First, a disclaimer. I am not seeking to insult or label people. My goal is to start a dialogue about a development that deeply concerns me. This development is not US-specific, but is occurring in Russia, Israel, Europe and undoubtedly other countries as well. However, since the US seems to be drawing a lot of attention lately, it seems logical to focus on the Trump administration.
Let’s start with the question in the title. During a previous discussion with TSZ-residents dazz and Erik, I initially resisted the “fascism” label for the Trump adminstration. In my opinion, that label is often applied too eagerly and I wanted to preserve the term for movements that objectively fit the term. The fascists from beginning of the 20th century were militarist and resorted to violence, for example through paramilitary forces such as the infamous Sturmabteilung in Germany. This is way more radical than their modern far-right counterparts, such as the German Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) or the French Rassemblement National, which mostly seek political influence through democratic and parliamentary means. But what then makes a political party or movement a fascist one? The characteristics of fascism I had to memorize for history class in high school were:
- Ultranationalism
- Admiration for strong charismatic leaders
- Preoccupation with racial purity
- Anti-liberalism
- Populism
- Militarism
The striving for racial purity is currently replaced by nativism, but otherwise the Trump administration is ticking a lot of boxes here. Still, I noted a lack of militarism (The “no new wars” claim). Also the fact that experts were not using that label weighed strongly in my opinion that it was premature to openly call modern far-right movements fascist. That time I said:
Of course, I am not a historian nor a politologist so once the experts start calling the Trump administration a fascist regime I will gladly follow suit.
Fast forward one year. The Trump regime broke its campaign promise and has started two illegal military conflicts, one in Venezuela and one in Iran. It has threatened both Canada and Denmark, two allied NATO members, with military action. The regime has also proved to be hostile towards its own citizens: Two peaceful demonstrants have been executed by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) during the Minneapolis protests. Note that ICE is beginning to look a lot like a paramilitary force. Also, i have since learned that the Department of Defense has been renamed “Department of War”. I cannot decide whether that is more creepy or more childish. So far for “no militarism”.
Importantly, I found that professional politologists started openly calling the Trump regime fascist. Recently, I read the book “Dit is Fascisme” (no translation needed, I trust) by Rosan Smits. Smits is a politologist who for years researched radicalization and violence in war zones. Currently, she is adjunct editor-in-chief at the online news platform De Correspondent. Her ideas are strongly influenced by historian Robert Paxton and philosopher Jason Stanley. Robert Paxton has been specializing in Vichy France and fascism. Like me, he initially resisted the “fascism” label for Trumpism, but changed his mind after the Capitol attack. Jason Stanly wrote the book “How Fascism Works: The Politics of Us and Them” in which he outlined ten “pillars of fascism”. These people I definitely regard as experts in relevant fields. In the book, Rosan Smits argues that it is not useful to distinguish between radical right, right-wing extremism and fascism. Rather we should think of these movements as consecutive steps in a progression towards ever more radical fascism. She compares this to a plan-of-action (draaiboek) that all proto-fascist movements go through. She has no problem calling the Trump administration fascist. In fact, this is even the title of chapter 2 in the book: “Het fascistische regime-Trump”. Again, I trust this does not need translation.
So now I am not sure whether it is right to call the Trump administration fascist. There is little doubt that Trumpism sports several hallmarks of classical fascism, such as an appeal to a mythical past (Make America Great Again), anti-intellectualism, a culture of victimhood and violent hostility towards critical counterforces. Therefore, it seems defensible to call Trumpism a form of fascism. On the other hand, the term “fascism” seems to generate more heat than light, often rendering reasoned debate impossible. Therefore, it could be more useful to focus on the actions of the adminstration than trying to affix a label to it.
Regardless of whether you agree or disagree, I would appreciate if people could do their best to create a “reasoned debate” in the thread. That is, I would like to hear the reasons you have for agreeing or disagreeing with the premise of the post. A discussion that only feeds on fear and anger will only serve as fertile soil for fascism, whatever you take that to be.
You can milden it down by calling it “a fascisized regime”.
At any rate, Mussolini was the first fascist, quite different from Hitler, also with a different fate, but both Hitler and Mussolini were properly fascist. Also Franco and Salazar were fascist regimes. All different, but all fascist. (Trump is closest to Mussolini, I’d say, the buffoon type.)
For those who are interested, you can learn in a mere five hours what fascism is.
