Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Dianne Feinstein has died

nytimes.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

271–280 of 377 posts

Re: Dianne Feinstein has died

#271

Post by checkyoursudo »

bhouston wrote: post #13
coldpie wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, and she's not the only one who is (edit: was) serving without being functional[1]. We need to start talking about upper age limits for public office. I believe it'd require a constitutional amendment, but I expect there's lots of support for it from all sides. I'd suggest 65 as a maximum age for being elected, which means one could serve to about age 71, for a six-year Senate term. [1] This article is from six y…

Are age limits viable in our aging population? I think they may not work because it would exclude so many people and many voters will be aged as well? I think a low bar competency test would be more viable.

If lower bounds are reasonable for certain reasons, then it seems reasonable to apply those certain reasons to upper bounds.

Not every 15 year old would make an unsatisfactory legislator, and yet ...

Re: Dianne Feinstein has died

#272

Post by Goronmon »

ianbutler wrote: post #137
Goronmon wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Term limits are just a mechanism to transfer power to un-elected officials and lobbyists, and to make sure any decent politicians are kicked out before they can have any lasting impact. Imagine working at a job where there were rules that forced your company to lay off all the most experienced folks after a few years. Sounds miserable to me.

How do you feel about the US presidency in that case?

Presidency is a special case as it is a singular role that holds enormous amounts of power. And former presidents still have the ability to transition back into Congress afterwards and affect change at that level.

Re: Dianne Feinstein has died

#273

Post by beej71 »

banannaise wrote: post #95
flagrant_taco wrote: post #77

I know the easy approach here is for people to want an age limit in Congress, but I've always been more partial to a term limit. I'm sure there are plenty of hypotheses as to why this happens, but whatever the cause elected officials seem to have an extremely easy go of getting re-elected these days. The increasing average age in Congress is just a side effect of that in my opinion.

The problem with term limits is that they don't apply to lobbyists. Lobbyists basically writing most of the legislation is already a major problem, and it becomes worse when all the representatives are new to the office.

99% tax on political donations received seems like a decent plan to me. KNK

Re: Dianne Feinstein has died

#274

Post by Goronmon »

flagrant_taco wrote: post #147
unsupp0rted wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see a need for term limits- as long as they keep being popular and able to do the job, they should do it. I see a need for impartial testing of "able to do the job", such as "can count backwards from 20 without falling asleep or missing any numbers or going briefly catatonic".

My main concern without term limits is when an elected official moves from being popular and effective at their job to being effective at getting reelected. Those are very different skills, with the latter risking politicians that are only reelected because of the power, favors, and connections they have collected. Term limits definitely aren't a magic fix, I just see the tradeoffs as worth it relative to my personal…

My main concern without term limits is when an elected official moves from being popular and effective at their job to being effective at getting reelected.

How does forcing new candidates every number of years ensure that elected officials will be "popular and effective at their job"?

Re: Dianne Feinstein has died

#276

Post by swasheck »

paradoxyl wrote: post #184
jliptzin wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is how it’s supposed to work. She was 85 when she got elected the last time. If voters don’t want 90 year olds in office, maybe they shouldn’t vote 85 year olds in for a 6 year term. If she can’t be beat in a primary, then we need something like ranked choice voting so people can safely vote for an alternative third party without risking spoiling the election for a candidate they definitely don’t want.

When do you think some third party is going to arise out of the broken cesspool of one-party machine politics in the state of dementia known as California? Please, fill us in.

no need to single out california. this is prevalent in so many places. texas. south carolina. wyoming. new mexico.

Re: Dianne Feinstein has died

#277

Post by krapp »

Goronmon wrote: post #272
ianbutler wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you feel about the US presidency in that case?

Presidency is a special case as it is a singular role that holds enormous amounts of power. And former presidents still have the ability to transition back into Congress afterwards and affect change at that level.

Should the Presidency be a special case? The President isn't supposed to be "leader of the government," just an administrator of one of three co-equal branches led by the people.

The president shouldn't be any more popular or powerful than a Senator or representative in Congress, arguably they should be less so because Congress writes the laws and controls the budget. But the way American politics works, driven by populism and celebrity worship, you'd think the President controls the entire government like the CEO of a company.

Remove their power to pardon and issue executive orders - a President shouldn't have the authority to overrule the judicial or legislative branches. Give them a single. six year term. Make it illegal for them to hold any further government position, then boot them out. The Presidency should be nothing more than a revolving door of nobody bureaucrats, like a Prime Minister.

Also, they shouldn't get Secret Service protection for life. They can have the same Second Amendment protections as other citizens after office, which are supposed to be perfectly sufficient. Or let them hire private security.

Re: Dianne Feinstein has died

#278

Post by eropple »

justin66 wrote: post #254
eropple wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2024-election/gavin-newsom-... > “Yes. Interim appointment. I don’t want to get involved in the primary,” Newsom said. “It would be completely unfair to the Democrats that have worked their tail off. That primary is just a matter of months away. I don’t want to tip the balance of that.”

Holy moly. "I wouldn't want an interim appointment I make to be political " is a silly enough sentiment that it cannot possibly be sincere. He just didn't know what the right move was yet, in terms of how he would benefit.

Eh. It's a silly line, but you can read "political" as "not backing any of the current candidates" and it reads fine.

Re: Dianne Feinstein has died

#279

Post by eropple »

alistairSH wrote: post #212
eropple wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Senate business can be conducted with the VP as tiebreaker as well, as I understand it? But I could be wrong.

I believe committee membership votes are currently subject to a supermajority, so filibuster rules apply. There won't be a new member seated to Judiciary without a Senate rules package. Sen. Manchin (D) likely won't allow that to happen. This means judicial nominations are effectively hamstrung for the time being.

Ah, I didn't realize that! Thank you.

Re: Dianne Feinstein has died

#280

Post by eropple »

justrealist wrote: post #170
bandyaboot wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I recall correctly, the Republicans can refuse to allow a replacement to be seated on the Judiciary committee…and they certainly will do that if they can.

The Republicans can't block anything unless the democrats agree to allow it. Like yes there are a lot of self-imposed rules in the Senaate, but it's fundamentally on the Democrats that they can't pull together 51 votes to tweak the rules.

(edit: ignore, I misread the vacancies list)
Post reply on HN