no method of trading. You can't exchange votes for bills. You can't become an expert in a particular policy. Bills are limited to one topic, so you can't write a bill that appeals in one part to some politicians and to another group in a second part. You can't gauge how members feel about a particular bill in advance, so you can't negotiate the details. After fact you can't see who voted for or against. But it doesn't matter because you can't actively influence them. You can't offer jobs, or punish members of your party by withholding perks

In 2036, while I won unopposed in MA-8, House Democrats lost 16 seats, despite winning 53.5% of the popular vote, relegating them to the minority with 208 to 227. Democrats lost one seat in the Senate (despite winning 61% of the vote). And the Presidency went to incumbent Republican N. Keen even though he only won 48.4% of the popular vote.

With Republicans controlling the House, Senate, and Presidency, there was nothing to do.

They passed a number of laws, including increasing the Social Security age from 69 to 72.

In real life, the minority proposes messaging bills. These are bills they know won't become law, but they propose to influence public opinion. The Political Process records the player's success rate of passing bills you propose. I assume: failed proposals are at worst detrimental, and at best, have zero effect. I doubt that proposing losing legislation helps win elections.

With Democrats regaining control of the House in 2038 (232 seats to 203), I tried passing a number of bills. Laws to implement Universal Pre-K, restart SNAP, require gun licenses and universal background checks all passed the House, but not a one was heard by a Senate committee. It's ok, the Republican President would have vetoed them anyways.

2040 was a special year. Democrats won a landslide victory in the House, Senate, and the Presidency. With 56%, Democrats claimed 243 seats in the House. Democratic candidate for president, Mackenzie Edmonds, flipped Arizona, Georgia, Florida, and North Carolina to win 53% of the popular vote, and 350 electoral votes. And with 62% of the vote, Democrats gained no seats in the Senate, retaining a minority of 48 to 52.

Unfortunately, that meant the situation was exactly the same as the previous year. In The Political Process it is nearly impossible to pass legislation unless one party controls the House, Senate, and the Presidency. All votes are performative. This unfortunately seems true of real life as well. The system of government created in the Constitution is a poor match for the modern age. There is so much government needs to do, but a minority is intent on halting all business. The Presidential system, combined with multiple checks, prevents the majority party from implementing the will of the people.

In The Political Process both sides only agree on thing; appropriations. As we are seeing, this is not true in real life, where congressional Republicans can not propose bills that will become law.

As the new House Appropriations chair, I wrote the Defense Appropriations for 2040. An appropriations bill is broken down into line items. The Defense appropriations contains at least a dozen items, distributing funds to the Air Force, Army, Coast Guard, Research, Nuclear Weapons, and more. Beneath each item are three numbers; the amount spent last year, the amount requested by the agency, and the amount requested by the President. The previous year's Defense appropriations amounted to $508 billion. I set each item to the amount requested by the President, resulting in a final of $426 billion. I proposed the bill to the House. They amended the bill twice, increasing the value to $467 billion, and then $495 billion. The amended appropriations passed the House, Senate, and President. On my second opportunity, I cut $511 billion to $416 billion, only to see the same result, a final of $487 billion. I gave up altering the appropriations bills after twice experiencing failure.

The next eight years passed in a blur. I was literally just hitting the Next Turn button, because despite winning absurd percentages of votes in the Senate 64%, 59% 60%, 53%, Democrats never had more than 49 seats. The House, bounced back and forth, despite Democrats always winning the popular vote. President Edmonds won reelection in 2044, but then 2048 hit.

Republicans won the House, Senate, and Presidency, despite only winning 46% of the vote. Myself, I ran unopposed for a Massachusetts Senate seat.

Twenty-eight years into The Political Process I began to question its complexity. The main question was (again), how do people vote? How do they chose their politicians? It started to seem like every district of every state is preset with its voters. Voters in any county always hold the same opinion, as do political parties. In other words, it seems as if the game is static, locked in, stuck. Over twenty-eight years all states were voting the same way. Sure, there were swing states, but they were the same as they had been since the beginning; PA, AZ, MI, GA. In the real world, politics may seem stable, but that is only because time, opinions, and memory, deceive us. Prior to 2008 Virginia hadn't voted for a Democrat since 1960. Colorado voted Republican from 1996 to 2004. And in 2000 New Hampshire voted Republican while Iowa voted Democratic. In 1996, which was 28 years ago, Democratic presidential candidate Bill Clinton won IA, MO, TN, KY, AK, MT, FL, and LA. I'm saying, things change, but I'm not sure The Political Process does.

With complete control Republicans immediately did what they usually do; write laws that harm the most vulnerable members of society, while rewarding the wealthiest.

They eliminated the Medicaid expansion. They increased the Social Security age from 72 to 75. Hey, Nikki Haley wants to do that too!

Meanwhile, polling (in The Political Process) said the public wanted a better funded Social Security program. I would punish the Republican party with their error and my knowledge.

Part III to follow.