Sunday Discussion Group

August 27, 2006

This may be a bit esoteric for a discussion-group topic — indeed, it’s possible none of you will like this at all — but I hoped to expand a bit on a subject that came up the other day.

In trying to diagnose what, if anything, ails our democracy, a number of political scientists and political observers tend to have a “magic bullet” in mind — one problem that’s at the root of it all. Address it, and the rest of the democratic system will improve. There’s plenty of options:

* Corporate influence — The Chomsky/Nader school of thinking tells us that corporate power and influence dominates the American system of government so thoroughly that it almost literally strangles any chance of improvement. To eliminate this flaw (somehow) is to free politics for everyone else.

* The media — Were it not for the traditional mainstream media’s malpractice, this theory goes, we’d have a system that holds elected officials accountable and offers voters the information they need to make wise decisions at the ballot box.

* Campaign finance — An off-shoot of the corporate-influence argument, this idea suggests elected officials are necessarily corrupted by a system that forces them to compete for corporate dollars. Indeed, campaign finance pressures lead practically all lawmakers to spend as much time raising money as they do actually trying to govern. Remove these pressures and we’ll remove the corrupting influence that so thoroughly undermines the entire process.

* Integrity of the voting process — This theory insists that none of these other problems really matter when voters go to the polls and vote for change, but their voices aren’t heard because a fraudulent voting system fails to fully and accurately tally the votes themselves. Before we tackle anything, these proponents argue, we have to have confidence in the voting process itself.

And then, of course, there’s my personal choice.

* The electorate — An unengaged, uninformed electorate that finds politics, policies, and government unworthy of their time ultimately allows all of the other problems to flourish. Our system of government depends, at its core, on voters making wise decisions. What we have instead is a system in which most Americans, in general, are woefully unaware of current events and are unwilling to even vote in the first place.

This argument posits that an uninformed electorate creates a dysfunctional democracy. Or as Digby put it the other day, “We simply cannot adequately govern ourselves if a large number of us are dumb as posts and vote for reasons that make no sense.”

So, do you have a favorite “magic bullet” argument for describing our political system? The be-all, end-all of the nation’s political problems?

From corporate influence/self interest flows all the other problems named. Unfortunately, I’m not sure a solution exists but public funding of elections might mitigate corporate influence at least a little.

Russert just called the democratic party the democrat party. I hate that.

  • I don’t know the answer to the question I’m about to pose and I should (I’m a political scientist), but how does the American public’s knowledge compare with that of other industrial democracies? I tend to agree with your “its the electorate” theory, but if the same argument can be made in other modern democracies, this has to be seen as a fundamental flaw of democracy, not just American democracy. Other countries have much better turnout rates for a variety of reasons (largely to do with the institutional structure of the electoral system). What I don’t know is if these citizens of other countries are more politically aware and sophisticated.

  • It IS all of the above, but if I were forced to choose one cause, it would have to be the electorate. Short of compelling people to take a questionaire to establish some degree of political literacy, I don’t know what to do about it.

  • Steve #2, I’m English, but I’ve lived in the US for eleven years. Based on twenty-five years of amateur observation, I’d say that the British electorate is as disengaged as that of the US. It also appears that the corporate media is responsible for most of the misinformation that’s out there. In the UK it’s the press, in the US it’s cable news.

  • It’s impossible to pick one reason, but if I had to, I would go with corporate influence. Somehow, we have to get back to “we the people,” not “we the large corporations.”

  • Yours is a position backed by Jefferson’s “Collective Wisdom” musings. I too am of this school of thought. Give any Tom, Dick or Harry a seemingly unbridled sense of liberty without a basic understanding of how such liberty has been achieved and what it takes to sustain it, and democratic anathema will surely manifest as a result of electorate neglect, ignorance and apathy. -Kevo

  • My choice is “The Electorate”. Constitutionally, we’ve been given the power to overcome all the other problems mentioned. The governments of other industrial nations are way ahead of us in terms of regulating corporate power, the media, campaign finance and the integrity of the voting process. They seem genuinely more interested in “the public interest” or “the common weal” than we are.

    I see no convincing evidence that we’ve become dumber or lazier than previous generations. Quite the contrary: we’re overwhelmingly better educated (formally anyway), and most Americans of both genders work so hard these days that they don’t know how to relax (we’re shocked to hear of European vacation schedules; very few of us have hobbies which require knowledge or skill, as opposed to pastimes which require neither).

    The fact is that almost nobody cares about government except those who are in it. Only a laughably tiny percent can even name their federal, state and local executives and representatives. Why would they need to? There’s damned little any of them can do about anything, even if they wanted to. Government has become much, much larger than in the days when in the 1860s anyone could walk into Lincoln’s office on Thursday mornings, or when in the 1930s your congressman had a staff of one plus a typist. Our nation’s role in the world since WWII, in addition to sheer size of government at all levels, makes it very hard for one individual to matter much, even to his own people.

    The problem stems from what sociologists in the middle of the last century called “mass society”. It’s not the largeness of it exactly, but the lack of what Durkheim called “secondary groupings” — structures which mediate between the mass of citizens and, e.g., governments or corporations. Many sociologists mid-century thought voluntary organizations would fill this gap, but nobody has time anymore for such things as unions, fraternal organizations, charities, even churches. Many expected technology (TeeVee) to fill the gap. But if anything it has made us more “atomized”, more alone, less in contact with one another. Families used to be brought together by mealtimes and the television set. Now we each get our own fast food, watch our own television (often at hours which suit us – tivo), walk through a crowd with iPod ear buds blocking even the sound of others.

    As a result of all this government has become something like it was in high school, a club in which very few people participate. Trouble is our governments, at all levels, deal with much more important matters than choosing the theme for this year’s prom or where to hold the gootball program’s car wash. I regret to say that I don’t see any way out of this morass either, though “if enough good people do nothing….”

    Maybe blogs like this one?

  • I really don’t think that there’s any one “magic bullet, per se; however, something that might work well—that is, if the uber-this-or-that side of the political spectrum could bring themselves to ever swallow the concept—is a “cluster bomb” solution.

    First, let’s start with corporate influence. I’ll be among the first in line to acknowledge that this is a huge problem for America. That wretched K Street Project needs to be utterly destroyed—but to leave any portion of the K Street concept intact does nothing more than to permit the eventual development of a Nader-esque KSP—which would be just as bad for the nation. Also, a democracy that functions, in part, on the free-enterprise system needs to have the corporate sector engaged in that partnership—and the complete elimination of corporate interests leaves the overall socioeconomic construct open to the disaster of the Stalinist collective concept of economic development.

    The media went in the direction that it did, not because of corporate buyouts, but because the uberschweinen mentality of the neoconservative linked up with the “change-or-else” mentality of the radical Theofascist extremist. “They” had the gumption to flood advertisers with threats of boycott; “we” sat on our collective hands, laughing at their ridiculous stunt. But—the stunt worked. Advertisers began to cave; commercial and cable/satellite programming began to shift toward a more conservative POV, and the historic pattern of the media is that the news division will follow the programming division—which is driven by the advertisers—which is driven by those who speak the loudest. If you want today’s broadcast news to embrace your ideology, then you have to threaten their entertainment sector with loss of your hard-earned dollars—five years in the past.

