[endofcapital]

The big tech giants seem to be A/B testing different ways of opposing and working with the government. Sooner or later these tests are going to start showing they have more power than the government, and they will start ignoring laws because they are irrelevant to increasing whatever metric is important this quarter.

This may have already happened, it's really hard to say.

[djsumdog]

This is more true than people realize. I'm not sure if it's entirely the case in this situation; as in that wasn't the initial intent but that's the way it turned out.

Things like Uber, AirBNB, even Google Waymo are all examples of this.

[jrochkind1]

I'm not so sure it wasn't the initial intent. What was the "HQ2 search" but an experiment in new ways of dealing with governments and seeing how much you can get from them?

[skh]

My current pet idea is that the Electoral College ought to be replaced with the CEOs of the Fortune 500 companies. That way we could do away with the facade that presidential elections currently create.

[djsumdog]

There 2014 Princeton study that showed only the top 10% of income earners political opinions are reflected in the political leanings of the elected representatives in the US. I did a short video on this: https://youtu.be/sD8KtaNzI8o

[zdragnar]

I saw somewhere that the turnout for Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez's election was somewhere around 4%. The voter turnout for most American elections is really quite low, and I wouldn't be surprised if there were distinct differences in turnout between income percentiles. Perhaps that might go some way towards explaining it.

Edit: I did a bit of research below, and 4% definitely does not seem accurate. I have no idea where the source for that 4% was :/

[chrisoverzero]

The population of New York's 14th Congressional District was (as of 2016) 691,715: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York%27s_14th_congressiona...

The number of votes cast in New York's 14th Congressional District election, 2018 was 141,122: https://ballotpedia.org/New_York%27s_14th_Congressional_Dist...

That's approximately 20% of the total population. I can find no info on what percentage of that 691,715 is eligible voters, but the 4% claim appears pretty ridiculous.

[skh]

Provided she's not lying it's hard to imagine that 4% number being believable. I don't think a House election ever had this low of a turnout.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BkuxZsylioX/

[dontbenebby]

>I saw somewhere that the turnout for Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez's election was somewhere around 4%

That's extremely common for local elections. For all the talk of money in politics, neither party could afford to fund opponents in every district.

[metildaa]

This seems suspiciously low, do you have a citation for that?

[zdragnar]

I found a reference that the primary turnout was around 11%: http://www.gothamgazette.com/state/7774-a-closer-look-at-vot...

> With 98 percent of precincts reporting as of Wednesday, the State Board of Elections shows 27,826 registered Democrats cast votes in Tuesday’s primary in New York’s 14th District. With 235,745 registered Democrats as of April, according to the BOE, this comes out to a turnout of around 11.8 percent.

NYT shows roughly 150,000 votes in the 14th precinct for the actual election: https://www.nytimes.com/elections/results/new-york-house-dis...

The population of the district is around 712,000 https://ballotpedia.org/New_York%27s_14th_Congressional_Dist...

So, the actual percentage is indeed higher than 4%. Even still, it's quite low.

[occamrazor]

Curious fact: in the City of London, companies vote in the election of the local council, with a number of votes which depends on the number of employees within the City.

[djsumdog]

GCP Grey does a great video on this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LrObZ_HZZUc

Jay Foreman does another great video on the very weird situation with the House of Lords:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RrQBTvRj0s8

[nostoc]

Obligatory reminder that London != City of London

[mc32]

What facade? CEOs? I don’t think Dems or Repubs would like to see that. Definitely not independents.

We’d get the most pro-business candidate every time. Not that any candidate has been anti/business, but can you imagine, it’d be pro-business on steroids. Schultz, One of the Waltons, corporate raiders?

[skh]

I think you take my comment more seriously than I intended. It's a suggestion meant to provoke thought about the nature/reality of U.S. presidential elections. With the suggestion one sees that my belief is that large corporations have far more influence on presidential elections than ordinary people like me have. But we have the facade that its actual humans that elect leaders and not the economic entities that are called persons in U.S. law.

[aaronbrethorst]

So vote for elected officials who will fight for a constitutional amendment to overturn Citizens United.

[mc32]

Didn’t citizens united essentially try to overturn a previous BCRA reform which disallowed a non commercial entity from publishing a political film? Basically they were trying to “answer” (a la rap battle) Moore’s 9/11 film, but got knocked down by BCRA regulation because it was considered “electioneering” while Moore’s were okay because they were published by a “bona fide filmmaker”.

I think it gets complicated but the decision had merits, I think. Obvs, the SCOTUS believes it did.

[skh]

From Wikipedia:

In the case, the conservative non-profit organization Citizens United sought to air a film critical of Hillary Clinton and to advertise the film during television broadcasts shortly before the 2008 Democratic primary election in which Clinton was running for U.S. President.

The federal law, however, prohibited any corporation (or labor union) from making an "electioneering communication" (defined as a broadcast ad reaching over 50,000 people in the electorate) within 30 days of a primary or 60 days of an election, or making any expenditure advocating the election or defeat of a candidate at any time. The court found that these provisions of the law conflicted with the United States Constitution.

They were prohibited from airing ads 30 days before the election. The decision in terms of effects and scope was terrible. It was a broad decision and had a very wide effect.

[skh]

Yes! In addition to doing this I write commentary on websites in the hopes of spurring action in others. I do this in real life as well.

[dontbenebby]

>My current pet idea is that the Electoral College ought to be replaced with the CEOs of the Fortune 500 companies. That way we could do away with the facade that presidential elections currently create.

