Do people on HN really think the very rich or the very poor were at all bothered by the Capitol riots? Government is irrelevant to both groups, in different ways.
Princeton already proved America is an oligarchy with a paper that was released a few years back, showing that when the rich wanted a certain policy implemented, it was passed into law at any almost 80% rate, compared with the "average voter" wanting a policy made into law at about a 50% rate.
Here's that article:
https://scholar.princeton.edu/sites/default/files/mgilens/fi...
Now here's what's super telling, or at least should be... if you Google "princeton oligarchy study america" or some combination, the very first fucking result you'll find will be a Vox article saying its wrong. Because the ultra-rich need to perpetuate the myth that your voice matters. Google needs you to be stupid enough to believe that.
1. Average voters still pass laws at a significant rate 2. An elite university publishes the study
It's very far from perfection but I don't think it's an oligarchy. There is always going to be a bias in favor of the rich. That's what money is for.
I dislike the rhetoric you're using that implies the parties are outside and beyond the reach of "normal" citizens. Of course they are institutions with substantial inertia and aims of their own. But as the elections of people as diverse as Cori Bush and Madison Cawthorne and Marjorie Taylor Greene show, it is certainly still possible to make your way from citizen to elected official.
If you want to run for office, not only do you have to spend time with these narcissistic, power drunk politicians at the local level, you have to get them to support you.
This meeting was on the extreme local level for a community of maybe 35k people. I can’t even imagine what the county level, or national level would be like.
Maybe others have had a better experience, but this disillusioned me from any participation in politics and politicians in general.
It's so much easier when the troublemakers show themselves out of the room. Of course, nobody could be blamed for wanting nothing to do with politics, but its only the people who are disgusted by the system that change it.
Everything from advertising to filing comes with serious cost in US federal election. In Texas alone it costs $3k to just get on a primary ballot for a federal election as a representative.
Even the candidates you mentioned had to raise over $1MM just to run their elections.
Yes, it's possible just very unlikely if you don't have the cash.
Sources:
Cori Bush Amount Raised: https://www.opensecrets.org/races/candidates?cycle=2020&id=M...
Madison Cawthorne Amount Raised: https://www.opensecrets.org/races/candidates?cycle=2020&id=N...
Marjorie Taylor Amount Raised: https://www.opensecrets.org/races/candidates?cycle=2020&id=G...
Filing in the 2020 Democratic and Republican Primary: https://www.sos.state.tx.us/elections/candidates/guide/2020/...
To update George Washington for current year: While political parties may now and then answer popular ends, they are likely in the course of time and things, to become potent engines, by which cunning, ambitious, and unprincipled politicians will be enabled to subvert the power of the people and to usurp for themselves the reins of government, destroying afterwards the very engines which have lifted them to unjust dominion.
If we want better governance in the US, we must limit or eliminate political parties
Subverting that isn't easy without giving up something that seems necessary. You can eliminate majority rules. You can eliminate freedom of association. You can eliminate voting. Even term limits don't help: you can eliminate the politician but not their constituents, who will find somebody equivalent to send.
I'm not saying it's impossible, but it's not as simple as "eliminate political parties". Even if you could wish them away with a magic wand, they'd come right back.
Source: https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/perspectives-on-poli...
What do you make of Jimmy Carter saying in 2014 that "America doesn't have a functioning democracy right now"?
Source: https://www.spiegel.de/politik/ausland/nsa-affaere-jimmy-car... Translated from German: https://archive.is/Lhlq2
It might be unpleasant to acknowledge, but there is increasingly overwhelming evidence to suggest that the major American political parties are indeed "outside and beyond the reach of 'normal' citizens".
In 2017, the DNC argued in federal court that, as a private corporation, it was entitled to select whichever candidate it preferred for the general election regardless of the preferences of "normal citizens" who voted in the party's primary election. This was in a hearing for a lawsuit filed by Sanders supporters who weren't happy about the DNC working with the Clinton campaign and against the Sanders campaign, as revealed by WikiLeaks.
Source: https://ivn.us/posts/dnc-to-court-we-are-a-private-corporati... and, for convenience, https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/independent-voter-network-ivn...
