Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Mictlantecuhtli]

I hate the republicans, but I cannot vote for the dems because of their stance on gun rights.

I believe gun ownership is the ultimate expression of trust a government can express to it's charges/subjects/citizens.

Because, it is too cool to be true.

That's about it, it's such a wedge issue that no other issues matter. Sorry.

Remember before how I said people too stupid to understand or even bother to get the issues shouldn't be voting in the first place? Here's a prime example of what it gets us. All opinions may be valid but not all opinions translate to non-retarded legislation. Once again, Montague is a perfect example of this. I can't help but only see him as a troll considering his non responses to the argument he helped kick up:

Well there is one thing, there is also another. Hmm.

yeah, nah, meh
 

[Owlbread]

I hate the republicans, but I cannot vote for the dems because of their stance on gun rights.

I believe gun ownership is the ultimate expression of trust a government can express to it's charges/subjects/citizens.

Because, it is too cool to be true.

That's about it, it's such a wedge issue that no other issues matter. Sorry.

Remember before how I said people too stupid to understand or even bother to get the issues shouldn't be voting in the first place? Here's a prime example of what it gets us. All opinions may be valid but not all opinions translate to non-retarded legislation. Once again, Montague is a perfect example of this. I can't help but only see him as a troll considering his non responses to the argument he helped kick up:

Well there is one thing, there is also another. Hmm.

yeah, nah, meh
 

Even if you see him as stupid, that is still your opinion (possibly mine as well), but people's opinions of who is and who isn't stupid should not decide who can and can't vote.

[Mictlantecuhtli]

Even if you see him as stupid, that is still your opinion (possibly mine as well), but people's opinions of who is and who isn't stupid should not decide who can and can't vote.

No, because when you vote you have a direct impact on the outcome of future legislation. Atleast that's the belief of those of us who still believe in the idea of America being a democracy representative of the people [some would argue against, but not the topic].

Having such a tenuous grasp on not only gun control [apparently his only political motivation to vote, and one he's severely uneducated on] but most likely a plethora of other critical issues strikes fear into me because it's foolishness like this that has ruined our government's credibility for the most part. You cannot tell me that a majority of our House being ideologues for either the far right or the [still right+] left is a coincidence. They pander to the types who decide an opinion is fact and then run with it. Then mix it with this cute epidemic we have nowadays I like to call Party Patriotism; where you [the proverbial 'you'] only love the country if your party runs it, hate the government if not. It's annihilated our union. Not once in my life has there been a time where a D and an R can find so little common ground in policy terms.

I'm not saying being stupid should automatically disallow you from being able to vote; I'm not even that smart nor do I claim to be more than others. There should just be a 'comprehension of issues' requirement added to the whole registration to vote process. Basic questions on topics that the legislation they help to cause will inevitably have an impact on. Perhaps even questions concerning candidates; tailored to which party they are registering as. It's not a perfect solution but it'd be a first step to removing the Akins from the House and filtering educated policy into our government.

If we have a test for people when they're simply trying to become citizens of our nation, we should have a similar test if they wish to have an effect on our policies. Sorry. If you are a fool with bull-headed out-of-fact opinions like Montague, you shouldn't be allowed to vote. His opinion will not change no matter what Obama or Democrats would do to support and proliferate heavy weapons across our country. It's the same issue we see with the NRA staunchly supporting Romney the ban-assault-weapons-bill-guy.

[palsch]

Do I need to remind you that Obama failed to vote for the extension of the FAWB when he was in the us senate in 04?

Given Obama was sworn into the Senate in January 2005... Yes. Yes you do.

There should just be a 'comprehension of issues' requirement added to the whole registration to vote process. Basic questions on topics that the legislation they help to cause will inevitably have an impact on.

Who gets to write and apply this test? I can think of about six ways to game it on major issues right off the top of my head.

Right now we have two political parties that can only agree on the facts surrounding important issues once in a blue moon. The number of topical questions you could ask a hardline Dem and hardline Rep and expect the same answers are relatively few. Passing the test would mean answering the same way the test was written, so you damned well better hope it wasn't by anyone with any commitment to one party or the other.

[Mictlantecuhtli]

Who gets to write and apply this test? I can think of about six ways to game it on major issues right off the top of my head.

You leave it out of the hands of the states, number one. Mississippi's bass-akward legislature would likely write a test skewed to keep blacks from voting with exorbitant questions; for example. If you leave it to the function of the FEC and very stringent national rules for the Board of Elections in each state to have fair and unbiased tests on penalty of removal from office and federal voter fraud charges [maybe even election tampering charges, which would be a blast to see how that'd go down] you'll see very much daylight between any cases of testing fraud.

