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Is there any realistic chance the two major parties will ever lose their stranglehold on control? There seems to be some rather substantially undemocratic barriers in the way of competition having it's voice heard currently.
WASHINGTON — The federal judge who found President Clinton in contempt of court last April levied a penalty of $90,686 against him Thursday, making him the first chief executive ever assessed such a payment.
Repeating her condemnation of Clinton for lying under oath in the Paula Corbin Jones sexual harassment lawsuit, U.S. District Judge Susan Webber Wright said that she was imposing the sanction to cover some of Jones' legal expenses and "to deter others who might consider emulating the president's misconduct."
Robert S. Bennett, Clinton's private attorney, said that he would not challenge the ruling. "We accept the judgment of the court and will comply with it."
In a 19-page ruling, Wright, a Little Rock, Ark., judge, made clear that she had calculated the penalty to cover expenses incurred by Jones' lawyers as a result of the president's false denials that he had ever been alone or had sex with former White House intern Monica S. Lewinsky.
Legal experts viewed the ruling as fair to the president, especially considering the judge's strong language last spring in excoriating Clinton for "false, misleading and evasive answers that were designed to obstruct the judicial process."
"Sanctions are not imposed to punish," the judge said Thursday, "but must be based upon evidence of actual loss."
Nonetheless, Wright's final determination in the civil case that led to last year's Lewinsky scandal--and to the president's impeachment by the House and trial in the Senate, which acquitted him, threatens further legal trouble for Clinton.
The now-complete federal court record could aid independent counsel Kenneth W. Starr should he decide to pursue criminal prosecution of Clinton before or after he leaves the White House.
Besides adding to the taint on Clinton's legacy, Wright's findings also could dim his prospects if, as expected, he chooses to practice law after leaving office.
The contempt matter arose from Clinton's deposition taken Jan. 17, 1998, when he was asked if he and Lewinsky had ever been alone together in the Oval Office.
"I don't recall," he replied. "It's possible that she . . . while she was working there, brought something to me and that, at the time she brought it to me, she was the only person there. That's possible."
He denied having sexual relations with Lewinsky or ever being alone with her in a hallway outside the Oval Office. In his grand jury testimony on Aug. 17, 1998, Clinton asserted that he had not lied in the Jones deposition. That evening, however, in a nationally televised speech, he acknowledged that he had "inappropriate intimate contact" with Lewinsky. White House lawyers later said that the contacts had occurred in the hallway outside the Oval Office.
The judge's unchallenged contempt ruling already was being reviewed by the Arkansas Supreme Court's Committee on Professional Conduct.
This panel, which includes two non-lawyer citizens, could revoke or suspend Clinton's license to practice law. Clinton is a licensed attorney in Arkansas--but no other state--and is a former law professor.
Wright, in figuring Clinton's monetary penalty, disregarded as "excessive" a demand by Jones' lawyers in Texas and Virginia for a court-imposed payment of nearly $500,000--more than five times the amount she selected.
Noting that Clinton made an out-of-court payment of $850,000 to Jones and her lawyers in November to settle the case, Wright said that "it is appropriate to limit fees and expenses to those incurred" through extra legal work that resulted from his contempt-of-court conduct when he lied in his January 1998 deposition.
She awarded $79,999 to the Dallas law firm of Rader, Campbell, Fisher & Pike, and $9,485 to the Virginia-based Rutherford Institute, a conservative public interest law firm that also assisted Jones. The judge added $1,202 to cover expenses for her trip to Washington to attend Clinton's deposition.
"The court takes no pleasure in imposing contempt sanctions against this nation's president and, no doubt like many others, grows weary of this matter," the judge wrote.
"Nevertheless, the court has determined that the president deliberately violated this court's discovery orders, thereby undermining the integrity of the judicial system, and that sanctions must be imposed to redress the president's misconduct and to deter others who might consider emulating the president's misconduct."
Clinton's lawyers denied misconduct by their client but avoided challenging Wright's findings. To do so would have occasioned further open court hearings, which the White House wishes to avoid.
The Dallas law firm had no immediate comment.
John Whitehead, director of the Rutherford Institute in Charlottesville, Va., said he was pleased that the judge imposed the penalty, although he wished it were larger.
"The key thing is how history will view this," Whitehead told the Associated Press. "They're not going to look at the money but at the first sitting president that was ever held in contempt."
Clinton is not expected to use his privately financed legal defense trust fund to pay his penalty, largely to avoid public criticism and because the penalty is "relatively light," a source close to the president said. Last year's Jones case settlement was largely covered by private insurers without drawing on the defense fund.
Wright said in her contempt order that the president's deposition testimony was "intentionally false, notwithstanding tortured definitions and interpretations of the term 'sexual relations.' "
Eldarain wrote: Is there any realistic chance the two major parties will ever lose their stranglehold on control? There seems to be some rather substantially undemocratic barriers in the way of competition having it's voice heard currently.
Also, as Marx points out, capitalism will sell the revolution the tools of its own destruction. Even now the NRA lobbies for the right to sell the revolution the AR-15s that will put an end to oppression. As previous generations have had the AK-47 as the symbol of freedom from tyranny our generation will embrace the AR-15.
Wyrmalla wrote: Has anyone heard about this? Its only just being picked up in the news over here, but I assume its a big thing? The fallout could be massive...
The Hamilton/Reynolds affair was worse. Typical republican, trying to dig up scandals by democrats and draw attention away from your guy's affairs.
Eldarain wrote: Is there any realistic chance the two major parties will ever lose their stranglehold on control? There seems to be some rather substantially undemocratic barriers in the way of competition having it's voice heard currently.
Also, as Marx points out, capitalism will sell the revolution the tools of its own destruction. Even now the NRA lobbies for the right to sell the revolution the AR-15s that will put an end to oppression. As previous generations have had the AK-47 as the symbol of freedom from tyranny our generation will embrace the AR-15.
Which would be logical, except for the fact that the most Communist-y individuals in the US loath firearms while those who like guns the most are definitely the opposite of Communists.
Wyrmalla wrote: Has anyone heard about this? Its only just being picked up in the news over here, but I assume its a big thing? The fallout could be massive...
The Hamilton/Reynolds affair was worse. Typical republican, trying to dig up scandals by democrats and draw attention away from your guy's affairs.
I'm concerned over what effect this could all have on the relationship between our two countries. If Clinton could be on his way out, though what's the chances of that (come on, its hardly Watergate), I wonder who the next guy could be? Someone with similar competency at least...
There are three big problems in American politics.
1) We're doing VERY well when half the eligible voters actually vote. Voter turnouts average around 35%.
2) Of those who do vote, 35-40% of them would vote for Genghis Khan on a 'Raze America to the ground!' platform so long as the little 'R' is there next to his name... and almost exactly the same percentage would do the same so long as the little 'D' is there instead. So with between 70% and 80% of the active voters brainlessly voting the party line, there's no real chance for third parties to get involved on any sort of large scale.
3) Of the 20-30% who don't vote party lines, a majority will vote for whoever's campaign ads were most pervasive, not persuasive. The candidate who spends the most money on ads almost always wins.
Unless at least one (and preferably all three) of these problems are solved, the American political situation will continue to degrade.
Vulcan wrote: There are three big problems in American politics.
1) We're doing VERY well when half the eligible voters actually vote. Voter turnouts average around 35%.
2) Of those who do vote, 35-40% of them would vote for Genghis Khan on a 'Raze America to the ground!' platform so long as the little 'R' is there next to his name... and almost exactly the same percentage would do the same so long as the little 'D' is there instead. So with between 70% and 80% of the active voters brainlessly voting the party line, there's no real chance for third parties to get involved on any sort of large scale.
3) Of the 20-30% who don't vote party lines, a majority will vote for whoever's campaign ads were most pervasive, not persuasive. The candidate who spends the most money on ads almost always wins.
Unless at least one (and preferably all three) of these problems are solved, the American political situation will continue to degrade.
4) There are not enough duels going on, I mean who wouldn't pay to see Cruz and Rand fight to the death with swords?
Vulcan wrote: There are three big problems in American politics.
1) We're doing VERY well when half the eligible voters actually vote. Voter turnouts average around 35%.
2) Of those who do vote, 35-40% of them would vote for Genghis Khan on a 'Raze America to the ground!' platform so long as the little 'R' is there next to his name... and almost exactly the same percentage would do the same so long as the little 'D' is there instead. So with between 70% and 80% of the active voters brainlessly voting the party line, there's no real chance for third parties to get involved on any sort of large scale.
3) Of the 20-30% who don't vote party lines, a majority will vote for whoever's campaign ads were most pervasive, not persuasive. The candidate who spends the most money on ads almost always wins.
Unless at least one (and preferably all three) of these problems are solved, the American political situation will continue to degrade.
4) There are not enough duels going on, I mean who wouldn't pay to see Cruz and Rand fight to the death with swords?
Oddly enough, Dueling isn't technically illegal in a few places in the US.
Also, you could potentially invoke Trial by Combat due to US Common Law being based on British Common Law as of and prior to the Revolutionary War. And at that time it was not illegal in Britain, and in the US it has never been banned.
Vulcan wrote: There are three big problems in American politics.
1) We're doing VERY well when half the eligible voters actually vote. Voter turnouts average around 35%.
2) Of those who do vote, 35-40% of them would vote for Genghis Khan on a 'Raze America to the ground!' platform so long as the little 'R' is there next to his name... and almost exactly the same percentage would do the same so long as the little 'D' is there instead. So with between 70% and 80% of the active voters brainlessly voting the party line, there's no real chance for third parties to get involved on any sort of large scale.
3) Of the 20-30% who don't vote party lines, a majority will vote for whoever's campaign ads were most pervasive, not persuasive. The candidate who spends the most money on ads almost always wins.
Unless at least one (and preferably all three) of these problems are solved, the American political situation will continue to degrade.
4) There are not enough duels going on, I mean who wouldn't pay to see Cruz and Rand fight to the death with swords?
Oddly enough, Dueling isn't technically illegal in a few places in the US.
Also, you could potentially invoke Trial by Combat due to US Common Law being based on British Common Law as of and prior to the Revolutionary War. And at that time it was not illegal in Britain, and in the US it has never been banned.
Generic trump supporter rebuff including but not limited to fake news, but her emails, cuck, 4d chess
You have correctly chosen the responses ingrained into the audience via active propaganda and gaslighting! Ie - the three main options of response -
1.) Whataboutism - Where you are willing to lower your own standards to any degree without regret as long as you can find a singular example, anywhere, anytime, of the 'other side' doing something similar. You decide moral and intellectual aspiration is for chumps, and you willingly accept becoming a dishonest and unethical person, becoming what you complain about with glee.
2.) Fake News! - You choose that anything that doesn't support your views is fake and part of a sinister conspiracy by liberals, intellectuals and the deep state. In doing so, you make yourself a ridiculously strong candidate for brainwashing and gaslighting, foregoing your own ability to reason and examine, and choosing that only one source of information is valid, all others are lies. Ironically, the one source is actively trying to shape your mind to be subservient and blind.
3.) Adhominem - just get the snowflake, don't listen or think, the more reasoned the argument is, the more evidence presented, the more basic your response should be. Shun the expert! Shame education! Revile effort!
Oddly enough, Dueling isn't technically illegal in a few places in the US.
Also, you could potentially invoke Trial by Combat due to US Common Law being based on British Common Law as of and prior to the Revolutionary War. And at that time it was not illegal in Britain, and in the US it has never been banned.
You probably won't be successful, but RAW it works Nobody has yet tried to invoke it, but the option is technically there.
Oooh, that is shaky ground- it works because they never said it doesn't? I wouldn't stake my trial on that.
On the other hand, the Constitution itself preserves our right to bear Letters of Marque. That's right, Congress can declare US citizens privateers if they wanted to. Yarrrr!
Vulcan wrote: There are three big problems in American politics.
1) We're doing VERY well when half the eligible voters actually vote. Voter turnouts average around 35%.
2) Of those who do vote, 35-40% of them would vote for Genghis Khan on a 'Raze America to the ground!' platform so long as the little 'R' is there next to his name... and almost exactly the same percentage would do the same so long as the little 'D' is there instead. So with between 70% and 80% of the active voters brainlessly voting the party line, there's no real chance for third parties to get involved on any sort of large scale.
3) Of the 20-30% who don't vote party lines, a majority will vote for whoever's campaign ads were most pervasive, not persuasive. The candidate who spends the most money on ads almost always wins.
Unless at least one (and preferably all three) of these problems are solved, the American political situation will continue to degrade.
I'd like one, just one, election at some point in my life where I can realistically vote FOR someone, not against someone. I'm tired of choosing between a giant douche and a turd sandwich. The one happy note in the last election was that it violated your third point. The guy that spent less won.
Vulcan wrote: There are three big problems in American politics.
1) We're doing VERY well when half the eligible voters actually vote. Voter turnouts average around 35%.
2) Of those who do vote, 35-40% of them would vote for Genghis Khan on a 'Raze America to the ground!' platform so long as the little 'R' is there next to his name... and almost exactly the same percentage would do the same so long as the little 'D' is there instead. So with between 70% and 80% of the active voters brainlessly voting the party line, there's no real chance for third parties to get involved on any sort of large scale.
3) Of the 20-30% who don't vote party lines, a majority will vote for whoever's campaign ads were most pervasive, not persuasive. The candidate who spends the most money on ads almost always wins.
Unless at least one (and preferably all three) of these problems are solved, the American political situation will continue to degrade.
I'd like one, just one, election at some point in my life where I can realistically vote FOR someone, not against someone. I'm tired of choosing between a giant douche and a turd sandwich. The one happy note in the last election was that it violated your third point. The guy that spent less won.
Preach man! Preach!
So... who's likely going to be Trump's opponent in 2020? If that candidate is even marginally better than HRC... Trump's toast innit he?
Keep in mind, conventional wisdom is kinda shot here... as we all knew HRC would win.
3) Of the 20-30% who don't vote party lines, a majority will vote for whoever's campaign ads were most pervasive, not persuasive. The candidate who spends the most money on ads almost always wins.
People are even shallower than that: sometimes it's just the candidate who looks better is the winner. I saw a (admittedly not perfectly scientific) study that was done where random people in a mall were shown two pictures and asked to choose who looked better. The pictures used were the official campaign photos of the candidates in various elections (in places far enough away that nobody in this mall would recognize them). On average, the person most people said looked better was also the person who won the election.
America doesn’t have a parliamentary style system right? So there is no ‘leader of the Democratic Party’ in a similar vein to leader of the conservative or labour parties in the uk right? Who’s a prominent enough democrat to take him on?
Future War Cultist wrote: America doesn’t have a parliamentary style system right? So there is no ‘leader of the Democratic Party’ in a similar vein to leader of the conservative or labour parties in the uk right? Who’s a prominent enough democrat to take him on?
It's the difference between presidential systems and super-presidential systems. Unlike Canada and France, the President, once elected, is no longer a member of parliament or congress, but an entirely separate branch of government. So while the President may be the leader of the Republican Party, he is not the leader of the Republican congress. What's the big difference? Trump can't fire congressmen and senators he doesn't like. They don't work for him. In Canada and France, The Prime Minister and President respectively have direct control of the house representation. Compared to many other European style systems, the American President has much less direct power over the workings of government.
Well, unless said president is willing to break the spirit of every law on the books, if not the letter, in which case no one knows what to do or if they do they are unwilling to do it... so...
Future War Cultist wrote: America doesn’t have a parliamentary style system right? So there is no ‘leader of the Democratic Party’ in a similar vein to leader of the conservative or labour parties in the uk right?
Nothing official per se like the parliamentary system.
Who’s a prominent enough democrat to take him on?
Bernie Sanders (VT senator) may have another go...
Kristen Gillibrand (NY senator)
Cory Booker (NJ senator)
Andrew Cuomo (NY Gov)
Mike Bloomberg (NY mayor and bajillionaire dude)
...and then, there's Joe Biden.
Future War Cultist wrote: America doesn’t have a parliamentary style system right? So there is no ‘leader of the Democratic Party’ in a similar vein to leader of the conservative or labour parties in the uk right?
Nothing official per se like the parliamentary system.
Who’s a prominent enough democrat to take him on?
Bernie Sanders (VT senator) may have another go...
Kristen Gillibrand (NY senator)
Cory Booker (NJ senator)
Andrew Cuomo (NY Gov)
Mike Bloomberg (NY mayor and bajillionaire dude)
...and then, there's Joe Biden.
I think Uncle Joe would wreck Trump... Trump's 4th of July Fireworks BS extravaganza distraction crap won't work on him, Joe has the exact right tone I think to diffuse the illusion Trump spins around himself of being tough. On top of it, Joe would wreck him inside-out on anything to do with... well knowing anything specific about anything. I just wish he were a younger man. The dems really do need to clear out the oldies, Pellosi, Schumer even Bernie, need to step aside and let some new leadership carry the torch. At this point they are too entrenched in the right's vitriolic list of hate names to invoke at the first sign of distress. Fresh blood, one would hope, one would assume, would leave the right without their easiest weapons, simply saying the name of anyone on that list.
MajorTom11 wrote: I think Uncle Joe would wreck Trump... Trump's 4th of July Fireworks BS extravaganza distraction crap won't work on him, Joe has the exact right tone I think to diffuse the illusion Trump spins around himself of being tough. On top of it, Joe would wreck him inside-out on anything to do with... well knowing anything specific about anything.
I like Joe, but he's 127 years old and has been kicked in the teeth on multiple President ial campaigns.
Of the list noted I would say only Booker has a chance.
^ Edited to reflect that above while you were quoting, I agree ultimately. Biden may be a perfect counterpoint to Trump, but for the health of politics in general, the aging leaders of the dem party needs to step aside so someone relatively new, like Obama in 2008, can come in unburdened by the free of charge hate and attacks Pelosi, Schumer and even Bernie can bring.
Corey Booker has a lot of potential, but he has not found a way to the national stage just yet. He has the spunk, but I am not sure if he has the cool.
Honestly I cannot think of one young democrat I am excited about for president. Booker has too many ties to Big Pharm for my liking
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Wolfblade wrote: This is all of course assuming Trump makes it to 2020
Possibly, the smart thing would be to damage him beyond repair and leave him in office, because the Theocrat that is next in line makes me nervous because the republicans would be more unified behind him
Ustrello wrote: Honestly I cannot think of one young democrat I am excited about for president. Booker has too many ties to Big Pharm for my liking
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Wolfblade wrote: This is all of course assuming Trump makes it to 2020
Possibly, the smart thing would be to damage him beyond repair and leave him in office, because the Theocrat that is next in line makes me nervous because the republicans would be more unified behind him
Pence would be as big an abomination as Trump but in a different way. You are right about the party too, but being honest, it's not like they are acting like a seperate and co-equal branch as it is anyways. There are some things I regard as fundamentally American, and one of them was an aspirational spirit to be the city on the hill... I wonder if they will ever get that back, because right now it just seems like a race to the bottom on the right, 'I'll do anything the opponent ever has and not think twice' is not the way to grow a healthy society or individual.
Ustrello wrote: Honestly I cannot think of one young democrat I am excited about for president. Booker has too many ties to Big Pharm for my liking
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Wolfblade wrote: This is all of course assuming Trump makes it to 2020
Possibly, the smart thing would be to damage him beyond repair and leave him in office, because the Theocrat that is next in line makes me nervous because the republicans would be more unified behind him
Oh yeah, I would agree, except it looks like basically everyone involved in Trump's campaign is up to their eyeballs with dealings with the Russians, from the lowest "coffee boy" all the way up to his "senior" advisers.
But I wouldn't count on Trump making it to 2020, I mean how many 70+ year old men do you know who eat ~4k calories per meal from McDonalds without any real exercise who are considered "healthy"? (And not the bs review from the WH doctor which clearly has his height wrong and just magically makes him land under obese by a tiny fraction of a pound)
Ustrello wrote: Honestly I cannot think of one young democrat I am excited about for president. Booker has too many ties to Big Pharm for my liking
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Wolfblade wrote: This is all of course assuming Trump makes it to 2020
Possibly, the smart thing would be to damage him beyond repair and leave him in office, because the Theocrat that is next in line makes me nervous because the republicans would be more unified behind him
Oh yeah, I would agree, except it looks like basically everyone involved in Trump's campaign is up to their eyeballs with dealings with the Russians, from the lowest "coffee boy" all the way up to his "senior" advisers.
But I wouldn't count on Trump making it to 2020, I mean how many 70+ year old men do you know who eat ~4k calories per meal from McDonalds without any real exercise who are considered "healthy"? (And not the bs review from the WH doctor which clearly has his height wrong and just magically makes him land under obese by a tiny fraction of a pound)
No I could see a stroke or heart attack happening at some point, because you are right he literally does not exercise
MajorTom11 wrote: ^ Edited to reflect that above while you were quoting, I agree ultimately. Biden may be a perfect counterpoint to Trump, but for the health of politics in general, the aging leaders of the dem party needs to step aside so someone relatively new, like Obama in 2008, can come in unburdened by the free of charge hate and attacks Pelosi, Schumer and even Bernie can bring.
Corey Booker has a lot of potential, but he has not found a way to the national stage just yet. He has the spunk, but I am not sure if he has the cool.
The other ones noted are old East Coast Liberal elites. Trump would go through them like crap through a goose.
Ustrello wrote: Honestly I cannot think of one young democrat I am excited about for president. Booker has too many ties to Big Pharm for my liking
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Wolfblade wrote: This is all of course assuming Trump makes it to 2020
Possibly, the smart thing would be to damage him beyond repair and leave him in office, because the Theocrat that is next in line makes me nervous because the republicans would be more unified behind him
Oh yeah, I would agree, except it looks like basically everyone involved in Trump's campaign is up to their eyeballs with dealings with the Russians, from the lowest "coffee boy" all the way up to his "senior" advisers.
But I wouldn't count on Trump making it to 2020, I mean how many 70+ year old men do you know who eat ~4k calories per meal from McDonalds without any real exercise who are considered "healthy"? (And not the bs review from the WH doctor which clearly has his height wrong and just magically makes him land under obese by a tiny fraction of a pound)
No I could see a stroke or heart attack happening at some point, because you are right he literally does not exercise
In addition to not eating healthy, yeah. I'm not even trying to be malicious (if I was I'd just point to his tiny hands or failed tax policy), but realistic about his health.
Ustrello wrote: Honestly I cannot think of one young democrat I am excited about for president. Booker has too many ties to Big Pharm for my liking
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Wolfblade wrote: This is all of course assuming Trump makes it to 2020
Possibly, the smart thing would be to damage him beyond repair and leave him in office, because the Theocrat that is next in line makes me nervous because the republicans would be more unified behind him
Oh yeah, I would agree, except it looks like basically everyone involved in Trump's campaign is up to their eyeballs with dealings with the Russians, from the lowest "coffee boy" all the way up to his "senior" advisers.
But I wouldn't count on Trump making it to 2020, I mean how many 70+ year old men do you know who eat ~4k calories per meal from McDonalds without any real exercise who are considered "healthy"? (And not the bs review from the WH doctor which clearly has his height wrong and just magically makes him land under obese by a tiny fraction of a pound)
No I could see a stroke or heart attack happening at some point, because you are right he literally does not exercise
In addition to not eating healthy, yeah. I'm not even trying to be malicious (if I was I'd just point to his tiny hands or failed tax policy), but realistic about his health.
I honestly think it is fine talking about his health because it is in the national interest for us to have a healthy president, of which Trump is obviously not
MajorTom11 wrote: ^ Edited to reflect that above while you were quoting, I agree ultimately. Biden may be a perfect counterpoint to Trump, but for the health of politics in general, the aging leaders of the dem party needs to step aside so someone relatively new, like Obama in 2008, can come in unburdened by the free of charge hate and attacks Pelosi, Schumer and even Bernie can bring.
Corey Booker has a lot of potential, but he has not found a way to the national stage just yet. He has the spunk, but I am not sure if he has the cool.
The other ones noted are old East Coast Liberal elites. Trump would go through them like crap through a goose.
This. The Left Coasters, New York Champaign Socialists, and New England Bluebloods all need to be purged from the party, for the Democrats to ever be a serious contender again. It was those types running the party into the ground that helped Trump triump over Killary.
The Democratic Party needs fresh meat and a change of platform. But judging from the "news" media, and continued pandering to the loonies on the Left (i.e. those that considers anybody right of Mao as a "fascist" or "nazi"), they are not going to do that. They're going to continue to push California and New England "progressivism" on the rest of the country, the ones who don't feel the need for Big Brother to wipe their asses for them everyday. And that is addition to playing the so-called "protected groups" (minorities, illegal aliens, homosexuals, etc) like a fiddle to keep the support (and votes) coming from those quarters. Their traditional sacred cows (gun control, the race card, etc) are just going to keep them on the losing end of the stage, except in their bastions of support (and even this isn't a guarantee).
That means either Trump will go back in in 2020, or if he decides to not run for re-election, Mike Pence. Unless the Democrats pull a magic rabbit out of their asses between now and then, puts up somebody fresh, and start sticking with the important things that actually matter on the national stage. Then, they might have a chance of bouncing back in 2020.
Yeah, agree the old school needs to step aside. Disagree that gun control and race issues will keep them losing. Also disagree the 'news' is applying to super leftists and pushing that agenda. The 'news' may lean left, but they tend to give a crap about facts and are willing to question their 'own side', more often than you might think.
The news doesn't cover Trump all the time negatively because they are making it up. He's a disaster. He's unamerican. Or, he's unamerican compared to the values of most of the country, compared to what America stood for for the past 80 years, and compared to Republicans just 15 years ago. Reagan and Lincoln are spinning in their graves, these were not men given to moral compromise and lessening the spirit of aspiration the country used to stand for.
Dems are going to wreck in November. 2020? I don't know... not yet. All depends on whether or not Republicans want to preside over the end of their party. This temporary armistice between moderate/classical Republicans and racist, xenophobic, fiscally irresponsible, do nothing not based in hatred of the other gakkers will not last forever. At some point, the center has to give. The alt-right Trumpers don't have the numbers, the message of the means to last, a whole generation of people who hate the fear and bullgak is about to come up to voting age, and they ain't havin it.
Honestly I feel like the Republicans are going to get destroyed in the next few years, they'll reorganize their gak and get away from the Xenophobia, and come back swinging and take control again for a while.
EDIT: I Mean, someone from Backwater, USA, is going to pretty safely vote Republican unless they do a 180 and go super left wing and embracing everything that a racist from Backwater, USA would hate. Why appeal to them more then you have to?
What both sides seem to need to learn is that messages of "Man, look at that guy, lol" like some of the Republicans ran against Obama and what the Democrats ran against Trump don't work in an election. Trump, while flinging his poop around, did appeal to people to rebuild and make things better, much like how Obama beat the drums of good change.
I could see the Dems blowing it if they run an old, tired leftie that runs almost purely on "Screw that Trump guy". Biden might be the exception, though that could be me wanting to see the amazing headlines Biden would produce with other world leaders.
The last two Republican presidents got into the White House despite having less votes than their opponent. The Republicans haven't gotten a non-incumbent president who was more popular than his opponent since before I was born.
If you want voter participation to increase, you gotta start with moving to some sort of proportional representation. There's currently no point for a Republican in California or a Democrat in Texas to vote in the presidential elections. Millions of voters are effectively disenfranchised because they live in the wrong states. The only problem is that it's unlikely in the extreme that the Republicans would agree to reform, because they're only getting their candidates into the White House through the current system's bias in the first place.
AlmightyWalrus wrote: The last two Republican presidents got into the White House despite having less votes than their opponent. The Republicans haven't gotten a non-incumbent president who was more popular than his opponent since before I was born.
Well, as long as they concentrate on old white people and the things that scare them, they have nothing to worry about, since those demographics are never, ever going to shift, right?
I agree with proportional representation. I'd love to see the interstate compact take effect. I think though that the 2 things we all agree on but will never change is the switch to metric, and the electoral college.
Crazyterran wrote: I could see the Dems blowing it if they run an old, tired leftie that runs almost purely on "Screw that Trump guy".
Got to disagree. Trump has been such an utter debacle, with such low approval ratings from everyone but his most rabid followers (who are going to vote for Trump no matter what), that "hey, we're at least marginally competent" is about all you need. If we go back and re-vote 2016, knowing what we know now, Clinton wins a landslide.
Trump, while flinging his poop around, did appeal to people to rebuild and make things better
And this is the sad truth of US politics. Trump talked about making things better, but it was all lies and we knew it was all lies. But the con man sold his followers a pile of lies with enough charisma and desperate people bought it. I mean, this was an election supposedly won by people frustrated with the economy and unemployed in key swing states, and they believed "I will save your jobs" lies from someone who built his wealth by screwing over his employees at every opportunity. US politics is going to be a mess as long as this kind of thing keeps happening. And the sad part is I have no idea how you fix the situation, too many people have too much contempt for the idea of facts and reasonable policy debate.
Peregrine wrote: And this is the sad truth of US politics. Trump talked about making things better, but it was all lies and we knew it was all lies. But the con man sold his followers a pile of lies with enough charisma and desperate people bought it.
Yes, HRC said the coal jobs were never coming back, and coal miners needed to be retrained and eased into new industries. Trump said he'd bring all those coal jobs back. People found that more believable.
Sheer insanity. But will those people, after seeing how he's managed to build an entire established infrastructure out of grifters, losers, has-beens and never was-s, playing a weekly game of Presidential Apprentice, admit that they were wrong? It was a pretty obvious lie even at the time.
Here's a question. Since we're asking who's the future of the Democratic Party, who's the future of the Republican Party?
Some people like to trot out the line that Trump only won because Hillary was "that bad", but that same reason would also apply to everyone on the Republican side who ran against Trump, meaning Rubio, Jeb, Cruz, etc., were also all "that bad".
Tannhauser42 wrote: Here's a question. Since we're asking who's the future of the Democratic Party, who's the future of the Republican Party?
Some people like to trot out the line that Trump only won because Hillary was "that bad", but that same reason would also apply to everyone on the Republican side who ran against Trump, meaning Rubio, Jeb, Cruz, etc., were also all "that bad".
Thus we come to the crux of the problem. Trump is a clear sign our political system is broken, and there is no easy answer. It's been the same old people with the same old ideologies and policies for far too long, and all he had to do was say "I'm not one of them".
Again, that's a result of the Electoral College. The main issue wasn't that people were too tired of the "same old", it's that some people's votes are worth more than others and that these people were comvinced to vote Trump.
Ripped off of Wiki, for 2012:
Spoiler:
A vote in Wyoming is worth more than three times a vote in New York. Even ignoring the monumental bias that a first past the post system introduces, this is just dumb. A vote in Maine or New Hampshire is literally 3/5ths of a Wyoming vote.
When a large number of the voters are effectively disenfranchised, of course the system is broken. Shuffling around the candidates doesn't change the fact that you have a system that's the antithesis of egalitarianism.
Y'know, it's pretty amazing that A) This conversation didn't immediately devolve into a complete gak show and B) There is consensus that at the very least, things are not going well and whomever you support, this is not a good time for American politics.
I have been watching the politics in the US avidly for years, I have lived there several times and I believe in America, despite some very ugly problems that stem mostly from the right. Religion and guns having undue influence in politics, the resistance to equality are big problems. The methodical devaluation or twisting of the very idea of ethics and morality. Most of all though, the systematic attack on facts, expertise, merit and results driven decisions is the biggest casualty of all.
If you have a society that cares about facts and objective results, then you automatically have a bulwark against propaganda and outright lies, right now, that isn't there.
I know I sound mega left when I speak, but the truth is I am pretty independent and open to conservative policy. I only care about results. Smaller government sounds good to me, but only if the results show it is as effective at large, or, that the savings is so huge it outweighs a loss in effectiveness. I am open to looking at immigration. I am open to finance reform (from the former conservative position of fiscal responsibility). But the thing is, the right is just ideological at this point. There is no care for examination or honest evaluation. They are just for or against, and they will act accordingly regardless of whatever experts say. The EPA. Immigration. Finance law. Tariffs. Trade. Just bulldozing through all of it with no regard for a decade from now, just an eye towards the immediate impact tomorrow and nothing else.
I am not against conservatism in general with a few exceptions - I believe in equality, including gender, race and orientation, I believe in environmental protection, I believe guns are a sickness in American society, not that they should be wiped out, but that far more control could be enacted that could actually help. It used to be there was still room for someone to be a Republican and be supportive of what I just listed. Not anymore. When did guns become a core pillar of being a Republican? I am open to conservatism, but I am against the GOP. Most are a bunch of goddam snakes who's word means nothing, who act against their core beliefs if the price is right, and who are enabling the sick man put in office. Few exceptions, made all the more stark that I can count them on one hand, McCain, Corker, Flake and Graham to a lesser degree. I don't like Grahams positions on a lot of things, but at least he will say what he thinks for real. I am sure there are a few others, but damn, if I was a conservative in the states I would be even madder at the current GOP and the changes they are making than i was at the dems.
And I will almost definitely be moving to the states this summer, and while I am very excited, i am also very concerned about where this is all going if the country, left and right, doesn't say eff this bs, let's talk facts and results, propaganda is not welcome.
I wonder if going through this now might help us as a nation in the long run, though. If people rely on what they read online without considering the source, our country's democracy was always going to be vulnerable to outside influence.
We see it to an even greater extent with the lack of campaign finance reform domestically, too! A wake up call that people need to try to tune out the noise and hear from candidates or reliable sources directly could really help matters. That's what I'm telling myself, anyway
And now I need to know what part of the states you're moving to, Tom, I really enjoyed our political debates in-person at AdeptiCon quite a few years ago
I just watch the local chariot races to decide my vote.
I will say this. I have never seen so many people at my local political off-year causus as I did this year. I also saw new people getting involved on the committees and chair positions.
I think people are starting to get a bit more enegaged in politics. Possibly more than they have been since the first Obama election.
AlmightyWalrus wrote: Again, that's a result of the Electoral College. The main issue wasn't that people were too tired of the "same old", it's that some people's votes are worth more than others and that these people were comvinced to vote Trump.
Ripped off of Wiki, for 2012:
Spoiler:
A vote in Wyoming is worth more than three times a vote in New York. Even ignoring the monumental bias that a first past the post system introduces, this is just dumb. A vote in Maine or New Hampshire is literally 3/5ths of a Wyoming vote.
When a large number of the voters are effectively disenfranchised, of course the system is broken. Shuffling around the candidates doesn't change the fact that you have a system that's the antithesis of egalitarianism.
I'm going to preface this by saying I did not vote in the last presidential election since I found both major party candidates to be morally corrupt to say the least. But the electoral college was somewhat designed with this in mind to ensure that the smaller communities would be able to check the power of the larger communities, see the federalist papers #10. I'm not saying that this check is well balanced since it can lessen the worth of a vote as you pointed out.
AlmightyWalrus wrote: Again, that's a result of the Electoral College. The main issue wasn't that people were too tired of the "same old", it's that some people's votes are worth more than others and that these people were comvinced to vote Trump.
Ripped off of Wiki, for 2012:
Spoiler:
A vote in Wyoming is worth more than three times a vote in New York. Even ignoring the monumental bias that a first past the post system introduces, this is just dumb. A vote in Maine or New Hampshire is literally 3/5ths of a Wyoming vote.
When a large number of the voters are effectively disenfranchised, of course the system is broken. Shuffling around the candidates doesn't change the fact that you have a system that's the antithesis of egalitarianism.
You are talking about just the results of the election, which brings up the flaws in our electoral college. I'm referring to the fact that Donald Trump not only managed to come out of left field and browbeat the republican party into backing him over a whole host of other "qualified" candidates, but won the election (due to the EC), and wasn't THAT far behind HRC in the popular vote in terms of the number of registered voters we have. The fact that any of that happened, despite his behavior, and all the dirt dug up on him, is indicative that our system is broken.
(Disclaimer: I am a moderate, refused to vote for either of them, and feel completely abandoned by both sides, which is another issue we have)
AlmightyWalrus wrote: Again, that's a result of the Electoral College. The main issue wasn't that people were too tired of the "same old", it's that some people's votes are worth more than others and that these people were comvinced to vote Trump.
Ripped off of Wiki, for 2012:
Spoiler:
A vote in Wyoming is worth more than three times a vote in New York. Even ignoring the monumental bias that a first past the post system introduces, this is just dumb. A vote in Maine or New Hampshire is literally 3/5ths of a Wyoming vote.
When a large number of the voters are effectively disenfranchised, of course the system is broken. Shuffling around the candidates doesn't change the fact that you have a system that's the antithesis of egalitarianism.
