@averagejoe1 saidThat is why there is a Constitution and a Bill of Rights limiting what the majority may do. If 51% of Americans were to vote for a law telling everyone where and what to eat, the Constitution would bar this.
Not a fair analogy. You have to say 100 people going to dinner, and 51 of them get to tell the other 49 where to go. The 49 have no voice. I thought you were for fairness and equality.
Anyway, rewrite it with 100 people. The '3' people you reference represent Sixty Per Cent. Slanthead. And, 60% would be reasonable.
27 Sep 22
@averagejoe1 saidYou’ve immediately moved the conversation away from ‘democracy’ and into the specifics of the US federal arrangements for selecting a POTUS. Your system demands that true democracy is sacrificed in order to maintain an equality of status ( to some degree ) amongst the states. This arrangement is most undemocratic when it comes to your senate. I’m sure the POTUS election is more representative than the make up of the senate.
Thankyou. Finally. Sonhouse was chicken. You are brave. Thankyou.
I will take you at your word on the definition. I would like a true discussion, if we may. "Everyone's vote is counted equally'.
#1. Right now, the Electoral College (EC) insures that all parts of the country are involved in selecting a president
If the election depended solely on the popu ...[text shortened]... ng overwhelmed by the will of the majority....51% could control 49%. A bit strong, dont you think?
@kevcvs57 saidI concur. The peculiarities of the U.S. electoral college system are irrelevant to the more general question what a democracy is. The essential thing about democracies is not the holding of elections or the particulars of how votes are tallied in the USA. China too holds elections, but it's not a democracy; in China, sovereignty is vested in a single party which controls all the levers of power. The essential thing about democracy is that sovereignty is vested in the populace at large, not in the organs of the state or an office (such as a monarchy) or a party (e.g., the Chinese Communist Party). How the populace at large makes it's will known to the state in a true democracy is a matter for practical implementation (rather than definition), and it need not be by the mechanism of voting in elections. Other mechanisms could be devised.
You’ve immediately moved the conversation away from ‘democracy’ and into the specifics of the US federal arrangements for selecting a POTUS. Your system demands that true democracy is sacrificed in order to maintain an equality of status ( to some degree ) amongst the states. This arrangement is most undemocratic when it comes to your senate. I’m sure the POTUS election is more representative than the make up of the senate.
Objections that a majority could tyrannise the minority are also irrelevant to the definition of "democracy." These objections have been met in practise by the implementation of constitutions and bills of rights.
27 Sep 22
@wajoma saidYou have inadvertently mentioned one of the most important facets of holding free and fair elections (as opposed to the sort of sham elections held in the USSR, China, and other autocracies): it's not so important how a candidate gets into power, whether by elections or hereditary lineage or coup d'etat; it's much more important how to get a sitting head of state out. This is one thing America has done right: they did it regularly, on schedule, peacefully, and with dignity -- until Donald Trump.
The other thing driving the 2 party see-saw is that the biggest motivator driving people to the polls is not to vote for something, but to vote something out. Then it becomes a vote for who is likely to have the most effect of getting 'X' out.
27 Sep 22
@moonbus saidYes pure democracy would contain the ever present danger of tyranny by the majority.
I concur. The peculiarities of the U.S. electoral college system are irrelevant to the more general question what a democracy is. The essential thing about democracies is not the holding of elections or the particulars of how votes are tallied in the USA. China too holds elections, but it's not a democracy; in China, sovereignty is vested in a single party which controls all ...[text shortened]... ese objections have been met in practise by the implementation of constitutions and bills of rights.
I would prefer a bill of rights containing basic protections for every one thus by extension any present or future minorities, than a list of powers that the state does or doesn’t have.
There would still be unsolvable tensions in any system. But that’s the price of living in ever larger and more diverse communities and hardly democracies fault or in it’s power to address them.
27 Sep 22
@averagejoe1 said"Not a fair analogy. You have to say 100 people going to dinner, and 51 of them get to tell the other 49 where to go. The 49 have no voice."
Not a fair analogy. You have to say 100 people going to dinner, and 51 of them get to tell the other 49 where to go. The 49 have no voice. I thought you were for fairness and equality.
Anyway, rewrite it with 100 people. The '3' people you reference represent Sixty Per Cent. Slanthead. And, 60% would be reasonable.
Of course you would think that. Because in your mind, people always want the same thing and it's always "us" vs "them". A liberal would never be able to see eye to eye with a conservative. The 51 aren't always the same. The issue discussed aren't always the same. One day 51 decide to go out for pizza and the next day 20 of the 49 join 31 of those 51 and they all decide to go for chinese. Or make a decision about what movie to watch in the evening.
You are basically admitting that rather than 49 people not getting their way, you would rather have 51 not getting their way. Becuase somehow it is more fair. That it's right that a texan who lives in the middle of bumfuk nowhere have as much say as 100 or whatever texans living in Dallas.
