Hypothetical situation.

[a completely inoffensive name]

Hypothetical situation. Say progressive and libertarian think tanks got together to hammer out an Constitutional Amendment intended to clean up the Federal Government and limit its scope. Say the two groups actually worked together and together the Constitutional Amendment that is presented turns out to be a big compromise on both parts as follows:

Progressives get all Federal government elections to be publicly funded elections, without any private donations allowed. Assume the amount of money allowed to be spent by each candidate is reasonable and fair to all. This essentially negates the SCOTUS rulings regarding money and free speech when it comes to Federal Government elections, including Congress and the President. Campaigning for money and donations is now pointless and no longer allowed.

Libertarians get a repeal of the 17th Amendment of the US Constitution. No more direct election of Senators by the people, allowing the state governments to elect their own senators again. This puts back in place the massive check on federal government expansion originally designed and States once again have an effective voice and power within the federal government.

My question to US citizens in here. Would you approve of this compromise to be written into the Constitution?

[Crazed Rabbit]

No. We already have a massive government, repealing the 17th won't make it go away.

Public funding might as well be called tenure for politicians. It's already exceedingly difficult to run outside the democratic or republican parties now, giving the government control of funding via a bill written by the politicians in power would ensure they always stay in power.

CR

[a completely inoffensive name]

No. We already have a massive government, repealing the 17th won't make it go away.

Public funding might as well be called tenure for politicians. It's already exceedingly difficult to run outside the democratic or republican parties now, giving the government control of funding via a bill written by the politicians in power would ensure they always stay in power.

CR

Public funding would be given to anyone above a certain percentage. We could make the percentage 1% for complete fairness if we wanted.

[PanzerJaeger]

Public funding would be given to anyone above a certain percentage. We could make the percentage 1% for complete fairness if we wanted.

How is that percentage obtained?

[a completely inoffensive name]

How is that percentage obtained?

On the premise of not excluding anyone AKA, not giving the Republican and Democrat Parties a life long duopoly as CR pointed out. If you have more than 1% in more than 1 nationwide poll, then you get funding.

[drone]

Progressives get all Federal government elections to be publicly funded elections, without any private donations allowed. Assume the amount of money allowed to be spent by each candidate is reasonable and fair to all. This essentially negates the SCOTUS rulings regarding money and free speech when it comes to Federal Government elections, including Congress and the President. Campaigning for money and donations is now pointless and no longer allowed.
Not sure this is the best idea, but a positive side effect would be that the winner has experience dealing with a fixed budget!


Libertarians get a repeal of the 17th Amendment of the US Constitution. No more direct election of Senators by the people, allowing the state governments to elect their own senators again. This puts back in place the massive check on federal government expansion originally designed and States once again have an effective voice and power within the federal government.
All for it. Plus that's 33 1/3 elections every two years the federal government won't have to pay for with part 1. ~;)

[a completely inoffensive name]

Current funding system is broken in favor of the two incumbent parties anyway. The two big parties get all the major funding from special interest groups who give them money simply because they are the big two, thus perpetuating their reign as the big two.

If you simply give every contestant that has any sort of following a set amount of money from start to finish, it becomes much easier to compete.

[Tuuvi]

I really like the idea of publicly funded elections but I'm not sure if it could really work out and change anything. How would the government decide who to fund without wasting money on crappy candidates who aren't going to get any votes? You say that funding would be given to candidates who can get a certain percentage of public support. But how is a potential candidate supposed to get public support without campaigning? If such a system were implemented, the only people who would be able to obtain public funding would be those who are already rich or are supported by special interest groups and corporations, so the status quo wouldn't be changed.

[a completely inoffensive name]

I really like the idea of publicly funded elections but I'm not sure if it could really work out and change anything. How would the government decide who to fund without wasting money on crappy candidates who aren't going to get any votes? You say that funding would be given to candidates who can get a certain percentage of public support. But how is a potential candidate supposed to get public support without campaigning? If such a system were implemented, the only people who would be able to obtain public funding would be those who are already rich or are supported by special interest groups and corporations, so the status quo wouldn't be changed.