    Campaign finance reform is a no-brainer solution; the “easy” path to reform. It’s delightfully simplistic to say “public funding only”—but in an era where a prime-time minute costs a couple million dollars, the huge sums available through corporate donations is the only functional path open to the candidate. And I’m not going to stay up until 2 in the morning to see someone’s commercial.

    Vote tallying will never be perfect, because the humans who run the vote-tallying process are just that—they’re humans. organis, subjective, and opinionated humans. Electronic voting apparati were supposed to eliminate this, but there’s still one drawback—the machines were designed and built by humans.

    Finally, it’s a complete cop-out to blame the electorate. I cannot remember the last time a candidate ignored the mud-slinging, and simply charged on with a progressive offense in a campaign. I also cannot remember the last time I had the opportunity to vote for someone who I really felt was fully qualified for the position—it’s always been a choice about “the lesser of evils.” Voting isn’t driven by “who-to-elect” thought processes any more—it’s driven, instead, by the ideology of “who-not-to-elect.” That never was the individual voter’s fault, it isn’t his/her fault today, it will never be in the future.

    To fix the system? Like I said—a “cluster-bomb” approach.

    First, levy a small tax on everyone. Yes—EVERYONE. Maybe only a dollar per year for low-income households, with higher amounts as affordability increases. This becomes the general fund which is evenly divided between candidates, with no “perks” funding available to the incumbency. This levels the playing field for the electorate, and serves as the first step to exclude the muscle of corporate influence. Add to this a complete dissolution of K Street, and all its smaller siblings in the states, counties, parishes, municipalities, and townships.

    Second, establish objective “fair-and-balance” advertising practices for the media. They’re supposed to be objective, so make that objectivity enforcible to a certain degree. If a commentator, or an editorial, makes a negative comment about someone, let them either produce the actual facts—not opinions—that support negative comment—with the alternative being a suspension from broadcast or publication. That would send an unquestionable message. On the other hand, if that commentator or editorialist has legitimate concerns as to why someone should nopt be elected, then they must be just as free to state their case—again, under the penalty that if they promote dishonest or deceitful commentary, thay are subject to the unquestionable penalty of suspension from their medium Think of it this way—the “swifties” would never have gotten their message beyond the occasional street-corner….

    The third issue—campaign finance reform, is pretty much resolved by the first issue.

    Fourth, simply allow that an election cannot be perfect—and in this light, fund the placement of additional monitors to tabulate the elction results. If we can sequester a jury during deliberations, then why not sequester the vote-count, from the moment the poll closes, until the final results are tabulated at a given level?

    Finally, let the candidates present—and document, with details—why “they” should be elected—and not why “the other candidate” should not. Give the electorate the tools they need to vote “for” someone—and understand that, if someone decides that their vote is worth more than the “lesser-of-evils” candidates who are on the ballot, then that someone is doing nothing more than exercising their Constitutionally-protected right to refrain from voting. (After all, “Freedom of Speech” comes with a price-tag for everyone—including those who like to throw wonderful little phrases like “voter apathy” around. Talk about you mudslinging campaigns…). This tandem, coupled with the “No-K” solution, should finally force the political parties to find fully-qualified candidates, rather than professional mudslingers.

  • Steve has great ideas which are actually doable. Bravo!

    I think in one form or fashion the electorate has to be at the root of all of the problems, however, because the electorate is the mass that allows or disallows what happens. “Consent of the governed”, and so forth. Americans work far longer work-years than other industrialized nations and get far less for it, and yet we still have a great deal of “stuff” in our houses, and that makes us comfortable. I suspect that we Americans, deep down, are simply not uncomfortable enough with the state of things to get invovled.

  • I believe that many of the causes you mention are valid — though I have STRONG reservations about the ‘corporate influence’ one (for another time, perhaps), There is a definite problem with Electronic Voting Machines that needs to be addressed.

    But my ‘main cause’ IS the electorate, for two reasons. The first is that — while there were jokes and such before — ever since the Nixon Administration I see a concentrated effort to ‘turn people off’ to politics, to make politicians seem like a ‘dirty, disgusting, unethical bunch of crooks.’ (As it happens, some are, but a hell of a lot — even on the ‘wrong side’ AREN’T. There are honest, hard-working, highly ethical politicians out there — and even some of the worst Republicans fit the mold. They may be wrong, there ideas may be dangerous, but they are honest and trying to do their best for the country as they see it.)
    The attacks, by the Coulter-Limbaugh-Cheney have increased. The idea that discussing a person’s positions are ‘dirty politics’ whether the attacks are honest or plain lies, etc, is, I think, deliberately designed to lower the electorate and thus favor the Republicans.

    But a more fundamental problem, that pervades politics and many other aspects of American life, is the refusal to teach skepticism and critical thinking. People simply aren’t taught that the way to deal with an assertion is to check it against the evidence, not compare the ‘authorities.’ Sometimes they don’t even know what evidence is. So they just listen to who ever is the most eloquent, who panders to their previous ideas, etc.

    Being a good citizen, which is what we are really talking about here, takes work, takes looking at the issues. It takes voting, but it takes understanding what you are voting for and about. And people are not willing to take on that extra work, to know about the issues, to look around at all those claims and see if they make sense. The blogosphere is helping in this — people AREN’T stupid, just lazy, and they didn’t have the information available. Now they do, and they are beginning to make use of it, which is why i retain my optimism, barely.

  • “In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist. Eisenhower’s farewell address to the nation in 1961.

    I would revise the comlex to be the the emerging unbridled concentration of power by corporate and private monied interests in covertly gaining control of world assets. (energy, information control, local and national governments, and the media).

    My vote is for “Unwarrented influence” by the complex, creating the matrix of misplaced power.

  • I blame it on the Founding Fathers. They created an electoral system designed to remove the population as far away from the results of their vote as possible. A parlimentary system where the electorate could overthrow the gov’t when it is obviously screwing up would introduce the level of instability need to overcome voter indifference and inertia. Keep everyone on edge and guessing is a good formula for keeping tabs on those in charge.

  • There is no single solution; democracy is a complex and intervowen system. For example, one part has to be a better education system, but given that people have lost the civic culture, that alone likely will not be enough without other changes.

    If I was forced to pick the smallest number of changes that would do the largest amount of good, I can get it down to 2 fairly easily, and both are legal decisions. First, reverse Buckley v. Valeo, which wrongheadedly said money = protected speech as opposed to the more rational money = unprotected megaphone through which some speech is amplified. Second, reverse the elimination of the Fairness Doctrine. These two decisions have done more to dumb down the electoral process and marginalize the influence of everyday Americans than any others.

    Were I allowed two more, the next two would be (1) K-12 education reform – more money, required civics courses, and a standardized requisite principles of American democracy exam before graduation; and (2) 1 or 2 years of mandatory public service post-high school — could be military, could be overseas Peace Corps type work, could be non-military domestic AmeriCorps type work, would be old WPA type physical labor.

    Were I allowed yet two more, they would be IRV (instant runoff voting) and nationally uniform, auditable voting devices.

    I think these six combined would go a long, long ways towards re-engaging the electorate and making them feel more ownership and faith in the value of their decisions. The reversal of the two legal decisions plus IRV would immeasurably change the way campaigns are run — I believe for the better. The education components and public service would give people better tools and more of an investment in the decisions the government makes.

