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Comment by panarky | Hacker News Reader

> Well, welcome to life in a democracy.

The problem is not that things change in a democracy. The problem is that the change we get does not represent the will of the people.

A majority of Americans is dissatisfied with the Patriot Act [1] yet it keeps getting renewed.

A majority of Americans thinks political spending is corrupt [2] and that the political system is rigged, yet we get Citizens United to pour even more corporate cash into the machine.

A majority of Americans voted for the Democrat in 2000, but the Republican was installed instead [3].

People overwhelmingly disapprove using public funds to bail out reckless bankers [4], but somehow it happens anyway.

There was a global uproar over SOPA and PIPA which shut down this draconian legislation. But you can't kill the zombie, and it keeps coming back, now in secret trade agreements like TPP and TTIP that citizens aren't even allowed to read.

The Total Information Awareness program was suspended in 2003 [5] after a public outcry over warrantless mass surveillance. Naturally it was all reincarnated into secret NSA programs.

We'll see the same thing with devices and personal encryption. This is only a temporary setback for the powers that be, they'll be back with another sensational, emotional case soon enough.

The current system does not represent the will of the people. It's an oligarchy supported by a security apparatus run amok.

[1] http://www.gallup.com/poll/5263/civil-liberties.aspx

[2] http://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2015-09-28/bloomb...

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_ele...

[4] http://www.gallup.com/poll/106114/six-oppose-wall-street-bai...

[5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Total_Information_Awareness

View on HN

The American government is not supposed to be a direct representation of the will of the people, but let's go through this anyway.

On the PATRIOT Act, the link you provided shows that 63% of Americans either want to keep the entire thing or make minor changes.

Citizens United came from the Supreme Court, an institution that is explicitly designed to be shielded from the will of the people as much as possible.

The 2000 election was a clusterfuck, but it has happened exactly once since 1888. Besides, if a few hundred votes go the other way in Florida then we wouldn't even be talking about it.

On bankers, 60% isn't overwhelming, and the government decided to go against the will of the people because they thought it was the best course of action. Most experts agree that it was the lesser of two evils.

You can go read the TPP for yourself. It's been out for three months. [1]

Americans are divided in their opinions on NSA surveillance. [2]

None of this matters though because the will of the people is not supposed to be the final say in government action. There founding fathers did not believe in direct democracy.

[1] https://ustr.gov/trade-agreements/free-trade-agreements/tran...

[2] http://www.people-press.org/2013/06/10/majority-views-nsa-ph...

> 63% of Americans [...]

100% of Americans have been specifically lied to by the government about those issues.

The best thing about Snowden's leaks is how the release has continually shown the government to be lying, and lying in response to the last batch of lies.

As such, opinions based on those lies aren't really valid.

If they got to a voting booth and saw a General Alexander's taped confession for treason they'd (probably) rethink those opinions.

> Americans are divided in their opinions on NSA surveillance.

Again, only because the NSA has spent our tax dollars on specifically telling us things that they know to be untrue. These people don't support the NSA, they just don't want to die in terrorism and don't know enough to know how unlikely that is, or how useless the NSA is in that regard.

> You can go read the TPP for yourself.

Oh great, now that it's too late and it's technically impossible for it to change.

> Citizens United came from the Supreme Court, an institution that is explicitly designed to be shielded from the will of the people as much as possible.

The people have nothing to do with that decision. It is just plain unconstitutional. The framers of the constitution never meant for personal rights to be applied to corporations.

The framers of the constitution never meant for government to have so much power that lobbying it would be able to buy much influence. Beyond that, considering that the vote was restricted to landed elites and mercantile class, there's more credence to the idea that the framers never meant for the government to stifle the speech of anyone (whether corporations or not) than there is to suggest they had any idea on corporate personhood.

Regardless, corporate personhood has existed since colonial times, and the framers didn't do anything to stop it. Meanwhile, the McCain-Feingold act that Citizens United overturned had only been on the books for 8 years before much of it was overturned.

> never meant for government to have so much power that lobbying it would be able to buy much influence

I don't think lobbying is a problem because the government has too much power, but rather because of the electoral system.

When voting is voluntary elections are won by the party that is best able to get out the vote. In order to get out the vote huge sums of money must be spent on political advertising and organization. When political parties are desperate for money it requires them to devote a lot of their time to fundraising and it makes them vulnerable to special interest groups with deep pockets (aka lobbyists). Voluntary voting means more opportunity for money to buy influence.

Compulsory voting, in contrast, means that almost all eligible voters will vote. Political parties can spend less money on advertising, less time fundraising, and more time developing policy and doing the job. Because the electors have to vote they're more likely to take an interest in the election, more likely to listen to the ideas being presented and vote accordingly. The only downside of compulsory voting is that there are more votes to count, but that cost is worth paying.

Compulsory voting is a practical step towards getting the money out of politics and improving the quality of a democracy.

I disagree. I think government authority is the sole foundation upon which all lobbying is built.

If the government has no authority over something, there is no value in lobbying the government for help with that something.

Example: The government has subsidizes and regulates farming. Therefore there is a powerful incentive for agricultural interests to buy special treatment. Add ethanol considerations, and you have oil interests at work too.

I don't see why political ads would decrease just because everybody had to vote.

> The only downside of compulsory voting is that there are more votes to count

Australia has compulsory voting. It also has the donkey vote, estimated at 2% of votes. That is a downside.

http://australianpolitics.com/voting/electoral-system/donkey...

Before they introduced compulsory voting in Australia voter turn out had fallen below 60%. So with compulsory voting the "true vote" if you like is total votes minus informal votes minus donkey votes. Voter turn out for Australian elections these days is greater than 94%. If 5% of those votes are informal or donkey votes then that's still 89% of voters completing "true votes". A 30% non-vote has a far greater influence over an election than a 2% donkey vote.

