6 ms·

Aaron seemed very opposed to large corporations and their control of information. The increase of control seems to be timed and in favor with the incoming admin

by webXL 6y ago

Aaron seemed very opposed to large corporations and their control of information. The increase of control seems to be timed and in favor with the incoming administration. Government using business to do its bidding is very troubling, and I'm sure Aaron would have been very concerned about that. Remember, this increase of power can be wielded by the next populist leader and there are plenty of dark possibilities outside of the current Overton Window.

cbozeman 6y ago
I've often spoken with my more left-leaning friends about the need to try and find middle ground with my more right-leaning friends, and quickly. Donald Trump was an incompetent, by almost any measure you want to use. However, he shifted the Overton Window dramatically. When the Republican version of Barack Obama bursts onto the scene - someone eloquent, competent, and thoroughly able to move effectively in the political sphere, there could be a very real problem for Democrats.
- Dumblydorr 6y ago
  I'm bullish on Democrats due to demographic shifts, but they'll need to gain more senators from rural states if they want to pass major legislation. GOP has to somehow consolidate Trumpists with Never Trumpers, may be tricky to do. How will independents respond to GOP after Trump is finished? Will they forgive and forget? So, in my view, both parties need to adapt or they will not achieve that much. Imagine if Dems had 49 senators, how little would get done in Biden's term, indeed that may be the case after midterms.
  - symlinkk 6y ago
    Which demographic shifts specifically?
  - shrimp_emoji 6y ago
    Or remove the electoral college (which is an anti-democratic contrivance originally meant to cajole then-slave states into remaining in the Union[0]) and make voting mandatory to completely nuke the GOP's strategy of voter disempowerment (which is their best hope as demographic shifts increasingly favor the Democrats). 0: https://time.com/4558510/electoral-college-history-slavery/ https://time.com/4558510/electoral-college-history-slavery/
    - hajile 6y ago
      The South could have a 3/5 slave vote with or without an electoral college. That was related to total votes and representatives in congress. If anything, Shay's Rebellion was the real reason. The majority (farmers) voted with their guns to steal from the minority (bankers). Democracy is two wolves and a sheep voting on what to eat for supper. Several Federalist papers are dedicated exclusively to this idea and the problems of previous democracies. Defending minorities (specifically religious minorities) was the primary reason for going with a Constitutional Republic instead. The Senate was a similar concession that smaller or less populous states deserved equal voice to larger states. I'd note that if slavery were the reason for the formation, then the Senate would have been a bad idea as it stripped power away from the Southern states (as that article points out, Virginia alone had more than 10% of the total House votes).
      - dragonwriter 6y ago
        > I’d note that if slavery were the reason for the formation, then the Senate would have been a bad idea as it stripped power away from the Southern states (as that article points out, Virginia alone had more than 10% of the total House votes). Its true that with the apportionment of House votes in the Constitution, the Senate (by comparison) had weaker representation of the South (30.8% in the Senate, 35.4% in the House), but, as with terms explicitly protecting slavery, the concern wasn’t for the immediate effect, but as insurance against trends that were already apparent with the expected internal and external expansion of the US and its political development. With the first Congress seated after the apportionment due to the 1790 Census (which included Kentucky, admitted in 1792), the Senate already was slightly more favorable to the South than the House (the South had 38.4% of the Senate and 37.1% of the House). With the Congress seated after the 1800 apportionment, the South had 46.1% of the Senate, and 39.0% of the House. The idea that the Senate would have been a “bad idea” in terms of political power in the South assumes that no one at the time of the Constitution had even considered the possibility of thinking a few years down the road.
    - cbozeman 6y ago
      That's a single legal scholar's interpretation, not even a historian's.
  - hajile 6y ago
