Now as an individual I feel comfortable in focusing on the actual issues of various campaigns, or more to the point for me, the beliefs and positions of the candidates and the parties; but at least in theory, what can be done about the fact that politicians seem to have given up on issue campaigning and focus more of their time and attention on what the other guy is screwing up then on how it could possibly be fixed?
posted
Honestly, they'll never stop doing it so long as it keeps working. Negative ads work, otherwise they wouldn't be done.
The only way to get it not to work, is either to start your own group, get your own funding, and start doing issue ads, or you have to punish politicians who use negative ads by writing them and telling them you aren't voting for them for that reason, and then vote for someone else.
I think the growth of the internet could possibly be the best thing to happen for positive issue oriented campaigns. Regular people have a much larger voice now than they ever have before, especially with places like Youtube and the "blogosphere."
Frankly I think the best thing that could happen for candidates is for us to never, ever donate to campaigns for people. Instead you should donate your money to advocacy groups that support a position on an issue. Their voices rise, and we discuss the issues, and then the candidates can come in and explain which issues they support and why, but it would put the focus back on the issues and away from the inane candidate crap.
Our money goes into those negative ads, so we should stop giving them ammo.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
| IP: Logged |
quote:Originally posted by Hobbes: Kill every politician that goes negative? Interesting idea, but you might rethink it when you find yourself in The Hague.
Hobbes
Can't make an omelet...
Posts: 16551 | Registered: Feb 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
Spending money on ads that support a candidate (essentially, mention a candidate's name in any sort of positive light) is strictly regulated and restricted. Spending money on ads that say a candidate is bad is comparatively unregulated.
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
| IP: Logged |
quote:Frankly I think the best thing that could happen for candidates is for us to never, ever donate to campaigns for people. Instead you should donate your money to advocacy groups that support a position on an issue
I like this idea a lot, it's both ssomething that can be done on an indivdual level as well as having national impact.
quote:Originally posted by Lyrhawn: Not knowing a super big amount about campaign finance law, what are the big problems and your suggested solutions fugu/Dag?
Edit to add: How in the hell is that against the law?
quote: The proliferation of issue ads, by defining as "electioneering communications" broadcast ads that name a federal candidate within 30 days of a primary or caucus or 60 days of a general election, and prohibiting any such ad paid for by a corporation (including non-profit issue organizations such as Right to Life or the Environmental Defense Fund) or paid for by an unincorported entity using any corporate or union funds;
posted
Ok, obviously one of us has to become president and change the laws then. I'd vote for Hobbes, but as I recently learned, he's not 35.
Posts: 2489 | Registered: Jan 2002
| IP: Logged |
posted
Hobbes, that's one of the main problems with McCain-Feingold: it tries to pigeonhole political speech and the groups who finance said speech into vague and artificial categories. Of course, there are numerous loopholes left behind as parsing casualties, so to speak.
Posts: 6316 | Registered: Jun 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
Given what I've seen here, the ads I suggested still wouldn't be outlawed, because they wouldn't mention candidates at all, they'd be true issue ads. The candidates would speak out for which ads they support and which ads they are against. Having less money, and having the majority of the money and attention fixed on the ads means they'd have less money for attacking and they'd have to focus their money on telling us what they'd support and oppose, so the issue ads wouldn't have to mention a candidate's name at all.
I'd be curious to see ideas that ties this into public funding for a candidate. Say, don't donate to a specific candidate at all, make all donations towards issue oriented groups that don't mention candidates, and then give the candidates public funds to explain which ideas they like and don't like and what they would do as president. If they squander their money on attack ads, you'll never know what they stand for, and theoretically they wouldn't be voted for. That's a bit more out there, and even I probably wouldn't support something that drastic that curtails speech that much, but at the moment I'm in favor of something drastic.
Still I'd probably advocate something more like my original proposal, don't donate to candidates, donate to groups who support your issues and let them create issue ads. Something has to break the cycle, and it's going to have to come from regular people, and it's going to have to be big, or it won't even dent the process.
Hobbes, I'll be your VP. By 2020 I'll just barely be legal to run. Either that or I'd make a great Secretary of Energy.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
Ultimately an issue ad must be connected to candidates if it is to affect electoral behavior. This cannot be left to candidates themselves, because often the candidate's record on a particular issue is as contentious as the issue itself.
