4 ms·

So what's the solution? Keep voting Democrat forever? You can't realistically ask a population to vote a party or politician forever. The real solution is to r

by mtgx 8y ago

So what's the solution? Keep voting Democrat forever? You can't realistically ask a population to vote a party or politician forever. The real solution is to reform the U.S. political system so that people don't have Republicans as their only alternative to Democrats when the Democrats become too corrupt, as well, or people just grow tired of some of their policies.

gaius 8y ago
So what's the solution? Keep voting Democrat forever? Remind me who was President when the Glass-Steagall Act was repealed? That’s at the heart of all of this. And the so-called Community Reinvestment Act.
- Randin 8y ago
  Bill Clinton
- jacobolus 8y ago
  Yes, Bill Clinton was a triangulating centrist who ended up with a kind of “Republican lite” message: still “business friendly” but now with less treasonous criminal conspiracy or international war crimes or outright war on labor or gross fiscal irresponsibility vs. the previous two administrations. After his policy agenda got derailed (especially healthcare which he hoped would be one of his signature achievements) and his party was wrecked in the midterms, and then he got dragged into years of frenzied investigations into nothing, he ended up signing a lot of the legislation that the GOP-controlled legislature put on his desk over the coming few years, because he thought that would help him out politically. It didn’t really work, but we got a lot of terrible policy out of it. I don’t think it’s fair to blame “Democrats” in general for a GOP-driven policy agenda though, just because Clinton didn’t veto every bill that came across his desk. Also, in comparison to the administrations either before or after him (or if we compare their Supreme Court picks, ugh) Clinton looks positively dreamy.
- larl 8y ago
  Yeah, ever since Bill Clinton the democrats have been Republicans, and the Republicans have been ... something new.
  - Scipio_Afri 8y ago
    Let's not be stupid... The repeal of Glass Stegal was the "Gramm–Leach–Bliley Act" in 1999. Those are 3 republicans in the name of that act. It was a republican house and Senate and some of the last months of the Clinton administration AFTER Bush had won election. It would've been passed under Bush but this way Clinton was able to also get some policies the Democratic party wanted in a lame duck session before he left. False equivalencies do not make both parties the same.
    - tunap 8y ago
      Don't forget the Commodities Futures Modernization Act when assessing the damage of 21st century banking and the, ahem, "Great Recovery".... https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commodity_Futures_Modernization_Act_of_2000 https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commodity_Futures_Modernizat...
    - deleted 8y ago
      [deleted]
TomMckenny 8y ago
A viable multiple party system is likely ideal but would need reformists in charge to bring it about. Historically in the US, parties undergo radical change: FDR's party is very different from Wilson and even more so than Andrew Johnson; Harding's is very different than Lincoln's. We are in what is called the 6th party system if I'm not mistaken. So practically speaking it could be that the primaries are more important than the actual elections.
- totalZero 8y ago
  First past the post systems generally converge to a two party equilibrium. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duverger%27s_law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duverger%27s_law
  - tialaramex 8y ago
    This is true, but it's orthogonal to the changes in parties themselves. Sometimes a party goes away in name but continues in spirit, at other times an existing name is retained but the core philosophy of the party changes enormously. For example the ordinary term for members of the Conservative and Unionist Party in England is "Tories" but legally Tories are a different and much older political party. The allegiances and policies shifted, those who opposed Whiggs in parliament hundreds of years ago and those today arguing about how exactly to leave the EU have almost nothing in common beyond being vaguely "centre-right".
Angostura 8y ago
Vote for sane republicans in the primaries?
- murph-almighty 8y ago
  People who vote in primaries are often more invested in their party's ideology than those who don't. They then choose people who best represent that ideology best, regardless of their capability of running. Hence why We've seen more and more extreme candidates taking primaries.

by mtgx 8y ago

gaius 8y ago

So what's the solution? Keep voting Democrat forever? Remind me who was President when the Glass-Steagall Act was repealed? That’s at the heart of all of this. And the so-called Community Reinvestment Act.

Randin 8y ago
Bill Clinton
jacobolus 8y ago
Yes, Bill Clinton was a triangulating centrist who ended up with a kind of “Republican lite” message: still “business friendly” but now with less treasonous criminal conspiracy or international war crimes or outright war on labor or gross fiscal irresponsibility vs. the previous two administrations. After his policy agenda got derailed (especially healthcare which he hoped would be one of his signature achievements) and his party was wrecked in the midterms, and then he got dragged into years of frenzied investigations into nothing, he ended up signing a lot of the legislation that the GOP-controlled legislature put on his desk over the coming few years, because he thought that would help him out politically. It didn’t really work, but we got a lot of terrible policy out of it. I don’t think it’s fair to blame “Democrats” in general for a GOP-driven policy agenda though, just because Clinton didn’t veto every bill that came across his desk. Also, in comparison to the administrations either before or after him (or if we compare their Supreme Court picks, ugh) Clinton looks positively dreamy.
larl 8y ago
Yeah, ever since Bill Clinton the democrats have been Republicans, and the Republicans have been ... something new.
- Scipio_Afri 8y ago
  Let's not be stupid... The repeal of Glass Stegal was the "Gramm–Leach–Bliley Act" in 1999. Those are 3 republicans in the name of that act. It was a republican house and Senate and some of the last months of the Clinton administration AFTER Bush had won election. It would've been passed under Bush but this way Clinton was able to also get some policies the Democratic party wanted in a lame duck session before he left. False equivalencies do not make both parties the same.
  - tunap 8y ago
    Don't forget the Commodities Futures Modernization Act when assessing the damage of 21st century banking and the, ahem, "Great Recovery".... https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commodity_Futures_Modernization_Act_of_2000 https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commodity_Futures_Modernizat...
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]

TomMckenny 8y ago

A viable multiple party system is likely ideal but would need reformists in charge to bring it about. Historically in the US, parties undergo radical change: FDR's party is very different from Wilson and even more so than Andrew Johnson; Harding's is very different than Lincoln's. We are in what is called the 6th party system if I'm not mistaken. So practically speaking it could be that the primaries are more important than the actual elections.

totalZero 8y ago
First past the post systems generally converge to a two party equilibrium. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duverger%27s_law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duverger%27s_law
- tialaramex 8y ago
  This is true, but it's orthogonal to the changes in parties themselves. Sometimes a party goes away in name but continues in spirit, at other times an existing name is retained but the core philosophy of the party changes enormously. For example the ordinary term for members of the Conservative and Unionist Party in England is "Tories" but legally Tories are a different and much older political party. The allegiances and policies shifted, those who opposed Whiggs in parliament hundreds of years ago and those today arguing about how exactly to leave the EU have almost nothing in common beyond being vaguely "centre-right".

Angostura 8y ago

Vote for sane republicans in the primaries?

murph-almighty 8y ago
People who vote in primaries are often more invested in their party's ideology than those who don't. They then choose people who best represent that ideology best, regardless of their capability of running. Hence why We've seen more and more extreme candidates taking primaries.