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>They’re looking to form a truly popular and organic democratic consensus, which cannot happen overnight. And how does voting trump achieve that. Unless you c

>They’re looking to form a truly popular and organic democratic consensus, which cannot happen overnight. And how does voting trump achieve that. Unless you conclude that the current situation is unfixable, and it should be torn down. It seems an extremely unwise gamble to make though. Im not convinced the class consensus v popular consensus is necessarily a bad thing. You can't expect the entire population to be well informed about all issues, our current system offloads the requirement for everyone to be knowledgeable about everything, which I would say is that gap. And again were moving away from the empathy position. I can generally make sense of political decisions, not as a perfect representation of the popular will, but as a combination of marrying divergent views with actual reality. That seems to be more an empathetic approach than the opposite. This seems to be an example of making a decision (right/wrong, doesn't matter) for the wrong reasons. So while it may be empathetic, it doesn't seem to be intelligent.

anonymouskimmer 3y ago
I worked as a package handler for FedEx for a while and mentioned to one of the other handlers (who was ex-military) that monarchists actually existed in the US. He mentioned something to the effect that serving a King seemed like a compelling idea. > Unless you conclude that the current situation is unfixable, and it should be torn down. It seems an extremely unwise gamble to make though. Democratic-Republican (in the political sense, not the political party sense) institutions are strong enough in the US that I genuinely cannot see how Trump could fully tear them down, even for a temporary time during the course of his presidency. I still fear what he will do. For example, 16 of the last 21 Supreme Court justices - 76% - have been appointed by Republican presidents despite Republican presidents only serving for 58% of those years. It's necessary to go back to 1938 to balance appointed Supreme Court justices at 21 to 21 Republican to Democrat appointments, with Republicans having served only 44% of the time as president.
Amezarak 3y ago
One thing I forgot to add is some concrete examples of the “defenders of democracy.” John Brennan, former CIA director who authorized and ordered CIA torture program, the assassination of American citizens, who said the CIA was above the law, and who spied on Congress to facilitate coverups - went on record on an NPR interview saying that they had to do whatever it took to get rid of Trump, and was lauded as a resistance hero. It makes me very uneasy to be on the same side as John Brennan. Similarly, a US general proudly announced on television that he lied to Trump about American troop presence so that they could maintain troops in the country in question. The American government is riddled with such people very clearly undermining democratic institutions, but they are ignored and lauded as heroes for opposing the enemy du jour. > You can't expect the entire population to be well informed about all issues, our current system offloads the requirement for everyone to be knowledgeable about everything, which I would say is that gap. Sure, this is a fundamental problem with the increasingly complex nature of modern society. But it’s also why, no matter who you vote for as an American, you get basically the same foreign policy, whether you elect Bush or Obama. Foreign policy is really not so much decided by the President, though he gets some influence, but by tens of thousands of State Department experts and to some extent the DoD and security establishment. Americans don’t get a say in whether it’s a good idea to meddle in the internal politics of every country on Earth, or whether the particular position taken in some country benefits them or not, they simply have to accept the expert view, even when it blows up in their faces and harms millions of people and leads to 9/11s or helps the arming of ISIS. There is no easy solution to this problem of expert interests gradually diverging from average American interests. Another example might be marijuana legalization. A large supermajority of Americans support medical marijuana but it remains federally illegal. This is an area where the “expert” political class does not really care so much and does not widely support it, so nothing happens. When there is political class consensus, forms don’t even matter - legislated law is set aside in favor of executive orders, if necessary to move as quickly as possible - and if the next President tries to rescind such an executive order, he will not be allowed. But you can’t simultaneously make the argument that “democracy is good” and “actually, we need rule by experts.” You’ve gone from saying Trump was bad because he ignored democracy to making an argument yourself about where democracy fails.
- anonymouskimmer 3y ago
  > Foreign policy is really not so much decided by the President, though he gets some influence, but by tens of thousands of State Department experts and to some extent the DoD and security establishment. And many, many treaties approved by Congress.
  - Amezarak 3y ago
    The US foreign policy establishment mostly bypasses the treaty ratification process nowadays because of the embarrassments that occur when they are not ratified. The number of signed, ratified, in-force treaties is probably much smaller than you think it is. The treaty legal process in the US was honestly not very well thought out to start with - the Congressional oversight role as practiced is treated more like a rubber stamp procedurally. And of course, they are set aside when the establishment finds them inconvenient. It’s mostly settled law the executive can unilaterally terminate or suspend treaties.

