Let's improve democracy

[Alphawolf55]

Wouldn't you just be able to theoritically set up expert groups that newcomers could contact with ready information?

[Bakustra]

Wouldn't you just be able to theoritically set up expert groups that newcomers could contact with ready information?

Right. That's what lobbyists are. The problem is that they're partisan, which is something that would apply to essentially any group you can think up. On many of these problems, anybody that's informed has an opinion. On others, the non-partisan are generally pretty out of it and poor at communicating to outsiders. Even then, they would tend to be either partisan or wield unacceptable amounts of kingmaking power.

[Alyrium Denryle]

Wouldn't you just be able to theoritically set up expert groups that newcomers could contact with ready information?

Or, you know, set up the system such that only people who already know the subject material are forced to make those decisions?

Right. That's what lobbyists are. The problem is that they're partisan, which is something that would apply to essentially any group you can think up. On many of these problems, anybody that's informed has an opinion. On others, the non-partisan are generally pretty out of it and poor at communicating to outsiders. Even then, they would tend to be either partisan or wield unacceptable amounts of kingmaking power.

Then you need to make a tradeoff. Do you want your expert groups to have a lot of soft power, or do you want your lawmakers beholden to partisan groups?

I would rather a lot of soft power be in the hands of the individuals best equipped to make decisions. Kingmaker power is not necessarily bad, if the results you get are actually good.

If congress listened to climatologists rather than lobbyists in the energy industry, we would have had climate change issues solved a long time ago, and the Deepwater Horizon spill would never have happened if the MMS was not snorting meth off of toaster ovens.

[Uncluttered]

I too, am an advocate of the 'none of the above' vote similar to the 'negative vote'. If 'none of the above' gets more votes than any of the candidates, then you scrap that election and start over with new candidates.

Who retains power in that circumstance? I can easily envision a scenario where the incumbents tell their supporters to repeatedly hit the "fuck the system" "none of the above" button to drag out their term, if only in a lame duck fashion.

I think if "none" get elected, it should go into sortition.

[Alphawolf55]

"Or, you know, set up the system such that only people who already know the subject material are forced to make those decisions?"

Well yeah that's what our systems have. But I'm talking about ways to improve Shep's system without sacrificing it's core ideals.

[Alyrium Denryle]

"Or, you know, set up the system such that only people who already know the subject material are forced to make those decisions?"

Well yeah that's what our systems have. But I'm talking about ways to improve Shep's system without sacrificing it's core ideals.

Shep has core ideals that make sense?

Kidding...

Sort of...

Still, the core ideal that is to be preserved is one that frankly is not worth preserving.

[Bakustra]

Wouldn't you just be able to theoritically set up expert groups that newcomers could contact with ready information?

Or, you know, set up the system such that only people who already know the subject material are forced to make those decisions?

Right. That's what lobbyists are. The problem is that they're partisan, which is something that would apply to essentially any group you can think up. On many of these problems, anybody that's informed has an opinion. On others, the non-partisan are generally pretty out of it and poor at communicating to outsiders. Even then, they would tend to be either partisan or wield unacceptable amounts of kingmaking power.

Then you need to make a tradeoff. Do you want your expert groups to have a lot of soft power, or do you want your lawmakers beholden to partisan groups?

I would rather a lot of soft power be in the hands of the individuals best equipped to make decisions. Kingmaker power is not necessarily bad, if the results you get are actually good.

If congress listened to climatologists rather than lobbyists in the energy industry, we would have had climate change issues solved a long time ago, and the Deepwater Horizon spill would never have happened if the MMS was not snorting meth off of toaster ovens.

I don't want that much power ending up in the hands of unelected officials, because they can't be replaced. Your system frankly would degenerate fairly quickly into oligarchy from my perspective. Simply saying that we should hand off the system to experts- they tried that in the 20s, with very mixed results.

[Alphawolf55]

"Or, you know, set up the system such that only people who already know the subject material are forced to make those decisions?"

Well yeah that's what our systems have. But I'm talking about ways to improve Shep's system without sacrificing it's core ideals.

Shep has core ideals that make sense?

Kidding...

Sort of...

Still, the core ideal that is to be preserved is one that frankly is not worth preserving.

What that he wants a democratic society that prevents a few powerful elite from retaining control throughout the decades?

Just because you distrust the will of the people, doesn't mean the ideal is worthless.

I mean, I dont' always trust people in academia but I'm not going to say they shouldn't be policy makers.

[MKSheppard]

So, Shep, is it your contention that John Dingell received and maintains his Congressional seat solely because of his father? Because he's popularly elected, oddly enough. Nepotism might explain his initial victories, but if he was totally incompetent, he'd have been out on his ass long ago.

You forgot the fact in a lot of Congressional districts in urban areas and in gerrymandered districts, there is virtually zero political opposition from the opposite spectrum -- once you have taken the seat and held onto it past a few elections -- you are now the solid incumbent; and can easily fight off any primary challenge, and defacto win the election, since the primary is the only thing that matters in such a case.

