Universal Health Coverage for the USA - "The Healthy Americans Act"

[Det. Bart Lasiter]

Tell me about the Electoral College.

Tell me about the Electoral College.

Tell me about the Electoral College.

Okay.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Electoral_College

[Nancy Allen``]

It says that the neutrality of the post is in dispute but I'll leave that one alone. Reading through it quickly I understand that the votes are counted in each state and then the representative comes forward and puts forth who their state had voted for. It's not the worst idea, but there are problems; representatives changing the vote and unrepresented states for example, that should be addressed. Maybe it should be made that all Americans have to vote but that would likely go against the grain of democracy America prides itself in.

 

Edit: Damn, that was put three times? Better fix that up.

[Jae Onasi]

Electoral college faqs.

[Totenkopf]

The "problems" with the electoral college system- by themselves- render it undemocratic. So I consider it to be quite a bad idea. In fact, I'd really like to hear what you consider the "WORST idea" to be.

 

I'm sure you'd have to say, perhaps, "divine right of kings" (you are an atheist afterall).

[Nancy Allen``]

I know, a regime where a dictator and tyrant appoints himself ruler without a vote, and anyone who disagrees is tortured and killed. That would be about the worst idea. For some it might rock their world, but the Saddam Hussein type of government, the Taliban government, the warring clans in Somalia, these are the type of government and elections I highly disapprove of.

[Windu Chi]

I know, a regime where a dictator and tyrant appoints himself ruler without a vote, and anyone who disagrees is tortured and killed. That would be about the worst idea. For some it might rock their world, but the Saddam Hussein type of government, the Taliban government, the warring clans in Somalia, these are the type of government and elections I highly disapprove of.

Who the hell would approve of those governments?

Those types of governments is analogous to someone holding a gun to your head ready to blow your brain out, first sign of dissension.

[Nancy Allen``]

Ask around, I'm sure someone would love this style of government.

[Spider AL]

I'm sure you'd have to say, perhaps, "divine right of kings" (you are an atheist afterall).

I was referring specifically to the worst way to run an allegedly democratic election, but that's my fault for not being more specific.

 

As for a hereditary monarchy... I don't think it would be much worse than what we have in our nations at the moment. The fact is that changes in government do not change policy or doctrine in any meaningful way. The effect is therefore pretty much the same as if we had a king or dictator and his court ruling for life.

 

Governments are either elected in a manner which is close to democratic... or they're not democratic at all. And our governments cannot be said to be democratically elected.

[Totenkopf]

You do realize that was a joke, right? (hence the )

[Nancy Allen``]

A friend of mine shared this thought with me, if the American government is half as bad as some people claim then why arn't there agents reading forums and the like and seeking to silence those who criticise Bush, Iraq, Israel, ect?

[Spider AL]

You do realize that was a joke, right? (hence the )

Oh, I realised the statement was flippant, Tot. But despite that, I felt it raised a point worth answering seriously.

 

A friend of mine shared this thought with me, if the American government is half as bad as some people claim then why arn't there agents reading forums and the like and seeking to silence those who criticise Bush, Iraq, Israel, ect?

Your friend sounds like quite the silly person.

 

The fact that we're not all being assassinated in our beds by the FBI or MI5 for speaking out against US/UK policy merely shows that the governmental reactions to criticism aren't as amoral as they could be. It doesn't mean they're not amoral.

 

And frankly, even if they were the kind of juntas who were routinely willing to assassinate dissidents, they wouldn't have to... because we're not currently a threat to the centres of power. We don't represent a majority, and the majority blindly accepts whatever nonsense is fed to them via the mainstream media. The majority comes out with warped things like:

 

"A true welfare state? Oh that'd never work. I mean, what little welfare we have is crumbling around us!"

 

When in fact, the limited welfare systems of our nations are working astonishingly well, considering the amount of governmental effort that goes into trying to kill them.

 

Or even such nonsense as:

 

"Oh, the war was definitely a mistake. But our hearts were in the right place!" etcetera, etcetera.

[Totenkopf]

What a killjoy. Always looking for an indoctrinal moment there, eh Al?

 

Now, in actual seriousness, "pray tell" what exactly do you see as the most moral and feasible government option available to mankind? Since pure "pick a type of government" only exists in a textbook anyway, what's your pick?

[Spider AL]

What a killjoy. Always looking for an indoctrinal moment there, eh Al?

I find that last remark more snide, than jovial.

 

But regardless, I'm certainly not going to apologise for taking our political situation seriously. In fact, I find the sorry state of our electoral system depressing.

 

Now, in actual seriousness, "pray tell" what exactly do you see as the most moral and feasible government option available to mankind? Since pure "pick a type of government" only exists in a textbook anyway, what's your pick?

What would be both feasible and moral? That's easy to answer. It's nothing very revolutionary, Tot. Just a roughly functional democracy.

 

To divine what we need to change about our systems to make them democratic, we first need to define exactly what is PREVENTING our systems from being democratic. Well, in no particular order, here's a list of some major things:

 

1. Electoral college (US, although frankly the UK system results in similar effects)

2. Schumpeterian "Representative Democracy" - misnomer (both US & UK)

3. First-past-the-post voting systems (both)

4. PR culture in politics (both)

5. Broadly centralised regimes (both)

6. Major Party affiliations (both)

 

 

1. The least radical, most effective change we could make in the US would be to scrap the electoral college system. It's utterly warped, totally undemocratic and there is absolutely no excuse for it. It's laughable. It totally devalues people's votes. People's votes mean almost nothing under this system.

