Larry Lessig Ends Presidential Campaign, Citing Unfair Debate Rules (washingtonpost.com) 309
An anonymous reader writes: Harvard law professor Larry Lessig is ending his run for the Democratic presidential nomination. Lessig blames the demise of his campaign on party rules that have left him "shut out" of the Democratic debates. "The party won't let me be a candidate," Lessig said in his final campaign video. "I can't ask people to support a campaign that I know can't get before the members of the Democratic Party."
Main problem: His initials aren't HRC (Score:2, Insightful)
This is the Democrat Party we are talking about. The coronation of Hillary for 2016 was decided years ago.
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
Yeah, people with a brain would have a potential exit from Mrs. Bill.
Re: (Score:2)
If that was truly the case, then there was no point in trying to stop him... Somehow, he scared the Democrats' brass.
Oh, that's just like the folks saying that Democrats were scared of Sarah Palin. I'm no Democrat, but wasn't anyone afraid of her, we just liked to have her around to laugh at.
You can't let everyone in on national debates, it just isn't practical. Even the present day overstaffed Republican debates are plain weird - at one time they were pretty funny to watch, now it just seems like people bragging about how long they've cheated on not taking their Thorazine. I suspect those will change as well - probably
Re: (Score:2)
That and less clever than Trump who managed to put one over on the other Democrats.
Re:Real problem: He's an idiot (Score:5, Informative)
Re: (Score:2)
If a candidate can't sustain at least 1% in the polls for six weeks, then they aren't a serious contender anyway.
How do you sustain 1% in the polls (Score:3, Insightful)
when they refuse to put your name in the polls? That's what they did.
Shutting Lessig out was to stop the idea that money should be taken out of politics, because most of that money goes to the media organisations. Letting Lessig in would cut their revenue significantly.
Remember, this is an industry that wants to get skipping adverts made illegal because it might hurt their profits, and CEOs claim it is "stealing from the company" not to watch the adverts.
You don't think they'd make up rules to save the bill
Re: (Score:2)
If the biased media unfairly refuses to acknowledge the candidate exists, how's he supposed to get the poll numbers?
Lessig lost because the media pre-ordained it, simple as that. It's the same reason Bernie Sanders will lose: the media categorically refuses to acknowledge him as a serious candidate despite the fact that he's been polling above HRC at least part of the time!
Circular logic (Score:3)
A candidate needs 1% to be in a debate, but can't get any national coverage because they are not in the debate.
That is such an obvious logic problem you have to hurt yourself in order to avoid it. We have not even gotten to the point of being over a year before the election. You know how we keep hearing that "it's a long time until election day and Trump and Carson could still lose the nomination"? Well the wey to prevent that would be to omit people from the discussion to begin with.
Re:Real problem: He's an idiot (Score:4, Interesting)
This is the Democrat Party we are talking about. The coronation of Hillary for 2016 was decided years ago.
No, his main problem was nobody knew who the fuck he was outside of a few nerds.
This guy was less prepared to run a presidential campaign than that fucking idiot Rick Perry. And that makes him a bigger idiot than Rick Perry--now there's an accomplishment.
It doesn't matter how prepared he is. Because the Clintons have the party establishment tied up, Dems have no viable candidates this year other than her, and she has a lot of legacy antipathy that will make the general election harder for her. Bernie's okay, but I figure he basically was allowed to run because he was too crazy a prospect to be a real threat to the Clinton machine.
Re:Real problem: He's an idiot (Score:5, Informative)
Never mind that Sanders has been polling above Clinton at least part of the time, he's not "viable" because "reasons."
Of course, the only reason people believe Sanders is "crazy" is because the media keeps claiming so, but that's a total lie -- in reality, Sanders' positions are completely reasonable and moderate.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Never mind that Sanders has been polling above Clinton at least part of the time, he's not "viable" because "reasons."
Of course, the only reason people believe Sanders is "crazy" is because the media keeps claiming so, but that's a total lie -- in reality, Sanders' positions are completely reasonable and moderate.
