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down with democracy...up with the republic...
I am also of the belief that political junkies don't have all of the answers. This smacks of the political class 'knowing what is best for you'. All I had to do to come to that conclusion was look at the source... The Blaze... aka Glenn Beck, someone that even as a right wing conservative, I can barely stomach for more than 10 minutes before I want to choke on my vomit. He's not universally 'popular', despite his own beliefs... its like saying that all liberals are in love with Howard Stearn. If either were, they wouldn't be locked up on a Sirius radio channel.
What is never suggested, is how do you implement something like this? Who gets to be the person that determines what those questions are, what if we require 25% of the questions to be about Native American history for example? Are they not just as much a part of American History as anyone else? Maybe we should require x questions on Black History, etc. you get the point.
At this point, we have heard venomous accusations about some mass left wing conspiracy invading Republican primaries and steering the vote toward Cruz... somehow, Hillary and Bernie, in the spare time between their dead-heat competition for their own nomination, are telling their voters to NOT turn out to vote for themselves, but instead turn out by the 100s of thousands in each state to vote for Trump to make sure Cruz doesn't win. Do you have any idea how stupid that sounds? Particularly to someone that has a lot of experience with government types? These are people that can obviously not get to a senate vote in a timely manner, let alone organize 50,000 volunteer staffers. This is absurd.
Maybe the more 'obvious' answer is that Cruz just isn't politically and/or personally appealing to wide chunks of the American voters? There isn't enough of the 'zeros' to significantly change predicted voting patterns, obviously, there is a combination of both new primary voters, as well as established primary voters to equal a 25-35% increase in Republican voter turnout.
I have the unique distinction of having never been 'wrong' on elections in my 28 year history of picking them. It's a combination of poll research, voter moods, and the objective likability of the candidates. I picked Romney's loss at his first debate during the primary, thinking he just came across as too strange to really attract the vote. He walked like a penguin, was obnoxious to people on the campaign trail, and had the general sense of being an asshole about him. That turned out to be very true, I even held my nose to vote for him in the general and I know I'm not alone in that assessment, I was voting for the R, not the person.
Maybe many people feel like that, if someone says they are a Republican, I'm not going to argue with them about it. If they say they are a Christian, I'll take it at face value until I see them walking into satanic ritual or something.
At this point, we've heard all of the excuses... there are too many people in the contest... it's the open primaries and democrats are crossing the fence (don't we kind of want something like that to happen? Shit, it would make it easy to win an election!), so and so was once a democrat (so was Reagan), so and so changed his mind on an issue (hasn't everyone done that in their lives? - if we didn't convert college students, it would have been a 110% democrat country long ago).
Hasn't everyone kind of looked at the imagery of night vision camera video of thousands of people running drugs in backpacks across the border and thinking "we have 350 million people in this country, we defeated fascism in less than 5 years, and we can't figure out how to build a fence?" Don't lie, everyone has thought that at one time or another. Doesn't it seem like 'everything' is made in China these days? Does anyone really believe we have '5% unemployment'?
What's the competition here? A simple marketing-designed campaign message, or complex flat tax & religious patriotism arguments. Personally, I kind of like my tax deductions and depreciation schedules.. a 15% flat tax would kick my ass... That's kind of the case for a lot of Republicans that own property, etc.
Sometimes the simplest answer is the right one, over-analyzing voters, the competence of politicians and political campaigns, or government itself is usually a fallacy and incorrect.
You are correct, of course. Most of this is a merely a thought experiment. But it's also an interesting commentary on how far our nation has fallen into mob rule.
"obviously, there is a combination of both new primary voters, as well as established primary voters"
I happen to believe that there is an even simpler answer: that there aren't two ideologies/parties which can sufficiently cover the voting spectrum. I think that the Democratic Party figured this out twenty+ years ago when they started moving their party toward hard-core progressivism and ignoring the large "blue-dog Democrats" that were so popular around Reagan's time. It's no wonder that the Democratic Party now votes almost entirely as a party because they are only supporting and campaigning for those who share progressive/socialist values.
