And sure - I agree that if 48% of the country gets to dictate to the other 52%, then there's a problem - I'm just not convinced that 52% dictating to the other 48% is better than 4% better.
Of course, the pro-Leave vote in the UK was 52%. In either case, how do you deal with what is, after all, a majority even if a small one?
And sure - I agree that if 48% of the country gets to dictate to the other 52%, then there's a problem - I'm just not convinced that 52% dictating to the other 48% is better than 4% better.
Of course, the pro-Leave vote in the UK was 52%. In either case, how do you deal with what is, after all, a majority even if a small one?
Withdraw from 52% of the UK's EU obligations? I'm sure that would be both practical and popular.
It's hard to gerrymander elections for governor when the whole State is one electorate.
That's not actually true. It's really easy. It just takes 2-3 election cycles to do it.
Consider Party A has around 40% support, and Party B 50%. Party B should always win state-wide elections. But over time the electoral boundaries for the state legislature have been gerrymanders such that on 40% support they control 41 out of 80 seats.
With their majority they have passed various laws and measures; especially things like voter ID and rules for polling places and postal voting etc.
So, in the areas where Party A is popular, there are a large number of polling places. Where B is popular there is one for a huge section of town. Now, voters need to drive, rather than walk to vote and then queue for hours. Whereas over the other side of the State, the polling place is easily reached, just round the corner and there's no queue. Party A's supporters have and use photo ID all the time and have no problem proving their eligibility to vote....
etc. etc....
It's very easy to gerrymander elections for governor (or US senator or even President), it just takes a little time.
Obviously what I have described is a hypothetical but then I've seen some of the electoral maps that have been the subject of various court cases, My hypothetical is very real.
It's hard to gerrymander elections for governor when the whole State is one electorate.
That's not actually true. It's really easy. It just takes 2-3 election cycles to do it.
Consider Party A has around 40% support, and Party B 50%. Party B should always win state-wide elections. But over time the electoral boundaries for the state legislature have been gerrymanders such that on 40% support they control 41 out of 80 seats.
With their majority they have passed various laws and measures; especially things like voter ID and rules for polling places and postal voting etc.
So, in the areas where Party A is popular, there are a large number of polling places. Where B is popular there is one for a huge section of town. Now, voters need to drive, rather than walk to vote and then queue for hours. Whereas over the other side of the State, the polling place is easily reached, just round the corner and there's no queue. Party A's supporters have and use photo ID all the time and have no problem proving their eligibility to vote....
It's hard to gerrymander elections for governor when the whole State is one electorate.
That's not actually true. It's really easy. It just takes 2-3 election cycles to do it.
Consider Party A has around 40% support, and Party B 50%. Party B should always win state-wide elections. But over time the electoral boundaries for the state legislature have been gerrymanders such that on 40% support they control 41 out of 80 seats.
With their majority they have passed various laws and measures; especially things like voter ID and rules for polling places and postal voting etc.
So, in the areas where Party A is popular, there are a large number of polling places. Where B is popular there is one for a huge section of town. Now, voters need to drive, rather than walk to vote and then queue for hours. Whereas over the other side of the State, the polling place is easily reached, just round the corner and there's no queue. Party A's supporters have and use photo ID all the time and have no problem proving their eligibility to vote....
That's voter suppression, not gerrymandering.
Yes. Words have meanings. Gerrymandering doesn't mean this.
It's hard to gerrymander elections for governor when the whole State is one electorate.
That's not actually true. It's really easy. It just takes 2-3 election cycles to do it.
Consider Party A has around 40% support, and Party B 50%. Party B should always win state-wide elections. But over time the electoral boundaries for the state legislature have been gerrymanders such that on 40% support they control 41 out of 80 seats.
With their majority they have passed various laws and measures; especially things like voter ID and rules for polling places and postal voting etc.
So, in the areas where Party A is popular, there are a large number of polling places. Where B is popular there is one for a huge section of town. Now, voters need to drive, rather than walk to vote and then queue for hours. Whereas over the other side of the State, the polling place is easily reached, just round the corner and there's no queue. Party A's supporters have and use photo ID all the time and have no problem proving their eligibility to vote....
That's voter suppression, not gerrymandering.
Yes. Words have meanings. Gerrymandering doesn't mean this.
Fine, but the two are connected and have a symbiotic relationship.
And sure - I agree that if 48% of the country gets to dictate to the other 52%, then there's a problem - I'm just not convinced that 52% dictating to the other 48% is better than 4% better.
Of course, the pro-Leave vote in the UK was 52%. In either case, how do you deal with what is, after all, a majority even if a small one?
Withdraw from 52% of the UK's EU obligations? I'm sure that would be both practical and popular.
It would have kept BJ and his cohorts busy for decades to work out. I wondered if Leorning Cniht's figures derived from that vote.
It's hard to gerrymander elections for governor when the whole State is one electorate.
That's not actually true. It's really easy. It just takes 2-3 election cycles to do it.
Consider Party A has around 40% support, and Party B 50%. Party B should always win state-wide elections. But over time the electoral boundaries for the state legislature have been gerrymanders such that on 40% support they control 41 out of 80 seats.