He's not viable because the general election is going to be a whole lot worse for him than the primaries, no matter how he's polling generally now. The attack ads almost write themselves. They do for Hillary too because of how much is anti-Clinton on the right, so neither of them are great for a general, but she's already been through all of them and her general numbers now are the result of that, whereas Bernie will see a hit once the general public has seen more attack aimed at him. Things like "social
Re: (Score:2)
It doesn't matter how prepared he is.
Yes, because nobody knew who the fuck he was outside of a few nerds.
Re: (Score:3)
So you can only get known if you're already known?
Honey Boo-Boo for President 2020!
Re:Real problem: He's an idiot (Score:4, Interesting)
Dems have no viable candidates this year other than her
While Bernie Sanders is an independent, he does caucus with the Democrats. He's also trying to get the nomination of the Democratic party. You haven't explicitly defined 'viable' here, but I believe Bernie Sanders does indeed satisfy the criteria to be elected President.
Bernie's okay, but I figure he basically was allowed to run because he was too crazy a prospect to be a real threat to the Clinton machine.
So you're dismissing his candidacy on emotional grounds? How helpful. If only everyone thought like you -- then maybe, just maybe, we'd have a chance at implementing meaningful change in this country.
Re:Real problem: He's an idiot (Score:4, Insightful)
It's not like the Democratic party called him up and gave him permission to run. He declared his candidacy and then quickly and effectively put out a message that the majority of [salon.com] the country [washingtonpost.com] agrees with in a way that caused a lot of people to start talking about him. He forced his way into the Democratic contest, he was not "allowed" in. If they would have tried to push him away then there either would have been a lot of people asking questions about why some candidates aren't allowed to debate (which neither party wants to answer), or he would just run as an independent.
He wasn't "allowed" to run, he made it happen because people agree with his message. The reason why there is so much doubt around his candidacy is because the media and the parties keep telling the public that he is a fringe candidate. He's not fringe, he's mainstream. The media is trying to push fringe candidates like Clinton and Trump/Rubio/Cruz on people and call them mainstream, but the polls show that the majority of the country supports Sanders when people aren't being shoved loaded terms like "socialism", where they think it means something that it doesn't. You can see that in polls where people say that they agree with Sanders' positions, and also that they wouldn't vote for a socialist. The media is controlling the dialog, which is why you think Sanders is a fringe candidate or does not have a realistic chance at getting elected.
Re: (Score:3)
They would change debate rules to keep him out and deny him access to anyone of significance in the party at any level, local, state, or federal.
...and then all of the supporters that he has been very effective in attracting would be asking questions that the DNC and the RNC do not want to answer. It would be very bad for the DNC to deny him access to the primary. Once he started spreading his message so effectively, and people started listening, then he ensured that he would have a place at the table. The DNC didn't help him get his message out, either, that was all his campaign. The DNC has opted out of putting up their own tables outside of h [dailykos.com]
Re:Real problem: He's an idiot (Score:5, Insightful)
Biden tried and failed to get his party's nomination TWICE already. In this business, the third time isn't the charm, and two strikes is out. His 2008 campaign was effectively over just moments after it started, as he unloaded a half-dozen controversial statements about his opponents that went viral, and never recovered.
His continued poorly-considered statements after becoming Vice President prove he hasn't learned anything, and any Biden campaign is going to be peppered with video of him telling the viewer to "Get a shotgun" followed by usage tips which would get anyone else arrested for negligent discharge of a firearm. Combine that with his advanced age and recently-deceased son, and it's obvious why he wouldn't and even shouldn't run, without resorting to crazy theories.
There's no major animosity between Obama and Clinton that would cause either to set-up the other for failure. Clinton was a close second in the 2008 primaries, far ahead of Biden, and the obvious presumptive nominee next time around.
And just because Biden was Obama's choice for VP doesn't indicate any particular preference or connection. VPs are generally chosen to fill-in and balance out voting blocks, not because the administration has any particular preference for them. In fact quite the opposite (disdain and animosity towards their chosen VPs) seems to be more common.
His presidential campaign never began. (Score:3, Insightful)
Lessig has great ideas, and we need someone really serious to fix the corruption in our system. However, I can't imagine anybody taking his platform seriously. He wants to resign after a partial term! I think people won't want to elect someone that's only serious about doing part of the job. A specialist. Unfortunately, the US has been sick for a long time and needs a specialist.
