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.
Except the variable is winning candidate and it is 2 part sentence not 3. You would be correct if he wrote something like this " They would completely love that exact same process if it lead to win and their guy won."
There is no implication that it currently favours the other guy. You need to work on your reading comprehension.
Them: “you’d like it if it helped you” You: “ahah, so you admit it helps you!”
It actually implies that. They would love process if it lead to their guy winning, directly imply, that they hate the process, because it leads to other guy winning.
You’re apparently going to die to the hill that the process is why Democrats win in California and not that they’re the overwhelming majority.
Thats not what we arguing here,
The argument has been that dyhb and you and others have said that California's inefficient election process legitimizes conservatives' conspiratorial thinking
I really have trouble seeing this as anything but the most deliberate bad-faith attempt to mischaracterize another person's posts.
Have you thought about whether the anger over why it takes weeks to find out tight election results advances conspiratorial thinking? Why is it taking so long, why can't we be like every other state (including big states) and countries? Oh, this guy knows the REAL reason why...
Voters that still don't know the outcome of tight races one week after ... or two weeks after ... or three weeks after is pouring gasoline on that fire. They aren't responsible for the fire itself, so I'm not contesting your contribution. You're just ignoring the other affects for no good reason.
How can you read anything about my posts and not come away understanding that the broken and delayed process makes an existing problem worse? Legitimizes? You read all that and say legitimizes?
What are you talking about? Those are the exact statements that support what I said that you were saying. Those quotes demonstrate that you think conspiracy theorists feel they are justified in being suspicious of election integrity because California takes a while to complete their elections. You're saying it's no wonder that this "advances conspiratorial thinking" and that this inefficiency "is pouring gasoline on that fire".
Is this a semantics issue? Are you and I using different definitions of "legitimizes"? Because you're clearly stating that California's inefficiency is making the conspiracy theorists feel that their concerns are legitimate / reasonable / understandable. The inefficiency might not be the only reason why conspiracy theorists freak out over California elections, but it gives them extra ammunition... they wonder, to quote you, "Why is it taking so long, why can't we be like every other state (including big states) and countries? Oh, this guy knows the REAL reason why..."
You are really really going to have to separate in your mind two different things. One is taking action to curb the pernicious influence of bad things in society. The other is justifying, excusing, or calling good the bad things in society. I don't think it is a semantics issue, since you are apparently having an incredibly difficult time separating these in your mind.
You're far too focused on calling people that want to fix the problem as somehow forgiving or condoning the existence of the problem in and of itself. I should call you a pretty bad math teacher if you point at a teacher going over common math mistakes on the whiteboard to say, "Look at this guy! Legitimizing bad math mistakes by writing them down on the board! Clearly, he's reinforcing in the minds of the students that shoddy solution techniques are acceptable in the world of rigorous mathematics!" Sorry, bro, but pointing out their existence and contribution to/acceleration of other ills is an entire world away from legitimization, and doesn't rank-order each mistake in terms of reasonability.
I think you're giving yourself way too much credit on what (and how) you're contributing to this conversation, especially if you look at the pushback you're receiving. The "two different things" that you're insisting I separate were both being pushed by you. You're bringing up what you perceive to be a way to reduce conspiracy theories (not accounting for what happens in real life, which is what I wrote earlier: "even if California ran more smoothly than any other state, Republicans would still make up conspiracy theories about any election they lose being rigged"), while also making statements that legitimize those conspiracy theories. You're trying to have it both ways and then complaining when people take issue with at least one (if not both) of your positions.
I have nothing to add, other than to ask you to make that differentiation in the interest of understanding your objection to my point.
While I appreciate the importance of discussing common math mistakes with students so that those errors aren't committed again, the equivalent analogy would be to discuss mistakes in reasoning with conspiracy theorists* so that those errors aren't committed again. For example, we can explain why an election taking a while doesn't imply there's foul play, and we can compare similarly low / negligible rates of fraud across different states (regardless of how long they take to complete their election). *I don't know if conspiracy theorists will understand and learn at the same rate as good-faith students, but I think that additional inconsistency in your analogy is perhaps less important to the original point you were trying to make.
I thought it was clear by now that I was talking about the ability of conspiracy theorists to spread their conspiracies among the rest of the population. You’re going back to a point nobody was making about the theorists themselves. Hence, I’m trying to understand if you’re being purposefully obtuse, or genuinely mistaken. We can’t talk about what makes fertile ground for the spread, and allay it, if every time I try to examine that you change the subject insistently.
Inflation at 4.2%. Trump is right... The USA is the hottest country on earth. Mostly, it is because no one can afford to use their air conditioners.
I don't know if in the past inflation could be directly related to a president's actions. Biden and Trump , however , both created their own inflation problems. Moar Tariffs! That'll fix it.
On June 10 2026 11:20 KwarK wrote: [quote] There is no implication that it currently favours the other guy. You need to work on your reading comprehension.
Them: “you’d like it if it helped you” You: “ahah, so you admit it helps you!”
It actually implies that. They would love process if it lead to their guy winning, directly imply, that they hate the process, because it leads to other guy winning.
You’re apparently going to die to the hill that the process is why Democrats win in California and not that they’re the overwhelming majority.
Thats not what we arguing here,
The argument has been that dyhb and you and others have said that California's inefficient election process legitimizes conservatives' conspiratorial thinking
I really have trouble seeing this as anything but the most deliberate bad-faith attempt to mischaracterize another person's posts.
Have you thought about whether the anger over why it takes weeks to find out tight election results advances conspiratorial thinking? Why is it taking so long, why can't we be like every other state (including big states) and countries? Oh, this guy knows the REAL reason why...
Voters that still don't know the outcome of tight races one week after ... or two weeks after ... or three weeks after is pouring gasoline on that fire. They aren't responsible for the fire itself, so I'm not contesting your contribution. You're just ignoring the other affects for no good reason.
How can you read anything about my posts and not come away understanding that the broken and delayed process makes an existing problem worse? Legitimizes? You read all that and say legitimizes?
What are you talking about? Those are the exact statements that support what I said that you were saying. Those quotes demonstrate that you think conspiracy theorists feel they are justified in being suspicious of election integrity because California takes a while to complete their elections. You're saying it's no wonder that this "advances conspiratorial thinking" and that this inefficiency "is pouring gasoline on that fire".
Is this a semantics issue? Are you and I using different definitions of "legitimizes"? Because you're clearly stating that California's inefficiency is making the conspiracy theorists feel that their concerns are legitimate / reasonable / understandable. The inefficiency might not be the only reason why conspiracy theorists freak out over California elections, but it gives them extra ammunition... they wonder, to quote you, "Why is it taking so long, why can't we be like every other state (including big states) and countries? Oh, this guy knows the REAL reason why..."
You are really really going to have to separate in your mind two different things. One is taking action to curb the pernicious influence of bad things in society. The other is justifying, excusing, or calling good the bad things in society. I don't think it is a semantics issue, since you are apparently having an incredibly difficult time separating these in your mind.
You're far too focused on calling people that want to fix the problem as somehow forgiving or condoning the existence of the problem in and of itself. I should call you a pretty bad math teacher if you point at a teacher going over common math mistakes on the whiteboard to say, "Look at this guy! Legitimizing bad math mistakes by writing them down on the board! Clearly, he's reinforcing in the minds of the students that shoddy solution techniques are acceptable in the world of rigorous mathematics!" Sorry, bro, but pointing out their existence and contribution to/acceleration of other ills is an entire world away from legitimization, and doesn't rank-order each mistake in terms of reasonability.
I think you're giving yourself way too much credit on what (and how) you're contributing to this conversation, especially if you look at the pushback you're receiving. The "two different things" that you're insisting I separate were both being pushed by you. You're bringing up what you perceive to be a way to reduce conspiracy theories (not accounting for what happens in real life, which is what I wrote earlier: "even if California ran more smoothly than any other state, Republicans would still make up conspiracy theories about any election they lose being rigged"), while also making statements that legitimize those conspiracy theories. You're trying to have it both ways and then complaining when people take issue with at least one (if not both) of your positions.
While I appreciate the importance of discussing common math mistakes with students so that those errors aren't committed again, the equivalent analogy would be to discuss mistakes in reasoning with conspiracy theorists* so that those errors aren't committed again. For example, we can explain why an election taking a while doesn't imply there's foul play, and we can compare similarly low / negligible rates of fraud across different states (regardless of how long they take to complete their election). *I don't know if conspiracy theorists will understand and learn at the same rate as good-faith students, but I think that additional inconsistency in your analogy is perhaps less important to the original point you were trying to make.
If, emphasis on that particular word, dangling a few carrots would placate people and stave off a lack of faith in various institutions, I mean I do think that is worth pursuing.
I do rather suspect, as it seems you also do that this would not actually happen. It’ll just shift to mail in ballots, voting machines or whatever else.
In isolation though, yeah can still be worth expediting some of those processes and seeming inefficiencies. Sure
‘We have to do x to stem conspiracy theories and whatnot’ seems quite daft to me and extremely unidirectional as a demand (or suggestion)
I agree. We've already seen the goalposts move in every direction possible over the past decade. These aren't people who are sincerely confused about the length of California's election and are curiously offering helpful ways to make things more efficient; these are conspiracy theorists who already have the next ten excuses and rationales lined up for why Democrats must be cheating. In fact, I bet if California became super efficient, we would hear the opposite: California probably isn't even counting all the votes, and they're just declaring whoever they want (obviously the Democrat) as the winner every time!