I'm going to preface this by saying I did not vote in the last presidential election since I found both major party candidates to be morally corrupt to say the least. But the electoral college was somewhat designed with this in mind to ensure that the smaller communities would be able to check the power of the larger communities, see the federalist papers #10. I'm not saying that this check is well balanced since it can lessen the worth of a vote as you pointed out.
I know that's the reason, I just think it's a really awful reason.
Even though I'm an independent voter in Maryland (a state that always goes Democratic) I think it's a very good reason. Without that system, huge areas of the country could be completely discounted. There are drawbacks, of course, but the alternative has huge ones, as well.
I also have very little sympathy for the democrats in this regard, since they basically rigged their primary results, so have little room to complain when the lackluster candidate they railroaded into the nomination couldn't defeat a candidate like Trump . If anything, I want more reforms for voting in primaries! As an independent, Maryland doesn't even allow me to vote in them...
RiTides wrote: Even though I'm an independent voter in Maryland (a state that always goes Democratic) I think it's a very good reason. Without that system, huge areas of the country could be completely discounted. There are drawbacks, of course, but the alternative has huge ones, as well.
I also have very little sympathy for the democrats in this regard, since they basically rigged their primary results, so have little room to complain when the lackluster candidate they railroaded into the nomination couldn't defeat a candidate like Trump . If anything, I want more reforms for voting in primaries! As an independent, Maryland doesn't even allow me to vote in them...
These primaries. Do they allow voters to choose who gets to stand for each party?
Someone getting more votes than someone else and thus being nominated isn't rigging.
Also, no, no one would be discounted. There'd still be votes to gain in Wyoming, or Vermont, or Alaska. It'd just stop a few swing states from being the ones that matter and force candidates to actually bother campaigning in the entire country.
It's also worth pointing out that the electoral college system was designed when the total population of the US was less than the population of just the Dallas-Fort Worth area today.
RiTides wrote: I wonder if going through this now might help us as a nation in the long run, though. If people rely on what they read online without considering the source, our country's democracy was always going to be vulnerable to outside influence.
I tend to think this is the case. I remember the big 'crash' in internet display advertising that occurred back when people stopped clicking on the little banners to see where they'd take them.
Although few have ever gone broke underestimating the intelligence of the public, I think ordinary citizens are mostly capable of learning to ignore the bullgak on FB, etc., and to understand the various political leans of different news outlets and their $imple motivation$ for their re$pective lean$.
RiTides wrote: Even though I'm an independent voter in Maryland (a state that always goes Democratic) I think it's a very good reason. Without that system, huge areas of the country could be completely discounted. There are drawbacks, of course, but the alternative has huge ones, as well.
I also have very little sympathy for the democrats in this regard, since they basically rigged their primary results, so have little room to complain when the lackluster candidate they railroaded into the nomination couldn't defeat a candidate like Trump . If anything, I want more reforms for voting in primaries! As an independent, Maryland doesn't even allow me to vote in them...
These primaries. Do they allow voters to choose who gets to stand for each party?
If you are registered as a member of that party, you can vote in the primaries. I believe some states allow independents to vote as well. Example, my parents are both republican, I am an independent. They could vote in the republican primary when it came to Pennsylvania, but I couldn't vote in either parties primary. However, I don't get harassed for money or surveys as often as they do, so worse has happened.
RiTides wrote: Even though I'm an independent voter in Maryland (a state that always goes Democratic) I think it's a very good reason. Without that system, huge areas of the country could be completely discounted. There are drawbacks, of course, but the alternative has huge ones, as well.
I also have very little sympathy for the democrats in this regard, since they basically rigged their primary results, so have little room to complain when the lackluster candidate they railroaded into the nomination couldn't defeat a candidate like Trump . If anything, I want more reforms for voting in primaries! As an independent, Maryland doesn't even allow me to vote in them...
These primaries. Do they allow voters to choose who gets to stand for each party?
Depends on the party. The democrat nomination committee was terrified that the public might choose a dark horse candidate again and so made two major changes in the past few years to theirs: 1) The creation of SuperDelegates, which consist or the party powerful and major donors. These guys get a major chunk of voting power, so a popular candidate has to be significantly more popular than the party favorite to succeed. 2) The labeling of the voting outcome as a recommendation instead of a mandate, with the DNC making the final determination. In theory, they could disregard the outcome of the primary voting although the political ramifications would be pretty ugly.
The republication primary is pretty open ended. Consider that Trump, for example, had been a democratic donor and supporter up until a couple years before and terrified the crap out of the RNC. They tried everything to stop him, but didn't really have any controls in place to prevent his supporters from showing up and voting for him in greater numbers than the other candidates. It kinda worked in that they had a candidate that did win an election, even if it's someone they spent most of their careers calling an enemy of the people and the first pro-gun control presidential candidate in a long time for them.
Finally you get systems like the Libertarians. Almost anyone can show up, give a speech, and seek votes in their primary. During the last election cycle, one candidate stripped on stage, another decried the evil of secret government conspiracies and the winner had only been a libertarian for about 3 months. The craizest part was that this meant the far-right party actually fielded the most centered candidate - being one in favor of less gun control, no restrictions on marijuana, gay marriage and freedom of religon.
Primaries are crazy spectacles and next cycle's look to be just as crazy.
AlmightyWalrus - Sorry if I wasn't clear, I was referring to the Democratic primary's practice of using "Super Delegates" to determine about 15% of their primary vote, regardless of the actual voting. Here's the Wikipedia entry and a quote:
In American politics, a superdelegate is an unpledged delegate to the Democratic National Convention who is seated automatically and chooses for themselves for whom they vote. These Democratic Party superdelegates (who make up just under 15% of all convention delegates) include elected officials and party activists and officials.
Democratic superdelegates are free to support any candidate for the presidential nomination. This contrasts with convention "pledged" delegates who are selected based on the party primaries and caucuses in each U.S. state, in which voters choose among candidates for the party's presidential nomination. Moreover, superdelegates are permitted to participate in the primary elections as regular voters.
At least in name, superdelegates are not involved in the Republican Party nomination process. There are delegates to the Republican National Convention who are seated automatically, but they are limited to three per state, consisting of the state chairsperson and two district-level committee members. Republican Party superdelegates are obliged to vote for their state's popular vote winner under the rules of the party branch to which they belong.[1]
Although the term superdelegate was originally coined and created to describe a type of Democratic delegate, the term has become widely used to describe these delegates in both parties,[2] even though it is not an official term used by either party.
This, combined with the email leaks scandal where it was portrayed that the democratic establishment was "rigging" things in favor of Hillary Clinton, is where my comment came from.
Like I said, as an independent voter in Maryland I'm not allowed to vote in either the Democratic or Republican primary (as Inquisitor Lord Bane replied above, that is what we call our process of selecting the presidential candidate from each party). But with the way that process plays out, and the fact that almost all Super Delegates went for Clinton, it absolutely played a large role in her winning the primary.
So while I think the national introspection on the security of our election process (regarding foreign actors And domestic financing) is a good one, it really is hard to feel bad for a candidate that benefited greatly from the Super Delegate mechanism to get her primary nod. It also is something the Democrats really need to take a look at, since right now their primary nomation process is actually much less "democratic" than the Republicans'! (And note I tend to lean democratic on many issues, or at least centrist)
Gerrymandering is a horrendous problem both in Canada and the US. Giving people in more sparsely populated areas more of a voice SOUNDS good. But when 40% of the country gets to decide what the entire country does, that is not at all good.
A minority should never be in a position to overrule the majority, at least not with a delta of that significance. If a significant majority of the country feels one way, and the empowered, gerrymandered minority feels different, what impetus do they have to meet in the middle? Or to adjust to the overall country?
Right now, again, one party, usually the one with the most nationalistic, radical views rigs the system via gerrymandering. The moderate other side doesn't pull crap like this, or, at least no on the same scale. On top of it, they then tell their people that it is in fact THEY who the system is rigged against... disgusting.
I'll tell you what, if multiple millions of people vote for one person to be president, that person should be president. Keep electoral colleges for house seats, but the president should be popular vote. Making every individual vote count for President might make people think more about who they are voting for.
Automatically Appended Next Post: PS - Steve - California, jumping coasts bud
I honestly don't see why anyone who's not part of the party should be allowed to vote on who that party nominates as their candidate. It's not like we expect Swedish citizens to be allowed to vote in UK elections, or Irish citizens to vote in German elections, or members of the Teacher's Union to be voting for representatives in the Steelworkers' Union.
AlmightyWalrus, given the great power of the primary election process, I'm surprised to see you arguing For going with a straight popular vote nationwide, and Against allowing all voters to participate in Primary voting. As far as I know, no state allows you to vote in Both primaries (you have to choose one) but unless I tie myself to one party or the other, in my state I cannot vote in Any.
I saw your post above about going with a straight popular vote forcing candidates to campaign across the entire country, but the effect would just be to shift where they campaign away from "purple" states, and towards the population centers on both coasts. I live near D.C. and Baltimore, so we'd get plenty of attention here, but I think we get enough attention without being the focus of the presidential campaigning.
And Tom, again I'm in Maryland, and we're one of two states being considered in the Supreme Court for gerrymandering, but it's the democrats who are in power, and who did the clear gerrymandering, in my state (Also, darn, was hoping you'd be closer to the east coast )
Imo, we need a bit less "tribalism", and more independent thinking, in our political process. Both parties abuse power when they have very large majorities, and a lot of the policies I would like to see enacted (such as campaign finance reform) affect both parties. They're both deeply funded by outside entities (and in fact, last I saw the democrats actually had the fundraising edge in large donations), and both need to be reformed in that regard.
At least we agree something needs fixing but to me, it's improving fairness of the process and closing loopholes within the current structure, not fundamentally shifting power in the nation as a whole by doing something like abolishing the electoral college. Since that would need ratifying by the majority of states (more of which would be neglected under such a system) or a massive 2/3 majority in the Senate (with 2 senators from each state meaning it's also reflective of a similar spread of opinions), that will likely never be much of a possibility anyway, though...
Bear in mind that I'm speaking from a perspective that assumes that you should also change to proportional representation ASAP. If there's a bunch of different parties that are actually represented then you also have a number of parties to choose to engage in. I'll concede the point when there's effectively just two parties to choose from though.
I'd still argue that proportional representation would be more fair than the current situation. Even if most of the efforts of campaigning was spent in the population centers, the people in the purple states would still have an impact on the outcome of the election, whereas under the current system a Democrat in Texas or a Republican in California is effectively meaningless. How is it fair that some people's votes don't count at all just because they happen to live in a certain place?
Yes, it'd suck for Vermont that they can't punch well above their population's weight anymore, but that's the point. Why should a larger number of people accept that a smaller number of people get to make decisions for them just because the roles would be reversed otherwise? I'd be more interested in hearing about any drawbacks that proportional representation would lead to that isn't drawbacks that already exist.
I think the main drawback of such a system, is that with such a massive country land-area-wise, with such a concentration of population on the coasts, a large "geographic" area of the country would feel disenfranchised, whereas now a certain percentage in very populous states do. But it would just shift the problem, not eliminate it, imo.
Since I live in a state that is very polarized towards one party, but I myself vote for candidates of both parties (although I've voted Democratic in the last 3 presidential elections) I personally feel the negative effects of the current system. But for me, it is worth it, because my state and others like it already have a lot of sway.
California's predicament in particular rings a bit hollow to many folks in the US, because California has a Lot of sway in the country already. Down to small things like labeling on a package, to much larger policies like emissions standards, if California goes a certain way, a lot of times that sets the policy for the rest of the country, since it is such a massive state with a large population.
I think the argument you're making also kind of shows the natural check-and-balance of the current setup, in that a voter for the minority party in Texas has the same problem as a voter for the minority party in California. It divides the national race up into smaller contests within state borders, for whichever states are swinging closer to centrist that election cycle. I think this is a good thing, personally, since it forces politicians to engage in regions rather than just nationally, but I can see the drawbacks. I just don't see a straight popular vote being better for the USA, and despite current political drama, the system has historically worked pretty well so far, imo!
Our country is designed to be 50 different states who have a combined defense budget, and a shared currency. This is why the electoral college came into being, to give the states equal power, because (on paper) on a federal level, they are all equal. Over time this thought process has changed quite a bit, but the system hasn't caught up yet. This is also why you hear screaming about States Rights, and why our states have conflicting laws. The federal government has much, much more power than our founding fathers designed it to have, and there has been no changes to our election process.
AlmightyWalrus wrote: Bear in mind that I'm speaking from a perspective that assumes that you should also change to proportional representation ASAP. If there's a bunch of different parties that are actually represented then you also have a number of parties to choose to engage in. I'll concede the point when there's effectively just two parties to choose from though.
I'd still argue that proportional representation would be more fair than the current situation. Even if most of the efforts of campaigning was spent in the population centers, the people in the purple states would still have an impact on the outcome of the election, whereas under the current system a Democrat in Texas or a Republican in California is effectively meaningless. How is it fair that some people's votes don't count at all just because they happen to live in a certain place?
Yes, it'd suck for Vermont that they can't punch well above their population's weight anymore, but that's the point. Why should a larger number of people accept that a smaller number of people get to make decisions for them just because the roles would be reversed otherwise? I'd be more interested in hearing about any drawbacks that proportional representation would lead to that isn't drawbacks that already exist.
People don't elect the President, the States do. Each state has the same representation in the Electoral College as they have in Congress. Every resident in every state has the same Electoral representation as they have Legislative representation. The lack of competitive races in states like California has nothing to do with the Electoral College the Electoral system isn't the reason why the Republican Party isn't competitive in California. Since the States elect the President the votes in one state don't affect the election in other states. Clinton won California by 3 million votes, Trump won Wisconsin by 23,000 votes, the popular vote in one state doesn't and shouldn't have any effect on the results of the election and Electoral apportionment in another state. Abolishing the electoral college in favor of a national popular vote would be the same as abolishing the Senate and having 100 senators elected by a national vote ignoring state boundaries. As long as we have states we'll have Federalism and it doesn't make sense to make presidential elections the one glaring exemption to that Federalist system.
AlmightyWalrus wrote: I honestly don't see why anyone who's not part of the party should be allowed to vote on who that party nominates as their candidate. It's not like we expect Swedish citizens to be allowed to vote in UK elections, or Irish citizens to vote in German elections, or members of the Teacher's Union to be voting for representatives in the Steelworkers' Union.
The problem for me is that primaries are treated as if they are simply intra-party elections to determine who the nominee of the party will be.
But in reality the individual states are tasked with running the primary elections, which means that the state has to print the ballots, spend the money on the infrastructure to hold the elections, pay for the cost of administering them, and to count the ballots. The state pays for the machines, the state pays for the training of workers and volunteers, the state pays for all of it. And if the state pays for it, that means that in reality we all pay for it.
Now, if my any random business in my state decides they need a new board of directors, they can't get the state to run their board elections for them. If my HOA wants a new president, we don't get to have the state run that election for us. If I want to know which business in the metro area has the best pizza, they don't get to have the state run a "vote for the best pizza" question on the ballot.
But somehow we have decided that political parties are able to proclaim primaries as "internal affairs" that are closed to participation by everybody else, while getting everybody else to pay for the cost of those "internal" elections.
I think if parties want to keep their primaries closed, they should be billed by the state for the cost of administering their private elections.
AlmightyWalrus wrote: Bear in mind that I'm speaking from a perspective that assumes that you should also change to proportional representation ASAP. If there's a bunch of different parties that are actually represented then you also have a number of parties to choose to engage in. I'll concede the point when there's effectively just two parties to choose from though.
I'd still argue that proportional representation would be more fair than the current situation. Even if most of the efforts of campaigning was spent in the population centers, the people in the purple states would still have an impact on the outcome of the election, whereas under the current system a Democrat in Texas or a Republican in California is effectively meaningless. How is it fair that some people's votes don't count at all just because they happen to live in a certain place?
Yes, it'd suck for Vermont that they can't punch well above their population's weight anymore, but that's the point. Why should a larger number of people accept that a smaller number of people get to make decisions for them just because the roles would be reversed otherwise? I'd be more interested in hearing about any drawbacks that proportional representation would lead to that isn't drawbacks that already exist.
People don't elect the President, the States do. Each state has the same representation in the Electoral College as they have in Congress. Every resident in every state has the same Electoral representation as they have Legislative representation. The lack of competitive races in states like California has nothing to do with the Electoral College the Electoral system isn't the reason why the Republican Party isn't competitive in California. Since the States elect the President the votes in one state don't affect the election in other states. Clinton won California by 3 million votes, Trump won Wisconsin by 23,000 votes, the popular vote in one state doesn't and shouldn't have any effect on the results of the election and Electoral apportionment in another state. Abolishing the electoral college in favor of a national popular vote would be the same as abolishing the Senate and having 100 senators elected by a national vote ignoring state boundaries. As long as we have states we'll have Federalism and it doesn't make sense to make presidential elections the one glaring exemption to that Federalist system.
The interesting thing is that as far as the constitution is concerned, there is not even any actual right to have any sort of popular vote of any kind for POTUS. Oklahoma could pass a law saying that we will pick our electors by randomly selecting names out of a hat, Texas could pass a law stating that their electors will be picked by holding a shooting contest in each district, California could pass a law saying that they will pick electors by selecting the next folks to cross the border, and Kansas can pick their electors from a group of grade school kids. Every one of those methods of choosing electors would be constitutional.
The electoral college has failed twice in the last five elections to match the popular vote. It does not help that in the two instances this has occurred, it has resulted in quite possibly the least popular and most divisive administrations this nation has seen in recent memory, and losing the popular vote undercut the popular trust in those administrations frm day 1.
Given that the electoral college has also been divorced from its independent "super citizen" / senatorial equivalent role in almost all respects (and instead is allocated on pure majority vote in each state, regardless of the magnitude of the victory, largely cancelling out millions of votes and allowing someone to win election with as little as a quarter of the popular vote), this dramatically undercuts its role and the public trust in that role. It is difficult to see what sort of check or balance it continues to serve in such light, and largey just instead looks to be another partisan gaming mechanism instead of serving any meaningful balance of power function. It disenfranchises millions of red voters in blue states and millions of blue voters in red states, stands in the way of any third party having any realistic chance, and gives some very small states radically outsized power than they have any real reason to wield.
The sooner the EC goes bye-bye, the better American democracy will be for it.
In Quebec, we have a system much akin to the US electoral college. It has been used by nationalists and separatists to essentially put the boonie minority in charge of the province. People who rarely if ever encounter minorities like English speakers and people of color, but who are told they are under threat from these 'others' by their nationalist party. They have no direct experience really, it is entirely a world view based on propaganda. (Sound familiar, to quote Trump just today, country is being stolen, dems are trying to dismantle our (whatever our means) way of life etc etc.
Here's the thing, I'm on the other end of this. I am an English speaking white male in Quebec. That, unlike anywhere else in North America, makes me an undesirable minority that must be assimilated entirely or never be considered a Quebecer, even being born here. I have heard my whole life from the govt how I am a problem, that I am responsible for hollywood, music and cultural invasion, and my language is offensive in a lot of this province. As far as Quebec at large is concerned, I might as well be wearing a hijab.
Ok, so besides the obvious, this is what is pissing me off. The mixed, more tolerant 'progressive' parts of this province, mostly Montreal itself, drive 60-70% of Business in the entire province. We pay the lion's share of taxes. Yet despite this, we are subject to the will of people who don't live in our reality whatsoever and want to govern based on fear and ignorance. They take our money happily enough, but they don't want to let us be equal. They think being a Quebecer means being a Francophone that's been here several generations... there is even a name for it, 'Pure-leine' - which means pure wool.
So even though the majority of this province doesn't want to seperate, and a significant portion of it's biggest city, and it's biggest economic engine, wants bilingualism and to let the society make progress instead of being locked into the 1960's forever, we have been shackled to the minority for decades. It has hurt us, socially and economically. It has divided us. It makes business difficult, because you can't simply succeed, that's not good enough to just have a viable business, you have to do it their way (in french) or get out.
Any of this sound familiar to you down there?
I have gotten to watch the results of gerrymandering, fear of the other politics my entire life. I have been the native minority that is told they are doing wrong even while they suceed. I am not antifrench at all. I speak french. I identify more with a Quebecer than I ever would with a british colombian, or a new brunswicker. I love so much about the french culture here. But unless I can fool someone into thinking my family has been here generations, it's not good enough. If they (they being the self-identified nationalist/seperatists) detect an accent, even if my french is otherwise perfect, it is offensive and not good enough.
The amount of businesses that left Quebec because of this is staggering. The amount of brain power that migrated out of here is staggering. There is a reason Toronto became the most powerful city in the last 50 years, it's because montreal went there to do business. We lost so much, and are still losing, because due to the exodus, due to the badly run government that never focused on improving anything if it was perceived to cost anything to french culture instead of doing things to help business thrive, to attract ip and brain power, taxes went up, cost of doing business went up.
We are only now barely crawling out of it into viable growth, but for the longest time, we were the definition of a nanny state with bloated bureaucracy and poor policy.
At the time, everyone here was like 'ya ya, let them go, we will make our shining city ourselves, the way we want, we won't mix our cultures, we will be supreme'. It didn't work. The world moved on without us. We were left behind and too proud to change or ask for help.
If it were not for the culture clash here leading to nationalism and seperatism, strict language laws and resultant terrible tax rates, I am 100% convinced Quebec, and Montreal, would still reign supreme in Canada as they did prior to 1960. We did this to ourselves. In the name of protecting our culture against the other. In the name of pride.
What I see happening down there makes me scared for you guys, not because I hate you, because I know where this road leads and anyone telling themselves what is happening now is going to be good for the US for any meaningful duration is delusional in the worst way. Doing wrong while being so convinced you are right with a complete inability to see what is sitting right in front of you... yeah.
Here's another thing that should ring familiar, even when federalist govt's are elected here (it goes back and forth just as it does with you guys), they won't touch the subject of minority rights or bilingualism. Why? For much the same reason that the Democrats avoid guns. The French Cultural lobby here is so strong, is such a hot-button issue, that those who would otherwise address the problems abstain out of terror of mobilizing every single last person with even mild seperatist leanings like an army, because much like the NRA and guns, they have convinced the self-identified population that any concession, and discussion, is tantamount to throwing everything away. French cultural supremacy is Quebec's second amendment. You can't even debate it with any hope of agreement on facts or intent to compromise. It is equivalent to questioning a religious person's faith, you just don't do it, and if you do, get ready to throw down.
It depends on how those votes can effect people in the lower pop areas. It would be bad if liberals in a city could domineer over rural areas with no checks.
Tannhauser42 wrote: Here's a question. Since we're asking who's the future of the Democratic Party, who's the future of the Republican Party?
Some people like to trot out the line that Trump only won because Hillary was "that bad", but that same reason would also apply to everyone on the Republican side who ran against Trump, meaning Rubio, Jeb, Cruz, etc., were also all "that bad".
While I generally like the direction this administration is going... holee fark balls I just wished Trump would stop tweeting! It NEVER fails when there's some good news, the Tweeter-In-Chief puts his foot in his big mouth.
As for the Republican's future?
People talk about the current GOP are mainly driven by *Legacy Republicans* or even *lefty Rockafeller Republicans*.
Something I don't think enough professional Republicans understand/appreciate about the frustrations of GOPers like Flake, Kasich or Corker...
He and other Republicans never talk about liberals, hardcore lefty types, the way they do about parts of the GOP coalition they don't like (ie, Freedom Caucas, Tea Party Caucas).
You may say that the parts of the GOP they/you don't like are worse than anything on the left, ok. But that's not going to move your voters.
Flake has been on MSNBC saying it's wrong for the GOP to talk about cultural issues. That's not something a Democrat would ever say. EVER. They simply don't believe that Politics isdownstream from culture. 'Tis why liberals/lefties/Democrats dominates pop culture/Hollywood/Colleges...
There are a lot of GOP/GOP leaners who see an onslaught from the liberals/left, which the elected Democrats gleefully participate in and then they see... the GOPers not just fail to push back but hem&haw to obliquely say thatpushing back is just not what the right people do.
People simply want the party they support to support them. Right or wrong a LOT of Republican voters don't see the GOP politicians supporting them.
The current GOP leadership class has made it clear they aren't interested in those fights. Fair enough...
But don't be upset when those people seek someone who will.... enter the Tweeter-In-Chief. Factor in the media giving El Trumpo 3 billion dollars of free airtime during the GOP primary and this.... you have a recipe of "how Trump happened".
It's supply and demand.
I'm not arguing either side is right or wrong (I'm sympathetic to both), but unless and until people accept that these parties are coalitions and everyone sees they are getting a reasonable return on investment...here we are.
My guess is, it's too late though. Trumpism is here to stay and as long as Democrats don't go insane, they'll have great chances in re-taking Congress and the WH.
And don't tell me the current professional GOP wing are the adults in the room.
They ran on the idea that ObamaCare was destroying the country. They then walked away from it in months after winning.
How the hell can you do that and expect people to say, "yeah, you guys are worth following and tying our fate to".
Not going to lie... I saw this a mile away.... when the Democrats retake Congress and WH, watch for the Tea Party Part Two-The Electricbugaloo.
Sure it does, because the Senators are already representatives for their respective State. The President's job isn't to be representative of any one State.
The fact that it's the States that elect the President is irrelevant, the point still stands: the Electoral congress effectively discriminates citizens in more popolous states.
Proportional representation on a State level could work as a compromise; you wouldn't make people's votes worthless and the smaller states would retain their advantage.
Vaktathi wrote: The electoral college has failed twice in the last five elections to match the popular vote. It does not help that in the two instances this has occurred, it has resulted in quite possibly the least popular and most divisive administrations this nation has seen in recent memory, and losing the popular vote undercut the popular trust in those administrations frm day 1.
Given that the electoral college has also been divorced from its independent "super citizen" / senatorial equivalent role in almost all respects (and instead is allocated on pure majority vote in each state, regardless of the magnitude of the victory, largely cancelling out millions of votes and allowing someone to win election with as little as a quarter of the popular vote), this dramatically undercuts its role and the public trust in that role. It is difficult to see what sort of check or balance it continues to serve in such light, and largey just instead looks to be another partisan gaming mechanism instead of serving any meaningful balance of power function. It disenfranchises millions of red voters in blue states and millions of blue voters in red states, stands in the way of any third party having any realistic chance, and gives some very small states radically outsized power than they have any real reason to wield.
The sooner the EC goes bye-bye, the better American democracy will be for it.
I don't know that the EC has to go, but it could does need to be improved by the individual states. I think even changing the voting mechanism to more closely match the mechanism by which the number of electors is determined would be a major improvement. Instate of having a statewide vote for all electors, assign electoral votes to each district with two electors chosen by the statewide vote. I don't have the time (and honestly I don't think I really have the desire either) to see how past elections would have turned out if electors were chosen that way, but it could only be an improvement. The other approach would be to assign electors proportionally to the total statewide vote.
The "by district" approach wouldn't have changed any of the Electoral votes in Oklahoma, but the proportional vote would have. I vote against the grain in Oklahoma, so I would have benefited from a proportional selection, but I still prefer the "by district" approach better I think.
A by district approach leads to district gerrymandering having a greater effect. Hopefully the Supreme Court puts a stop to it like the PA Supreme Court did (Though they were then impeached...Go figure...)
Grey Templar wrote: It depends on how those votes can effect people in the lower pop areas. It would be bad if liberals in a city could domineer over rural areas with no checks.
And it's ridiculous that a sparsely populated rural area can override the population of a city.
You don't get to have it both ways talking about how "if liberals in a city could domineer over rural areas with no checks" when we have conservatives in rural areas doing exactly that right now.
skyth wrote: A by district approach leads to district gerrymandering having a greater effect. Hopefully the Supreme Court puts a stop to it like the PA Supreme Court did (Though they were then impeached...Go figure...)
Yeah, you would have to figure out how to fix the gerrymander problem.
Really, my solution to the electoral problem is Ranked Voting (In both elections and primaries), getting rid of gerrymandering (make the circumference of each district in a state divided by the square root of the area be roughly equal would be a start), and a tax credit for voting.
There is an answer to be had here. There is a way to vet gerrymandering scientifically... It's not witchcraft, it's stats. If the dems gerrymandered too, then they should be forced to re-district just like the GOP had to.
The solutions are available, don't kid yourselves guys, it's the political will to do it that is lacking and nothing else. If data strategy can lead to gerrymandering, then data policy can eliminate it.
In Quebec, we have a system much akin to the US electoral college. It has been used by nationalists and separatists to essentially put the boonie minority in charge of the province. People who rarely if ever encounter minorities like English speakers and people of color, but who are told they are under threat from these 'others' by their nationalist party. They have no direct experience really, it is entirely a world view based on propaganda. (Sound familiar, to quote Trump just today, country is being stolen, dems are trying to dismantle our (whatever our means) way of life etc etc.
Here's the thing, I'm on the other end of this. I am an English speaking white male in Quebec. That, unlike anywhere else in North America, makes me an undesirable minority that must be assimilated entirely or never be considered a Quebecer, even being born here. I have heard my whole life from the govt how I am a problem, that I am responsible for hollywood, music and cultural invasion, and my language is offensive in a lot of this province. As far as Quebec at large is concerned, I might as well be wearing a hijab.
Ok, so besides the obvious, this is what is pissing me off. The mixed, more tolerant 'progressive' parts of this province, mostly Montreal itself, drive 60-70% of Business in the entire province. We pay the lion's share of taxes. Yet despite this, we are subject to the will of people who don't live in our reality whatsoever and want to govern based on fear and ignorance. They take our money happily enough, but they don't want to let us be equal. They think being a Quebecer means being a Francophone that's been here several generations... there is even a name for it, 'Pure-leine' - which means pure wool.
So even though the majority of this province doesn't want to seperate, and a significant portion of it's biggest city, and it's biggest economic engine, wants bilingualism and to let the society make progress instead of being locked into the 1960's forever, we have been shackled to the minority for decades. It has hurt us, socially and economically. It has divided us. It makes business difficult, because you can't simply succeed, that's not good enough to just have a viable business, you have to do it their way (in french) or get out.
Any of this sound familiar to you down there?
I have gotten to watch the results of gerrymandering, fear of the other politics my entire life. I have been the native minority that is told they are doing wrong even while they suceed. I am not antifrench at all. I speak french. I identify more with a Quebecer than I ever would with a british colombian, or a new brunswicker. I love so much about the french culture here. But unless I can fool someone into thinking my family has been here generations, it's not good enough. If they (they being the self-identified nationalist/seperatists) detect an accent, even if my french is otherwise perfect, it is offensive and not good enough.
The amount of businesses that left Quebec because of this is staggering. The amount of brain power that migrated out of here is staggering. There is a reason Toronto became the most powerful city in the last 50 years, it's because montreal went there to do business. We lost so much, and are still losing, because due to the exodus, due to the badly run government that never focused on improving anything if it was perceived to cost anything to french culture instead of doing things to help business thrive, to attract ip and brain power, taxes went up, cost of doing business went up.
We are only now barely crawling out of it into viable growth, but for the longest time, we were the definition of a nanny state with bloated bureaucracy and poor policy.
At the time, everyone here was like 'ya ya, let them go, we will make our shining city ourselves, the way we want, we won't mix our cultures, we will be supreme'. It didn't work. The world moved on without us. We were left behind and too proud to change or ask for help.
If it were not for the culture clash here leading to nationalism and seperatism, strict language laws and resultant terrible tax rates, I am 100% convinced Quebec, and Montreal, would still reign supreme in Canada as they did prior to 1960. We did this to ourselves. In the name of protecting our culture against the other. In the name of pride.
What I see happening down there makes me scared for you guys, not because I hate you, because I know where this road leads and anyone telling themselves what is happening now is going to be good for the US for any meaningful duration is delusional in the worst way. Doing wrong while being so convinced you are right with a complete inability to see what is sitting right in front of you... yeah.
Here's another thing that should ring familiar, even when federalist govt's are elected here (it goes back and forth just as it does with you guys), they won't touch the subject of minority rights or bilingualism. Why? For much the same reason that the Democrats avoid guns. The French Cultural lobby here is so strong, is such a hot-button issue, that those who would otherwise address the problems abstain out of terror of mobilizing every single last person with even mild seperatist leanings like an army, because much like the NRA and guns, they have convinced the self-identified population that any concession, and discussion, is tantamount to throwing everything away. French cultural supremacy is Quebec's second amendment. You can't even debate it with any hope of agreement on facts or intent to compromise. It is equivalent to questioning a religious person's faith, you just don't do it, and if you do, get ready to throw down.
This is a great post. I can't even add anything to this.
On a pleasant note, I work with a lot of Quebecois out of province (they make up a disproportionate amount of our military) and the majority of them who have spent time outside of Quebec all agree how ridiculous a lot of Quebec policies are.
That said, I'd kill for those university tuition rates or childcare costs.
Grey Templar wrote: It depends on how those votes can effect people in the lower pop areas. It would be bad if liberals in a city could domineer over rural areas with no checks.
And it's ridiculous that a sparsely populated rural area can override the population of a city.
You don't get to have it both ways talk about how "if liberals in a city could domineer over rural areas with no checks" when we have conservatives in rural areas doing exactly that right now.
But "have it both ways" is the central problem with our politics. And it's a problem with both sides.
Obama was an idiot for ever proposing face-to-face meetings with North Korea, and Trump is a genius for agreeing to face-to-face meetings with North Korea.
Trump is a monster for cheating on his wife with prior to being elected, and it shouldn't matter that Clinton got blown by an intern while being President.
75% of what people bitch about has nothing at all to do with what actually happened. It only matters because someone they don't like did anything at all, which becomes obvious as soon as someone they like does it and then they stop caring.
Vaktathi wrote: The electoral college has failed twice in the last five elections to match the popular vote. It does not help that in the two instances this has occurred, it has resulted in quite possibly the least popular and most divisive administrations this nation has seen in recent memory, and losing the popular vote undercut the popular trust in those administrations frm day 1.
Given that the electoral college has also been divorced from its independent "super citizen" / senatorial equivalent role in almost all respects (and instead is allocated on pure majority vote in each state, regardless of the magnitude of the victory, largely cancelling out millions of votes and allowing someone to win election with as little as a quarter of the popular vote),
Hence, my argument to repeal the 17th Admendment.
this dramatically undercuts its role and the public trust in that role. It is difficult to see what sort of check or balance it continues to serve in such light, and largey just instead looks to be another partisan gaming mechanism instead of serving any meaningful balance of power function. It disenfranchises millions of red voters in blue states and millions of blue voters in red states, stands in the way of any third party having any realistic chance, and gives some very small states radically outsized power than they have any real reason to wield.
The sooner the EC goes bye-bye, the better American democracy will be for it.
Quite the opposite. Worked as intended. A majority of States chose the president. See: United STATES. Not NY and CA et al
To give you the idea... consider there are 3,141 counties in the United States.
Trump won 3,084 of them. Clinton won 57.
For context...there are 62 counties in New York State.
Trump won 46 of them. Clinton won 16.
Clinton won the popular vote by approx. 1.5 million votes combined.
For giggles... let's go back to NY state as there are 5 counties that encompass NYC, (Bronx, Brooklyn, Manhattan, Richmond & Queens) and Clinton received well over 2 million more votes than Trump. (Clinton only won 4 of these counties; Trump won Richmond)
Therefore these 5 counties alone, more than accounted for Clinton winning the popular vote of the entire country.
These 5 counties comprise 319 square miles. The United States is comprised of 3, 797,000 square miles.
When you have a country that encompasses almost 4 million square miles of territory, it would be ludicrous to even suggest that the vote of those who inhabit a mere 319 square miles should dictate the outcome of a national election. Even though by virtue of being a populous state, they have more representation in Congress than most states.
Large, densely populated cities (NYC, Chicago, LA, etc) don’t and shouldn’t speak for the rest of our country.
Put another way: Hillary Clinton only won a majority of the popular vote in only thirteen states, the fewest of any major-party nominee since Bob Dole in 1996. In other words...Clinton was minority in 37 states. Here’s the map of where she and Trump carried popular majorities:
I get that some of you don't like Trump... but, that's on the quality of his opponent, who was an exceptionally bad candidate, not the EC.
MajorTom11 wrote: There is an answer to be had here. There is a way to vet gerrymandering scientifically... It's not witchcraft, it's stats. If the dems gerrymandered too, then they should be forced to re-district just like the GOP had to.
To be fair, the Democratis party does do it as well. This is one of the reasons why the SCOTUS ended up hearing two separate cases on the same subject in the same term: a challenge against political gerrymandering in a red state, and a challenge against political gerrymandering in a blue state. That way the ruling won't have the same risk as being tainted as a "Conservative/Liberal court ruling against a Liberal/Conservative state" ruling.
The solutions are available, don't kid yourselves guys, it's the political will to do it that is lacking and nothing else. If data strategy can lead to gerrymandering, then data policy can eliminate it.
