A Red March to Fix The States

Social democrats because they are the majority of leftists.

If you don't like a single Frank Ocean song, you have no soul.

If working within the political system's rules to suppress a minority is authoritarian, what would you call the current situation, where the system is used to suppress a MAJORITY?

Furthermore, I think Guantanamo must be destroyed.

How are they surpressed? There is nothing stopping people from voting Democrat.

If you don't like a single Frank Ocean song, you have no soul.

While a full-blown socialist looting of the rich would get much opposition from conservatives, they'd suddently stop bitching soon afterwards.

Joe Conservative ain't got much reason to whine if you can suddenly afford a plasma TV, a PS 3, a nice laptop, a decent house, health insurance and a Chevy Captiva...

You exist because we allow it and you will end because we demand it.

It may also be relevant to note that Obama got more electoral votes than he did popular votes. I realize Obama is probably not Savage's idea of a true Scotsman, but the rural states that voted for him weren't even pretending to be such.

That is a very frivolous reason to rob people, and will destroy the social contract. Signed, Paul.

edited 18th Dec '11 10:09:43 AM by DomaDoma

Hail Martin Septim!

The system is weighted so that the moderate-liberal majority is fairly easily drowned out by the conservative minority.

Even a proportionally-represented system with... what is it, instant-run off voting?... wouldn't necessarily totally fix the issue.

I am now known as Flyboy.

The self-described conservatives are a minority, the self-described independents and moderates are a minority, and the self-described liberals are the smallest minority of all. To lump the last two groups together is one of the finest examples of a statistical lie I have ever seen.

(P.S.: I like approval voting, myself. Too bad it's an anti-incumbent policy.)

edited 18th Dec '11 10:13:26 AM by DomaDoma

Hail Martin Septim!

I seriously, seriously doubt that.

^Yeah, most people, if faced with an opinion other than theirs, won't listen carefully and look for flaws in reasoning. Instead, they'll just not pay attention.

Infinite Tree: an experimental story

@Doma,

The defense rests.

I am now known as Flyboy.

Party registration isn't as accurate a measure as self-description; party affiliation is often residual from one's youngest voting days, and people tend to bear right with age. Last I looked, Orson Scott Card was a registered Democrat.

Hail Martin Septim!

According to this, even in the apex year for the Tea Party conservatives were only 2/5ths of the country. Liberals, on the other hand, were 1/5th, but that leaves the other 2/5ths as moderates, for a basic vindication of my statement: there are more liberals and moderates than there are conservatives, and yet conservatives have a disproportionate amount of control in the government, compared to their actual numbers.

I am now known as Flyboy.

For these purposes, I guess the moderates in Congress don't count - or they all count as liberal; the post-2010 Congress has much more than 20% Democratic representation. But yes, people with more polarized positions are more likely to vote than the ones who are all right with the balance. Beats compulsory voting; we have enough voters as it is who can't name their representatives.

edited 18th Dec '11 11:00:24 AM by DomaDoma

Hail Martin Septim!

I do not think that the apex of the tea party movement would be a good thing to measure by...

And anyways, we should be working for more parties, not less!

We'd probably get more voters with proportional representation (which I've become partial too, somewhat), instant run-off voting, and publicly-funded campaigns...

To measure the strength of conservatism.

You might as well count all the moderates as liberals, since there are many more self-identified moderates with the Democrats than with the Republicans...

edited 18th Dec '11 11:03:45 AM by USAF713

I am now known as Flyboy.

We would. But try getting any government body not presided over by George "Fuck Power I've Got A Precedent To Set" Washington to make those changes.

Party registration again. Tsk, tsk. My mom is one of those self-described independents with a Democrat registration, and she votes on a candidate-by-candidate basis.

edited 18th Dec '11 11:06:32 AM by DomaDoma

Hail Martin Septim!

Well, so long as we keep them far away from Congress or the Presidency, the Green Party could do it if they took control of a significant number of State Governments...

...

