The General American Politics Thread

[Ming Ming Hatsune]

EC wasn't a problem until this election. (Yes I know about the Bush/Gore, but as far as I know, not many people complained about EC then it is today).

And I strongly disagree with EC getting replaced. Because this stops candidates from going to states that don't feel "important" and all they have to do is rally in California, Florida, Texas and areas around New York.

Because if popular vote takes over, it's THOSE states that will always have the say on America's next president and nowhere else.

Other news: http://www.news965.com/news/news/local/tech-company-ceo-fired-after-threatening-kill-trum/ns8KJ/

Can't believe this man.

[Jovahexeon Jax Joranvexeon]

30 minutes ago, Ming Ming Hatsune said:

 

EC wasn't a problem until this election. (Yes I know about the Bush/Gore, but as far as I know, not many people complained about EC then it is today).

Actually,  not only did people complain en masse about that election,  but there was also the infamous Florida recounts which really rubbed salt into wounds of the matter. 

[Candescence]

1 hour ago, Ming Ming Hatsune said:

EC wasn't a problem until this election. (Yes I know about the Bush/Gore, but as far as I know, not many people complained about EC then it is today).

And I strongly disagree with EC getting replaced. Because this stops candidates from going to states that don't feel "important" and all they have to do is rally in California, Florida, Texas and areas around New York.

Nevermind the problem you're describing already exists, except the states you named are basically replaced by Ohio, Florida, Pennsylvania and Virginia. Candidates spend time in other states, but much less - only eighteen states were visited by Obama and Romney in the previous election, with basically the entire northwest, the region with the most small states, basically being ignored.

tl;dr: The Electoral College doesn't ensure the majority of the states decides who is elected.

 

[Ming Ming Hatsune]

1 hour ago, Candescence said:

Nevermind the problem you're describing already exists, except the states you named are basically replaced by Ohio, Florida, Pennsylvania and Virginia. Candidates spend time in other states, but much less - only eighteen states were visited by Obama and Romney in the previous election, with basically the entire northwest, the region with the most small states, basically being ignored.

tl;dr: The Electoral College doesn't ensure the majority of the states decides who is elected.

 

After watching that, maybe it should get replaced. Maybe.

But what should it be replaced by? Popular vote? I'm pointing at Brexit. Brexit won by popular vote, and all I hear from Britain voters were "WE MADE A MISTAKE!!!" "Britain, what have you done?". If Trump won by popular vote but lost in EC, would you be angry with the EC and it must be replaced?

[Tani Coyote]

1 hour ago, Candescence said:

The problem is, faithless electors aren't illegal, so they wouldn't be throwing out the law. The actual state-based popular vote is practically a suggestion even in states that criminally punish faithless electors.

It's still breaking the law even if it's not enforced. So yes, they are throwing out the law if they go faithless if their particular state says so, because each state has authority over its votes.

1 hour ago, Candescence said:

Having a bunch of elites who can disregard the popular vote if they feel that the alternative is a negative result of tyranny of the majority in a certain case is literally how the Electoral College was designed, in order to compromise between a regular popular vote and the President being picked by Congress.

Considering it is up to each state on how their electors are allotted and how many historically did not have electors given by popular vote, I'm not so sure that was the nature of the compromise. The Electoral College is meant to let each state choose the President rather than the public, paying tribute to the United States' original conception as a federation of sovereign states rather than a single country. In the modern era, the lack of abolition or reform of the Electoral College indicates implicit consent by the people to let this system remain, so it is democratic by proxy.

Maybe a century or two ago it would fly to have elites make choices against the will of the public, but that is no longer how it is. The Senate was reformed, the parties gave up their monopoly on choosing the nominee, etc. People erroneously refer to us being a republic as if that excludes democracy, but the fact is we are a democracy and power lies with the people.

Democrats threw a fit over the DNC pushing Clinton, and Americans are right in throwing a fit if the Electoral College decides in their pompous, aristocratic, self-righteous wisdom to go against the public will.

Plus it's just insulting. It assumes that those who voted for Trump did so only because they were stupid, as opposed to having a legitimate interest in his Presidency. It's paternalistic thinking that, if one subscribes to it at all, invalidates the whole idea of democracy. If the masses are stupid, they shouldn't be allowed to vote at all.

