US Politics: A Sinematic view on voting rights and the filibuster

[Week]

3 hours ago, Kal Corp said:

Its a scandal because of how bad that tax law is. Thats entirely the point - how absurd the rules are being exploited. 

We are getting to the point where 'it is legal" is exactly the reason revolt will happen. 

Hrm, I can't think of any other set(s) of laws where legality was justification for immoral, unethical, and discriminatory behavior...

[TrackerNeil]

5 minutes ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

Ron DeSantis is mandating surveys as to the beliefs of Florida College Students.  If one of the answers isn’t “none of your damn business” I suspect things will get ugly:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2021/06/24/florida-intellectual-freedom-law-mandates-viewpoint-surveys/?fbclid=IwAR1itBYeXmOLWP4YCXbhJlwtLWoYGG6YmYPJ4tXEhPtX8gSAum1wZYIJRZQ

Yeah, I was just reading about this on the Post.

Although I imagine the secret goal is to get the deplorables all fired up, I don't even know what the open goal is. Sure, DeSantis is making noise about funding, but what does that mean? If insufficient numbers of college students profess conservative opinions, Florida will...what? Withhold money until the surveys reflect more conservatism? I can hear FIRE writing letters, even now.

 

[Centrist Simon Steele]

On 6/22/2021 at 7:32 PM, TrackerNeil said:

I feel as though many people really don't know what "defund the police" would really mean; it's a way to signal solidarity with racial justice. And, look, I'm not necessarily against virtue-signaling, which is what is happening when a coffee shop puts a rainbow flag in the window to let gay people know you are safe here. I just want that signaling to accomplish something more than making the signal-sender feel good.

Also, whenever I ask someone what defund the police means, I usually get an answer that is pretty much reform the police. I make it a point of not getting hung up on slogans; I just want to know what we're going to actually do.

Yeah, I get that--I try not to think of it as a slogan, but reforming or whatever, I think the current state of police in the U.S. would require significant defunding of the current methods (weapons, militarized, etc.).

When I used to teach in a middle school, I had a "safe space" sign on my door--and, yeah, I never thought of that as virtue signaling so much as letting students know they were safe in our classroom. But, you know, anything that you do publicly now will be called "virtue signaling" by right wingers who think the left is triggered by everything.

[Kalbear]

Also, as things get Really Bad, folks need to recognize that not only is democracy not an inevitable end, it may not be the best means of governance for a world that is dealing with disaster after disaster. Not that authoritarian governments are necessarily better, but simple majoritarian rule based on popularity may lag significantly behind benevolent autocracies and bureaucracies in terms of effective and useful change. 

I mean, it's worse that a republic in the US can be effectively held to a MINORITY of people governing under a heavily anti-science, anti-fact populist policy, but majority rules might not be that great either. 

China's incredibly effective policy towards Covid is an example of something that democracies can almost never manage if their populace is divided or isn't particularly rational. Obviously irrational autocracies exist too (like Brazil, basically), but more of these events are going to happen, and so far democracies are not doing super awesome at managing them. 

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

3 minutes ago, Kal Corp said:

Also, as things get Really Bad, folks need to recognize that not only is democracy not an inevitable end, it may not be the best means of governance for a world that is dealing with disaster after disaster. Not that authoritarian governments are necessarily better, but simple majoritarian rule based on popularity may lag significantly behind benevolent autocracies and bureaucracies in terms of effective and useful change. 

I mean, it's worse that a republic in the US can be effectively held to a MINORITY of people governing under a heavily anti-science, anti-fact populist policy, but majority rules might not be that great either. 

China's incredibly effective policy towards Covid is an example of something that democracies can almost never manage if their populace is divided or isn't particularly rational. Obviously irrational autocracies exist too (like Brazil, basically), but more of these events are going to happen, and so far democracies are not doing super awesome at managing them. 

Looking for platonic phliosopher kings?  Anyone in mind for role?

[Kalbear]

7 minutes ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

Looking for platonic phliosopher kings?  Anyone in mind for role?

No, not really. Probably the 'best' system would be something mostly similar to Singapore - a collection of experts in their field who work largely on merit and talk to each other a lot. 

And keep in mind, a non-democracy or republic would suck in a lot of other ways. That said, we're going to have to recognize that the next couple of generations are likely going to be defined by massive crisis on a number of axis, and democracies are not necessarily going to perform well in those circumstances. FDR and Churchill did well in the face of massive crisis, but before them were Chamberlain and Hoover, and other places may simply not recover from their version of Hoover - and the US may not recover from Trump. 

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

1 minute ago, Kal Corp said:

No, not really. Probably the 'best' system would be something mostly similar to Singapore - a collection of experts in their field who work largely on merit and talk to each other a lot. 

And keep in mind, a non-democracy or republic would suck in a lot of other ways. That said, we're going to have to recognize that the next couple of generations are likely going to be defined by massive crisis on a number of axis, and democracies are not necessarily going to perform well in those circumstances. FDR and Churchill did well in the face of massive crisis, but before them were Chamberlain and Hoover, and other places may simply not recover from their version of Hoover - and the US may not recover from Trump. 

