Are American Politics Broken?

[Wiglaf]

Congress also passed a 375-1 U.S. House Resolution congratulating the New Orleans Saints on their first Superbowl win. I guess that was a terrible idea, too? And I suppose so was the Great Society program, Medicare, Medicaid, and nuking Japan?

[DaShi]

**** the Saints!

[Guynemer]

Congress also passed a 375-1 U.S. House Resolution congratulating the New Orleans Saints on their first Superbowl win. I guess that was a terrible idea, too? And I suppose so was the Great Society program, Medicare, Medicaid, and nuking Japan?

I'm gonna go ahead and say "yes" to all of the above. EDIT: possible exception for the nuke, depends on when you ask me and what my blood sugar is. SECOND EDIT: did Congress vote on nuking Japan? That doesn't even apply, you monster.

[giblets]

Congress also passed a 375-1 U.S. House Resolution congratulating the New Orleans Saints on their first Superbowl win. I guess that was a terrible idea, too? And I suppose so was the Great Society program, Medicare, Medicaid, and nuking Japan?

Who voted against it?

[Wiglaf]

Dan Burton, from Indiana.

did Congress vote on nuking Japan? That doesn't even apply, you monster.

They supported it

Funny you oppose Medicare but support Obamacare now. Perhaps if a BLACK MAN invented Medicare you'd be for it. You are a Race baiter who is caught up in the hype

[Guynemer]

What in the ****ing world gave you the impression that I support Obamacare?

It is too late in the evening to come up with some slanderous insult to demonstrate that I do not take Wiggy seriously, so just assume something is here that fits the description.

[giblets]

Medicare would probably be a lot better if it wasn't a bipartisan cluster****. Every other country in the developed world managed to get government-funded healthcare right while the US has runaway costs and inadequate coverage.

[Guynemer]

Yup; and Obamacare does precisely ****-all to fix that problem.

[Barnabas]

Bush jr winning while getting less votes than Al Gore is an example of American politics being broken, the guy who got less votes won.

Another from that same election would be Bush jr winning because the 1 million minority in a country of 300 million known as Cuban Americans deciding the election, if the whole issue of the Elian kid who was sent back to Cuba had never happened, Cuban Americans wouldn't have felt the need to punish democrats, and Al Gore would have won Florida, and Saddam would still rule Iraq.

If you change the electoral system, you change the politics, you would have more political parties too

[Hauldren Collider]

The electoral college isn't what holds third parties back. If a handful of large states weren't winner-takes-all (California, New York and Texas would probably be enough), it would arguably foster third parties, because they could become compromise candidates in the House of Representatives.

[Zevico]

Third parties are held back by the first past the post system, to some extent. Preferential voting does away with strategic voting considerations.

[C0ckney]

i never thought i'd say this but zevico is dead right.

proportional representation.

[giblets]

The electoral college isn't what holds third parties back. If a handful of large states weren't winner-takes-all (California, New York and Texas would probably be enough), it would arguably foster third parties, because they could become compromise candidates in the House of Representatives.

He didn't specify exactly how he thinks the electoral system should be changed.

[Zevico]

i never thought i'd say this but zevico is dead right.

proportional representation.

Except that I didn't say that I supported proportional representation. I said I supported a preferential voting system. That's where you vote for your preferred candidate, but if he doesn't get enough votes to win a seat, your vote passes to your next preferred candidate, and so on. It does away with the need for a runoff, for example.

I have not read much on it myself but my understanding was that French politics under the proportional system was widely regarded as quite corrupt and De Gaulle is credited with creating a representative democratic model in France with individual MPs accountable to individual constituencies. This reduces corruption by making it harder for dirty candidates to win a seat by gaining the local public's support (as opposed to the generalised support that voters might give to a given party).

[Zevico]

Third party candidates really only exist in two cases: (1) where the national or local branch of the dominant two centre parties are so corrupt or out of touch that the voters won't want them; (2) on the fringes of the political spectrum. If the two dominant parties are clean the third party may exist briefly but won't get momentum. It will be squeezed out of existence. The fringe parties are simply a byproduct of ideological disagreements.