The Republicans stupidly assume that this gives them a larger voting base. It doesn't. It is impossible to appeal to everyone at the same time. Anyone who has taken Marketing 101 in college will tell you that the secret to successful product marketing is segmentation - focusing on specific/targeted markets. This is where the Republicans are absolutely awful and why they get in so much trouble: being a Republican in today's age means absolutely nothing ideologically! It used to be that the Republican party was largely conservative in nature. That hasn't really been true for two decades at least, but is one of the reasons RINO is such an common pejorative. RINO really means anti-conservative Republican.
What really needs to happen is that we need more choices in the political landscape. We have only two choices right now and together they only barely represent about 50% of the voting public and that number decreases every year. I think we need more market segregation so that there are more options for people to pick from. We need a Libertarian Party (Rand Paul). We need a Constitution Party (Ted Cruz). We need a Business Party (Donald Trump). We need these to fill in the holes left by the Republican Party (Marco Rubio), the Democratic-Progressive Party (Hillary Clinton), and the Democratic-Socialist Party (Bernie Sanders).
I generally agree on the spectrum and multi-party thing, but our electoral college system more or less makes a third-party, or multiple parties unlikely. If you split up the electoral vote counts, it quickly becomes impossible to win the presidency. I know other countries do the coalitions to form a government thing, but I don't see how that would work without significantly changing the constitution. For example, would the 'Peace & Freedom Party' or whatever support a Democrat in exchange for a couple of cabinet positions and turning over their 30 electoral votes (?), would the Senate then confirm the cabinet positing, what if it doesn't? etc.
The other argument I'm sick of is "if so & so is on the top of the ticket, every Republican down the ticket will suffer..." Oh really? what does one have to do with the price of tea in China? Romney was the top of the ticket in 2012, and the Republicans gained seats... and you can't find a worse candidate than that guy was. We've had strong Republican presidents that lost seats during the mid-year, so if any Republicans are in trouble, it's the winds of change blowing.
What is really a fact, is between Sanders, Trump, and Cruz, about 70% of the voters are saying "I've had enough of this BS"... and are voting for something completely different. It's not 65% voting against Trump... I still have yet to figure out that math on that bullshit when he's getting the high 40's pretty regularly in a 4-man race. It's 70% are not happy, period.
The smart thing to do would be to understand that, embrace that, and maybe start realizing that the guys that have been there for 20, 30, and 40 years need to go back to being a 'citizen' as the elected government was intended. I'm not in favor of term limits if someone is doing a good job, but the gerrymandering of districts to makes sure the same person always wins is really a problem for me. I live in a district that literally follows a freeway lane (one freeway lane) for 30 miles, connecting two very conservative districts and skipping over 30 miles of very liberal political leanings... consequently, we have Tom McClintock. I happen to like Tom McClintock very much, he's very ultra-conservative, does he necessarily represent the general political direction of Northern California? Not really. He's also impossible to defeat even if the district wanted to change direction, he didn't even have an opponent in the last election to my knowledge. That's not good for the Republic. Tom uses the term "Rathead in a Coke Bottle" by the way. I think I first heard it from him actually.
That's largely a result of the Twelfth Amendment. Prior to its passing, the President went to the highest vote-getter and the Vice-President went to the second highest. I'd like to re-institute that system.
Your concerns about coalition government are well-founded and I am not trying to dismiss them. What I think broadening out the Party system would do is make it much harder for any single Party to run government. That's how we've gotten Obamacare and other similar disasters.
"What is really a fact, is between Sanders, Trump, and Cruz, about 70% of the voters are saying "I've had enough of this BS""
I agree. The people do not feel as if any of the mainstream candidates is truly representative of them. There was a great article I read that was an analysis of many of Trump's supporters and it contended that it wasn't Republicans who were voting for Trump as much as the disenfranchised Democrats!
