Lawrence Lessig Wants To Run For President So He Can Resign 458
An anonymous reader writes: Harvard law professor Lawrence Lessig has announced his intention to explore a bid for the U.S. presidency. By Labor Day, he will decide whether he has the support necessary to enter the Democratic primary. His goals are rather unusual — he says, "I want to run to be a different kind of president. 'Different' not in the traditional political puffery sense of that term. 'Different,' quite literally. I want to run to build a mandate for the fundamental change that our democracy desperately needs. Once that is passed, I would resign, and the elected Vice President would become President."
His top picks for a running mate include Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders. Lessig calls it a "Presidency as referendum," a hack for the U.S. Constitution to give more power back to the citizens. "In no plausible sense do we have a representative democracy in America today." In an interview with the Washington Post, Lessig added, "Until we find a way to fix the rigged system, none of the other things that people talk about doing are going to be possible."
His top picks for a running mate include Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders. Lessig calls it a "Presidency as referendum," a hack for the U.S. Constitution to give more power back to the citizens. "In no plausible sense do we have a representative democracy in America today." In an interview with the Washington Post, Lessig added, "Until we find a way to fix the rigged system, none of the other things that people talk about doing are going to be possible."
Showed too much of his hand (Score:5, Insightful)
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Actually could work. "If you give me this, I'll leave" If not you probably have to put up with "four more years!"
Re:Showed too much of his hand (Score:4, Insightful)
Except that the most powerful man in the world doesn't usually resign, even in a democracy.
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Except that the most powerful man in the world doesn't usually resign, even in a democracy.
the most powerful man in the world eats presidents for breakfast.
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Actually could work. "If you give me this, I'll leave" If not you probably have to put up with "four more years!"
Why would four years of President Lessig be any worse than four years of Bernie Sanders or Elizabeth Warren? Also, he wants Citizens United overturned, which isn't up to congress. He would need to either replace some Supreme Court Justices, or amend the constitution to override the free speech clause.
Re:Showed too much of his hand (Score:4, Insightful)
Or pass a law saying that corps are not people, need to act somewhat responsibly and only have rights/privileges specifically granted to them.
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Or pass a law saying that corps are not people
You do realize that is already recognized law? Corporate personhood doesn't make corporations people. It'd really help if you understood the actual legal situation first.
Re:Showed too much of his hand (Score:4, Insightful)
Or pass a law saying that corps are not people, need to act somewhat responsibly and only have rights/privileges specifically granted to them.
God damn it, this meme just won't die!
The Supreme Court opinion exicity pointed out this "corporate right" to free speech was not due to corporation-as-person, but derived from the right of people who are the corporation, who take their speech rights with them.
In short, Congress cannot define a group of people, and require people to give up their right to speech when joining it, to take advantage of that group's provided features.
As for money itself, 80% of political donation goes to advertising, and that is "the press" in the first amendment -- literally the modern version of a printing press, the means of mass-producing speech for distribution. Kings can and did restrict printing presses to backdoor censor. "The Press" isn't just a guy with a notepad, a more modern addition to the concept of "freedom of the press".
Money buys mass production of speech. To restrict this is to violate this old notion that the king cannot restrict mass production of speech.
And the court has also ruled that ensuring equality of quantity of political speech (loosely correlated with equal money) was also "wholely foreign to the First Amendment."
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Yes, but the executives take the logical construct's money, of which there is a copious amount, and use it to influence legislators. [opensecrets.org] It's not their own personal money they're spending. Putting limits on how they can spend the construct's money is not the same thing as putting limits on how they can spend their own money.
Re:Showed too much of his hand (Score:4, Insightful)
then let them spend their own money to buy candidates, not the corporation's.
they cannot both have the legal shield of the corporation separating them into distinct legal entities when it suits them, and ignore it when it doesn't.
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Since corporations are totally artificial creations of the law in the first place I don't see how they can have any rights beyond what is explicitly allowed in the laws that make them possible.
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Smarter than you based on your legal analysis I guess. The law isn't computer code.
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I have actually read the official Citizens United opinions. The majority opinion did state that ruling against Citizens United would have resulted in exactly what I stated because there exists no rational way to distinguish Mother Jones as a corporation from NBC from GE from Citizens United. Nobody on the left seems to want to stifle the speech of the first three in that list but all four are corporations.