There's no winning with these people. I think making things more accurate and more efficient are generally good ideas, but I think attempting to change something simply to placate conspiracy theorists is a fool's errand.
On June 10 2026 23:16 GreenHorizons wrote: Everyone knows California, being the 4th biggest economy in the world on its own, being dominated for ~60 years by Democrats, including a super majority for the last ~decade, should absolutely be an exemplar of elections in the world.
It isn't. That is unambiguously Democrats fault (arguably to their credit).
What exactly do you guys think you lose by recognizing that?
This is kinda where I land, yeah. Seems obvious (superficially) that California's elections could be better, but rather than concede that point, there's fighting on that hill. For what? What are you/they fighting over? What do you lose by conceding the hill?
I never fought on that hill. I said a reasonable ask would be to make California's tallying faster. My fight is that I don't that it's the main contributor to why people think it's rigged. My contention is the main source is the President of the United States and his supportive media echo chambers calling Rigged! Rigged! before any election is the main cause of conspiracies and then the same supporting media echo chamber clip chimps during and after the election to support the conspiracy narrative. And the President broadcasts these lies on his reTruths and will not be corrected even when his own aides try to show him the full context.
On June 10 2026 03:21 Falling wrote: A reasonable ask would be, hey California could you speed up your process, we need results in a more timely manner. That is not what is happening.
2016 Election is RIGGED rigged! (wins anyways) 2020 Election is rigged. RIGGED! (loses but try to rig the election in his favour by leaning on States to find votes for him) 2024 Election is rigggggged RIGGED RIGGED! rigggggged! (wins anyways) California election RIGGGGGGGGGGGED!
Rigged! RIGGGED! From the President of the United States of America and his cronies and his followers. Is NOT the same thing 'California should be faster'
Thank you for your attention to this matter.
Roger. Thanks! I hadn't been following closely enough, so I'm misreading/misunderstanding what hill you're fighting on. That satisfies my question at least, though I can't speak for GH.
For me there's a few different but not entirely unrelated aspects.
To me it's sorta similar to Republicans playing dumb about voter ID.
California could/should very easily be an exemplar for elections in the US and arguably the world if Democrats functionally having total control for ~60 years and basically one of the biggest potential budgets in the world was how we could/should get there.
It isn't, because Democrats don't want it to be. I believe that obviously has other implications, but as far as US democracy functions, it's one of Democrats best examples of countering Republicans' legal efforts at undermining democracy for partisan benefit.
On June 10 2026 23:16 GreenHorizons wrote: Everyone knows California, being the 4th biggest economy in the world on its own, being dominated for ~60 years by Democrats, including a super majority for the last ~decade, should absolutely be an exemplar of elections in the world.
It isn't. That is unambiguously Democrats fault (arguably to their credit).
What exactly do you guys think you lose by recognizing that?
This is kinda where I land, yeah. Seems obvious (superficially) that California's elections could be better, but rather than concede that point, there's fighting on that hill. For what? What are you/they fighting over? What do you lose by conceding the hill?
I never fought on that hill. I said a reasonable ask would be to make California's tallying faster. My fight is that I don't that it's the main contributor to why people think it's rigged. My contention is the main source is the President of the United States and his supportive media echo chambers calling Rigged! Rigged! before any election is the main cause of conspiracies and then the same supporting media echo chamber clip chimps during and after the election to support the conspiracy narrative. And the President broadcasts these lies on his reTruths and will not be corrected even when his own aides try to show him the full context.
On June 10 2026 03:21 Falling wrote: A reasonable ask would be, hey California could you speed up your process, we need results in a more timely manner. That is not what is happening.
2016 Election is RIGGED rigged! (wins anyways) 2020 Election is rigged. RIGGED! (loses but try to rig the election in his favour by leaning on States to find votes for him) 2024 Election is rigggggged RIGGED RIGGED! rigggggged! (wins anyways) California election RIGGGGGGGGGGGED!
Rigged! RIGGGED! From the President of the United States of America and his cronies and his followers. Is NOT the same thing 'California should be faster'
Thank you for your attention to this matter.
Roger. Thanks! I hadn't been following closely enough, so I'm misreading/misunderstanding what hill you're fighting on. That satisfies my question at least, though I can't speak for GH.
They don't like the people who object the loudest. It is that simple. Somehow every other comparable political entity manages better than this and thinks a timely accurate count is important but they are reduced to saying "who cares" because they can't even cede a mm of ground.
If you give me a reason to care I'd be happy to reconsider. But this conversation has gotten worthlessly repetitive because nobody can seem to do that.
On June 10 2026 23:16 GreenHorizons wrote: Everyone knows California, being the 4th biggest economy in the world on its own, being dominated for ~60 years by Democrats, including a super majority for the last ~decade, should absolutely be an exemplar of elections in the world.
It isn't. That is unambiguously Democrats fault (arguably to their credit).
What exactly do you guys think you lose by recognizing that?
This is kinda where I land, yeah. Seems obvious (superficially) that California's elections could be better, but rather than concede that point, there's fighting on that hill. For what? What are you/they fighting over? What do you lose by conceding the hill?
I never fought on that hill. I said a reasonable ask would be to make California's tallying faster. My fight is that I don't that it's the main contributor to why people think it's rigged. My contention is the main source is the President of the United States and his supportive media echo chambers calling Rigged! Rigged! before any election is the main cause of conspiracies and then the same supporting media echo chamber clip chimps during and after the election to support the conspiracy narrative. And the President broadcasts these lies on his reTruths and will not be corrected even when his own aides try to show him the full context.
On June 10 2026 03:21 Falling wrote: A reasonable ask would be, hey California could you speed up your process, we need results in a more timely manner. That is not what is happening.
2016 Election is RIGGED rigged! (wins anyways) 2020 Election is rigged. RIGGED! (loses but try to rig the election in his favour by leaning on States to find votes for him) 2024 Election is rigggggged RIGGED RIGGED! rigggggged! (wins anyways) California election RIGGGGGGGGGGGED!
Rigged! RIGGGED! From the President of the United States of America and his cronies and his followers. Is NOT the same thing 'California should be faster'
Thank you for your attention to this matter.
Roger. Thanks! I hadn't been following closely enough, so I'm misreading/misunderstanding what hill you're fighting on. That satisfies my question at least, though I can't speak for GH.
They don't like the people who object the loudest. It is that simple. Somehow every other comparable political entity manages better than this and thinks a timely accurate count is important but they are reduced to saying "who cares" because they can't even cede a mm of ground.
That resonates somewhat given that it's the group that took the mm of somebody complaining on a facebook group and turned it into "They're eating the dogs", but also 'that group' isnt necessarily you/dyhb/etc.
On June 10 2026 11:20 KwarK wrote: [quote] There is no implication that it currently favours the other guy. You need to work on your reading comprehension.
Them: “you’d like it if it helped you” You: “ahah, so you admit it helps you!”
It actually implies that. They would love process if it lead to their guy winning, directly imply, that they hate the process, because it leads to other guy winning.
You’re apparently going to die to the hill that the process is why Democrats win in California and not that they’re the overwhelming majority.
Thats not what we arguing here,
The argument has been that dyhb and you and others have said that California's inefficient election process legitimizes conservatives' conspiratorial thinking
I really have trouble seeing this as anything but the most deliberate bad-faith attempt to mischaracterize another person's posts.
Have you thought about whether the anger over why it takes weeks to find out tight election results advances conspiratorial thinking? Why is it taking so long, why can't we be like every other state (including big states) and countries? Oh, this guy knows the REAL reason why...
Voters that still don't know the outcome of tight races one week after ... or two weeks after ... or three weeks after is pouring gasoline on that fire. They aren't responsible for the fire itself, so I'm not contesting your contribution. You're just ignoring the other affects for no good reason.
How can you read anything about my posts and not come away understanding that the broken and delayed process makes an existing problem worse? Legitimizes? You read all that and say legitimizes?
What are you talking about? Those are the exact statements that support what I said that you were saying. Those quotes demonstrate that you think conspiracy theorists feel they are justified in being suspicious of election integrity because California takes a while to complete their elections. You're saying it's no wonder that this "advances conspiratorial thinking" and that this inefficiency "is pouring gasoline on that fire".
Is this a semantics issue? Are you and I using different definitions of "legitimizes"? Because you're clearly stating that California's inefficiency is making the conspiracy theorists feel that their concerns are legitimate / reasonable / understandable. The inefficiency might not be the only reason why conspiracy theorists freak out over California elections, but it gives them extra ammunition... they wonder, to quote you, "Why is it taking so long, why can't we be like every other state (including big states) and countries? Oh, this guy knows the REAL reason why..."
You are really really going to have to separate in your mind two different things. One is taking action to curb the pernicious influence of bad things in society. The other is justifying, excusing, or calling good the bad things in society. I don't think it is a semantics issue, since you are apparently having an incredibly difficult time separating these in your mind.
