|
Now that we have a new thread, in order to ensure that this thread continues to meet TL standards and follows the proper guidelines, we will be enforcing the rules in the OP more strictly. Be sure to give them a complete and thorough read before posting! NOTE: When providing a source, please provide a very brief summary on what it's about and what purpose it adds to the discussion. The supporting statement should clearly explain why the subject is relevant and needs to be discussed. Please follow this rule especially for tweets.
Your supporting statement should always come BEFORE you provide the source.If you have any questions, comments, concern, or feedback regarding the USPMT, then please use this thread: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/website-feedback/510156-us-politics-thread |
On January 03 2021 03:38 Danglars wrote:Show nested quote +On January 03 2021 03:32 ChristianS wrote:
I don’t think I’ve seen a single person anywhere argue that House representation should be anything other than proportional to population. What would that scheme even be? # of representatives rises quadratically with population?
The underlying principle is obviously that a government “of the people, by the people, and for the people” should decide its representation primarily by the opinion of the majority of people. If you’re going to privilege the opinion of some people by a couple orders of magnitude over the opinion of other people, you should present a compelling reason why they should be so over-represented. Protecting less populous communities and lifestyles from tyranny of the majority is potentially such a reason, but then apply it equally.
Or if you’ve got a different reason, spit it out. When people say "these areas need to have equal representation" and you, yourself "equal representation," it should be said that they don't have equal representation as the system exists today. It's literally one half of one third of the governing system. It deserves to be pointed out that equal only applies to the Senate, and as such arguments exist in electoral arguments more generally, people want them to have proportionately less representation in a system that already gives them less representation today. See: Electoral college reform, House reform. Please contest any of the factual basis you dispute in this post.
The senate is the most egregious, but the house also over represents people from smaller states by a bit. Then there’s the presidency that also over represents small states through the EC. And of course, the president picks the Supreme Court with approval by the senate, so they too over represent small states. All three branches of government give more power to small states with the senate only being the most ridiculous. This is not a 1/2 of a 1/3rd problem.
We’ve had two presidents in the last 20 years lose the popular vote. Sure, the election would be campaigned differently if the popular vote counted, but it sure points to a problem that the majority who voted didn’t get their president in 2/6 elections.
Then you have the bullshit of the senate where the majority leader can prevent votes on bills that have already been passed in the house. Stuff like the $2000 handout would easily pass if voted on. It might even be filibuster proof. That points to a very incomplete constitution that relied on norms and human decency to operate. When you have immoral scum like McConnel in charge, norms and human decency don’t work.
A split doesn’t work as the split is much more rural vs urban than state vs state. But we do get closer and closer to wide scale violence as people get sick of the tyranny of the minority.
|
On January 03 2021 03:19 Danglars wrote:Show nested quote +On January 03 2021 02:54 Mohdoo wrote:On January 03 2021 02:39 Danglars wrote:On January 03 2021 02:15 Mohdoo wrote:On January 03 2021 01:41 Danglars wrote:
It’s getting kind of blatant with the criticism of the Senate for helping large states not dominate a country of many states precisely because some people wish the larger states possessed the ability to dominate in greater measure.
It’s desirable that these kind of people wedded to those kind of wishes are frustrated. They have a message that rarely resonates outside of populous urban centers, they don’t want to change it, they’ve given up persuasion, they just want to force feed it to the rest of the country. A simple re-read of the last dozen or so posts should make this kind of thinking dead obvious. I’m not convinced the logic of empowering small groups is useful. There’s way more grocery workers then doctors, more construction workers than lawyers, more technicians than engineers. There are numerous examples of groups that are smaller than others that we don’t specifically make sure to empower through distorted vote mechanisms. The doctor vote has significantly less cultural power than the construction worker vote. Isn’t that a bad thing for the same reason? The senate model makes less densely populated areas more equivalent to more populated areas. Less populated areas generally have stagnant culture but I don’t see why that stagnation needs to be kept equal to places with more developed cultures. I understand the basic premise that that stagnant areas tend to be culturally distinct from the urban areas, but I don’t see where there jump exists that shows those areas need to have equal representation to a larger population. In your eyes, why is it important that the smaller group has more representation per person? May I say, your treatment of “less populated areas have stagnant culture but I don’t see why that stagnation needs to be kept equal” is exactly the kind of elitist bullshit that prompts the increased tyranny of the majority arguments. If you are fine so demeaning your fellow citizens, go have the courage to endorse a final separation of the country into a half that wants to be rid of cultures they generalize as lesser cultures. We don’t have to be an United States if certain populous states view some 20-30 of the 50 as a burden culturally and electorally. They can be states of a different union, and maintain firmer structures of division of power, if that’s the will of the biggest and richest. Cultural stagnation is a well understood dynamic documented in sociology and psychology. Amish civilization is an example of isolation encouraging cultural stagnation. Are you saying this idea is so offensive to you that you can’t bring yourself to give your perspective on my question? All you can bring yourself to say is “well then let’s split the country in half”? Being demeaning doesn’t mean I’m not interested in the contribution of the people I am demeaning. They still make the collective stronger, despite our disagreements. Everyone thinks some group of people are dumb and wrong. You’ve been very clear how wrong and dumb plenty of people are. Let me amend my previous post to state, if you are fine so demeaning your fellow citizens, based in your appreciation of the current trends in sociology and psychology, go have the courage to endorse a final separation of the country into a half that wants to be rid of cultures they generalize as lesser cultures. I haven't gone after the culture of the urban dense cities, but maybe to earn your respect, I better launch into diatribes about failing schools, rampant crime, and extreme homelessness, and how that's traceable to their supposedly more vibrant cultures. I don't really see that as a great direction, particularly for the maintenance of the union, but if y'all are so intent on dictating terms of continued sharing of power from big blue states to smaller red states, maybe that's the inevitable conclusion. If I imagine a huge majority of citizens in California and New York and New Jersey etc really do think like you do, then I don't stand in the way of your secession to form a nation that precisely decides national decisions in precise proportion to their population. If current power sharing is really so disgusting and damaging to them, by all means they shouldn't be held in the union that grants equal power to STATES in a United States of America in one half of one third of the government of those United States of America. State decisions in blue states with supermajorities of Democrats already can ignore the opinions of the country hicks in states with lesser cultures. By God, that's by design, and the delegation of power to the national government of everything is what got us into this mess in the first place. Cede power back to the states, redistribute less money from federal taxation, and let people with sociology degrees not worry about the political representation from states that border theirs. Pardon the statement of my opinion, but this whole debate sounds like noblesse oblige. The poorer, smaller states are living high on the hog from the largesse of the bigger states, and they should be brought down lower, seeing as how they'd be so destitute and pitiable if, for some reason, they were cut off from the benefits brought by the bigger, bluer areas of the country. They're now tired of that "responsibility," and are sadly announcing they're no longer fine with supporting that obligation. To which I say: it's fine, any kind of union of red counties will be fine. It should be more obvious to people participating that I don't think smaller states will vote for less power in the union, so the honest truth is that big states should leave if they can't pass electoral reform to their liking and this situation is so unbearable to them, and the same to the smaller states vice versa. The big states already have bigger representation in the House; some people want it to be more extreme. The big states already have bigger representation in electoral votes for President; some people want it to be more extreme. These arguments always come up when Democrats fail to secure a major electoral win, and no surprise, they narrowly won the states necessary for the Presidency, and lost power in the House.
I think it is very betraying how you constantly talk about states, to the point where you say stuff like "The big states already have bigger representation in the House". What you do not do is talk about people. Because that would lead to a completely different reaction.
People in bigger states have far less representation than people in smaller states. This is true in the senate, the presidential election and even in the house the representation is unequal, and some people have fewer representatives per person than others.