With their majority they have passed various laws and measures; especially things like voter ID and rules for polling places and postal voting etc.
So, in the areas where Party A is popular, there are a large number of polling places. Where B is popular there is one for a huge section of town. Now, voters need to drive, rather than walk to vote and then queue for hours. Whereas over the other side of the State, the polling place is easily reached, just round the corner and there's no queue. Party A's supporters have and use photo ID all the time and have no problem proving their eligibility to vote....
That's voter suppression, not gerrymandering.
Yes. Words have meanings. Gerrymandering doesn't mean this.
Fine, but the two are connected and have a symbiotic relationship.
I don't think the semantics changes the point.
Yes but when people are talking about one thing, using the word wrong is jarring.
It's hard to gerrymander elections for governor when the whole State is one electorate.
That's not actually true. It's really easy. It just takes 2-3 election cycles to do it.
Consider Party A has around 40% support, and Party B 50%. Party B should always win state-wide elections. But over time the electoral boundaries for the state legislature have been gerrymanders such that on 40% support they control 41 out of 80 seats.
With their majority they have passed various laws and measures; especially things like voter ID and rules for polling places and postal voting etc.
So, in the areas where Party A is popular, there are a large number of polling places. Where B is popular there is one for a huge section of town. Now, voters need to drive, rather than walk to vote and then queue for hours. Whereas over the other side of the State, the polling place is easily reached, just round the corner and there's no queue. Party A's supporters have and use photo ID all the time and have no problem proving their eligibility to vote....
That's voter suppression, not gerrymandering.
Yes. Words have meanings. Gerrymandering doesn't mean this.
Fine, but the two are connected and have a symbiotic relationship.
I don't think the semantics changes the point.
Yes but when people are talking about one thing, using the word wrong is jarring.
And sure - I agree that if 48% of the country gets to dictate to the other 52%, then there's a problem - I'm just not convinced that 52% dictating to the other 48% is better than 4% better.
Of course, the pro-Leave vote in the UK was 52%. In either case, how do you deal with what is, after all, a majority even if a small one?
Withdraw from 52% of the UK's EU obligations? I'm sure that would be both practical and popular.
It would have kept BJ and his cohorts busy for decades to work out. I wondered if Leorning Cniht's figures derived from that vote.
I'm not entirely convinced that anyone in cabinet could calculate 52% of something without the % button on a calculator.
And sure - I agree that if 48% of the country gets to dictate to the other 52%, then there's a problem - I'm just not convinced that 52% dictating to the other 48% is better than 4% better.
Of course, the pro-Leave vote in the UK was 52%. In either case, how do you deal with what is, after all, a majority even if a small one?
Withdraw from 52% of the UK's EU obligations? I'm sure that would be both practical and popular.
It would have kept BJ and his cohorts busy for decades to work out. I wondered if Leorning Cniht's figures derived from that vote.
I'm not entirely convinced that anyone in cabinet could calculate 52% of something without the % button on a calculator.
I am prepared to be generous enough to assume that they know what 52% means.
And sure - I agree that if 48% of the country gets to dictate to the other 52%, then there's a problem - I'm just not convinced that 52% dictating to the other 48% is better than 4% better.
Of course, the pro-Leave vote in the UK was 52%. In either case, how do you deal with what is, after all, a majority even if a small one?
Withdraw from 52% of the UK's EU obligations? I'm sure that would be both practical and popular.
It would have kept BJ and his cohorts busy for decades to work out. I wondered if Leorning Cniht's figures derived from that vote.
I'm not entirely convinced that anyone in cabinet could calculate 52% of something without the % button on a calculator.
I am prepared to be generous enough to assume that they know what 52% means.
This is perilously close to an argument I have been seeing on the webs, generally by conservatives, to the effect that minority rule is better than majority rule because in majority rule the "tyranny of the majority" means the minority runs a risk of being run roughshod over.
That argument is obvious nonsense. If someone is running roughshod over someone else, it's hard to find an argument for 48% trampling 52% to be better than 52% trampling 48%. But it's also hard to find an argument that says that the latter is very much better than the former.
What is very much better is if nobody gets trampled.
I may as well confess my personal bias at this point, and point out that there's quite a significant difference between someone's rights being trampled on because they're aggressively stopped by the police, and possibly shot and killed, because they're under suspicion of being black, and somebody whose "rights" are trampled on because their employer chooses not to employ people who are aggressively racist in public.
( @Gee D : I wasn't explicitly thinking about Brexit, but I'm quite prepared to believe that that's where my subconscious obtained that particular pair of numbers. And it does well enough as an example, although it's not far from a typical vote split in a US election either.)
This is perilously close to an argument I have been seeing on the webs, generally by conservatives, to the effect that minority rule is better than majority rule because in majority rule the "tyranny of the majority" means the minority runs a risk of being run roughshod over.
That argument is obvious nonsense. If someone is running roughshod over someone else, it's hard to find an argument for 48% trampling 52% to be better than 52% trampling 48%. But it's also hard to find an argument that says that the latter is very much better than the former.
