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Eric Satt shared a link to the group: Democratic Open Forum.
18 hrs ·
The Electoral College was Founded, with Roots Grounded in Slavery!
James Madison, slave owner from Virginia and the nation's 4th President, proposed that we needed this Electoral College to give southern plantation owners, an equal shot at winning the White House. His fear (and other slave owners' fear) was that there were far more free, White males who could vote in the northern states and that they would control the presidency if each man received an equal vote.
First thing the framers of the Constitution did was count each slave as 3/5 of a person (instead of not being counted at all, which is how it should have been since they had no voting rights...The Three-Fifths Compromise). There were 500,000 slaves in the South. Counting 60% of their population towards votes and creating an Electoral College system that placed an inordinate number of Electors in the South, especially in Virginia, gave the them an unfair advantage towards the presidency. In fact, during the first 32 of 36 years after our Constitution was ratified, the presidency was won by a Virginian!!
Jefferson beat Adams in 1800, because of the Three-Fifths Compromise and Electoral College.
Fast forward. Slavery ended in 1865 yet the institution of the Electoral College still exists. It's a holdover from a terrible time in our nation's past. Slavery is gone so why are we keeping this outdated relic and allowing it to decide Presidents?
In the last 16 years, we have seen two USA Presidents selected, not by the people but by the Electoral College - Bush and now Trump. The former was, by most accounts, an abysmal failure. I don't expect much better from the latter.
http://time.com/4558510/electoral-colleg...y-slavery/
Let's allow Americans to make decisions for America. Kill the Electoral College.
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(12-22-2016, 08:41 PM)X_4AD_84 Wrote: If Trump were just a bit more hideous I'm willing to bet there would have been enough rogue Electors to stop him. Be careful what you wish for. The Electoral College is part of the system of checks and balances. If the electorate goes insane, it can intervene. We were close to that happening this time.
Long term thinking is not something the left is good at. I bet they are wishing they hadn't changed the filibuster rules in the Senate right about now. Oops! 
Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard. -- H.L. Mencken
If one rejects laissez faire on account of man's fallibility and moral weakness, one must for the same reason also reject every kind of government action. -- Ludwig von Mises
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(12-23-2016, 03:57 AM)Galen Wrote: (12-22-2016, 08:41 PM)X_4AD_84 Wrote: If Trump were just a bit more hideous I'm willing to bet there would have been enough rogue Electors to stop him. Be careful what you wish for. The Electoral College is part of the system of checks and balances. If the electorate goes insane, it can intervene. We were close to that happening this time.
Long term thinking is not something the left is good at. I bet they are wishing they hadn't changed the filibuster rules in the Senate right about now. Oops!
Both sides of the political spectrum are as vulnerable to political myopia, to contempt for the Other Side, to stereotyping...
Few saw the 2016 election turning out as it did.
Now we are stuck with a pathological leader and stooges in Congress. We have gone from having sensible politics to having something more reminiscent of some proto-fascist regime like that of Hungary in the late 1930s. We have a President who got elected with the aid of a foreign power hostile to democracy, and one who shows no willingness to bend to try to win over some who 'failed' to support him electorally. If you didn't support him, then 'ask not what your country can do for you -- ask what your country can do to you". The now-dominant Republican Party has gone from seeing service as the objective of government to the enforcement of the will of the economic elites. Those elites have much the same ethos of plantation owners, Gilded-Age plutocrats, and a Soviet-style nomenklatura that people are nothing more than their economic roles, a truly dehumanizing attitude toward the common man. The President won heavily on a contempt for learned, imaginative people in favor of anger, tribalism, and greed. Our incoming President lacked the spine to reject the likes of David DuKKKe and has willingly denied science (climate change) in favor of ideology.