1 hour ago, Ming Ming Hatsune said:

And I strongly disagree with EC getting replaced. Because this stops candidates from going to states that don't feel "important" and all they have to do is rally in California, Florida, Texas and areas around New York.

Nonsense. Not only are those states ideologically different to a point of precluding winning them all, with national popular vote, each state will be ideologically split.

You might win 70% of Californians, but the 30% who go the other way mean you have to make up the difference elsewhere. It's impossible to win 100% of the votes in each of the most populous states, so rural states will be a necessity.

If one really wants a good compromise between the current system and nationwide popular vote, it would be a requirement each state's votes be allotted proportionately. This would make practically every state competitive, albeit with some focus still towards the larger ones (this inevitable if your desire is democracy), while also giving a voice to the minority opinion within each state.

Under the current system, Democrats in Texas may as well not bother voting for President. Their only real reason to go is Congressional seats and ballots. This is another perk to a proportional or national vote: many Congressional seats would become more competitive, as now minority political groups have a reason to hit the polls. Presidential turnout frequently translates into down-ticket turnout.

47 minutes ago, Jovahexeon the Sapphire said:

Actually,  not only did people complain en masse about that election,  but there was also the infamous Florida recounts which really rubbed salt into wounds of the matter. 

I think it'll really become an issue now. First time in over a century in 2000? Not a problem, really.

Two times in five elections? It's way too common. I wouldn't be surprised if we see a case for serious reform now.

[Ming Ming Hatsune]

1 minute ago, Noelgilvie said:

Nonsense. Not only are those states ideologically different to a point of precluding winning them all, with national popular vote, each state will be ideologically split.

You might win 70% of Californians, but the 30% who go the other way mean you have to make up the difference elsewhere. It's impossible to win 100% of the votes in each of the most populous states, so rural states will be a necessity.

70% of Californians is a BIG number compared to 70% of Nevadians or people in Montana. I'll agree that Republicans have to almost double the work to level or better that 70% of Californians. This is one of the reasons why Clinton lost, because she was so confident on her blue states. I'm being dead serious about California and other popular states that can dictate America's next president. 

Compare this with Brexit. Scotland as Nevada and England as California. Scotland got a high 62% of people who want to remain compared to England's 42%. But because England has more population than Scotland, Scotland's super high 62% wasn't enough.

[-Robin-]

If people understand that their vote ultimately does matter, then the "work" required to counterbalance a California majority would be a piece of cake.

 

41% of eligible voters did not vote last Tuesday. That is pathetic. By swapping over to a more direct system of representation - maybe making the way Maine and Nebraska do it the standard rather than the exception - you'd see a lot more outreach and motivation because then their votes really do have an impact on the end result.

[Candescence]

I also would like to advocate a proportional system of voting. Probably Single Transferable Vote, which would also eliminate the potential problem with "spoiler candidates" since candidates without sufficient first-round votes will have their votes transferred to the canditates with more votes based on who voters marked as their second vote. The system needs to eliminate "strategic voting" altogether, so voters can vote how they feel is best without even thinking about how other people might vote. And larger districts ensures that gerrymandering is much harder to do.

[Patticus]

Maybe if the Electoral College stays, new rules should be put in effect to account for weird eventualities like 2016/2000?

Say there's a candidate who wins the electoral college and another who wins the popular vote - if the Electoral College winner has more than, say, 100 points than the popular vote winner, they are the de facto winner. But if they don't, and the popular vote winner leads by, let's say a million votes or more, they are the defacto winner; though this would invite criticism for handing more power to the coastal states. If both or neither criterion are met, we go to an instant run-off backup system.

That's all I can think of that could preserve the existing system.

 

Handing the decision to the House in the eventuality that neither candidates has enough votes doesn't seem wise to me since they'll just vote for whomever the majority party there wants. Hardly impartial.