What is very much better is if nobody gets trampled.
This is very often used as a justification for maintaining the status quo (and in the U.S. as an argument why the winners of elections cannot be allowed to fulfill their various campaign promises/agenda items). The basic idea is that as long as no one gets to exercise the powers of government then no one "gets trampled", leaving aside anyone getting trampled by the current status quo.
Almost any exercise of power, even in the form of doing nothing, is going to be to someone's disadvantage. For example, building a new municipal library will advantage some people (readers, students, librarians) and disadvantage others (taxpayers, the illiterate, etc.) Not building a new municipal library will reverse those categories of advantage and disadvantage. I'm not sure I'd go so far as to say that any of those groups is getting "trampled", but I'm not trying to make a rhetorical point about the ordinary exercise of political power. Decisions have to be made and going with the most popular option seems a decent way to go, absent other considerations.
I think LC's point becomes clearer if you think over the long term. To oversimplify, if the electoral system is set up in such a way that effectively creates two groups with diametrically opposed interests, one consistently representing 40% of the population and the other consistently representing 60% of the population, then foreseeably government becomes entirely in the interests only of the 60%. I think this is the dynamic you want to avoid. (I appreciate this is becoming increasingly tangential to the merits of the Electoral College.)
Where was it someone mentioned that Democrats need to do more for farmers?
Well, Biden's proposals for farmers may admittedly be a mixed bag. But he is promising to restore the trade agreements with several countries in regard to farm products. China is not included in that yet. It appears he wants to use the restoration of trading agreements with China as a bargaining chip. Moreover, Biden is promising more support to land grant colleges which were instituted to develop better farming techniques at the turn of the 20th century. On the other hand, farmers are afraid his carbon-free and sustainability emphasis will negatively impact farming as a whole
After preferences are distributed here, the usual voting on a 2 party preferred basis is usually in that 52/48 range, sometimes a bit closer, sometimes a bit wider
After preferences are distributed here, the usual voting on a 2 party preferred basis is usually in that 52/48 range, sometimes a bit closer, sometimes a bit wider
It sounds like there's a fairly complicated process that gets you there though? I'm thinking that if you do have ranking, it's more likely that whoever gets the 52% will be more acceptable to the 48% who didn't vote for them than if there were just two candidates with radically opposed platforms?
On another note, I just saw something in the Atlantic to the effect that Alaska is starting up a quite different primary system with ranked ballots. It sounds interesting, and perhaps less polarizing than some of the systems currently in use.
It sounds like there's a fairly complicated process that gets you there though? I'm thinking that if you do have ranking, it's more likely that whoever gets the 52% will be more acceptable to the 48% who didn't vote for them than if there were just two candidates with radically opposed platforms?
Distribution of preferences (usually the lower house) is pretty simple. You count all the first preference votes in an electorate. If someone has obtained more than 50% of the valid votes, that person is elected. If no candidate has, then the second preferences of the voters for the least acceptable candidate are counted, and so on until one candidate has more than 50% of the valid votes in an electorate. There is no guarantee that the party with the most seats in fact obtained a majority of votes overall. The unsuccessful party might win all of its seats with large majorities and still obtain less than a majority of seats.
What is complicated is the Hare-Clark proportional system normally used for upper houses only. I have a very general understanding only of that. Whereas the second preferences of the least acceptable candidate are counted at full value (ie a vote each) the Hare-Clark system involves a distribution of the votes of the most successful candidate but at less than full value. The mathematics are horrendous and the consequences for those doing the counting can be tragic.
It sounds like there's a fairly complicated process that gets you there though? I'm thinking that if you do have ranking, it's more likely that whoever gets the 52% will be more acceptable to the 48% who didn't vote for them than if there were just two candidates with radically opposed platforms?
I think that might depend on to what extent the political discourse drives public opinion, and to what extent it follows it.
If public opinion is largely split into two extremes, with few people occupying the middle ground, it's hard to come up with a compromise candidate who is "more acceptable" to the other lot, unless you have the man in the middle who everyone hates equally (and STV doesn't get you that).
It is, I think, fair to say that a transferable vote system allows both a moderate and an extreme candidate of similar political stripes to run, which could plausibly prevent some more moderate voters being dragged out to the extremes by the rhetoric of the extreme candidate that's closer to their starting position.
They need to lie down quietly in a darkened room for some time in an endeavour to regain their sanity.
(My comment was not really serious, and here it would be recognised as such. I made a mistake in assuming that it would be. The counting process for an election determined by the Hare-Clark system can be horrendous. At the last (2019) Senate election, which was for a half-Senate only, there were well over 100 candidates in my State alone. Each vote needs to be counted, and then after the first round of counting determined those who had obtained the necessary quota, the second preferences had then to be determined combining direct votes with apportioned votes from those already successful. The process continues until all seats are taken. This can take days, but a pretty accurate estimate is usually available by the end of the 3rd day. I assume that some sort of computer programme has made things a bit simpler.)
An update rundown of the status of the Biden cabinet. (Last update here.)
Five Biden appointees have already approved by the Senate: Austin (Defense), Yellen (Treasury), Blinken (State), Buttigieg (Transportation), and Mayorkas (Homeland Security).
