4 ms·
The practical consequence of this system is that it effectively allows a minority of voters from rural areas to impose their will onto large urban centers
by spankalee 1y ago
The practical consequence of this system is that it effectively allows a minority of voters from rural areas to impose their will onto large urban centers
- mlrtime 1y agoWhich you want the opposite to happen , not a better system.
- spankalee 1y agoHow in the world is minority rule better than majority rule?
- newfriend 1y agoWe don't have minority rule though, we have a balance.
- spankalee 1y agoWhat? We absolutely do have minority rule. In both the Senate and the House, the Republican majorities represent a minority of the population.
- newfriend 1y agoTrump easily won the popular vote. What makes you say that they represent a minority of the population? The fact that both the House and Senate are nearly 50% by party again points to the fact that we have a good balance.
- acdha 1y agoTrump got 49% of the votes cast, which is roughly a quarter of the US population.
- newfriend 1y agoDo you have a better way of determining which party is the "majority" in Congress? That is what we are discussing here. Whether the current makeup of Congress accurately represents the votes of the people or not. Obviously I understand that not every person voted in the election (many are not even eligible). It is simply not relevant to this conversation, and is an often trotted out diversion meant to diminish the mandate given by the actual voters.
- acdha 1y agoIn this case it’s much simpler: the question was minority rule and you can see that power in the executive, legislative, and judicial branches is held by Republican politicians representing less than a majority—Trump is arguably the best claim they have on plurality since he is come very close to winning the popular vote since so many Democrats stayed home—and enacting policies which are very unpopular, in most cases policies which are unpopular even among registered Republicans.
- spankalee 1y agoDid I mention Trump? The fact that we have minority rule in the Senate, House, and Supreme Court is exactly why we don't have any checks and balances any more and Trump gets to act like an emperor.
- newfriend 1y agoAgain, you're saying "minority rule". But Trump (Republican) won the popular vote. So which party is the minority? Do you have another way of determining which party is the majority/minority besides votes for the President? It seems clear that the majority in the 2024 election preferred Republican governance, and so they gained control over President/House/Senate.
- spankalee 1y agoYes, minority rule. You keep bringing up the presidency, but I'm talking about the Senate. Republicans have a majority in the Senate when their senators received a minority of votes, by about 24 million votes.
- newfriend 1y agoIs this a joke? You think Democrat Senators got 24 million more votes? Where are you getting these nonsense numbers? Update Here are some rough numbers I found quickly (because your numbers are obvious nonsense): President R - 77.3m - 49.8% D - 75.0m - 48.3% Others - 2.9m - 1.9% Senate D - 55.9m - 49.1% R - 54.4m - 47.7% Others - 3.7m - 3.2% House R - 74.4m - 49.8% D - 70.6m - 47.2% Others - 4.6m - 3.1% Looks like the system is working to me. The Senate vote not withstanding of course because of some smaller states, but it's not some extreme miscarriage of justice as you imply. The majority party won and is currently enacting policies that voters wanted. I'm sorry that your beliefs aren't as popular as you thought.
- spankalee 1y agoSorry, I copy and pasted wrong, the Democratic senators represent 24M more people, and had about 2.8M more votes, yet have 6 fewer seats counting the independents that caucus with the Dems. So fewer voters and constituents for a pretty significant majority in senators.