You're far too focused on calling people that want to fix the problem as somehow forgiving or condoning the existence of the problem in and of itself. I should call you a pretty bad math teacher if you point at a teacher going over common math mistakes on the whiteboard to say, "Look at this guy! Legitimizing bad math mistakes by writing them down on the board! Clearly, he's reinforcing in the minds of the students that shoddy solution techniques are acceptable in the world of rigorous mathematics!" Sorry, bro, but pointing out their existence and contribution to/acceleration of other ills is an entire world away from legitimization, and doesn't rank-order each mistake in terms of reasonability.
I think you're giving yourself way too much credit on what (and how) you're contributing to this conversation, especially if you look at the pushback you're receiving. The "two different things" that you're insisting I separate were both being pushed by you. You're bringing up what you perceive to be a way to reduce conspiracy theories (not accounting for what happens in real life, which is what I wrote earlier: "even if California ran more smoothly than any other state, Republicans would still make up conspiracy theories about any election they lose being rigged"), while also making statements that legitimize those conspiracy theories. You're trying to have it both ways and then complaining when people take issue with at least one (if not both) of your positions.
I have nothing to add, other than to ask you to make that differentiation in the interest of understanding your objection to my point.
While I appreciate the importance of discussing common math mistakes with students so that those errors aren't committed again, the equivalent analogy would be to discuss mistakes in reasoning with conspiracy theorists* so that those errors aren't committed again. For example, we can explain why an election taking a while doesn't imply there's foul play, and we can compare similarly low / negligible rates of fraud across different states (regardless of how long they take to complete their election). *I don't know if conspiracy theorists will understand and learn at the same rate as good-faith students, but I think that additional inconsistency in your analogy is perhaps less important to the original point you were trying to make.
I thought it was clear by now that I was talking about the ability of conspiracy theorists to spread their conspiracies among the rest of the population. You’re going back to a point nobody was making about the theorists themselves. Hence, I’m trying to understand if you’re being purposefully obtuse, or genuinely mistaken. We can’t talk about what makes fertile ground for the spread, and allay it, if every time I try to examine that you change the subject insistently.
How would their ability to spread their conspiracy theories be affected by California improving their election system? Can't they still take to social media and their echo chambers and continue to say that elections are rigged?
It actually implies that. They would love process if it lead to their guy winning, directly imply, that they hate the process, because it leads to other guy winning.
You’re apparently going to die to the hill that the process is why Democrats win in California and not that they’re the overwhelming majority.
Thats not what we arguing here,
The argument has been that dyhb and you and others have said that California's inefficient election process legitimizes conservatives' conspiratorial thinking
I really have trouble seeing this as anything but the most deliberate bad-faith attempt to mischaracterize another person's posts.
Have you thought about whether the anger over why it takes weeks to find out tight election results advances conspiratorial thinking? Why is it taking so long, why can't we be like every other state (including big states) and countries? Oh, this guy knows the REAL reason why...
Voters that still don't know the outcome of tight races one week after ... or two weeks after ... or three weeks after is pouring gasoline on that fire. They aren't responsible for the fire itself, so I'm not contesting your contribution. You're just ignoring the other affects for no good reason.
How can you read anything about my posts and not come away understanding that the broken and delayed process makes an existing problem worse? Legitimizes? You read all that and say legitimizes?
What are you talking about? Those are the exact statements that support what I said that you were saying. Those quotes demonstrate that you think conspiracy theorists feel they are justified in being suspicious of election integrity because California takes a while to complete their elections. You're saying it's no wonder that this "advances conspiratorial thinking" and that this inefficiency "is pouring gasoline on that fire".
Is this a semantics issue? Are you and I using different definitions of "legitimizes"? Because you're clearly stating that California's inefficiency is making the conspiracy theorists feel that their concerns are legitimate / reasonable / understandable. The inefficiency might not be the only reason why conspiracy theorists freak out over California elections, but it gives them extra ammunition... they wonder, to quote you, "Why is it taking so long, why can't we be like every other state (including big states) and countries? Oh, this guy knows the REAL reason why..."
You are really really going to have to separate in your mind two different things. One is taking action to curb the pernicious influence of bad things in society. The other is justifying, excusing, or calling good the bad things in society. I don't think it is a semantics issue, since you are apparently having an incredibly difficult time separating these in your mind.
You're far too focused on calling people that want to fix the problem as somehow forgiving or condoning the existence of the problem in and of itself. I should call you a pretty bad math teacher if you point at a teacher going over common math mistakes on the whiteboard to say, "Look at this guy! Legitimizing bad math mistakes by writing them down on the board! Clearly, he's reinforcing in the minds of the students that shoddy solution techniques are acceptable in the world of rigorous mathematics!" Sorry, bro, but pointing out their existence and contribution to/acceleration of other ills is an entire world away from legitimization, and doesn't rank-order each mistake in terms of reasonability.
I think you're giving yourself way too much credit on what (and how) you're contributing to this conversation, especially if you look at the pushback you're receiving. The "two different things" that you're insisting I separate were both being pushed by you. You're bringing up what you perceive to be a way to reduce conspiracy theories (not accounting for what happens in real life, which is what I wrote earlier: "even if California ran more smoothly than any other state, Republicans would still make up conspiracy theories about any election they lose being rigged"), while also making statements that legitimize those conspiracy theories. You're trying to have it both ways and then complaining when people take issue with at least one (if not both) of your positions.
I have nothing to add, other than to ask you to make that differentiation in the interest of understanding your objection to my point.
While I appreciate the importance of discussing common math mistakes with students so that those errors aren't committed again, the equivalent analogy would be to discuss mistakes in reasoning with conspiracy theorists* so that those errors aren't committed again. For example, we can explain why an election taking a while doesn't imply there's foul play, and we can compare similarly low / negligible rates of fraud across different states (regardless of how long they take to complete their election). *I don't know if conspiracy theorists will understand and learn at the same rate as good-faith students, but I think that additional inconsistency in your analogy is perhaps less important to the original point you were trying to make.
I thought it was clear by now that I was talking about the ability of conspiracy theorists to spread their conspiracies among the rest of the population. You’re going back to a point nobody was making about the theorists themselves. Hence, I’m trying to understand if you’re being purposefully obtuse, or genuinely mistaken. We can’t talk about what makes fertile ground for the spread, and allay it, if every time I try to examine that you change the subject insistently.
How would their ability to spread their conspiracy theories be affected by California improving their election system? Can't they still take to social media and their echo chambers and continue to say that elections are rigged?
Isn’t understanding so much better than claiming I’m trying to legitimize it? I think so!
The length of counting and the degree to which it hasn’t been fixed, when almost every other self-respecting state counts better, is the breeding ground for suggestion. I’m sorry that incompetence and self-interest in hiding it as explanation (passed bad election law, poor leadership, poor appointments, whatever) is boring compared to the conspiracy advocate’s claim that it’s being done with intention to cheat the system. That’s a human nature issue, so take it up with your behavioral economists or cognitive psychologists.
Now take away that impetus. California has changed its election law and its administrative processes to give quicker vote counting and now is an ordinary state instead of an outlier when it comes to elections. As GH might say, the Democrats have run it for decades, and they solved the problem and can advertise it to the world. Now, there isn’t a non-conspiratorial population reminded every two years that the system is bad, hasn’t been changed, and they’ll have to keep waiting for absurd periods. They aren’t grumbling about the antiquated and poorly run system when they first catch wind of the cheating conspiracy du jour by the bad actors. You’ve already cut off big routes of the conspiracy: something underhanded is happening in the exaggerated timeline between when the first votes come in and the count is almost entirely concluded. The conspiracist must now surmount two obstacles. There’s no underlying knowledge “in the air” that the system is screwed up apart from the conspiracist’s information, and there was no knowledge that someone is successfully exploiting a flaw. They must provide more and overcome more basic doubt. That’s what I want to happen as an easy partial fix.
Because I hate to break it to you, but it’s unlikely that you magically compel Trump & buds to accept that he lost 2020 and stop spreading whatever happens in 2028 if his successor loses. You are somewhat limited in what you can change. Fix what you can, and keep working on what you can’t. Prepare for yourself a better field to defend and argue from, because I guarantee you that possessing better ground for argument beats marketing to the public your excuses for failure.
On June 10 2026 13:00 KwarK wrote: [quote] You’re apparently going to die to the hill that the process is why Democrats win in California and not that they’re the overwhelming majority.
Thats not what we arguing here,
The argument has been that dyhb and you and others have said that California's inefficient election process legitimizes conservatives' conspiratorial thinking
I really have trouble seeing this as anything but the most deliberate bad-faith attempt to mischaracterize another person's posts.
Have you thought about whether the anger over why it takes weeks to find out tight election results advances conspiratorial thinking? Why is it taking so long, why can't we be like every other state (including big states) and countries? Oh, this guy knows the REAL reason why...
Voters that still don't know the outcome of tight races one week after ... or two weeks after ... or three weeks after is pouring gasoline on that fire. They aren't responsible for the fire itself, so I'm not contesting your contribution. You're just ignoring the other affects for no good reason.
How can you read anything about my posts and not come away understanding that the broken and delayed process makes an existing problem worse? Legitimizes? You read all that and say legitimizes?
What are you talking about? Those are the exact statements that support what I said that you were saying. Those quotes demonstrate that you think conspiracy theorists feel they are justified in being suspicious of election integrity because California takes a while to complete their elections. You're saying it's no wonder that this "advances conspiratorial thinking" and that this inefficiency "is pouring gasoline on that fire".