I am cautiously optimistic that SCOTUS will force a change, but I'm not holding my breath either.
Frankly, liberals need to drop gun control and be all for personal gun ownership. Namely because gun control has its roots in racism within the Democratic Party. It was originally brought about in an attempt to limit African Americans access to guns, and went hand in hand with other attempts to limit their ability to vote and attend “white” schools. Democrats need to stop being hippocrits on this, as the party that allegedly champions personal rights and freedom.
What I would do is tie expansion of gun rights to healthcare. Give conservatives what they want with guns in exchange for what liberals want with healthcare. No restrictions on private ownership of weaponry of any kind(abolish all state laws regarding restricted weapons), no limits on open carry(abolish all state laws restricting this), a national CCW program, and a national background check system which operates by pooling all felony convictions and mental institution databases. Also it should contain methods to remove individuals from the “no buy” list via an appeals process. In exchange, we could create basically a government health insurance option paid for by all tax payers that would be have to be accepted at any health provider. It would only provide a minimal level of coverage however so private providers would still be superior. The cost for this could be collected via tax returns based on number of dependents and would be a flat per person rate. No exemptions for Income either.
Vaktathi wrote: The electoral college has failed twice in the last five elections to match the popular vote. It does not help that in the two instances this has occurred, it has resulted in quite possibly the least popular and most divisive administrations this nation has seen in recent memory, and losing the popular vote undercut the popular trust in those administrations frm day 1.
Given that the electoral college has also been divorced from its independent "super citizen" / senatorial equivalent role in almost all respects (and instead is allocated on pure majority vote in each state, regardless of the magnitude of the victory, largely cancelling out millions of votes and allowing someone to win election with as little as a quarter of the popular vote), this dramatically undercuts its role and the public trust in that role. It is difficult to see what sort of check or balance it continues to serve in such light, and largey just instead looks to be another partisan gaming mechanism instead of serving any meaningful balance of power function. It disenfranchises millions of red voters in blue states and millions of blue voters in red states, stands in the way of any third party having any realistic chance, and gives some very small states radically outsized power than they have any real reason to wield.
The sooner the EC goes bye-bye, the better American democracy will be for it.
I don't know that the EC has to go, but it could does need to be improved by the individual states. I think even changing the voting mechanism to more closely match the mechanism by which the number of electors is determined would be a major improvement. Instate of having a statewide vote for all electors, assign electoral votes to each district with two electors chosen by the statewide vote. I don't have the time (and honestly I don't think I really have the desire either) to see how past elections would have turned out if electors were chosen that way, but it could only be an improvement. The other approach would be to assign electors proportionally to the total statewide vote.
The "by district" approach wouldn't have changed any of the Electoral votes in Oklahoma, but the proportional vote would have. I vote against the grain in Oklahoma, so I would have benefited from a proportional selection, but I still prefer the "by district" approach better I think.
Without queation there are lots of better alternative ways of doing the EC than what we do now, but the fundamental question remains...why have an EC? The president is a national office elected to represent the nation as a whole, why not have a single nation-wide vote? Splitting that up into smaller elements simply allows additional partisan and geographic gimmickry and the chance for a nonrepresentational result.
Vaktathi wrote: The electoral college has failed twice in the last five elections to match the popular vote. It does not help that in the two instances this has occurred, it has resulted in quite possibly the least popular and most divisive administrations this nation has seen in recent memory, and losing the popular vote undercut the popular trust in those administrations frm day 1.
Given that the electoral college has also been divorced from its independent "super citizen" / senatorial equivalent role in almost all respects (and instead is allocated on pure majority vote in each state, regardless of the magnitude of the victory, largely cancelling out millions of votes and allowing someone to win election with as little as a quarter of the popular vote),
Hence, my argument to repeal the 17th Admendment.
this dramatically undercuts its role and the public trust in that role. It is difficult to see what sort of check or balance it continues to serve in such light, and largey just instead looks to be another partisan gaming mechanism instead of serving any meaningful balance of power function. It disenfranchises millions of red voters in blue states and millions of blue voters in red states, stands in the way of any third party having any realistic chance, and gives some very small states radically outsized power than they have any real reason to wield.
The sooner the EC goes bye-bye, the better American democracy will be for it.
Quite the opposite. Worked as intended. A majority of States chose the president. See: United STATES. Not NY and CA et al
To give you the idea... consider there are 3,141 counties in the United States.
Trump won 3,084 of them.
Clinton won 57.
.
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Vaktathi wrote: Without queation there are lots of better alternative ways of doing the EC than what we do now, but the fundamental question remains...why have an EC? The president is a national office elected to represent the nation as a whole, why not have a single nation-wide vote? Splitting that up into smaller elements simply allows additional partisan and geographic gimmickry and the chance for a nonrepresentational result.
Because the Constitution states that 538 people are allowed to vote for President, and states are able to pick those 538 people in any way they want.
You, I, or anyone else has ZERO constitution right to pick our POTUS. We hold our constitution sacred, but there is some amazingly stupid stuff in it as well.
AlmightyWalrus wrote: Sure it does, because the Senators are already representatives for their respective State. The President's job isn't to be representative of any one State.
The fact that it's the States that elect the President is irrelevant, the point still stands: the Electoral congress effectively discriminates citizens in more popolous states.
Proportional representation on a State level could work as a compromise; you wouldn't make people's votes worthless and the smaller states would retain their advantage.
No it doesn't. California has more than 18 times as many Electoral votes as Wyoming (55 vs 3) that's the same representation those states get in Congress. What compelling reason is there for California residents to have a greater impact on the Executive branch of the Federal govt than they do on the Legislative branch? Equal representation in both branches of government isn't discriminatory.
In Quebec, we have a system much akin to the US electoral college. It has been used by nationalists and separatists to essentially put the boonie minority in charge of the province. People who rarely if ever encounter minorities like English speakers and people of color, but who are told they are under threat from these 'others' by their nationalist party. They have no direct experience really, it is entirely a world view based on propaganda. (Sound familiar, to quote Trump just today, country is being stolen, dems are trying to dismantle our (whatever our means) way of life etc etc.
Here's the thing, I'm on the other end of this. I am an English speaking white male in Quebec. That, unlike anywhere else in North America, makes me an undesirable minority that must be assimilated entirely or never be considered a Quebecer, even being born here. I have heard my whole life from the govt how I am a problem, that I am responsible for hollywood, music and cultural invasion, and my language is offensive in a lot of this province. As far as Quebec at large is concerned, I might as well be wearing a hijab.
Ok, so besides the obvious, this is what is pissing me off. The mixed, more tolerant 'progressive' parts of this province, mostly Montreal itself, drive 60-70% of Business in the entire province. We pay the lion's share of taxes. Yet despite this, we are subject to the will of people who don't live in our reality whatsoever and want to govern based on fear and ignorance. They take our money happily enough, but they don't want to let us be equal. They think being a Quebecer means being a Francophone that's been here several generations... there is even a name for it, 'Pure-leine' - which means pure wool.
So even though the majority of this province doesn't want to seperate, and a significant portion of it's biggest city, and it's biggest economic engine, wants bilingualism and to let the society make progress instead of being locked into the 1960's forever, we have been shackled to the minority for decades. It has hurt us, socially and economically. It has divided us. It makes business difficult, because you can't simply succeed, that's not good enough to just have a viable business, you have to do it their way (in french) or get out.
Any of this sound familiar to you down there?
I have gotten to watch the results of gerrymandering, fear of the other politics my entire life. I have been the native minority that is told they are doing wrong even while they suceed. I am not antifrench at all. I speak french. I identify more with a Quebecer than I ever would with a british colombian, or a new brunswicker. I love so much about the french culture here. But unless I can fool someone into thinking my family has been here generations, it's not good enough. If they (they being the self-identified nationalist/seperatists) detect an accent, even if my french is otherwise perfect, it is offensive and not good enough.
The amount of businesses that left Quebec because of this is staggering. The amount of brain power that migrated out of here is staggering. There is a reason Toronto became the most powerful city in the last 50 years, it's because montreal went there to do business. We lost so much, and are still losing, because due to the exodus, due to the badly run government that never focused on improving anything if it was perceived to cost anything to french culture instead of doing things to help business thrive, to attract ip and brain power, taxes went up, cost of doing business went up.
We are only now barely crawling out of it into viable growth, but for the longest time, we were the definition of a nanny state with bloated bureaucracy and poor policy.
At the time, everyone here was like 'ya ya, let them go, we will make our shining city ourselves, the way we want, we won't mix our cultures, we will be supreme'. It didn't work. The world moved on without us. We were left behind and too proud to change or ask for help.
If it were not for the culture clash here leading to nationalism and seperatism, strict language laws and resultant terrible tax rates, I am 100% convinced Quebec, and Montreal, would still reign supreme in Canada as they did prior to 1960. We did this to ourselves. In the name of protecting our culture against the other. In the name of pride.
What I see happening down there makes me scared for you guys, not because I hate you, because I know where this road leads and anyone telling themselves what is happening now is going to be good for the US for any meaningful duration is delusional in the worst way. Doing wrong while being so convinced you are right with a complete inability to see what is sitting right in front of you... yeah.
Here's another thing that should ring familiar, even when federalist govt's are elected here (it goes back and forth just as it does with you guys), they won't touch the subject of minority rights or bilingualism. Why? For much the same reason that the Democrats avoid guns. The French Cultural lobby here is so strong, is such a hot-button issue, that those who would otherwise address the problems abstain out of terror of mobilizing every single last person with even mild seperatist leanings like an army, because much like the NRA and guns, they have convinced the self-identified population that any concession, and discussion, is tantamount to throwing everything away. French cultural supremacy is Quebec's second amendment. You can't even debate it with any hope of agreement on facts or intent to compromise. It is equivalent to questioning a religious person's faith, you just don't do it, and if you do, get ready to throw down.
This is a great post. I can't even add anything to this.
On a pleasant note, I work with a lot of Quebecois out of province (they make up a disproportionate amount of our military) and the majority of them who have spent time outside of Quebec all agree how ridiculous a lot of Quebec policies are.
That said, I'd kill for those university tuition rates or childcare costs.
Thanks dude. I know tons of awesome francophones whom I love. I have to stress that the 'Problem' Quebecer I speak of is self-identifying, and the minority. Quebec is an awesome place, and the thing that pisses me off the most is that because of the Xenophobia of a few, they act like the great, beautiful parts need to be horded and protected, not shared and shown off. I see a lot of that in the states now... wheras when I was young, I loved the states because they showed their best to the world and said anyone, anyone, could be part of their dream if they loved it too. That was something.
Tuition fees are stunningly good, and honestly should have gone up. Daycare pretty damn sweet too. But don't forget, in exchange for that though, we have the worst medical system in the western world (average 18-36 hour waits in emergency rooms!), highest taxes in north america (I pay 50% or close enough in taxes on my pay cheque), we have ridiculous laws that serve no purpose but to make business difficult in the name of french (bill 101), our infrastructure is pretty disastrous... Trust me, I would ditch the cheap hydro, uni and daycare in exchange for lower income tax, sales tax and unrestricted access to business. In fact, I am, hence the move to California
Thanks for taking the time to read, one stunning thing about this whole situation in Quebec is that very few are familiar of just what happens here, Canada keeps it quiet, the minorities here are a statistically irrelevant cohort for both federal and provincial elections, no one will ever take a stand for us. 1 million anglo and allophones, swept under the rug for 50 years or more. When I tell people in the US we have laws here forbidding english signage and keyboards etc etc, they think I am joking or exaggerating heavily. Pretty effed up when you think about it, an epic gaslighting.
Vaktathi wrote: The electoral college has failed twice in the last five elections to match the popular vote. It does not help that in the two instances this has occurred, it has resulted in quite possibly the least popular and most divisive administrations this nation has seen in recent memory, and losing the popular vote undercut the popular trust in those administrations frm day 1.
Given that the electoral college has also been divorced from its independent "super citizen" / senatorial equivalent role in almost all respects (and instead is allocated on pure majority vote in each state, regardless of the magnitude of the victory, largely cancelling out millions of votes and allowing someone to win election with as little as a quarter of the popular vote), this dramatically undercuts its role and the public trust in that role. It is difficult to see what sort of check or balance it continues to serve in such light, and largey just instead looks to be another partisan gaming mechanism instead of serving any meaningful balance of power function. It disenfranchises millions of red voters in blue states and millions of blue voters in red states, stands in the way of any third party having any realistic chance, and gives some very small states radically outsized power than they have any real reason to wield.
The sooner the EC goes bye-bye, the better American democracy will be for it.
I don't know that the EC has to go, but it could does need to be improved by the individual states. I think even changing the voting mechanism to more closely match the mechanism by which the number of electors is determined would be a major improvement. Instate of having a statewide vote for all electors, assign electoral votes to each district with two electors chosen by the statewide vote. I don't have the time (and honestly I don't think I really have the desire either) to see how past elections would have turned out if electors were chosen that way, but it could only be an improvement. The other approach would be to assign electors proportionally to the total statewide vote.
The "by district" approach wouldn't have changed any of the Electoral votes in Oklahoma, but the proportional vote would have. I vote against the grain in Oklahoma, so I would have benefited from a proportional selection, but I still prefer the "by district" approach better I think.
Without queation there are lots of better alternative ways of doing the EC than what we do now, but the fundamental question remains...why have an EC? The president is a national office elected to represent the nation as a whole, why not have a single nation-wide vote? Splitting that up into smaller elements simply allows additional partisan and geographic gimmickry and the chance for a nonrepresentational result.
Why have states at all then? We're all US residents/citizens why divide the country up into small semi autonomous states instead of having just one big state for everyone?
No it doesn't. California has more than 18 times as many Electoral votes as Wyoming (55 vs 3) that's the same representation those states get in Congress. What compelling reason is there for California residents to have a greater impact on the Executive branch of the Federal govt than they do on the Legislative branch? Equal representation in both branches of government isn't discriminatory.
Without an Electoral College, residents in California would have the same impact on the Executive branch as the voters in Wyoming. Why should a vote matter less, because the person voting lives where there are more voters?
The legislative branch and the executive branch have two different purposes.
MajorTom11 wrote: There is an answer to be had here. There is a way to vet gerrymandering scientifically... It's not witchcraft, it's stats. If the dems gerrymandered too, then they should be forced to re-district just like the GOP had to.
To be fair, the Democratis party does do it as well. This is one of the reasons why the SCOTUS ended up hearing two separate cases on the same subject in the same term: a challenge against political gerrymandering in a red state, and a challenge against political gerrymandering in a blue state. That way the ruling won't have the same risk as being tainted as a "Conservative/Liberal court ruling against a Liberal/Conservative state" ruling.
The solutions are available, don't kid yourselves guys, it's the political will to do it that is lacking and nothing else. If data strategy can lead to gerrymandering, then data policy can eliminate it.
I am cautiously optimistic that SCOTUS will force a change, but I'm not holding my breath either.
Exactly why I say a single standard of scientifically determined statistics, algorithmically derived, should be applied to all. Dems, Reps, whatever. The system, or complete lack of one, is the issue here, and it is an issue because we absolutely have the know-how and data to implement it really effing fast. Like I said, political will to enact the solution is the issue, not finding a solution.
Why have states at all then? We're all US residents/citizens why divide the country up into small semi autonomous states instead of having just one big state for everyone?
Why have a discussion, why not just have hyperbole instead?
MajorTom11 wrote: There is an answer to be had here. There is a way to vet gerrymandering scientifically... It's not witchcraft, it's stats. If the dems gerrymandered too, then they should be forced to re-district just like the GOP had to.
To be fair, the Democratis party does do it as well. This is one of the reasons why the SCOTUS ended up hearing two separate cases on the same subject in the same term: a challenge against political gerrymandering in a red state, and a challenge against political gerrymandering in a blue state. That way the ruling won't have the same risk as being tainted as a "Conservative/Liberal court ruling against a Liberal/Conservative state" ruling.
The solutions are available, don't kid yourselves guys, it's the political will to do it that is lacking and nothing else. If data strategy can lead to gerrymandering, then data policy can eliminate it.
I am cautiously optimistic that SCOTUS will force a change, but I'm not holding my breath either.
Exactly why I say a single standard of scientifically determined statistics, algorithmically derived, should be applied to all. Dems, Reps, whatever. The system, or complete lack of one, is the issue here, and it is an issue because we absolutely have the know-how and data to implement it really effing fast. Like I said, political will to enact the solution is the issue, not finding a solution.
Very true. The current question before SCOTUS will determine if they accept a "scientific" approach to measure the partisan impact on gerrymanders, and if they do I hope it will lead to states to utilize that same measure while drawing district lines.
Gerrymandering should be a federal issue, with controls and standards universally applied if you ask me. This is one of those cases where if it doesn't apply to everyone, it's pointless, so federal imho.
Well that's the thing, lots of Americans agree we need change, everyone is just divided on how we need to do it. I know people all across the political spectrum and if you cut out specific views on things like gun control, abortion, etc. they all start to sound very similar. Lots of people don't trust the established government, lots of people feel they are being screwed by the system, lots of people want things to change.
It's part of why Obama won and part of why Trump won. Both promised to be something different to the status quo. It didn't matter that they may have made promises they wouldn't keep, or even if their views didn't really match up with the voter's that well, they were a chance to have things change. In both situations their opponents represented the "status quo", essentially a vote for the government to stay as it is. Race and Gender don't really play into that as much as we saw with Clinton, the big thing is the supposed policy changes that may result. And say what you will about Hillary, she absolutely did not represent change in the eyes of most voter's, other than the potential to be the first female president. And since lots of Americans vastly overestimate the power the president has, many assume that's the main place that vote matters. So they went with the candidate who represented change and figured it couldn't be worse than the alternative they already knew.
If the Dems go with an established candidate next election, they will lose. Doesn't matter if it's Clinton or pelosi or whatever, it's just another case of "meet the new boss, same as the old boss" in the public's eyes If the Dems want to win they need new blood. They're in the same position as the Republicans, many of their higher ups are seen as crooked and untrustworthy by more centrist and independent voter's. Picking one if them means you're doubling down on your party faithfuls and praying that carries the day, which at this point is pretty much proven to be a losing strategy.
Of course there's a lot of changes that need to be done regardless of which way you lean to make for a healthier government. We desperately need better education to encourage coming of age voter's to research their parties and question their leader's actions. We desperately need new blood and perhaps even term limits on senators and other positions. Funding and cronyism needs major attention. Radicalization of both sides is derailing almost any hope of cross party cooperation and has turned politics into a taboo conversation topic in almost all areas of life.
Of course, it's easy to point out the flaws, the issue is agreeing on a solution, and no matter what you pick it will not be easy. As sad as it sounds, I was almost happy Trump won. We really need the system to show how truly broken it is to facilitate proper change, and Trump is a major tipping point in showing just how many problems lurk below the surface to the general public. I don't think he's going to singlehandedly tick off the public to the point of a second revolution or anything, but if we get a couple of more "Trump" moments it could be what the American public needs to finally get motivated and give a gak about politics.
For full disclosure, I voted for Gary Johnson as I knew any vote other than Trump was completely wasted in Kentucky. I voted for Gary purely as an attempt to show that there was support for 3rd parties in the government, especially since it couldn't hurt anything. Gary Johnson matched up with more of my views and even though he appears to be absolutely insane sometimes, at least for once I got to vote for someone rather than against someone.
Which is honestly the most damning thing about USA politics. Voting against someone for president is probably more common than voting for someone for president. When a supposedly democratic country of 300 million people can only produce 2 choices, and you feel you must go with the lesser of two evils, something is wrong.
Vaktathi wrote: The electoral college has failed twice in the last five elections to match the popular vote. It does not help that in the two instances this has occurred, it has resulted in quite possibly the least popular and most divisive administrations this nation has seen in recent memory, and losing the popular vote undercut the popular trust in those administrations frm day 1.
Given that the electoral college has also been divorced from its independent "super citizen" / senatorial equivalent role in almost all respects (and instead is allocated on pure majority vote in each state, regardless of the magnitude of the victory, largely cancelling out millions of votes and allowing someone to win election with as little as a quarter of the popular vote),
Hence, my argument to repeal the 17th Admendment.
this dramatically undercuts its role and the public trust in that role. It is difficult to see what sort of check or balance it continues to serve in such light, and largey just instead looks to be another partisan gaming mechanism instead of serving any meaningful balance of power function. It disenfranchises millions of red voters in blue states and millions of blue voters in red states, stands in the way of any third party having any realistic chance, and gives some very small states radically outsized power than they have any real reason to wield.
The sooner the EC goes bye-bye, the better American democracy will be for it.
Quite the opposite. Worked as intended. A majority of States chose the president. See: United STATES. Not NY and CA et al
To give you the idea... consider there are 3,141 counties in the United States.
Trump won 3,084 of them.
Clinton won 57.
.
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Vaktathi wrote: Without queation there are lots of better alternative ways of doing the EC than what we do now, but the fundamental question remains...why have an EC? The president is a national office elected to represent the nation as a whole, why not have a single nation-wide vote? Splitting that up into smaller elements simply allows additional partisan and geographic gimmickry and the chance for a nonrepresentational result.
Because the Constitution states that 538 people are allowed to vote for President, and states are able to pick those 538 people in any way they want.
You, I, or anyone else has ZERO constitution right to pick our POTUS. We hold our constitution sacred, but there is some amazingly stupid stuff in it as well.
Maine and Nebraska award their Electoral College electors/votes on a proportional basis, more states could do the same if their state govt chose to do so.
The Reapportionment Act of 1929 and the SCotUS case of Wood v Broom are what really messed up the Electoral College because those events opened to door for widespread Gerrymandering and Party control of the election process while setting an arbitrary limit on the House of Representatives which made it impossible to standardize the population size of congressional districts.
The Reapportionment Act of 1929 (ch. 28, 46 Stat. 21, 2 U.S.C. § 2a) was a combined census and apportionment bill passed by the United States Congress on June 18, 1929, that established a permanent method for apportioning a constant 435 seats in the U.S. House of Representatives according to each census. The bill neither repealed nor restated the requirements of the previous apportionment acts that districts be contiguous, compact, and equally populated.
It was not clear whether these requirements were still in effect until in 1932 the Supreme Court of the United States ruled in Wood v. Broom[1] that the provisions of each apportionment act affected only the apportionment for which they were written. Thus the size and population requirements, last stated in the Apportionment Act of 1911, expired immediately with the enactment of the subsequent Apportionment Act.
The Act of 1929 gave little direction concerning congressional redistricting. It merely established a system in which House seats would be reallocated to states which have shifts in population. The lack of recommendations concerning districts had several significant effects.
The Reapportionment Act of 1929 allowed states to draw districts of varying size and shape. It also allowed states to abandon districts altogether and elect at least some representatives at large, which several states chose to do, including New York, Illinois, Washington, Hawaii, and New Mexico. For example, in the 88th Congress (in the early 1960s) 22 of the 435 representatives were elected at-large.
No particular apportionment method was used during the period 1850 to 1890, but from 1890 through 1910, the increasing membership of the House was calculated in such a way as to ensure that no state lost a seat due to shifts in apportionment population.[5] In 1881, a provision for equally populated contiguous and compact single member districts was added to the reapportionment law, and this was echoed in all decennial reapportionment acts through to 1911.[7]
Then, in 1920, the Republicans removed the Democrats from power as the Whigs had done in 1838, taking the presidency and both houses of Congress. Due to increased immigration and a large rural-to-urban shift in population from 1910 to 1920, the new Republican Congress refused to reapportion the House of Representatives with the traditional contiguous, single-member districts stipulations because such a reapportionment would have redistricted many House members out of their districts.[8][9] A reapportionment in 1921 in the traditional fashion would have increased the size of the House to 483 seats, but many members would have lost their seats due to the population shifts, and the House chamber did not have adequate seats for 483 members. The Reapportionment act of 1929 did away with any mention of districts at all. This provided a solution to the problem of threatened incumbents by allowing the political parties in control of the state legislatures to draw districting lines at will and to elect some or all representatives at large.
No it doesn't. California has more than 18 times as many Electoral votes as Wyoming (55 vs 3) that's the same representation those states get in Congress. What compelling reason is there for California residents to have a greater impact on the Executive branch of the Federal govt than they do on the Legislative branch? Equal representation in both branches of government isn't discriminatory.
Without an Electoral College, residents in California would have the same impact on the Executive branch as the voters in Wyoming. Why should a vote matter less, because the person voting lives where there are more voters?
The legislative branch and the executive branch have two different purposes.
The States have the same responsibility in election candidates to the Legislative and Executive branches so how do you remove States from one election and not the other?
MajorTom11 wrote: Gerrymandering should be a federal issue, with controls and standards universally applied if you ask me. This is one of those cases where if it doesn't apply to everyone, it's pointless, so federal imho.
Very much agreed in this regards.
Would have to be directed by SCOTUS somehow as it'll be neigh impossible to get Congress to pass something...as those state representative wants this power to maximize their incumbancies (sp?).
Why have states at all then? We're all US residents/citizens why divide the country up into small semi autonomous states instead of having just one big state for everyone?
Why have a discussion, why not just have hyperbole instead?
MajorTom11 wrote: There is an answer to be had here. There is a way to vet gerrymandering scientifically... It's not witchcraft, it's stats. If the dems gerrymandered too, then they should be forced to re-district just like the GOP had to.
To be fair, the Democratis party does do it as well. This is one of the reasons why the SCOTUS ended up hearing two separate cases on the same subject in the same term: a challenge against political gerrymandering in a red state, and a challenge against political gerrymandering in a blue state. That way the ruling won't have the same risk as being tainted as a "Conservative/Liberal court ruling against a Liberal/Conservative state" ruling.
The solutions are available, don't kid yourselves guys, it's the political will to do it that is lacking and nothing else. If data strategy can lead to gerrymandering, then data policy can eliminate it.
I am cautiously optimistic that SCOTUS will force a change, but I'm not holding my breath either.
Exactly why I say a single standard of scientifically determined statistics, algorithmically derived, should be applied to all. Dems, Reps, whatever. The system, or complete lack of one, is the issue here, and it is an issue because we absolutely have the know-how and data to implement it really effing fast. Like I said, political will to enact the solution is the issue, not finding a solution.
Very true. The current question before SCOTUS will determine if they accept a "scientific" approach to measure the partisan impact on gerrymanders, and if they do I hope it will lead to states to utilize that same measure while drawing district lines.
SCotUS can't stop Gerrymandering. The court can decide that State legislatures have acted unconstitutionally in drawing a given set of congressional districts but SCotUS cannot create Federal law governing apportionment of districts. Congress needs to pass a law that sets a given apportionment standard and if that law is challenged then SCotUS can determine it's constitutionality.
The sad fact, shown to be true throughout our history, is that the current incumbent politicians and Parties do not wish to pass any legislation that reduces their current power so we continue to be plagued with gerrymandering because neither Party, when in power, has the will do act for the sake of the people and the betterment of our election process if it will hurt themselves in the short term.
The States have the same responsibility in election candidates to the Legislative and Executive branches so how do you remove States from one election and not the other?
By writing a constitutional amendment to get rid of the electoral college, that's how?
I think we have a stupid system to pick our President.
I also think that we currently run our country as if we had a parliamentary system and our POTUS is the Prime Minister whenever the White House and Congress share the same party, and that it is stupid to do it that way when we have a constitution that is based on a non-parliamentary system.
In Quebec, we have a system much akin to the US electoral college. It has been used by nationalists and separatists to essentially put the boonie minority in charge of the province. People who rarely if ever encounter minorities like English speakers and people of color, but who are told they are under threat from these 'others' by their nationalist party. They have no direct experience really, it is entirely a world view based on propaganda. (Sound familiar, to quote Trump just today, country is being stolen, dems are trying to dismantle our (whatever our means) way of life etc etc.
Here's the thing, I'm on the other end of this. I am an English speaking white male in Quebec. That, unlike anywhere else in North America, makes me an undesirable minority that must be assimilated entirely or never be considered a Quebecer, even being born here. I have heard my whole life from the govt how I am a problem, that I am responsible for hollywood, music and cultural invasion, and my language is offensive in a lot of this province. As far as Quebec at large is concerned, I might as well be wearing a hijab.
Ok, so besides the obvious, this is what is pissing me off. The mixed, more tolerant 'progressive' parts of this province, mostly Montreal itself, drive 60-70% of Business in the entire province. We pay the lion's share of taxes. Yet despite this, we are subject to the will of people who don't live in our reality whatsoever and want to govern based on fear and ignorance. They take our money happily enough, but they don't want to let us be equal. They think being a Quebecer means being a Francophone that's been here several generations... there is even a name for it, 'Pure-leine' - which means pure wool.
So even though the majority of this province doesn't want to seperate, and a significant portion of it's biggest city, and it's biggest economic engine, wants bilingualism and to let the society make progress instead of being locked into the 1960's forever, we have been shackled to the minority for decades. It has hurt us, socially and economically. It has divided us. It makes business difficult, because you can't simply succeed, that's not good enough to just have a viable business, you have to do it their way (in french) or get out.
Any of this sound familiar to you down there?
I have gotten to watch the results of gerrymandering, fear of the other politics my entire life. I have been the native minority that is told they are doing wrong even while they suceed. I am not antifrench at all. I speak french. I identify more with a Quebecer than I ever would with a british colombian, or a new brunswicker. I love so much about the french culture here. But unless I can fool someone into thinking my family has been here generations, it's not good enough. If they (they being the self-identified nationalist/seperatists) detect an accent, even if my french is otherwise perfect, it is offensive and not good enough.
The amount of businesses that left Quebec because of this is staggering. The amount of brain power that migrated out of here is staggering. There is a reason Toronto became the most powerful city in the last 50 years, it's because montreal went there to do business. We lost so much, and are still losing, because due to the exodus, due to the badly run government that never focused on improving anything if it was perceived to cost anything to french culture instead of doing things to help business thrive, to attract ip and brain power, taxes went up, cost of doing business went up.
We are only now barely crawling out of it into viable growth, but for the longest time, we were the definition of a nanny state with bloated bureaucracy and poor policy.
At the time, everyone here was like 'ya ya, let them go, we will make our shining city ourselves, the way we want, we won't mix our cultures, we will be supreme'. It didn't work. The world moved on without us. We were left behind and too proud to change or ask for help.
If it were not for the culture clash here leading to nationalism and seperatism, strict language laws and resultant terrible tax rates, I am 100% convinced Quebec, and Montreal, would still reign supreme in Canada as they did prior to 1960. We did this to ourselves. In the name of protecting our culture against the other. In the name of pride.
What I see happening down there makes me scared for you guys, not because I hate you, because I know where this road leads and anyone telling themselves what is happening now is going to be good for the US for any meaningful duration is delusional in the worst way. Doing wrong while being so convinced you are right with a complete inability to see what is sitting right in front of you... yeah.
Here's another thing that should ring familiar, even when federalist govt's are elected here (it goes back and forth just as it does with you guys), they won't touch the subject of minority rights or bilingualism. Why? For much the same reason that the Democrats avoid guns. The French Cultural lobby here is so strong, is such a hot-button issue, that those who would otherwise address the problems abstain out of terror of mobilizing every single last person with even mild seperatist leanings like an army, because much like the NRA and guns, they have convinced the self-identified population that any concession, and discussion, is tantamount to throwing everything away. French cultural supremacy is Quebec's second amendment. You can't even debate it with any hope of agreement on facts or intent to compromise. It is equivalent to questioning a religious person's faith, you just don't do it, and if you do, get ready to throw down.
This is a great post. I can't even add anything to this.
On a pleasant note, I work with a lot of Quebecois out of province (they make up a disproportionate amount of our military) and the majority of them who have spent time outside of Quebec all agree how ridiculous a lot of Quebec policies are.
That said, I'd kill for those university tuition rates or childcare costs.
Thanks dude. I know tons of awesome francophones whom I love. I have to stress that the 'Problem' Quebecer I speak of is self-identifying, and the minority. Quebec is an awesome place, and the thing that pisses me off the most is that because of the Xenophobia of a few, they act like the great, beautiful parts need to be horded and protected, not shared and shown off. I see a lot of that in the states now... wheras when I was young, I loved the states because they showed their best to the world and said anyone, anyone, could be part of their dream if they loved it too. That was something.
Tuition fees are stunningly good, and honestly should have gone up. Daycare pretty damn sweet too. But don't forget, in exchange for that though, we have the worst medical system in the western world (average 18-36 hour waits in emergency rooms!), highest taxes in north america (I pay 50% or close enough in taxes on my pay cheque), we have ridiculous laws that serve no purpose but to make business difficult in the name of french (bill 101), our infrastructure is pretty disastrous... Trust me, I would ditch the cheap hydro, uni and daycare in exchange for lower income tax, sales tax and unrestricted access to business. In fact, I am, hence the move to California
Thanks for taking the time to read, one stunning thing about this whole situation in Quebec is that very few are familiar of just what happens here, Canada keeps it quiet, the minorities here are a statistically irrelevant cohort for both federal and provincial elections, no one will ever take a stand for us. 1 million anglo and allophones, swept under the rug for 50 years or more. When I tell people in the US we have laws here forbidding english signage and keyboards etc etc, they think I am joking or exaggerating heavily. Pretty effed up when you think about it, an epic gaslighting.
Oh I know the 'problem' Quebecois is a distinct minority, seems to be the trend these days with vocal fringes. I have yet to have the pleasure of living in Quebec (outside of ~6 months in a giant building), but I've snowboarded most of the notable hills, and it is a stunning province all around. Fortunately, Montreal still seems to hold on to some reputation as a welcoming bastion, though I don't know ultimately how true that is I haven't been there in years.
I never bothered to check the Quebec tax rates (mostly because they're never published with every other province, gotta go to the Quebec page for that, of course), and holy gak, I'm floored. I thought NS was the highest, but you have me beat by nearly 5% in the top bracket! Still, I'm fairly left leaning, so I'd gladly sacrifice ~5% of my total income for cheap daycare for all, and cheaper tuition, among other things. The cultural bills and business restrictions are definitely a waste of tax dollars though. While the infrastructure is old, it seems to be a trend nationwide. I know that Toronto is going through its share of troubles too. That said, the new Hwy 30 bypass on the south shore is one of the single greatest additions to the Canadian highway network of all time.
Yeah, the pushback against English and the Anglophones will go down as a failure in history when we look back, hopefully. Its certainly not doing the province any good. Shame really.
Thanks for the perspective though, always good to hear an inside opinion about local politics I'm not swept up on.
SCotUS can't stop Gerrymandering. The court can decide that State legislatures have acted unconstitutionally in drawing a given set of congressional districts but SCotUS cannot create Federal law governing apportionment of districts. Congress needs to pass a law that sets a given apportionment standard and if that law is challenged then SCotUS can determine it's constitutionality.
They can stop it if they set a precedent that can be consistently applied. They managed to stop (for the most part) racial gerrymanders by setting a standard in court, but they have not found partisan gerrymanders unconstitutional. If SCOTUS says "this is the way we determine a partisan gerrymander", then they have set a standard for states to follow.
The sad fact, shown to be true throughout our history, is that the current incumbent politicians and Parties do not wish to pass any legislation that reduces their current power so we continue to be plagued with gerrymandering because neither Party, when in power, has the will do act for the sake of the people and the betterment of our election process if it will hurt themselves in the short term.
And that's the core of the issue. Our two-party system has basically resulted in a national Prisoner's Dilema.
SCotUS can't stop Gerrymandering. The court can decide that State legislatures have acted unconstitutionally in drawing a given set of congressional districts but SCotUS cannot create Federal law governing apportionment of districts. Congress needs to pass a law that sets a given apportionment standard and if that law is challenged then SCotUS can determine it's constitutionality.
They can stop it if they set a precedent that can be consistently applied. They managed to stop (for the most part) racial gerrymanders by setting a standard in court, but they have not found partisan gerrymanders unconstitutional. If SCOTUS says "this is the way we determine a partisan gerrymander", then they have set a standard for states to follow.
I think D-usa has the right of it here, SCOTUS can't write novel, independent law, but they can refine and modify existing law. Gerrymandering is covered, thus as Marcus says, Scotus merely has to set a standard about how to determine if the law or policy is being applied correctly and the rest falls into place from there. May be mistaken but that would be my understanding as well.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Ideally though, yes, a congressional law explicitly made would be best.
I think D-usa has the right of it here, SCOTUS can't write novel, independent law, but they can refine and modify existing law. Gerrymandering is covered, thus as Marcus says, Scotus merely has to set a standard about how to determine if the law or policy is being applied correctly and the rest falls into place from there. May be mistaken but that would be my understanding as well.
Exactly.
