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Comment by kunai | Hacker News Reader

Every time I see something like this, I would normally go on some boilerplate rant about the troubles of our government and society, and how USG should be paying NOAA instead of the RIAA, MPAA, NSA, and CIA and how this corruption is awful and terrible and despicable and horrifying.

I've done enough of that. I want to actually solve things instead of wasting my time on the 'net talking about them. The problem is, I don't know how on earth we can get the crooks and corrupt out of our government. It's seems like muckrakers don't even exist anymore, and those that do (Greenwald) barely get attention.

I wish I could do something. I bet many other on HN do as well, but ultimately, I'll just go on with my day job and silence the inner cries of freedom.

We all do.

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> The problem is, I don't know how on earth we can get the crooks and corrupt out of our government.

The fundamental problem is that while everyone agrees there are a ton of crooks and corrupt people in government, nobody can agree on which ones. There's a large fraction of people who think only about half of government is crooked and corrupt, another large fraction who think the same of the other half, and far too few people who realize that both halves are.

More seriously, we have a voting system that effectively created the two-party mostly-centrist system we have today[1], which lives and dies by the idea that a compromise between two extreme positions is always the right answer[2,3].

So, personally, my preferred choice of windmill is less broken voting systems, though voting for third-party candidates (particularly in local elections where they actually have a chance) is a close second.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duverger%27s_law

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overton_window

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

These are the consequences of gerrymandering -- hyper-majorities where one side rarely (if ever) cooperates with the other. Hell, cooperation is internally translated as capitulation.

Our congressional representatives don't have to care about their constituents because they are guaranteed re-election due to electoral districts being meticulously reorganized in their party's favour.

We need a third party that one of the two has to appease in order to get any work done, and if that third party is ignored by one then the other gains favour. Until then, we will live in tyranny of "The Other Side" holding us hostage.

Stop spreading FUD -- they're definitely not "consequences of gerrymandering". The political science literature is pretty clear that gerrymandering doesn't have near the impact that many attribute to it.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2013/02/17/r...

Gerrymandering is not about creating hyper-majorities. That would be counterproductive - votes above 50% are wasted. It is about maximizing number of likely seats. Also the country has sorted itself geographically (e.g. cities vs. rural) along ideological lines, so non-gerrymandered districts might as much if not more one-sided.

[1] http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2013/02/17/r... [2] http://www.newrepublic.com/article/114989/government-shutdow...

[Edit] Hyper-majority may be a result, but not on the side controlling redistricting: the opposite side may be gerrymandered into few concentrated districts.

I think you are confused. Our congressional representatives, by and large, are doing exactly what their constituents want. While congress as a whole has a dismal approval rating, individual congressmen do not. That is, in fact, the real problem.

There are many causes for this. Gerrymandering is not really one of them.

Actually, gerrymandering does the opposite. The goal of gerrymandering for your party is as many seats as possible where you have a large but not super-massive advantage. You'd rather have three 55-45 seats than a 65-35 and two 50-50s, whereas you try to stick your opponent with as many 70-30s as possible.

I have thought about this a lot but there appears to be no workable solution. I predict things will just get steadily worse.

The one thing that might help would be to somehow limit the power these clowns have as then there would be little incentive for corruption or ability to screw things up. Something like a new Bill of Right saying what they CAN'T do. However getting them to relinquish any power is pretty much impossible instead they will little by little accumulate more.

Corruption is "dishonest or fraudulent conduct by those in power, typically involving bribery." Corruption is possible because people making laws are known entities. Corruption would be quite difficult if the wealthy could not contact the Decision Makers.

Logically, Decision Makers must become anonymous. I have started a project that describes how policy creation can be completely anonymous, thereby eliminating (or greatly impeding) corruption. The project is public:

https://bitbucket.org/djarvis/world-politics/

Take a look at the system mock-ups. Better yet, join the project and contribute your thoughts.

https://bitbucket.org/djarvis/world-politics/wiki/Interests%...

https://bitbucket.org/djarvis/world-politics/wiki/Policy%20P...

https://bitbucket.org/djarvis/world-politics/wiki/Debate%20P...

https://bitbucket.org/djarvis/world-politics/wiki/Supporting...

The idea hinges on using randomly selected moderators to act as guardians for contributor content. The key is that moderators are only allowed to be guardians for a limited, and also random, amount of time. Think of it as a cross between StackOverflow and randomly selected voluntary jury duty with temporally random privileges.

Some of the random moderators, especially those who vote on military R&D and procurement, must be chosen from a list of citizens pre-screened with Top Secret clearance. The list will leak to the military-industrial complex within hours.

Perhaps the process should be reversed. Random selection from the pool of all candidates, followed by a 'proof of fitness' check that is conducted in secret in such a way that the identity is not as easily subjected to being leaked. This would eliminate the list, but as to how to best perform the second step, I'm not entirely sure.

The background check to get the clearance takes 9 months and is performed by private contractors.

Rather clever idea. Does have some flaws however a promising start.

What are the flaws and how would you fix them?