The Australian Electoral Commission has a page about it: http://www.aec.gov.au/About_AEC/Publications/voting/index.ht...

The framers never intended for individuals to give up their rights just because they form corporations.

I have the right to freedom of speech. You have the right to freedom of speech(assuming that you're an American citizen).

If you and I form a partnership with the express purpose of working together to combine our voices and speak together, we retain that right to freedom of speech.

That was what Citizens United held.

Beyond that, you're just plain wrong. Corporations are legal persons. Only persons can be parties to legal actions. If your neighbor's dog escapes and bites you, can you sue the dog? Of course not. You sue the neighbor, the person responsible. If your neighbor kills your dog, can your dog's puppies sue your neighbor? Of course not. Again, non-persons cannot be party to legal actions. A corporation can own property, pay taxes, sue, be sued and as a legal person, corporations have rights. They don't have all of the same rights as people, that's why I find it so frustrating when people conflate "people" with "persons". Legally, they are different concepts.

> Corporations are legal persons. Only persons can be parties to legal actions.

True, only due to bad precedent. "Should they be?" is a question we the people should have had a chance to argue and debate. Instead, it was by a judicial fiat that made a new type of citizenry. And honestly, they are pretty fucked up, with requiring their primary focus to be "Make money at all costs". A human with a similar 'ethics' would be called a sociopath.

Better yet, I'll believe corporations are legal people when Texas executes one.

Secondly, Patently false. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_forfeiture_in_the_United...

United States v. 12 200-ft. Reels of Film

United States v. $124,700 in U.S. Currency

United States v. Approximately 64,695 Pounds of Shark Fins

United States v. Article Consisting of 50,000 Cardboard Boxes More or Less, Each Containing One Pair of Clacker Balls

United States v. Forty Barrels & Twenty Kegs of Coca-Cola

You want more?

> A corporation can own property, pay taxes, sue, be sued and as a legal person

But it can't go to jail, and fines that are levied for wrongful behavior are often less than the profits obtained from said behavior and come about through settlements with no admission of wrongdoing, and without any executives being held responsible.

> The framers never intended for individuals to give up their rights just because they form corporations.

A person never lost their individual right to freedom of speech if they formed or became a member of a corporation.

A person never lost their individual right to freedom of speech if they formed or became a member of a corporation.

That was precisely the issue before the court in this case. Did the individuals who formed the corporation Citizens United retain their right to freedom of speech as it related to releasing a documentary about Hillary Clinton near an election, in violation of McCain-Feingold?

The court ruled that they did not lose their right to freedom of speech.

>I find it so frustrating when people conflate "people" with "persons"

They are virtually synonymous. People is a plural form of person. Most people don't speak legalese.

People is a plural form of person.

Not in the context of the Constitution. "The people" makes reference to American Citizens. "Person" makes reference to legal persons.

The first and original definition of "person" is "a human being".

An alternate, legal definition is "a corporation."

Lets break down that definition and dive deeper into the abstraction.

A law is a piece of paper with words written on it that some people agree on.

A corporation is created by filing articles of incorporation. Again, this is a piece of paper with words written on it.

So, in reality using law to define a corporation as a person you have a piece of paper saying a piece of paper is a human being.

Legal and common definitions are often at odds.

Legally, marijuana and cocaine are "narcotics" but pharmacologically they are not.

The law defines personhood for biological entities too.

One minute before birth, it's not a legal person. One second after birth, it is a legal person.

This is nothing new.

If you don't like the law, convince enough people that the law should be changed.

Let's make sure we know what we're talking about here. The CU decision was over a bunch of people who made a movie that was critical of a political candidate, and aired that movie not long before the election.

Is it your contention that we really should prevent this kind of thing from happening? Because to me, it seems like the very cornerstone of the democratic system. The minute such activity is illegal, the people have lost and we've become an oligarchy, unable to provide information to our fellow citizens necessary to cast informed votes.

The CU decision was over a bunch of people who made a movie that was critical of a political candidate, and paid a TV station to air that movie not long before the election. Congress had restricted spending on political advertising and it was this restriction that CU overturned. You're arguing that the cornerstone of democracy is the ability of the wealthiest to spend unlimited amounts on propaganda to convince citizens that they should vote for the candidates that benefit the wealthy the most.

I'm arguing that the incumbents have a built-in, guaranteed communications channel. Any obstacle to speech by the people (whether they're rich or poor) leaves no response to those in power. In effect, then, the rules enforce an oligarchy.

In fact, your argument that the CU decision only benefits the wealthy is precisely the opposite of the reality. In fact, the wealthy don't need to cooperate in corporate bodies to finance public speech: folks like Donald Trump can get up on a pulpit with their own personal wealth. It's only us regular people who have the need to cooperate (i.e., to incorporate into a body to handle the demands of our effort).

Thus, CU is a benefit to the regular guy, without having much effect on the opportunities available to the rich who can go it alone.

> The minute such activity is illegal, the people have lost and we've become an oligarchy, unable to provide information to our fellow citizens necessary to cast informed votes.

'The people' aren't the ones 'providing information', campaigns full of biased individuals trying to beat a competitor are. The system and its 'elections' has nothing to do with the people, it has to do with a few powerful wealthy entities struggling for power.

Yes, we should definitely prevent a very small minority of political Übermenschen with more money than God from being able to control the system for their own aims.

Campaigns are actually explicitly prohibited from coordinating in any way with the so-called SuperPAC's that have unlimited fundraising ability.

As the parent said, how would you propose to limit political speech in a meaningful way without infringing on the free speech rights of the public at large?

I admit I haven't read the CU decision, but whatever else it is, it has apparently opened the door to no-limit campaign financing. Which is bad for democracy.

