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Andrew Yang Founds the Forward Party

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Re: Andrew Yang Founds the Forward Party

#301

Post by matsemann »

vintermann wrote: post #151
lalaland1125 wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ranked choice has a lot of advantages over the alternatives that are often underestimated by people too worried about theory. The big advantage of ranked choice is that it is simple to understand and implement. In elections, it is essential that the average person understand exactly how the system works. An election result that people don't understand/trust is worse than useless.

No it isn't, technically. I can guarantee you that most people in Norway can't explain the Sainte-Laguë divisors method which delivers proportional representation. What is true, is that simplicity is a propaganda advantage for actually getting it passed, since "It's too complex so we can't trust it" is a good attack line even if it isn't true. I'm not sure that advantage is worth it, given that 1. it's a terribly lon…

You don't need to know the method, though. You just need to know that in Norway getting above or under the 4% line drastically affects how many representatives a party will get, and vote according to that.

Re: Andrew Yang Founds the Forward Party

#302

Post by Traster »

nielsbot wrote: post #138

The Democracy Dollars plank doesn't say it will eliminate money in politics, so I don't think it goes far enough. Love the plank on eliminating the revolving door however. We really need that. (cf. Sinema)

I think that essentially, because of the supreme court's interpretation of money as speech, it would be very difficult to pass a law to get money out of politics without the SCOTUS overturning it. So at that point you need a constitutional ammendment or to pack/replace the supreme court. Both of these are incredibly ambitious things to do. So it's probably that this freedom bucks idea is a way of dis-empowering the private money in politics by making it compete with public money.

Re: Andrew Yang Founds the Forward Party

#303

Post by boomboomsubban »

hef19898 wrote: post #176
jagrsw wrote: post #159

".. because our founding fathers .." It's interesting to see that all sides of political dispute in US, even parties (like this one) which want to cater to the seemingly more rational and less emotional part of the populace use the argument of "the founding fathers wanted it this way, so... that must be the correct way of doing things forever".

That American obsession with the founding fathers always puzzles me as a non-American. France is in tis 5th Republic, the second since WW2. Germany went through a lot of Government changes since the 18th century as well, as did a lot of other countries in Europe. With the exception of some wierdos nobody puts those long gone governments on a pedestal.

Our schooling drills the near divinity of our founding fathers and the constitution they created into us from a very young age.

Re: Andrew Yang Founds the Forward Party

#304

Post by tokai »

Karto wrote: post #158

The top line, "Not Left. Not Right. Forward." kind of reminds me of Macron's "En Marche" ("Let's Go") that took over France in a storm, taking over the presidency AND the parliament only one year after its foundation, with very few previously known political figures in its ranks. The whole thing looked like doing management rather than politics, and offered an alternative to fed-up voters who didn't dare turn to the…

Sounds like the good old Third Way.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_Way

Re: Andrew Yang Founds the Forward Party

#305

Post by southerntofu »

Juliate wrote: post #286
southerntofu wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "En Marche" ("Let's Go") that took over France in a storm (...) with very few previously known political figures in its ranks "En marche" is not "Let's go" ("allons-y") but "March on", a military reference. They had key figures in the previous government, for example Macron who was ministry of economy and supervised the destruction of working law protections (2016 reforms) for the "socialist" (huge quotation marks)…

You seem to suggest Manuel Valls has also been prime minister under Macron presidency (after having been under Hollande's), which he hasn't. Also, the "neither left not right is also a fascist meme" is both true and misleading: when you have several leftist parties that reclaim being "the only true left" for themselves, portraying anything else as evil or stupid, and rightist parties that move further and further to…

> You seem to suggest Manuel Valls has also been prime minister under Macron presidency (after having been under Hollande's), which he hasn't.

Thanks for correction. I thought he was prime minister of Macron, but that was in fact Edouard Philippe. I must have confused with Jean-Yves le Drian, previously Ministry of Defense (under Hollande) then Foreign Affairs (under Macron).

> and both wings being plagued with moral/financial scandals

I don't agree with all of their politics, but when was the last time you heard the NPA or LO (left-wing parties) had a financial/moral scandal? I've never heard of any.

> you may as well consider that the left/right dichotomy is broken, or that the parties broke it joyfully

Left/Right dichotomy (collectivism/capitalism) is as alive as ever, in terms of politics. But the "left" and "right" labels have lost any form of sense when parts of the left in the 80/90s started accepting capitalism, applying right wing programs (eg. neoliberalism) and then started to campaign/act on extreme-right ideas (eg. anti-immigration measures). But the media apparatus have not called them out on moving right and continue to call them "left" without any form of meaning. That's why we're so confused about the terms, at least in Western Europe and North America.

