|
Although this thread does not function under the same strict guidelines as the USPMT, it is still a general practice on TL to provide a source with an explanation on why it is relevant and what purpose it adds to the discussion. Failure to do so will result in a mod action. |
On October 24 2018 23:08 Toadesstern wrote:Show nested quote +On October 24 2018 23:03 Big J wrote:On October 24 2018 22:36 iamthedave wrote:On October 24 2018 22:27 Big J wrote:On October 24 2018 22:22 Jockmcplop wrote:On October 24 2018 22:16 Gorsameth wrote:On October 24 2018 22:08 TheDwf wrote:On October 24 2018 21:54 Gorsameth wrote:On October 24 2018 21:44 TheDwf wrote:
The EU is undemocratic because there is no corresponding European people who decided to merge their older nations and mutualize their budget, laws, territory and sovereignty Pretty sure the European people voted for the governments that came together and formed the EU. And France even held a referendum for it so 'you' actually got to vote for it. (even tho it only won by a very narrow margin) If you talk about Maastricht, it was 25 years ago and yes, it only won 51/49. But the TCE was also refused in 2005, and it contained all prior treaties, including Maastricht. So from there, there should have been a clarification. But conservatives and "social-democrats" made everything to bury the theme and passed a copy of the TCE together in the Congress in 2008, betraying Sarkozy's promise of a "mini-treaty". Sounds less like a lack of Democracy and more like you don't agree with the choice your Democratically elected government made. Welcome to life. Its somewhere between the two or a little of both really. If your democratically elected government decides to sell out some of your democratic rights, do you still have democracy? I think the answer is yes, but less so. That's a common logical fallacy. A democracy cannot sellout democratic rights just like the mathematical "set of all sets that don't contain themselves" cannot be allowed to be a set by the definition of "a set". Or how tolerance cannot tolerate the intolerant. It's a basic definition problem. If your definition of democracy allows for undermining democracy then it is actually not democracy in the first place. Every democracy allows for undermining democracy. That's how democracies get undermined in the first place. The Greeks were writing about this problem when they came up with the idea hundreds of years ago. Every law system can be undermined by the anarchic nature of reality. The world is made up by the self-interests of living and acting people and those actions don't need to follow laws or fit into descriptions of "democracy" or any other system. The concern of politics is to overcome that anarchy for some reason. The concern of liberal politics is to find a system that works for all reasons that don't deny other reasons and mediate all conflicts of interests. All of that is philosophically nice, but the world does not run on philosophy but on people subscribing to technical methods. Like democracy. Which is not a technical method if it can deny itself. just to put this clearly to save us all some time: According to this you would be against two nations merging even if both nations held a referndum and in both nations the outcome was 99% in favor of the merger. Because those 1% that disagreed with it would have lost their democracy (democractic rights) in some way. Your vote only is worth 50% now, you don't get to vote on something you got to vote on earlier etc. I don't think there's a point in arguing with that...
Just like previously you missunderstand.
I have a say in voting for the Austrian government and therefore indirectly in the choosing of the Austrian commissioner. If the Austrian commissioner rules something that concerns me it is democratic in some way.
That is not true for all the other commissioners.
It is one thing to have someone represent you that you voted against, it is another if you didnt get to vote. In your nation example I got to vote, just like in the US election example previously. I did not get to vote on Mrs. Merkel and her commissioner though, regardless of the outcome.
|
On October 24 2018 23:17 Big J wrote:Show nested quote +On October 24 2018 23:08 Toadesstern wrote:On October 24 2018 23:03 Big J wrote:On October 24 2018 22:36 iamthedave wrote:On October 24 2018 22:27 Big J wrote:On October 24 2018 22:22 Jockmcplop wrote:On October 24 2018 22:16 Gorsameth wrote:On October 24 2018 22:08 TheDwf wrote:On October 24 2018 21:54 Gorsameth wrote:On October 24 2018 21:44 TheDwf wrote:
The EU is undemocratic because there is no corresponding European people who decided to merge their older nations and mutualize their budget, laws, territory and sovereignty Pretty sure the European people voted for the governments that came together and formed the EU. And France even held a referendum for it so 'you' actually got to vote for it. (even tho it only won by a very narrow margin) If you talk about Maastricht, it was 25 years ago and yes, it only won 51/49. But the TCE was also refused in 2005, and it contained all prior treaties, including Maastricht. So from there, there should have been a clarification. But conservatives and "social-democrats" made everything to bury the theme and passed a copy of the TCE together in the Congress in 2008, betraying Sarkozy's promise of a "mini-treaty". Sounds less like a lack of Democracy and more like you don't agree with the choice your Democratically elected government made. Welcome to life. Its somewhere between the two or a little of both really. If your democratically elected government decides to sell out some of your democratic rights, do you still have democracy? I think the answer is yes, but less so. That's a common logical fallacy. A democracy cannot sellout democratic rights just like the mathematical "set of all sets that don't contain themselves" cannot be allowed to be a set by the definition of "a set". Or how tolerance cannot tolerate the intolerant. It's a basic definition problem. If your definition of democracy allows for undermining democracy then it is actually not democracy in the first place. Every democracy allows for undermining democracy. That's how democracies get undermined in the first place. The Greeks were writing about this problem when they came up with the idea hundreds of years ago. Every law system can be undermined by the anarchic nature of reality. The world is made up by the self-interests of living and acting people and those actions don't need to follow laws or fit into descriptions of "democracy" or any other system. The concern of politics is to overcome that anarchy for some reason. The concern of liberal politics is to find a system that works for all reasons that don't deny other reasons and mediate all conflicts of interests. All of that is philosophically nice, but the world does not run on philosophy but on people subscribing to technical methods. Like democracy. Which is not a technical method if it can deny itself. just to put this clearly to save us all some time: According to this you would be against two nations merging even if both nations held a referndum and in both nations the outcome was 99% in favor of the merger. Because those 1% that disagreed with it would have lost their democracy (democractic rights) in some way. Your vote only is worth 50% now, you don't get to vote on something you got to vote on earlier etc. I don't think there's a point in arguing with that... Just like previously you missunderstand. I have a say in voting for the Austrian government and therefore indirectly in the choosing of the Austrian commissioner. If the Austrian commissioner rules something that concerns me it is democratic in some way. That is not true for all the other commissioners. It is one thing to have someone represent you that you voted against, it is another if you didnt get to vote. In your nation example I got to vote, just like in the US election example previously. I did not get to vote on Mrs. Merkel and her commissioner though, regardless of the outcome.
