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[Bauglir]

-snip-

[Leafsnail]

It's nothing to do with "direct democracy" versus "representative democracy", incidentally.  This would still be representative democracy, just with each person having the same amount of say.

Let's put it this way... if we went to a pure democracy based system... if I lived in a small state, I'd be talking about succession because there would be no way for that state to have a choice in anything.  They'd be better off as a country of their own so they could make their own laws without having to bend to the will of California.

They can still make their own laws. This is NOTHING to do with the rights of individual states to do that.  Stop bringing it up.

What it is to do with is their sway over national issues.

[Sowelu]

I think that the goal, in part, is to treat the states as 50 individual people of different wealth and power.  Let the majority create rules for all of them, but also protect the minority.

[Earthquake Damage]

They can still make their own laws. This is NOTHING to do with the rights of individual states to do that.  Stop bringing it up.

What it is to do with is their sway over national issues.

Au contraire, this is very much a state issue.  Congress controls the national purse.

[Sir Pseudonymous]

Let's put it this way... if we went to a pure democracy based system... if I lived in a small state, I'd be talking about succession because there would be no way for that state to have a choice in anything.  They'd be better off as a country of their own so they could make their own laws without having to bend to the will of California.

Perhaps then it would be better to abolish the states all together, and redraw them as organizational districts based around relatively equal population. It wouldn't solve this alleged issue of backwater hicks not getting a "fair" representation of "significantly more than an individual in a higher-density area", but that's a rather fucktarded thing to be trying to protect ("Let's give them farmers the rights of ten of them evil city folk! We all know they're the only good Christian Capitalists, what with their higher rates of church attendance, teenage pregnancy, divorce, bastardy, abortion, pornography consumption, and massive gubmint subsidies!" ).

[Renault]

They can still make their own laws. This is NOTHING to do with the rights of individual states to do that.  Stop bringing it up.

What it is to do with is their sway over national issues.

Au contraire, this is very much a state issue.  Congress controls the national purse.

No, Congress controls the Federal purse. States still control the State purses. The issue is why small states with small populations should have an equal voice to a state with a huge one. It's not really an issue of who controls what financing. I strongly doubt it would change much no matter how you allocate seats.

[nenjin]

Except federal mandates that place financial burdens on the states. Pollution mandates, infrastructure, health care....or less tangible burdens, like No-Child-Left-Behind.

You guys are thinking to narrowly on this.

[Renault]

A legitimate concern, except that most federal mandates are funded, like NCLB-- $24 billion annually as of 2001. And none of those are serious encroachments on state sovereignty, which I think was the concern expressed earlier. And even if they were, the people of the nation--or rather, their representatives, since someone was making a fuss over that--decided that such mandates were called for. If you really believe in a Federalist system, you must recognize that means yes, the Federal government does get to place burdens on the states sometimes. Otherwise, it's just a confederacy of states, and...well, we don't need to go into that.

[nenjin]

I'm actually in favor of a federalist system. But:

A legitimate concern, except that most federal mandates are funded, like NCLB-- $24 billion annually as of 2001.

Still hasn't been enough according to what I've seen. States have still felt they've bared the brunt of the burden for adopting NCLB. Although the states that are struggling the most honestly needed reform. But since we're talking about population weight here, who gets the lion's share of that money is directly proportional to their voting ability, when what's left over may not come closer to satisfying the needs of smaller states. If you accept that yes, the federal government places burdens on states sometimes and they have to accept it, then you'd probably accept that states have to bear a burden in proportion to their size? Do you support smaller states that can't make up the difference, or do you support larger states that may be better able to fund these things themselves? The answer to that question comes down directly to "who has more clout and votes." And I don't see the majority, in that situation, caring that the minority is going to struggle, which I think is wrong.

I don't deny that's a simplified view of the reality, that in a truly fair system everyone would hash out their ability to meet the requirements and need would be assessed and aid given out where it's needed the most. But that's not how earmarks have historically been given out. It's been about who can bully/weasel or negotiate the most favorable terms for their state. So. I don't want to categorically given the lion's share based on proportion, because it doesn't always reflect reality.

(And to the same token, neither does the current system, as evidenced by the bridge to nowhere. But at least we can point to that and say "that's wrong" rather than trying to argue with a super majority that they're being greedy.)

[Aqizzar]

That's just it though, the "bridge to nowhere" was not an aberration.  It was the norm, and just happened to be a particularly repugnant example of such, mostly because of the angry fossil trying to defend it.

Your description of the situation, that burden should reflect size, is exactly what everyone's been arguing about.  It's not just an oversimplification, it's backwards.  At the risk of sounding like a smarmy ass, I'll reproduce an example I've used before -

Let's look at the Census Bureau's numbers for Federal Aid to State Governments over some recent years, 2000-2007.  And those of you insisting that a little personal, moral, and fiscal responsibility in government would solve the spending question should pay close attention, and strain your brains to remember which people were in charge of federal spending at the time.  Compare these to state populations, specifically the biggest state (California, running at a whopping deficit) versus the smallest state (Wyoming, running a tiny surplus):

California - 36.9 million people, $46billion in aid in 2005 = $1250 per person.
Wyoming - 0.5 million people, $2billion in aid in 2005 = $4000 per person.

The less-populated states that are vastly over-represented in the Senate receive vastly more federal money and assistance per capita, and in some cases even in raw figures, than the larger states.  And it extends through to specific policies even.  I still remember an uproar in 2005, when Congress approved a bill that states would receive Homeland Security funding prorated by a list of "likely terrorism targets".  Wyoming had more approved "likely targets" than New York, and received more federal money to protect them.

That's the argument I've been making about the Senate.  It so massively over-represents the concerns of rural states that they receive extra money and better treatment than more populous areas, not equal nor proportional but flat out better, because they form such a large voting block in a body where each geographical demarcation gets the same voice regardless of any other concerns.

[nenjin]

That's the argument I've been making about the Senate.  It so massively over-represents the concerns of rural states that they receive extra money and better treatment than more populous areas, not equal nor proportional but flat out better, because they form such a large voting block in a body where each geographical demarcation gets the same voice regardless of any other concerns.

Yeah, I remember the HLS thing.

I guess I'm not convinced the exact opposite wouldn't be true under a different system. And how or what gets decided in committees isn't really a reflection of voting power. That's much closer the Dem/Republican political blocks divvying up the power in Washington in each cycle. That it happened in the Bush cycle, to red states, which are all smaller, shouldn't come as a big surprise. When the shoe is on the other foot, the same happens in reverse.

I'm pretty sure the distribution of HLS money didn't go through an up and down vote of Congress anyways, did it?

[Andir]

Serious question here... what's stopping those folks in California that feel "ripped off" from moving to Wyoming?

[nenjin]

Have you been to Wyoming man?! You move there either because you like vast desolate wildernesses, or you need to cook meth.

[Urist Imiknorris]

Californian pride. To them, the state is going to hell, but it's still better than anywhere else.

[Andir]

Pfft, all I know is that I moved from Chicago to Ohio and I practically halved my cost of living and got pretty much the same pay... paid off my car, all my debt, and now I'm putting back a ton of cash for a house...

Also, living here doesn't feel like living in a prison state with undercover cops aggravating people on the highways, corrupt toll road management, and a million people ready to sue you to oblivion for getting into a fender bender.