Let me add a positive suggestion. It’s down to the last few days, but if you’re reading this and still thinking about limiting out, your dollars will be better spent in the next district over.
OR-5 is currently represented by Kurt Schrader, a centrist democrat with a long history of blocking any sort of ambitious or progressive legislation. He was one of the members behind splitting Build Back Better, and therefore killing most of the interesting stuff off (including if I’m not mistaken, a bunch of Covid response funding). But his district was just re-drawn and about half the voters have changed.
He has a strong primary challenger in Jamie McLeod-Skinner, a lawyer with city management experience who is running to his left (you can’t really run to Schrader’s right as a democrat). McLeod-Skinner seems cool, and in her previous run came closer to getting elected in a safe R district than seemed possible, basically through heroic networking and ground game.
Here is American politics right now: good ideas are not scarce, the votes to enact them are. Replacing Schrader is a slam dunk, and it’s a cheaper race. It’s a better use of your dollar. Here’s a link: https://jamiefororegon.com/
Thanks! Constructive suggestions about good things to do seem great.
I think Carrick is getting a lot of support from a combination of making crucial issues like pandemic preparedness priorities, and also benefiting from reputation networks here (so people are justifiably confident that he isn’t going to be in it for himself or giving out political favours, which is just a super-important dimension). It’s certainly plausible that McLeod-Skinner’s campaign is a great opportunity to help out with, but my personal impression is that you haven’t (yet) made a comparably strong case, so I’m not sure how many people will be persuaded by what you’ve said so far. But if you (or anyone) wanted to dive into a deeper analysis of the value of supporting different campaigns from an impartial welfarist perspective, that could be useful, and I imagine you’d find a receptive (if critical!) audience here.
[Not me for US races; I’m not an American so won’t be giving anything. I’m following this one because Carrick is an ex-colleague and I think he’s a great guy.]
I know some Oregonians too and I think they find the use of money in all politics deplorable and would be fine or pretty happy with the candidate mentioned in the original post.
Do you mind telling us who you are and what your relationship with this OR-5 candidate is?
I’m not sure every person here understands how many forum accounts/time/erudite writing a full $2,900 political donation could produce.
Thinking behind my comment above or why you should care (something something minimal trust investigations)—I’m not saying I’m Correct, but this is how I sort of think so if this is terrible someone should stop me.
(I’m on mobile so formatting is weak.)
The comment pattern satisfies noticeable patterns for me that suggest a lot of practice or intent.
— Something noticeable is the how they repeat certain critiques in a way that is superficial. They do this in such a way I doubt their writing could be the full story behind this person’s views, or another plausible explanation is that their view is shallow and they found this content to fill out the comment. Either of these is less consistent with how I expect most concerned people to pop onto the forum to talk about OR-6. It suggests cultivation.
— Broadly, opinions and views repeat patterns and ideas that come from elsewhere.
— Their messaging across comments is pretty tight and goes through a progression I find deliberate . (I was born in Oregon and can see OR-6, have a favourable view of you guys) but then moves into critiques of funding later on, and then moves into what I would consider outright rhetoric and a leading point (is this the best way to spend your money?), which then seats the position for an ask.
— Note that the later content gives a funny characterization of EA (the CEA reference is not the biggest issue), this isn’t deceptive but it is consistent with learning enough about EA to make this comment (eg no real prior interest).
I don’t think this is evil or anything. The person is just trying to support someone they care about. The level of sophistication here is like at the level of any experienced campaigner.
My friends uses similar level of sophistication for buying a used car for example.
Other points:
— EAs focus on messaging and branding and have historic sensitivities. I think it would benefit EAs to know how sensitivities are being broadcast and their effect.
— Many political races have a candidate who could be supported to move it to the left. It’s unclear how or why the indicated race OR-5 would be a good donation.
— In general, no one has agreed or even raised the topic of EA generally supporting left (or right candidates). The support of the candidate mentioned in the OP has a more specific theory of change.
— The forum has been broadcast in national media multiple times now. I’m guessing the reason why cultivated activity hasn’t appeared is because communicating and learning EA diction and coming up with the indicated pattern I pointed out takes time and is risky. I think this has some information to judge comments that do make it in (Something something Bayesian).