    In this election, Trump received more votes than any other sitting president in history. He lost and now the Democrats seem to assume that those 75M people will suddenly change their beliefs because 78M people hold different beliefs. Moreover, it seems that people voted against Trump more than for Biden because they thought Trump was rude and distasteful. They fail to recall that this was actually a political route for Democrats. Democrats lost seats in the House when they were expected to gain. They eked out parity in the Senate that probably disappears in 2 years. More importantly, they lost almost all state government races. Remember, Trump's biggest policy positions (bring our troops home, bring our jobs back, hard on china, the wall, etc) were all Democrat positions a mere 5-7 years ago. Now that the Republicans have taken over those more centrist ideas, they have gained a huge number of supporters. The Democrats are fractured between centrists and progressives. That fracture is much worse than the Republicans because it is ideological while the Republican fracture is a cult of personality. Trump will fade. Another person will replace him. They will have all of his populism and charm (yes, he's a natural entertainer). They won't have his rude abrasiveness. He'll then have the majority needed to censor the other side now that the Republicans have decided they agree with the progressives on that point.
    - esyir 6y ago
      I do hope that happens. Seeing that all principles here on censorship essentially turn into "censor those not on my side", I'd derive some meagre satisfaction from that backswing, even if I too well burn at that same stake.
  - mech422 6y ago
    I can't reply directly to hijile below, so I'll leave this here: >>Democrats seem to assume that those 75M people will suddenly change their beliefs as long as 78M people continue to hold their beliefs, I really don't think the democrats care. A minority vote is a minority vote - whether its 4.9 percent or 49 percent. Personally, I think the dems will work more towards eliminating the EC and gerrymandering thats gone against them. edit: change second '4.9' to '49'. I really need more coffee..
- sudosysgen 6y ago
  I agree. As someone pretty far on the left I was shook by the banning of Donald Trump, and this trend of censorship makes me really, really, really scared. If you're anything but a very centrist Democrat, this should scare the crap out of you.
  - dragonwriter 6y ago
    The actual Left has been a target of private censorship and public suppression even when the Right got a free pass for so long that, as someone on the Left, I’m not at all scared that some private censorship is happening to violent extremists on the Right (mildly surprised, but not scared.) Though “you should be scared because what has been happening to the Left longer, and much more severely, than to the Right might happen to you” is a pretty common propaganda theme directed at the Left by the Right recently. Unlike the Right, which has had an existence of extreme privilege where even the KKK got a pass on government scrutiny because it was valued loyal organization around the same time that the second big round of government institutionalized anti-Communist hysteria, the Left has been built around organizations to route around establishment suppression for over a century. And most people to the left of center-right neoliberal Democrats are quite aware of that.
    - sudosysgen 6y ago
      While this is true, on the internet at least I haven't seen leftists sites like revleft or crimethinc get denied access to hosters, yet. But yes, you're right that the left is the source of private censorship for a long time, which is why lemmy is developped by a lot of leftists, for example. If they're ready to ban a right wing president though, I can imagine how severe the crackdown on the left would be.
      - amanaplanacanal 6y ago
        Honestly, if leftists start calling for violent Revolution because they lose an election, I’m not going to be too upset if they get deplatformed too. Perhaps I’m just too comfortable with my life, but I suspect most other people would agree.
- bebopcowboy 6y ago
  He won’t. They’ll just censor him
- conception 6y ago
  This can only be true if Republican efforts at voter suppression continue to be successful while also states don’t choose to forgo the electoral college. Republicans only win because of a tremendously successful campaign to not let people vote. They are very much a minority party by any measure except outsized influence. They have fewer voters. Fewer people identify with them. Fewer people support their policies. If Democrats can continue to get voters out, like in GA, they will lose seats.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