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So, with passage of a simple law, the government can be given power to search and seize the assets of corporations anytime without a warrant?
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That was the
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Statists are always encroaching on civil liberties. When was the last time the democrats or the republicans stood against that? The left uses the 'we care about your needs and feelings' excuse while the neocons use the 'we want to protect you' excuse. They both want to increase the size of the state at the expense of the middle and lower class.
Re:Showed too much of his hand (Score:4, Interesting)
I've had the same idea before, and that doesn't have to be an issue.
My campaign would be simple: "Here are the things that Congress must pass. Until they pass every one of these, no strings attached, I will veto EVERY SINGLE BILL that comes across my desk. That includes budgets and any bill that continues the functioning of our government. By electing me, you are approving of this action and Congress will know precisely what the majority requires of them."
One change: my running mate would not be a traditional candidate, but would be like-minded. One of the bills that must pass would require another election to be held to determine who becomes President and Vice-President immediately after the bill is passed. I don't want the candidacy of my running mate to become an issue.
Re:Showed too much of his hand (Score:4, Informative)
By electing me, you are approving of this action and Congress will know precisely what the majority requires of them.
I was going to say that the correct term is "plurality", but that's not even accurate. It's closer than "majority", however. The actual majority to which you refer is the electors, not the voters, and if you are truly such a nutter you'll find them voting for someone else.
If you DO manage to get enough electors to win, then you should realize that every congressman will have his constituents to think about, and they're collectively going to overrule your vetoes. They'll have veterans who want VA benefits, government employees who want paychecks, Universities and independent research organizations that want grant monies to pay their people, etc etc etc. You won't have partisanship to fall back on because you've abandoned all party affiliations in this quest, and both parties will have no hesitation to abandon you.
One of the bills that must pass would require another election to be held to determine who becomes President and Vice-President immediately after the bill is passed.
And as soon as the Speaker of the House is sworn in, he can call for that bill to be rescinded (or pass a new one just like the old one). The Speaker is not appointed by the President, he is elected by his state first and then elected by the other house members, and you have as much chance of getting him to go along with your plan as you do of getting elected in the first place.
If you believe you can call for such a bill to hold an election before you resign, then you should realize there is no provision in the Constitution for holding an election to replace a current, qualified President.
I don't want the candidacy of my running mate to become an issue.
Of course it will be an issue, because they will be a heartbeat away from the Presidency. You don't get to change the succession rules before you become President, and as soon as you do become "it" the current succession rules apply. Only if you demand the existing Succession Act be repealed or changed as part of your reign can you keep him out of the line of succession and thus not an issue -- but that can only happen after you are elected and he's been an issue.
Re:Showed too much of his hand (Score:4, Informative)
they're collectively going to overrule your vetoes
At least then, they will prove that they are unwilling to respect the direct decision of the people.
he can call for that bill to be rescinded (or pass a new one just like the old one)
If the new President calls to reverse a decision made directly by the people, it's instant political suicide.
you should realize there is no provision in the Constitution for holding an election to replace a current, qualified President.
Indeed there is. Article II, Section 1, Clause 6:
In Case of the Removal of the President from Office, or of his Death, Resignation, or Inability to discharge the Powers and Duties of the said Office, the Same shall devolve on the Vice President, and the Congress may by Law provide for the Case of Removal, Death, Resignation or Inability, both of the President and Vice President, declaring what Officer shall then act as President, and such Officer shall act accordingly, until the Disability be removed, or a President shall be elected.
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A much bigger problem is how your actions split the vote up. Say you run a "referendum ticket" with yourself and your left-wing Real President.
If the voter has two tickets: "you + lefty" vs. "righty", then you conflate left-wing vs whatever you're referending on - you can't know who supported the referendum, and who simply didn't want righty. So you say, "I know, I'll run another ticket with me + right-wing candidate," at which point you're now splitting the right-wing ticket (because votes don't magically
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One of the dangers in creating such a scenario is that if the executive branch no longer has its confimed long-term appointees, the highest-ranking lifetime bureaucrats that are not appointed and serve through multiple administrations become the de-facto leaders of their departments. You end up with Deputy Directors with more power than cabinet secretaries, and if those Deputy Directors do not go along with the plans of the President they can make the President little more t
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Imagine if Obama announced he'd resign if congress passed bill X.
