Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Oh Shuma, we missed you.

Forget term limits, I'm ready for presidential term conscriptions!

"Malfred's presidential conscription will begin on the 633rd minute of August 2020 and end
on the 634th minute of that same hour. In a prepared statement, he has promised to
wave at the cameras and threaten to veto whatever legislation the Congress has cooked up.

"He will be succeeded by Frazzled, who has stated that he will repeal whatever malfred does."

A more interesting thought experiment might be to ask which presidents, after their two terms, would have had a good shot of holding the office for a third term if they could have ran.

Truman: could have ran, but would have gotten creamed.

Ike: Probably would have held it, he was pretty popular. Did he have four more years in him?

Johnson: would have gotten demolished if he chose to run, which he could have.

Nixon: resigned before he could run again, has very popular until said resignation.

Reagan: as one of the only two term presidents to turn over the office to his own party, it seems likely that he coudl have won reelection even with the scandals and concerns. His age, and frankly, declining mental status would have been massive worries.

Bubba: Even with the lewinsky scandal, he carried high approval ratings through the end of his terms. America was fat and happy then, it seems unlikely we would have ditched him for McCain or W in 2000. it would have been a nasty race though.

W: would have gotten creamed. opinion polls aren't everything, but he was pretty deeply unpopular.

Looking at this, I think presidential politics might be simpler than anything thinks: are economic times good? If so, then the party retains the office. If not, expect a shift. The exceptions are 1) during a war that's going well and/or is popular, the party will hold on, and 2) long drawn out and unpopular wars will torpedo your chances, and 3) truly sordid scandals will affect races.

The one real outlier to this theory is W in 2000, as times were still good and you'd think that democrats would hold onto the white house, like the GOP did in 88. I think Gore being such a lousy candidate and W campaigning on values after the Bubba years outweighed the prosperity. I'm not a political insider, but it seems to me that Gore ran a terrible campaign while W ran smart. The influx of evengelical voters wasn't exactly predicted back then either.

Emperors Faithful wrote:Wow, people REALLY dig this Osama...I mean Obama dude, don't they?

No, people are just sheep and latch on to anything. That's the way it is in a democracy where education has no relevance to voting. Lets just find someone who can spew empty rhetoric that will inspire the masses and we win. It is a disparaging reality, and one that I am afraid will bring great sadness and trouble.
'

JEB_Stuart wrote:
No, people are just sheep and latch on to anything. That's the way it is in a democracy where education has no relevance to voting. Lets just find someone who can spew empty rhetoric that will inspire the masses and we win. It is a disparaging reality, and one that I am afraid will bring great sadness and trouble.
'

Ah, cynicism. The poor man's intelligence.

Also, the word you want to use is 'discouraging' not 'disparaging'.

dogma wrote:

JEB_Stuart wrote:
No, people are just sheep and latch on to anything. That's the way it is in a democracy where education has no relevance to voting. Lets just find someone who can spew empty rhetoric that will inspire the masses and we win. It is a disparaging reality, and one that I am afraid will bring great sadness and trouble.
'

Ah, cynicism. The poor man's intelligence.

Also, the word you want to use is 'discouraging' not 'disparaging'.

H. L. Mencken and Oscar Wilde were renowned for their poor intellect.

Despite your condescension, Jeb does have point in that populism should be avoided.

dogma wrote:

Ah, cynicism. The poor man's intelligence.

Also, the word you want to use is 'discouraging' not 'disparaging'.

My apologies for the wrong wording. Yes, it is true, I am cynical when it comes to our current form of democracy, but lets be honest, populism is not a good idea. The masses are not to be trusted on matters on a truly important scale. Party line voters, both conservative and liberal, as well as single issue voters have brought more polarization to this country then the news media could ever dream of. No longer are people able to think of issues as private, or of their own positions being fallible. Also, let us not forget that populism drove Adolph Hitler into power, not a coup. I simply warn of the dangers that populism faces and how the people are definitely fallible. Balance is needed and the people must sometimes be denied their immediate wants and desires for the sake of the future.

I think for the right to vote you have to go through a few tests
1: A voting test that measure your intelligence
2: 2 years of callege
3: 2 years in the military.

Zip Napalm wrote:
H. L. Mencken and Oscar Wilde were renowned for their poor intellect.

Since when is renown the measure of merit?

JEB_Stuart wrote:
My apologies for the wrong wording.