And the democrats voting thing just doesn't hold, while its certainly true that he is very much attracting independents and disenfranchised Blue Dog Democrats, I fail to either see where that is a problem, nor does it significantly change the outcome. He continues to win whether its an open or closed primary, not by as large of a margin, but that only indicates to me that Cruz is just not attractive in a general election.
The other criticism - Trump can't beat Hillary, is also BS, they only poll 'likely voters' for that, not the 65% that don't usually vote... when its really about 1 establishment versus 1 rebelling figure, the 70% that are unhappy with the establishment are going to vote for their preferred, in fact, many Bernie voters suggest Trump is their alternative because they have so much hatred of Hillary.
Nonetheless the numbers that show up continue to be very different from what was polled. Ask Hillary about Michigan. If she can't beat a self-declared socialist, she can't beat a marketing master. Secondly, he hasn't even started on her, he has no personal boundaries, the whole Clinton Bimbo Eruption is coming out, Benghazi, Email, Impeached for not defining 'oral sex' as 'sex', lying to congress, its all coming out... Granted, much of that is 'not Hillary', but it's certainly Bill and he's on the trail for her, so he's certainly fair game. Just wait until the Clinton Foundation donor records are commonly known.... Is it really wise to have a person as President that takes millions from friends of Putin, supporters of Islamic terrorism, or Russian mafia figures?
I would argue that a more likely conspiracy is not that democrats are 'crossing lines' to make sure that Trump wins out of a perception that he is a weaker candidate, rather, I would be amazed if Bernie is not getting significant contributions from Republicans to help keep him in the race and keep clubbing on Hillary... that would be conservative 'malpractice' to not do so... heck, both my wife and I threw him some cash, and I know many who have as well, I think its hilarious. That's just good defense.
Cruz and his people are so arrogant that they can't possibly imagine that not everyone sees his point of view. Regardless of his politics and that question, that standpoint of his is probably his most negative trait. Having a legitimate conversation and debate is a hallmark of our republic, you would think he as a trial lawyer would understand that.
I wasn't holding it as a problem per se, merely an indication of how the current system isn't representative of the majority of the people as per your observation. The original thrust of the article was to analyze whether or not Trump's popularity was coming from the traditional/conservative base of the Republican party or somewhere else and the author looked at whether or not the voting primaries were open or closed in nature. What he noted was that Trump was losing in states with closed primaries and winning in states with open primaries. He also noted that overall participation in the Democratic primaries was down about the same number of votes that the Republican primaries were up year-over-year. It was a strong correlation pointing to the base of Donald Trump's support not being conservative in nature, but rather strongly libertarian or what once would have been called the "blue-dog Democrat" - those disenfranchised by the Democratic Party's move farther left.
"that only indicates to me that Cruz is just not attractive in a general election"
With only polling data to go from (as reliable as that is), that isn't a well-founded belief, however. In national polls comparing candidates head-to-head, both Rubio and Cruz beat Hillary and Sanders head-to-head. "The Donald" loses to Hillary (though he defeated Sanders). See http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epol...
I also saw another analysis that noted that Trump's support had peaked out at about 38% and hasn't moved in months, while the winnowing of the Republican field has seen both Rubio and Cruz steadily climb in favorability polls in the Republican Party. That article suggested that "The Donald" had peaked and that he was winning because so many candidates were still in the field fighting for each others' votes. Of course, by the time Rubio and Kasich drop out, it may well be a moot point because Florida in particular is a winner-take-all state. If Trump gets it because the rest of the vote is split, it's going to be very difficult for Cruz to overcome the vote gap.
"Cruz and his people are so arrogant that they can't possibly imagine that not everyone sees his point of view."
