Government Policy and Budget Discussion Thread (no politics)

[utee94]

That's why I do vote.

Because if I was literally the only one, I cannot imagine all the fun of knowing that all of you had to live under a Libertarian POTUS for four years because of me. It would be high comedy.

It wouldn't just be you, because I would have voted for the same candidate. 

[betarhoalphadelta]

I totally appreciate the electoral college and what it does. I would only like to see one change to it (Which is constitutional and Nebraska use to do it (maybe still does)).

I would have the electors elected by congressional districts. So say a state has 25 electoral votes.  23 for congressional representation and 2 for senatorial.  So if I won the popular vote of the state I would get the 2 senatorial electors and I would get the electors for each district in which I received the majority vote. So I could get 19 of the electors, but my opponent won 6 districts so he would get 6. I think this would put states such as California and New York that are solid blue because of their major urban areas in play, but would also put many solid red states with large blue districts into play.

I disagree. I think this proposal would convince a potential POTUS to spend most of their time ONLY on large urban areas. The "bang for the buck" so to speak is so much higher there. 

Nobody would spend any time or money in primarily rural states if you didn't believe you'd get the entire state win or lose. It would be a waste of resources.

[MichiFan87]

I disagree. I think this proposal would convince a potential POTUS to spend most of their time ONLY on large urban areas. The "bang for the buck" so to speak is so much higher there.

Nobody would spend any time or money in primarily rural states if you didn't believe you'd get the entire state win or lose. It would be a waste of resources.

Most of the attention is going to go to Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Arizona, and Florida as it is.... Everyone knows how the other 44 states and DC are going to go. Some states like Minnesota and Iowa will be more competitive than others like Kansas and New Jersey, but I'd be surprised if most of the campaign spending goes anywhere but those 6 swing states.

If the popular vote mattered, then there would be more campaign money spent not only in California, Texas, and New York, but also even the Great Plains states, Southeast, and Northwest.

[betarhoalphadelta]

Most of the attention is going to go to Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Arizona, and Florida as it is.... Everyone knows how the other 44 states and DC are going to go. Some states like Minnesota and Iowa will be more competitive than others like Kansas and New Jersey, but I'd be surprised if most of the campaign spending goes anywhere but those 6 swing states.

If the popular vote mattered, then there would be more campaign money spent not only in California, Texas, and New York, but also even the Great Plains states, Southeast, and Northwest.

Agreed. Essentially the proposal from @Riffraft gets us closer to popular vote mattering, because large urban areas contain many more Congressional districts, so from the decision of "where do I buy advertising time" you hit a lot more voters (and a lot more districts) in Los Angeles than you do in Sioux Falls. 

While I'll agree that having a bunch of attention focused on swing states at the exclusion of "safe" states is its own problem, I don't think this change would benefit rural "safe" states. It would cause both Republican and Democrat policies to favor the needs of urban voters and nobody would care about the needs of rural voters.

[bayareabadger]

Agreed. Essentially the proposal from @Riffraft gets us closer to popular vote mattering, because large urban areas contain many more Congressional districts, so from the decision of "where do I buy advertising time" you hit a lot more voters (and a lot more districts) in Los Angeles than you do in Sioux Falls.

While I'll agree that having a bunch of attention focused on swing states at the exclusion of "safe" states is its own problem, I don't think this change would benefit rural "safe" states. It would cause both Republican and Democrat policies to favor the needs of urban voters and nobody would care about the needs of rural voters.

I find the last paragraph to be a sticky one because I honestly think the "safe" states idea is just moving things around. I mean, you have to win over Columbus and Cleveland suburbs more than LA suburbs, and you have Coldwater, Ohio being worlds more valuable than Auburn, Ca. or Auburn, Alabama. 

The rural vs. urban thing is a tricky one as well. On one hand, favoring more over fewer is the argument against favoring urban needs over rural, but on the other hand, voting is literally about more over fewer. If you want to help more constituents, you'd focus on places with more people. Right now we're just playing with borders. 

Then there's the irony that servicing rural needs tends to costs more on average (the post office), and more often than not in our current situation, rural voters are voting for less government meeting needs, not more. 

(It's also worth noting that in the @Riffraft plan, gerrymandering is going to get highly ugly)

[betarhoalphadelta]

The rural vs. urban thing is a tricky one as well. On one hand, favoring more over fewer is the argument against favoring urban needs over rural, but on the other hand, voting is literally about more over fewer. If you want to help more constituents, you'd focus on places with more people. Right now we're just playing with borders.

I've mentioned before that the answer is more federalism. The fundamental difference is that the policies that best help residents in Cheyenne, Wyoming are likely different than the policies that best help residents of San Francisco, CA. If everything is decided in Washington, then if you tailor policies towards Wyoming it means that those in California feel disenfranchised, and if you tailor policies for San Francisco the people in Cheyenne feel disenfranchised. They feel like their elected representatives are not respecting their needs.

If Cheyenne is allowed to decide its own policies and San Francisco its own as well, then there's no conflict. 

The big problems is when you get into individual rights. If Cheyenne decides it wants to outlaw gay marriage while San Francisco wants to outlaw guns... You have a problem. Which is why my ideal system is that individual rights are protected federally [the widest possible jurisdiction], while government powers are distributed to state or local authorities [the smallest efficient jurisdiction].

