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Show HN: I'm tired of corrupt US politicians, so I created this

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Re: Show HN: I'm tired of corrupt US politicians, so I created this

#81

Post by CWuestefeld »

david927 wrote: post #70
CWuestefeld wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The wealthiest countries in the world have large governments I'm not sure that trying to emulate the [other] wealthiest countries is the best of goals. Doesn't that ensure that we will be, optimally, second best? Given that corruption is endemic everywhere, including those other wealthy countries, isn't it worthwhile to strive for something better? Outlaw political campaign advertising That's just another way of sayi…

I'm not sure that trying to emulate the [other] wealthiest countries is the best of goals. You don't have to mimic, but it does give a very strong indication that size of government isn't the problem. [Outlaw political campaign advertising is] just another way of saying "Throw out the 1st Amendment and outlaw freedom of speech". Nice try. No, this is "access to media." And currently it's controlled by the wealthy whe…

it does give a very strong indication that size of government isn't the problem

Not necessarily. It may be that size of government is a problem, but those other countries have encountered a different bottleneck before reaching it.

Nice try. No, this is "access to media."

If you're saying that I won't be allowed to put up a billboard saying "Senator Smith is a rat", or take out a newspaper ad saying the same, then you have shot the 1st Amendment squarely between the eyes.

all evidence has been that the greater the democracy, the greater the success. You can take the king; I'll take the people, every time.

I think you're arguing in circles. For one thing, there are still a lot of monarchies in the world, many of them quite free.

But more important, the entire point that you're arguing against is (if you'll excuse me for paraphrasing; I hope I'm not making a strawman): "It seems to me that the real solution is to dramatically limit the size of government, so that there is nothing to be bought"

That is, the top post in this thread wants to strip away the power of government, and allow people to make their own decisions (including using the power of the market to constrain the action of corporations seen to be doing bad things).

But you seem to be saying that in this case people cannot be trusted, so we need to give additional power to the government to constrain runaway corporations, and in particular to keep those very same corrupt politicians from selling out.

This is self-contradictory in two ways:

First, you've said on the one hand that you'll take power away from the government and vest it in the people, "every time" -- yet in order to support this, you're proposing that we do just the opposite (i.e., prevent people from voicing their opinions as widely as they feel warranted).

Second, you're postulating that the politicians are corrupt and can't be trusted. Yet your solution relies on giving them more power to limit our political behavior. It seems like you're giving them our weapons while telling them "use these guns to ensure that you don't shoot us".

Re: Show HN: I'm tired of corrupt US politicians, so I created this

#82

Post by nickik »

waterside81 wrote: post #66
mrkmcknz wrote: post #64

I think the US election system is fundamentally flawed. Why wouldn't a UK like approach work of limiting campaign budgets? Focus more on politics and not lobbying/fundraising.

Because there's too much money to be made from campaigning. TV networks alone are rolling in the cash during these prolonged primaries & campaigns.

Countrys are to big, there is too much power in few places. I think a more federalistic system helps and even within one governing entity you can distribute the power more. One thing I really like that we have in Switzerland, we have 7 instead of one president and they are all elected from parlament (the president cant just get people who are his drones).

Re: Show HN: I'm tired of corrupt US politicians, so I created this

#83

Post by JanezStupar »

toyg wrote: post #44
JanezStupar wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Democracy in classical sense means participation of the aristocracy, not wide populist participation as practiced in 20th century. I along with many of people I discuss politics agree that for wellbeing of democracy the civic duties and privileges should be limited and not available to everybody as a universal right. Ignorance is the worst enemy of democracy. Letting the ignorant majority participate in democratic pr…

Bollocks. Democracy is, literally, "rule by the people"; you can twist the definition of "people", but once you do, they stop being "people" in other contexts too, and you really don't want to go there, if you really care about your fellow man (if you don't, you can pick your preferred system that favours your preferred type of assholes: with the right blood, with the right money, with the right degrees, with the rig…

But literally all historically successful democracies have limited what set of populace are the "people".

I am not US citizen however I know that when the US was created "the people" were pretty much in minority. It was also expected that "the people" will respect and defend their civic freedoms.

The Switzerland for example historically only allowed armed men to vote and even today if one rejects their military service they give up their voting right.

As noble as this popular democracy concept seems in theory in practice it means throwing pearls before the swine. In modern west 50% of people are just to willfully ignorant to understand what civic rights and duties mean.

I am not in favor of any kind of representative model I am also not in favor of direct democracy.

One mechanism would be imposing a citizens tax of 5% of income for those who want their civic rights. That should clear the field pretty fast.

Re: Show HN: I'm tired of corrupt US politicians, so I created this

#84

Post by bad_user »

wwwtyro wrote: post #30
bad_user wrote: post #11

This is a parody, but something like this could work: (1) show a list of bills that are passing Congress / the Senate (2) for each proposal, show a list of politicians that supports or opposes it (3) have a way for the user to flag politicians he wants to reward (4) plus a way for the user to setup a recurring monthly donation, distributed towards the politicians he supports, with a note pointing to your online profi…

I like something similar: (1) show a list of bills currently under consideration (2) allow the user to 'vote' on each bill with some monetary amount, along with a preferred direction for the legislation ('aye' or 'nay') (3) after voting occurs, the cash is distributed evenly to the legislators that voted in the direction the user desired.

I'm not sure it would be legal.

