I for one am praying for an AI to just take over... lol
See the companies squirm trying to figure out how to bribe a machine.
See the companies squirm trying to figure out how to bribe a machine.
Good God manlobbyists, liberals and traitorous right wingers who flood our country with illegals intentionally, and a left-wing media that doesn't report the truth to the American people, leaving a good majority of us stupid and willing to vote for someone as obviously evil as Hillary Clinton.
This country is without doubt the best in the world right now, but that also means we have a ton of rats trying to subvert us and turn us into Weimar republic and subsequently, into the soviet union.
What I've been saying all alongInstead of writing a treatise on why you don't like the American electoral system, you should instead research how other countries do it and suggest ways the American system could change to be fairer, drawing inspiration from other countries.
Maine is using ranked choice voting for state races this year as well. Utah and Oregon both passed ranked choice voting as well, but I believe only for local races.What I've been saying all along
Don't you guys have a ranked/"preferential" voting system down in Australia, rather than one where you only get to vote for one candidate?
The country is broken into electorates, the size of which could be several small country towns or a suburb of a city (done by population). You vote for who you want to represent your electorate, not for the prime minister you want. You can either number all the candidates in order, so if your number 1 candidate has the smallest number of votes your vote changes to your second preference and then everything is recounted etc. If you choose to not number all the boxes, each candidate makes a series of preference deals so that if they don't make it, the vote passes to someone they agree with. There can be a dozen or more parties. At the end, the party with the majority of the seats becomes the majority, and their leader is the prime minister. The leader can change any time so someone none of the public voted for can become prime minister - I learned recently that only 5 of the last 13 prime ministers initially came into power through an election.What I've been saying all along
Don't you guys have a ranked/"preferential" voting system down in Australia, rather than one where you only get to vote for one candidate?
That's a vast overestimate, but yeah there were a portion who did feel screwed over by Bernie's loss in the primary and followed the trolls over to the Trump side. It only took ~80,000 votes in 2 states to win the electoral college, so that's potentially enough Bernie bros to swing it. In that regard you're correct.Half the people who voted Trump probably only did so because they hated Clinton so much.
There can be a dozen or more parties.
I count 41 in my state last election! http://mobile.abc.net.au/news/federal-election-2016/guide/snsw/
Wow, this reads like straight out of mein kampf.lobbyists, liberals and traitorous right wingers who flood our country with illegals intentionally, and a left-wing media that doesn't report the truth to the American people, leaving a good majority of us stupid and willing to vote for someone as obviously evil as Hillary Clinton.
This country is without doubt the best in the world right now, but that also means we have a ton of rats trying to subvert us and turn us into Weimar republic and subsequently, into the soviet union.
We can surely aspire to better than that, and indeed biology itself would say we do. Also the entire point of socialisation, later farming and such, was to produce excess to allow specialisation and such, might something there play into this?If you don't go out and hunt for your food, you ain't gonna fucking eat and you and your pride will starve. If you don't defend your pride from threats, your your children will be killed, your women taken and raped, and your entire way of life will no longer exist.
He's a self-proclaimed nationalist, so you may not be that far offWow, this reads like straight out of mein kampf.
What embarrassment? I'm not embarrassed at all. It doesn't matter what your definition of liberal is, or what the classic definition of liberal is. These people call themselves liberal, so I will address them as such.A token search might have saved you some embarrassment right there.
A liberals fighting for entirely open borders? The few I have seen espouse such ideals would not typically fall under the definition of liberal (liberalism at its heart being rather concerned with the welfare of the individual rather than a collective, which is where I typically find the open borders set). Or is it just that you are using liberal as a slur without an understanding of the concepts underpinning it*? Certainly I doubt they would differ much on your assessment of unfettered immigration, though I would say fighting and dying for ideals rather a country is a better plan. Similarly what threats do you imagine there to be in the US? There is a lot of ocean either side and amazing natural defences top and bottom.
The brain/skills drain of places is a rather interesting concept, amusingly the internal US South's brain drain providing a considerable amount of data.
*more amusingly I imagine you would describe yourself as right wing after a fashion, your talking points certainly reflecting many I find there. If you are going to go with the two party thing then arguably you would want to be attracting the people that would fall under liberalism as many of said same seem to be rather unimpressed with a lot of the present "left" politics. If we must do hashtag politics then #walkaway I believe to be the umbrella term for it.