Thus, the only way you can be removed from office are due to a few things:

A.) Major political scandal. You are found molesting young children or whatever -- this is big enough to ensure that you either resign in disgrace, or get defeated in the primary.

B.) You Retire.

C.) You die in office.

So regardless of your proposal, you would still have aging officeholders.

Sure. Mainly because some people would be older than the average -- it takes a lot of contacts and money to get elected, something a 30 something doesn't have.

And also because existing office holders would be grandfathered in -- Truman could have run for a third and fourth terms, since he was grandfathered in, for example.

Incorporating term limits would help, but at the expense of handing the functions of government over to lobbyists.

You know, I hate this myth that if we put in federal term limits; the legislative side becomes a bunch of mouth-breathing incompetents who have to be led across the issues by Lobbyists.

We have term limits in the executive branch; and guess what?

Experience is not a problem (the current occupant excepted); because before someone becomes President, they've usually had experience in managment, whether in business or as a State Governor. If not management, some form of political experience in the legislative branch.

The same thing would be the case in the U.S. Congress; because when you look at the records for a lot of the current occupants, you see that they've had experience at some sort of local or city level office; before they ran for their state's legislature; and then worked their way into Congress.

Many of the issues facing the states are very similar to that facing the feds -- albeit the Feds operate on a larger level.

Same thing with Lobbyists -- you have them on a smaller and local level. So insinuating that with term limits in place; politicans would be elected into high office with no experience is totally fallicious.

Oh. I just remembered another reform.

Ban gerrymandering. Political districts should resemble some goddamned form of reality on a map; not blatant political redrawing to ensure that someone can be elected with 90% of the vote, or to ensure future Democrat/Republican victories.

[Alyrium Denryle]

Ban gerrymandering. Political districts should resemble some goddamned form of reality on a map; not blatant political redrawing to ensure that someone can be elected with 90% of the vote, or to ensure future Democrat/Republican victories.

I think we have exactly one thing we agree one Shep

[Bakustra]

So, Shep, is it your contention that John Dingell received and maintains his Congressional seat solely because of his father? Because he's popularly elected, oddly enough. Nepotism might explain his initial victories, but if he was totally incompetent, he'd have been out on his ass long ago.

You forgot the fact in a lot of Congressional districts in urban areas and in gerrymandered districts, there is virtually zero political opposition from the opposite spectrum -- once you have taken the seat and held onto it past a few elections -- you are now the solid incumbent; and can easily fight off any primary challenge, and defacto win the election, since the primary is the only thing that matters in such a case.
*snip*

You shouldn't complain about urban districts being solidly Democratic when you avidly support the party that constantly works to fuck 'em over. Gerrymandering is problematic, but unrelated. Banning that has little to do with term limits. I find it hilarious that you complain that I'm treating politicians as easily mislead, while you insist that the electorate is too stupid to ever throw out an incumbent.

Term limits are different for the executive, seeing as he doesn't write and vote on laws, and also has a little thing called a cabinet. (PS: Smooth move there, repeating slogans from previous elections. Here's my little contribution "Hey, hey, LBJ, how many kids you kill today?") So you're suggesting that the majority of state-level lawmakers have experience in foreign policy, or for that matter welfare programs? That's news to me! Those are critical areas, and my point is that lawmakers have no real option but lobbyists for information initially. That's ignoring the other benefits of having experienced individuals, but whatever.

[Thanas]

*snip*

A technocracy is not a democracy. Your proposals have been massively off-topic.

Moreover, they seem to stem not from a desire to change the system, but rather because you disagree with the current system's decision.

[blahface]

I really don't like the idea of voting by mail - at least not for the general election. It undermines the concept of a secret ballot. It would be too easy to bribe, pressure, or coerce someone into voting a certain way. I would however extend voting to a week instead of just one day so everyone has more of an opportunity to vote.

Also, Destructionator, is that seriously the only change you'd make? How can anyone be content with the first past the post system? FPTP is one of the very worst voting systems we could have. What about approval voting, the Condorcet method, or IRV?

[Bakustra]

The advantages of alternate voting are usually more apparent in parliamentary systems where we have more than two viable parties. As it is, preferential and approval voting would mainly serve to keep splinter groups like the Greens and Libertarians from breaking too many voters off. Frankly, if you wanted to improve the American system, proportional voting for legislatures would be the way to go, I think. Ultimately, a parliamentary system might be better overall, but at the very least proportional votes would a) end gerrymandering altogether and b) enable minor parties to gain seats and recognition.

Condorcet voting, meanwhile, is far too time-consuming for people, I think.

[Samuel]

This is a pretty good reason for me to be conservative - if an uneducated idiot like me starts fucking around with the system of government, I'd probably just make it worse anyway.