Two appointees, Raimondo (Commerce) and Granholm (Energy), have had appearances before the relevant Senate committees and been approved by those committees but not the full Senate.
Four, McDonough (Veterans Affairs), Vilsack (Agriculture), Fudge (Housing & Urban Development), and Cardona (Education), have had a committee hearing but no committee vote yet.
One appointee, Walsh (Labor), has a committee hearing scheduled for a future date.
Three appointees do not have committee hearings or votes scheduled yet. They are Garland (Justice), Haaland (Interior), and Becerra (Health & Human Services).
It should be noted that the Senate just passed its organizing resolution (the rules under which they'll operate in 2021) yesterday (3 February 2021) so the Democrats finally get their committee chairmanships. Maybe now that Dick Durbin chairs the Judiciary Committee instead of Lindsey Graham the Republicans' absurd vendetta against Merrick Garland can come to an end a brief pause.
And apparently Josh Hawley (R-Sedition) still doesn't believe Biden is president, having voted against all five cabinet appointees who have had a full Senate vote so far.
Important news, at least for my state. Biden just released relief funds for the devastating fires we had in our state last year. Two small villages in my county were burned to the ground when a high wind-driven fire descended on them. Gov. Inslee had requested relief on 16 September, but Trump refused to act on them since we have been a blue state since forever. The deal of it is, the two villages in our county had long been Trump supporters up until this last election. I am certain when the next election comes, the people will remember who thought to help them out.
An update of the status of the Biden cabinet. (Last update here.)
Six Biden appointees have been approved by the Senate: Austin (Defense), Yellen (Treasury), Blinken (State), Buttigieg (Transportation), Mayorkas (Homeland Security), and McDonough (Veterans Affairs).
Five appointees, Raimondo (Commerce), Granholm (Energy), Fudge (Housing & Urban Development), Walsh (Labor), and Cardona (Education), have had appearances before the relevant Senate committees and been approved by those committees but not the full Senate.
One, Vilsack (Agriculture), has had a committee hearing but no committee vote yet.
One appointee, Garland (Justice), has a committee hearing scheduled for a future date.
Two appointees do not have committee hearings or votes scheduled yet. They are Haaland (Interior) and Becerra (Health & Human Services).
I was no fan of the previous administration, but...what the hell happened to actual journalism since Biden took office? Seems like the media are falling all over themselves to write one inane fluff piece after another instead of doing their actual jobs.
Case in point, Newsweek's headline yesterday: "Joe Biden, playing as Luigi, wins in Mario Kart race against granddaughter at Camp David"
Had Trump still been in power, this headline would have been preceded by "As Thousands of Americans Die from COVID-19..."
Or CNN's tweet yesterday: "President Biden has expressed a preference for a fire built in the Oval Office fireplace, and sometimes adds a log himself to keep it going." Had Trump still been in power, this headline would have been preceded by "As Millions of Americans Shiver due to Power Outages..."
If this is what it's gonna be like for the next four years, don't be surprised if people tune out entirely. If they haven't already.
I'm sure if you tune into Fox you can get your fill of fake outrage.
The flaw in your comparisons is that Biden is taking the virus seriously and there isn't much he could be doing that he isn't already. This was demonstrably not the case with his predecessor.
By the way, this:
I was no fan of the previous administration, but...
I was no fan of the previous administration, but...what the hell happened to actual journalism since Biden took office? Seems like the media are falling all over themselves to write one inane fluff piece after another instead of doing their actual jobs.
You were unable to find any substantive articles on the new administration? Like who has been nominated to be in the cabinet, or how the relief bill is shaping up? Or are you just missing stories about how the press secretary came out of the gate telling preposterous lies about how many people showed up at the inauguration?
I was no fan of the previous administration, but...what the hell happened to actual journalism since Biden took office? Seems like the media are falling all over themselves to write one inane fluff piece after another instead of doing their actual jobs.
Case in point, Newsweek's headline yesterday: "Joe Biden, playing as Luigi, wins in Mario Kart race against granddaughter at Camp David"
Quite. There are quite a number of substantive articles if you read the Reuters news agency site. Including such things as Biden pitching his stimulus bill in Wisconsin; A NATO gathering where Biden's Pentagon will try to rebuild European trust; a Biden review of Guantanamo with the express intent of closing the prison before he leaves office; etc.
Maybe it's nice to hear about a president doing something normal, that's suitable for a child to hear about?
And Joe will probably have to deal with a lot of residual...crap...from the press, because the person who just retired was so awful all the time, and needed investigation all the time. So they'll watch him like hawks.
And there's the rub. He really did retire. Pension, Secret Service protection, travel allowance, franking privilege. As opposed to being fired, which would have carried with it none of those.
The key here is not that he has asked them to resign. This is common with a change of administration but with the two that remain. Or rather the one that remains and the one who's role is changing.