Trump supporters aren't all bad people. They are often decent enough toward family members and neighbors. But I can see the narrowness of their thinking. These people tell me that he will "make America Great Again" without being able to say what that means. What does it really mean? Only for straight, white Protestants? Only for plutocrats? Back in the 1920s, when minorities 'knew their (subordinate, exploited) places' and workers didn't retire until they died on the job or retired to quick death, and when Big Business didn;t have to face unions? Their fault is the superficiality of their thought; they attach themselves to a slogan that can mean whatever they want it to mean but that the person who offers it can then make it mean what he wants it to be. Back to the 60-hour workweek under management as brutal as that of the 1920s? Back to the time in which kids dropped out of school to become industrial workers? Add to that, Donald Trump coarsened American politics, calling for violence toward opponents (something that no prior nominee for a major party had done) and bragged about grabbing women by their crotches.
Oh, there will be plenty of work. That's how it is in a fascist regime; it's just that people get paid just enough to barely survive if they accede to their own exploitation and dehumanization. Yes, Nazi Germany quickly had a labor shortage -- and its workers were serfs. and Donald Trump shows many of the hallmarks of a fascist. The Republican Party seems to act upon the assumption that no human suffering, no inequality, and no environmental degradation is in excess so long as the Right People get what they want.
I see two possible dangers. One is that the Republican Party will use its accession to power with a President who won almost as small a share of the popular vote as Dukakis in 1988 and McCain in 2008 has a right to entrench the power of the Master Class of big landowners, plutocrats, and the executive nomenklatura. Donald Trump is a severely-flawed person, a demagogue, who will surely give America a truly raw deal. Entrenched power on behalf of rapacious elites? Welcome to the Jim Crow South. What could be as bad? The 'Left' winning in much the same manner in 2020 because of its ability to exploit a failure. Imagine the liberal or quasi-liberal nominee winning with the aid of the intelligence services of China as Donald Trump did in 2016 with the connivance of Russia.
I expect to hate life under a Trump Presidency much as non-communists hated life under Fidel Castro. I might not be the sort who takes a makeshift raft with no idea of how to navigate a strong current in waters full of sharks and jellyfish under the baking sun to freedom or to put myself in the wheel well of a jetliner headed toward Europe with the risk of being tossed out early or perishing of hypoxia and cold along the way. I will be ill fit for a fascistic America, but I can easily imagine myself being in a position in which death solves all my personal problems. Donald Trump offers the antithesis of my core beliefs, and at my age I am unlikely to change those.
The best thing for white America (and it was white America that voted for Trump and the Reactionary Party) is that it will adopt values that the non-white part of the American electorate. The black, Hispanic, and Asian parts of the American middle class respect learning and rational thought; they must have done so to get into the middle-income category. White people can get away with a contempt for reason that other people can't. I can think of educational reforms (we need more formal education -- not less -- just to deal with the economic reality of robot production that will cut the need for work.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.
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The electoral college is an integral part of our Republic. I am looking forward to the next four years.
… whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. Phil 4:8 (ESV)
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12-23-2016, 09:04 PM
(This post was last modified: 12-24-2016, 07:25 PM by Eric the Green.)
(12-23-2016, 03:57 AM)Galen Wrote: (12-22-2016, 08:41 PM)X_4AD_84 Wrote: If Trump were just a bit more hideous I'm willing to bet there would have been enough rogue Electors to stop him. Be careful what you wish for. The Electoral College is part of the system of checks and balances. If the electorate goes insane, it can intervene. We were close to that happening this time.
Long term thinking is not something the left is good at. I bet they are wishing they hadn't changed the filibuster rules in the Senate right about now. Oops!
Except Obama was able to get a lot of judges in, except to the Supreme Court of course. Perhaps a stop-gap to some of what the GOP will do to us.
The Oops belongs entirely to those who voted for Trump. As our new energy secretary would say, "oops!" In a televised debate he couldn't even remember the name of the department he now has been appointed to lead, and wanted to abolish That is the pattern of Republicans: appoint people to positions that they want to abolish. Wolves guarding the sheep.
radind "looks forward" to the next 4 years. To me, I could look forward to it if I enjoyed watching a destruction derby.