As soon as you stop talking about states and how they are treated, and instead talk about the people in those states, stuff looks very differently, and Danglars position becomes even more absurd.
It is utterly indefensible why some peoples votes should count for more than other peoples votes. Yet exactly that is happening. Imagine applying this principle to any other division of people. Maybe rich people should get more votes? Or black people? Yet somehow it seems sensible to the people who win using this system that just because you are in a small rural state, you should get more votes than a person living in a large state or a city.
This is basically the core of the issue. Should all votes be equal, or should some people get extra votes?
|
On January 03 2021 03:46 micronesia wrote:Show nested quote +On January 03 2021 03:35 Danglars wrote:On January 03 2021 02:28 micronesia wrote:
Building off of what was previously said, I think the current design of the government has not scaled properly in accordance with how geographic demographics have shifted over the life of the nation. Some protections against tyranny of the minority by the majority are appropriate and the implementation in 1787 was likely well-intentioned, but the status quo is no longer effective. If the population of every smaller state goes to 2, and everyone else lives in the more populous states, it no longer makes sense for those small states to have almost complete control of the Senate. What we are living in is less extreme than that but the same general idea. I addressed this in a different post, but to be more direct, the extreme example of 2 vs 300 million sounds like two different nations living side by side, and no real national government could adequately govern those in the middle, who would be cut off from decisions affecting them should we presume that the national government retains current levels of federal taxation and domestic spending. "could adequately govern those in the middle..." middle of what?
I'm generalizing to the well-known trope of "flyover country." Many small states lie in the middle of the country, geographically speaking, and vote principally Republican, which is the main problem for Democrats, and if you ask me, the main reason why they want them to have diminished Representation. I can put in a map of state or county level votes if you'd like.
Show nested quote +When you say "those small states to have almost complete control of the Senate," which is almost certainly an indefensible, exaggerated assertation It is a hypothetical, not an assertion. It is intentionally exaggerated. I don't believe it is indefensible.
Show nested quote +would you like to set the bar at the ~26 states under ~5mil (~1/8 the population of the largest state of the union)? I'd say the largest states already have plenty of control of the Senate, the trouble is, the Democrats have failed to secure Texas, Florida, (historically) Georgia, North Carolina, Tenessee ... and half of Ohio, Pennsylvania. I wonder how much of "the biggest states don't have a big enough say over the smaller states in the USA" is actually closeted "some of the biggest states of the Union are ninnies that won't vote with us, which is why we're failing to capture the necessary votes on bills we'd like to see passed." If we actually had a nationally representative voice, I'd ask some citizens of Texas and Florida if they think smaller states have too much of a voice over theirs. Clearly the divides in the country are not as simple as big states vs small states, only.
That's the trouble when criticizing the present system. Where's the injured party? Are larger states being bossed around by the smaller states by nature of their greater number? Are smaller states injured by the larger state's greater representation in the House and electorally in the Presidency? Hypothetically, would the larger states even notice if their interventions and national dictats amounted to overriding state sovereignty and trashing their concerns?
Those are concerns for me. Majoritarianism is in its ascendency at the large cultural split between urban and rural. And you've probably read enough of my posts here to know that I view the numerical majority to have blinders on when it comes to respecting the civil rights of minority communities.
|
On January 03 2021 04:20 RenSC2 wrote:Show nested quote +On January 03 2021 03:38 Danglars wrote:On January 03 2021 03:32 ChristianS wrote:
I don’t think I’ve seen a single person anywhere argue that House representation should be anything other than proportional to population. What would that scheme even be? # of representatives rises quadratically with population?
The underlying principle is obviously that a government “of the people, by the people, and for the people” should decide its representation primarily by the opinion of the majority of people. If you’re going to privilege the opinion of some people by a couple orders of magnitude over the opinion of other people, you should present a compelling reason why they should be so over-represented. Protecting less populous communities and lifestyles from tyranny of the majority is potentially such a reason, but then apply it equally.
Or if you’ve got a different reason, spit it out. When people say "these areas need to have equal representation" and you, yourself "equal representation," it should be said that they don't have equal representation as the system exists today. It's literally one half of one third of the governing system. It deserves to be pointed out that equal only applies to the Senate, and as such arguments exist in electoral arguments more generally, people want them to have proportionately less representation in a system that already gives them less representation today. See: Electoral college reform, House reform. Please contest any of the factual basis you dispute in this post. The senate is the most egregious, but the house also over represents people from smaller states by a bit. Then there’s the presidency that also over represents small states through the EC. And of course, the president picks the Supreme Court with approval by the senate, so they too over represent small states. All three branches of government give more power to small states with the senate only being the most ridiculous. This is not a 1/2 of a 1/3rd problem. We’ve had two presidents in the last 20 years lose the popular vote. Sure, the election would be campaigned differently if the popular vote counted, but it sure points to a problem that the majority who voted didn’t get their president in 2/6 elections. Then you have the bullshit of the senate where the majority leader can prevent votes on bills that have already been passed in the house. Stuff like the $2000 handout would easily pass if voted on. It might even be filibuster proof. That points to a very incomplete constitution that relied on norms and human decency to operate. When you have immoral scum like McConnel in charge, norms and human decency don’t work. A split doesn’t work as the split is much more rural vs urban than state vs state. But we do get closer and closer to wide scale violence as people get sick of the tyranny of the minority.
Hence, why I pointed that out to ChristianS. It isn't really about equal representation, and it should be pointed out that people routinely argue for things to be more unequal to a greater degree (in your view, more equal in other ways).
|
On January 03 2021 01:59 TheYango wrote:Show nested quote +On January 03 2021 01:41 Danglars wrote:
It’s getting kind of blatant with the criticism of the Senate for helping large states not dominate a country of many states precisely because some people wish the larger states possessed the ability to dominate in greater measure.
It’s desirable that these kind of people wedded to those kind of wishes are frustrated. They have a message that rarely resonates outside of populous urban centers, they don’t want to change it, they’ve given up persuasion, they just want to force feed it to the rest of the country. A simple re-read of the last dozen or so posts should make this kind of thinking dead obvious. The thing is, how much of the country's population is represented by "large" states has only grown since the country's inception. In 1770 the difference in population between the most- and least-populous states was about a factor of 20 (~447k in Virginia vs. ~23k in Georgia). In 2020 that difference is something closer to a factor of 70 (~570k in Wyoming vs. 40 million in California). Attempts to protect a minority from being dominated by a majority need to be tempered by how much of a minority you're actually giving power relative to how much of a majority. The kind of balanced power structure that made sense in 1770 hasn't actually scaled to the realities of the country's population distribution in 2020, and "because that's how it always was" is not a good enough defense of those systems to not consider amending them.
Except we have a body that rewards states based on population - it's called the House of Representatives. (Which to be honest should have far more members than they do currently) Not every single Government body needs to be based purely on population. It is important to have a body like the Senate especially in a country where the states are (should) be quite autonomous and were independent countries before joining together. It is interesting folks who are presumably very pro-egalitarianism are very anti-egalitarianism when it concerns the Senate.
|
On January 03 2021 03:47 ChristianS wrote:Show nested quote +On January 03 2021 03:38 Danglars wrote:On January 03 2021 03:32 ChristianS wrote:
I don’t think I’ve seen a single person anywhere argue that House representation should be anything other than proportional to population. What would that scheme even be? # of representatives rises quadratically with population?
The underlying principle is obviously that a government “of the people, by the people, and for the people” should decide its representation primarily by the opinion of the majority of people. If you’re going to privilege the opinion of some people by a couple orders of magnitude over the opinion of other people, you should present a compelling reason why they should be so over-represented. Protecting less populous communities and lifestyles from tyranny of the majority is potentially such a reason, but then apply it equally.