There are already laws protecting freedom of expression, so I think it's disingenuous to suggest that CU is all about freedom of expression, and therefore good for democracy.

If you're interested and opinionated, you should read the decision. It's mostly in plain English and the reasoning can be understood by someone who is not a lawyer. It's not long and can be found with Google, probably as a PDF from the Supreme Court site.

It doesn't really open the door to no-limit campaign financing. It says that the government can't put a limit on how much money a person or group of people (like the "Citizens United" nonprofit--hence the name) can spend to promote their OWN opinions.

There is a difference between 1) giving a political candidate $1 million, and 2) spending $1 million to shoot, print, and promote a documentary movie about a political candidate.

#1 is still illegal. And it's hard to imagine a way to limit #2 without giving someone the power to determine which movie (or website, or podcast) is "legal" and which is "illegal" speech about a candidate.

If we can't speak freely each other about candidates, how can we hope to have a valid political process at all?

Freedom of speech doesn't disappear as soon as people band together in an organization or corporation. The free speech of the corporation is simply the aggregate free speech of the shareholders in that corporation, and that's what Citizens United held.

The framers of the constitution never intended for the United States to become a massive welfare state, either. There's absolutely nothing in there covering programs like universal healthcare, social security, food stamps, et al. The framers very blatantly would not have supported such vast tax based subsidization of entitlements in which one citizen is forced to pay for another. They also would never have supported the total government cost in the US being equal to nearly 40% of the economy. Does that mean the US should end those programs and slash the government down to a fraction of its current size?

The absence of these items from the Constitution does not imply their opinions on the matter. The Constitution sets out a system of government, not a definition of how the economy should be run.

As to what you assert their opinions would be, you'd have to look at their own writings and find something to the effect; noting what many of the constructs you described wern't even being considered during that time. But that evidence won't be in the Constitution.

The Constitution lays out who's responsible for what, and who can make what decisions. It is not a bible stating the mores of the nation.

Yes.

The people whose jobs are to determine that say otherwise.

Aren't outlets of the free press primarily corporations?

>There founding fathers did not believe in direct democracy.

Do you know why they didn't? Because it wasn't feasible to do so when information was traveling at the speed of the horse drawn carriage.

>In a large society, inhabiting an extensive country, it is impossible that the whole should assemble to make laws. The first necessary step, then, is to depute power from the many to a few of the most wise and good. But by what rules shall you choose your representatives? Agree upon the number and qualifications of persons who shall have the benefit of choosing, or annex this privilege to the inhabitants of a certain extent of ground.

-John Adams, Thoughts on Government

The limitation or assumption that "it is impossible that the whole should assemble" is no longer true.

There's also a philosophical reason for the adoption of an indirect, representative democracy. One specific example is to protect against Tyranny of the Majority [1].

I'm dubious that a country where most issues are voted on directly by the people could function with any significant amount of participation, mostly because people are not experts in most fields, and don't necessarily understand e.g. the macroeconomic effects of letting the largest banks in the world all go bankrupt. We elect representatives because there is a lot of work to do governing a country thousands of miles wide with over 300 million people, and I want people who can devote their profession to improving government in charge. Ones that we get to vote for regularly, of course.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tyranny_of_the_majority

"Second. It is of great importance in a republic not only to guard the society against the oppression of its rulers, but to guard one part of the society against the injustice of the other part. Different interests necessarily exist in different classes of citizens. If a majority be united by a common interest, the rights of the minority will be insecure. "

- James Madison, Federalist #51 : http://www.constitution.org/fed/federa51.htm

The context of your Federalist Papers quote is in regards to separation of powers (legislative, executive, judicial) and not indirect vs. direct democracy.

Tyranny of the majority and mob rule are just pejorative synonyms for democracy. Which would you rather have, tyranny by the majority or tyranny by a minority (i.e. monarchy/oligarchy/dictatorship)? Personally I'd argue for something else altogether.

At one end of the debate was the likes of Thomas Jefferson and John Adams who argued for the "tyranny of the majority" (democracy) and at the other was the likes of Alexander Hamilton, who wanted Oligarchy:

>I believe the British government forms the best model the world ever produced, and such has been its progress in the minds of the many, that this truth gradually gains ground. This government has for its object public strength and individual security. It is said with us to be unattainable. All communities divide themselves into the few and the many. The first are the rich and well born, the other the mass of the people. The voice of the people has been said to be the voice of God; and however generally this maxim has been quoted and believed, it is not true in fact. The people are turbulent and changing; they seldom judge or determine right. Give therefore to the first class a distinct, permanent share in the government. They will check the unsteadiness of the second, and as they cannot receive any advantage by a change, they therefore will ever maintain good government.

-Alexander Hamilton, Farrand's Records of the Federal Convention, v. 1, p. 299.1787-06-19

It would indeed be nice to delegate to the experts (i.e. scientists, engineers, psychologists etc.) on relevant issues, rather than having climate change deniers[1] on the Environmental Committee and people who have never sent an email[2] in their life on the Committee for Privacy and Technology.

[1]https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lindsey_Graham

[2]https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Inhofe

Doesn't mean that "first necessary step" is no longer necessary or even a good idea. It just means that original assumption no longer holds.

Your examples are all pretty disingenuous.

> A majority of Americans is dissatisfied with the Patriot Act [1] yet it keeps getting renewed.

First, what polls say is not the same as what the electorate believes. Actual voters skew older and more conservative that the general public. Second, your poll doesn't show that Americans are dissatisfied with the Patriot Act. 63% of those polled think it requires no or only minor changes. 62% think it's about right or doesn't go far enough.

