The latest round of Americans Elect nonsense is at CNN.com this weekend as a technocrat appeals to the iGeneration about voting, the Sensible Centrist Austerity way. Now with technology!
This digital revolution is more than just innovating for convenience. Something deeper and more significant is at stake: the integrity of our consent, the underpinning of our government’s legitimacy and authority.
“Consent of the governed” only exists if it can be expressed, and that is an increasingly difficult task. When we vote for president, we don’t simply vote for the best candidate; we vote for the best candidate who has previously been ratified by one of two political parties.
This creates a philosophical “blackout” space in which no candidate, because of his or her beliefs, will ever be elected president (see Jon Huntsman). This blackout space should concern all of us, because of its appeal to the general electorate, who will never get that option. What’s worse is that this space is growing with each cycle. It’s not clear that either Ronald Reagan or Bill Clinton would get through their primaries today.
That’s why the Americans Elect innovation is so exciting — because it relieves us of anachronistic structures that harm our political system. It’s the iTunes of politics.
Status quo apologists and those who benefit from partisan gridlock might pooh-pooh this idea, particularly if the candidate doesn’t get to Ross Perot levels in November. But these critics miss the point. Americans Elect is not just about running for the White House in 2012. It’s about electing our leaders in a new way so that the governed are truly consenting.
Right, because removing the political party middlemen from the traditional process of the rich buying our elections makes it that much better solely on the purity factor, except for the fact that they are lying about doing it. Primaries are for suckers, now engage in our primary!
That particular cargo shipload of manure up there was written by Nathan Daschle. You know, son of former Dem Senate Leader Tom Daschle. Just a reminder that it’s not just wealthy, obnoxiously centrist Republicans flogging the Throw Your Vote Away movement here in an attempt to make the “reasonable” case for crushing austerity amid tax cuts for the one percent because it’s our duty, being good serfs, to pay for our lords. It’s feel-good political euthanasia, designed solely to put down resistance to the status quo of “We’re your betters, now here’s what you need to do for us.” To help you remain tranquil in the face of almost certain electoral death, smooth jazz will be deployed in 3…2…1…
Daniel Larison nails these guys to the wall:
There is a powerful case to be made that a two-party system that operates within the very narrow confines of bipartisan consensus on many major policies is harmful to the country. Americans Elect isn’t making that case or anything like it. What the Americans Elect project represents is an effort to produce the distilled essence of everything that is wrong with the current two-party system and then pretend that it is an exciting, new alternative.
S’truth right there, folks. By comparison, Paul Ryan is at least somewhat honest about his plans to Soylent Green us all. And let’s remember that there’s nothing Centrist about the GOP.
daveNYC
Bill Clinton wouldn’t be able to win as a Democrat? Because the party has lurched so far for where I was his wife almost won four years ago?
cmorenc
The only way to effectively dismantle the dysfunctional confines of the existing two-party electoral structure, both in Presidential and Congressional elections, is to enact the instant-primary format of voting, where voters select, in order, their first, second, and third choices for each office. In the event no one gets a majority of first-choice votes, second-choice votes are added to their total, and so on, until someone has a majority. This, for example, would have allowed many voters in 2000 to have selected: 1) Ralph Nader 2) Al Gore without the disastrously counterproductive, unintended consequences of voting for an attractive third-party candidate with no chance of winning. This would also influence the two main parties’ candidates, even when they were overwhelmingly likely to win, by having to favorably enough cater to these voters to win their second-choice votes, but in the general election campaign rather than in existing primaries where they currently can “pivot” and hope low-information voters aren’t paying attention to the b.s. they spewed earlier.
The problem is that neither of the two entrenched major parties are going to be willing to cede an inch toward any new system that might dilute the power of their existing institutional power, even though this “instant runoff” structure would be extremely popular with most voters.
cmorenc
@daveNYC:
You were: a) almost Bill Clinton’s wife four years ago? b) almost won Bill Clinton’s wife four years ago ?? Geez, and all this time we wuz thinkin’ it was Mark Penn that so screwed up the Clinton brand in 2008, and it was your fault all along.
Matoko Borgia-Steeler
livewire.talkingpointsmemo.com/entries/dem-sen-manchin-not-committing-to-obama-in
Michael Bloody Tomasky and Joe Bloody Manchin. What gifts West Virginia has given the centrist cause, eh?
Linda Featheringill
I have found no reason why you should trust Americans Elect. They probably aren’t particularly dishonest but frequently look like they aren’t very bright. And they really think they can made a difference. Hmmph.
rikyrah
the reason you don’t trust them, is because they can’t be trusted, and you’ve been Black in America longer than 3 days, Zander.
you can see it a mile away.
Gin & Tonic
@cmorenc:
Evidence, please?
dmsilev
What the fuck does this even mean? Beyond the obvious, which is that Thomas Friedman is running a writing school for nascent pundits.