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One reason the electoral college was adopted, was because it was a substitute for the parliamentary democracy the British were developing.
I say, let's just go to a parliamentary democracy like the British have, and which every other democratic country imitates, and which even the USA imitated when it set up the government in its recent colony Iraq.
So how about that! Iraq has a more democratic government than we have, and we set it up!
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12-23-2016, 10:06 PM
(This post was last modified: 12-23-2016, 10:57 PM by pbrower2a.)
(12-23-2016, 02:36 PM)radind Wrote: The electoral college is an integral part of our Republic. I am looking forward to the next four years.
If it existed to protect the rights of States that got to represent non-voting persons at a rate of three-fifths of a free person, then it is obsolete because the rationale is no longer valid. 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments.
I dread the next four years in which wealth and corporate power are effectively represented and people are not. Government representing economic power is either feudal or fascist.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.
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(12-23-2016, 10:06 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: (12-23-2016, 02:36 PM)radind Wrote: The electoral college is an integral part of our Republic. I am looking forward to the next four years.
If it existed to protect the rights of States that got to represent non-voting persons at a rate of three-fifths of a free person, then it is obsolete because the rationale is no longer valid. 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments.
I dread the next four years in which wealth and corporate power are effectively represented and people are not. Government representing economic power is either feudal or fascist.
The electoral college is not obsolete because it still protects the rights of the smaller states.
… whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. Phil 4:8 (ESV)
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(12-24-2016, 09:31 AM)radind Wrote: (12-23-2016, 10:06 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: (12-23-2016, 02:36 PM)radind Wrote: The electoral college is an integral part of our Republic. I am looking forward to the next four years.
If it existed to protect the rights of States that got to represent non-voting persons at a rate of three-fifths of a free person, then it is obsolete because the rationale is no longer valid. 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments.
I dread the next four years in which wealth and corporate power are effectively represented and people are not. Government representing economic power is either feudal or fascist.
The electoral college is not obsolete because it still protects the rights of the smaller states.
The electoral college does not protect any "rights," except for the right of smaller states to have more say in who is elected president than larger states. At the least, it is undemocratic, and this election proved it beyond a shadow of a doubt.
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Fortunately for me, it would take another Constitutional amendment to do away with the Electoral College.
Quote:https://www.archives.gov/federal-registe...about.html
… “The founding fathers established it in the Constitution as a compromise between election of the President by a vote in Congress and election of the President by a popular vote of qualified citizens.”…
… whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. Phil 4:8 (ESV)
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12-24-2016, 07:20 PM
(This post was last modified: 12-24-2016, 07:21 PM by Eric the Green.)
So it was radind, in addition to making sure the slave states joined the union. I say 1) let the slave states go if they want, and 2) establish a parliamentary system, and thus end the need for the compromise.
As a compromise, the electoral college now does not have any relevance. It does not represent the people.
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12-24-2016, 07:23 PM
(This post was last modified: 12-24-2016, 07:23 PM by Eric the Green.)
(12-24-2016, 06:37 PM)radind Wrote: Fortunately for me, it would take another Constitutional amendment to do away with the Electoral College.
No, it will take states representing 270 electoral votes to agree that they will vote in the electoral college for the winner of the popular vote. That's a law that has been already passed by states with 163 votes.
That could happen sooner than a constitutional amendment, although I don't suppose the current swing states will want to give up their power to choose the president anytime soon.
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(12-24-2016, 07:20 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: So it was radind, in addition to making sure the slave states joined the union. I say 1) let the slave states go if they want, and 2) establish a parliamentary system, and thus end the need for the compromise.
As a compromise, the electoral college now does not have any relevance. It does not represent the people.
The former 'slave states' are no longer slave states. I am hearing more about leaving from the liberal progressives.
The electoral college still protects the rights of the smaller states.
… whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. Phil 4:8 (ESV)
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12-25-2016, 12:46 AM
(This post was last modified: 12-25-2016, 12:49 AM by pbrower2a.)