Or if you’ve got a different reason, spit it out. When people say "these areas need to have equal representation" and you, yourself "equal representation," it should be said that they don't have equal representation as the system exists today. It's literally one half of one third of the governing system. It deserves to be pointed out that equal only applies to the Senate, and as such arguments exist in electoral arguments more generally, people want them to have proportionately less representation in a system that already gives them less representation today. See: Electoral college reform, House reform. Please contest any of the factual basis you dispute in this post. Show nested quote +The big states already have bigger representation in the House; some people want it to be more extreme. This is what I was responding to. Haven’t seen a single person anywhere argue that # of representatives per state should scale >linearly with population, and while I’m sure someone at some point has said it, it obviously violates the principle everyone is implicitly arguing about (i.e. that everyone’s vote should count equally). No idea what you’re referring to with “House reform,” if there’s some movement I’m unaware of to double CA’s house representatives or something you’ll have to give me a link. Why should people in wyoming have 70X (or w/e) more say than me on SCOTUS confirmations? This question isn’t rhetorical; give me an actual justification for weighting this way.
Maybe we are arguing at cross purposes. You previously stated about "equal representation," when it is a truth that more populous states enjoy greater representation in the national government as things stand today. Equal representation of states only applies to half of the legislative branch of the federal government, and does not apply to the other half of the legislative branch of the government, or to the executive branch, or to the judicial branch. You agree that the problem does not consist of equal representation, or only narrowly consists of equal representation?
|
On January 03 2021 04:20 RenSC2 wrote:Show nested quote +On January 03 2021 03:38 Danglars wrote:On January 03 2021 03:32 ChristianS wrote:
I don’t think I’ve seen a single person anywhere argue that House representation should be anything other than proportional to population. What would that scheme even be? # of representatives rises quadratically with population?
The underlying principle is obviously that a government “of the people, by the people, and for the people” should decide its representation primarily by the opinion of the majority of people. If you’re going to privilege the opinion of some people by a couple orders of magnitude over the opinion of other people, you should present a compelling reason why they should be so over-represented. Protecting less populous communities and lifestyles from tyranny of the majority is potentially such a reason, but then apply it equally.
Or if you’ve got a different reason, spit it out. When people say "these areas need to have equal representation" and you, yourself "equal representation," it should be said that they don't have equal representation as the system exists today. It's literally one half of one third of the governing system. It deserves to be pointed out that equal only applies to the Senate, and as such arguments exist in electoral arguments more generally, people want them to have proportionately less representation in a system that already gives them less representation today. See: Electoral college reform, House reform. Please contest any of the factual basis you dispute in this post. The senate is the most egregious, but the house also over represents people from smaller states by a bit. Then there’s the presidency that also over represents small states through the EC. And of course, the president picks the Supreme Court with approval by the senate, so they too over represent small states. All three branches of government give more power to small states with the senate only being the most ridiculous. This is not a 1/2 of a 1/3rd problem. We’ve had two presidents in the last 20 years lose the popular vote. Sure, the election would be campaigned differently if the popular vote counted, but it sure points to a problem that the majority who voted didn’t get their president in 2/6 elections. Then you have the bullshit of the senate where the majority leader can prevent votes on bills that have already been passed in the house. Stuff like the $2000 handout would easily pass if voted on. It might even be filibuster proof. That points to a very incomplete constitution that relied on norms and human decency to operate. When you have immoral scum like McConnel in charge, norms and human decency don’t work.A split doesn’t work as the split is much more rural vs urban than state vs state. But we do get closer and closer to wide scale violence as people get sick of the tyranny of the minority.
That's an issue with the rules of the Senate, not the makeup of the Senate. You state your 2nd paragraph as if that is a fact and not a qualified opinion. Why is that a particular problem? Why are republican forms of Government necessarily worse than democratic ones in your opinion? Is it merely because you feel it "unfair" or don't find republican Federalist (papers) views persuasive? I think the system is not great, but it is infinitely better than a more democratic system.
By the way, I've brought this up before but go look at Canada. Look at what their parties received for votes and what seats they got in their Government. If you think the US is shit you also have to think Canada is shit, but something tells me you'd balk.
|
United States24677 Posts
On January 03 2021 04:23 Danglars wrote:
That's the trouble when criticizing the present system. Where's the injured party? Are larger states being bossed around by the smaller states by nature of their greater number? Are smaller states injured by the larger state's greater representation in the House and electorally in the Presidency? Hypothetically, would the larger states even notice if their interventions and national dictats amounted to overriding state sovereignty and trashing their concerns?
Those are concerns for me. Majoritarianism is in its ascendency at the large cultural split between urban and rural. And you've probably read enough of my posts here to know that I view the numerical majority to have blinders on when it comes to respecting the civil rights of minority communities.
Note that I am not arguing for all powers in the U.S. to be handled simply by majority rule.
At the beginning I was saying the current system is outdated and needs some adjustments. Your attempts to home in on exactly what the problems are by trying to point to "injury" is, I think, not the right way to do it. While I don't want there to be injured parties in the U.S., I think there are other ways to measure the effectiveness of the system of governance than simply by looking for injury. Focusing exclusively on injury is an unnecessarily transactional and limited way to measure fairness and prosperity. To say there's no injured party (not that I believe that), therefore status quo is the right approach, doesn't sit well with me. Changing the system of governance in this case is different from trying to win a court case.
If you want me to get more detailed about exactly what is wrong with the status quo (which I'm unlikely to do since I was just offering some thoughts on the matter, not preparing a dissertation or trying to start an argument), it might help to clarify whether you acknowledge (or disagree) that some tinkering may be warranted with how distribution of citizens leads to representation in government.
|
On January 03 2021 04:30 Danglars wrote:Show nested quote +On January 03 2021 03:47 ChristianS wrote:On January 03 2021 03:38 Danglars wrote:On January 03 2021 03:32 ChristianS wrote:
I don’t think I’ve seen a single person anywhere argue that House representation should be anything other than proportional to population. What would that scheme even be? # of representatives rises quadratically with population?
The underlying principle is obviously that a government “of the people, by the people, and for the people” should decide its representation primarily by the opinion of the majority of people. If you’re going to privilege the opinion of some people by a couple orders of magnitude over the opinion of other people, you should present a compelling reason why they should be so over-represented. Protecting less populous communities and lifestyles from tyranny of the majority is potentially such a reason, but then apply it equally.
Or if you’ve got a different reason, spit it out. When people say "these areas need to have equal representation" and you, yourself "equal representation," it should be said that they don't have equal representation as the system exists today. It's literally one half of one third of the governing system. It deserves to be pointed out that equal only applies to the Senate, and as such arguments exist in electoral arguments more generally, people want them to have proportionately less representation in a system that already gives them less representation today. See: Electoral college reform, House reform. Please contest any of the factual basis you dispute in this post. The big states already have bigger representation in the House; some people want it to be more extreme. This is what I was responding to. Haven’t seen a single person anywhere argue that # of representatives per state should scale >linearly with population, and while I’m sure someone at some point has said it, it obviously violates the principle everyone is implicitly arguing about (i.e. that everyone’s vote should count equally). No idea what you’re referring to with “House reform,” if there’s some movement I’m unaware of to double CA’s house representatives or something you’ll have to give me a link. Why should people in wyoming have 70X (or w/e) more say than me on SCOTUS confirmations? This question isn’t rhetorical; give me an actual justification for weighting this way. Maybe we are arguing at cross purposes. You previously stated about "equal representation," when it is a truth that more populous states enjoy greater representation in the national government as things stand today. Equal representation of states only applies to half of the legislative branch of the federal government, and does not apply to the other half of the legislative branch of the government, or to the executive branch, or to the judicial branch. You agree that the problem does not consist of equal representation, or only narrowly consists of equal representation?