Posts: 26071 | Registered: Oct 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
I'm not convinced of that. I've never been alive while it's been tried in an election to see it one way or the other. Every election I've been alive for and followed has been about the candidates, their past, the dirt dug up on them, and grandiose promises, it has never been about the issues.
I don't think enough people realize what the issues are, how they are effected by them, and the impact they will have on their future. A real issue oriented campaign could change their voting patterns from being focused on candidates' dirty laundry onto things that matter.
Besides, I suppose if it really came down to it, an ad could support a party, rather than the candidate. Are their rules against supporting a party if they don't name the candidate?
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
1) Eliminate SupremeCourt justices who can't figure out the difference between corporations and persons, between commercial speech and free speech, between commercially monopolizing the public airwaves and free speech. Anybody that disingenuous shouldn't be allowed near the Law, except maybe looking outward through prison bars. 2) Eliminate all legal precedents which relied on such disingenuity. 3) Quit pretending that campaign contributions aren't bribes. 4) Quit pretending that "issues campaigns" purchasing media space aren't specificly designed to support one candidate over another; ie to bribe politicians. 5) Quit pretending that privacy is necessary to protect those funding "issues campaigns", to protect those engaging in bribery. 6) Eliminate incumbent advantage. Politicians should not be allowed to run for office while holding office. And neither be allowed to solicit nor to receive campaign contributions while holding office. Nor have agents doing such activities on their behalf.
posted
The right to do as a group what one is allowed to do individually is at the heart of the first amendment. If people can't pool resources to fund expression, then only individually rich people will be able to afford access to meaningful public forums.
I'm also a little amazed at the idea that speech designed to influence the electoral behavior of others is something bad.
It's what the first amendment is all about.
Posts: 26071 | Registered: Oct 2003
| IP: Logged |
I think that the only thing that will help is an electorate that is informed enough to tell the difference between real information and propaganda. An electorate that demands real reporting on issues from the news media. Who can sift through the messages to get to truth. Who has the energy and the inclination and the background and the freakin' attention span to understand complicated issues.
Right now, our news media is almost entirely bought and paid for by corporations. Can we really expect Exxon Mobile to pay to inform the public about environmental issues? Can we expect Boeing to buy journalists to disclose the truth about war?
Posts: 11187 | Registered: Sep 2005
| IP: Logged |
quote:Originally posted by Morbo: McCain–Feingold Act aka Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002 made illegal some forms of political speech. While I support campaign finance reform, McCain-Feingold is fatally flawed and should be either repealed or drastically overhauled.
Didn't the Supreme Court strike down certain sections of this recently? I think they designated certain corporate-sponsored TV ads as protected political speech.
quote:Originally posted by MEC: Have everyone vote third party?
Change the election rules to make voting for a third party viable. The two parties have forced us into choosing between them, and as Hobbes noted in the first post, they're almost identical. They have set the system up to exclude third parties, and that's not good for America.
Posts: 1592 | Registered: Jan 2001
| IP: Logged |
The law was not struck down. The Court held that it was inconsistent with the first amendment for the law to prohibit a specific set of ads. The law is still constitutional to the extent that the law is applied to "ads that expressly advocate the election or defeat of a candidate for federal office" or their "functional equivalent."
The Court held that the ad in question was neither express advocacy nor its equivalent.
The court held that the intent of the speech to affect electoral behavior was irrelevant to the evaluation - the ad is deemed express advocacy "only if the ad is susceptible of no reasonable interpretation other than as an appeal to vote for or against a specific candidate."
The FEC's position - which was expressly rejected by the Court - was that any ad during the 90 days preceding an election that advocated people contact their representative was the functional equivalent of express advocacy.
quote: I think they designated certain corporate-sponsored TV ads as protected political speech.
The corporation was a group of people who had joined together (assembled, if you will) to advocate a particular political point of view.
Posts: 26071 | Registered: Oct 2003
| IP: Logged |
quote:Originally posted by Morbo: McCain–Feingold Act aka Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002 made illegal some forms of political speech. While I support campaign finance reform, McCain-Feingold is fatally flawed and should be either repealed or drastically overhauled.
Didn't the Supreme Court strike down certain sections of this recently? I think they designated certain corporate-sponsored TV ads as protected political speech.
quote:Originally posted by MEC: Have everyone vote third party?
Change the election rules to make voting for a third party viable. The two parties have forced us into choosing between them, and as Hobbes noted in the first post, they're almost identical. They have set the system up to exclude third parties, and that's not good for America.