Some things are pretty simple and obvious though. If you ask why something is done and there is no good rationale for it, or the rationale for not changing it to a better alternative is non existant, than you should change it.

For example (in the United States) we have the House of Representatives by population and the Senate with two per state. Why do we need votes apportioned that way? It was origionally like that to get the small states in the Union, but now it only serves to give them disproportionate power.

[Thanas]

But in practice, I doubt a more mathematically elegant voting system would make a difference anyway. How many times does a third party candidate make a differece?

In countries with proportional voting, nearly all the time.

[Alyrium Denryle]

*snip*

A technocracy is not a democracy. Your proposals have been massively off-topic.

Moreover, they seem to stem not from a desire to change the system, but rather because you disagree with the current system's decision.

My complaint is that the process has led to poor decision making, and systemic corruption. That I disagree with the decisions follows fairly logically from that complaint.

A technocracy can be a democracy, depending on how it is set up. Strictly speaking, the senate prior to amendment 17 would have rendered the US undemocratic because senators were appointed. Same with the british government, which while technically is a constitutional monarchy has a democratic component.

In my view, the only way to really improve on democracy is to partition the system such that the democratic components of the system are not responsible for the writing of policy, but the approval of it. The representatives in the upper house are still accountable for their decisions to the people, who's representatives can remove them from office.

[Thanas]

So why is that a democracy in your mind? Democracy does include the concept of policy made by the publicly elected.

[Alyrium Denryle]

So why is that a democracy in your mind? Democracy does include the concept of policy made by the publicly elected.

Well, in this case, they are elected. Just by different subsets. I suppose I am a mental splitter who both does and does not consider an elected body made up of people elected from a subset of the population strictly democratic. I could make an argument for either. No matter what the answer to that question is though, the system as a whole is still a democratic system, if a constrained one.

[Thanas]

It's not, because the people have no say in the political process if they are not experts. If they are not experts, they can't even start a political initiative, much less modify one.

Thus, this system is fundamentally undemocratic.

Even further, who gets a say? Do the creationists get a say in how evolution is taught? Do Neo-Nazis get a say about immigration? Do right-wingers get a say about gay marriage? Do all of those have the chance to make and influence policy as decision makers?

If not, that system is undemocratic and not a democracy.

Also, it would be in essence a horrible oppression of the above-mentioned groups. Which might be what they deserve or what would be the smart thing to do, but it is not a democratic way of thinking.

In fact, it really reminds me how the catholic church is set up.

[Alyrium Denryle]

It's not, because the people have no say in the political process if they are not experts. If they are not experts, they can't even start a political initiative, much less modify one.

I did in fact mention that the people themselves have the power of initiative.

Even further, who gets a say? Do the creationists get a say in how evolution is taught? Do Neo-Nazis get a say about immigration? Do right-wingers get a say about gay marriage? Do all of those have the chance to make and influence policy as decision makers?

Yes. If you can find a homophobic pediatrician who will argue that gays are a threat to our children, they can stand for election, and vote for candidates. They would also have the power of initiative as private citizens.

[Thanas]

Again, that is not a democracy. Power of initiative alone does not suffice for that.

[blahface]

Is there evidence that this actually happens on a worse scale than any other coercion and fraud at traditional voting places? Vote by mail has been in Oregon for quite some time now, and the 'net tells me the UK does it too.

I googled for fraud and found a few stories, but mostly it was opinion pieces rather than fact. It seems to me that if it was a horrible system, it would have been destroyed by now.

I don't know if there is any serious fraud or coercion going on with it or not, but the point is that there is potential for it.

But in practice, I doubt a more mathematically elegant voting system would make a difference anyway. How many times does a third party candidate make a differece?

Perhaps this is just because the voting system tends to screw third parties, so they never have a chance in the first place. I don't really know. This is a pretty good reason for me to be conservative - if an uneducated idiot like me starts fucking around with the system of government, I'd probably just make it worse anyway.

I think that if we had a better voting system, the extra competition would put a better check on the incumbents. They wouldn't just be able to rely on being better than one crazy opponent. They'd actually have to work for their constituents.

[Uraniun235]

I don't know if there is any serious fraud or coercion going on with it or not, but the point is that there is potential for it.

If you're in a position where you can stand over someone's shoulder as they fill out their ballot and coerce them into voting how you want them to, you would already have enough power over them to intimidate them into not going to a poll anyway.

[blahface]

I don't know if there is any serious fraud or coercion going on with it or not, but the point is that there is potential for it.

If you're in a position where you can stand over someone's shoulder as they fill out their ballot and coerce them into voting how you want them to, you would already have enough power over them to intimidate them into not going to a poll anyway.

Somebody can always lie about whom they intend to vote for. Also, it would be more difficult to find people who tend to vote a certain way and bribe them not to vote than it is to just offering a couple bucks to vote a particular way.