US election system. Is the US really a democracy, or a duocracy?

[Figment]

When all else fails, character attacks. Again? Oh please.

[Malorn]

Meh.

[Figment]

Don't mistake your unwillingness to listen and defaultive dismissal with debate and certainly not with idiocy on my part.


Then why are you incapable of realising that every stage of your electoral system further increases the majority representation of a large minority?

You don't get proportionaly represented in a state, but district represented. These districts represent local majorities. These large minorities are turned into majorities after which then get amplified when these state candidates pass votes on the next stage. In this process votes are lost, making it impossible for votes to be equal because your rural vs city system is bull. It doesn't work that way, because if they were equal votes they'd be equal in then weight in the result.

Instead a vote in one county or district outweighs that in another. This called inequality. In other nations this is called vote rigging.

Look at the video example I linked a few pages back on how a district system can change a 26% vote vs a 28% vote in a 10% vote and a 40% vote and come back to me on how this is fair or equal.

[Malorn]

Meh.

[ItsTheSheppy]

Originally Posted by Malorn

In this thread an anti American with no understanding of the US government calls the creators of the greatest nation on Earth nothing special.

Figments ignorance is only matched by the irrelevance of his country.

You know Malorn, I really like living in America. I love it, in fact. Talk about hitting the jackpot that I was born here, and white and male and middle class too! I mean, what's not to love?

But as much as I think the USA is a very successful nation and far and away the most influential on the globe, and even I think you sound like a fanboy.

It's not perfect, you know. And neither were the founding fathers. I mean they had some good ideas for their time and all, but they weren't gods. They were richy-rich dudes who thought only property-owning men should have a say in government and that owning human beings as property was an everyday convenience. All things in perspective.

[Saifoda]

Originally Posted by Figment

..
It's not the greatest in the world, only two types of people can get into power, meaning it's tyrannical.
...

Ok genius, show me exactly where in the Constitution it says ANYTHING about a two-party system... I'll wait.

Originally Posted by Malorn

...
That's how it works. That's why it is the way it is. Anyone wanting their voice heard and to be fairly represented should love this system, and anyone who wants to impose their will on the rest of the country is going to be disappointed (by design).

I think here is where I have to disagree with you my friend. What you said is how it's SUPPOSED to work, and when it was like that it worked very well and could work very well in the future. But it is not so any more. Politicians are beholden not only to their campaign contributors, because of the monopoly on media, but most primarily to the central banks. The whole reason the bailouts in '07/'08 happened is because the banks MANDATED it happen, and the government had to play nicey-nice; it's a see-saw relationship between them, and it is exactly the root cause of what is screwing everything up. Best thing we can do is change the monetary policy so that the currency is once again in the hands of Congress and NOT the Fed, and for the currency to be spent into the economy, not loaned into existence.

Originally Posted by ItsTheSheppy

...
They were richy-rich dudes who thought only property-owning men should have a say in government and that owning human beings as property was an everyday convenience. All things in perspective.

Well, partially yes. It is true that most of them, including Jefferson and Washington (two of the most liberty-loving of the founding fathers) owned slaves. Both, especially Jefferson who was in a better position to work for it, wanted slavery abolished at the onset of the nation but would have lost the support of the southern states had he pushed too hard for it. The reason they both still owned slaves, rather than freeing them, is that their slaves' lives were actually pretty damn decent, especially for slaves. They knew that if they freed them into a still largely bigoted society that they would have actually been worse off.

[HalfManHalfGod]

Originally Posted by Neurotoxin

Once again, the people have no direct representation under that system. These elected officials don't represent us, don't consult us, and do not work for the working class. When workers have a grievance, they can protest in the streets at the risk of getting arrested or getting assaulted with a variety of deadly "non-lethal" weaponry.

If you love your system so damn much, open it up, make a fourth branch, the Populous Branch, and let it be the tiebreaker in any two-way ties.

uhh...we already have that, its called the House of Representatives. Its a DIRECT result of the populous vote. Hench they have elections EVERY 2 years. Case-in-point 2010 mid-term elections, the Tea Party voting and was a huge shellacking. My representative actually represents me very well, Joe Walsh, good guy, have you ever tried talking to your representative?


I swear our public school systems are failing our children.


Good to see most you are still banging away in here.

[Saifoda]

Originally Posted by HalfManHalfGod

uhh...we already have that, its called the House of Representatives. Its a DIRECT result of the populous vote. Hench they have elections EVERY 2 years. Case-in-point 2008 mid-term elections, the Tea Party voting and was a huge shellacking.

I swear our public school systems are failing our children.


Good to see most you care still banging away in here.

Not to switch gears here or anything (again) but since you mentioned public schools....

I fancy conversations with people who are really behind public education; "We need more teachers, more classrooms, more text books. We just need to raise test scores, get better classroom instruction, blah blah blah." The thing most people don't even realize is that public education was built FROM THE GROUND UP to put people into factories. Literally! That's how it got started near round a hundred some odd years ago. They needed to make kids smart enough to run the machines in factories. Oddly enough, that's another thing that's not taught in public schools

[Figment]

Originally Posted by Saifoda

Ok genius, show me exactly where in the Constitution it says ANYTHING about a two-party system... I'll wait.

