I think your example just highlights my point. Currently abortion rights are enshrined at the federal level. The SCOTUS is not going to ban abortions. They are going to throw it right back down to the state level. If you lose access to abortions, it is because your local politicians decided to ban them. This is exactly why you don't put your faith in the federal government and pay more attention to local government.
Love 'em or hate 'em, the Republican Party appears to understand this very well. They made state and local government a priority because they know that is where politics begins. Their success at the national level is disproportionate to the size of their voting bloc because they know how to play the game.
Anyone who opposes their ideals needs to remember that, and get involved locally.
Your claim was the President has the lowest impact on one’s life. As I showed, it is a reality that the President’s actions have a significant impact on people’s lives, probably bigger than a mayor or state senator or state representative probably has in the recent past.
Whether the President should or should not is irrelevant. The salient fact is that if the presidential election results for 2016 were different, then abortion access for millions or tens of millions of women would not be on the chopping block.
> Their success at the national level is disproportionate to the size of their voting bloc because they know how to play the game.
This is a trivial fact when the game is designed such that certain voting blocs in certain arbitrarily drawn boundaries have more voting power than other same size or bigger voting blocs in other arbitrarily drawn boundaries. Unless you live in a place that can be flipped to your candidate or party, there is not much to do locally.
>As I showed, it is a reality that the President’s actions have a significant impact on people’s lives, probably bigger than a mayor or state senator or state representative probably has in the recent past.
The president nominating a justice that decided to allow the Texas abortion law to remain in effect while it is being challenged has a bigger impact than the state senator who drafted the law?
Of course, the President has more power overall, but your ability to have any impact in that election is infinitesimal if you're in a swing state and non-existent otherwise. The fact Congressional districts are gerrymandered is all the more reason to vote for state legislatures. Even in local districts that are dominated by a single party, the real election occurs during the primaries. Chances are, if you get to know the candidates, there's going to be one you prefer.
People seem to forget that the purpose of democracy is to give a chance to make sure your own interests are heard, not to give you an opportunity to impose your will on the rest of the country. Our government isn't designed for the latter. You'd need a more authoritarian structure to do that. Trying to do so in a democracy just results in politicians who are more interested in virtue signaling absolutist positions than drafting policy that genuinely benefits their constituents.
I was referring to the expected outcome of the Supreme Court essentially overturning Roe v Wade later this year.
The rest of your comment is agreeable, but does not address the jist of mine which is that the President can and does have an effect on people’s every day lives in a noticeable way, hence people paying attention to them in the news.
> People seem to forget that the purpose of democracy is to give a chance to make sure your own interests are heard, not to give you an opportunity to impose your will on the rest of the country
As an aside, this is what the pro abortion choice position is. The people who want an abortion can get one, and the people who do not, do not get one. The abortion anti choice bloc wants to impose their will the rest of the country/state/city/whatever.
Love 'em or hate 'em, the Republican Party appears to understand this very well. They made state and local government a priority because they know that is where politics begins. Their success at the national level is disproportionate to the size of their voting bloc because they know how to play the game.
Anyone who opposes their ideals needs to remember that, and get involved locally.