I'd suggest you watch several of Ted Cruz' town hall meetings. He's talked face to face with people who staunchly oppose him yet he is polite while explaining to them why he feels the way he does. Iowa was a classic example where he was able to convince a majority of the voters that even though he opposed the subsidies which were their life, he explained how eliminating ALL the subsidies would be better for everyone. (http://www.nbcnews.com/video/iowa-vot...) Does he feel strongly about things? Yes, because he holds to specific principles. But seeing someone else's point of view does not mean I have to change mine. I think you may be confusing the two.
The second part of that particular comment with which I must take issue is the insinuation that Trump doesn't engage in that type of behavior. Trump's vulgar personal attacks on everyone from Megyn Kelly to Marco Rubio to basically everyone else demonstrate that Trump is an even worse offender than your perception of Cruz. Short of [maybe] Hillary Clinton, there isn't a candidate still in the race as narcissistic as Donald Trump. Does he have some ideas I agree with? Yes. My primary concern with Trump is whether or not he will choose to limit himself to the duties of the Office of the President when he has already come out in favor of Executive Orders as a means of advancing policy/agenda. I don't want another Emperor-wanna-be. I don't want a reality TV show star who just wants time in the limelight. I want someone who's principles take us to free markets and an original interpretation of the Constitution. I am the least wary of Cruz abusing the position. Hillary tops that list, but Trump isn't too far behind.
"...you would think he as a trial lawyer would understand that."
As a lawyer who defended - successfully I might add - both the First and Second Amendments before the Supreme Court, I think he understands it better than any other candidate hands down. And his conduct when confronted in town hall meetings and rallies by oppositionists only reinforces that opinion in me. I've watched Donald Trump's behavior and he frankly comes off so similar to Obama (petulant, whiny, angry, and accusational when he loses vs. incredibly arrogant and condescending when he wins) that it's tremendously off-putting to me. The last person I want in the White House is someone who can be so easily goaded to lose one's temper. That's the hallmark of a person of remarkably little self-control.
As I said though, Cruz's enemy isn't his politics, its his mannerisms. He basically insulted everyone in the state of New York for example as 'questionable politics', or however he put it. Instead of attacking Trump, he chose to attack 30 million people for example without acknowledging that Trump polls very highly in New York and New Jersey. As I said in a previous post, electoral points win elections, not votes, if you flip New York & New Jersey, its game-over for the democrats. I'd argue he could easily take California as well, as we are mostly a red-state with a few urban outcroppings (all but 6 California counties normally vote 'red'). Flip enough in the urban areas and California is very much in play. Cruz would never be successful at that, he's kind of hispanic, but he's Cuban, not really hispanic in the sense of Mexican or Central American. Over 50% of California is hispanic. The Southern baptist preacher thing is popular in Texas politics, but nowhere else... his assumption was that it would be in the south, but that's just not proving it.
And while you are correct that Trump attacked Megyn Kelly (and kind of rightfully so based on her questioning during that debate), he has since been very gracious to her and she's very endearing of him it seems on election nights. In fact he was complimenting her in his news conference last night and they flipped to her and she smiled/blushed/etc. He's a gentleman when he wants to be. I've seen Megyn simply asking other candidates when they are going to get out of the race because they have no chance.
Contrary, we can make the same argument about Rubio, he has acted like a spoiled frat boy the last couple of weeks, his own antics have sealed his fate while trying to point out Trump's faults. He made himself look like a total fool in the process.