    There are many more changes (and many that flow from those above, like campaign finance and lobby reform that aren’t possible until Buckley is reversed), but these 6 would, I think, be a huge step in the right direction.

  • I think Steve is on to something. One reason many people hate politics and politicians are the name calling, mudslinging ads. They throw up their hands and ignore the entire lot.
    Publicly finance elections, and financially penalize candidates who use patently dishonest characterizations. No doubt, much of this is subjective. But at the same time, as much is blatant. As things stand now, there is no repercussion to out and out lying – something that would be considered simple criminal fraud in any other circumstance.

  • For an alternative as to who should be allowed to vote: Read Robert A. Heinlein’s “Starship Troopers.” Don’t bother renting the movie of this book that came out several years ago; RAH is probably still spinning in his grave.

  • The electorate — because only “we the people” can solve any of the problems mentioned.

    To come anywhere near solutions, citizens must have a means of learning and understanding the facts (the Media and education) and acting on them (representation).

    I agree with several observations posted above. Citizens have always felt estranged from the political process, but I think that estrangement has become worse — despite more available information than ever. We have become dangerously passive. Still, it is within our power to demand, through letters and economic strength, that news outlets do a better, more objective job of news gathering and analysis.

    Regarding representation, I strongly agree with Steve. The practice of candidates being privately chosen in “smoke-filled rooms” was condemned and reformed. But the result has been a swarm of lousy candidates, including rich men running for sport. Somehow, the selection process must be improved. Campaign finance reform is critical because without it, we will get more and more sleazy “marketing” of sleazy candidates.

    One simple action we could take regarding elections is to find a way to mandate a *series* of debates that would be more extensive and more substantial than the “American Idol” performances we have now. Other countries have that sort of thing without mandates. We have party pep rallies.

    Finally — and this may be impossible — we should find some way to remind the American people just how revolutionary and fragile our democracy is. What the Constitution says, means, and how it came to pass. As a nation, we need to understand (as others have said) that freedom demands responsibility, that the highest priority should be the common good, and that legislatures will sell out and screw “we the people” to the wall if we don’t pay attention for even a moment — which is less likely with good public servants.

    Let me add that I think CB posed a good question and that all the responses I’ve seen have been thoughtful.

  • I agree with CB. An educated, informed electorate is the key to dealing with the other four factors.

    “If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be. ”
    Thomas Jefferson

    It is not a magic bullet, it is a start. As an engineer, I learned (in painful ways) that a complex system (such as a socio/political/economic one of a nation) requires nuanced solutions (some simple, some incredibly complex.)

  • “Integrity of the voting process” is NOT a silver bullet. It is the very foundation of a democratic society. Electronic voting systems that utilize proprietary voting machines constitutes nothing less than a secret vote count. There is no discussion on how to “fix” what’s wrong, unless the very foundation of a democratic society exists. It does not exist in our country, today. We are a nation that executes elections through a secret vote count. Australia utilizes a voting process that requires public scrutiny of its electronic voting process. They can discuss silver bullets. America utilizes a voting process that eliminates public scrutiny of its electronic voting process, notwithstanding all the paper ballots one can eat. You can’t “fix” what doesn’t exist. We do not live in a country that has a democratic form of government. We live in a nation that accepts a secret vote count. Now, maybe we should be talking about how our nation can create a democratic society.

  • An afterthought —

    We need to disabuse ourselves of the notion that we and our nation and our way of doing things is better than any other on the planet. We oppose change and introspection because we can’t conceive that we could possibly be wrong. This is America.

  • I agree with Martin, who puts it far more eloquently.

    The system allows two parties to dominate the political scene and marginalize budding political parties. To suggest that the entire political spectrum is best represented by either Republicans or Democrats is simply asinine. Particularly when the “moderates” of one party or the other suggest the adoption of positions that closely mirrors the opposing party is the only way to win elections. Allowing the Green Party, the Constituion Party, the Libertarians, the Socialists, etc., a voice and full participation in the system would energize voters and make for a more representative democracy.

  • I think that the disengaged electorate creates a vacuum that is easily filled by the big money interests. Although the ignorance of the electorate is the root cause, I tend to feel that the problem is more easily fixed by changing campaign finance laws. It is my hope that when people feel that their vote has more power and that politicians are more responsive to their needs, they will be more inclined to vote.

    I’m a physician working in women’s health and I am stunned by how few women understand their own reproductive cycle which is something that they are made aware of on a monthly basis. They took a health class in junior high and apparently got nothing out of it. I don’t think that giving young people civics classes about far more abstract and impersonal matters is likely to make much of a dent in the problem of ignorance.

    As a small child growing up in a Chicago suburb, I remember having my mother point out the precinct captain one day as if he were some sort of celebrity. 20 years later as a “precinct captain” in San DIego during the Dukakis campaign, I was told to find somebody originally from Chicago, introduce yourself as the precinct captain, and ask for their help with election day. I was told that they would be flattered. I tried it and sure enough it worked. “Tribal” or machine politics helped keep people a lot more engaged. I’m pretty sure that my interest in politics comes from being raised in a political family (of the wrong kind!!) in a political neighborhood (suburban Chicago, then suburban D.C.)

  • [W]hat, if anything, ails our democracy[?]
    Here is a thought experiment which should immediately yield an answer to this question. It’s a Sunday so your local country club is like packed with golfers, swimmers, tennis players, and ladies who lunch. Walk around the grounds and ask people, “What, if anything, ails our democracy?” Any guesses as to what sort of answers you will get? Well, my experience with these folks leads me to say the dominant answer will be, “Our democracy doesn’t have a problem.” You might here a little grumbling about the war in Iraq or gas prices, but for the most part these people are quite happy about the way things are going. (An aside: You may not even hear any grumbling about gas prices. A republican friend of mine explained to me that he hedges against the rise in gas prices by investing in oil companies. If you’ve got the bucks even rising energy costs are that big of a problem.)

    The reason things are just peachy for these folks, but not for the vast majority of us, is that there is no countervailing force against corporate power. Unions are weak, the media have been co-opted and universities are being turned in to the handmaidens of business in the name of economic development. Certainly as Ed notes there are cultural changes which play a role in causing the problem.

    The problem stems from what sociologists in the middle of the last century called “mass society”. It’s not the largeness of it exactly, but the lack of what Durkheim called “secondary groupings” — structures which mediate between the mass of citizens and, e.g., governments or corporations. Many sociologists mid-century thought voluntary organizations would fill this gap, but nobody has time anymore for such things as unions, fraternal organizations, charities, even churches. Many expected technology (TeeVee) to fill the gap. But if anything it has made us more “atomized”, more alone, less in contact with one another. Families used to be brought together by mealtimes and the television set. Now we each get our own fast food, watch our own television (often at hours which suit us – tivo), walk through a crowd with iPod ear buds blocking even the sound of others.

    Unlike Ed I don’t think the problem stems from the cultural changes. I see the failure of secondary grouping as akin to the failure of an immune system when an organism develops cancer. The out of control growth of corporate power is the cancer. The origins of this cancer can be traced to Lewis Powell’s memorandum to the US Chamber Commerce in 1971. The primary failure of the immune system which allowed the cancer to grow was the US Supreme Courts decision in First National Bank of Boston v. Bellotti which gave corporations first amendment rights and which, incidentally, was written by Associate Justice Lewis Powell. That is the source of our ailment.

