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On February 07 2014 08:04 Introvert wrote:Show nested quote +On February 07 2014 07:52 Chocolate wrote:On February 07 2014 07:37 Introvert wrote:Since the states don't choose Senators, it means that they have no say when the Federal Government seizes all their power. Remember that originally the states were supposed to be the ones making most decisions on most things. The 17th (and 16th) amendments perfectly coincided with the progressive movements attempt to empower government. If Senators were chosen by states, you wouldn't have the absurdity of most of a states legislature and House members opposing something only to have the senator support it. The founders, based on what they knew of history, feared direct democracy. Just like the left criticizes the right for shouting "communist!" the left's favorite buzzword/s is/are "democracy" or "the middle class." if the states had control, maybe so many of these senators wouldn't vote for things that break the back of the state. The gerrymandering issue is a legitimate concern, I will admit. That could be addressed simultaneously to the amendment repealing the 17th  I love how everyone here is ignorant on the history or reasoning behind it but still feels educated enough to speak about it. Please, continue."Why would they want that!" Maybe if you took American Government you would know. Or maybe you still weren't taught it anyway, this is America after all. The last thing the state run school will teach about is how bloated the Fed Gov. has become and how far from the founding we've drifted. While I'm generally skeptical of direct elections due to the number of side effects they cause, I can't really support such an effort, as it seems too blatant an attempt to simply gain power in the senate for repubs, and Cruz is untrustworthy. If they'd make the proposal when it wouldn't be to their benefit, then their claim about it being about states rights would be more believable. Do you know how long this process takes? To say it's a Republican power grab is absurd. Also, Democrat states would have to agree with it. Introvert do you think it's bad that people might disagree with some parts of the constitution, or that some people only look at what the constitution actually says as opposed to what some people think the founders meant to say? Because I honestly don't give a shit if the founding fathers had a particular idea, just because they thought of something over 200 years ago doesn't make it any more valid than another idea that they didn't think of (or that didn't make sense at the time). I'm not necessarily trying to defend the bloat, as there are many sectors of the federal government that are overly bloated or just should not exist at all, but rather the notion that the founding fathers did not create a perfect governmental system. No, it's fine to disagree. But I think it's a waste of time for people to essentially begin debating something from the middle out. For you to say "Because I honestly don't give a shit if the founding fathers had a particular idea" is a great example of this. The document wasn't/isn't perfect, but to dismiss it based on age is absurd (isn't that a logical fallacy? I believe it is). If you don't know why they did it, then it will seem pointless. But one should at least make an attempt to understand the reasoning before bleating out the standard opposition line. Show nested quote +state legislature is generally the most corrupt special interest group known to american politics. can't be a good idea to let them have any more relevance
the ny state legislature gets wired up by teh fbi to root out corruption rofl and it's not even working that well.
As for the corruption remark, I have to say that the whole system is corrupt. At least people can have more of an influence locally than even state wide. Every political philosopher that's written in favor of this system has noted that it requires an informed and active citizenry. If the 17th was repealed, it might even get people more involved, which is always good. I say corruption is far harder to fight state wide. It's a lot easier to be informed locally, if one really makes the effort.
Fair enough. I wasn't trying to be dismissive based on age, my bad. I was rather trying to get at the concept that simply because something is old doesn't mean it is something to be venerated anything more than something new and of equal merit.
Do you guys think we will ever not have a department of homeland security?
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@xdaunt
it seems like you are implying that climate regulation is an epistemic impossibility. are you familiar with stability regions of non-linear systems, control systems theory in general or is it intuition? have the decency to employ a semblance of pragmatism, it's part and parcel of every policy...
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I'd rather design a governmental system that works well without an informed and active citizenry. More fault tolerance in a system is good.
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On February 07 2014 09:05 zlefin wrote:
I'd rather design a governmental system that works well without an informed and active citizenry. More fault tolerance in a system is good.
Technocracy to the mooooon. I kind of agree, though. I don't trust the average voter to be informed at all
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On February 07 2014 06:55 {CC}StealthBlue wrote:Show nested quote +It may be an idea whose time came and went 100 years ago.
Nevertheless, it's back.
A number of Republican politicians and conservative commentators are calling for repeal of the 17th Amendment. Ratified in 1913, it gave voters the power to elect U.S. senators directly.
Before that, senators were generally selected by state legislatures. Returning that authority to the states would give them much more sway in Washington, restoring their role as a check on federal expansion, repeal supporters say.