What about Venezuela? It is without question a sad tragedy, however I am not sure what real relevance that has to the point being made. If you are not careful you will dip into a debate tactic sometimes "whataboutism" wherein one attempts to deflect from an issue by presenting another unpleasant event. Typically considered a rather disingenuous tactic. Or if you prefer just because somewhere else is comparatively a shithole does not mean you take your eyes off the prize, or maybe lead by example rather than resting on your laurels.
We can surely aspire to better than that, and indeed biology itself would say we do. Also the entire point of socialisation, later farming and such, was to produce excess to allow specialisation and such, might something there play into this?
Going further there social inequality has nothing to do with results, some confuse the concept and I too find it intensely aggravating. A phrasing that might be worth contemplating is equality of opportunity rather than equality of outcome.
Are you saying it's ok for someone else's choices to affect what you're able to do? What happened to land of the free home of the brave? This would be the opposite of freedom.Some people might have parents who were smart, and saved up money so their kids don't have to struggle. That isn't a sign of being spoiled, it's a sign that the system fucking worked and that this kid's parents did the right thing.
If your parents had made beytter choices, they might have been better prepared and able to give their kids more opportunities. Sure.Are you saying it's ok for someone else's choices to affect what you're able to do? What happened to land of the free home of the brave? This would be the opposite of freedom.
If your parents aren't rich, you're cut off from ever accessing many things in life (e.g. going to university or having quality healthcare) and restricted from having choices available that could help your kids. Of course you think this is OK as long as you're on the "haves" side of the haves/have nots side of the divide.
If your parents had made beytter choices, they might have been better prepared and able to give their kids more opportunities. Sure.
You think I'm on the haves? id on't even fucking have health care right now despite the fact that I currently work a very physical job overnights. I'm not rich by any stretch of the imagination.
if you can'tgo to university, then find somehting fucking else to do. You don't need to go to univesity to be successful. Go to a fucking trade school. Go to a library and use their computers to browse Youtube and learn a skill. Do fucking somehting.
So ... we all have 'opportunities' ... and they're all 'equal' ... yet some people get opportunities others don't. This is not a contradiction, how? If I can afford to go to an elite private school, then go to Harvard and get my tuition fees paid, and become a lawyer and make a six figure income by the time I'm 25, but you, who are smarter, could only go to the local public school, didn't get into Harvard, can't afford to even go to a community college, and are forced to take up unpaid internships and live hand to mouth for 10 years before you even crack a living wage, and then you die of tuberculosis because you couldn't afford healthcare - this is equality of opportunity, in your eyes?However, when thought of logically, "equality of opportunity" is something we all already fucking have.
Sorry, but I thought that this would speak for itself. I'm from Belgium, I really don't think our system is perfect by any means. However, I dare say that when compared to the USA, we have a de facto better system when it comes to democracy in terms of "ruling by the people". Let's see...Instead of writing a treatise on why you don't like the American electoral system, you should instead research how other countries do it and suggest ways the American system could change to be fairer, drawing inspiration from other countries.
That's quite interesting! Thanks for writing that up. Voting is obligatory here too, and I'm not sure if it is best - should someone who comes in and votes the way the campaigners outside tell them to, or the TV ads tell them to, get as much of a vote as those who do loads of research to make an informed decision about what is best? There's probably a good argument to make it obligatory but I don't know what it is - maybe that the election should count the voices of every citizen, instead of skipping people that can't get time off work etc.Sorry, but I thought that this would speak for itself. I'm from Belgium, I really don't think our system is perfect by any means. However, I dare say that when compared to the USA, we have a de facto better system when it comes to democracy in terms of "ruling by the people". Let's see...
1) we have a good handfull of competing parties. And too many posts, but I'll spare you a boring difference between regional and federal government AND between Flanders and Wallonie. But each election, we get to vote for the following parties:
-PVDA: this party is what passes for extreme left, and most likely described as "communist scum" in the USA. To be honest...they're not that far off.
-Groen: a mainly left-side party with strong emphasis on the environment
-SP-A: classic left. mainly concerned with affordable jobs. Basically the union's choice. Bernie Sanders would probably fit either in here best.