Why do you think anyone would mean "equal representation of states" when saying "equal representation"?
Everyone who is not you means "Equal representation of PEOPLE".
And that is exactly the problem. Some people get extra votes.
|
On January 03 2021 04:37 micronesia wrote:Show nested quote +On January 03 2021 04:23 Danglars wrote:
That's the trouble when criticizing the present system. Where's the injured party? Are larger states being bossed around by the smaller states by nature of their greater number? Are smaller states injured by the larger state's greater representation in the House and electorally in the Presidency? Hypothetically, would the larger states even notice if their interventions and national dictats amounted to overriding state sovereignty and trashing their concerns?
Those are concerns for me. Majoritarianism is in its ascendency at the large cultural split between urban and rural. And you've probably read enough of my posts here to know that I view the numerical majority to have blinders on when it comes to respecting the civil rights of minority communities. Note that I am not arguing for all powers in the U.S. to be handled simply by majority rule. At the beginning I was saying the current system is outdated and needs some adjustments. Your attempts to home in on exactly what the problems are by trying to point to "injury" is, I think, not the right way to do it. While I don't want there to be injured parties in the U.S., I think there are other ways to measure the effectiveness of the system of governance than simply by looking for injury. Focusing exclusively on injury is an unnecessarily transactional and limited way to measure fairness and prosperity. To say there's no injured party (not that I believe that), therefore status quo is the right approach, doesn't sit well with me. Changing the system of governance in this case is different from trying to win a court case. If you want me to get more detailed about exactly what is wrong with the status quo (which I'm unlikely to do since I was just offering some thoughts on the matter, not preparing a dissertation or trying to start an argument), it might help to clarify whether you acknowledge (or disagree) that some tinkering may be warranted with how distribution of citizens leads to representation in government.
The 17th Amendment fucked everything up. The Senate is meant to represent the values and issues of the respective states, not the people (though the people indirectly can make their voices known through their state legislature elections). That is the House of Reps. It is not a coincidence the more we drift towards simple majority bodies the more sectarian the country becomes. De Tocqueville knew this when he wrote about America.
|
On January 03 2021 04:42 Simberto wrote:Show nested quote +On January 03 2021 04:30 Danglars wrote:On January 03 2021 03:47 ChristianS wrote:On January 03 2021 03:38 Danglars wrote:On January 03 2021 03:32 ChristianS wrote:
I don’t think I’ve seen a single person anywhere argue that House representation should be anything other than proportional to population. What would that scheme even be? # of representatives rises quadratically with population?
The underlying principle is obviously that a government “of the people, by the people, and for the people” should decide its representation primarily by the opinion of the majority of people. If you’re going to privilege the opinion of some people by a couple orders of magnitude over the opinion of other people, you should present a compelling reason why they should be so over-represented. Protecting less populous communities and lifestyles from tyranny of the majority is potentially such a reason, but then apply it equally.
Or if you’ve got a different reason, spit it out. When people say "these areas need to have equal representation" and you, yourself "equal representation," it should be said that they don't have equal representation as the system exists today. It's literally one half of one third of the governing system. It deserves to be pointed out that equal only applies to the Senate, and as such arguments exist in electoral arguments more generally, people want them to have proportionately less representation in a system that already gives them less representation today. See: Electoral college reform, House reform. Please contest any of the factual basis you dispute in this post. The big states already have bigger representation in the House; some people want it to be more extreme. This is what I was responding to. Haven’t seen a single person anywhere argue that # of representatives per state should scale >linearly with population, and while I’m sure someone at some point has said it, it obviously violates the principle everyone is implicitly arguing about (i.e. that everyone’s vote should count equally). No idea what you’re referring to with “House reform,” if there’s some movement I’m unaware of to double CA’s house representatives or something you’ll have to give me a link. Why should people in wyoming have 70X (or w/e) more say than me on SCOTUS confirmations? This question isn’t rhetorical; give me an actual justification for weighting this way. Maybe we are arguing at cross purposes. You previously stated about "equal representation," when it is a truth that more populous states enjoy greater representation in the national government as things stand today. Equal representation of states only applies to half of the legislative branch of the federal government, and does not apply to the other half of the legislative branch of the government, or to the executive branch, or to the judicial branch. You agree that the problem does not consist of equal representation, or only narrowly consists of equal representation? Why do you think anyone would mean "equal representation of states" when saying "equal representation"? Everyone who is not you means "Equal representation of PEOPLE". And that is exactly the problem. Some people get extra votes.
The US polity is based on states, not people. I don't like pointing to names of countries because 99% it means jack shit, but the US is aptly named. Because you have no understanding of US history you make silly statements like you did. You don't know why the Senate is the way it is. You don't know about the Federalist and Anti-Federalist debates. You don't know the arguments for and against the things you propose. These issues aren't new. They're part of the founding of this country. There's a reason the US rejected democracy in favor of a representative republic. (Even though in an objective sense I'm not a fan of the Constitution, I'd rather have the Articles of Confederation still, that's another topic)
|
On January 03 2021 04:48 Wegandi wrote:Show nested quote +On January 03 2021 04:42 Simberto wrote:On January 03 2021 04:30 Danglars wrote:On January 03 2021 03:47 ChristianS wrote:On January 03 2021 03:38 Danglars wrote:On January 03 2021 03:32 ChristianS wrote:
I don’t think I’ve seen a single person anywhere argue that House representation should be anything other than proportional to population. What would that scheme even be? # of representatives rises quadratically with population?
The underlying principle is obviously that a government “of the people, by the people, and for the people” should decide its representation primarily by the opinion of the majority of people. If you’re going to privilege the opinion of some people by a couple orders of magnitude over the opinion of other people, you should present a compelling reason why they should be so over-represented. Protecting less populous communities and lifestyles from tyranny of the majority is potentially such a reason, but then apply it equally.
Or if you’ve got a different reason, spit it out. When people say "these areas need to have equal representation" and you, yourself "equal representation," it should be said that they don't have equal representation as the system exists today. It's literally one half of one third of the governing system. It deserves to be pointed out that equal only applies to the Senate, and as such arguments exist in electoral arguments more generally, people want them to have proportionately less representation in a system that already gives them less representation today. See: Electoral college reform, House reform. Please contest any of the factual basis you dispute in this post. The big states already have bigger representation in the House; some people want it to be more extreme. This is what I was responding to. Haven’t seen a single person anywhere argue that # of representatives per state should scale >linearly with population, and while I’m sure someone at some point has said it, it obviously violates the principle everyone is implicitly arguing about (i.e. that everyone’s vote should count equally). No idea what you’re referring to with “House reform,” if there’s some movement I’m unaware of to double CA’s house representatives or something you’ll have to give me a link. Why should people in wyoming have 70X (or w/e) more say than me on SCOTUS confirmations? This question isn’t rhetorical; give me an actual justification for weighting this way. Maybe we are arguing at cross purposes. You previously stated about "equal representation," when it is a truth that more populous states enjoy greater representation in the national government as things stand today. Equal representation of states only applies to half of the legislative branch of the federal government, and does not apply to the other half of the legislative branch of the government, or to the executive branch, or to the judicial branch. You agree that the problem does not consist of equal representation, or only narrowly consists of equal representation? Why do you think anyone would mean "equal representation of states" when saying "equal representation"? Everyone who is not you means "Equal representation of PEOPLE". And that is exactly the problem. Some people get extra votes. The US polity is based on states, not people. I don't like pointing to names of countries because 99% it means jack shit, but the US is aptly named. Because you have no understanding of US history you make silly statements like you did. You don't know why the Senate is the way it is. You don't know about the Federalist and Anti-Federalist debates. You don't know the arguments for and against the things you propose. These issues aren't new. They're part of the founding of this country. There's a reason the US rejected democracy in favor of a representative republic. (Even though in an objective sense I'm not a fan of the Constitution, I'd rather have the Articles of Confederation still, that's another topic)
Weird how only the republicans who are currently getting massive vote subsidies seem to think that that is good. And "You don't know shit" isn't a good argument.