That’s a fair statement.  The advantage of Democratic norms is the ability to change if the people in charge aren’t working well.    I’m not sure how removing that ability to change helps.  I acknowledge the ability to change leadership in no way guarantees a good change.  

[Kalbear]

1 minute ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

That’s a fair statement.  The advantage of Democratic norms is the ability to change if the people in charge aren’t working well.  

IMO, the advantage is that you can change peacefully if things aren't working well. Plenty of governments have changed the people in charge fairly recently. It might not have worked out for those in power though. 

1 minute ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

 I’m not sure how removing that ability to change helps.  I acknowledge the ability to change leadership in no way guarantees a good change.  

The other main democratic norm is that you cannot do anything quickly and you often require some form of agreement across the board to do things. That usually is a feature - that you cannot make easy massive changes to the entire system, so it enforces stability and process. But it also means that bad actors can easily gum up the works, and the failure mode of a 2-party representative system is where one party simply refuses to do anything in the face of massive issues. And in a two party system, especially one that is highly partisan, that party that does nothing is often not punished for that action (and in the case of highly populist bs views, is even rewarded for it). 

A lot of this is condemnation of the US's form of bullshit representation, mind you, but other countries can have similar issues and blind spots that are problematic. Having elected presidents is a major issue as another example, and I would make a soft bet that France will fall into some kind of pseudo crisis based on this in the next few years.

[Isalie]

2 hours ago, Zorral said:

 Means of effective birth control, the means of which can be and usually are controlled by women themselves, and dentistry, are extraordinarily significant, and indeed have changed societies.  Think of how different George Washington's life might have been if he'd had access to my dentist.

 

I thought we were talking about genetics, not cultural progress.

[maarsen]

32 minutes ago, TrackerNeil said:

Yeah, I was just reading about this on the Post.

Although I imagine the secret goal is to get the deplorables all fired up, I don't even know what the open goal is. Sure, DeSantis is making noise about funding, but what does that mean? If insufficient numbers of college students profess conservative opinions, Florida will...what? Withhold money until the surveys reflect more conservatism? I can hear FIRE writing letters, even now.

 

In the aftermath of the 60s, schools were still trying to limit the speech and dress of students. It was a losing battle as we saw what the older kids were doing and copied them. Some of us went out of our way to be as obnoxious as possible in expressing our views on reactionary adults. I can expect the same in Florida from those not too amenable to right wing stuff being pushed at them.

[A Horse Named Stranger]

2 hours ago, Zorral said:

Think of how different George Washington's life might have been if he'd had access to my dentist.

More bling-bling in his mouth?

[Fez]

20 minutes ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

That’s a fair statement.  The advantage of Democratic norms is the ability to change if the people in charge aren’t working well.    I’m not sure how removing that ability to change helps.  I acknowledge the ability to change leadership in no way guarantees a good change.  

The thing about autocracies though is that the vast majority of them did have at least the tacit approval of a majority of their subjects. And they worked to maintain that approval since if they lost it the odds started going up that they'd end up dead; either from revolution a rival killing them off. Even Hitler backed down, partially, after the only time he booed by a crowd.*

Point being, autocracies are more violent, and individual rights don't really exist, but they generally try to stay responsive to the demands of the population just like democracies do.

 

*It was after he started going after Bishop von Galen, who had denounced the Nazi murder of the mentally ill. Hitler wanted to kill von Galen, but Goebbels warned him that the entire Westphalian region was ready to rise up in revolt if that happened; and Hitler getting booed at a rally was proof of that. And the "Aktion T4" program was publicly cancelled. It continued in secret, though in a somewhat reduced scope.

[A Horse Named Stranger]

56 minutes ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

Ron DeSantis is mandating surveys as to the beliefs of Florida College Students.  If one of the answers isn’t “none of your damn business” I suspect things will get ugly:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2021/06/24/florida-intellectual-freedom-law-mandates-viewpoint-surveys/?fbclid=IwAR1itBYeXmOLWP4YCXbhJlwtLWoYGG6YmYPJ4tXEhPtX8gSAum1wZYIJRZQ

Is that a method to screen for suitable new candidates to provide Gaetz and co with the girlfriend experience?

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

4 hours ago, Mlle. Zabzie said:

Actually I do believe that average people should be able understand tax laws (not really possible right now) and that are huge problems with the current Code.  We should have a rewrite like in 1939, 1954 and 1986.  The current Code is so encrusted with bedazzled pay-fors and incentives that it is collapsing under its own weight.  But there is zero political will to do a rewrite, and I am afraid it is only going to get worse if Congress see saws back and forth under narrow margins.  It will keep me in business, for sure, but “tax reform” (as distinguished from changes in marginal rates and some foreign stuff at the margins that only people like me understand) ain’t happening any time soon, absent a landslide by either party. And all of this is pretty apparent without publishing personal details of private citizen’s tax returns and giving truly zero context about them.  Bah humbug.  I guess it sells “papers” (or gets clicks).