 

By scrapping it, the US moves a huge step closer to democracy.

 

*

 

2. Schumpeterian "democracies" (like ours) are really nothing of the kind. In Schumpeterian systems, the people may elect representatives... but the representatives they elect don't then have to do what the people wanted them to, they don't have to follow through on pre-election promises and they don't have to abide by the results of a public referendum, etcetera. It's like elected monarchy.

 

By bringing in legislation forcing individual representatives to enact policy directly based on public voting, (effectively changing our abhorrent Schumpeterian system into a far more moral "Direct Democracy") we would move a step closer to democracy.

 

*

 

3. First-past-the-post voting systems (FPTP) like ours, are systems in which representatives are chosen based on who "got the most votes." Which sounds fine, until you realise that the person who gets the most votes isn't necessarily the most popular with the most people.

 

For instance, if 100 people vote, and 50 of them vote for a leftist guy, 40 vote for a rightist guy and 10 vote for a middle guy, under our system, the leftist guy gets in. Okay. But suppose the fifty people who voted for other people really hate this leftist guy. Then half the electorate isn't happy, and NONE of the candidates had the overall majority of electoral votes. (51 or above.)

 

How can we try to make this situation better? Here we bring in "alternative voting" systems, which are already being employed to some degree in certain UK elections. There are many types, and arguably most of these types are superior in the democratic sense than FPTP systems are.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Preferential_voting - Not a bad list.

 

So by changing to an alternative system, we could move closer to democracy.

 

*

 

4. PR culture in politics: As stated above, the PR culture in politics contributes vastly to the influence of the wealthy on the political scene. By outlawing party-political advertising and purely PR-related appearances (national talk shows, etcetera), we would cut the amount of cash that goes into advertising a candidate, and thus make the election less dependent on who has the money to advertise.

 

Candidates would then be forced to travel around their prospective constituency more, have more public debates with their opponents, engage more with local people, etcetera.

 

Thus the people would get to know candidates and their policies better, the culture of pure personality would be crippled, and we would move a step closer to democracy.

 

*

 

5. Broadly centralised regimes are a problem, as they rarely reflect the will of the people that they are so disconnected from. We should further de-centralise most of the day-to-day running of our nations. Local government should have far more power, and local government representatives should be the ones to get together and decide national policy. The overriding national executive should be reduced to performing a purely administrative role, in other words, devoted purely to keeping local-level government running smoothly.

 

Then, we'd be a step closer to democracy, as local representatives would have more leeway to perform the will of their local electorate.

 

*

 

6. Major party affiliations are a canker on democracy. Both our nations define themselves by party affiliations to some extent, but whenever I've been in the US I've been shocked at how strongly the line between "democrat" and "republican" is drawn.

 

Of course, in reality both major parties in both our nations are merely two arms of the "business party". So defining yourself as "left" or "right" is meaningless and counter-productive.

 

Furthermore, parties have to have "leaders", and leaders focus attention onto one individual, and away from the party. This is a bad thing, as it gets the people looking at one man with limited power, when they should be looking at a party with a great deal of power. So we have a "culture of individuals" in politics, which merely functions as a distraction from the truth.

 

By totally abolishing party affiliations, individual local representatives would no longer be forced to go along with the will of their party, but would instead go along with the will of their people. A fully independent system of representation might well be more expensive and time-consuming to run than a major-party system, but expense is hardly an issue when you're striving for such an important thing: democracy.

 

*

 

So any one of these changes would move us closer to democracy. All of these changes at once would result in quite a democratic system, with people involved with their politicians at a local level, with politicians elected in a more fair and balanced way, with politicians performing the will of their constituents and ONLY the will of their constituents, with the will of each district combining to form the will of the nation, and would result in a nation which really WOULD have a moral right to lecture the rest of the world on freedom and democracy. We currently have no such right.

 

Could we make it work? We'd have to try to find out. But our current system doesn't "work", unless you happen to be one of the financial elite. Which, judging by the fact that we're all on the internet... we probably are. However, the fact that I do pretty well out of a corrupt system doesn't mean I want it to continue. I have morals, after all.

[tk102]

Look what happens when I walk away from the thread...

... the topic walks away from the title ...

[Totenkopf]

Look what happens when I walk away from the thread...

... the topic walks away from the title ...

 

You aren't really surprised, are you (disappointed, I'm sure)?

 

 

What a killjoy. Always looking for an indoctrinal moment there, eh Al?

 

I find that last remark more snide, than jovial.

 

But regardless, I'm certainly not going to apologise for taking our political situation seriously. In fact, I find the sorry state of our electoral system depressing.

 

 

Perhaps you're familiar with the expression "half in jest..." Still, your response is overly sensitive and defensive, but that's your burden I suppose. Lighten up, Spi. Nevertheless, thanks anyway for spelling out your position.

[ET Warrior]

All discussion about Civil Rights that seemed to be mainly between Al and Jae has been moved to a new thread. Please keep all such discussions to that thread now. It looks like I might be splitting this discussion off into a discussion about Effective forms of government, but I'll need time to read over it more.