Nowhere.

Show me any third group that got into the US house of representatives that's not Democrat or Republican and try, please try, to understand why even those people who want to vote for the greens vote for the Democrats.


Please do. PLEASE try to realise why the district system causes this see-saw system.

If you can't imagine why you would vote Democrat because you'd rather see a Democrat in power than a Republican, even if you'd even more so wanted to see a Green party member in charge, then I'm indeed a genius.

Because apparently it's so hard to derive simple observations.



IN THEORY, which I already pointed out before, the idea would have been that these parties that get elected into office would not be all called Democrats or Republicans, because on a state level there'd be other parties who'd get in charge.

Show me one state. Just ONE state, where other groups than Democrats or Republicans get to be in charge. Or where ONE STATE votes for a non-Democrat or Republican.



Or if THIS happens because the system favours only those who get a bit of a district majority, so it's pointless to vote for those who will probably not win the district and in fact makes you and those that are close to you LOSE the district because you'd divide your vote over two candidates that are closest to your position.


It's not hard to figure out. In a representative election, you don't have to think about a strategic choice to even have your vote count, because it always counts and the people that are close to your opinion can work together. This means that your strategic vote in a representative election is for those groups you'd like to see work together.


What's so difficult about realising district systems are deliberately setup to influence the vote result, meaning it's vote rigging? They're setup to diminish the influence of one voter over the other, Malorn even realises that but he thinks that's a positive thing.

Freedom of expression? Sure! Just don't let it actually have an impact! Might as well live in Cuba. There you can vote on one party as well. Difference there is they don't now and then play the role of opposition and blockading the other party.

Well, partially yes. It is true that most of them, including Jefferson and Washington (two of the most liberty-loving of the founding fathers) owned slaves. Both, especially Jefferson who was in a better position to work for it, wanted slavery abolished at the onset of the nation but would have lost the support of the southern states had he pushed too hard for it. The reason they both still owned slaves, rather than freeing them, is that their slaves' lives were actually pretty damn decent, especially for slaves. They knew that if they freed them into a still largely bigoted society that they would have actually been worse off.

You forget though that they all disagreed on pretty much everything and that the constitution was a compromise.


You know, the one thing Malorn seems to hate, he'd rather see one party form a majority and tyrannise the (re)public and just hopes that this one party happens to be a conservative corporate party. Because hey, everyone else probably hates them, capitalism and everything else, right?! Ignorance is bliss.

Back to the founding fathers... Compromising with other parties on all these key points. Establishing a majority of votes for each and every single act that got into the constitution and every amendment made afterwards. So there's a majority vote needed, but there's no majority in charge? Hmm. No, you're right, it's just the majority of the large minority. So rather than having a lot of people be in charge of the government, you see a small group of people hold on to power and never give it away. Limited terms don't matter much, same group of people and would probably just lead to nepotism and things like Putin arranges in Russia to cling on to power.

Why was compromise needed then? Because at that time the two party system hadn't evolved yet. There was no experience with district voting elections, yet they somehow knew this would be the best way? And this subjective opinion is beyond critique or change? Hmm.



District systems can be shown to always end up in two party systems, where a third party has virtually no chance.

Look at any district system and look at how many party's are heard and compare it to other nations. The whole tyranny thing is laughable because all of northern Europe would have been dictatorships by that argument. They'd be pisspoor etc etc.

And what's more, there'd be no way to explain why they're doing so damn well compared to the rest of the world, despite having a much smaller internal market and not needing to loan excessive amounts of money to keep the own economy running.



But hey. If we're to believe Malorn, none of us love freedom, we're all anti-kapitalist communists and if we criticize anything he likes we're immediately retarded anti-Americans, just because Malorn can't bother to read or differentiate between the definitions of different political currents, nor accept or respect this thing called FREEDOM OF SPEECH. Because hey, if you're a foreigner "STFU and GTFO and how dare you have an opinion on Ahmehricuh".

"If you're not with us (read: me) then you're against us!"

That's the only argument I can see you use to come to the conclusion why I'd be hating on America. The jealousy argument you used before was so weak it was laughable. You're incapacity to critically look at America and its problems NEXT to its good side, while ignoring that I regularly pointed out good sides to America and pretending I only hammer on the bad sides is testament to that.


If we'd only discuss the good sides we'd have some sort of praising thread, we can have one of those if you want, but what'd be the point other than stimulating an already overgrown ego?

Constructive critique is not bashing. It's helping. Patriots who hate critique on their own country and blame everything on others and denounce critique by default are the biggest obstacle to a country progressing and improving on itself.

[Malorn]

Meh.

[Saifoda]

Wait, dude, are you for seriousness right now?

"And what's more, there'd be no way to explain why they're doing so damn well compared to the rest of the world, despite having a much smaller internal market and not needing to loan excessive amounts of money to keep the own economy running."

