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https://www.taiwannews.com.tw/en/news/4393548
Taiwan, among others, reject the idea that 5 days is long enough to isolate after testing positive. The CDC has no apparent reason to push this kind of nonsense. If a Republican were president while this shortening of quarantine time was president, people would be screaming about business interests being held above the health of people forced to work.
I am adding this to my list why this administration is untenable. This is too negligent and/or transparently economy-focused.
Biden should be:
1) Yelling about it being unethical for people in congress selling stocks and advocating for making it illegal
2) Fixing student debt crisis
3) Ordering the FDA to reschedule marijuana and sending legislation to congress to legalize it
4) Prioritizing Americans' health over stock prices by keeping CDC guidelines safe
He could have done all of these things. He has done none of them. It is hard to see this as anything other than a failure.
This is not my ideal/wish list. This is my bare minimum for feeling sufficiently represented. If Biden does these things before 2024, he's got my vote.
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On January 03 2022 03:43 KwarK wrote:
I think these polls could use more options so that people could specify why they thought it was illegitimate. Whether they just didn’t like the “most votes loses” quirk of the system or if they thought he actually rigged it.
Iirc it was still 73% or something when it was broken out to “russia manipulated vote tallies,” explicitly separated from stuff like electoral college, bot farms, hacking opponents, etc.
I have to admit I’m still skeptical of the number, it doesn’t match with Democrats I knew in person and it didn’t seem like how people were acting. It felt to me like a consequence of most people not following the news all that closely or lacking reading comprehension. “Oh, yeah, Russia did something in the election, right? That seemed like kind of a big deal. They hacked, uh, they hacked the election? Changed vote tallies, that sounds right.”
Even if that’s the case, though, isn’t that an indication that the mechanisms of power are really just a black box to most people, and they’re not overly concerned with “legitimacy” as democracy would define it? The side they like is “legitimate” and the side they don’t like is “illegitimate” but that isn’t especially contingent on whether they seized power by election or military junta?
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On January 03 2022 02:10 Starlightsun wrote:Show nested quote +On January 03 2022 01:15 mierin wrote:
One of these days, "but Republicans are evil" isn't going to be enough to explain things like why 8 democrats voted against increasing the federal minimum wage. Did even a single Republican vote for it? Democrats suck and Republicans are evil are not mutually exclusive.
That is the main problem in the US. You have two parties, one of them consists of evil fascists, the other party consists of old conservative neoliberals who don't do anything to make things better.
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On January 02 2022 16:19 JimmiC wrote:Show nested quote +On January 02 2022 12:46 Belisarius wrote:It’s quite possible that within my lifetime I’m not going to live in a democracy any more. If that happens is this the response I can expect from Americans? Temporary outrage with no particular action, then go back to normal and vaguely hope that next time their vote will count? It breaks my heart to say it, but it's never been easier to find current examples of failing and failed democracies, as the west rusts out and autocrats everywhere capitalise on the license the pandemic has given them. Hong Kong is the most obvious, but there are just so damn many right now. We should try to learn from the slices of life those examples are giving us, imo. Really, democracies often die a slow, mundane death. When things are changing for the worse the average person tends to focus on what they can control, keep out of sight and hope it blows over. The sad fact is, the abstract idea is just not important enough to people for them to risk everything to defend it. It's often a while before the loss of it really affects someone keeping their head down. By then it's too late. You're absolutely right to point out that of the tens or hundreds of thousands who believed the election was stolen, only a few hundred were crazy enough to go to the capitol. On the one hand this is positive, since it wasn't stolen. On the other, I agree it suggests we might get the same ratio the other way if and when Trump 2.0 stages a real coup. And stop with the covid ruining democracies. Democracies have always made rules and people had to follow them, even those who disagreed. Hell we've has conscription where young people were forced to go to war and nost to die to protect it, but now people not being able to eat at a resturant if they choose to not get vaccinated or have to wear a mask on a bus is so darn terrible its gone to hell?
I'm not really sure who you're arguing with, but it's not me. It's hardly a hot-take that the pandemic has been a huge challenge for democracies to navigate, and presented opportunities for authoritarians to grab power.