Re: (Score:3)
He decided to remove the resignation component from his plans weeks ago. He was prepared to go whole hog. The Democratic Party still didn't want him in.
Re: (Score:2)
Maybe if he hadn't started off with such a silly plan in the first place, people might have taken him a little more seriously.
Re:His presidential campaign never began. (Score:5, Interesting)
He decided to remove the resignation component from his plans weeks ago. He was prepared to go whole hog. The Democratic Party still didn't want him in.
Maybe if he hadn't started off with such a silly plan in the first place, people might have taken him a little more seriously.
There are many labels you could give his plan, but "silly" seems inappropriate, at least if you know any history. The Founding Fathers would probably have strongly approved of such an initiative, since they knew their history too and modeled our country after principles of ancient Greece and Rome.
The ancient Romans had a specific way of dealing with a major crisis -- they'd elect a dictator [wikipedia.org] as an "extraordinary magistrate" whose sole purpose was to deal with the crisis and then resign. The classic example invoked by the Founding Fathers was Cincinnatus [wikipedia.org] who twice was given absolute power by the Romans and then gave it up to return to his farm. For the Romans, there was nothing worse than a politician who sought to keep power for a long time -- a trend that held for centuries until Julius Caesar finally broke that system and turned the Republic into an Empire.
George Washington has been compared to Cincinnatus a number of times, in that Washington could likely have been declared king after the Revolutionary War, but refused -- and then also made the example of resigning from the Presidency after two terms to avoid setting a precedent for a kind of king-like life-long reign.
I agree that Lessig's idea was idealistic and weird from a modern political perspective, but our country was founded on the ideal of a man who would take power to usher in ultimate reform (particularly in a crisis) and then give it up and return to his normal life. The Romans -- and the Founding Fathers -- thought there was no greater patriotic or noble duty than to be able give up great power once you have served your purpose.
The thing that's sad about Lessig's run is not only that he failed to get attention to his actual platform, but also that his revival of this old idea of giving up power failed to galvanize the American people, at a time when our system is moving increasingly toward concentrated power in the Executive Branch of the Federal Government. Such a return to the ideals of the Founders may be one of the few things that could prevent an ultimate devolution into a Caesar-like autocratic regime at some point in the future. (And if that sounds overly alarmist, consider that the decline of the Roman Republic happened gradually introduced by reformers who pledged to help "the people" more and more, and with each stage of "populist" reform -- and periodic scare tactics and wars -- the "people" voted to give up more and more rights to their ruler.)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
It's because when he's run against female candidates in the past, they bury him with spurious accusations of sexism (even though he's a feminist), but he's not politically-correct enough to defend against the tactic.
yeah right (Score:4, Insightful)
Perhaps a single issue "I'm going to pass one law and then resign" candidate just isn't well aligned with the Democratic party platform? Just a thought.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: yeah right (Score:2)
Putin would have a field day exploiting the power vacuum in so many ways.
His mission has appeal beyond Democrats (Score:2)
I wonder if the Democratic Party is the wrong platform for the kind of reform Lessig is gunning for. It's a shame that Third Party candidates hardly have a chance, because this really is where his candidacy belongs.
More Details (Score:5, Informative)
HuffPo actually explains how the rules changed: [huffingtonpost.com]
The DNC's rules for candidate participation in their debates were pretty straightforward--or so we thought. In August, before the Lessig campaign began, DNC Chair, Debbie Wasserman-Schultz, announced the standards for being included in the debates. As she described the rule, a candidate had to have 1 percent in three DNC sanctioned national polls, "in the six weeks prior to the debate."
[...]
And indeed, that is precisely the rule that was applied in the first debate. As CNN specified in a late September memo, to qualify a candidate had to poll at 1 percent in the "polls released between August 1, 2015 and October 10, 2015." The first debate was October 12.
[...]
During that call, I was told that the DNC participation standard for the debates was for a candidate to be at one percent in three polls conducted, "six weeks prior to the debate"--not the clarified rule cited earlier by Wasserman-Shultz and the DNC political director that a candidate had to be at one percent in three polls conducted "in the six weeks prior to the debate."
