US Politics: Meet the New Right, same as the Old Right

[karaddin]

Can you give an example of how voting someone first outright hurts them? We've seen some issues with the preferential voting in the senate, but all of them would have been avoided by preferencing the major parties and major minor parties first or early. And those largely come from letting the parties control preference flow rather than it being determined by the voter like it is in the lower house.

And my comment was specifically comparing to first past the post, and your objection doesn't undermine this at all.

[Seli]

...

Re: Seli

I disagree with this view. While there are definite physiological and physical components to addiction, I do not put it in the same category as cancer or MRSA infection, which is what "medical problem" brings to my mind.

So how would you evaluate the legal and moral components of a case where a drug addict physically harms someone else in a permanent and irreversibleway as a result of their addiction? Perhaps a drug addict was driving a car while under the influence and caused a car wreck that paralyzes the passengers in the other car? How would you assess the legal and moral culpability?

Difficult, and all circumstances need to be taken into account. That is why we ought to have a legal system trying to find that balance.

[The Marquis de Leech]

Can you give an example of how voting someone first outright hurts them?

Imagine four candidates: A, B, C, D. I rank them in that order

The vote totals on first preferences are:

A: 100 (2nd Pref: 100 B.)

B: 60 (2nd Pref: 60 C)

C: 50 (2nd Pref: 50 A)

D: 40 (2nd Pref: 40 C)

All D preferences go to C. So:

A: 100

C: 90

B: 60

All B preferences go to C. So:

C: 150

A: 100

C wins.

Now suppose 15 A voters decide that despite the fact we really want A, first preferencing D is smarter. We second preference A instead. So:

A: 85 (2nd Pref: 85 B.)

B: 60 (2nd Pref: 60 C)

D: 55 (2nd Pref: 40 C 15 A)

C: 50 (2nd Pref: 50 A)

C is removed, so:

A: 135

B: 60

D: 55

A wins.

In this scenario, if I (and my 14 friends) first preference A, A loses. If we second preference A, A wins.

Hence the counter-intuitive nature of preferential voting that can under certain circumstances make it worse than FPP.

And my comment was specifically comparing to first past the post, and your objection doesn't undermine this at all.

FPP is rotten, but the tactical flaws in that system involve not voting for your favourite candidate in order to prevent the less desired opposition getting in. The preferential voting flaw above is a whole other can of worms: it involves needing to rank someone lower in order to help them. For all FPPs many faults, at least you know that voting for a candidate is the best way of getting that candidate elected.

[The Marquis de Leech]

And that's the weakness of preferential voting in comparison to the likes of FPP. Comparing it to proportional voting opens up another problem: gerrymandering, deliberate or accidental. It is still very common in Australia for governments (state or federal) to be elected when the Opposition actually got more votes.

[karaddin]

Thats an extremely uncommon scenario and seems far more consistent with party preferencing ala our senate than it does via individual preferences like our lower house, I'll take the system that works far better in the majority of cases.

[The Marquis de Leech]

Thats an extremely uncommon scenario and seems far more consistent with party preferencing ala our senate than it does via individual preferences like our lower house, I'll take the system that works far better in the majority of cases.

I was trying to create a simplistic scenario deliberately: a "real" election gets incredibly messy. The point is that only the second preferences of the eliminated candidates count - not everybody's second preferences - so elections get determined by the order in which elimination happens, with the potential for perverse results. A double ballot system like the French have, where everyone gets to revote on the top two, is a good deal fairer, though there you have the problem of turnout among people whose candidate missed out.

But since we're talking realism: suppose you're dealing with this system in the UK, and you're dealing with a seat where Labour has a small FPP lead over the Tories, with the Lib Dems slightly further back. Do you as a Labour voter vote Labour, then hope that Lib Dems preferences won't get the Tories over the line? Or despite the fact that you are a supporter of the leading party, is it better to first preference the Lib Dems in the hope that second preferences from Labourites will keep the Tories out? It's a tactical headache that would certainly arise in practice.

[OnionAhaiReborn]

Yea, and I don't really see the virtue in single-member districts that should lead us to support a complicated scheme for including a broad spectrum of ideologies when proportional representation very obviously achieves this cleanly.

I will say that almost anything you could imagine would be better than the way we run elections in the United States, though. Gerrymandering, FPP, a breathtakingly undemocratic upper house, the electoral college...

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

OAR,

I've never seen value in single member districts. They promote pork barrel spending and having the national government getting involved in issues on the local level just so the reps can get re-elected.