Reasoned debate with whom? With fascists? By definition, they are not reasoned. In the American context, (conservative) Republicans have been calling the Democratic Party communists – and fascists at the same time – since Reagan at least. They stopped reasoning a very long time ago, and now they formed a theocratic cult around a leader who never in his life reasoned ever once.
Thanks for the YT-link. I’ll give it a spin.
With the people that support them. Trump received roughly half of all the votes during the 2024 presidential election. Also in Europe a considerable portion of the populace votes far-right. For example, in the recent Dutch parliamentary elections nearly one-third of the votes went to far-right parties. Calling all of these people fascists may make them somewhat defensive. Also, I have to believe that a good portion of these people can indeed be reasoned with. The alternative is too scary to consider.
No, it doesn’t. When they are a majority or the lion share of the country, then they are in power, the country *is* fascist, and there is nothing to be defensive about.
Is colewd defensive? He’s proud to be what he is!
Corneel:
I lean toward her view. Just as important as the current status of the movement is the direction in which it’s moving and what it’s aiming for. It’s obvious that Trump would love a fully fascist society centered around him as an object of devotion and admiration, with unlimited power. That makes him a fascist in my view regardless of the extent to which he’s so far succeeded in moving society in that direction.
Agreed, and you’re right to be cautious about its application. I think it’s actually intended to supplant reasoned debate at times. Easier to simply label someone a fascist than to carefully state the case against them.
I remember seeing people call George W. Bush a fascist, which was ridiculous. There was plenty to criticize about him, but to call him a fascist just diluted the force of the label and made the critic look overwrought. The parallel on the right is when people run around indiscriminately labeling their opponents as socialists or communists — “Komrade Kamala” being a prime example.
However, there’s a countervailing danger of being too reluctant to apply a label when it truly is appropriate. The sanewashing of Trump, for instance. It’s long been objectively clear that Trump is a malignant narcissist, which makes him dangerous, but people (especially in the mainstream media) have shied away from saying so for fear of sounding shrill when they should have been sounding the alarm.
If someone could point to something Trump has done and say “No true fascist would do that“, then I’d consider the possibility that the label was inappropriate. I haven’t seen that, though, so I’m comfortable calling him a fascist.
Erik, to Corneel:
He isn’t, actually. I’ve asked him no less than five times which he would prefer if given a choice between a) the US remaining a democracy or b) the US becoming a dictatorship under Trump. He refuses to answer.
If he preferred a democracy, he wouldn’t hesitate to say so. There’s nothing embarrassing about that choice. Yet he says nothing. I conclude therefore that he would choose a Trump dictatorship, which is appalling.
He’d choose a dictatorship, but he’s reluctant to say so. He isn’t proud of his position. He’s ashamed of it, and rightly so.
This forum is (likely) not the entire life he is living. He has his merry gang of fellow fascists that he is part of. This is why he can keep returning here unmoved and unrevised.
I know more corners of the internet and there are enough 100%-Trumpite places that have convinced me that, yes, Americans are utter bigots, racists and hypocrites, the country is fascist now and the fascists have no shame. They think they win every time when they “trigger the libs”. Whenever you reply to them, whenever you state your point of view, they score a point because they “triggered” you. Some of them sometimes feel brief pity for anti-Trumpers, but it’s brief.
In my internet-interactions, I have seen three instances of near-conversion away from Trumpism. None of this was over any point of ideology or policy, economics, war, nothing. They were all over the danger that their personal Medicare was going to be taken away. Even so, all instances remained a temporary shock. None of these persons has decided to begin voting Democrat. Trump may be bad in some ways, but the Democrat Party is eternally far worse, according to them.
ETA: No amount of discussion over policy or ideology can touch them. There is never any reasoned debate with them for a second. Only their dole and personal welfare has an effect – not talking about it, but when they actually lose it.
Corneel,
Hi Corneel
What do you think the characteristics of an ideal Government would be? Where do the left and the rights advocacy currently stand against this ideal?
I would love to hear colewd’s take on the OP, since he clearly admires Trump. Like keiths, my guess is that he will resist him or Trump being called a fascist. ETA: and there he is!
Oh yes! One of the messages of Rosan Smits’ book was how fascists will twist the meaning of words to mean the exact opposite. The goal of many fascists is to strip the very word “fascist” from its proper meaning and turn it into an insult for people telling them off.
