• 1 Post
  • 113 Comments
Joined 1 year ago
cake
Cake day: June 10th, 2023

help-circle



  • Do you have any idea how long it took to make any kind of healthcare reform happen when we finally got the ACA? If we just remove it, that’s not going to make everyone “work that much harder to get Medicare for All”, it will set us back arguing over even the things that the ACA got us. Suddenly, denying coverage for pre-existing conditions is back on the table.

    And what the hell would Democrats say to the tens of millions of people who lose their health coverage when they vote to repeal the ACA? “Don’t worry, this is going to make things so desperate that we’ll all feel really determined to pass universal healthcare!”

    It makes absolutely no sense what you’re saying!





  • What I’m saying is that the problem is systemic. It’s not stuck because the big parties are just better at blocking other parties than they are in Europe. It’s a consequence of a system that punishes similar candidates. It’s just not possible for everyone to simply decide to vote for more parties in this system, because whichever side has more parties will just lose, lose, lose as the similar candidates cannibalize each other.










  • I think this is where the specific definition of “nice” is crucial. I think it’s very possible to still be “nice” while also being confrontational or standing up for things, and in fact, doing it nicely but without backing down can sometimes be extremely effective.

    I know the “nice” you are referring to, where someone uses it as a shield for uncaring, selfish behavior. I’d of course rather have someone who isn’t so “nice” who earnestly tries to do the right thing than that kind of nice.



  • It makes perfect sense why we only have two parties while many countries in Europe have lots of parties. It’s not magic and it’s not because our parties are just so good at stopping third parties.

    The reason we are like this is because our voting system punishes similar candidates who run against each other. This results in parties that are more like coalitions, each made up of various factions that would be separate parties in a better system, who run a primary to pick one candidate to send forth, so that they don’t cannibalize each other in the general election.

    The bad part is that even the primaries generally have the same flawed first-past-the-post voting scheme, so similar candidates often have to strategically drop out or not run at all.

    This voting system desperately needs to be fixed. But you can’t fix it by simply acting like we just have to decide to have more parties, nor can you fix it by voting third party and screwing over one of the parties. I think this idea of voting third party in this election is appealing to some because it makes you feel like you’re doing something to fix it. You’re not.

    In my view the best hope of fixing this is pushing for election reform locally and winning over communities to the idea. There are some parts of the country with better voting systems in place. We should build on that.