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Cards Against Humanity Launches a Super Pac to Match Elon Musk's Super Pac

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81–90 of 94 posts

Re: Cards Against Humanity Launches a Super Pac to Match Elon Musk's Super Pac

#81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is more of a problem without the electoral college, because as I said the popular vote is sensitive to voter turnout. No turnout means no representation. The electors can always step up to represent their state, and if even they can't then presumably the entire election would be delayed.

I’m not sure if the electors are legally allowed to decide in the absence of voter turnout. Besides, if you can suppress popular vote, you can also suppress the electors.

It is far more likely that electors can do what they need to do. They can be substituted if some candidates become unavailable. However, there is no replacement for voters. Barring an emergency that completely stops a state from having elections, the decision will be made. I've never heard of a state election being delayed due to natural disasters or anything. There is no minimum required voter turnout for a conclusion to be reached, in any case.

Re: Cards Against Humanity Launches a Super Pac to Match Elon Musk's Super Pac

#82

There is really any mystery as to why half the voters don't vote? Unless you live in one of the half dozen "swing states", your vote is just a symbolic gesture with little chance of impacting the overall outcome.

All that means is that we don't have a one-person one-vote system. Some people's votes matter more than others. What we have is a case of civil inequality. If we build a system where everyone's votes count the same (radical and extreme idea, I know), then each person will have the same fundamental incentive to vote.

> we don’t have a one-person one-vote system.

Correct, and that’s a good thing! Intelligence is not evenly distributed among individuals, and susceptibility to psyops and propaganda is a huge issue. The plain truth of the matter is that a majority of people simply aren’t qualified to weigh in on national issues. True democracy works when you’ve got a small group of like-minded individuals of roughly equal stature (13 original colonies) but not when you’ve got an entire empire (Roman republic)

Re: Cards Against Humanity Launches a Super Pac to Match Elon Musk's Super Pac

#83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Damn imagine if everyone's vote was equally weighted, what a disaster for democracy that would be. Mob rule!!

I sense some sarcasm. But you ought to know that the founders, along with Aristotle and other Greeks (basically, the inventors of democracy), were afraid of mobs and sought to temper the whims of the people. States are given representation proportional to their populations, and also equal representation (in the Senate). The EC and House seats aren't just based on voter turnout, voter population, or even the actual nu…

Current system theoretically allows for the presidency to be won even though the candidate got less than 30% of the popular vote. In my opinion the existence of such an edge case makes it undefendable.

What do you mean here by "incentivizes fraud"? Lying on the campaign trail is not fraud. In any case, the same argument about fraud still applies, you just need to target swing states.

Re: Cards Against Humanity Launches a Super Pac to Match Elon Musk's Super Pac

#84
post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, devolving powers to the states is what makes it a federation. Having a state-representative legislative chamber makes it a federation. Electing a federal president via popular vote does not indicate defederation any more than the existence of the House of Representatives does.

The states negotiated terms before they agreed to join. Not having a popular vote is part of the reason why we have a federal system in the first place. People can argue pros and cons, but it's fairly meaningless since we're already in an established deal, and it's very unlikely that the many states will agree to undo that deal.

Amending the Constitution does seem like a fairly remote possibility, but then there's also this:

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

Re: Cards Against Humanity Launches a Super Pac to Match Elon Musk's Super Pac

#85
post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I sense some sarcasm. But you ought to know that the founders, along with Aristotle and other Greeks (basically, the inventors of democracy), were afraid of mobs and sought to temper the whims of the people. States are given representation proportional to their populations, and also equal representation (in the Senate). The EC and House seats aren't just based on voter turnout, voter population, or even the actual nu…

> the founders, along with Aristotle and other Greeks Slavers who designed and oversaw slaver states.

That does not discredit what they said or thought on this issue. This is essentially an ad hominem.

Re: Cards Against Humanity Launches a Super Pac to Match Elon Musk's Super Pac

#86
post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I sense some sarcasm. But you ought to know that the founders, along with Aristotle and other Greeks (basically, the inventors of democracy), were afraid of mobs and sought to temper the whims of the people. States are given representation proportional to their populations, and also equal representation (in the Senate). The EC and House seats aren't just based on voter turnout, voter population, or even the actual nu…

Current system theoretically allows for the presidency to be won even though the candidate got less than 30% of the popular vote. In my opinion the existence of such an edge case makes it undefendable. What do you mean here by "incentivizes fraud"? Lying on the campaign trail is not fraud. In any case, the same argument about fraud still applies, you just need to target swing states.