They'd have to believe him first - wouldn't happen.
Lessig/Sanders, Sanders/Lessig (Score:3, Interesting)
Both sound good to me. Let's see if Bernie can continue to gain support around the country.
Re:Lessig/Sanders, Sanders/Lessig (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Lessig/Sanders, Sanders/Lessig (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Lessig/Sanders, Sanders/Lessig (Score:5, Informative)
Who is the communist? I assume you mean Sanders? He is a self-proclaimed socialist, not communist, and even then his ideas are not truely socialist.
Shifting election day (Score:5, Insightful)
>> shift election day to a national holiday
I'd love to. How about April 15 when the feeling of just having paid our taxes is fresh?
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April 15 was chosen for tax day precisely because it was nearly 6 months away from election day.
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And that's precisely the reason why it ought to be changed.
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I don't know about the US, but in Canada April/May is typically the period where people get their tax *return*. Since most people pay too much taxes during the year (since it is taken from every pay as if you had no deduction for child, registered savings, etc.), they get a refund after filling their report.
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It's that way here in the US, too.
However, the "populist" view is that "I pay too much in taxes" and that view gets magnified every year in late March/early April.
In my opinion, the best option the next President can propose is to have a peaceful way for states to secede. That way hopefully Texas and the old Confederacy can create the Christian People's Democratic Republic of 'Murrica, and the "conservatives/libertarians" can flock to their Utopia.
Good luck to Professor Lessig...he's going to need it.
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In theory, in the US, we fill out a form which is handed to the employer that give a number of deductions that you are taking. For me as a single parent of two, the computation comes out to 5 (one for each kid, three for me)
Here is the "I am an employee" version of the form, the W-4
http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf... [irs.gov]
Now, in practice, I always pay way to much taxes, and get a huge tax return, but there is a penalty for not paying enough taxes through the year on a routine basis, so it is not worth correcting.
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Withholdings, particularly over-withholdings, are terrible on so many levels. First, the government gets an interest-free loan. Second, that money is unavailable to you to use during the year, when you might actually need it, or at least could invest it, or spend it. Third, it makes people less cognizant of their taxes because they never "see" their gross earnings except on paper, just their net pay. Fourth, refunds feel like free money, which decreases what might otherwise be angst over forking over mo
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I agree that I would prefer to pay all my income taxes at the end of the year, of course. But I don't have that choice, unfortunately.
However I do not agree that withholding is a free loan. The government has to pay bills through the year, not only in April.
Also I understand that many people would not plan enough and would be bankrupt in April if there were no withholdings.
big words (Score:5, Insightful)
"fundamental change that our democracy desperately needs"
Hold onto your wallets and run for the hills.
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I am holding onto my wallet, I'm trying to keep the millionaires and billionaires out of it!
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
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You're of course correct.
However, the president does have quite a bit of power in setting the legislative priorities.
The president can also more or less say: "I will veto every f***ing bill that comes on my desk until you hacks do what I want you to do. Get it done!" Obviously his veto can be overruled, but if he can recruit a large block of legislators in both houses, it would be difficult to overrule the veto for all but the most bi-partisan efforts.
Re:the worst summary for the worst proposal. (Score:5, Insightful)
That is the realy problem with the American system since FDR appeared on the scene and maybe even going back a little before that.
Presidents do set policy lots of it. Congress has abdicated responsibility over and over again and handed executive agency broad rule making powers. You can't take those powers back once you give them up either because the President has his veto pen. We gave the president the power to commit military forces without a vote. Its hard to say nope you can't run your war after he has been doing it for two months. What would Congress refuse to allow a covered retreat? Can't happen not really. The budget is two big and the president has to great a discretionary authority all ready to make shutdowns or default threats effective. Obama as your will recall pretty much threatened to make the House of Representatives a moot body and just issue a trillion dollar coin on the Treasury Departments executive authority. Essentially we have allowed the President to be above the law.
Lessig is right about the need to dismantle the two party system but that isn't the first step. In fact if you make that the fist step the consequences will likely be disastrous. It would dilute the 'will' of the Legislative branch even further. Only a near unified legislature can resist the presidency as it is. If we go multiparty now we almost certainly will end up with a President becoming a dictator we can never get rid of. Step one is a castrate the office of the President. We need to pass laws returning power to the Legislature, removing rule making authorities, removing standing authorizations, an "opposition" party that controls the legislature at odds with the sitting President is the only way that can happen.
