Subverting the Supermajority

[Hydra009]

We are told that America is divided and polarized as never before. Yet when it comes to many important areas of policy, that simply isn’t true.

About 75 percent of Americans favor higher taxes for the ultrawealthy. The idea of a federal law that would guarantee paid maternity leave attracts 67 percent support. Eighty-three percent favor strong net neutrality rules for broadband, and more than 60 percent want stronger privacy laws. Seventy-one percent think we should be able to buy drugs imported from Canada, and 92 percent want Medicare to negotiate for lower drug prices. The list goes on.

The defining political fact of our time is not polarization. It’s the inability of even large bipartisan majorities to get what they want on issues like these. Call it the oppression of the supermajority. Ignoring what most of the country wants â€" as much as demagogy and political divisiveness â€" is what is making the public so angry.

Entire categories of public policy options are effectively off-limits because of the combined influence of industry groups and donor interests. There is no principled defense of this state of affairs â€" and indeed, no one attempts to offer such a justification. Instead, legislative stagnation is cynically defended by those who benefit from it with an unconvincing invocation of the rigors of our system of checks and balances.

Source:  https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/05/opinion/oppression-majority.html

Here's an interesting counterpoint to the widespread idea that Americans are split right down the middle ideologically and can't accomplish anything because they don't agree on anything.  Well, there actually are a bunch of issues where one position is wildly popular and its opposite is wildly unpopular.  Take a wild guess which one Congress favors.  (And coincidentally, the popular positions tend to be leftist positions)

Elections come and elections go, one party gets power, then loses it to another party, and day after day, the will of the public goes almost completely unheeded.  Almost as if it were by design.  And this moribund state of affairs is defended, even applauded, in some circles.  No doubt the lobbyists and special interests applaud these brave souls in return.

[Unbeliever]

Elections come and elections go, one party gets power, then loses it to another party, and day after day, the will of the public goes almost completely unheeded.  Almost as if it were by design. 

I think it is by design, the design of the moneyed aristocracy. They hold all all the cards, and know how to shuffled them so that they always win.

I recall that a few years ago Ralph Nader was trying to work with conservatives on this very issue, of the majority of people favoring certain policies that were, in effect "bipartisan" or even non-partisan (like the ones mentioned). I haven't heard anything lately abut that, so I don't think it got very far.

[Baruch]

Suppression of majority, is supposed to only happen, with the Presidential election, thru the Electoral College.  To prevent cities from overly dominating voting.  Other than that, I know of no system to suppress majority will.

On the other hand, the Deep State may have other plans.  Including poll fraud both before and after voting.

Unbeliever is right ... the 1% do own the country.  We are merely consumers.

Actual democracy might only happen in small New England towns ... if there.  When I was part of a condominium association ... we were purely democratic only for a short time, and then we got "professional property management".  You can imagine what that change was like.

[Unbeliever]

It's not so much about suppressing majority will as it is controlling majority will.

[Baruch]

It's not so much about suppressing majority will as it is controlling majority will.

That has been well in hand for over 200 years ... consider the Federalist Papers and Anti-Federalist Papers, all of which occurred in the fake news of 1788.

[Cavebear]

Source:  https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/05/opinion/oppression-majority.html

Here's an interesting counterpoint to the widespread idea that Americans are split right down the middle ideologically and can't accomplish anything because they don't agree on anything.  Well, there actually are a bunch of issues where one position is wildly popular and its opposite is wildly unpopular.  Take a wild guess which one Congress favors.  (And coincidentally, the popular positions tend to be leftist positions)

Elections come and elections go, one party gets power, then loses it to another party, and day after day, the will of the public goes almost completely unheeded.  Almost as if it were by design.  And this moribund state of affairs is defended, even applauded, in some circles.  No doubt the lobbyists and special interests applaud these brave souls in return.

When the supermajority of voters believe what the controlling political party pushes, massive sudden political changes are likely to occur.

2020 will be a very interesting election.  The Republicans will be swamped out of power UNLESS they decide to go utterly anti-Trump. 

[Baruch]

Prophets often eat their glass balls.  Consider ... Hillary has a 98% chance of winning.