A Stanford University computer scientist named John Koza has formulated a compelling and pragmatic alternative to the Electoral College. It’s called National Popular Vote (NPV), and has been hailed as “ingenious” by two New York Times editorials. In April, Maryland became the first state to pass it into law. And several other states, including Illinois and New Jersey, are likely… return to article
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Reader Comments (45)Page 1 of 1 pagesThe only advantage of this plan is that it effectively forces the electoral college vote to mirror the popular vote.
As described in the article, though, each state’s electors would be determined by the national popular vote and therefore could not be determined until every state’s results had been determined and any challenges resolved.
It would make more sense to award the electors according to the popular vote in that state. If electors from each state were awarded in proportion to the popular vote in that state—not ‘winner take all’—the resulting electoral college vote would parallel the national vote.
Posted by peterkc on Dec 31, 2007 at 5:42 AM Sounds good to me — as long as a paper trail is included. As an Illlinois resident I don’t want anymore representation from Chicago cemeteries.
As for Bad-boy-o-vich, I’d settle for a voice vote of “Goodbye”!
Posted by whattheheck on Dec 31, 2007 at 9:05 AM The United States of America is a Federal Republic, and is defined as such in the Constitution. The Founders feared the tyranny of raw democracy, and built in restraints that protect minorities, minority viewpoints, and electoral procedures, and that also balance the contending forces.
The Senate and the Electoral College are the two most visible aspects of our Federal Republic. Each state, large and small, California and Rhode Island, has two Senators and the Senate has important functions to perform, on the rare occasions it chooses to perform them. This keeps a few large states from dominating many small states, and this was the express intent of the Founders and of the Constitution. The Electoral College was also structured to keep a few large states from dominating many small states.
How NPV works is this: Instead of a state awarding its electors to the top vote-getter in that state’s winner-take-all presidential election, the state would give its electoral votes to the winner of the national popular vote. This would be perfectly legal because the U.S. Constitution grants states the right to determine how to cast their electoral votes, so no congressional or federal approval would be required.
This “perfect(ly) legal(ity)” is in doubt. Not only does ITT routinely advocate illegal actions and illegal violations of legal actions, the NPV wipes out a fixture of the Federal structure our Constitution, so it must pass muster by the Supremes before in can be termed (perfectly or imperfectly) legal.
Now, does Maryland, a relatively small state, really wish to surrender its sovereignty to the tyranny of the majority? Probably not. Case in point: in 2000, Gore lost the popular vote in his home state of Tennessee and Bush got Tennessee’s Electoral votes. Had Gore won in his own state, he would have won outright regardless of the outcome of Florida.
The end result of all these cockamamie “reforms” that Sinisteres advocate is to destroy a well thought out system of checks and balances, for their own temporary political advantage. But any change will cut both ways, while destroying the integrity of the system.
Sinisteres were not able to win elections in the 1930s either as Communists or as Socialists, nor in the 1940s as Progressives, nor now as illiberal “Liberals”. They win occasionally by outright theft, as in Kennedy’s dead Illini voters in 1960, or Johnson’s first Senate victory. They could not win in 2000 in the Courts. So they want to change the rules until they win, at which point I suppose there will be no more changes, and definitely no more Constitution.
If you fear the tyranny of raw democracy, you will hate what the Sinisteres have in store for you after they take complete control. The milk lines in Venezuela should give you a good idea of what to expect, in case you have already forgotten the corruption and inefficiency that led to the collapse of the Soviet Union.
The Sinisteres do not want a balance the contending forces, they want control.
Posted by scorp on Dec 31, 2007 at 10:47 AM “They win occasionally by outright theft...”
You must mean like Bush in 2000? Or maybe Bush again in 2004 (betcha didn’t know that certain Ohio Republicans are going to jail over that election)?
You have clearly studied at the Joseph Goebbels School of Propaganda, just like Rudy Giuliani and most other Republicans. Fear of milk lines? Please.
Posted by cdamian on Dec 31, 2007 at 2:09 PM This idea is a bit off the mark. Our founding fathers realized that more populous states could skew the popular vote. We are a Republic, not a democracy...there is a difference. The electoral college was devised along the same lines as congress...votes based on population. This gives the states electoral votes in proportion to population. If a state were to have candidate A win the popular vote in the state, and candidate B win the overall popular votes, that state’s voters would have no real representation...one of the main reasons that we are no longer British colony. This method could leave the entire election up to a handful of large states.
I suggest that a state’s electoral votes be given based on percentages within that state, a more realistic view based on how the voters have voted. For example, if candidate A wins 75% of the popular vote, then they receive 75% of the electoral votes and candidate B receives 25%. This would also make it much harder to have the fraud that is alleged in other elections. There wouldn’t be haggling over a few hundred votes like we had in Florida in 2000, the electoral votes would have been split pretty much 50/50. By doing this it allows the voters from all parties to be represented, and eliminate the advantages of the larger states, especially in a close race.
More than electoral college reform, we need to have realistic choices besides the two parties we have now. I find that most of the folks I know are much closer to the center than either party is now. Compared to other nations, our left is still pretty far right, and our right is much closer to the center. In other words, both parties are pretty close together compared to the international spectrum. If a truly centrist party were to evolve, it would leave the nut cases at both ends of the spectrum and give rise to a government more in tune with a majority of the population.
Posted by tktt1 on Dec 31, 2007 at 3:19 PM Damian -
Kennedy’s theft of the 1960 Presidential election and Johnson’s theft of his first Senate term are well documented. The only documentation of President Bush’s 2000 election is by the Supremes, the highest court in the land. That is not quite the same as the squalid and corrupt Dimocratic practice, regardless of the Dims braying and bleating about year 2000.
... betcha didn’t know that certain Ohio Republicans are going to jail over that election ...
In fact, I spent considerable time researching that very question back a couple of years ago. I am certainly not going to say that all Republicans are innocent of voter fraud, but the actual documented cases were all perpetrated by Dims, including assault of an elderly Republican lady by Dim union thugs resulting in her broken arm, destruction of Republican campaign material and signs, the slashing of tires on Republican Party vehicles in Wisconsin, and false voter registrations by ACORN in Kansas City, MO.
In an attempt to determine just what it is you are alleging, I Googled “vote fraud crime 2004 Ohio” and got 558,000 hits. The first ten entries are summarized as follows:
* Five hits on Democratic allegations of voting machine fraud in Ohio.
* One serious academic study of voter fraud that found a total of exactly 24 federal convictions in three years (2002-2005). The study concluded that there is a very low incidence of actual voter fraud, and that political losers often allege voter fraud when they lose (see item above).
* One Sinister site with a list of PC news articles.
* Three hits on two Dimocratic poll workers who were convicted of election fraud in Cuyahoga County, OH. One of the workers, Kathleen Dreamer, has been identified as both a Dimocrat and a Republican in different sites. The fraud seems to have been in faking recount procedures to avoid work, and not having a significant effect on actual vote count.
Since I am very interested in the subject of voter fraud and can find little incidence of actual Republican-perpetrated wrongdoing, I would be very interested in your data, if you have any. None of your BDS fantasies, thanks.
“Fear of milk lines? Please.”
http://pliniocabrera.blogspot.com/2007/11/venezuela-long-lines-to-get-milk-sugar r.html
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4188/is_20071121/ai_n21112656
http://www.guardian.co.uk/venezuela/story/0,,2210473,00.html
You’re very welcome.
Posted by scorp on Dec 31, 2007 at 9:57 PM Having a fair election for president in no way affects our status as a republic of states and the reality of the U.S. Senate. The current system in fact makes a mockery of state equality, as most states and all of their people are absolutely, completely ignored in presidential campaigns.
The goal is to have a candidate elected where every vote is equal—a system our founders thought important to have for every single Member ever to serve in the U.S House of Representatives. Dividing states’ electoral votes doesn’t accomplish this goal at all. The National Popular Vote plan is the way to go.
Posted by Foolio on Jan 1, 2008 at 10:44 AM Scorp--
Check out http://www.rollingstone.com/news/story/10432334/was_the_2004_election_stolen.&nb bsp; I’m sure you’ll probably turn typical right-wing lunatic and start screaming “LIBERAL MEDIA!” but the article is impeccably sourced and should put to rest any doubts you have regarding the true nature of the lying, cheating, full-of-their-own-feces Repugnicans. Exit-poll statistical impossibilities, the misdeeds of Ken Blackwell, “caging” of minority voters, illegal disenfranchisement of ex-felons, barriers to registration in violation of the Voting Rights Act, illegal orders preventing the distribution of provisional ballots, eliminating precincts in Democratic-leaning areas without providing additional voting machines, even a faked terrorist threat that allowed Blackwell’s Repugnican cronies to perform the recount without any reporters present...it’s all right there.