There is a thing called grassroots campaigning. It does work when the politician has a strong character. This is how Ron Paul became a name that is on TV now. He didn't have special interest groups shoving money into his pockets because he wants government so small the special interest groups can't manipulate it to their benefit.

People like Ron Paul, Ralph Nader and especially most of all Ross Perot have shown that if there was a level playing field for all candidates in terms of funding, there could be some serious political changes made.

[Tuuvi]

There is a thing called grassroots campaigning. It does work when the politician has a strong character. This is how Ron Paul became a name that is on TV now. He didn't have special interest groups shoving money into his pockets because he wants government so small the special interest groups can't manipulate it to their benefit.

People like Ron Paul, Ralph Nader and especially most of all Ross Perot have shown that if there was a level playing field for all candidates in terms of funding, there could be some serious political changes made.

I forgot about grassroots campaigning, with that in mind publicly funded campaigns are something I support. I think the biggest challenge facing the US right now is our political system, because it is preventing or at least slowing down our ability to fix our problems. Publicly funded campaigns would go a long way in reforming the current system.

I'm a bit iffy on repealing the 17th amendment, but I think I would vote for a constitutional amendment like the one you suggest.

[rory_20_uk]

If it is over 1% = state funding, get read for the USA to be funding some very dodgy parties indeed - who will all get the same level of support as the big parties. Is the Neo-nazi anti Jew / Muslim Party allowed the funding? Where does free speech end in relation to campaigns?

What about activities which are not linked to the campaigns in legal fact but basically are in practice? In the UK there was a programme a while back about how candidates were sailing as close to the wind as humanly possible to give their campaign more money - spending loads before the campaign officially started, "volunteers" were in fact basically seconded staff etc etc.

Senators are already doing their best to get funds for their state with scant regard for "the bigger picture". this system might make them even more grabby.

~:smoking:

[Furunculus]

"Progressives get all Federal government elections to be publicly funded elections"

I would never agree to this, politics should be the battle for ideas and mindshare, with powerful ideas attracting powerful backing (read: money), and public funding would destroy this by turning politicians into a nomenklatura ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nomenklatura) disinterested in representing the people.

[Beskar]

"Progressives get all Federal government elections to be publicly funded elections"

I would never agree to this, politics should be the battle for ideas and mindshare, with powerful ideas attracting powerful backing (read: money), and public funding would destroy this by turning politicians into a nomenklatura ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nomenklatura) disinterested in representing the people.

But America is a good example of this not happening anyway, since the corporations are the ones who fund them (read: corruption) and not the people.

[drone]

I would never agree to this, politics should be the battle for ideas and mindshare, with powerful ideas attracting powerful backing (read: money), and public funding would destroy this by turning politicians into a nomenklatura ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nomenklatura) disinterested in representing the people.
US politicians are already disinterested in representing the people, their donors get the love instead. And the nomenklatura were appointed, not elected.

[Major Robert Dump]

mmmm, trusting in polls. Surely there is a better way.

[Subotan]

A better package of reforms to end the partisanship currently afflicting the United States would be to end gerrymandering across the United States, scrap primaries for both parties and institute the Maine-Nebraska electoral college system (http://archive.fairvote.org/e_college/me_ne.htm) for the Presidency across all states.