We need more polarization not less. We need to build up a level of hostility that will cause a legislature to grit their teeth and say "We are gonna break this President" consequences be damned. After that you can begin trying to weaken the mechanisms that let those people stay in power.
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You wouldn't need to dismantle the 2 party system if the primaries were open. A two party system with robust primaries would be far better than a multi party system.
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In what way?
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"presidents dont make laws"
Except for the 34 executive order per year on average:
http://theweek.com/speedreads/... [theweek.com]
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Which, you know, aren't laws.
Your link is *also* not a law, but instead, a story about one football player punching another player in the face. I don't think it's an executive order either, but it's been a little while since my highschool civics class.
Re:the worst summary for the worst proposal. (Score:4, Informative)
I guess it is good we dont have Reagan and his 47 per year, right? Obama has issued the least since Cleveland.
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Presidents do have more power than that, though in a very different way from what's commonly portrayed. They lead the executive branch, and the executive branch does the majority of the heavy lifting of government. They set regulations, negotiate treaties, do scientific research (including judging grant applications), decide where to spend money on national infrastructure, etc. The President's relationship to it is usually indirect: he appoints the top-level people, who manage the career civil servants who
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Seriously? Presidents have nearly unchecked control over the entire executive branch. For the record, that includes the following agencies:
Department of Agriculture
Department of Commerce
Department of Defense
Department of Education
Department of Energy
Department of Health and Human Services
Department of Homeland Security
Department of Housing and Urban Development
Department of the Interior
Department of Justice
Department of Labor
Department of State
Department of Transportation
Department of the Treasury
Departme
To be an American... (Score:2)
My Canadian vote wouldn't help though. Damn.
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That is Trump's support in a nutshell.
Doesn't matter how mean he is or anything like that. And it takes somebody as arrogant as he to believe that he can make things better. And make no mistake, he totally believes it.
The establishment will find a way to burn him down though...
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Doesn't matter how mean he is or anything like that. And it takes somebody as arrogant as he to believe that he can make things better. And make no mistake, he totally believes it.
Do you not listen to ANY of the candidates? They ALL know they can make things better. Every one of them. They're ALL as "arrogant" as Trump, which isn't saying much. Even the candidates for local city council know they can make things better.
As to Lessig, it will, of course, require 8 years before he's anywhere close to successful (in his opinion) and isn't it an interesting coincidence that 8 years is the term limit?
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They sure seem to be making shit up about him left and right.
I still have yet to find any account of what he actually said to the Fox presenter that CNN is complaining was so bad. It seems like they are just throwing shit at him until something sticks.
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Did you look at only the first word? Is implying that she asked him the tough questions because she was on her period not considered bad in your opinion?
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So, "blood coming out of her eyes" must have something to do with a period, because she is a woman?
My point is that CNN has been coming out with these hit pieces on him since he declared his intention to run. Just do a search on CNNs home page for the word Trump, there are 8 mentions of him on their page, 4 mentions of Clinton, 0 about Cruz. Search for whatever name you like.
Look at the pieces, them freaking out because he allegedly said something about blood coming out of her eyes. Or the article about
Non biased? (Score:4, Insightful)
Yeah, sure: he only wants radical leftists as 'running mates'.
Fuck you Larry for marginalizing what's otherwise a reasonably non partisan position on the 'brokenness' of government.
Of course, the last time someone tried attacking the machine, the Left Wing, the Media, and the "bosses" of the Right decided that none of them wanted such a message to succeed, so they cheerfully and successfully painted the Tea Party as right wing, racist, radicals.
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Yeah, sure: he only wants radical leftists as 'running mates'.
Fuck you Larry for marginalizing what's otherwise a reasonably non partisan position on the 'brokenness' of government.
Of course, the last time someone tried attacking the machine, the Left Wing, the Media, and the "bosses" of the Right decided that none of them wanted such a message to succeed, so they cheerfully and successfully painted the Tea Party as right wing, racist, radicals.
He's a lefty so he is leaning to lefties. Would love the right to come forward with someone offering the same kind of promise. Then we can have our reform AND still vote for the candidate that appeals to our issues the most.