The problem for me personally with the third party is that no, the other two are not identical. I always hear a lot of people saying that, and on some things they are, and they certainly sound identical when they are sniping at each other, but when it comes to the big issues they are anything but identical. The problem with voting third party is that the third party is almost never going to win, especially with things the way they are, so all you're really doing is helping the guy you REALLY don't want to win. If I have to choose between two candidates, one who represents all my views, and one who represents 85% of them, and I know that I can get the second guy elected but the first guy doesn't have a chance, I'm going with the second guy. 85% is better than 0%.
Maybe we should be more European and vote for a platform instead of a person, and then let the party choose the guy. You'll have a lot more options. Isn't that how Britain or France do it? I'm not entirely sure.
I still think the centrists of the nation should form their own party and leave the extreme left and right out in the cold, but no one is ever willing to take the first step. Guys like Lincoln Chaffee (spelling?) and Joe Lieberman, maybe even Hillary Clinton, aren't the extreme ends of their party, they are the extreme middle of the party. But they won't form a third party in bits and pieces, it would have to be a massive swing. And I don't see that happening. The only other way is a grassroots effort to oust these guys, and I think we're still a decade away from that. People are too apathetic to be annoyed enough to do anything about the status quo.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
| IP: Logged |
Lyrhawn: It's a bad system when you can't vote for the guy who represents 100% of your views because he isn't "electable" for whatever reason. That's why I said we should change the system to make third parties viable. Something like Instant Runoff Voting would make it so a third party candidate wouldn't "spoil" the chances of a major party candidate.
If Joe Lieberman and Hillary Clinton are the "extreme middle of their party", then the Democrats absolutely do not represent the will of the people or even the people who vote for them (85% or more of Democrats want to end the Iraq war now, and Joe L. is pushing for war in Iran and Syria as hard as he can, Hillary definitely doesn't want to withdraw any time soon and says the surge is working and "we have to be ready to fight the next war."
Are you serious about Lieberman being the middle of his party, because his views are even more antithetical to the views of the Democratic base than Hillary's.
What are the big issues that Democratic and Republican candidates are "anything but identical" on? The Democratic Congress gave Bush even more unconstitutional spying powers than he asked for, has not stood up to the Executive's power-grab, secrecy-oriented politics with anything stronger than threats.
The big parties are totally against allowing third parties to become a viable force in elections. Does that position represent the will of anybody in the electorate?
Posts: 1592 | Registered: Jan 2001
| IP: Logged |
quote:Hillary definitely doesn't want to withdraw any time soon and says the surge is working and "we have to be ready to fight the next war."
Nato, I think that's a serious misunderstanding of what Hillary is saying. She's arguing that we can't afford to work up effective tactics four years after starting a war. That was in no way a call to invade another country.
EDIT - added quotes for clarity.
Posts: 2907 | Registered: Nov 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
Well Lieberman is the extreme middle of the Republican party too, that's why I think he's more of a centrist. But you can't just take ONE issue from Hillary and say she doesn't represent the party. She's liberal on almost every big Democratic issue, and all you have to say is "Hillarycare" to scare away Republican voters. The only thing Democrats really attack her for is for being too much of a warhawk. But even then she isn't on the Republicans side. And in the context of the speech you linked to, she said it's working in some areas, and it is, in some areas, which doesn't take away from the problems it caused, and she slammed the war in the same 15 seconds. And we DO have to be prepared to fight the next war. You think wars are all over? She's not Dennis Kucinich, she's much more pragmatic when it comes to military matters than I think any of the Democratic candidates.
What aren't they identical on?
War. Taxes. Spending (not necessarily the amount, but what to spend it on). Healthcare. Environment. Abortion. Church and State. Education.
So...pretty much everything?
I'd be okay a system more ameniable to third parties. I wasn't saying the status quo was good, I was just saying the status quo isn't necessarily what everyone derides it as.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
I do think the presence of a third party would have a positive influence on the tone of campaigns. On that topic, does it seem to anyone else that the Libertarian philosophy has been gaining ground lately? I wouldn't be too surprised if they were serious contenders within a couple decades running on the "we leave you the hell alone" platform.