The one who remains is the one who is investigating Hunter Biden. I.e. The President has gone out of his way, and done more than he is required to do in order to avoid even the possibility of a hint of interfering into a (almost certainly spurious) investigation into his son. The other is a special prosecutor who was tasked with investigating the origins of the Russia investigation on behalf of Trump. I.e. his job is to prove a completely false conspiracy theory. The interesting bit here is that you're not supposed to be a special prosecutor and a DOJ employee. So Biden has fixed that.
Again going above and beyond to be seen to be doing the right thing.
I was no fan of the previous administration, but...what the hell happened to actual journalism since Biden took office? Seems like the media are falling all over themselves to write one inane fluff piece after another instead of doing their actual jobs.
Case in point, Newsweek's headline yesterday: "Joe Biden, playing as Luigi, wins in Mario Kart race against granddaughter at Camp David"
Had Trump still been in power, this headline would have been preceded by "As Thousands of Americans Die from COVID-19..."
Or CNN's tweet yesterday: "President Biden has expressed a preference for a fire built in the Oval Office fireplace, and sometimes adds a log himself to keep it going." Had Trump still been in power, this headline would have been preceded by "As Millions of Americans Shiver due to Power Outages..."
If this is what it's gonna be like for the next four years, don't be surprised if people tune out entirely. If they haven't already.
Interesting, I saw this complaint, word for word, on a conservative Facebook site that was shared by one of my friends. Either Powderkeg wrote both posts or he copied a post.
I was no fan of the previous administration, but...what the hell happened to actual journalism since Biden took office? Seems like the media are falling all over themselves to write one inane fluff piece after another instead of doing their actual jobs.
Case in point, Newsweek's headline yesterday: "Joe Biden, playing as Luigi, wins in Mario Kart race against granddaughter at Camp David"
Had Trump still been in power, this headline would have been preceded by "As Thousands of Americans Die from COVID-19..."
Or CNN's tweet yesterday: "President Biden has expressed a preference for a fire built in the Oval Office fireplace, and sometimes adds a log himself to keep it going." Had Trump still been in power, this headline would have been preceded by "As Millions of Americans Shiver due to Power Outages..."
If this is what it's gonna be like for the next four years, don't be surprised if people tune out entirely. If they haven't already.
Interesting, I saw this complaint, word for word, on a conservative Facebook site that was shared by one of my friends. Either Powderkeg wrote both posts or he copied a post.
Or (for completeness' sake) Powderkeg wrote the original post and someone copied it from them.
Currently, the franking privilege is granted (with differing restrictions) to Members of Congress, the Vice President, certain congressional officers, former Members of Congress, former Presidents, former Vice Presidents, widows of Presidents, and a relative of a Member who dies in office. In the past, Congress has granted the franking privilege to high-ranking officers in the executive branch, postmasters, military leaders, and soldiers during wartime.
At this point Biden is being blamed for all the power outages and frozen pipes in Texas. Conservatives are complaining he is living in a White House warmed with petroleum products while he is not permitting Texas to use their vast resources.
Just to be clear, long ago Texas chose not to be a part of any of the national power grids. They did not want to deal with any federal regulations. Most Texas homes are heated by electric furnaces. When it gets this cold, there is a very big drain on the current system. Moreover, the natural gas generators Texas has built over the past few years are not very efficient in extremely cold weather and a number of their coal-fired generators are off line for maintenance work. And the two nuclear reactors outside of Houston shut down because they were not designed for the extreme cold either.
The one thing that Biden has done, though, is he moved quickly to declare Texas a federal disaster area so they can receive FEMA funds.
At this point Biden is being blamed for all the power outages and frozen pipes in Texas. Conservatives are complaining he is living in a White House warmed with petroleum products while he is not permitting Texas to use their vast resources.
Just to be clear, long ago Texas chose not to be a part of any of the national power grids. They did not want to deal with any federal regulations. Most Texas homes are heated by electric furnaces. When it gets this cold, there is a very big drain on the current system. Moreover, the natural gas generators Texas has built over the past few years are not very efficient in extremely cold weather and a number of their coal-fired generators are off line for maintenance work. And the two nuclear reactors outside of Houston shut down because they were not designed for the extreme cold either.
The one thing that Biden has done, though, is he moved quickly to declare Texas a federal disaster area so they can receive FEMA funds.
Did Texan authorities reject the hydro-electric power stations which Trump so generously offered them?
At this point Biden is being blamed for all the power outages and frozen pipes in Texas. Conservatives are complaining he is living in a White House warmed with petroleum products while he is not permitting Texas to use their vast resources.
Joe Biden has been in office for 29 days and according to conservatives he's been able to reverse the effects of a quarter century of Republican governance in the state of Texas. Pull the other one!
Energy and policy experts said Texas’ decision not to require equipment upgrades to better withstand extreme winter temperatures, and choice to operate mostly isolated from other grids in the U.S. left power system unprepared for the winter crisis.
Policy observers blamed the power system failure on the legislators and state agencies who they say did not properly heed the warnings of previous storms or account for more extreme weather events warned of by climate scientists. Instead, Texas prioritized the free market.
The whole thing is worth a read if you've got the time.
Did Texan authorities reject the hydro-electric power stations which Trump so generously offered them?