Hi colewd. Let me first apologize, since I was convinced you wouldn’t show up in this thread. Thanks for participating.
I have stated elsewhere on this site that I consider left versus right differences to have become unimportant. The more important distinction now is democratic versus anti-democratic. I don’t care about an “ideal” government, but I do expect my government to defend democracy, minority rights, free press and rule of law. This is why political movements like the Trump administration scare me.
So, do you care to comment on the OP? I am guessing you disagree that Donald Trump and his administration are fascist but can you tell us why?
Hi Corneel
I want to have a substantive discussion but when we use words like democracy and fascism they need to be defined in context. Here you attempted to define fascism and that’s a good step. Democracy is another word that needs definition as you see it as an ideal.
Let me give this a swag. A country that has elected officials based on a fair voting system. Here is Websters definition.:
As far as the discussion goes ” Is Trumpism a flavour of Fascism”. it may be but it also maybe the ideal attempt at democracy. I don’t think you believe Fascism is good and neither do I so these terms need to be sorted out to make the discussion productive.
I personally think the US Left is further away from representing the ideals of democracy than the right. Your country may be the opposite.
colewd:
That’s delusional.
Trump:
And:
In Davos:
From a Reuters interview:
Well, I remember the “Stop the Steal” lie and the January 6 storming of the Capitol, so you will have to excuse me that I don’t buy that Trumpism or MAGA are anywhere near the “ideals of democracy”.
But I do not want to discuss that. Rather, I am rather curious to hear why you believe Trumpism, which “may be” fascism, is “also maybe” the ideal attempt at democracy. Last time I checked, fascism is a repressive ideology that is intolerant of political opposition and seeks to establish a totalitarian state. Could you elaborate a litte?
Corneel,
Hi Cornell
Good counter 🙂 First I am not claiming Trumpism or whatever that means is the ideal state. A logical argument might be around Trumps current position and actions and see if that is closer or further away to an ideal democracy vs other political groups.
What evidence would we look at to determine if someone was trying to establish a totalitarian state? The first move might be to make sure the population could not change the current regime. Do you agree?
Another move might be to sensor free speech. Another might be to limit the balance of power by reducing the power of alternative branches of government.
The guy has not read the OP, specifically this part:
Prediction: He will not address it now either.
colewd, to Corneel:
That would be the end goal, yes. And Trump is trying hard to get us there, but fortunately the system hasn’t collapsed yet. He pressures states to permanently steal congressional seats by gerrymandering. He openly and repeatedly talks about wanting an unconstitutional third term and even had “Trump 2028” hats lying around in the Oval Office. He would stay in power forever if he could.
Trump hates free speech and has been trying to silence his critics for his entire time in office. The latest example is that he is using his weaponized FCC to strong-arm Disney (owner of ABC) into firing Jimmy Kimmel. It’s a disgusting abuse of power.
Trump ignores court orders and attacks judges, including Supreme Court justices. He constantly tries to bypass Congress by issuing illegal executive orders. Tariffs are supposed to be imposed by Congress, not by the president, but Trump ignored that and imposed them anyway. He was supposed to get congressional approval before going to war, but he ignored that obligation. The War Powers act requires him to get congressional approval for any military operation that continues for more than 60 days, but he hates sharing power with Congress and is claiming that “hostilities have terminated”, which is an obvious lie, and that he therefore doesn’t need congressional approval to continue the war.
He checks all of the totalitarian boxes you listed: he wants to remain in power permanently, he hates free speech and tries to censor his critics, and he tries to bulldoze over the legislative and judicial branches of the federal government.
Why do you support him? Don’t you care about democracy? And why won’t you answer my simple question, which I am now repeating for the sixth time?
I should add that right after telling Congress that “hostilities have terminated”, Trump said this in a speech at The Villages in Florida:
Hostilities have terminated, and we’re still in a war. No contradiction there.
Not only is Trump a dishonest dictator wannabe, but he’s also too incompetent to keep his lies straight.
keiths,
Lunatics with a nuclear weapon. Perish the thought.
Allan:
Stop being rational. You’re going to confuse Bill, who isn’t used to goose/gander thinking.