But what about the senate or the congress? I know there are a lot of Californians who would love to vote in Texas atm.
|
On October 24 2018 23:29 Neneu wrote:Show nested quote +On October 24 2018 23:17 Big J wrote:On October 24 2018 23:08 Toadesstern wrote:On October 24 2018 23:03 Big J wrote:On October 24 2018 22:36 iamthedave wrote:On October 24 2018 22:27 Big J wrote:On October 24 2018 22:22 Jockmcplop wrote:On October 24 2018 22:16 Gorsameth wrote:On October 24 2018 22:08 TheDwf wrote:On October 24 2018 21:54 Gorsameth wrote:
[quote]Pretty sure the European people voted for the governments that came together and formed the EU.
And France even held a referendum for it so 'you' actually got to vote for it. (even tho it only won by a very narrow margin) If you talk about Maastricht, it was 25 years ago and yes, it only won 51/49. But the TCE was also refused in 2005, and it contained all prior treaties, including Maastricht. So from there, there should have been a clarification. But conservatives and "social-democrats" made everything to bury the theme and passed a copy of the TCE together in the Congress in 2008, betraying Sarkozy's promise of a "mini-treaty". Sounds less like a lack of Democracy and more like you don't agree with the choice your Democratically elected government made. Welcome to life. Its somewhere between the two or a little of both really. If your democratically elected government decides to sell out some of your democratic rights, do you still have democracy? I think the answer is yes, but less so. That's a common logical fallacy. A democracy cannot sellout democratic rights just like the mathematical "set of all sets that don't contain themselves" cannot be allowed to be a set by the definition of "a set". Or how tolerance cannot tolerate the intolerant. It's a basic definition problem. If your definition of democracy allows for undermining democracy then it is actually not democracy in the first place. Every democracy allows for undermining democracy. That's how democracies get undermined in the first place. The Greeks were writing about this problem when they came up with the idea hundreds of years ago. Every law system can be undermined by the anarchic nature of reality. The world is made up by the self-interests of living and acting people and those actions don't need to follow laws or fit into descriptions of "democracy" or any other system. The concern of politics is to overcome that anarchy for some reason. The concern of liberal politics is to find a system that works for all reasons that don't deny other reasons and mediate all conflicts of interests. All of that is philosophically nice, but the world does not run on philosophy but on people subscribing to technical methods. Like democracy. Which is not a technical method if it can deny itself. just to put this clearly to save us all some time: According to this you would be against two nations merging even if both nations held a referndum and in both nations the outcome was 99% in favor of the merger. Because those 1% that disagreed with it would have lost their democracy (democractic rights) in some way. Your vote only is worth 50% now, you don't get to vote on something you got to vote on earlier etc. I don't think there's a point in arguing with that... Just like previously you missunderstand. I have a say in voting for the Austrian government and therefore indirectly in the choosing of the Austrian commissioner. If the Austrian commissioner rules something that concerns me it is democratic in some way. That is not true for all the other commissioners. It is one thing to have someone represent you that you voted against, it is another if you didnt get to vote. In your nation example I got to vote, just like in the US election example previously. I did not get to vote on Mrs. Merkel and her commissioner though, regardless of the outcome. But what about the senate or the congress? I know there are a lot of Californians who would love to vote in Texas atm.
Yes, I am not a fan of these systems, plain as that. America in general has insane problems with democracy, from the democratic superdelegate farce to gerrymandering to winner takes it all, the flawed distributon of the electoral college and as you say the senate and congress system. Everything is tinkered to prevent representation outside of party elites as much as possible.
A mutual institution needs a mutual vote with a representative distribution to be a democratic organ of everyone.
|
It seems like Israel is overreaching in its aim to completely silence all criticism, interfering in the ability of activists worldwide to show their displeasure at its illegal occupation and random murder of Palestinians.
After the laughable attempt to sue two New Zealanders for encouraging Lourdes not to play a gig, they are now attempting to strongarm every political party in Europe.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/oct/24/european-parties-urged-agree-israel-boycott-bds-antisemitic-mep
A conference in Brussels backed by the Israeli government is to push for all European political parties to sign up to “red lines” that declare boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) tactics to be “fundamentally antisemitic”.
The two-day convention, attended by Israel’s minister of Jerusalem affairs, Ze’ev Elkin, will propose a text for prospective MEPs and political parties to sign up to before European elections in May next year.
The text urges EU member states to sign up to the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s “working definition of antisemitism” and exclude from government any politicians or parties that breach it.
Most controversially, one of the red lines – based on a resolution adopted by Angela Merkel’s Christian Democratic Union in Germany in 2016 – calls on “all political parties to pass a binding resolution rejecting BDS activities as fundamentally antisemitic”.
Rabbi Menachem Margolin, the founder of the European Jewish Association, an umbrella group of organisations that is co-organising the conference with the Europe Israel Public Affairs (EIPA) group, said: “These ‘red lines’ when passed will represent not our line in the sand but our line in the concrete, and serve as a wake-up call to politicians that the very future of Jewish Europe is on the line here.”
|
On October 24 2018 23:54 Jockmcplop wrote:It seems like Israel is overreaching in its aim to completely silence all criticism, interfering in the ability of activists worldwide to show their displeasure at its illegal occupation and random murder of Palestinians. After the laughable attempt to sue two New Zealanders for encouraging Lourdes not to play a gig, they are now attempting to strongarm every political party in Europe. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/oct/24/european-parties-urged-agree-israel-boycott-bds-antisemitic-mepShow nested quote +A conference in Brussels backed by the Israeli government is to push for all European political parties to sign up to “red lines” that declare boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) tactics to be “fundamentally antisemitic”.