Newsbusters.org admitted that they were mistaken when claiming that Kathleen Dreamer was a Democrat. She is, in fact, a Repugnican, as reported here: http://toledoblade.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070313/NEWS24/70313029. p; Your claim that she had been identified as both on different sites shows that you don’t know squat about research...I found out that she’s a Republican in less than three minutes. I also googled “Kennedy election theft 1960” and found no articles among the top 10 that claimed for a fact that Nixon won. In fact, everything I read shows that there was no evidence convincing enough to overturn Kennedy’s victory. Since you have provided absolutely no documentation for a claim that you say is well-documented, I will assume that you are continuing the grand conservative tradition of revisionist history.
I’m also curious as to which, if any, Democratic candidates have advocated nationalization of any industries. That is, of course, why there were lines in the Soviet Union and why there are lines in Venezuela. Your use of fear tactics is worthy of Rudy “Noun, Verb, 9/11” Giuliani. “If you vote Democratic, the United States will turn Communist/be attacked again/blah blah blah!” People like you and Rudy are guilty of using psychological terrorism on citizens of the United States. There’s a word for that--treason.
And the only bondage that I fantasize about is seeing Bush, Cheney, and the other traitors currently occupying the White House being led to prison in handcuffs. Sicko.
Posted by cdamian on Jan 1, 2008 at 7:02 PM The only way this country is going to get back to ‘government for the people by the people’ is if our votes really count. The popular vote is the only way to have an actual true result. The electors do not use the popular vote to cast their votes. They vote anyway they want. You can see that by the election of 2000. Gore won the popular vote, but the electors chose to vote what they wanted, and they cast the votes for Bush not Gore like the United States Citizens wanted.
Note to Scorp: WHAT? I have no idea on what kind of an opinion you were trying to express or what you were even talking about. If you were trying to say the goverment’s way of doing things are just fine, I got a reality check for you. My community is so jobless, broke, and in such economical disaster, I am so fearful of what is to become of it. Businesses are closing, such as were I was employed, crime rate is up because people have had to resort to stealing to sell to keep a roof over there heads and feed their children, the schools don’t even have books to teach my children (were is no child left behind), so many have lost their homes because they can’t make the mortgage payment and pay the taxes.....I could go on. Were is the government to help us....nowhere. They are more interested in making money for themselves by sending work to other less fortunate countries to give them jobs for less pay, worried about fighting another countries war (you aren’t going to change their ways of like, all bush wants is to control the world and have their oil rights in his hand), running up the US Bills and expect the citizens to pay for it ( I would really like to see the US expense records and budget).
I really hope that some day the government will reorganize and start listening to the people instead of listening to the change jingle in their pockets.....I for one don’t have to dimes to rub together(Because there are not any jobs to be had even with a college education, in which I have earned and still owe the government for because of college loans)
Posted by mbeesley on Jan 1, 2008 at 8:47 PM Oh, come now, Damian, don’t be such a Sinisturd. RFK, Jr.’s article in Rolling Stone is “impeccably sourced”, while the Supreme’s decision in 2000 is evidence of electoral theft?
Meanwhile, the Sinister MSM overlooked or ignored massive voter fraud in Ohio? That would be highly untypical; the MSM is more likely to perpetrate voter fraud, as CBS attempted to do in forging the Bush ANG records. It does not occur to you that the Sinister hysteria in Ohio did not merit serious consideration, not even by your media allies?
As I pointed out, Kathleen Dreamer is identified as both a Republican and a Dimocrat on different sites. You are sure she is a Republican because of what the Toledo Blade says, but the address you give does not provide information on Ms. Dreamer. Some researcher you are! But back to the original question, do you have any data concerning “certain Ohio Republicans (that) are going to jail over that election”?
I’m also curious as to which, if any, Democratic candidates have advocated nationalization of any industries.
I don’t think you are near as stupid as you pretend, but let’s check that hypothesis. Who was Antonio Gramsci? Which, if any, Democratic politician has advocated a War on Poverty, which utterly wasted $6 trillion, the only tangible result being the near total destruction of Black family life in the United States? Which, if any, Democratic candidates have advocated losing the War Against the Terrorists, after voting for it? Bonus points: which, if any, Democratic candidates have advocated losing the War Against the Terrorists, after voting against it? Extra bonus points: which, if any, Democratic politicians have advocated losing a previous war against terrorists?
Posted by scorp on Jan 1, 2008 at 9:57 PM I never said anything about the Supreme Court’s decision.
13 paragraphs down in the Blade article for the statement about Dreamer’s party affiliation.
Gramsci was an Italian socialist, communist, and anti-fascist in the early 1900s, you elitist jerk.
I won’t even dignify the ridiculously framed questions in the rest of your comment.
Posted by cdamian on Jan 1, 2008 at 10:21 PM The whole idea of a popular vote is one man/one vote. As in 2000 when Gore had more popular votes than Shrub, but they weren’t in the ‘right’ States, the more populous ones.
Saying that the Electoral College protects smaller States from the bigger ones is a stretch.
NY Representatives will always outnumber New Mexico Representatives. The Electoral College does nothing for that until the Presidential Election rolls around.
The States with smaller Electoral College representation only see the leading candidates if they have an early Primary.
How many candidates have visited New Mexico, South Dakota, Wyoming, Idaho, etc., etc. None. Because their few Electoral Votes won’t make any difference, providing the candidate sweeps the larger States.
Abolishing the Electoral College is the only way to get back to majority rule, as in whoever gets the majority of votes wins. Not based on any formula, just actual numbers.
As to Ohio Election Fraud, has Scorp not heard of the Letter that the CEO of Diebold sent to Shrub promising that Shrub would carry Ohio? And the fact that no State will use Diebold machines, so now they re-named it Premier Voting Machines and still are having trouble, because it can’t pass certification tests?
It always seemed strange to me that Shrub won in ‘04 with 52% and three days later his approval rating was at 48%, a more accurate number of folks who actually voted for him.
Shrubs’ term in office has pointed up many defects in our system. High among them are the signing statements that allow a President to sign a bill into law and then secretly add a statement that the law won’t be enforced. My Civics class, taught many years ago, said that could only happen through a Veto, which Congress can then over-ride, if they had the votes.
Posted by farmer on Jan 2, 2008 at 7:54 AM “Sinisturd?” “Stupid?” Scorp, for someone who is so concerned about obeying the law, you’re breaking your agreement with ITT when you signed up for an account. Perhaps you should take that log out of your eye before you point out the slivers in others’ eyes.
Florida’s Electoral College votes were awarded based on a legal decision swung by a few Supreme Court justices appointed by Bush I, not by a majority of votes. The result is that Bush II has busted the budget in a way that should make any conservative outraged, and he has violated the law of the land in many ways. He is an outrage upon our Republic, and history will judge him harshly for the fool he is.
Our system is flexible, not inflexible, and as a voter and taxpayer, I will gladly accept progressive, incremental change that makes my vote more valuable. NPV represents that kind of change, but I fully expect that those who profit from the existing skewed Electoral College system will fight it tooth and nail.
Breadlines? Scorp, you really ought to be worried about populist revolt, which is brewing as we speak. If our economy goes into severe recession because of financial speculation and terminal federal debt based on an ugly, illegal war, people like you will find a fist in your mouth one day.
Posted by Modesto on Jan 2, 2008 at 9:03 AM The small states are the most disadvantaged of all under the current system of electing the President. Political clout comes from being a closely divided battleground state, not the two-vote bonus. Small states are almost invariably non-competitive in presidential election. Of the 13 smallest states, Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Alaska regularly vote Republican, and Rhode Island, Delaware, Hawaii, Vermont, Maine, and DC regularly vote Democratic. These 12 states together contain 11 million people. Because of the two electoral-vote bonus that each state receives, the 12 non-competitive small states have 40 electoral votes. However, the two-vote bonus is an entirely illusory advantage to the small states. Ohio has 11 million people and has “only” 20 electoral votes. As we all know, the 11 million people in Ohio are the center of attention in presidential campaigns, while the 11 million people in the 12 non-competitive small states are utterly irrelevant. Nationwide election of the President would make each of the voters in the 12 smallest states as important as an Ohio voter.