-CD&V: the most centered party. Concerned with whatever is politically hot (and therefore not really standing for anything in particular).
-VLD: the classic employer's party. Loves the free market, but is about center-right
-NV-A: initially elected because they want to split up Flanders, but since they're in government they just have some right-ish agenda.
-Vlaams Blok: basically the party for racists. Ironically enough: even though often seen as 'extreme right' on the streets (which is also why other parties downright refuse to form a government with them), even they don't dream about following Trump's stances.
-a few blanks. Each election, you've got a few jokers. Small parties that are either throwaway votes (I'll get to that) or just focus on one particular issue
...and that's just on Flanders's side. Wallon has differently named and lead parties, but who are sort of similar.
Result: none of that "I have to vote for the least evil" bullshit. If you don't like a party's stance, you just pick another one. Not many people go the whole spectrum, but depending how they fare they might rise or lower in the polls.
Note: we only get to vote for one party, and from one person within that party (no, this shouldn't be the party leader...you can vote for anyone within). I'd much prefer it if we could rank these parties in terms of importance rather than just voting for one, but alas. Oh, and even better: I want to be able to fucking vote for Wallon parties, damnit!
2) once the votes are counted, the percentage of votes each party had determines the amount of governmental power might have. At this point, the parties start talking to each other, because a representing government needs to consist of the majority of what the people voted for. This can be a problem if all the parties have roughly the same amount of votes (and different ideologies), but that's where compromising comes in.
Result: none of that "I represent 51% of the voters, so screw the rest of the population" bullshit. Let alone that "I have less votes but in better positions, so I call ALL the shots".
3) influence is a tricky one, but here too, the different parties, alliances and opposition help smooth things out. In both our countries, it's almost unheard that someone within the party critiques someone from their own party. But there can be plenty of critique from the opposition, or - much harder to deal with - another party in the government. As it stands, NV-A and CD&V are on some sort of cold war against each other. But because they're both in the government and they both can make the government fall if they leave, they are forced to settle their differences and come to agreements.
The influence of lobbying groups...I've got to admit I don't know much about that. I'm inclined to believe that they have a harder time because groups need to bribe multiple parties AND keep it secret for others, but again: I'm not too familiar with that on our end. One study revealing that the Belgian government is among the least corrupt in the world is obviously nice, but hardly overwhelming evidence.
On media, we're different in that we still do have state television. These are more or less obligated to give each party airtime depending on their popularity and (within reasons) to report rather unbiassed. When there's upcoming elections (like what'll happen in about three months from now), there is a "no commercial period" forced on the parties. While that's obviously hard to truly maintain (a couple weeks ago, I've heard of a mini-scandal: two NV-A politicians walked around in campaign T-shirts), it's nowhere NEAR the circus that it is in America.
Result: a more civil climate among politicians. It's still nowhere near as it should be (politicians still sort-of try to shift credit to them and blame to others), but it's easy to see which ones we prefer.
...and one I want to bring up while it's not mentioned in my opening post:
4) make voting obligated. This is rather controversial, and even in our country not many think our obligation to vote is a good thing. To those, I'd like to point out American situations that reflect the other side of a right to vote as opposed to a duty.
-since we have to vote, we might as well take interest in politics. Or at least enough to know what each party stands for.
-every Belgian has a passport (unless I'm mistaken, the best ID you have is a driver's license), and that's really all you need to vote.
-during election days, children see their parents vote and get taught into the why.
-since everyone needs to vote, election boots are put up in every area
Result: none of that bullshit like people having to spend hours to vote (Christ...the most time I ever spent voting is 30 minutes, and that was because I went during rush hour. It's also including door-to-door travel time), having trouble getting registered or votes being ignored for other reasons.
@alexg1989 : okay...I read your posts, and as you can imagine, I disagree with most. However, I would suggest that you make your own thread if you want to discuss things, as you left talking about elections more than a few posts ago. Go on...try it. It's free.
lobbyists, liberals and traitorous right wingers who flood our country with illegals intentionally, and a left-wing media that doesn't report the truth to the American people, leaving a good majority of us stupid and willing to vote for someone as obviously evil as Hillary Clinton.
This country is without doubt the best in the world right now, but that also means we have a ton of rats trying to subvert us and turn us into Weimar republic and subsequently, into the soviet union.