The two-day convention, attended by Israel’s minister of Jerusalem affairs, Ze’ev Elkin, will propose a text for prospective MEPs and political parties to sign up to before European elections in May next year.
The text urges EU member states to sign up to the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s “working definition of antisemitism” and exclude from government any politicians or parties that breach it.
Most controversially, one of the red lines – based on a resolution adopted by Angela Merkel’s Christian Democratic Union in Germany in 2016 – calls on “all political parties to pass a binding resolution rejecting BDS activities as fundamentally antisemitic”.
Rabbi Menachem Margolin, the founder of the European Jewish Association, an umbrella group of organisations that is co-organising the conference with the Europe Israel Public Affairs (EIPA) group, said: “These ‘red lines’ when passed will represent not our line in the sand but our line in the concrete, and serve as a wake-up call to politicians that the very future of Jewish Europe is on the line here.”
This is disgusting but not surprising, this worrying trend has been there for years and BDS activists are already repressed/criminalized in France. Since European mainstream governments are too cowardly to really challenge the Israeli occupying regime and condemn its crimes, they try to move to the next step and institutionalize their crippling beam ("you criticize our behaviour, you're antisemitic!").
|
On October 24 2018 23:17 Big J wrote:Show nested quote +On October 24 2018 23:08 Toadesstern wrote:On October 24 2018 23:03 Big J wrote:On October 24 2018 22:36 iamthedave wrote:On October 24 2018 22:27 Big J wrote:On October 24 2018 22:22 Jockmcplop wrote:On October 24 2018 22:16 Gorsameth wrote:On October 24 2018 22:08 TheDwf wrote:On October 24 2018 21:54 Gorsameth wrote:On October 24 2018 21:44 TheDwf wrote:
The EU is undemocratic because there is no corresponding European people who decided to merge their older nations and mutualize their budget, laws, territory and sovereignty Pretty sure the European people voted for the governments that came together and formed the EU. And France even held a referendum for it so 'you' actually got to vote for it. (even tho it only won by a very narrow margin) If you talk about Maastricht, it was 25 years ago and yes, it only won 51/49. But the TCE was also refused in 2005, and it contained all prior treaties, including Maastricht. So from there, there should have been a clarification. But conservatives and "social-democrats" made everything to bury the theme and passed a copy of the TCE together in the Congress in 2008, betraying Sarkozy's promise of a "mini-treaty". Sounds less like a lack of Democracy and more like you don't agree with the choice your Democratically elected government made. Welcome to life. Its somewhere between the two or a little of both really. If your democratically elected government decides to sell out some of your democratic rights, do you still have democracy? I think the answer is yes, but less so. That's a common logical fallacy. A democracy cannot sellout democratic rights just like the mathematical "set of all sets that don't contain themselves" cannot be allowed to be a set by the definition of "a set". Or how tolerance cannot tolerate the intolerant. It's a basic definition problem. If your definition of democracy allows for undermining democracy then it is actually not democracy in the first place. Every democracy allows for undermining democracy. That's how democracies get undermined in the first place. The Greeks were writing about this problem when they came up with the idea hundreds of years ago. Every law system can be undermined by the anarchic nature of reality. The world is made up by the self-interests of living and acting people and those actions don't need to follow laws or fit into descriptions of "democracy" or any other system. The concern of politics is to overcome that anarchy for some reason. The concern of liberal politics is to find a system that works for all reasons that don't deny other reasons and mediate all conflicts of interests. All of that is philosophically nice, but the world does not run on philosophy but on people subscribing to technical methods. Like democracy. Which is not a technical method if it can deny itself. just to put this clearly to save us all some time: According to this you would be against two nations merging even if both nations held a referndum and in both nations the outcome was 99% in favor of the merger. Because those 1% that disagreed with it would have lost their democracy (democractic rights) in some way. Your vote only is worth 50% now, you don't get to vote on something you got to vote on earlier etc. I don't think there's a point in arguing with that... Just like previously you missunderstand. I have a say in voting for the Austrian government and therefore indirectly in the choosing of the Austrian commissioner. If the Austrian commissioner rules something that concerns me it is democratic in some way. That is not true for all the other commissioners. It is one thing to have someone represent you that you voted against, it is another if you didnt get to vote. In your nation example I got to vote, just like in the US election example previously. I did not get to vote on Mrs. Merkel and her commissioner though, regardless of the outcome.
no, I did not misunderstand at all.
You don't get to vote in all areas. Like Neneu already said, he doesn't get to vote in other Norwegian regions and I don't get to vote in Bavaria either.
Their election results do have real world influences on me (at least in the case of Bavaria), despite me not having a say in it at all. I do get to vote this week in Hesse though,
It's the exact same thing with the EU just one step up the ladder. You don't get to vote in Germany but you get to vote in Austria.