Nicole
What’s hilarious about their incredible concern about the Party determining the candidate, instead of the people, is that it was pretty clear this spring that the Party really would have preferred someone, anyone, other than Romney, but Romney can buy whatever he wants (though I think the White House itself might not end up being within his price range).
Seriously, they just saw their theory in action in the GOP primary. And the GOP ended up with the wealthiest guy, who, it just so happens, has no actual positions or principles, other than getting more money to his friends.
beltane
@Gin & Tonic: The only real-world example I know of regarding IRV was in Burlington, VT, where it turned out not to be as popular as its proponents had hoped. Burlington has now gone back to running its elections the old-fashioned way.
Culture of Truth
Ummm…. what?
Culture of Truth
Very likely the’d adjust their message and sail through. But even if true, so what?
Culture of Truth
No iTunes is popualar, like Obama. Romney is Google Play.
AE is Zune.
Ash Can
Meh. How many voters even know who these clods are, anyway?
Forum Transmitted Disease
Extra horseshit with horseshit on top.
Had Huntsman run as a Dem, he’d have beaten Obama in the primaries and would have beaten Reagan’s wipeout of Mondale in the general. Huntsman’s policies and beliefs aren’t the problem, he’s essentially the white, Jack Mormon version of Obama.
The problem here is not the two party system (although there are so many problems with it that I couldn’t list them all if I had all day) the problem is, as John stated so long ago, is that one of the parties is proposing pizza for dinner and the other one is offering tire rims and anthrax.
Suffern ACE
Honestly. Clinton probably would have beaten bush part ii and McCain, and Obama in the primary. He might even have been able to beat nixons head in futurama. He would get the nom in those elections.
I’m still not certain how much more corporate the party has to be before it stops being the democratic party. Or is it a case that AE likes the Democratic party policies but hates its voters?
Shane Taylor
The declared candidate with the most supporters on the Americans Elect website? Buddy Roemer. It’s the Roemer revolution!
Americans Elect had to postpone online voting for a month, because not enough people gave a damn.
Nylund
So how do these Americans Elect Caucuses work? Are they limited to the “declared” candidates?” Is it a contest between T.J. O’Hara and his 365 supporters and Mike Ballantine’s 257? Or is it open to all the candidates people want to “draft” as well? IE, the ones that haven’t said they even want to be Americans Elect’s candidate (and includes the likes of Obama, Ron Paul, etc….you know, people that the two parties totally ignore).
Come on people, this is serious stuff! Don’t you know that Tom Friedman gets crappy service on Amtrak?!
pseudonymous in nc
In other news, French voters get to choose between one of ten presidential candidates on Sunday: the top two go through to the runoff in a fortnight. How do they manage that without the plutocratic wankery of American Select?
@beltane:
In Burlington, they had a fairly contentious mayoral election in 2009 where the nature of the transfers created the impression of unfairness — here are both sides of the argument.
Culture of Truth
@Suffern ACE: Sounds right. Or maybe the love what they wish the GOP was. In any case, it’s clear they’re not down with extrmeme wingnuts and really hate hippies.
Nylund
@Shane Taylor: In fifth place is T.J. O’Hara with 356 supporters. I feel like Balloon-Juice alone could draft John Cole and push him to top tier status within a day.
Gin & Tonic
@Nylund:
Who the fuck is T.J. O’Hara?
evap
@cmorenc:
The problem is that “instant runoff” (which is used in Ireland, among other countries) has problems as well. In fact, it is a mathematical theorem that any voting method based on voters ranking of the candidates has flaws (when there are more than 2 candidates). This is the famous Arrow’s Impossibility Theorem.
Zandar
@Ash Can:
Couple percentage points is all they need.
Nylund
At this point, all American’s Elect wants is to find enough rubes to give them money so that they can repay the millions they were loaned by their original Wall St. supporters.
It has nothing to do with changing politics or finding a better candidate anymore. It’s just about bailing out the people who wasted millions of dollars on the projects. If someone is going to lose money on this, they’d damn well prefer it be a bunch of rubes on the internet than themselves.
What I really don’t know is if Tom Friedman really cares about this third-party nonsense anymore, or if he’s just using his Times gig as a way to help make sure his rich friends don’t lose millions on this joke. Probably a bit of both…first and foremost, cut the losses for his buddies, but if he can get Gary Johnson or Michael Bloomberg on the ticket in all 50 states, he’ll give himself a big pat on the back as well.
Judas Escargot, Your Postmodern Neighbor
From Daschle’s article, here’s a tell:
As a general rule, only trust someone who uses a term like “disruptive technology” when it’s in the third person. “The automobile was a disruptive technology” is commentary. “Our new disruptive technology implements new cross-platform synergies between business processes throughout the Enterprise” is bullshytt.
This article isn’t presenting a political viewpoint: It’s ad copy for a politically-oriented social networking site that wants your eyeballs and your cash.
Young CEO Daschle happens to be Tom Daschle’s son, BTW (which CNN neglects to mention).
xian
@Nylund: let’s do this!