And here's my last criticism of the approach - the assumption that just because someone is evangelical, that they 'must' vote for an evangelical candidate. Isn't that kind of like saying that a black voter 'must' vote for a black candidate, or a female 'must' vote for a female? If the last was true, this would have been over yesterday, but its not. In fact, 35% of evangelicals say they are pro-choice (for example). I was in the dentist yesterday and the girl doing my teeth cleaning was (for some reason I'll never understand) talking about health insurance and how she had went to get an IUD after recently getting married and they told her it would be $1200 after her insurance paid its share, but $800 if she bought the device online from Canada... but then instead went to Planned Parenthood and it was free. Cruz is out there saying he will 'defund Planned Parenthood' and pretty much without really looking at the facts... Trump in contrast is 'correctly' saying that they do a lot of critical work for young women without much income. I'll stand on the podium every time and say that it is cheaper to hand out free contraception than welfare benefits for single moms... We can debate the fact that the guy is a willing participant and should do the right thing and join the military & take care of business... but we all know that is a small number, most of them bail out and the kid grows up in poverty. Attacking the institution that is the only thing preventing that (not belittling their obvious sins), is offensive to big chunks of America. My wife and I are comfortably in that horrible wealthy group that doesn't 'pay our fair share of taxes', but my wife went to Planned Parenthood when she was a young woman in college to get the things she needed, and she won't touch voting for Cruz for that single issue reason. We're also Catholic and she thinks evangelicals are pretty much a cult, but I won't get into that either. Suffice it to say, Cruz isn't winning big with Catholics either, a much larger group than evangelicals.
Trump's strategy (what I'm saying) is pretty darn genius, the only people he has legitimately offended, are also people that can't vote or vote against him (illegal immigrants).
"I'm not buying the argument that Trump loses against Hillary or Bernie"
I'm just reporting what polling is saying. Until the vote actually takes place, it's all just speculation anyway.
"If Cruz was benefiting from it, he wouldn't be complaining about the open primary process. "
I've never heard any such complaints. The last thing I heard was Cruz rejecting the idea of a brokered convention and letting the votes go where they lie. From a person still in second place, that's pretty remarkable to me.
"He basically insulted everyone in the state of New York"
I'd go back and re-read what Cruz actually said. He criticized New York-style politics (which are decidedly liberal/progressive) and associated Donald Trump with that because of his acknowledged participation in them and his payments to New York Democrats as "the price of business". If you really want to get into the gaffes, Trump's description of Iowans as "stupid" is notable (https://www.bostonglobe.com/news/poli.... That is Trump very literally insulting everyone in the state of Iowa.
"if you flip New York & New Jersey, its game-over for the democrats"
Very true, but also very hard to pull off. They were saying the same thing about Romney, too. Remember, Hillary Clinton was a Senator from New York State. I think it would be incredibly idealistic to pull that lever at this juncture. I'm not saying he couldn't do it - especially if Hillary actually gets indicted - but I think you paint a much rosier picture than I do at this point in time. The same for California. I'd love to see them vote for a change, but I don't see the prospect with more than a 15% chance of happening.
"And while you are correct that Trump attacked Megyn Kelly (and kind of rightfully so based on her questioning during that debate),"
Ah, so it is justified to attack someone in the press with disgusting and vile language because you don't like a question they ask? Not buying that one. Civility is marked by those who ignore the incivility in others. Again it comes back to self-control. If it is that easy to push "The Donald's" buttons, can you imagine what might happen when he talks to certain foreign dignitaries, like from China, Iran, or Russia? And what about when Trump is the instigator? Are you willing to call him out as the bully? He was the first one to go after Ted Cruz as "nasty"...
"Contrary, we can make the same argument about Rubio"
Agreed. Both sides are making idiots of themselves. But they are also both playing the game. It's the sign of a narcissist when even the perceived slight is something one can't let go.
"the assumption that just because someone is evangelical, that they 'must' vote for an evangelical candidate."
I don't know who is making that assumption. I'm certainly not. I didn't pull the lever last night for Cruz because of his religious views. Besides that, didn't Donald Trump make a big deal about being a Christian, too? I think you're reading a lot more into that issue than really exists.
"Cruz is out there saying he will 'defund Planned Parenthood' and pretty much without really looking at the facts... Trump in contrast is 'correctly' saying that they do a lot of critical work for young women without much income."
That's an ideological stance that differs not one whit from Hillary Clinton, which is why Cruz is pointing it out. Cruz is focused on conservative voters and a hot-button issue with them. Remember, Romney lost in part because he couldn't present a clear alternative to Obama on key issues like the ACA.
