I admit this isn’t a solution, but what I see as the problem is that the 2 party system is failing the country as a whole. It’s just not going away anytime soon
I don’t think that’s accurate, D. Ward. It is only antique electoral infrastructure that keeps the Republican party competitive. Without the two-senator rule and the electoral college, the will of the clear majority of Americans would be felt.
That said, I’m for dissolution. It won’t be long now before serious people in high places float the idea.
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It’s time for Mr. Happy to spend some quality time with Mr. Spack.
Ending gerrymandering would be a start. Right now the districts are drawn to concentrate voters of each party such that candidates don’t have to appeal to the other side - or even the middle. in fact, appealing to the middle will just get you primaried from the outside. This results in US Representatives becoming more and more extreme, which prohibits compromise in government (because, again, fraternizing with the enemy will get you primaried).
Meanwhile, in the Senate, the smallest 26 states - representing just 18% of the population - can put together a majority of 52 Senators. Montana gets two Senators but only qualifies for one House seat. WTF is up with that? It’s crazy, and it’s only going to get worse as the less populous states are losing people to the big cities.
Ditto the electoral college, which overvalues small state votes and undervalues big state votes. So as people leave say, Iowa to go to Illinois, they dilute the value of their vote in Illinois while increasing the value of a vote in Iowa.
Also, like impeachment was put on the books specifically for the case of a President doing what Trump has done - so was the electoral college put in place as a backstop against the electorate picking a President like Trump in the first place. The electors were supposed to undo the bad choice of the voters but, when we really needed them to save us from ourselves, they just acted as a rubber stamp.
Trump is stress-testing the entire US system, and it’s barely holding together. He is showing that we are not actually a country governed by laws, we are a country governed by men (gender specificity intentional) and men (plus Collins and Murkowski) are failing us.
You can fuck off too.
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Contrary to your argument, the Electoral College is what is keeping the country together. The country would have never formed without the Electoral College.
The Electoral College hasn’t resembled anything close to its original intent since the 12th amendment. The Electoral College, as intended, was designed to avoid exactly the shithole that the two parties got us into in 2016.
I would pay good money to watch Happy and Clayton discuss politics for an hour over beers.
You’re my hero.
Since this word seems to be popping up all over the place these days…it’s “poseur”, meaning an insincere person. “Poser” means a baffling question.
The purpose of the Electoral College was two fold:
- It was to prevent a “winner-take-all” mindset at the state level, and
- The Founders believed the masses were too stupid to think things through and would be swayed by some hand-waving populist yahoo.
Both were lost a long time ago. The current Electoral College system is the single biggest example of how we’ve totally fucked things up.
Thanks, I actually wondered, but it seemed too French for my tastes.
We Hudsons are English, so most everything is too French for my tastes.
That makes kissing less exciting.
“When it comes to brown nosing JimR, Hap is Pinocchio.”
Right. Some of you were around for an epic fight between JimR and I over whether Octavio Dotel should be a starter or reliever, with me arguing reliever because of his high pitch count per inning as a starter. JimR happens to be correct most of the time, and an even higher percentage about baseball. Just because I agree with him doesn’t mean asskissing. A lot of times it’s over the difference between video game baseball as espoused by many posters and real baseball.
Well, we got to the point that we all knew we would, just in time for the crunch vote. Retiring Sen. Lamar Alexander put out a statement yesterday that said:
- Trump is guilty as fuck
- So no more witnesses needed
- But it’s not worthy of removal from office
So much for this being a country of laws.
Oh, and while we’re discussing heroes of democracy, John Bolton can step up to a microphone at any time and say what he knows…what he’s written in his fucking book…and get his testimony out.
So long as he doesn’t breach national security - and his publisher has stated that they worked very hard to make the book pass national security muster - he has a first amendment right to talk about whatever the fuck he wants to whoever the fuck he wants. This kiss-chase with a subpoena is pathetic.
That’s true, but he could get prosecuted and be bled dry financially. Prudence dictates not kicking the antpile.
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He. Is. Publishing. A. Fucking. Book.