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By ness31
#15104786


Brought to you by one half of the Weinstein brothers.

Its a nice thought, but how on earth will it be accomplished?
By Patrickov
#15104796
I read a few comments and have a feeling that soft Trumpers or Practical Trumpers are the most positive to this idea. If the basic situation does not change this movement will help Biden in this election.
By ness31
#15104802
It’s a totally radical idea. These are smart people so I’m curious how they think they’re going to achieve this remodeling of American politics. They talk of a ‘groundswell’ of people needed to back the concept...so at least they know what they’re up against :lol:
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By Steve_American
#15105006
I suggested public mass demonstrations a few years ago.
I hoped that Progressives were numerous enough.
Obviously, it didn't happen.

I also have suggested on this site in a few places lists of gov. changes with just laws and requiring amendments.
For example just a law could require all the states to elect US House Reps. from 1 district for states with 1 to 10 Reps., then from a small number of districts each with 5 to 8 Reps. Voters would split their 1 vote between a few candidates by voting for all he wants to. Machines count the votes and tally the fractional votes. This should make gerrymandering useless. About 37 states currently have 10 or less Reps and would have 1 district.
. . . If a district had 7 Reps. a 3rd party could bullet vote for 1 guy and get elected with about 14% of the vote.
By ness31
#15105020
Rugoz wrote:They want to run with 2 centrist candidates against Biden and Trump? Good luck with that. :roll:


Im no specialist in American politics so I’m kinda clueless.

Is it constitutionally valid to parachute 2 candidates in bypassing the primaries? That would be awesome, but the system seems to be set up in such a way to make it virtually impossible :hmm:

And the coin toss thing, it’s only symbolic right up until the point when the President has to pull rank:

Only when they cannot reach agreement, or when a decision does not allow for consultation, does the President decide independently. A coin flip determines which candidate runs at the top of the ticket.


So, are they essentially President and Vice President?

I think this is exciting stuff. I hope Americans turn out in droves to fuck both major parties up :|
By ness31
#15105240
Kanye West has announced he is running for President
By annatar1914
#15105255
Unthinking Majority wrote:He's crazier than Trump, if that's possible.


Trump's not crazy. I've warned people for years against the spread of the language of psychology and psychiatry to describe people and their behaviors, and this person's case is one I'm particularly energetic about. Why? Because neither Trump nor Kanye West are crazy at all. They're in fact what some have called a type of people; ''master persuaders'', people who artfully use neuro-linguistic programming techniques on other persons on such a genius (even instinctive) level and it's rare that other's pick up on it sufficiently to notice. What they have are personas, their public lives are not their private lives. They are very good actors, although they may sometimes actually believe what they say, it's more important to them that others believe what they say.

This says nothing about their moral fitness or capacity for good or evil, by the way. Abraham Lincoln was a master persuader in his day for example.
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By Local Localist
#15105256
annatar1914 wrote:Trump's not crazy. I've warned people for years against the spread of the language of psychology and psychiatry to describe people and their behaviors, and this person's case is one I'm particularly energetic about. Why? Because neither Trump nor Kanye West are crazy at all. They're in fact what some have called a type of people; ''master persuaders'', people who artfully use neuro-linguistic programming techniques on other persons on such a genius (even instinctive) level and it's rare that other's pick up on it sufficiently to notice. What they have are personas, their public lives are not their private lives. They are very good actors, although they may sometimes actually believe what they say, it's more important to them that others believe what they say.

This says nothing about their moral fitness or capacity for good or evil, by the way. Abraham Lincoln was a master persuader in his day for example.


Would you say that it's possible to be a 'master persuader' without realising what you're doing? It seems that some have a natural gift for rhetoric, though they aren't specifically channelling it to any coherent ends.
By annatar1914
#15105259
Local Localist wrote:Would you say that it's possible to be a 'master persuader' without realising what you're doing? It seems that some have a natural gift for rhetoric, though they aren't specifically channelling it to any coherent ends.


There are master persuaders that have a natural gift for it. But as for goals and ends of these people, they're so far above what others are capable of that it's difficult to how they couldn't achieve them. It just looks like 10-dimensional chess to most people. Of course, what works in some cultures with some people doesn't translate as well in and with others, but most of this sort of thing is universal, based on people's primal needs, wants, fears, and desires.

And again, just because they do this isn't necessarily a moral judgement call on my part, although I do make those judgements.
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By Local Localist
#15105263
annatar1914 wrote:There are master persuaders that have a natural gift for it.



This implies that many don't. Do you believe that people such as the American president have trained themselves to become masters of persuasion?
By Patrickov
#15105267
Local Localist wrote:Would you say that it's possible to be a 'master persuader' without realising what you're doing? It seems that some have a natural gift for rhetoric, though they aren't specifically channelling it to any coherent ends.


