2016 USA Presidential election thread II: And. Here. We. Go!

[Twilight Sky]

I feel like all these people calling for treason don't actually understand what treason is (the same could be said for all the people calling it for Clinton because emails).

Also at this point I'm pretty sure damn near everyone crying over this Russia stuff hasn't even bothered to read past the headlines. The way people have been talking about it makes it seem like Russia hacked our fucking voting machines to directly install Trump as president. As opposed to the reality of the situation where they hacked some emails and exposed people to the actual truth of what top ranking Dems think about people. To say nothing of the fact that there's no proof that the Kremlin was actually involved.

It's still a bad situation regardless, but to be perfectly honest considering our country's actions in fucking with the rest of the world I'm surprised it took this long to happen.

The only vibe I'm getting is that it would be all fine and dandy if it were true.

[6souls]

http://www.citypages.com/news/univer...tcom/406012375

U of MN joins Kellogg in pulling their ads from Breitbart in protest of the content. They didn't specifically advertise with Breit, but the company they outsource their ads to does.

[Coren]

Trump will turn the entire place into a dumpster fire, repubs will convince everybody it's really the dem's fault, and the cycle will continue.

I half expect a constitutional convention now that they have 37 state houses/governorships.

[Krandor]

Wisconsin recount finalized. Trump gained an additional 162 vote lead over Clinton.

[Byrthnoth]

Democracy depends on popular opinion. When popular opinion can be influenced by self-interested international forces, you should begin to question whether it is really a good choice for making national decisions in the 21st century.

[Quicklet]

Democracy depends on popular opinion. When popular opinion can be influenced by self-interested international forces, you should begin to question whether it is really a good choice for making national decisions in the 21st century.

Popular opinion chose the other person though, by a modestly significant margin given the circumstances.

[Byrthnoth]

True. Don got exactly what he needed where he needed it and scored a sizable EC victory with a popular vote loss. I don't think that was the result of some carefully crafted Russo-Republican strategy so much as blind luck.

Point stands, though. If we're really worried that foreign powers can pretty easily influence national decisions in a popular vote, should we be making national decisions through a popular vote? There must be a better way that isn't just an electoral college blurred proxy of the popular vote.

[Andalusian girls]

did you really just say we should question representative government in the 21st century

is this real life

have individuals on the left so thoroughly lost their minds with this defeat

[Byrthnoth]

No, I'm basically questioning whether we should abolish the electoral college or reform it so it's actually electors who make the choice. It's still representation and I'd keep advocating for popular voting in the primary, but the EC could be representation that doesn't have to vote for an obviously unqualified candidate.

[Andalusian girls]

so you just want to reverse the past 200 years of constitutional progress and end the direct election of public officials

[Byrthnoth]

constitutional progress would have abolished the EC instead of creating bound electors. We've at best moved sideways from the original implementation, unless you want to try to argue that we have avoided an oligarchy somehow.

also, I've pretty much only been proposing things specifically for the presidency, which is the only race large/important enough to be worth the cheap foreign media blitz that we saw from Russia this season.


This election season made it incredibly obvious that facts need another line of defense that doesn't currently exist. The question is just where to build it.

[Kincard]

On some level I can understand the desire for people who actually know what the fuck they're talking about to have a larger say, which is why I thought the bitching about the superdelegate system was kinda dumb. I don't like how the idea of democracy has become like a religion to some people where popular vote is just plainly accepted as being inherently good, there are lots of countries which use the popular vote and their system has massive issues with populism (funny enough the aforementioned Taiwan is one of those places). When the populace is making retarded decisions the only thing going along with it does is reduce the amount of civil unrest, and is that really worth it when it comes to making decisions like who's controlling the fucking nukes

Also a problem is that the Electoral College has failed in their original intent. They were supposed to prevent unqualified idiots from ascending to the most important position in the country yet this year they're facilitating the opposite happening.

I mean, I get that the saying is that democracy is the worst system except for all those other systems so maybe this is just frustration based off a sample size of 1, it's just annoying that it seems like we've resigned ourselves to thinking there's no better way than what we have

abolishing FPTP would be a good start tbh

[Gryffes]

abolishing FPTP would be a good start tbh

I blame FPTP for brexit honestly, cba typing a dissertation on why though.

[Andalusian girls]

constitutional progress would have abolished the EC instead of creating bound electors. We've at best moved sideways from the original implementation, unless you want to try to argue that we have avoided an oligarchy somehow.

also, I've pretty much only been proposing things specifically for the presidency, which is the only race large/important enough to be worth the cheap foreign media blitz that we saw from Russia this season.


This election season made it incredibly obvious that facts need another line of defense that doesn't currently exist. The question is just where to build it.

the 17th Amendment ordained Senators would be directly elected by popular vote rather than appointed by state assemblies, the party primaries have evolved in a single lifetime from backroom deals in smoke filled conventions to a system people actually vote in, electors are now (mostly) compelled to follow the popular vote in their states rather than choose whomever they desire, et cetera. there has been consistent progress away from the aristocratic features of the our original political systems.

and it is good to recall a direct popular vote would have seen both Trump and Dubya defeated, without the need for some dimestore dystopian unelected government body imbued with the power to overturn the will of the people. regardless of who you or i consider the best available option the legitimacy of political power is derived from the consent of the governed; hallowing out democratic institutions and making them subject to bureaucratic or autocratic apparatuses to insure more favorable outcomes is the most amoral and short-sighted proposal i can imagine. i would take a thousand Trumpian demagogues over such.

