Jump to content

Political Discussion Thread (With Rules)


Simon

Recommended Posts

7 hours ago, megaplayboy said:

The Senate is essentially broken, as far as representative democracy goes.  The 15 most populous states have around 2/3 of the population/citizens of the country, and in a decade or so, this number will hit around 70%.  The other 35 states have around 1/3, and soon only about 30%.  However, those 15 states have 30 senators, and those 35 have 70.  So you will have 70% of the citizenry represented by 30% of the Senate, and 30% of the citizenry represented by 70% of the Senate.  The Senate's consent is required for any legislation, for the appointment of government officials, and for the removal of government officials via impeachment.  It also has an oversight function.  The population ratio, in 1790, between the most and least populous states, was about 10:1.  The population ratio today, between California and Wyoming, is nearly 80:1.  The amount of power allocated to small states under this scheme is not only disproportionate to their population, it's disproportionate to their economic power as well.  Those small state senators wind up having power not only over policy affecting their own states, but the big states as well, including such crucial things as urban policy, infrastructure policy, and so forth.  The countermajoritarian nature of the Senate is reinforced by the staggered election of Senators, with only 1/3 up every 2 years, while the House members are all up for re-election every 2 years.  The Senate essentially embodies a sort of "tyranny of the minority".  

 

There is a reason the Electoral College was set up the way it is; so that all States and all people in them do have some say. Otherwise those 15 states would have ALL the say in matters.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 minute ago, Greywind said:

 

There is a reason the Electoral College was set up the way it is; so that all States and all people in them do have some say. Otherwise those 15 states would have ALL the say in matters.

But when the relative population has skewed by nearly an order of magnitude, it shifts the balance of power towards the smaller states, who then get to shift the federal tax monies of those big states toward their own smaller states.  Which has actually happened.  

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The alternative in the 18th century was to simply not have a unified country. Is the perceived problem you speak of today worth not ever having had a unified nation? I assume you'd say no. If the perceived problem today worth breaking up the nation ala some desires of Canadians and Alaskans to form a more 'representative' smaller nation acceptable? I would generally assume you think no, Mega. 

 

So what are we left with? A constitutional amendment process that would absolutely require those smaller states to willfully relegate themselves into nothingness. I know you can understand the practical issue with this and why it won't happen. So what are we left to do? I can't think of another alternative. Can you? 

 

Perhaps the one 'solution' I can devise is for is to change how we frame this facts. The senate isn't unfair to populous states, it is perfectly even to states by judging thwm based on thw statehood and nothing more. Perhaps we could even go back to having state legislators picking the senators and restore them to their original role of representing states, not people. This might help us push back on some national government creep and restore more federallism. 

 

La Rose. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

13 minutes ago, 薔薇語 said:

The alternative in the 18th century was to simply not have a unified country. Is the perceived problem you speak of today worth not ever having had a unified nation? I assume you'd say no. If the perceived problem today worth breaking up the nation ala some desires of Canadians and Alaskans to form a more 'representative' smaller nation acceptable? I would generally assume you think no, Mega. 

 

So what are we left with? A constitutional amendment process that would absolutely require those smaller states to willfully relegate themselves into nothingness. I know you can understand the practical issue with this and why it won't happen. So what are we left to do? I can't think of another alternative. Can you? 

 

Perhaps the one 'solution' I can devise is for is to change how we frame this facts. The senate isn't unfair to populous states, it is perfectly even to states by judging thwm based on thw statehood and nothing more. Perhaps we could even go back to having state legislators picking the senators and restore them to their original role of representing states, not people. This might help us push back on some national government creep and restore more federallism. 

 

La Rose. 

States are made up of people, but they're not actually people.  The current system effectively privileges the interests of the minority over the majority.  That is actually a real problem from an equity standpoint. You could construct a legislative majority in the Senate that represents a quarter or less of the population.   And let gerrymandering leverage you to a narrow majority in the House, even while receiving fewer votes overall.  It's a subversion of democracy rather than a realization of it.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

5 hours ago, st barbara said:

If, as has been reported, Trump is cooling on Kavanaugh as his supreme court nomination and may withdraw it, who is his next choice ?

 

Is it even possible for Trump to withdraw the nomination at this stage?  If it is, what would be the repercussions on both Trump and Kavanaugh if that were to happen?  I always thought that once the nomination was submitted, the most that the President could do is withdraw his supports but the nomination would still be there.  The nominated candidate would still continue as an unsupported candidate, which would not make any official difference in the official processes.  Everything would still continue as it normally does in this situation.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

There is no effing way Trump withdraws Kavanaugh's nom.  The drunk is literally Trump's get-out-of-jail-free card.  Repealing Roe is just a nice byproduct.  They're just holding a sham hearing and a sham investigation to give themselves some political cover so they can hold on to the Senate in a month.

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Yeah, Roe is never the issue for me.  I would probably be fine with Kavanaugh (until all this recent stuff happened) except he completely sidestepped the Presidential questions.  Honestly, I cant even understand how a President can be above the law is even debatable.  That should be an obvious NO.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

5 hours ago, megaplayboy said:

States are made up of people, but they're not actually people.  

 

Never said otherwise. The difficulty here is not in MY desire to see states as people but perhaps in yours to expect them to be such. 

