6 ms·

Or, they get threatened with loss of their seats. Which is accomplished by educating the population. It's a lot more gratifying to live in this conspiratorial

by azernik 11y ago

Or, they get threatened with loss of their seats. Which is accomplished by educating the population. It's a lot more gratifying to live in this conspiratorial world where a romanticized resistance against our corporate overlords is the only way, but it's not a useful mental model for actually succeeding at anything.

scotty79 11y ago
> Or, they get threatened with loss of their seats. They get seats by spending money on campaigns. Public is easily manipulated by political marketing. The only thing that could put them out of there seats would be more money spent for a smear campaign against them. > It's a lot more gratifying to live in this conspiratorial world where a romanticized resistance against our corporate overlords is the only way, but it's not a useful mental model for actually succeeding at anything. As opposed to romanticized world where money (got from industry) put into political marketing has no effect on votes and you achieve political goals by educating voters (at no cost other than your sincere effort)?
- twoodfin 11y ago
  You might want to look into how much money Jeb Bush's Super PAC has spent in the primary season so far, to very little effect.
  - ddingus 11y ago
    At the National level, it does appear lots of money won't necessarily translate into a win. However, those who do win, unless they are named Sanders, will be bound by said money. On a local level, money does matter more, and it's effects are meaningful.
    - cmdkeen 11y ago
      On a local level a huge number of candidates run unopposed. Even for Congress there were 31 unopposed candidates in 2014. Money isn't everything. Giving a damn matters too.
      - mikeash 11y ago
        How many of those congressional races were unopposed because the potential opposition didn't have enough money to make a credible effort?
    - mixedCase 11y ago
      I bet it took a lot of hard work not to name Trump there.
      - ddingus 11y ago
        How so?
- cookiecaper 11y ago
  >They get seats by spending money on campaigns. Public is easily manipulated by political marketing. The only thing that could put them out of there seats would be more money spent for a smear campaign against them. This is overly simplistic. If it were exclusively about cash resources, the most cash-rich candidates would win every time. We know that doesn't happen. Yes, money does play an important role (because it costs money to run ads, print signage, get people to hang said signage, staff phone banks, etc. -- not because there's some reptilian overlord that has to be paid before he lets you become POTUS), but it's not the only role. More important than money is to control a media outlet that the general public trusts. Pundits have more power than politicians because it's so easy for them to generate outrage. ABC, CBS, NBC, and the cable channels really hold the bulk of political sway in this country. They can frame not only the political discourse, but all significant social discourse, in the terms that they prefer. The internet is dampening and decentralizing their power a bit, which is why non-establishment candidates like Ron Paul and Bernie Sanders were able to gain any traction at all, but their influence is still massive.
  - alanwatts 11y ago
    >If it were exclusively about cash resources, the most cash-rich candidates would win every time. Correct me if I'm wrong but haven't the past 3 presidential elections been won by the candidate with the biggest cash flow? And yes, of course it is not the only factor as you noted, media coverage is crucial and information via the internet is rapidly becoming a more important factor. But the problem is: the same people who own and operate these massive media corporations also own the internet infrastructure and are also the ones who are pouring massive amounts of bribes/funding into the elections.
    - cookiecaper 11y ago
      >Correct me if I'm wrong but haven't the past 3 presidential elections been won by the candidate with the biggest cash flow? First, correlation is not causation. Second, this chart [0] shows Romney and Obama were neck-and-neck as far as dollars raised, and that Romney actually had spent slightly more than Obama. This chart says it covers through September 2012, so maybe Obama did end up spending a bit more (or maybe he didn't), but the difference in spending is very small. When you ask why Romney lost in 2012, there are a couple answers that get cited. First, Romney's leaked "47% comment" was disastrous for him. Second, Obama's team used technology much more effectively to get out the vote. Apparently there was a group working on software on Romney's side, but it wasn't managed correctly and the software was not usable by election day. [0] http://elections.nytimes.com/2012/campaign-finance http://elections.nytimes.com/2012/campaign-finance