So the DNC had said 1% in the six weeks before the debate and used that standard in the first debate, but in the second debate where Lessig qualified by that standard they switched to 6 weeks before the debate.
It seems odd even if you don't take the wording at face value and wonder about the missing upper bound in the range given by "six weeks before the debate".
I can see why the DNC doesn't want a candidate who is there almost explicitly as a one issue protest candidate but that's a fairly dirty way to go about it.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
Well put. Frankly, I don't know why he even wanted to campaign in the first place, since he made it clear he didn't want to be the prez. Wasting people's time much?
I think you completely missed the point of his campaign. He DID want to be President, to accomplish a particular task in a moment of crisis, a move that would have undoubtedly been approved of by the U.S. Founders. It seems modeled after the principle of the Roman dictator [wikipedia.org] (who was elected to serve in a moment of crisis and then expected to resign immediately afterward) and particularly Cincinnatus. (I've written more about this in another post above.)
He wanted to be President to accomplish a particula
Re: (Score:2)
"but that's a fairly dirty way to go about it."
Are you really surprised?
Re:More Details (Score:5, Informative)
They changed the required 1% on the polls rule from "in the six weeks prior to the debate" To 3 polls "at least six weeks prior to the debate"
Blindness happens to smart people too... (Score:3)
It was quite obvious from day one that the people who organize the party have absolutely zero interest in Larry's platform, and that they will make sure that anything like his project gets hidden from the general public.
As soon as he had any chance to be something more than a "decorative" candidate the party would make sure that he is blocked, because the system suits them just fine.
The core issue is that the sheep vote for who ever has the more shiny adverts, so there is no "short term fix", maybe something like a 10 year project starting with a general campaign telling the public to under no circumstance vote for an incumbent candidate, no matter how bad the other guys are the only way you as a citizen can be listened is by showing that you have the power to punish a politician, and you need to punish all of them just for being unable to fix the system.
Then campaign on : look at the tools that enable you to asses you representatives past performance, and future projects, ignore their adverts they are of no value what so ever...
Then maybe, just maybe for the third round people will vote for their candidates because they believe in what they are achieving, or really planning to achieve and not because they have more shiny ads and are not quite as bad as the other guy(gal).
And there's still a year to go. (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Canadians haven't figured out that an election can be a real money maker for some influential people and a $Country's Next Supermodel for the plebs....err rest it seems.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:And there's still a year to go. (Score:4, Informative)
Voting is not compulsory in the UK.
Re: And there's still a year to go. (Score:2)
It is a little ridiculous, but as I was telling my kids a few hours ago, parliamentary elections are inherently easier and quicker than a Presidential election would ever be. Party slates and party voting is just a lot easier than publicly selecting your party's standard bearer. In most parliamentary elections, the party has already decided its leadership internally (via party conferences) and generally puts forth it's slate fairly easily. The actual election season is thus just the race between the various
Error In Title: it's not simply "unfair rules" (Score:5, Informative)
Note that he raised more money than Webb and Chafee, who were allowed in the first debate; and if his name hadn't been excluded from polls, it's even conceivable he would have been allowed into the first debate.
Unclear Rules (Score:3)
Lessig's campaign asked the DNC for clarity on the rule, and they kept waffling back and forth on whether it requires 1% in the polls >6 weeks before the debate, or 6 weeks before the debate. I have a feeling that noone at the DNC actually knows which it is, explaining the conflicting answers; the 'rule' is probably only there for show, and never actually critically applied; it is simply 'known' which candidates have enough buzz, and those are the ones that make it to the debate.
He's absolutely delusional (Score:2)
Reading his statements, it's clear he was absolutely DELUSIONAL about the effort and skills required to do what he claimed he would do... even worse than Donald Trump.
Go through the comments that followed his recent article in The Atlantic (don't bother reading his statement). Everybody but him (and I maybe TWO random commentators) could see how glaringly irrational and fraught with obvious flaws his whole idea was:
http://www.theatlantic.com/pol... [theatlantic.com]
The Democrats are looking at (Score:2)
the Republican Clown Cars or recent elections and are working hard to eliminate non-serious candidates who have zero chance.