  - indigochill 6y ago
    There's an interesting problem here, though, which is why the US federal government is structured as it is: there are fewer people in, say, Utah than in California. And generally people in California may have different interests than those in Utah. But as citizens of the US, Utah(ians?) deserve representation at the national level, which they just wouldn't have in a first-past-the-post popular vote. A direct popular vote would always give the advantage to candidates who represent coastal and urban interests because that's where people are overwhelmingly concentrated, and this would leave rural voters disenfranchised. It might be interesting to re-evaluate whether representation by geography still makes sense. I'm more partial to the parliamentary approach, where parties get representation proportional to votes cast for them, so this way there could be a "rural interests party" which rural voters could vote for and receive representation proportional to their population. This might also do an end-run around the mind-bogglingly corrupt practice of gerrymandering?
    - hguant 6y ago
      The question of what to call citizens of Utah is a long and thorny one; currently the US Government Printing Office uses "Utahn." [0] Apparently this was a big 'issue' in the 80's, when the US government usage was "Utahan" or "Utahian," while the local usage was "Utahn." Webster's currently lists "Utahan" as the correct usage, as far as I can tell (their website is trash - searching for "Utahan" and "Utahn" just redirects to the "Utah" entry. [0] https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GPO-STYLEMANUAL-2016/pdf/GPO-STYLEMANUAL-2016.pdf https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GPO-STYLEMANUAL-2016/pdf...
- Reedx 6y ago
  If a sitting President can be deplatformed from the Internet, then wouldn't a Presidential Candidate be? Would said candidate be able to run a successful campaign without it?
  - webXL 6y ago
    > someone eloquent, competent, and thoroughly able to move effectively in the political sphere How will they be able to deplatform that? Are you endorsing deplatforming anyone to the right of Joe Biden?
    - Reedx 6y ago
      No, just extrapolating from here. It could be used against the next Bernie too. Any populist candidate, whether from the left or right.
      - deleted 6y ago
        [deleted]
  - joshuahaglund 6y ago
    If they incite violence yeah. Is that confusing?
    - Reedx 6y ago
      Check back when Bernie (or the next Bernie, if he doesn't run again) is deplatformed, and we'll see who was confused. Just remember back to how the media and establishment pulled together to stop Bernie during the primaries. Think this new tool won't be used the next time they're in danger of losing power to an outsider?
      - joshuahaglund 6y ago
        If "the next Bernie" promotes violence then he's not the next Bernie and I won't support him and I don't understand what's so hard to understand about that. Y'all think "it's both sides" but, in America, this call to violence (straight up armed insurrection) is unique in right wing politics. And if it showed up in the Left I wouldn't tolerate it. Show me someone on the right who was deplatformed who didn't preach hate.
- atq2119 6y ago
  Frankly, when the Republican version of Barack Obama arrives, it's game over for the United States as a democracy.
jonathanlb 6y ago
> The increase of control seems to be timed and in favor with the incoming administration. Government using business to do its bidding is very troubling Is that really the case with Facebook, Twitter, et al.? Didn't Facebook and Twitter have favorable standing with Trump's administration (vis a vis keeping Trump on the platform despite his violating their ToS repeatedly)?
- webXL 6y ago
  I have some doubts about this claim of Trump "violating their ToS repeatedly" I just google'd "trump tos violations list" and nothing like a clear list came up. That should be relatively easy, right? Especially after 1/6? Here's a search from before this year: https://www.google.com/search?q=trump+twitter+violations+%22list%22&&source=lnt&tbs=cdr%3A1%2Ccd_min%3A%2Ccd_max%3A1%2F1%2F2021&tbm= https://www.google.com/search?q=trump+twitter+violations+%22... "When the looting starts, the shooting starts" came to mind (you have to go to archive.org to view it, which is kinda sad in a way... are videos of the 3rd Reich next to go?): https://web.archive.org/web/20200701003329/https://www.latimes.com/world-nation/story/2020-05-29/twitter-flags-trump-tweet-glorifying-violence-protests-minneapolis https://web.archive.org/web/20200701003329/https://www.latim... Can anyone come up with one?