Fact is that it gave you probably the worst president in the history of your country, winning with a minority of the votes, and placing 3 judges for the next decades to fuck up the supreme court. Doesn't sound like a good result of a well-working system to me.
|
On January 03 2021 04:20 Simberto wrote:Show nested quote +On January 03 2021 03:19 Danglars wrote:On January 03 2021 02:54 Mohdoo wrote:On January 03 2021 02:39 Danglars wrote:On January 03 2021 02:15 Mohdoo wrote:On January 03 2021 01:41 Danglars wrote:
It’s getting kind of blatant with the criticism of the Senate for helping large states not dominate a country of many states precisely because some people wish the larger states possessed the ability to dominate in greater measure.
It’s desirable that these kind of people wedded to those kind of wishes are frustrated. They have a message that rarely resonates outside of populous urban centers, they don’t want to change it, they’ve given up persuasion, they just want to force feed it to the rest of the country. A simple re-read of the last dozen or so posts should make this kind of thinking dead obvious. I’m not convinced the logic of empowering small groups is useful. There’s way more grocery workers then doctors, more construction workers than lawyers, more technicians than engineers. There are numerous examples of groups that are smaller than others that we don’t specifically make sure to empower through distorted vote mechanisms. The doctor vote has significantly less cultural power than the construction worker vote. Isn’t that a bad thing for the same reason? The senate model makes less densely populated areas more equivalent to more populated areas. Less populated areas generally have stagnant culture but I don’t see why that stagnation needs to be kept equal to places with more developed cultures. I understand the basic premise that that stagnant areas tend to be culturally distinct from the urban areas, but I don’t see where there jump exists that shows those areas need to have equal representation to a larger population. In your eyes, why is it important that the smaller group has more representation per person? May I say, your treatment of “less populated areas have stagnant culture but I don’t see why that stagnation needs to be kept equal” is exactly the kind of elitist bullshit that prompts the increased tyranny of the majority arguments. If you are fine so demeaning your fellow citizens, go have the courage to endorse a final separation of the country into a half that wants to be rid of cultures they generalize as lesser cultures. We don’t have to be an United States if certain populous states view some 20-30 of the 50 as a burden culturally and electorally. They can be states of a different union, and maintain firmer structures of division of power, if that’s the will of the biggest and richest. Cultural stagnation is a well understood dynamic documented in sociology and psychology. Amish civilization is an example of isolation encouraging cultural stagnation. Are you saying this idea is so offensive to you that you can’t bring yourself to give your perspective on my question? All you can bring yourself to say is “well then let’s split the country in half”? Being demeaning doesn’t mean I’m not interested in the contribution of the people I am demeaning. They still make the collective stronger, despite our disagreements. Everyone thinks some group of people are dumb and wrong. You’ve been very clear how wrong and dumb plenty of people are. Let me amend my previous post to state, if you are fine so demeaning your fellow citizens, based in your appreciation of the current trends in sociology and psychology, go have the courage to endorse a final separation of the country into a half that wants to be rid of cultures they generalize as lesser cultures. I haven't gone after the culture of the urban dense cities, but maybe to earn your respect, I better launch into diatribes about failing schools, rampant crime, and extreme homelessness, and how that's traceable to their supposedly more vibrant cultures. I don't really see that as a great direction, particularly for the maintenance of the union, but if y'all are so intent on dictating terms of continued sharing of power from big blue states to smaller red states, maybe that's the inevitable conclusion. If I imagine a huge majority of citizens in California and New York and New Jersey etc really do think like you do, then I don't stand in the way of your secession to form a nation that precisely decides national decisions in precise proportion to their population. If current power sharing is really so disgusting and damaging to them, by all means they shouldn't be held in the union that grants equal power to STATES in a United States of America in one half of one third of the government of those United States of America. State decisions in blue states with supermajorities of Democrats already can ignore the opinions of the country hicks in states with lesser cultures. By God, that's by design, and the delegation of power to the national government of everything is what got us into this mess in the first place. Cede power back to the states, redistribute less money from federal taxation, and let people with sociology degrees not worry about the political representation from states that border theirs. Pardon the statement of my opinion, but this whole debate sounds like noblesse oblige. The poorer, smaller states are living high on the hog from the largesse of the bigger states, and they should be brought down lower, seeing as how they'd be so destitute and pitiable if, for some reason, they were cut off from the benefits brought by the bigger, bluer areas of the country. They're now tired of that "responsibility," and are sadly announcing they're no longer fine with supporting that obligation. To which I say: it's fine, any kind of union of red counties will be fine. It should be more obvious to people participating that I don't think smaller states will vote for less power in the union, so the honest truth is that big states should leave if they can't pass electoral reform to their liking and this situation is so unbearable to them, and the same to the smaller states vice versa. The big states already have bigger representation in the House; some people want it to be more extreme. The big states already have bigger representation in electoral votes for President; some people want it to be more extreme. These arguments always come up when Democrats fail to secure a major electoral win, and no surprise, they narrowly won the states necessary for the Presidency, and lost power in the House. I think it is very betraying how you constantly talk about states, to the point where you say stuff like "The big states already have bigger representation in the House". What you do not do is talk about people. Because that would lead to a completely different reaction. People in bigger states have far less representation than people in smaller states. This is true in the senate, the presidential election and even in the house the representation is unequal, and some people have fewer representatives per person than others. As soon as you stop talking about states and how they are treated, and instead talk about the people in those states, stuff looks very differently, and Danglars position becomes even more absurd. It is utterly indefensible why some peoples votes should count for more than other peoples votes. Yet exactly that is happening. Imagine applying this principle to any other division of people. Maybe rich people should get more votes? Or black people? Yet somehow it seems sensible to the people who win using this system that just because you are in a small rural state, you should get more votes than a person living in a large state or a city. This is basically the core of the issue. Should all votes be equal, or should some people get extra votes?
The states have the power in the electoral college, the states have the power in the senate, and the states have power given to them by the constitution reserved from the federal government (now mostly an afterthought). It's by design and its a damn good one that's preserved this Republic for years when the European states were dissolving their governments and warring against each other. Let them have their gilet jaunes and elites against Brexit and migrant crises and grecian bailouts, where power if taken away from even countries, much less states, and invested in more distant bodies.
The pure population vote wielding their power through a strong national government is the road to a diminished America, trodding on the interests of the minority population, and on state rights as a whole (what's left of them, honestly). States are the system. One house of Congress is totally states. That's the fundamental unit of the Republic when we talk about the Federal Government, and it's in the name if anybody was wondering. Talking about people rather than states is casting out the fundamentals of the design, from the electoral college, to the Senate, to Article V, to the 10th amendment. The founders were wise to insulate governance from the tyranny of the mob, Democracy being a normal way for a nation to tear itself apart, and I frankly don't envy the more centralized countries their modes of government nor the resulting state of being. The states are the more fundamentally representative bodies of the voice of the people, being closer to the people naturally, and after that, it's the mayor's office and city councils. The national government, and proponents of a more powerful and less state-centered federal government, are advocating for politicians only caring for the New York Cities and Los Angeleses of the country, and bossing around the interests of smaller states at the will of the larger states. God knows the densely packed peoples of New York City have no special insight into the healthcare and taxation of the peoples of Iowa, but Massachusetts may vote to have a socialized health care system for their state decided by the people living in Massachusetts.
|
On January 03 2021 04:48 Wegandi wrote:Show nested quote +On January 03 2021 04:42 Simberto wrote:On January 03 2021 04:30 Danglars wrote:On January 03 2021 03:47 ChristianS wrote:On January 03 2021 03:38 Danglars wrote:On January 03 2021 03:32 ChristianS wrote:
I don’t think I’ve seen a single person anywhere argue that House representation should be anything other than proportional to population. What would that scheme even be? # of representatives rises quadratically with population?