I wonder how President Lessig would react to a terrorist attack in the US? How would he cope with Russia, China, and the Middle East in general? What were his plans for spending and funding? Did he even give any thought to that?
Did he ever consider that he might be faced with responding to a nuclear attack, and the standard US response to such a thing?
so what method does he propose? (Score:2)
*Some* method has to be used to gradually reduce the list of people to debate. What does Lessig propose? He could not even gather the support for that. Is that the fault of the process, or him?
Not a real Democrat (Score:2)
Lessg's key issue is imposing stricter government restrictions on speech. The party elites don't support his plan, the rank and file don't support his plan, and the broad electo
He was a trivial, one-issue campaigner (Score:2)
He had the bully pulpit to be a centrist, and a single issue that's of importance to thinking individuals on BOTH sides of the political fence who are getting tired of the Hobson's Choice of the two-ever-more radicalized party establishments. There is a mass of people on the right who are conservative, and who want nothing to do with the right-wing activists that have taken over the GOP. There is (I'd guess) a similar mass on the left, probably quieter as they've held the presidency for 2 terms. But thes
Wrong way to protest (Score:2)
Westerners don't use this tool nearly enough which is ironic, given that most Americans could last quite awhile before succumbing to starvation.
Good riddance! (Score:2)
Don't let the door hit you in the ass on the way out, Professor. The last thing we need in a president is an anti-First Amendment fanatic.
Michael Medved (Score:2)
The system is broken (Score:4, Informative)
This is what happens to all candidates that don't have strong poling numbers. They get shut out of the debates. They get hardly any questions at all. I thought this was supposed to be a democracy? I think that all candidates should get equal time in the debates. Give them all x number of minutes to make their case to the American voters. Without moderators jumping in or getting cut off by other candidates. Every time a candidate jumps in take a minute of time away from their talking time.
The current format is a circus. Nothing more than name calling and gotcha questions. Let's find out what they really have to say and let them stand or fall on their own merits.
Re: (Score:3)
You think you want to know the truth...but you don't. It's worse than anything you could even imagine.
Re: (Score:2)
Nobody knows these things...and remember they are passing laws and regulations, like gerrymandered districts. 'Winning' the US House and Senate is impossible if you haven't been paying attention at the local level.
And I'm just as guilty as the next on this.
Re: (Score:2)
Not only do I know the names of each and every single one of them - I have met each and every single one of them, in person. Of course, it helps living in an unincorporated township in the middle of nowhere. I don't have to know nearly as much information. I do wish there were some way to ensure we had an informed voter while actually not abusing such a system. Alas, I am unable to think of such a thing. Even tests can be made to give prejudicial results with things as simple as verbiage.
Maybe if you had to
Re: (Score:2)
Yep, Nothing like people who don't vote in primaries or the general complaining their vote doesn't matter.
Re: (Score:2)
The weird thing is that the US president is as important as he is at all.
Why isn't he just "the head of ministers" that he a president is in most countries; just like all the other ministers with a few specific extra responsibilities.
Instead, in the US, the president is like a king; exactly the type of ruler they opposed so ardently.
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
Except he isn't really? I mean he can't even PROPOSE laws, he has to have someone else do it.
What part of "I have a phone and a Pen and I'm not afraid to use them" didn't register with you? The president may not be able to make law, but they have a LOT of power.
Re: (Score:3)
I think that we need to scrutinize election rules under the same constitutional lens we're using for gun laws.
The fundamental problem with that approach is that these aren't Constitutional rules. They're PARTY rules. And the parties can make damned near any rule they want, because it's their party. If you want to run under the banner of that party, then they call the shots.
George Washington warned about party shenanigans in his Second Farewell Address [virginia.edu]. Starting about where it says "[Page 11]".
Re: this is why we have crap for politicians (Score:5, Interesting)
Step one: learn your own history. Jefferson forsaw the rise of an American aristocracy and created a perfect tool to prevent and undo it: the estate tax. Since the early 20th century rightwingers have been progressively dismantling that tool and now, surprize surprize, America is ruled by a de facto aristocracy.
Restore the estate tax to 95% and the problem (in all its many forms) is fixed in one generation.