The fact that the bonus of two electoral votes is an illusory benefit to the small states has been widely recognized by the small states for some time. In 1966, Delaware led a group of 12 predominantly low-population states (North Dakota, South Dakota, Wyoming, Utah, Arkansas, Kansas, Oklahoma, Iowa, Kentucky, Florida, Pennsylvania) in suing New York in the U.S. Supreme Court, arguing that New York’s use of the winner-take-all effectively disenfranchised voters in their states. The Court declined to hear the case (presumably because of the well-established constitutional provision that the manner of awarding electoral votes is exclusively a state decision). Ironically, defendant New York is no longer a battleground state (as it was in the 1960s) and today suffers the very same disenfranchisement as the 12 non-competitive low-population states. A vote in New York is, today, equal to a vote in Wyoming—both are equally worthless and irrelevant in presidential elections.
Posted by joreko on Jan 2, 2008 at 2:18 PM Oh yeah, Scorp, one other thing...Dan Rather’s reporting was accurate. Check the historical record. The White House, in response to pressure from journalists who were looking for the truth, released all of Bush’s military records. When reporters pointed out that the records showed that Bush did, in fact, fail to complete his obligation to the Champagne Unit, the White House then said that the documents were forged. In other words, the White House knowingly provided the media with phony records.
Posted by cdamian on Jan 2, 2008 at 4:09 PM Modesto -
I “will find a fist in (my) mouth one day”? What is with you Sinisteres and violence? Why do you not prefer reasoned (or unreasoned, as you often do) debate?
I have been threatened with death, beheading, assault, and the wish for my death on this site, always by Sinisteres. I can’t say it has never happened, but I certainly have never seen any physical threats to anyone by any Dexter. The only thing I will say is that I am perfectly willing and able to defend myself from physical and verbal assault. The irony is that you Sinisteres pretend to abhor violence when the nation is defending itself, and you wish to confiscate our weapons that the Founders made sure we could retain to defend ourselves from oppressive government (and from such as you?).
Your powers of observation are quite modest, Modesto. Before I spoke disparagingly of Damian, he compared me to the Nazi Minister of Propaganda. You can go back over two years on this site, and you will find that I speak with utmost respect to all participants until they verbally assault me and my values. Then they have made themselves fair game, as you have just done.
Florida’s Electoral College votes were awarded based on a legal decision swung by a few Supreme Court justices appointed by Bush I, not by a majority of votes.
And your point would be ... what? The question should be that the Constitution and the laws based on the Constitution be followed. From memory, the Florida Supreme Court (eight Dims, one Rep) declared that the law need not be followed, and I think that the item in question was a deadline for declaring a winner in the vote. That is when an appeal went to the Supremes. Are we going to follow the law, or not? Sinisteres are notorious for making up laws as they go along, to bad effect: the Soviet Union, Allende’s Chile, Chavez’ Venezuela, and now you Sinisteres. Anything you don’t like, you declare to be illegal, to hell with what the law says, and what the Supremes, the final arbiters of the law, say. Gore participated fully in the legal process of the election until he saw political advantage in trying to subvert the legal rules; adios, rules. Gore knew the rules before he ran, and he ran anyway. It was unseemly to try to change the rules in the middle of the game, but that does not deter Sinisteres, who routinely fail in their political and economic ventures, in spite of (because of) routinely bending the rules in their own favor.
... those who profit from the existing skewed Electoral College system will fight it tooth and nail ...
Mr. Gore fought tooth and nail to overturn a system in which he was an officer. Anyone else?
The result is that Bush II has busted the budget in a way that should make any conservative outraged ...
Umm, no. The budget was busted much earlier in the first years of the Clinton Administration when he foolishly raised taxes. This had the effect of limiting investment, assuring that jobs and growth would slow in the ensuing (eight) years (until Bush could undo the damage that Clinton had created). But the effects of the massive Clinton tax hikes were temporarily offset by the peace dividend that resulted from Reagan’s forced collapse of the Soviet Union. Then Clinton compounded his error by allowing the dot.com Bubba Bubble to get entirely out of control. Like all economic bubbles, this one resulted in euphoric market rises with increased tax receipts that ultimately led to outrageously high market prices and false economic performance, which was doomed to collapse. The collapse began in Clinton’s final year when the NASDAQ fell 50%, and it eventually fell by a total of 80% before Bush’s tax cuts and economic reforms stabilized the situation and brought the markets back to realistic levels. Along with the NASDAQ collapse, the Clinton budget surplus fell by $108 billion in his last year. How could it not, since it was based on reduced investment and inflated bubble prices? Sinisteres are uniformly oblivious to the fact that the dot.com bubble and the surplus were in free fall during Clinton’s last year, just as they are oblivious to the fact that the deficit is decreasing. Bush inherited Clinton’s Folly, passed tax cuts and reforms in 2001 and 2002, the deficit stabilized in 2002 and 2003, and we have now four straight years of declining deficits, emphatically not based on the Bubba Bubble foolishness.
You are good at Critical Studies but you are lousy at critical thought. You need to go re-read your notes from Econ 101, preferably not with a Marxist instructor.
... and he has violated the law of the land in many ways.
Name two. Hell, just name one.
.. you really ought to be worried about populist revolt ...
Umm, no. That is the least of my worries. The American voter has endured and resisted and shattered repeated Sinister assaults on their government, by Communists, Socialists, Progressives, and now by the so-called “Liberals”. The current, and most effective assault to date has been the Gramscian takeover of the old media, the Academy, the Episcopal Church, and the ACLU. But old media is dying (check their stock quotes), the Vietnam-era professoriate is dying, the anti-war idiots can barely muster a Corporal’s Guard at national rallies, and the Episcopal Church is disintegrating from internal conflicts. When Bush and Petraeus get done with them, the anti-war traitors will be lucky to muster a Private’s Guard.
If our economy goes into severe recession ...
Well, the economy went into a seventeen-year period of stagnation when President Johnson foolishly tried to buy guns and butter, with no plans to pay for either of them, culminating in the Carter Catastrophe. Nothing worked until the Reagan reforms. Then there was the Bubba Bubble, but we have already discussed that.
Since the end of WWII, the Dimocrats have started wars they did not have the balls to finish, and created economic disasters that threatened the economy. The Republicans bail out the pathetic Dim war efforts and create prosperity out of economic crisis. So, the only plausible scenario in which “our economy goes into severe recession” arises if we elect a Dimocrat.
... terminal federal debt ...
I’m serious about the Econ 101 remedial work; you really need it. The USA is so economically powerful that we can borrow trillions and pay 3% for the privilege. If we can keep the Congress out of the cookie jar, we can invest that borrowed money for something worthwhile, with perhaps a 10% rate of return: correcting SS and Medicare, (re)building infrastructure, solving the energy equation. Of all the stupid stunts Bill Clinton pulled, creating a surplus was without a doubt the stupidest. Why in the hell didn’t he put that money to use in solving our real problems, which grew immeasurably worse while he was diddling Monica, or whomever?
... an ugly, illegal war ...
I give up, what war would that be? In terms of civilian casualties, American casualties, dollar cost, and results, Afghanistan/Iraq is by far the most successful war in American history, and unlike the Dim’s Korea and Vietnam, we are going to win this one. Keep in mind that only Congress can make war legally, and they did so by a wide margin. So, what is it you are saying, MoveOn talking points?
Posted by scorp on Jan 2, 2008 at 6:29 PM Damian -
... Dan Rather’s reporting was accurate.
Let’s see if I understand this correctly: ABC fired Dan Rather and Mary Mapes for reporting the news accurately.
Not likely. Not only would reporting the news accurately be a first for ABC, you are a prime example of why Sinisteres are widely regarded as insane little dumbshits.
Posted by scorp on Jan 2, 2008 at 6:54 PM Getting off topic here, but it was CBS, not ABC, who fired Rather. And he was fired because he lied. Had he told the story the way it happened, he would have gotten his point across and kept his job. He chose to lie.
We all know Shrub used his family influence to get into Texas Air National Guard and then asked for an early discharge so he could work on political campaign as designated party boy.And FL Secretary of State, Kathy Harris, is who declared Shrub the winner in FL.