Is this a semantics issue? Are you and I using different definitions of "legitimizes"? Because you're clearly stating that California's inefficiency is making the conspiracy theorists feel that their concerns are legitimate / reasonable / understandable. The inefficiency might not be the only reason why conspiracy theorists freak out over California elections, but it gives them extra ammunition... they wonder, to quote you, "Why is it taking so long, why can't we be like every other state (including big states) and countries? Oh, this guy knows the REAL reason why..."
You are really really going to have to separate in your mind two different things. One is taking action to curb the pernicious influence of bad things in society. The other is justifying, excusing, or calling good the bad things in society. I don't think it is a semantics issue, since you are apparently having an incredibly difficult time separating these in your mind.
You're far too focused on calling people that want to fix the problem as somehow forgiving or condoning the existence of the problem in and of itself. I should call you a pretty bad math teacher if you point at a teacher going over common math mistakes on the whiteboard to say, "Look at this guy! Legitimizing bad math mistakes by writing them down on the board! Clearly, he's reinforcing in the minds of the students that shoddy solution techniques are acceptable in the world of rigorous mathematics!" Sorry, bro, but pointing out their existence and contribution to/acceleration of other ills is an entire world away from legitimization, and doesn't rank-order each mistake in terms of reasonability.
I think you're giving yourself way too much credit on what (and how) you're contributing to this conversation, especially if you look at the pushback you're receiving. The "two different things" that you're insisting I separate were both being pushed by you. You're bringing up what you perceive to be a way to reduce conspiracy theories (not accounting for what happens in real life, which is what I wrote earlier: "even if California ran more smoothly than any other state, Republicans would still make up conspiracy theories about any election they lose being rigged"), while also making statements that legitimize those conspiracy theories. You're trying to have it both ways and then complaining when people take issue with at least one (if not both) of your positions.
I have nothing to add, other than to ask you to make that differentiation in the interest of understanding your objection to my point.
While I appreciate the importance of discussing common math mistakes with students so that those errors aren't committed again, the equivalent analogy would be to discuss mistakes in reasoning with conspiracy theorists* so that those errors aren't committed again. For example, we can explain why an election taking a while doesn't imply there's foul play, and we can compare similarly low / negligible rates of fraud across different states (regardless of how long they take to complete their election). *I don't know if conspiracy theorists will understand and learn at the same rate as good-faith students, but I think that additional inconsistency in your analogy is perhaps less important to the original point you were trying to make.
I thought it was clear by now that I was talking about the ability of conspiracy theorists to spread their conspiracies among the rest of the population. You’re going back to a point nobody was making about the theorists themselves. Hence, I’m trying to understand if you’re being purposefully obtuse, or genuinely mistaken. We can’t talk about what makes fertile ground for the spread, and allay it, if every time I try to examine that you change the subject insistently.
How would their ability to spread their conspiracy theories be affected by California improving their election system? Can't they still take to social media and their echo chambers and continue to say that elections are rigged?
Isn’t understanding so much better than claiming I’m trying to legitimize it? I think so!
The length of counting and the degree to which it hasn’t been fixed, when almost every other self-respecting state counts better, is the breeding ground for suggestion. I’m sorry that incompetence and self-interest in hiding it as explanation (passed bad election law, poor leadership, poor appointments, whatever) is boring compared to the conspiracy advocate’s claim that it’s being done with intention to cheat the system. That’s a human nature issue, so take it up with your behavioral economists or cognitive psychologists.
Now take away that impetus. California has changed its election law and its administrative processes to give quicker vote counting and now is an ordinary state instead of an outlier when it comes to elections. As GH might say, the Democrats have run it for decades, and they solved the problem and can advertise it to the world. Now, there isn’t a non-conspiratorial population reminded every two years that the system is bad, hasn’t been changed, and they’ll have to keep waiting for absurd periods. They aren’t grumbling about the antiquated and poorly run system when they first catch wind of the cheating conspiracy du jour by the bad actors. You’ve already cut off big routes of the conspiracy: something underhanded is happening in the exaggerated timeline between when the first votes come in and the count is almost entirely concluded. The conspiracist must now surmount two obstacles. There’s no underlying knowledge “in the air” that the system is screwed up apart from the conspiracist’s information, and there was no knowledge that someone is successfully exploiting a flaw. They must provide more and overcome more basic doubt. That’s what I want to happen as an easy partial fix.
Because I hate to break it to you, but it’s unlikely that you magically compel Trump & buds to accept that he lost 2020 and stop spreading whatever happens in 2028 if his successor loses. You are somewhat limited in what you can change. Fix what you can, and keep working on what you can’t. Prepare for yourself a better field to defend and argue from, because I guarantee you that possessing better ground for argument beats marketing to the public your excuses for failure.
All of that would be nice, but that's a complete fantasy. It's incredibly naive and it's wrong.
We already know - for a fact - that none of what you're hypothesizing could even remotely come true. An improved California election system would not lead to what you're hoping would happen. I wish it could! I wish it would. But that fairy tale has been utterly disproven over the past decade - not because of California's specific situation, but because we know incontrovertibly that conspiracy theorists will still continue to stubbornly spout the same bullshit even if they've been proven factually incorrect and even if things change. They've already decided that things are rigged, regardless of reality.
There's endless goalpost-moving when it comes to conspiracies, and several posts have recently explained this. Those conspiracy theorists already have the next ten conspiracies lined up for why California is rigged. If California is suspiciously too slow, then fixing that means that California is suspiciously too fast, or just plain old always suspicious *because it's California and let's just distrust California because can you really trust those guys*? And surely improving California's system is toooootally a cover-up because now those Californians know we're on to 'em, and a million other ridiculous lines... you can't win with these people, even if you attempt to address their (fake) concerns.
As I mentioned earlier, if people wanted to take a look at why California has slow election results and try to figure out legitimate ways to improve California's efficiency, then that would be a fine goal. But none of that happened. Instead, people were talking about just how suspicious California's situation is, and could we really blame the conspiracy theorists when California is such an outlier, and maybe addressing this will "cut off big routes of the conspiracy".
The argument has been that dyhb and you and others have said that California's inefficient election process legitimizes conservatives' conspiratorial thinking
I really have trouble seeing this as anything but the most deliberate bad-faith attempt to mischaracterize another person's posts.
Have you thought about whether the anger over why it takes weeks to find out tight election results advances conspiratorial thinking? Why is it taking so long, why can't we be like every other state (including big states) and countries? Oh, this guy knows the REAL reason why...
Voters that still don't know the outcome of tight races one week after ... or two weeks after ... or three weeks after is pouring gasoline on that fire. They aren't responsible for the fire itself, so I'm not contesting your contribution. You're just ignoring the other affects for no good reason.
How can you read anything about my posts and not come away understanding that the broken and delayed process makes an existing problem worse? Legitimizes? You read all that and say legitimizes?
What are you talking about? Those are the exact statements that support what I said that you were saying. Those quotes demonstrate that you think conspiracy theorists feel they are justified in being suspicious of election integrity because California takes a while to complete their elections. You're saying it's no wonder that this "advances conspiratorial thinking" and that this inefficiency "is pouring gasoline on that fire".
Is this a semantics issue? Are you and I using different definitions of "legitimizes"? Because you're clearly stating that California's inefficiency is making the conspiracy theorists feel that their concerns are legitimate / reasonable / understandable. The inefficiency might not be the only reason why conspiracy theorists freak out over California elections, but it gives them extra ammunition... they wonder, to quote you, "Why is it taking so long, why can't we be like every other state (including big states) and countries? Oh, this guy knows the REAL reason why..."
You are really really going to have to separate in your mind two different things. One is taking action to curb the pernicious influence of bad things in society. The other is justifying, excusing, or calling good the bad things in society. I don't think it is a semantics issue, since you are apparently having an incredibly difficult time separating these in your mind.
You're far too focused on calling people that want to fix the problem as somehow forgiving or condoning the existence of the problem in and of itself. I should call you a pretty bad math teacher if you point at a teacher going over common math mistakes on the whiteboard to say, "Look at this guy! Legitimizing bad math mistakes by writing them down on the board! Clearly, he's reinforcing in the minds of the students that shoddy solution techniques are acceptable in the world of rigorous mathematics!" Sorry, bro, but pointing out their existence and contribution to/acceleration of other ills is an entire world away from legitimization, and doesn't rank-order each mistake in terms of reasonability.
I think you're giving yourself way too much credit on what (and how) you're contributing to this conversation, especially if you look at the pushback you're receiving. The "two different things" that you're insisting I separate were both being pushed by you. You're bringing up what you perceive to be a way to reduce conspiracy theories (not accounting for what happens in real life, which is what I wrote earlier: "even if California ran more smoothly than any other state, Republicans would still make up conspiracy theories about any election they lose being rigged"), while also making statements that legitimize those conspiracy theories. You're trying to have it both ways and then complaining when people take issue with at least one (if not both) of your positions.
I have nothing to add, other than to ask you to make that differentiation in the interest of understanding your objection to my point.