"I'll stand on the podium every time and say that it is cheaper to hand out free contraception than welfare benefits for single moms."
And if that's how PP made most of its money, I doubt there would be as much uproar about the matter - aside from the fact that we both know there is no such thing as a free handout of any kind.
Again, you're welcome to vote how you see fit and I sincerely appreciate the pleasant discussion. What I am looking for is a President who respects the rule of law and the Office of President of the United States. If Donald Trump fits that category, great. If not, he really will be the biggest con man in this century (or maybe second behind Barack Obama). Romney was laughed to scorn during his debate with Obama when he cited Putin and Russia as still the greatest threat to the United States. Romney turned out to be dead on. I hope he isn't right on Trump as well.
Behind closed doors, Cruz has been crying foul at just about every opportunity he gets - "its the open primaries", etc.. He actually started laying out his campaign about 5-6 years ago, as to what it would take, and he's been using voter turnout numbers from the last election in the strategy where evangelicals largely stayed home. Call it the mormon thing, the odd mannerisms of the candidate, being the only one out of 350 million Americans that couldn't really directly criticize ObamaCare, or a mixture of all of those.
His campaign has been completely designed from the ground up with rhetoric to attract the evangelical voter, but assuming that all other votes would remain the same. Unfortunately, we are in an anti-establishment and disruptive cycle of politics, so the rhetoric and strategy as-designed is 4 years out of date. He also never anticipated a non-traditional candidate. Neither did Hillary you might say.
I think we're both getting at the same thing, I don't sense that either of us are particularly invested in this at a personal level (I know I'm not), and I agree, the exchange is interesting.
I actually get a lot of personal satisfaction out of watching the powers that be crumbling into an abysmal black hole of depression over things not going their way.
I'd personally really like to see both Kasich and Rubio get out (very soon), just to settle the question of Cruz vs Trump, if Cruz wins, I'll vote all day for him. I've been just arguing that he is not the super-candidate the ultra-right has made him out to be. If that was the case, the South should have been a cakewalk. He actually took his largest shellacking in the South (in contrast).
It's really about the party being very, very out of touch with their constituents, and the anti-voter sentiment that has developed is very alarming. Romney taking to the airwaves and the phone banks is particularly insulting, as he's advocating Cruz in some states, Rubio in others, and Kasich in Ohio... he's only trying to setup a situation where he can swoop in at the election or some non-sense like that, anyone that can't see that is particularly dense.
One thing I know we will both agree on, is if they pull the hoodwinks over at the convention and nullify the will of the voters, be it Trump or Cruz, I think we'll see the end of the Republican party.
In a hilarious twist of fate, the Democrat contest is equally rigged. The 'Super Delegates' are somehow standing 100% with Hillary, practically nullifying Bernie's wins. I think we may legitimately see a situation where Bernie wins the voter-driven delegate count, or comes so close so as to not guarantee a Hillary win prior to the convention, say its 52 to 48% or something, and then the 'Super Delegates' break 100% for Hillary... you might see a severe civil war in their ranks as well.
This is what has become so corrupt about our system, and the one thing that I really do like about Trump. Traditionally, the barrier to entry is enormous, you have to 'pay your dues'... you need to be out walking precincts for 3 elections before you can really even get some help running for school board. Before I learned the 'process' - I did it the hard way, I walked the precinct and got signatures for my name to go on the ballot and filed my paperwork. The party didn't endorse me, and instead, they went with the guy that they 'liked'. I found out later how that 'works' - they bring in all the party people to drinks at a bar and pass the nomination papers around and everyone signs them over beers & scrapes the peanuts off... that's how you get backed in California. In a large state, the cost is unimaginable for the media time, so you need that party support. Trump turned that on its ear and no one saw him coming.