Posted by farmer on Jan 2, 2008 at 7:13 PM Scorp,
I didn’t ask if it was likely. I asked you to look into the historical record. Do some research...I mean REAL research, which means not using FreeRepublic.com as a starting point. But judging from the fact that you have no idea what network Dan Rather even worked for, I guess I shouldn’t expect you to be bothered by pesky little facts. You probably believed FOX News when they said that Mark Foley was a Democrat, too.
It’s quite funny how you tell others to learn critical thinking when everything you say came out of Rush Limbaugh’s asshole first. Anti-war traitors? Um, excuse me, but exercising the right to free speech is hardly traitorous. On the contrary, it is people such as yourself, Limbaugh, and Bill O’Reilly who expect dissenters to keep quiet that are traitorous and un-American.
I’m also curious about your sunshine-up-the-bunghole optimism regarding the war in Iraq (which is not the same as the war in Afghanistan, but again, don’t let the facts get in the way of your anal-expulsive chatter). If this was really the most successful war we’ve ever fought, it would be over by now. We’ve been in Iraq longer than we were in World War II, or Korea, for that matter....oops, facts again, my bad.
I wonder if some Democrats who post on this site have ever been offended by your labeling of them as “Dimocrats” and “Sinisteres.” I’m not going to bother going back and reading more of your ridiculous drivel than I already have, but I’d be willing to bet that this post is not the first time you compared all left-of-center individuals to the Soviets. Yeah, you’re always respectful.
That being said, I’m sorry that I compared you to Joseph Goebbels. I should have compared Limbaugh, O’Reilly, Hannity, and the other talking head idiots from whom you steal your ideas to Goebbels. You’re just another brainwashed right-wing wack-job who routinely parrots the above-mentioned talking heads’ revisionist history, to wit: Bush didn’t bust the budget? The only president in history dumb enough to CUT taxes during a war? Or Al Gore fighting tooth and nail? You mean the Al Gore who more or less rolled over and LET Bush steal the presidency? He could have pressured at least a dozen senators to object to the official roll call of the Electoral College. But no, he didn’t even do that. He rolled over, and in doing so, became at least partially responsible for one of the biggest failures of Democratic government in the history of humanity: the appointment, as opposed to the election, of a president.
And by the way, complaining that somebody wants to punch you in the mouth right before calling somebody a dumbshit just makes you look like a little bitch.
Posted by cdamian on Jan 2, 2008 at 8:55 PM LXXI.
The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ,
Moves on: nor all your Piety nor Wit
Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line,
Nor all your Tears wash out a Word of it.- Rubaiyat, Omar the Tent Maker
My apologies to ABC and to ITT readers. I seldom watch network television, as they are all a bunch of Sinister ideologues in precipitous moral and financial decline. (For that matter, I have never in my life listened to Limbaugh, Hannity, or O’Reilly.)
So, can all your Tears wash out the 100 million dead victims of Communism? No. How about the catastrophe Allende and the KGB inflicted on Chile? No. How about the stagnation and decline that has afflicted Western Europe for two decades? No. The disaster Chavez is creating in Venezuela now? No.
To the extent that nations embrace Sinister principles and practices, they spiral downward into inefficiency, corruption, destruction, and death. To the extent that these same nations embrace free markets, democracy, and the rule of law, they prosper and grow, Chile, China, and Eastern Europe being prime examples. China is, of course, trying to harness a totalitarian political system with free-market economics, thereby limiting their potential for growth, as spectacular as it has been. (Thank you, President Nixon.)
This Dexter = growth, Sinister = destruction equation appears to be an historical absolute, and is exactly the opposite of what Marx taught you - or not. Marx advocated the destruction of families and social values, but he did not tell you that the result would be your impoverishment and death.
I have a co-worker and friend, Black dude, and we often argue politics. He hates Bush but he hates Dims equally. We agree that the War on Poverty was an expensive ($6 trillion) disaster (break-up of Black families, drug use, crime) but his take is that it was a deliberate effort (by Whitey) to destroy Blacks and Black families. He eventually agreed that Moynihan and most Republicans had opposed the War on Poverty.
Wait a minute. State control, destruction of families, destruction of values, disastrous results: right out of the Marxist play book. We have a microcosm of Marxism in action right here in the United States. And you Sinisteres want more?
Hope springs eternal. NEXT TIME, Marxism will work as advertised.
Ummm, no. There will be no next time for Sinisteres in the United States of America.
Damian, to forestall you from saying anything really stupid (stupidity does not become you), please identify any portions of this post that I got from Limbaugh, or from anybody else.
Posted by scorp on Jan 3, 2008 at 11:48 AM Allow me to apologize for claiming that you have simply been repeating conservative punditry. However, I have heard almost everything you have said in this thread before, and almost all of it has come from partisan hacks, so you can understand why someone who pays attention to the media would be confused.
You should ask the sweatshop workers in China what they think of their economic growth. The economic microcosm we are experiencing in the United States is not Marxist; it is fascist. Near-absolute corporate power, church interests intruding on the state, never-ending war against stateless enemies, suppression of dissent, rule by fear...this is what most conservatives (Republican and Democrat--they’re practically identical) support. The “Sinisteres” whom you hate so much have been working tirelessly to stem the tide of fascism in the United States. Great minds like Mike Gravel, Dennis Kucinich, and Ron Paul have been trying to alert the citizenry of the dangers involved in “staying the course,” as Bush would no doubt phrase it. The mainstream media which you claim is so liberal and communistic has not allowed these men any significant air time, which pretty much proves that the MSM is not liberal at all. Nobody is advocating that the United States adopt a strictly communist economy. I have not advocated it in any of my posts, and I know of no successful politicians who have advocated it recently.
The destruction of the family was brought about by Reagan’s economic policies. Before Reagan, families could survive with one working parent. After Reagan got through with his deregulation of the economy, families needed two incomes to survive, children hardly saw their parents so values could not be passed down, and parents hardly saw each other, which is why half of all marriages fail. I think if there’s anything we can both agree on, it is that Reagan is not a Marxist. But there is one similarity worth pointing out: both Soviet-style socialism and supply-side capitalism fail for the same reason: greed. Greed by the Politburo who lined their own pockets with the sweat of the proletariat, and greed by corporate bigwigs who line their own pockets with the sweat of the American working class.
Posted by cdamian on Jan 3, 2008 at 3:46 PM Let’s give it a try. ... I do not advocate change just for change but if there seems to be at least an equal balance of pluses and minuses as with a current system, and the cost to implement is not extremely high, change is acceptable. A direct national count falls into that category for me. ... As for minority interests being protected, that means those who hold beliefs and life-requirements different than the majority; it does not refer to skin color, language, ethnicity, or gender. ... I have lived in varoius parts of the country, rural and metropolitan; I’ve lived with money and without; there is much more in common than people realize across the states. There difference comes in the interpretation. For example, in New York city, entry-level wages may be $40,000 a year. In Pierre, South Dakota, those wages may be $22,000. Yet, both entry-level workers are going to be concerned about transportation, health care, housing, retirement, education, et al. Thus, I am not concerned about protecting small states’ rights. ... Here’s one last argument: Take a look at the National Governors Association and see how many states, of all sizes, take the same approach to problems because that is the fashion of the moment.
Posted by SillyLeftist on Jan 4, 2008 at 8:08 AM From Maryland (yea!):
It is duly noted that NPV would have to pass Supreme Court review, but I suspect that it would. Also note that Congress could try to prohibit NPV plans, but that may have a more difficult review by the Court.
The fact is that the Electoral College (EC) is an anachronism that would be best gotten rid of, except for the extreme difficulty of amending the Constitution (overall a good thing, else we could have flag-burning and school prayer amendments junking up the document). The era in which state identity is supreme ended long ago - somewhere around 1865. Sorry, but almost all of us identify ourselves as Americans, not Marylanders, Nebraskans, etc.—OK, with the possible exception of Texans…
The EC was one of a few provisions put in the Constitution to coerce the southern states to ratify it - so was counting most black people as 3/5 of a person and we eventually got rid of that disgrace. My preference would be to have the Constitution amended to eliminate the EC and let Americans vote as a people, not as members of a state, but I’d accept NPV as an easier alternative. I’m lucky, I’m a liberal in a liberal state; if you are contrary to your State’s prevailing ideology, the EC makes your vote pointless.
I’d also like to see States adopt Instant Runoff Voting (IRV), so that a vote for a more ideological candidate didn’t in fact benefit a candidate antithetical to the voter’s beliefs. With IRV, a vote for Nader wouldn’t have helped elect Bush; a vote for Buchanan wouldn’t have helped elect Clinton. It hard to imagine the Republicrats supporting IRV or any other election reform that might jeopardize their incumbency, however.