I rather think it's more like Trump (or even Lincoln in that case), for an instance, identified what the general public worried or perceived as a problem, magnifying it in his narrative, therefore attracting the "right" crowd to enable him a place in the White House and, thus, American History or even World History.

There is no need to exaggerate his "abilities". He just got something right at the right time.
By annatar1914
#15105269
Local Localist wrote:This implies that many don't. Do you believe that people such as the American president have trained themselves to become masters of persuasion?


It appears to be an ''Art'' for some, while a ''Science'' for others. Some techniques of persuasion must be taught, and even naturals to this arena can hone their skills once they are familiar enough with what it is they are doing. And again, every fish knows the water he swims in, even if he can't see it he knows it's there.
By annatar1914
#15105270
Patrickov wrote:I rather think it's more like Trump (or even Lincoln in that case), for an instance, identified what the general public worried or perceived as a problem, magnifying it in his narrative, therefore attracting the "right" crowd to enable him a place in the White House and, thus, American History or even World History.

There is no need to exaggerate his "abilities". He just got something right at the right time.


One has to know the right time and place. Setting the stage before the persuasion is where the victory is already won. Sun Tzu knew this of course, by the way. So again, this is a very old and pretty universal social technology.
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By quetzalcoatl
#15105279
I did read the Medium article. It seemed remarkably vague as to what its specific aims would be.

A more definitive set of unity proposals might look some thing like this:

1) Strong non-partisan effort to eliminate the overwhelming financial corruption that has been engendered by by both existing parties.

2) Strong system of electoral security to assure that every eligible citizen is afforded a reasonable opportunity to vote, and that the votes are accurately counted. "Reasonable" is hard to define here, but it should preclude black districts with tens of thousands of voters being reduced to one polling location. Total elimination of hackable EVMs. Parties should not be allowed to administer their primaries.

3) The artificial barriers to third party participation in elections need to be torn down.

4) Popular determination of spending priorities. For example, ballots would contain a list of general spending categories, and voters would be asked to rate them 1 - 12 (or whatever) in order of importance.

My preliminary list would include:
*Weapons systems
*Military pay
*Veterans Administration
*Highway/bridge infrastructure
*Rail infrastructure
*Aviation infrastructure
*Power distribution infrastructure
*Foreign food aid
*Foreign military aid
*Post Office
*Federal Job Guarantee
*Healthcare Insurance

Congress would be obliged to honor these priorities - they would have to spend more on item 3 than item 5, and could not bring up item 12 and make it item 2.

----------------------

If the intention of this movement is to "unite" the nation behind some kind of austerity budget it will fail - people are already struggling.
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By Rugoz
#15105284
What I always get from these threads is that Americans cannot agree on how to reform the system so nothing gets ever done. Being against "corruption" is not a reform proposal. It seems politicians and activists deliberately keep things surface level, either because they think their audience is stupid or because they don't want to give anyone a reason to disagree.

Shouldn't the reform start at the state level anyway? People complain about the 2-party system, but has any state actually changed its electoral system from FPTP to something else?
By Patrickov
#15105288
Rugoz wrote:Shouldn't the reform start at the state level anyway? People complain about the 2-party system, but has any state actually changed its electoral system from FPTP to something else?


But how is the electoral system supposed to work anyways? I have no problem with small states to keep FPTP to make their voices heard, but I have no idea on how big states should split electoral votes, and where should the boundary/ies between small / (medium / ...) / big states be drawn.

More importantly, I actually think FPTP electoral vote system can be circumvented by some kind of migration scheme.
User avatar
By Local Localist
#15105295
Everyone talks about scrapping the first past the post system as if it's some universally agreed upon thing, as though they've never heard the argument for the system in the first place. I'm not strongly for or against it, but I'll just put a rationale for the system out there so it's on the table:

1. The first past the post system ensures that more rural localities are able to be heard. If an industrialised nation were not divided into electorates, the urbanites would have complete control over everything, and all the nation's resources would be allocated toward fixing problems in urban areas. Farmers and smaller communities should necessarily have more of a voice than individuals in large cities, as they will be entirely ignored otherwise.

2. New Zealand scrapped the first past the post system in 1996. In their most recent election, neither the reigning National Party nor the Labour Party could gain a parliamentary majority, due to the increased representation of minor parties in the political system. Now, until that point, the National Party had been in coalition with the NZ First Party, so the NZ First voters would've assumed that their vote would go toward that coalition. However, after the election had been held and the votes had been counted, the NZ First Party decided to form a coalition with the Labour Party, meaning that despite the National Party having more seats overall, and the NZ First Party having been voted for with the understanding that they would support the Nationals, the Labour Party formed the government.

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