But... I'm not in charge.

[CWSooner]

Catch 22, the Yosarian Rule.

Actually, Kant's categorical imperative is the operative rule.

"Act only according to that maxim whereby you can, at the same time, will that it should become a universal law."

[Cincydawg]

I can't understand that.

[CWSooner]

5) He just had a don't ask don't tell policy in the military. He basically ignored the HIV/AIDS pandemic. Never tried to do a single thing about the crack epidemic plaguing black communities in inner-cities the 80s.

Funding for AIDS research basically doubled each year of Reagan's presidency.

[img width=500 height=290.994]https://i0.wp.com/www.nationalreview.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/pic_giant_062812_HH_0-1.jpg?fit=600%2C350&ssl=1[/img]

"Don't ask, don't tell" was Clinton's policy.  However, discharges for homosexuality declined during Reagan's presidency.

[CWSooner]

I can't understand that.

Act in the way that you could recommend everybody act.
If you would recommend that nobody vote, then you can in good conscience not vote.

[CWSooner]

I've mentioned before that the answer is more federalism. The fundamental difference is that the policies that best help residents in Cheyenne, Wyoming are likely different than the policies that best help residents of San Francisco, CA. If everything is decided in Washington, then if you tailor policies towards Wyoming it means that those in California feel disenfranchised, and if you tailor policies for San Francisco the people in Cheyenne feel disenfranchised. They feel like their elected representatives are not respecting their needs.

If Cheyenne is allowed to decide its own policies and San Francisco its own as well, then there's no conflict.

The big problems is when you get into individual rights. If Cheyenne decides it wants to outlaw gay marriage while San Francisco wants to outlaw guns... You have a problem. Which is why my ideal system is that individual rights are protected federally [the widest possible jurisdiction], while government powers are distributed to state or local authorities [the smallest efficient jurisdiction].

But... I'm not in charge.

I'm with you, Bwarb.  Returning to more federalism would help a lot of what ails us.  Too many issues becoming nationalized means that what Cheyenne and San Francisco decide to do about mass transit or feeding homeless people or having schools named for Christopher Columbus become life-or-death national issues.

[Big Beef Tacosupreme]

1. He was elected because Jimmy Carter was a f'ing disaster. Democrats? Republicans? Nobody knows WTF that even means anymore.

2. No.

3. Bulljive.

People who are the center-right give far more to charity than those on the left, based on proportion of income. You are a "data guy" and I HAVE DATA. One example would be your presumed* hero Bill Gates. He gives far less of his percentage of income than I do. ONE example.

I'd much rather ME distribute my money than some dumbass in DC. I'm good at. Those in DC SUCK at it.


* I <<think>> I know where you roll. Please give 20% of your income to charity, like I do, and have done for years.

Volunteer too. 15 hours per week. Rock on.

Points 1-3 don't really refute anything I said, or even discuss them.  In fact, I will also agree with point 1.  JC had a rough presidency, some his fault, some not.  But RR did focus on the cold war during his campaign.

As for charitable giving, I'm not sure what that has do with anything.  I found it interesting so I looked it up.  Turns out the difference is ... church.  More Republicans go to church regularly than democrats do, and donate accordingly.  And the difference wasn't huge, either.  ($60-$100 per year more.)

Who said Bill Gates is my hero?  And your 1% number?  I had to look that up as well.  He gave $4.78B to his foundation in 2019. His entire net worth is in the neighborhood of $100B, so I can't figure out how that 1% was arrived upon.  Perhaps if you cherry pick.  He only gave $138M in 2018, but will likely have donated over $50B to his foundation by the end of this year.  He also plans on giving away the vast majority of his wealth before he dies or after he dies. 

I suppose you're trying to say that you vote republican because you prefer to give away your money as you see fit, as opposed to paying taxes?  Well, I think we all feel that way.  But if we look through reality tinted glasses, our government has massive debt.

Here's data for you.  After we pay for Social Security, Medicare, interest on our debt, and defense, we are already deficit spending.  That means that every other thing the government spends money on is deficit spending.  Mind you, this was at a time of economic prosperity.  Bottom line:  We have to eventually raise federal taxes.  Nobody likes them.  Nobody wants to.  But we sorta have to.

uilty as charged for not giving 20%, although I hope to do that eventually.   But let's stay on topic. haha

[Big Beef Tacosupreme]

Respectfully, I disagree on every point except #5.  Reagan would not be a member of today's Democratic Party.  What about today's Democrats would draw him in?  He wouldn't like the current all-in-for-Trump GOP either, though.  He was also pro-immigration, another way he wouldn't like today's GOP.  He'd be a man without a party.

I had a long rebuttal posted, but I deleted it, as this thread is supposed to be "no politics."

Eh, I tried to stay factual.  But I probably shouldn't have posted.  You're a better man than me.

[Cincydawg]

Act in the way that you could recommend everybody act.
If you would recommend that nobody vote, then you can in good conscience not vote.

I disagree.  It's akin to the Golden Rule, which I also disagree with.

I do my thing, you do your thing, everyone is happy so long as out things don't conflict.  You keep your helo separate from me on final and call your spots.

Utee probably will read something else into this.