Yeah, no, that's not going to happen.

I am now known as Flyboy.

The Green Party is way too single-minded to be a significant force. It's like a mirror-universe version of Sarah Palin, who doesn't much care about any other political issue as long as there's plenty of domestic hunting, mining and drilling. (Or didn't when she wrote Going Rogue. I've lost track.)

Hail Martin Septim!

@64: Until you scrap the winner-take-all system of elections (whether in the context of the Electoral College or in terms of members of the House of Representatives being elected winner-take-all in self-contained districts within states as opposed to being elected proportionally across the entirety of the state), you'll never have more than two parties.

I do not recall the specific sociologist / political scientist, but someone showed that proportional representation leads itself to multiple parties and winner-take-all elections lead to coalescence around two major parties.

The real problem is that it takes about 6.05% of the population to stifle any law in the US. Remember that due to Senatorial rules, 41 senators can completely block any bill from seeing a vote on the Senate floor. If you get 50.01% of the population from the least populous 21 states together to form a completely lockstep voting bloc, you can completely stop anything the rest of the country wants to do. Obviously, I took the absolute most extreme case possible, but there is very much a problem when such a situation is possible under the rules thus allowed.

edited 18th Dec '11 11:15:14 AM by DarkConfidant

The Green Party actually has a whole platform, and while they would make for terrible governmental leaders if allowed anywhere near the military (they support unilateral and total nuclear disarmament), they would not be that bad for State Government leaders...

I am now known as Flyboy.

Yep, and the electoral college was based on checking things like the balance between slave and free states, and the fear that the western states would expand to colossal proportions. Unlike the "living constitution" twerps, I say it should be fixed with an amendment. (And unlike the other system overhauls we've discussed, it could happen. The electoral college has pissed off incumbents of both parties within recent memory, but not so recent that it's a cheap shot against the sitting President.)

Hail Martin Septim!

re: party registration

Not all states require one to register with one party or another, either. Here in SC, for example, the only concern about a voter's party is to ensure that one who voted in one party's primary election doesn't also vote in that of another.

Going back to the OP, ignoring the intolerance of opposing political views thing, while I don't think it would succeed (see the Free State Project, and that's a much smaller target of just one state; years ago, there was a fundie Christian*

group that was talking about doing the same in SC... and as of a few years ago had all of 50 members in the group) it probably would be amusing to watch how all those Liberal Arts and Business degree holders would handle having to actually earn a living outside of paper shuffling.

(No, it's not all cow milking and farming in "fly-over country", but outside the major cities there's a lot less call for administrative sorts beyond government bureaucracies that can only get so big before running out of taxpayers, *

and a lot more call for people to work to provide physical products.)

All your safe space are belong to Trump

I am pretty sure if you wanted to colonize flyover country you would not be able to use your average liberals. You would need the really hardcore commune types, and I doubt you would be able to find that many.

Most of this aimed at the Op.

How about we come back to reality for a moment here. Violent revolution will not work. We have covered this time and time again. Not only will there be large segments of the population against it the overwhelming bulk of the military will be against it.

Lets consider another fact. The portion of populace you blindly lump together and have a hate boner for are also the better armed portion of the populace. Starting a red revolution is pretty much a gurantee to call them together.

Using violence to force your view down someone elses throat only breeds contempt and violence in return and is just as abusive as the system in place.

I am not seeing any good reason to follow your suggestion as it only leads to more of the same shit. Meet the new boss same as the old boss.

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Moderates and Independants do not always vote along party lines and for a good reason. Also measuring the height of the tea party is just measuring the height of the teaparty. Teapart=/=Republican.

Who watches the watchmen?

This isn't supposed to be a violent revolution, Tuefel, it's a voter subversion.

He's basically saying that a whole bunch of liberals need to go out and try and counteract the votes of conservatives in the national elections, as I understand it.

It's still far-fetched, but at least it's reasonable, compared to "execute all the government leaders and police!"

I am now known as Flyboy.