The underlying principle is obviously that a government “of the people, by the people, and for the people” should decide its representation primarily by the opinion of the majority of people. If you’re going to privilege the opinion of some people by a couple orders of magnitude over the opinion of other people, you should present a compelling reason why they should be so over-represented. Protecting less populous communities and lifestyles from tyranny of the majority is potentially such a reason, but then apply it equally.
Or if you’ve got a different reason, spit it out. When people say "these areas need to have equal representation" and you, yourself "equal representation," it should be said that they don't have equal representation as the system exists today. It's literally one half of one third of the governing system. It deserves to be pointed out that equal only applies to the Senate, and as such arguments exist in electoral arguments more generally, people want them to have proportionately less representation in a system that already gives them less representation today. See: Electoral college reform, House reform. Please contest any of the factual basis you dispute in this post. The big states already have bigger representation in the House; some people want it to be more extreme. This is what I was responding to. Haven’t seen a single person anywhere argue that # of representatives per state should scale >linearly with population, and while I’m sure someone at some point has said it, it obviously violates the principle everyone is implicitly arguing about (i.e. that everyone’s vote should count equally). No idea what you’re referring to with “House reform,” if there’s some movement I’m unaware of to double CA’s house representatives or something you’ll have to give me a link. Why should people in wyoming have 70X (or w/e) more say than me on SCOTUS confirmations? This question isn’t rhetorical; give me an actual justification for weighting this way. Maybe we are arguing at cross purposes. You previously stated about "equal representation," when it is a truth that more populous states enjoy greater representation in the national government as things stand today. Equal representation of states only applies to half of the legislative branch of the federal government, and does not apply to the other half of the legislative branch of the government, or to the executive branch, or to the judicial branch. You agree that the problem does not consist of equal representation, or only narrowly consists of equal representation? Why do you think anyone would mean "equal representation of states" when saying "equal representation"? Everyone who is not you means "Equal representation of PEOPLE". And that is exactly the problem. Some people get extra votes. The US polity is based on states, not people. I don't like pointing to names of countries because 99% it means jack shit, but the US is aptly named. Because you have no understanding of US history you make silly statements like you did. You don't know why the Senate is the way it is. You don't know about the Federalist and Anti-Federalist debates. You don't know the arguments for and against the things you propose. These issues aren't new. They're part of the founding of this country. There's a reason the US rejected democracy in favor of a representative republic. (Even though in an objective sense I'm not a fan of the Constitution, I'd rather have the Articles of Confederation still, that's another topic)
Everyone knows this, people are questioning the wisdom and ethics of it. We’ve all learned this stuff in high school. What many people are saying is that maybe the system we came up with a really long time ago can be improved. Nothing established that long ago should be guaranteed amazing hundreds of years in the future.
|
On January 03 2021 04:52 Simberto wrote:Show nested quote +On January 03 2021 04:48 Wegandi wrote:On January 03 2021 04:42 Simberto wrote:On January 03 2021 04:30 Danglars wrote:On January 03 2021 03:47 ChristianS wrote:On January 03 2021 03:38 Danglars wrote:On January 03 2021 03:32 ChristianS wrote:
I don’t think I’ve seen a single person anywhere argue that House representation should be anything other than proportional to population. What would that scheme even be? # of representatives rises quadratically with population?
The underlying principle is obviously that a government “of the people, by the people, and for the people” should decide its representation primarily by the opinion of the majority of people. If you’re going to privilege the opinion of some people by a couple orders of magnitude over the opinion of other people, you should present a compelling reason why they should be so over-represented. Protecting less populous communities and lifestyles from tyranny of the majority is potentially such a reason, but then apply it equally.
Or if you’ve got a different reason, spit it out. When people say "these areas need to have equal representation" and you, yourself "equal representation," it should be said that they don't have equal representation as the system exists today. It's literally one half of one third of the governing system. It deserves to be pointed out that equal only applies to the Senate, and as such arguments exist in electoral arguments more generally, people want them to have proportionately less representation in a system that already gives them less representation today. See: Electoral college reform, House reform. Please contest any of the factual basis you dispute in this post. The big states already have bigger representation in the House; some people want it to be more extreme. This is what I was responding to. Haven’t seen a single person anywhere argue that # of representatives per state should scale >linearly with population, and while I’m sure someone at some point has said it, it obviously violates the principle everyone is implicitly arguing about (i.e. that everyone’s vote should count equally). No idea what you’re referring to with “House reform,” if there’s some movement I’m unaware of to double CA’s house representatives or something you’ll have to give me a link. Why should people in wyoming have 70X (or w/e) more say than me on SCOTUS confirmations? This question isn’t rhetorical; give me an actual justification for weighting this way. Maybe we are arguing at cross purposes. You previously stated about "equal representation," when it is a truth that more populous states enjoy greater representation in the national government as things stand today. Equal representation of states only applies to half of the legislative branch of the federal government, and does not apply to the other half of the legislative branch of the government, or to the executive branch, or to the judicial branch. You agree that the problem does not consist of equal representation, or only narrowly consists of equal representation? Why do you think anyone would mean "equal representation of states" when saying "equal representation"? Everyone who is not you means "Equal representation of PEOPLE". And that is exactly the problem. Some people get extra votes. The US polity is based on states, not people. I don't like pointing to names of countries because 99% it means jack shit, but the US is aptly named. Because you have no understanding of US history you make silly statements like you did. You don't know why the Senate is the way it is. You don't know about the Federalist and Anti-Federalist debates. You don't know the arguments for and against the things you propose. These issues aren't new. They're part of the founding of this country. There's a reason the US rejected democracy in favor of a representative republic. (Even though in an objective sense I'm not a fan of the Constitution, I'd rather have the Articles of Confederation still, that's another topic) Weird how only the republicans who are currently getting massive vote subsidies seem to think that that is good. And "You don't know shit" isn't a good argument. Fact is that it gave you probably the worst president in the history of your country, winning with a minority of the votes, and placing 3 judges for the next decades to fuck up the supreme court. Doesn't sound like a good result of a well-working system to me.
You're extremely myopic. Didn't folks tell me why can't Republicans just change their views to win votes of newly admitted states like PR and DC when we had that argument? Why can't Democrats just change their views to win in places like Idaho, Oklahoma, Kansas, etc.? All you guys care about is power (and 99% of GOP). The ramifications of the changes to the system you're proposing would accelerate US collapse.
The reason I said you're ignorant as fuck, is because you're ignorant as fuck. I'm not going to regurgitate 800 pages of the Federalist debates from the 1780s at you, but suffice to say, the US had this argument with each other all ready. There are innumerable good reasons why the US is more of a republic than a democracy.
User was temp banned for this post.
|
On January 03 2021 04:56 Mohdoo wrote:Show nested quote +On January 03 2021 04:48 Wegandi wrote:On January 03 2021 04:42 Simberto wrote:On January 03 2021 04:30 Danglars wrote:On January 03 2021 03:47 ChristianS wrote:On January 03 2021 03:38 Danglars wrote:On January 03 2021 03:32 ChristianS wrote:
I don’t think I’ve seen a single person anywhere argue that House representation should be anything other than proportional to population. What would that scheme even be? # of representatives rises quadratically with population?
The underlying principle is obviously that a government “of the people, by the people, and for the people” should decide its representation primarily by the opinion of the majority of people. If you’re going to privilege the opinion of some people by a couple orders of magnitude over the opinion of other people, you should present a compelling reason why they should be so over-represented. Protecting less populous communities and lifestyles from tyranny of the majority is potentially such a reason, but then apply it equally.