Posts: 2907 | Registered: Nov 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
The main problem I'm seeing is that people who vote on issues are going to vote how they're going to vote. If I'm forced to choose between a limited number of candidates (even if that number is greater than two) there's certain issues that automatically disqualify a candidate for me. Going positive or negative is not going to affect the issue vote, only proclaiming, and I suppose to an (unfortunately) lesser extent, advocating issues can get that vote. So we're down to people who vote character (or whatever you want to call it, vote for the person rather than their beliefs). I would think that if I voted this way (and to a certain extent, I do) I could be more easily swayed by one provable negative rather than a series of impossible to prove positives.
By which I mean, honor, hard work, honesty, integrity are things I value, but very difficult to prove one has in an election; especially considering the strong motivation to lie if you don't! It may be provable that candidate A gave $1,000,000 to charities last week, but that doesn't prove generosity in any one's mind since we're all jaded enough to expect ulterior motive. However, if we can prove that candidate A slept with their babysitter there's really no saving that one. Not only that, but we're so much more likely to believe negative things about our leaders than positive. It would be difficult to convince the American public that Congressmen are great guys, but I wouldn't have to speak more than about 4 sentences to have the vast majority of the US on board with me when I disparage the honesty and personal courage of the entire legislative branch of the Federal government. A negative is so much easier to prove than a positive, and can have (I think) a much larger effect on people's opinion. The problem with running an issue-ad solution would be, it wouldn't change the effectiveness of the mud-slinging!
Is the only solution to ending mud-slinging changing the attitude of the American voter, and if so, how can that be done?
You need a fundamental shift in the way things are done and more importantly, the way they are perceived in this country. That isn't going to happen until something goes way too far, and the rather large section of the American populace that doesn't much give a damn gets motivated to actually vote. Too many people don't care enough, and even the ones that do are buying into the status quo. And so you need a huge, huge shift, a huge wave of discontent, much larger than what brought Democrats into the majority to wash over Washington, and then you might get your change.
But let's not pretend that mud slinging is new. Ending the mud-slinging in American politics would be putting an end to 230 years of the practice, and if they haven't gotten it done in the last two centuries, I wonder how we'll get it done now. Though I should credit us by saying we're a lot nicer now than we used to be.
The problem with mud slinging Hobbes, is that much of it has the ring of truth, but there's never much to it. You say something that a lot of people are willing to believe, and then it doesn't matter if its true or not, they go down. There's too much lying, and our lovely friends in the fourth estate are NOT doing their damned jobs by investigating this stuff. That's the big thing we've been missing that we've had for the last 200 years or so, we've lost our fact checkers. Otherwise I don't see how draft dodger George Bush is painted as a war hero while what, two time purple heart wearer and bronze star winner John Kerry (or something like that) is the craven opportunist who cheated his way into those medals while serving in Vietnam. Where is the truth? And where is the American drive to FIND the truth? Without those fundamentals, I don't know what kind of positive change you can really expect.
This 2008 election isn't really different than any other, with the exception of the utterly insane amount of debates the parties are having, it's like a traveling sideshow. But I find something a bit different than anything I've seen in the last 10 years, with Barack Obama. When he talks, when he gives his speeches, I don't feel like I'm being made to feel afraid. I feel like he wants me to be hopeful. That's a feeling I can't say any other candidate in the last two elections has ever made me feel. His ideas are almost standard Democratic fair, so he passes muster, but it's that quality of hope for a brighter tomorrow that has convinced me to vote for him.
What would an election be like where EVERYONE was like that?
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
Well, he did say, "never much" which implies there's often something but never a lot, which I would say is fairly accurate.
On the topic question: I wrote a strongly-worded letter to the Canadian Liberal Party Website once about its crappiness. I didn't make any/much difference but it was the thought that counted.
I voted for a third party when the election came anyway.
Posts: 8473 | Registered: Apr 2003
| IP: Logged |
quote:Originally posted by Hobbes: Kill every politician that goes negative? Interesting idea, but you might rethink it when you find yourself in The Hague.
Hobbes
Can't make an omelet...
Without killing a few politicians? Messy omelette.
quote:Originally posted by Lyrhawn: Well Lieberman is the extreme middle of the Republican party too, that's why I think he's more of a centrist. But you can't just take ONE issue from Hillary and say she doesn't represent the party. She's liberal on almost every big Democratic issue, and all you have to say is "Hillarycare" to scare away Republican voters. The only thing Democrats really attack her for is for being too much of a warhawk. But even then she isn't on the Republicans side. And in the context of the speech you linked to, she said it's working in some areas, and it is, in some areas, which doesn't take away from the problems it caused, and she slammed the war in the same 15 seconds. And we DO have to be prepared to fight the next war. You think wars are all over? She's not Dennis Kucinich, she's much more pragmatic when it comes to military matters than I think any of the Democratic candidates.