[Mad Convoy]

After some mulling over, I think an electoral collage is good for ensuring that every state gets a say. I think popular vote works fine for the most part in smaller countries, but a bigger, more spaced out country like the US needs some kind of system to keep everything proportional and organized. However, I would be hard pressed to claim that its without flaws. For one, it isn't adjusted enough to factor for demographic changes as well as population changes. I think if we are to keep the electoral collage, it should be adjusted before every presidential election for, at the very least, population. Another unfortunate downside of the electoral collage as it is set up now is that it feeds into the mentality that your vote doesn't really count. For example, say that your district voted exactly like the rest of the state for Marty McPolitician. Great, the electoral collage will count all of the states' points towards Marty. Now, say that your district didn't vote exactly like the rest of the state. Too bad, all of your states' points are still going towards Marty. If stuff like this this keeps happening over and over again, you may eventually conclude that your district doesn't really matter in the grant scheme of things and not vote-- which is pretty bad. The solution, I think, is to go by a districts only. This is not without fault-- gerrymandering by Republicans and Democrats would have to be addressed as it would become more significant, but not only is that a lot easier in theory to overpower with increased traffic than the current system, that it can be resolved by letting the federal government decide the territory of districts, not the state politicians who would have a vested motive to do gerrymandering and might be left unchecked.

As for single transferrable vote, I think using a "first choice, second choice" system is open to the same issues as the current system-- namely, because it assumes that everybody will have Republican or Democrat as a first or second choice somewhere when realistically, people are likely to just do the strategic voting thing and go third party twice.  A solution might be to have each candidate sign up to either have their votes transferred to the Republican or Democrat candidate if they are determined to have a low chance of winning by a significant margin-- but even that might have some problems as some of the really non-conventional third parties, like the Communist Party, or a party that has styled itself on rejecting the system, like the Libertarian Party, may not want to side with either party which could pose issues on the off-chance somebody from one of them actually manages to get noticed on the campaign trail.

--------

It is becoming increasingly obvious that Trump really had no plan as president-- he's been flip-flopping like crazy on all his old promises and seems to be arbitrarily selecting his cabinet rather than looking for qualified capable individuals, likely because he doesn't actually know too many that are willing to work with him and are pro-GOP. I can't quite be sure of the effect of this, but I'm predicting that this will mean that Obama is going to be stepping up to the plate a lot more than usual for somebody who technically won't be in power anymore after January-- after all, Trump said that he was going to get consultations from Obama beyond the usual period for former presidents to consult their successors, and I have a feeling that extension is going to be longer than a few months.

I'm worried about the holdup though. The GOP does not seem to like his choices for his cabinet, and they can and will use their majorities to reject his selections if they see it fit. The same could very well happen with the Supreme Court nominee, whoever Trump chooses.  If this goes on for too long, the Oval Office will be left without key assistants and administrators, or left with the prior assistants and administrators who do not seem to like Trump one bit. Furthermore, if the Trump trend of wiffle-waffling continues, he might be too indecisive to get anything done in a timely manner, if at all. This can be good in some ways-- this could, for example, delay the weakening of the EPA enough so that it can still have something of an impact long enough for his presidency to pass and a new guy to come in and strengthen it again, or keep him from making any progress on the wall and thus not wasting as much money on it than if he did have the decisiveness to get it going. But it can also be bad if the country needs to make a quick decision on, say, if it needs to decide if it should counterattack or even enter war.

I do have some bad news though. It seems like that Bannon has figured out how to have an influence on Trump's decisions and thoughts-- through the use of flattery and exploiting his pride. For example, in a recent interview, when it seemed like Trump was about to go along with the Paul D. Ryan's suggestion to drop his policies in the name of unity, Bannon quickly interrupted him to remind Trump that he had a promise to fulfill and insinuated that Ryan might be showing a lack of respect for him personally. Trump immediately backpedaled and claimed that "you can't do that" in reference to going along with Ryan's suggestion. This is really concerning as Bannon is strongly associated with a white nationalist movement, and hints what we've all suspected of Trump in terms of him making for a weak, unprepared president. Granted, it has yet to be seen if the more reasonable Priebus, Obama, or any of his future cabinet will have influence, but Bannon's emergence as an advisor that Trump relies on is concerning to say the least.  https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/how-bannon-flattered-and-coaxed-trump-on-policies-key-to-the-alt-right/2016/11/15/53c66362-ab69-11e6-a31b-4b6397e625d0_story.html?hpid=hp_hp-top-table-main_bannon815p%3Ahomepage%2Fstory 

