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District based voting isn't democratic. Proportion representation is the only real democratic choice, the district based voting simply doesn't work. Cheating w

District based voting isn't democratic. Proportion representation is the only real democratic choice, the district based voting simply doesn't work. Cheating with elections is so much easier with district voting than proportional representation. The founders of the constitution hated parties but ended up with the game that leaves only a two party competition. That's hardly a choice, it's a single bit. A real democratic system allows you to grow a political movement naturally over the years to take over and replace corrupt parties peacefully. But district voting system allows two party system to remain in power indefinitely. It completely prevents the entire point of democracy of allowing peaceful transition of power and replacement of corrupt power structures. There's an additional problem, which is why isn't even harder to replace district voting, that those in charge of counting votes are local to each district, which is letting the car guard the cream. In proper system with proportional representation, you need to ensure that each location doesn't abuse it's power to count votes and to fabricate population counts to gain an advantage, and you can only do so if you bring random people from different locations to count the votes in each place.

belorn 3y ago
Proportional representation is great when the population is fairly homogeneous with similar political issues and goals, and you don't need a union of different independent regions and groups. The European Union would not work with proportional representation, and countries like Iceland would struggle with their very large difference between city population and country population. The point of disproportional representation is to reduce the political power imbalance between of high population areas with low population areas. The alternative is to split up the country or union so that each unique area and demographic govern themselves in isolation. Few people want that outcome so a compromise has to be chosen. In iceland as an example, the combined country districts has a majority if they all band together, while the Reykjavík district is by size the absolute single biggest and has well above 50% of Iceland population. Its a compromise that while political power is still very much centered in Reykjavík, they can't blindly ignore the country population.
- esteth 3y ago
  I'm not sure I understand the "why" here though. Why should you get more of a say because you want something different than the majority? Why should the majority be beholden to the political view of the minority because of the geographic distribution of the minority?
  - arrozconcosas 3y ago
    Ask someone from an urban area any basic question about a rural area, and they will be clueless about some simple things. I once had a friend who grew up in Chicago ask me if a cow was a Buffalo because it was brown and he thought cows were into black and white. That’s a silly example but it applies even more so to more meaningful policy decisions that happen is rural areas.
    - School-Cotton 3y ago
      The states in the US aren’t divided on urban/rural lines though. They are divided arbitrarily. Someone from Hoboken, New Jersey has a lot more in common with someone from Brooklyn than the latter does with someone from a farm in rural upstate NY.
      - giantg2 3y ago
        Exactly. In theory this is not a big deal because of the 10th amendment and the states having legislatures that provide some level of urban/rural balance. In practice, it's more complicated.
      - rayiner 3y ago
        Maybe, but someone from a farm in rural upstate New York is also quite different from someone from a farm in Georgia. Because of mass media and news, Americans aren’t necessarily attuned to their cultural differences. Anecdote: my parents moved to the Virginia side of the DC suburbs in 1989. In 2018, they moved 50 miles to the Maryland side, to be near my wife and our kids. I moved around a lot between high school and now so I didn’t notice it. But my dad (he travels all over the developing world for his career) immediately noticed. (And they both hate Maryland, lol.) He can tell the accents are different. The way people make small talk is different. In his view (as a Bangladeshi and then a Virginian) people are less courteous. When he pointed it out, I couldn’t unsee it. Maryland is the southernmost part of the mid-Atlantic (NJ/DE/PA). Virginia is the northernmost part of the south. Even just looking at places 25 miles on either side of DC, the Maryland side has way more Jewish people and Catholics, and way fewer Asians. (Growing up in northern Virginia in the 1990s, I don’t think I ever met a Catholic. Apparently, Virginia is only 8% Catholic compared to 20% for Maryland.)