What aren't they identical on?
War. Taxes. Spending (not necessarily the amount, but what to spend it on). Healthcare. Environment. Abortion. Church and State. Education.
So...pretty much everything?
I don't think Clinton and Lieberman pull to the center of the Democrats (some of whom, after all, put Howard Dean in charge of the DNC) so much as what some view as the center of the electorate.
And I think that the party remains big enough that there are still some questions about Hillary with regard to, for example, trade issues, media censorship, and welfare reform, in addition to a lack of clarity regarding her attitude about Iraq.
I agree about Obama. I'd vote for Hillary over the perceived GOP front runners, but I'd vote a lot more happily for Obama.
As long as I have power to warp reality to my whim (ha), a couple of things come to mind regarding third parties and negative politics.
As far as the former, it's been suggested that a ballot that allowed for "first choice, second choice" voting could make third parties more viable and possibly allow them to get more funding.
For the latter, a well-funded, impartial (warping reality fiercely) group that posted its own ads analyzing the skew and accuracy of others' ads might do a bit to quell the temptation to engage in irrelevant (or at least inaccurate) political sniping.
Posts: 3826 | Registered: May 2005
| IP: Logged |
quote:Originally posted by Lyrhawn: Well Lieberman is the extreme middle of the Republican party too, that's why I think he's more of a centrist. But you can't just take ONE issue from Hillary and say she doesn't represent the party. She's liberal on almost every big Democratic issue, and all you have to say is "Hillarycare" to scare away Republican voters. The only thing Democrats really attack her for is for being too much of a warhawk. But even then she isn't on the Republicans side. And in the context of the speech you linked to, she said it's working in some areas, and it is, in some areas, which doesn't take away from the problems it caused, and she slammed the war in the same 15 seconds. And we DO have to be prepared to fight the next war. You think wars are all over? She's not Dennis Kucinich, she's much more pragmatic when it comes to military matters than I think any of the Democratic candidates.
I'm not saying she isn't representative of the "Democratic" position, I'm saying that the "Democratic" position doesn't represent what people actually want (or what is good for the country). Most people who end up voting for Democratic candidates want to leave Iraq right now and believe peace is the most effective foreign policy. Kucinich and Gravel might represent them closer in some ways, but what would really be good for those voters would be viable third parties that can effectively take on the big parties that don't actually represent people very well. The voting question always comes down to which of two bad options is closest to what you want, and that is a failure of democracy. The big parties are not options that are good for America, and the way they have set up the system ensures that they will remain in power. until we can change the system so that the big parties need to respect the little guys on the outside enough to actually consider their arguments in debate, we will continue to see debate dominated by the framings provided by two big parties that are not good for us and not very different from each other, and we will never see any progress on a lot of issues that really matter.
Here's one example: Do you really think dodgy home remodeler Sen. Ted Stevens (R-AK) knows enough about the Internet to be proposing legislation that almost everybody on the Internet thinks is stupid? The last bi-partisan Senate meeting on the subject was a closed to the media press conference supporting internet filtering and against Net Neutrality. These two parties want to give control of the data that is allowed to travel across the internet to the corporations that own the lines. Now, do you trust AT&T enough, even after illegally letting the NSA tap into their network backbone, even after they didn't even let Pearl Jam say "George Bush Leave this world alone" on their Lollapalooza webcast, to control the data on YOUR internet? The obvious non-partisan solution to this problem is to build our own damn information superhighway system, just like we built the interstates. Run fiber-optic lines all over the country to every home. (Of course, we still need a government that won't let the NSA spy on us without a warrant, but nothing will get accomplished on these issues while these two parties control the system of government.)
quote: What aren't they identical on?
War. Taxes. Spending (not necessarily the amount, but what to spend it on). Healthcare. Environment. Abortion. Church and State. Education.
So...pretty much everything?
I'd be okay a system more ameniable to third parties. I wasn't saying the status quo was good, I was just saying the status quo isn't necessarily what everyone derides it as.
