3 ms·

> And it's a bit insulting to say California voters don't have the wherewithal to digest political advertisements and make their own decisions. On top of this,

> And it's a bit insulting to say California voters don't have the wherewithal to digest political advertisements and make their own decisions. On top of this, voters don’t even need to digest political advertisements. The state sends a booklet that describes all the proposition, the pro position, rebuttals to the pro position, the con position and rebuttals to the con position, plus how much money was spent from each side, plus who made those contributions. All there, in black and white, in your mailbox.

ryandrake 6y ago
Unpopular opinion, but I think we're giving a little too much credit to the average voter. There are a lot of low-information voters out there who don't pour through the booklets and published rebuttals and rebuttals to the rebuttals. Media saturation works. It doesn't always work, and you can always go back and find exceptions, even some very high profile ones, but if it didn't work in general, we wouldn't see so much money pouring into political advertisements. There's a reason we track and measure campaigns by counting dollars spent.
- dragonwriter 6y ago
  > but if it didn't work in general, we wouldn't see so much money pouring into political advertisements. We might, because professional political strategists (who advise campaigns on what works) tend also to be involved in the firms that do this work, and direct their clients to spend money with entities in which they have a financial interest. It is an industry which is absolutely rife with the kinds of conflicts of interest that wouldn't be tolerated for long elsewhere. And its also an industry where people very often fail upward due to connections rather than succeeding on their track record.
- strawberrypuree 6y ago
  I’m one of those schmucks who thinks the solution to ignorance and misinformation is education, and that there should always be more options for voters, not fewer. It’s not about credit to the voters, it’s about making sure the avenues for change are always open. That’s one thing I love about California — it’s a fucking mess, we have no one to blame but ourselves, and there’s always someone trying to do something about it. Compare this to the Texas style of democracy — legislature meets only ever other year and if you don’t like something you can get out - I’ll take the California way.
- int_19h 6y ago
  You don't solve this problem by ditching direct democracy in favor of representative one, though. The end result is that people still vote for populists, who are either clueless and quickly run things into the ground, or are pandering sociopaths. The "philosopher representatives" has been shown to be as much of a sham as philosopher kings.

ryandrake 6y ago

Unpopular opinion, but I think we're giving a little too much credit to the average voter. There are a lot of low-information voters out there who don't pour through the booklets and published rebuttals and rebuttals to the rebuttals. Media saturation works. It doesn't always work, and you can always go back and find exceptions, even some very high profile ones, but if it didn't work in general, we wouldn't see so much money pouring into political advertisements. There's a reason we track and measure campaigns by counting dollars spent.

dragonwriter 6y ago
> but if it didn't work in general, we wouldn't see so much money pouring into political advertisements. We might, because professional political strategists (who advise campaigns on what works) tend also to be involved in the firms that do this work, and direct their clients to spend money with entities in which they have a financial interest. It is an industry which is absolutely rife with the kinds of conflicts of interest that wouldn't be tolerated for long elsewhere. And its also an industry where people very often fail upward due to connections rather than succeeding on their track record.
strawberrypuree 6y ago
I’m one of those schmucks who thinks the solution to ignorance and misinformation is education, and that there should always be more options for voters, not fewer. It’s not about credit to the voters, it’s about making sure the avenues for change are always open. That’s one thing I love about California — it’s a fucking mess, we have no one to blame but ourselves, and there’s always someone trying to do something about it. Compare this to the Texas style of democracy — legislature meets only ever other year and if you don’t like something you can get out - I’ll take the California way.
int_19h 6y ago
You don't solve this problem by ditching direct democracy in favor of representative one, though. The end result is that people still vote for populists, who are either clueless and quickly run things into the ground, or are pandering sociopaths. The "philosopher representatives" has been shown to be as much of a sham as philosopher kings.