You are scared crapless that even Texas might turn blue just because your message is such garbage that you can only reach people who never left their home town of twenty thousand
It's hilarious to me that the weaklings in the republican party are so shameless in saying "we might never be able to convince 51% of the country to support us so we want to make sure the others can't do anything we don't agree with unless they win 60% in the system we rigged so it's impossible to turn some states blue to get that 60%"
maybe they should make a rule that the Lakers still win if the other team beats them by less than 20 points. Or that people from Iowa pay less federal income tax or their drinkable water be allowed to contain twice as much lead as New York's drinkable water.
Heh the party of personal responsibility and pulling oneself by their bootstraps needs a handout in elections because it's just not fair that 51% of the country likes the other guys. The gop are the political welfare queens.
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27 Sep 22
@moonbus saidHell, no. Quite clearly not. It was the great experiment of the capitalists ante verba to fool the plebs into thinking they'd got rid of the upper classes. And it succeeded, too: the plebs continue to be fooled.
America was and is the great experiment in government by consent of the governed.
27 Sep 22
@kevcvs57 saidKev.... Kev. So now you say a majority can constitute tyranny, which is what I have been preaching to you little people for years. You know, the many analogies about 51% controlling the other 49%? And I am saying it this week, on two separate threads.
Yes pure democracy would contain the ever present danger of tyranny by the majority.
No liberal agrees with my 51/49 paragraph after paragraph, but then you slyly slip in this sentence? Which simply says what I have been trying to convince everyone of ad nauseam.
So, you have realized it, having read my posts, then, put it out there under your name.
I don't care, but I wish you could be a man and say you see what AvJoe has been trying to say.
I am glad you see the light. Now, moving on, could you tell us, when y'all say 'I just want my fair share'. from whence does this fair share come?
27 Sep 22
@zahlanzi saidSee post to Kev just above.
"Not a fair analogy. You have to say 100 people going to dinner, and 51 of them get to tell the other 49 where to go. The 49 have no voice."
Of course you would think that. Because in your mind, people always want the same thing and it's always "us" vs "them". A liberal would never be able to see eye to eye with a conservative. The 51 aren't always the same. The issue ...[text shortened]... age is such garbage that you can only reach people who never left their home town of twenty thousand
27 Sep 22
@zahlanzi saidSee post to Kev just above. It is about majority rule, tyranny, such as that. Pretty simple.
It's hilarious to me that the weaklings in the republican party are so shameless in saying "we might never be able to convince 51% of the country to support us so we want to make sure the others can't do anything we don't agree with unless they win 60% in the system we rigged so it's impossible to turn some states blue to get that 60%"
maybe they should make a rule that t ...[text shortened]... ust not fair that 51% of the country likes the other guys. The gop are the political welfare queens.
The stuff you two are casting aspersions about, etc, do not override or change the common fact in the post pointed out in the posts above.
Rail on with your hypotheticals and turning states blue and the basketball points, and comparing states. What a laugh, your very comparisons totally confirm the reasons for the Electoral College.
Pitiful.
27 Sep 22
@shallow-blue saidSomeone here suggested 'one man, one vote.' Almost right. More realistically: 'one White, Anglo-Saxon, Protestant, heterosexual, monogamous, land-owning male, one vote.'
Hell, no. Quite clearly not. It was the great experiment of the capitalists ante verba to fool the plebs into thinking they'd got rid of the upper classes. And it succeeded, too: the plebs continue to be fooled.
@moonbus saidNow here is a wasted post. Since all of the categories that are listed have every right to vote, together, arrive on the same bus, why post some airhead comment like this.
Someone here suggested 'one man, one vote.' Almost right. More realistically: 'one White, Anglo-Saxon, Protestant, heterosexual, monogamous, land-owning male, one vote.'
Moonbus, please don't be like Kev and Shav et al. Be like Sonhouse, he is right on!!!
27 Sep 22
@kevcvs57 saidThe way to avoid tyranny of a majority is to have more than two parties, such that no one party can control the legislative process. This forces coalitions, which forces consensus-politics rather than the obstructionist-politics we see in America's two-party system today.
Yes pure democracy would contain the ever present danger of tyranny by the majority.
I would prefer a bill of rights containing basic protections for every one thus by extension any present or future minorities, than a list of powers that the state does or doesn’t have.
There would still be unsolvable tensions in any system. But that’s the price of living in ever larger and more diverse communities and hardly democracies fault or in it’s power to address them.
27 Sep 22
@averagejoe1 saidOh, yes, quite right, I forgot to add </sarcasm> to that post. Thanks for reminding me. Won't happen again.
Now here is a wasted post. Since all of the categories that are listed have every right to vote, together, arrive on the same bus, why post some airhead comment like this.
Moonbus, please don't be like Kev and Shav et al. Be like Sonhouse, he is right on!!!
</sarcasm>