rayiner 3y ago
I don’t think not “democratic” is the right phrasing. Democracy is a multi-dimensional design space. I think it’s more accurate to say that district based voting prioritizes a value (connection between a constituency and single, independent legislator) that’s become less salient in the age of mass media and powerful political parties.
vharuck 3y ago
I agree that proportional representation would be better. It's painful living in a "purple" state when that means one party handily wins state-wide elections but the other has a right grip on state legislature. >In proper system with proportional representation, you need to ensure that each location doesn't abuse it's power to count votes and to fabricate population counts to gain an advantage, and you can only do so if you bring random people from different locations to count the votes in each place. There are protections for the voting and counting processes. Each candidate gets to send a representative (often a lawyer) to audit. And the workers are chosen from the community. Allowing non-residents to become poll workers would quickly lead to national political groups sending partisan members across districts. Population counts are created by the federal Bureau of the Census. Unless there's a constitutional amendment, that's a guarantee. Abd they're one of the last agencies we should fear about becoming politically corrupted.
- germinalphrase 3y ago
  “ Abd they're one of the last agencies we should fear about becoming politically corrupted” The moment they have power worth corrupting…
letmeinhere 3y ago
We can keep the districts—which people seem to like—and get rid of the easily-rigged elections by: - establishing multi-member districts - electing those members via a proportional (e.g. party list) or semi-proportional (e.g. ranked choice) voting system The first of these is actually pretty common at the municipal level (think at-large city/county council seats), but unfortunately are almost always chosen by plurality means, which means that the dominant party within the district almost always sweeps. You really need both features for this to improve on the single-member districts.
dalbasal 3y ago
Maybe but... There are lots of different voting mechanisms around the world. So e are "better" in the sense that people (including me) like them more... but... Games mature and you end up with some sort of antipattern party politics emerging. Eg in many multiparty systems extremist small parties can strongarm governments. Acceptability to the majority isn't a thing. Party leaders become little chiefs. Not saying it's worse. It might even be better, but it's not much better. Also, the US has relatively strong separation of powers. The house, senate and president are weak independently of eachother. Weak institutions and weak parties will probably result in complete indecisiveness. Imo, if we're suggesting progress on democracy, we need more radical steps. Eg a randomly selected representative body.
- giantg2 3y ago
  I generally agree. "Weak institutions and weak parties will probably result in complete indecisiveness." The other option is that they learn to work together for decent compromises. It's also possible that slow legislation is not a design flaw but rather a feature. The way it is now is mostly stalemates, virtue signaling (passing bills they know will be vetoed), and jamming laws through as fast as possible without any true debate.
  - red-iron-pine 3y ago
    Aye, the slowness and "design by committee" aspect of a large legislative body was known to the writers of the constitution. They wanted it to move slow, to ensure due consideration. That it would lead to deadlock or other problems became rapidly clear -- i.e. the Vice President of the USA shooting the head of the opposing party in a duel -- and we've seen things like the consolidation of power in the President as a response.
- pjc50 3y ago
  > the US has relatively strong separation of powers But each level has the same two parties competing for it! So your only outcomes are "deadlock" or "tyranny of the 51%". It's particularly silly for things like the Supreme Court where judges are given partisan life appointments.
giantg2 3y ago
If we're going with proportional voting, it should be based off the vote count and not just population count. A major issue I see is that most people just don't care or don't think their vote counts. These disconnected people make for a weak democracy where the people in power can basically use their indifference for the benefit of their power.
- chongli 3y ago
  Australia has solved this problem with mandatory voting. Those who fail to vote are hit with a $20 fine. They generally have above 90% turnout in elections.
  - giantg2 3y ago
    A lot of people here would still probably take the fine if it were only $20.
    - chongli 3y ago