- lloyd-christmas 11y ago
  Let's play a game. It's called "NAME! YOUR! REPRESENTATIVES!!!!". We'll start with the easiest and work our way up (subjectively): 1) Who's the President? 2) Who's your Governor? 3) Who's your Mayor? 4) Who are your Senators? 5) Who's your Representative? 6) Who's your State Senator? 7) Who's your State Representative/Assembly member?* I ask these questions every time someone brings up their "The system is rigged, maaaaan". I've only found a handful of people that could name their Representative. Most people can't even name their senators. I always find it fascinating how people are able to trash talk their representatives when they don't even know who they are. * Excluding you communist unicameral Nebraskans
  - guard-of-terra 11y ago
    Sounds like a useful website to have.
    - lloyd-christmas 11y ago
      http://whoismyrepresentative.com/ http://whoismyrepresentative.com/
  - khattam 11y ago
    The way system is setup, there is no way someone who cares for me is in any of those positions, because I did nothing to put them there, and nor did anyone who voted for them. They did it themselves and got help from people who they can help back. You can waste your time knowing about these people and trying to get them to do something which you think is good for everyone even though there are powerful people who pay him to not do it, or spend the time to be one day in a position to get them to do something good for you by paying them. I think the latter will be much more effective and long term that you don't need to know anything or anyone. You just need to find the person who has that power. When that person is no longer in power, just find the next one who is. If you never need those people, even better that you didn't spend time on any of those shitheads.
    - rms_returns 11y ago
webkike 11y ago
The fact of the matter is we've always lived in a 50/50 conspiracy world. Sure, its never as bad as the worst extreme we can think of, but its always half as bad. Not even Stalin's dictatorship, which is what 1984 is based on, was as bad as 1984.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
- bobwaycott 11y ago
  1984 was not based on Stalin's dictatorship. There seems to be a common misconception among too many people who've heard this parroted, erroneously assuming that because Orwell was strongly wary of, and frequently wrote about, totalitarianism, this must mean he was writing about Stalin specifically. He was not. In fact, 1984 was written just as much about the UK and USA as it was totalitarian fascism and Stalinism. This is borne out in his letters. 1984 was focused on what Orwell believed might happen to the world if the atomic showdown was inconclusive (a rough paraphrase of one of his remarks in a letter). It was written as a tale of what would happen when the West—specifically the UK and USA—would find themselves challenged and take the attractive slide away from democratically operated [socialist] society toward strengthening and worshipping millionaires and "petty fuhrers", leading to outright totalitarianism that offered stability, predictability, and controlled externalities, all of which would provide simpler, thoughtless, controlled selves. For more directly from Orwell in one of his letters considered to foreshadow 1984's thesis, see here: https://books.google.com/books?id=WXGbfAHYecwC&pg=PA232&lpg=PA232#v=onepage&q&f=false https://books.google.com/books?id=WXGbfAHYecwC&pg=PA232&lpg=...
  - pakled_engineer 11y ago
    1984 is definitely influenced from the state propaganda Orwell saw coming out the Soviet Union such as the book character Emmanuel Goldstein who is quite obviously Trotsky, and the state rewriting history by editing Goldstein out of party photographs is Trotsky again, the idea of loving a leader and hating the party, many more parallels. It's written as a warning of how futile it will be to resist totalitarianism in a future advanced technological state
alanwatts 11y ago
What is a useful mental model for succeeding?
- azernik 11y ago
  Here's a plausible one. Money doesn't override voters, but it can make decisions that the voters don't care about. How many voters care enough to check up on their Congressional representatives' views on copyright? And how many lobbyists do? And this cynicism about the system only makes the problem worse. Why check up on votes on banking regulations if you think the donors are going to decide it anyway?

