this post was submitted on 17 Mar 2024
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Can't Americans do something to change the way elections happen? I still think 81 is too old to run as a politician let alone a president. People say America is one of the greatest democracies but I'm really not seeing it.
Also no offence guys, I'm not into politics. Just a layman question.
The TL;DR of it is that the people with the power to change that are the same people who benefit from it the most and therefore whose best interests are to prevent it from changing.
And America is the greatest democracy in the same way that corporations find that they did nothing wrong upon investigating themselves.
Technically yes, but no, not really.
We're not a great democracy at all. We're a world power. Big difference. World Powers have this weird history of being shit governments. Ask Russia and China sometime
Or, as Republicans would remind you, we've never been a Democracy at all, but a Republic.
We aren't the greatest democracy. The only choice we have is some state ballots and representatives from a 2 party system. It takes decades to get things passed that 70% of Americans want. The largest predictor of something getting passed is if rich donors want it.
In a technical sense, yes. In a practical sense, no.
As an American, I can tell you it's a shitty democracy. Politicians are openly bribed in the form of "lobbying" by corporate interests and the rich. Its a two party system thanks to having FPTP voting everywhere.
Any given legislation has a 30% chance of getting approved regardless of public support, unless said legislation is supported by the rich, then it's far closer to 100% chance.
America is is on the fence post with outright fascism on one side, and milquetoast flawed democracy on the other.
Maybe, but it's hard. It would take a Constitutional amendment.
A Constitutional amendment is even harder!
The louder and more often a politician proclaims some great quality, the less true it is.
America, with it's voting system designed by landowners to mathematically create a power duopoly, is at best straddling the boundary between Democracy and Dictatorship, which is why you end up with situations like this, were all there is two anti-choices ("vote me ´cause I ain't him"), somewhat better than what's going on in Russia but far from good enough.
All that harping about Greatest Democracy In The World ^TM^ is pure compensation.
They thought, "We don't want tyranny if the majority!"
But then we ended up with tyranny of the minority, and that's worse!
Yes but they are too brainwashed into thinking they must vote either red or blue to save the country
It's the disproportionate electoral system. A serious third candidate would "spoil" the vote of one party, and then you just hand the win to the other side.
No, it isn't. That's the brainwashing part. Americans believe it so they keep voting for people they don't like, keeping the status quo. Everyone you talk to is like "I'd vote third party, but the System". If all the people that want to, voted third party, neither of them would stand a chance. But defeatism got into US citizens almost as much as people in Russia.
I mean, that is literally what happened to get us 8 years of W Bush, and the Iraq and Afghan wars. Versus Gore, who was at least running on a platform with heavy focus on things like climate change.
Gore won the election. The media, and then the Supreme Court, insidiously handed it to W Bush.
Mathematically, with our first past the post, and the Electoral College, we are deadlocked into the two party system.
The only remedy will be to change both of those things. But until then you can make one of the following choices, depending on your political leaning:
If there are other logical possibilities, is be interested to hear.
A third party would spoil corrupted red and blue ambitions because as soon as they see a drop in their votes they go in panic mode and they have to change their policies to actually appeal people.
Republicans were (are?) a huge backer for the Green party because a strong Green candidate guarantees a Republican win.
Our democracy is a great democracy the way an antique car is a great car: great in its time, but it's time for an upgrade.