Pardon my French, but what fucking century are you living in? Do a simply google search on "Europe Financial Crises" or "Greek Debt" or "Spain Bank Bailouts."






Your point is taken about the district system, I'm not saying that it's what we need or want or whats best, but what I AM saying is that you asserted the Constitution was flawed in certain ways (not disputing all of them) and that one of those ways was the two-party system, and that that assertion was incorrect. I understand there are certain things "lost in translation" so to speak, so I think I just misunderstood what you were trying to say and you probably misspoke about it as well.

[Neurotoxin]

Malorn thinks the politicians he votes to elect represent him over the corporate agenda that got them on ballots. LOL, what a moron.

That's it, I'm done here. Everything I have to say on the subject is contained in my multiple lengthy responses.

[Saifoda]

Congratulations; I guess all the world's problems are now fixed in the 7 pages prior to this with your blessings of chart-busting IQ genius posts.

[Figment]

Originally Posted by Saifoda

Wait, dude, are you for seriousness right now?

"And what's more, there'd be no way to explain why they're doing so damn well compared to the rest of the world, despite having a much smaller internal market and not needing to loan excessive amounts of money to keep the own economy running."

Pardon my French, but what fucking century are you living in? Do a simply google search on "Europe Financial Crises" or "Greek Debt" or "Spain Bank Bailouts."

A little bit above that I was stating northern Europe (meaning Scandinavia, Germanic countries). The ones with issues are all mediteranean countries, which we always said were spending too much money. Hence why we have to bail them out. Since we (the northern countries) do have our things in order. Or had anyway if we don't toss it all in the bottomless pit called southern Europe. We've already bailed out Iceland, Ireland, Portugal, Greece, Spain and Italy on several occasions since the start of the crisis.

And aside from the corruption, the crisis exists largely thanks to US banks. Thanks for that.

Southern Europe has always been corrupt and dysfunctional. Unfortunately European leaders were having orgasms on a concept of a loose federal union, with a strong financial tie and hoping to encourage peace and bonding through economic ties. Didn't work at all due to the differences between economies and cultures (especially in terms of proficiency, work ethics, corruption, fraud, etc) and anyone could have seen this coming (Netherlands even wanted to refuse to let the Greeks in, but got intimidated in accepting them back when the Euro was started because the Greeks pretended their books were in order - iirc thanks to Goldman Sachs who made it appear that way).

Context, but you're right, southern Europe is a mess (but as you can tell, the ones paying for it are we and we're not that happy about it since Greece, certainly as a populace, isn't really planning on reforming as far as we can tell. They're currently blaming us for their imminent bankrupcy because we stop their insane budgets and despite having sorted 90% of their bank loans to be lifted).

Southern Europe is also the part with a non-functional democratic system.

Your point is taken about the district system, I'm not saying that it's what we need or want or whats best, but what I AM saying is that you asserted the Constitution was flawed in certain ways (not disputing all of them) and that one of those ways was the two-party system, and that that assertion was incorrect. I understand there are certain things "lost in translation" so to speak, so I think I just misunderstood what you were trying to say and you probably misspoke about it as well.

Fair enough. It's got little to do with the constitution, Malorn is the one who keeps pretending I hate it or don't understand it or something since he's horny for its draftees.

[Saifoda]

Originally Posted by Figment

A little bit above that I was stating northern Europe (meaning Scandinavia, Germanic countries). The ones with issues are all mediteranean countries, which we always said were spending too much money. Hence why we have to bail them out. Since we (the northern countries) do have our things in order. Or had anyway if we don't toss it all in the bottomless pit called southern Europe. We've already bailed out Iceland, Ireland, Portugal, Greece, Spain and Italy on several occasions since the start of the crisis.

And aside from the corruption, the crisis exists largely thanks to US banks. Thanks for that.

Southern Europe has always been corrupt and dysfunctional. Unfortunately European leaders were having orgasms on a concept of a loose federal union, with a strong financial tie and hoping to encourage peace and bonding through economic ties. Didn't work at all due to the differences between economies and cultures (especially in terms of proficiency, work ethics, corruption, fraud, etc) and anyone could have seen this coming (Netherlands even wanted to refuse to let the Greeks in, but got intimidated in accepting them back when the Euro was started because the Greeks pretended their books were in order - iirc thanks to Goldman Sachs who made it appear that way).

Context.

Southern Europe is also the part with a non-functional democratic system.



Fair enough. It's got little to do with the constitution, Malorn is the one who keeps pretending I hate it or don't understand it or something since he's horny for its draftees.

Basically southern europe can eat a dick. And yeah sorry I didn't tie in that you were still referring to northern vs southern europe in the next paragraph.


Northern Europe does have some good shit goin on, what the nordic model and all, unfortunately, much like modern day USA with it's blatant disregard for the Constitution and Constitutional process (i.e. Article V), it's part of an out of control monster (Euro/ECB) with it's debt-based currency system, much like ours with the Fed -- only they can even have their bank (ECB) be part of the construct of the Euro system because of the lack of proper oversight anyways.