Origuy
San Francisco uses rank-choice voting for city elections. I don’t live in the city, but I know it takes a while to get results. I’ve heard they may drop it and go back to the old way. It eliminates runoffs, which saves money.
Phil Perspective
@Judas Escargot, Your Postmodern Neighbor: Not to mention .. Daschle’s son uses to be a DNC official I believe. So he’s another idiot fuck stick who likely says the Democratic Party has moved too far to the left.
Mnemosyne
Where’s Timmeh to tell us all that the only reason we hate American Select is because they’re bucking the system and there’s no evidence that they’re just trying to play spoiler in November? That was one of his more classic appearances, especially once he admitted he had no idea what American Select was, just that they were running against Obama so they must be good by definition.
Karmakin
@Forum Transmitted Disease: To be fair, the problem is that there’s a large pro-pizza constituency, and in fact the constituency for healthy food is relatively small.
gaz
There is no way that online voting is safe.
I can crack most digital signatures in under 10 minutes.
I have a cloud with about a dozen petaflops.
If I spent a bit of money (far less than a new car), I could have 3.72 MORE petaflops, right on my desk.
SSL is not safe. Digital signatures are not safe. And if I can hack you, you bet your sorry ass that there’s 100’s – nay 1000’s more that can. I’m nobody special. And that’s what this idiot Nathan over at CNN should be worried about.
Morons. The lot of them.
Tim Connor
@cmorenc: Lots of big words here. A fair number of grandiose allegations. Little or no data to support said allegations.
Have you been studying at the Paul Ryan School of Logic?
Enhanced Voting Techniques
Bloomburg is the great white of hope of American Select? Are they on crack? Bloomburg would have to be an utter idiot to accept a candidacy from them. Even if he ended up a spoiler for Obama the Right would still hate Bloomburg for not supporting Romney.
danimal
@Nylund: I’m in!
gaz
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: If there’s any consistency at all among the glibertarians, it’s that they’re not too bright.
taylormattd
How embarrassing.
You almost get the feeling the first draft of this said “It’s the WebTV of politics.”
taylormattd
And by the way, this should be a new tag:
TooManyJens
@evap:
Sure, but a system wouldn’t have to be flawless to be better than what we have.
Also, I get the feeling Nathan Daschle doesn’t realize what a shitty, bloated piece of crap iTunes has become. From what I’ve heard, even other Apple developers hate iTunes and the iTunes team.
Gravenstone
Perhaps it’s just my tired old eyes, but I read Zandar’s first link in the OP as “Americans Eject”. Perhaps things would be better if we could eject the troublemakers.
Tonal Crow
Yeah. It’s about ratfuckers, hackers, computer viruses, and foreign 3-letter agencies using internet voting to put candidates on our Presidential ballot.
AA+ Bonds
Any piece that starts with ‘the digital revolution’ can be ignored.
Sincerely,
A Twenty Something Tech Worker
Hujo
We are the ony “Democracy” in the world with only 2 viable parties–and has been stated above and elsewhere, this corporate duopoly rabidly resists any attemps to change the system and make it more inclusive. The Republicans were successful in ousting the Whigs, but that was the last shot.
I agree that “America Elects” is a dud
AA+ Bonds
@gaz:
To me the important part is the chanese factor: their site will be annihilated by hordes of white boys with minor savvy, major free time, and infinite rage
AA+ Bonds
Yes I would like to vote please, my login? Why it is:
or ‘1’=’1′ /*
Sly
Slow, intrusive, bloated, proprietary, and in constant need of updates.
Catsy
WIN.
QFTMFT.
Catsy
@Forum Transmitted Disease:
Is this snark or just ignorant firebagger horseshit?
This is the same Jon Huntsman who panders to climate change deniers.
The same Jon Huntsman whose own “jobs” plan consists of a wingnut wish-list.
There is no world in which Huntsman is even remotely comparable to Obama–let alone the skull-splitting stupidity of equating them.
gaz
@AA+ Bonds: this.
cmorenc
@Tim Connor:
Note that NONE of the critics of this idea posed any alternatives to the current corrupt system where your effective options are to either accept voting for the D or R candidate, or throw your vote away. You’re rage against the system posing as intelligent cynics knowledgeable in the evils of both the two-party system and the even greater evils of folks posing as “third way” idealists, yet you are utterly useless in coming up with anything constructive yourself. A less polite way to put it is, you’re full of shit and are yourselves facilitators of the current system, even while posing as harsh critics.
Some Loser
@cmorenc: He’s not the one making up bullshit.
Joe Bohemouth
While this might be a good idea for presidential elections, it is a terrible idea for Congress.
Instant runoff voting actually leads to results that are less proportional than first past the post. It overweights candidates of the center (whom voters on both left and right may rank as second choice) while underweighting strongly left or right wing candidates (whom no one would rank as second choice). You’d end up with a ton more Joe Libermans and Olympia Snowes, far fewer Bernie Sanderses and Ron Pauls.