War: After an election that practically every pundit called a strong rejection of the war in Iraq , the newly elected Democratic Congress has absolutely failed to do anything to make it end sooner and have in fact allowed an escalation of troop levels (never mind the fact that anybody even LET Bush call this a "surge")
Taxes/Fiscal/Monetary policy: (almost all of) both of the major parties' representatives in Washington support the Income Tax, Fiat Currency, the Federal Reserve system. I can only think of one representative who is against these things, and that proportion is hardly representative of the population as a whole. The current credit/banking system is falling apart, risking hyperinflation of the Dollar right now (The Fed under Bernacke (sp?) does not appear to be against inflation--and their "liquidity boost" a week ago--creating $38bn and putting it into the economy--seems like an inflationary policy to me...)
Spending: Oh yeah? Are you saying that the current crop of Republicans are the ones that spend less, or the Democratic folks? The Democrats spend TONS and the Republicans spent TONS. As far as what they spend it on, the Democratic leadership recently approved the biggest military budget EVER (and I don't even think that includes money allocated for "the war"). On the other side of the aisle, you have Bush's requested budget, which has been ENORMOUS over the last 7 years, putting us into a huge deficit so soon after we had a surplus. And then there are the Ted "I am guilty of asking the Senate for pork and proud of the Senate for giving it to me" Stevenses of the world. I think a many-party system, where there is always more than one player to negotiate with, would lead to tighter budgets that actually address serious problems, like my earlier example taking the Internet out of corporate control, but something like "making college affordable for poor people" is something that would be good too.
Health Care: How has either party's current position on health care helped people be healthy in the last ten years? I see a lot of uninsured Americans who are suffering right now, and the number of people who are destroyed financially over medical bills is astounding. I don't see anybody in Congress stepping up to really fight for them to have a decent life.
Environment: If you're trying to argue that the two parties actually cover a reasonable part of the spectrum, why does the Sierra Club have such a hard time of ever getting anything done? Why are the emissions standards so loose and distant? I don't really see very many environmental advocates in Washington. If you know some good ones, please point them out to me. I live in Oregon, so timber policy is important to me. Who in Congress is working for a REAL sustainable forest strategy on public lands?
Abortion (and I'll include sex education policy here too): The current Republicans tend to be against abortion and many of them are also against comprehensive education and free access to birth control. My position is that birth control should be freely provided to people who can't afford it (through grants, charity, federal programs, whatever is needed), and nothing should be done to compromise comprehensive birth control education. I think that through education and ever-improving tools that prevent unwanted pregnancy, we can reduce the need for abortion to a very low level. I don't really see anybody in Congress fighting very hard for this kind of approach--the two parties instead use Abortion as a wedge issue to prevent opposition to their policies on other matters hurting their overall support. They frame it so that if you have a strong preference on the abortion issue, there's only one choice that is compatible with it, and you have to accept it in order to vote your conscience on abortion. This is stupid, and if we could change things so that third parties were viable, "wedge issues" would no longer work like this. As a side effect, then we could talk about every issue on its own merits. This would not minimize the importance of the abortion question, but it might allow us to make some progress toward a world where abortions are no longer needed.
Separation of Church and State: I think that if you respect the intent of the original founders (and original intent is indeed the doctrine I prefer), the separation of church and state is a clear and necessary principle to abide by in the interpretation of the Constitution. The two party system seems to have allowed the (i think) minority of Christians who want to crumble this wall to have a magnified voice on the national stage. But this is a significant issue because of Bush's Supreme Court appointees etc. There is a worrying number of church/staters in government, but the current system makes it easier for incumbents to keep their position than it should be.
Education: As a dirt-poor college student, I don't think either party supports education enough. The amount of debt that today's college students are in is staggering, and the amount of money spent on earlier education is way below what it should be. The Republicans seem to support education even less than the Democratic reps.
Posts: 1592 | Registered: Jan 2001
| IP: Logged |
posted
You've left out a number of substantive differences. And you'll be able to find at least one member in Congress of both parties who swings the other way on any one issue I'm sure, but I'm talking about majorities:
War: Democrats all say the war was a mistake, that it's wasteful, and that we've been going about it the wrong way. Most Republicans still hold to it being the right thing, that we need to stay there, and that we're winning. They want to pull out, they've tried to run legislation through, but they don't have the numbers. If they don't have the numbers, they don't have the numbers. The only other option is to basically shut down Congress over the issue. But I really think it's a safe bet that if Democrats had REALLY pressed the issue, had basically shut down the government over it, they'd have gotten all the blame. Though personally I would've supported them wholeheartedly.