(12-24-2016, 07:40 PM)radind Wrote: (12-24-2016, 07:20 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: So it was radind, in addition to making sure the slave states joined the union. I say 1) let the slave states go if they want, and 2) establish a parliamentary system, and thus end the need for the compromise.
As a compromise, the electoral college now does not have any relevance. It does not represent the people.
The former 'slave states' are no longer slave states. I am hearing more about leaving from the liberal progressives.
The electoral college still protects the rights of the smaller states.
The compromise necessary in 1780s to protect 'small' states is no longer necessary. Maybe it would make some sense for some of the 'bigger' states (California, Texas, and Florida, especially) to break into smaller ones.
Maybe we liberals do not trust the President-Elect with out civil liberties and expect economic conditions to get far worse very quickly.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.
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12-25-2016, 04:29 AM
(This post was last modified: 12-25-2016, 05:26 AM by Eric the Green.)
(12-24-2016, 07:40 PM)radind Wrote: (12-24-2016, 07:20 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: So it was radind, in addition to making sure the slave states joined the union. I say 1) let the slave states go if they want, and 2) establish a parliamentary system, and thus end the need for the compromise.
As a compromise, the electoral college now does not have any relevance. It does not represent the people.
The former 'slave states' are no longer slave states. I am hearing more about leaving from the liberal progressives.
The electoral college still protects the rights of the smaller states.
That liberals want to leave, shows that in fact it still is a slave state. The legacy of slavery is still with us, especially in places like Alabama, but also everywhere in the USA where people continue to support that legacy by voting for it.
The electoral college protects the ability of a minority of deceived voters to choose our president. Florida, Texas and Pennsylvania are not small states.
It is a bit of a task to control my reactions to people such a radind, who seem intelligent, and willing to understand and explore issues like climate change. I don't want to dump on him too much. But he claims that he cannot listen to much of what I say, because he has a different world view. But it is not a different world view; it is only turning away from reality. Radind is as capable of anyone of recognizing reality. My words will not help him, I know. But I also know that some people in Alabama-- maybe a small minority--- are able to do just that.
People in Alabama can change; especially some young people and their teachers. I enjoyed watching this program tonight on the World Channel, along with The Buddha, Wayne Dyer, and angelic singing by Libera on PBS. It was nice programming for Christmas Eve. This program linked below shows how young people, black and white, can work together to produce a play based on a classic novel and film that represents better than any other what Alabama had to deal with, and still deals with today. I wonder if radind has the courage to watch it.
http://worldchannel.org/programs/episode...ckingbird/
http://www.pbs.org/video/2365417086
We will push forward, and we shall overcome together, or so I hope. Some of us will stand up against the conformity of current opinion. But to "look forward" to a president who intends to destroy the climate, kill wildlife, open up sacred places everywhere to more drilling, more mining, more pipelines, more killing; to destroy our public education system, to take back health care and guarantees of higher pay for overtime, to allow greedy corporations to take advantage of workers and consumers, to take away voting rights and freedom, to stir up racial and religious bias and hatred, and enshrine white supremacy in The White House; to "look forward" to all that, and more stuff like it, knowing full well whom Trump is appointing, shows lack of moral compass.
And despite his claims, radind is still deeply embedded in the old red-state culture and mindset, which is still largely based on the slave society of the past which the electoral college was set up to protect-- and DID protect on Nov.8. But I believe the moral compass does live inside of him, and each of us, if like The Buddha and The Christ, we can learn to calm and transcend the cravings and temptations within us and discover that we are all the divine source; buddhas and christs all. And that we are all one people on one Earth, now under threat from we the people.
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(12-22-2016, 08:41 PM)X_4AD_84 Wrote: (12-22-2016, 08:07 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: Eric Satt shared a link to the group: Democratic Open Forum.
18 hrs ·
The Electoral College was Founded, with Roots Grounded in Slavery!