Years ago, I saw and endorsed the most articulate, conservative, and brilliant [black] Republican candidate I had seen in a long time for a state office, the party picked 'the other guy' because he happened to be an attorney for Yes on Prop 8 (the gay marriage ban). The guy I liked had lived in the district for 30 years, had been on school board, community college board, volunteered extensively at his church, volunteered at every charity in town, and was the Chief of Staff for another elected official downtown for the last 6 years. Couldn't pick a better guy, but he wasn't 'their' guy - so they refused to endorse him. Let's add that the Yes on 8 guy didn't actually live in the district, he rented a 1 bedroom apartment for a mailbox and called it good, needless to say the Democrat opponent sniffed that out in 30 seconds... like, what's a high-dollar attorney doing living in a $400 / month dump? Of course, it didn't go well, and a seat that had been Republican since the beginning of time for a district that is about 12% Veteran and a per-capita income north of $80,000 was lost.
So, I'm not terribly invested into any one of these guys, I'm just really, really enjoying watching both parties get their asses handed to them with their dirty laundry on the line.. It would seem, that how the sausage is made is finally being done out in the open.
I sincerely hope both will learn something from this, but I really, really doubt it.
So say the people who want the government to control our health care -- and really all aspects of our lives.
"The idea is that citizenship should be something you not only know how to wrestle with, but also earn."
Yes!
But I question the wisdom of aggregating both political power and money in the same hands with no counterbalance. If you were to suggest one portion of the Legislature to be voted on based on property and another to be a popular representation... Oh, wait: you'd get back to the original Senate and House.
In a very real sense, however, the country is already being ruled by the rich. It's called Lobbying. And what has been the result: laws passed that favor a few at the expense of the many. Your suggestion is interesting, but basically leads to business oligarchies running the country and we can pretty much see that in Japan with the keiretsus. Their economic meddling led to their meltdown in the 90's from which they haven't really recovered.
Now one idea I have floated before is to restrict campaign finance contributions to individuals who actually lived within a representative's district. If you - personally - don't live in that district, you can't donate money to them. Can you imagine what that would do to the excesses of lobbying?
And it's not a free speech issue at all. "No taxation without representation" can just as easily be turned on its head as "No representation without taxation" - which is one of the points you make and I agree with. Voting ultimately is about individual voters anyway - not corporations, unions, etc. What I get tired of are people with a lot of money going into other states and trying to affect their politics even though they aren't going to be the ones affected by decisions made for that district - like Bloomberg's recent stab at Virginia's gun rights or the Wisconsin education union vs Scott Walker or a hundred+ other such attempts. I want politics to get back to being local because I believe it would encourage more people to get involved and educated - which leads to better decision-making and better life in general.
"I think that the change to only letting taxpayers vote would change things considerably..."
I completely agree, but I would advocate for something slightly more specific: that those who receive welfare checks waive their rights to vote from the time when they receive the checks until the voting year after they stop receiving them.
I do not disagree that gerrymandering is a problem, but this proposal was not meant to deal with gerrymandering.
Fifth grade civics is not an adequate understanding of government to pass a "voter IQ" test.
People are voting to unabashedly steal from others. The test must have some trick questions that expose looters and cause immediate rejection from voting.
I also like the other idea that if you make your subsistence from government welfare checks, you are ineligible to vote. I think we ought to add one little checkbox at the bottom of the government welfare forms that says "By accepting this service, I acknowledge that I am unfit to vote and hereby waive my privilege to vote in any elections this year."
Dems who'd oppose such a test as well as picture IDs would surely circulate cheat sheets.
In states where property ownership is declared as joint for married couples, that's not a problem. It certainly might be in states where married couples must still file individually.
"You go to the welfare line, and you sign away voting before you get your check."
YES!
Also, persons running for any office, even dog-catcher, should be made to take the test. And they must pass by 85%.