Posted by JazzyJake on Jan 4, 2008 at 11:48 AM JJ -
I’m lucky, I’ a liberal in a liberal state; if you are contrary to your State’ prevailing ideology, the EC makes your vote pointless.
Ignorance is bliss.
As a self-confessed “liberal in a liberal state”, you also display all the characteristics of the Sinister education you suffered: historical ignorance and utter lack of logic.
The EC was one of a few provisions put in the Constitution to coerce the southern states to ratify it - so was counting most black people as 3/5 of a person and we eventually got rid of that disgrace.
I absolutely defy you to find a single historical reference in support of either of the points in this your perfectly absurd statement. On the contrary, the balance of republican federalist and raw tyrannical democratic tendencies was carefully contrived to make the system work effectively. And consider your statement “counting most black people as 3/5 of a person” was “put in the Constitution to coerce the southern states to ratify it “. Think, man, think. Do you really believe that the Southern states were advocating a reduced role for themselves in Congress? Not just no, but goddamshitfuckhell, NO! The NORTHERN states did not want to count any slaves in the population for determining representation in Congress, because they had fewer slaves than in the South. The South wanted to count all slaves in their population totals, and the result was (one of many) imperfect compromises on the way to our republican system that has worked so well for so long. And in your profound ignorance, you wish to destroy it.
I have long thought that ignorance is our worst enemy, and you have just verified this observation.
Posted by scorp on Jan 4, 2008 at 1:53 PM If ignorance is bliss you must be very happy.
Does anyone want to have an intelligent conversation?
Posted by JazzyJake on Jan 4, 2008 at 2:06 PM Damian -
... I have heard almost everything you have said in this thread before, and almost all of it has come from partisan hacks, so you can understand why someone who pays attention to the media would be confused.
Well, you should be well qualified to recognize a partisan hack if you saw one, including the Sinister media, but I somehow doubt that you do. Like this:
You should ask the sweatshop workers in China what they think of their economic growth.
Very shortly before Nixon went to China for the express purpose of opening the Chinese economy to the West, and eventually opening their political system to liberalism (not Liberalism!), 30 million Chinese died of starvation in one of the politically correct paroxysms that periodically rack Sinister states. Shortly after that the Great (?) Cultural Revolution paroxysm followed, and a generation went without schooling, sort of like JJ above, and suffered other deprivations.
Given the limited choice among starvation, ignorance, and economic progress, the only conditions they have actually experienced, you think the “sweatshop workers” in China will choose the Marxist options (starvation and ignorance) over the capitalist option (economic progress, paychecks)?
As a dedicated Sinistere, you will undoubtedly choose the Marxist options for them, if not for yourself, but in my four trips to China starting in 1984 I have observed that the Chinese people have massively chosen the free-market option; this is the source of Chinese growth and rising prosperity. You can make snide politically correct Marxist remarks about “sweatshop workers” if you want, but the Chinese people will think you a fool. I have long thought that the Chinese are the finest natural capitalists in the world, dedicated, persistent, and thrifty, and the growing prosperity of China confirms this. Unfortunately, they have a political problem that has not yet gone away, but it will.
The destruction of the family was brought about by Reagan’s economic policies.
There you go again. Before the War on Poverty, five out of six Black children lived in families with two parents. The War on Poverty paid women to evict their men from the homes, and now less than a third of Black children live in homes with two parents. According to the Census Bureau, the percentage of people on welfare fell slightly during the Reagan years, exactly the opposite of what you just said. The damage done to Black families was massive, and will take decades to repair. All for a politically correct paroxysm of domestic Marxism, total cost $6 trillion.
Posted by scorp on Jan 4, 2008 at 10:06 PM “There you go again.”...That was funny, and almost a little bit intelligent.
Once again, I will not dignify your pathetic attempt to frame the issue of China’s economy. I am quite interested to know that you are able to speak for a billion people, but I will not respond to the skewed, intellectually dishonest choice you present as if it were factually based. It is clear that in your haste to kneel at the altar of free-market capitalism that you have closed your mind to all other issues regarding the Chinese economy, such as the fact that sweatshops are morally wrong and only a morally bankrupt individual would say anything resembling praise of the current system.
I never said anything about welfare during the Reagan years, nor did I say anything about African-Americans. Stop putting words in my mouth. But while we’re on the subject, you should read “Storming Caesar’s Palace” by Annelise Orleck. Operation Life was one of the best examples of how the War on Poverty would have worked if it had been managed properly. Of course, the incredibly successful and popular program was defunded by Ronnie Raygun, so we’ll never know how successful it could have been. One thing is certain: there were many factors, including the rise of drug use, the sexual revolution, a counter-culture that spurned civil institutions like marriage, and a lack of upward mobility tied to supply-side economics that led to the decline of the family. Maybe you’re right, that the African-American family was damaged before the Reagan years. I couldn’t find any evidence to support that claim outside of the WSJ editorial page and the Limbaugh Institute, but that doesn’t necessarily mean you’re wrong. I’m willing to accept that. Reagan’s economic policies, however, caused the same amount of damage to all families of all ethnicities. All Reagan did was ensure that any damage that had been previously done to the African-American family was now shared equally by all families. All for a reactionary paroxysm of fascism, raising the national debt to its highest point as a percentage of gross domestic product in history.
Posted by cdamian on Jan 5, 2008 at 7:42 AM Damian -
Jean Piaget, the Swiss psychologist, described human cognitive development as a series of stages. In the Pre-Operational stage of early childhood, youngsters from the ages of about two years to about seven years exhibit certain characteristic communication modes, including what Piaget termed “Egocentrism”. Children at this level tend to talk past one another, with little reference to or understanding of what the other says or means.
Talking to a Sinstere is sort of like talking to a two year old, but at a different, more sinister, “stage” of development, if I may stretch Piaget’s organizational scheme.
The most basic consideration in understanding communication problems between Dexter and Sinister viewpoints relates to Marx’s rejection of “bourgeois morality”. Marx held that bourgeois morality was bad and was to be rejected: honesty, honor, personal integrity, family values, all were to be destroyed in the pursuit of higher communitarian values, such as the dictatorship of the proletariat. To this effect, Stalin robbed banks to support Lenin’s Revolution, millions died in the Soviet Union, China, Korea, Vietnam, and Cambodia, and legitimate governments were routinely subverted in pursuit of Socialist “ideals”. None of which bothers you in the least.
Consequently, having embraced robbery, genocide, subversion, and lesser crimes in pursuit of your values, a little dishonesty between friends does not faze you either, such as this:
<blockquote>All Reagan did was ensure that any damage that had been previously done to the African-American family was now shared equally by all families. All for a reactionary paroxysm of fascism, raising the national debt to its highest point as a percentage of gross domestic product in history. <blockquote>
But are you being deliberately dishonest, or are you dumbly and blindly following Krugman’s Sinister talking points on personal income, or is it that you are too ignorant to run a simple reality check on what you say, or perhaps you are a useless idiot in service to a Sinister master? Every point in your paragraph is demonstrably, emphatically false, and your only object seems to be to further the Sinister effort to subvert my country.
Of these falsehoods, the easiest to demonstrate is the last, “raising the national debt to its highest point as a percentage of gross domestic product in history”. This is nonsense, of course. In the first six months of 1942, immediately after Pearl Harbor, the United States wrote war-related purchase orders that totaled greater than the GDP, and at he end of the war, the debt totaled over 125% of GDP. Now the ratio of debt to GDP is a benign <65% and falling. So you just overstated the real historical/current debt ratio by almost 100%. The Chinese can put their loans to us to excellent use, and we have excellent uses for the money we borrow, which serve as cheap source of funds for domestic priorities, providing we can keep the Congress focused on what the priorities are.
Having rejected conventional values, Sinisteres scream bloody murder when we defend our values, believing that we should role over and die when faced with Marxist inevitability. But Marxism in many different locations and contexts has repeatedly proven to be incompetent and inefficient, not to mention genocidal, and not in any way inevitable. So fuck you, boy. Don’t push me.
And tell us how much of this I got from Limbaugh.
Posted by scorp on Jan 6, 2008 at 6:25 PM I’d like to point out that I’m not quite sure why the American flag does not appear under my posts. I’m from Wisconsin, so this is just as much my country as it is yours.