The problem with the partisan gerrymandering is that it just has been hard to apply existing laws to the problem. The 14th Amendment is fairly easy to apply when it comes to "obvious" things, like how race impacts cracking and packing. That makes it easier to apply a ruling that is based on the population that is impacted. One of the sticking points in a previous gerrymander ruling was that we didn't have a way to objectively measure how "partisan" a gerrymander was, and that the court wasn't comfortable making a ruling that would be based on subjective findings. The current case argues that they found an objective way of measuring the partisan impact, so we'll see how it turns out.
SCotUS can't stop Gerrymandering. The court can decide that State legislatures have acted unconstitutionally in drawing a given set of congressional districts but SCotUS cannot create Federal law governing apportionment of districts. Congress needs to pass a law that sets a given apportionment standard and if that law is challenged then SCotUS can determine it's constitutionality.
They can stop it if they set a precedent that can be consistently applied. They managed to stop (for the most part) racial gerrymanders by setting a standard in court, but they have not found partisan gerrymanders unconstitutional. If SCOTUS says "this is the way we determine a partisan gerrymander", then they have set a standard for states to follow.
The sad fact, shown to be true throughout our history, is that the current incumbent politicians and Parties do not wish to pass any legislation that reduces their current power so we continue to be plagued with gerrymandering because neither Party, when in power, has the will do act for the sake of the people and the betterment of our election process if it will hurt themselves in the short term.
And that's the core of the issue. Our two-party system has basically resulted in a national Prisoner's Dilema.
As long as the Federal apportionment laws on the books are deliberately vague and malleable SCotUS won't be able to give a clear roadmap for constitutional redistricting. Truly egregious abuses of the apportionment laws can be challenged in court and appealed up to SCotUS and if they choose to hear the case SCotUS can rule that such egregious abuses are unconstitutional but that won't stop a state legislature from trying to gerrymander in a slightly less egregious and therefore legal manner and then we'd have to go through the legal process all over again because the law is too vague. In stances when the lack of clarity of the legislation leads to legal challenges SCotUS has pretty consistently ruled that Congress needs to pass better, more clear legislation because the court doesn't want to do Congress' job for them.
Vaktathi wrote: The electoral college has failed twice in the last five elections to match the popular vote. It does not help that in the two instances this has occurred, it has resulted in quite possibly the least popular and most divisive administrations this nation has seen in recent memory, and losing the popular vote undercut the popular trust in those administrations frm day 1.
Given that the electoral college has also been divorced from its independent "super citizen" / senatorial equivalent role in almost all respects (and instead is allocated on pure majority vote in each state, regardless of the magnitude of the victory, largely cancelling out millions of votes and allowing someone to win election with as little as a quarter of the popular vote),
Hence, my argument to repeal the 17th Admendment.
this dramatically undercuts its role and the public trust in that role. It is difficult to see what sort of check or balance it continues to serve in such light, and largey just instead looks to be another partisan gaming mechanism instead of serving any meaningful balance of power function. It disenfranchises millions of red voters in blue states and millions of blue voters in red states, stands in the way of any third party having any realistic chance, and gives some very small states radically outsized power than they have any real reason to wield.
The sooner the EC goes bye-bye, the better American democracy will be for it.
Quite the opposite. Worked as intended. A majority of States chose the president. See: United STATES. Not NY and CA et al
To give you the idea... consider there are 3,141 counties in the United States.
Trump won 3,084 of them.
Clinton won 57.
I would have to ask why do we care about counties? I cross 3 county borders every day and cant tell you squat about the difference between them, while when I lived in CA the single county I lived in had more people than the entire state I now reside does and encompasses vastly more area than all 3 of the ones I cross today do. They're not something people generally tend to identify or associate with strongly, I've never encountered anyone who has referenced what county they live in when asked where they are from. They are internal state divisions that have little connection to population, cultural, economic or ethnic divides, with little or no set size or number. I just dont see what representational relevancy they have aside from to cherry pick a very specific data set that is going to overwhelmingly vastly overrepresent rural voters by orders of magnitude because practically nobody (in a relative sense) lives in most of those counties.
Yeah, if you section stuff up by County, Trump won huge. When put into the context that a County has no relation at all to anything, and that Alpine county in CA barely squeeks into the 4 digits on population, while Los Angeles county alone has literally *ten thousand times* as many people, the relevancy of counties in a national election becomes zero. States at least have very real cultural, ethnic, economic, historical, and major geographic distinctions in most cases to drive some state specific representation (such as in congress), but counties by and large do not in the same ways.
With a straight national vote state, city, county, etc lines become irrelevant. They dont matter aside from how you organize reporting, but at the end youd calculate all votes, not votes by geographic region. Candidates could run on vastly different platforms than they do now. They would in fact have to. A vote in rural Wyoming and a vote in NYC would count the same, and instead of going after those stark urban/rural divides that the EC pushes, you could campaign on much more universal issues and platforms where you could draw much more heavily on centrist candidates that appeal to people wherever they live, not trying to suck up to specific areas.
I get that some of you don't like Trump... but, that's on the quality of his opponent, who was an exceptionally bad candidate, not the EC.
I have always had issues with the EC, Trump is just the latest and most egregious example of its failure as an institution.
Why have states at all then? We're all US residents/citizens why divide the country up into small semi autonomous states instead of having just one big state for everyone?
Mainly because not everything is a direct contest for a single nationally representative office.
Because the Constitution states that 538 people are allowed to vote for President, and states are able to pick those 538 people in any way they want.
You, I, or anyone else has ZERO constitution right to pick our POTUS. We hold our constitution sacred, but there is some amazingly stupid stuff in it as well.
aye, thats fair, everyone has something they dislike in there, the EC is one of my big bugbears
whembly wrote: I get that some of you don't like Trump... but, that's on the quality of his opponent, who was an exceptionally bad candidate, not the EC.
Well, I voted against Trump, but I agree with this statement.
Clinton was a historically vulnerable candidate with tons of baggage, and just about the only candidate that someone like Trump with all His baggage could beat.
The democrats have only themselves to blame for pushing her through the primary process, not the election rules. Even a candidate as far left of the US center as Sanders was probably would have beaten Trump. And that too would have been historic
For myself (and Tom and I have discussed this before ) I just view it as messy democracy doing its thing. There will be a democratic wave in the election later this year, and our system of checks and balances with the legislative and the judicial branches is working overtime in the interim. But the system itself, being able to handle a president like Trump, is working pretty darn well!
whembly wrote: Quite the opposite. Worked as intended. A majority of States chose the president. See: United STATES. Not NY and CA et al
I've explained to you multiple, multiple, multiple times that this simply isn't true. That's not how population distribution works in the real world. There aren't enough people in those two states to carry a candidate in a general popular vote election.
For context...there are 62 counties in New York State.
Trump won 46 of them.
Clinton won 16.
Clinton won the popular vote by approx. 1.5 million votes combined.
For giggles... let's go back to NY state as there are 5 counties that encompass NYC, (Bronx, Brooklyn, Manhattan, Richmond & Queens) and Clinton received well over 2 million more votes than Trump. (Clinton only won 4 of these counties; Trump won Richmond)
Therefore these 5 counties alone, more than accounted for Clinton winning the popular vote of the entire country.
These 5 counties comprise 319 square miles.
The United States is comprised of 3, 797,000 square miles.
When you have a country that encompasses almost 4 million square miles of territory, it would be ludicrous to even suggest that the vote of those who inhabit a mere 319 square miles should dictate the outcome of a national election. Even though by virtue of being a populous state, they have more representation in Congress than most states.
Large, densely populated cities (NYC, Chicago, LA, etc) don’t and shouldn’t speak for the rest of our country.
There's so much to unpack here but I'll just go with the fact that misrepresenting math is bad and you shouldn't do it. Also, you're hung up on who won a county or city, not how many people voted for whom, which is a far more telling statistic.
Put another way: Hillary Clinton only won a majority of the popular vote in only thirteen states, the fewest of any major-party nominee since Bob Dole in 1996. In other words...Clinton was minority in 37 states. Here’s the map of where she and Trump carried popular majorities:
Spoiler:
I get that some of you don't like Trump... but, that's on the quality of his opponent, who was an exceptionally bad candidate, not the EC.
whembly wrote: Quite the opposite. Worked as intended. A majority of States chose the president. See: United STATES. Not NY and CA et al
I've explained to you multiple, multiple, multiple times that this simply isn't true. That's how how population distribution works in the real world. There aren't enough people in those too states to carry a candidate in a general popular vote election.
Scooty... that's your opinion on this issues... not something clad as something there's only one right answer.
You have problems with EC because of the reasons you stated.
I don't have problems with EC because of the reasons I've stated.
Doesn't mean one of us is right and the other is wrong.
For context...there are 62 counties in New York State.
Trump won 46 of them.
Clinton won 16.
Clinton won the popular vote by approx. 1.5 million votes combined.
For giggles... let's go back to NY state as there are 5 counties that encompass NYC, (Bronx, Brooklyn, Manhattan, Richmond & Queens) and Clinton received well over 2 million more votes than Trump. (Clinton only won 4 of these counties; Trump won Richmond)
Don't have facebook... but, okay I stand corrected.
Therefore these 5 counties alone, more than accounted for Clinton winning the popular vote of the entire country.
These 5 counties comprise 319 square miles.
The United States is comprised of 3, 797,000 square miles.
When you have a country that encompasses almost 4 million square miles of territory, it would be ludicrous to even suggest that the vote of those who inhabit a mere 319 square miles should dictate the outcome of a national election. Even though by virtue of being a populous state, they have more representation in Congress than most states.
Large, densely populated cities (NYC, Chicago, LA, etc) don’t and shouldn’t speak for the rest of our country.
There's so much to unpack here but I'll just go with the fact that misrepresenting math is bad and you shouldn't do it. Also, you're hung up on who won a county or city, not how many people voted for whom, which is a far more telling statistic.
No, it's useful as the voting population generally votes a certain way by region/local.
Put another way: Hillary Clinton only won a majority of the popular vote in only thirteen states, the fewest of any major-party nominee since Bob Dole in 1996. In other words...Clinton was minority in 37 states. Here’s the map of where she and Trump carried popular majorities:
Spoiler:
I get that some of you don't like Trump... but, that's on the quality of his opponent, who was an exceptionally bad candidate, not the EC.
Why have states at all then? We're all US residents/citizens why divide the country up into small semi autonomous states instead of having just one big state for everyone?
Mainly because not everything is a direct contest for a single nationally representative office.
Because the Constitution states that 538 people are allowed to vote for President, and states are able to pick those 538 people in any way they want.
You, I, or anyone else has ZERO constitution right to pick our POTUS. We hold our constitution sacred, but there is some amazingly stupid stuff in it as well.
aye, thats fair, everyone has something they dislike in there, the EC is one of my big bugbears
The PotUS is the executive of the nation, the nation is a republic of 50 distinct States, the number of people residing in those states is wholly irrelevant to the fact that our nation is made up of States and each State is responsible for electing Federal representatives, including voting for PotUS. The residents of the States have never had any right to vote for PotUS or elect PotUS, the States themselves have always had the responsibility of choosing Electors to cast votes for PotUS in the Electoral College but whether or not residents get to participate in a popular vote to determine the Electors and the votes of the Electors is subject to the respective State legislatures implementing such a system.
Statehood matters it can't just be swept aside for Presidential elections. The PotUS represents the nation not the citizenry. President Trump isn't MY president in the same sense that my state legislator is MY representative or that my Congressional representative is MY representative. The President is chosen by the States not by the people, nobody has a guaranteed right to cast a vote for the President because people don't elect the PotUS, the States do. The Federal govt was designed to have the House wherein the people are represented, the Senate wherein the individual States are represented and the President who represents all the states as a unified nation.
We don't even have a right to vote in a Party primary for PotUS. If the Republican Party decided that in order to avoid candidates like Trump from winning their nomination the Party would change its bylaws and go back to the old system of Party leaders choosing the nominee themselves (Hubert Humphrey won the nomination for the Democrats in 1968 and didn't even enter any of the 13 state primaries (because out of 50 states only 13 had Democratic primaries)) they could make that change and it would be perfectly legal. The process of successfully changing the Party bylaws to remove primary elections would be daunting but it's certainly possible.
If it hasn't been asked was there a noticeable increase or decrease in voter participation in Maine and Nebraska in presidential elections after they implemented the splitting of EC votes by percentage?
Ustrello wrote: If it hasn't been asked was there a noticeable increase or decrease in voter participation in Maine and Nebraska in presidential elections after they implemented the splitting of EC votes by percentage?
For clarity, it's not by percentage.
It's two votes for the winner of the statewide total, and then one vote for the winner of each individual district. It's still "winner takes all", they just have more individual opportunities to win each electoral vote.
whembly wrote: Quite the opposite. Worked as intended. A majority of States chose the president. See: United STATES. Not NY and CA et al
I've explained to you multiple, multiple, multiple times that this simply isn't true. That's how how population distribution works in the real world. There aren't enough people in those too states to carry a candidate in a general popular vote election.
Going by the numbers on CNN (https://www.cnn.com/election/2016/results) Clinton beat Trump by 2,868,691 in the popular vote. Clinton also beat Trump by 4,269,978 in the popular vote in California. Therefore, simply by winning California by a wide margin Clinton overcame losing to Trump in the popular vote in the other 49 states (and DC) combined.
Ustrello wrote: If it hasn't been asked was there a noticeable increase or decrease in voter participation in Maine and Nebraska in presidential elections after they implemented the splitting of EC votes by percentage?
Don't know about Maine and Nebraska in particular, but I know there's studies that have shown that there's a correlation between proportionally representative systems and higher voter turnout that is hard to explain with other factors, I'll see if I can find some of them.
whembly wrote: Quite the opposite. Worked as intended. A majority of States chose the president. See: United STATES. Not NY and CA et al
I've explained to you multiple, multiple, multiple times that this simply isn't true. That's how how population distribution works in the real world. There aren't enough people in those too states to carry a candidate in a general popular vote election.
Going by the numbers on CNN (https://www.cnn.com/election/2016/results) Clinton beat Trump by 2,868,691 in the popular vote. Clinton also beat Trump by 4,269,978 in the popular vote in California. Therefore, simply by winning California by a wide margin Clinton overcame losing to Trump in the popular vote in the other 49 states (and DC) combined.
Which wouldn't have mattered if Clinton hadn't also gotten a bunch of votes in the other states, which is the entire argument.
So what is the argument here, that a state with 2 million people in it should have equal standing to a state with 40 million because it's the united STATES?
Yeah sorry, that makes no sense. You are prioritizing an arbitrary border over the first, most sacred principal of a democracy, that every citizen gets a vote, and their vote counts.
If you think it is more important to make South Dakota equal to California or New York just because they are all states, while completely turning your back on THE CITIZENS OF THE COUNTRY that live in those states, sorry, but I think your priorities are horrendously out of wack. Country first. Citizens first.
MajorTom11 wrote: So what is the argument here, that a state with 2 million people in it should have equal standing to a state with 40 million because it's the united STATES?
Yeah sorry, that makes no sense. You are prioritizing an arbitrary border over the first, most sacred principal of a democracy, that every citizen gets a vote, and their vote counts.
If you think it is more important to make South Dakota equal to California or New York just because they are all states, while completely turning your back on THE CITIZENS OF THE COUNTRY that live in those states, sorry, but I think your priorities are horrendously out of wack. Country first. Citizens first.
Well... yes, that was the general intent behind the formation of the nation. Each State was an equal entity, no one state was supposed to be valued more then another. If it came down to just the people, then there would have been no need for the states.
Do you also hate the Senate structure by the same logic, Tom?
The structure of our government specifically is not just "majority rules", whether looking at the electoral college or the Senate. I personally think it's a good thing, as it spreads representation across the nation. If you went to the other extreme, it would be harder to keep the "union" intact, imo.
MajorTom11 wrote: So what is the argument here, that a state with 2 million people in it should have equal standing to a state with 40 million because it's the united STATES?
Yeah sorry, that makes no sense. You are prioritizing an arbitrary border over the first, most sacred principal of a democracy, that every citizen gets a vote, and their vote counts.
If you think it is more important to make South Dakota equal to California or New York just because they are all states, while completely turning your back on THE CITIZENS OF THE COUNTRY that live in those states, sorry, but I think your priorities are horrendously out of wack. Country first. Citizens first.
That's just it, South Dakota and California are NOT equal.
South Dakota has 3 electoral votes.
California has 55 electoral votes.
It behooves a candidate to make their appeal across multiple states...rather than the high populous cities.
MajorTom11 wrote: So what is the argument here, that a state with 2 million people in it should have equal standing to a state with 40 million because it's the united STATES?
Yeah sorry, that makes no sense. You are prioritizing an arbitrary border over the first, most sacred principal of a democracy, that every citizen gets a vote, and their vote counts.
If you think it is more important to make South Dakota equal to California or New York just because they are all states, while completely turning your back on THE CITIZENS OF THE COUNTRY that live in those states, sorry, but I think your priorities are horrendously out of wack. Country first. Citizens first.
That's just it, South Dakota and California are NOT equal.
South Dakota has 3 electoral votes.
California has 55 electoral votes.
It behooves a candidate to make their appeal across multiple states...rather than the high populous cities.
You keep saying that, and people keep pointing out that it wouldn't be enough to win the big population centers, and you ignore it. Rinse, repeat.
With proportional representation you have to spread your efforts because every vote matters. The way it is now, with some states being "secure" for one party or another, you focus on a few swing states to win. The situation you're afraid of is literally already happening and would be solved with proportional representation.
The issue is compounded both by the electoral college system itself and by the fact that the individual States insist on using a winner-takes-all system that disenfranchises voters.
Again, it would not "solve" the issue of disenfranchisement, imo, it would only shift it...
Going to a popular-total-only system has major drawbacks too, but you're ignoring them as much as whembly is the drawbacks of the current system...
I'm definitely open to the idea of splitting the electoral vote totals of individual states like in the Nebraska example, though, that is very interesting!
Candidates still (safely) ignore the vast majority of the United State, they still only visit a small number of states.
The candidates ignore California for the same reason they ignore Oklahoma: our votes don't matter because everybody already knows what color the state will swing. Swing States don't get visited because the EC makes them some magical entity that makes them more important as a smaller state than California or New York. Swing states get visited because they are competitive states where turning a vote around can actually make a difference.
Take California as an example: ~4,000,000 vote advantage for the winning side. Why would the Republican party even try to do anything there other than doing some small visits to raise some money? They could spend some resources there and swing voters, and let's say they can get a 500,000 swing towards the Republican Party. With the EC the way it is right now, what does that accomplish? Nothing. The state is still blue, and the state electors still all vote for the Democrat.
But in the popular vote count, the Democrat still wins by the state by 3,000,000 but the national vote now drops from 2,800,000 to 1,800,000. The entire race becomes more competitive. Without the EC, each vote counts in every state.
Yes, without the EC candidates will probably focus on population centers, because that's where the most people live and some states might get ignored. But states already get ignored, the EC didn't fix that and all it did is change which states are the ones that get ignored. But ignoring states comes at a cost without the EC because 25,000 people voting one way or the other in a small state actually makes an impact rather than keeping states the same color no matter what.
MajorTom11 wrote: So what is the argument here, that a state with 2 million people in it should have equal standing to a state with 40 million because it's the united STATES?
Yeah sorry, that makes no sense. You are prioritizing an arbitrary border over the first, most sacred principal of a democracy, that every citizen gets a vote, and their vote counts.
If you think it is more important to make South Dakota equal to California or New York just because they are all states, while completely turning your back on THE CITIZENS OF THE COUNTRY that live in those states, sorry, but I think your priorities are horrendously out of wack. Country first. Citizens first.
That's just it, South Dakota and California are NOT equal.
South Dakota has 3 electoral votes.
California has 55 electoral votes.
It behooves a candidate to make their appeal across multiple states...rather than the high populous cities.
You keep saying that, and people keep pointing out that it wouldn't be enough to win the big population centers, and you ignore it. Rinse, repeat.
I'm ignoring it as it's nonsense. The current system objective is to maximize the electoral votes. With something like a popular vote, the campaigns would look different in that the campaigns would functionally work to maximize the population centers.
With proportional representation you have to spread your efforts because every vote matters. The way it is now, with some states being "secure" for one party or another, you focus on a few swing states to win. The situation you're afraid of is literally already happening and would be solved with proportional representation.
The issue is compounded both by the electoral college system itself and by the fact that the individual States insist on using a winner-takes-all system that disenfranchises voters.
At the end of the day, this is the system that we have. Presidents who has lost the popular vote is not at all uncommon in our history.
The debate largely revolves around the idea that the popular vote (or it's variant) is a better system... and many disagrees.
The EC is about maximizing the Electoral Votes and campaigns are conducted as such.
If the another system is in placed, then the campaigns will adjust their tactics accordingly.
RiTides wrote: Again, it would not "solve" the issue of disenfranchisement, imo, it would only shift it...
How? How are you going to manage to disenfranchise millions of voters in a proportional representation system? Voters in more rural areas no longer running the show isn't them being disenfranchised, it's them no longer being propped up by the system. It's a disenfranchisement only relative to the current, constructed state that is explicitly constructed to favour the minority over the majority.
I think one of the issues with the pro-EC arguments is that they often rely on simple falsehoods like "it keeps candidates from focusing on only a few states".
RiTides wrote: Again, it would not "solve" the issue of disenfranchisement, imo, it would only shift it...
Going to a popular-total-only system has major drawbacks too, but you're ignoring them as much as whembly is the drawbacks of the current system...
I'm not ignoring it... it's something that's baked in the system. Everyone knows what's going on here...
I'm definitely open to the idea of splitting the electoral vote totals of individual states like in the Nebraska example, though, that is very interesting!
That's probably a more reasonable system, in which the 50 states ought to replicate.
MajorTom11 wrote: So what is the argument here, that a state with 2 million people in it should have equal standing to a state with 40 million because it's the united STATES?
Yeah sorry, that makes no sense. You are prioritizing an arbitrary border over the first, most sacred principal of a democracy, that every citizen gets a vote, and their vote counts.
If you think it is more important to make South Dakota equal to California or New York just because they are all states, while completely turning your back on THE CITIZENS OF THE COUNTRY that live in those states, sorry, but I think your priorities are horrendously out of wack. Country first. Citizens first.
That's just it, South Dakota and California are NOT equal.
South Dakota has 3 electoral votes.
California has 55 electoral votes.
It behooves a candidate to make their appeal across multiple states...rather than the high populous cities.
You keep saying that, and people keep pointing out that it wouldn't be enough to win the big population centers, and you ignore it. Rinse, repeat.
I'm ignoring it as it's nonsense. The current system objective is to maximize the electoral votes. With something like a popular vote, the campaigns would look different in that the campaigns would functionally work to maximize the population centers.
What? You're literally arguing that the alternative to the current system would be a system that you believe would mean candidates wouldn't campaign across multiple states, but rather in the high populous cities (ignoring the fact that the high populous cities are across multiple states too). This is pointed out as incorrect to you and then you for some reason start explaining how the current system works. We know how it works. We're saying that your characterisation of how proportional representation would work is actually how it works right now, and that proportional representation would be an improvement.
EDIT: Put it this way: is it more fair that the candidates spend their energy and time to convince 250,000 people, or 25 million, if we're assuming that it is beneficial when the candidates interact with more people?
Ustrello wrote: If it hasn't been asked was there a noticeable increase or decrease in voter participation in Maine and Nebraska in presidential elections after they implemented the splitting of EC votes by percentage?
Don't know about Maine and Nebraska in particular, but I know there's studies that have shown that there's a correlation between proportionally representative systems and higher voter turnout that is hard to explain with other factors, I'll see if I can find some of them.
whembly wrote: Quite the opposite. Worked as intended. A majority of States chose the president. See: United STATES. Not NY and CA et al
I've explained to you multiple, multiple, multiple times that this simply isn't true. That's how how population distribution works in the real world. There aren't enough people in those too states to carry a candidate in a general popular vote election.
Going by the numbers on CNN (https://www.cnn.com/election/2016/results) Clinton beat Trump by 2,868,691 in the popular vote. Clinton also beat Trump by 4,269,978 in the popular vote in California. Therefore, simply by winning California by a wide margin Clinton overcame losing to Trump in the popular vote in the other 49 states (and DC) combined.
Which wouldn't have mattered if Clinton hadn't also gotten a bunch of votes in the other states, which is the entire argument.
No, the argument was that "There aren't enough people in those two[sic] to a carry a candidate in a general popular vote election" which is demonstrably false as winning 8 million votes in California is enough to offset losing all the votes in a dozen other states or offset losing the collective popular vote in the other 49 states. And there are enough voters in the top 9 states Electorally that if they all voted for the same candidate those 9 states would guarantee a victory by popular vote. so there are enough voters in "NY and CA et al" to give a candidate a popular vote victory.
Clinton didn't campaign at all in many states and campaigned very little in other states and she still won the popular vote by a couple million because she won a lot of votes in very populous states. If the Presidential election was merely a popular vote contest that campaign trend would not be reversed it would be exacerbated. If you are bothered by the idea that "only a few states matter" a popular vote only creates a greater imbalance. Candidates don't campaign much, if at all, in states like Alaska, Hawaii, Montana, Idaho, Vermont, Maine, Delaware, Rhode Island, North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska and New Mexico and that's in a system that "makes rural voters count more than urban voters."
Which is still an improvement over the current situation because it means the campaigns reach more people. The government is supposed to be for the people of the US, not for the geographical territories of the US.
No, the argument was that "There aren't enough people in those two[sic] to a carry a candidate in a general popular vote election" which is demonstrably false as winning 8 million votes in California is enough to offset losing all the votes in a dozen other states or offset losing the collective popular vote in the other 49 states. And there are enough voters in the top 9 states Electorally that if they all voted for the same candidate those 9 states would guarantee a victory by popular vote. so there are enough voters in "NY and CA et al" to give a candidate a popular vote victory.
Depends on the definition of "et al." in this case, but winning by 8 million in California would only matter because there were people in the rest of the states that also voted Clinton. California would have "carried" the election in the sense that it turned a defeat into a win, but it wouldn't have "carried" the election in the sense that it single-handedly decided the election. I think we're talking past each other using two different interpretations of "carrying the election".
The question comes down to: do you believe every person's vote counts and is of equal value to every other person's vote? If so, then why are you willing to accept a system that denies that?
California, like the vast majority of states, is a chicken/egg situation:
Did voters vote for Hillary because the GOP really didn't do any campaigning there, or did the GOP not really do any campaigning there because voters would have always voted for Hillary?
What we do know is that with the current system, the GOP has ZERO reason to spend a single dollar in California because swinging the vote total by 3,000,000 people will make zero difference in how the election turns out. The state is still blue, and all the votes still go to Hillary.
So it's kind of pointless to look at vote totals for any state and decide that this is a good reason to argue in favor of any particular system, if our current system doesn't encourage either party to focus on voter turnout in most of them.
d-usa wrote: Yes, without the EC candidates will probably focus on population centers, because that's where the most people live and some states might get ignored. But states already get ignored, the EC didn't fix that and all it did is change which states are the ones that get ignored.
That's all I'm saying - and I'm actually in complete agreement with this.
Changing the system alters which states get the focus, but this isn't necessarily good or bad, just different.
You could accomplish the same "every vote counts" result by splitting the electoral college result of states, and my understanding is that each state has the right to make these rules themselves. So, California and Texas could follow the Nebraska and Maine examples, if they wish - and that's within the current system without needing a constitutional amendment that's likely never to happen!
Well, right now there is no reason to focus on many states because even a significant swing in votes doesn't matter. The electoral votes will be the same even if you swing the total by 10%.
I don't know if the majority of states will still be ignored if a system would use popular vote instead though. Maybe they still would because a 2% swing in North Dakota isn't a lot of votes. But maybe they would decide that a 2% swing across all the small states is worth it to swing the overall total vote.
But as I just posted, you can accomplish similar results of every vote mattering by splitting the electoral college votes of states. This is a viable alternative, whereas completely doing away with the EC is not, as enough small states will never support it. What did you think about this option?
It would have to be implemented on a state by state basis, but it's doable, unlike the amendment route.
d-usa wrote: I think one of the issues with the pro-EC arguments is that they often rely on simple falsehoods like "it keeps candidates from focusing on only a few states".
States like Wyoming are always going to be largely ignored by Presidential candidates because they lack enough Electoral votes to be important because they don't have enough people in them. That's never going to change unless tens of millions of citizens relocate to more sparsely populated states.
What the EC is supposed to do is level the playing field by having all States participate with a minimum number of Electors so that even sparsely populated States can have an impact collectively even though they aren't as important individually. Wyoming has less people it has 3 Electors, California has a lot of people it has 55 Electors, California is more important to candidates than Wyoming. That's the advantage that CA voters have, they are far more desirable and important to candidates than voters in Wyoming. It would be difficult to make Wyoming matter any less to the Electoral process without just removing the State from the process completely. The only sense in which California voters don't have a louder voice in the process than Wyoming voters is the ratio of voters to Electoral Votes and that problem isn't caused by the Electoral College it's caused by Congress.
Congress decided to put an arbitrary cap on the number of representatives in the House and consequently put a cap on Electoral Votes. If Congress wasn't so intent on messing around with apportionment to enable their gerrymandering the number of Representative/EC votes per state could grow organically and not be limited to robbing Peter to pay Paul. Current Federal law only stipulates that Congressional districts should be approximately the same size in population (within 15%) within the State so there is a huge variance nationally. Representatives in the House should all be representing roughly the same number of people but because Congress can't stop themselves from fething stuff up we've had the same disparity problem in regards to population per Congressional district/EC vote since 1929. It never gets addressed because the only time it gets talked about is when a President wins the Electoral vote but not the popular vote and that only happens about 9% of the time.
Fixing the Federal law so that every X number of people in every state equals 1 Congressional district/EC vote will fix the unfairness in the system.
RiTides wrote: But as I just posted, you can accomplish similar results of every vote mattering by splitting the electoral college votes of states. This is a viable alternative, whereas completely doing away with the EC is not, as enough small states will never support it. What did you think about this option?
It would have to be implemented on a state by state basis, but it's doable, unlike the amendment route.
Proportional representation on a State level could work as a compromise; you wouldn't make people's votes worthless and the smaller states would retain their advantage.
It'd probably somehow have to change the current number of EC delegates though so that there's some granularity in the smaller states.
Future War Cultist wrote:America doesn’t have a parliamentary style system right? So there is no ‘leader of the Democratic Party’ in a similar vein to leader of the conservative or labour parties in the uk right? Who’s a prominent enough democrat to take him on?
Eldarain wrote:Is there any realistic chance the two major parties will ever lose their stranglehold on control? There seems to be some rather substantially undemocratic barriers in the way of competition having it's voice heard currently.
Q: Why are there only two major parties in the U.S.?
Taken from the Full Answer: "The U.S. political system is based on what political scientists call a single-member district plurality (SMDP). That’s a fancy way of saying that the U.S. elects representatives from particular districts, with the person who gets the most votes in a district (also called a plurality) winning the seat. Each district is winner-take-all, and votes in one district have no effect on other districts. Presidential elections, though nationwide contests, are likewise really state-by-state races, thanks to the Electoral College, in which every state except Maine and Nebraska awards all of its electoral votes to whichever candidate wins a plurality of the state’s votes."
The United States does not adhere to a democratic system. In actually, the nation is a "federalist republic" whereby government and governance are cultivated via 50 'mini-countries' vs many other democratic systems where provinces are not nec. "states", legally speaking {for example: States in the U.S. have their own secretaries of state, speakers of the house, vice governors, etc etc. [In the late 1700s early 1800s, the original states were very much mini-countries which chose to band together for self-preservation]}. The nation is quite literally, as the saying goes, E Pluribus Unum, "out of many, one".
This is why the U.S. never holds nation-wide referendums on issue like same-sex marriage (as has been done in other democracies) because there are no mechanisms for such actions. Rather, if one were to try something akin to a "national referendum" it would look more like a constitutional amendment process whereby the individual states would vote and the results within said states would be tallied one way or the other {35 states yay, 15 states nay for example}.
The Federalist Republic system is partially why it is difficult for smaller parties to make headway: because they are actually trying to gain ground in 50 individual mini-countries rather than promoting themselves on a nation-wide system.
This is also why, as opposed to every other "democracy" on the face of planet earth, the leader of the executive branch is not the person who receives the most votes. Rather- it is the person who wins the "most states". In this way, one could rightfully argue that the president can in fact be undemocratically chosen [see: 2016], since they can "win" the office without accruing the most votes. This can easily happen in Republic Systems and has happened multiple times in the U.S. just during my young life-time.
FTR: Governorships and state-level offices are usually elected democratically with the winner being the individual who receives the most votes.
If any part of that made you feel incredibly frustrated Welcome to my world: WHY DO YOU THINK I PLAY ORKS?! CATHARTIC RELIEF- THATS WHY!!
Wow, we managed to get all the way to page 5 before "the US isn't a democracy it's a republic" popped up.
I'll just let Merriam-Webster answer that one for me:
Merriam Webster wrote:
Is the United States a democracy or a republic?
One of the most commonly encountered questions about the word democracy has nothing to do with its spelling or pronunciation, and isn’t even directly related to the meaning of the word itself. That question is “is the United States a democracy or a republic?” The answer to this, as with so many other questions about meaning, may be phrased as some form of “it depends.”
Some people believe that a country calling itself a democracy must be engaged in direct (or pure) democracy, in which the people of a state or region vote directly for policies, rather than elect representatives who make choices on their behalf. People who follow this line of reasoning hold that the United States is more properly described as a republic, using the following definition of that word: ”a government in which supreme power resides in a body of citizens entitled to vote and is exercised by elected officers and representatives responsible to them and governing according to law.”
However, both democracy and republic have more than a single meaning, and one of the definitions we provide for democracy closely resembles the definition of republic given above: “a government in which the supreme power is vested in the people and exercised by them directly or indirectly through a system of representation usually involving periodically held free elections.”
So if someone asks you if the United States is a democracy or a republic, you may safely answer the question with either “both” or “it depends.”
This is also why, as opposed to every other "democracy" on the face of planet earth, the leader of the executive branch is not the person who receives the most votes. Rather- it is the person who wins the "most states". In this way, one could rightfully argue that the president can in fact be undemocratically chosen [see: 2016], since they can "win" the office without accruing the most votes. This can easily happen in Republic Systems and has happened multiple times in the U.S. just during my young life-time.
It's technically correct, in that it's happened twice in the last 18 years. It's, on the other hand, rather misleading, since it's happened a total of 5 times since 1776; claiming that this can "easily happen" and using the word "multiple" instead of just saying "twice" is just blatantly misleading.
It can "easily happen" in the sense that such an outcome is impossible in parliamentary systems, which, I would argue, are more democratic (so long as the party which gains the most votes has an absolute majority)
As for the Merriam-Webster description: it is correct that "it [very much] depends" on the context. The United States, at a national level, IS a republic. The representatives of said republic are elected democratically, but we do not vote for parties, we vote for representatives from individual mini-democracies.
This drastically alters how we make laws, how those laws are enforced, and what mechanisms are available to us regarding governance over the entirety of the country.
Which doesn't mean that the US isn't a Democracy, only that it isn't a specific type of democracy. Fair enough on the comparison to parliamentary systems though.
MajorTom11 wrote: So what is the argument here, that a state with 2 million people in it should have equal standing to a state with 40 million because it's the united STATES?
Yeah sorry, that makes no sense. You are prioritizing an arbitrary border over the first, most sacred principal of a democracy, that every citizen gets a vote, and their vote counts.
If you think it is more important to make South Dakota equal to California or New York just because they are all states, while completely turning your back on THE CITIZENS OF THE COUNTRY that live in those states, sorry, but I think your priorities are horrendously out of wack. Country first. Citizens first.
Well... yes, that was the general intent behind the formation of the nation. Each State was an equal entity, no one state was supposed to be valued more then another. If it came down to just the people, then there would have been no need for the states.
That's hopelessly simplistic. First of all, the state is a jurisdiction entity and a governance entity. But you are a resident of the state, you are a citizen of the country. When it comes to the country, your citizenship is what matters, not what state you live in. States exist to perform a myriad of functions, thousands each, and forms one of the 3 main tiers of government, municipal, state and federal. By the same logic, might as well wipe out municipalities and cities right? Don't conflate something so complex down to a single function. Nothing in the composition of a country is singular. One can vote as a resident of the state for state level elections, because they are a resident in that state. One can vote federally, because they are a citizen of the country.
They are not mutually inclusive. They are separate systems explicitly designed to have jurisdiction over seperate levels of administration and law. What does your passport say? Your birth certificate? Citizen of South Carolina? OR the United States of America?
whembly wrote: Frankly, the 17th Amendment got it wrong.