There's a lot of uncertainty and I think the only thing confirmed so far is that Trump is really indecisive and unprepared for the role of President. Whether he actually decides to carry through his policies, the next four years are going to be pretty rough under him. I will again bring up how uncertain Trump's future as president will be, but my current prediction that he's going to be a do-nothing president of some sort, whether because Congress, the military, etc. doesn't let him do much or because he's too indecisive, changing his views on the basis of who he's last spoken to and allowing his cabinet and advisors to have most of the control in terms of decision-making

[Tani Coyote]

As with BLM, articles are circulating about a four year old's father supposedly dying in an ambulance blocked by anti-Trump protests. Not yet circulated by any major news outlet, but all the independent right-wing ones are seizing on it.

The old information war, where the major and minor media outlets each point the finger of bias at the other.

22 hours ago, Ming Ming Hatsune said:

70% of Californians is a BIG number compared to 70% of Nevadians or people in Montana. I'll agree that Republicans have to almost double the work to level or better that 70% of Californians. This is one of the reasons why Clinton lost, because she was so confident on her blue states. I'm being dead serious about California and other popular states that can dictate America's next president. 

Compare this with Brexit. Scotland as Nevada and England as California. Scotland got a high 62% of people who want to remain compared to England's 42%. But because England has more population than Scotland, Scotland's super high 62% wasn't enough.

That's also a poor comparison because the UK is a much smaller country, composed of only 4 state-equivalents. We have 50, all with different economies, climates, histories, etc.

The fact is the percent of Californians who vote Republican will force the Democrats to pick up votes elsewhere. Even in the "small state protecting" Electoral College, focus goes towards big states if they happen to have a swing vote. Small states only get attention if they have swing votes, and they will always be valued less than larger states.

21 hours ago, -Robin- said:

41% of eligible voters did not vote last Tuesday. That is pathetic. By swapping over to a more direct system of representation - maybe making the way Maine and Nebraska do it the standard rather than the exception - you'd see a lot more outreach and motivation because then their votes really do have an impact on the end result.

I'd hope the closeness of the 2000 and 2016 races would motivate people in the future.

Those who are angry about Trump's victory but who still insist on not voting have zero right to complain in the future.

Plus for the sake of their personal gratification in not voting or voting third party they forced the greater evil on everyone else. Such an action is immoral.

11 hours ago, Mad Convoy said:

After some mulling over, I think an electoral collage is good for ensuring that every state gets a say. I think popular vote works fine for the most part in smaller countries, but a bigger, more spaced out country like the US needs some kind of system to keep everything proportional and organized. 

We have the US Senate for that. And the small states getting one House vote regardless of size. And Senatorial courtesy on appointees. And so on.

The small states get enough consideration. It's time to make the President represent the people I'd say.

Quote

As for single transferrable vote, I think using a "first choice, second choice" system is open to the same issues as the current system-- namely, because it assumes that everybody will have Republican or Democrat as a first or second choice somewhere when realistically, people are likely to just do the strategic voting thing and go third party twice.  A solution might be to have each candidate sign up to either have their votes transferred to the Republican or Democrat candidate if they are determined to have a low chance of winning by a significant margin-- but even that might have some problems as some of the really non-conventional third parties, like the Communist Party, or a party that has styled itself on rejecting the system, like the Libertarian Party, may not want to side with either party which could pose issues on the off-chance somebody from one of them actually manages to get noticed on the campaign trail.

There's also a possibility that candidates with more popularity will be eliminated in certain circumstances.

Range voting and approval voting are alternative options for a single seat. I would say approval is better, because it is a simple yes or no on each candidate, whereas range is subject to arbitrary point allotments.

Quote

I'm worried about the holdup though. The GOP does not seem to like his choices for his cabinet, and they can and will use their majorities to reject his selections if they see it fit. The same could very well happen with the Supreme Court nominee, whoever Trump chooses.  If this goes on for too long, the Oval Office will be left without key assistants and administrators, or left with the prior assistants and administrators who do not seem to like Trump one bit.

So long as Trump doesn't let Congress walk over him, this won't be too bad necessarily. There's a worrying trend Trump is going for loyalty over ability, and that sort of nepotism will not bode well for the functioning of government.