My friends uses similar level of sophistication for buying a used car for example.
Ouch, was I really that bad?
I’m gonna retract the parent comment and didn’t mean to raise questions about my motivations. (I think you’re suggesting I might be a McLeod-Skinner secret agent? I’m flattered, I think). For what it’s worth, I have no connection to her campaign, have never met her, and am actually not even a donor in her current race (I donated to her first campaign a few years ago).
I was simply trying to provide an alternative, since I think you all are mis-spending kind of a lot of money.
Many political races have a candidate who could be supported to move it to the left.
For the amount being spent in OR-6, you could have had a significant influence on a bunch of those.
Nothing you wrote was bad. In fact it was fantastic.
I think you could use your real name and that seems very low cost.
The one issue on substance is that I wish you could have delved into more, was engaging about the long, high effort comments that was made about pandemic prevention, which isn’t the same as covid response. Especially not just saying that an incremental package from another candidate was comparable.
There is such a world of difference between pandemic prevention and another covid response package—that difference reflects how you could influence the people here who are donating to the candidate in the OP to donate somewhere else.
Re: too much spending.
(Another reason why the money is going where it is, is that this could lift the cruel 50% work hours that a congresswoman spends just calling donors and serving the party, with that lifted, they have freedom to serve their country and their constituents).
As a meta comment (a point about the process of my commenting), I guess my main issue is with the response here with the EA.
By the way I’m not an EA, no one likes me so this isn’t official or anything like that.
For anyone else reading this, including full on partisan and political policy people—I think EA and everyone would welcome detailed, policy like discussion on pandemic preparation.
You can do this even if it (highly) unfavorable to the candidate. That is the nature of EA.
One major opportunity with this press and money is that someone could use attention to create a virtuous cycle of actual policy discussion (as opposed to too much discussion about owls or gotchas).
A real convincing thread here about improving policy in pandemics that satisfies the EA would very possibly unlock principled political funding that protects Americans.
If you really had the knowledge, many people would navigate you through the silly EA terminology and habits.
Let me add a positive suggestion. It’s down to the last few days, but if you’re reading this and still thinking about limiting out, your dollars will be better spent in the next district over.
OR-5 is currently represented by Kurt Schrader, a centrist democrat with a long history of blocking any sort of ambitious or progressive legislation. He was one of the members behind splitting Build Back Better, and therefore killing most of the interesting stuff off (including if I’m not mistaken, a bunch of Covid response funding). But his district was just re-drawn and about half the voters have changed.
He has a strong primary challenger in Jamie McLeod-Skinner, a lawyer with city management experience who is running to his left (you can’t really run to Schrader’s right as a democrat). McLeod-Skinner seems cool, and in her previous run came closer to getting elected in a safe R district than seemed possible, basically through heroic networking and ground game.
Here is American politics right now: good ideas are not scarce, the votes to enact them are. Replacing Schrader is a slam dunk, and it’s a cheaper race. It’s a better use of your dollar. Here’s a link: https://jamiefororegon.com/
Thanks! Constructive suggestions about good things to do seem great.
I think Carrick is getting a lot of support from a combination of making crucial issues like pandemic preparedness priorities, and also benefiting from reputation networks here (so people are justifiably confident that he isn’t going to be in it for himself or giving out political favours, which is just a super-important dimension). It’s certainly plausible that McLeod-Skinner’s campaign is a great opportunity to help out with, but my personal impression is that you haven’t (yet) made a comparably strong case, so I’m not sure how many people will be persuaded by what you’ve said so far. But if you (or anyone) wanted to dive into a deeper analysis of the value of supporting different campaigns from an impartial welfarist perspective, that could be useful, and I imagine you’d find a receptive (if critical!) audience here.
[Not me for US races; I’m not an American so won’t be giving anything. I’m following this one because Carrick is an ex-colleague and I think he’s a great guy.]
I know some Oregonians too and I think they find the use of money in all politics deplorable and would be fine or pretty happy with the candidate mentioned in the original post.