It should've been used to allow popular vote for President and kept states Congress to electing federal Senators.
hrm, thats an interesting thought. From what I recall, the 17th was enacted after the state legislatures and local party machinery basically were caught being naughty one too many times, though my memory is somewhat hazy in that count. I think personally id still be for their direct election, but if any federal representation was going to be left to state legislatures, the Senate probably makes the most sense.
On another note, we've made it to page six without spilling blood or a lock, good job all!
AlmightyWalrus wrote: Which doesn't mean that the US isn't a Democracy, only that it isn't a specific type of democracy. Fair enough on the comparison to parliamentary systems though.
The parties frequently run the country as if it is a parliamentary system though, which is what makes me often pretty frustrated.
Paul Ryan stated that as the Speaker of the House, he represents the Republican Party and their voices and desires, which is frankly incorrect. He represents all the individual representatives as well as the House of Representatives as a whole. The Speaker of the House is not the de-facto leader of whatever party is in the majority. They already have a Majority Leader and a Majority Whip, in the same vein as the Minority Leader and Minority Whip.
And during the recent issues with healthcare, tax-cuts, and especially funding, we had multiple times where the Senate (and sometimes the House) had plans and compromises, and then they met with Trump who declared that he didn't like this or that, and then the plan fell through. Bills are developed by Presidents, and then shaped by what Presidents want, and the Senate then ends up passing nothing rather than passing something that Trump doesn't agree with. But it shouldn't matter what a President wants as far as drafting a bill and moving it through the process is concerned. Yeah, it's helpful if you got the support of the POTUS, but at the same time he doesn't really have a say until the end where he can sign it or veto it. We often treat the POTUS as if he is a Prime Minister, serving as leadership of the party in power in the legislative chambers, and won't move forward with the legislative process if he doesn't like something. Republicans in the House and Senate need to step-up and decide that they are their own co-equal branch of the Government and pass whatever bill they want, and then Trump can either man-up and veto it or he can design to sign it. Right now he gets to derail whatever bill he wants, and (rightfully) blame the lack of legislative process on the legislature because they didn't pass anything.
AlmightyWalrus wrote: Which doesn't mean that the US isn't a Democracy, only that it isn't a specific type of democracy. Fair enough on the comparison to parliamentary systems though.
For sure, a republic utilizes democratic mechanisms, I just think it's important to analyze the system we're talking about.
For example: I lived in the UK for two years and I am personally unaware of a situation where a set of laws, such as Firearm regulations, might differ drastically between say, Greater London, and Surrey or Kent. {this is not a gun-laws phishing exercise, its just the first example I could think of}. In the U.S. one can abide the firearm laws of their particular state, cross over a border, and immediately be in violation of the new state's local laws [concealed carry for example].
IF MY EXAMPLE OF LAWS BETWEEN PROVINCES IN OTHER COUNTRIES IS WRONG -- Please let me know with references! I'm happy to learn new stuff
AlmightyWalrus wrote: Which doesn't mean that the US isn't a Democracy, only that it isn't a specific type of democracy. Fair enough on the comparison to parliamentary systems though.
For sure, a republic utilizes democratic mechanisms, I just think it's important to analyze the system we're talking about.
For example: I lived in the UK for two years and I am personally unaware of a situation where a set of laws, such as Firearm regulations, might differ drastically between say, Greater London, and Surrey or Kent. {this is not a gun-laws phishing exercise, its just the first example I could think of}. In the U.S. one can abide the firearm laws of their particular state, cross over a border, and immediately be in violation of the new state's local laws [concealed carry for example].
IF MY EXAMPLE OF LAWS BETWEEN PROVINCES IN OTHER COUNTRIES IS WRONG -- Please let me know with references! I'm happy to learn new stuff
You also have to keep the size of what you are talking about in mind. If you are talking about laws being the same when moving between London and Kent, it would probably be more like comparing driving between different counties in the same State.
I don't know about the specifics, but I think that there can be some laws that apply specifically, and which may differ, between England, Scotland, and Northern Ireland rather than the UK as a whole.
If I might throw something else into the mix here: Something that I thoroughly LOVE about elections in the UK are the laws(?) stipulating that national elections can only last 90 days. I dream of a world where national elections in the US don't last... what, 2 years now?? Who knows. Thoughts??
Whazgog Da Despot wrote: If I might throw something else into the mix here: Something that I thoroughly LOVE about elections in the UK are the laws(?) stipulating that national elections can only last 90 days. I dream of a world where national elections in the US don't last... what, 2 years now?? Who knows. Thoughts??
I would like that too. Keep campaigning concentrated to within 3 months of Election Day.
Whazgog Da Despot wrote: If I might throw something else into the mix here: Something that I thoroughly LOVE about elections in the UK are the laws(?) stipulating that national elections can only last 90 days. I dream of a world where national elections in the US don't last... what, 2 years now?? Who knows. Thoughts??
I would like that too. Keep campaigning concentrated to within 3 months of Election Day.
3 months for main election and 2 or 3 for the primary seem like a good amount
AlmightyWalrus wrote: Which doesn't mean that the US isn't a Democracy, only that it isn't a specific type of democracy. Fair enough on the comparison to parliamentary systems though.
For sure, a republic utilizes democratic mechanisms, I just think it's important to analyze the system we're talking about.
For example: I lived in the UK for two years and I am personally unaware of a situation where a set of laws, such as Firearm regulations, might differ drastically between say, Greater London, and Surrey or Kent. {this is not a gun-laws phishing exercise, its just the first example I could think of}. In the U.S. one can abide the firearm laws of their particular state, cross over a border, and immediately be in violation of the new state's local laws [concealed carry for example].
IF MY EXAMPLE OF LAWS BETWEEN PROVINCES IN OTHER COUNTRIES IS WRONG -- Please let me know with references! I'm happy to learn new stuff
You might want to consider the size of the UK versus say California or Montana. It's more of a size issue than a federalization issue. I would point out that for the longest time there were very distinct weapon laws between North Ireland and the rest of the UK. Once you have enough territory you end up running into problems where culture/territory group A has very different values and legal desires than culture/territory group B.
d-usa wrote: Just make the election Ranked Choice for an instant runoff and get rid of the primary.
We’ve never been required to have any primaries at all, they’re strictly a political party process independent of the need to elect people to office. Nobody has to pay any attention or credence to Democrats or Republicans we’ve always been able to vote however we want and the Parties have always been able to choose their candidates however they want.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
AlmightyWalrus wrote: And regardless of whether it changes the amout of states being focussed on it lets more people's votes actually matter.
In a straight up popular vote involving 120 million voters or more every vote is always going to be equally important or equally meaningless.
Besides we don’t actually vote for the presidential candidates we vote to select Electors who vote in the Electoral College on our behalf.
Whazgog Da Despot wrote: If I might throw something else into the mix here: Something that I thoroughly LOVE about elections in the UK are the laws(?) stipulating that national elections can only last 90 days. I dream of a world where national elections in the US don't last... what, 2 years now?? Who knows. Thoughts??
I would like that too. Keep campaigning concentrated to within 3 months of Election Day.
3 months for main election and 2 or 3 for the primary seem like a good amount
States get to decide when they have their primaries which is why we have the race to be first and a primary season that stretches for so long that both major Party candidates are already selected before every state votes.
d-usa wrote: Why does it takes months across all 50 states for what should be an online vote of party members to pick their candidate?
Because the people who the parties rely on the most to show up and vote still haven't quite figured out what this "online thing" is all about.
Besides, if they could make online voting work effectively for primaries, then they could do it for the real election, too. And making it easier to vote is something one party has been doing their best (worst?) to prevent.
The issue is that people like to argue that primary voting is a state issue, run by states. But they also like to argue that primary voting is a party issue, run by parties.
d-usa wrote: Why does it takes months across all 50 states for what should be an online vote of party members to pick their candidate?
Because the people who the parties rely on the most to show up and vote still haven't quite figured out what this "online thing" is all about.
Besides, if they could make online voting work effectively for primaries, then they could do it for the real election, too. And making it easier to vote is something one party has been doing their best (worst?) to prevent.
No online voting... please.
Stick to paper ballots... there's nothing stopping us from having the primary day (or election day) all done on one day.
d-usa wrote: Just make the election Ranked Choice for an instant runoff and get rid of the primary.
We’ve never been required to have any primaries at all, they’re strictly a political party process independent of the need to elect people to office. Nobody has to pay any attention or credence to Democrats or Republicans we’ve always been able to vote however we want and the Parties have always been able to choose their candidates however they want.
And you're completely missing the point. How things currently work is largely irrelevant when people talk about how things could work better. Ranked voting would be a much better system than we have currently.
d-usa wrote: So why am I paying for the elections of a private group closed to outsiders?
not sure what you're referring to...
...unless you're talking about closed primaries where you had to be a member of a party, rather than an open primary???
That's exactly the issue:
Why is the State of Oklahoma administering and burdening the cost for a private election for the Democratic Party of Oklahoma, the Republican Party of Oklahoma, and the Libertarian Party of Oklahoma.
Why is the State of Oklahoma not opening up their ballot service to any other private entities?
Why am I paying for private inter-party elections that I cannot participate in?
Parties with closed primaries should be forced to pay the cost of administering their elections.
d-usa wrote: So why am I paying for the elections of a private group closed to outsiders?
not sure what you're referring to...
...unless you're talking about closed primaries where you had to be a member of a party, rather than an open primary???
That's exactly the issue:
Why is the State of Oklahoma administering and burdening the cost for a private election for the Democratic Party of Oklahoma, the Republican Party of Oklahoma, and the Libertarian Party of Oklahoma.
Why is the State of Oklahoma not opening up their ballot service to any other private entities?
Why am I paying for private inter-party elections that I cannot participate in?
Parties with closed primaries should be forced to pay the cost of administering their elections.
The States shouldn’t be payin for any of the primaries. Unfortunately the politicians that run the states belong to the two Parties that want the Stste to pay for their primaries. All Parties should be responsible for self funding their primary process whatever it may be. The State should be responsible for registration, voter rolls, and administering the polling places and ballots on Election Day. The State should have a deadline for the submission of Party candidates so they can produce correct ballots but aside from the cost of the ballots the State shouldn’t be paying the cost for the Parties.
Eldarain wrote: Is there any realistic chance the two major parties will ever lose their stranglehold on control? There seems to be some rather substantially undemocratic barriers in the way of competition having it's voice heard currently.
Also, as Marx points out, capitalism will sell the revolution the tools of its own destruction. Even now the NRA lobbies for the right to sell the revolution the AR-15s that will put an end to oppression. As previous generations have had the AK-47 as the symbol of freedom from tyranny our generation will embrace the AR-15.
Nope, AR-15 jams too much, AK-47 is THE hot item for a revolutionary.
AlmightyWalrus wrote: Which doesn't mean that the US isn't a Democracy, only that it isn't a specific type of democracy. Fair enough on the comparison to parliamentary systems though.
For sure, a republic utilizes democratic mechanisms, I just think it's important to analyze the system we're talking about.
For example: I lived in the UK for two years and I am personally unaware of a situation where a set of laws, such as Firearm regulations, might differ drastically between say, Greater London, and Surrey or Kent. {this is not a gun-laws phishing exercise, its just the first example I could think of}. In the U.S. one can abide the firearm laws of their particular state, cross over a border, and immediately be in violation of the new state's local laws [concealed carry for example].
IF MY EXAMPLE OF LAWS BETWEEN PROVINCES IN OTHER COUNTRIES IS WRONG -- Please let me know with references! I'm happy to learn new stuff
You might want to consider the size of the UK versus say California or Montana. It's more of a size issue than a federalization issue. I would point out that for the longest time there were very distinct weapon laws between North Ireland and the rest of the UK. Once you have enough territory you end up running into problems where culture/territory group A has very different values and legal desires than culture/territory group B.
Sheer size of the US matters as well as we are a lot more "diverse" naturally than other countries since we are all at one point or another immigrants. One of our biggest issues as a country as far as I am concerned is we really don't much like each other and certainly don't spend much time trying to. Add an unhealthy amount of distrust to the contempt and you can see why we have a hard time getting things done nationally.
For sure, a republic utilizes democratic mechanisms, I just think it's important to analyze the system we're talking about.
For example: I lived in the UK for two years and I am personally unaware of a situation where a set of laws, such as Firearm regulations, might differ drastically between say, Greater London, and Surrey or Kent. {this is not a gun-laws phishing exercise, its just the first example I could think of}. In the U.S. one can abide the firearm laws of their particular state, cross over a border, and immediately be in violation of the new state's local laws [concealed carry for example].
IF MY EXAMPLE OF LAWS BETWEEN PROVINCES IN OTHER COUNTRIES IS WRONG -- Please let me know with references! I'm happy to learn new stuff
You're not entirely correct there. Cartridge firing handguns IIRC can still be legally owned in Northern Ireland and on the Isle of Man (Or could last time I checked) but are almost completely banned elsewhere in the UK. Scotland has also fairly recently instituted licencing for airguns which is not a requirement elsewhere in the UK. The Isle of Man also has their own separate system of permits for air weapons and crossbows which are not applicable elsewhere. It doesn't differ from county to county, true, but there are circumstances where crossing from one jurisdiction within the UK to another can turn legal ownership into a serious criminal offence. Anyway, apologies for the off-topic diversion.
Vulcan wrote: There are three big problems in American politics.
1) We're doing VERY well when half the eligible voters actually vote. Voter turnouts average around 35%.
2) Of those who do vote, 35-40% of them would vote for Genghis Khan on a 'Raze America to the ground!' platform so long as the little 'R' is there next to his name... and almost exactly the same percentage would do the same so long as the little 'D' is there instead. So with between 70% and 80% of the active voters brainlessly voting the party line, there's no real chance for third parties to get involved on any sort of large scale.
3) Of the 20-30% who don't vote party lines, a majority will vote for whoever's campaign ads were most pervasive, not persuasive. The candidate who spends the most money on ads almost always wins.
Unless at least one (and preferably all three) of these problems are solved, the American political situation will continue to degrade.
I'd like one, just one, election at some point in my life where I can realistically vote FOR someone, not against someone. I'm tired of choosing between a giant douche and a turd sandwich. The one happy note in the last election was that it violated your third point. The guy that spent less won.
First off, shocked this is still open. I thought it was an inventively cruel (and well played) April fools joke by the mods. Still not sure it isn't...
d-usa wrote: And during the recent issues with healthcare, tax-cuts, and especially funding, we had multiple times where the Senate (and sometimes the House) had plans and compromises, and then they met with Trump who declared that he didn't like this or that, and then the plan fell through. Bills are developed by Presidents, and then shaped by what Presidents want, and the Senate then ends up passing nothing rather than passing something that Trump doesn't agree with. But it shouldn't matter what a President wants as far as drafting a bill and moving it through the process is concerned. Yeah, it's helpful if you got the support of the POTUS, but at the same time he doesn't really have a say until the end where he can sign it or veto it. We often treat the POTUS as if he is a Prime Minister, serving as leadership of the party in power in the legislative chambers, and won't move forward with the legislative process if he doesn't like something. Republicans in the House and Senate need to step-up and decide that they are their own co-equal branch of the Government and pass whatever bill they want, and then Trump can either man-up and veto it or he can design to sign it. Right now he gets to derail whatever bill he wants, and (rightfully) blame the lack of legislative process on the legislature because they didn't pass anything.
I find this a genuinely insightful way of putting things, thanks Dakka OT!
Just one suggestion to maybe stop this thread from getting locked and the subject perma-banned - perhaps specific incidents that are particularly contraversial like school shootings shouldn't be raised here? This should stick to the nuts and bolts of US politics, and if possible avoid specific, contraversial events. Those events normally get their own threads anyway, beacuse there's a lot more to discuss in those events than just the political angle. Just a suggestion.
Anyhow, anyone remember back to the heady days of 2017 when Trump would continuously mention how well the stock market was travelling under him? Never mind it grew even faster under Obama, the general consensus was that presidents make a mistake when they take credit for a rising market because they have no control over when it will reverse. Well Trump has proved them wrong, because a president can impact the stock market. By doing stupid things like starting trade wars. Over the weekend the market dropped about 2% after news of Chinese retaliation to US trade sanctions broke. This is the second major reversal of the Trump presidency, and the result is interesting - from the day Trump signed the tax cut that was intended to improve investment return and therefore grow productivity and jobs, the market has dropped 4.4% overall. The tax cut was pretty flimsy and unlikely to have much impact in the first place, but now Trump has sunk any rationale for it with his trade war.
So it turns out a president maybe can impact a stock market, if he does something really stupid.
Ashiraya wrote: This is probably a joke thread, but you know, whatever.
I did find this gem on reddit.
It's getting a lot of play on twitter. In terms of of media control I'm not sure its that big a deal, if this was 1990 it'd be panic stations but these days media is presented from so many companies across so many platforms I don't think it matters. The bigger issue to me is that so many Americans eat this stuff up, which we already knew because of FOX News, Breitbart etc, but this is just a reminder how bad the problem is. A lot of Americans just don't care that their news is given a political bias dictated by head office, as long as that political bias suits their own politics. Depressing stuff.
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MajorTom11 wrote: Corey Booker has a lot of potential, but he has not found a way to the national stage just yet. He has the spunk, but I am not sure if he has the cool.
The way to the major stage is the primary campaign. Success in early states in the primary campaign take people barely known outside the beltway and turn them in to national political figures. Obama was a guy who gave a great convention speech, then successes in early states in 2008 made him a national figure. GW Bush was a governor with a modest national profile and a Dad who was a one term president, Bill Clinton was a governor with no national profile at all.
Hell, I'd say not being on the national spotlight before your primary run is a big advantage. Most candidates who were well established figures before their political run did pretty badly. Hillary Clinton, Romney, McCain and Bob Dole were all very well known before their presidential runs.
I have no idea how Booker will do. You never really know until a person is placed in the national spotlight. We all know Booker is running. Whether he'll flourish is something we'll find out in 2019 and 2020.
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Frazzled wrote: The other ones noted are old East Coast Liberal elites. Trump would go through them like crap through a goose.
That's a really bad take. In 2016 Trump beat a poor to middling candidate, and he only managed that by shooting the moon in picking up the close states. 80,000 votes across three swing states was Trump's margin of victory.
While none of the Democrats listed strike me as particularly impressive, they're all going to produce more coherent, understandable campaigns than Hillary 'go read my website' Clinton. So for Trump to win we'd have to argue that either he will be better liked than he was in 2016, or Republicans as a whole will be stronger than in 2016. Now 2020 is a long time away, but both things are intensely wrong right now and getting more wrong by the day. 2020 is a long time away, so I guess anything can happen but calling it likely, let alone probable is ridiculous.
But you didn't even limit yourself to just likely, you didn't even limit yourself to probable. You said Trump 'would'. Really bad take.
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oldravenman3025 wrote: This. The Left Coasters, New York Champaign Socialists, and New England Bluebloods all need to be purged from the party, for the Democrats to ever be a serious contender again. It was those types running the party into the ground that helped Trump triump over Killary.
This line about Democrats needing to do something radical needs to die. It's horribly wrong.
From 1992 until 2016, that's 24 years and 7 presidential elections, Democrats have won the popular vote in all but one election, and that election was in the wake of 9/11 with a huge rally effect around the sitting president. Sure, elections aren't won by popular vote, but it shows the Dems aren't just competitive but the stronger party on the whole. Think of it this way - had the coin flip elections in 2000 and 2016 broken the other way we'd be talking about Dems dominating the presidency for a quarter century, and talking about the Republicans as a party pushed down in to local politics and congressional obstructionism. Which would be silly of course, but it goes to show how much political narrative is just plain bad analysis.
And that's before we get to what's happened to Republicans in elections since they took control and their actual policies were revealed. The special elections so far have shown Republicans likely to lose a lot in the 2018 mid-terms.
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RiTides wrote: Even though I'm an independent voter in Maryland (a state that always goes Democratic) I think it's a very good reason. Without that system, huge areas of the country could be completely discounted. There are drawbacks, of course, but the alternative has huge ones, as well.
Think of it this way, as resident of Maryland in a popular vote system a candidate won't do much to chase your vote because Maryland isn't that big. But in the current EC system candidates do nothing to chase your vote because Maryland isn't swinging Republican. You intended for the EC to give small states some say, but instead it gave almost all states, including most of the smaller states, absolutely no say at all.
Popular vote would be dominated by larger states, but it would still be an improvement for most smaller states because they would at least have some relevance.
But there are ways to move to a better system without dumping the weighting to smaller states. For instance, the EC system could be kept with each state getting electoral votes equal to its number of seats in congress, so smaller states get the boosted weighting from all having two senate seats. But instead of having almost almost all states give their electoral votes on a winner take all basis, you could have EV proportionately allocated. So Maryland has 10 EV, and it the vote went like 2016 then Clinton would get 6, Trump 3 and Johnson 1 (or Trump 4 and Johnson 0 depending on how you break up partial results). There would be a reason to campaign there, because instead of a certain 10 votes for the Democratic candidate, campaigning could shift the Dem to 7, or the Rep to 4 or 5. The roughly 40 to 45 states that are currently irrelevant would be relevant again, while small states would still keep their weighting.
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RiTides wrote: AlmightyWalrus - Sorry if I wasn't clear, I was referring to the Democratic primary's practice of using "Super Delegates" to determine about 15% of their primary vote, regardless of the actual voting.
The super-delegates aren't good, but people way overstate how problematic they are. There has literally never been a single instance of super-delegates swinging a result away from the popular vote. The one time it might have happened was 2008 when a whole lot of delegates pledged to Clinton, only for Obama to win the popular vote. You know what happened? As soon as people realised Obama was going to win the popular vote they all switched from Clinton to Obama. This is because the super-delegates know that handing the result to a candidate with less votes would fracture the base and kill their turnout in the upcoming general election, they're not going to do it unless the majority candidate is bad on a Trump like scale.
There are much bigger issues in the primaries, such as how delegates are actually assigned. See, just winning the vote on primary day isn't the end of the process. For instance, in 2016 at the Nevada convention Sanders team turned up in huge numbers, and tried to use votes on the day to give Sanders more delegates out of Nevada than Clinton got, despite Clinton having won the primary. Republican primaries have a similar issue, Ted Cruz actually managed to score a majority of delegates in some states that Trump had won, Paul Manafort was originally brought on to the Trump team give them some expertise of their own and rival Cruz's manipulation of the system.
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MajorTom11 wrote: There is an answer to be had here. There is a way to vet gerrymandering scientifically... It's not witchcraft, it's stats. If the dems gerrymandered too, then they should be forced to re-district just like the GOP had to.
The solutions are available, don't kid yourselves guys, it's the political will to do it that is lacking and nothing else. If data strategy can lead to gerrymandering, then data policy can eliminate it.
The Dems do gerrymander, Maryland for instance. It's just Republicans do more of it, and they do it much harder. As well as, you know, Republicans being Republicans, there's a couple more reasons why. The first is just a natural thing - the migration in to cities by mostly liberal people has naturally concentrated the Democratic vote, boosting the effect of deliberate gerrymandering. The second issue is that 2010 was a Republican wave election, they won a stupid number of state houses and governorships, and so when the 2010 census results opened up for redistricting these new Republican majorities set about using new data techniques to make some of the most outrageous gerrymanders you could think of.
As for solutions... independant electoral commissions work just fine. The only reason to refuse to let an impartial body draw up a decent map is because you want to gerrymander.
sebster wrote: That's a really bad take. In 2016 Trump beat a poor to middling candidate, and he only managed that by shooting the moon in picking up the close states. 80,000 votes across three swing states was Trump's margin of victory.
We may still disagree on this, but I feel like the Russian influence on the election is a very important factor to mention. Especially in light of what's been revealed since. Now I'm not suggesting Russia swayed 80,000 voters, or even just 800 voters, from the candidate they would have picked anyway but I think it's entirely plausible that the toxicity generated convinced a lot more than 80,000 voters to simply 'give up' and stay home. And we both know the vast majority of non-voter citizens go Democrat when they actually show up.
MajorTom11 wrote: There is an answer to be had here. There is a way to vet gerrymandering scientifically... It's not witchcraft, it's stats. If the dems gerrymandered too, then they should be forced to re-district just like the GOP had to.
The solutions are available, don't kid yourselves guys, it's the political will to do it that is lacking and nothing else. If data strategy can lead to gerrymandering, then data policy can eliminate it.
The Dems do gerrymander, Maryland for instance. It's just Republicans do more of it, and they do it much harder. As well as, you know, Republicans being Republicans, there's a couple more reasons why. The first is just a natural thing - the migration in to cities by mostly liberal people has naturally concentrated the Democratic vote, boosting the effect of deliberate gerrymandering. The second issue is that 2010 was a Republican wave election, they won a stupid number of state houses and governorships, and so when the 2010 census results opened up for redistricting these new Republican majorities set about using new data techniques to make some of the most outrageous gerrymanders you could think of.
As for solutions... independant electoral commissions work just fine. The only reason to refuse to let an impartial body draw up a decent map is because you want to gerrymander.
I've found this video by John Oliver to be an extremely valuable (and non-biased) run-down of the gerrymandering situation.
Currently, California is hemorrhaging population. According to the news at the moment they have a net population loss of about 200 people per day, and the rate is increasing. That doesn't sound like much, but this time next year they could be down 70,000 people.
This means that by 2020 California could loose a couple electoral votes, while the conservative states (unlikely to shift blue) could gain some. This could very well make a Democratic comeback more complicated.
Grey Templar wrote: Frankly, liberals need to drop gun control and be all for personal gun ownership.
"Liberals need to stop being liberal about this issue" is a thing lots of people like to say right now. It's exactly as valuable as all the "conservatives need to stop being conservative about this issue" hot takes we saw from 2006 to 2016.
Namely because gun control has its roots in racism within the Democratic Party. It was originally brought about in an attempt to limit African Americans access to guns, and went hand in hand with other attempts to limit their ability to vote and attend “white” schools. Democrats need to stop being hippocrits on this, as the party that allegedly champions personal rights and freedom.
You're slightly kind of right about some of this, but mostly you're pretty wrong. There have been a lot of bit of gun control, and most had little to do wth racism The 1936 act that placed tight controls on fully auto, and the amendment in the 80s that only allowed for grandfathering and no new weapons wasn't based in racism, it was based in criminals using auto weapons to outshoot police.
The bit you're kind of a little bit right about was that some gun laws have been pretty damn racist. For instance, California has proposed and passed some gun laws targeting specific makes and models because they were preferred by black people, particularly the Black Panthers. But here's a funny thing - the NRA was in support of each of those laws. This is because when you look back in history, everyone was more than a little bit racist.
But even if we ignore the factual errors in your claim, more than anything the existence of some racist reasoning behind some past laws as a reason to reject a law today with no racial elements is some really crappy analysis.
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d-usa wrote: And during the recent issues with healthcare, tax-cuts, and especially funding, we had multiple times where the Senate (and sometimes the House) had plans and compromises, and then they met with Trump who declared that he didn't like this or that, and then the plan fell through. Bills are developed by Presidents, and then shaped by what Presidents want, and the Senate then ends up passing nothing rather than passing something that Trump doesn't agree with. But it shouldn't matter what a President wants as far as drafting a bill and moving it through the process is concerned.
Sort of. IT depends how much political capital the president is willing to spend. For instance when Trump shot down three or four bills protecting dreamers that had bi-partisan support, it was because Trump was willing to go to the mat to stop the bill (well not Trump but actually John Kelly and Steve Miller, but the effect is the same).
However, Trump had a clear idea for the budget he wanted, with cuts to almost everything outside the military. But congress put up a bill that had nothing Trump wanted, but because this wasn't the fight Trump wanted, and because Trump and his staff are miles out of their depth on anything that involves the actual management of the country, Trump rolled over. Congressional Republicans got the spending they wanted, because they were willing to fight on the issue and Trump was not.
Afterwards Trump swore he'll never sign a budget like that again, and everyone laughed.
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whembly wrote: Stick to paper ballots... there's nothing stopping us from having the primary day (or election day) all done on one day.
There is a lot to be said for the travelling carnival style of primaries. It gives lower profile candidates a chance concentrate their limited resources on the smaller early states, to prove they have something about them with good results in those early states. Without that system then the only winners you'd see would be candidates who were already very well connected, and very well financed.
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NinthMusketeer wrote: We may still disagree on this, but I feel like the Russian influence on the election is a very important factor to mention. Especially in light of what's been revealed since. Now I'm not suggesting Russia swayed 80,000 voters, or even just 800 voters, from the candidate they would have picked anyway but I think it's entirely plausible that the toxicity generated convinced a lot more than 80,000 voters to simply 'give up' and stay home. And we both know the vast majority of non-voter citizens go Democrat when they actually show up.
Did we every disagree on this? Honestly I've been all over the shop on this issue, so it wouldn't surprise if at some point I argued the opposite of what you posted above, but I don't remember it.
Anyhow, I agree that when the margin of victory was so low, pretty much anything that had any impact at all must have had a decisive impact. And I agree the intent wasn't to win people over to Trump, but to dissuade liberal leaning voters from turning up at all.
Thing is its near impossible to tell if the Russian ops had any impact at all. Because their campaign geared up over time, and was running from very early in the primary, its hard to pick out the impact in any poll movements (unlike Comey's late announcement where you can see a 2 point shift immediately). We can look to Clinton's trashed reputation and claim that was due to Russia running fake news attack pieces, but Republicans have been running fake attack pieces on Clinton since the early 90s, I don't think those attacks started working for the first time in 2017 when a Russian started doing it. Certainly the Russian hacking and the ludicrous non-stories that came out of various emails had some effect, if only because it focused the coverage on her emails and other loosely related issues, which meant each of Trump's long string of scandals all got less coverage.
But we can't know for sure that it had an effect, and we certainly can't know the scope of the effect. But if there was even a small effect, then given the closeness of the election it would have swung the result.
I've found this video by John Oliver to be an extremely valuable (and non-biased) run-down of the gerrymandering situation.
I look forward to going home, putting the kids to bed, making a coffee and clicking on that link to be told the video is not available in my area
Grey Templar wrote: Frankly, liberals need to drop gun control and be all for personal gun ownership.
"Liberals need to stop being liberal about this issue" is a thing lots of people like to say right now. It's exactly as valuable as all the "conservatives need to stop being conservative about this issue" hot takes we saw from 2006 to 2016.
Namely because gun control has its roots in racism within the Democratic Party. It was originally brought about in an attempt to limit African Americans access to guns, and went hand in hand with other attempts to limit their ability to vote and attend “white” schools. Democrats need to stop being hippocrits on this, as the party that allegedly champions personal rights and freedom.
You're slightly kind of right about some of this, but mostly you're pretty wrong. There have been a lot of bit of gun control, and most had little to do wth racism The 1936 act that placed tight controls on fully auto, and the amendment in the 80s that only allowed for grandfathering and no new weapons wasn't based in racism, it was based in criminals using auto weapons to outshoot police.
The bit you're kind of a little bit right about was that some gun laws have been pretty damn racist. For instance, California has proposed and passed some gun laws targeting specific makes and models because they were preferred by black people, particularly the Black Panthers. But here's a funny thing - the NRA was in support of each of those laws. This is because when you look back in history, everyone was more than a little bit racist.
But even if we ignore the factual errors in your claim, more than anything the existence of some racist reasoning behind some past laws as a reason to reject a law today with no racial elements is some really crappy analysis.
Yes, they were supported by the NRA at the time, but that is irrelevant. The point is that Liberals are quite quick to smear anything even remotely associated with racism by the most tenuous of threads, yet despite the Racist origins of the Gun Control platform they aren't dropping it. They may not have racist reasons now for pushing gun control, but their behavior towards other actions that used to be associated with racism makes them hypocrites on this issue.
Plus there is the fact that Gun Control has no evidence that banning guns, limiting access to guns, etc... has any effect on crime.
The number of crimes committed with fully automatic weapons in the last hundred years was a grand total of 3 incidents. Oh, and for a good chunk of that time Fully Automatic weapons were unregulated. You could buy a Thompson Machine Gun through the mail. Yet, the amount of crime resulting from these weapons being available for all practical purposes is non-existent. So why try to ban them at all? Simple, Liberals don't like an armed population that could resist a totalitarian government, so the spin is that these weapons are dangerous and horrible and need to be taken away from everybody despite there being zero evidence for that being necessary. This from the party that allegedly champions personal freedom, equality, and liberty.
According to the FBI crime statistics, in 1993, only 3% of Homicides used a rifle of some kind. Yet Liberals keep pushing to ban AR-15s and other "Scary Looking Assault Rifles" despite them accounting for such negligible amounts of crime and murder, and among a backdrop of violent crime and murder dropping.
In 2013 there was a total of 11,208 homicides committed with a firearm in the US. Out of 315.5 million people. About 3.5 gun homicides per 100,000 people. That is such an insignificant number.
So called "Mass Shootings" have really bad definitions, as does "School Shooting". The Investigative Assistance for Violent Crimes Act of 2012 defines a Mass Shooting as any shooting involving 3 victims other than the perpetrator. The problem is this easily includes crimes which really don't fit the classic idea of a "Mass Shooting". A gang attacking a rival gang and killing 3 people is technically a mass shooting. But it clearly doesn't belong in the same category as the guy who shot up Las Vegas. Likewise with a "School Shooting", a dude committing suicide in a school parking lot, or a negligently discharged bullet landing on school property, obviously don't belong in the same category as the Parkland School Shooting. Yet they are all lumped in together and used to artificially inflate the numbers of these incidents.
We can look to Clinton's trashed reputation and claim that was due to Russia running fake news attack pieces, but Republicans have been running fake attack pieces on Clinton since the early 90s, I don't think those attacks started working for the first time in 2017 when a Russian started doing it.
It would also be pretty foolish to think that Russia only started running fake ads in the 2016 election. I'm sure they've been trying to muck about on the internet with US elections as long as social media has existed and they'll probably keep doing it forever.
Currently, California is hemorrhaging population. According to the news at the moment they have a net population loss of about 200 people per day, and the rate is increasing. That doesn't sound like much, but this time next year they could be down 70,000 people.
This means that by 2020 California could loose a couple electoral votes, while the conservative states (unlikely to shift blue) could gain some. This could very well make a Democratic comeback more complicated.
That's all pure wrongness. Here's California's actual population per year, with actuals for 2010 to 2017 and forecasts for 2018 to 2020.
The 2020 project has California at 3m more people than 2020, an increase of 8%. Even if we ignore projections, its up 2.3m to the end of 2017, 6%. In contrast, there's a lot of red states that are stagnant. Mississippi has grown a whopping 16,803 growth from 2010 to 2017, 0.57%. Kansas has grown 60,005, 2.1%. West Virginia has fallen 37,137, down 2%. Kentucky is up 114,822, 2.65% That's just me picking states that are strongly red states, interesting that they all showed really mediocre growth. But I'm not claiming growth is bad across all red states, I didn't click and calc the numbers but Texas and Idaho are red states with strong growth (why is Idaho growing fast?!)
Anyhow, even if we accept your 'never mind the growth from 2010 to 2017 that's stopped now and Cali is now in negatives, losing 70k per year', it would end up with California still up 2.08 million, growth of 5.6%
Yeah, CA ain't in negative growth. Yet... I expect that will change though with the issues that are plaguing the state. Namely economic factors forcing young people to migrate elsewhere because they can't afford to live here. It'll be a state of geriatrics and hopelessly in-debted individuals within the next few decades.
Just by the trends you list there, CA would have negative growth by 2050 or so.
Yes, they were supported by the NRA at the time, but that is irrelevant.
No, it is the exact point. 'In history people on that side of the issue were racist' is meaningless, because it doesn't show any racism behind the modern iteration, and because in history almost everything had some racism behind it. It's a meaningless attack made for no reason but villification.
The point is that Liberals are quite quick to smear anything even remotely associated with racism by the most tenuous of threads
Liberals claim racism for tactical reasons so you're going to as well.
Plus there is the fact that Gun Control has no evidence that banning guns, limiting access to guns, etc... has any effect on crime.
That's completely false but if you want to claim it then whatever, turning this thread in to yet another gun control debate would go nowhere and just get it locked. So be wrong about this, I won't bite. If you want to start a new thread about guns then go and be wrong in there, I might even go there and explain all the ways you're wrong. But I won't be getting this thread locked over your wrongness.
It would also be pretty foolish to think that Russia only started running fake ads in the 2016 election. I'm sure they've been trying to muck about on the internet with US elections as long as social media has existed and they'll probably keep doing it forever.
That wasn't even close to the point being discussed.
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Grey Templar wrote: Yeah, CA ain't in negative growth. Yet... I expect that will change though with the issues that are plaguing the state. Namely economic factors forcing young people to migrate elsewhere because they can't afford to live here. It'll be a state of geriatrics and hopelessly in-debted individuals within the next few decades.