As for the Senate and its undemocratic nature you should read Aristotle's "Politics" and his discription of his prefered structure for government for at least a partial explanation for why we have democratic, aristocratic, and monarchal, elemants to the US national government.

[The Marquis de Leech]

The world has moved on from Aristotle though. Recall that in his worldview, aristocracy (literally "rule by the best") is the benevolent twin of oligarchy, monarchy is the benevolent twin of tyranny, and democracy is the malevolent twin of polity.

Not that the Senate can really be justified in terms of Aristotlean aristocracy. Rather than its membership being of a better class than the plebs in the House, its existence, like so much of the US system, is to make change difficult. It's a system where the status quo is God.

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

RBPL,

A fair criticism. But the US was born out of fear of a legislature with little or no limits on its power supported by a titular monarchy. As such the Consitution as orginally conceived makes a certain amount of historical sense.

Additionally, the favored status given to the Status Quo benefits the reforms made by both the New Deal and the Great Society otherwise they could have easily been eliminated since their creation.

[awesome possum]

Good article in Esquire based on some points Louis CK brought up in his Letterman interview. The short of it: the Common Core is bullshit, it's killing the fun in learning, and parents (and their kids) need to know they can just walk out of it.

If a system or person with no regard for you is sucking the fun out of learning — if that system is making it harder for you to go to school every day — we should be working to fix the system.

If the system is making most children cry, that’s not the fault of the student. It’s not the fault of the teacher, either. It’s the fault of a system that tries to accommodate everyone, but winds up helping no one.

Louis made his grievances against the culture of younger and younger standardized testing clear for the first time on Twitter earlier this week. He tweeted his kid’s homework, an example of the overly complicated subtraction processes in the new Common Core worksheets, and told his daughter not to do it.

Then he turned it into a nice little bit for his Late Show appearance.

“It’s called teaching to the test,” he said. “They decided there’s a new way kids should think — and we’re gonna prove they’re thinking it by having them pass these tests, or we burn the school down.”

[sToNED_CAT]

You may have noticed, but political parties (shared coalitions of groups with similar goals) are a democratic reality, whether the system is proportional or not. Ditto the whip system.

But in countries with proportional representation the parties are much stronger. All financing goes through them and the dissenters can be expelled from party just because of different opinion.

[TerraPrime]

Was watching the Maddow show last night and apparently the left-over militia men (and it is mostly men, from the clips I saw) are now forming check points around Bunkerville and stopping motorists to ask for IDs.

What?

First, how does a group of people loosely affiliated with the idea of personal freedom decide that they need to stop other people from moving around? Isn't that, like, anti-freedom?

Second, what authority do they think they have to erect barracades in Bunkerville, Nevada? Most of these peopel are not from the area. They do not live there. They do not own properties there. They do not work there.

Third, what sort of ID are they looking for? I am guessing it would have to be something issued by a government? Wouldn't that go against their anti-government thing? Or do they behave like that enigmatic Bundy reasoning that "Federal governemnt bad, state government good"? Or are they accepting non-government issued IDs like Blockbuster cards (do they have a Blockbuster in Bunkerville?)?

Forth, when will they start shooting each other and save the Feds the trouble? And can I donate money to supply them with bullets when that happens? Or will the Federal government give them tax exemption on the cost of bullets in their next year's income tax, if any of them actually file income tax?

[maarsen]

Was watching the Maddow show last night and apparently the left-over militia men (and it is mostly men, from the clips I saw) are now forming check points around Bunkerville and stopping motorists to ask for IDs.

What?

First, how does a group of people loosely affiliated with the idea of personal freedom decide that they need to stop other people from moving around? Isn't that, like, anti-freedom?

Second, what authority do they think they have to erect barracades in Bunkerville, Nevada? Most of these peopel are not from the area. They do not live there. They do not own properties there. They do not work there.

Third, what sort of ID are they looking for? I am guessing it would have to be something issued by a government? Wouldn't that go against their anti-government thing? Or do they behave like that enigmatic Bundy reasoning that "Federal governemnt bad, state government good"? Or are they accepting non-government issued IDs like Blockbuster cards (do they have a Blockbuster in Bunkerville?)?

Forth, when will they start shooting each other and save the Feds the trouble? And can I donate money to supply them with bullets when that happens? Or will the Federal government give them tax exemption on the cost of bullets in their next year's income tax, if any of them actually file income tax?