Those polls also have some very interesting statistics. 30% of those polled think that the government should take all steps necessary to prevent future terrorist attacks, even if that means violating basic civil liberties. 65% think otherwise, but 55% of those polled do not think the government's programs violate civil liberties. 55% of those polled in 2006 were okay with the Bush administration's wiretaps. 53% of those polled in 2006 thought that the Bush administration was about right or did not go far enough in restricting peoples' civil liberties to fight terrorism.

> A majority of Americans thinks political spending is corrupt [2] and that the political system is rigged, yet we get Citizens United to pour even more corporate cash into the machine.

In a 2010 poll, 68% of those polled thought the government should be able to prevent the sale of violent video games to minors: http://www.gallup.com/poll/1588/children-violence.aspx. Yet in 2011, the Supreme Court struck down a California law doing precisely that (Brown v. EMA). I think few people on HN would say that was wrongly decided. Given that the Supreme Court reviews laws that have been passed by elected legislatures, it is almost guaranteed that when it strikes down a law, it will be going against popular opinion.

> A majority of Americans voted for the Democrat in 2000, but the Republican was installed instead [3].

Frankly, I think we should not only abolish the electoral college, but the states as well. But in the meantime, who the "majority of Americans voted for" is not how we decide the election of the President.

> Frankly, I think we should not only abolish the electoral college, but the states as well.

I was with you until this part.

States gave us a path to gay marriage, and allow people to move to different areas that hold different values than the whole nation.

I'd suggest trying instant runoff voting before moving to something as drastic as abolishing states. I think IRV would allow people to express their votes and opinions more clearly than the system we have today.

In Australia, which has IRV, it's not clear to me there's much difference. Candidates are still elected to single-member constituencies, and we still get a two-party system little different from the US.

Do you think IRV alone helps? What exactly do you propose?

Aside: in Australia, which has IRV, gay marriage is still not legal. Yay democracy. /s

> In Australia, which has IRV, it's not clear to me there's much difference. Candidates are still elected to single-member constituencies, and we still get a two-party system little different from the US.

How long has Australia had IRV? I don't think it's a magic solution on its own. But I do think it allows voters to more clearly express their wishes without playing as many games wondering what the rest of the voter base will do. That's not democracy.

Anyway, IRV does not guarantee your favorite will win and it only gives different results in certain situations, such as close elections. Maybe Australia hasn't had the right circumstances come up yet. There are still a lot of barriers to becoming a presidential candidate, and many good people just don't want that job, like Biden. I'm sure that's true at other levels of government too. I know I would not like to be in a room arguing for gay marriage against some Christians. Or discussing budget for things I don't understand. Or any other number of boring things. And at the end of your term, if you aren't reelected, there's a good chance many people don't like you. Public office isn't glorious while you're there. It's only glorious after you're long dead, and even then you probably had to do something hugely important to be praised.

> Do you think IRV alone helps? What exactly do you propose?

A good government is made up of active voters. I propose making good use of your voice through the internet, in person, and on the phone and in letters to your representatives. Inspire others to do so, keeping the focus on supporting issues you care about, and less so much about people or particular candidates. Share facts. Don't try to brainwash your fellow citizen by convincing them to vote in your man. Discuss and debate with mutual respect for everyone you meet, because we are all equals, you, me, the president, and those natives in Brazil who don't want to meet anyone from outside their jungle village. The more you can discuss without disrespecting someone's right to their own opinion, the more trustful and open our society will become, and we will advance to use technologies you can't imagine today. I know this because we're living in that future that people from the 1950s couldn't fathom. Use your vote and your voice, or risk losing it. It's your choice.

> How long has Australia had IRV? As long as I have been around -- 30 years or more.

IRV has nothing to do with reducing the strength of two main parties. It just reduces the weirdness in the case of moderately close races.

Okay, so there can still be two main parties, but isn't the idea to allow third party candidates to run without taking votes away from the most similar candidate? I haven't studied all the different forms of voting [1]. I know there isn't one that's perfect, I just think we can make some improvements on what we have now. I am not ashamed to admit most of my understanding of this comes from CP Grey's animal kingdom =).

EDIT: Just read a bit about approval voting and score voting. I guess I'll suggest those next time instead of mentioning IRV.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voting_system#Compliance_of_se...

Talking about criteria with voting methods is like comparing weight and horsepower of race cars. That's the wrong approach. You want to put them on the track and get average race times. You can do this with voting methods too.

http://ScoreVoting.net/BayRegsFig.html http://ScoreVoting.net/PropDiatribe.html

> A good government is made up of active voters.

Another thing Australia has, besides IRV, is compulsory voting.

I think 'rayiner' might just have meant "it would be preferable that the President be elected by popular vote of the entire nation without regard to state boundaries". While it's possible he was suggesting that the States themselves should be abolished, I think it's just awkward phrasing.

Nope, I think we should get rid of the states and turn them into administrative districts of the federal government. The state governments are hotbeds of corruption, ruled by minority interests because state elections have low voter turnout, and add an enormous administrative tax to pretty much every economic or legal transaction that happens in the U.S.

Respect for elaborating.

> The state governments are hotbeds of corruption, ruled by minority interests because state elections have low voter turnout, and add an enormous administrative tax to pretty much every economic or legal transaction that happens in the U.S.

Maybe that needs to happen once in awhile for us to wake up and start exercising our rights again.

I don't think the world has gotten any easier to administrate. If anything it's gotten tougher. I like the idea of allowing smaller areas to administrate themselves outside the national constitution. The world is changing more quickly every day, states have worked well for 240 years at preventing dissolution, and if we consolidate more power we risk creating a majority who is unhappy enough to revolt, in my opinion.

Our goal is not to become all powerful and ignore citizens who aren't making use of their right to vote. Our goal is to be balanced, and in doing so we find strength as a byproduct. When you seek power as a goal, you have already started down the path to failure when someone inevitably usurps your authority. Sustainability is our goal, and balance is the way.