Freedom house's annual report covers this very well and is worth at least skimming.
https://freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-world/2021/democracy-under-siege
As COVID-19 spread during the year, governments across the democratic spectrum repeatedly resorted to excessive surveillance, discriminatory restrictions on freedoms like movement and assembly, and arbitrary or violent enforcement of such restrictions by police and nonstate actors. Waves of false and misleading information, generated deliberately by political leaders in some cases, flooded many countries’ communication systems, obscuring reliable data and jeopardizing lives. While most countries with stronger democratic institutions ensured that any restrictions on liberty were necessary and proportionate to the threat posed by the virus, a number of their peers pursued clumsy or ill-informed strategies, and dictators from Venezuela to Cambodia exploited the crisis to quash opposition and fortify their power.
Dictators looking for excuses to suppress dissent have repeatedly used covid measures for their own goals. They've been used to delay elections (eg. Hong Kong), "quarantine" activists (eg China, El salvador), accrue poorly-defined powers (eg Hungary), increase surveillance (eg pretty much everyone), suppress criticism (eg. phillipines) and far more.
Even for counties whose governments honestly tried to act in the best interests of their citizens, we can all see that the whole thing drove a crowbar into the cracks. Housing has skyrocketed while industries collapsed, many without wealth have been left with no resources to weather the storm, and the antivax nonsense has pushed huge numbers of people into alternative facts bubbles that they will be very hard to get out of. Moreover, with all countries forced to focus more inwardly and the west's reach waning, many would-be dictatorships have been emboldened to double down (eg. Belarus, HK again) and rattle sabres (eg. on Taiwan, Ukraine).
None of this is new or exclusively due to covid, but it's not a surprise that democracy appeared to decline more last year than in any other in the last two decades. It's extremely worrying.
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On January 03 2022 01:21 Mohdoo wrote:Show nested quote +On January 03 2022 01:15 mierin wrote:
One of these days, "but Republicans are evil" isn't going to be enough to explain things like why 8 democrats voted against increasing the federal minimum wage. Because 8 democrats were elected by people who weighed the pros and cons of the available options, which ended with those 8 democrats being elected. If these people were voting in a way that is a deal breaker to their constituents, they would not be elected. The problem is the voters.
You're assuming a far more informed and motivated US electorate than reality presents imo. Not to mention the kind of difficulty presenting a primary challenge to an established Democrat that doesnt literally and directly insult their constituency.
The system doesnt work nearly that cleanly, established Democrats have the money, they have the connections, they have the brand recognition, fighting them in an election is very hard, and not because they're so keenly in tune with their voters.
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On January 03 2022 11:10 Zambrah wrote:Show nested quote +On January 03 2022 01:21 Mohdoo wrote:On January 03 2022 01:15 mierin wrote:
One of these days, "but Republicans are evil" isn't going to be enough to explain things like why 8 democrats voted against increasing the federal minimum wage. Because 8 democrats were elected by people who weighed the pros and cons of the available options, which ended with those 8 democrats being elected. If these people were voting in a way that is a deal breaker to their constituents, they would not be elected. The problem is the voters. You're assuming a far more informed and motivated US electorate than reality presents imo. Not to mention the kind of difficulty presenting a primary challenge to an established Democrat that doesnt literally and directly insult their constituency. The system doesnt work nearly that cleanly, established Democrats have the money, they have the connections, they have the brand recognition, fighting them in an election is very hard, and not because they're so keenly in tune with their voters.
We’re saying the same thing. Regardless of how or why, people are voting for the people we have. It isn’t hopeless against the establishment. We have numerous examples of progressives, such as AOC, winning against establishment dems. It can happen when people vote for it.
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It’s still exceptionally hard to get a non Party Democrat in and it’s a lot harder still to make people want to vote when everything is their fault instead of the fault of their elected officials.
My problem is blaming people who arent in control of their elected officials for their elected officials, people can’t recall their Senators for example, once you vote your power is gone and the shill who turned on you is basically untouchable. It’s a revolving door of shills and I’d rather focus blame on the shills rather than the people who wind up having to vote the shill in.
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On January 03 2022 13:48 Zambrah wrote:
It’s still exceptionally hard to get a non Party Democrat in and it’s a lot harder still to make people want to vote when everything is their fault instead of the fault of their elected officials.
My problem is blaming people who arent in control of their elected officials for their elected officials, people can’t recall their Senators for example, once you vote your power is gone and the shill who turned on you is basically untouchable. It’s a revolving door of shills and I’d rather focus blame on the shills rather than the people who wind up having to vote the shill in.
I don’t know what you mean they can’t control anything. You mean between election cycles? So you’re saying let’s blame the shills, and where does that go? There’s no path to a better senate without more, better votes. People not voting or people voting for bad candidates is by far the biggest issue. Oregon has great senators. We vote for good candidates. Other states vote for worse candidates. Look at Texas LOL. It feels really easy to point to each state and see why they get the senators they do.