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The right has Trump, and you see how the media is trying to crucify him.
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Re:Non biased? (Score:5, Insightful)
they cheerfully and successfully painted the Tea Party as right wing, racist, radicals
A fairly large certain percentage of left wingers and right wingers agree that the govt is broken. The centrist response is to keep the status quo. The left wing response is to blame money in politics as having undue influence, hurting democracy and turning it into an oligarchy, and the fix is to limit money, and impose higher taxes on the super wealthy to try to create a more balanced society. The right wing response is to blame government for being bad at governing, and the solution is to dismantle the government, in particular using the starve the beast methodology, to cripple the power the government has by limiting money, and reducing taxes.
The tea party, so named after an anti-tax movement, has as its core ideology, the idea of lowering taxes and preventing government from functioning. That is a radical idea- that govt works best when it is completely broken and can't act at all. This naturally would create a power vacuum where corporations and oligarchs would gain power. I don't understand how the solution to a broken government is to break it more? It's an irrational platform, designed at its very core to shift power into the hands of unelected power brokers. Needless to say, that goes against Lessig's goals, and is why he chooses a left wing running mate.
Re:Non biased? (Score:4, Insightful)
Do you think the spying components will lose money first? Or will the oversight components be first on the chopping block? You want a weaker govt, that means less oversight, right?
OR
Since the govt can't afford to run the program, maybe it will be outsourced to a private company that can provide national security features, and as a bonus they can monetize the information they get by spying, to fund the program by selling directed advertising. Its a win-win for you: Now the govt doesn't have any information on you, and you don't have to pay extra taxes.
Is that the future you want? I understand that point of view just fine, but you are not following it to the logical conclusions.
No chance (Score:3)
A lot of candidates are said to have no chance of winning the election. Here we have an actual case of no chance.
In Lessig's case it's less than no chance, it is negative chance. Every time he runs one of these stunts his cause is hurt more than it is helped.
Tell me how well Lessig's Mayday PAC is doing these days. How many super pacs has he ended with it?
Conservative against big money (Score:2)
I'm primarily conservative but hate the way the republican party panders to corporations. I would almost vote for Lessig because of this. My belief though is that government shouldn't be in the business of giving ANYONE free shit short of people who absolutely cannot be denied are incapable of providing for themselves. Severely disabled, damaged war vets, etc. For this I would have trouble with Lessig handing the reigns over to a true died in the wool Democrat which would be what gives me pause in voting fo
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If you hate the way the Republican party panders to corporations, you may want to consider looking into Ted Cruz. He is running a strong anti-corruption platform. Many of the other candidates will bring us "more of the same," but Ted, if nothing else, wants to clean up the corruption and I believe he would. He's already made tons of enemies in his own party which means he must be doing something right.
I'd like him to run, but not resign (Score:3)
I think he is far more suitable as President than those he has suggested as VPs. So his resigning would be a mistake in my opinion.
So much wrong with this (Score:5, Insightful)
the greatness of America will be reflected in its government too. It once was. When we are finally equal citizens, it will again
Bovine excreta. Lessig doesn't actually believe that. America's government used to be elected by white male landowners. And all the freedoms and founding principles that were important to the Founding Fathers --- er... "Parents" -- is stuff Lessig and Sanders totally hate and want to demolish. The whole continuum from European socialism to forms of communism is simply not compatible with the founding freedoms of America as articulated in our fundamental documents.
My basic problem with Sanders was very well expressed by Margaret Thatcher: "The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other people's money." So let's radically change our government so we can start confiscating and spending other people's money even faster, because that will make everything better!
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The reason socialism is gaining traction in the American electorate is that the level of ignorance has reached the point where the average voter isn't aware that TANSTAAFL.
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So for you the key is the Vice President. Lessig has one agenda - fundamental electoral reform to bring Congress back in sync with the American populace.
Nope, it's part of the same ball of wax. The "purer" a democracy, the shorter the time until that system of government collapses. This happens precisely because people will cheerfully vote to give themselves other people's property.
The VP gets to do all those things you believe destroy America...
Not destroy America, just destroy American prosperity. You know, like Greece. Or Detroit.
Stupid (Score:2)
So, Larry, if the Congress ignores your "mandate for the fundamental change," and presents you with a hacked-up, watered down Bill (or no Bill at all), what are you going to do? Resign in shame having accomplished nothing? Or, stay on and violate your pledge to resign while you try and make tweaks and recover something of what you want?