James Madison, slave owner from Virginia and the nation's 4th President, proposed that we needed this Electoral College to give southern plantation owners, an equal shot at winning the White House. His fear (and other slave owners' fear) was that there were far more free, White males who could vote in the northern states and that they would control the presidency if each man received an equal vote.
First thing the framers of the Constitution did was count each slave as 3/5 of a person (instead of not being counted at all, which is how it should have been since they had no voting rights...The Three-Fifths Compromise). There were 500,000 slaves in the South. Counting 60% of their population towards votes and creating an Electoral College system that placed an inordinate number of Electors in the South, especially in Virginia, gave the them an unfair advantage towards the presidency. In fact, during the first 32 of 36 years after our Constitution was ratified, the presidency was won by a Virginian!!
Jefferson beat Adams in 1800, because of the Three-Fifths Compromise and Electoral College.
Fast forward. Slavery ended in 1865 yet the institution of the Electoral College still exists. It's a holdover from a terrible time in our nation's past. Slavery is gone so why are we keeping this outdated relic and allowing it to decide Presidents?
In the last 16 years, we have seen two USA Presidents selected, not by the people but by the Electoral College - Bush and now Trump. The former was, by most accounts, an abysmal failure. I don't expect much better from the latter.
http://time.com/4558510/electoral-colleg...y-slavery/
Let's allow Americans to make decisions for America. Kill the Electoral College.
If Trump were just a bit more hideous I'm willing to bet there would have been enough rogue Electors to stop him. Be careful what you wish for. The Electoral College is part of the system of checks and balances. If the electorate goes insane, it can intervene. We were close to that happening this time.
No, we were not close to that happening.
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(12-25-2016, 12:46 AM)pbrower2a Wrote: (12-24-2016, 07:40 PM)radind Wrote: (12-24-2016, 07:20 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: So it was radind, in addition to making sure the slave states joined the union. I say 1) let the slave states go if they want, and 2) establish a parliamentary system, and thus end the need for the compromise.
As a compromise, the electoral college now does not have any relevance. It does not represent the people.
The former 'slave states' are no longer slave states. I am hearing more about leaving from the liberal progressives.
The electoral college still protects the rights of the smaller states.
The compromise necessary in 1780s to protect 'small' states is no longer necessary. Maybe it would make some sense for some of the 'bigger' states (California, Texas, and Florida, especially) to break into smaller ones.
Maybe we liberals do not trust the President-Elect with out civil liberties and expect economic conditions to get far worse very quickly.
We have a different opinion and a different worldview. I see things improving and i will take time to see what actually happens.
… whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. Phil 4:8 (ESV)
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(12-25-2016, 04:29 AM)Eric the Green Wrote: (12-24-2016, 07:40 PM)radind Wrote: (12-24-2016, 07:20 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: So it was radind, in addition to making sure the slave states joined the union. I say 1) let the slave states go if they want, and 2) establish a parliamentary system, and thus end the need for the compromise.
As a compromise, the electoral college now does not have any relevance. It does not represent the people.
The former 'slave states' are no longer slave states. I am hearing more about leaving from the liberal progressives.
The electoral college still protects the rights of the smaller states.
That liberals want to leave, shows that in fact it still is a slave state. The legacy of slavery is still with us, especially in places like Alabama, but also everywhere in the USA where people continue to support that legacy by voting for it.
The electoral college protects the ability of a minority of deceived voters to choose our president. Florida, Texas and Pennsylvania are not small states.
It is a bit of a task to control my reactions to people such a radind, who seem intelligent, and willing to understand and explore issues like climate change. I don't want to dump on him too much. But he claims that he cannot listen to much of what I say, because he has a different world view. But it is not a different world view; it is only turning away from reality. Radind is as capable of anyone of recognizing reality. My words will not help him, I know. But I also know that some people in Alabama-- maybe a small minority--- are able to do just that.