I can see a way to create a list of questions that 'all sides' would agree on: Allow all parties unlimited vetoes on the questions and a limited amount of time in which to create the test. If it does not get created in that span of time, then dissolve the committee, appoint new people and try again. Do this until a test emerges.
I wounder 'how' this would work, though. Would you have to take the test in the voting booth, concurrent with voting? That would be the only way you could be sure that the person taking the test and the person casting the vote were the same individual.
Jan
I like it. And don't pay any committee member who doesn't produce a functional test!
"Would you have to take the test in the voting booth, concurrent with voting?"
Sure. And make it an adaptive test so sharing answers doesn't get you very far.
Jan
Seriously, though, part of the author's contention is that we don't need more passive voters waiting for others to tell them what to do, how to vote, or what the answers to the test questions are. We need actively engaged voters who research the issues, look at history, and think for themselves.
Can you imagine what would happen to the makeup of Congress if not only the voters, but the candidates had to pass this test to vote today? My vote would be worth tens of thousands of votes! ;)
.
This article unintentionally shows the slippery slope the test could take. The article starts off saying it shouldn't be seen as a duty to vote even if you don't know what the election is about. It says you should have to get at least a 70% on a ten-question test of basic facts to vote.
Then he says you should vote if you don't pay taxes. Everyone pays taxes, but I assume he means income taxes. Now we're talking about excluding half the population. We'd be excluding disabled people, people retired on a modest income, people who had a bad year in business. Then he goes on implies that youth, excessive drinking, and being single, not being involved in community organizations should disqualify voters. You can see it quickly sliding into a vote for a narrow group of people. If we got there, the elections would be decided by the committee that determines who gets to vote rather than the people. He says "the system is rigged," in reference to our current system, but it sounds more like his proposed system.
So while I strongly disagree with how he presents this, I agree with his initial claim: there should be some basic test of facts to vote. It wouldn't be perfect. Ignorant people would still vote. But it would be a little harder. There would be a little less effort by campaigns to reach voters who hardly know what's going on and may just hear a few soundbites on the radio when they pass by it. This article unintentionally illustrates, though, once voting rights aren't sacrosanct, there's the risk of voting being decided by people like this author with a laundry list of traits that make you ineligible to vote.
are "paying into the system". Seeing how irration-
ally the public schools are run, I do not want any
fifth-grade exam determining who may and who
may not vote.
That said, I do not approve of agitating
people to vote who do not care to. My idea is,
if you want to vote for my candidate, vote. If
you want to vote for his opponent, well, maybe
you would benefit from a little more time in bed
before you went to work, and maybe you won't
have time then, and that's all right.That is to
say: If you don't want to vote, you probably
shouldn't.
Ditto for forcing a narrow voting window. That is an appalling suggestion that can easily be used to exclude entire classes of voters. For example, slashing the number of voting venues in areas with high black or Hispanic populations, forcing them to queue up for the full 12 hours with, even then, no guarantee of getting a vote in. Meanwhile, in the comfortable white middle/upper class areas, plenty of polling stations where people can come in, validate themselves, cast their votes and be out in 2 minutes before a warden puts a ticket on their double-parked BMW.
As for the civics test - there might be some merit in this, just as long as candidates can sit it in their own language. For example, some specialist engineer freshly recently in from Norway, but just gained voting rights, might have the most appalling English, but have good intelligence and general awareness about the USA. Why should s/he be denied a vote?
In other words, only those who are net contributors to the wealth of the community may vote, those who are net consumers of that wealth created by others may not. This also does away with the "education" qualification. Education, certainly in the public school system, is more indoctrination than anything else anyway.
Just dreaming. LOL
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"I am for doing good to the poor, but I differ in opinion of the means. I think the best way of doing good to the poor, is not making them easy in poverty, but leading or driving them out of it. In my youth I traveled much, and I observed in different countries, that the more public provisions were made for the poor, the less they provided for themselves, and of course became poorer. And, on the contrary, the less was done for them, the more they did for themselves, and became richer."