Or if you’ve got a different reason, spit it out. When people say "these areas need to have equal representation" and you, yourself "equal representation," it should be said that they don't have equal representation as the system exists today. It's literally one half of one third of the governing system. It deserves to be pointed out that equal only applies to the Senate, and as such arguments exist in electoral arguments more generally, people want them to have proportionately less representation in a system that already gives them less representation today. See: Electoral college reform, House reform. Please contest any of the factual basis you dispute in this post. The big states already have bigger representation in the House; some people want it to be more extreme. This is what I was responding to. Haven’t seen a single person anywhere argue that # of representatives per state should scale >linearly with population, and while I’m sure someone at some point has said it, it obviously violates the principle everyone is implicitly arguing about (i.e. that everyone’s vote should count equally). No idea what you’re referring to with “House reform,” if there’s some movement I’m unaware of to double CA’s house representatives or something you’ll have to give me a link. Why should people in wyoming have 70X (or w/e) more say than me on SCOTUS confirmations? This question isn’t rhetorical; give me an actual justification for weighting this way. Maybe we are arguing at cross purposes. You previously stated about "equal representation," when it is a truth that more populous states enjoy greater representation in the national government as things stand today. Equal representation of states only applies to half of the legislative branch of the federal government, and does not apply to the other half of the legislative branch of the government, or to the executive branch, or to the judicial branch. You agree that the problem does not consist of equal representation, or only narrowly consists of equal representation? Why do you think anyone would mean "equal representation of states" when saying "equal representation"? Everyone who is not you means "Equal representation of PEOPLE". And that is exactly the problem. Some people get extra votes. The US polity is based on states, not people. I don't like pointing to names of countries because 99% it means jack shit, but the US is aptly named. Because you have no understanding of US history you make silly statements like you did. You don't know why the Senate is the way it is. You don't know about the Federalist and Anti-Federalist debates. You don't know the arguments for and against the things you propose. These issues aren't new. They're part of the founding of this country. There's a reason the US rejected democracy in favor of a representative republic. (Even though in an objective sense I'm not a fan of the Constitution, I'd rather have the Articles of Confederation still, that's another topic) Everyone knows this, people are questioning the wisdom and ethics of it. We’ve all learned this stuff in high school. What many people are saying is that maybe the system we came up with a really long time ago can be improved. Nothing established that long ago should be guaranteed amazing hundreds of years in the future.
Right, we get it. You hate the country as conceived. You yell about the President destroying our institutions, but that's your active goal. I just find that a bit funny. If you want to live in a pure Democracy you're going to have to find another country because the people that you want to make irrelevant won't stay long (and you need a Constitutional Amendment and these states aren't going to vote for it - so...).
Republic > Democracy. I wouldn't frame your opinion as one of "improvement". They're different systems with different values.
PS: The fellow from Germany doesn't know this.
|
On January 03 2021 04:30 Danglars wrote:Show nested quote +On January 03 2021 03:47 ChristianS wrote:On January 03 2021 03:38 Danglars wrote:On January 03 2021 03:32 ChristianS wrote:
I don’t think I’ve seen a single person anywhere argue that House representation should be anything other than proportional to population. What would that scheme even be? # of representatives rises quadratically with population?
The underlying principle is obviously that a government “of the people, by the people, and for the people” should decide its representation primarily by the opinion of the majority of people. If you’re going to privilege the opinion of some people by a couple orders of magnitude over the opinion of other people, you should present a compelling reason why they should be so over-represented. Protecting less populous communities and lifestyles from tyranny of the majority is potentially such a reason, but then apply it equally.
Or if you’ve got a different reason, spit it out. When people say "these areas need to have equal representation" and you, yourself "equal representation," it should be said that they don't have equal representation as the system exists today. It's literally one half of one third of the governing system. It deserves to be pointed out that equal only applies to the Senate, and as such arguments exist in electoral arguments more generally, people want them to have proportionately less representation in a system that already gives them less representation today. See: Electoral college reform, House reform. Please contest any of the factual basis you dispute in this post. The big states already have bigger representation in the House; some people want it to be more extreme. This is what I was responding to. Haven’t seen a single person anywhere argue that # of representatives per state should scale >linearly with population, and while I’m sure someone at some point has said it, it obviously violates the principle everyone is implicitly arguing about (i.e. that everyone’s vote should count equally). No idea what you’re referring to with “House reform,” if there’s some movement I’m unaware of to double CA’s house representatives or something you’ll have to give me a link. Why should people in wyoming have 70X (or w/e) more say than me on SCOTUS confirmations? This question isn’t rhetorical; give me an actual justification for weighting this way. Maybe we are arguing at cross purposes. You previously stated about "equal representation," when it is a truth that more populous states enjoy greater representation in the national government as things stand today. Equal representation of states only applies to half of the legislative branch of the federal government, and does not apply to the other half of the legislative branch of the government, or to the executive branch, or to the judicial branch. You agree that the problem does not consist of equal representation, or only narrowly consists of equal representation?
And as pointed out to you, your half of a third is blatantly wrong. People from larger states count less in the house. They count less in the senate. They count less in the president. And by counting less in the president and senate, they count less in the Supreme Court.
The senate is only the most un-representative of the people, but all branches are unrepresentative of the people. Most people are willing to accept the flaws of the house as it’s not terribly off, but the senate at this point is ridiculous. At a minimum, we need a process to merge or split states that are too populous or not populous enough.
Wegandi, don’t accuse people of not understanding history and then wish we were still under the articles of confederation. They failed. Perhaps learn your history?
|
On January 03 2021 04:37 micronesia wrote:Show nested quote +On January 03 2021 04:23 Danglars wrote:
That's the trouble when criticizing the present system. Where's the injured party? Are larger states being bossed around by the smaller states by nature of their greater number? Are smaller states injured by the larger state's greater representation in the House and electorally in the Presidency? Hypothetically, would the larger states even notice if their interventions and national dictats amounted to overriding state sovereignty and trashing their concerns?
Those are concerns for me. Majoritarianism is in its ascendency at the large cultural split between urban and rural. And you've probably read enough of my posts here to know that I view the numerical majority to have blinders on when it comes to respecting the civil rights of minority communities. Note that I am not arguing for all powers in the U.S. to be handled simply by majority rule. At the beginning I was saying the current system is outdated and needs some adjustments. Your attempts to home in on exactly what the problems are by trying to point to "injury" is, I think, not the right way to do it. While I don't want there to be injured parties in the U.S., I think there are other ways to measure the effectiveness of the system of governance than simply by looking for injury. Focusing exclusively on injury is an unnecessarily transactional and limited way to measure fairness and prosperity. To say there's no injured party (not that I believe that), therefore status quo is the right approach, doesn't sit well with me. Changing the system of governance in this case is different from trying to win a court case. If you want me to get more detailed about exactly what is wrong with the status quo (which I'm unlikely to do since I was just offering some thoughts on the matter, not preparing a dissertation or trying to start an argument), it might help to clarify whether you acknowledge (or disagree) that some tinkering may be warranted with how distribution of citizens leads to representation in government.