People in Alabama can change; especially some young people and their teachers. I enjoyed watching this program tonight on the World Channel, along with The Buddha, Wayne Dyer, and angelic singing by Libera on PBS. It was nice programming for Christmas Eve. This program linked below shows how young people, black and white, can work together to produce a play based on a classic novel and film that represents better than any other what Alabama had to deal with, and still deals with today. I wonder if radind has the courage to watch it.
http://worldchannel.org/programs/episode...ckingbird/
http://www.pbs.org/video/2365417086
We will push forward, and we shall overcome together, or so I hope. Some of us will stand up against the conformity of current opinion. But to "look forward" to a president who intends to destroy the climate, kill wildlife, open up sacred places everywhere to more drilling, more mining, more pipelines, more killing; to destroy our public education system, to take back health care and guarantees of higher pay for overtime, to allow greedy corporations to take advantage of workers and consumers, to take away voting rights and freedom, to stir up racial and religious bias and hatred, and enshrine white supremacy in The White House; to "look forward" to all that, and more stuff like it, knowing full well whom Trump is appointing, shows lack of moral compass.
And despite his claims, radind is still deeply embedded in the old red-state culture and mindset, which is still largely based on the slave society of the past which the electoral college was set up to protect-- and DID protect on Nov.8. But I believe the moral compass does live inside of him, and each of us, if like The Buddha and The Christ, we can learn to calm and transcend the cravings and temptations within us and discover that we are all the divine source; buddhas and christs all. And that we are all one people on one Earth, now under threat from we the people.
We are just too far apart. Merry Christmas.
… whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. Phil 4:8 (ESV)
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12-25-2016, 11:00 AM
(This post was last modified: 12-25-2016, 06:28 PM by pbrower2a.)
I see an America that will behave much like the Marxist caricature of early capitalism with workers sweated with no security even of food on behalf of plutocrats of unrestrained indulgence and unlimited capacity for brutality. The Master Class gets crushing power on January 20, and within a few years, 95% of the people will suffer for 2% of the people in an economic order as exploitative and reactionary as the Jim Crow South. I can see a New Serfdom if America comes under the permanent rule of people who believe that no human suffering is in excess so long as the ruling elite gets whatever it wants.
You may believe that economic power and political power can be separated, but I cannot be so sure. Economic power buys political power (lobbyists really control the Federal and most state legislatures, so we no longer have a representative democracy) and political power leads to the accretion of economic power among the well-connected. Our system now fosters sociopathic behavior among the political and administrative elites.
I see America taking the role of the Evil Empire that the rest of the world dreads -- the Soviet Union except with real economic power that can buy any weapons system, kill any American dissident, and can corrupt any election, in which a hypocritical version of Christianity (really transmuted into the plutolatry of Ayn Rand) 'informs' the culture. The only hope that I have is that people will resist it here and abroad. Otherwise the USA becomes the "Universal State" that is the penultimate and dooming stage of a civilization through its dominant empire. Innovation vanishes; enterprise degrades to cronyism; top leadership ossifies and relies upon yes-men for advice; elites become irresponsible and rapacious. As a saying in the Byzantine Empire (one of Toynbee's examples of the Universal State) went, "to innovate is to injure".
The West has had its offers of the Universal State -- the Hapsburg monarchy of Spain and Austria, Napoleon's continental system, Wilhelmine Germany, Nazi Germany, and the Soviet Union. All have failed. America has much more economic power (and can get more if it turns workplaces into sweatshops) and military power. America has succeeded to now because it can attract the Best and Brightest. That could be over soon.
The educational system, however inadequate it may be in elevating the talents of the poor, is even less competent in fostering humane values among the potential leaders. Youth enter college believing in little more than sex, intoxicants, mass low culture, material gain and indulgence, vocational success, and bureaucratic power and graduate believing much the same. That is much of the problem.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.
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(12-25-2016, 09:40 AM)radind Wrote: We are just too far apart. Merry Christmas.
You are just not paying attention.
May the Christ be reborn in each of us.
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