That being said, go blow yourself, scorp. You’re just a goddamn schoolyard bully who doesn’t have anybody to pick on anymore. The fact that you have to insult me at every turn just shows that you can’t handle real, honest debate. I never advocated or showed any tolerance of robbery, genocide, or any other crimes, and you fucking know it. Don’t push you? Ha! This is the essence of conservative debate right here, everyone: put words in your opponent’s mouth, make constant ad hominem attacks, and threaten anyone who disagrees.
OK, so the graph I saw didn’t go back far enough. I didn’t see the Truman numbers. But if you’re going to call me out for dishonesty, you might want to reconsider the statement that the ratio of debt to GDP is falling. http://zfacts.com/p/318.html.
Keep Congress focused on domestic priorities? Talk about dishonesty. It is the executive branch that has ignored domestic priorities and the Republican minority in Congress that has filibustered every attempt at creating positive domestic results. The money we borrow has gone for the first preventative war in American history. Are you really proud of that? Does it make you feel macho that you live in a country that attacks sovereign nations for fabricated reasons? Don’t bother answering, because I already know.
You want to talk about robbing banks? Ask Neil Bush about that. Or the president’s good buddy, Ken Lay (who would have brought the Bush administration down if he had actually gone to trial--funny how he happened to kick the bucket just before his trial was going to start). You make it sound like Republicans have done no wrong over the years. There is no more intellectually dishonest argument than that. Of course, you think Nixon was the second coming of Christ, so I shouldn’t be surprised.
I’d like to know how you think that Reagan’s economic policies actually helped people. More divorce during the 80s, more latch-key kids during the 80s, more juvenile crime during the 80s, and all as a result of parents having to work more because of “trickle-down” economics. So your “conventional values” are not conventional at all. They are anti-family, anti-child, and anti-upward-mobility. You accuse me of supporting the Marxist idea of family as secondary to the state. On the contrary, I believe in family. That’s why I support minimum wage increases, the shifting of the tax burden back to the upper class where it belongs, sensible regulations to protect workers from corporate greed and wrongdoing, and social and financial assistance for those who need it. It is supporters of immoral conservative policies who are ruining the United States by kneeling at the altar of free-market capitalism and deregulation, thereby ensuring that the vast majority of wealth in the United States is off limits to almost everyone. This is your idea of the American dream--wage slavery. WORSE THAN MARXISM!!!
And no, you didn’t get any of this from Limbaugh. That freaking hypocritical pig has a hundred times the political sense that you do.
Posted by cdamian on Jan 6, 2008 at 8:18 PM Each state is given the charge to choose how it will select its Electors, but one possible problem with NPV is that the law compels Maryland’s electoral votes to take into account voting patterns outside the state’s borders. The Constitution is clear that electoral votes are allotted by state, to represent, as best an indirect voting method can, the choice of the majority of voters within that particular state.
As for the legality of the law itself, the article is not entirely correct in saying that “no federal approval would be required”, because the constitutionality of all laws, federal or state or local, is to be decided by the Supreme Court. It may be that advocates for NPV can demonstrate its constitutionality if challenged, but it is not to be assumed.
The “direct democracy” preference sounds good at first take, nice sounding words and all, but the system of using Electors is the only thing that prevents a few huge-population states from drowning out those states with small populations. The big states are influential enough. And as with other examples in America’s history (e.g. race relations), when the principle of protecting minority rights to temper majority rule is not strictly upheld, the results are disastrous for the 50% - 1 or fewer who are outgrouped. This applies to the less populous states as well.
If protecting the integrity of the election is the goal, I advocate 1) forbidding electronic vote tabulation in favor of 100% hard copy ballots, 2) proof of qualification to vote being required, 3) drastic penalties for acts that interfere with legally cast votes, 4) more drastic penalties for officials who finagle the system so as to disenfranchise legal voters, 5) slow ballot counts in the physical presence of representatives of all parties that competed, with every single ballot being tabulated before the job is considered “finished”, and 6) no reporting of results until every district across the country has counted and confirmed its results. All of this would require citizen vigilance and a choice for strict, verifiable accuracy over speed of reporting or a misplaced infatuation with fancy technology.
Posted by Kuya on Jan 9, 2008 at 3:21 AM Which may not sound encouraging, but maybe we can agree that instantaneous reporting of results, prediction of outcome based on samples, and love affairs with tricky machines that are easy to manipulate are comparatively trivial concerns, compared to the integrity of election results.
Posted by Kuya on Jan 9, 2008 at 3:26 AM One last thing, sorry for the afterthought…
The majority-take-all approach for Electoral votes is neither required by the Constitution nor is it universal among the states. Citizens can gang up on their state legislatures to change those rules, if they so choose.
Posted by Kuya on Jan 9, 2008 at 3:33 AM Kuya,
You say that the Electoral College is what prevents States with large populations from shutting out smaller States.
How does that square with Gore getting more popular votes than Shrub, but Shrub winning the Electoral Vote?
The only way to prevent what you say is to go to a one man/one vote regardless of where you live.
As it is, if 51% of NY voter’s are for one candidate, that candidate gets NY Electoral Votes which can override several other States with smaller Electoral Votes.
To me, that is not right.
Posted by farmer on Jan 9, 2008 at 8:52 AM Damian -
I never advocated or showed any tolerance of robbery, genocide, or any other crimes, and you fucking know it.
Well, not exactly.
You advocate every Sinister position and repeat every Sinister propaganda in contemporary American politics. Have you forgotten that a central premise of Marxism holds that bourgeois morality must be destroyed and that any lie is justified to effect that destruction? So, you practice dishonesty, but not the criminal corollaries that eventuate as a result of your Sinister philosophy? You expect me to believe that? Couldn’t you just acknowledge that “mistakes were made” as Krushchev did, talking about twenty or so million innocent dead civilians in the Soviet Union?
Consequent to your embrace of the Sinister position, you can repeat absurdities such as this:
… the fact that sweatshops are morally wrong …
Of course! But you ignore that thirty million Chinese dead of Sinister Communist terrorism and deliberate starvation is also, and emphatically more so, morally wrong. You ignore that it was President Nixon who effected the break with the past. And you ignore the fact that it might be just a tad difficult to move 500 million Chinese from a condition of abject poverty and starvation to a position of Jeffersonian democracy and capitalist prosperity without going through some intermediate stage. So bitch all you want, but we are making the world a better place, regardless of your Sinister obstructionism.
It’s not that Sinisteres are liars, it is that you lie when it serves to promote your political objectives without regard to objective reality, and consequently I cannot trust anything that a Sinistere says. Every thing you say has to be verified.
Fortunately, there are objective checks on what you say. I do not need to “research” Sinister propaganda when CBS has already fired Rather and Mapes for lying, after the ANG memo proved to have been written on equipment that did not exist at the time it was supposedly written. A radio station once advertised “genuine autographed photos of Jesus Christ”, which is about as credible as Dan Rather’s (and your) foolishness.
You have a child-like faith that your Sinister Marxist masters are correct in spite of a century and a half of abject failure of Marxism in diverse climes and circumstances. Your faith transcends fact, logic, common sense, and critical analysis.
For example, you keep referring to “fascism” with respect to the United States. I assume that you are lying again, but perhaps not; maybe you really are that dumb. Marx was the chief proponent of “international socialism”, which was supposed to sweep the industrialized nations of the world as they existed in the mid-nineteenth century, and thereby eliminate capitalism. Marxists perceived that capitalism was their chief enemy. Marx would have been dumbfounded to learn that Russia became Socialist, since Russia was feudal and, according to Marx’s “historical laws”, Russia had to undergo a couple of hundred years of capitalist development before Socialism would spontaneously erupt.
Now Italy was far more capitalist and qualified for Socialism than Russia, and Mussolini embraced Socialism, which was not exactly a spontaneous development either. But Mussolini had no interest in “international” Socialism, and was as opposed to capitalism as Marx. Mussolini wanted to restore the grandeur of the Roman Empire and he adopted the ancient symbol of Roman authority, the fasces. The bundle of rods tied around the fasces represented the exclusive group nature of the political power, and has a very close parallel in the idea of the Soviet in the USSR. “Soviet” translates as “committee”, and both Soviet and fasces signify that the controlling power was a bureaucracy. I hope I don’t have to spell out to you what that means.
Hitler very much admired Mussolini and his movement, and he adopted the term “National Socialist”, abbreviated as NaZi in the German. Both German and Italian movements in WWII are now referred to as “fascist”.