Re: this is why we have crap for politicians (Score:5, Insightful)
Step one: learn your own history. Jefferson forsaw the rise of an American aristocracy and created a perfect tool to prevent and undo it: the estate tax. Since the early 20th century rightwingers have been progressively dismantling that tool and now, surprize surprize, America is ruled by a de facto aristocracy.
Restore the estate tax to 95% and the problem (in all its many forms) is fixed in one generation.
You might want to listen to "right-wingers" now and then to learn something. The estate tax in its current form has been around for 90 years - not since Jefferson. During that time the exemptions haven't been indexed to inflation so the size of an estate that is taxed is now dramatically smaller than it was back then. That means that it hits small businesses and farms the hardest. Meanwhile actual rich people have carved out big enough exemptions that they don't have to worry about it.
While I don't care to "dismantle it" (of course, I'm not a "right-winger", anyway) it needs to be fixed back to its original purpose of taxing rich people. The debate is similar to the left trying to raise taxes on "the rich" while succeeding in raising taxes on the middle class instead. Doctors and lawyers are not "rich". (In case you're that far left, let me make this simple: "but he has more money than me :(" doesn't mean "he" is "rich")
I know someone right now who owns a farm that's been the family for a few generations. During the time the city has grown up around it and the property values have soared. She's 84, husband is gone. It's unlikely that her four kids can come up with the money when she's gone, so the land will be sold. That wasn't the intent.
Re: this is why we have crap for politicians (Score:4, Insightful)
I know someone right now who owns a farm that's been the family for a few generations. During the time the city has grown up around it and the property values have soared. She's 84, husband is gone. It's unlikely that her four kids can come up with the money when she's gone, so the land will be sold. That wasn't the intent.
Today, the estate tax applies to inherited assets in excess of $5.43 million. She has 4 heirs, and they can each inherit $5.43 million free from the estate tax. If it's "unlikely that her four kids can come up with the money when she's gone", the implication is that they'll face an estate tax burden greater than $0. That means that the total value of this farm exceeds $21.72 million, assuming the heirs cannot afford any tax burden.
I'd argue that someone with a single asset worth $21.72 million is indeed wealthy, and that the intent of the estate tax was (and is) indeed to tax her. If she chooses to allocate her assets such that she doesn't have any liquid capital, only the farm, then that's her choice. To spin her as some sort of charity case, however, is disingenuous at best. There's enough wealth to generate an annual revenue of $434,400 at a modest 2% interest rate (and even a CD will yield closer to 2.45%). Split evenly between the five family members, that's $86,880 per year per person, indefinitely, living off the interest alone. That's 3.25 times the size of the median individual income. While she has my sympathies for the loss of her husband, I won't be losing any sleep over this independently wealthy family's financial situation.
Re: this is why we have crap for politicians (Score:3)
The US version was instituted at a different time and for a different reason. The one I cited.
Re: this is why we have crap for politicians (Score:2)
Assuming your right... why should we care what the tiny minority destined to acquire ten million they didnt earn have to say ?
Re: (Score:2)
He looks like he's trying for "one s, one apostrophe".
Re: (Score:2)
I am prepared to censure him gently for using the apostrophe (forgive me if I would do so in my imagination only) if you would tell me how to deal with the following situation, not using an apostrophe or some similar mark.
Suppose a family's surname is S. How would you reference two of them? Or, a little more realistically, suppose Mr. Lessig's name were Mr. Less. How would you reference two of the members of his family?
Always writing "two members of the Sanders family" strikes me as rather circumlocutory, b
Re: (Score:3)
one person - one vote?
If we are going to "Get back to" something, it was originally one LAND OWNER - One Vote. Owning land was like owning stock, own stock and you can vote on how the company was run, own land and you can vote on how the country was run.
Technically it was any Free, male, land owner in most places but some allowed free, female, land owners as well.
Re: (Score:2)
Lessig might have actually had a chance, can't have the possibility of messing up the Royal Coronation underway!
Same reason Biden is not running.
I thought it was Jeb's turn this time? I guess Obama messed the schedule up.
Re: (Score:3)
Yes, Obama was not supposed to get the nomination before and Hillary is Rather Irked about that.
The Republicans at least have the good sense this time to kick out THIER retread.