Quote

It seems like that Bannon has figured out how to have an influence on Trump's decisions and thoughts-- through the use of flattery and exploiting his pride. For example, in a recent interview, when it seemed like Trump was about to go along with the Paul D. Ryan's suggestion to drop his policies in the name of unity, Bannon quickly interrupted him to remind Trump that he had a promise to fulfill and insinuated that Ryan might be showing a lack of respect for him personally. Trump immediately backpedaled and claimed that "you can't do that" in reference to going along with Ryan's suggestion.

The good news is that happened before he was elected. Given how Trump is a master panderer, we'll just have to see if he'll so quickly change his mind now that he's actually in a position of power.

Quote

There's a lot of uncertainty and I think the only thing confirmed so far is that Trump is really indecisive and unprepared for the role of President. Whether he actually decides to carry through his policies, the next four years are going to be pretty rough under him. I will again bring up how uncertain Trump's future as president will be, but my current prediction that he's going to be a do-nothing president of some sort, whether because Congress, the military, etc. doesn't let him do much or because he's too indecisive, changing his views on the basis of who he's last spoken to and allowing his cabinet and advisors to have most of the control in terms of decision-making

I honestly wouldn't be too surprised if the US gets a taste of parliamentary government. Trump may be the official head of state, but we're likely to see someone or a group of people influencing the day to day operations to a point they could be classed Prime Ministers in all but name.

[Dizcrybe]

It's official, the election results have caused a rise in hate crime.

[Patticus]

Bernie Sanders has been appointed to a key Democratic senate leadership role, and is set to become the ranking Democrat (or just ranking senator?) on the Senate Budget Committee. He was appointed the position by incoming Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, despite not actually being a member of the Democratic Party any more. A slightly unusual decision, but one that shows a developing understanding of where the party needs to go in the next 4 years.

Schumer, it must be noted, is also a supporter of Keith Ellison's bid for the vacant DNC chair position. Ellison was a vocal proponent of Sanders' presidential bid, and has secured much of the remaining Democratic establishment's support for his bid.

Meanwhile, Hillary Clinton's popular vote lead on Donald Trump has risen to over 1 million votes. She got all the right votes in all the wrong places.

In other news, Rand Paul is going to derail any attempt to appoint either Bolton or Giuliani as Secretary of State. In the closely divided senate, he holds a lot of sway. Should Giuliani somehow get the position anyway, he would add metric tons of interest conflicts to an administration already wallowing in them.

[KHCast]

 

This better not be the case or I'm gonna piss blood 

[Patticus]

I can only hope that, if that particular intellectually bankrupt pond scum gets Trump's nomination, every single member of the Senate Judiciary Committee will be so incensed and repulsed that he will be denied the role.

[Dizcrybe]

I tried calling my representative, but I'm not sure if the voicemail actually went through. I pressed pound, because usually that ends the recording, but nothing happened. Is this one of those instances where you send the message by hanging up?

[CrownSlayers Shadow]

Okay, so the fuck ups are stacking higher now...

This is gonna be an interesting term.

[Mad Convoy]

"Potential" is the key word here-- there are 20 other people that Trump is considering instead of that asshole to put forward, not to mention that he has demonstrated a very loose definition of "definitive" and similar adjectives.

But still, the fact that this guy is even being considered at all is very worrying. He, like Trump, would not be fit for the position in terms of experience and in terms of intention. I really hope the Senate Judiciary Committee will see that he is not fit for Court and block him from the role if he does indeed turn out to be Trump's choice-- or, if nothing else, his inane arguments wind up having the opposite effect and dissuade people from following his beliefs.

I think Noelglivie hit upon a really good point when he said that Trump is going for loyalty over ability. I, however, don't think Trump is doing that consciously. For one, he lacks the connections with many politicians which would be necessary for him to nominate them. His connections lay more in the business world-- hence why a lot of his potential cabinet are indeed businessmen that he has worked with in the past. He's also in an uncertain position as it appears that even he doesn't really know how he's going to deal with the role of president-- so, as a lot of people are apt to do, he's falling back on what he knows worked in the past and who he believes he can trust. Problem is, a presidency is not a business, so what worked in business won't work in politics. Stuff like this is why all the presidents before him, even perceived outsiders like Jimmy Carter, have always gotten some political experience beforehand-- and I think Trump, and the electorate at large, is about to get a very hard lesson in that.