    All else flows form it. For example, extending first amendment rights to corporations has allowed them to exploit the uninformed and muddle headed swing voter.

    PS, Ed I just checked out your home page. Great panoramic photo.

  • A “magic bullet” for this would have to be even more “magical” than the Single Bullet in the JFK assassination that went every which way to accomplish its goal.

    All of those items are equally interrelated. People have been coming up with a “magic bullet” for centuries – Communism and Nazism and Fascism were “magic bullets” to solve the problem of liberal capitalistic democracy.

    Sorry to be a pessimist, but there is no “final solution,” no “magic bullet,” it’s not a disease that can be controlled with the political equivalent of penicillin. All you can hope for is a bit of progress here and there. But that doesn’t mean you stop, because then the pigs win.

  • I come in at the tail-end of this (competing commitments), haven’t read all the details and preceding comments, but have some ideas I’d like to record. If I’m repeating what others have said, then I’m probably in good company.

    Of all the possible systems of government democracy seems to have the most going for it in terms of fairness, accountability and adaptability. In the past, other systems are known to have worked very well in specific instances, but these days with the size and complexity of our societies, a democratic system of government is a precious commodity not to be trashed or taken for granted.

    However, in the face of such dire evidence (see also Dave Johnson) of voter ignorance and apathy, I don’t think the situation should be left to chance or good will. I would advocate and support the formulation of measures that would protect and foster democratic procedures for the protection of citizens’ rights and welfare. After all what else is a society to do but organise itself for its own and neighbors’ collective good?

    These measures would include — and here comes the bitter pill — a statutory obligation to vote (Australia has such a law [as far as I am aware. Shall check that], for example), and a minimum knowledge of issues at stake. Failure to vote or failure to pass a minimum knowledge test would incur some penalty both as an incentive to make the effort and as an affirmation of the value of having the opportunity. It’s not so different from a vehicle driving test requirement, which everyone accepts.

    If we are serious about democracy as our preferred system of government, we should, IMO, be prepared to take the necessary steps to ensure its effectiveness and endurance.

    Anyway, that’s my prime solution (I don’t like bullets, magic or otherwise), which I offer to the melting pot.

  • I think a good start would be to pass a constitutional amendment taking the vote away from all white males born below the Mason Dixon line. You might include in that amendment any one who is a member of a “megaChurch” or has made a donation to ANY televangalist. Frankly, you have then taken away the stupidist group and the MOST superstitous. People who are either to dumb to or have made a choice to turn their brains off. NOTHING good has come from either group, NOTHING. Racism, homophobia, xenophobia, misoginy, all around religious bigotry, you name it, they got it covered. A bit radical I know, but hay, if you’re gonna fantasize!

  • I think it’s the electorate, too.

    On one hand, there are those who don’t even know what the issues are. Another factor, I think, is that voting is not mandatory as it is in some other democracies — those who don’t vote in Australia have to pay a small fine. Persistent no-shows may face prison time: http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/opinion/200837_compulsoryvoting24.html

    If the two were coupled — you must vote, and you must know what the issues are and who represents various sides of the issues so you can vote for your own welfare — America’s political awareness would surely be heightened.

    Some say that voting should not be mandatory in democracies, but I say balderdash! Other things are required of citizens, like jury duty and paying taxes, so why not voting?

  • Before I’d slam the Electorate for being inconsistent in their voting patterns the “less knowledgable” they are about politics, I would really want to investigate if the authors didn’t proclaim the Electorate “ignorant” for not voting consistently conservative or liberal as defined by the authors.

    People do on occasion “vote” against their preceived interests. When Warran Buffet does it, it’s considered noble. When working class whites do it, it’s considered stupid (by us, anyway).

    But sometimes people don’t vote their own interests. Sometimes they vote for what they preceive to be the good of the country. And those perceptions can mix up a person’s voting patterns.

    If I was going to blame someone for our ills, I’d blame politicians who lie and reporters and editors who repeat those lies rather than puncture them. All the corrupting misinformation out in the electorate has been caused by some lying politician (Dick Cheney, anyone) who was not called to account.

  • Just some food for thought — no one has mentioned religion. An awful lot of people are convinced that the Magic Bullet is to inject religion into more aspects of our lives — i.e. government, schools, etc. I don’t buy it, but there is something to be said for that traditional Judeo-Christian moral and ethical code, minus the fundie evangelical proselytizing. There really are many religious Christians who try to live a righteous life and are yanked around by the hypocritical Christian right wing and don’t buy into it either. What would Jesus’s magic bullet be?

  • First, great topic discussion today. No need to feel any hesitation CB. I think Steve and Alibubba have great and insightful ways to improve our electorate to make us more responsible.

    I believe the problem lies with complacency, apathy, and the non-questioning citizen. I am going to be starting my job as a professor at an urban university tomorrow, and I am going to do my best to make my students look at things and begin to question. I was speaking to a colleague of mine about what the level of student that I will have, and he said, let them know that you want quality, no matter what. I think often in education and other fields, we have too often accepted less and less, and that breeds an uneducated society.

    It is funny. People are sucked into advertising and misinformation in politics simply because they don’t ask the question: Why are these people bothering to sell me this? Most of the time, one’s points, be it selling a car or an idea, especially on TV, are so hollow and shallow that it insults our intelligence. If we can get more people just to ask questions of people in power, even if it is to say, no I am not going to buy a such and such because they don’t make quality or they are pollutors or whatever, then more people will make informed choices not just in politics, but in life.

    Finally, I am reminded of one of the Simpson’s Halloween episodes where all the advertising billboards are destroying Springfield. Lisa goes to the head of the advertising company to try to stop the destruction, and the corporate head says, “well, advertising’s a funny thing. If you don’t pay attention to it, it just goes away.”

    Thanks CB for the venue.

  • It seems to me that some updated version of the Fairness Doctrine would address, to some extent, several of these issues:

    The media – if there was some reasonable way to prevent blatant falsehoods, and to at least label polemic argument as distinct from reporting, this would go a long way.

    Corporate influence – the direct influence of giving money and resources would not be touched, but the ability to influence the electorate through the media, think-tanks, etc., would at least be somewhat curtailed.

    The electorate – I still believe (perhaps naively) that people are not so much stupid as busy. If they only catch snippets of information, and that information is contradictory or polemic, it is unsurprising that most people don’t take the time to dig deep enough to understand what is going on.

    Even with all of that, I am not sure what form a new Fairness Doctrine would take – the “week for notification” clause, for example, would never work with the 24 news cycle. Also, there are many first amendment issues to resolve.

  • I knew this would happen. Now that I got my pet solution off my chest (no, I don’t have an incontinent hamster) and feel free to read the other comments, I have first to say I’m completely with Tom Poe #19 that there’s no discussion about fixing wrongs until the foundation is secure. This new book by Aviel Rubin, “Brave New Ballot”, tells a pretty shocking story of vulnerability of electronic voting machines to fraud, tampering, hacking and simple malfunction. I almost take it as read that this situation must be addressed as a prerequisite to any discussion of solutions to the other problems of democracy in America.