It’s not clear to me how we got from “Trumpism may be the ideal attempt at democracy” to “I don’t think Trump is trying to establish a totalitarian state” but here goes: The playbook for wannabe autocrats usually involves trying to accumulate as much executive power as possible, neutralizing counterforces and silencing of dissenting voices. Trump’s bypassing of the congress by his ruling by decree, his repeated clashes with the judicial system and the press and his intimidation of universities, comedians and other critics (including the German chancellor for crying out loud) fits seamlessly.
But I don’t think I got an answer to my question. Did you really say that Trumpism “may be” fascism? And if so, how do you square that with it possibly being “the ideal attempt at democracy”? I really didn’t follow your train of thought there.
Corneel,
I think our conversation will be more productive if we drop the labels and focus on deviation from the Ideal democracy and how much the last few regimes varied from it. You and I have common ground that we want people to have a strong voice on how our prospective governments are run. The interesting conversations is where the disconnects occur between Government function and what the citizens want out of their perspective government. One complication and difference between our countries is that the US is a Constitutional republic.
Currently, the main difference is that our king has less political power than yours.
OK, shoot. How did the previous few “regimes” deviate from “the ideal democracy” that the “citizens” envisioned and why is the current US government living up to it?
Corneel, to colewd:
Haha. True dat.
colewd, to Corneel:
‘Democracy’ is as much of a label as ‘fascism’ is, so dropping the labels would defeat the purpose of the discussion. Corneel wants to know what’s behind this statement of yours:
To anyone who has even a fuzzy understanding of fascism — enough to know that Hitler, Mussolini and Franco were fascists — that statement is bizarre. How do you reconcile them? What would a regime look like if it were both fascist and “the ideal attempt at democracy”?
The topic is the Trump regime’s (massive) deviation from an ideal democracy, which can be assessed without reference to any other administration. For the record, though, I’m not aware of any American administration that was less democratic than Trump’s. Are you?
Trump doesn’t. That’s why he’s trying to censor people, steal Congressional seats through partisan gerrymandering, and suppress voting among groups that don’t like him. Why do you support him, if you want people to have a strong voice in how they are governed?
Given Trump’s dismal 34% approval rating (64% disapprove!), it’s clear that he’s delivering exactly what the citizens don’t want.
In my view, America has a couple of significant systemic obstacles to ‘pure’ democracy. One is the lifetime appointment of the Supreme Court – you are at the mercy of the intersect of the party in power when someone dies and the length of the appointee’s subsequent life. When you elect all manner of low-grade functionaries – ‘dog-catcher’ is apocryphal, or anachronistic, but serves to illustrate – you should have more say in these people with considerable political power and zero accountability.
The other is the almost complete absence of a mechanism to shorten a Presidential term. Forget the 25th. We have a constant churn of PMs – typically at the mercy of their party rather than the electorate, and turnover is not necessarily a good thing, but it does restrict the concentration of power in one individual.
Allan:
Well, there’s impeachment, though that only works with a conscientious Senate, and you only get a conscientious Senate if the people vote for conscientious candidates. Also, the ‘high crimes and misdemeanors’ standard sets a high bar — you can’t impeach a president for merely doing a shitty job. We’re stuck with Trump for another 2 1/2 years unless he dies, resigns, does something serious enough that he gets impeached and even spineless Senate Republicans vote to convict, or he gets 25thed.
The 25th requires a conscientious VP and Cabinet, and with a president like Trump who ignores qualifications and hires on the basis of slavish loyalty. The 25th does allow the Cabinet to be bypassed, though, if Congress sets up a body for that purpose. The VP still has to be involved, so you either need a conscientious VP or one whose personal ambition outweighs their loyalty to the President. JD Vance is an interesting case. He has no principles as far as I can see, and I’m sure he would throw Trump under the bus if he thought he could get away with it.
My personal pie-in-the-sky wish list for improving American democracy:
1) Ditch the electoral college in favor of the popular vote. It’s ridiculous when the structure of the system can determine who becomes president, and not the voters.
2) Redo the Senate for proportional representation. Right now Wyoming residents have 67 times as much representation in the Senate as Californians, which is absurd.
3) Ranked choice voting to reduce polarization.
4) Nonpartisan redistricting commissions in all states.
5) A nonpartisan commission to appoint federal judges (including Supreme Court justices).
6 ) A magic wand to transform gullible, irresponsible and ill-informed voters into better ones.
Corneel,
1. The main deviation was opening the border that was not popular and a partial cause of losing the election. This was unique to Biden.
