Hacker News Reader

Comment by blacksmith_tb | Hacker News Reader

I tend to think recalls in general are bug in a democratic system. For candidates who have done something actually terrible (like breaking laws) there's impeachment or other kinds of dismissal. Otherwise, you wait until the end of the term and vote the bum out?

View on HN

>Otherwise, you wait until the end of the term and vote the bum out?

I don't see how that's a convincing argument for why it's a "bug". Quick remediation seems like a feature?

But why have terms in the first place, if they're that up in the air? The nicest thing I could say for a recall effort is that voters who were too apathetic to vote for another candidate now feel motivated to engage in the process, but as it's an extra vote it incurs costs which the normal cadence of elections doesn't.

I would agree if it was trivial to bring these things about, but it takes a lot of public backing to even get to this point.

It’s just like if we were to hold a state ratification convention. Things would have to be really wrong for us to successfully make changes to our constitution & get everyone on board.

The terms are ordinary balances, for regular circumstances. Recall is for extraordinary bad performance. Like performance reviews and firing on the spot in companies. The former is regular, the latter is for somebody who really screwed up.

The problem is that in practice, recall elections have lower turnout, and so a sufficiently-aggrieved minority can pay to replace the choice of the majority. (Also you don’t get to vote for the replacement, the mayor chooses one in this case).

I think there are clear cases where a recall is useful, but it’s probably fair to say it’s too easy to initiate a frivolous recall in CA right now.

Because the term is long and the harm the bum can do in several years can be enormous. The people hire somebody to do the job, if that person botches the job, the people should have the ability to fire them, not just wait till the term ends.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com