The guy who's in charge of Trump's EPA transition thinks that climate change is a hoax, that the Clean Power Plan is illegal, that the Endangered Species Act should be repealed, that the Paris Climate Agreement is unconstitutional.
The likely pick to head the DOE is a lobbyist for the oil industry who wants to open up Federal lands for energy exploration.
Good lord this election is going to have far-reaching consequences.
I guess my point is that if you want significant action on climate change (I do too!), you were always going to have to fight for it with your representatives (R or D) vs the industry donors.
Between
* extra energy consumption based on war efforts on both sides and rebuilding countries afterwards,
* as well as oil fields being literally set on fire,
that is a few tons of CO2 as well.
I don't like him but unless certain folks I respect that Americans disliked him less than the alternative.
This is known as "respect for the Democracy".
That said it seems he is less likely to start a war than the other candidate.
In four years, we'll either have a 1-party system or an N-party system.
Man, c'mon - why you gotta lump all conservatives in with these people? You can be a conservative without being an absolute anti-science/anti-intellectual/anti-environment/etc lunatic.
but you can't vote liberal without voting in bleeding-hearts. it's the same for conservatives. sooner or later you're going to have to vote for an absolute anti-science/anti-intellectual/anti-environment/etc lunatic.
when partisanship trumps all, almost none of it is so black and white. it becomes shades of grey.
Why when I decide climate change is super important do I also have to align with 15 other unrelated policies as well?
Parties are all-or-nothing and that's painful. Because I find that no party represents me in more than like 20% of my political positions.
I should be able to delegate better.
Instead we'd recommend one of the European-republic forks (E.g. Germany's federalism 2.0) or, if you're feeling adventurous, one of the smaller forks like 'Direct Democracy' or the nordic-style forks.
Please note that those newer implementations have significantly higher system requirements, usually calling for a well educated population that is willing to debate and compromise rationally.
Not just $5 here or $20 there. Donate to match your desire for a better future.
If we'd had a more nuanced system that allowed voting negative in addition to positive... pretty sure Johnson would have won.
We must prove that something which may be more complex than our current system is still just as fair (or more fair).
For example rank voting. You rank the candidates when you vote. When counting, you count all the votes for each candidate. You eliminate the candidate with the fewest votes. Everyone who had that candidate as a first choice reallocates their votes to their second choice. Repeat until there's a winner.
Suddenly it's okay to vote for that third party, because through rank voting you can ensure that your third party vote does not end up propping up the candidate you like the least.
Why isn't it used today?
Does such a group exist?
You can either rank the vote manually or vote for a party and they get to pick how the vote is ranked between all the candidates.
Also lots of countries have preferential voting systems. Lots of people in AU don't vote for the major parties.
The US system is just crazy.
Socially liberal fiscal conservatives might not like this administration's social changes, but conservative fiscal legislation will get much less scrutiny since the Democrats have almost no power. Vice versa for the rare fiscally liberal social conservatives.
This is the same thing I heard from Democrats in 2000 and 2004, and the same thing I heard from Republicans in 2008. It is unlikely to actually happen. People are too complacent, and a good chunk of America will be perfectly satiated by cheap prices at the pump.
There are cheaters and people making.. "clever use of game mechanics", let's say. But the vote does matter.
In fact, one of the main reasons the system is so broken today is because there isn't enough vote. Trump, like Obama, was able to get to power by inspiring people to vote.
> They didn't get there where they are because of paying attention to your opinion but because of ignoringt it.
You know, if it was that easy, I'd be the one sitting on billions of dollars right now.
We have to play games all the day where "the other party cheats anyway". But there are only two games where your efforts to make things work out are divided by 140.000.000. Election and lottery.
>> There are cheaters and people making.. "clever use of game mechanics", let's say. But the vote does matter.
Yes, votes does matter. And your vote matters as well. But its relevance is divided by 140.000.000. Good luck, man!
>> In fact, one of the main reasons the system is so broken today is because there isn't enough vote.
And this is because the non-voters have better things to do with their lives than playing the sucker's game.
>> You know, if it was that easy, I'd be the one sitting on billions of dollars right now.
Only because we could not cheat our way to the top does not mean that the people at the top are saints. Maybe they are just better cheaters than you and me.
Once you remove the percentage of people who don't vote and take the electoral college into account, that number is way lower and we haven't even begun to touch how one person can mass influence votes.
Just because you yourself have one single vote doesn't mean your voice is one in a sea of hundreds of millions. Far from it.
> And this is because the non-voters have better things to do with their lives than playing the sucker's game.
Why do you think so much effort is spent on preventing various inconvenient groups of people to vote?
It's funny how a lot of people downplay their own voice in a democracy. You have far more influence than you can imagine.
You strike me as quite terribly close minded though, and I don't really feel like convincing people when they adopt such a cynical attitude, so if you're actually interested you can read the excellent Dictator's Handbook by Bruce Bueno de Mesquita.
From google.
>> You're so focused on it.
I know. It is kind of "occupational disease". I do statistics.
>> Once you remove the percentage of people who don't vote
Not voting is also a voting. In fact it is voting against all of the candidates and / or against the voting system.
>> Just because you yourself have one single vote doesn't mean your voice is one in a sea of hundreds of millions.
Actually it does. Having one single vote among hundreds of millions means having only one single vote among hundreds of millions.
>> It's funny how a lot of people downplay their own voice in a democracy.
You mean the people who can divide 1 by hundreds of millions? It's funny how not all of the people can do the math.
>> You strike me as quite terribly close minded
You are right. Just because I have a different opinion than you I am terribly [put some negative attribute here].
My take on democracy: you have the right to build your own opinion and talk about it and you have to accept the opinion of others as well as the fact that they talk about it, even if you do not agree with them. Not agreeing with you does not mean being [put some negative attribute here] and you do not have to convince others of your being right.
You are wellcome.
What a waste of words.
I do not agree with you but I think there is enough place on earth for more than one opinion.
It is somehow ironic that you, son of the land of the free, have to learn this from someone born behind the iron curtain.
[1] suwa.org
People need to see it as an opportunity and then take it.
Perhaps this is it.