I don't know if you're serious about this, but given the lead time involved in hydroelectric construction, anything started during the Trump administration* most likely wouldn't be online yet.
At this point Biden is being blamed for all the power outages and frozen pipes in Texas. Conservatives are complaining he is living in a White House warmed with petroleum products while he is not permitting Texas to use their vast resources.
Just to be clear, long ago Texas chose not to be a part of any of the national power grids. They did not want to deal with any federal regulations. Most Texas homes are heated by electric furnaces. When it gets this cold, there is a very big drain on the current system. Moreover, the natural gas generators Texas has built over the past few years are not very efficient in extremely cold weather and a number of their coal-fired generators are off line for maintenance work. And the two nuclear reactors outside of Houston shut down because they were not designed for the extreme cold either.
The one thing that Biden has done, though, is he moved quickly to declare Texas a federal disaster area so they can receive FEMA funds.
Did Texan authorities reject the hydro-electric power stations which Trump so generously offered them?
Turns out Trump wasn't able to get Mexico to pay for it.
At this point Biden is being blamed for all the power outages and frozen pipes in Texas. Conservatives are complaining he is living in a White House warmed with petroleum products while he is not permitting Texas to use their vast resources.
Just to be clear, long ago Texas chose not to be a part of any of the national power grids. They did not want to deal with any federal regulations. Most Texas homes are heated by electric furnaces. When it gets this cold, there is a very big drain on the current system. Moreover, the natural gas generators Texas has built over the past few years are not very efficient in extremely cold weather and a number of their coal-fired generators are off line for maintenance work. And the two nuclear reactors outside of Houston shut down because they were not designed for the extreme cold either.
The one thing that Biden has done, though, is he moved quickly to declare Texas a federal disaster area so they can receive FEMA funds.
Did Texan authorities reject the hydro-electric power stations which Trump so generously offered them?
Turns out Trump wasn't able to get Mexico to pay for it.
Is that why Ted Cruz suddenly flew off to Mexico yesterday?
At this point Biden is being blamed for all the power outages and frozen pipes in Texas. Conservatives are complaining he is living in a White House warmed with petroleum products while he is not permitting Texas to use their vast resources.
Just to be clear, long ago Texas chose not to be a part of any of the national power grids. They did not want to deal with any federal regulations. Most Texas homes are heated by electric furnaces. When it gets this cold, there is a very big drain on the current system. Moreover, the natural gas generators Texas has built over the past few years are not very efficient in extremely cold weather and a number of their coal-fired generators are off line for maintenance work. And the two nuclear reactors outside of Houston shut down because they were not designed for the extreme cold either.
The one thing that Biden has done, though, is he moved quickly to declare Texas a federal disaster area so they can receive FEMA funds.
Did Texan authorities reject the hydro-electric power stations which Trump so generously offered them?
Turns out Trump wasn't able to get Mexico to pay for it.
Is that why Ted Cruz suddenly flew off to Mexico yesterday?
Comments
Of course, the pro-Leave vote in the UK was 52%. In either case, how do you deal with what is, after all, a majority even if a small one?
Withdraw from 52% of the UK's EU obligations? I'm sure that would be both practical and popular.
That's not actually true. It's really easy. It just takes 2-3 election cycles to do it.
Consider Party A has around 40% support, and Party B 50%. Party B should always win state-wide elections. But over time the electoral boundaries for the state legislature have been gerrymanders such that on 40% support they control 41 out of 80 seats.
With their majority they have passed various laws and measures; especially things like voter ID and rules for polling places and postal voting etc.
So, in the areas where Party A is popular, there are a large number of polling places. Where B is popular there is one for a huge section of town. Now, voters need to drive, rather than walk to vote and then queue for hours. Whereas over the other side of the State, the polling place is easily reached, just round the corner and there's no queue. Party A's supporters have and use photo ID all the time and have no problem proving their eligibility to vote....
etc. etc....
It's very easy to gerrymander elections for governor (or US senator or even President), it just takes a little time.
Obviously what I have described is a hypothetical but then I've seen some of the electoral maps that have been the subject of various court cases, My hypothetical is very real.
AFZ
That's voter suppression, not gerrymandering.
Yes. Words have meanings. Gerrymandering doesn't mean this.
Fine, but the two are connected and have a symbiotic relationship.
I don't think the semantics changes the point.
It would have kept BJ and his cohorts busy for decades to work out. I wondered if Leorning Cniht's figures derived from that vote.
Yes but when people are talking about one thing, using the word wrong is jarring.
Fair enough
I'm not entirely convinced that anyone in cabinet could calculate 52% of something without the % button on a calculator.
I am prepared to be generous enough to assume that they know what 52% means.
There public statements would suggest otherwise.
AFZ
That argument is obvious nonsense. If someone is running roughshod over someone else, it's hard to find an argument for 48% trampling 52% to be better than 52% trampling 48%. But it's also hard to find an argument that says that the latter is very much better than the former.
What is very much better is if nobody gets trampled.