You're claiming to be against this principle in general. You're argument isn't even that it's illegitimate representation (which again, I can somewhat understand at least), it's that the system behind that representation is undemocratic.
|
On October 24 2018 22:54 TheDwf wrote:Show nested quote +On October 24 2018 22:45 Neneu wrote:On October 24 2018 22:42 TheDwf wrote:On October 24 2018 22:38 Neneu wrote:On October 24 2018 22:31 TheDwf wrote:
The main question is who decides for whom in a given place. Even if the EU Parliament had power, you can see that we would quickly run into political aberrations. Exemple: in country A, a government of "radical" socialists is elected. But in the EU Parliament from the previous election, conservatives dominate. You're telling us that people from the country A, who just voted for radical socialists, should get a conservative fiscal policy because in the 26 other countries, conservatives mostly came ahead? It makes zero sense... But it is the same in several countries. I mean, if I were living in the state of Bavarian in Germany and I voted for some radical right wing party, I might have been pissed about who are controlling the entire federal parliament, but I would not call Germany an undemocratic nation. The current nations are precisely not the regions of a European nation But would you call such a system democratic? Or is it undemocratic when the system is applied to a 'federal' institution between nations and democratic when applied to a nation and its regions? If people recognize their nation (= they're willing to live together) and don't secede, it's democratic. Popular support is the key, for instance the loss of popular support (and thus legitimacy) is what triggers crisis linked to independentism (e.g. the Catalunya case)
And unlike Catalunya, nations are free to leave the EU at any time they feel like it! Did you miss the Brexit happening?
|
On October 24 2018 23:03 TheDwf wrote:Show nested quote +On October 24 2018 22:57 Neneu wrote:On October 24 2018 22:54 TheDwf wrote:On October 24 2018 22:45 Neneu wrote:On October 24 2018 22:42 TheDwf wrote:On October 24 2018 22:38 Neneu wrote:On October 24 2018 22:31 TheDwf wrote:
The main question is who decides for whom in a given place. Even if the EU Parliament had power, you can see that we would quickly run into political aberrations. Exemple: in country A, a government of "radical" socialists is elected. But in the EU Parliament from the previous election, conservatives dominate. You're telling us that people from the country A, who just voted for radical socialists, should get a conservative fiscal policy because in the 26 other countries, conservatives mostly came ahead? It makes zero sense... But it is the same in several countries. I mean, if I were living in the state of Bavarian in Germany and I voted for some radical right wing party, I might have been pissed about who are controlling the entire federal parliament, but I would not call Germany an undemocratic nation. The current nations are precisely not the regions of a European nation But would you call such a system democratic? Or is it undemocratic when the system is applied to a 'federal' institution between nations and democratic when applied to a nation and its regions? If people recognize their nation (= they're willing to live together) and don't secede, it's democratic. Popular support is the key, for instance the loss of popular support (and thus legitimacy) is what triggers crisis linked to independentism (e.g. the Catalunya case) But with Brexit in mind, can't you apply the same thing to EU? You mean that if people don't outright leave the EU, they agree with its behaviour and rules?
No. But that wasn't what you were arguing. You were claiming the EU is undemocratic. That's not the same as "disagreeing with its rules". Moving the goalpost, methinks.
|
On October 25 2018 00:07 Toadesstern wrote:Show nested quote +On October 24 2018 23:17 Big J wrote:On October 24 2018 23:08 Toadesstern wrote:On October 24 2018 23:03 Big J wrote:On October 24 2018 22:36 iamthedave wrote:On October 24 2018 22:27 Big J wrote:On October 24 2018 22:22 Jockmcplop wrote:On October 24 2018 22:16 Gorsameth wrote:On October 24 2018 22:08 TheDwf wrote:On October 24 2018 21:54 Gorsameth wrote:
[quote]Pretty sure the European people voted for the governments that came together and formed the EU.
And France even held a referendum for it so 'you' actually got to vote for it. (even tho it only won by a very narrow margin) If you talk about Maastricht, it was 25 years ago and yes, it only won 51/49. But the TCE was also refused in 2005, and it contained all prior treaties, including Maastricht. So from there, there should have been a clarification. But conservatives and "social-democrats" made everything to bury the theme and passed a copy of the TCE together in the Congress in 2008, betraying Sarkozy's promise of a "mini-treaty". Sounds less like a lack of Democracy and more like you don't agree with the choice your Democratically elected government made. Welcome to life. Its somewhere between the two or a little of both really. If your democratically elected government decides to sell out some of your democratic rights, do you still have democracy? I think the answer is yes, but less so. That's a common logical fallacy. A democracy cannot sellout democratic rights just like the mathematical "set of all sets that don't contain themselves" cannot be allowed to be a set by the definition of "a set". Or how tolerance cannot tolerate the intolerant. It's a basic definition problem. If your definition of democracy allows for undermining democracy then it is actually not democracy in the first place. Every democracy allows for undermining democracy. That's how democracies get undermined in the first place. The Greeks were writing about this problem when they came up with the idea hundreds of years ago. Every law system can be undermined by the anarchic nature of reality. The world is made up by the self-interests of living and acting people and those actions don't need to follow laws or fit into descriptions of "democracy" or any other system. The concern of politics is to overcome that anarchy for some reason. The concern of liberal politics is to find a system that works for all reasons that don't deny other reasons and mediate all conflicts of interests. All of that is philosophically nice, but the world does not run on philosophy but on people subscribing to technical methods. Like democracy. Which is not a technical method if it can deny itself. just to put this clearly to save us all some time: According to this you would be against two nations merging even if both nations held a referndum and in both nations the outcome was 99% in favor of the merger. Because those 1% that disagreed with it would have lost their democracy (democractic rights) in some way. Your vote only is worth 50% now, you don't get to vote on something you got to vote on earlier etc. I don't think there's a point in arguing with that... Just like previously you missunderstand. I have a say in voting for the Austrian government and therefore indirectly in the choosing of the Austrian commissioner. If the Austrian commissioner rules something that concerns me it is democratic in some way. That is not true for all the other commissioners. It is one thing to have someone represent you that you voted against, it is another if you didnt get to vote. In your nation example I got to vote, just like in the US election example previously. I did not get to vote on Mrs. Merkel and her commissioner though, regardless of the outcome. no, I did not misunderstand at all. You don't get to vote in all areas. Like Neneu already said, he doesn't get to vote in other Norwegian regions and I don't get to vote in Bavaria either. Their election results do have real world influences on me (at least in the case of Bavaria), despite me not having a say in it at all. I do get to vote this week in Hesse though, It's the exact same thing with the EU just one step up the ladder. You don't get to vote in Germany but you get to vote in Austria. You're claiming to be against this principle in general. You're argument isn't even that it's illegitimate representation (which again, I can somewhat understand at least), it's that the system behind that representation is undemocratic.