[drone]

A better package of reforms to end the partisanship currently afflicting the United States would be to end gerrymandering across the United States, scrap primaries for both parties and institute the Maine-Nebraska electoral college system (http://archive.fairvote.org/e_college/me_ne.htm) for the Presidency across all states.
Funny you should mention that. I've always though this would be ideal, since the candidates tend to just ignore states they have no chance in overall, even if some of the districts are up for grabs. Then comes today's WaPo with this (http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-gop-is-trying-to-rig-the-electoral-college/2011/09/20/gIQA4NFIjK_story.html):

Recently a new ploy has emerged, focused on the electoral college. In Pennsylvania, Senate Majority Leader Dominic Pileggi (R) has proposed changing the way the state’s electoral votes are tallied in presidential elections. (A state’s electoral votes reflect the number of its U.S. congressional districts, plus two more for its Senate seats.) Instead of having all of Pennsylvania’s electoral votes go to the candidate who carries the state’s popular vote, as is the long-standing practice in Pennsylvania and 47 other states, Pileggi wants to apportion those votes by congressional district.

Since Bill Clinton carried Pennsylvania in 1992, the state has gone Democratic in every presidential election. In 2008, Barack Obama carried Pennsylvania with 55 percent of its popular vote, thereby winning its 21 electoral votes. But if Pileggi’s plan had been in place, John McCain would have been given 10 electoral votes by virtue of winning 10 congressional districts. Obama would have been awarded nine for the nine congressional districts he carried, plus two for carrying the state’s popular vote.

The 2010 Census reduced Pennsylvania’s congressional delegation from 19 to 18, and the Republican legislature and governor have drawn new lines intended to create GOP majorities in 12 of the 18 districts. Under Pileggi’s plan, Obama could carry the state in 2012 — by winning huge majorities in heavily Democratic Philadelphia — and still lose the majority of its electoral votes.

Tom Corbett, Pennsylvania’s Republican governor, has said he’ll support the Pileggi plan. Other swing states that came under GOP control after 2010 could adopt their own versions: Thus Obama could carry Michigan, thanks to strong support in Detroit, or Ohio, as a result of big numbers in Cleveland and Columbus, and still lose most of those states’ electoral votes.

[Subotan]

It would have to be reformed on a nationwide scale though. Although it doesn't really matter for either Maine or Nebraska, as they're so small, state-by-state change would be blatant gerrymandering. I remember there was a scheme a back in 2007 by Californian Republicans to do the same thing - such a move without an equivalent reform in, say, Texas, would have been an outrageous abuse of power.

EDIT: And it's not just the GOP who likes it. There was another plan after the 2000 election to reform some of the mountain states like Colorado - however, the state Democrats mysteriously started abandoning the reform once Colorado's electoral college votes hinted at going unanimously to the Democratic Party.

[Furunculus]

But America is a good example of this not happening anyway, since the corporations are the ones who fund them (read: corruption) and not the people.

well, as ever, my refrain is other countries can do as they please but i'll never support it in britain


US politicians are already disinterested in representing the people, their donors get the love instead.

And the nomenklatura were appointed, not elected.

your two points demonstrate both a strength and a weakness of the US political system.

re the latter point, in britain the lack of open recall and a open primaries mechanisms often creates fantastically safe seats, so they come to act as a nomenklatura.

on the latter point, the US has very polarised politics and only two parties to represent those poles, so you get the same effect as british safe seats but on a much grander scale.

what the US needs is a point-five party in addition to its two party system, like the British Lib-Dem's


what are the problems with the Lib-Dems that make them so objectionable? Well, this boils down to two core problems; the first of which is that in a First-Past-The-Post (FPTP) electoral system a vote for them is essentially a waste, the second is that their policies are rarely conform to coherent platform that is recognisably guided by core principles.

These non-qualities are in fact vital to the healthy operation of British representative democracy because we operate a type of plurality electoral system (FPTP), rather than a system of Proportional Representation (PR), which gives tremendous power to induce change by the sitting government, and for that to sit satisfactorily with the electorate they must have a guarantee that the government is absolutely committed to acting as a servant of the people. The Lib-Dem’s are that guarantee.