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To put it plainly. Congress has like a 20% approval rating but an 80% re-election rate. You can argue if that is because of gerrymandering, people being clueless when they vote or people actually thinking their congressmen are the only good ones but the system is broken somewhere.
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On January 03 2022 12:30 Mohdoo wrote:Show nested quote +On January 03 2022 11:10 Zambrah wrote:On January 03 2022 01:21 Mohdoo wrote:On January 03 2022 01:15 mierin wrote:
One of these days, "but Republicans are evil" isn't going to be enough to explain things like why 8 democrats voted against increasing the federal minimum wage. Because 8 democrats were elected by people who weighed the pros and cons of the available options, which ended with those 8 democrats being elected. If these people were voting in a way that is a deal breaker to their constituents, they would not be elected. The problem is the voters. You're assuming a far more informed and motivated US electorate than reality presents imo. Not to mention the kind of difficulty presenting a primary challenge to an established Democrat that doesnt literally and directly insult their constituency. The system doesnt work nearly that cleanly, established Democrats have the money, they have the connections, they have the brand recognition, fighting them in an election is very hard, and not because they're so keenly in tune with their voters. We’re saying the same thing. Regardless of how or why, people are voting for the people we have. It isn’t hopeless against the establishment. We have numerous examples of progressives, such as AOC, winning against establishment dems. It can happen when people vote for it.
AOC bends the knee to the establishment Dems when they need her to, same goes for the rest of "the squad". Besides the obviously skewed electoral system (heavily favoring conservative neoliberal establishment Dems in several ways) there's always the Bidens and Sinemas who will just lie.
I think you're misplacing your confidence in the potential of the US's bourgeois democracy, particularly when it looks poised to be handed over to Trump and Republicans over the next few years.
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On January 03 2022 14:45 Mohdoo wrote:Show nested quote +On January 03 2022 13:48 Zambrah wrote:
It’s still exceptionally hard to get a non Party Democrat in and it’s a lot harder still to make people want to vote when everything is their fault instead of the fault of their elected officials.
My problem is blaming people who arent in control of their elected officials for their elected officials, people can’t recall their Senators for example, once you vote your power is gone and the shill who turned on you is basically untouchable. It’s a revolving door of shills and I’d rather focus blame on the shills rather than the people who wind up having to vote the shill in. I don’t know what you mean they can’t control anything. You mean between election cycles? So you’re saying let’s blame the shills, and where does that go? There’s no path to a better senate without more, better votes. People not voting or people voting for bad candidates is by far the biggest issue. Oregon has great senators. We vote for good candidates. Other states vote for worse candidates. Look at Texas LOL. It feels really easy to point to each state and see why they get the senators they do.
They can't recall their Senators, as an example, once you elect the shill they're in their elected position for their term and theres nothing you can do to punish the promise breaking in the meantime. Eats up a lot of time, and thats exclusively the ones who are ultra-blatant about their shilling like Sinema.
My problem is boiling things down to "people not voting for good candidates," because thats just incredibly simplistic, at the end of the day there are myriad reasons why we get the crappy candidates we get, and placing everything on the backs of the general US populace takes focus away from the people who I think are primarily responsible for the fucked up state of the US, aka the people in power, politicians, wealthy fucks, etc.
The people in power create the system that creates the brainwashing/coercing into submission of the general populace, I would rather focus my attention on the people in power rather than the brainwashed/coercing into submission.
Sure, the electorate technically has lots of power, but the system has been warped in such a way as to minimize their systematic power, and done a great job of suppressing the non-systematic powers we have. I put the majority of blame on the people who make and maintain the warped system.
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Northern Ireland27355 Posts
Is there no recall mechanism for a Senate seat at all, or does it exist but the bar is set so prohibitively high as to be de facto impossible.
Sinema the candidate and Sinema the Senator could be two entirely different people.
There’s a marked difference between not delivering on promises once ensconced in Washington with political realities, compromises and roadblocks to factor in, and having no intention to and blatantly lied to one’s electorate.
It’s a difficult line to draw in a non-arbitrary, codified way, but like pornography I know it when I see it.
There’s a lot else wrong systematically, but at its very core a representative democracy absolutely requires elected representatives to represent the folks who installed them. If they have blatantly lied to get there, they shouldn’t be safe until the next cycle.