On some level I can understand the desire for people who actually know what the fuck they're talking about to have a larger say, which is why I thought the bitching about the superdelegate system was kinda dumb. I don't like how the idea of democracy has become like a religion to some people where popular vote is just plainly accepted as being inherently good, there are lots of countries which use the popular vote and their system has massive issues with populism (funny enough the aforementioned Taiwan is one of those places). When the populace is making retarded decisions the only thing going along with it does is reduce the amount of civil unrest, and is that really worth it when it comes to making decisions like who's controlling the fucking nukes

Also a problem is that the Electoral College has failed in their original intent. They were supposed to prevent unqualified idiots from ascending to the most important position in the country yet this year they're facilitating the opposite happening.

I mean, I get that the saying is that democracy is the worst system except for all those other systems so maybe this is just frustration based off a sample size of 1, it's just annoying that it seems like we've resigned ourselves to thinking there's no better way than what we have

abolishing FPTP would be a good start tbh

a popular vote, or the will of the majority, is of course not inherently good. from the Athenian Assembly executing 6 of their 8 senior strategoi following a spectacular and unexpected victory over the Spartans in the middle of the Peloponnesian War, to the majority of Americans at one point accepting race-delineated chattel slavery, to the citizens of Weimar not once but thrice giving Hitler's NSDAP a parliamentary plurality, the folly of the many is well documented. but our founders recognized this and it is why we are not a direct democracy but a representative republic with checks and balances on any individual's or group's power through the three overlapping branches of the federal government and the outsized autonomy American states have relative to the administrative subunits of most other nations.

i understand the urge that those who know best be given more power than the ignorant masses, but that is the most dangerous thinking in all politics. it is a notion felt and heard from Cromwell's Parliamentarians, to Robespierre's Jacobins, to Lenin's Bolsheviks, to Mussolini's fascists, it is a toxin that undermines free societies and uniformly leads to such sorry pages of human history. even today i am sure many Russians and many Turks and many Venezuelans had many good reasons to accept such an argument.

the consent of the governed is the foundational moral maxim of all political organization, it is the only thing that gives any one any right to govern another. proposals that do not violate it, such as changing to a non-FPTP system or abolishing the electoral college, are matters we should consider. proposals that do violate it should be fought as one fights hell all Montagues and thee.

[Kincard]

I wouldn't be so foolish as to suggest we get rid of representative government altogether in favor on some supposed ultra technocrat philosopher king shite because as you said, similar lines of thought have led to some pretty ugly things. I guess I just have what's probably an unpopular opinion in that I don't think having a body of experts having a stronger influence or guiding hand on the outcome is necessarily a bad thing, basically kinda sorta like the Superdelegate system the Democratic Party already has. But we all know the verbal bludgeoning a lot of people were using (from both sides this year) was how it's inherently unjust because it's not a direct popular vote. True that I can see situations where the political elites end up having blinders on to issues the hoi palloi are dealing with (and I'm sure many would argue exactly that happened this year with Clinton) but the opposite can also be true, where the experts see issues that the masses may not be aware of.

I mean, we trust the President to select important personnel for several government positions which aren't popularly elected, after all. Is that really so different?

[dasva]

I wouldn't be so foolish as to suggest we get rid of representative government altogether in favor on some supposed ultra technocrat philosopher king shite because as you said, similar lines of thought have led to some pretty ugly things. I guess I just have what's probably an unpopular opinion in that I don't think having a body of experts having a stronger influence or guiding hand on the outcome is necessarily a bad thing, basically kinda sorta like the Superdelegate system the Democratic Party already has. But we all know the verbal bludgeoning a lot of people were using (from both sides this year) was how it's inherently unjust because it's not a direct popular vote. True that I can see situations where the political elites end up having blinders on to issues the hoi palloi are dealing with (and I'm sure many would argue exactly that happened this year with Clinton) but the opposite can also be true, where the experts see issues that the masses may not be aware of.

I mean, we trust the President to select important personnel for several government positions which aren't popularly elected, after all. Is that really so different?

It kind of is different in that it's yet another layer of separation. Though whether we should have less, more or just fine is another question that will change with each election. But regardless would depend on how you go about it. Like say if these super voters were similarly sort of (or purely directly) voted on by the populace every few years and had term limits I could see it working. But if they were able to stay in position or be placed into position by those that stay their positions for long periods I don't see it going well as it would likely create situations where those in position would have an ever increasing chance of keeping or increasing their advantage

[Cail]

Michigan to Audit 'Significant' Mismatches in Detroit Vote

[Psion]

i could see how the electoral college used to be useful in a time where news took days or weeks to travel from one end to the other and the populace was generally uninformed. nowadays, however, we have the internet, news is nearly instant, and generally the majority of people are informed on issues. as for the significant minority, i think we should have laws that restrict news stations to actually post... news. none of this opinionated, unresearched articles so full of logical holes a mouse would mistake it for swiss cheese.

basically back then the politicians tended to be more intelligent than the general populace, but can we really say the same thing now?

[Cail]

Uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

[Zealot]

There was an FCC rule about what could be said on the news, or at least providing equal time when reporting on political news. It was repealed under Reagan and the language removed entirely under Obama.