![[image loading]](https://i.imgur.com/SBiuPXG.png)
|
On October 25 2018 01:29 Big J wrote:Show nested quote +On October 25 2018 00:07 Toadesstern wrote:On October 24 2018 23:17 Big J wrote:On October 24 2018 23:08 Toadesstern wrote:On October 24 2018 23:03 Big J wrote:On October 24 2018 22:36 iamthedave wrote:On October 24 2018 22:27 Big J wrote:On October 24 2018 22:22 Jockmcplop wrote:On October 24 2018 22:16 Gorsameth wrote:On October 24 2018 22:08 TheDwf wrote:
[quote]
If you talk about Maastricht, it was 25 years ago and yes, it only won 51/49. But the TCE was also refused in 2005, and it contained all prior treaties, including Maastricht. So from there, there should have been a clarification. But conservatives and "social-democrats" made everything to bury the theme and passed a copy of the TCE together in the Congress in 2008, betraying Sarkozy's promise of a "mini-treaty". Sounds less like a lack of Democracy and more like you don't agree with the choice your Democratically elected government made. Welcome to life. Its somewhere between the two or a little of both really. If your democratically elected government decides to sell out some of your democratic rights, do you still have democracy? I think the answer is yes, but less so. That's a common logical fallacy. A democracy cannot sellout democratic rights just like the mathematical "set of all sets that don't contain themselves" cannot be allowed to be a set by the definition of "a set". Or how tolerance cannot tolerate the intolerant. It's a basic definition problem. If your definition of democracy allows for undermining democracy then it is actually not democracy in the first place. Every democracy allows for undermining democracy. That's how democracies get undermined in the first place. The Greeks were writing about this problem when they came up with the idea hundreds of years ago. Every law system can be undermined by the anarchic nature of reality. The world is made up by the self-interests of living and acting people and those actions don't need to follow laws or fit into descriptions of "democracy" or any other system. The concern of politics is to overcome that anarchy for some reason. The concern of liberal politics is to find a system that works for all reasons that don't deny other reasons and mediate all conflicts of interests. All of that is philosophically nice, but the world does not run on philosophy but on people subscribing to technical methods. Like democracy. Which is not a technical method if it can deny itself. just to put this clearly to save us all some time: According to this you would be against two nations merging even if both nations held a referndum and in both nations the outcome was 99% in favor of the merger. Because those 1% that disagreed with it would have lost their democracy (democractic rights) in some way. Your vote only is worth 50% now, you don't get to vote on something you got to vote on earlier etc. I don't think there's a point in arguing with that... Just like previously you missunderstand. I have a say in voting for the Austrian government and therefore indirectly in the choosing of the Austrian commissioner. If the Austrian commissioner rules something that concerns me it is democratic in some way. That is not true for all the other commissioners. It is one thing to have someone represent you that you voted against, it is another if you didnt get to vote. In your nation example I got to vote, just like in the US election example previously. I did not get to vote on Mrs. Merkel and her commissioner though, regardless of the outcome. no, I did not misunderstand at all. You don't get to vote in all areas. Like Neneu already said, he doesn't get to vote in other Norwegian regions and I don't get to vote in Bavaria either. Their election results do have real world influences on me (at least in the case of Bavaria), despite me not having a say in it at all. I do get to vote this week in Hesse though, It's the exact same thing with the EU just one step up the ladder. You don't get to vote in Germany but you get to vote in Austria. You're claiming to be against this principle in general. You're argument isn't even that it's illegitimate representation (which again, I can somewhat understand at least), it's that the system behind that representation is undemocratic.
I would argue that in your 2nd example, the 7 medivil dudes voting for a german king, that that's a democractic system as long as the 7 medivil dudes themselves got that position trough an election themselves and represent a part of the nation that is divided in some non-shady-7way way (I'm not going out of my way to explain that in great detail, I think we can all agree more or less what that means).
You seem to disagree with that because that's essentially what's happening.
Just like I mentioned earlier, the people in Hawaii don't vote for their president, they vote in their state, their state then sends it's delegates according to how people voted in Hawaii and the delegates from all states decide on who governs and who becomes president.
That's something you don't like but that doesn't make it undemocratic.
Again, I think the confusion here is between what's democratic or isn't vs what's legitimate or illegitimate representation. Those two aren't necessarily related
|
Even if you all voted on your commissioners, it wouldn’t change much. The other nations would still have equal voting power to what they have now and would still call out nations for piling debt upon debt.
Edit: Also, please don't bring the US system for the president into this. Delegates have always voted with the state and it is a non-factor in the political process. Calling that out is like saying the Queen rules England because the parliament someones asks her for approval to do stuff as a matter of tradition.
|
@BigJ what is the difference between:
A: everybody in Germany votes to elect 7 guys, who then get together and decide everything about Germany, and
B: Germany is divided into 7 regions, each of which elects 1 guy, who then get together and decide everything about Germany
Assuming that each of the 7 regions are roughly equal in size, population, etc.
E: guess Toadesstern beat me to it.
|
On October 25 2018 01:45 Plansix wrote:
Even if you all voted on your commissioners, it wouldn’t change much. The other nations would still have equal voting power to what they have now and would still call out nations for piling debt upon debt.
exactly.
He dislikes that system but even if they were directly voted for would still be against it because an Austrian commisioner should have no power over what Germany does in his mind (or vice versa).
That's not an issue of democratic or not that's in issue of illegitimate representation. He disagrees with those commissioniers having those powers in the first place because the EU isn't one big state/country.
Which is something entirely different from what was argued in the first place.