I should be the one apologizing, that was unnecessarily pedantic.

JEB_Stuart wrote:
Yes, it is true, I am cynical when it comes to our current form of democracy, but lets be honest, populism is not a good idea.

Agreed. Plato did a pretty good job of articulating my position on democracy.

JEB_Stuart wrote:
The masses are not to be trusted on matters on a truly important scale. Party line voters, both conservative and liberal, as well as single issue voters have brought more polarization to this country then the news media could ever dream of. No longer are people able to think of issues as private, or of their own positions being fallible.

I'd say that's less a matter of democracy, and more a matter of media ubiquity; but the effect is the same.

Polonius wrote:A more interesting thought experiment might be to ask which presidents, after their two terms, would have had a good shot of holding the office for a third term if they could have ran.

Truman: could have ran, but would have gotten creamed.

Ike: Probably would have held it, he was pretty popular. Did he have four more years in him?

Johnson: would have gotten demolished if he chose to run, which he could have.

Nixon: resigned before he could run again, has very popular until said resignation.

Reagan: as one of the only two term presidents to turn over the office to his own party, it seems likely that he coudl have won reelection even with the scandals and concerns. His age, and frankly, declining mental status would have been massive worries.

Bubba: Even with the lewinsky scandal, he carried high approval ratings through the end of his terms. America was fat and happy then, it seems unlikely we would have ditched him for McCain or W in 2000. it would have been a nasty race though.

W: would have gotten creamed. opinion polls aren't everything, but he was pretty deeply unpopular.

Looking at this, I think presidential politics might be simpler than anything thinks: are economic times good? If so, then the party retains the office. If not, expect a shift. The exceptions are 1) during a war that's going well and/or is popular, the party will hold on, and 2) long drawn out and unpopular wars will torpedo your chances, and 3) truly sordid scandals will affect races.

The one real outlier to this theory is W in 2000, as times were still good and you'd think that democrats would hold onto the white house, like the GOP did in 88. I think Gore being such a lousy candidate and W campaigning on values after the Bubba years outweighed the prosperity. I'm not a political insider, but it seems to me that Gore ran a terrible campaign while W ran smart. The influx of evengelical voters wasn't exactly predicted back then either.

It should be remembered that Gore won the popular vote (by a narrow margin.) Bush only won the election thanks to the controversial legal decision about the controversial operation of the registration and voting in Florida.

Kilkrazy wrote:
It should be remembered that Gore won the popular vote (by a narrow margin.) Bush only won the election thanks to the controversial legal decision about the controversial operation of the registration and voting in Florida.

True Bush did win because of a controversial legal decision, but that was what finally settled the continual recounts where Bush kept winning. It was just a legal recourse to put a stop to the endless whining and recounts by the Gore campaign. Ultimately though, Bush did have a much better crafted campaign that appealed to the average voter, versus the stodgy, boring appearance that Gore perpetrated throughout the campaign.

The reason for my post was not to advance any partisan view of recent electoral history.

My point was that the theory was advanced that the party of president normally changes when economic times are bad, indicating dissatisfaction with the incumbent's handling of the economy. The opinion was given that Bush 2000 was an unusual result since economic times weren't bad, in other words, there was no particular reason to vote against the Democrats.

In fact, despite a stodgy, boring campaign by Gore, and so on, Bush hardly won a ringing popular endorsement, which would reflect widespread condemnation of Democrat economic mismanagement.

In other words, it wasn't a particularly unusual result in terms of the economy based voting theory.

garret wrote:I think for the right to vote you have to go through a few tests
1: A voting test that measure your intelligence
2: 2 years of callege
3: 2 years in the military.

#1 - Singular possessive of "measure" is "measures".
#2 - "College", not "callege"
#3 - I assume by your own standards you wouldn't be voting, judging by that.

Not trying to be pedantic, but it's an ironic post.

Kilkrazy wrote:The reason for my post was not to advance any partisan view of recent electoral history.

My point was that the theory was advanced that the party of president normally changes when economic times are bad, indicating dissatisfaction with the incumbent's handling of the economy. The opinion was given that Bush 2000 was an unusual result since economic times weren't bad, in other words, there was no particular reason to vote against the Democrats.

In fact, despite a stodgy, boring campaign by Gore, and so on, Bush hardly won a ringing popular endorsement, which would reflect widespread condemnation of Democrat economic mismanagement.