Technically, the states have only prevented dissolution for a bit less than 151 years. The previous streak lasted about 79 years.

Surely, the Confederate secession qualifies as a dissolution.

I am of the opinion that the U.S. would fare better with more states, rather than fewer. If Los Angeles, New York City, Chicago, San Francisco, Dallas, Houston, Miami, Philadelphia, Boston, and San Diego all became city-states, the usual civic corruption would have less impact on the statewide governments of the donor states.

One could say the same about cities and counties, except in LA, where they call them parishes, or AK, where they call them boroughs.

But I don't expect that change anytime soon. It was after all the states who gave up some of their sovereign powers to form a federal system after breaking free of British rule.

Approval Voting is much simpler, and without the perverse incentives that come with instant runoff voting.

Here's my problem with Approval Voting: Let's say you are left-wing, and there is a left-wing, centrist, and right-wing candidate running. Do you approve the centrist candidate? If you approve the centrist candidate, you may block the right-wing candidate, but you also may block the left-wing candidate. There is no clear and obvious way for the voter to translate their preference into an approval vote.

This isn't a problem. Numerous contentious Approval Voting elections and exit polls have been held with Approval Voting, showing voters can certainly cast a vote without being paralyzed by indecisiveness.

If YOU can't make up your mind, then just don't vote. Seriously. You can get Approval Voting and just not even show up and vote. You'll still get massively better election outcomes because of all the people who do show up to vote are using an objectively better decision-making algorithm. Yes, objectively better.

http://ScoreVoting.net/BayRegsFig.html

I didn't intend to suggest someone wouldn't vote because they are "paralyzed by indecisiveness." My concern is that people will vote sub-optimally due to poor information about other voters preferences and poor understanding of the strategy involved.

That's a valid concern. http://www.electology.org/score-voting-threshold-strategy argues that in approval voting an honest ballot would give you (by some measure) at least 91% of the impact of a perfect tactical ballot.

An honest vote in first-past-the-post, say for your awesome friend Bob for President, would give you approximately 0% return compared to the proper strategy of voting for the lesser evil of Clinton.

This is a common logical fallacy. I'll explain.

Suppose Approval Voting gives you a utility ("happiness") of 10 if you're tactical, or 9 if you're honest.

Now suppose Voting System X, in which a sincere and tactical vote are obviously identical (ignore the fact that this requires the system to use randomness), gives you a utility of 7.

Now do you _really_ want to take the latter system because there's no disparity in your happiness based on whether you knew the best strategy? Or would you rather take the system that gives you a better result?

More details here. www.electology.org/topic/tactical-voting

I'm sorry, but you've completely missed the point. Nobody is talking about the "disparity in your happiness based on whether you knew the best strategy."

Obviously, if the honest approval ballot give me 9 utility points, and the strategy approval ballot gives me 10 utility points that's better then the system that always give me 7 utility points.

However, it seems to me that the situation is much more along the lines that an honest approval vote gives me 2 utility points, and a strategic one gives me a utility of 9.

See, I hold to political positions that almost always put me in the minority. If I only approved those candidates that that I actually liked, I'd only approve candidates with effectively zero chance of winning. This would let my least favorite candidate win, thus granting me very little utility.

Hence, I'll probably take System X, even if approval voting might, in theory, do better if everyone applied the strategy correctly.

> This is a common logical fallacy. I'll explain.

No, it's not. I agree with you. (But perhaps didn't express that right.)

Actually, that discussion is about an honest score voting ballot, not an honest approval ballot.

Hmm, the author confusingly mixes topics.

Approval Voting is Score Voting on a 0-1 scale. I tried to be clear about the distinctions as they apply. If you can cite any specific sentences that you think could be made clearer, please let me know.

I think I confused myself there.

If you want your site to be usable for drive-by-quoting in an Internet discussion, perhaps you want to make two copies of that text, one specifically for Approval Voting and one for score voting in general?

PS Overall nice website, I am reading more.

Thanks. We've changed platforms a couple of times and have lost some pages and introduced some broken links and "CSS" issues along the way. We need more manpower to make it pretty, but no one cares enough about democracy to give us the millions to invest in such things. :)

This was the original site from years ago: https://sites.google.com/a/electology.org/www/approval-votin...

Ironically, my startup just got through YC and my fingers are crossed that we're successful enough for me to one day fund such reforms, so we'll never be threatened by a Trump again.

Congratulations!

I wonder what the right strategy would be? I guess start small and introduce sensible and simple voting everywhere you can:

- Shareholder votes in a company - Where to go for dinner - Vote for mayor in a small town - ...

Most people don't even know that there are different voting systems, yet alone that some of them are vastly better than others. (It's like watching people play Monopoly, when they are much better games around these days.)

For what it's worth, voting system changes typically result from a two-party system splitting: http://repositori.upf.edu/handle/10230/506. When countries end up with more then two parties, those parties suddenly have an incentive to institute better voting systems. That would suggest you'd have to take out the Republican/Democrat duopoly to change the US system, but perhaps Trump will do some good after all.

Interesting. They had some changes in party systems in the US over the course of the country's life, but did they change the voting system?

Britain also had some changes (with labour replacing liberal at the beginning of the 20th century).

I hail from Germany, which traditionally has a more proportional system. (It's a weird mix that seems to do reasonably well in practice. They could replace the first-past-the-post of the `Erststimme' with a score voting system, but the Erststimme isn't that important anyway.) They never had less than three parties in the federal parliament after WWII, even with a 5% threshold needed to move in.

The UK had three somewhat relevant parties in the 20th century (though only two relevant parties per county). Why haven't they changed electoral system? (And when they had a referendum about it, why did they suggest the dreadful IRV?..)

The USA has had changes of party systems, but never in a way that resulted in a lasting third party.

