4 ms·

Visualizing the State of Democracy, by Country

7 points by jonbaer 6y ago

ebg13 6y ago
It's an interesting visualization, but, to reuse a phrase that I heard here recently, these scores are a Ouija board based on entirely arbitrary choices made by an entirely arbitrary group of people. The US has not met the alleged criteria for Full Democracy or even Flawed Democracy within the bounds of my living memory. None of our elections are fair because of: - extreme gerrymandering - rampant voter suppression - first-past-the-post decisionmaking that entrenches two faces of a neoliberal corporatocracy distinct only in their identity politics but not significantly in their economic or foreign policies - laws that prevent or obstruct ever investigating plausibly fraudulent election outcomes in favor of announcing results expediently - media conglomerate kingmaking - perpetually fatally flawed vote casting mechanisms that regularly and repeatedly flip, invalidate, and discard votes, often without any kind of oversight or potential for review (e.g. a paper trail) - voter fatigue because this shit just keeps happening over and over - repeatedly discarding mailed-in votes just because and then not making voting days a mandated holiday - and a million other things that I'm not even thinking of On top of that our executive branch has zero transparency whatsoever, and many of our highest positions of power go to people who are there only because they kiss the ring, including people currently who have literally no merits other than being related. We even have a justice department memo now saying that the Whitehouse is exempt from Federal Anti-Nepotism laws. Also the questions are just complete rubbish, from treating "confidence" as a valid proxy for democracy to believing that some random schmoe's answer to "On average, other people X" means fuck all.
- burfog 6y ago
  You missed a few, but not a million other things. You missed the voter fraud. There are some ingenious and horrifying methods described here: https://nypost.com/2020/08/29/political-insider-explains-voter-fraud-with-mail-in-ballots/ https://nypost.com/2020/08/29/political-insider-explains-vot... You missed the fact that non-citizens in California have given the state an unfair representation in the US House of Representatives. This one is particularly bad, since the state has an incentive to help people violate the law. You missed the fact that voters don't even have to identify themselves properly in many states. India and Mexico can manage this, but here it became a political issue. Trust in democracy is eroded because there is no possible way to even tell if ID fraud is occurring.
burfog 6y ago
Let's call that a "Flawed Visualization". I always start with a quick check, comparing the USA with a few specific European countries. I can see that the USA got ranked below the UK, below Sweden, and below Germany. OK, we can disregard this data. Another quick check is to look at the USA by year. If the rating suddenly dropped in 2016, when the people got what they wanted despite heavy opposition from the powerful elite, then the rating is junk.
- colejohnson66 6y ago
  Sure, Trump had opposition from rich people, but make no mistake: the conservative elite wanted a right-wing candidate
  - burfog 6y ago
    What conservative elite? Are there any? If you mean the republican party leadership, they wanted Jeb! Or maybe, it could have been Rubio or Kasich. They definitely did not want Cruz or Trump. They kept fighting against the people's choice even after he got in office. Romney is still fighting.
- lefrenchy 6y ago
  Didn’t Trump literally lose the popular vote?
  - burfog 6y ago
    That literally wasn't the contest to be won. The rules have been set in our Constitution for ages, long before 2016, so nobody should be surprised. Nevertheless, many people do suspect that he actually got the most votes. One of the actual troubles in the USA is that we do see ballot stuffing. Witnesses saw people filling out ballots after the election in Broward County, FL. It will likely be far worse for 2020. Here are some of the clever ways that it happens: https://nypost.com/2020/08/29/political-insider-explains-voter-fraud-with-mail-in-ballots/ https://nypost.com/2020/08/29/political-insider-explains-vot... So, not saying the USA is perfect... but the visualization is still clearly biased for political reasons.

7 points by jonbaer 6y ago

It's an interesting visualization, but, to reuse a phrase that I heard here recently, these scores are a Ouija board based on entirely arbitrary choices made by an entirely arbitrary group of people. The US has not met the alleged criteria for Full Democracy or even Flawed Democracy within the bounds of my living memory. None of our elections are fair because of: - extreme gerrymandering - rampant voter suppression - first-past-the-post decisionmaking that entrenches two faces of a neoliberal corporatocracy distinct only in their identity politics but not significantly in their economic or foreign policies - laws that prevent or obstruct ever investigating plausibly fraudulent election outcomes in favor of announcing results expediently - media conglomerate kingmaking - perpetually fatally flawed vote casting mechanisms that regularly and repeatedly flip, invalidate, and discard votes, often without any kind of oversight or potential for review (e.g. a paper trail) - voter fatigue because this shit just keeps happening over and over - repeatedly discarding mailed-in votes just because and then not making voting days a mandated holiday - and a million other things that I'm not even thinking of On top of that our executive branch has zero transparency whatsoever, and many of our highest positions of power go to people who are there only because they kiss the ring, including people currently who have literally no merits other than being related. We even have a justice department memo now saying that the Whitehouse is exempt from Federal Anti-Nepotism laws. Also the questions are just complete rubbish, from treating "confidence" as a valid proxy for democracy to believing that some random schmoe's answer to "On average, other people X" means fuck all.

burfog 6y ago
You missed a few, but not a million other things. You missed the voter fraud. There are some ingenious and horrifying methods described here: https://nypost.com/2020/08/29/political-insider-explains-voter-fraud-with-mail-in-ballots/ https://nypost.com/2020/08/29/political-insider-explains-vot... You missed the fact that non-citizens in California have given the state an unfair representation in the US House of Representatives. This one is particularly bad, since the state has an incentive to help people violate the law. You missed the fact that voters don't even have to identify themselves properly in many states. India and Mexico can manage this, but here it became a political issue. Trust in democracy is eroded because there is no possible way to even tell if ID fraud is occurring.

burfog 6y ago

Let's call that a "Flawed Visualization". I always start with a quick check, comparing the USA with a few specific European countries. I can see that the USA got ranked below the UK, below Sweden, and below Germany. OK, we can disregard this data. Another quick check is to look at the USA by year. If the rating suddenly dropped in 2016, when the people got what they wanted despite heavy opposition from the powerful elite, then the rating is junk.

colejohnson66 6y ago
Sure, Trump had opposition from rich people, but make no mistake: the conservative elite wanted a right-wing candidate
- burfog 6y ago
  What conservative elite? Are there any? If you mean the republican party leadership, they wanted Jeb! Or maybe, it could have been Rubio or Kasich. They definitely did not want Cruz or Trump. They kept fighting against the people's choice even after he got in office. Romney is still fighting.
lefrenchy 6y ago
Didn’t Trump literally lose the popular vote?
- burfog 6y ago
  That literally wasn't the contest to be won. The rules have been set in our Constitution for ages, long before 2016, so nobody should be surprised. Nevertheless, many people do suspect that he actually got the most votes. One of the actual troubles in the USA is that we do see ballot stuffing. Witnesses saw people filling out ballots after the election in Broward County, FL. It will likely be far worse for 2020. Here are some of the clever ways that it happens: https://nypost.com/2020/08/29/political-insider-explains-voter-fraud-with-mail-in-ballots/ https://nypost.com/2020/08/29/political-insider-explains-vot... So, not saying the USA is perfect... but the visualization is still clearly biased for political reasons.