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Last time I proposed this same thing in a blog comment section (Lawyers, Guns, and Money) a couple of people said "but filibuster" and the rest went straight to

Last time I proposed this same thing in a blog comment section (Lawyers, Guns, and Money) a couple of people said "but filibuster" and the rest went straight to an absolute firehose of middle-school-level verbal abuse. I've had similar reactions from other self-proclaimed progressives. Nonetheless I stand by the idea. These big omnibus bills give every single opponent (and some "mavericks" a.k.a. turncoats in one's own party) their very own personal reason to vote against it without political consequence. A more focused bill at least has a slight chance of prying loose a few around the edges, if only because they know that their "no" vote will be used effectively against them in the next election cycle with no room for excuses. When your legislative success rate (not counting bills to name post offices) is close to zero already, might as well try something different.

colpabar 4y ago
It just seems like it'd be such a huge win from a PR angle, even if the bills fail. You could literally post screenshots of the bills in their entirety on twitter showing how simple they are (student debt is abolished, college is free, medicine is free, etc) and just say "here is what we tried to do for you, and here are the people who said no." I think the most productive change we could make to our government right now would be to set a page limit on new legislation. But this might produce legislation that actually helps normal people, which is why it'll never happen.
- leetcrew 4y ago
  that doesn't sound like a very good idea to me. legislation is not complex only because of pork; there are always edgecases and loopholes to be handled. I highly doubt a reasonable solution to any of the problems you listed could be described in a mere ten pages. take student debt for instance. imo there's a decent case for erasing undergrad debt under a certain threshold, but if you took on a six figure debt to attend a fancy liberal arts college, that's on you to unfuck. similarly, people like lawyers and doctors take on a lot of education debt, but that's also priced into their respective salaries. a professional paying off an outsized debt with an outsized salary doesn't need or deserve the assistance of the median taxpayer. a naive implementation of such could potentially be net regressive. obviously you might disagree with some of that, my point is just to show that "abolish student debt" is controversial and complex even among people that agree at a high level.
  - notacoward 4y ago
    A single sentence bill might indeed be too short to address edge cases and attract support, but it can still be single topic and probably no more than ten or twenty pages. Literally no legislator actually reads all of these 1000-page entire-legislative-agenda monstrosities. At best they have their own aides do it and summarize the highlights. More often, they just follow their own party's "leadership" on what parts to use as excuses.

colpabar 4y ago

It just seems like it'd be such a huge win from a PR angle, even if the bills fail. You could literally post screenshots of the bills in their entirety on twitter showing how simple they are (student debt is abolished, college is free, medicine is free, etc) and just say "here is what we tried to do for you, and here are the people who said no." I think the most productive change we could make to our government right now would be to set a page limit on new legislation. But this might produce legislation that actually helps normal people, which is why it'll never happen.

leetcrew 4y ago
that doesn't sound like a very good idea to me. legislation is not complex only because of pork; there are always edgecases and loopholes to be handled. I highly doubt a reasonable solution to any of the problems you listed could be described in a mere ten pages. take student debt for instance. imo there's a decent case for erasing undergrad debt under a certain threshold, but if you took on a six figure debt to attend a fancy liberal arts college, that's on you to unfuck. similarly, people like lawyers and doctors take on a lot of education debt, but that's also priced into their respective salaries. a professional paying off an outsized debt with an outsized salary doesn't need or deserve the assistance of the median taxpayer. a naive implementation of such could potentially be net regressive. obviously you might disagree with some of that, my point is just to show that "abolish student debt" is controversial and complex even among people that agree at a high level.
- notacoward 4y ago
  A single sentence bill might indeed be too short to address edge cases and attract support, but it can still be single topic and probably no more than ten or twenty pages. Literally no legislator actually reads all of these 1000-page entire-legislative-agenda monstrosities. At best they have their own aides do it and summarize the highlights. More often, they just follow their own party's "leadership" on what parts to use as excuses.