In other words, it wasn't a particularly unusual result in terms of the economy based voting theory.

Ity supports my argument, with a good economy, even Gore almost became president. Serially!

JEB_Stuart wrote:My apologies for the wrong wording. Yes, it is true, I am cynical when it comes to our current form of democracy, but lets be honest, populism is not a good idea. The masses are not to be trusted on matters on a truly important scale.

When you say populism, are you sure you don't mean demagoguery or something like that? Populism is about framing the debate in terms of the will of the people vs the elites. Whereas you seem to be talking about the dangers of rule by the mob, something very different.

sebster wrote:
When you say populism, are you sure you don't mean demagoguery or something like that? Populism is about framing the debate in terms of the will of the people vs the elites. Whereas you seem to be talking about the dangers of rule by the mob, something very different.

No I don't mean mob rule, I mean it in the sense of universal suffrage. Time and time again the people has not risen to the challenge of education and common sense. They continue to make decisions on the whims of the time. This, to me anyway, is dangerous and should be done away with. Balance is always a good thing, and I think that in order to participate in government one should have at least be more educated. The decisions our government makes should be based on reason, logic and facts, NOT emotions or whims. The people are fickle, and thus cannot be trusted. Oh, and I come from a lower class family, which has only increased my sentiment.

lord_sutekh wrote:

garret wrote:I think for the right to vote you have to go through a few tests
1: A voting test that measure your intelligence
2: 2 years of callege
3: 2 years in the military.

#1 - Singular possessive of "measure" is "measures".
#2 - "College", not "callege"
#3 - I assume by your own standards you wouldn't be voting, judging by that.

Not trying to be pedantic, but it's an ironic post.

I suppose your right.
But i still think there should be some sort of requirment for voting.
Democracy is a great system it just that when we let everyone vote we get idiots who dont know hat there voting for or what it will do.

And when we limit the franchise, we say that one person is more or less worthy than another under the law according to someone's arbitrary standard. It's been done before, and it was just as wrong then as it is now. There are morons on all extremes of the political spectrum, even ones that have managed to make it through college (and even medical school); in the grand scheme, they balance each other out.

lord_sutekh wrote:And when we limit the franchise, we say that one person is more or less worthy than another under the law according to someone's arbitrary standard. It's been done before, and it was just as wrong then as it is now. There are morons on all extremes of the political spectrum, even ones that have managed to make it through college (and even medical school); in the grand scheme, they balance each other out.

I am afraid I might get burned at the stake for this comment, but here it goes. In theory all people are equal, but in reality they are not. If you had to choose between a life saving doctor or a homeless bum, who would you choose? All people are born equal and it is up to themselves to better their life and value. Now in some countries where they aren't even given a chance this is an unfair standard, but in the US and other Western countries everyone has the ability to better themselves. My family story is living proof. Also, I don't mean degrees for education, I mean well reasoned, fact educated opinions on issues that are voted upon. How can you make an honest and intelligent decision if you don't even know the issue itself? I hope in the grand scheme of things that your statements are in fact true, but I fear for society on the possibility that they are false.

We all know the reality, but who gets to choose the dividing line? The choice is not between the afforementioned "life saving doctor or homeless bum", but between a doctor who has saved 15 lives and one who has saved 16 lives. How do you set an absolute demarcation for human capability, when it has so many shades? I know a number of people who have never attended a day of college with a much better grasp of the challenges and issues of modern society than a few PhDs that I know through my mother (who happens to be one herself). What standards can we use to divide the worthy and the unworthy that don't a) falsely deny the franchise from capable and intelligent people and b) utterly betray everything that our country stands for? The former might be possible, but the latter is not.

Highly educated people are capable of ignoring facts just as readily as uneducated; the birthers are a fine example, demanding a paper copy of something that went electronic years ago (http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/feature/2009/07/24/klein_dobbs/index.html). It's been debunked more times than one can really count, but there are still highly educated people, even in office, who blindly hold to this myth. How do you judge who can vote based off of how reasonable their opinions or beliefs are, without having a huge bias?

garret wrote:I think for the right to vote you have to go through a few tests
1: A voting test that measure your intelligence
2: 2 years of callege
3: 2 years in the military.

