[coliveira]

One thing Americans don't seem to realize is that the current constitution needs to be rewritten once we get out of this mess. One of the consequences of dictatorships is that they deform the constitution for their purposes. It seems that republicans have done enough to deform the system in an irreparable way.

[rayiner]

How would you propose rewriting it that wouldn’t just mean “less democracy” and “more control by credentialed elites?”

[aragilar]

Some suggestions:

* Drop the electoral collage * Proportional and/or preferential voting * Term limits/retirement ages * An independent electoral organisation with real teeth to prevent gerrymandering (and verify the election) * Free and easy voter IDs (if ID are ever required) * All election days are public holidays, with requirements to allow workers on the day to vote * Compulsory voting (works in AU) * Minimum number of polling booths per X people * Absentee voting * Changing to a parliamentary system where the president is a figurehead

[rayiner]

Agree with many of these. But changing to a parliamentary system would make the GOP even stronger: they won the House popular vote in 8 of the last 13 elections, including comfortably both in 2000 and 2016.

But there is no such thing as an “independent electoral organization.” The Framers never credited the idea of an “independent” body that could be trusted to be somehow “above politics.” That’s why the constitutional government is like a game of rock paper scissors. Everything can be checked by everything else.

[aragilar]

I suggest you look at other countries' electoral organisations and their processes, and how they are used to prevent gerrymandering.

[Braxton1980]

Are you sure that any change to address the recent issues would always result in those two outcomes?

Also, Elon Musk is the richest elite in the world so it seems we already are at the bottom of the problem.

[rayiner]

But the power Musk holds isn’t the result of him being rich, it’s because he has a populist cult of personality. The candidate who spent twice the money lost the election. Musk has power because he got on stage with Trump in Pennsylvania promising to fire all the federal workers.

[turtlesdown11]

Absolutely incorrect. Musk holds power because he spent $290m on the election boosting the winning candidate.

[rayiner]

But the money didn’t win the election.

[turtlesdown11]

source?

[unclebucknasty]

>Musk has power because he got on stage with Trump in Pennsylvania promising to fire all the federal workers.

From Gallup [0]—top issues among all registered voters:

The economy

Democracy in the U.S.

Terrorism and national security

Types of Supreme Court justices candidates would pick

Immigration

Education

Healthcare

Gun policy

Abortion

^^Taxes

Crime

Distribution of income and wealth in the U.S.

^^The federal budget deficit

Foreign affairs

Situation in Middle East between Israelis and Palestinians

Energy policy

Relations with Russia

Race relations

Relations with China

Trade with other nations

Climate change

Transgender rights

^^Items under which "firing all federal workers" could conceivably fit, and that's a massive stretch. Still, even with that generosity granted, they're 10th and 13th on the list.

[0] https://news.gallup.com/poll/651719/economy-important-issue-...

[rayiner]

If you look at polling, Trump voters prioritized democracy slightly more highly than Harris voters. The permanent government is a democracy issue.

[unclebucknasty]

Not even Trump or Musk is making this claim as the driving purpose of DOGE.

[kergonath]

The thing is, the current situation is "more control by credentialed elites". Way more than at any point since at least WWII. It’s just that the elites are oligarchs who kneeled before Trump. He is the only one giving credentials.

[rayiner]

Musk isn’t a credentialed elite—someone who holds power by virtue of attaining credentials to run an organization or institution with regulatory power. Musk holds power by virtue of having a populist cult of personality.

The credentialed elites are the Ivy League graduates who go work for government and do things like have the SBA make loans to minorities that white people aren’t eligible for: https://www.foxbusiness.com/media/court-rules-biden-admin-di.... They’re the ones who see, for example, immigration and affirmative action as moral causes—even though most voters oppose both—and have injected those ideas into all our government programs, corporate HR, etc.

What happened is that a plurality of voters decided that they’d rather have billionaire industrialists in charge than the Ivy League pencil pushers.

[myvoiceismypass]

Rewrite? You'll never even get 3/4 of the states to ratify a single constitutional amendment ever again.

[kelnos]

Not sure how a "rewrite" would even work. Our current constitution does not have any provisions for discarding it and starting over. The amendment process requires too many states to agree for any sweeping changes. (We couldn't even get enough states to pass something as simple and seemingly uncontroversial as the equal rights amendment before it expired.)

And I think this is -- at least for now -- actually a good thing. Because if we could rewrite the constitution, I suspect it would be rewritten by the same kind of people who wrote the Project 2025 playbook.

[mise_en_place]

Do you volunteer for such a massive undertaking?

Sarcasm aside, I'm seeing a lot of wackiness on both sides of the political spectrum lately. The Constitution is fine and provides provisions for changing it via amendments. You guys aren't involved in the political process at all, I caucused and was a delegate so I can tell you the system is fine and working as intended. Don't complain about it if you aren't even involved in the process. That just makes you look silly.