2020 Election

Never meant? By whom? The guys in the powdered wigs? You're right. The foundling fathers didn't care much for democracy. Universal white male suffrage got popular in the 1830s and 40s. Lincoln expressed the ideal succinctly: "government of the people, by the people, for the people." Gradually, the idea expanded to include the newly liberated slaves (1870), direct election of U.S. Senators (1913), women (1920), and eighteen year olds (1971). It's here to stay, as illustrated by the titles of most American Government textbooks. It became a central legitimating principle in domestic politics and foreign policy. G.W. Bush and his Neocons gave it as their main justification for the Iraq War--bringing the blessings of American-style democracy to the Middle East. There has been some resistance, notably by the far right John Birch Society, which insisted the U.S. was a "republic", not a democracy.

When you say "we are not a democracy", you're either aligning yourself with those folks or being a realist in recognizing that the U.S. falls short of the ideal (along with others like "liberty and justice for all') by continuing such blatantly undemocratic practices as the electoral college. But if you say it's a term mainly "leftists" use, you brand yourself as an extreme right winger, in the same camp with the Betsy Ross flag fans. As political scientist Murray Edelman noted, in The Symbolic Use of Politics, "democracy" is an important legitimating symbol in the U.S., providing "symbolic assurance" to Americans who might otherwise see no reason to abide by the outcomes of elections. Disparage it too much and we might have another revolution or civil war on our hands. Put the powdered wig away, and join the twenty-first century!

 

No.

 

Biden has a chance because he is a moderate. Americans like moderation, and not extremist(for the most part).
I will say that in a debate with trump, I am not sure if Biden can go for the kill. I think Warren, Sanders, or Harris would.
Re: Ray Gun. I find it ironic that trump supporters don't realize that Ray Gun was responsible for the huge influx of illegals, in 1986. He was also responsible for the Mariel boat lift, from Cuba, in the eighties.

 

Doesn't seem like a lot of leftists or democrats realize it either.

 

Actually Americans are fed up with moderates, which is just another name for people who won't get anything done.

 

Panic

So rightists are opposed to democracy?

I had a discussion a few years ago here when some right wingers kept saying that the US wasn’t a democracy it was a Republic which seemed silly to me since the two are not mutually exclusive but after talking with these right wingers it became clear that the reason they were emphasising ‘republic’ was because a republic can be undemocratic, you can have a republic that doesn’t have any element of democracy in it, although what they seemed to want was a limited democratic system with wealth being a criteria, a kind of plutocratic oligarchy, where only those with a certain amount of money could have a vote.

Not sure what you mean by ‘smaller nations’ it shouldn’t really be an issue seems more like someone getting in an excuse early. Anyway my own favourite would be a system based on Proportional Representation and that has been tried in a few places in the US, the thing was that where it was tried it diminished the power of the two major parties so they basically worked to get rid of it (see below).

Most moves toward more democracy or equality in the US has been attacked by the right as socialist and communist.

 

LOL But I think it’s only the right that find this guff interesting and keep bringing it up because they don’t have any rational political arguments so they run away from those discussions and bring up crap about calling a policeman a police officer like that is the biggest crime in history.

 

Proportional Representation


Here are extracts from - A Brief History of Proportional Representation in the United States, [my bold]

“The most extensive research to date has been produced by Kathleen Barber and several colleagues. Their study, Proportional Representation and Electoral Reform in Ohio, systematically analyzed the political effects of PR in five Ohio cities. In many cases their findings were also confirmed by results in other PR cities. For example, Barber found that choice voting produced fairer and more proportional representation of political parties. In particular, it eliminated the tendency of winner-take-all systems to exaggerate the seats given to the largest party and to underrepresent the smaller parties. In the election before the adoption of PR in Cincinnati, the Republicans won only 55% of the vote, but received 97% of the seats on the council. In the first PR election, the results were much more proportional, with the Republicans winning 33.3% of the seats based on 27.8% of the vote, and the rival Charter party winning 66.7% of the seats on 63.8% of the vote.

Similarly, in the last pre-PR election in New York City, the Democrats won 95.3% of the seats on the Board of Alderman with only 66.5% of the vote. During the use of PR, the Democrats still had a majority of the seats, but it was a much smaller one that reflected more accurately their strength in the electorate. In 1941, proportional representation gave the Democrats 65.5% of the seats on 64% of the vote. Moreover, it also produced representation for the Republicans and three smaller parties in proportion to their voting strength. Similar results occurred in the other PR cities, demonstrating that this system greatly improved the accuracy of partisan representation.