Do you mind telling us who you are and what your relationship with this OR-5 candidate is?
I’m not sure every person here understands how many forum accounts/time/erudite writing a full $2,900 political donation could produce.
Thinking behind my comment above or why you should care (something something minimal trust investigations)—I’m not saying I’m Correct, but this is how I sort of think so if this is terrible someone should stop me.
(I’m on mobile so formatting is weak.)
The comment pattern satisfies noticeable patterns for me that suggest a lot of practice or intent.
— Something noticeable is the how they repeat certain critiques in a way that is superficial. They do this in such a way I doubt their writing could be the full story behind this person’s views, or another plausible explanation is that their view is shallow and they found this content to fill out the comment. Either of these is less consistent with how I expect most concerned people to pop onto the forum to talk about OR-6. It suggests cultivation.
— Broadly, opinions and views repeat patterns and ideas that come from elsewhere.
— Their messaging across comments is pretty tight and goes through a progression I find deliberate . (I was born in Oregon and can see OR-6, have a favourable view of you guys) but then moves into critiques of funding later on, and then moves into what I would consider outright rhetoric and a leading point (is this the best way to spend your money?), which then seats the position for an ask.
— Note that the later content gives a funny characterization of EA (the CEA reference is not the biggest issue), this isn’t deceptive but it is consistent with learning enough about EA to make this comment (eg no real prior interest).
I don’t think this is evil or anything. The person is just trying to support someone they care about. The level of sophistication here is like at the level of any experienced campaigner.
My friends uses similar level of sophistication for buying a used car for example.
Other points:
— EAs focus on messaging and branding and have historic sensitivities. I think it would benefit EAs to know how sensitivities are being broadcast and their effect.
— Many political races have a candidate who could be supported to move it to the left. It’s unclear how or why the indicated race OR-5 would be a good donation.
— In general, no one has agreed or even raised the topic of EA generally supporting left (or right candidates). The support of the candidate mentioned in the OP has a more specific theory of change.
— The forum has been broadcast in national media multiple times now. I’m guessing the reason why cultivated activity hasn’t appeared is because communicating and learning EA diction and coming up with the indicated pattern I pointed out takes time and is risky. I think this has some information to judge comments that do make it in (Something something Bayesian).
Ouch, was I really that bad?
I’m gonna retract the parent comment and didn’t mean to raise questions about my motivations. (I think you’re suggesting I might be a McLeod-Skinner secret agent? I’m flattered, I think). For what it’s worth, I have no connection to her campaign, have never met her, and am actually not even a donor in her current race (I donated to her first campaign a few years ago).
I was simply trying to provide an alternative, since I think you all are mis-spending kind of a lot of money.
For the amount being spent in OR-6, you could have had a significant influence on a bunch of those.
Nothing you wrote was bad. In fact it was fantastic.
I think you could use your real name and that seems very low cost.
The one issue on substance is that I wish you could have delved into more, was engaging about the long, high effort comments that was made about pandemic prevention, which isn’t the same as covid response. Especially not just saying that an incremental package from another candidate was comparable.
There is such a world of difference between pandemic prevention and another covid response package—that difference reflects how you could influence the people here who are donating to the candidate in the OP to donate somewhere else.
Re: too much spending.
(Another reason why the money is going where it is, is that this could lift the cruel 50% work hours that a congresswoman spends just calling donors and serving the party, with that lifted, they have freedom to serve their country and their constituents).
As a meta comment (a point about the process of my commenting), I guess my main issue is with the response here with the EA.
By the way I’m not an EA, no one likes me so this isn’t official or anything like that.
For anyone else reading this, including full on partisan and political policy people—I think EA and everyone would welcome detailed, policy like discussion on pandemic preparation.
You can do this even if it (highly) unfavorable to the candidate. That is the nature of EA.
One major opportunity with this press and money is that someone could use attention to create a virtuous cycle of actual policy discussion (as opposed to too much discussion about owls or gotchas).
A real convincing thread here about improving policy in pandemics that satisfies the EA would very possibly unlock principled political funding that protects Americans.
If you really had the knowledge, many people would navigate you through the silly EA terminology and habits.