The International Socialists and the National Socialists had common roots and both were philosophically opposed to capitalism, but their tactical rivalry prevailed: they hated each other with a passion. We allied with the Soviet Union during WWII, not because Stalin was a fine fellow (he was not), but because Hitler was perceived to be the greater threat.
Operationally and philosophically, Communists and Fascists are identical, only differing on who their chosen victims were to be, which turned out to be each other. Both were categorically opposed to capitalism. So it is silly of you to try to identify capitalism with fascism. You are full of feces, if not fasces.
Posted by scorp on Jan 9, 2008 at 8:35 PM “Socialism is a fraud, a comedy, a phantom, a blackmail."--Benito Mussolini
Ever since I suggested that Republicans were just as guilty as Democrats of election fraud, you have called me every name from a Marxist to a Sinisturd (that was precious). You constantly accuse Marxists (and, falsely, me) of genocide, but you don’t think twice about atrocities committed by capitalist societies. You have yet to accurately represent any of my positions in your arguments and counter-arguments. You may have the last word if you want, but I am not going to waste any more of my time on this discussion, as you cannot even continue it intelligently without framing everything I say.
Posted by cdamian on Jan 9, 2008 at 10:56 PM Hello farmer,
As you’re likely aware, it has happened a few times that the popular vote went to one candidate while the electoral vote went to the other, with the president-elect being the electoral winner. I can’t say I’m 100% pleased with that possibility of outcome either (although in 2000 my main discontent was that Bush took office, more so than that there was a disjoint between popular and electoral result per se… I’d have been unhappy even if there had been no such conflict). However, I do see why the framers of the constitution were most concerned about the status of the various states and how they interacted in elections (i.e. trying to hammer out compromises that enough of them would accept), rather than focusing on the voting behavior of the population. They were trying to find a way to unite independent provinces, and of course in those days there was no such thing as universal suffrage so the “voice of the people” as represented by election results was not as salient an issue in the popular mind as today. Regular guys’ votes weren’t asked for or wanted. State endorsements via electoral votes were.Clearly no system can be perfect, and this may simply be a limitation inherent to a federal system, since the states are really the “deciders” of who will be president.
Doing away with the federal system is theoretically possible, I suppose, although moving to a national system as you describe would need a major revamp of the entire system. As I write, I’m not entirely sure that even a constitutional amendment would be sufficient to make that change. It may be that it would require virtually a new constitution (does anyone out there know the fact of that?). Also, I wouldn’t expect small states to sit still for it, even if an amendment would be enough.
Any state can make a change away from the majority-take-all practice that most use now, if enough people got behind it. I’ve always felt that that practice could easily lead to bad distortions, and I say that as one born in California, with a massive share of electoral votes. Plus, in the case of a so-called “faithless elector” who disregards the majority vote in their region, lots of states have laws to punish them if it’s thought that they abused their station. But again, citizens and/or their state reps would have to keep their eye on things and if they felt that faithlessness was in hand, then they could prosecute.
I think what’s up for the most part is a complacency among the populace, no motivation to initiate a change even if they thought current practice was out of whack. I do have to give credit to those behind NPV for even getting off their butts to take the issue on. Many people probably don’t even know they have the power to do so, maybe thinking majority-take-all must be permanent.
Posted by Kuya on Jan 10, 2008 at 1:52 AM Kuya
I am at a loss to understand why the Electoral System is fair to smaller States while a popular vote isn’t.
Back when 90% of the population was on the East Coast, it would seem to make some sense.
But now with the population spread out more, I can’t see it.
Nevada and Wyoming will still lose out to Michigan or Illinois, whereas with a popular vote, the result could be different.
As to re-framing the Constitution, I don’t want that either. But as this only affects one office in Government, I don’t see why a simple Constitutional Amendment removing the Electoral College wouldn’t be all that it takes.
Just like the R’s are wanting to put a variation of the Federal System in play in California. They would only have to carry certain districts in the State to win an election.
All other offices are voted on by a popular vote. The Presidency needs to be the same.
Posted by farmer on Jan 10, 2008 at 6:08 AM Hello again farmer,
A new understanding of who exactly should elect the Prez would have to develop, and NPV may be a step in that direction, although it is still odd to me that the law would compel one state’s Electors to take into account the rest of the country’s cumulative results. That new understanding was what happened when Amend 17 came down and led to Senators being popularly elected, and I can’t see that it hurt the democracy.It may be that a new amendment would be enough, I just don’t know the absolute fact of that. It was enough for Senators, so maybe for President too.
The distribution of population across the country is the key, as you mention as well. For example, in my late grandfather’s home state of Arkansas, there are well under half the people statewide than in the county of Los Angeles. My concern would be that those localities with huge populations would overwhelm the less populated places even more than the current electoral system already allows them to do.
My take on that distribution encourages me to continue thinking the electoral system should be kept, but I should clarify that my view is the result of a sort of calculus on what would decentralize regional influence in an election most, which I believe is the more democratic choice (even if I want the US to remain a constitutional republic, naturally I’d also want the system to be as “democratic” as it can be within that structure). So it’s not exactly that I’m a staunch Electoral-ist, more that I’m a decentral-ist, if that makes sense.
This conversation we’ve been having now has me curious about the actual math of electoral decentralization as a function of today’s population distribution. Allow me to do a little more digging around for information, and I’ll get back to you. Just want to check the numbers.
Posted by Kuya on Jan 10, 2008 at 11:25 PM Kuya
Any system that allows a Shrub to win the office while losing the popular vote has to be changed.
God knows Al Gore wasn’t the greatest choice, but against the Shrub, he was.
No system can be set up to account for the variances in population between the Metro Area of one State and the Rural Area of another State.
This current ‘administration’ has shown the Country what happens when a person can ‘win’ an Election on what amounts to a technicality.
That in itself is plenty of reason to change the current system.
Posted by farmer on Jan 10, 2008 at 11:44 PM Damian -
... betcha didn’t know that certain Ohio Republicans (plural) are going to jail over that election ...
Ever since I suggested that Republicans were just as guilty as Democrats of election fraud ...
You are right. And I still don’t know that. The site you provided still does not work, and the only Republican(?) (singular) cited is still identified with different party labels on different sites, and at any rate she did not have any effect on the outcome of any election; her crime was cutting corners in a recount verification. Do you have a legitimate case of voter fraud involving Republican misdeeds, or do you not?
In relation to, I presume you have noted that the recent New Hampshire polls were quite accurate as far as the Republican voting, and quite inaccurate as far as the Demonicrat voting. Even the various Demonicrat candidates’ own polls were off. And now Kos accuses Hillary of voter fraud involving DIEBOLD (!) voting machines. Are you finally starting to see a pattern here?
If you are going to accuse Republicans of crimes you really ought to find some evidence other than a statistical anomaly. Like, when Demonicrats commit voter fraud and intimidation, they leave behind real evidence like faked voter registrations by ACORN (Missouri and Washington State), or the elderly republican lady with the broken arm, courtesy of Demonicrat union thugs, or the slashed tires by the sons of the Wisconsin Demonicrat Party officials.
I am certainly not going to claim that all Republicans are without sin, but if you are going to claim that both parties are equally guilty of voter fraud, you should be able to produce some evidence to support your position. You have not done so. I have been following the discussion on voter fraud in detail for a number of years, and I would welcome any real evidence to support the contention that Republicans are guilty of voter fraud, for the novelty if nothing else. But there is virtually no evidence of Republican voter fraud that I have seen.
And then I end up back contrasting the Marxist position that dishonesty is justified and commendable if it produces the desired political result, versus the American belief in honesty and integrity.
I won’t even dignify the ridiculously framed questions in the rest of your comment.
Once again, I will not dignify your pathetic attempt to frame the issue of China’s economy.
Are my questions too hard for you? Every time I ask a question that does not fall within your Marxist catechism, you bug out of the conversation.
Nobody is advocating that the United States adopt a strictly communist economy. I have not advocated it in any of my posts, and I know of no successful politicians who have advocated it recently.
No shot, Sheerluck. And since you claim to know who Antonio Gramsci is, do you really expect Sinistere politicians to advocate the failed Marxist economic model? But Johnson’s fake War on Poverty, costing only $6 trillion, is straight out of Marx and Gramsci, and it does not involve economic or industrial Communism.
Greed by the Politburo who lined their own pockets with the sweat of the proletariat, and greed by corporate bigwigs who line their own pockets with the sweat of the American working class.