"There's no doubt that was a major step toward the explosion of federal power and the undermining of the authority of the states," Texas GOP Sen. Ted Cruz said at a summit of the American Legislative Exchange Council, a conservative group of state legislators and businesses, back in December.
The issue has come up in any number of campaigns over the past decade, but it hasn't caught on much as a voting issue. It takes a while to explain the history and why trying to reverse it — by taking away or diminishing the effect of popular votes for Senate — would be a good thing.
Even proponents don't think there's any foreseeable chance of jumping all the hurdles involved in rewriting the Constitution. But giving states themselves — as opposed to individual voters within states — more of a voice in Washington is an issue with considerable resonance among parts of the conservative coalition.
As things stand, letting legislatures decide would guarantee Republicans a majority in the U.S. Senate. The GOP currently holds majorities in both chambers in 26 states, along with effective control of the nonpartisan Nebraska Legislature. Democrats control 18 legislatures, with the others split.
"You'd have to educate people about what the 17th Amendment is all about and what the repercussions are," says Republican Jim McKelvey, who pushed the matter in his unsuccessful campaign for the Virginia House of Delegates last year. "State sovereignty has been trounced on. It's one of the big problems." Source At least then we wouldn't have Senators behaving as much in their personal permanent incumbency and actually thinking about how legislation that passes affects the state that elected them. Like Madison said,The state legislatures will jealously and closely watch the operations of this Government, and be able to resist with more effect every assumption of power, than any other power on earth can do; and the greatest opponents to a Federal government admit the State Legislatures to be sure guardians of the people’s liberty.
Then we might have more accountability for state senators that vote for something (say, ACA) that their state then brings lawsuit against because it's terrible for the state. In this atmosphere of increasing federal control and decreasing state rights, it would be one step in the right direction. I'd like nothing better than state legislature-elected senators rejecting ACA-type bills, and returning the issue to the states.
Unchecked "assumption of power" actually describes very well the federal government in the last 20 years of politics, if not longer
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On February 07 2014 08:09 oneofthem wrote:Show nested quote +On February 07 2014 08:04 Introvert wrote:On February 07 2014 07:52 Chocolate wrote:On February 07 2014 07:37 Introvert wrote:Since the states don't choose Senators, it means that they have no say when the Federal Government seizes all their power. Remember that originally the states were supposed to be the ones making most decisions on most things. The 17th (and 16th) amendments perfectly coincided with the progressive movements attempt to empower government. If Senators were chosen by states, you wouldn't have the absurdity of most of a states legislature and House members opposing something only to have the senator support it. The founders, based on what they knew of history, feared direct democracy. Just like the left criticizes the right for shouting "communist!" the left's favorite buzzword/s is/are "democracy" or "the middle class." if the states had control, maybe so many of these senators wouldn't vote for things that break the back of the state. The gerrymandering issue is a legitimate concern, I will admit. That could be addressed simultaneously to the amendment repealing the 17th I love how everyone here is ignorant on the history or reasoning behind it but still feels educated enough to speak about it. Please, continue."Why would they want that!" Maybe if you took American Government you would know. Or maybe you still weren't taught it anyway, this is America after all. The last thing the state run school will teach about is how bloated the Fed Gov. has become and how far from the founding we've drifted. While I'm generally skeptical of direct elections due to the number of side effects they cause, I can't really support such an effort, as it seems too blatant an attempt to simply gain power in the senate for repubs, and Cruz is untrustworthy. If they'd make the proposal when it wouldn't be to their benefit, then their claim about it being about states rights would be more believable. Do you know how long this process takes? To say it's a Republican power grab is absurd. Also, Democrat states would have to agree with it. Introvert do you think it's bad that people might disagree with some parts of the constitution, or that some people only look at what the constitution actually says as opposed to what some people think the founders meant to say? Because I honestly don't give a shit if the founding fathers had a particular idea, just because they thought of something over 200 years ago doesn't make it any more valid than another idea that they didn't think of (or that didn't make sense at the time). I'm not necessarily trying to defend the bloat, as there are many sectors of the federal government that are overly bloated or just should not exist at all, but rather the notion that the founding fathers did not create a perfect governmental system. No, it's fine to disagree. But I think it's a waste of time for people to essentially begin debating something from the middle out. For you to say "Because I honestly don't give a shit if the founding fathers had a particular idea" is a great example of this. The document wasn't/isn't perfect, but to dismiss it based on age is absurd (isn't that a logical fallacy? I believe it is). If you don't know why they did it, then it will seem pointless. But one should at least make an attempt to understand the reasoning before bleating out the standard opposition line. state legislature is generally the most corrupt special interest group known to american politics. can't be a good idea to let them have any more relevance
the ny state legislature gets wired up by teh fbi to root out corruption rofl and it's not even working that well.