The bigger the government gets, the more intrusive it becomes and the harder it is to convince a majority of the people that they can use the government to live better at someone else's expense: at some point too many people become the "someone else" who is providing the financing. Therefore, as the government becomes bigger, it has to become less democratic, less responsive to the will of the people. We are seeing this now in the rebellion in the House of Representatives, the most democratic part of government.

I guess the single-member district system leads to your two-party system. If you had voting districts large enough to choose e.g. 10 or 20 representatives, then even parties with only 10% or 5% support in the population would get their representatives elected. And you'd have a multi-party congress.

Look at how political parties come and go in some European countries (not the UK, though). Not instantly, but in a 20 year time scale or so, the situation can change quite a lot in these countries.

No, districts don't create the two-party system (or at least not alone); plurality (first-past-the-post) voting does: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duverger%27s_law

Aren't single-member district system and first-past-the-post the very same thing?

Not at all. You can have a single-member district system using a different voting system, most of which are better than plurality (first-past-the-post). And you can have a multi-member district system using the multi-winner equivalent of first-past-the-post (effectively first-N-past-the-post), rather than some better system.

Article V permits the states to amend the Constitution without the assent of Congress.

Read The Liberty Amendments[1] to get fired up.

[1] http://www.amazon.com/Liberty-Amendments-Restoring-American-...

According to Amazon review here are his (Mark Levin, conservative talk radio person) proposals:

1. Term limits, including for justices.

Sure, why not start out with the one everyone agrees with.

2. Repealing Amendment 17 and returning the election of senators to state legislatures

Here's another meh one. At least everyone can agree with it.

3. A congressional supermajority to override Supreme Court decisions (overruling what could be a stacked court)

This is where he starts to go off the rails into conservative uptopianism. This would be just awful. If you don't want a stacked court don't confirm the justices.

4. Spending limit based on GDP

Awful idea. WWII wants it's financing back.

5. Taxation capped at 15%

A worse idea than #4 if possible.

6. Limiting the commerce clause, and strengthening private property rights

Sigh...

7. Power of states to override a federal statute by a three-fifths vote.

Hmm, I remember something else about states rights and "three fifths" in American history.

>Limiting the commerce clause, and strengthening private property rights

For context, the commerce clause has been interpreted very broadly. The clause itself reads, "To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes;"

One of the classic examples of the broad interperatation of this clause is Wickard v. Filburn [1]. There was a quota on how much wheat a farmer could produce, and Filburn exceeded his quota. The constitutional justification for this law is that wheat is interstate commerce. Filburn's defence was that he was not selling the wheat at all, let alone across state lines, but rather using it himself to feed his livestock. Filburn lost in the Supreme Court because it causes an indirect effect to interstate commerce in the sense that Filburn would have purchased wheat if he did not grow it himself.

Not that it is directly relevant, but another fun example of loose interpretations of the constitution is roe v wade, where they managed to invoke the 3rd amendment to defend a woman's right to an abortion. If you are not familiar with the third amendment, don't worry; my constitutional law teacher took a moment to apologize when we got to this part because earlier in the coarse he had assured us that the 3rd amendment would never come up. It reads:

  No Soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house, without the consent of the Owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner to be prescribed by law.

[1]http://www.oyez.org/cases/1940-1949/1942/1942_59/

"roe v wade, where they managed to invoke the 3rd amendment to defend a woman's right to an abortion..."

This is gross caricature of the actual argument. Roe uses the 14th amendment as the basis of the right to privacy (and abortion). Additionally it had to comment on the lower courts ruling. The lower court had ruled to overturn the law (thus making abortion legal) but the basis had been the 9th amendment and "penumbral" privacy rights. It did not reject this argument but made it secondary to the 14th amendment.

Term limits and repealing the 17th Amendment are pretty bad, and it just gets worse from there.

I feel largely the same. One idea I've always been a fan of is term limits for every elected office. Don't allow it to be a career option.

I see your point, but I think it may take a while to get traction. You need some time to learn the ropes before you can get shit done.

With that said, I wish it wasn't the case.

> You need some time to learn the ropes before you can get shit done.

I used to hold the same view. Just yesterday I decided that if it takes a significant portion of one term just to learn the ropes, things are broken. They should stop learning and start doing.

They seem to be learning the wrong lessons, anyway. They end up learning how to consolidate and maintain power-bases.

What we're seeing now in Congress is the risk of having a considerable number of new members. We now see a substantial minority which cares more about ideology than maintaining the function of the institution.

If everyone in Congress is relatively new, power will end up concentrating in the people who are in Washington for the long term: lobbyists and staffers, all unelected. Beyond that, term-limited politicians have less of an incentive to please their current employers (the electorate) and more to please potential future employers (lobbyists).

Have to agree. The Senate and House should have term limits, and not very long ones.

In my opinion the most 'bought' politicians are the ones that have been there the longest, people like Boehner and Reid. They have the most time to build up relationships with special interests and acquire power / influence to deliver deals to said interests.

There's a counter argument to that, in that it's a job like any other that takes time to learn: http://www.heraldtribune.com/article/20111112/COLUMNIST/1111...

I would point out the tactics concerning the targeted application of protests (time and location), targeted third-party vote syphoning, and traditional hyper-local "get out the vote" programs. But, I have been down-voted for my opinions before, and I really don't feel like responding to negative replies tonight.

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