      I don't think too many people would be upset if this meant wealthier people (who can't afford the $20) would be less likely to vote.
      - giantg2 3y ago
        I suppose voter suppression or selective promotion is popular with most groups so long as it affects the "right" people.
        uoaei 3y ago
        Considering the rich have far more influence in general on how the general public lives, considering their positions in industry and economic power, it seems appropriate to balance that somehow.
        giantg2 3y ago
thebigwinning 3y ago
> Cheating with elections is so much easier with district voting than proportional representation. It's the opposite. A single compromised location can tip a in a national popular election. It almost becomes an arms race of cheating. With district based they can only affect their district.
- MagnumOpus 3y ago
  That is not true. National popular elections still rely on the same voting booths with known numbers of local voters. A location with a thousand voters turning out a million votes would be instantly detected and investigated. Someone wanting to swing a national popular vote fraudulently would need to compromise tens of thousands of ballot boxes to steal on the order of ten million votes -- a much harder ask than compromising a hundred ballot boxes to swing three states in the Senate/Electoral College or gerrymandering twenty districts in Congress.
  - thebigwinning 3y ago
    > A location with a thousand voters turning out a million votes Easy to detect for a small town, not for a big city, where there are literally millions but who knows how many actually vote. In fact I could cite the exact kinds of statistical reasoning for certain counties in the recent election, but you wouldn't accept that.
snarf21 3y ago
> The founders of the constitution hated parties but ended up with the game that leaves only a two party competition. That's hardly a choice, it's a single bit. I've come to believe that the only thing we need to change to have a three party system is to make all votes for bills in Congress to require 70%+. Today things can be passed with 50.00001% which is basically binary. With the required compromise and negotiation, a third party would have power to swing the vote for yea or nea and dilute the power of the duopoly. At first, it might just take form as a caucus until enough power is built to build a proper party with funding for candidates. I know it is a pipe dream because the powers that be wouldn't want to give up their hammer. I think this is one thing that the founders got wrong. Having to build compromise could be good for everyone in the end.
- jagraff 3y ago
  Due to the filibuster, most bills require 60 votes (60%) to pass the senate. It hasn’t lead to more cooperation - it’s lead to a paralyzed government that can’t pass good laws.
  - dpifke 3y ago
    A paralyzed government also can't pass bad laws. Considering how rarely laws are repealed, this is arguably a feature, not a bug.
    - ianburrell 3y ago
      A paralyzed government can’t pass required laws. The budget has to be passed every year. That will never happen with supermajority. No new programs, no cuts, just confusing resolutions. The debt ceiling has to be increased occasionally and if you thought recent negotiations were bad, supermajority would be worse. A paralyzed government can’t pass good laws. All the problems in the country that would never get fixed. Current inaction is bad enough, but supermajority would never pass anything except the bland and disasters.
      - MichaelZuo 3y ago
2OEH8eoCRo0 3y ago
Why do members of the same party often disagree? I think we get a bit too wrapped up on the "two parties" thing as if there are only two opinions as well.
shoxidizer 3y ago
> There's an additional problem, which is why isn't even harder to replace district voting, that those in charge of counting votes are local to each district, which is letting the car guard the cream. American elections are administered locally to prevent top-down rigging, especially from the federal to the state level. Presumably local politicians will be more accountable to local people than an election authority across the country. And if the local people don't want to hold them accountable because they like them, then the politician is at least representing their contstituency in some way. And from the perspective of other districts, a corrupt district cannot affect their own elections, only send, at worst, a representative they don't like as if the two districts sinply disagreed. If a national election authority were corrupted, there wouldn't be anything local political organizations could do, especially if this applied to local executive or judicial positions. And of course the original states were not going to cede the counting of their votes the federal government. The electoral college is widely operated as a winner-takes-all system because it means that no state has to trust any other.

