4 ms·

Guess you're not very old, then. Or you want things that a supermajority doesn't, which is As Designed.

philwelch 3y ago
Someone who was born in late 1992 or 1993 would be 31 years old now, which isn’t very old but also isn’t particularly young. It’s also worth pointing out that there’s much less impetus to amend the constitution when you can just circumvent it, which both parties have consistently done for quite some time now. For what it’s worth, even Antonin Scalia was of the opinion that it is too hard to amend the constitution. So I don’t think that’s an entirely unreasonable idea. I just don’t think that’s an excuse to just ignore it or attempt to game the system with court packing and the like.
- AlbertCory 3y ago
  FWIW: is this supposed to add credibility, that you found one conservative justice? "Too hard" really means "we're not getting what we want." Again, that is As Designed. Amendments really are supposed to represent an overwhelming consensus. Not just the blue states (or the red).
  - philwelch 3y ago
    Dude, calm down. I’m mostly agreeing with you and partly conceding that maybe 3/4 of the states is too high a bar. 2/3 of the states would be a more reasonable supermajority that would still need to cross the blue/red divide. There’s no way you’re getting 2/3 of the states to do something radical like repeal the Second Amendment (more than half of the states have expanded gun rights since 1990) or decide the abortion issue on the federal level. And please, Antonin Scalia was not just “one conservative justice”.
    - AlbertCory 3y ago
      I'm calm, dude. Maybe say what you mean in the first place. If all you meant was "2/3 instead of 3/4" you should have said it. In much of the "democratic" world, changing the constitution is something every dictator does to allow himself to stay in office. What's to guarantee that we don't end up with that? Props to Scalia. But he wasn't an Ultimate Authority.
      - philwelch 3y ago
        > In much of the "democratic" world, changing the constitution is something every dictator does to allow himself to stay in office. What's to guarantee that we don't end up with that? That’s what happens if it’s too easy to amend the constitution. If it’s too difficult, the government either ignores it entirely or interprets it in increasingly ludicrous ways because it’s impossible to get anything done any other way. I think the US is clearly experiencing this particular failure mode, and if we want to get back to operating within the text of the Constitution, we need to tune the amendment threshold accordingly. Right now it takes 38 states to amend the constitution. For the sake of comparison, 30 states are blacklisted from doing business with the city of San Francisco because their laws aren’t progressive enough. That’s actually the highest interesting number of states I can find that all fit on any one side of an interesting partisan divide—when it comes to guns, abortions, and other similarly divisive issues, it’s almost impossible to find even 30 states that all land on one side or the other.

Someone who was born in late 1992 or 1993 would be 31 years old now, which isn’t very old but also isn’t particularly young. It’s also worth pointing out that there’s much less impetus to amend the constitution when you can just circumvent it, which both parties have consistently done for quite some time now. For what it’s worth, even Antonin Scalia was of the opinion that it is too hard to amend the constitution. So I don’t think that’s an entirely unreasonable idea. I just don’t think that’s an excuse to just ignore it or attempt to game the system with court packing and the like.

AlbertCory 3y ago
FWIW: is this supposed to add credibility, that you found one conservative justice? "Too hard" really means "we're not getting what we want." Again, that is As Designed. Amendments really are supposed to represent an overwhelming consensus. Not just the blue states (or the red).
- philwelch 3y ago
  Dude, calm down. I’m mostly agreeing with you and partly conceding that maybe 3/4 of the states is too high a bar. 2/3 of the states would be a more reasonable supermajority that would still need to cross the blue/red divide. There’s no way you’re getting 2/3 of the states to do something radical like repeal the Second Amendment (more than half of the states have expanded gun rights since 1990) or decide the abortion issue on the federal level. And please, Antonin Scalia was not just “one conservative justice”.
  - AlbertCory 3y ago
    I'm calm, dude. Maybe say what you mean in the first place. If all you meant was "2/3 instead of 3/4" you should have said it. In much of the "democratic" world, changing the constitution is something every dictator does to allow himself to stay in office. What's to guarantee that we don't end up with that? Props to Scalia. But he wasn't an Ultimate Authority.
    - philwelch 3y ago
      > In much of the "democratic" world, changing the constitution is something every dictator does to allow himself to stay in office. What's to guarantee that we don't end up with that? That’s what happens if it’s too easy to amend the constitution. If it’s too difficult, the government either ignores it entirely or interprets it in increasingly ludicrous ways because it’s impossible to get anything done any other way. I think the US is clearly experiencing this particular failure mode, and if we want to get back to operating within the text of the Constitution, we need to tune the amendment threshold accordingly. Right now it takes 38 states to amend the constitution. For the sake of comparison, 30 states are blacklisted from doing business with the city of San Francisco because their laws aren’t progressive enough. That’s actually the highest interesting number of states I can find that all fit on any one side of an interesting partisan divide—when it comes to guns, abortions, and other similarly divisive issues, it’s almost impossible to find even 30 states that all land on one side or the other.