by webXL 6y ago

cbozeman 6y ago

I've often spoken with my more left-leaning friends about the need to try and find middle ground with my more right-leaning friends, and quickly. Donald Trump was an incompetent, by almost any measure you want to use. However, he shifted the Overton Window dramatically. When the Republican version of Barack Obama bursts onto the scene - someone eloquent, competent, and thoroughly able to move effectively in the political sphere, there could be a very real problem for Democrats.

Dumblydorr 6y ago
I'm bullish on Democrats due to demographic shifts, but they'll need to gain more senators from rural states if they want to pass major legislation. GOP has to somehow consolidate Trumpists with Never Trumpers, may be tricky to do. How will independents respond to GOP after Trump is finished? Will they forgive and forget? So, in my view, both parties need to adapt or they will not achieve that much. Imagine if Dems had 49 senators, how little would get done in Biden's term, indeed that may be the case after midterms.
- symlinkk 6y ago
  Which demographic shifts specifically?
- shrimp_emoji 6y ago
  Or remove the electoral college (which is an anti-democratic contrivance originally meant to cajole then-slave states into remaining in the Union[0]) and make voting mandatory to completely nuke the GOP's strategy of voter disempowerment (which is their best hope as demographic shifts increasingly favor the Democrats). 0: https://time.com/4558510/electoral-college-history-slavery/ https://time.com/4558510/electoral-college-history-slavery/
  - hajile 6y ago
    The South could have a 3/5 slave vote with or without an electoral college. That was related to total votes and representatives in congress. If anything, Shay's Rebellion was the real reason. The majority (farmers) voted with their guns to steal from the minority (bankers). Democracy is two wolves and a sheep voting on what to eat for supper. Several Federalist papers are dedicated exclusively to this idea and the problems of previous democracies. Defending minorities (specifically religious minorities) was the primary reason for going with a Constitutional Republic instead. The Senate was a similar concession that smaller or less populous states deserved equal voice to larger states. I'd note that if slavery were the reason for the formation, then the Senate would have been a bad idea as it stripped power away from the Southern states (as that article points out, Virginia alone had more than 10% of the total House votes).
    - dragonwriter 6y ago
      > I’d note that if slavery were the reason for the formation, then the Senate would have been a bad idea as it stripped power away from the Southern states (as that article points out, Virginia alone had more than 10% of the total House votes). Its true that with the apportionment of House votes in the Constitution, the Senate (by comparison) had weaker representation of the South (30.8% in the Senate, 35.4% in the House), but, as with terms explicitly protecting slavery, the concern wasn’t for the immediate effect, but as insurance against trends that were already apparent with the expected internal and external expansion of the US and its political development. With the first Congress seated after the apportionment due to the 1790 Census (which included Kentucky, admitted in 1792), the Senate already was slightly more favorable to the South than the House (the South had 38.4% of the Senate and 37.1% of the House). With the Congress seated after the 1800 apportionment, the South had 46.1% of the Senate, and 39.0% of the House. The idea that the Senate would have been a “bad idea” in terms of political power in the South assumes that no one at the time of the Constitution had even considered the possibility of thinking a few years down the road.
  - cbozeman 6y ago
    That's a single legal scholar's interpretation, not even a historian's.
- hajile 6y ago
  In this election, Trump received more votes than any other sitting president in history. He lost and now the Democrats seem to assume that those 75M people will suddenly change their beliefs because 78M people hold different beliefs. Moreover, it seems that people voted against Trump more than for Biden because they thought Trump was rude and distasteful. They fail to recall that this was actually a political route for Democrats. Democrats lost seats in the House when they were expected to gain. They eked out parity in the Senate that probably disappears in 2 years. More importantly, they lost almost all state government races. Remember, Trump's biggest policy positions (bring our troops home, bring our jobs back, hard on china, the wall, etc) were all Democrat positions a mere 5-7 years ago. Now that the Republicans have taken over those more centrist ideas, they have gained a huge number of supporters. The Democrats are fractured between centrists and progressives. That fracture is much worse than the Republicans because it is ideological while the Republican fracture is a cult of personality. Trump will fade. Another person will replace him. They will have all of his populism and charm (yes, he's a natural entertainer). They won't have his rude abrasiveness. He'll then have the majority needed to censor the other side now that the Republicans have decided they agree with the progressives on that point.
  - esyir 6y ago
    I do hope that happens. Seeing that all principles here on censorship essentially turn into "censor those not on my side", I'd derive some meagre satisfaction from that backswing, even if I too well burn at that same stake.
- mech422 6y ago
  I can't reply directly to hijile below, so I'll leave this here: >>Democrats seem to assume that those 75M people will suddenly change their beliefs as long as 78M people continue to hold their beliefs, I really don't think the democrats care. A minority vote is a minority vote - whether its 4.9 percent or 49 percent. Personally, I think the dems will work more towards eliminating the EC and gerrymandering thats gone against them. edit: change second '4.9' to '49'. I really need more coffee..
sudosysgen 6y ago
I agree. As someone pretty far on the left I was shook by the banning of Donald Trump, and this trend of censorship makes me really, really, really scared. If you're anything but a very centrist Democrat, this should scare the crap out of you.
- dragonwriter 6y ago