[KHCast]

The guy apparent has a gay history lol. And no one was surprised 

[Patticus]

4 hours ago, KHCast said:

The guy apparent has a gay history lol. And no one was surprised 

>Person gets raised in strict household which is against homosexuality
>Person has sexy encounter with member of same sex during adolescence or something
>Person remains deeply loyal to upbringing, religion etc, is extremely uncomfortable with encounter
>Becomes anti-LGBTQ advocate

It's a tale so common it has become a cliche.

[KHCast]

If this guy did in fact do gay porn, and that's seemingly it, unfortunately he can do what a lot of "straight" guys that are in or that did gay porn do: say it was a tough time and they needed money.

[Mad Convoy]

We now know one member of Trump's cabinet. Its Mike Pompeo, and he's accepted the offer to be the director of the CIA. https://www.rt.com/usa/367387-trump-cia-director-pompeo/

He seems to be a Tea Party Republican and a representative of Kansas. He has a long history of paranoia with Muslims, having accused several imams in the past of being terrorists. He wants to put sanctions on Arabian countries in terms of weapon export and end the Iran Nuclear Deal. I worry that this will lead to a spark in paranoia against Arabs, as well as unnecessary and invasive investigations stemming from said paranoia. But he also views executive orders as undemocratic and wishes that Trump would put an end to relying on them like Obama did, which should make for some interesting times.

He also wants Alabama Senator Jeff Sessions to be his Attorney General. This man is notorious for his racism, having once condemned a white lawyer as a "disgrace to his race" for representing a black man, joked that the KKK didn't seem so bad until he realized that they smoke pot, and being very against organizations like the ACLU and NAACP, accusing them of trying to shove civil rights down everybody's throat. (Though he's since tried to backpedal on most of these statements, claiming that he can't remember if he really said those things because he has a loose tongue and trying to present a reinterpretation of them). Indeed, he was actually rejected in 1986 by the judiciary committee for this reason-- but now that he's been a Senator of Alabama for 20 years (!), he has a lot more connections and a better shot at getting the position Trump is now nominating him for. As the attorney general, he could potentially be seeing a position overseeing the most racially diverse part of the government-- the military.
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/17/us/politics/specter-of-race-shadows-jeff-sessions-potential-trump-nominee-for-cabinet.html?_r=0

Yikes! This is all very worrying!

[KHCast]

Well trump already got a white supremacist in, why stop there? Expose how racist America is on a glorious trainwreck, and shove it in the fucking faces of those that try to underplay it and even say it doesn't exist. Jesus, we have t made much progress it seems 

[Mad Convoy]

19 minutes ago, KHCast said:

Well trump already got a white supremacist in, why stop there? Expose how racist America is on a glorious trainwreck, and shove it in the fucking faces of those that try to underplay it and even say it doesn't exist. Jesus, we have t made much progress it seems 

No, what's happened is that we've hit a stage of pushback. Historically, whenever racial movements make a huge leap, there's a segment of the population that feels alienated by it. In most cases, as it is here, people feel like their way of life and their culture is threatened by this leap in progress, which is terrifying to them as they are not mentally prepared to deal with the change. So this segment of the population flips out and rises up in opposition. In the 20th century, it was the KKK, which intensified its activities as people began to actually care about black people-- many racists were also pushed into positions of power like the Senate by them in hopes of impeding progress. Before that, it was Andrew Johnson, and before that the South fought passionately in the Civil War.

The good news is that this population is a minority of Americans-- most Americans want to respect people regardless of race. The bad news is that this population is very good at uniting, getting into positions of power or getting those who think like them into positions of power, and intimidating those who disagree to give the illusion that they're the majority, which makes it genuinely effective in slowing progress as well as preserving systemic racism.

Cracked (of all places!) has a great article on the matter-- http://www.cracked.com/blog/dont-panic/.

[KHCast]

If they're able to hinder progress that bad then what I said stands in that we haven't made much progress it seems.

 

A lot of the white population even if not racist are willing to look past it if there's personal benefit. Trumps nomination kinda goes to show that. Wouldn't be surprised if many of my white friends on social media regarding many of these choices go "it won't be that bad guys, you're overreacting, give the man a chance, maybe he'll be a decent guy"