Edit: Also, please don't bring the US system for the president into this. Delegates have always voted with the state and it is a non-factor in the political process. Calling that out is like saying the Queen rules England because the parliament someones asks her for approval to do stuff as a matter of tradition.
but that "middleman" in between is what he doesn't like about the system.
|
On October 25 2018 01:40 Toadesstern wrote:Show nested quote +On October 25 2018 01:29 Big J wrote:On October 25 2018 00:07 Toadesstern wrote:On October 24 2018 23:17 Big J wrote:On October 24 2018 23:08 Toadesstern wrote:On October 24 2018 23:03 Big J wrote:On October 24 2018 22:36 iamthedave wrote:On October 24 2018 22:27 Big J wrote:On October 24 2018 22:22 Jockmcplop wrote:On October 24 2018 22:16 Gorsameth wrote:
[quote]Sounds less like a lack of Democracy and more like you don't agree with the choice your Democratically elected government made.
Welcome to life.
Its somewhere between the two or a little of both really. If your democratically elected government decides to sell out some of your democratic rights, do you still have democracy? I think the answer is yes, but less so. That's a common logical fallacy. A democracy cannot sellout democratic rights just like the mathematical "set of all sets that don't contain themselves" cannot be allowed to be a set by the definition of "a set". Or how tolerance cannot tolerate the intolerant. It's a basic definition problem. If your definition of democracy allows for undermining democracy then it is actually not democracy in the first place. Every democracy allows for undermining democracy. That's how democracies get undermined in the first place. The Greeks were writing about this problem when they came up with the idea hundreds of years ago. Every law system can be undermined by the anarchic nature of reality. The world is made up by the self-interests of living and acting people and those actions don't need to follow laws or fit into descriptions of "democracy" or any other system. The concern of politics is to overcome that anarchy for some reason. The concern of liberal politics is to find a system that works for all reasons that don't deny other reasons and mediate all conflicts of interests. All of that is philosophically nice, but the world does not run on philosophy but on people subscribing to technical methods. Like democracy. Which is not a technical method if it can deny itself. just to put this clearly to save us all some time: According to this you would be against two nations merging even if both nations held a referndum and in both nations the outcome was 99% in favor of the merger. Because those 1% that disagreed with it would have lost their democracy (democractic rights) in some way. Your vote only is worth 50% now, you don't get to vote on something you got to vote on earlier etc. I don't think there's a point in arguing with that... Just like previously you missunderstand. I have a say in voting for the Austrian government and therefore indirectly in the choosing of the Austrian commissioner. If the Austrian commissioner rules something that concerns me it is democratic in some way. That is not true for all the other commissioners. It is one thing to have someone represent you that you voted against, it is another if you didnt get to vote. In your nation example I got to vote, just like in the US election example previously. I did not get to vote on Mrs. Merkel and her commissioner though, regardless of the outcome. no, I did not misunderstand at all. You don't get to vote in all areas. Like Neneu already said, he doesn't get to vote in other Norwegian regions and I don't get to vote in Bavaria either. Their election results do have real world influences on me (at least in the case of Bavaria), despite me not having a say in it at all. I do get to vote this week in Hesse though, It's the exact same thing with the EU just one step up the ladder. You don't get to vote in Germany but you get to vote in Austria. You're claiming to be against this principle in general. You're argument isn't even that it's illegitimate representation (which again, I can somewhat understand at least), it's that the system behind that representation is undemocratic. I would argue that in your 2nd example, the 7 midivil dudes voting for a german king, that that's a democractic system as long as the 7 midivil dudes themselves got that position trough an election themselves and represent a part of the nation that is divided in some non-shady-7way way (I'm not going out of my way to explain that in great detail, I think we can all agree more or less what that means). You seem to disagree with that because that's essentially what's happening. Just like I mentioned earlier, the people in Hawaii don't vote for their president, they vote in their state, their state then sends it's delegates according to how people voted in Hawaii and the delegates from all states decide on who governs and who becomes president. That's something you don't like but that doesn't make it undemocratic. Again, I think the confusion here is between what's democratic or isn't vs what's legitimate or illegitimate representation. Those two aren't necessarily related
Yes, I think that is the gist of where we disagree. I don't believe that is democratic in the sense of the word. Just because you have a say in it doesn't mean that the people rule over themselves, which is the meaning of democracy. Voting is a technical implementation to get to a democratic decision, the gist of democracy however is that those who rule are the same as those that are ruled.
The first law of the Austrian constitution says: "Austria is a democratic republic. Its legal powers stem from the people." The election stuff is a technical implementation that is seen as "sufficient implementation" of that by the constitutional court, but not equivalent to the meaning of democracy.
|
On October 25 2018 01:52 Toadesstern wrote:Show nested quote +On October 25 2018 01:45 Plansix wrote:
Even if you all voted on your commissioners, it wouldn’t change much. The other nations would still have equal voting power to what they have now and would still call out nations for piling debt upon debt. exactly. He dislikes that system but even if they were directly voted for would still be against it because an Austrian commisioner should have no power over what Germany does in his mind (or vice versa). That's not an issue of democratic or not that's in issue of illegitimate representation. He disagrees with those commissioniers having those powers in the first place because the EU isn't one big state/country. Which is something entirely different from what was argued in the first place. Show nested quote +Edit: Also, please don't bring the US system for the president into this. Delegates have always voted with the state and it is a non-factor in the political process. Calling that out is like saying the Queen rules England because the parliament someones asks her for approval to do stuff as a matter of tradition. but that "middleman" in between is what he doesn't like about the system.
The middleman is historical and practically irrelevant. The delegates of the electoral college have never deviated from their role as representatives of the state's intent. It is simply a formality that is so unimportant that it is barely reported on and the public never notices.