This is the same sort of bright thinking that lost him the Eldred copyright-extension case.
I've considered this (Score:2)
I have considered running for a congress seat due to a desire to effect tax policies. Once I'm out of policies, it's time to move on; that may mean down, to capitalize on city council positions for more complex initiatives--notably, education.
I could stay high up and attempt to restore the power of the individual worker, but I doubt I could gain popular support--and, thus, moral authorization--of the voting base to tear down any and all government support of self-driven college education. People are qu
So... (Score:2)
we would really be voting for the vice president as president?
I don't see the point (Score:2)
Why doesn't he just endorse Sanders or Warren? I don't see the point.
I would vote for him in a heart beat. (Score:2)
I will say that I prefer a different approach. Most states have the ability to amend their constitution via ballot. It would be useful for the group to put together a measure that should match what would go into our federal constitution. Yes, SCOTUS, esp this current activists SCOTUS, would kill it as a threat to the status quo. BUT, in each state that it passed, it would send a message to any CONgress critter running that we want our democratic representation back and
A better option is to be VP... (Score:2)
There's no way LL can get the name recognition he needs to raise the funds to be loud enough to get his message out. That's a shame in our society and one of the problems hopefully he could fix.
A better option would be to approach Bernie Sanders and ask to be his VP. They could run the same campaign and the same platform. As VP a majority of LL's time could go to implementing the changes needed once elected. A president simply does not have the time to focus 100% of their time on "fixing things". And h
So close and then a miss. (Score:2)
Re:Socialism (Score:5, Insightful)
You are talking about communism, not democratic socialism like in parts of Europe. In fact, you can't have free market capitalism without restrictions on money in politics, and still have any kind of democracy.
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Re:Socialism (Score:5, Informative)
Europeans have social democracies, not democratic socialism. From Wikipedia:
Yes, the difference matters a great deal. I know of no European country that is governed as a democratic socialist country. Many countries nominally have "democratic socialist parties", but they largely do not actually pursue democratic socialism anymore.
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It is obvious what I meant when I mentioned Europe. Social democracy.
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If by "democracy" you mean "strict majority rule" aka "mob rule", you are correct. But that is only one form of democracy, and not a very desirable one. In fact, most democracies are set up with significant safeguards against majority rule.
When it comes to wealth and personal property, the authors of the US Constitution explicitly believed that private property and wealth needs to
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Sweden is nominally a constitutional monarchy. In practice, it is a social democracy, modeled on the German welfare state. In no way is Sweden a "socialist" country. In fact, on the Heritage index of economic freedoms, it ranks quite highly. http://www.heritage.org/index/... [heritage.org]
Re:Socialism (Score:4, Informative)
I assume Bernie Sanders knows enough about socialism to understand what that means.
What you are saying is that what he is really doing is performing the same kind of "bait and switch" that "national socialists" performed in 1920's Germany; if you look at their 1920 party program [wikipedia.org], perhaps you're right. That makes him even less acceptable as a candidate.
People willing to pool their resources for the common good is what a free market accomplishes.
What Bernie Sanders and socialism advocate is some people "willing" to pool other people's resources for what is ostensibly the common good. No matter whether you think (like Sanders) that such coercion is justified and useful, don't try to pretend that it is voluntary; such coercion takes authoritarian government.
(Whether government is ever "authoritative" is debatable.)
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Sweden is fairly monolithic in nature, a singular people and culture, so socialism's failures haven't reached it yet, but there are cracks even there. Whenever another "culture" invades, it will succumb to the inevitable failure when the minority culture realizes that it can vote itself goodies from the public trough.
Here is a good article on this topic: http://www.newsmax.com/Herbert... [newsmax.com]
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Says someone who knows very little about world governments, political theory, and related definitions under those headings.
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Better to be a looser than a loser
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you're premise for running is false, and you won't be elected.
People running under false premises don't get elected?
Re:Professor? (Score:5, Insightful)
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I'm always wondering if that's actually a problem or not.... There are ofcourse some downsides to it, but if people had more of a say, wouldn't we just amplify the prisoners dilemma to an epic scale? everybody would just vote what's best for them, not the community, taking everything down with them.