While I appreciate the importance of discussing common math mistakes with students so that those errors aren't committed again, the equivalent analogy would be to discuss mistakes in reasoning with conspiracy theorists* so that those errors aren't committed again. For example, we can explain why an election taking a while doesn't imply there's foul play, and we can compare similarly low / negligible rates of fraud across different states (regardless of how long they take to complete their election). *I don't know if conspiracy theorists will understand and learn at the same rate as good-faith students, but I think that additional inconsistency in your analogy is perhaps less important to the original point you were trying to make.
I thought it was clear by now that I was talking about the ability of conspiracy theorists to spread their conspiracies among the rest of the population. You’re going back to a point nobody was making about the theorists themselves. Hence, I’m trying to understand if you’re being purposefully obtuse, or genuinely mistaken. We can’t talk about what makes fertile ground for the spread, and allay it, if every time I try to examine that you change the subject insistently.
How would their ability to spread their conspiracy theories be affected by California improving their election system? Can't they still take to social media and their echo chambers and continue to say that elections are rigged?
Isn’t understanding so much better than claiming I’m trying to legitimize it? I think so!
The length of counting and the degree to which it hasn’t been fixed, when almost every other self-respecting state counts better, is the breeding ground for suggestion. I’m sorry that incompetence and self-interest in hiding it as explanation (passed bad election law, poor leadership, poor appointments, whatever) is boring compared to the conspiracy advocate’s claim that it’s being done with intention to cheat the system. That’s a human nature issue, so take it up with your behavioral economists or cognitive psychologists.
Now take away that impetus. California has changed its election law and its administrative processes to give quicker vote counting and now is an ordinary state instead of an outlier when it comes to elections. As GH might say, the Democrats have run it for decades, and they solved the problem and can advertise it to the world. Now, there isn’t a non-conspiratorial population reminded every two years that the system is bad, hasn’t been changed, and they’ll have to keep waiting for absurd periods. They aren’t grumbling about the antiquated and poorly run system when they first catch wind of the cheating conspiracy du jour by the bad actors. You’ve already cut off big routes of the conspiracy: something underhanded is happening in the exaggerated timeline between when the first votes come in and the count is almost entirely concluded. The conspiracist must now surmount two obstacles. There’s no underlying knowledge “in the air” that the system is screwed up apart from the conspiracist’s information, and there was no knowledge that someone is successfully exploiting a flaw. They must provide more and overcome more basic doubt. That’s what I want to happen as an easy partial fix.
Because I hate to break it to you, but it’s unlikely that you magically compel Trump & buds to accept that he lost 2020 and stop spreading whatever happens in 2028 if his successor loses. You are somewhat limited in what you can change. Fix what you can, and keep working on what you can’t. Prepare for yourself a better field to defend and argue from, because I guarantee you that possessing better ground for argument beats marketing to the public your excuses for failure.
All of that would be nice, but that's a complete fantasy. It's incredibly naive and it's wrong.
We already know - for a fact - that none of what you're hypothesizing could even remotely come true. An improved California election system would not lead to what you're hoping would happen. I wish it could! I wish it would. But that fairy tale has been utterly disproven over the past decade - not because of California's specific situation, but because we know incontrovertibly that conspiracy theorists will still continue to stubbornly spout the same bullshit even if they've been proven factually incorrect and even if things change. They've already decided that things are rigged, regardless of reality.
There's endless goalpost-moving when it comes to conspiracies, and several posts have recently explained this. Those conspiracy theorists already have the next ten conspiracies lined up for why California is rigged. If California is suspiciously too slow, then fixing that means that California is suspiciously too fast, or just plain old always suspicious *because it's California and let's just distrust California because can you really trust those guys*? And surely improving California's system is toooootally a cover-up because now those Californians know we're on to 'em, and a million other ridiculous lines... you can't win with these people, even if you attempt to address their (fake) concerns.
As I mentioned earlier, if people wanted to take a look at why California has slow election results and try to figure out legitimate ways to improve California's efficiency, then that would be a fine goal. But none of that happened. Instead, people were talking about just how suspicious California's situation is, and could we really blame the conspiracy theorists when California is such an outlier, and maybe addressing this will "cut off big routes of the conspiracy".
There you go muttering about today’s conspiracists and not tomorrow’s. Let them change the goalposts to their own satisfaction. Most are too far gone and will need one-on-one patient intervention. You ever talk to someone that blames Russia for 2016 and effortlessly switches to the Jews or AIPAC for 2024? But their goals to convince others just got harder because of … bare competence. Maybe I’m discovering that you’ve given up on competence as well as declaring that it wouldn’t matter, but I wouldn’t go that far yet.
So fix the broken system, and if you’re right on this unstated infinite gullibility hypothesis, no harm done. I’m less pessimistic and cynical than you on that subject.
On June 10 2026 18:06 DarkPlasmaBall wrote: [quote] The argument has been that dyhb and you and others have said that California's inefficient election process legitimizes conservatives' conspiratorial thinking
I really have trouble seeing this as anything but the most deliberate bad-faith attempt to mischaracterize another person's posts.
Have you thought about whether the anger over why it takes weeks to find out tight election results advances conspiratorial thinking? Why is it taking so long, why can't we be like every other state (including big states) and countries? Oh, this guy knows the REAL reason why...
Voters that still don't know the outcome of tight races one week after ... or two weeks after ... or three weeks after is pouring gasoline on that fire. They aren't responsible for the fire itself, so I'm not contesting your contribution. You're just ignoring the other affects for no good reason.
How can you read anything about my posts and not come away understanding that the broken and delayed process makes an existing problem worse? Legitimizes? You read all that and say legitimizes?
What are you talking about? Those are the exact statements that support what I said that you were saying. Those quotes demonstrate that you think conspiracy theorists feel they are justified in being suspicious of election integrity because California takes a while to complete their elections. You're saying it's no wonder that this "advances conspiratorial thinking" and that this inefficiency "is pouring gasoline on that fire".
Is this a semantics issue? Are you and I using different definitions of "legitimizes"? Because you're clearly stating that California's inefficiency is making the conspiracy theorists feel that their concerns are legitimate / reasonable / understandable. The inefficiency might not be the only reason why conspiracy theorists freak out over California elections, but it gives them extra ammunition... they wonder, to quote you, "Why is it taking so long, why can't we be like every other state (including big states) and countries? Oh, this guy knows the REAL reason why..."
You are really really going to have to separate in your mind two different things. One is taking action to curb the pernicious influence of bad things in society. The other is justifying, excusing, or calling good the bad things in society. I don't think it is a semantics issue, since you are apparently having an incredibly difficult time separating these in your mind.
You're far too focused on calling people that want to fix the problem as somehow forgiving or condoning the existence of the problem in and of itself. I should call you a pretty bad math teacher if you point at a teacher going over common math mistakes on the whiteboard to say, "Look at this guy! Legitimizing bad math mistakes by writing them down on the board! Clearly, he's reinforcing in the minds of the students that shoddy solution techniques are acceptable in the world of rigorous mathematics!" Sorry, bro, but pointing out their existence and contribution to/acceleration of other ills is an entire world away from legitimization, and doesn't rank-order each mistake in terms of reasonability.
I think you're giving yourself way too much credit on what (and how) you're contributing to this conversation, especially if you look at the pushback you're receiving. The "two different things" that you're insisting I separate were both being pushed by you. You're bringing up what you perceive to be a way to reduce conspiracy theories (not accounting for what happens in real life, which is what I wrote earlier: "even if California ran more smoothly than any other state, Republicans would still make up conspiracy theories about any election they lose being rigged"), while also making statements that legitimize those conspiracy theories. You're trying to have it both ways and then complaining when people take issue with at least one (if not both) of your positions.
I have nothing to add, other than to ask you to make that differentiation in the interest of understanding your objection to my point.
While I appreciate the importance of discussing common math mistakes with students so that those errors aren't committed again, the equivalent analogy would be to discuss mistakes in reasoning with conspiracy theorists* so that those errors aren't committed again. For example, we can explain why an election taking a while doesn't imply there's foul play, and we can compare similarly low / negligible rates of fraud across different states (regardless of how long they take to complete their election). *I don't know if conspiracy theorists will understand and learn at the same rate as good-faith students, but I think that additional inconsistency in your analogy is perhaps less important to the original point you were trying to make.
I thought it was clear by now that I was talking about the ability of conspiracy theorists to spread their conspiracies among the rest of the population. You’re going back to a point nobody was making about the theorists themselves. Hence, I’m trying to understand if you’re being purposefully obtuse, or genuinely mistaken. We can’t talk about what makes fertile ground for the spread, and allay it, if every time I try to examine that you change the subject insistently.
How would their ability to spread their conspiracy theories be affected by California improving their election system? Can't they still take to social media and their echo chambers and continue to say that elections are rigged?
Isn’t understanding so much better than claiming I’m trying to legitimize it? I think so!
The length of counting and the degree to which it hasn’t been fixed, when almost every other self-respecting state counts better, is the breeding ground for suggestion. I’m sorry that incompetence and self-interest in hiding it as explanation (passed bad election law, poor leadership, poor appointments, whatever) is boring compared to the conspiracy advocate’s claim that it’s being done with intention to cheat the system. That’s a human nature issue, so take it up with your behavioral economists or cognitive psychologists.