Arguing what would happen is silly because there is endless political rules sorcery that would be attempted by any chamber that would be ignored if it ever was attempted. Like the classic theory of trying to confirm judges when when the old senators are sworn out and before the new senators are sworn in. Is it possible to do? Sure. Would anyone accept it? Never.
|
On October 25 2018 01:59 Big J wrote:Show nested quote +On October 25 2018 01:40 Toadesstern wrote:On October 25 2018 01:29 Big J wrote:On October 25 2018 00:07 Toadesstern wrote:On October 24 2018 23:17 Big J wrote:On October 24 2018 23:08 Toadesstern wrote:On October 24 2018 23:03 Big J wrote:On October 24 2018 22:36 iamthedave wrote:On October 24 2018 22:27 Big J wrote:On October 24 2018 22:22 Jockmcplop wrote:
[quote]
Its somewhere between the two or a little of both really.
If your democratically elected government decides to sell out some of your democratic rights, do you still have democracy? I think the answer is yes, but less so. That's a common logical fallacy. A democracy cannot sellout democratic rights just like the mathematical "set of all sets that don't contain themselves" cannot be allowed to be a set by the definition of "a set". Or how tolerance cannot tolerate the intolerant. It's a basic definition problem. If your definition of democracy allows for undermining democracy then it is actually not democracy in the first place. Every democracy allows for undermining democracy. That's how democracies get undermined in the first place. The Greeks were writing about this problem when they came up with the idea hundreds of years ago. Every law system can be undermined by the anarchic nature of reality. The world is made up by the self-interests of living and acting people and those actions don't need to follow laws or fit into descriptions of "democracy" or any other system. The concern of politics is to overcome that anarchy for some reason. The concern of liberal politics is to find a system that works for all reasons that don't deny other reasons and mediate all conflicts of interests. All of that is philosophically nice, but the world does not run on philosophy but on people subscribing to technical methods. Like democracy. Which is not a technical method if it can deny itself. just to put this clearly to save us all some time: According to this you would be against two nations merging even if both nations held a referndum and in both nations the outcome was 99% in favor of the merger. Because those 1% that disagreed with it would have lost their democracy (democractic rights) in some way. Your vote only is worth 50% now, you don't get to vote on something you got to vote on earlier etc. I don't think there's a point in arguing with that... Just like previously you missunderstand. I have a say in voting for the Austrian government and therefore indirectly in the choosing of the Austrian commissioner. If the Austrian commissioner rules something that concerns me it is democratic in some way. That is not true for all the other commissioners. It is one thing to have someone represent you that you voted against, it is another if you didnt get to vote. In your nation example I got to vote, just like in the US election example previously. I did not get to vote on Mrs. Merkel and her commissioner though, regardless of the outcome. no, I did not misunderstand at all. You don't get to vote in all areas. Like Neneu already said, he doesn't get to vote in other Norwegian regions and I don't get to vote in Bavaria either. Their election results do have real world influences on me (at least in the case of Bavaria), despite me not having a say in it at all. I do get to vote this week in Hesse though, It's the exact same thing with the EU just one step up the ladder. You don't get to vote in Germany but you get to vote in Austria. You're claiming to be against this principle in general. You're argument isn't even that it's illegitimate representation (which again, I can somewhat understand at least), it's that the system behind that representation is undemocratic. I would argue that in your 2nd example, the 7 midivil dudes voting for a german king, that that's a democractic system as long as the 7 midivil dudes themselves got that position trough an election themselves and represent a part of the nation that is divided in some non-shady-7way way (I'm not going out of my way to explain that in great detail, I think we can all agree more or less what that means). You seem to disagree with that because that's essentially what's happening. Just like I mentioned earlier, the people in Hawaii don't vote for their president, they vote in their state, their state then sends it's delegates according to how people voted in Hawaii and the delegates from all states decide on who governs and who becomes president. That's something you don't like but that doesn't make it undemocratic. Again, I think the confusion here is between what's democratic or isn't vs what's legitimate or illegitimate representation. Those two aren't necessarily related Yes, I think that is the gist of where we disagree. I don't believe that is democratic in the sense of the word. Just because you have a say in it doesn't mean that the people rule over themselves, which is the meaning of democracy. Voting is a technical implementation to get to a democratic decision, the gist of democracy however is that those who rule are the same as those that are ruled. The first law of the Austrian constitution says: "Austria is a democratic republic. Its legal powers stem from the people." The election stuff is a technical implementation that is seen as "sufficient implementation" of that by the constitutional court, but not equivalent to the meaning of democracy.
yes, but then again what is the difference between taking this one step further? From the national to the EU level. Only your disagreement with it?
Your statement was
A democracy cannot sellout democratic rights just like the mathematical "set of all sets that don't contain themselves" cannot be allowed to be a set by the definition of "a set".
which most people in here turned to and said that your democratic rights never were sold out in the first place.
You get to vote like everyone else in this process.
Yes, they might have diminished to some degree because your vote is now worth less as you share it with more people on that one matter but you still have that right. Hence me saying that if that's your statement you wouldn't or shouldn't allow for any governance that isn't yourself.
The moment I set up a club with my 2 buddies I have less power to decide what flag we use for our club compared to my 1man club. It's very much possible that I get outvoted. The same is true the higher you go up the ladder and for some reason it's all cool up to specifically (and not including) the EU. Up to that point that wasn't an issue and never was but with the EU it's suddenly a thing that's prinicipally impossible to implement no matter how it's executed because it's supposedly anti-democratic in it's very essence.
|
On October 25 2018 02:51 Toadesstern wrote:Show nested quote +On October 25 2018 01:59 Big J wrote:On October 25 2018 01:40 Toadesstern wrote:On October 25 2018 01:29 Big J wrote:On October 25 2018 00:07 Toadesstern wrote:On October 24 2018 23:17 Big J wrote:On October 24 2018 23:08 Toadesstern wrote:On October 24 2018 23:03 Big J wrote:On October 24 2018 22:36 iamthedave wrote:On October 24 2018 22:27 Big J wrote:
[quote]
That's a common logical fallacy. A democracy cannot sellout democratic rights just like the mathematical "set of all sets that don't contain themselves" cannot be allowed to be a set by the definition of "a set".