Taxes: Democrats want a higher gas tax, higher taxes on the wealthy, a repeal of Bush's tax cuts. Republicans are against all that, and want to repeal the "Death Tax" which Democrats want to keep in place.
Spending: Democrats want more money for domestic policy issues like healthcare, the environment, and education. Republicans say those things are either too expensive, or are already funded enough. Examples: Democrats want more money for Pell grants, more money for renewable research while at the same time cutting tax breaks for oil companies, and they want a lot more money for NCLB, Republicans rejected all of those things.
Healthcare: This one is easy. Look at the plans the Democrats are pushing forth. They want big universal healthcare plans. Most of them will cover ALL Americans, some still leave a few million out. Republicans want smaller plans still provided by employers, and they want government out of it entirely. Tommy Thompson gave the only good summation of a plan from a Republican I though, and that's probably because he was in charge of HHS.
Environment: Please, don't make me laugh. Shouldn't this one be easy? Republicans like drilling for oil, and look at Bush, he's arguably the biggest enemy of the environment in the last 50 years. The man tried to relax the Clean Air Act, tried to make it easier for logging companies to cut down forests, is selling off our protected lands to big business, and isn't doing a thing to help renewables and conservationists other than crying foul about how harmful it will be to industry when even industry experts are saying there's billions to be made. Democrats want to raise the gas tax to spur the Green sector and to pay for road and bridge fixes, they also want more protection for endangered species, the air, and the forests, and the water. Bush has been overruled by the courts several times, with several more cases looming from states that want higher standards than the national standard, and Bush, from the party that says no to big government and yes to state governments, is telling them to shut up. His "Clear Skies" plan was ruled to have violated the Clean Air Act, he's in violation of a law passed in 1990 that mandated a report on Global Warming by now, and he is in violation of a law that mandates power plants must upgrade their air scrubbers when they remodel their plants. Republicans are the enemy when it comes to the environment, and Democrats might not be the heroes, but at least they aren't doing anything as a team or individually super powerful men to ruin it.
Abortion: Again, by and large: Republicans in Congress are against it, Democrats in Congress are for it.
Separation of Church and State: This is far trickier. Democrats look, at least from Republican ads, like they are out to totally whitewash God from the public sphere, and that is not at all what the founders would have wanted. They were religious men, who wanted everyone to be able to worship freely, but they never intended for political figures to have to hide their religion when they got into public life. National support for a particular religion is alarming and should be addressed when it happens, but we should be careful of going too far in the other direction as well.
Education: Republicans aren't doing nearly enough to support increases in funding, or more importantly, fundamental changes in the way we approach education in this country. Democrats want changes, they want lower costs for college, more aid, more funding for schools, higher pay for teachers, but they can't get any of that with Republicans in the way.
And I'll say this as a blanket pre-emptive rebuttal: Without a supermajority, as in, a majority that can quell a fillibuster and a veto threat, the Democrats aren't all powerful, and have to swallow a lot of what the Republicans want, because that's just how the government works. Blaming Democrats for not having enough numbers to push their issues through is ridiculous. You should be blaming the people who didn't vote enough of them into office. And still they managed to pass a higher minimum wage, which Republicans opposed but had to swallow in the end.
I think a lot of the reason why it looks like no one is getting anything done is that both sides are far more interested in stymying the other side than they are in making progress. Which is why I've said numerous time not to vote for incumbents. We need fresh blood, not bad blood. The differences in these issues are there. But they can't make headway when the margins are so close. Either party can stop the other if they really want to, and nothing gets done. That is confused often, with thinking the parties are the same.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
Alright, so you've painted a picture of many Republicans in washington as pretty horrible, and in many of these cases the Democrats are the "less bad" or "well-meaning but ineffective" option. This is pretty much the same thing that I was trying to point out by saying that they're too similar. When our country is under the control of these two parties, these are the ONLY options. You recommend that people don't vote for incumbents, but if the only option for getting rid of a not-so-great Democratic incumbent (for example) is to vote for a Republican, how are we going to improve anything. We need to demand that elections change to allow third parties in. Our debate needs some fresh air, and the issues third parties bring to the table are being sidelined under the current order of business.
This sort of thing is why Jon Stewart was able to get Crossfire off the air. He went on and didn't let them drag him into the standard dualist debate. Instead he told them what they were doing was Bad for America. The current framing of the issues is bad for America, and if we're going to get a different framing, we've got to demand change to how the system works.