I'll respect your reticence to go into full dissertations. I think the proper direction would be for the federal government to reimagine its role as one much smaller, dealing mostly with national defense, foreign treaties, and regulations affecting between-state matters like highways and lawsuits and multistate crime organizations. Domestic policy is a state matter. Only then would increased "tinkering" be a valuable shot. The car traveling at 100 mph is much more likely to crash with tinkering with the steering wheel that goes slightly in the direction of overcorrection, than that traveling at 40 mph. I should distinguish: tinkering should only be done with democratic votes within the present system, which is to say, by convincing the people's representatives in house, senate, and president's office that they have more to gain than lose by ceding power to the more populous regions of the country. Too little is made of campaigning to change minds to the value of the proposals; too much is made of the right minds having the better opinions doing action by fiat without buy-in. The second caution of tinkering is seeing the current rate of population migration away from states like California and New York; the big boys with big pops don't necessarily manage their affairs well at all, and the country may be better off with them having equal or lesser power nationally (California may even lose a seat in the House of Representatives)
|
United States42656 Posts
On January 03 2021 04:58 Wegandi wrote:Show nested quote +On January 03 2021 04:52 Simberto wrote:On January 03 2021 04:48 Wegandi wrote:On January 03 2021 04:42 Simberto wrote:On January 03 2021 04:30 Danglars wrote:On January 03 2021 03:47 ChristianS wrote:On January 03 2021 03:38 Danglars wrote:On January 03 2021 03:32 ChristianS wrote:
I don’t think I’ve seen a single person anywhere argue that House representation should be anything other than proportional to population. What would that scheme even be? # of representatives rises quadratically with population?
The underlying principle is obviously that a government “of the people, by the people, and for the people” should decide its representation primarily by the opinion of the majority of people. If you’re going to privilege the opinion of some people by a couple orders of magnitude over the opinion of other people, you should present a compelling reason why they should be so over-represented. Protecting less populous communities and lifestyles from tyranny of the majority is potentially such a reason, but then apply it equally.
Or if you’ve got a different reason, spit it out. When people say "these areas need to have equal representation" and you, yourself "equal representation," it should be said that they don't have equal representation as the system exists today. It's literally one half of one third of the governing system. It deserves to be pointed out that equal only applies to the Senate, and as such arguments exist in electoral arguments more generally, people want them to have proportionately less representation in a system that already gives them less representation today. See: Electoral college reform, House reform. Please contest any of the factual basis you dispute in this post. The big states already have bigger representation in the House; some people want it to be more extreme. This is what I was responding to. Haven’t seen a single person anywhere argue that # of representatives per state should scale >linearly with population, and while I’m sure someone at some point has said it, it obviously violates the principle everyone is implicitly arguing about (i.e. that everyone’s vote should count equally). No idea what you’re referring to with “House reform,” if there’s some movement I’m unaware of to double CA’s house representatives or something you’ll have to give me a link. Why should people in wyoming have 70X (or w/e) more say than me on SCOTUS confirmations? This question isn’t rhetorical; give me an actual justification for weighting this way. Maybe we are arguing at cross purposes. You previously stated about "equal representation," when it is a truth that more populous states enjoy greater representation in the national government as things stand today. Equal representation of states only applies to half of the legislative branch of the federal government, and does not apply to the other half of the legislative branch of the government, or to the executive branch, or to the judicial branch. You agree that the problem does not consist of equal representation, or only narrowly consists of equal representation? Why do you think anyone would mean "equal representation of states" when saying "equal representation"? Everyone who is not you means "Equal representation of PEOPLE". And that is exactly the problem. Some people get extra votes. The US polity is based on states, not people. I don't like pointing to names of countries because 99% it means jack shit, but the US is aptly named. Because you have no understanding of US history you make silly statements like you did. You don't know why the Senate is the way it is. You don't know about the Federalist and Anti-Federalist debates. You don't know the arguments for and against the things you propose. These issues aren't new. They're part of the founding of this country. There's a reason the US rejected democracy in favor of a representative republic. (Even though in an objective sense I'm not a fan of the Constitution, I'd rather have the Articles of Confederation still, that's another topic) Weird how only the republicans who are currently getting massive vote subsidies seem to think that that is good. And "You don't know shit" isn't a good argument. Fact is that it gave you probably the worst president in the history of your country, winning with a minority of the votes, and placing 3 judges for the next decades to fuck up the supreme court. Doesn't sound like a good result of a well-working system to me. You're extremely myopic. Didn't folks tell me why can't Republicans just change their views to win votes of newly admitted states like PR and DC when we had that argument? Why can't Democrats just change their views to win in places like Idaho, Oklahoma, Kansas, etc.? All you guys care about is power (and 99% of GOP). The ramifications of the changes to the system you're proposing would accelerate US collapse. The reason I said you're ignorant as fuck, is because you're ignorant as fuck. I'm not going to regurgitate 800 pages of the Federalist debates from the 1780s at you, but suffice to say, the US had this argument with each other all ready. There are innumerable good reasons why the US is more of a republic than a democracy.
Are you seriously flipping “if the Republicans can’t win a majority of votes they should pick more popular policies” to “if the Democrats want to win they should drop their more popular policies and appeal to the niche interests of an over represented minority”? Does that sound like a working system to you?
|
On January 03 2021 05:04 RenSC2 wrote:Show nested quote +On January 03 2021 04:30 Danglars wrote:On January 03 2021 03:47 ChristianS wrote:On January 03 2021 03:38 Danglars wrote:On January 03 2021 03:32 ChristianS wrote:
I don’t think I’ve seen a single person anywhere argue that House representation should be anything other than proportional to population. What would that scheme even be? # of representatives rises quadratically with population?
The underlying principle is obviously that a government “of the people, by the people, and for the people” should decide its representation primarily by the opinion of the majority of people. If you’re going to privilege the opinion of some people by a couple orders of magnitude over the opinion of other people, you should present a compelling reason why they should be so over-represented. Protecting less populous communities and lifestyles from tyranny of the majority is potentially such a reason, but then apply it equally.
Or if you’ve got a different reason, spit it out. When people say "these areas need to have equal representation" and you, yourself "equal representation," it should be said that they don't have equal representation as the system exists today. It's literally one half of one third of the governing system. It deserves to be pointed out that equal only applies to the Senate, and as such arguments exist in electoral arguments more generally, people want them to have proportionately less representation in a system that already gives them less representation today. See: Electoral college reform, House reform. Please contest any of the factual basis you dispute in this post. The big states already have bigger representation in the House; some people want it to be more extreme. This is what I was responding to. Haven’t seen a single person anywhere argue that # of representatives per state should scale >linearly with population, and while I’m sure someone at some point has said it, it obviously violates the principle everyone is implicitly arguing about (i.e. that everyone’s vote should count equally). No idea what you’re referring to with “House reform,” if there’s some movement I’m unaware of to double CA’s house representatives or something you’ll have to give me a link. Why should people in wyoming have 70X (or w/e) more say than me on SCOTUS confirmations? This question isn’t rhetorical; give me an actual justification for weighting this way. Maybe we are arguing at cross purposes. You previously stated about "equal representation," when it is a truth that more populous states enjoy greater representation in the national government as things stand today. Equal representation of states only applies to half of the legislative branch of the federal government, and does not apply to the other half of the legislative branch of the government, or to the executive branch, or to the judicial branch. You agree that the problem does not consist of equal representation, or only narrowly consists of equal representation? And as pointed out to you, your half of a third is blatantly wrong. People from larger states count less in the house. They count less in the senate. They count less in the president. And by counting less in the president and senate, they count less in the Supreme Court. The senate is only the most un-representative of the people, but all branches are unrepresentative of the people. Most people are willing to accept the flaws of the house as it’s not terribly off, but the senate at this point is ridiculous. At a minimum, we need a process to merge or split states that are too populous or not populous enough. Wegandi, don’t accuse people of not understanding history and then wish we were still under the articles of confederation. They failed. Perhaps learn your history?
You're still framing this in terms of your hypothesized fairer system. The larger states possess increased House representation compared to smaller states. You're just angry that it isn't the type of increased representation you should prefer, but this should not stop you from admitting the fact that larger states do have increased representatives in both House and Electoral College. I've pointed it out, and we have very little to talk about if this basic admission is a bridge too far for you personally.
|
|
|
|
|
|
EPT