Umm, the reason housing is expensive is because specific locations have so many people looking to move and work there. "High migration causes high demand for housing which causes negative migration" is an impossible thing.
Just by the trends you list there, CA would have negative growth by 2050 or so.
Huh? I didn't give a trend. I took cuda1179's factoid, and used it in place of the actual forecast figures, just to show that even if his figure was right it wouldn't have the impact he thought it would.
That's completely false but if you want to claim it then whatever, turning this thread in to yet another gun control debate would go nowhere and just get it locked. So be wrong about this, I won't bite. If you want to start a new thread about guns then go and be wrong in there, I might even go there and explain all the ways you're wrong. But I won't be getting this thread locked over your wrongness.
Yeah nope. The evidence does not support gun control and bans as being effective at all. Just go read the FBI crime statistics if you care to enlighten yourself.
MajorTom11 wrote: So what is the argument here, that a state with 2 million people in it should have equal standing to a state with 40 million because it's the united STATES?
Yeah sorry, that makes no sense. You are prioritizing an arbitrary border over the first, most sacred principal of a democracy, that every citizen gets a vote, and their vote counts.
If you think it is more important to make South Dakota equal to California or New York just because they are all states, while completely turning your back on THE CITIZENS OF THE COUNTRY that live in those states, sorry, but I think your priorities are horrendously out of wack. Country first. Citizens first.
Ah so essentially "These states don't matter now because the don't have population to fight back against the majority" instead. Because the only things that would certainly be good for states that many term "Flyover" is that they now have no real say in anything. I suppose those states should just buck up and enjoy what California and New York dictates for them right? Because it's quite clear that there's some disdain going on for such states right now.
Grey Templar wrote: Yeah, CA ain't in negative growth. Yet... I expect that will change though with the issues that are plaguing the state. Namely economic factors forcing young people to migrate elsewhere because they can't afford to live here. It'll be a state of geriatrics and hopelessly in-debted individuals within the next few decades.
Umm, the reason housing is expensive is because specific locations have so many people looking to move and work there. "High migration causes high demand for housing which causes negative migration" is an impossible thing.
.
No its not an impossible thing. Its a description of a cycle. People want to move somewhere and work there, which drives prices up. Eventually to the point where you cant afford to live there anymore, which leads to migration elsewhere. It seems every week there is an article about Bay Area housing becoming more and more expensive. Such that even Executives at Google and Amazon are having difficulty finding housing near work. If they are having trouble, just imagine what middle class people are having to endure.
Seriously dude, I'm freaking experiencing this first hand. I'd need to earn twice what I do now to afford rent for a tiny 1 bed room apartment of my own in this area.
I basically have to plan on leaving CA if I want to enjoy any decent standard of living on my own.
NinthMusketeer wrote: We may still disagree on this, but I feel like the Russian influence on the election is a very important factor to mention. Especially in light of what's been revealed since. Now I'm not suggesting Russia swayed 80,000 voters, or even just 800 voters, from the candidate they would have picked anyway but I think it's entirely plausible that the toxicity generated convinced a lot more than 80,000 voters to simply 'give up' and stay home. And we both know the vast majority of non-voter citizens go Democrat when they actually show up.
Did we every disagree on this? Honestly I've been all over the shop on this issue, so it wouldn't surprise if at some point I argued the opposite of what you posted above, but I don't remember it.
Anyhow, I agree that when the margin of victory was so low, pretty much anything that had any impact at all must have had a decisive impact. And I agree the intent wasn't to win people over to Trump, but to dissuade liberal leaning voters from turning up at all.
Thing is its near impossible to tell if the Russian ops had any impact at all. Because their campaign geared up over time, and was running from very early in the primary, its hard to pick out the impact in any poll movements (unlike Comey's late announcement where you can see a 2 point shift immediately). We can look to Clinton's trashed reputation and claim that was due to Russia running fake news attack pieces, but Republicans have been running fake attack pieces on Clinton since the early 90s, I don't think those attacks started working for the first time in 2017 when a Russian started doing it. Certainly the Russian hacking and the ludicrous non-stories that came out of various emails had some effect, if only because it focused the coverage on her emails and other loosely related issues, which meant each of Trump's long string of scandals all got less coverage.
But we can't know for sure that it had an effect, and we certainly can't know the scope of the effect. But if there was even a small effect, then given the closeness of the election it would have swung the result.
I disagree on whether or not the Russian meddling had any impact at all, it definitely had an impact, especially considering the somewhat recent indictments of 3 Russian companies and 13 nationals that were involved in a several years long plan (data gathering, ad campaigns, protests/group organizations/rallies, bots/trolls, etc starting after Trump went to Russia for the Miss Universe contest iirc), along with the hacking done by Russians in at least 7 states, there's no way they didn't influence the election. It also started back in 2014, well before the 2016 election primaries were even considered obviously. And while you're right we might not know the entire effect the hacking and campaign by the Russians might have had, we can certainly say they meddled and influenced the election, be it changing addresses or names so people couldn't vote without multiple forms of ID, or actually changing votes, which might be a little too brazen, and the former is certainly harder to prove was done maliciously instead of a records update by the actual person.
For the Russians to do all of that and NOT influence the election is just a silly notion at this point.
Grey Templar wrote: No its not an impossible thing. Its a description of a cycle. People want to move somewhere and work there, which drives prices up. Eventually to the point where you cant afford to live there anymore, which leads to migration elsewhere.
Except your cycle misses out one really big step - the price is responsive to the level of demand. When the price starts encouraging some people to look elsewhere and thereby cool demand you don't see the price just keep going up and up and force demand in to the negatives. Instead you see demand start to decline, and price level off or even drop. This is called arbitrage, it is the central mechanic of economics.
Seriously dude, I'm freaking experiencing this first hand. I'd need to earn twice what I do now to afford rent for a tiny 1 bed room apartment of my own in this area.
The discussion isn't about the price of housing in the major IT hubs in Cali, we all know its expensive. The debate is whether demand driven price increases can lead to negative demand. Hopefully my answer above shows this is an impossibility.
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Wolfblade wrote: I disagree on whether or not the Russian meddling had any impact at all, it definitely had an impact, especially considering the somewhat recent indictments of 3 Russian companies and 13 nationals that were involved in a several years long plan (data gathering, ad campaigns, protests/group organizations/rallies, bots/trolls, etc starting after Trump went to Russia for the Miss Universe contest iirc), along with the hacking done by Russians in at least 7 states, there's no way they didn't influence the election. It also started back in 2014, well before the 2016 election primaries were even considered obviously. And while you're right we might not know the entire effect the hacking and campaign by the Russians might have had, we can certainly say they meddled and influenced the election, be it changing addresses or names so people couldn't vote without multiple forms of ID, or actually changing votes, which might be a little too brazen, and the former is certainly harder to prove was done maliciously instead of a records update by the actual person.
For the Russians to do all of that and NOT influence the election is just a silly notion at this point.
That's evidence that Russia worked to influence the election, which is not in dispute. I think we all know Russia worked to influence the election. The question is whether their work actually impacted individual's voting decisions. I think it is extremely likely that the Russian campaign had a meaningful impact, but we can't know for certain. Afterall, Russia spent a few million a month on their troll farm operation, but Trump and Clinton both spent about a billion on campaigning. Russia gets more bang for its buck because Russian labour is so much cheaper, but even then the amount Russia spent was a pittance compared to Trump and Clinton's campaigns. So in terms of the troll farm that ended up producing those indictments I doubt there was much impact.
The bigger question of Russian impact comes from their data hacks, and those produced a lot of media coverage negative to Clinton which may have had an impact, either in harming Clinton or in drowning out media time that might otherwise have focused on Trump's scandals. The problem though is that we can't ever point to a moment where a Russia driven story broke and Clinton dropped in the polls. This is because Russia ran those things as a drip feed and so they're hard to isolate because they were constantly coming. So there really is no clear evidence we can point to and say with any factual basis that Russia had impacted the polls by x%
NinthMusketeer wrote: We may still disagree on this, but I feel like the Russian influence on the election is a very important factor to mention. Especially in light of what's been revealed since. Now I'm not suggesting Russia swayed 80,000 voters, or even just 800 voters, from the candidate they would have picked anyway but I think it's entirely plausible that the toxicity generated convinced a lot more than 80,000 voters to simply 'give up' and stay home. And we both know the vast majority of non-voter citizens go Democrat when they actually show up.
Did we every disagree on this? Honestly I've been all over the shop on this issue, so it wouldn't surprise if at some point I argued the opposite of what you posted above, but I don't remember it.
Anyhow, I agree that when the margin of victory was so low, pretty much anything that had any impact at all must have had a decisive impact. And I agree the intent wasn't to win people over to Trump, but to dissuade liberal leaning voters from turning up at all.
Thing is its near impossible to tell if the Russian ops had any impact at all. Because their campaign geared up over time, and was running from very early in the primary, its hard to pick out the impact in any poll movements (unlike Comey's late announcement where you can see a 2 point shift immediately). We can look to Clinton's trashed reputation and claim that was due to Russia running fake news attack pieces, but Republicans have been running fake attack pieces on Clinton since the early 90s, I don't think those attacks started working for the first time in 2017 when a Russian started doing it. Certainly the Russian hacking and the ludicrous non-stories that came out of various emails had some effect, if only because it focused the coverage on her emails and other loosely related issues, which meant each of Trump's long string of scandals all got less coverage.
But we can't know for sure that it had an effect, and we certainly can't know the scope of the effect. But if there was even a small effect, then given the closeness of the election it would have swung the result.
It was 2016, so a while back. At any rate, I agree we'll never know if it did flip the election.
That's completely false but if you want to claim it then whatever, turning this thread in to yet another gun control debate would go nowhere and just get it locked. So be wrong about this, I won't bite. If you want to start a new thread about guns then go and be wrong in there, I might even go there and explain all the ways you're wrong. But I won't be getting this thread locked over your wrongness.
Yeah nope. The evidence does not support gun control and bans as being effective at all. Just go read the FBI crime statistics if you care to enlighten yourself.
It's common sense. You want less people to smoke, make it harder to get cigarettes. You want less people to drive, make it harder to get automobiles. You want less people to use guns, make it harder to get guns. A basic graph of gun ownership vs gun violence by state tells the whole story. Sure, there is evidence the opposite is true, but it comes from sources that simply cannot be trusted. But really the matter like climate change; there's no debate, just the US Republican base denying something the rest of the first world understands implicitly. Even the NRA, who we'd assume to be experts on the matter, believe that more guns=more gun crime. They say otherwise but their actions to the tune of millions of dollars lobbying against any studies being done shows us what they actually believe.
A bigger question is why so many gun advocates think that particular point is even needed for their argument. Tons of people die in auto accidents every day but that doesn't mean cars should be banned, because giving a society freedom means giving it the freedom to hurt itself. Something along the lines of one in 20,000 guns are used to commit a crime. And there is plenty of historical evidence showing that the US has been far more lenient on gun control and also had far less mass shootings at the same time. And finally, the statistical harm caused by mass shootings is tiny, something like less than 3% of all gun deaths, which is only a fraction of violent deaths, which is only a fraction of deaths overall. Taking a step back, it's simple to see how the US culture of glorifying the famous of any sort and the ease of making national news for weeks by going to a school and firing off a few rounds might encourage such behavior. Finally, from a pragmatic perspective, a forward-thinking gun advocate would push as hard as they could for a compromise now since gun ownership (and support for gun ownership) continue to trend downward and have been for a long time. So a compromise now, under a fully GOP government, is going to be a hell of a lot better than what will happen later.
But a large chunk of gun advocates would rather dig the grave for their cause by focusing on an easily-disproved point of contention that undermines the credibility of all gun advocates, even when they say things that are totally accurate.
And FWIW, I don't have a horse in this race. I don't own a gun, I don't have any problem with people around me owning guns, nor do I have a problem with gun control becoming stricter/less strict. I couldn't care less which way the matter goes.
This is a matter of vital importance to the public safety. While we recognize that assault weapon legislation will not stop all assault weapon crime, statistics prove that we can dry up the supply of these guns, making them less accessible to criminals. We urge you to listen to the American public and to the law enforcement community and support a ban on the further manufacture of these weapons.
Peregrine wrote: This is a matter of vital importance to the public safety. While we recognize that assault weapon legislation will not stop all assault weapon crime, statistics prove that we can dry up the supply of these guns, making them less accessible to criminals. We urge you to listen to the American public and to the law enforcement community and support a ban on the further manufacture of these weapons.
-Saint Reagan, beloved leftist
Was that when they put gun laws in place in Cali because Black Panthers had the temerity to arm themselves?
Peregrine wrote: This is a matter of vital importance to the public safety. While we recognize that assault weapon legislation will not stop all assault weapon crime, statistics prove that we can dry up the supply of these guns, making them less accessible to criminals. We urge you to listen to the American public and to the law enforcement community and support a ban on the further manufacture of these weapons.
Yes, in the classic democratic looney left, bleeding (and undoubtedly racist) heart liberal, Reagan signed the Mulford Act, which banned open carry after the Black Panthers were arming themselves. He also banned machine guns for domestic civilian import dated post-86, supported the Brady Bill, and the Assault Weapons Ban. He called for a complete manufacturing ban on the exact firearm Grey Templar just so recently bought: a semiauto AK.
So now that we got that out of the way maybe we can steer away from the low-quality bait that got us here.
Think of it this way, as resident of Maryland in a popular vote system a candidate won't do much to chase your vote because Maryland isn't that big. But in the current EC system candidates do nothing to chase your vote because Maryland isn't swinging Republican. You intended for the EC to give small states some say, but instead it gave almost all states, including most of the smaller states, absolutely no say at all.
Popular vote would be dominated by larger states, but it would still be an improvement for most smaller states because they would at least have some relevance.
But there are ways to move to a better system without dumping the weighting to smaller states. For instance, the EC system could be kept with each state getting electoral votes equal to its number of seats in congress, so smaller states get the boosted weighting from all having two senate seats. But instead of having almost almost all states give their electoral votes on a winner take all basis, you could have EV proportionately allocated. So Maryland has 10 EV, and it the vote went like 2016 then Clinton would get 6, Trump 3 and Johnson 1 (or Trump 4 and Johnson 0 depending on how you break up partial results). There would be a reason to campaign there, because instead of a certain 10 votes for the Democratic candidate, campaigning could shift the Dem to 7, or the Rep to 4 or 5. The roughly 40 to 45 states that are currently irrelevant would be relevant again, while small states would still keep their weighting.
I think the latest election where a state like Michigan and Pennsylvania went red kinda throws this on its head a bit. Both had spent the last 24 years going blue. I am slightly amused though, since this was the first election I didn't vote republican, and my state finally flipped.
simonr1978 wrote:
You're not entirely correct there. Cartridge firing handguns IIRC can still be legally owned in Northern Ireland and on the Isle of Man (Or could last time I checked) but are almost completely banned elsewhere in the UK. Scotland has also fairly recently instituted licencing for airguns which is not a requirement elsewhere in the UK. The Isle of Man also has their own separate system of permits for air weapons and crossbows which are not applicable elsewhere. It doesn't differ from county to county, true, but there are circumstances where crossing from one jurisdiction within the UK to another can turn legal ownership into a serious criminal offence. Anyway, apologies for the off-topic diversion.
Perhaps my choice of the UK specifically, as a broad example, is misplaced, because what I really want to focus on is the dichotomy between provinces within in a particular country. Are laws drastically different between say, Bayern and Hessen, in Germany, such that you can break laws by stepping across the border? What about say, British Columbia and Alberta? Between Rouen and Le Mans in France? Genuinely asking, because my relatively ignorant assumption is that other nation's {which are generally parliamentary democracies and not, strictly speaking, republics in the way the US is} do not consistently have a situation where someone can break laws just by passing through different provinces within the country.
Again- this is all in reference to the idea that republics have a fundamentally more difficult task in trying to craft and enforce national laws/mandates because of the constraints and society can suffer because of this. It seems a little ridiculous that moving between US states is almost like you're moving into a different country [geography aside] (compared to other democracies). See: healthcare availability, firearm laws, banking availability/restrictions, insurance providers etc. I recently moved half way across the continent to the DoC and my bank doesn't have a single branch either in the DoC or in the two adjacent states. Someone is supposed to get a new drivers license whenever they move between a state, and my health insurance isn't valid in my new location. Surely this is not true of other democracies?
thekingofkings wrote:
Sheer size of the US matters as well as we are a lot more "diverse" naturally than other countries since we are all at one point or another immigrants. One of our biggest issues as a country as far as I am concerned is we really don't much like each other and certainly don't spend much time trying to. Add an unhealthy amount of distrust to the contempt and you can see why we have a hard time getting things done nationally.
I would also add that there seems to be a consistent trend [culturally] within the US towards insulation (now and historically). There is a drastic lack of opportunity for people within the US, generally, to interact with people who are different from themselves. This is, of course, partially due to geography, but also due to what I would consider to be a dismissiveness of non-American ideas, beliefs, or cultural traditions. Studies have shown that one's ability to empathize, sympathize, or perceive the humanity in others is linked to a consistent exposure to people and places that are unfamiliar to you.
Perhaps my choice of the UK specifically, as a broad example, is misplaced, because what I really want to focus on is the dichotomy between provinces within in a particular country. Are laws drastically different between say, Bayern and Hessen, in Germany, such that you can break laws by stepping across the border? What about say, British Columbia and Alberta? Between Rouen and Le Mans in France? Genuinely asking, because my relatively ignorant assumption is that other nation's {which are generally parliamentary democracies and not, strictly speaking, republics in the way the US is} do not consistently have a situation where someone can break laws just by passing through different provinces within the country.
Well, your three examples of non-Republic countries actually includes two Republics:
Grey Templar wrote: Frankly, liberals need to drop gun control and be all for personal gun ownership.
"Liberals need to stop being liberal about this issue" is a thing lots of people like to say right now. It's exactly as valuable as all the "conservatives need to stop being conservative about this issue" hot takes we saw from 2006 to 2016.
I actually agree with this...
What's changed was that the gun-control crowd are much more honest.
Namely because gun control has its roots in racism within the Democratic Party. It was originally brought about in an attempt to limit African Americans access to guns, and went hand in hand with other attempts to limit their ability to vote and attend “white” schools. Democrats need to stop being hippocrits on this, as the party that allegedly champions personal rights and freedom.
You're slightly kind of right about some of this, but mostly you're pretty wrong. There have been a lot of bit of gun control, and most had little to do wth racism The 1936 act that placed tight controls on fully auto, and the amendment in the 80s that only allowed for grandfathering and no new weapons wasn't based in racism, it was based in criminals using auto weapons to outshoot police.
The bit you're kind of a little bit right about was that some gun laws have been pretty damn racist. For instance, California has proposed and passed some gun laws targeting specific makes and models because they were preferred by black people, particularly the Black Panthers. But here's a funny thing - the NRA was in support of each of those laws. This is because when you look back in history, everyone was more than a little bit racist.
But even if we ignore the factual errors in your claim, more than anything the existence of some racist reasoning behind some past laws as a reason to reject a law today with no racial elements is some really crappy analysis.
A) he's totally right that much of the gun-control initiatives in the past were for racists reasons as the ex-slave holders didn't want their former slaves armed. Read up the arguments in the Dredd Scott case.
B) The point here wasn't to distinctly state that "Gun Control = Racisms"... its to convey that initiative like these isn't pure (ie, to keep people safe), as there are other unstated reasons that would likely prove to be unconstitutional (ie, Obama era change to allow bureaucrats to put people accepting SS help on NICS db without proper judicial adjudication).
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d-usa wrote: And during the recent issues with healthcare, tax-cuts, and especially funding, we had multiple times where the Senate (and sometimes the House) had plans and compromises, and then they met with Trump who declared that he didn't like this or that, and then the plan fell through. Bills are developed by Presidents, and then shaped by what Presidents want, and the Senate then ends up passing nothing rather than passing something that Trump doesn't agree with. But it shouldn't matter what a President wants as far as drafting a bill and moving it through the process is concerned.
Sort of. IT depends how much political capital the president is willing to spend. For instance when Trump shot down three or four bills protecting dreamers that had bi-partisan support, it was because Trump was willing to go to the mat to stop the bill (well not Trump but actually John Kelly and Steve Miller, but the effect is the same).
However, Trump had a clear idea for the budget he wanted, with cuts to almost everything outside the military. But congress put up a bill that had nothing Trump wanted, but because this wasn't the fight Trump wanted, and because Trump and his staff are miles out of their depth on anything that involves the actual management of the country, Trump rolled over. Congressional Republicans got the spending they wanted, because they were willing to fight on the issue and Trump was not.
Afterwards Trump swore he'll never sign a budget like that again, and everyone laughed.
I laughed too... all congress has to do is fund something he really REALLY likes (in this case the Defense Budget).
I don't ever see him vetoing any GOP passed bills... and seriously doubt he'd do that to a Democratic passed bill. He'll be made out as an even more of a pariah, and he simply wants to be loved by all.
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whembly wrote: Stick to paper ballots... there's nothing stopping us from having the primary day (or election day) all done on one day.
There is a lot to be said for the travelling carnival style of primaries. It gives lower profile candidates a chance concentrate their limited resources on the smaller early states, to prove they have something about them with good results in those early states. Without that system then the only winners you'd see would be candidates who were already very well connected, and very well financed.
Very true and well stated. However, it's a system that does elongate the campaign season and I was only inferring that there's nothing stopping us from having the primary election held on one day.
Well, with DACA they had some bipartisan agreements. Then Trump said he would veto it and they killed it, even though he said he would sign anything they give him. But in the end Trump will be able to say that Congress is the one who killed DACA because they never produced any kind of bill for him to consider, and he wouldn't be lying.
They should have done like the budget: be an independent branch of the government, come up with your own plan, pass it, and send it to Trump and let him do whatever he wants. If he vetoes something, then the Representatives and Senators are safe because they can say "we tried, he vetoed it". If they never send him anything, then they are the ones who failed.
Basically, I feel about the "veto" the same way that I feel about the "filibuster". You shouldn't be able to kill a bill by threatening a veto or a filibuster, you need to put your ass on the line and actually stand there and filibuster or put your ink on the paper to veto. Refusing to do your job because someone else is just threatening to make it hard is a failure on your part.
For the previous 6 years the House knew that the Senate wasn't going to do much of anything with their fivehundred ACA repeal bills, and they knew that Obama would veto it anyway it they did. But they still passed bill after bill to say "we did our job, they/he didn't do theirs/his".
d-usa wrote: Well, your three examples of non-Republic countries actually includes two Republics:
Federal Republic of Germany
French Republic
French Regions do not have legislatures and thus no independent legislative authority. Yes, Germany is a federalist state. No, simply having the word "Republic" in your name does not make you a Federalist Republic, in the same way that NO ONE says The United States of Mexico even though that's actually what the country's formal name is.
My question still stands: do nations which are predominately made up of provinces suffer legislative inconsistencies which drastically undermine the ability of the national government to make and administer laws across the nation as a whole, as well as protect and enforce the laws equally across the citizenry?
d-usa wrote: Well, your three examples of non-Republic countries actually includes two Republics:
Federal Republic of Germany
French Republic
French Regions do not have legislatures and thus no independent legislative authority. Yes, Germany is a federalist state. No, simply having the word "Republic" in your name does not make you a Federalist Republic, in the same way that NO ONE says The United States of Mexico even though that's actually what the country's formal name is.
My question still stands: do nations which are predominately made up of provinces suffer legislative inconsistencies which drastically undermine the ability of the national government to make and administer laws across the nation as a whole, as well as protect and enforce the laws equally across the citizenry?
Yet, France is a Republic and Germany is a Republic.
Because being a Republic has nothing at all to do with anything you are talking about. A Republic is a form of government with a non-hereditary Head of State who is elected by the public, that's it. That is all it means.
A Republic can have a presidential system, a parliamentary system, the head-of-state can be elected directly or indirectly.
In the case of the United States, we have a Presidential system based on a liberal democracy where we elect a council in the form of the electoral college who then picks the President. As far as us being a "republic", that is all it means.
As far as anything you are talking about, us being a Republic doesn't mean anything and makes us nothing special, especially since you are comparing us to other Republics, all while trying to make some sort of point that they are not really a Republic and are therefore different.
Once you figure out an actual argument based on actual things, maybe we can address the points you think you are making.
whembly wrote: Stick to paper ballots... there's nothing stopping us from having the primary day (or election day) all done on one day.
There is a lot to be said for the travelling carnival style of primaries. It gives lower profile candidates a chance concentrate their limited resources on the smaller early states, to prove they have something about them with good results in those early states. Without that system then the only winners you'd see would be candidates who were already very well connected, and very well financed.
Very true and well stated. However, it's a system that does elongate the campaign season and I was only inferring that there's nothing stopping us from having the primary election held on one day.
Nothing is stopping us from having a Primary Day except the fact that the States can hold their primaries whenever they want and states like New Hampshire and Iowa enjoy the attention they get from being first and don't want to give it up. I'd be happy if we had a Primary Day but I don't see how we can convince all 50 states to actually do it.
whembly wrote: Stick to paper ballots... there's nothing stopping us from having the primary day (or election day) all done on one day.
There is a lot to be said for the travelling carnival style of primaries. It gives lower profile candidates a chance concentrate their limited resources on the smaller early states, to prove they have something about them with good results in those early states. Without that system then the only winners you'd see would be candidates who were already very well connected, and very well financed.
Very true and well stated. However, it's a system that does elongate the campaign season and I was only inferring that there's nothing stopping us from having the primary election held on one day.
Nothing is stopping us from having a Primary Day except the fact that the States can hold their primaries whenever they want and states like New Hampshire and Iowa enjoy the attention they get from being first and don't want to give it up. I'd be happy if we had a Primary Day but I don't see how we can convince all 50 states to actually do it.
It would be nice to shave 6 month of the campaigns by getting the states to agree with this. But I'm guessing that individual business lobbies in those states are making too much money from having a stretched out season.
It would be nice to shave 6 month of the campaigns by getting the states to agree with this. But I'm guessing that individual business lobbies in those states are making too much money from having a stretched out season.
I personally think that there would be a way to have a set campaign term, while still allowing for the "rolling" primaries and some of the other fairly unique things the US does for elections.
I do think that each voting period can, and should be a holiday (ie, primary day, and voting day) to provide the greatest possible opportunity to turn in paper ballots and get more voters involved.
But, I do think that you are right that businesses and their lobbies (not to even bring up the monsters of Citizens' United and McCutcheon) are benefiting too much from the way things are now.
Really seems like you're going to the old, disproved, argument that modern Democrats are even remotely similar to the Democrats before the 1960's.
Nothing of that sort.
That's the case where it was argued that african american weren't citizen...and thus didn't enjoy the protections recognized by the Constitution/Bill of Rights.
"[If black people were] entitled to the privileges and immunities of citizens, it would exempt them from the operation of the special laws and from the police regulations which [Southern states] considered to be necessary for their own safety. It would give the persons of the negro race, who were recognized as citizens in any one State of the Union...the full liberty of speech in public and in private upon all subjects upon which its own citizens might speak; to hold public meetings upon political affairs, and to keep and carry arms wherever they went. And all of this would be done in the face of the subject race of the same color, both free and slaves, inevitably producing discontent and insubordination among them, and endangering the peace and safety of the State."
skyth wrote: Really seems like you're going to the old, disproved, argument that modern Democrats are even remotely similar to the Democrats before the 1960's.
In his post he explicitly mentioned the racism motivation without mentioning party at all even when another poster had floated that earlier. Not fair to cast shade for something Whembly clearly avoided doing.
It would be nice to shave 6 month of the campaigns by getting the states to agree with this. But I'm guessing that individual business lobbies in those states are making too much money from having a stretched out season.
I personally think that there would be a way to have a set campaign term, while still allowing for the "rolling" primaries and some of the other fairly unique things the US does for elections.
I do think that each voting period can, and should be a holiday (ie, primary day, and voting day) to provide the greatest possible opportunity to turn in paper ballots and get more voters involved.
But, I do think that you are right that businesses and their lobbies (not to even bring up the monsters of Citizens' United and McCutcheon) are benefiting too much from the way things are now.
And it's not even big businesses probably. I wonder how many mom & pop motels, diners, etc in some of the small early primary states make a large chunk of their living every four years during the primary season, with campaigns and media outlets living in those states. Rent for office space, cost of logistics, spending on ads, catering, etc etc etc. There is a lot of money made with these long campaigns, both in lobbying money spend on the politicians themselves, as well as the actual costs of running campaigns.
Wolfblade wrote: I disagree on whether or not the Russian meddling had any impact at all, it definitely had an impact, especially considering the somewhat recent indictments of 3 Russian companies and 13 nationals that were involved in a several years long plan (data gathering, ad campaigns, protests/group organizations/rallies, bots/trolls, etc starting after Trump went to Russia for the Miss Universe contest iirc), along with the hacking done by Russians in at least 7 states, there's no way they didn't influence the election. It also started back in 2014, well before the 2016 election primaries were even considered obviously. And while you're right we might not know the entire effect the hacking and campaign by the Russians might have had, we can certainly say they meddled and influenced the election, be it changing addresses or names so people couldn't vote without multiple forms of ID, or actually changing votes, which might be a little too brazen, and the former is certainly harder to prove was done maliciously instead of a records update by the actual person.
For the Russians to do all of that and NOT influence the election is just a silly notion at this point.
That's evidence that Russia worked to influence the election, which is not in dispute. I think we all know Russia worked to influence the election. The question is whether their work actually impacted individual's voting decisions. I think it is extremely likely that the Russian campaign had a meaningful impact, but we can't know for certain. Afterall, Russia spent a few million a month on their troll farm operation, but Trump and Clinton both spent about a billion on campaigning. Russia gets more bang for its buck because Russian labour is so much cheaper, but even then the amount Russia spent was a pittance compared to Trump and Clinton's campaigns. So in terms of the troll farm that ended up producing those indictments I doubt there was much impact.
The bigger question of Russian impact comes from their data hacks, and those produced a lot of media coverage negative to Clinton which may have had an impact, either in harming Clinton or in drowning out media time that might otherwise have focused on Trump's scandals. The problem though is that we can't ever point to a moment where a Russia driven story broke and Clinton dropped in the polls. This is because Russia ran those things as a drip feed and so they're hard to isolate because they were constantly coming. So there really is no clear evidence we can point to and say with any factual basis that Russia had impacted the polls by x%
It's true Trump and Clinton spent more campaigning, but how much of that was travel and other physical costs? Russia spent less because it didn't physically need to be there, or do anything in person. their efforts were all digitally focused (i.e. group/rally forming over facebook, or bots/trolls on basically any social media site). And while we can't say X% of votes were swayed, the evidence heavily points to Russian interference swinging the election (from the massive rally/group organization efforts on the part of the Russians, to the actual hacking, to the ads that reached over 126 million people on facebook alone). However, I think Mueller knows a lot more and as it comes closer to wrapping up his investigation I suspect we'll learn a lot more, potentially triggering a constitutional crisis which is why more hasn't been revealed.
Yet, France is a Republic and Germany is a Republic.
Because being a Republic has nothing at all to do with anything you are talking about. A Republic is a form of government with a non-hereditary Head of State who is elected by the public, that's it. That is all it means.
A Republic can have a presidential system, a parliamentary system, the head-of-state can be elected directly or indirectly.
In the case of the United States, we have a Presidential system based on a liberal democracy where we elect a council in the form of the electoral college who then picks the President. As far as us being a "republic", that is all it means.
As far as anything you are talking about, us being a Republic doesn't mean anything and makes us nothing special, especially since you are comparing us to other Republics, all while trying to make some sort of point that they are not really a Republic and are therefore different.
Once you figure out an actual argument based on actual things, maybe we can address the points you think you are making.
You still haven't address the question or the root of my argument. The federalist republic system in the U.S. DOES have ramifications because the laws are not applied equally across the citizenry. It is absurd that my health benefits cannot carry over across state lines, or that banking/financial accessibility is restricted between states. Drivers Licenses, car insurance, on and on and on.
Parliamentary democracies are not the same as a Federalist Republic - If the systems were the same, Trump wouldn't be president. That literally can't happen if a majority of votes are won by a party.
Additionally, my original point about the Fed. Rep. system was in response to someone asking why the US doesn't have multiple political parties. It's BECAUSE of the Fed. Rep. system and the way that politics are stratified and compartmentalized thus making it incredibly difficult (almost the point of impossibility) for alternative parties to obtain political influence.
Just imagine: If the far right were siphoned off into their own little political party, like in parliamentary democracies, the grown-ups who actually know how to efficiently govern a nation would easily be able to run the country while sufficiently ostracizing the ridiculous notions held my a clear minority of the population. But the US doesn't have this because it's a Fed. Rep. system so one of only two major political parties is currently being held to the whims of a distinct minority of their members who view their leader with messianic mysticism. This is not good for the nation at large.
So yes, the systems are drastically different, not all "republics" are the same, and that matters very much, both in application, and in the ramifications of said application.
When you stop pretending that any of your questions have anything to do with us being a republic, and stop pretending that other republics are different because you don't think they are republics, then your questions are worth answering.
But there is no point answering a question, when the very question is fundamentally flawed and based on a complete misunderstanding of the governments of all of the countries involved.
Additionally, my original point about the Fed. Rep. system was in response to someone asking why the US doesn't have multiple political parties. It's BECAUSE of the Fed. Rep. system
We don't have multiple political parties because we use a "first past the post system" with single-member districts, which almost always results in a two-party system. NOTHING about us being a republic forces us to use the system of elections we are currently using.
skyth wrote: Really seems like you're going to the old, disproved, argument that modern Democrats are even remotely similar to the Democrats before the 1960's.
In his post he explicitly mentioned the racism motivation without mentioning party at all even when another poster had floated that earlier. Not fair to cast shade for something Whembly clearly avoided doing.
The post that was quoted that he responded to explicitly called out the Democratic Party. It's unattributed but I thought it was fron him.
Yet, France is a Republic and Germany is a Republic.
Because being a Republic has nothing at all to do with anything you are talking about. A Republic is a form of government with a non-hereditary Head of State who is elected by the public, that's it. That is all it means.
A Republic can have a presidential system, a parliamentary system, the head-of-state can be elected directly or indirectly.
In the case of the United States, we have a Presidential system based on a liberal democracy where we elect a council in the form of the electoral college who then picks the President. As far as us being a "republic", that is all it means.
As far as anything you are talking about, us being a Republic doesn't mean anything and makes us nothing special, especially since you are comparing us to other Republics, all while trying to make some sort of point that they are not really a Republic and are therefore different.
Once you figure out an actual argument based on actual things, maybe we can address the points you think you are making.
You still haven't address the question or the root of my argument. The federalist republic system in the U.S. DOES have ramifications because the laws are not applied equally across the citizenry. It is absurd that my health benefits cannot carry over across state lines, or that banking/financial accessibility is restricted between states. Drivers Licenses, car insurance, on and on and on.
Parliamentary democracies are not the same as a Federalist Republic - If the systems were the same, Trump wouldn't be president. That literally can't happen if a majority of votes are won by a party.
Additionally, my original point about the Fed. Rep. system was in response to someone asking why the US doesn't have multiple political parties. It's BECAUSE of the Fed. Rep. system and the way that politics are stratified and compartmentalized thus making it incredibly difficult (almost the point of impossibility) for alternative parties to obtain political influence.
Just imagine: If the far right were siphoned off into their own little political party, like in parliamentary democracies, the grown-ups who actually know how to efficiently govern a nation would easily be able to run the country while sufficiently ostracizing the ridiculous notions held my a clear minority of the population. But the US doesn't have this because it's a Fed. Rep. system so one of only two major political parties is currently being held to the whims of a distinct minority of their members who view their leader with messianic mysticism. This is not good for the nation at large.
So yes, the systems are drastically different, not all "republics" are the same, and that matters very much, both in application, and in the ramifications of said application.
To marginalize extremists we just need people to stop voting for them in primaries and elections. Voter apathy and low turnout aren't problems inherent to the Fed Rep system. As long as people are willing to limit themselves to only voting for (R) and (D) we're left with choosing the lesser of two evils in a prisoner's dilemma. We had a long stretch of years in the beginning of our national history wherein we had more than 2 political parties in our Fed Rep system, there are many reasons why we've become entrenched in the hyper partisan 2 Party system but the mere fact that we're a Federalist Republic isn't one of them.
I really think a bigger deal is being made out of this than should be. This is not the first time a major network has instructed its syndicates to spout out the company's opinions. Reading a form letter on air is a lot more common than you'd think.