Here is a Chat gpt list of popular and unpopular.
https://chatgpt.com/share/69fbcf6c-1588-83e8-837d-51202691565a
colewd,
Your ChatGPT prompts completely miss the point. You just asked it for popular and unpopular policies. That has nothing to do with the question at hand, which was about deviations from an “ideal democracy” — that is, one that adheres perfectly to democratic principles.
I’ve already listed several of the ways in which Trump and his regime are virulently antidemocratic, and there are more. Corneel is asking you to point out what was undemocratic about other recent administrations and why you think the Trump regime deviated less from the democratic ideal.
I see (both here and elsewhere on the internet) that this is the first thing that comes to mind for Americans, showing how flawed their understanding of political dynamics is.
When elected by popular vote, the president (as the role currently is in USA) will get even more power and the opportunity for abuse will be steeper than it is now. The three major flaws in the role of the president of USA, as I see them, are that (a) it’s a cabinet role, (b) plus a commander-in-chief of the army, and (c) there are no checks and balances (impeachment does not cut it and has been proven historically to have zero effect).
The electoral college was instituted so that the president would not think “People put me here because they love me. I’m accountable only to the people, not to any political institution.” This is what Trump thinks (choosing polls to validate his opinion as he sees fit) and that’s the problem. With actual direct elections, there will be no argument against such thinking. And with the powers of commander-in-chief and no checks and balances guarding against random deployments of ICE on American cities and military attacks abroad, the president of USA has more power than any king or dictator in the rest of the world has. And the #1 improvement idea that American internet commentators come up with is to give their president still more power…
What needs to be done instead is to have two separate roles, vested in two separate persons, one of head of state (a non-partisan commander-in-chief), another of head of government (a cabinet role) like in normal countries. And the head of government must never be elected directly. The head of government needs to be elected in the parliament, be accountable to the parliament, and step down when losing the confidence of the parliament.
The problem with Americans is that they think they can prop up a unique(ly despotic) system, call it democracy and get away with it. Sorry, no.
Erik:
Heh.
Why? Presidents already claim mandates based on the popular vote (in Trump’s case, even when he loses it). They don’t refrain from exercising their full power just because they were indirectly elected, and I see no evidence that the courts or Congress would be less aggressive in checking presidential power simply because the voters were directly choosing the president.
Which keeps the military under civilian control while allowing decisions to be made expeditiously.
The fact that impeachment is difficult doesn’t mean that there are no checks and balances. The legislature is a check on presidential power (though much diminished lately due to the spinelessness of Republicans) and the courts still are.
That has nothing to do with why the electoral college was established. What political institutions do you think presidents would no longer be accountable to if they were elected by popular vote?
That doesn’t make sense. Poll results are poll results whether or not the president is directly elected by the people, and a president can cherry pick polls under either system.
Congress has control of the budget and can withhold funding for ICE, the military, or anything else. Congressional approval is also required for military operations lasting longer than 60 days. The system provides checks and balances, but the feckless Republicans in Congress are refusing to do their jobs. It’s a them problem, not a system problem.
I still have no idea why you think the electoral college diminishes presidential power.
Since we’re subcontracting the writing process to ChatGPT…
First, this is not about “full power” but abuse of power. Keep this in mind.
Suppose the president claims that the people elected him, the people love him, the people want him in power, he is only accountable to the people, not to anyone else. If the people indeed elected him directly, then his claims are true. He is not saying anything unconstitutional. However, when the constitution provides for a different mechanism to elect the president, then the president’s claims are blatantly unconstitutional, hence he is abusing his powers and is subject to removal. Now suppose the removal fails. Even so, everybody knows that the president is abusing his powers, because the constitution is clear.
But in USA you have debates and theories about what the president can and cannot do, how far the executive power can reach, etc. so regular people who do not follow politics closely cannot be sure. Add to this the ridiculous Supreme Court that you have with its literalists who have no problem attributing absolute immunity, i.e. absolute power to the president, so insofar as the judicial branch is concerned, Trump is doing good. And there are no attempts to remove him by anyone.
The point is to have clarity on whether the abuse of power is happening or not. The American constitution does not provide this clarity.