Senators represent STATES. They are fairly distributed based on that criteria. They were originally even selected by the state legislatures and not by direct popular vote. 

So we again get back to my only potential solution for the problem you perceive: reframing how you look at it. If, however, you have another possibility to the solution I didn't already point out above, I would be curious what you think it is. 

 

La Rose. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

If population should be the sole determinant of representation, presumably that should extend internationally.  The US has a population just over 322 million, third place behind China (just over 1.4 billion) and India (over 1.32 billion).  Any 3 of the next 10 would outvote the US.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_population_(United_Nations)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

13 minutes ago, Hugh Neilson said:

If population should be the sole determinant of representation, presumably that should extend internationally.  The US has a population just over 322 million, third place behind China (just over 1.4 billion) and India (over 1.32 billion).  Any 3 of the next 10 would outvote the US.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_population_(United_Nations)

 

Good Point. Why should the UK, Japan, US, and India all have the same vote share in the UN? Also, why shouldn't we be able to directly elect our UN ambassador? 

 

La Rose. 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

3 hours ago, 薔薇語 said:

 

Never said otherwise. The difficulty here is not in MY desire to see states as people but perhaps in yours to expect them to be such. 

Senators represent STATES. They are fairly distributed based on that criteria. They were originally even selected by the state legislatures and not by direct popular vote. 

So we again get back to my only potential solution for the problem you perceive: reframing how you look at it. If, however, you have another possibility to the solution I didn't already point out above, I would be curious what you think it is. 

 

La Rose. 

Small states already have protections and prerogatives in our system.  They have the 10th amendment protecting their rights and their separate dominion.  The citizens of the various states have local, city, county and state representation.  However, at the federal level it's problematic to give small state senators broad veto power over spending on such things as infrastructure and urban development in the most heavily populated areas of the country.   They also have the ability to extract rents for their states, which come at the expense of taxpayers in larger, wealthier states.   

There are separate but related problems with devolving certain matters to the states(such as the vast disparities in public education between states), but that's a topic for another time.

Senators represent the citizens of entire states more than the states themselves.   The citizens vote for them and senators who narrowly construe their responsibilities will quickly find themselves out of a job.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

As long as small states use their senatorial advantage only to extract Federal tax money for themselves, I'm okay with that. The problems that concern me arise from the split between predominantly urban states and predominantly rural states -- and rural states tend to have lower populations than urban states. Uran/rural in turn correlates strongly with liberal/conservative. So, small, rural, conservative states have disproportionate influence on things like confirming Supreme Court justices, where the Senate alone has power.

 

As the big, urban states continue to grow faster than the smaller, more rural states, the disparity in the House will grow ever greater. If populous but purple states such as Illinois may turn firmly blue as urban Democrats finally swamp the structural advantages conservative Republicans have built through gerrymandering. Plausibly, the US might end up with a House that is permanently Democratic. At that point, a Senate that is genuinely in play (or even permanently Republican) could be desirable. Perhaps with a Constitutional amendment that both the House and Senate must approve any government action, such as confirming justices. As that is as neutral, structural change that does not (yet) clearly favor either party, it might have a chance of ratification.

 

Dean Shomshak

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, Greywind said:

Try it this way: if the lower populated states decided to stop shipping things like food to the larger populated states what do you think would happen?

The same thing that would happen if the largest State stopped shipping food to the smaller states. Which State do you think is the largest Ag producer exactly?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

8 hours ago, megaplayboy said:

Senators represent the citizens of entire states more than the states themselves.   The citizens vote for them and senators who narrowly construe their responsibilities will quickly find themselves out of a job.

 

You keep wanting to equate Senators with House-Reps. Senators were designed to protect the explicit interests of small urban states against large rural states at creation. They were also suppose to ensure the states could have a say in the level of federalism being observed. So trying to expect this office to somehow be based on proportional population would be an odd desire inconsistent with the office's design. 

I am not saying you are incorrect in your view of how illsuited senators are at representing proportionality, but that you are incorrect in desiring that of an office explicitly not designed for that purpose. 

La Rose. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

22 minutes ago, Lucius said:

 

I'm going to guess California?
 

Lucius Alexander

 

Which state produces most palindromedaries?


In terms of size of Agricultural production (USD), California is the largest. California is also not producing much in the way of staples (corn, soybean, wheat, rice) because they aren't as profitable. 

From the USDA's website, though:

"Which are the top 10 agricultural producing States?

In 2017, the top 10 agricultural producing States in terms of cash receipts were (in descending order): California, Iowa, Texas, Nebraska, Minnesota, Illinois, Kansas, North Carolina, Wisconsin, and Indiana. These and related statistics can be found in ERS's Farm Income and Wealth Statistics."


Those are 8 flyover states plus two very different "big" state. 

La Rose. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

There is a difference between "The electoral system should be a system that balances the rights of smaller populations and larger ones" and "The electoral system we have is the only way to do this, or even effectively does so".

 

And "There is no more functional way" is false, the system is outdated, and needs adjusting. The idea that losing any of that power is a fair cause for uprisings is overblown.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.

Guest
Unfortunately, your content contains terms that we do not allow. Please edit your content to remove the highlighted words below.
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
×
×
  • Create New...