Or how tolerance cannot tolerate the intolerant.
It's a basic definition problem. If your definition of democracy allows for undermining democracy then it is actually not democracy in the first place. Every democracy allows for undermining democracy. That's how democracies get undermined in the first place. The Greeks were writing about this problem when they came up with the idea hundreds of years ago. Every law system can be undermined by the anarchic nature of reality. The world is made up by the self-interests of living and acting people and those actions don't need to follow laws or fit into descriptions of "democracy" or any other system. The concern of politics is to overcome that anarchy for some reason. The concern of liberal politics is to find a system that works for all reasons that don't deny other reasons and mediate all conflicts of interests. All of that is philosophically nice, but the world does not run on philosophy but on people subscribing to technical methods. Like democracy. Which is not a technical method if it can deny itself. just to put this clearly to save us all some time: According to this you would be against two nations merging even if both nations held a referndum and in both nations the outcome was 99% in favor of the merger. Because those 1% that disagreed with it would have lost their democracy (democractic rights) in some way. Your vote only is worth 50% now, you don't get to vote on something you got to vote on earlier etc. I don't think there's a point in arguing with that... Just like previously you missunderstand. I have a say in voting for the Austrian government and therefore indirectly in the choosing of the Austrian commissioner. If the Austrian commissioner rules something that concerns me it is democratic in some way. That is not true for all the other commissioners. It is one thing to have someone represent you that you voted against, it is another if you didnt get to vote. In your nation example I got to vote, just like in the US election example previously. I did not get to vote on Mrs. Merkel and her commissioner though, regardless of the outcome. no, I did not misunderstand at all. You don't get to vote in all areas. Like Neneu already said, he doesn't get to vote in other Norwegian regions and I don't get to vote in Bavaria either. Their election results do have real world influences on me (at least in the case of Bavaria), despite me not having a say in it at all. I do get to vote this week in Hesse though, It's the exact same thing with the EU just one step up the ladder. You don't get to vote in Germany but you get to vote in Austria. You're claiming to be against this principle in general. You're argument isn't even that it's illegitimate representation (which again, I can somewhat understand at least), it's that the system behind that representation is undemocratic. I would argue that in your 2nd example, the 7 midivil dudes voting for a german king, that that's a democractic system as long as the 7 midivil dudes themselves got that position trough an election themselves and represent a part of the nation that is divided in some non-shady-7way way (I'm not going out of my way to explain that in great detail, I think we can all agree more or less what that means). You seem to disagree with that because that's essentially what's happening. Just like I mentioned earlier, the people in Hawaii don't vote for their president, they vote in their state, their state then sends it's delegates according to how people voted in Hawaii and the delegates from all states decide on who governs and who becomes president. That's something you don't like but that doesn't make it undemocratic. Again, I think the confusion here is between what's democratic or isn't vs what's legitimate or illegitimate representation. Those two aren't necessarily related Yes, I think that is the gist of where we disagree. I don't believe that is democratic in the sense of the word. Just because you have a say in it doesn't mean that the people rule over themselves, which is the meaning of democracy. Voting is a technical implementation to get to a democratic decision, the gist of democracy however is that those who rule are the same as those that are ruled. The first law of the Austrian constitution says: "Austria is a democratic republic. Its legal powers stem from the people." The election stuff is a technical implementation that is seen as "sufficient implementation" of that by the constitutional court, but not equivalent to the meaning of democracy. yes, but then again what is the difference between taking this one step further? From the national to the EU level. Only your disagreement with it?
I would have absolutely no problem if we had a EU constitution that started with:
Article 1: "The European Union is a democratic republic. Its legal powers stem from the people."
The point is that this is not the case.
In your quote above I am still just clarifiying our disagreement on the matter of whether the commission (and the council) are democratic institutions of the EU, which I don't believe is the case.
On October 25 2018 02:51 Toadesstern wrote:Show nested quote +Your statement was A democracy cannot sellout democratic rights just like the mathematical "set of all sets that don't contain themselves" cannot be allowed to be a set by the definition of "a set". which most people in here turned to and said that your democratic rights never were sold out in the first place. You get to vote like everyone else in this process. Yes, they might have diminished to some degree because your vote is now worth less as you share it with more people on that one matter but you still have that right. Hence me saying that if that's your statement you wouldn't or shouldn't allow for any governance that isn't yourself. The moment I set up a club with my 2 buddies I have less power to decide what flag we use for our club compared to my 1man club. It's very much possible that I get outvoted. The same is true the higher you go up the ladder and for some reason it's all cool up to specifically (and not including) the EU. Up to that point that wasn't an issue and never was but with the EU it's suddenly a thing that's prinicipally impossible to implement no matter how it's executed because it's supposedly anti-democratic in it's very essence.
That is not the point here. There is a Marxist stance on this that is at least interesting to discuss, which would probably critizise exactly what you believe that I critizise here, but I don't actually do that. The numbers don't matter in my argument. What matters is whether I am eligible to vote for each and every commissioneer and each and every council member, or whether we "trade", like "Austria gets to send one, Belgium gets to send one...". The second one gives me power over one matter as a trade for another matter. It is not democratic if I rule you in some way, and then you rule me in another way as trade. Each one of us needs a say in both matter to qualify as democracy in my eyes.
I personally believe in methods/technical implementations forming reality and nothing else. If two things are different they shouldn't run under the same name.
So let me ask you the other way around: if what I describe as democracy amounts to the same concept as what you believe to be a democratic EU... why not do it my way if it is the same for you anyways?
I very much believe that the EU is not democratic and since I am not one to believe the current and former rulers of it have been idiots, I very much believe this is by purpose. Maybe because they cannot and could not push for something more democratic (yet?), but technically it amounts to the same result which is not good.
|
|
|
Didn't Merkel already shut that down? Sounds like beating a dead horse.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
EPT