anonymouskimmer 3y ago

I worked as a package handler for FedEx for a while and mentioned to one of the other handlers (who was ex-military) that monarchists actually existed in the US. He mentioned something to the effect that serving a King seemed like a compelling idea. > Unless you conclude that the current situation is unfixable, and it should be torn down. It seems an extremely unwise gamble to make though. Democratic-Republican (in the political sense, not the political party sense) institutions are strong enough in the US that I genuinely cannot see how Trump could fully tear them down, even for a temporary time during the course of his presidency. I still fear what he will do. For example, 16 of the last 21 Supreme Court justices - 76% - have been appointed by Republican presidents despite Republican presidents only serving for 58% of those years. It's necessary to go back to 1938 to balance appointed Supreme Court justices at 21 to 21 Republican to Democrat appointments, with Republicans having served only 44% of the time as president.

Amezarak 3y ago

One thing I forgot to add is some concrete examples of the “defenders of democracy.” John Brennan, former CIA director who authorized and ordered CIA torture program, the assassination of American citizens, who said the CIA was above the law, and who spied on Congress to facilitate coverups - went on record on an NPR interview saying that they had to do whatever it took to get rid of Trump, and was lauded as a resistance hero. It makes me very uneasy to be on the same side as John Brennan. Similarly, a US general proudly announced on television that he lied to Trump about American troop presence so that they could maintain troops in the country in question. The American government is riddled with such people very clearly undermining democratic institutions, but they are ignored and lauded as heroes for opposing the enemy du jour. > You can't expect the entire population to be well informed about all issues, our current system offloads the requirement for everyone to be knowledgeable about everything, which I would say is that gap. Sure, this is a fundamental problem with the increasingly complex nature of modern society. But it’s also why, no matter who you vote for as an American, you get basically the same foreign policy, whether you elect Bush or Obama. Foreign policy is really not so much decided by the President, though he gets some influence, but by tens of thousands of State Department experts and to some extent the DoD and security establishment. Americans don’t get a say in whether it’s a good idea to meddle in the internal politics of every country on Earth, or whether the particular position taken in some country benefits them or not, they simply have to accept the expert view, even when it blows up in their faces and harms millions of people and leads to 9/11s or helps the arming of ISIS. There is no easy solution to this problem of expert interests gradually diverging from average American interests. Another example might be marijuana legalization. A large supermajority of Americans support medical marijuana but it remains federally illegal. This is an area where the “expert” political class does not really care so much and does not widely support it, so nothing happens. When there is political class consensus, forms don’t even matter - legislated law is set aside in favor of executive orders, if necessary to move as quickly as possible - and if the next President tries to rescind such an executive order, he will not be allowed. But you can’t simultaneously make the argument that “democracy is good” and “actually, we need rule by experts.” You’ve gone from saying Trump was bad because he ignored democracy to making an argument yourself about where democracy fails.

anonymouskimmer 3y ago
> Foreign policy is really not so much decided by the President, though he gets some influence, but by tens of thousands of State Department experts and to some extent the DoD and security establishment. And many, many treaties approved by Congress.
- Amezarak 3y ago
  The US foreign policy establishment mostly bypasses the treaty ratification process nowadays because of the embarrassments that occur when they are not ratified. The number of signed, ratified, in-force treaties is probably much smaller than you think it is. The treaty legal process in the US was honestly not very well thought out to start with - the Congressional oversight role as practiced is treated more like a rubber stamp procedurally. And of course, they are set aside when the establishment finds them inconvenient. It’s mostly settled law the executive can unilaterally terminate or suspend treaties.