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Theres no mechanism for it,
There is no way to recall a member of Congress before their term ends, nor has there ever been. No U.S. senator or member of the House of Representatives has been recalled by the electorate. Americans are unable to remove an elected member of the House or Senate from office because there is no recall mechanism set forth in the Constitution.
https://www.thoughtco.com/can-members-of-congress-be-recalled-3368240
And naturally they'll never even entertain the idea of adding a method through which they could be recalled because why make rules that harm yourself.
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On January 03 2022 22:09 WombaT wrote:
Is there no recall mechanism for a Senate seat at all, or does it exist but the bar is set so prohibitively high as to be de facto impossible.
Sinema the candidate and Sinema the Senator could be two entirely different people.
There’s a marked difference between not delivering on promises once ensconced in Washington with political realities, compromises and roadblocks to factor in, and having no intention to and blatantly lied to one’s electorate.
It’s a difficult line to draw in a non-arbitrary, codified way, but like pornography I know it when I see it.
There’s a lot else wrong systematically, but at its very core a representative democracy absolutely requires elected representatives to represent the folks who installed them. If they have blatantly lied to get there, they shouldn’t be safe until the next cycle.
If you think this is actually a big problem why does Congress have such a high re-election rate.
Why are they not getting voted out?
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Its hard to fight against money in elections. The people who can afford to campaign competitively are already shitty, and the ones who can't stand no chance against the rich, or the people the partys support with all of their money.
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United States44287 Posts
People don’t recognize how important primaries are in a simple plurality system. You don’t really have any kind of choice in the general election, you can either vote for the guy attempting to bring about a fascist theocracy or you can vote for the other guy. At that point it really doesn’t matter who the other guy is.
The election that should be capturing your interest is the one where you pick the other guy. Voting for him (against the fascist) is a formality, what matters is getting the best possible other guy. We cede so much power to parties in terms of selecting the other guy for us and the parties don’t represent our best interests. The Left need to do to the Democrats what the Tea Party did to the Republicans, fuck the neoliberal moderates, they’re still going to vote for whoever the party picks because the Republicans will run Voldemort as their next candidate.
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On January 03 2022 22:45 Gorsameth wrote:Show nested quote +On January 03 2022 22:09 WombaT wrote:
Is there no recall mechanism for a Senate seat at all, or does it exist but the bar is set so prohibitively high as to be de facto impossible.
Sinema the candidate and Sinema the Senator could be two entirely different people.
There’s a marked difference between not delivering on promises once ensconced in Washington with political realities, compromises and roadblocks to factor in, and having no intention to and blatantly lied to one’s electorate.
It’s a difficult line to draw in a non-arbitrary, codified way, but like pornography I know it when I see it.
There’s a lot else wrong systematically, but at its very core a representative democracy absolutely requires elected representatives to represent the folks who installed them. If they have blatantly lied to get there, they shouldn’t be safe until the next cycle.
If you think this is actually a big problem why does Congress have such a high re-election rate. Why are they not getting voted out?
Do they have runoff voting or primaries for Congress elections?
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On January 03 2022 23:21 maybenexttime wrote:Show nested quote +On January 03 2022 22:45 Gorsameth wrote:On January 03 2022 22:09 WombaT wrote:
Is there no recall mechanism for a Senate seat at all, or does it exist but the bar is set so prohibitively high as to be de facto impossible.
Sinema the candidate and Sinema the Senator could be two entirely different people.
There’s a marked difference between not delivering on promises once ensconced in Washington with political realities, compromises and roadblocks to factor in, and having no intention to and blatantly lied to one’s electorate.
It’s a difficult line to draw in a non-arbitrary, codified way, but like pornography I know it when I see it.
There’s a lot else wrong systematically, but at its very core a representative democracy absolutely requires elected representatives to represent the folks who installed them. If they have blatantly lied to get there, they shouldn’t be safe until the next cycle.
If you think this is actually a big problem why does Congress have such a high re-election rate. Why are they not getting voted out? Do they have runoff voting or primaries for Congress elections? They have primaries. That's how the Tea Party took over the Republican Congress from the more moderates.
I imagine the issue there is tho that most people simply don't care. A quick google search mentioned that 2018 for example was a really good year with almost 20% of voters voting in Congressional primaries, up from 14% in 2014. source
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Northern Ireland27355 Posts
On January 03 2022 22:45 Gorsameth wrote:Show nested quote +On January 03 2022 22:09 WombaT wrote:
Is there no recall mechanism for a Senate seat at all, or does it exist but the bar is set so prohibitively high as to be de facto impossible.