Re: Show HN: I'm tired of corrupt US politicians, so I created this

#85

Post by tobylane »

scottdw2 wrote: post #40
andrewcooke wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

that doesn't solve the real problem, though, which is that some entities are much more powerful than others. by removing the government, which can work as a (limited, imperfect) balance, you give other powerful institutions (ie big corporations) even more power. it won't be the government searching your laptop, it will be the airline, as part of a conglomerate that includes media companies. government exists for a re…

No. Government is force. Airlines, like most businesses, are subject to market forces. If Delta said "we have to search the data on your computer before you can fly", you can choose not to fly. Someone would have a strong incentive to provide a mode of travel that did not involve laptop searches. I didn't say "no government". I said "small government". There's a difference. You need the force of government to protect…

Whereever the line is, corruption will push politicians to go over the line. In the smallest possible government only judges are publically employeed, and even they could be bribed.

Look at Europe, it's big government. There's less corruption, less lobbying. Some places pay high salary and do get less bribery. Mostly it's more transparency.

Re: Show HN: I'm tired of corrupt US politicians, so I created this

#86

Post by wladimir »

toyg wrote: post #76
wladimir wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A literal democracy would have everyone being able to vote on any law at any level, which is clearly impractical It used to be impractical due to obvious infrastructure reasons. But with the internet, is it still? And I'm not sure that there always needs to be an "ignorant majority". If people are closely involved with any aspect of lawmaking, they'll feel more responsible for being educated about political issues. M…

It used to be impractical due to obvious infrastructure reasons. But with the internet, is it still? The history of electronic voting is not particularly encouraging for the various "democracy in technology" theories. Besides, even if you sorted out the infrastructure requirements (see security etc), you'd still be left with the day-to-day drudgery of real politics: reading thousands of pages of bills, proposals, ana…

reading thousands of pages of bills, proposals, analysis, point, counter-point, etc etc etc, is boring and a time-sink

A crowd-sourcing approach could certainly work here. People will go through boring work if they think it is worthwhile. Having free time is by no means restricted to the rich anymore. Github for politics? (people could do something useful online instead of playing BlaVille, for a change...)

we'll need good AIs to summarize and simulate

I don't believe that such AIs will be feasible any time soon. Also, it would raise even more security issues. Who controls the AI?

Re: Show HN: I'm tired of corrupt US politicians, so I created this

#88

Post by mseebach »

toyg wrote: post #44
JanezStupar wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Democracy in classical sense means participation of the aristocracy, not wide populist participation as practiced in 20th century. I along with many of people I discuss politics agree that for wellbeing of democracy the civic duties and privileges should be limited and not available to everybody as a universal right. Ignorance is the worst enemy of democracy. Letting the ignorant majority participate in democratic pr…

Bollocks. Democracy is, literally, "rule by the people"; you can twist the definition of "people", but once you do, they stop being "people" in other contexts too, and you really don't want to go there, if you really care about your fellow man (if you don't, you can pick your preferred system that favours your preferred type of assholes: with the right blood, with the right money, with the right degrees, with the rig…

Splitting hairs over the literal meaning of a term defined literally thousands of years ago is pointless.

Democracy is a philosophical institution and you need a lot more than a dictionary of ancient Greek to define it.

Democracy is about the rule of the people. Voting, direct or indirect through representation, is merely a means towards this end. Other important elements of democracy is free speech and free assembly - if the people aren't free to organise themselves, they can't effectively rule. There are plenty of examples of non-free elections, and it's obvious that the presence of those doesn't make the host country a democracy.

Another very important - and much forgotten - factor is the protection of minorities. Americans often lament that a minority of 40 senators can filibuster a law, because supposedly it's undemocratic to give such power to a smaller fraction than 50%. Originally, it was just one senator, although he had to physically filibuster the vote - and the purpose of this rule was to protect the minority from getting run over by the majority. This protection is paramount to a democracy - whether or not the filibustering rules, current or original, in the US Senate is a good way of securing this protection is another matter.

If you want to get technical, anything less that full consensus on everything can be considered undemocratic - because when one part of demos imposes it's will on another part, then it's not rule of the people any more - it's rule of a part of the people.

Re: Show HN: I'm tired of corrupt US politicians, so I created this

#89

Post by DirkScheuring »

scottdw2 wrote: post #16

I don't think that public funding of elections or free advertising (see the bottom of the page) are the solutions to government corruption. That would just force bribers to be more covert. It's analogous to the fact that SOPA wouldn't stop piracy. It seems to me that the real solution is to dramatically limit the size of government, so that there is nothing to be bought, rather then just changing the currency used to…

It seems to me that the real solution is to dramatically limit the size of government, so that there is nothing to be bought, rather then just changing the currency used to make the purchase.

Either you have an elected government which makes the law, or the decision about how to behave is made by individual interests and resources, which are much easier to buy or otherwise influence than elected representatives.

Re: Show HN: I'm tired of corrupt US politicians, so I created this

#90

Post by JumpCrisscross »

davidw wrote: post #60
vectorpush wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

dramatically limit the size of government Any specifics? "Limit the size of government" is a trite platitude that anyone could agree with on some level. Shove 100 random people in a room and you have 200 conflicting ideas about the appropriate role of government.

Maybe someone should write a bot that replays these tedious discussions, freeing up people to do more productive work. M-x libertopians-vs-lefties Or something like that.

The reason this debate rages incessantly is because government, like any institution, grows over time. It takes constant dialogue to evaluate when it has gone too far and then suddenly shrink it when that time comes.

Mindless it may seem because of no resulting action 99% of the time, but the same can be said of pre-flight engine tests.

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