There are two kinds of right wing extremists. The first type hates big government because they don't like anyone telling them what they can't do. The second group hates big government because they hate anyone telling them what they can't do to everyone else. Given enough time they will start shooting at each other.

[maarsen]

And that's the weakness of preferential voting in comparison to the likes of FPP. Comparing it to proportional voting opens up another problem: gerrymandering, deliberate or accidental. It is still very common in Australia for governments (state or federal) to be elected when the Opposition actually got more votes.

This happens in Canada all the time. I have developed an algorithm for how to make your vote more effective in such circumstances when more than 1 party is running. First eliminate the candidate or party that you absolutely detest. Then of the 2 or more left, choose the one candidate left that is female, if there is one. Men in power tend to become delusional about the length of their dicks and make everything into a contest about who has the biggest one. I realize that women can be just as silly as men, but they tend to take a longer view of issues. The other fact is that the female candidate is more likely to lose and voting for her encourages more women in general to run for office.

[The Iceman of the North]

But in countries with proportional representation the parties are much stronger. All financing goes through them and the dissenters can be expelled from party just because of different opinion.

How is this a feature of proportional representation? The party whip is not something that is exclusive to systems with PR.

As for financing going through the parties, rather than the candidates, I fail to see the problem.

To me, the main thing is that the internal nomination process within the parties are democratic, and not that the leadership appoint the candidates. But this is something that have to be sorted within each party, and is unrelated to the election system.

[grumdin]

Was watching the Maddow show last night and apparently the left-over militia men (and it is mostly men, from the clips I saw) are now forming check points around Bunkerville and stopping motorists to ask for IDs.

What?

First, how does a group of people loosely affiliated with the idea of personal freedom decide that they need to stop other people from moving around? Isn't that, like, anti-freedom?

Second, what authority do they think they have to erect barracades in Bunkerville, Nevada? Most of these peopel are not from the area. They do not live there. They do not own properties there. They do not work there.

Third, what sort of ID are they looking for? I am guessing it would have to be something issued by a government? Wouldn't that go against their anti-government thing? Or do they behave like that enigmatic Bundy reasoning that "Federal governemnt bad, state government good"? Or are they accepting non-government issued IDs like Blockbuster cards (do they have a Blockbuster in Bunkerville?)?

Forth, when will they start shooting each other and save the Feds the trouble? And can I donate money to supply them with bullets when that happens? Or will the Federal government give them tax exemption on the cost of bullets in their next year's income tax, if any of them actually file income tax?

Rachel Maddow :)

[Wise Fool]

Rachel Maddow :)

Is there an actual comment you are making here or has all this reduced you to nouns and emoticons?

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

maarsen,

There are two kinds of right wing extremists. The first type hates big government because they don't like anyone telling them what they can't do. The second group hates big government because they hate anyone telling them what they can't do to everyone else. Given enough time they will start shooting at each other.

That's very true. Whether there would be open conflict between the two groups remains to be seen.

[TerraPrime]

I didn't relate Maddow's opinion on this, only her reporting. Which, incidentally, is corroborated by other sources.

Fox news associate in Nevada: http://www.fox5vegas.com/story/25372237/horsford-urges-sheriff-gillespie-to-investigate-militia-in-bunkerville

An AP story posted on the Fox News website: http://www.foxnews.com/us/2014/05/01/neighbors-grow-weary-militia-remaining-with-nevada-cattle-rancher-in-federal/

Here's an article from a Nevada newspaper:

BUNKERVILLE — Rancher Cliven Bundy, whose refusal to pay fees for grazing cattle on public lands for 21 years led to a controversial roundup by the Bureau of Land Management, debunked claims Tuesday that militia followers who rallied to his cause continue to stir up this rural community with checkpoints and an armed presence.

In a different newspaper article, by a reporter from AP:

Bundy denies that militia members set up checkpoints on public property. He said armed guards do stop and screen visitors at the gate to his ranch.

A group of militia members who stopped a neighboring rancher trucking cattle last Saturday to Arizona, about 12 miles to the east, were helping his son, Ryan Bundy, the family patriarch said. They wanted to ensure that Bundy cattle weren't being rustled.

A guard also is stationed on a dirt road leading to a gravel quarry on private land where DeLemus and his group have been camping for almost three weeks.

That's Bundy's side of the story.

These milita people also posted YouTube videos airing their grievance against each other. Do a search and you will find them.