Re:Professor? (Score:5, Insightful)
That usually doesn't work, a common analogy is two wolves and a sheep voting on what's for dinner.
The founding fathers were very adamant that there must be certain inalienable rights, and a balance of power between the have's and the have not's.
And thus, a republic was born.
Re:Professor? (Score:5, Insightful)
Please don't get hung up on arguing over definitions.
WRONG - That is the kind of post modernist thinking that has gotten us into all this trouble in the first place. That is how you end up with "kinetic military actions."
Definitions and ensuring we have a common understanding are VERY IMPORTANT. If fact its the cornerstone you need for the very idea of "codified law". This is why Trump is polling so well. People want someone that says what he means. They are truly tiring of weasel word soup. If Trump actually had ideas, that were not vapid, offensive, irrational or some combination of those, he'd have the GOP primary locked already. As it is I know people who don't agree with a single thing he has said since he announce his candidacy yet they still pick him over the SIXTEEN other GOP candidates. That really says something!
Re: (Score:3)
With 300 million people, is it really possible for them to have a "say" in what's happening? The present system is far from ideal, and there's a lot I would do to change it, but even if you implemented every procedural change I had in mind your individual vote still isn't going to add up to much.
Real issues aren't binary. I can't think of any way for 300 million people to meaningfully collaborate on writing a bill. It's hard enough getting a few hundred Congressmen to do it. The binary part comes at the ver
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You are right. With 300 million people there are just too many opinions. We've simplified the process. The USA is run as an oligarchy where rich people and corporations tell congress and the president what to do. There only a few thousand people who really "matter" (Oligarch lives matter!) in the system so it's much easier. You can just ignore the rest (and send in the goons if they get too rowdy).
Re:Professor? (Score:4, Informative)
One doesn't exclude the other.
A republic simply means that there is no monarch reigning over the country. Adding "constitutional" before it simply means that the basic law is defined in a document, instead of being arbitrarily defined by the feelings of a human being on that day.
You can have absolute monarchies, constitutional monarchies, constitutional republics and I guess even absolute republics (North Korea comes to my mind, as the leader is above the constitution, but is technically not a monarch either, at least on paper).
A democracy simply means that the people have (at least some of the) power. Adding "representative" before it simply means that the people elect representatives, which then votes laws, instead of letting the people vote laws directly.
Pretty much all democracies at the state level are representative, even tough some offer some elements of direct democracy (Switzerland).
There are constitutional monarchies which are also representative democracies, like the UK.
Re:Professor? (Score:5, Funny)
"absolute republics"
“Ankh-Morpork had dallied with many forms of government and had ended up with that form of democracy known as One Man, One Vote. The Patrician was the Man; he had the Vote.”
"That hasn't worked out so well" (Score:5, Insightful)
What is it that you miss so much from the Bush years? the trillion dollar war searching for nonexistent WMDs? the insanely mismanaged response to Katrina? the disastrous economy with bank bailouts and huge unemployment? the political outing of undercover CIA agents? the debunked evidence of yellow-cake uranium presented as fact to the UN? Abu Ghraib prisoner torture? How about his complete failure to find Osama Bin Laden? Or do you just genuinely miss having the rest of the world hate us?
No thanks. I'll take the current economy with its strong dollar & 5% unemployment, 15+ million people newly with healthcare, no more wars, a nuclear agreement with Iran, regularization of relations with Cuba, legalized same sex marriage, strengthened bank regulations (without hurting the economy), a dead Osama Bin Laden, DADT repeal, etc. BTW: it's also nice to have a president who can speak in complete sentences.
Good luck with Jeb!
Re: (Score:3)
To be perfectly fair the economic collapse can't really be blamed on a single president. That disaster was decades in the making. The bailouts are more attributable to him but they couldn't happen without the agreement of congress. And not bailing out the finance sector could have made the collapse much more serious than it was. What I would say that he definitely has responsibility for is not imprisoning any of the responsible parties, or really levying any punishments at all. Although it's not like Obama
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You seem to think that because I don't like Obama that I must gush all over Bush.
You couldn't be any further from the truth. You're presenting a false dichotomy.
You should know better.
Re:No Thanks (Score:4)
America can't even remember what socialism means any more.
Hint: It doesn't mean giving subsidies to private insurance companies to cover high-risk patients.
Re: (Score:2)