Re: (Score:2)
It's never a democracy unless it is in your favor. /s
The system is rigged, unless you or your candidate wins. /not sure if snark
Re: (Score:2)
Why would choosing a party candidate be democratic?
Do you know the meaning of the phrase "Eating your own dog food"?
Re: (Score:2)
Using the term "republic" to mean "representative democracy" is not a good idea, as to most people "republic" simply means a country without a dynastic leader. It might be a dictatorship, it might be a direct democracy, or it might be a representative democracy, or anything else.
Re: (Score:3)
Well, the THIRD definition at dictionary.com is "a state in which the head of government is not a monarch or other hereditary head of state", but the FIRST definition is "a state in which the supreme power rests in the body of citiz
Re: (Score:2)
But when you combine that with the fact that the two dominant parties completely control the electoral process, that's called "tyranny."
Re: (Score:2)
And nobody still knows who Lessig is.
Nobody knew who Ben Carson was before either, but they do now.
That's the power of the primary debates, is anyone can come into national prominence.
Re: (Score:2)
A lot more people would have known who he is if he had been allowed into the Democratic Party debates.
Yeah, that's even true for you Mr. Anonymous. It's hardly a reason to include him in a "PARTY" debate.
Re: Actual Threats Need Not Apply (Score:3)
Yep. No liberal I know votes democrat because they trust the politicians or has any faith in them delivering on election promises. They vote democrat because if they dont the republicans would give big red button to a batshit insane lunatic.
Better a bad but sane president than a batshit crazy one. Good candidates dont get to be an option anymore.
Re: (Score:3)
Same reason Biden is not running.
Not quite. Biden isn't running because he doesn't want to get whacked.
By who? Hillary? I think Biden knows that unless Hillary gets perpwalked in handcuffs, his best day in the polls would be when he officially started the campaign. He doesn't have the juice to compete with the Clinton machine. He'd loose like he did before.
Or the Republican? It's pretty clear to me that the republican nominee would wipe the floor with Biden. Biden is a walking gaff machine when he's out talking off the cuff, and if he ran it would really hard for him to stay on prompter. He'd be foreve
Re:Larry Lessig Ends Presidential Campaign... (Score:5, Interesting)
... and no one except his Mom and a few slashdot editors knows or cares.
That may change. For me, even just a few years ago, the corrupting influence of money in politics wasn't an issue that I'd ever really thought much about. There was a lot that I was angry about. But it was hard to make sense of it all.
The Iraq war never made any sense. If there was any country that should been held accountable for 9/11, it was Saudi Arabia. But somehow Saudi Arabia was our "friend". And then there was the housing/financial collapse followed by a long recession. Supposedly the Tea Party was all freaked out about the budget deficit but their solution was to advocate cutting taxes on the rich. Huh? If you're really concerned about budget deficits then you raise taxes - particularly on the people who can easily afford to pay more.
In his Gettysburg Address, which he probably wrote while he had smallpox, Abraham Lincoln talks about the USA having been founded to have a government of, by, and for the people. Now, at least until our robotic overlords take power, governments are always comprised of people. But what Abraham Lincoln meant was ordinary people - that the U.S.A was founded to be different than Europe, and most of the rest of the world, that was, at the time, governed by a small, mostly hereditary, ruling class living lives of frivolous luxury by exploiting everyone else. To me, one of the most egregious betrayals of the principles on which the USA was founded occurs at times when the USA is itself controlled by a small mostly hereditary ruling class and when the ruling class uses the US military to support brutal dictatorships in other countries because these dictatorships give money and other personal favors to members of the US ruling class - i.e. the "banana republic".
So why does a candidate like Hillary, who claims to be all about women's rights, have such a cozy relationship with Saudi Arabia? Obviously, follow the money. Like the Bushes, the Clintons have been given millions and millions of dollars by the Saudi ruling family. Do we want yet another president for the USA who deep in the pocket of brutal dictatorships like Suadi Arabia? Well, my personal answer is: Absolutely not!
There was a time when I didn't get it. But now, with Hillary running for president, and likely to receive the democratic nomination. Lessig's message about the corrupting influence of money was exactly what was needed. It's just too bad that the Democratic party chose to shut him down and suppress his message.