    And while I’m at it, I just want to register my afterthought agreement with Alibubba’s afterthought at #20. The first step to improvement is recognising defect.

  • My magic bullet is the same as yours: an informed electorate. By an odd coincidence, it was the Founders’ magic bullet (okay, magic pistol ball) as well.

    Why aren’t there public service campaigns reminding people that they have an obligation to inform themselves? Jesus Christ, we’re running spots encouraging people to have dinner with their families! This is at least that important.

    I’d even take it a step further and implement a test at the polling places. No, not like they used to do in the south. This would be three fairly easy questions about the basics of our system. “Who is the Chief Justice?” for example. Or “When did Alaska become a state?” The questions and the answers would be anounced well ahead of time. More than that, they would be promoted — run as PSAs on TV and radio, carried in the papers. Offered on the local news as part of the coverage of upcoming elections. Hey, if they can spend a minute covering the winning lotto numbers or the results of “American Idol,” I don’t think it’s out of line to require something like this. Again, the answers as well as the questions are part of this campaign.

    And on election day, you have to answer two of the three questions correctly. Hell, they can refer to notes, cut the thing out of the paper. They just have to have the answer. So that what we are really testing here is not what the voter knows, but how well the voter is paying attention.

    It’ll never happen of course. Maybe it shouldn’t. But something has to be done to make people realize that this is a duty they owe the republic, not to mention their children.

  • In #1 smiley says: From corporate influence/self interest flows all the other problems named.

    It’s easy to see that all the following points in CB’s list can easily flow from that, down to the electorate. But that, too, can clearly be seen to flow from the corporate influence when you consider that a) people are often gullible and easily led and b) a few corporations led by Republicans own virtually all the media.

    Do you think Berlusconi was elected prime minister of Italy because he was the best man for the job? Good grief, he couldn’t even attend world leader events in Spain because he’d been convicted there of tax fraud and antitrust violations. But he virtually owned the media in Italy, and what more can one need? They don’t call the media “opinion makers” for nothing.

    I don’t see an easy solution to getting people engaged and intelligent on a general level. TV is a powerful medium for propaganda, and there are way too many people too gullible in the face of it. I could see that changing if our school system would have a comprehensive multi-year curriculum which would teach kids to recognize logical fallacies, propaganda, advertising gambits, etc. But of course we can’t realistically expect that to happen.

    This is the modern fascist state. Get used to it.

  • The way children are taught nonparticipation.

    This ties into the “uninformed electorate” idea.

    For 18 years, when we’re training children for other things, we don’t allow their participation in politics. They have no training in researching candidates, no habits are formed in voting. Their only experience with voting, in fact, is in school elections where they elect figureheads who have no actual political power.

    Then we tell them that their vote matters.

    Why should they believe that, when it’s patently not true?

  • If you want to see what’s wrong with the media, just go read today’s Washington Post. Try Laura Blumenfield’s apologia for the poor Israelis and how they’re “morally torn” over targeted killings , or try the big article by Jim VandeHei and Zach Goldfarb that totally distorts the Democratic position on Iraq . Talk about an AIPAC disinformation campaign – this is how it works.

  • Lot’s of great ideas mentioned above — and to be truthful I don’t always feel secure wading in here because so many of the commentors here have such a deep understanding of politics. But, here goes.

    Several of you have alluded to the fact that people need to be engaged en masse and that’s always the problem. How do we get them engaged? If sizable numbers of people were really engaged in what is happening with our democracy we wouldn’t be having discussions about corporate America having more influence than the average citizen. To really make a difference it will take tens of millions of engaged citizens, not tens of thousands. The type of engagement needed goes beyond just showing up to vote once or twice a year and an occasional LTE. Somehow visions of angry citizens with torches and pitchforks charging into the town square comes to mind.

    I think that a magic bullet is possible but will need to come in a form where a majority of the country feels its pain. I’m thinking of something equivalent to the Great Depression where the entire country collectively had to deal with dire circumstances. Along those lines 9/11 was really just a scratch. When the pain of not taking action becomes greater than the pain of taking action then we might get to the point of truly fixing some of the wrongs in the United States.

    I really hate sounding so cynical, but I think that the underlying foundation of the economy is growing weaker by the day and our wake-up call is on the horizon.

  • Just one thought on this: Several people have endorsed CB’s “it’s the electorate” line, which I like too. But a few others have called for mandatory voting. Mandatory voting would be a disaster in this country. Too many people would go to the polls and vote for the first person on the ballot just to avoid the fine. When it comes to voting, what we need is quality, not quantity. This may sound elitist, but I maintain that people who don’t want or cannot follow the major issues, don’t know the differences between the major parties and who actually believe everything they see in negative campaign commercials should not be encouraged to vote. On Election Day, we can put something really nice on the TV for them all day long.

  • Morbo, I think you’re on to something brilliant. We know that women tend to vote more progressively then men, and there is a particularly uninformed, vote for Larry the Cable Guy (the folks who voted Bush because they thought he’d be better to “have a beer with”) crowd that we really would rather just stay home. So for them, I say a multi-channel all-day marathon of The Man Show, Jeff Foxworthy and said Cable Guy on Election Day would be just the trick to improve our government.

  • The electorate, and how about the culture of voting

    Maybe we should say, NOT VOTING. In Puerto Rico, where I come from, general elections get regularly more than 80% participation of those registered to vote. And more than 80% of eligible voters register and make sure that their vote is counted. Can you guys imagine the results if the US voted like that?

    People here don’t care about voting. On election day, my friends and I would get together and go to the voting station. It was what everyone did. Oh wait, it helped that election day was a Holiday. Maybe we should start there. Then we could make sure every political party had a representative at every stage of the process, in every voting location until the last vote is counted. But before we get all that, people need to care, people need to go vote.

  • For an alternative as to who should be allowed to vote: Read Robert A. Heinlein’s “Starship Troopers.” Don’t bother renting the movie of this book that came out several years ago; RAH is probably still spinning in his grave.

    Perhaps Fallenwoman has something here. Heinlein suggested in this novel that only those individuals who completed two years of “social service” (military) be allowed to vote. In the novel, the franchise is reserved only for discharged vets.

    Maybe Fallenwoman isn’t a troll after all. If we instituted this now, we could rid the government of almost all Republicans in one fell swoop. No George W. Bush, no Dick Cheney, no Rick Santorum, no Saxby B. Chambliss, no Denny Hastert, no Roy Blunt, no Karl Rove. Gosh, we’d have people like Al Gore, John Kerry and Jack Murtha running the country, instead of hapless chickenshits we have now.

    Brilliant, Fallenwoman!

  • Mandatory voting would be a disaster in this country. ? — You mean, Morbo, more than what we have now? Hard to imagine.

    At the moment, how many vote.. 34% ? I’ve seen that figure somewhere. That’s an aristocracy, not a democracy. Now even if, say, 60% of mandatory voters vote at random, over time, surely, they’d start to feel uncomfortable about it. No? Well, I don’t know — maybe not.

    But, here’s a plus: think of the money that would be saved trying to get the vote out. That article that anney refered to, also makes the point that “It’s certainly true that low-income workers and welfare recipients receive the same focus and attention as wealthy Australians from politicians because, as a consequence of compulsory voting, their votes count as much as those of the wealthy retirees ..”. Here, the lowest voter turnout is among the poor and the marginalized.