Sinema the candidate and Sinema the Senator could be two entirely different people.
There’s a marked difference between not delivering on promises once ensconced in Washington with political realities, compromises and roadblocks to factor in, and having no intention to and blatantly lied to one’s electorate.
It’s a difficult line to draw in a non-arbitrary, codified way, but like pornography I know it when I see it.
There’s a lot else wrong systematically, but at its very core a representative democracy absolutely requires elected representatives to represent the folks who installed them. If they have blatantly lied to get there, they shouldn’t be safe until the next cycle.
If you think this is actually a big problem why does Congress have such a high re-election rate. Why are they not getting voted out?
Whether a big problem or not, it seems structurally odd for such a mechanism not to be there. Rarely happens here, but it does happen from time to time.
A lot of US mechanisms fall into the ‘good in theory, bad in practice’ camp for me, being distorted with our current political, technological and social circumstances. The lack of a recall mechanism seems to be both bad in theory, bad in practice.
I assume the re-election rate is higher despite atrocious approval ratings because, it’s an even more two party system, and well specifically a Senate seat is a bigger prize than a seat in a unicameral Parliament.
If I can’t primary the shitbag from my own party, I’m either not voting or voting for the shitbag.
In the U.K, there will either be a credible alternative that I like, with the added buffer that it’s one seat, so not massively impactful in all likelihood.
The balance of power in the US is frequently a deadlocked Senate or a 1/2 seat swing either way, that’s a really impactful amount of sway for my hypothetical protest vote.
Approval ratings for Congress on a whole are, extremely low as well, which I imagine is important.
A 20% approval rate for a cherished institution with an 80+ approval rate among the populace and you’re fucked. If it’s 20% for 30% or whatever the actual number is, I assume people just shrug that politicians are going to be politicians and so don’t get too animated. If it’s a badly functioning cesspool full of people of dubious character, what’s the difference which dubious person you’re sending.
But yeah lots of factors, I assume others in here have more sensible and data-backed analyses than my spitballing.
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On January 03 2022 23:39 WombaT wrote:Show nested quote +On January 03 2022 22:45 Gorsameth wrote:On January 03 2022 22:09 WombaT wrote:
Is there no recall mechanism for a Senate seat at all, or does it exist but the bar is set so prohibitively high as to be de facto impossible.
Sinema the candidate and Sinema the Senator could be two entirely different people.
There’s a marked difference between not delivering on promises once ensconced in Washington with political realities, compromises and roadblocks to factor in, and having no intention to and blatantly lied to one’s electorate.
It’s a difficult line to draw in a non-arbitrary, codified way, but like pornography I know it when I see it.
There’s a lot else wrong systematically, but at its very core a representative democracy absolutely requires elected representatives to represent the folks who installed them. If they have blatantly lied to get there, they shouldn’t be safe until the next cycle.
If you think this is actually a big problem why does Congress have such a high re-election rate. Why are they not getting voted out? Whether a big problem or not, it seems structurally odd for such a mechanism not to be there. Rarely happens here, but it does happen from time to time. A lot of US mechanisms fall into the ‘good in theory, bad in practice’ camp for me, being distorted with our current political, technological and social circumstances. The lack of a recall mechanism seems to be both bad in theory, bad in practice. I assume the re-election rate is higher despite atrocious approval ratings because, it’s an even more two party system, and well specifically a Senate seat is a bigger prize than a seat in a unicameral Parliament. If I can’t primary the shitbag from my own party, I’m either not voting or voting for the shitbag. In the U.K, there will either be a credible alternative that I like, with the added buffer that it’s one seat, so not massively impactful in all likelihood. The balance of power in the US is frequently a deadlocked Senate or a 1/2 seat swing either way, that’s a really impactful amount of sway for my hypothetical protest vote. Approval ratings for Congress on a whole are, extremely low as well, which I imagine is important. A 20% approval rate for a cherished institution with an 80+ approval rate among the populace and you’re fucked. If it’s 20% for 30% or whatever the actual number is, I assume people just shrug that politicians are going to be politicians and so don’t get too animated. If it’s a badly functioning cesspool full of people of dubious character, what’s the difference which dubious person you’re sending. But yeah lots of factors, I assume others in here have more sensible and data-backed analyses than my spitballing. There are primaries where you can vote for another candidate to be your parties representative in the actual election. Once elected tho a representative serves until the end of their term, and that is the case in most democracies that I know off. Removing an elected official prior to a new election is not a thing.
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