Every system has edge cases. You can't defend the possibility of millions of people having zero representation just because they did not vote either.

I think it's obvious what fraud I'm talking about: fraudulent votes. It stands to reason that a large state can generate more fraudulent votes than a small state can generate legitimately. Fraud is always an issue but it is more of an issue with popular vote because who can question extremely high voter turnout?

Re: Cards Against Humanity Launches a Super Pac to Match Elon Musk's Super Pac

#87
post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the founders, along with Aristotle and other Greeks Slavers who designed and oversaw slaver states.

That does not discredit what they said or thought on this issue. This is essentially an ad hominem.

It matters when you are pointing to the 'hominem' as political thought leaders. I think it's fair as a counter to an appeal to authority.

Re: Cards Against Humanity Launches a Super Pac to Match Elon Musk's Super Pac

#88
post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That does not discredit what they said or thought on this issue. This is essentially an ad hominem.

It matters when you are pointing to the 'hominem' as political thought leaders. I think it's fair as a counter to an appeal to authority.

It would only be fair as a counter to their authority if the attack is relevant. I don't think it is relevant to drag slavery into a discussion about the nature of democracy and mob rule, or that the existence of widespread slavery on every continent at the time detracts from their insight. It is a purely tangentual argument to be had. For all your moralizing, I know for a fact that a vast majority of the whiners today would not have had the courage to fight slavery when it was happening literally everywhere. The ancient Greeks and the founders of the US have in common the fact that they laid the groundwork for the slavery-free condition we enjoy today, whether you like that or not. They were the geniuses of their time, and outstanding among all geniuses of all time.

Re: Cards Against Humanity Launches a Super Pac to Match Elon Musk's Super Pac

#89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is brainwashing. The formula is this: YOU learn all by yourself what all electable candidates say they want to do. YOU figure out all by yourself which ones LIE. One lie is enough, if they do it they keep doing it. And then YOU chose which election program you want to vote for. Ideally you chose what is best for the country but this is rather challenging for people. We can forgive them for being stuck thi…

>There is not one journalist who knows anything. This seems like a brazenly false statement. Also genuinely worrying, as you're discrediting all journalists based on... your feelings? Something that has been pushed for over the last 8 years by one party under the guise of labels such as "fake news" and "mainstream media". Maybe you meant to say "everything", but parroting anti-news propaganda is only making everyone…

i go over the lengthy list of registered candidates then try to find the article about them.

If the article exists it doesn't really get into their program.

You can see how many facebook likes and youtube views they have.

Jill Stein has 10k views on her most popular video. The nr 1 video in google about afroman running has 1k views. He is a famous person. There are countless other candidates.

https://ballotpedia.org/List_of_registered_2024_presidential...

The traffic isn't enough to account for global journalism.

Perhaps you want to entertain the chicken and ego concept where candidates need to be famous enough before anyone should ask what they are about.

Show me the informed journalist. I would love to read everything they ever wrote.

Re: Cards Against Humanity Launches a Super Pac to Match Elon Musk's Super Pac

#90
post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Current system theoretically allows for the presidency to be won even though the candidate got less than 30% of the popular vote. In my opinion the existence of such an edge case makes it undefendable. What do you mean here by "incentivizes fraud"? Lying on the campaign trail is not fraud. In any case, the same argument about fraud still applies, you just need to target swing states.

Every system has edge cases. You can't defend the possibility of millions of people having zero representation just because they did not vote either. I think it's obvious what fraud I'm talking about: fraudulent votes. It stands to reason that a large state can generate more fraudulent votes than a small state can generate legitimately. Fraud is always an issue but it is more of an issue with popular vote because who…

Can you name edge cases of popular vote system that electoral college system does not also have?

You do realize that just because the popular vote is national does not mean that all the votes would be dumped at a desert in New Mexico and then tallied? Vote tally would still happen at the level of polling places and then aggregated - exactly how it's done in the electoral college system now. The only difference would be an introduction of one more level of aggregation (from state to nationwide). You could still detect fraud at earlier stages.

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