1. Haven't you guys already tried that? No vote for the illiterate?
2. The US educational naming conventions baffle me (actually some of the UK ones do too, disturbingly (for me) Mrs Spiggott is a teacher) this could be highly prescriptive, certainly it ties in with no. 1.
3. Any branch of the military or just the Mobile Infantry?

garret wrote:I think for the right to vote you have to go through a few tests
1: A voting test that measure your intelligence
2: 2 years of callege

Words cannot describe how hilariously ironic I find this.

JEB_Stuart wrote:No I don't mean mob rule, I mean it in the sense of universal suffrage.

Okay. Just for future reference populism is the claim that the will of the people is being subverted by the elites (who can be ivory towered intellectuals, jews, or whoever happens to be evil right now). Which is basically the opposite of what you're saying the problem is. The word to describe the problem you're claiming would probably be demagoguery, it isn't an exact fit but its used to mean more or less what you're claiming quite a bit.

Time and time again the people has not risen to the challenge of education and common sense. They continue to make decisions on the whims of the time. This, to me anyway, is dangerous and should be done away with. Balance is always a good thing, and I think that in order to participate in government one should have at least be more educated. The decisions our government makes should be based on reason, logic and facts, NOT emotions or whims. The people are fickle, and thus cannot be trusted. Oh, and I come from a lower class family, which has only increased my sentiment.

I'm not going to defend the political knowledge of the average citizen. I can't, because most people know almost nothing about government and how it works. The Economist (I think it was the Economist) ran a classic survey a while back, asking US citizens if government gave too much in foreign aid. The answer was an overwhelming 'yes'. They were then asked how much should be given, and among the people who said too much aid was given the average was around 10%. Somewhat hilariously this was two or three times the amount actually given.

But I still have to disagree with your idea. The idea of exactly who is qualified to vote is so subjective. It is hard enough to avoid districting ending up a partisan mess, how fair do you expect any kind of test of voter knowledge to be?

And what's most likely in the current environment is for the major parties to start teaching to the test, coaching people who strongly support their party to take the test. This would increase the voting power of the true believers of the major parties, while decreasing the voting power of those cynical with the current state of affairs. This is a very bad result.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

JEB_Stuart wrote:I am afraid I might get burned at the stake for this comment, but here it goes. In theory all people are equal, but in reality they are not. If you had to choose between a life saving doctor or a homeless bum, who would you choose? All people are born equal and it is up to themselves to better their life and value. Now in some countries where they aren't even given a chance this is an unfair standard, but in the US and other Western countries everyone has the ability to better themselves.

One of the great things about Western democracies is that they've gotten closer to true meritocracies than any other society in history. One of the great problem of Western democracies is for people to think we are a lot closer to meritocracies than we really are.

Actually I would be supportive of educational limitations on voting, but not as stereotyped.

To vote you should have to have a class on two things: 1. The US political system and current Constitution (with focus on the Bill of Rights especially the 10th Amendment); and: 2) Economics for Dummies. It should be taught in an easy understand 'hands on' manner so that anyone can get it.

With that basis of understanding we would have a citizenry able to make more informed voting decisions.

One of the best quotes from West Wing:

Josh: 68% think we give too much in foreign aid, and 59% think it should be cut.
Will: You like that stat.
Josh: I do.
Will: Why?
Josh: Because 9% think it's too high and shouldn't be cut. 9% of respondents could not fully get their arms around the question. There should be another box you can check for "I have utterly no idea what you're talking about. Please, God, don't ask for my input.""

Frazzled wrote:Actually I would be supportive of educational limitations on voting, but not as stereotyped.

To vote you should have to have a class on two things: 1. The US political system and current Constitution (with focus on the Bill of Rights especially the 10th Amendment); and: 2) Economics for Dummies. It should be taught in an easy understand 'hands on' manner so that anyone can get it.

With that basis of understanding we would have a citizenry able to make more informed voting decisions.

To horribly mangle an old saying, "You can lead a voter to knowledge, but you can't make him think."

On the other hand. If we require a class to drive, we should freeking require a simple class to do something far more important-vote.

Could it be mandatory? And would people be forced to repeat until they passed?

1. mandatory.

2. yes you could repeat it, just like a driver's license. In fact I'd be down with it being just a test like that with a free class. If you feel you don't need the class just take the test.

Frazzled wrote:On the other hand. If we require a class to drive, we should freeking require a simple class to do something far more important-own a gun.

*scarpers quickly*

Prisoners can't vote in the USA right ? That's just whilst they're incarcerated yes ? Or is it only for certain crimes they lose it ?