As for the corruption remark, I have to say that the whole system is corrupt. At least people can have more of an influence locally than even state wide. Every political philosopher that's written in favor of this system has noted that it requires an informed and active citizenry. If the 17th was repealed, it might even get people more involved, which is always good. I say corruption is far harder to fight state wide. It's a lot easier to be informed locally, if one really makes the effort. this is not 1770 dude. look at the reality
I know, all history and learning began in 1913, right? All political philosophy pre-progressive era is outmoded!
Fair enough. I wasn't trying to be dismissive based on age, my bad. I was rather trying to get at the concept that simply because something is old doesn't mean it is something to be venerated anything more than something new and of equal merit.
Do you guys think we will ever not have a department of homeland security?
I never argued based on age, I said it would be wise to know WHY the system was set up the way it was. Everyone else brought up its age as a point of attack.
I don't know what you are getting at with that last question. As long as a department is only formed to execute a Constitutionally allowed function (and the department is not redundant) then I don't have a problem with it,
I'd rather design a governmental system that works well without an informed and active citizenry. More fault tolerance in a system is good.
You are retreading the classic problem... who gets to design? Who is "informed?"
And my personal favorite- why on earth think that those who are educated are any more more moral, unbiased and virtuous than everyone else? Whether you concentrate power in a few scientists or a few politicians, you get the same result, generally speaking. It's because they are both human.
As I believe William F. Buckley said: I'd rather be governed by the first 100 people in the Boston phone directory than the faculty at Harvard.
Unchecked "assumption of power" actually describes very well the federal government in the last 20 years of politics, if not longer.
Don't worry, A) it's all of our own good, and B) they will stop before they become tyrannical. History clearly shows that, right?
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Introvert - I never said the power would all be concentrated in that way; the point being, you make false assumptions then criticize based on those assumptions.
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On February 07 2014 11:06 zlefin wrote:
Introvert - I never said the power would all be concentrated in that way; the point being, you make false assumptions then criticize based on those assumptions.
Then please tell me what you mean. I take your statement to mean that things should only be run by those who are educated on particular matters and that the general populace doesn't really need to be involved. Your statement implies that the people will make fewer and fewer important decisions. Unless you are advocating that the people shouldn't know what those who are in charge are actually doing, which seems far less likely than the other interpretation.
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New York’s affiliate of the National Rifle Association has seen its membership explode in the months since Gov. Andrew Cuomo passed new and strict gun control measures. Now, the state chapter has the largest membership roll in the country.
“Membership growth over the past year has pushed [the New York State Rifle & Pistol Association] into the top spot over the Texas State Rifle Association and California Rifle & Pistol Association,” the chapter said on its website, Newsmax reported.
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/feb/6/nra-new-york-doubles-membership-face-new-gun-laws/
Go citizens!
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NRA is not in favor of citizens, or they wouldn't advocate foolishness so often. If they stuck to actual sensible policies they'd be great, but they don't.
And you cited a method of selection from buckley which satisfies the criteria I named, and which seems to your tastes, so my point stands about not making assumptions.
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WASHINGTON, Feb 5 (Reuters) - President Barack Obama's administration will announce on Wednesday the formation of seven "climate hubs" to help farmers and rural communities adapt to extreme weather conditions and other effects of climate change, a White House official said.
The hubs will act as information centers and aim to help farmers and ranchers handle risks, including fires, pests, floods and droughts, that are exacerbated by global warming.
The hubs will be located in Ames, Iowa; Durham, New Hampshire; Raleigh, North Carolina; Fort Collins, Colorado; El Reno, Oklahoma; Corvallis, Oregon; and Las Cruces, New Mexico, the official said.
Additional "sub hubs" will be set up in Rio Piedras, Puerto Rico; Davis, California; and Houghton, Michigan.
The hubs are an example of executive actions Obama has promised to take to fight climate change.
The president has made the issue a top priority for 2014 and has the authority to take many measures that address it without congressional approval.
Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack will make the announcement of the "Regional Hubs for Risk Adaptation and Mitigation to Climate Change" at a White House briefing, the official said.
"For generations, America's farmers, ranchers and forest landowners have innovated and adapted to challenges," Vilsack said in a statement.