Proportional representation also encouraged fairer racial and ethnic representation. It produced the first Irish Catholics elected in Ashtabula, and the first Polish-Americans elected in Toledo. In Cincinnati, Hamilton, and Toledo, African-Americans had never been able to win city office until the coming of PR. Significantly, after these cities abandoned PR, African-Americans again found it almost impossible to get elected.”

What scuppered PR movement was money and fear - doesn’t that sound familiar in todays America.

“In Cleveland, well-financed opponents sponsored five repeal referendums in the first ten years of PR, with the final one succeeding. Similarly, PR opponents in Hamilton finally won their repeal effort after four failed referendums in 12 years.

Many Americans in the early twentieth century were hostile to political and racial minorities--the very groups aided by PR... They warned whites that PR was helping to increase black power in the city and asked them whether they wanted a "Negro mayor." Their appeal to white anxieties succeeded, with whites supporting repeal by a two to one margin..

In New York City, fear of communism proved the undoing of proportional representation. Although one or two Communists had served on the PR-elected city council since 1941, it was not until the coming of the Cold War that Democratic party leaders were able to effectively exploit this issue. As historian Robert Kolesar discovered, the Democrats made every effort in their repeal campaign to link PR with Soviet Communism, describing the single transferable vote as "the political importation from the Kremlin," "the first beachhead of Communist infiltration in this country," and "an un-American practice which has helped the cause of communism and does not belong in the American way of life."(3) This "red scare" campaign resulted in the repeal of PR by an overwhelming margin.”

As the piece concludes -

“While the repeal of proportional representation in these American cities is taken by opponents as evidence that this voting system failed, proponents argue that it is more accurate to conclude that this system was rejected because it worked too well. They note that PR worked well in throwing party bosses out of government--bosses who never relented in their attempts to regain power--and it worked well in promoting the representation of racial, ethnic, and ideological minorities that were previously shut out by the winner-take-all system”

 

Following on from my earlier post – my big fear is that the US economy will crash before the election (or soon after)

That will scupper any plans for making things better and the right will claim it’s all the Democrats fault.

And the next crash will be worse than the last causing a lot of pain and the right will claim it’s all the Democrats fault

And the blowback will mean another right wing populist gets in (this time a clever one)

And the US is fucked.

 

lol, maybe Bernie should have AOC teach him about economics.
Bernie Sanders to Cut Staff Hours Due to $15 Minimum Wage

 

His employees are salaried. So instead of negotiating a higher salary his campaign negotiated better hours. I dont see the issue. His staff also doesnt pay anything for their health insurance which is a really good and really rare emoloyee benefit, as you probably know.
Also, AOC minored in economics in school

Edit, and actually I just saw in another article Sanders increased their pay to 42k. So I dunno which one is accurate

 

Trump is lashing out at Fox for a poll showing Bidenl and Bernie beating him if the election were held today. Biden has a ten point lead and Bernie has a six point lead over the Prez,
Fox News Poll: Biden holds commanding lead for Democratic nomination
Trump attacks Fox News over latest poll
Fox News Anchor Explains to Trump How Polls Work After President Attacks Network
The nerve of those turncoats at Fox reporting inconvenient truths!

 

Insecurity on display again.

 

I was watching that unfold earlier today …lol….reminds me of earlier this year when the Trump re-election team fired several pollsters after survey results were leaked indicating the president would lose
to his Democratic rivals in four key battleground states

 

Looks like Bernie took his first economics lesson of his entire life. How the hell is Occasional-Cortex gonna help him out?

When you raise the price floor on wages too high, employers (such as his campaign) cannot afford to pay the employees! Therefore hours must be cut, and layoffs must be made!

Candid photo of Bernie taking an economics class:

 

Is that photo Bernie or the old guy in the balcony on Sesame Street?

 

Word on the (digital) street is that Trump will be using the examples of congressional districts to show that too many of them are run by career politicians who care more about illegal aliens than their own constituents. Elijah is just the beginning and he's starting to get push back from people in his district.

Looks like an interesting year is unfolding. Window dressing won't work this time.

 

Gives the Russians something new to work on.

 

When people take lies or half-truths and make compelling arguments for and against them.

 

You mean Trump is? Parts of the district are affluent and the residents highly educated, so Trump shows his ignorance and racism once again.

Window dressing won't work this time.[/QUOTE]Maybe Putin and those Russian trolls and bots will come through again!