Now take away that impetus. California has changed its election law and its administrative processes to give quicker vote counting and now is an ordinary state instead of an outlier when it comes to elections. As GH might say, the Democrats have run it for decades, and they solved the problem and can advertise it to the world. Now, there isn’t a non-conspiratorial population reminded every two years that the system is bad, hasn’t been changed, and they’ll have to keep waiting for absurd periods. They aren’t grumbling about the antiquated and poorly run system when they first catch wind of the cheating conspiracy du jour by the bad actors. You’ve already cut off big routes of the conspiracy: something underhanded is happening in the exaggerated timeline between when the first votes come in and the count is almost entirely concluded. The conspiracist must now surmount two obstacles. There’s no underlying knowledge “in the air” that the system is screwed up apart from the conspiracist’s information, and there was no knowledge that someone is successfully exploiting a flaw. They must provide more and overcome more basic doubt. That’s what I want to happen as an easy partial fix.
Because I hate to break it to you, but it’s unlikely that you magically compel Trump & buds to accept that he lost 2020 and stop spreading whatever happens in 2028 if his successor loses. You are somewhat limited in what you can change. Fix what you can, and keep working on what you can’t. Prepare for yourself a better field to defend and argue from, because I guarantee you that possessing better ground for argument beats marketing to the public your excuses for failure.
All of that would be nice, but that's a complete fantasy. It's incredibly naive and it's wrong.
We already know - for a fact - that none of what you're hypothesizing could even remotely come true. An improved California election system would not lead to what you're hoping would happen. I wish it could! I wish it would. But that fairy tale has been utterly disproven over the past decade - not because of California's specific situation, but because we know incontrovertibly that conspiracy theorists will still continue to stubbornly spout the same bullshit even if they've been proven factually incorrect and even if things change. They've already decided that things are rigged, regardless of reality.
There's endless goalpost-moving when it comes to conspiracies, and several posts have recently explained this. Those conspiracy theorists already have the next ten conspiracies lined up for why California is rigged. If California is suspiciously too slow, then fixing that means that California is suspiciously too fast, or just plain old always suspicious *because it's California and let's just distrust California because can you really trust those guys*? And surely improving California's system is toooootally a cover-up because now those Californians know we're on to 'em, and a million other ridiculous lines... you can't win with these people, even if you attempt to address their (fake) concerns.
As I mentioned earlier, if people wanted to take a look at why California has slow election results and try to figure out legitimate ways to improve California's efficiency, then that would be a fine goal. But none of that happened. Instead, people were talking about just how suspicious California's situation is, and could we really blame the conspiracy theorists when California is such an outlier, and maybe addressing this will "cut off big routes of the conspiracy".
There you go muttering about today’s conspiracists and not tomorrow’s. Let them change the goalposts to their own satisfaction. Most are too far gone and will need one-on-one patient intervention. You ever talk to someone that blames Russia for 2016 and effortlessly switches to the Jews or AIPAC for 2024? But their goals to convince others just got harder because of … bare competence. Maybe I’m discovering that you’ve given up on competence as well as declaring that it wouldn’t matter, but I wouldn’t go that far yet.
So fix the broken system, and if you’re right on this unstated infinite gullibility hypothesis, no harm done. I’m less pessimistic and cynical than you on that subject.
To that end... does anyone actually have a specific suggestion for improving California's election system? Like, can we identify some actual problems and posit solutions / better ways they could run it? Like, they're currently doing X, but they should really consider doing Y instead.
On June 10 2026 23:17 dyhb wrote: [quote]I really have trouble seeing this as anything but the most deliberate bad-faith attempt to mischaracterize another person's posts. [quote][quote]How can you read anything about my posts and not come away understanding that the broken and delayed process makes an existing problem worse? Legitimizes? You read all that and say legitimizes?
What are you talking about? Those are the exact statements that support what I said that you were saying. Those quotes demonstrate that you think conspiracy theorists feel they are justified in being suspicious of election integrity because California takes a while to complete their elections. You're saying it's no wonder that this "advances conspiratorial thinking" and that this inefficiency "is pouring gasoline on that fire".
Is this a semantics issue? Are you and I using different definitions of "legitimizes"? Because you're clearly stating that California's inefficiency is making the conspiracy theorists feel that their concerns are legitimate / reasonable / understandable. The inefficiency might not be the only reason why conspiracy theorists freak out over California elections, but it gives them extra ammunition... they wonder, to quote you, "Why is it taking so long, why can't we be like every other state (including big states) and countries? Oh, this guy knows the REAL reason why..."
You are really really going to have to separate in your mind two different things. One is taking action to curb the pernicious influence of bad things in society. The other is justifying, excusing, or calling good the bad things in society. I don't think it is a semantics issue, since you are apparently having an incredibly difficult time separating these in your mind.
You're far too focused on calling people that want to fix the problem as somehow forgiving or condoning the existence of the problem in and of itself. I should call you a pretty bad math teacher if you point at a teacher going over common math mistakes on the whiteboard to say, "Look at this guy! Legitimizing bad math mistakes by writing them down on the board! Clearly, he's reinforcing in the minds of the students that shoddy solution techniques are acceptable in the world of rigorous mathematics!" Sorry, bro, but pointing out their existence and contribution to/acceleration of other ills is an entire world away from legitimization, and doesn't rank-order each mistake in terms of reasonability.
I think you're giving yourself way too much credit on what (and how) you're contributing to this conversation, especially if you look at the pushback you're receiving. The "two different things" that you're insisting I separate were both being pushed by you. You're bringing up what you perceive to be a way to reduce conspiracy theories (not accounting for what happens in real life, which is what I wrote earlier: "even if California ran more smoothly than any other state, Republicans would still make up conspiracy theories about any election they lose being rigged"), while also making statements that legitimize those conspiracy theories. You're trying to have it both ways and then complaining when people take issue with at least one (if not both) of your positions.
I have nothing to add, other than to ask you to make that differentiation in the interest of understanding your objection to my point.
While I appreciate the importance of discussing common math mistakes with students so that those errors aren't committed again, the equivalent analogy would be to discuss mistakes in reasoning with conspiracy theorists* so that those errors aren't committed again. For example, we can explain why an election taking a while doesn't imply there's foul play, and we can compare similarly low / negligible rates of fraud across different states (regardless of how long they take to complete their election). *I don't know if conspiracy theorists will understand and learn at the same rate as good-faith students, but I think that additional inconsistency in your analogy is perhaps less important to the original point you were trying to make.
I thought it was clear by now that I was talking about the ability of conspiracy theorists to spread their conspiracies among the rest of the population. You’re going back to a point nobody was making about the theorists themselves. Hence, I’m trying to understand if you’re being purposefully obtuse, or genuinely mistaken. We can’t talk about what makes fertile ground for the spread, and allay it, if every time I try to examine that you change the subject insistently.
How would their ability to spread their conspiracy theories be affected by California improving their election system? Can't they still take to social media and their echo chambers and continue to say that elections are rigged?
Isn’t understanding so much better than claiming I’m trying to legitimize it? I think so!
The length of counting and the degree to which it hasn’t been fixed, when almost every other self-respecting state counts better, is the breeding ground for suggestion. I’m sorry that incompetence and self-interest in hiding it as explanation (passed bad election law, poor leadership, poor appointments, whatever) is boring compared to the conspiracy advocate’s claim that it’s being done with intention to cheat the system. That’s a human nature issue, so take it up with your behavioral economists or cognitive psychologists.
Now take away that impetus. California has changed its election law and its administrative processes to give quicker vote counting and now is an ordinary state instead of an outlier when it comes to elections. As GH might say, the Democrats have run it for decades, and they solved the problem and can advertise it to the world. Now, there isn’t a non-conspiratorial population reminded every two years that the system is bad, hasn’t been changed, and they’ll have to keep waiting for absurd periods. They aren’t grumbling about the antiquated and poorly run system when they first catch wind of the cheating conspiracy du jour by the bad actors. You’ve already cut off big routes of the conspiracy: something underhanded is happening in the exaggerated timeline between when the first votes come in and the count is almost entirely concluded. The conspiracist must now surmount two obstacles. There’s no underlying knowledge “in the air” that the system is screwed up apart from the conspiracist’s information, and there was no knowledge that someone is successfully exploiting a flaw. They must provide more and overcome more basic doubt. That’s what I want to happen as an easy partial fix.
Because I hate to break it to you, but it’s unlikely that you magically compel Trump & buds to accept that he lost 2020 and stop spreading whatever happens in 2028 if his successor loses. You are somewhat limited in what you can change. Fix what you can, and keep working on what you can’t. Prepare for yourself a better field to defend and argue from, because I guarantee you that possessing better ground for argument beats marketing to the public your excuses for failure.
All of that would be nice, but that's a complete fantasy. It's incredibly naive and it's wrong.
We already know - for a fact - that none of what you're hypothesizing could even remotely come true. An improved California election system would not lead to what you're hoping would happen. I wish it could! I wish it would. But that fairy tale has been utterly disproven over the past decade - not because of California's specific situation, but because we know incontrovertibly that conspiracy theorists will still continue to stubbornly spout the same bullshit even if they've been proven factually incorrect and even if things change. They've already decided that things are rigged, regardless of reality.
