Perhaps the BEST B1G Forum anywhere, here at College Football Fan Site, CFB51!!!

I trust drunks way more than trust fund babies. Especially if they have good stuff and share.

The drunks I know buy their share of rounds


https://youtu.be/dFaPw_uVUHA

I guess I still don't totally see what that does. It seems to say "the states" are not the people of the states, but the folks in the statehouses. Which, if we want the senate to be an insulated distillation of our statehouse's interested. I've lived in five states, and I've not looked at one and thought "Man, that statehouse is the panacea for bad corrupt government."

The down-the-road effects are interesting. All that senate race money just pours into local races. Pours in. And every redistricting is a bloodbath because the amount of a thumb that can be put on the scale there is pretty crazy. For any issues one might have with the senate, they're not allowed to redraw states to favor them.

In short, I still struggle to see the upside. Making politicians in Columbus, Ohio, Tallahassee, Florida, Sacramento, California or Springfield, Illinois more powerful and insulating senators more doesn't seem a particular net good, especially in an era where states are more arbitrary as designations, not less.

When an elected official is accountable to an entity, that is the entity that he/she will work to please. Currently, out elected officials are sucking up to their party leaders or things like committee assignments and party funds for their elections, all the while ignoring the people that were elected to serve. They are also for the most part, inaccessible to their constituents. 

If they were sent by the state legislature, at the very least they would be looking to work in the states interest as that is most likely what the state legislature would demand. Also, I can easily call my elected state representative and voice my concerns. I can drive to his office and pretty much walk in and have a discussion with him. I cannot even conceive of doing this with one of my state senators. 

When an elected official is accountable to an entity, that is the entity that he/she will work to please. Currently, out elected officials are sucking up to their party leaders or things like committee assignments and party funds for their elections, all the while ignoring the people that were elected to serve. They are also for the most part, inaccessible to their constituents.

If they were sent by the state legislature, at the very least they would be looking to work in the states interest as that is most likely what the state legislature would demand. Also, I can easily call my elected state representative and voice my concerns. I can drive to his office and pretty much walk in and have a discussion with him. I cannot even conceive of doing this with one of my state senators.

They'll still have to suck up for the committee assignments. And they'll still have to suck up to party leaders, just different ones (state party leaders). They will not have to suck up for party funds, though your state representative will have to do that considerably more. 

The second bolded part ... maybe? I mean, we're basically saying the voter cannot divine the interests of the state, but the elite politician can, and won't just insert their own interests and party's interests in place of state's interest. And that is a supposition I'm highly skeptical of. 

The first sentence, I guess is where we differ. You feel that the idea of direct voting does not make a politician accountable to the people voting. Beyond all the machinations, this seems the central thesis. And I can't really get on board there, especially when the alternative is simply making them more accountable to other politicians, ones that have shown me little indication they're working that hard for their state's interest anyway. 

@bayareabadger The theory is that state legislatures want to be important and have power to do stuff. They lose relative power when powers and decision-making that were once the province of the individual states get drawn into the federal government in Washington DC. 

The 17th was part of the Progressive Era when the progressives knew that the best way to effect the changes they wanted to see was to do so at the federal level, rather than battling it state legislature by state legislature. They capitalized on the fact that state legislatures "played politics" with Senate appointments on a regular basis and enacted the 17th as a more "democratic" measure to give control of the Senate to the voters directly, rather than state legislatures.

People who are a little more of the libertarian bent view the 16th (which funded the federal government) and the 17th (which took state legislatures out of the equation in determining how much power was in Washington rather than in their own hands) as two critical levers which led to the giant federal behemoth that we have today. 

The theory is that repealing the 17th would lead to state governments pushing Senators to devolve power from Washington DC back to individual statehouses, and that it might reduce the size of the federal government and allow states to set their own policies on matters that we today see as federal. I'm not sure I believe it would actually make much of a difference, personally, but that's the theory behind opposition to the 17th. 

A printer? But why?

And may I suggest the retirement starts with those two things going over the railing.

It's much easier to transport this printer than it is to transport a monitor. I need to see visuals as I'm solving things in CAD. This printer weighs 4 pounds.

When you own a business, you never shut it off until you retire.

Yes, we are all evil people.

I think he was asking, why are you doing work on your vacation? I echo the sentiment!

Heh, I actually was asking about a printer. My main guess was printing emails like some old school folks do. The answer was illuminating, in that its a reminder that even those Badge is a business owner, he's an engineer who owns a business, not a business person who owns an engineering company. The difference is subtle, bit notable.