You seem to both acknowledge the system isn't fair and that there's no way to really change that, so isn't that tantamount to really just advising people to do what's best for you and ignore the collective problem and how it plagues society?

Quote

Which bad tax policies have I defended?  We may disagree as to whether they are bad or not

In your aforementioned post you seemed quite comfortable with people using the tax code to the fullest extent legally to avoid paying as much as you could in taxes. Is that a fair representation of your macro level view without getting into the many weeds of tax policy?

[Hereward]

1 hour ago, Kal Corp said:

IMO, the advantage is that you can change peacefully if things aren't working well. Plenty of governments have changed the people in charge fairly recently. It might not have worked out for those in power though. 

The other main democratic norm is that you cannot do anything quickly and you often require some form of agreement across the board to do things. That usually is a feature - that you cannot make easy massive changes to the entire system, so it enforces stability and process. But it also means that bad actors can easily gum up the works, and the failure mode of a 2-party representative system is where one party simply refuses to do anything in the face of massive issues. And in a two party system, especially one that is highly partisan, that party that does nothing is often not punished for that action (and in the case of highly populist bs views, is even rewarded for it). 

A lot of this is condemnation of the US's form of bullshit representation, mind you, but other countries can have similar issues and blind spots that are problematic. Having elected presidents is a major issue as another example, and I would make a soft bet that France will fall into some kind of pseudo crisis based on this in the next few years.

I don’t think this a feature of a two-party system. It’s a feature of the US electoral system and the effective veto power of the unelected Supreme Court.

The UK has had profoundly transformative governments elected in a two-party system. e.g, 1945, 1979, 1983 and 1997. It seems to me that if the president, Senate and HoR were all elected at the same time, for the same term, transformation would be possible in wave years, even despite the Supreme Court. Of course, that’s a) unlikely to ever happen and b) sadly works both ways.

Edit: I suppose, in such cases, the brake, apart from public opinion, would be the SC in the US and the Civil Service, and possibly the Monarchy, in the UK.

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

And in more funny news, Rudy just got his law license suspended in NY. How has he not been disbarred? 

[Kalbear]

42 minutes ago, Hereward said:

I don’t think this a feature of a two-party system. It’s a feature of the US electoral system and the effective veto power of the unelected Supreme Court.

The UK has had profoundly transformative governments elected in a two-party system. e.g, 1945, 1979, 1983 and 1997. It seems to me that if the president, Senate and HoR were all elected at the same time, for the same term, transformation would be possible in wave years, even despite the Supreme Court. Of course, that’s a) unlikely to ever happen and b) sadly works both ways.

Edit: I suppose, in such cases, the brake, apart from public opinion, would be the SC in the US and the Civil Service, and possibly the Monarchy, in the UK.

That's fair. I think it's also a feature of having an elected executive; having a parliamentary democracy means that whatever government is elected automatically has majority rule built in at basically every level, and that's absolutely not the case in the US. In theory the UK doesn't have a fully two-party system either, at least not to the degree that the US does (though it clearly isn't as multiparty as it could be). 

[Rippounet]

2 hours ago, Kal Corp said:

A lot of this is condemnation of the US's form of bullshit representation, mind you, but other countries can have similar issues and blind spots that are problematic. Having elected presidents is a major issue as another example, and I would make a soft bet that France will fall into some kind of pseudo crisis based on this in the next few years.

Funnily enough (?), France is definitely headed toward a major multi-dimensional political crisis in the next few years, but the presidential system isn't going to play much of a role there,
Or, to put it differently: we have such serious problems that this one ain't gonna be at the top of the list.

[Mlle. Zabzie]

1 hour ago, Tywin et al. said:

You seem to both acknowledge the system isn't fair and that there's no way to really change that, so isn't that tantamount to really just advising people to do what's best for you and ignore the collective problem and how it plagues society?

In your aforementioned post you seemed quite comfortable with people using the tax code to the fullest extent legally to avoid paying as much as you could in taxes. Is that a fair representation of your macro level view without getting into the many weeds of tax policy?

Mmmm...I'm not sure that the system is unfair per se as having some bad policy features.  Fairness is a playground argument.  

And, as to your second point, that is literally my job description.  I mean, I don't recommend positions that I don't think are at least more likely than not to be sustained (that is, we don't peddle shelters), but it is literally my job to understand the rules and advise people how to optimize their after tax position within them.  Please don't be surprised that I think this is just fine.

[Week]

4 minutes ago, The Great Unwashed said:

Re: your 2nd point - I really do understand that you are just calling balls and strikes for your audience. I work in the due diligence field for commercial real estate. 

It's like calling balls and strikes where the rules (of course depending on your net worth and types of income -- which are related) state that the strike zone changes in size and the ball pitched may be anything from a super ball and a bowling ball*. Sucks, but hey that's the rules and nobody can agree to change them. Sucks if you get a bowling ball to the noggin.

*These are only thrown directly at your head.