Let us see if we understand this correctly. “Greed by the Politburo” resulted in inefficiency and corruption, and the collapse of the Soviet Union. That is a fact. Meanwhile, “greed by corporate bigwigs” in the USA has resulted in the strongest economy and among the highest living standards in the world. Those are facts. Does that make sense to you? You honestly do not see the difference in the two systems? You want to change the excellent system we have in favor of the failed Marxist model?
One thing is certain: there were many factors, including the rise of drug use, the sexual revolution, a counter-culture that spurned civil institutions like marriage, and a lack of upward mobility tied to supply-side economics that led to the decline of the family.
The abuse of sex and drugs and the destruction of the family were straight out of the Marxist plan for destruction of “bourgeois morality” and the family. That was why Sinisteres such as yourself celebrate the success of the War on Poverty: maximum damage to families, particularly Black families, and maximum damage to our economy, two for one. And then you hypocritically complain about the national debt ($9 trillion) and ignore the $6 trillion cost pissed away on the so-called War on Poverty.
But if you’re going to call me out for dishonesty, you might want to reconsider the statement that the ratio of debt to GDP is falling. http://zfacts.com/p/318.html.
Ummm, no. There is a debt clock on the Skeptical Optimist that is updated monthly. I have followed it for a number of months, and every month it ticks slowly but steadily downward. The zfacts graph is not precise enough to show what the clock shows. Speaking of, now that you have seen the data going back to near WWII, how do you suppose we were able to bring the debt down so far, by raising taxes? No. By investing in the future of America, we caused the economy to grow reducing the relative size of the debt.
The money we borrow has gone for the first preventative war in American history. Are you really proud of that?
An ounce of prevention ... Do you prefer the fat, dumb, and happy approach to protecting ourselves? Clinton ignored al-Qa’eda and the Jihadists when they bombed the Embassies and the USS Cole, and he ran like a dog from Somalia. That convinced Bin Laden that the USA would not fight, and led directly to 09/11. There are people out there who want to kill us, including several Sinisteres on this site that have threatened me with death or bodily harm. And Sinisteres (Reid, Pelosi by name) have now allied with al-Qa’eda to defeat us.
And don’ start your “Iraq was innocent” nonsense. The Gulf War in the early 1990s was a cooperative UN operation, and Iraq was under UN sanctions from the day that Saddam was defeated until we went into Iraq in 2003. We now are under UN approval to be in Iraq, following the Iraq War Resolution 2002, approved by the Congress of the United States of America. By definition, that means we are there legally. The Demonicrats don’t like it, but this is a democracy regardless.
Or the president’s good buddy, Ken Lay (who would have brought the Bush administration down if he had actually gone to trial--funny how he happened to kick the bucket just before his trial was going to start).
Do you have any particular basis for this weird statement, or is this just a little bit of recreational bitching on your part? Ken Lay slept in the White House during Bush 41’s administration, played golf with President Clinton in the early 1990s, and was well acquainted with Bush 43. The Enron fraud occurred during the Clinton administration, as in fact did the WorldCom, Tyco, Rite Aid, Sunbeam, Waste Management, and Cendant frauds. There was a climate of corruption in the last years of the Clinton Administration, and unfortunately it was not limited to Bill and Hill. But GWB’s Justice Department (AGAG, in fact) prosecuted the criminals, and we have been blessed with a dearth of criminal behavior for the last few years. But does GWB get any credit from the Sinisteres for bringing integrity to the corporate community? Well, no. Sinisteres support and expect corruption as a part of their assault on bourgeois morality, particularly when they can make false and hypocritical charges against their political opponents/Americans.
“Socialism is a fraud, a comedy, a phantom, a blackmail."--Benito Mussolini
So, are you agreeing or disagreeing with the Mussolini statement? I would not have expressed it just that way, but Mussolini had the basic idea right. Socialism really is a fraud, a comedy, a phantom, a blackmail, and a crock of shit, so why do you heartily embrace it? Keep in mind that Mussolini’s father was a radical Socialist agitator, and young Benito grew up in the family tradition. He continued his work as a Socialist political operator and Socialist newspaper editor for years until he founded the Fascist movement based on Socialist principles, but with a nationalist orientation. That is when he began criticizing Socialism, while continuing to practice Socialist principles.
Changing names of political movements sort of reminds one of our domestic Sinisteres. Within the last century, in the USA, the Communists could not get themselves elected, so they began calling themselves Socialists. The Socialists could not get themselves elected, so they began calling themselves Progressives, hijacking a perfectly honorable name for their Sinister objectives. The Progressives could not get themselves elected, so they began calling themselves Liberals, hijacking another perfectly honorable name for their Sinister objectives. Now Hillary is calling herself a Progressive again. The last Communist who ran for President while calling himself a Progressive was Henry Wallace, in 1948. He lost. Badly. Hillary undoubtedly does not recognize the symbolism and irony.
On the evidence, people who promote Sinister propaganda are, in fact, Sinisteres (Communists, Socialists, whatever) who are trying to subvert the American experiment. As long as you confine yourself to talk-talk, fine: Freedom of Speech and all that. If you take action to impose your totalitarian philosophy, we are at war and you lose. You shit-head Sinisteres have lost every governing effort you have undertaken, and democracy has won every war and governing effort it has undertaken (possible exception: Vietnam, when the Sinisteres created a designated loss). Think about it.
Enjoy.
Posted by scorp on Jan 12, 2008 at 3:02 PM It’s amazing how ignorant some of these comments are about how the Electoral College works. Awarding electoral votes doesn’t mean the electors have to vote “yes”. So the stopgap some of you negative commentators are worried about losing - a ‘college’ of elite white men making sure an extremist doesn’t get into office (a lotta good that did the past two elections) - would still be there.
I love it - states award their electoral votes to the winner of the national popular vote. Then if an extremist is elected by popular vote - say, Dennis Kucinich - the smart electors could refuse to cast their votes for him, putting a moderate like Cheney back in power instead.
How does In These Times attract so many mindless rightwing jingoists?
Posted by yosephus on Jan 13, 2008 at 11:48 AM Sup farmer,
Sorry for delay, busy busy…
32 states + DC have a higher % of electoral votes than % of population. 8 of those are within 1%.
13 states have a higher % of the pop than % of electoral votes. CA, NY, TX are among them.
5 states have equal % of pop v. electoral votes. MD is among them.
I give the nod to the electoral system if only to put some kind of brake on the biggies or any particular region dominating any more than they already do, because the US is after all a federation of semi-independent states (changeable in theory, but not easily, and also not likely IMO because I think too many people in the country will want to stand pat, esp. small state residents). The majority-take-all practice is a state by state affair, no constitutional amendment needed for change. I see this as the major distortive influence, rather than the electoral system per se.
Citizen action is what is required, if enough people give a damn to begin. I credit the backers of NPV for getting off their duffs, but I still have an issue with any states’ electoral votes being in any way statutorily determined by factors outside its borders.
However if the voters in any particular state want to give it a try, it’s their prerogative. If/When the law’s constitutionality is challenged, I’ll be interested to see the outcome.
If you care about the raw data, let me know, didn’t include it because it came across as pedantic.
Hasta luego, be well,
K
Posted by Kuya on Jan 14, 2008 at 5:56 PM Kuya
Will take your word on the data. Sure ain’t up to wading through pedantic data.
I just have a problem with a system wherein the majority of votes in an election isn’t enough to win that election.
Granted that it has only happened three or four times in 200+ years, but it still seems wrong. Especially when a President such as the Shrub is a result.
‘Course that all goes back to the Voter’s not having the sense to check out a candidates qualifications and background, relying instead on scripted sound bites and photo-ops to make their decision.
I’ve made that point with several R’s here who complained that he turned out to be a lousy President. Maybe they will next time.
This country can’t survive another cheerful clueless idiot in the WH.
Nice to have a discussion with someone and no name calling or other BS going on. Thanks.
Posted by farmer on Jan 14, 2008 at 8:15 PM I think the idea of awarding a state’s (or district’s, in the case of Washington D.C.) electoral votes according to the popular vote is a bad idea. The District of Columbia always votes overwhelmingly Democratic. If a Republican had only a very slight lead in the popular vote, then the D.C. electors would be awarded to the Republican. Do you think the Washington, D.C. voters would be happy with that ? They’d be FURIOUS and rightly so.
I’m a Libertarian and will not vote for any of the possible Democratic or Republican candidates.
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