Hitler had to go through several changes of constitution: Call new elections to get a favourable parliament, have the parliament pass the Enabling Act, abolish all competing parties, and combine the posts of head of government and head of state into himself, so it was clear to everyone that he changed the constitutional order to obtain his desired powers. Trump did not need to do any of this, he did not need to change any laws to be able to do what he is doing. The American constitution was despotic and undemocratic from the get-go.
Erik:
Lying isn’t unconstitutional. I do consider lying to be an abuse of power, at least when it is harmful to the country, but presidents can lie regardless of how they are elected. You haven’t shown that “the opportunity for abuse will be steeper than it is now” if presidents are elected by popular vote.
Second, if a president says the people elected him and that he is accountable to them, he is correct. He’s not accountable to the electors — they are just the means by which the people elected him. After all, the names on the ballot in 2024 were Kamala Harris and Donald Trump. The names of the electors appeared nowhere on the ballot.
There are requirements to the president. He needs to be fit for office. Blabbering unconstitutionalities means that he is not fit for office, but subject to removal. It is so very peculiarly American of you to not grasp this.
Bill Clinton was, by most standards, the most successful president in the last 50 years, and never came close to a popular vote majority.
Erik:
“He claims that the people elected him! Impeach him, now!”
Come on, Erik. The people do elect US presidents, and a president who points that out isn’t “blabbering unconstitutionalities”. They’re pointing out an obvious truth.
Even if it were false, it isn’t unconstitutional to say something that disagrees with the constitution. It’s doing something unconstitutional, not saying it, that makes it unconstitutional.
Back to your original claim, which was:
In what specific ways would a popular vote system increase presidential power and open up more opportunities for abuse? The electors are just proxies for the voters. Candidates know this, which is why they appeal directly to the voters during their campaigns. The voters elect them regardless of whether this is done directly via the popular vote or indirectly via the electoral college.
The electoral college’s main (dys)function these days is to distort the will of the people and sometimes put the wrong person in the White House. It’s remarkable that this has happened in two of the last seven presidential elections.
The electoral college was never intended to limit presidential power, and it doesn’t. Getting rid of it wouldn’t increase presidential power.
It is so very peculiarly Erik of you of you to say that.
petrushka:
True, but he got more votes than his opponents, so the electoral college result didn’t clash with what the popular vote would have produced. Plus it’s evident that Clinton would have won both elections even if Ross Perot hadn’t run.
There is a danger of a third-party candidate skewing the results, but that applies to both the electoral college and a popular vote system. That’s why I included ranked choice voting in my pie-in-the-sky wish list.
ETA: For anyone who isn’t familiar with it:
What is ranked choice voting?
I’m skeptical.
You cannot predict the results of making changes to election rules without accounting for the certainty that campaign strategies would change.
For example, as it stands, there is no incentive for New England republicans to vote in federal elections, but that could change if Gerrymandering were banned, or if the presidential election were popular vote.
It would be interesting to see.
petrushka:
That’s true, but my point isn’t that voting patterns might not change. I’m saying that it isn’t automatically a cause for concern in a popular vote system if the winning candidate doesn’t get a majority of the vote. Suppose Perot hadn’t run. Under that condition, if a majority of voters would have voted for Clinton in ’92 or ’96, then the actual results — Clinton’s wins — would have been fine. If not, the results would have been undesirable from a democratic standpoint.
Ranked choice voting ameliorates that problem. Perot would have been eliminated after the first round of counting, and the final result would have been determined by voter preference between Clinton and his Republican opponent.
petrushka:
Yes, and it would also incentivize Democrats who would otherwise stay home because they thought the election was in the bag.
Perhaps most importantly, a popular vote would mean that presidential candidates would need to campaign across the entire country rather than concentrating on the swing states.
So you’re happy with Trump? Then forget your wish list and be happy.
Seriously, presumably you want a democratic form of government. Therefore you must want standards for the president, most urgently *less* power for the president, far less than now, and not even an inch more in any way, such as bragging rights for having the *direct* popular vote.
The standards are that the president does not brag, does not blab, does not lie, does not overstep, does not even *seem* corrupt, has a long reputation of statesmanship etc. Alas, you as a typical American have no standards, so there is no way to help you out.
Erik:
That’s a uniquely Erik response. If I correctly maintain that the people elect the president, then I must be happy with Trump.
At this point I’d wager that what you just wrote makes no sense even to you, but I’ll bite. First, do you think a guy like Trump is going to refrain from bragging because the people elected him via the electoral college and not by direct popular vote? This is a guy who brags about elections he lost:
Never mind that Biden got 81 million, 7 million more than Trump.