Certainly there are places like the UK, or my homeland, Canada, that have had three relevant parties for a while without changing the system. Although both UK and Canada have forces pushing for reform. The recently elected government of Canada gave an election promise to change the system, but, well, I'm not holding my breath.

But I'm not saying at all that any country with multiple parties will enact voting reform, but statistically, it seems that voting reform is often brought about that way.

I suspect IRV was brought to vote in the UK, because that was deal that could be reached between the Conservatives who didn't want change, and the Liberal Democrats who did. However, I will note that IRV isn't so bad when selecting members of a legislature. Approval/Condorcet elect compromise candidates, but we don't want to simply have a legislature of compromise candidates, but rather representative of how people voted. But some from of proportional system is probably better.

That's a common logical fallacy. What's important is not "how much utility did I lose by not casting the most optimal vote in Voting System X?" What's important is, "how much utility did I lose by not _using_ Voting System X?"

Explained here with a simple graphic to visualize it. www.electology.org/topic/tactical-voting

That's an interesting point. Yes, approval voting, like all other voting systems, requires voters to not only know their preferences, but also to play a little `game' (in the game theory sense of the word).

The optimal strategy on who to vote for depends not only on preferences, but also on what you know about the other voters. Polls help here.

The nice thing about approval voting is that, even though their might not be one single, clear and obvious way to translate your preference into your vote; but there is a clear and obvious family of ways to do so. And they have nice properties.

In-first-past-the-post, people often elect to give their vote to the lesser evil, instead of their preferred (third-party) candidate.

In approval voting, you will never have to give a compromise candidate more `vote' than any other candidate you prefer.

Ie all families of sensible voting strategies for approval voting look like this:

- sort candidates in order of preference - figure out a cutoff - approve anyone above the cutoff

The optimal cutoff depends on the peculiarities of the election (polls etc).

In practice, people manage this quite well intuitively. (I have run approval votings for small things, like which restaurant to take the team to.)

I like the idea but don't agree that all you do is vote above the cutoff. If there are 10 choices and I approve of 3, but I know my 7 and 9 are the only possible winners, I'll likely vote 1 2 3 7.

Your best strategy is to approve all candidates you prefer to the expected value of the winner. http://www.electology.org/score-voting-threshold-strategy

This works out well, tending to elect Condorcet winners. http://ScoreVoting.net/AppCW.html

Thanks. So the best strategy is even simpler!

So you do vote above the cutoff. But the optimal cutoff is really simple to find from the polls.

I don't think that works. Polls tell you the levels of support of the candidates, they don't give you the probability of each candidate winning which is what you need to figure out the expected value of the winner.

I guess it's back to the prediction markets (or fivethirtyeight) then.

I don't think other system require "playing the game" in the same way as approval voting. You can game any voting system by voting strategically, but approval voting seems unique in actually expecting people to have to vote strategically.

You can vote strategically in any deterministic voting method. There's nothing special about Approval Voting. People can vote honestly based on whether they approve (have a favorable opinion of) a candidate. Or they can be tactical and base the decision on probability of winning.

And in approval voting at least your strategy is very close to honesty.

Your strategic consideration only consists in choosing a cutoff.

> I don't think other system require "playing the game" in the same way as approval voting.

You must be joking? Almost no one ever votes their true preference in first-past-the-post. People usually vote for the lesser evil of the top two candidates, because any other strategy (like voting for who you'd actually like to win the election) just wastes your vote.

In any case, check out eg https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Approval_voting for other people's thoughts on the system. There's much more online about all aspects and pros and cons that we don't need to rehash.

Sorry, I tend to think of FPTP as being so messed up it doesn't qualify as a voting system. I was comparing approval voting to alternatives like Ranked Pairs/IRV/Borda etc.

Oh, OK. I am arguing for Approval Voting because it's the simplest voting system up from FPTP, and easy to explain.

Borda Count really invites the gaming, though. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Borda_count#Potential_for_tact...

Borda is better than Plurality and IRV regardless of the amount of tactical voters.

http://ScoreVoting.net/BayRegsFig.html

Interesting. I'd have to look at that simulation.

What about cloning candidates? The simulation only looks at strategic voting.

The simulation uses random utility generators, which sometimes create situations where two candidates are highly similar and thus "partially" clones. The point is to model reality.

Compliance with "independence of clones" is in this property chart. http://scorevoting.net/CompChart.html

I get where you are coming from on Approval Voting. The simplicity of the system is very attractive.

Other systems might be slightly better. But Approval Voting is dead simple to explain, and you don't even need new ballot papers compared to plurality.

The only system that's generally better is Score Voting aka Range Voting. But you want to _avoid_ ranked voting methods.

http://ScoreVoting.net/NESD.html

I don't think the argument presented there works.

Consider the example with A, B, and C at the end. It claims that approval voting would probably elect C, but why? If the voters apply perfect strategy, B supporters won't approve C, and B will win. The same is true of range voting, where B supporters will give C a rating of zero.

It does not seem escapable that a majority voter block can dictate their wishes on the whole population by exaggerating their stated preferences.

As long as you need a majority, that's still very democratic? (If it was a plurality only, that would be harder.)

Yes, but the page in question is arguing that approval/rank voting is better because it doesn't always elect the majority's first choice.

I'm pretty convinced that for single winner elections approval voting is pretty great.

I haven't convinced myself when multiple people can get elected.

Yes, Approval Voting is simpler and radically superior to IRV. www.electology.org/approval-voting-vs-irv

Bayesian Regret calculations show IRV is actually THE WORST of the five commonly discussed alternative voting systems.