I really think a bigger deal is being made out of this than should be. This is not the first time a major network has instructed its syndicates to spout out the company's opinions. Reading a form letter on air is a lot more common than you'd think.
I think the point is that it is denouncing fake news while coming off as fake news, and they are buying another broadcasting company and will be approaching monopoly territory quickly with 72 percent of homes being reached by their message.
djones520 wrote: I think the latest election where a state like Michigan and Pennsylvania went red kinda throws this on its head a bit. Both had spent the last 24 years going blue. I am slightly amused though, since this was the first election I didn't vote republican, and my state finally flipped.
This election the tipping point was Pennsylvania, which was interesting but not really out of the blue, Pennsylvania was also the tipping point in 1996. In between it was Colorado twice, in 2012 and 2008, in 2004 it was Iowa and in 2000 it was Florida, rather famously.
The exact set of states which are key to each election, and exactly which state turns out to be the tipping point changes with each cycle, but it works from a pretty narrow pool of states in general. It won't ever be Kentucky or Maryland, if those states flip it will only be in absolute landslide election.
So a system designed to increase the importance of small and mid-sized states has actually made most small and mid-sized states irrelevant.
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NinthMusketeer wrote: It was 2016, so a while back. At any rate, I agree we'll never know if it did flip the election.
Impressed by your memory. I can't remember conversations I had last week.
But yeah, I think we agree. Given the closeness of the election then any impact would have flipped the result, and Russia most likely had an impact. But we can't really quantify the Russian impact, which makes it hard to say with absolute certainty that there was an impact.
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whembly wrote: A) he's totally right that much of the gun-control initiatives in the past were for racists reasons as the ex-slave holders didn't want their former slaves armed.
As I already explained, he's a bit right because racism certainly played a role in some guns proposals and some gun laws. But that's entirely meaningless because history is full of racism, and so racism played a role in lots of laws and proposed laws. 'some gun laws used to have racist motivations behind them" is exactly as meaningful as 'some laws used to have racist motivations behind them'.
B) The point here wasn't to distinctly state that "Gun Control = Racisms"...
That's the point. It doesn't directly state it, because it's obviously stupid. So instead it is left as the implied conclusion. Afterall, if there's no intent to link it to modern gun control, why mention it at all?
It's junky, dishonest debate. He shouldn't know better than to post it, you should know better than to try and defend it.
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I laughed too... all congress has to do is fund something he really REALLY likes (in this case the Defense Budget).
Uh... the Republicans are pretty keen on the increase in defense as well. That wasn't a quid pro quo to give Trump something. The whole omnibus is a Republican dream bill, with all the spending they love - look at the splash of money to help agriculture in rural states. Some Democrats got brought on by single items here and there, and mostly by commitments not to cut some Democrats preferred stuff.
I don't ever see him vetoing any GOP passed bills... and seriously doubt he'd do that to a Democratic passed bill. He'll be made out as an even more of a pariah, and he simply wants to be loved by all.
That's not true. Three bi-partisan Dreamer bills were brought to Trump, he rejected each, even though they gave him his money for his wall. On issues where Trump has a consistent position, which is basically immigration and arguably trade, he'll do his own thing. But anything else, especially if there's some level of understanding required, Trump gets grumpy but he rolls over and signs.
People talk about Trump playing to the angry, confused, older voter. That's not quite right. Trump is an angry, confused older person.
Very true and well stated. However, it's a system that does elongate the campaign season and I was only inferring that there's nothing stopping us from having the primary election held on one day.
I agree it could be shorted. There's a serious problem when people are sick of elections before the general has even started. I think there's a middle ground between the current process and running it all on a single day. Certainly most electioneering after Super Tuesday is pretty junky. By that point anyone who's going to be a real chance is already known, the favourite is known and so on.
So maybe the best thing would be to leave Iowa with its special place as the first primary, because history matters. Then you have New Hampshire, and maybe a couple of other states can be added to that to give some demographic and geographic balance. Then you roll in to Super Tuesday. After that you have one more election day, for everybody else. This was you give smaller players a chance to start in smaller states, raise funds and escalate if they perform well, but you also get those whole thing over and done with much quicker.
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d-usa wrote: They should have done like the budget: be an independent branch of the government, come up with your own plan, pass it, and send it to Trump and let him do whatever he wants. If he vetoes something, then the Representatives and Senators are safe because they can say "we tried, he vetoed it". If they never send him anything, then they are the ones who failed.
If the Republican leadership puts up a bill giving residency status to Dreamers, then they reap the cost from the large anti-immigration faction in their base. But they gain nothing if Trump shoots it down, people angry at Trump's immigration stance won't bother drawing a distinction between Trump and his Republicans in congress, they'll vote against both.
So putting up a bill to get vetoed would angry much of their own base, while pleasing no-one. It's lose/lose, and so Republican leadership is right not to put up anything without Trump's commitment to sign.
d-usa wrote: It would be nice to shave 6 month of the campaigns by getting the states to agree with this. But I'm guessing that individual business lobbies in those states are making too much money from having a stretched out season.
As I said earlier, the current system means a less connected, lower profile candidates can actually compete on an even footing in early states. If they go nowhere then their backers have lost a couple of million. If they do well in Iowa and New Hampshire then they will attract new backers and be able to get the resources for a shot at good results on Super Tuesday. If they do well there then they'll be backed for the rest of the primary seasons.
But if there's a single day primary, then only people who are extremely well connected before the campaign will have the resources to advertise in all 50 states at one time. In 2016 the primaries would have been over before they began, with Jeb Bush and Hillary Clinton holding about $100m each, they would have flooded the country with their message. Ted Cruz maybe could have reached half of Jeb's warchest if he'd really pumped his donors for cash, no-one else would have gotten 20% to compete with.
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Wolfblade wrote: It's true Trump and Clinton spent more campaigning, but how much of that was travel and other physical costs? Russia spent less because it didn't physically need to be there, or do anything in person. their efforts were all digitally focused (i.e. group/rally forming over facebook, or bots/trolls on basically any social media site). And while we can't say X% of votes were swayed, the evidence heavily points to Russian interference swinging the election (from the massive rally/group organization efforts on the part of the Russians, to the actual hacking, to the ads that reached over 126 million people on facebook alone). However, I think Mueller knows a lot more and as it comes closer to wrapping up his investigation I suspect we'll learn a lot more, potentially triggering a constitutional crisis which is why more hasn't been revealed.
The cost of travel etc doesn't really matter. Afterall, if on-line spending was more effective then Clinton and Trump would have just stayed home and poured all their money in to on-line operations. But none of that really matters, end of the day Russia spent $1.25m a month on ads and its troll farm. That sounds like a lot, but even if we assume that amount was spent every month for the 18 months (which is a big overstatement), then we'd be talking about $22m, compared to Clinton and Trump expenditures of around $1bn each. There's no kind of efficiency that can boost the Russian spend up to being equal with something that's 100 times bigger.
That said, it isn't just about the scale of the Russian spend, arguing about it or trying to quantify it's scale is a needless distraction. Even in terms of Russia activity it is a side issue, because the most significant thing Russia did was the hacking.
The important thing to the Russia spend is that it gives clear evidence that Russia was active in the campaign, which is a crime in itself. We can then see their operations focused on operations to boost Trump, Sanders and Stein, so we have evidence that they had a strategy to harm Clinton's chances of winning. Which is important to establishing the motivations behind the Russian hacks of the DNC and Podesta, which were the really decisive operations undertaken by Russia.
It's largely strategic. Note the guy has already handed over emails and recordings of conversations that Mueller reportedly didn't already have. So while this isn't a deal to flip and turn state's, he has still become a co-operating witness. And of course, because he's already been sentenced he can no longer plead the 5th and can be compelled to testify, should he be required and become unwilling to do so.
The really interesting thing is that from Day One Mueller approached this thing using the same methodology he used to bring down the NY organised crime syndicates, and every part has fit so neatly. I mean, I thought I was pretty cynical on Trump from the get-go, but I never thought his organisation was functionally the same as a crime syndicate, but here we are.
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Whazgog Da Despot wrote: You still haven't address the question or the root of my argument. The federalist republic system in the U.S. DOES have ramifications because the laws are not applied equally across the citizenry. It is absurd that my health benefits cannot carry over across state lines, or that banking/financial accessibility is restricted between states. Drivers Licenses, car insurance, on and on and on.
Parliamentary democracies are not the same as a Federalist Republic - If the systems were the same, Trump wouldn't be president. That literally can't happen if a majority of votes are won by a party.
Seriously dude, these terms you keep throwing around, they have actual meanings you need to learn.
You want know something fun, Australia is a parliamentary democracy, it also a Federalist system, but it is not a Republic. It isn't a Republic because the Queen is our head of state, and literally all 'Republic' means is that you don't have a hereditary head of state, even just a figurehead means you aren't a Republic.
Parliamentary democracy means the head of state is given power by the legislative, basically it means the elected members their pick one of their own to be the leader. So Australia and the UK are parliamentary democracies, but the US and France aren't, because their presidents are elected in processes seperate to the election of the legislature.
A Federalist system is one where there is a clear and formal seperation of powers between the central government and individual states. The US and Australian constitutions both have these formal separations of powers, making both system Federal.
Now we've hopefully got all of that sorted, to answer your question about gun control and Federalism, Australia has a Federal system, and regulation of guns is actually down to each individual state. So when Australia passed its gun control and buyback scheme in the 90s, it was actually a two step process, with the federal government passing laws to fund the buy back and regulations, and the states agreeing to a uniform set of gun laws, which each state then passed through their own state legislatures. It was quite a thing.
Those uniform gun laws actually just had their first possible pin prick, in Tasmania. During their recent election the Liberal Party (they're the right wing, conservative party in our system)
Additionally, my original point about the Fed. Rep. system was in response to someone asking why the US doesn't have multiple political parties. It's BECAUSE of the Fed. Rep. system and the way that politics are stratified and compartmentalized thus making it incredibly difficult (almost the point of impossibility) for alternative parties to obtain political influence.
No, the two party system in the US has nothing to do with being Federalist or a Republic. Federalism actually makes more parties more viable, as parties representing specific regions become more viable in a system with empowered state and regional governments.
The reason the US has a two party system is you have electorate based, single winner elections, and first past the post elections dominate. If you have proportional representation then minor parties would be able to gain some power and representation despite not being the most powerful party. And if you dropped first past the post for more prefential voting or run-off systems, then people would be able to support minor parties without forfeiting their say in who they prefer out of the two major party candidates.
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Mario wrote: Just replace youtube with youpak in the URL to view stuff that's regionally restricted.
I'll try that. Cheers.
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cuda1179 wrote: I really think a bigger deal is being made out of this than should be. This is not the first time a major network has instructed its syndicates to spout out the company's opinions. Reading a form letter on air is a lot more common than you'd think.
You're ignoring a few things. Sinclair has a market share like no other syndicate. Nor is Sinclair just giving the company's opinion, it's giving a particularly partisan opinion, as part of increasingly partisan coverage, prior to this company hired conservative pundits were required to be broadcast by local stations. And while an organisation like FOX News spouts similar partisan stuff, at least FOX built its presence with a new station, it added a voice, albeit a crazy voice, to the media environment - Sinclair isn't adding a new voice because its built its network by purchasing existing stations, replacing formerly local voices.
Now, personally I think the impact of this will be limited, because unlike say 30 years ago TV isn't the driver of opinion it once was. These days so much political info is spread through the media. I'm worried about this in the same way that I'm worried about a possible monopoly of the telegraph.
However, when you say this is the same as smaller syndicates, you're wrong.
It's largely strategic. Note the guy has already handed over emails and recordings of conversations that Mueller reportedly didn't already have. So while this isn't a deal to flip and turn state's, he has still become a co-operating witness. And of course, because he's already been sentenced he can no longer plead the 5th and can be compelled to testify, should he be required and become unwilling to do so.
The really interesting thing is that from Day One Mueller approached this thing using the same methodology he used to bring down the NY organised crime syndicates, and every part has fit so neatly. I mean, I thought I was pretty cynical on Trump from the get-go, but I never thought his organisation was functionally the same as a crime syndicate, but here we are.
I don't find it to be cynical. This is obviously a very serious matter, and was from the start. Accordingly it makes sense to approach it as methodically as possible, treat it as a organized criminal structure (because with Russian involved that's a good analogy) so if the investigation finds that there was no collusion everyone can be sure that is the case. If the most rigorous investigation possible produced no result, then nothing is going to produce any result and even hard Democrats could not reasonably dispute the result. If there was collusion, then obviously the approach is not only justified but needed. The ultimate point is that assuming there was collusion OR assuming there wasn't, Mueller's approach is the best method. Notably there are Republican congressmen out there with their heads still screwed on who fully support this very much because they feel there was no collusion.
Which leads into how any Trump supporter either supports the investigation, opposes it because they feel he is guilty, or opposes it because they are deluded. The disappointment is in how many people fall into the last category. I mean, if there was a desire to avoid exposing wrongdoing that they believed happened then at least there would be logic involved. A classic example of the old saying that maliciousness should never be assumed when a situation can be explained by stupidity.
Wolfblade wrote: It's true Trump and Clinton spent more campaigning, but how much of that was travel and other physical costs? Russia spent less because it didn't physically need to be there, or do anything in person. their efforts were all digitally focused (i.e. group/rally forming over facebook, or bots/trolls on basically any social media site). And while we can't say X% of votes were swayed, the evidence heavily points to Russian interference swinging the election (from the massive rally/group organization efforts on the part of the Russians, to the actual hacking, to the ads that reached over 126 million people on facebook alone). However, I think Mueller knows a lot more and as it comes closer to wrapping up his investigation I suspect we'll learn a lot more, potentially triggering a constitutional crisis which is why more hasn't been revealed.
The cost of travel etc doesn't really matter. Afterall, if on-line spending was more effective then Clinton and Trump would have just stayed home and poured all their money in to on-line operations. But none of that really matters, end of the day Russia spent $1.25m a month on ads and its troll farm. That sounds like a lot, but even if we assume that amount was spent every month for the 18 months (which is a big overstatement), then we'd be talking about $22m, compared to Clinton and Trump expenditures of around $1bn each. There's no kind of efficiency that can boost the Russian spend up to being equal with something that's 100 times bigger.
That said, it isn't just about the scale of the Russian spend, arguing about it or trying to quantify it's scale is a needless distraction. Even in terms of Russia activity it is a side issue, because the most significant thing Russia did was the hacking.
The important thing to the Russia spend is that it gives clear evidence that Russia was active in the campaign, which is a crime in itself. We can then see their operations focused on operations to boost Trump, Sanders and Stein, so we have evidence that they had a strategy to harm Clinton's chances of winning. Which is important to establishing the motivations behind the Russian hacks of the DNC and Podesta, which were the really decisive operations undertaken by Russia.
I disagree, I mean, the facebook ads alone reached 126 million people, roughly the same number as the total amount of people who voted, and again, a lot of the expenses can be chalked up to having to fly a bunch of people and equipment from place to place, then house and feed them. And note, I never said it was as effective. But why couldn't it be? Information gets around much more quickly, unlike 20-30 years ago where to hear a candidate's message you either had to go see them at a rally in person, or wait for hopefully true information to make it into whatever local paper/rumor mill is near you. I mean, anyone showing up to rally probably knows who they're gonna vote for, especially if they are cheering wildly in the crowd. Even if the online only efforts aren't as effective as personally campaigning somewhere, that doesn't mean the Russian efforts were meaningless, after all ad campaigns have been proven to work, as did their groups duping people into pro trump groups/rallies/etc.
It's largely strategic. Note the guy has already handed over emails and recordings of conversations that Mueller reportedly didn't already have. So while this isn't a deal to flip and turn state's, he has still become a co-operating witness. And of course, because he's already been sentenced he can no longer plead the 5th and can be compelled to testify, should he be required and become unwilling to do so.
The really interesting thing is that from Day One Mueller approached this thing using the same methodology he used to bring down the NY organised crime syndicates, and every part has fit so neatly. I mean, I thought I was pretty cynical on Trump from the get-go, but I never thought his organisation was functionally the same as a crime syndicate, but here we are.
It's not surprising really, the best way to take something down in this situation is to obviously start with the weakest link you can find and get them to flip and give up someone above them, then work on them and get them to give up someone above them. It's probably the best way to root out as much information as possible.
The Roger Stone email to Sam Nunberg where Stone states his relationship with Julian Assange is out.
Spoiler:
Also out is the original authorisation Rosenstein gave to Mueller to investigate Manafort. Manafort applied in court that Mueller had no authority to investigate him, so in response Mueller's team provided the authorisation, with other parties under investigation redacted. The interesting bit, and the backfire against Manafort, is the authorisation is not just for Manafort's criminal activity in the Ukraine, but also for collusion with Russia. So now it's out there, plain as day.
Sorry, to clarify, I thought my prior impression of Trump was cynical. I had thought he was a lazy, half-brained braggart with impulse control of a toddler and no moral compass what-so-ever. So when we learned about his long string of shady and outright criminal actions I wasn't surprised at all. I thought my impression was on the more cynical side, but it turns out I wasn't cynical enough.
So I had thought this would play out like an Enron thing, where the dynamic was a lot of fairly straight white collar types panicking and attempting some haphazard cover ups but mostly being truthful and forthcoming with investigators because they're ordinarily straight people who get intimidated when federal investigators sit them down for a chat. I had thought most info would be fairly easy to access, because while the stuff was hidden, it was hidden within an org that was on the whole meant to be a lawful operation with normal record keeping. Did you watch Sam Nunberg's public meltdown, where he said he wasn't going to hand over emails, couldn't understand failure to do so could mean jail time, and then a day later handed over the emails that showed Roger Stone's contact with wikileaks? That dynamic was what I thought we'd see, albeit not always that funny.
I'm realising now I had no idea the actual nature of Trump's organisation and his people. A lot of people have been caught lying to the FBI, that's a contempt for the law that's more common with a seasoned criminal organisation, not a bunch of straights caught up in a white collar crime. The investigation is spending a lot of time trying to overcome firewalls that were built to hide connections and allow deniability - again that's something you see in criminal organisations. And these challenges are being overcome because in addition to the lying, it turns out a bunch of Trump's guys were running their own criminal ops before and during their time with Trump, giving Mueller leverage to flip them.
I'm not saying Trump is Gotti, obviously he's not running drugs or ordering people's deaths. But the org he is running and the way it is being dismantled is like a criminal syndicate. That is a hell of a thing, and way beyond the seriousness of what I thought we were facing early in the investigation.
Which leads into how any Trump supporter either supports the investigation, opposes it because they feel he is guilty, or opposes it because they are deluded. The disappointment is in how many people fall into the last category. I mean, if there was a desire to avoid exposing wrongdoing that they believed happened then at least there would be logic involved. A classic example of the old saying that maliciousness should never be assumed when a situation can be explained by stupidity.
I'm not sure I see a functional difference between people who genuinely believe there's nothing for Mueller to find, and people who want Mueller's investigation to end to prevent everything being found. That both groups exist in reasonably large amounts is terrifying, and a major challenge for your democracy.
Well, criminals don't exactly hire straight laced people who are on the up and up. Criminals (especially those with an ego problem like trump) generally hire lackeys and minions who'll go along with whatever they're doing. I'm just waiting for Kushner or one of the younger trumps to be indicted and see how fast he either disowns them, or how loudly he complains it's unfair.
I really think a bigger deal is being made out of this than should be. This is not the first time a major network has instructed its syndicates to spout out the company's opinions. Reading a form letter on air is a lot more common than you'd think.
I think the point is that it is denouncing fake news while coming off as fake news, and they are buying another broadcasting company and will be approaching monopoly territory quickly with 72 percent of homes being reached by their message.
Here's another take on the Sinclair scripting issue. It's a much deeper dive than Oliver's grab at low hanging fruit. There are multiple references to KOMO 4, the Sinclair channel in my area.
The Roger Stone email to Sam Nunberg where Stone states his relationship with Julian Assange is out.
Also out is the original authorisation Rosenstein gave to Mueller to investigate Manafort. Manafort applied in court that Mueller had no authority to investigate him, so in response Mueller's team provided the authorisation, with other parties under investigation redacted. The interesting bit, and the backfire against Manafort, is the authorisation is not just for Manafort's criminal activity in the Ukraine, but also for collusion with Russia. So now it's out there, plain as day.
Sorry, to clarify, I thought my prior impression of Trump was cynical. I had thought he was a lazy, half-brained braggart with impulse control of a toddler and no moral compass what-so-ever. So when we learned about his long string of shady and outright criminal actions I wasn't surprised at all. I thought my impression was on the more cynical side, but it turns out I wasn't cynical enough.
So I had thought this would play out like an Enron thing, where the dynamic was a lot of fairly straight white collar types panicking and attempting some haphazard cover ups but mostly being truthful and forthcoming with investigators because they're ordinarily straight people who get intimidated when federal investigators sit them down for a chat. I had thought most info would be fairly easy to access, because while the stuff was hidden, it was hidden within an org that was on the whole meant to be a lawful operation with normal record keeping. Did you watch Sam Nunberg's public meltdown, where he said he wasn't going to hand over emails, couldn't understand failure to do so could mean jail time, and then a day later handed over the emails that showed Roger Stone's contact with wikileaks? That dynamic was what I thought we'd see, albeit not always that funny.
I'm realising now I had no idea the actual nature of Trump's organisation and his people. A lot of people have been caught lying to the FBI, that's a contempt for the law that's more common with a seasoned criminal organisation, not a bunch of straights caught up in a white collar crime. The investigation is spending a lot of time trying to overcome firewalls that were built to hide connections and allow deniability - again that's something you see in criminal organisations. And these challenges are being overcome because in addition to the lying, it turns out a bunch of Trump's guys were running their own criminal ops before and during their time with Trump, giving Mueller leverage to flip them.
I'm not saying Trump is Gotti, obviously he's not running drugs or ordering people's deaths. But the org he is running and the way it is being dismantled is like a criminal syndicate. That is a hell of a thing, and way beyond the seriousness of what I thought we were facing early in the investigation.
Which leads into how any Trump supporter either supports the investigation, opposes it because they feel he is guilty, or opposes it because they are deluded. The disappointment is in how many people fall into the last category. I mean, if there was a desire to avoid exposing wrongdoing that they believed happened then at least there would be logic involved. A classic example of the old saying that maliciousness should never be assumed when a situation can be explained by stupidity.
I'm not sure I see a functional difference between people who genuinely believe there's nothing for Mueller to find, and people who want Mueller's investigation to end to prevent everything being found. That both groups exist in reasonably large amounts is terrifying, and a major challenge for your democracy.
Ah, I misinterpreted. At any rate, while we don't know yet what I suspect has happened is that Mueller tapped into Trump's business to make sure he had all the bases covered and realized that Trump's business is a rabbit hole of amoral and downright criminal activity. He has literally built his career on cutting corners through the law wherever it suits him, plenty of which I'm sure you've noted back in 2016. But that's just the stuff too minor to bother covering up. Trump's business has a very long history of sweeping documentation under the rug to keep it from surfacing in court, and while I can't say I have solid evidence on any one thing once someone goes through Trump's past with a fine-toothed comb it becomes readily apparent that the only way he has managed to make money is from illegal deals.
Think about it this way; Trump is (supposedly) running the country like he'd run his business and we can all see how poorly run that is. Isn't it strange that someone so clearly incompetent at management of any sort had a successful business for so long? It's one thing to have difficulty transferring business experience into the political sphere but we are talking a guy who by all indications cannot tell what is actually real (vs things he decides are real with no evidence whatsoever). How does someone like that ever manage a massive business competently enough to draw any profit all these years? How did it not start hemorrhaging money decades ago? Profits from reality TV & an economic system favoring the wealthy only go so far, leaving a margin with no readily available explanation to fill it.
However, this is only my opinion based on circumstantial evidence so I'd say it's merely a plausible theory at best.
NinthMusketeer wrote: How does someone like that ever manage a massive business even competently, let alone well?
He didn't. Trump's business history is almost as much of a dumpster fire as his political career so far, and that's despite him making a habit of licensing his brand to other people and letting them take all of the risks and effort. Trump's image of a successful businessman is mostly because people can't tell the difference between the real Trump and the reality tv show character he played.
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sebster wrote: I'm not sure I see a functional difference between people who genuinely believe there's nothing for Mueller to find, and people who want Mueller's investigation to end to prevent everything being found. That both groups exist in reasonably large amounts is terrifying, and a major challenge for your democracy.
IMO both are bad, but for different reasons. People who believe that there's nothing to find may be in some serious denial (or simply uninformed) but might at least be willing to admit that Trump needs to go if more stuff is found and a persuasive enough case is made. That's dangerous because ignorance is easily exploited, but it's potentially a fixable problem. People who want the investigation to end before it finds something know that Trump is guilty but are willing to reject the rule of law as long as it's Their Guy that might be guilty. That's a far greater threat, because they have made a conscious choice to dismantle the system to their own benefit.
NinthMusketeer wrote: How does someone like that ever manage a massive business even competently, let alone well?
He didn't. Trump's business history is almost as much of a dumpster fire as his political career so far, and that's despite him making a habit of licensing his brand to other people and letting them take all of the risks and effort. Trump's image of a successful businessman is mostly because people can't tell the difference between the real Trump and the reality tv show character he played.
Thanks for catching me on this, I phrased that wrong. I did not mean to suggest that the business had been run well but in hindsight that's pretty much what I said.
NinthMusketeer wrote: Ah, I misinterpreted. At any rate, while we don't know yet what I suspect has happened is that Mueller tapped into Trump's business to make sure he had all the bases covered and realized that Trump's business is a rabbit hole of amoral and downright criminal activity. He has literally built his career on cutting corners through the law wherever it suits him, plenty of which I'm sure you've noted back in 2016. But that's just the stuff too minor to bother covering up. Trump's business has a very long history of sweeping documentation under the rug to keep it from surfacing in court, and while I can't say I have solid evidence on any one thing once someone goes through Trump's past with a fine-toothed comb it becomes readily apparent that the only way he has managed to make money is from illegal deals.
Yeah, most of the corner cutting is, I mean its illegal but its also standard for the New York property scene. You know, stuff like Trump keeping black people out of his developments in the 1970s, abusing water rights on his New Jersey golf course, or Jared and Ivanka lying about occupancy rates to bring more buyers in to the struggling Trump SoHo... it's illegal but also fairly mundane stuff that is often not prosecuted, and if it is it's normally resolved with a fine that's way lower than it should be.
But from late in the campaign and after Trump won some much more outlandish stuff started being talked about. Russian money laundering, stuff like that. Now, as far as I know that stuff isn't proven, nor is there anything in the public that's more than circumstantial at this point, but whereas I had thought that stuff seemed way out there, now while that stuff isn't proven, it now fits with what we know.
Think about it this way; Trump is (supposedly) running the country like he'd run his business and we can all see how poorly run that is. Isn't it strange that someone so clearly incompetent at management of any sort had a successful business for so long? It's one thing to have difficulty transferring business experience into the political sphere but we are talking a guy who by all indications cannot tell what is actually real (vs things he decides are real with no evidence whatsoever). How does someone like that ever manage a massive business even competently, let alone well? How did it not start hemorrhaging money decades ago? Profits from reality TV & an economic system favoring the wealthy only go so far, leaving a margin with no readily available explanation to fill it.
Trump inherited a large swathe of NY real estate at the start of a multi-decade NY property boom. Just sitting still would have seen his assets grow to a couple of billion or more. He blew through most of that anyway, building up debt on those assets for Trump's other vanity projects - people talk about the casino and airline disasters, but Trump's poured just as much in to golf courses and they've probably never made a penny. But then, as Peregrine said, somehow despite being objectively bad at business, Trump somehow managed to convince a lot of people he was good at business, mostly by just repeatedly claiming that he was good at business. That led to the Apprentice, which made Trump $150m over its run, but even more lucrative for Trump was his shift to just selling his brand, licensing it to any condo or high rise that needed a profile raise to attract investors. Much like Trump's political career, this licensing process was remarkably failure proof, no matter how many 'Trump' properties fell apart even before a shovel hit the ground, there was always another developer and another batch of investors ready to pay a few million to use the Trump name.
So there was always a normal explanation for why Trump still had money after all the failures. But now it turns out maybe there was a lot more going on as well.
However, this is only my opinion based on circumstantial evidence so I'd say it's merely a plausible theory at best.
There's a lot of speculation at this point. We're all working on partial facts and trying to make sense of them.
Peregrine wrote: IMO both are bad, but for different reasons. People who believe that there's nothing to find may be in some serious denial (or simply uninformed) but might at least be willing to admit that Trump needs to go if more stuff is found and a persuasive enough case is made. That's dangerous because ignorance is easily exploited, but it's potentially a fixable problem. People who want the investigation to end before it finds something know that Trump is guilty but are willing to reject the rule of law as long as it's Their Guy that might be guilty. That's a far greater threat, because they have made a conscious choice to dismantle the system to their own benefit.
At the beginning of 2016 I would have agreed with you. But now I have little belief that that kind of ignorance is accidental. There's a culture among a fairly large group of people to put up walls to certain kinds of information, and now I think there is probably nothing so big those walls can't keep it out. So to me both groups are basically the same.
Another way to look at this, I think it is likely that at some point in the future it will be widely accepted that Trump did illegal stuff and was a generally crap president. But we won't get to that point by negative information coming out that bursts through the protective bubble, causing Trumpers to give up on their man, which leads to Trump losing office. Rather, it will happen after Trump is gone from office, however that happens, at which point Trump people will have no reason to pretend he's a competent president and non-criminal, they will drop the walls or move them to the next Republican leader, and Trump's support will drop away dramatically.
Ouze wrote: In the US, I think once you have a certain net worth, it's no longer possible to fail like normal people. You just fail upward.
As long as you can afford the best lawyers (only the best, mind you), you can get away with almost anything.
It probably also helps to have millions stashed away in overseas banks.
Peregrine wrote: IMO both are bad, but for different reasons. People who believe that there's nothing to find may be in some serious denial (or simply uninformed) but might at least be willing to admit that Trump needs to go if more stuff is found and a persuasive enough case is made. That's dangerous because ignorance is easily exploited, but it's potentially a fixable problem. People who want the investigation to end before it finds something know that Trump is guilty but are willing to reject the rule of law as long as it's Their Guy that might be guilty. That's a far greater threat, because they have made a conscious choice to dismantle the system to their own benefit.
At the beginning of 2016 I would have agreed with you. But now I have little belief that that kind of ignorance is accidental. There's a culture among a fairly large group of people to put up walls to certain kinds of information, and now I think there is probably nothing so big those walls can't keep it out. So to me both groups are basically the same.
Another way to look at this, I think it is likely that at some point in the future it will be widely accepted that Trump did illegal stuff and was a generally crap president. But we won't get to that point by negative information coming out that bursts through the protective bubble, causing Trumpers to give up on their man, which leads to Trump losing office. Rather, it will happen after Trump is gone from office, however that happens, at which point Trump people will have no reason to pretend he's a competent president and non-criminal, they will drop the walls or move them to the next Republican leader, and Trump's support will drop away dramatically.
Kinda like how now, the old defenders of Bill Clinton has gone full circle in realizing that his treatment of women may had merits.
Welcome to partisan politics, which is further exacerbated by the internet, 24-hr news cycle and particularly social media.
whembly wrote: Kinda like how now, the old defenders of Bill Clinton has gone full circle in realizing that his treatment of women may had merits.
You might have a point if anyone was supporting impeaching Trump over his affairs, instead of (correctly) pointing out that he's a horrible person. The defense of Clinton was not that he was a great person for cheating on his wife, it was that his actions were not a crime. I genuinely have no idea why you would think that his defenders have gone "full circle" on anything.
Additionally, the Bill Clinton issues are now being viewed through a cultural shift that took place over 20 years, capped off by post-Weinstein perceptions of abuse by men in power.
To say that the people who now view Bill Clinton differently solely because he's not "their guy" anymore, politically, I think is only a small part of it. If that were the case you would have seen the backlash start in 2001.
whembly wrote: Kinda like how now, the old defenders of Bill Clinton has gone full circle in realizing that his treatment of women may had merits.
You might have a point if anyone was supporting impeaching Trump over his affairs, instead of (correctly) pointing out that he's a horrible person. The defense of Clinton was not that he was a great person for cheating on his wife, it was that his actions were not a crime. I genuinely have no idea why you would think that his defenders have gone "full circle" on anything.
Are we pretending that there are not people thinking this is just another reason to impeach Trump?
whembly wrote: Kinda like how now, the old defenders of Bill Clinton has gone full circle in realizing that his treatment of women may had merits.
You might have a point if anyone was supporting impeaching Trump over his affairs, instead of (correctly) pointing out that he's a horrible person. The defense of Clinton was not that he was a great person for cheating on his wife, it was that his actions were not a crime. I genuinely have no idea why you would think that his defenders have gone "full circle" on anything.
Are we pretending that there are not people thinking this is just another reason to impeach Trump?
This is sort of how I remember the first year or so of Trump's presidency through the lens of Youtube.
Ouze wrote: Additionally, the Bill Clinton issues are now being viewed through a cultural shift that took place over 20 years, capped off by post-Weinstein perceptions of abuse by men in power.
To say that the people who now view Bill Clinton differently solely because he's not "their guy" anymore, politically, I think is only a small part of it. If that were the case you would have seen the backlash start in 2001.
There is that as well.
But I think we also should keep in mind that Bill got his cigar wet in the Oval Office, while Trump was getting his before he was ever an elected figure anywhere. So seeing Democrats being outraged now, after defending Bill (and many still defending him today), wreaks of partisan double standards.
Which, to be fair, is also evident when the folks who even last year vocally made it clear that the woman who didn't divorce her husband for getting blown in the White House isn't fit to be POTUS are now defending a serial adulterer who just happens to be a POTUS on their side of the political spectrum.
As an unabashed dirty stinking socialist (and a Canuck to boot, eh?) I can admit I've gone full circle on Bill. When it came out, I was all "it's just a beej" and "she was just a whore looking to score with the leader of the free world".
But now, 20 years later, I've come to learn a lot more about the relationship between power and consent. I've also read Lewinsky's account of things. 1998 Feeder was wrong.
Culture has progressed since 1998. It is basically never okay for a boss to initiate sexual contact with a subordinate. That includes Presidents and interns.
whembly wrote: Kinda like how now, the old defenders of Bill Clinton has gone full circle in realizing that his treatment of women may had merits.
You might have a point if anyone was supporting impeaching Trump over his affairs, instead of (correctly) pointing out that he's a horrible person. The defense of Clinton was not that he was a great person for cheating on his wife, it was that his actions were not a crime. I genuinely have no idea why you would think that his defenders have gone "full circle" on anything.
I was responding to Seb's point about how people "put up walls to certain kinds of information" and how people change their opinions long after Bill Clinton's presidency.
whembly wrote: I was responding to Seb's point about how people "put up walls to certain kinds of information" and how people change their opinions long after Bill Clinton's presidency.
But I don't see where this change is. At the time the opinion from his supporters was "it was a thing to do, but it wasn't illegal and the impeachment attempt was 100% partisan politics". Now the opinion of his supporters is "it was a thing to do, but it wasn't illegal and the impeachment attempt was 100% partisan politics". The only change is that, in the context of broader social change, we've come to a more complex understanding of " thing to do" and the reasons for that opinion have shifted from purely "cheating on your spouse is bad" to more consideration for the power imbalance involved.
whembly wrote: I was responding to Seb's point about how people "put up walls to certain kinds of information" and how people change their opinions long after Bill Clinton's presidency.
But I don't see where this change is. At the time the opinion from his supporters was "it was a thing to do, but it wasn't illegal and the impeachment attempt was 100% partisan politics". Now the opinion of his supporters is "it was a thing to do, but it wasn't illegal and the impeachment attempt was 100% partisan politics". The only change is that, in the context of broader social change, we've come to a more complex understanding of " thing to do" and the reasons for that opinion have shifted from purely "cheating on your spouse is bad" to more consideration for the power imbalance involved.
Bill Clinton was impeached for lying under oath... not for using an intern as a mobile cigar humidifier in the oval office. But, I didn't bring up that up.
I brought up the fact that the Bill Clinton's supporters ignoring credible claims of harassments/rape, in support of sebster's statement.
whembly wrote: Kinda like how now, the old defenders of Bill Clinton has gone full circle in realizing that his treatment of women may had merits.
You might have a point if anyone was supporting impeaching Trump over his affairs, instead of (correctly) pointing out that he's a horrible person. The defense of Clinton was not that he was a great person for cheating on his wife, it was that his actions were not a crime. I genuinely have no idea why you would think that his defenders have gone "full circle" on anything.
Are we pretending that there are not people thinking this is just another reason to impeach Trump?