belorn 3y ago

Proportional representation is great when the population is fairly homogeneous with similar political issues and goals, and you don't need a union of different independent regions and groups. The European Union would not work with proportional representation, and countries like Iceland would struggle with their very large difference between city population and country population. The point of disproportional representation is to reduce the political power imbalance between of high population areas with low population areas. The alternative is to split up the country or union so that each unique area and demographic govern themselves in isolation. Few people want that outcome so a compromise has to be chosen. In iceland as an example, the combined country districts has a majority if they all band together, while the Reykjavík district is by size the absolute single biggest and has well above 50% of Iceland population. Its a compromise that while political power is still very much centered in Reykjavík, they can't blindly ignore the country population.

esteth 3y ago
I'm not sure I understand the "why" here though. Why should you get more of a say because you want something different than the majority? Why should the majority be beholden to the political view of the minority because of the geographic distribution of the minority?
- arrozconcosas 3y ago
  Ask someone from an urban area any basic question about a rural area, and they will be clueless about some simple things. I once had a friend who grew up in Chicago ask me if a cow was a Buffalo because it was brown and he thought cows were into black and white. That’s a silly example but it applies even more so to more meaningful policy decisions that happen is rural areas.
  - School-Cotton 3y ago
    The states in the US aren’t divided on urban/rural lines though. They are divided arbitrarily. Someone from Hoboken, New Jersey has a lot more in common with someone from Brooklyn than the latter does with someone from a farm in rural upstate NY.
    - giantg2 3y ago
      Exactly. In theory this is not a big deal because of the 10th amendment and the states having legislatures that provide some level of urban/rural balance. In practice, it's more complicated.
    - rayiner 3y ago
      Maybe, but someone from a farm in rural upstate New York is also quite different from someone from a farm in Georgia. Because of mass media and news, Americans aren’t necessarily attuned to their cultural differences. Anecdote: my parents moved to the Virginia side of the DC suburbs in 1989. In 2018, they moved 50 miles to the Maryland side, to be near my wife and our kids. I moved around a lot between high school and now so I didn’t notice it. But my dad (he travels all over the developing world for his career) immediately noticed. (And they both hate Maryland, lol.) He can tell the accents are different. The way people make small talk is different. In his view (as a Bangladeshi and then a Virginian) people are less courteous. When he pointed it out, I couldn’t unsee it. Maryland is the southernmost part of the mid-Atlantic (NJ/DE/PA). Virginia is the northernmost part of the south. Even just looking at places 25 miles on either side of DC, the Maryland side has way more Jewish people and Catholics, and way fewer Asians. (Growing up in northern Virginia in the 1990s, I don’t think I ever met a Catholic. Apparently, Virginia is only 8% Catholic compared to 20% for Maryland.)

rayiner 3y ago

I don’t think not “democratic” is the right phrasing. Democracy is a multi-dimensional design space. I think it’s more accurate to say that district based voting prioritizes a value (connection between a constituency and single, independent legislator) that’s become less salient in the age of mass media and powerful political parties.

vharuck 3y ago

I agree that proportional representation would be better. It's painful living in a "purple" state when that means one party handily wins state-wide elections but the other has a right grip on state legislature. >In proper system with proportional representation, you need to ensure that each location doesn't abuse it's power to count votes and to fabricate population counts to gain an advantage, and you can only do so if you bring random people from different locations to count the votes in each place. There are protections for the voting and counting processes. Each candidate gets to send a representative (often a lawyer) to audit. And the workers are chosen from the community. Allowing non-residents to become poll workers would quickly lead to national political groups sending partisan members across districts. Population counts are created by the federal Bureau of the Census. Unless there's a constitutional amendment, that's a guarantee. Abd they're one of the last agencies we should fear about becoming politically corrupted.

germinalphrase 3y ago
“ Abd they're one of the last agencies we should fear about becoming politically corrupted” The moment they have power worth corrupting…

letmeinhere 3y ago

We can keep the districts—which people seem to like—and get rid of the easily-rigged elections by: - establishing multi-member districts - electing those members via a proportional (e.g. party list) or semi-proportional (e.g. ranked choice) voting system The first of these is actually pretty common at the municipal level (think at-large city/county council seats), but unfortunately are almost always chosen by plurality means, which means that the dominant party within the district almost always sweeps. You really need both features for this to improve on the single-member districts.

dalbasal 3y ago

Maybe but... There are lots of different voting mechanisms around the world. So e are "better" in the sense that people (including me) like them more... but... Games mature and you end up with some sort of antipattern party politics emerging. Eg in many multiparty systems extremist small parties can strongarm governments. Acceptability to the majority isn't a thing. Party leaders become little chiefs. Not saying it's worse. It might even be better, but it's not much better. Also, the US has relatively strong separation of powers. The house, senate and president are weak independently of eachother. Weak institutions and weak parties will probably result in complete indecisiveness. Imo, if we're suggesting progress on democracy, we need more radical steps. Eg a randomly selected representative body.

giantg2 3y ago
I generally agree. "Weak institutions and weak parties will probably result in complete indecisiveness." The other option is that they learn to work together for decent compromises. It's also possible that slow legislation is not a design flaw but rather a feature. The way it is now is mostly stalemates, virtue signaling (passing bills they know will be vetoed), and jamming laws through as fast as possible without any true debate.
- red-iron-pine 3y ago
  Aye, the slowness and "design by committee" aspect of a large legislative body was known to the writers of the constitution. They wanted it to move slow, to ensure due consideration. That it would lead to deadlock or other problems became rapidly clear -- i.e. the Vice President of the USA shooting the head of the opposing party in a duel -- and we've seen things like the consolidation of power in the President as a response.
pjc50 3y ago
> the US has relatively strong separation of powers But each level has the same two parties competing for it! So your only outcomes are "deadlock" or "tyranny of the 51%". It's particularly silly for things like the Supreme Court where judges are given partisan life appointments.