  The actual Left has been a target of private censorship and public suppression even when the Right got a free pass for so long that, as someone on the Left, I’m not at all scared that some private censorship is happening to violent extremists on the Right (mildly surprised, but not scared.) Though “you should be scared because what has been happening to the Left longer, and much more severely, than to the Right might happen to you” is a pretty common propaganda theme directed at the Left by the Right recently. Unlike the Right, which has had an existence of extreme privilege where even the KKK got a pass on government scrutiny because it was valued loyal organization around the same time that the second big round of government institutionalized anti-Communist hysteria, the Left has been built around organizations to route around establishment suppression for over a century. And most people to the left of center-right neoliberal Democrats are quite aware of that.
  - sudosysgen 6y ago
    While this is true, on the internet at least I haven't seen leftists sites like revleft or crimethinc get denied access to hosters, yet. But yes, you're right that the left is the source of private censorship for a long time, which is why lemmy is developped by a lot of leftists, for example. If they're ready to ban a right wing president though, I can imagine how severe the crackdown on the left would be.
    - amanaplanacanal 6y ago
      Honestly, if leftists start calling for violent Revolution because they lose an election, I’m not going to be too upset if they get deplatformed too. Perhaps I’m just too comfortable with my life, but I suspect most other people would agree.
bebopcowboy 6y ago
He won’t. They’ll just censor him
conception 6y ago
This can only be true if Republican efforts at voter suppression continue to be successful while also states don’t choose to forgo the electoral college. Republicans only win because of a tremendously successful campaign to not let people vote. They are very much a minority party by any measure except outsized influence. They have fewer voters. Fewer people identify with them. Fewer people support their policies. If Democrats can continue to get voters out, like in GA, they will lose seats.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- indigochill 6y ago
  There's an interesting problem here, though, which is why the US federal government is structured as it is: there are fewer people in, say, Utah than in California. And generally people in California may have different interests than those in Utah. But as citizens of the US, Utah(ians?) deserve representation at the national level, which they just wouldn't have in a first-past-the-post popular vote. A direct popular vote would always give the advantage to candidates who represent coastal and urban interests because that's where people are overwhelmingly concentrated, and this would leave rural voters disenfranchised. It might be interesting to re-evaluate whether representation by geography still makes sense. I'm more partial to the parliamentary approach, where parties get representation proportional to votes cast for them, so this way there could be a "rural interests party" which rural voters could vote for and receive representation proportional to their population. This might also do an end-run around the mind-bogglingly corrupt practice of gerrymandering?
  - hguant 6y ago
    The question of what to call citizens of Utah is a long and thorny one; currently the US Government Printing Office uses "Utahn." [0] Apparently this was a big 'issue' in the 80's, when the US government usage was "Utahan" or "Utahian," while the local usage was "Utahn." Webster's currently lists "Utahan" as the correct usage, as far as I can tell (their website is trash - searching for "Utahan" and "Utahn" just redirects to the "Utah" entry. [0] https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GPO-STYLEMANUAL-2016/pdf/GPO-STYLEMANUAL-2016.pdf https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GPO-STYLEMANUAL-2016/pdf...
Reedx 6y ago
If a sitting President can be deplatformed from the Internet, then wouldn't a Presidential Candidate be? Would said candidate be able to run a successful campaign without it?
- webXL 6y ago
  > someone eloquent, competent, and thoroughly able to move effectively in the political sphere How will they be able to deplatform that? Are you endorsing deplatforming anyone to the right of Joe Biden?
  - Reedx 6y ago
    No, just extrapolating from here. It could be used against the next Bernie too. Any populist candidate, whether from the left or right.
    - deleted 6y ago
      [deleted]
- joshuahaglund 6y ago
  If they incite violence yeah. Is that confusing?
  - Reedx 6y ago
    Check back when Bernie (or the next Bernie, if he doesn't run again) is deplatformed, and we'll see who was confused. Just remember back to how the media and establishment pulled together to stop Bernie during the primaries. Think this new tool won't be used the next time they're in danger of losing power to an outsider?
    - joshuahaglund 6y ago
      If "the next Bernie" promotes violence then he's not the next Bernie and I won't support him and I don't understand what's so hard to understand about that. Y'all think "it's both sides" but, in America, this call to violence (straight up armed insurrection) is unique in right wing politics. And if it showed up in the Left I wouldn't tolerate it. Show me someone on the right who was deplatformed who didn't preach hate.
atq2119 6y ago
Frankly, when the Republican version of Barack Obama arrives, it's game over for the United States as a democracy.

jonathanlb 6y ago

> The increase of control seems to be timed and in favor with the incoming administration. Government using business to do its bidding is very troubling Is that really the case with Facebook, Twitter, et al.? Didn't Facebook and Twitter have favorable standing with Trump's administration (vis a vis keeping Trump on the platform despite his violating their ToS repeatedly)?

webXL 6y ago
I have some doubts about this claim of Trump "violating their ToS repeatedly" I just google'd "trump tos violations list" and nothing like a clear list came up. That should be relatively easy, right? Especially after 1/6? Here's a search from before this year: https://www.google.com/search?q=trump+twitter+violations+%22list%22&&source=lnt&tbs=cdr%3A1%2Ccd_min%3A%2Ccd_max%3A1%2F1%2F2021&tbm= https://www.google.com/search?q=trump+twitter+violations+%22... "When the looting starts, the shooting starts" came to mind (you have to go to archive.org to view it, which is kinda sad in a way... are videos of the 3rd Reich next to go?): https://web.archive.org/web/20200701003329/https://www.latimes.com/world-nation/story/2020-05-29/twitter-flags-trump-tweet-glorifying-violence-protests-minneapolis https://web.archive.org/web/20200701003329/https://www.latim... Can anyone come up with one?