So basically a "house of lords" for America, but instead of bishops and lords it's tech CEOs and celebrities? :)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_of_Lords

[magduf]

That's actually not a bad idea. We've already proven that the American people do a terrible job selecting a president with the current Electoral College system, so letting the F500 CEOs select the President surely can't be any worse.

[chiefalchemist]

Whoa. Let's back up a bit. The DNC and the GOP do a terrible job finding qualified candidates that can do the job. The system is designed to elect the electable. We The People don't have much say in who the parties serve up, who is willing to run, etc.

If the relentless (Media) attacks of DJT are an indication, there are few "outsiders" who are going to get involved in the future. And isn't that exactly what status quo'ers like the DNC and GOP want?

[skh]

If the relentless (Media) attacks of DJT are an indication, there are few "outsiders" who are going to get involved in the future.

Consider the possibility that he isn't being attacked. That his actions/statements are being reported on. That what you call an attack is indicative of the nature of the man. When you cause George Will to leave the party then....

[chiefalchemist]

George Will? He's part of the status quo that laid down the foundation on which Trump build his successful candidacy. That George Will? The old white blowhard? That failure is not Trump's fault, it's Will's & Co. But people like Will don't have the integrity to stand up and be counted. Instead, they use diversion and misdirection, and sadly people fall for that. Will left because he was embarrassed, embarrassed by his own incompetence. Trump was a convenient excuse.

My benchmarks are these:

1) The USA went to War in Iraq over over lie. Thousands died, gazillions were spent, etc. as a result of that lie. The Media barely noticed. People who believe Trump is the worst thing ever clearly never understood who and Dick Cheney was. Trump is a pussy cat compared to Cheney.

2) Not only did BHO renew the (so called) Patriot Act but he expanded its depth & breadth. The Snowden revelation also came to light on Obama's watch. Again, the Media barely noticed. Real journalists would find both of these troubling. Instead, BHO was our first BuzzFeed POTUS.

--

I am by no mean a fan of DJT but the truth is nothing he has done to date comes close to either one of those. He's got __a lot__ of work to do to top either one of those. The Media is bending over backwards to discredit DJT because:

1) It's a favor to the DNC. It lets the DNC off the hook because ppl are too distracted to ask the DNC what should be asked. That is: "How negligent and incompetent do to have to be to lose to DJT? And what heads are going to roll for your debacle? We want names!!!"

2) The GOP doesn't like him either. He stepped in on their dance, made all their candidates look like the fools that they are, and made it to the Whitehouse. That's not how it works.

3) Neither party wants to see another outsider do what DJT did, and they will, by any means necessary, make sure it doesn't happen again any time soon.

4) Trump is good for the Media's business. They love the "outrage". They love the "controversy." As long as it draws eyes and clicks - cha-ching, cha-ching, cha-chaig - they're happy. The media finally discovered that giving Bush #2 and Obama free passes didn't help pay their bills. For the Mainstream Media DJT is like printing money.

That is the context. That's how W.DC operates.

[skh]

George Will? He's part of the status quo that laid down the foundation on which Trump build his successful candidacy. That George Will? The old white blowhard? That failure is not Trump's fault, it's Will's & Co. But people like Will don't have the integrity to stand up and be counted.

George Will has been a solid conservative for decades and written numerous books lauded by conservatives. Consider the possibility that it was precisely his integrity that caused him to abandon the party. Perhaps it's possible that Trump represents a part of the party that a reasonable person with some sense of moral and intellectual consistency wants nothing to do with. How far right does the party have to go before you will question the state of affairs? Trump called Ted Cruz a liar. He implied Jeb Bush is a wimp. He implied that Ted Cruz's wife is ugly. He implied that Rand Paul is ugly. He said that McCain is a loser because he was a POW. He was a loser for getting captured. Trump agreed that his own daughter is a nice piece of ass. This was on the Howard Stern Show. How far does the man have to go to lose credibility in your eyes?

[ConceptJunkie]

Forget everything else, it's First Past the Post voting that is the cause of many of our problems (e.g., no possibility of third parties).

If we had an alternative voting system (there are several good ones), people could actually vote _for_ someone rather than just _against_ someone, and there would be some criteria for voting other than who can put out the most inflammatory campaign commercials.

But again, the status quo would never go for it, and I suspect most voters wouldn't go for a system that can't be explained on a bumper sticker. I'm not trying to insult the intelligence of the average voter, just their attention spans.

[magduf]

Or maybe we shouldn't be voting for people at all, but instead parties. That's how it works in Europe, and they don't have the two-party system we have because of it.

[loudmax]

I understand your sentiment, but I have to disagree. No matter how bad things are, we can always do worse.

[magduf]

It's hard to imagine getting a worse Pres than the one we have now...

[skh]

Imagine a version of Donald Trump that was smart and competent.

[magduf]

A version of Trump that was actually smart and competent would probably result in an economic boom rather than stupid government shutdowns and dumb and ineffectual tariffs.

[JohnFen]

> so letting the F500 CEOs select the President surely can't be any worse.

Oh, I really think it could.

[selflesssieve]

This is already happening. Corporate Lawyers exist solely for this reason. What can we get away with? How much will it cost? What is the opportunity cost of doing this in Location A, B, C. Strategies are employed to save money. Fines are the cost of doing business.

And lest I forget to mention the lobbying that happens everyday.

[aaronbrethorst]

it has already happened. it's not hard to say. https://www.propublica.org/article/how-the-irs-was-gutted