Re: Larry Lessig Ends Presidential Campaign... (Score:5, Insightful)
Ive met him a few times and Im from a third world country with no PHD at all. Yet he listened to my ideas with interest and gave constructive and useful suggestions. He listened to my talks the way I listened to his lectures.
You are slandering a man in ignorance. Elitist ? Exactly the opposite. He is a man who spends his life in search of new ideas and cares not where he finds them
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
You're talking right out of your ass here, or at best, projecting. Seek help, in case its the latter. Even such a bigot as you has the right to know his own mind.
He's not really wrong, though he should have said extreme left. That of course is the left part of the spectrum, where anything that isn't a part of your ideology is far-right. You can look at the amount of garbage coming out of universities attacking common people from wrong think, going directly after freedom of speech and expression, attacking people for wearing costumes they find offensive, whining about how people are invading their safe spaces while engaging in so much self-hate and white guilt that
Re: (Score:2)
Paranoid bullshit.
Idiot that hasn't been paying attention.
Banning of expression and speech [thoughtcatalog.com] banning wrongthink [washingtonpost.com]
Banning of speech on university campuses [thefire.org] and another [thefire.org] banning costumes [kron4.com] and another [huffingtonpost.ca] safe spaces, and no dissent [equalitycanada.com] safe spaces and pro-racial segregation. [spectator.co.uk] Did I miss anything, or do you need a few dozen more examples? This isn't isolated, you can find more examples of every single one.
Re: (Score:2)
I forgot in my previous post, that this isn't a left-vs-right thing. This is the pro-authoritarian left mainly right now, with some on the right with shared beliefs(aka horseshoe theory [wikipedia.org] in action), and pro-social libertarian left and right fighting against this garbage. This is how far banning people for wrongthink [spectator.co.uk] has gotten.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
To some extend, nobody knows who Martin O'Malley is...
Well, I know he's a Democrat. I can't say the same about Mr. Lessig.
Re: (Score:3)
Yes, some of us do know who Martin O'Malley is. He screwed up Baltimore as mayor and then decided to do to the rest of Maryland what he did to Baltimore as governor. Seeing Washington right next door, he decided his ego was big enough to encompass that as well and is now running for the Democrat nomination. But he doesn't have a vagina so this isn't his year.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: Who? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: Who? (Score:5, Interesting)
He also garnered more than 1% of the vote (Score:2, Informative)
In one poll, he needed to garner more than 1% in three, but after winning that margin in one poll, they took his name off the next polls.
Because then they could cite the rules about needing to poll to refuse him a seat.
Meanwhile, how many republican nominees did they let in, even on the same damn channels..?
Re: (Score:2)
Well, clown cars do get funnier the more clowns you stuff into them.. hence allowing everybody who even smelled like a republican candidate a chance to get in.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: Who? (Score:2)
Lincoln and FDR. To a lesser extent LBJ. The rest were basically figureheads.
Re: (Score:2)
LBJ changed things all right, just not in a good way. He massively deepened America's involvement in the Vietnam War, leading to the deaths of 50,000 Americans and around a million Vietnamese. He was one of the worst Presidents in US history.
He did manage to get the Civil Rights Act passed, so that's good, and he tried to do something good with his Great Society program (though the actual results weren't that great), but his involvement in the war more than makes up for all that.
Re: Who? (Score:2)
Well the gp didnt say only good changes
Re: Who? (Score:4, Funny)
Re: Who? (Score:4, Insightful)
If we don't get leaders that actually solves problems into positions of power it really doesn't matter what we elect.
Lessig has no realistic plan to solve, or even address, any problem. His plan is to amend the constitution (something the president has no power whatsoever to do) and then resign. That isn't a plan, it is a fantasy.
Re: (Score:2)
Yeah, I'm shocked at how naive most Slashdotters seem to be about politics. "What? A single-issue gimmick candidate who didn't actually want to be president (until he got laughed at) got shut out of a major public debate? CONSPIRACY!"
No shit, Sherlock. The DNC isn't a charity; they exist to get people elected. The debates promote the entire party, and they're trying to create a contrast with the Republican clown show. There's little benefit to adding fringe kooks to the debate.
"He's no more of a kook than a