    The motivation among political campaigners would become directed more towards educating with facts and valid policies rather than the current high-powered psychotrickery, lies and phoney persuasion.

    Okay, I grant you, looking from Digby’s post, “Remedial Democracy”, which CB refers to, in which he says:

    We’re giving them too much credit. I met voters who told me they were voting for Bush, but who named their most important issue as the environment.

    it’s pretty bad. Was it because they knew a ‘bush’ was a leafy plant thing that made them think an eponymous candidate would be good for the environment?

  • Having gone back and reread CB’s question — is there a “magic bullet?,” I’d say “no.” But the more I think about, I think agreeing on a “magic target” (also alluded to by CB) is a more effective route. That target, in my opinion, should be education.

    There is plenty of justifiable criticism of America’s system of public education, but trying to educate millions of people is both a lofty ambition and a very tough challenge.

    Here, I’m not talking exclusively about civics class. I’m talking about exposure and analysis. (If I had my way, there would be a mandatory class on the difference between fact and opinion.)

    My wife teaches French, and she’s a damn good teacher. By following her personal teaching standards, she makes tons of after-school work for herself by constantly giving quizzes because, that way, she knows where each kid stands in his/her knowledge of French. In addition, she spends extra time on, not just French culture, but world culture. It’s an effort to make her students (who are not quite inner city) see beyond their limited circumstances.

    The reason I mention all that is because she has had many students visit or contact her after they graduated to thank her for opening their eyes to the simple matter of other cultures. One was a rapper who went on tour in Japan who, because of *French* class, was more open to Japanese culture. Another was a guy who graduated years ago and admitted he was a lousy French student. But, his studies led him into a PhD in Medieval Literature. He found that he had to master French in order to pursue his career, and now teaches at the University of Toulouse.

    Sorry about droning on, but I think education is the closest thing to a magic bullet — and that ain’t saying it’s easy.

  • Maybe a couple of definitions would help.
    “Informed, educated” voter = Voted for my candidate
    “unqualified” voter” = Voted for the other guy

  • I share everyone’s frustration with a disengaged and uncaring electorate. But — and I hate to say this because I am an organizational psychologist and hence, my business is “business” — I would have to give the “magic bullet award” to corporate influence.

    I’ve always looked at the government as providing a check & balance on big business — through regulation and other forms of oversight. For example, we can generally believe what the banker tells us are the terms of our mortgage, because that is so heavily controlled.

    In my experience, the disenfranchisement of the electorate stems from a feeling that they are just “little people” who can’t control much of anything because it’s already controlled by the big companies. A complicit media which misdirects (heard much about Jon-Benet Ramsey lately?) or slants what they present; the ability of companies like Diebold to help steal elections; and the campaign finance debacle which gives disproportionate influence to companies instead of the people who are to be served by the government are truly just “effects”, not “causes” in and of themselves.

  • Stephen Earl Bennett’s piece (linked to in the article Digby links to; see here) notes that uninformed voters can be wildly inconsistent in their policy preferences, which causes me to pose this question: we always hear, ad nauseam about the wisdom of independent voters who don’t consistently support a party from one presidential race to another… the kind of people who swayed from, say, Bush I in ’88 to Clinton in ’92 to Bush II in ’00.

    But surely there must be some people who’ve gone the other way… e.g., voters who went for Dukakis in ’88, Dole in ’96 and Kerry in ’04… so what’s up with them? I would love to see an article that looks at swing voters who have consistently “swung” the wrong way and find out what makes them tick. I wonder if it would turn out that they’re just as intelligent and/or informed as other swing voters, aside from backing the wrong candidates in the horse race.

  • [Good “take,” DrGail.] Without repeating Steve’s comments verbatim, it appears that most comments mention or allude to money. Three of CB’s five options involve the vortex of money. Media, Campaign finance, and corporate influence. All three are related to governmental dysfunction. Politicos need campaign funds and corporations contribute, with strings attached. Media need advertising which comes from corporations, with strings attached. So, the quickest and easiest way to some solutions is to seriously address campaign finance reform. (Even politicians hate begging for money.) And once again, substantive debates would add more sense and clarity to the political process than relentless televised slime and platitudes.

  • “For an alternative as to who should be allowed to vote: Read Robert A. Heinlein’s “Starship Troopers.” Don’t bother renting the movie of this book that came out several years ago; RAH is probably still spinning in his grave.” – Fallenwoman

    Oh, the movie got the Federal Service requirement for citizenship and voting rights correct. Of course, Johnny Rico should have been a short Phillopino guy, and not some Northern European looking Argentine.

  • Maybe Fallenwoman isn’t a troll after all. If we instituted this now, we could rid the government of almost all Republicans in one fell swoop. No George W. Bush, no Dick Cheney, no Rick Santorum, no Saxby B. Chambliss, no Denny Hastert, no Roy Blunt, no Karl Rove. Gosh, we’d have people like Al Gore, John Kerry and Jack Murtha running the country, instead of hapless chickenshits we have now. –prm @ 43

    Haven’t read the book myself but your summary suggests that people without military service couldn’t *vote*, not that they couldn’t run for office. In fact, my bet would be that the way Fallenwoman envisions the system, running for office (or being nominated for a position in the government) would be the same (or better) “social service” as serving in the army. And the way it would play in practice would be that the hoi-polloi would serve in the military and the elite in the office.

    As to mandatory voting. Can’t institute it before first making it possible for everyone to vote, otherwise those who’re already disenfrenchised would be hit the hardest by the penalties. That means registering everyone — automatically — at 18 (or shortly before). Possible in the totalitarian country like Poland used to be, where the govt always kept the tabs on everyone, from birth, but, here? It also means shifting the election day to a Sunday, so that most people don’t have to take the time off from work (risking a loss of income or even, perhaps, their job). Maybe eve spreading it over Saturday and Sunday (in Poland, once the black regime took over from the red, many in the church objected to having polititcs intrude on God’s day). I guess it would be the Congress who’d have to make such changes. And I don’t see the Congresss being moved in that direction.

  • Haven’t read the book myself but your summary suggests that people without military service couldn’t *vote*, not that they couldn’t run for office. In fact, my bet would be that the way

    It’s even better. Heinlein, in all his facist glory, suggests that “citizenship” be limited to those who complete their two years of federal or military service. So … following that to a logical conclusion with our system of government, only “citizens” can be “elected” to office and “vote.” Also, in Heinlein’s imaginary world, military service is so tough and exacting it would weed out AWOL Bush and “Other Priorities” Cheney. No citizenship, no franchise, no elected office. See?

    Of course it does set up a an elite class of “citizens” and class of non-citizens, whom Heinlein apparently says are very happy with their second-class status. And he’s kind of down on representative democracy or republicanism and favors a de facto military dictatorship.

    Of course, when you look at it that way, Fallenwoman is indeed a facist troll who hates our democratic society and freedom. Why do you hate America, Fallenwoman?

  • Television has a powerful subliminal impact on our society.
    We are exposed to hours and hours of ads (political and otherwise), managed news, and shows that boast, tease, frighten and distort.
    Entertainment has become our containment ..holding us in a state of trancelike mindless receptivity.
    Our nation is helpless before the “fair and balanced” tube.
    We can’t fight trance wizards like Rove with mere words and ideas, but rather we need to be casting our images on tv to induce a counter trance.
    Not what the founders intended, but it all comes down to television merchandising.

