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Edited by Mrph1 on Nov 30th 2023 at 11:03:59 AM
Rand Paul’s filibuster in opposition to Brennan, drone policy ends after nearly 13 hours
You have to admire his stamina.
Everything is Possible. But some things are more Probable than others. JEBAGEDDON 2016Also, election days in the U.S. are not holidays. It can take hours to vote in some districts and a poor person can literally lose their job for taking time off to vote.
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"It's not a coincidence that the poorest districts in the U.S. tend to vote Democrat and also have some of the longest lines to vote.
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"That's me, for the most part. The way I see it, while the Republicans are definitely worse than the Democrats, the Democrats aren't much better. Sure, they have better economic policies, but, to me, the choice is between being tortured to death (Republicans) and being shot in the head (Democrats). Sure, I'd prefer being shot in the head over tortured to death, but do I really want to be shot in the head?
On a side note, I consider the Greens to be far to moderate for me. I mean, they're reformists, and I don't think reformism will ever achieve the results I seek while constrained within a hierarchical society.
From Braeburn's filibuster story:
Maybe he had a catheter? More seriously, you can get colleagues to hold the floor for you while you take breaks.
edited 7th Mar '13 7:22:22 AM by Fighteer
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"How big is a US Ward?
In Britain, a Ward
is often a village (or part of one), or even a part of a Housing Estate — there are 7707 individual Wards alone in England. Each of those has a Councillor, that sits in their Local Council, and each has its own Polling Station, which is used for all Elections. They can be in Church Halls, Community Centres, Schools & Leisure Centres, or even in a temporary Portacabin
◊. As such, queues to vote are rare.
edited 7th Mar '13 8:10:55 AM by Greenmantle
Keep Rolling On@Serocco: I'd like to know. Maybe they were cheering Wyden on.
@Greenmantle: we call them "districts" in the U.S. (and "ridings" in Canada, if you were wondering). How large they are depend on how crazy the last round of gerrymandering was.
Share it so that people can get into this conversation, 'cause we're not the only ones who think like this.In British, sizes of Wards and Constituencies are set by the Boundary Commissions
. Electoral Matters are the responsibility of the Electoral Commission
.
Basically, our Elections are Run by Non-Governmental, Independent Bodies.
edited 7th Mar '13 8:19:26 AM by Greenmantle
Keep Rolling OnIn the United States, they are set by whichever party is in power in each state, and therefore arranged in whatever way is most inconvenient for the voters that they don't like. That is, except in states monitored by the Voting Rights Act, which is currently in front of the Supreme Court on the grounds of being "obsolete".
edited 7th Mar '13 8:20:24 AM by Fighteer
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"In Canada they're arranged by population. In most of Canada they're kind of big, but the Greater Toronto Area has a ton of tiny ridings mostly because 20% of the population is in the GTA. Also, the ridings are fixed until the population changes enough. The last reorganization was in 2003 and we're having another one.
Random fact spoiled to prevent derail: The GTA is: the Amalgamated City of Toronto and 24 other cities in Durham, Peel, York and and Halton regions. Occasionally the Hamilton region is included in which case, the Greater-Toronto-Hamilton Area is one of the top 50 most populated places in the world.
edited 7th Mar '13 8:28:50 AM by Zendervai
The only requirement for electoral districts in the US is that they a) need to have roughly similar populations and b) that they may not be set in racially discriminatory ways. I recall that courts have explicitly stated that politically-biased redistricting is OK as long as it meets the previous standards (And that is easy to do).
"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard FeynmanDon't they also have to be contiguous?
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"@ 50791
...With a couple of exceptions. There are a few places where a couple people get locked into a room and do the best they can to be non-political.
The biggest problem with fixing it is that the people who would change it are the ones that are using it the way it is. And the people who vote for them like it because it lets them get what they want without worrying about the rest of the population.
Another thing you have to remember: the US is HUGE and the government has to pay the people who work the polls. It doesn't pay a lot, but it can still be a significaint expense for the government. Why would they put up more polling places than they need? This means that some districts in the countryside are rather large and your polling place could be quite a ways away.
edited 7th Mar '13 8:28:03 AM by Belian
Yu hav nat sein bod speeling unntil know. (cacke four undersandig tis)the cake is a lie!Of course, but as noted, to do that, you'd need the people in power to vote for it, when the status quo benefits them.
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"

NYPD will arrest you for carrying condoms
Ten numbers the rich would like to see fudged
(interesting factoids, including "only three percent of the rich are entrepreneurs")
Democrat Ron Wyden joins the Senate filibuster on drones
Share it so that people can get into this conversation, 'cause we're not the only ones who think like this.