I may as well confess my personal bias at this point, and point out that there's quite a significant difference between someone's rights being trampled on because they're aggressively stopped by the police, and possibly shot and killed, because they're under suspicion of being black, and somebody whose "rights" are trampled on because their employer chooses not to employ people who are aggressively racist in public.
( @Gee D : I wasn't explicitly thinking about Brexit, but I'm quite prepared to believe that that's where my subconscious obtained that particular pair of numbers. And it does well enough as an example, although it's not far from a typical vote split in a US election either.)
This is very often used as a justification for maintaining the status quo (and in the U.S. as an argument why the winners of elections cannot be allowed to fulfill their various campaign promises/agenda items). The basic idea is that as long as no one gets to exercise the powers of government then no one "gets trampled", leaving aside anyone getting trampled by the current status quo.
Almost any exercise of power, even in the form of doing nothing, is going to be to someone's disadvantage. For example, building a new municipal library will advantage some people (readers, students, librarians) and disadvantage others (taxpayers, the illiterate, etc.) Not building a new municipal library will reverse those categories of advantage and disadvantage. I'm not sure I'd go so far as to say that any of those groups is getting "trampled", but I'm not trying to make a rhetorical point about the ordinary exercise of political power. Decisions have to be made and going with the most popular option seems a decent way to go, absent other considerations.
Well, Biden's proposals for farmers may admittedly be a mixed bag. But he is promising to restore the trade agreements with several countries in regard to farm products. China is not included in that yet. It appears he wants to use the restoration of trading agreements with China as a bargaining chip. Moreover, Biden is promising more support to land grant colleges which were instituted to develop better farming techniques at the turn of the 20th century. On the other hand, farmers are afraid his carbon-free and sustainability emphasis will negatively impact farming as a whole
It sounds like there's a fairly complicated process that gets you there though? I'm thinking that if you do have ranking, it's more likely that whoever gets the 52% will be more acceptable to the 48% who didn't vote for them than if there were just two candidates with radically opposed platforms?
On another note, I just saw something in the Atlantic to the effect that Alaska is starting up a quite different primary system with ranked ballots. It sounds interesting, and perhaps less polarizing than some of the systems currently in use.
Distribution of preferences (usually the lower house) is pretty simple. You count all the first preference votes in an electorate. If someone has obtained more than 50% of the valid votes, that person is elected. If no candidate has, then the second preferences of the voters for the least acceptable candidate are counted, and so on until one candidate has more than 50% of the valid votes in an electorate. There is no guarantee that the party with the most seats in fact obtained a majority of votes overall. The unsuccessful party might win all of its seats with large majorities and still obtain less than a majority of seats.
What is complicated is the Hare-Clark proportional system normally used for upper houses only. I have a very general understanding only of that. Whereas the second preferences of the least acceptable candidate are counted at full value (ie a vote each) the Hare-Clark system involves a distribution of the votes of the most successful candidate but at less than full value. The mathematics are horrendous and the consequences for those doing the counting can be tragic.
Tragic how, please?
Thx.
I think that might depend on to what extent the political discourse drives public opinion, and to what extent it follows it.
If public opinion is largely split into two extremes, with few people occupying the middle ground, it's hard to come up with a compromise candidate who is "more acceptable" to the other lot, unless you have the man in the middle who everyone hates equally (and STV doesn't get you that).
It is, I think, fair to say that a transferable vote system allows both a moderate and an extreme candidate of similar political stripes to run, which could plausibly prevent some more moderate voters being dragged out to the extremes by the rhetoric of the extreme candidate that's closer to their starting position.
They need to lie down quietly in a darkened room for some time in an endeavour to regain their sanity.
(My comment was not really serious, and here it would be recognised as such. I made a mistake in assuming that it would be. The counting process for an election determined by the Hare-Clark system can be horrendous. At the last (2019) Senate election, which was for a half-Senate only, there were well over 100 candidates in my State alone. Each vote needs to be counted, and then after the first round of counting determined those who had obtained the necessary quota, the second preferences had then to be determined combining direct votes with apportioned votes from those already successful. The process continues until all seats are taken. This can take days, but a pretty accurate estimate is usually available by the end of the 3rd day. I assume that some sort of computer programme has made things a bit simpler.)
Five Biden appointees have already approved by the Senate: Austin (Defense), Yellen (Treasury), Blinken (State), Buttigieg (Transportation), and Mayorkas (Homeland Security).
Two appointees, Raimondo (Commerce) and Granholm (Energy), have had appearances before the relevant Senate committees and been approved by those committees but not the full Senate.
Four, McDonough (Veterans Affairs), Vilsack (Agriculture), Fudge (Housing & Urban Development), and Cardona (Education), have had a committee hearing but no committee vote yet.
One appointee, Walsh (Labor), has a committee hearing scheduled for a future date.
Three appointees do not have committee hearings or votes scheduled yet. They are Garland (Justice), Haaland (Interior), and Becerra (Health & Human Services).
It should be noted that the Senate just passed its organizing resolution (the rules under which they'll operate in 2021) yesterday (3 February 2021) so the Democrats finally get their committee chairmanships. Maybe now that Dick Durbin chairs the Judiciary Committee instead of Lindsey Graham the Republicans' absurd vendetta against Merrick Garland can come to an end a brief pause.