  • I truly believe that clean elections is the key to the dilemma. We would still get bad politicians, but we’d get a lot more good ones if they didn’t have to become whores to get/stay in office. With a few more good politicians, we could have tremendous change, namely the other things on the list. The changes over time would be all we need.

    An asterisk at the bottom of my page: If the elections are decided by black boxes which can’t be monitored (as with our current Diebold voting system) than all the clean elections in the world won’t help.

    So a) protect the votes, b) free the politicians from whoredom. c) sit back and watch all the other problems get solved (over time).

  • Bingo, Kali! Do you know that the average television viewing per household has consistently been from 7.5 to 8.5 hours per day — since 1975 at least?

    Guess what you never see on TV, with the exception of “Married with Children.” Anyone watching TV.

  • Very late to the party and feeling oh so cynical – even after reading some very interesting posts.
    Magic bullet?
    How about a electoral season of Survivor?
    – Survivor “Pennsylvania Avenue” or
    – Survivor “Connecticut Jr. Senator” or
    – Survivor “Abramoff Connection”? with our hosts Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert!
    I have never been able to understand why my friends find the contrived conniving on Survivor episodes to be more interesting than the “real world” our national politics, but there you have it.
    From the above rant, you may conclude that I believe the electorate to be in need of a magic bullet, but, in fact, my notion of “what ails” our democracy as one giant “cirular reference” in which the electorate is both the result and a(n) variable / input to the equation of that democracy. Resolving a circular reference can be really tedious, and I’m pretty certain I am not equal to this task, so I offer a few random thoughts:
    > I felt a good deal of alignment with Zeitgeist’s six steps to begin democratic sobriety.
    > I agree with Morbo that mandatory voting is not a good idea. He is right about quality vs. quantity. That said, I would be in favor of looking for ways to make it easier (e.g., making election day a holiday) for those who want to vote to do so.
    > My “gut” reaction to CB’s post was that all roads would eventually lead back to “corporate / influence ,” but I think once we get there we might find that “corporate influence” is just a polite phrase for “greed.” [Note: I admit that I am making no distinction at this point between “corporate” interests and “monied” interests.] IMO, the issues listed between corporate influence and the electorate (media and campaign finance) are manifestations of corporate influence upon the electorate.
    – A corporation never votes against its interests unless its management blunders in determining what its interests are.
    – Corporations employ large numbers of the electorate and can influence them in any number of ways that impede a citizen’s ability to engage in the democratic process (this can range from keeping rank and file wages low while looting a company to pay fat exec salaries and benefits, working salaried folk 60 to 70 hours a week as a “baseline,” communicating that government regulations will hurt profitability, cause lay-offs, etc. Part of this is exploiting the employee’s desire to maximize their own compensation but part of it is just the result of an imbalance of power. Finally, anyone who has ever worked for a large corporation know that oft times success is not always the result of merit and bucking the system leads nowhere fast. Many times people who rise to the top are more alphabet and attitude than aptitude. Some people may carry that “Why bother?” cynicism over to their political world views.
    -Corporations want government resources to be spent on furthering or protecting their interests, but they do not want to pay taxes to support those resources. And they are willing to make the calculus of spending money to make (or save) much more money.
    – Corporations own the media and have co-opted news personalities turning them into highly paid celebrities who will not rock the boat by trying to inform the electorate. Yes, the electorate could work harder to get at the truth, and I wish they would trade Survivor for C-Span, but I believe injecting profit motive into the news has made it harder for the electorate to become informed.
    – Corporations spend money to buy political favors; corporations accept money to advertise the politicians who will give the political favors; corporations are paid by politicians for advice about how to convince the electorate to vote for them so they can deliver the political favors for which they took campaign contributions. Nobody but us little smucks have any interest in stopping that gravy train. I don’t know about you but the “power” of my vote and my voice (“Dammit, I’ll write my Congressman!”) feels pretty pale by comparison. I keep trying but I admit it is more out of principle than any dream that I will change anything. I think the one thing that most sets me apart from most of the people with whom I spend time is that I still believe that the actions of my government are – in the end – my actions. If the government tortures; I torture. So, I feel compelled to make my dissent crystal clear. I think many people no longer view their government as an extension of themselves, and that is a crying shame.

  • I’m surprised that you didn’t include Gerrymandering. The idea that State Supreme Courts should oversee all redistricting as a matter of population change, rather than giving the responsibility to the party in power, as a tool to ensure reelection and power retention. This is obviously important as it would give voters a greater “Stick” of accountability for their representatives.

    But this is not my favorite issue.

    The idea that has captured my imagination for the last 5 years is that the federal government has been systematically gamed and to either be in effective, self destructive or a tool for the administration. Large and small every government agency has been staffed with Hacks, Food & Drug, Environmental Protection, FEMA and so on all the way up to the Pentagon and the Office of Special Plans. The idea that the entire US bureaucracy is so vulnerable to gamesmanship is self evidently dangerous.

    As Lawrence Wilkerson said, while discussing how this has occurred at the highest levels of National Security, he said that our National Government should be able to “Withstand any President.” Meaning no matter how stupid, or craven, the government should still operate as the government.

    I personally think is the ultimate answer. Is that the government should ultimately be run by competent professionals.

    Bonus thoughts!

    If you don’t know about Wilkerson’s speech about the “Cabal” running foreign policy, you should check it out. It is the most impressive bit of whistle blowing I’ve seen in the last 5 years. And though Wilkerson is talking about National Security, I think this dream of a built in competence in government should be applied across the board.

    Anyway, those are my 2 cents for Sunday Discussion.

    http://www.tpmcafe.com/story/2005/10/20/94239/203

  • Democracy works on the bellshaped curve. Our idiots cancel each other out and the rational middle can be swayed by a rational argument. Optimism required.

  • As someone pointed out above, the electorate here in the U.K. isn’t very well informed either, yet the partisanship that exists in the U.S. does not exist here.

    Fox News doesn’t exist either (well, you can get it on Sky, but no one watches it except Americans).

    All of the conservatives who vote that I know watch Fox News exclusively. The partisanship that we see today didn’t exist to nearly the same degree before Fox News arrived. (And also shows like Crossfire, that encourage political bickering.)

    I agree that our current state of affairs is due to many factors, but the one thing that would improve matters is to get rid of Fox News. I’m not sure how to do that unless we improve the rest of the media outlets and force them to compete in a fair environment.

  • Just out of curiosity—has anyone considered the ramifications of Fallenwoman’s suggestion?

    If, for example, an individual would have to complete 2 years of military service as a prerequisite to being considered a citizen, then anyone deemed unfit for service—or those who choose not to serve (the 1st provides for that decision-making process, and to establish a precedent for “exceptions to the Constitution” is a dangerous thing to do in the eras of Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld and Neoconservative Theofascism), would be denied that citizenship—and its benefits. What might the nation “do” with such “non-citizens?” Establish our own “untermenschen” class? The new-and-improved “slave-market source?” The “undesirable” tag? Will the United States develop its own version of the “yellow star” forced upon Hitler’s Jews?