The best is Score Voting, but it's not as simple as Approval Voting. http://ScoreVoting.net/BayRegsFig.html

Clay Shentrup Co-founder of The Center for Election Science

Cool. Here's a better introduction to score voting [1]

The site you linked looks like it was built in 1998

[1] http://electology.org/score-voting

I wrote most of that page. :)

States arguably also inhibited the path to gay marriage as well. You can't really know that one for sure.

Maybe, but it would not have stuck if passed unilaterally. When we collectively decided to legalize gay marriage, it was very clear there was a majority in favor. This came about by pockets of the government trying it out first.

You're overlooking the fact that people and politicians need time to grow and hone their skills. Without states, without giving them some ability to be corrupt, there is no testing ground. Politicians at the national level would not be experienced negotiators because the first step in being a politician would be joining the federal government. And I don't think forcing gay marriage on the US would've been a good idea any sooner even if we'd had a sufficiently progressive president and congress. I have deep sympathy for all the people who had to wait so long for society to officially accept them, but I think even they can respect that we might not be as strong of a unified society if gay marriage had become legal in, say, the 80s, rather than today. A unilateral decision by a president and majority congress could have set the issue back even further.

> First, what polls say is not the same as what the electorate believes. Actual voters skew older and more conservative that the general public.

It seems to me that minority interests have a disproportional influence on policy decisions and that a single issue may not have a high enough priority to get elected representatives to change policy on that issue.

For example, if you look at the the NMSL (National Maximum Speed Limit) that was in effect from 1974 through 1995, it was quite obvious, based on traffic speed measurements, that almost no one was complying with the law on interstate highways, yet it took 13 years before it was modified to allow for 65 mph speed limits and another 8 years before it was repealed entirely.

So, it's entirely possible that the electorate was not in favor of that particular law long before 1995, but that single issue wasn't important enough for congress to vote on for around a decade.

Why is the 2000 election a disingenuous example? Bush lost the overall popular vote and it is almost certain that a majority of people tried to vote for Gore in Florida.

We also don't elect presidents based on who people "tried to vote for." Bush won the first count, and he won the automated recount. It should never have progressed further than that. 7 of 9 justices agreed that the ad-hoc recount that applied different standards to different counties violated the equal protection clause.

Moreover, we have no way of knowing whether Bush or Gore "won" Florida. Voting is a mechanism for measuring something. Like any method of measurement, it has a margin of error. The margin between Bush and Gore was so close that it was almost certainly smaller than the error in the voting mechanism itself. The scientifically right answer would have been to exclude Florida (and, in fact, several other states decided by very small margins) from the sampling process.

The butterfly ballot funneled thousands of votes to Buchanan. Recounting miscast votes would not have helped.

An electoral college winner losing the overall popular vote has happened much more than once. Florida was more or less a coin flip that landed on its edge and stayed that way.

It's happened four times, of which the first went to the House to decide, and the 1876 and 1888 were in a time of widespread corruption, but nonetheless it's still very rare, especially in the modern day, and I wouldn't expect it to happen again in our lifetimes.

The system is designed specifically to thwart the majority sometimes. Sometimes the majority is wrong. Now, the thwarting doesn't always happen when the majority is wrong, but we might be grateful for the electoral college for instance, this time around.

The breadth and complexity of the issues the government has to deal with are far beyond what any one citizen could keep track of, that's why we don't have a direct democracy.

> Sometimes the majority is wrong

s/sometimes/most of the time

The US isn't based on majority rule. No one wants that.

Exactly -- because the US isn't a democracy (majority rule), it's a democratic republic.

It's not a direct democracy. That didn't mean it's not a democracy.

If you redefine democracy to be the narrowest possible interpretation, you eliminate every government in the world. You also make the word pretty much useless.

It might be fair, though, to exclude governments whose founding documents and the position papers written to advance them expressly eschew and prohibit democratic rule, in favor of a limited and enumerated republic.

There are some governments who claim authority to take any action authorized by the democratic process. The US government is not among them. Ergo, it is not properly classified as a "democracy."

You're defining "democracy" more narrowly than is reasonable. The 2nd definition at Merriam-Webster, for example [0], is "a government in which the supreme power is vested in the people and exercised by them directly or indirectly through a system of representation usually involving periodically held free elections". "Republic" and "democracy" are not mutually exclusive.

[0] http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/democracy

Reducing the discussion to a dictionary definition is emblematic of many of the problems in today's political discourse. This pithy, literal definition of a term is not relevant, especially when that same term, in the same context, is discussed at length, in light of various philosophies on the matter, in the Federalist Papers.

I don't think there's a better source of information about whether the government of the united States of America is a democracy than the position papers written to advance the four corners of its founding instruments, and they deliver an unambiguous "no."

Let's say, for a a moment, that your definition, which seems to conflate these two distinguishable scenarios (one in which a government's power is strictly limited and enumerated, and another in which that power extends to the bounds of whatever a voting majority or their representatives might desire), is a reasonable one.

How, then, do you discuss this distinction?

...and even by your definition, while an individual state might quality, the government of the USA does not: "supreme power" is wholly unavailable through the US government, at least in its legitimate purview (of course it exceeds this boundary frequently and flagrantly). It has dominion only over the specific areas outlined in the constitution; those not mentioned are reserved for the states or the people.

> I don't think there's a better source of information about whether the government of the united States of America is a democracy than the position papers written to advance the four corners of its founding instruments, and they deliver an unambiguous "no."

I'm not a constitutional scholar, so forgive me. What exactly do you think unambiguously demonstrates that the United States is not a democracy?

> ...and even by your definition, while an individual state might quality, the government of the USA does not: "supreme power" is wholly unavailable through the US government, at least in its legitimate purview (of course it exceeds this boundary frequently and flagrantly)

I feel like the definition addressed this. (In fact, given that this is Webster's, I'd expect that the definition was written to specifically include the United States government.) The definition says "the supreme power is vested in the people and exercised by them directly or indirectly". The fact that the Constitution reserves nonenumerated powers for "the states or the people" indicates a recognition that the power is vested in the people. The "legitimate purview", as you put it, consists of powers granted by the people who hold "supreme power".