And apparently Josh Hawley (R-Sedition) still doesn't believe Biden is president, having voted against all five cabinet appointees who have had a full Senate vote so far.
Six Biden appointees have been approved by the Senate: Austin (Defense), Yellen (Treasury), Blinken (State), Buttigieg (Transportation), Mayorkas (Homeland Security), and McDonough (Veterans Affairs).
Five appointees, Raimondo (Commerce), Granholm (Energy), Fudge (Housing & Urban Development), Walsh (Labor), and Cardona (Education), have had appearances before the relevant Senate committees and been approved by those committees but not the full Senate.
One, Vilsack (Agriculture), has had a committee hearing but no committee vote yet.
One appointee, Garland (Justice), has a committee hearing scheduled for a future date.
Two appointees do not have committee hearings or votes scheduled yet. They are Haaland (Interior) and Becerra (Health & Human Services).
Josh Hawley (R-Sedition) maintains his streak of voting against all Biden cabinet appointees. Hawley also voted against Avril Haines becoming Director of National Intelligence, a cabinet-level post but not officially part of the cabinet. It's almost like Hawley doesn't accept that Joe Biden is now president.
Case in point, Newsweek's headline yesterday: "Joe Biden, playing as Luigi, wins in Mario Kart race against granddaughter at Camp David"
Had Trump still been in power, this headline would have been preceded by "As Thousands of Americans Die from COVID-19..."
Or CNN's tweet yesterday: "President Biden has expressed a preference for a fire built in the Oval Office fireplace, and sometimes adds a log himself to keep it going." Had Trump still been in power, this headline would have been preceded by "As Millions of Americans Shiver due to Power Outages..."
If this is what it's gonna be like for the next four years, don't be surprised if people tune out entirely. If they haven't already.
The flaw in your comparisons is that Biden is taking the virus seriously and there isn't much he could be doing that he isn't already. This was demonstrably not the case with his predecessor.
By the way, this:
Reads an awful lot like:
and consequently sounds about as convincing.
https://www.newsweek.com/topic/joe-biden
...and so on.
By my count, that's one inane fluff piece about Mr Biden, one about Mr Trump, and a number of attempts at "actual journalism".
This is far from obvious. Since your first post on this site you've devoted almost all your energy to trash-talking and concern trolling various Democrats, with a quick sideline in pro-Trump apologia. For someone who claims to not be a fan of the previous administration* you certainly spend a lot of time carrying water for them. That's fine, but don't pretend you're not doing that.
Maybe it's nice to hear about a president doing something normal, that's suitable for a child to hear about?
And Joe will probably have to deal with a lot of residual...crap...from the press, because the person who just retired was so awful all the time, and needed investigation all the time. So they'll watch him like hawks.
Biden asked nearly all US attorneys to resign.
The key here is not that he has asked them to resign. This is common with a change of administration but with the two that remain. Or rather the one that remains and the one who's role is changing.
The one who remains is the one who is investigating Hunter Biden. I.e. The President has gone out of his way, and done more than he is required to do in order to avoid even the possibility of a hint of interfering into a (almost certainly spurious) investigation into his son. The other is a special prosecutor who was tasked with investigating the origins of the Russia investigation on behalf of Trump. I.e. his job is to prove a completely false conspiracy theory. The interesting bit here is that you're not supposed to be a special prosecutor and a DOJ employee. So Biden has fixed that.
Again going above and beyond to be seen to be doing the right thing.
Very encouraging.
AFZ
Yes. I do recall seeing that somewhere, but I can't find the reference now. I may be misremembering.
Interesting, I saw this complaint, word for word, on a conservative Facebook site that was shared by one of my friends. Either Powderkeg wrote both posts or he copied a post.
Or (for completeness' sake) Powderkeg wrote the original post and someone copied it from them.
From a 2016 report by the Congressional Research Service:
Just to be clear, long ago Texas chose not to be a part of any of the national power grids. They did not want to deal with any federal regulations. Most Texas homes are heated by electric furnaces. When it gets this cold, there is a very big drain on the current system. Moreover, the natural gas generators Texas has built over the past few years are not very efficient in extremely cold weather and a number of their coal-fired generators are off line for maintenance work. And the two nuclear reactors outside of Houston shut down because they were not designed for the extreme cold either.
The one thing that Biden has done, though, is he moved quickly to declare Texas a federal disaster area so they can receive FEMA funds.
Did Texan authorities reject the hydro-electric power stations which Trump so generously offered them?
Joe Biden has been in office for 29 days and according to conservatives he's been able to reverse the effects of a quarter century of Republican governance in the state of Texas. Pull the other one!
Here's a Texas Tribune article discussing the situation. The key bit:
The whole thing is worth a read if you've got the time.
I don't know if you're serious about this, but given the lead time involved in hydroelectric construction, anything started during the Trump administration* most likely wouldn't be online yet.
Turns out Trump wasn't able to get Mexico to pay for it.
Is that why Ted Cruz suddenly flew off to Mexico yesterday?
No, Cruz doesn't give a dam.