> more subtle and demanding understanding than just left/right, progress/conservatism, is not completely absurd either

Oh sure, we have to look at the measures behind the keywords. I think that was exactly my point to begin with: that just because you say "neither left nor right" doesn't mean you aren't very very very right-wing. And having a "progress party" with the leader's face placated everywhere and no actual discussions of the most pressing issues we face as an entire species is not giving me a lot of confidence.

Re: Andrew Yang Founds the Forward Party

#306

Post by bmj »

aazaa wrote: post #2

The Platform page lists a selection of positions that I think would not be very controversial. https://www.forwardparty.com/platform Surprisingly, the issue that Yang is known for, UBI, is not on the list. UBI is, however, present here: https://www.forwardparty.com/whyforward I wonder if that was accidental.

It's important to note that Yang's organization is just a PAC, and not a political party (yet). Yang doesn't need to outline a full platform because the organization will support any politician that lines up with the platform. Once the group does become a political party, it will most definitely need to stake positions on more "controversial" issues.

Re: Andrew Yang Founds the Forward Party

#307

Post by avh02 »

DonHopkins wrote: post #273
muspimerol wrote: post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Again, the US has never had anything remotely as horrible as the French Revolution or Nazi Germany. That’s likely a consequence of a constitutional government with limited powers. Uhhh... slavery? American Indian genocide? The Civil War? The US has certainly had things at least "remotely as horrible" as the French Revolution or Nazi Germany, although the holocaust is a bit of stretch.

Not only did America have the Civil War over slavery, but the losers are still trying to fight it today, they can't face the reality that they lost the last election, and they even tried to pull off a violent insurrection, breaking into and defecating and urinating and marching through the halls of Congress with a Confederate battle flag. https://theconversation.com/the-confederate-battle-flag-whic... >The Confederat…

"infinitely [...] stable"

Re: Andrew Yang Founds the Forward Party

#308

Post by arnoooooo »

vadfa wrote: post #192
Karto wrote: post #158

The top line, "Not Left. Not Right. Forward." kind of reminds me of Macron's "En Marche" ("Let's Go") that took over France in a storm, taking over the presidency AND the parliament only one year after its foundation, with very few previously known political figures in its ranks. The whole thing looked like doing management rather than politics, and offered an alternative to fed-up voters who didn't dare turn to the…

"forward" means "progress" which means "left". I don't really see the point there :P I've seen many parties claim "we are not left-wing or right-wing" but they evidently have to be either.

In the case of "Macron", forward was clearly "right", as it was mostly about getting rid or reducing social schemes. In France, "neither right nor left" generally means "right".

Re: Andrew Yang Founds the Forward Party

#309

Post by vadfa »

arnoooooo wrote: post #308
vadfa wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"forward" means "progress" which means "left". I don't really see the point there :P I've seen many parties claim "we are not left-wing or right-wing" but they evidently have to be either.

In the case of "Macron", forward was clearly "right", as it was mostly about getting rid or reducing social schemes. In France, "neither right nor left" generally means "right".

That's economically right, but socially left. I haven't really seen anything conservative coming from Macron. I don't see how he's from the right.

Re: Andrew Yang Founds the Forward Party

#310

Post by Aleatoire24 »

hef19898 wrote: post #201
qsort wrote: post #196

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I suspect a huge part of Macron's success was his opponent. France elections have a top-2 runoff, and I wouldn't be surprised if many electors were like "I don't like Macron but I really don't want Le Pen to win". The whole "socially progressive, economically middle of the road" political coalition that would win every election on HN is extremely unpopular in the real world.

In order to qualify for the run-off, Macron had to end up in the top 2 first. Which he did. And that En Marche got the parliament as well was a bit of a surprise. Curious to see how things play out next year so.

The National Assembly scores wasn't a surprise, since presidential mandate last 5 years like the AN's deputies mandate and the AN elections come right after the presidential election we haven't see any cohabitation government like it was the case in the past when the presidential mandate lasted 7 years. And LREM, which is easy to place as centrist, is full of recruits that come from the PS (Socialist Party) and LR (The Republican, last name in date of the main party from the right). And LREM got the support of classic center party like the MODEM which get many members promoted in the current government structures.
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