Please note, "the United States" isn't just the federal government, but the federal government as well as the governments of the 50 federated states of the union (and tributaries/territories).

> in which the supreme power is vested in the people

We don't have that. We get to pick from a closed set of possible representatives and they aren't bound to follow our desires. (Or even check...)

It's not the indirection of the representative, it's that they aren't required to even try to represent. Your vote in the USA essentially elects a mini-tyrant who theoretically wants to be elected again so much that they'll pander to you in exchange for that but only so far as they can use you. As soon as they'll get enough money by selling you out to compensate for your lost vote, they will.

And worse, this is how it's supposed to work.

Democracy is a term which refers to both republics and plebiscites. The word you are looking for is "plebescite". Plebescite is widely believed to have been problematic in ancient Greece, which is why it's relatively rare.

Yes, though you must consider that if your representative isn't bound to vote to represent you (even in general) the word is pretty watered down already.

Is that a distinction worth making? By that standard, how many countries in the world are actually democracies?

Absolutely it is. Google the difference. A democratic republic ultimately derives power from the people. There are more checks and balances in place in America than one person one vote. More info [1]

[1] http://www.thisnation.com/question/011.html

No, but I think Americans want a semblance of representation. When The People have close to 0% sway in Congress' opinions on bills, and corporations have like 70%, I'd say that's a pretty big freaking deal, no?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5tu32CCA_Ig

Every time there's an argument about wanting more democracy in the US, it seems someone always appears to say "but that's mob rule!". No, nobody wants mob rule. But there's a canyon between what exists now and what a more representative government could look like.

Excellent video, I hadn't seen that.

Predictably, the argument devolves into one about direct democracy vs. representative democracy, and that's really not the issue at all.

The issue is that the current system consistently acts contrary to the will of the people.

To quote the Princeton study from your video:

  The preferences of the average American appear to have only a
  minuscule, near-zero, statistically non-significant impact upon
  public policy.

> The preferences of the average American appear to have only a minuscule, near-zero, statistically non-significant impact upon public policy.

That's a feature, not a bug.

I'm curious about this capital-P People. Does working for a corporation revoke membership in this club?

> When The People have close to 0% sway in Congress' opinions on bills, and corporations have like 70%, I'd say that's a pretty big freaking deal, no?

There's plenty of time to undo the actions of the past 10, 20, even 30 years.

If you sit back on your heels, throw your arms up in the air, don't vote and say nothing, then you won't be participating in democracy. But if you do use your voice and vote then at least you can say you tried. Everything won't always go your way and we don't have a perfect system. But given our diverse population it is a pretty good one. I say that while in full agreement that there are a lot of laws that need to be reversed or undone.

You'll never entirely remove money from politics. And, we should keep trying to remove it even though we know we won't end up with a perfect solution. That said, lobbyists aren't inherently evil and many share our viewpoints (for example, the EFF)

Personally, I don't believe that "at least you can say you tried" is morally superior to not participating in a rigged game.

I did not say anything about morals. I'm not superior to you. I'm just stating my opinion. Choose to do as you wish. If you choose to not participate in the formation of this government, you are free to continue living in the US or live elsewhere. You could even try to start a revolution though I wouldn't recommend it. It is entirely up to you.

Certainly not! It's much better to be ruled by sociopaths and megalomaniacs.

Versus the stupid and the ignorant?

You realise it's not either/or?

The US is a plutocracy. It's in no sense a working democracy. There's a public voting circus every couple of years, but policy - which is the only thing that really matters in politics - is largely defined by Wall St, the Fed, and by mil-ind corporate lobbying groups.

All of the above are politically unaccountable and legally untouchable. See for example the ridiculous excuses made to prevent the passage of:

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

This sort of thing is said all the time, but we do see significant policy changes based on voting, such as the switch to Barack Obama from George W. Bush. It's not clear to me that the corporations drove that in a major way. Another example is Herbert Hoover to Franklin Roosevelt. I imagine you wouldn't suggest that the corporations wanted the Socialist ideas proposed by Roosevelt.

Just because an election or a vote doesn't go your way, or the government doesn't shift dramatically every election, doesn't mean the nation does not have a working democracy.

Yes! I'd prefer to be governed by ordinary people rather than an intelligent and wealthy adversary intentionally working against my interests.

The problem is that "governance by ordinary people" is not really on the table as an option. Governance by popular vote might be, but given how short-sighted and easily swayed the average loosely aware citizen is, the result is more likely to be "governance by demagogues and whoever has the most advertising dollars".

Yes and nearly 8 in 10 Americans believe in angels [0]

You're cherry-picking topics you (presumably) agree on.

[0] http://www.cbsnews.com/news/poll-nearly-8-in-10-americans-be...

Is your point that people who believe in angels have no capability to govern themselves, so they should be grateful to their corporate overlords?

Or is your point that people who believe in angels need to be surveilled without warrants and have their meager earnings confiscated to enrich the elite?

My point is that the current popular opinion based on a casual response to an (unbiased?) question should not necessarily be used to determine the policy of a nation.

A majority of Americans voted for the Democrat in 2000, but the Republican was installed instead

That's a feature, not a bug.

The Electoral College was specifically designed to mitigate the power of densely populated areas.

All of those things are real problems. But it sounds like you're looking for an excuse to throw up your hands and give up. That's not going to make things any better.

Sometimes the will of the people prevails, and sometimes it doesn't. When it doesn't, it's really disheartening; sometimes all our effort is for naught. But if we don't even try, it will always be for naught.

Actually, neither candidate got a majority in 2000 election, either nationally or in Florida.

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