Growing up in a blue household, social group, and state, I'm less familiar with the history of the anti-democratic machinations of the RNC, but my understanding of the Trump phenomenon was that, at least early on, many Republican voters were attracted to the idea of a political outsider who they hoped wouldn't sell them out like they felt RNC-affiliated Republicans had been doing.
Some contemporary sources seem to back up that interpretation: https://archive.fo/2Vidx (Wall Street Journal) and https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/elections/2016/...
But where is the american movement to end the FPTP-voting system?
On the democrat side, see the treatment of Bernie Sanders and Tulsi Gabbard (Both non-traditional democrats in different ways) by their party.
Honestly, after seeing both how the GOP and Democrats treated Trump, Sanders, and Gabbard, I find myself supportive of all three of them despite them having a very different views. I simply like that they're not either party.
It increasingly seems that both parties are becoming incredibly dogmatic, and anyone who doesn't fall in line is simply barred from public discourse or elected office. It is increasingly true that in order to even get to elected office you need the support of a party.
In my state of Oregon, the democrats and republicans actually mandated that you be part of a party before being elected to office. You can no longer run as an independent. It's so bad, some people made an 'independent party' just to be able to have non-democrat or republican candidates on the ballot, but this suffers from the same issues as parties, in that those individuals still need to be 'nominated' by a select group of people annointed by the party organizers, which means even the independent party has a bias, even if they try to minimize it.
We need major electoral reform, nationwide, but it doesn't benefit any party to do that. What I would like to see are protesters from both BLM, Antifa, or whatever and the capitol protesters (not the rioters of any group please...) band together for a change and demand a better means of governance from their legislators. The people need to band together on common principles, instead of being divided by stupid policy points.
When we saw the same thing being done to Sanders by the Democratic party (almost an exact mirror of what happended to Paul) it was a strong hint as to what is really going on. Neither party is"better" in this regard...
No, no party is better really. The GOP is the same. It's run by the same kinds of old farts. My main source of good feelings towards the GOP is that I tend to agree with their unelected members. But more and more I'm seeing those members also hate the GOP establishment. I wouldn't be surprised to see the party fracture heavily soon. I hope the democrat party also has the same split. There are good, decent democrats that share common principles and who I'm sure cannot stand their party leadership. I mean, the DNC is so bad, that I actually feel sorry for my left-leaning friends who also seem unable to get any representation.
This seems absurd. If your political reasoning puts you in a situation where Trump and Sanders are both options for you then your system is broken - they are antithetical to each other in style, philosophy, character and most importantly policy. Based on your logic, if both parties rejected Stalin then you'd be in favor of him.
At least voting for a 3rd party one can be said to be contributing to a cause closest to one's ideal, but being favorable to anyone who the mainstream doesn't approve of just seems like flawed logic.
Anti-establishmentarianism can bring together people of different political persuasions who all want to dismantle parts of the current system. What comes after that is a new battle, and that one may end up fought along more traditionally ideological lines.
Corbyn for instance, very much left wing, opposed EU because of all the globalist bankers and buerocrats in Brussels controlling the society, cheap labor bringing down wages.
If you're a bit older or have better knowledge, then trumps policies are far more similar to someone like Sanders if they really wanted to team up. (I'm not talking about his speech and the way of saying things)
I actually have supported with many actions of Antifa / BLM (probably wouldn't guess that from my post history), including the protests at Pelosi's and McConnell's houses, and the disruption of the globalist meetings you mention. I don't agree with them in their destruction of property, especially that of small mom-and-pop businesses, or even big business if it affects small businesses (by raising insurance rates for example). And obviously, I disagree with anything actually threatening lives.
If Hitler invaded hell I would make at least a favourable reference to the devil in the House of Commons. -- Winston Churchill
Yes, I'd rather have a social democrat that rejects Stalin than a fiscal conservative that embraced him.
Unlike the various 'what-ifs' of policy issues, anyone can examine the actual record of Stalin and his policies. And, in my opinion, anyone who finds him a source of inspiration, regardless of their stated policy preferences, has a severe lack of judgement.