There's endless goalpost-moving when it comes to conspiracies, and several posts have recently explained this. Those conspiracy theorists already have the next ten conspiracies lined up for why California is rigged. If California is suspiciously too slow, then fixing that means that California is suspiciously too fast, or just plain old always suspicious *because it's California and let's just distrust California because can you really trust those guys*? And surely improving California's system is toooootally a cover-up because now those Californians know we're on to 'em, and a million other ridiculous lines... you can't win with these people, even if you attempt to address their (fake) concerns.
As I mentioned earlier, if people wanted to take a look at why California has slow election results and try to figure out legitimate ways to improve California's efficiency, then that would be a fine goal. But none of that happened. Instead, people were talking about just how suspicious California's situation is, and could we really blame the conspiracy theorists when California is such an outlier, and maybe addressing this will "cut off big routes of the conspiracy".
There you go muttering about today’s conspiracists and not tomorrow’s. Let them change the goalposts to their own satisfaction. Most are too far gone and will need one-on-one patient intervention. You ever talk to someone that blames Russia for 2016 and effortlessly switches to the Jews or AIPAC for 2024? But their goals to convince others just got harder because of … bare competence. Maybe I’m discovering that you’ve given up on competence as well as declaring that it wouldn’t matter, but I wouldn’t go that far yet.
So fix the broken system, and if you’re right on this unstated infinite gullibility hypothesis, no harm done. I’m less pessimistic and cynical than you on that subject.
To that end... does anyone actually have a specific suggestion for improving California's election system? Like, can we identify some actual problems and posit solutions+ Show Spoiler +
/ better ways they could run it? Like, they're currently doing X, but they should really consider doing Y instead.
Depends on what one's intentions are.
If they are to bring California's electoral system up to par with their ostensible leadership's aspirations and with other developed countries/respectable states? Perhaps make it the exemplar it ostensibly should be?
Or if we're trying to maintain/improve it (and California generally) as a counter to Republicans doing things like partisan gerrymandering in states they control?
On June 10 2026 18:06 DarkPlasmaBall wrote: [quote] The argument has been that dyhb and you and others have said that California's inefficient election process legitimizes conservatives' conspiratorial thinking
I really have trouble seeing this as anything but the most deliberate bad-faith attempt to mischaracterize another person's posts.
Have you thought about whether the anger over why it takes weeks to find out tight election results advances conspiratorial thinking? Why is it taking so long, why can't we be like every other state (including big states) and countries? Oh, this guy knows the REAL reason why...
Voters that still don't know the outcome of tight races one week after ... or two weeks after ... or three weeks after is pouring gasoline on that fire. They aren't responsible for the fire itself, so I'm not contesting your contribution. You're just ignoring the other affects for no good reason.
How can you read anything about my posts and not come away understanding that the broken and delayed process makes an existing problem worse? Legitimizes? You read all that and say legitimizes?
What are you talking about? Those are the exact statements that support what I said that you were saying. Those quotes demonstrate that you think conspiracy theorists feel they are justified in being suspicious of election integrity because California takes a while to complete their elections. You're saying it's no wonder that this "advances conspiratorial thinking" and that this inefficiency "is pouring gasoline on that fire".
Is this a semantics issue? Are you and I using different definitions of "legitimizes"? Because you're clearly stating that California's inefficiency is making the conspiracy theorists feel that their concerns are legitimate / reasonable / understandable. The inefficiency might not be the only reason why conspiracy theorists freak out over California elections, but it gives them extra ammunition... they wonder, to quote you, "Why is it taking so long, why can't we be like every other state (including big states) and countries? Oh, this guy knows the REAL reason why..."
You are really really going to have to separate in your mind two different things. One is taking action to curb the pernicious influence of bad things in society. The other is justifying, excusing, or calling good the bad things in society. I don't think it is a semantics issue, since you are apparently having an incredibly difficult time separating these in your mind.
You're far too focused on calling people that want to fix the problem as somehow forgiving or condoning the existence of the problem in and of itself. I should call you a pretty bad math teacher if you point at a teacher going over common math mistakes on the whiteboard to say, "Look at this guy! Legitimizing bad math mistakes by writing them down on the board! Clearly, he's reinforcing in the minds of the students that shoddy solution techniques are acceptable in the world of rigorous mathematics!" Sorry, bro, but pointing out their existence and contribution to/acceleration of other ills is an entire world away from legitimization, and doesn't rank-order each mistake in terms of reasonability.
I think you're giving yourself way too much credit on what (and how) you're contributing to this conversation, especially if you look at the pushback you're receiving. The "two different things" that you're insisting I separate were both being pushed by you. You're bringing up what you perceive to be a way to reduce conspiracy theories (not accounting for what happens in real life, which is what I wrote earlier: "even if California ran more smoothly than any other state, Republicans would still make up conspiracy theories about any election they lose being rigged"), while also making statements that legitimize those conspiracy theories. You're trying to have it both ways and then complaining when people take issue with at least one (if not both) of your positions.
I have nothing to add, other than to ask you to make that differentiation in the interest of understanding your objection to my point.
While I appreciate the importance of discussing common math mistakes with students so that those errors aren't committed again, the equivalent analogy would be to discuss mistakes in reasoning with conspiracy theorists* so that those errors aren't committed again. For example, we can explain why an election taking a while doesn't imply there's foul play, and we can compare similarly low / negligible rates of fraud across different states (regardless of how long they take to complete their election). *I don't know if conspiracy theorists will understand and learn at the same rate as good-faith students, but I think that additional inconsistency in your analogy is perhaps less important to the original point you were trying to make.
I thought it was clear by now that I was talking about the ability of conspiracy theorists to spread their conspiracies among the rest of the population. You’re going back to a point nobody was making about the theorists themselves. Hence, I’m trying to understand if you’re being purposefully obtuse, or genuinely mistaken. We can’t talk about what makes fertile ground for the spread, and allay it, if every time I try to examine that you change the subject insistently.
How would their ability to spread their conspiracy theories be affected by California improving their election system? Can't they still take to social media and their echo chambers and continue to say that elections are rigged?
Isn’t understanding so much better than claiming I’m trying to legitimize it? I think so!
The length of counting and the degree to which it hasn’t been fixed, when almost every other self-respecting state counts better, is the breeding ground for suggestion. I’m sorry that incompetence and self-interest in hiding it as explanation (passed bad election law, poor leadership, poor appointments, whatever) is boring compared to the conspiracy advocate’s claim that it’s being done with intention to cheat the system. That’s a human nature issue, so take it up with your behavioral economists or cognitive psychologists.
Now take away that impetus. California has changed its election law and its administrative processes to give quicker vote counting and now is an ordinary state instead of an outlier when it comes to elections. As GH might say, the Democrats have run it for decades, and they solved the problem and can advertise it to the world. Now, there isn’t a non-conspiratorial population reminded every two years that the system is bad, hasn’t been changed, and they’ll have to keep waiting for absurd periods. They aren’t grumbling about the antiquated and poorly run system when they first catch wind of the cheating conspiracy du jour by the bad actors. You’ve already cut off big routes of the conspiracy: something underhanded is happening in the exaggerated timeline between when the first votes come in and the count is almost entirely concluded. The conspiracist must now surmount two obstacles. There’s no underlying knowledge “in the air” that the system is screwed up apart from the conspiracist’s information, and there was no knowledge that someone is successfully exploiting a flaw. They must provide more and overcome more basic doubt. That’s what I want to happen as an easy partial fix.
Because I hate to break it to you, but it’s unlikely that you magically compel Trump & buds to accept that he lost 2020 and stop spreading whatever happens in 2028 if his successor loses. You are somewhat limited in what you can change. Fix what you can, and keep working on what you can’t. Prepare for yourself a better field to defend and argue from, because I guarantee you that possessing better ground for argument beats marketing to the public your excuses for failure.
All of that would be nice, but that's a complete fantasy. It's incredibly naive and it's wrong.
We already know - for a fact - that none of what you're hypothesizing could even remotely come true. An improved California election system would not lead to what you're hoping would happen. I wish it could! I wish it would. But that fairy tale has been utterly disproven over the past decade - not because of California's specific situation, but because we know incontrovertibly that conspiracy theorists will still continue to stubbornly spout the same bullshit even if they've been proven factually incorrect and even if things change. They've already decided that things are rigged, regardless of reality.
There's endless goalpost-moving when it comes to conspiracies, and several posts have recently explained this. Those conspiracy theorists already have the next ten conspiracies lined up for why California is rigged. If California is suspiciously too slow, then fixing that means that California is suspiciously too fast, or just plain old always suspicious *because it's California and let's just distrust California because can you really trust those guys*? And surely improving California's system is toooootally a cover-up because now those Californians know we're on to 'em, and a million other ridiculous lines... you can't win with these people, even if you attempt to address their (fake) concerns.
As I mentioned earlier, if people wanted to take a look at why California has slow election results and try to figure out legitimate ways to improve California's efficiency, then that would be a fine goal. But none of that happened. Instead, people were talking about just how suspicious California's situation is, and could we really blame the conspiracy theorists when California is such an outlier, and maybe addressing this will "cut off big routes of the conspiracy".
There you go muttering about today’s conspiracists and not tomorrow’s. Let them change the goalposts to their own satisfaction. Most are too far gone and will need one-on-one patient intervention. You ever talk to someone that blames Russia for 2016 and effortlessly switches to the Jews or AIPAC for 2024? But their goals to convince others just got harder because of … bare competence. Maybe I’m discovering that you’ve given up on competence as well as declaring that it wouldn’t matter, but I wouldn’t go that far yet.