giantg2 3y ago

If we're going with proportional voting, it should be based off the vote count and not just population count. A major issue I see is that most people just don't care or don't think their vote counts. These disconnected people make for a weak democracy where the people in power can basically use their indifference for the benefit of their power.

chongli 3y ago
Australia has solved this problem with mandatory voting. Those who fail to vote are hit with a $20 fine. They generally have above 90% turnout in elections.
- giantg2 3y ago
  A lot of people here would still probably take the fine if it were only $20.
  - chongli 3y ago
    I don't think too many people would be upset if this meant wealthier people (who can't afford the $20) would be less likely to vote.
    - giantg2 3y ago
      I suppose voter suppression or selective promotion is popular with most groups so long as it affects the "right" people.
      - uoaei 3y ago
        Considering the rich have far more influence in general on how the general public lives, considering their positions in industry and economic power, it seems appropriate to balance that somehow.
        giantg2 3y ago

thebigwinning 3y ago

> Cheating with elections is so much easier with district voting than proportional representation. It's the opposite. A single compromised location can tip a in a national popular election. It almost becomes an arms race of cheating. With district based they can only affect their district.

MagnumOpus 3y ago
That is not true. National popular elections still rely on the same voting booths with known numbers of local voters. A location with a thousand voters turning out a million votes would be instantly detected and investigated. Someone wanting to swing a national popular vote fraudulently would need to compromise tens of thousands of ballot boxes to steal on the order of ten million votes -- a much harder ask than compromising a hundred ballot boxes to swing three states in the Senate/Electoral College or gerrymandering twenty districts in Congress.
- thebigwinning 3y ago
  > A location with a thousand voters turning out a million votes Easy to detect for a small town, not for a big city, where there are literally millions but who knows how many actually vote. In fact I could cite the exact kinds of statistical reasoning for certain counties in the recent election, but you wouldn't accept that.

snarf21 3y ago

> The founders of the constitution hated parties but ended up with the game that leaves only a two party competition. That's hardly a choice, it's a single bit. I've come to believe that the only thing we need to change to have a three party system is to make all votes for bills in Congress to require 70%+. Today things can be passed with 50.00001% which is basically binary. With the required compromise and negotiation, a third party would have power to swing the vote for yea or nea and dilute the power of the duopoly. At first, it might just take form as a caucus until enough power is built to build a proper party with funding for candidates. I know it is a pipe dream because the powers that be wouldn't want to give up their hammer. I think this is one thing that the founders got wrong. Having to build compromise could be good for everyone in the end.

jagraff 3y ago
Due to the filibuster, most bills require 60 votes (60%) to pass the senate. It hasn’t lead to more cooperation - it’s lead to a paralyzed government that can’t pass good laws.
- dpifke 3y ago
  A paralyzed government also can't pass bad laws. Considering how rarely laws are repealed, this is arguably a feature, not a bug.
  - ianburrell 3y ago
    A paralyzed government can’t pass required laws. The budget has to be passed every year. That will never happen with supermajority. No new programs, no cuts, just confusing resolutions. The debt ceiling has to be increased occasionally and if you thought recent negotiations were bad, supermajority would be worse. A paralyzed government can’t pass good laws. All the problems in the country that would never get fixed. Current inaction is bad enough, but supermajority would never pass anything except the bland and disasters.
    - MichaelZuo 3y ago

2OEH8eoCRo0 3y ago

Why do members of the same party often disagree? I think we get a bit too wrapped up on the "two parties" thing as if there are only two opinions as well.

shoxidizer 3y ago

> There's an additional problem, which is why isn't even harder to replace district voting, that those in charge of counting votes are local to each district, which is letting the car guard the cream. American elections are administered locally to prevent top-down rigging, especially from the federal to the state level. Presumably local politicians will be more accountable to local people than an election authority across the country. And if the local people don't want to hold them accountable because they like them, then the politician is at least representing their contstituency in some way. And from the perspective of other districts, a corrupt district cannot affect their own elections, only send, at worst, a representative they don't like as if the two districts sinply disagreed. If a national election authority were corrupted, there wouldn't be anything local political organizations could do, especially if this applied to local executive or judicial positions. And of course the original states were not going to cede the counting of their votes the federal government. The electoral college is widely operated as a winner-takes-all system because it means that no state has to trust any other.