    Fallenwoman: (n) “She who has traversed the barrel, and now seeks ideological solace beneath the barrel’s bottom.”

    Next—what about those under the age of 18? Would any of you have the nation deny services and rights to minors? Or do they no longer count? If “those under age 18” are denied legal protections, representations, and advocacy, then one might reach the conclusion that the children and youth of America constitute mere property.

    The creation of a military-centric regime in the United States, with mandatory voting that historically does little more than allow a government to maintain updated surveillance upon its citizenry, is the hallmark of a dictatorship. Or, would any of the other participants in this discussion prefer to hand Herr Bush the same level of autocratic authority as, say, Kim Jong Il?

    Personally, I think not….

  • I think there is way too little of talk over “what might have been”…

    What I mean is, we have come so low now in expectations, in what we even think can be, we forget what a real leader might actually do.
    We forget what real liberty was. We forget what kind of world we COULD shape.

    Many people in the US don’t even have a basic understanding of why the constitutional provisions are important. Why “rule of law” is so important.
    Why it was never meant to “just trust” our leaders.

    We forget what a rational, measured, and just response to 911 would have been, could have been. We have forgotten what a brave leader, a tough leader would be like.

    We get more and more petty, small minded, scared, and have less power than in any time in history.

  • “As to mandatory voting. Can’t institute it before first making it possible for everyone to vote, otherwise those who’re already disenfrenchised would be hit the hardest by the penalties. That means registering everyone — automatically — at 18 (or shortly before).” – libra

    You mean, like the Selective Service registration I had to do when I was seventeen? Not that hard, really.

    “Heinlein, in all his facist glory, suggests that “citizenship” be limited to those who complete their two years of federal or military service. So … following that to a logical conclusion with our system of government, only “citizens” can be “elected” to office and “vote.”” –

    Please, Heinlein was not a facist. But he does clearly state in Star Ship Troopers that you can not run for office unless you’ve done your federal service. There is a character in the book (and in the movie, the black girl) who only joins for a chance to change the system.

    “If, for example, an individual would have to complete 2 years of military service as a prerequisite to being considered a citizen, then anyone deemed unfit for service…” – Steve

    The book makes clear that in fact it is impossible to be deemed unfit for service. If you ask, they will find you something to do that qualifies, even if you are Stephen Hawkings.

    As for those who suggest that the world of SST is a military dictatorship, please understand that citizenship doesn’t happen until AFTER you leave the military. All the voters and office holders were veterans, but none were military. Of course, none were chicken hawks like Cheney either 😉

    “What might the nation “do” with such “non-citizens?” Establish our own “untermenschen” class? The new-and-improved “slave-market source?” The “undesirable” tag? Will the United States develop its own version of the “yellow star” forced upon Hitler’s Jews?” – Steve

    Well, supposing that Fallenwoman and her ilk set up the system, probably. Supposing that Max Clelland, Jim Webb and Colin Powell set up the system, not so much.

    In the book the world has gone through a WWIII event and the returning veterans are the only source of stability. They are the ones who set up the system. Heinlein doesn’t suppose they enslave the citizens who don’t do federal service. They don’t even lose any rights except the right to vote. That may be a concept that would be impossible to implement in the real world, but it is the premise of the book.

  • “and the complete elimination of corporate interests leaves the overall socioeconomic construct open to the disaster of the Stalinist collective concept of economic development.”

    Anybody for a Mixed Economy? Too much state planning leads to the drawbacks that plagued the Soviet economy, too little and rampant profiteering, oligarchy and monopoly prevail.

  • If I were drawing parallel’s between modern America and classic Sci-Fi I think I would lean more towards Philip K. Dick’s In the Days of Perky Pat, The Mould of Yancy or Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch. Distracted pleasure seeker masses held down by a manipulative elites.

  • Simple Improvement: FCC could mandate that TV and radio stations provide slices of free air time to political candidates during elections. This could significantly reduce the cost of running a credible campaign, reducing barriers to entry for new candidates and relieving some of the pressure on incumbents to work the money treadmill all the time.

  • If indeed power corrupts, then the federal government is the source of its own corruption. No amount of patching, tuning or rearranging of deck chairs can stem the tide. There is simply too much power, prestige, ego and cold cash at stake for corruption to be deterred by a few paultry laws or civil liberties. We’re talking real world here.

    So, although I wouldn’t necessarily argue for a smaller government, I would definitely argue for a weaker one. I suppose that is my “magic bullet”. I can think of several means that would further this goal:

    – Support any increase in congressional power, especially at the expense of the executive. The House is the true citizens’ representive and is most responsive to their will and mood. Note the projections for this fall.

    – Support any demands, from whatever quarter, for fiscal responsibility AND co-opt our Republican friends by refusing to consider new taxes against the citizenry. I will leave it as an exercise for the reader to deduce where new revenues might originate. =)

    – Always favor transparency over obscurity, openness over secrecy, even if it is your own ox or earmark being gored.

    – Wield the Bill of Rights like a club, all 10 of them. Support not only the ACLU but also the NRA (hold your nose if you must). We don’t want the corrupt to be able to pick and choose so we must forego the luxury as well. Every triumph of the individual citizen weakens the collective power of the state.

    – Remember that even an electorate composed of only PhDs. would generate irrational results. Why? Because voting is a cultural and emotional as well rational exercise for many. The media, enslaved by ratings, is driven by what already exists in the citizenry, not the other way around. No matter what your plan is, if the Jacksonians aren’t onboard, it ultimately isn’t going anywhere…

  • Although all of the items you listed are vital, here is my personal litany of knock-down electoral reforms:
    – Make Election Day a federal holiday
    – Lowering the voting age to 17 (If they can join the Army at 17…)
    – Compulsory voter registration upon HS graduation (registering for the draft is compulsory…)
    – Enact something similar to the Arizona Voter Reward Act on a national scale
    – End spoiler voting by enacting Instant Runoff Voting
    – Reform the Electoral College so the winner of the popular vote wins the presidency

    The following issues are a bit more vague/complicated that deserve some serious brainpower for a decent solution:
    – Break the wedge-issue lock with true multiparty (i.e. more than two) elections
    – Eliminate redistricting absurdity by giving the power of redistricting to non-partisan officials
    – Shortening the campaign season (to reduce campaign contribution dependency)
    – Provide meaningful public election financing

    In summary, the two-party system belongs in a museum, not in our modern electoral process. America leads the world in many other ways, so why don’t we stay at the forefront of democratic innovation? Are we just lazy?

  • In my experience, the disenfranchisement of the electorate stems from a feeling that they are just “little people” who can’t control much of anything because it’s already controlled by the big companies.

    Yes, but the problem is the step between disenfranchisement and franchisement; guilt. As long as the little man has no power(thinks he has no power), he is not responsible for the things done in his name; it is those damnable elites messing up the country(or those damnable liberals). It is the same reason people will say “They all do it” if a politician they voted into office is caught doing something bad. It is a lot easier to cast apsersions on all(especially your defeated opponent/opponent’s supporters who are looking to now gain ground) than to admit that you were wrong and to work to fix the system so that the abuse cannot happen again. There’s nothing to be gained by admitting wrong and fixing the system.

  • The electorate. Vote third party. Show the money and power can be taken away. As long as there are two parties controlling the two parties and taking money from the monied, the game is rigged.

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