It is not by design that Britain now has a two-point-five party system, it results from the collapse of the Liberals at the start of the twentieth century and the rise of Labour, leaving the Conservatives to fuse with the rump of the old Liberal party and emerge with a more libertarian streak than was previously the case, ready to take on the powerful new ideology of socialism in the form of the British Labour party. In essence the old Liberal Party ceased to be relevant to the aims and expectations of the people. That the Liberals no longer represented the will of the people would not normally be a bar to power given the oppositional nature of politics, but it happened at a time when this new political ideology arose and was captivating the masses, and so Britain got lucky and managed to overthrow the dominance of a political party that that had ceased to perform a useful function. Of course the remainder of the old Liberals survive to this day in the form of the modern Lib-Dems, a party with a long and honourable tradition, a truly national mandate, and a platform for political governance that spans the whole range of governments responsibilities.

Of course this “platform for political governance that spans the whole range of governments responsibilities” is riddled with inconsistencies, is frequently incoherent and even schizophrenic, and often accused of being opportunistic, but that is the lot given to the point-five party in a two-point-five party system. The Lib-Dem’s must harry the edges of mainstream politics looking for weakness in its larger foes, continually looking for the party that is making itself irrelevant to the people by allowing ideology to ossify its outlook in an ever changing world. This combination of weakness and irrelevance must then be exploited mercilessly, hounding its larger victim in front of a new-world electorate that no longer responds to those outdated ideas. It is precisely this thrusting opportunism that forces the major parties to continually react to the will of the people, because if they slip for even a second they know that there is a credible alternative waiting in the wings to take their place in the sun.

This two-point-five party system is an accidental answer to the problem with plurality systems described above, which is best seen in the United States where the lack of a credible alternative party leads to the entrenchment of the incumbent parties regardless of their lack of responsiveness to the need of the electorate, thus creating a highly polarised and fractious political system. That point-five party is not something that can be concocted at will, but seeing as history has dealt us this hand let us then make the most of it.

The FPTP electoral system has fantastic advantages over PR because by giving a government so much power to make change you allow it to react to a changing world more readily than can ever be achieved in the viscous morass of coalition politics as typified by the continent. For a people that are happy to accept that challenge; to compete with the rest of the world with ideas and commerce there is no better system of governance, however its major problem is the need for a cohesive society. As said elsewhere; it is no coincidence that many european states have a political system based on proportional representation, and why would they not when repeated trauma and dislocation prevent the electorate from trusting the politician not to become a tyrant, and the politician from trusting the electorate not to install a demagogue, But in Britain we have that cohesive society, and when you hear people whine about the “tyranny of the majority” they are really only transplanting a problem from the continent in an effort to hide the growing obsolescence of the view they represent. The most important benefit of the FPTP system over PR is that it allows the electorate to punish failure, by kicking them out of office.

The importance of the point-five is also the reason why the Lib-Dem’s are fundamentally different from other small parties such as UKIP, the Greens or the BNP. All of the above are legitimate parties that service a legitimate need from among the electorate, but they exist precisely because the tectonic scale of the major parties causes them to occasionally fail to represent a minor but important view-point, and their birth signals the build up of political pressure around that unserviced view. This pressure will be vented by a political earthquake in the form of temporary electoral success, but that very success causes the tectonic plates of British politics to resettle in a position of reduced electoral tension as they steal the electoral ‘clothes’ of the upstarts.

Seen in this light a vote for the Lib-Dem’s is an investment in the future health of your political system, even if there is no payback in the short or medium term, whereas a vote for a minor party is merely an act of political leverage with short term cost, designed to shift the position of an incumbent for medium term benefit. Both however have a useful role to play in Britain’s FPTP electoral system which is why you should always be wary of politicos from the big parties telling you to vote for them in order to keep the other guy out regardless of your principles, even when they are such estimable individuals as Daniel Hannan.

I very often disapproves of Lib-Dem policy, but to paraphrase a great man, I will defend to the death the importance of the position they occupy in Britain’s representative democracy.