Once again, it'd be best if it were tailored to ask easy to answer, easily known answers on the positions of major candidates; especially those of the party they are registering as. Positions of candidates do not change according to your party affiliation. It's not an SAT, it's a comprehension test. Set the failing threshold to more than 65% wrong and not too many people will be stopped from registering. There would be almost no excuse to fail if the passing threshold was set lower, but that would dilute the impact of the plan. It's not a perfect blanket solution but it's something I've thought of a bit and it'd help force information into our voting process. Not everyone votes based on information and that is the most dangerous thing in a Democracy.

[mainiac]

No the most dangerous thing in democracy is restricting the franchise.

Rousseau was wrong.  The electorate considering the candidates do not resemble judges considering cases.  In Rousseau's defense he lived to early to see the contradicting evidence.  You however have two hundred years of evidence so should know better.  Don't try to restrict the franchise to 'good' voters because it's our system of 'good' voters and 'bad' voters that has a decent track record.  We should aim for a more direct translation, i.e. popular votes and mandatory voting.

[SalmonGod]

Everyone agrees that killing is not good, and should be avoided where possible.  Problems become instantly apparent when you realize that while that value is universal, it is not weighed equally against other values that are not held universally (such as differing views on self-defense) and ideas like "human" do not have a universal definition.

You'll find disagreement on "killing is not good" as well, not to mention all the many situations that can make it morally acceptable to different people (some of which may make it morally acceptable to some but not to others, etc).

Yeah, I knew somebody would bring this up.  It's as close to universal as any value I can think of.  I'd still argue that very, very few people actually believe killing of equal human beings to be a decent act.  Many people are able to kill without remorse, but they're able to do so because they hold some other value higher than human life, they invent criteria which allows them to redefine some people as lesser or non-human, or they're psychologically dysfunctional.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

By definition, any society must hold the value that killing other members of their species is at least usually not a good thing.

Otherwise, such a society would quickly cease to exist.

[Mictlantecuhtli]

No the most dangerous thing in democracy is restricting the franchise.

I think that matters little when less than 55% of the [voting] population is likely to vote in a presidential election. So you could argue the polarization of the democracy has restricted the franchise already. When the people who are going to turn out are likely predispositioned towards one skewed opinion [as they are now, hence the awful voter turnouts now thanks to massive disenfranchisement] then the policies of the government that comes out of it is likely to be less efficient and have more core issues. We're having that issue now, currently. I think we simply need to find a better way to handle these things in general; the mass media and repeated lies are more powerful than policies and law which is very concerning to me. I just want a country that has politics with some damn flexibility.

Rousseau was wrong.  The electorate considering the candidates do not resemble judges considering cases.  In Rousseau's defense he lived to early to see the contradicting evidence.  You however have two hundred years of evidence so should know better.  Don't try to restrict the franchise to 'good' voters because it's our system of 'good' voters and 'bad' voters that has a decent track record.  We should aim for a more direct translation, i.e. popular votes and mandatory voting.

I do agree though. I'm not advocating disenfranchisement of uneducated people. There's a big line with what I'm talking about and how I feel you think I'm coming off, because I actually think mandatory voting should be enacted and enforced. Strongly. I think it's a crisis that less than 70% of a democracy gives a damn enough to vote thanks to our country's politics being so tangled up in party patriotism that we can't get anything done since if the 'other side' does anything good it's either ignored or twisted about to be a negative jab. I'm tired of it. Mandatory voting coupled with a voter comprehension test of sorts would accomplish leaps and bounds for our country, in my opinion.

[SalmonGod]

Only if I get the option to turn in something like a blank vote.  If there isn't an option to express disenfranchisement, then those who are disenfranchised will only become more resentful when forced to grant their legitimacy anyway.

[Mictlantecuhtli]

That's why you have that empty spot to write in Noodle God or Fuck This Election.

[Jervill]

Spoiler: Or Lizard People (click to show/hide)

[MetalSlimeHunt]

Yeah, I know of no mandatory voting system that actually requires you to pick a candidate. (Outside of "elections" in dictatorships. Hearing about how North Korean "elections" are done was interesting.)

Though if you can vote at all you are by definition not disenfranchised already, so I don't know what you're on about.

[Sheb]

Well, no one can prevent you from no filling nothing on your ballot paper. How do election in Best Korea works?

[MonkeyHead]

Not sure, but I am pretty sure that:

a) What Best Korean State media says about the election isnt 100% linked to reality, and

b) People who didnt put what they should have on the ballot probably had a midnight appointment with the secret police arranged.