Which party in Washington is fighting for your right to have your vote counted fairly and accurately in the face of states and parties using unsafe Diebold/ES&S voting machines in their elections? I haven't heard anybody in the House or Senate mention it.
Which party is protecting us from abuses of power and unconstitutional wiretapping?
Dick and Lynn Cheney saved $110,000 in income taxes last year due to the tax program Bush implemented in the last couple Congresses. If Democrats are for higher taxes on the wealthy (Even framing it like that is ridiculous because if anything, they would just restore the tax levels to Pre-Bush levels...), I don't see them fighting very hard for it. Neither party is fiscally responsible, and I think the only thing that will wake them up is if they have a viable competitor that IS fiscally responsible in the form of a separate party or two.
You support the Democrats, but you said it yourself, they're not heroes. Why not demand a system where people who were more "heroic" actually had a chance of getting their voice heard and their position respected?
Posts: 1592 | Registered: Jan 2001
| IP: Logged |
posted
I think somewhere in there you mistook my posts as support for the status quo, I don't support the status quo. And you can not vote for the incumbent and not vote for the other party at the same time. Either you support someone else in the same party, and you change the party from within, or you can try your luck at supporting a third party candidate.
The kind of thing that Jon Stewart is doing is the kind of thing EVERYONE needs to do, that's what I was talking about before. America is too lazy for its own good.
And as far as Democrats not fighting hard enough, like I said, with a majority that slim and an opposition president, they have three options: 1. Strike a deal with Republicans. 2. Lose. 3. Grind government to a halt by digging their heels in. "Fighting hard" doesn't much matter when at the end of the day the opposition can still stop you.
I support the Democrats because I think they have the best chance of getting this country back on track, and at the very least, they might be able to undo a lot of the damage Republicans have done. A few months ago even I might have called myself a Democrat, but not really now. Maybe if Obama wins and lives up to his promise to change things, maybe then. But right now they're the best chance I can see. I'm all in favor of more parties, and I'm all in favor of changing the system. But the parties aren't going to change it for us, we have to make them change, or force the change on them. And you aren't going to do that with an apathetic public. Same thing goes for the news networks.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
| IP: Logged |
quote:You support the Democrats, but you said it yourself, they're not heroes. Why not demand a system where people who were more "heroic" actually had a chance of getting their voice heard and their position respected?
That would require fixing our broken caucus system and getting Instant Runoff Voting installed in the general and presidential elections.
The Status Quo does not want a fixing of the broken caucus system nor an implementation of Instant Runoff Voting.
Posts: 15421 | Registered: Aug 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
I must say (and I may be the only one) that I am delighted with the early campaigning and the crowds on stage for the many debates. I think that it gives "fringe" candidates a voice and gets some fresh ideas out there. While, for example, I think the Congressman Kucinich would not make either a good nominee or a good president, I think that his voice is an important one. I think that his ideas get some traction and that is good for the more viable candidates to hear.
Posts: 11187 | Registered: Sep 2005
| IP: Logged |
quote:Originally posted by Samprimary: That would require fixing our broken caucus system and getting Instant Runoff Voting installed in the general and presidential elections.
The Status Quo does not want a fixing of the broken caucus system nor an implementation of Instant Runoff Voting.
Yep.
I don't think the ruling parties will ever allow IRV, but I will keep demanding it and insisting that the democracy we have is hardly democracy anyway. Democracy is touted as a system where the people are able to choose the best candidate for the job after evaluating all the possibilities. The two parties have made this impossible by forcing us into a lesser-of-two-evils situation nearly every single time.
I do think that H. Clinton or B. Obama would be an improvement over Dubya, but I don't think they are committed to ending this war and changing our foreign policy on a very big scale. They both seem support Israel's govt's foreign policy goals more than goals that I think would actually be good for this country. Do you think they will actually roll back all the abuses of power Bush has perpetrated on us for the last 6 years? I don't see either of them talking about how we should scrap the PATRIOT Act.
Posts: 1592 | Registered: Jan 2001
| IP: Logged |
Printer-friendly view of this topic
![[Smile]](smile.gif)
![[Dont Know]](graemlins/dontknow.gif)
![[Evil Laugh]](graemlins/evillaugh.gif)
![[Big Grin]](biggrin.gif)
![[Wall Bash]](graemlins/wallbash.gif)
