Orrin Hatch writes about a meeting that actually hadn't happened yet

[franklin]

And yeah, I would love a centrist party too so I have a home, but this system creates pertinent discourse. That verbal fight seems to me to be what bothers people so much. Why?



(That, and AM radio has thrown a monkey wrench into it and completely ****ed the R party.)

 

[♪alt13]

It moderates the political process as progress takes hold but has the unintended consequences of getting way out of hand. When that looks like it will happen people switch parties and turn the tide back the other way. It also has a nice way of slowing down the radicals with loud voices from pushing their agendas down our throats. Politics has a nice way of paying attention to the loudest cry babies screaming wolf while not paying attention to the majority with reason who don't pipe up much but go on with their daily lives instead. Do you want a 10 party system that can grab power with, say a 15% majority, and then push their agenda onto you?

It's easier to chill and switch parties when you don't like the flavor of your local voting majority.

Which is why we should have ranked choice voting. Right now candidates get elected with the support of only about 30% of the voting age population and less than half of those that vote. Under Ranked choice voting the candidate needs to seek 2nd best and third best votes in order to win. This helps assure that a larger proportion of citizens at least approve of if not fully support a candidate.

 

[franklin]

Which is why we should have ranked choice voting. Right now candidates get elected with the support of only about 30% of the voting age population and less than half of those that vote. Under Ranked choice voting the candidate needs to seek 2nd best and third best votes in order to win. This helps assure that a larger proportion of citizens at least approve of if not fully support a candidate.

Does it? Is your issue that many people don't exercise their right to vote?

 

[Stoked]

also, lol @ the notion of the DNC being considered an "extremist" party. If Hillary didn't have her email scandals behind her she'd easily be the most centrist American presidential candidate of my lifetime

She is distrusted for far more than her emails.

 

[♪alt13]

Does it? Is your issue that many people don't exercise their right to vote?

Yes I think it does. Another option would be approval voting. Either one is going to temper the election better than our current binary first past the post system. In a ranked choice system candidates would be less dependent upon energizing a base and more dependent on being acceptable to people that may not share the opinions of that base.

The fact that many people do not exercise their right to vote is an issue but not the entire issue. I think that most of the people that don't vote have become cynical about the process and I think they have good reason to be. I don't think that they are too busy to vote or that they are unfamiliar with the candidates or that they just don't care. I think they know that they don't have a vote that matters and they don't feel that anyone is really representing them.

 

[♪alt13]

Check out [url]www.fairvote.org[/URL] if you're at all interested in alternatives to the current ballot system.

 

[franklin]

Yes I think it does. Another option would be approval voting. Either one is going to temper the election better than our current binary first past the post system. In a ranked choice system candidates would be less dependent upon energizing a base and more dependent on being acceptable to people that may not share the opinions of that base.

The fact that many people do not exercise their right to vote is an issue but not the entire issue. I think that most of the people that don't vote have become cynical about the process and I think they have good reason to be. I don't think that they are too busy to vote or that they are unfamiliar with the candidates or that they just don't care. I think they know that they don't have a vote that matters and they don't feel that anyone is really representing them.

Hope and Change!
Hope and Change!
Change!
Change!
Change!

The easy solution is to simply vote opposite party and make your vote matter. It doesn't matter what system you create, you will not cure voter apathy.

 

[green]

Which is why we should have ranked choice voting. Right now candidates get elected with the support of only about 30% of the voting age population and less than half of those that vote. Under Ranked choice voting the candidate needs to seek 2nd best and third best votes in order to win. This helps assure that a larger proportion of citizens at least approve of if not fully support a candidate.

The solution to young people voting is online voting. It's pretty simple: make an app that allows people to vote. You'd see young voters voting in record numbers.

But then the old codgers would lose their power and no one wants that.

Oh, and campaign finance reform. As long as big business can buy our politicians, we are screwed.

 

[Stoked]

The solution to young people voting is online voting. It's pretty simple: make an app that allows people to vote. You'd see young voters voting in record numbers.

But then the old codgers would lose their power and no one wants that.

Oh, and campaign finance reform. As long as big business can buy our politicians, we are screwed.

What kind of voting app wouldn't be super easy to hack and thereby skew results?

 

[JimLes]

Hate people that have a pre set opinion and are unwilling to budge or admit they were wrong.

Isn't that the whole point of politics? That you have opinions, you present them in your campaign, you get elected, and then you stick to those positions as promised?

I mean, is there anyone here who can honestly say they did not think less of Obama(however little you might have thought of him before) when his views on gay marriage "evolved" exactly when it became politically convenient?

 

[JimLes]

Most of those issues are not that black and white. How much more gun control? Or in what specific ways? Same with Abortion, education, healthcare, immigration, foreign policy... It's not an A or B choice world. There is A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H...

Fine, it's A or B1, B2, B3 then. You either support complete, unfettered access to abortion or not. That's binary. You support foreign wars or not. That's binary. You either support special policies against Muslim immigration or not. You either want to discriminate against Muslims or you don't want to. Wanting to discriminate a little is still wanting to discriminate.

These issues are binary, and the attempts to make them "not black and white" or talk about "moderate" positions is nothing more than a conservative attempt at semantics.

 

[Joe Bagadonuts]

Fine, it's A or B1, B2, B3 then. You either support complete, unfettered access to abortion or not. That's binary. You support foreign wars or not. That's binary. You either support special policies against Muslim immigration or not. You either want to discriminate against Muslims or you don't want to. Wanting to discriminate a little is still wanting to discriminate.

These issues are binary, and the attempts to make them "not black and white" or talk about "moderate" positions is nothing more than a conservative attempt at semantics.

We live in a country with an awful lot of people from a ton of different backgrounds. Most recognize that compromise is necessary. It's for that reason that we rarely end up with an all or nothing situation like the one you describe.

Can we abort an 8 month old fetus on a whim? No? then by your definition abortion must be illegal.
Are we allowed to obtain an unlimited collection of weapons? No? Then by your definition we must not have the right to bear arms. Or maybe we do have these rights, but have reached compromises somewhere in the middle.