So fix the broken system, and if you’re right on this unstated infinite gullibility hypothesis, no harm done. I’m less pessimistic and cynical than you on that subject.
I’m not sure it’s pessimistic or cynical, just mere observation
On June 10 2026 23:40 DarkPlasmaBall wrote: [quote] What are you talking about? Those are the exact statements that support what I said that you were saying. Those quotes demonstrate that you think conspiracy theorists feel they are justified in being suspicious of election integrity because California takes a while to complete their elections. You're saying it's no wonder that this "advances conspiratorial thinking" and that this inefficiency "is pouring gasoline on that fire".
Is this a semantics issue? Are you and I using different definitions of "legitimizes"? Because you're clearly stating that California's inefficiency is making the conspiracy theorists feel that their concerns are legitimate / reasonable / understandable. The inefficiency might not be the only reason why conspiracy theorists freak out over California elections, but it gives them extra ammunition... they wonder, to quote you, "Why is it taking so long, why can't we be like every other state (including big states) and countries? Oh, this guy knows the REAL reason why..."
You are really really going to have to separate in your mind two different things. One is taking action to curb the pernicious influence of bad things in society. The other is justifying, excusing, or calling good the bad things in society. I don't think it is a semantics issue, since you are apparently having an incredibly difficult time separating these in your mind.
You're far too focused on calling people that want to fix the problem as somehow forgiving or condoning the existence of the problem in and of itself. I should call you a pretty bad math teacher if you point at a teacher going over common math mistakes on the whiteboard to say, "Look at this guy! Legitimizing bad math mistakes by writing them down on the board! Clearly, he's reinforcing in the minds of the students that shoddy solution techniques are acceptable in the world of rigorous mathematics!" Sorry, bro, but pointing out their existence and contribution to/acceleration of other ills is an entire world away from legitimization, and doesn't rank-order each mistake in terms of reasonability.
I think you're giving yourself way too much credit on what (and how) you're contributing to this conversation, especially if you look at the pushback you're receiving. The "two different things" that you're insisting I separate were both being pushed by you. You're bringing up what you perceive to be a way to reduce conspiracy theories (not accounting for what happens in real life, which is what I wrote earlier: "even if California ran more smoothly than any other state, Republicans would still make up conspiracy theories about any election they lose being rigged"), while also making statements that legitimize those conspiracy theories. You're trying to have it both ways and then complaining when people take issue with at least one (if not both) of your positions.
I have nothing to add, other than to ask you to make that differentiation in the interest of understanding your objection to my point.
While I appreciate the importance of discussing common math mistakes with students so that those errors aren't committed again, the equivalent analogy would be to discuss mistakes in reasoning with conspiracy theorists* so that those errors aren't committed again. For example, we can explain why an election taking a while doesn't imply there's foul play, and we can compare similarly low / negligible rates of fraud across different states (regardless of how long they take to complete their election). *I don't know if conspiracy theorists will understand and learn at the same rate as good-faith students, but I think that additional inconsistency in your analogy is perhaps less important to the original point you were trying to make.
I thought it was clear by now that I was talking about the ability of conspiracy theorists to spread their conspiracies among the rest of the population. You’re going back to a point nobody was making about the theorists themselves. Hence, I’m trying to understand if you’re being purposefully obtuse, or genuinely mistaken. We can’t talk about what makes fertile ground for the spread, and allay it, if every time I try to examine that you change the subject insistently.
How would their ability to spread their conspiracy theories be affected by California improving their election system? Can't they still take to social media and their echo chambers and continue to say that elections are rigged?
Isn’t understanding so much better than claiming I’m trying to legitimize it? I think so!
The length of counting and the degree to which it hasn’t been fixed, when almost every other self-respecting state counts better, is the breeding ground for suggestion. I’m sorry that incompetence and self-interest in hiding it as explanation (passed bad election law, poor leadership, poor appointments, whatever) is boring compared to the conspiracy advocate’s claim that it’s being done with intention to cheat the system. That’s a human nature issue, so take it up with your behavioral economists or cognitive psychologists.
Now take away that impetus. California has changed its election law and its administrative processes to give quicker vote counting and now is an ordinary state instead of an outlier when it comes to elections. As GH might say, the Democrats have run it for decades, and they solved the problem and can advertise it to the world. Now, there isn’t a non-conspiratorial population reminded every two years that the system is bad, hasn’t been changed, and they’ll have to keep waiting for absurd periods. They aren’t grumbling about the antiquated and poorly run system when they first catch wind of the cheating conspiracy du jour by the bad actors. You’ve already cut off big routes of the conspiracy: something underhanded is happening in the exaggerated timeline between when the first votes come in and the count is almost entirely concluded. The conspiracist must now surmount two obstacles. There’s no underlying knowledge “in the air” that the system is screwed up apart from the conspiracist’s information, and there was no knowledge that someone is successfully exploiting a flaw. They must provide more and overcome more basic doubt. That’s what I want to happen as an easy partial fix.
Because I hate to break it to you, but it’s unlikely that you magically compel Trump & buds to accept that he lost 2020 and stop spreading whatever happens in 2028 if his successor loses. You are somewhat limited in what you can change. Fix what you can, and keep working on what you can’t. Prepare for yourself a better field to defend and argue from, because I guarantee you that possessing better ground for argument beats marketing to the public your excuses for failure.
All of that would be nice, but that's a complete fantasy. It's incredibly naive and it's wrong.
We already know - for a fact - that none of what you're hypothesizing could even remotely come true. An improved California election system would not lead to what you're hoping would happen. I wish it could! I wish it would. But that fairy tale has been utterly disproven over the past decade - not because of California's specific situation, but because we know incontrovertibly that conspiracy theorists will still continue to stubbornly spout the same bullshit even if they've been proven factually incorrect and even if things change. They've already decided that things are rigged, regardless of reality.
There's endless goalpost-moving when it comes to conspiracies, and several posts have recently explained this. Those conspiracy theorists already have the next ten conspiracies lined up for why California is rigged. If California is suspiciously too slow, then fixing that means that California is suspiciously too fast, or just plain old always suspicious *because it's California and let's just distrust California because can you really trust those guys*? And surely improving California's system is toooootally a cover-up because now those Californians know we're on to 'em, and a million other ridiculous lines... you can't win with these people, even if you attempt to address their (fake) concerns.
As I mentioned earlier, if people wanted to take a look at why California has slow election results and try to figure out legitimate ways to improve California's efficiency, then that would be a fine goal. But none of that happened. Instead, people were talking about just how suspicious California's situation is, and could we really blame the conspiracy theorists when California is such an outlier, and maybe addressing this will "cut off big routes of the conspiracy".
There you go muttering about today’s conspiracists and not tomorrow’s. Let them change the goalposts to their own satisfaction. Most are too far gone and will need one-on-one patient intervention. You ever talk to someone that blames Russia for 2016 and effortlessly switches to the Jews or AIPAC for 2024? But their goals to convince others just got harder because of … bare competence. Maybe I’m discovering that you’ve given up on competence as well as declaring that it wouldn’t matter, but I wouldn’t go that far yet.
So fix the broken system, and if you’re right on this unstated infinite gullibility hypothesis, no harm done. I’m less pessimistic and cynical than you on that subject.
To that end... does anyone actually have a specific suggestion for improving California's election system? Like, can we identify some actual problems and posit solutions+ Show Spoiler +
/ better ways they could run it? Like, they're currently doing X, but they should really consider doing Y instead.
Depends on what one's intentions are.
If they are to bring California's electoral system up to par with their ostensible leadership's aspirations and with other developed countries/respectable states? Perhaps make it the exemplar it ostensibly should be?
Or if we're trying to maintain/improve it (and California generally) as a counter to Republicans doing things like partisan gerrymandering in states they control?
The initial concern and focus seemed to be centered around having the process be faster. More efficient without sacrificing accuracy. Take less time. Be considered finished in fewer days, perhaps around the average amount of time it takes the other 49 states to finish their equivalent elections. Maybe that could be accomplished without a political slant.
On June 11 2026 06:42 KwarK wrote: Trump has declared that he loves inflation because he turned the lights off on the ship and Iran doesn’t even know. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4SYLSGpOSbg&ra=m
He does have a habit of publicly talking my about the US’s secret plans. Which is obviously some sort of super amazing 4d chess people that dum people can’t figure out.
On June 11 2026 06:42 KwarK wrote: Trump has declared that he loves inflation because he turned the lights off on the ship and Iran doesn’t even know. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4SYLSGpOSbg&ra=m
He does have a habit of publicly talking my about the US’s secret plans. Which is obviously some sort of super amazing 4d chess people that dum people can’t figure out.
High inflation is good because it can come down which is good because low is good and therefore he loves high.
It will come down when oil supplies from the Gulf resume which has actually happened already because the lights are off. But even though oil is already leaving the Gulf it will come down when the war ends and the oil leaves the Gulf which it is already doing with the lights off.
Iran doesn’t know the lights are off. How could they, they don’t have radar. That’s how we defeated them. But now is the time to let them know.
EPT