When talking about Republican crazies it's important not to forget that there are Democrat crazies who are almost as numerous and almost as deluded. Trump could trip on the White House grass and those people would say he was disrespecting the office.
whembly wrote: Kinda like how now, the old defenders of Bill Clinton has gone full circle in realizing that his treatment of women may had merits.
You might have a point if anyone was supporting impeaching Trump over his affairs, instead of (correctly) pointing out that he's a horrible person. The defense of Clinton was not that he was a great person for cheating on his wife, it was that his actions were not a crime. I genuinely have no idea why you would think that his defenders have gone "full circle" on anything.
Are we pretending that there are not people thinking this is just another reason to impeach Trump?
When talking about Republican crazies it's important not to forget that there are Democrat crazies who are almost as numerous and almost as deluded. Trump could trip on the White House grass and those people would say he was disrespecting the office.
This is a good point. Sometimes I wonder if I am caught up in the same kind of irrational anti-Trump hysteria that the people that thought Obama was going to put gun owners in FEMA camps were.
Too bad Obama didn't have the same stream of consciousness Twitter habit. It would have been easier to determine his motivations.
NinthMusketeer wrote: When talking about Republican crazies it's important not to forget that there are Democrat crazies who are almost as numerous and almost as deluded. Trump could trip on the White House grass and those people would say he was disrespecting the office.
I don't think this is at all true. There are left-wing crazies, sure, but they aren't anywhere near as numerous or influential as the right-wing crazies. Let us recall that the republican primaries in 2016 gave us the worst presidential candidate in recent history, and likely in the entire history of the US, winning over raving lunatics that were somehow worse than Trump. The democrats, on the other hand, gave us a fight between a center-left career politician and a slightly more left-leaning career politician, and the more centrist of the two won by a significant margin. The potential raving lunatic candidates never even made it onto the ballot, and certainly didn't have any meaningful influence in the election. There was no democrat equivalent to Ben "the pyramids were ancient grain silos" Carson or Rick "totally not an obscene image" Santorum.
whembly wrote: Kinda like how now, the old defenders of Bill Clinton has gone full circle in realizing that his treatment of women may had merits.
You might have a point if anyone was supporting impeaching Trump over his affairs, instead of (correctly) pointing out that he's a horrible person. The defense of Clinton was not that he was a great person for cheating on his wife, it was that his actions were not a crime. I genuinely have no idea why you would think that his defenders have gone "full circle" on anything.
Are we pretending that there are not people thinking this is just another reason to impeach Trump?
When talking about Republican crazies it's important not to forget that there are Democrat crazies who are almost as numerous and almost as deluded. Trump could trip on the White House grass and those people would say he was disrespecting the office.
I agree with Peregrine, I doubt there are nearly as many crazy democrats and they're certainly nowhere near as loud. I mean, who do the democrats have that can compare to Joe Arpaio? Or Paul Ryan? For every crazy democrat there is atleast 2-3 republicans that are as bad or worse.
NinthMusketeer wrote: When talking about Republican crazies it's important not to forget that there are Democrat crazies who are almost as numerous and almost as deluded. Trump could trip on the White House grass and those people would say he was disrespecting the office.
I don't think this is at all true. There are left-wing crazies, sure, but they aren't anywhere near as numerous or influential as the right-wing crazies. Let us recall that the republican primaries in 2016 gave us the worst presidential candidate in recent history, and likely in the entire history of the US, winning over raving lunatics that were somehow worse than Trump. The democrats, on the other hand, gave us a fight between a center-left career politician and a slightly more left-leaning career politician, and the more centrist of the two won by a significant margin. The potential raving lunatic candidates never even made it onto the ballot, and certainly didn't have any meaningful influence in the election. There was no democrat equivalent to Ben "the pyramids were ancient grain silos" Carson or Rick "totally not an obscene image" Santorum.
The Democrats nominated a bad candidate that failed to generate enough enthusiasm to earn enough votes to win states like Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Ohio and Florida, all states that Obama won twice. The Republican turnout in 2016 grew by about 500k, the Democratic turnout dropped by 3 million.
The "raving lunatics that were somehow worse than Trump" that Trump won over were the same people that voted for Mitt Romney and John McCain. The army of crazy deplorables that turned out to elect Trump had no problem staying home and letting Obama win in '08 and '12 when Republican turnout was lower than '16 but millions of Obama voters, faced with the possibility of a Trump presidency, chose to stay home instead of voting for Hillary Clinton.
That's one of the downsides of partisan politics, it's always real convenient to blame the other side for everything.
whembly wrote: Kinda like how now, the old defenders of Bill Clinton has gone full circle in realizing that his treatment of women may had merits.
You might have a point if anyone was supporting impeaching Trump over his affairs, instead of (correctly) pointing out that he's a horrible person. The defense of Clinton was not that he was a great person for cheating on his wife, it was that his actions were not a crime. I genuinely have no idea why you would think that his defenders have gone "full circle" on anything.
Are we pretending that there are not people thinking this is just another reason to impeach Trump?
When talking about Republican crazies it's important not to forget that there are Democrat crazies who are almost as numerous and almost as deluded. Trump could trip on the White House grass and those people would say he was disrespecting the office.
I agree with Peregrine, I doubt there are nearly as many crazy democrats and they're certainly nowhere near as loud. I mean, who do the democrats have that can compare to Joe Arpaio? Or Paul Ryan? For every crazy democrat there is atleast 2-3 republicans that are as bad or worse.
Nah, there are just as many. The difference is they are better at disguising their crazyness under a veneer of respectability. The crazyness is evident when you look at what their ultimate policy goals and ideals are. If you want specifics, Bernie Sanders is a straight up leftwing crazypants.
whembly wrote: Kinda like how now, the old defenders of Bill Clinton has gone full circle in realizing that his treatment of women may had merits.
You might have a point if anyone was supporting impeaching Trump over his affairs, instead of (correctly) pointing out that he's a horrible person. The defense of Clinton was not that he was a great person for cheating on his wife, it was that his actions were not a crime. I genuinely have no idea why you would think that his defenders have gone "full circle" on anything.
Are we pretending that there are not people thinking this is just another reason to impeach Trump?
When talking about Republican crazies it's important not to forget that there are Democrat crazies who are almost as numerous and almost as deluded. Trump could trip on the White House grass and those people would say he was disrespecting the office.
I agree with Peregrine, I doubt there are nearly as many crazy democrats and they're certainly nowhere near as loud. I mean, who do the democrats have that can compare to Joe Arpaio? Or Paul Ryan? For every crazy democrat there is atleast 2-3 republicans that are as bad or worse.
Nah, there are just as many. The difference is they are better at disguising their crazyness under a veneer of respectability. The crazyness is evident when you look at what their ultimate policy goals and ideals are. If you want specifics, Bernie Sanders is a straight up leftwing crazypants.
It's all a matter of perspective and priorities.
Bernie is only left through the (fairly far-right) lens of American politics. If he was Canadian, he'd be a centrist.
whembly wrote: Kinda like how now, the old defenders of Bill Clinton has gone full circle in realizing that his treatment of women may had merits.
You might have a point if anyone was supporting impeaching Trump over his affairs, instead of (correctly) pointing out that he's a horrible person. The defense of Clinton was not that he was a great person for cheating on his wife, it was that his actions were not a crime. I genuinely have no idea why you would think that his defenders have gone "full circle" on anything.
Are we pretending that there are not people thinking this is just another reason to impeach Trump?
When talking about Republican crazies it's important not to forget that there are Democrat crazies who are almost as numerous and almost as deluded. Trump could trip on the White House grass and those people would say he was disrespecting the office.
I agree with Peregrine, I doubt there are nearly as many crazy democrats and they're certainly nowhere near as loud. I mean, who do the democrats have that can compare to Joe Arpaio? Or Paul Ryan? For every crazy democrat there is atleast 2-3 republicans that are as bad or worse.
Nah, there are just as many. The difference is they are better at disguising their crazyness under a veneer of respectability. The crazyness is evident when you look at what their ultimate policy goals and ideals are. If you want specifics, Bernie Sanders is a straight up leftwing crazypants.
It's all a matter of perspective and priorities.
Bernie is only left through the (fairly far-right) lens of American politics. If he was Canadian, he'd be a centrist.
That is true. Other countries are far more left wing than the US, but we are talking about the context of US politics here.
whembly wrote: Kinda like how now, the old defenders of Bill Clinton has gone full circle in realizing that his treatment of women may had merits.
You might have a point if anyone was supporting impeaching Trump over his affairs, instead of (correctly) pointing out that he's a horrible person. The defense of Clinton was not that he was a great person for cheating on his wife, it was that his actions were not a crime. I genuinely have no idea why you would think that his defenders have gone "full circle" on anything.
Are we pretending that there are not people thinking this is just another reason to impeach Trump?
When talking about Republican crazies it's important not to forget that there are Democrat crazies who are almost as numerous and almost as deluded. Trump could trip on the White House grass and those people would say he was disrespecting the office.
I agree with Peregrine, I doubt there are nearly as many crazy democrats and they're certainly nowhere near as loud. I mean, who do the democrats have that can compare to Joe Arpaio? Or Paul Ryan? For every crazy democrat there is atleast 2-3 republicans that are as bad or worse.
Nah, there are just as many. The difference is they are better at disguising their crazyness under a veneer of respectability. The crazyness is evident when you look at what their ultimate policy goals and ideals are. If you want specifics, Bernie Sanders is a straight up leftwing crazypants.
So Bernie Sanders is the only name you can come up with? I agree he's the most far left currently (even if it's not that far left compared to the rest of the 1st world countries), but compared to Joe Arpaio (John Oliver covers everything he's done pretty well), Paul Ryan (the horrible tax rework recently comes to mind), or Arthur Jones (Self proclaimed Nazi and holocaust denier). The worst you can level at Bernie is he wants everyone to have healthcare. Truly a monster compared to a Nazi, corrupt/power mad sheriff, or a guy so deeply bought by the corporations it's unsettling.
But really, Bernie is probably the closest in viewpoint to the younger generations (i.e. almost anyone not currently in office), and was also the only presidential candidate to get his campaign funds solely through non super PAC/lobbyist groups. If there are as many as you claim, list them. List anyone as bad as Joe Arpaio, or Arthur Jones or Paul Ryan.
I could level far worse at Bernie. Namely him being deeply biased against Christians and freedom of religion in general. During questioning of an appointment candidate he asked utterly irrelevant questions about the guy's religious beliefs to an unconstitutional level.
Grey Templar wrote: I could level far worse at Bernie. Namely him being deeply biased against Christians and freedom of religion in general. During questioning of an appointment candidate he asked utterly irrelevant questions about the guy's religious beliefs to an unconstitutional level.
And nobody actually objects to Healthcare itself. Its the baggage of big government oversight and increased taxes that is objected to.
I dunno, look at Roy Moore, it's important to keep church and state separate otherwise you get nutjobs like him trying to impose their beliefs as law, and thus it is important to make sure they wouldn't be biased against one group, especially when the candidate he was interviewing/questioning had expressed anti-islamic sentiments.
Hrm, no there has very much been a strong element of "why should *I* have to pay for *them*" thinking coming out of the GOP on healthcare. Hell, Ron Paul openly said people without insurance in need of care should be left to die and was *applauded* for it on national television.
Grey Templar wrote: I could level far worse at Bernie. Namely him being deeply biased against Christians and freedom of religion in general. During questioning of an appointment candidate he asked utterly irrelevant questions about the guy's religious beliefs to an unconstitutional level.
And nobody actually objects to Healthcare itself. Its the baggage of big government oversight and increased taxes that is objected to.
Big government oversight and increased taxes to access a service you have little to no choice in utilizing is better than the current big pharma oversight and leading cause of bankruptcy system America has, no?
Grey Templar wrote: I could level far worse at Bernie. Namely him being deeply biased against Christians and freedom of religion in general. During questioning of an appointment candidate he asked utterly irrelevant questions about the guy's religious beliefs to an unconstitutional level.
And nobody actually objects to Healthcare itself. Its the baggage of big government oversight and increased taxes that is objected to.
Okay lets be honest here, Republicans have been injecting their religion into their politics for quite some time now and it is facing predictable backlash now and for the past few years as well. Don't try and act like a persecuted class because Christians still make up 70+ percent of the American population, and maybe keep your religion out of politics like it was meant to be.
Vaktathi wrote: Hrm, no there has very much been a strong element of "why should *I* have to pay for *them*" thinking coming out of the GOP on healthcare. Hell, Ron Paul openly said people without insurance in need of care should be left to die and was *applauded* for it on national television.
Ron Paul definitely put his foot in his mouth on that one and I can't defend that.
However regarding the general resistance to publicly funded healthcare. Its an objection to having to pay for other people's healthcare. Not an objection to people actually having healthcare. This is because healthcare is not viewed, and is not currently enshrined as, any sort of right that people have.
Now I personally would be willing to compromise on this. If it came with some expanded protections for 2nd amendment rights.
Grey Templar wrote: I could level far worse at Bernie. Namely him being deeply biased against Christians and freedom of religion in general. During questioning of an appointment candidate he asked utterly irrelevant questions about the guy's religious beliefs to an unconstitutional level.
And nobody actually objects to Healthcare itself. Its the baggage of big government oversight and increased taxes that is objected to.
Okay lets be honest here, Republicans have been injecting their religion into their politics for quite some time now and it is facing predictable backlash now and for the past few years as well. Don't try and act like a persecuted class because Christians still make up 70+ percent of the American population, and maybe keep your religion out of politics like it was meant to be.
See, thats an unreasonable demand. First and foremost because Religion by definition involves every aspect of someone's life. People who don't understand religion think its just something you should or can keep to yourself, but religion is a more pervasive thing than that. It effects how you act, including how you vote.
What you are taking the Separation of Church and State to mean is that everybody should be Atheists as far as politics is concerned. That itself is quite deplorable as its effectively forcing a "Religious Test" upon involvement in politics.
However regarding the general resistance to publicly funded healthcare. Its an objection to having to pay for other people's healthcare. Not an objection to people actually having healthcare. This is because healthcare is not viewed, and is not currently enshrined as, any sort of right that people have.
Emphasis mine, this is classic feth you Jack, I got mine. Textbook Laveyan philosophy.
Now I personally would be willing to compromise on this. If it came with some expanded protections for 2nd amendment rights.
However regarding the general resistance to publicly funded healthcare. Its an objection to having to pay for other people's healthcare. Not an objection to people actually having healthcare. This is because healthcare is not viewed, and is not currently enshrined as, any sort of right that people have.
Emphasis mine, this is classic feth you Jack, I got mine. Textbook Laveyan philosophy.
I'll counter with this.
Should there be laws that if something happens to someone else you are legally obligated to help them? Why? Thats a path that just leads to total loss of any personal freedom.
Health Insurance companies are large and in every single aspect of our lives, and often they own the insurance plans, providers, equipment manufacturing, drug distribution, and every other aspect.
Maybe we should start treating them as a public space or something.
Automatically Appended Next Post: If we talk religion, we might as well lock this thread. Because nothing brings out the stupid on every side more than gun control and religion.
However regarding the general resistance to publicly funded healthcare. Its an objection to having to pay for other people's healthcare. Not an objection to people actually having healthcare. This is because healthcare is not viewed, and is not currently enshrined as, any sort of right that people have.
Emphasis mine, this is classic feth you Jack, I got mine. Textbook Laveyan philosophy.
I'll counter with this.
Should there be laws that if something happens to someone else you are legally obligated to help them? Why? Thats a path that just leads to total loss of any personal freedom.
No, of course not. Paying taxes doesn't fall under that, though. Your tax dollars already go to things you may not personally benefit from. Why is healthcare different?
No, of course not. Paying taxes doesn't fall under that, though. Your tax dollars already go to things you may not personally benefit from. Why is healthcare different?
Because its not really a necessary thing for the functioning of society. Roads, Emergency Services, National Defense, Subsidized Education. Thats stuff I do/will/have benefit from, and these benefits from tax money have been around for a very long time. Plus its something I can see, its tangible. My tax dollars pay for national parks and game reserves, which I rarely go to, but at any time I can choose to go benefit from it. Like going hunting for the first time this year.
Healthcare is different. People don't go see the doctor if they don't feel sick. If I am healthy, I have zero reason to ever go see a doctor. Unlike say going to a National Park on a whim which could happen at any time.
So a person who is young and fit might choose not to purchase health insurance. Because after all there are likely better more useful things to spend that money on. Like rent, savings, car payments, etc... Health insurance is expensive.
Now this person is taking a risk that they don't suffer some catastrophic injury or catch a terrible disease. But that was their choice, which is key. People here in the US want to be able to choose, and forcing them to buy expensive healthcare they might not be able to afford is a problem.
I'm lucky that my employer has generous healthcare coverage, but if I had to foot the bill for my own healthcare I wouldn't be able to afford it. Oh and I would be ineligible for any of the Obamacare subsidies either. Thats why forced purchase of healthcare under Obamacare was bad because so many people are in my position. You make too much to qualify for the healthcare subsidies, but not enough to actually afford to pay for it. So I would rather have the option of not paying for it at all and roll the dice hoping I don't have an accident or contract something that forces hospitalization.
So I would rather have the option of not paying for it at all and roll the dice hoping I don't have an accident or contract something that forces hospitalization.
Under this plan, I still pay for your healthcare.
At least be consistent and say that nobody should have to give you any treatment of any kind unless you can pay for it out of pocket and you should be left to die if you can't afford it. Of you don't have insurance, it should be cash or death.
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Grey Templar wrote: [ If I am healthy, I have zero reason to ever go see a doctor.
Thinking like this is why healthcare is so expensive in the US, and why we have health outcomes that make us the shame of every other western country.
Do you also not take your car in for preventative maintenance until your engine blows?
So I would rather have the option of not paying for it at all and roll the dice hoping I don't have an accident or contract something that forces hospitalization.
Under this plan, I still pay for your healthcare.
At least be consistent and say that nobody should have to give you any treatment of any kind unless you can pay for it out of pocket and you should be left to die if you can't afford it. Of you don't have insurance, it should be cash or death.
Yes, I would say that would be a fair thing under the current system.
Grey Templar wrote: [ If I am healthy, I have zero reason to ever go see a doctor.
Thinking like this is why healthcare is so expensive in the US, and why we have health outcomes that make us the shame of every other western country.
Do you also not take your car in for preventative maintenance until your engine blows?
I do take my car in. But that isn't nearly equivalent to going in for a yearly checkup with a doctor. Cars break down a lot faster. And I'm not required to pay some sort of Maintenance Insurance on vehicles that pays for repairs and such.
But hey, I'll trade forcing everyone to pay for universal healthcare if we can expand protections for the 2nd amendment. If I'm going to lose some freedom over my finances I want some expanded freedom in another area.
So a person who is young and fit might choose not to purchase health insurance. Because after all there are likely better more useful things to spend that money on. Like rent, savings, car payments, etc... Health insurance is expensive.
Now this person is taking a risk that they don't suffer some catastrophic injury or catch a terrible disease. But that was their choice, which is key. People here in the US want to be able to choose, and forcing them to buy expensive healthcare they might not be able to afford is a problem.
Insurance is only expensive because of the massive healthcare industrial complex in the US. I live in the only province in Canada that charges a medical insurance premium, and it's ~95 USD a month for myself, my wife and two kids. With 10x population, aka buying power, the US could provide universal healthcare with much greater ease.
I'm lucky that my employer has generous healthcare coverage, but if I had to foot the bill for my own healthcare I wouldn't be able to afford it. Oh and I would be ineligible for any of the Obamacare subsidies either. Thats why forced purchase of healthcare under Obamacare was bad because so many people are in my position. You make too much to qualify for the healthcare subsidies, but not enough to actually afford to pay for it. So I would rather have the option of not paying for it at all and roll the dice hoping I don't have an accident or contract something that forces hospitalization.
Affordable Care Act was a garbage compromise, but perhaps better than nothing. You folks need Universal Healthcare, stat!
So a person who is young and fit might choose not to purchase health insurance. Because after all there are likely better more useful things to spend that money on. Like rent, savings, car payments, etc... Health insurance is expensive.
Now this person is taking a risk that they don't suffer some catastrophic injury or catch a terrible disease. But that was their choice, which is key. People here in the US want to be able to choose, and forcing them to buy expensive healthcare they might not be able to afford is a problem.
Insurance is only expensive because of the massive healthcare industrial complex in the US. I live in the only province in Canada that charges a medical insurance premium, and it's ~95 USD a month for myself, my wife and two kids. With 10x population, aka buying power, the US could provide universal healthcare with much greater ease.
I think it also has to do with how Insurance works. If the pricetag for medical treatments was actually based on cost and set profit margin like other products and services it would be much more affordable too. Instead insurance results in massively inflated prices.
So I would rather have the option of not paying for it at all and roll the dice hoping I don't have an accident or contract something that forces hospitalization.
Under this plan, I still pay for your healthcare.
At least be consistent and say that nobody should have to give you any treatment of any kind unless you can pay for it out of pocket and you should be left to die if you can't afford it. Of you don't have insurance, it should be cash or death.
Yes, I would say that would be a fair thing under the current system
So what you're endorsing here is that, if you don't have insurance or the money to pay, and step on a rusty nail, the fairest outcome is for you to die of tetanus. This is the option you would rather have.
No, of course not. Paying taxes doesn't fall under that, though. Your tax dollars already go to things you may not personally benefit from. Why is healthcare different?
Because its not really a necessary thing for the functioning of society. Roads, Emergency Services, National Defense, Subsidized Education. Thats stuff I do/will/have benefit from, and these benefits from tax money have been around for a very long time. Plus its something I can see, its tangible. My tax dollars pay for national parks and game reserves, which I rarely go to, but at any time I can choose to go benefit from it. Like going hunting for the first time this year.
The point of a government is to care for its citizens, making sure they're healthy is part of that, just like making sure the roads aren't crap, or that your food and water aren't tainted with rat poison.
So I would rather have the option of not paying for it at all and roll the dice hoping I don't have an accident or contract something that forces hospitalization.
Under this plan, I still pay for your healthcare.
At least be consistent and say that nobody should have to give you any treatment of any kind unless you can pay for it out of pocket and you should be left to die if you can't afford it. Of you don't have insurance, it should be cash or death.
Yes, I would say that would be a fair thing under the current system
So what you're endorsing here is that, if you don't have insurance or the money to pay, and step on a rusty nail, the fairest outcome is for you to die of tetanus. This is the option you would rather have.
I mean, what can you even really say to that?
Oh stop being so dramatic like everybody who had no ability to pay would always die. Yes, it would be sucky for anybody in that situation.
I'm not some total libertarian whacko though. I'd be willing to compromise on healthcare if I got something else in return.
No, of course not. Paying taxes doesn't fall under that, though. Your tax dollars already go to things you may not personally benefit from. Why is healthcare different?
Because its not really a necessary thing for the functioning of society. Roads, Emergency Services, National Defense, Subsidized Education. Thats stuff I do/will/have benefit from, and these benefits from tax money have been around for a very long time. Plus its something I can see, its tangible. My tax dollars pay for national parks and game reserves, which I rarely go to, but at any time I can choose to go benefit from it. Like going hunting for the first time this year.
The point of a government is to care for its citizens, making sure they're healthy is part of that, just like making sure the roads aren't crap, or that your food and water aren't tainted with rat poison.
Yes. To an extent. You don't want the government to have anywhere near as much control as many on the left side of the aisle would like, totalitarianism is not a good place to live.
Grey Templar wrote: Oh stop being so dramatic like everybody who had no ability to pay would always die. Yes, it would be sucky for anybody in that situation.
I'm not some total libertarian whacko though. I'd be willing to compromise on healthcare if I got something else in return.
"Well, yes, it's a shame that your infant had to die of the whooping cough, but if I can't get that transferrable machine gun, then we have nothing to talk about"
I mean, I don't think I'm mischaracterizing your statements. This is exactly what you're endorsing.
Yes. To an extent. You don't want the government to have anywhere near as much control as many on the left side of the aisle would like, totalitarianism is not a good place to live.
Grey Templar wrote: Oh stop being so dramatic like everybody who had no ability to pay would always die. Yes, it would be sucky for anybody in that situation.
I'm not some total libertarian whacko though. I'd be willing to compromise on healthcare if I got something else in return.
"Well, yes, it's a shame that your infant had to die of the whooping cough, but if I can't get that transferrable machine gun, then we have nothing to talk about"
I mean, I don't think I'm mischaracterizing your statements. This is exactly what you're endorsing.
To be fair, when I get shot by all the bullets from the machine guns, I will get healthcare to fix me up!
Grey Templar wrote: Oh stop being so dramatic like everybody who had no ability to pay would always die. Yes, it would be sucky for anybody in that situation.
I'm not some total libertarian whacko though. I'd be willing to compromise on healthcare if I got something else in return.
"Well, yes, it's a shame that your infant had to die of the whooping cough, but if I can't get that transferrable machine gun, then we have nothing to talk about"
I mean, I don't think I'm mischaracterizing your statements. This is exactly what you're endorsing.
Isn’t compromise the foundation of a functional democracy? Everybody is lamenting that there isn’t enough compromise these days. Yet you now spin this as me trying to hold dying infants hostage. You are better than that Ouze.
I don't think I'm spinning anything. You said that you don't think, sans insurance or funds, emergency medical care should be provided. This is literally what you said! Do you think only adults need emergency care?
And the argument is that there is nothing in it for you, so it's totally rational for you to think that. Again, this is like, literally what you said! I mean, I don't even have to embellish it. What you said was so insane that I can't even make it more hyperbolic.
Man bringing this thread back really was a huge mistake. The mods were absolutely right.
...oh, also the blurb about using Military Funds to build the border wall... lolwat?Preeeeeeeeeeety sure the executive branch can't spend money outside the parameters set by Congress.
...oh, also the blurb about using Military Funds to build the border wall... lolwat?Preeeeeeeeeeety sure the executive branch can't spend money outside the parameters set by Congress.
Obama and Bush also send troops, but the details were a bit different.
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Grey Templar wrote: Only person making this thread go downhill is you. Chill out man, I’m trying to make this thread work.
In one thread, you argue that you shouldn't be forced to pay a penny towards someone else's healthcare.
In another thread, you argue that a private company should be broken up because they won't let you monetize a video about guns next to videos of a keyboard playing cat (RIP Keyboard Cat).
I think it also has to do with how Insurance works. If the pricetag for medical treatments was actually based on cost and set profit margin like other products and services it would be much more affordable too. Instead insurance results in massively inflated prices.
That's true, yeah. Supply and demand doesn't really apply when it comes to "buy this product or die/suffer".
Grey Templar wrote: That is true. Other countries are far more left wing than the US, but we are talking about the context of US politics here.
We are talking about the US, but the global scale matters in the context of deciding if someone is "crazy" or not because the word means something more than just "a politician whose ideas I disagree with". And that's where we see the difference:
The democrats, at their farthest left, tend to advocate policies that exist in other stable and successful countries. Whether you like that direction or not it's impossible to argue that it isn't one that is based in reality, because we see it working elsewhere. "We should be more like Canada" is not crazy. And that center-left position tends to be the limit. The fringe elements of the left, the raving lunatics with no sense of reality, don't have any meaningful voice in the party. They may vote D because it's better than any other party, but they aren't getting their candidates on the ballot and they aren't setting the platform.
The republicans, at their farthest right, go off the deep end into Alex Jones territory. They openly embrace fringe elements to the point that Alex Jones and the Nazi party are now the fringe elements, and the former fringe elements have become the core of the party. And they're proud of not dealing with reality. A key moment in the primary debates IMO was when Kasich said something like "illegal immigration is bad, but we need realistic solutions" and all of the other candidates jumped all over him for being soft on immigration and competed to see who could yell the loudest about BUILD THE WALL and DEPORT THEM ALL.
No, of course not. Paying taxes doesn't fall under that, though. Your tax dollars already go to things you may not personally benefit from. Why is healthcare different?
Because its not really a necessary thing for the functioning of society. Roads, Emergency Services, National Defense, Subsidized Education. Thats stuff I do/will/have benefit from, and these benefits from tax money have been around for a very long time. Plus its something I can see, its tangible. My tax dollars pay for national parks and game reserves, which I rarely go to, but at any time I can choose to go benefit from it. Like going hunting for the first time this year.
The point of a government is to care for its citizens, making sure they're healthy is part of that, just like making sure the roads aren't crap, or that your food and water aren't tainted with rat poison.
Yes. To an extent. You don't want the government to have anywhere near as much control as many on the left side of the aisle would like, totalitarianism is not a good place to live.
Neither is a total libertarian controlled "government" if such a thing can be called a government.
And yes, there would need to be moderation, like in all things. The government should provide for it's citizens' health, but not control their every action obviously.
Grey Templar wrote: That is true. Other countries are far more left wing than the US, but we are talking about the context of US politics here.
We are talking about the US, but the global scale matters in the context of deciding if someone is "crazy" or not because the word means something more than just "a politician whose ideas I disagree with". And that's where we see the difference:
The democrats, at their farthest left, tend to advocate policies that exist in other stable and successful countries. Whether you like that direction or not it's impossible to argue that it isn't one that is based in reality, because we see it working elsewhere. "We should be more like Canada" is not crazy. And that center-left position tends to be the limit. The fringe elements of the left, the raving lunatics with no sense of reality, don't have any meaningful voice in the party. They may vote D because it's better than any other party, but they aren't getting their candidates on the ballot and they aren't setting the platform.
The republicans, at their farthest right, go off the deep end into Alex Jones territory. They openly embrace fringe elements to the point that Alex Jones and the Nazi party are now the fringe elements, and the former fringe elements have become the core of the party. And they're proud of not dealing with reality. A key moment in the primary debates IMO was when Kasich said something like "illegal immigration is bad, but we need realistic solutions" and all of the other candidates jumped all over him for being soft on immigration and competed to see who could yell the loudest about BUILD THE WALL and DEPORT THEM ALL.
I think both sides are mischaracterizing the extreme wings here...
Both of you say these things because you're coming from a biased point of view.
Otherwise, it's waaaay too easy to start painting with the widest brush available to make your points.
If it's far to say many on the left would like for a totalitarian government, then it's fair to say many on the right would like a fascist dictatorship, correct?
Of course not. Let's not be silly. There's plenty on both sides to debate without resorting to hyperbole.
whembly wrote: I think both sides are mischaracterizing the extreme wings here...
Then who is the democrat equivalent of Ben "the pyramids were ancient grain silos" Carson, or Rick "butts are fun" Santorum? If you're going to pull the "both sides are bad" act then you have to provide something to support it.
The reality is that the government is responsible for the healthcare of it's citizens. This is because the government is responsible for the wellbeing of it's citizens, because that is why government exists. Further, by working collectively as a society to ensure everyone has their healthcare costs covered there is a net benefit to members because of the increase in productivity that results. Not to mention the factor of simply giving a dam about other people. If the US government simply footed the bill for everyone's health insurance flat-out I'd bet that within a decade the increased tax revenue would be offsetting the costs entirely, if not leading to a net increase in revenue.
This ties into the heavy irony that humans who act selfishly by and large end up worse off. Wealthy and powerful, sure, but that counts for nothing if you're miserable. Look at Trump, in a material sense he is extremely successful but he is also extremely unhappy. Hell, look at any of the pricks you see around you in your own life, as compared to the nicer individuals. Which group ends up happier in the end?
feeder wrote: If it's far to say many on the left would like for a totalitarian government, then it's fair to say many on the right would like a fascist dictatorship, correct?
Of course not. Let's not be silly. There's plenty on both sides to debate without resorting to hyperbole.
To be fair, for many it's not that the government is telling people what to do. Both sides are pro-government telling people what to do. They just want different things being told to different people.
feeder wrote: If it's far to say many on the left would like for a totalitarian government, then it's fair to say many on the right would like a fascist dictatorship, correct?
Of course not. Let's not be silly. There's plenty on both sides to debate without resorting to hyperbole.
To be fair, for many it's not that the government is telling people what to do. Both sides are pro-government telling people what to do. They just want different things being told to different people.
Oh, absolutely. But to say there are 'many' people working for a totalitarian or fascist state in the US is more than a bit absurd. I'm happy US politics is back in the Dakka OT, because our shared hobby gives all posters a common ground you won't find elsewhere we can discuss this topic. I'd like to keep it.
Let me see, as a Canadian, with my wishy-washy Prime Minister Trudeau it makes the contrast with Trump almost scary, no it IS scary.
None of my business I know, I remember being asked prior to his election who would be the next American President?
I had answered "The one they deserve.".
I am SO terribly sorry.
Having the poster-boy for narcissism as the top leader is a very scary place to be and I genuinely give my sympathies.
I must admit, I think Justin is being so nice because he thinks everyone is suffering enough and there is little point in poking the bear: he could lash out at anyone.
So much is getting changed in the background, people were hoping the "checks and balances" could minimize the damage.
So yeah, the guy sure knows his showmanship.
Please feel free to point out anything that would show he is a champion of the underdog.
I am still looking.
Seeing the guy stacking all the various levels of government with cronies is better than a soap-opera for entertainment value.
A little piece of my soul shrivels up and dies with each passing year his is in office.
I really have nothing to say to my children about ethics as being a thing of value with that dude as the most powerful man of state.
I am being a wee bit extreme, could easily be confused with a crying leftist, I think I had always held an ideal of what it meant to be a man ("real man" or "good man") and that guy is far from it.
I think the main thing going for Justin is he tries a little too hard not to be offensive.
Donald, really does not care and gives the smell test on a decision: "how does it benefit me?"
I guess the main #1 thing on my mind, is if the President goes way too far: what are people prepared to do to reign-in this loose cannon?
Will there be ANYTHING that he could be answerable to when he is done stacking the deck?
Would even the two term maximum be any barrier to him? Really?
I figure he focuses on how to manage the votes for his 4th year and during the 8 years in, find a way to overturn the two term max.
I will be looking real hard at the 22nd amendment for a bit.
I've been reading a bit about the problems the teachers in Oklahoma are going through. Seriously, this is one of the reasons why we need a federal government that can step in and provide the needed assistance when a state so totally fails like this.
whembly wrote: I think both sides are mischaracterizing the extreme wings here...
Then who is the democrat equivalent of Ben "the pyramids were ancient grain silos" Carson, or Rick "butts are fun" Santorum? If you're going to pull the "both sides are bad" act then you have to provide something to support it.
Hillary Clinton. ...natch. Game Over.
For the bonus rounds, don't forget:
Bernie Sanders
Elizabeth Warrens
Nancy Pelosi
Harry Reid
Al 'Freaking' Franken
They're whackadoos that if a more rational democrat takes their place, they will be dominant in future elections.
Seriously, stop arguing from the standpoint that the Democrats in general are the adult in the rooms. There are jackwagons on both aisle.
Just call them out individually without painting the whole party without agency.
Vaktathi wrote: Hrm, no there has very much been a strong element of "why should *I* have to pay for *them*" thinking coming out of the GOP on healthcare. Hell, Ron Paul openly said people without insurance in need of care should be left to die and was *applauded* for it on national television.
And to put the icing on the cake, applauded by people claiming to be 'pro-life' to boot.
I've been reading a bit about the problems the teachers in Oklahoma are going through. Seriously, this is one of the reasons why we need a federal government that can step in and provide the needed assistance when a state so totally fails like this.
My wife has been out there every day this week. She's a therapist at one of the elementary schools here, so she's supporting the teachers.
The teachers union has been asking for a raise for teachers, support staff, and more importantly adequate funding for the schools themselves. The legislature passed a partial raise for teachers, and no additional funding for schools. And they also don't have the actual funding to pay for the raise, and after raising taxes for the first time in a couple decades to partially fund it, they are already scheduled to repeal some of those taxes before they ever come into effect. So teachers are on strike since Monday. Yesterday the House found out that most teachers only have shuttles available until 3pm, so they scheduled their session to start at 3pm thinking they would just wait for teachers to leave. My wife's school, and many others, simply moved the shuttles around and still ended up filling the capitol.
Yesterday Governor Fallin said that Teachers wanting more funding for schools are "acting like teenagers wanting a better car". So I made my wife a new sign for today:
So far our legislature has claimed that teachers have given death threats to them or their staff (Oklahoma City PD and the Oklahoma Highway Patrol did not receive any notification of any threats). The legislators then claimed "outside" agitators from Chicago and Antifa, which surprised no one.
It did result in "Antifa? No, AntiFallin!" signs though, so there's that.
Me thinks...
. If anything, I want more reforms for voting in primaries! As an independent, Maryland doesn't even allow me to vote in them...
(Also, darn, was hoping you'd be closer to the east coast 
thing to do, but it wasn't illegal and the impeachment attempt was 100% partisan politics". Now the opinion of his supporters is "it was a 