by azernik 11y ago

scotty79 11y ago

> Or, they get threatened with loss of their seats. They get seats by spending money on campaigns. Public is easily manipulated by political marketing. The only thing that could put them out of there seats would be more money spent for a smear campaign against them. > It's a lot more gratifying to live in this conspiratorial world where a romanticized resistance against our corporate overlords is the only way, but it's not a useful mental model for actually succeeding at anything. As opposed to romanticized world where money (got from industry) put into political marketing has no effect on votes and you achieve political goals by educating voters (at no cost other than your sincere effort)?

twoodfin 11y ago
You might want to look into how much money Jeb Bush's Super PAC has spent in the primary season so far, to very little effect.
- ddingus 11y ago
  At the National level, it does appear lots of money won't necessarily translate into a win. However, those who do win, unless they are named Sanders, will be bound by said money. On a local level, money does matter more, and it's effects are meaningful.
  - cmdkeen 11y ago
    On a local level a huge number of candidates run unopposed. Even for Congress there were 31 unopposed candidates in 2014. Money isn't everything. Giving a damn matters too.
    - mikeash 11y ago
      How many of those congressional races were unopposed because the potential opposition didn't have enough money to make a credible effort?
  - mixedCase 11y ago
    I bet it took a lot of hard work not to name Trump there.
    - ddingus 11y ago
      How so?
cookiecaper 11y ago
>They get seats by spending money on campaigns. Public is easily manipulated by political marketing. The only thing that could put them out of there seats would be more money spent for a smear campaign against them. This is overly simplistic. If it were exclusively about cash resources, the most cash-rich candidates would win every time. We know that doesn't happen. Yes, money does play an important role (because it costs money to run ads, print signage, get people to hang said signage, staff phone banks, etc. -- not because there's some reptilian overlord that has to be paid before he lets you become POTUS), but it's not the only role. More important than money is to control a media outlet that the general public trusts. Pundits have more power than politicians because it's so easy for them to generate outrage. ABC, CBS, NBC, and the cable channels really hold the bulk of political sway in this country. They can frame not only the political discourse, but all significant social discourse, in the terms that they prefer. The internet is dampening and decentralizing their power a bit, which is why non-establishment candidates like Ron Paul and Bernie Sanders were able to gain any traction at all, but their influence is still massive.
- alanwatts 11y ago
  >If it were exclusively about cash resources, the most cash-rich candidates would win every time. Correct me if I'm wrong but haven't the past 3 presidential elections been won by the candidate with the biggest cash flow? And yes, of course it is not the only factor as you noted, media coverage is crucial and information via the internet is rapidly becoming a more important factor. But the problem is: the same people who own and operate these massive media corporations also own the internet infrastructure and are also the ones who are pouring massive amounts of bribes/funding into the elections.
  - cookiecaper 11y ago
    >Correct me if I'm wrong but haven't the past 3 presidential elections been won by the candidate with the biggest cash flow? First, correlation is not causation. Second, this chart [0] shows Romney and Obama were neck-and-neck as far as dollars raised, and that Romney actually had spent slightly more than Obama. This chart says it covers through September 2012, so maybe Obama did end up spending a bit more (or maybe he didn't), but the difference in spending is very small. When you ask why Romney lost in 2012, there are a couple answers that get cited. First, Romney's leaked "47% comment" was disastrous for him. Second, Obama's team used technology much more effectively to get out the vote. Apparently there was a group working on software on Romney's side, but it wasn't managed correctly and the software was not usable by election day. [0] http://elections.nytimes.com/2012/campaign-finance http://elections.nytimes.com/2012/campaign-finance
lloyd-christmas 11y ago
Let's play a game. It's called "NAME! YOUR! REPRESENTATIVES!!!!". We'll start with the easiest and work our way up (subjectively): 1) Who's the President? 2) Who's your Governor? 3) Who's your Mayor? 4) Who are your Senators? 5) Who's your Representative? 6) Who's your State Senator? 7) Who's your State Representative/Assembly member?* I ask these questions every time someone brings up their "The system is rigged, maaaaan". I've only found a handful of people that could name their Representative. Most people can't even name their senators. I always find it fascinating how people are able to trash talk their representatives when they don't even know who they are. * Excluding you communist unicameral Nebraskans
- guard-of-terra 11y ago
  Sounds like a useful website to have.
  - lloyd-christmas 11y ago
    http://whoismyrepresentative.com/ http://whoismyrepresentative.com/
- khattam 11y ago
  The way system is setup, there is no way someone who cares for me is in any of those positions, because I did nothing to put them there, and nor did anyone who voted for them. They did it themselves and got help from people who they can help back. You can waste your time knowing about these people and trying to get them to do something which you think is good for everyone even though there are powerful people who pay him to not do it, or spend the time to be one day in a position to get them to do something good for you by paying them. I think the latter will be much more effective and long term that you don't need to know anything or anyone. You just need to find the person who has that power. When that person is no longer in power, just find the next one who is. If you never need those people, even better that you didn't spend time on any of those shitheads.
  - rms_returns 11y ago

webkike 11y ago

The fact of the matter is we've always lived in a 50/50 conspiracy world. Sure, its never as bad as the worst extreme we can think of, but its always half as bad. Not even Stalin's dictatorship, which is what 1984 is based on, was as bad as 1984.

deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
bobwaycott 11y ago
1984 was not based on Stalin's dictatorship. There seems to be a common misconception among too many people who've heard this parroted, erroneously assuming that because Orwell was strongly wary of, and frequently wrote about, totalitarianism, this must mean he was writing about Stalin specifically. He was not. In fact, 1984 was written just as much about the UK and USA as it was totalitarian fascism and Stalinism. This is borne out in his letters. 1984 was focused on what Orwell believed might happen to the world if the atomic showdown was inconclusive (a rough paraphrase of one of his remarks in a letter). It was written as a tale of what would happen when the West—specifically the UK and USA—would find themselves challenged and take the attractive slide away from democratically operated [socialist] society toward strengthening and worshipping millionaires and "petty fuhrers", leading to outright totalitarianism that offered stability, predictability, and controlled externalities, all of which would provide simpler, thoughtless, controlled selves. For more directly from Orwell in one of his letters considered to foreshadow 1984's thesis, see here: https://books.google.com/books?id=WXGbfAHYecwC&pg=PA232&lpg=PA232#v=onepage&q&f=false https://books.google.com/books?id=WXGbfAHYecwC&pg=PA232&lpg=...
- pakled_engineer 11y ago
  1984 is definitely influenced from the state propaganda Orwell saw coming out the Soviet Union such as the book character Emmanuel Goldstein who is quite obviously Trotsky, and the state rewriting history by editing Goldstein out of party photographs is Trotsky again, the idea of loving a leader and hating the party, many more parallels. It's written as a warning of how futile it will be to resist totalitarianism in a future advanced technological state

alanwatts 11y ago

What is a useful mental model for succeeding?

azernik 11y ago
Here's a plausible one. Money doesn't override voters, but it can make decisions that the voters don't care about. How many voters care enough to check up on their Congressional representatives' views on copyright? And how many lobbyists do? And this cynicism about the system only makes the problem worse. Why check up on votes on banking regulations if you think the donors are going to decide it anyway?