3 ms·

I don’t think current times are playing out at all as they intended. The federal government is much too large and too powerful, and Congress is too insulated f

I don’t think current times are playing out at all as they intended. The federal government is much too large and too powerful, and Congress is too insulated from their constituents. This emboldens their corruption and playing to special interests instead of the people they are supposed to represent. This is more an indictment of 20th and 21st century politicians than it is the founders.

lesuorac 3y ago
> Congress is too insulated from their constituents. +1 When you're running for a district you can slice the population up into various causes and then run on that. It doesn't matter if your platform is "far-X" because if you can scoop up 20% of the population that's a win at the ballot. Congress really needs to be larger than it is, the citizen:representative ratio should really be fixed at a ratio and not fixed at the #of representatives. Plenty of other countries have more representatives than the US despite a smaller population. Assuming that we picked say 150k citizens: 1 representative then you should also be able to forfeit your vote along with ~150k other people to select a representative.
nh23423fefe 3y ago
This is more of what I said I don't care about. I don't care what you imagine the 15th-generation ancestors, of some minority of the living population, think. I don't care if you want to blame someone else for "not implementing the obvious vision of the founders." They aren't here and can't make any decisions for us that we couldn't better make ourselves. They aren't wiser than us. Our present state isn't some deviation from their potential utopia. Their intentions are completely irrelevant. Comporting our behavior and desires with whatever someone might imagine they would want is nonsense.
- jojobaskins 3y ago
  You're giving 0 credit where some is due. This is the other side of the extreme. Most government structures don't last that long, the fact that the one they made has lasted relatively in tact for a few hundred years means their ideas have some merit beyond the bounds of their time. Also I'm not sure who you mean by "us", the ruling class of today?
  - nh23423fefe 3y ago
    I can't see what credit has to do with anything. Evaluating the quality of the government they created has nothing to do with us maintaining it. Its ours (the living) not theirs (the dead). We owe them nothing. Monarchy existed for 1000s of years. Longevity is irrelevant. It is never relevant who had the idea. Invoking the founders as a justification for anything is error. They are an arbitrary group of non-extants. Why are you trying to connect the two ideas.
    - jojobaskins 3y ago
      I'm not really saying we owe them anything just that (some of) their ideas seem to work. I guess a few monarchies have lasted a while but centralizing all the power and leading with dogma is easier than coming to a group consensus. All I really want to say is don't throw out the baby with the bathwater...
User23 3y ago
Congress doesn't govern. None of our "legislators" writes any substantial legislation. They just go on junkets and sign off on what the bag men tell them to. This is evidenced by how all of the fake partisan conflict instantly disappears when the shot-callers want something done, like, say, sending weapons to Ukraine.

lesuorac 3y ago

> Congress is too insulated from their constituents. +1 When you're running for a district you can slice the population up into various causes and then run on that. It doesn't matter if your platform is "far-X" because if you can scoop up 20% of the population that's a win at the ballot. Congress really needs to be larger than it is, the citizen:representative ratio should really be fixed at a ratio and not fixed at the #of representatives. Plenty of other countries have more representatives than the US despite a smaller population. Assuming that we picked say 150k citizens: 1 representative then you should also be able to forfeit your vote along with ~150k other people to select a representative.

nh23423fefe 3y ago

This is more of what I said I don't care about. I don't care what you imagine the 15th-generation ancestors, of some minority of the living population, think. I don't care if you want to blame someone else for "not implementing the obvious vision of the founders." They aren't here and can't make any decisions for us that we couldn't better make ourselves. They aren't wiser than us. Our present state isn't some deviation from their potential utopia. Their intentions are completely irrelevant. Comporting our behavior and desires with whatever someone might imagine they would want is nonsense.

jojobaskins 3y ago
You're giving 0 credit where some is due. This is the other side of the extreme. Most government structures don't last that long, the fact that the one they made has lasted relatively in tact for a few hundred years means their ideas have some merit beyond the bounds of their time. Also I'm not sure who you mean by "us", the ruling class of today?
- nh23423fefe 3y ago
  I can't see what credit has to do with anything. Evaluating the quality of the government they created has nothing to do with us maintaining it. Its ours (the living) not theirs (the dead). We owe them nothing. Monarchy existed for 1000s of years. Longevity is irrelevant. It is never relevant who had the idea. Invoking the founders as a justification for anything is error. They are an arbitrary group of non-extants. Why are you trying to connect the two ideas.
  - jojobaskins 3y ago
    I'm not really saying we owe them anything just that (some of) their ideas seem to work. I guess a few monarchies have lasted a while but centralizing all the power and leading with dogma is easier than coming to a group consensus. All I really want to say is don't throw out the baby with the bathwater...

User23 3y ago

Congress doesn't govern. None of our "legislators" writes any substantial legislation. They just go on junkets and sign off on what the bag men tell them to. This is evidenced by how all of the fake partisan conflict instantly disappears when the shot-callers want something done, like, say, sending weapons to Ukraine.