"Today, they face a new and more complex threat in the form of a changing and shifting climate, which impacts both our nation's forests and our farmers' bottom lines," he said.
Environmentalists want big economies such as the United States and China to reduce their emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases that scientists blame for heating the planet, but they have urged policy makers around the world to take action as well to help communities adapt to rising temperatures now.
Source
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On February 07 2014 11:53 zlefin wrote:
NRA is not in favor of citizens, or they wouldn't advocate foolishness so often. If they stuck to actual sensible policies they'd be great, but they don't.
And you cited a method of selection from buckley which satisfies the criteria I named, and which seems to your tastes, so my point stands about not making assumptions.
The NRA consists of free-willed citizens. It's not some mandatory union membership, so I'd say those in its ranks would disagree with you. But let's do gun control again so soon, we just went over it -_-
I wasn't challenging some point about making assumptions. When your post consists of 2 sentences, some extrapolation and assumption must be made. Unless you meant for your post to sit there and and receive no response.
So I still don't quite know what you mean. The quote was obviously tongue-in-cheek, saying the educated would be worse rulers than random, normal citizens. I don't see how that relates to your point about them being less informed.
I apologize for not understanding you, help me out here.
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On February 07 2014 12:03 Introvert wrote:Show nested quote +On February 07 2014 11:53 zlefin wrote:
NRA is not in favor of citizens, or they wouldn't advocate foolishness so often. If they stuck to actual sensible policies they'd be great, but they don't.
And you cited a method of selection from buckley which satisfies the criteria I named, and which seems to your tastes, so my point stands about not making assumptions. The NRA consists of free-willed citizens. It's not some mandatory union membership, so I'd say those in its ranks would disagree with you. But let's do gun control again so soon, we just went over it -_-
Just saying, the fact that something is made up of free-willed citizens doesn't make an organization necessarily good or in favor of citizens. There's been quite a few truly horrific organizations and I'm sure all their members would disagree as well. There's nothing stopping a group of free-willed idiots from getting together for whatever purposes.
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On February 07 2014 11:58 {CC}StealthBlue wrote:Show nested quote +WASHINGTON, Feb 5 (Reuters) - President Barack Obama's administration will announce on Wednesday the formation of seven "climate hubs" to help farmers and rural communities adapt to extreme weather conditions and other effects of climate change, a White House official said.
The hubs will act as information centers and aim to help farmers and ranchers handle risks, including fires, pests, floods and droughts, that are exacerbated by global warming.
The hubs will be located in Ames, Iowa; Durham, New Hampshire; Raleigh, North Carolina; Fort Collins, Colorado; El Reno, Oklahoma; Corvallis, Oregon; and Las Cruces, New Mexico, the official said.
Additional "sub hubs" will be set up in Rio Piedras, Puerto Rico; Davis, California; and Houghton, Michigan.
The hubs are an example of executive actions Obama has promised to take to fight climate change.
The president has made the issue a top priority for 2014 and has the authority to take many measures that address it without congressional approval.
Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack will make the announcement of the "Regional Hubs for Risk Adaptation and Mitigation to Climate Change" at a White House briefing, the official said.
"For generations, America's farmers, ranchers and forest landowners have innovated and adapted to challenges," Vilsack said in a statement.
"Today, they face a new and more complex threat in the form of a changing and shifting climate, which impacts both our nation's forests and our farmers' bottom lines," he said.
Environmentalists want big economies such as the United States and China to reduce their emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases that scientists blame for heating the planet, but they have urged policy makers around the world to take action as well to help communities adapt to rising temperatures now. Source
so...if farmers are too lazy to google things...theyll google it for them or is there going to be more substantive work?
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My statement doesn't require any extrapolation or assumption. Let us review it:
I'd rather design a governmental system that works well without an informed and active citizenry. More fault tolerance in a system is good.
You can simply take it at face value, that designing such a system would be nice. It might be difficult, and commenting on the various difficulties involved in it might be reasonable. Or mentioning various ways it might be done would be fine, or how various partial attempts have been done in the past. Ignoring it, or deciding you have nothing useful to add to it is fine.
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On February 07 2014 12:52 zlefin wrote:
My statement doesn't require any extrapolation or assumption. Let us review it:
I'd rather design a governmental system that works well without an informed and active citizenry. More fault tolerance in a system is good.
