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I’ve never heard of the author until today, so I don’t have any bias against him, but I think his argument makes a lot of sense. Personally, my preferred solu

I’ve never heard of the author until today, so I don’t have any bias against him, but I think his argument makes a lot of sense. Personally, my preferred solution to polarization is voting reform (I actually think approval voting would be a better fix than RCV though) but he makes a good point that voting reform is a long term solution to a short term problem. I still think it’s worth pursuing, but there’s no way it will help us with the 2024 presidential election, for example. The Democratic Party moving to the center could be done much more quickly, and if the strategy was successful in winning elections, might force the Republican Party to similarly adopt more moderate positions. Another “solution” to polarization in the US is a civil war. This should definitely be avoided at all costs, but would probably eventually reduce polarization when the winning side forces the losing side to adopt their policies (like how the North forced the South to end slavery after the Civil War). Having a single party dominate politics for a while sounds a little scary, but if they’re democratically elected, I guess that’s what people want, right? And, to me, it’s a much more palatable short-term solution to polarization than Civil War II.

_bohm 4y ago
Did the Civil War really facilitate depolarization in the US? The South is arguably still recovering economically from the Civil War, and retains a very strong cultural identity linked to the Confederacy. Walk into the gift shop in the Alabama state capitol, and you can buy Confederate Army uniforms for your kids.
- panick21_ 4y ago
  The South was economically speaking essentially very, very, very behind until WW2 and its after match. They didn't recover 'just fine'. And considering that the South was literally turning into traditional aristocracy including changing low codes and so on, now is much closer to what we would consider the center.
rjsw 4y ago
Are you suggesting that the Democratic Party should move to the left or to the right? Seen from Europe it is currently right of centre.
- rayiner 4y ago
  Americans as a whole are right of center on economic issues compared to Europe. But the current tension in America revolves around cultural issues. On that, the Democratic Party is significantly left of center, to the point where they reject political debate on a number of cultural issues where Europeans debate and are willing to compromise. For example in 2016, the European Court of Human Rights rejected the claim that the “right to marriage” under the EU Convention on Human Rights encompasses same-sex marriage: https://eclj.org/marriage/the-echr-unanimously-confirms-the-non-existence-of-a-right-to-gay-marriage https://eclj.org/marriage/the-echr-unanimously-confirms-the-.... In Germany, same sex marriage became legal by legislative vote, with Angela Merkel voting against it (putting her to the right of Donald Trump on the issue). There was no political crisis around these votes. While many in Europe support same-sex marriage, most see it as a political issue, not something beyond the reach of the political process. Contrast the US, where progressives are talking about “packing” the Supreme Court over its rejecting the notion that the Constitution contains a right to abortion so expansive that it would render invalid nearly every abortion law in Europe. That decision made international news, with countries like France criticizing the Supreme Court, even though their own abortion laws were illegal under Roe, and the case in question, Dobbs, upheld a Mississippi law that was basically the same as the law in France.
  - tptacek 4y ago
    There is no appetite in the Democratic party to pack the Supreme Court; it's a fringe position. Both poles of American politics are full of fringe ideas; on the left, you have things like "impeach Clarence Thomas", and on the right you have things like "defund the FBI and then have prosecutors in every red state secure punitive search warrants for Democratic politicians". It's true that Roe, especially as originally conceived, put America to "the left" of Europe. We're to the left of Europe on all sorts of things: bankruptcy laws, no-fault divorces, exclusion of illegally obtained evidence, same-sex marriage, the right to wear religious garb in public spaces, the insistence that religious education be kept out of public schooling, no mandatory military service, and, of course, the First Amendment. But your argument here includes a sleight of hand, because you confining your analysis to Dobbs itself, but ignore the state laws that it enabled, many of which are radically to the right of the European consensus. For instance, Ohio bans abortion at the moment a fetal heartbeat is detected, with no exceptions for rape or incest, so that a 10 year old girl had to be smuggled into a neighboring state within weeks of Dobbs passing. Your point is that Europe doesn't put these questions outside of the political process. But you've run far past the end zone with that (seemingly correct) argument, by trying, and failing, to characterize the positions of the American political poles. It's a shame, because the real point you have to make here is interesting; you shouldn't crud it up with the partisan stuff.

_bohm 4y ago

Did the Civil War really facilitate depolarization in the US? The South is arguably still recovering economically from the Civil War, and retains a very strong cultural identity linked to the Confederacy. Walk into the gift shop in the Alabama state capitol, and you can buy Confederate Army uniforms for your kids.

panick21_ 4y ago
The South was economically speaking essentially very, very, very behind until WW2 and its after match. They didn't recover 'just fine'. And considering that the South was literally turning into traditional aristocracy including changing low codes and so on, now is much closer to what we would consider the center.

rjsw 4y ago

Are you suggesting that the Democratic Party should move to the left or to the right? Seen from Europe it is currently right of centre.

rayiner 4y ago
Americans as a whole are right of center on economic issues compared to Europe. But the current tension in America revolves around cultural issues. On that, the Democratic Party is significantly left of center, to the point where they reject political debate on a number of cultural issues where Europeans debate and are willing to compromise. For example in 2016, the European Court of Human Rights rejected the claim that the “right to marriage” under the EU Convention on Human Rights encompasses same-sex marriage: https://eclj.org/marriage/the-echr-unanimously-confirms-the-non-existence-of-a-right-to-gay-marriage https://eclj.org/marriage/the-echr-unanimously-confirms-the-.... In Germany, same sex marriage became legal by legislative vote, with Angela Merkel voting against it (putting her to the right of Donald Trump on the issue). There was no political crisis around these votes. While many in Europe support same-sex marriage, most see it as a political issue, not something beyond the reach of the political process. Contrast the US, where progressives are talking about “packing” the Supreme Court over its rejecting the notion that the Constitution contains a right to abortion so expansive that it would render invalid nearly every abortion law in Europe. That decision made international news, with countries like France criticizing the Supreme Court, even though their own abortion laws were illegal under Roe, and the case in question, Dobbs, upheld a Mississippi law that was basically the same as the law in France.
- tptacek 4y ago
  There is no appetite in the Democratic party to pack the Supreme Court; it's a fringe position. Both poles of American politics are full of fringe ideas; on the left, you have things like "impeach Clarence Thomas", and on the right you have things like "defund the FBI and then have prosecutors in every red state secure punitive search warrants for Democratic politicians". It's true that Roe, especially as originally conceived, put America to "the left" of Europe. We're to the left of Europe on all sorts of things: bankruptcy laws, no-fault divorces, exclusion of illegally obtained evidence, same-sex marriage, the right to wear religious garb in public spaces, the insistence that religious education be kept out of public schooling, no mandatory military service, and, of course, the First Amendment. But your argument here includes a sleight of hand, because you confining your analysis to Dobbs itself, but ignore the state laws that it enabled, many of which are radically to the right of the European consensus. For instance, Ohio bans abortion at the moment a fetal heartbeat is detected, with no exceptions for rape or incest, so that a 10 year old girl had to be smuggled into a neighboring state within weeks of Dobbs passing. Your point is that Europe doesn't put these questions outside of the political process. But you've run far past the end zone with that (seemingly correct) argument, by trying, and failing, to characterize the positions of the American political poles. It's a shame, because the real point you have to make here is interesting; you shouldn't crud it up with the partisan stuff.