You can simply take it at face value, that designing such a system would be nice. It might be difficult, and commenting on the various difficulties involved in it might be reasonable. Or mentioning various ways it might be done would be fine, or how various partial attempts have been done in the past. Ignoring it, or deciding you have nothing useful to add to it is fine.
Ok, let's work with that then. Why would it be nice? What benefit would it provide? Lots of systems "work" but we obviously have preferences.
I'd rather not have that system, but maybe that's because I'm having a hard time imagining such a thing. Do you mean a Fahrenheit 451 type of system? Where the people are just concerned with their own small worlds, their TVs, etc? Where the government just is and acts, and no one really pays attention?
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The benefit it would provide is it would be less harmed when citizen interest/activity is in fact low.
All else being equal (as nothing else was mentioned) - it's preferable to have a system which is more robust against bad circumstances (low civic engagement).
I'm not necessarily imagining any specific system, merely that it would be a nice property to have if we could design a way to do it that keeps all else equal (or close to equal).
When you try to imagine an instance of it, you end up filling in details to get a full system, rather than just a property; as a result, you see the negative sideeffects that can occur in many systems with that property; so you keep seeing those effects. You need to not try to imagine an instance, and just look at the property on its own, as a property.
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On February 07 2014 13:38 zlefin wrote:
The benefit it would provide is it would be less harmed when citizen interest/activity is in fact low.
All else being equal (as nothing else was mentioned) - it's preferable to have a system which is more robust against bad circumstances (low civic engagement).
I'm not necessarily imagining any specific system, merely that it would be a nice property to have if we could design a way to do it that keeps all else equal (or close to equal).
When you try to imagine an instance of it, you end up filling in details to get a full system, rather than just a property; as a result, you see the negative sideeffects that can occur in many systems with that property; so you keep seeing those effects. You need to not try to imagine an instance, and just look at the property on its own, as a property.
ok, I see what you are saying. It was hard for me to see it because I'm used to looking at situations and thinking of exceptions, problems, and logical inconsistencies. When we are talking politics, we normally aren't operating in a vacuum, either. There are always external concerns.
So when you start musing about some (IMO) impossible scenario, I didn't see it. Like a frictionless surface I thought you were advocating something more concrete.
I don't really like it anyway, but to each his own.
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If we're talking about representative government, that's a frightening assumption that the populace will not care that much who their representatives are and what they're doing. I'm remembering one of the only exciting parts of the 2012 runup, which was Clint Eastwood's speech at convention. We own this country. Politicians are employees of ours. And, so, they're just going to come around and beg for votes every few years. And when somebody does not do the job, we got to let 'em go.
It's hard to blame the Democrats for seizing power for themselves in the federal government. Citizens like being told Washington is hard at work spreading the compassion we've outsourced to them. Who cares how we're going to pay for it all, how fast it's expanding ... you might get a subsidy and you deserve it! They're that shining army of social justice, and if they say they're going to fix problems, they mean it! Hope, change, and a chicken dinner.
With low participation, it is only those extremely visible circumstances, like widespread unemployment and millions losing their health insurance, that starts a small surge in activity. You might even say when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object, evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism ... that's when citizens get back interested in what government's doing.
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On February 07 2014 18:09 Danglars wrote:
If we're talking about representative government, that's a frightening assumption that the populace will not care that much who their representatives are and what they're doing. I'm remembering one of the only exciting parts of the 2012 runup, which was Clint Eastwood's speech at convention. We own this country. Politicians are employees of ours. And, so, they're just going to come around and beg for votes every few years. And when somebody does not do the job, we got to let 'em go.
It's hard to blame the Democrats for seizing power for themselves in the federal government. Citizens like being told Washington is hard at work spreading the compassion we've outsourced to them. Who cares how we're going to pay for it all, how fast it's expanding ... you might get a subsidy and you deserve it! They're that shining army of social justice, and if they say they're going to fix problems, they mean it! Hope, change, and a chicken dinner.
With low participation, it is only those extremely visible circumstances, like widespread unemployment and millions losing their health insurance, that starts a small surge in activity. You might even say when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object, evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism ... that's when citizens get back interested in what government's doing.
*And getting a new, most probabably better healthcare plan under the ACA. And the unemployment is something you( or rather we=the western world) did ourselves. We let the Chinese/Taiwanese build our high tech toys, unskilled employees, whether it be in the US or the EU getting fucked as their jobs get shipped overseas - or done by a Computer.
Talking about something like a postindustrial world and what that implies might be a good idea too if we are discussing systems of government and what people should be able to do for themselves.
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EPT