And:
Makes perfect sense. To win an election, you don’t need to beat your opponent. You just need to get more votes than prior incumbents.
Anyone who’s dishonest enough to brag about elections he lost won’t hesitate to brag, period. The idea that he would be inhibited by the existence of the electoral college, of all things, is ludicrous.
Second, the political power of a president isn’t diminished in the slightest by the involvement of the electoral college. Why would it be? Political power depends on the support of the voters. The electors merely do what the voters tell them to do.
So if I dedicate an entire thread to documenting Trump’s lies, it must be because I have no standards and I’m fine with Trump’s dishonesty.
It’s weird that you’re opposed to eliminating the electoral college, because if it had been eliminated prior to 2016, Trump most likely would never have become president and he wouldn’t be the president now. Clinton won the popular vote by a 2.1% margin, after all.
A good list, but beware of unintended consequences. You should probably ask yourself “if this wish came true, what would politicians do?”
But this system (and a similar one for Senators, since abandoned) was created for a reason. The system remains as a formal structure; the reason for it has been lost. I don’t know if that reason can be revived. I doubt we’d want to try.
But the same concerns apply. I would love to see your alternative to provide proportional representation for the Senate. California and Wyoming are both states, and their populations are forever unequal. Maybe you’re suggesting abandoning the Senate altogether? How would that work? By making it a clone of the House?
Not understood. How would I rank-choose any Democrat on the ballot if I’m a Republican voter? I would never vote for a Democrat under any circumstances!
Now, this is a great idea, provided I get to choose the commissioners.
Same problem. Who guards the guardians? Might be better to change the rules so that every new President gets to exchange 2 Supreme Court justices, and 25% of the entire jucidiary.
That’s what it would take. There have been many attempts to restrict voting to those familiar with the candidates and the issues. We know what happened with all that. The latest strategy is to construct districts where a majority of voters, whether responsible or not, gullible or not, informed or not, will vote for the party preferred by those drawing up the districts.
(On a related tangent, the last time the Supreme Court had a majority of justices nominated by Democrats was 1969. Both Alito and Thomas are being encouraged to retire while Trump is still in office…)
Americans are fine with Trump’s dishonesty and criminality. One proof of this is that Americans elected him *for a second time*. You have elections. You had a choice and you elected him. You already knew who he was and you decided, yes, more of Trump please.
Another proof of this is that he remains in power. The alleged constitutional checks and balances are not working.
So, if you are not happy with this, if you indeed have standards, then at least two big things need to change:
– Elections need to be proportional
– President needs to have less power
And I’d add a third thing: Have normal parties. Parties need to be made accountable. At the end of Trump’s first term, he arranged a coup attempt. The party that arranged it should have been banned – if you have standards. Unfortunately, under a two-party system that you have now, when you ban one of them, the other would rule a one-party regime. Proportional elections with multi-mandate districts would ensure more parties.
The good thing with your wish list is to overhaul the election system. The bad thing is that you have no ideas about the role of the president, even though right now this is the absolute number one problem to deal with. As all Americans, you avoid looking into the experience in normal countries and take any lessons. The number one lesson is give less power to the head of state and the best way to achieve it is to have the roles of head of state and head of government separate.
Ah yes, the “egregious and immoral act” of allowing too many brown people into the country. I still recommend reading “How Migration Really Works” by Hein de Haas. In particular the chapter titled “Mythe 21: Immigration restrictions reduce immigration” might interest you, since in this chapter Hein de Haas shows the scientific evidence that more strict immigration policies will temporarily increase immigration levels.
None of this has anything to do with democracy of course. In fact, the deportation of immigrants to Cecot prison in El Salvador without due process and the razzias for undocumented immigrants show how repressive the Trump administration is and that it does not value civil rights at all. Also, these immigration policies are clearly motivated by xenophobia and racism. That doesn’t look like the “ideal democracy” to me. It looks like fascism.
So that was it? You believe “the citizens” wanted stricter immigration policies and that the previous governments didn’t deliver? That is why you said that the current administration is “the ideal attempt at democracy”?
Agree with this. The two-party system is bonkers. Political issues do not neatly cluster into two opposing camps, let alone having many different political issues where your preference may be supported by the other party.
More relevant to this thread, now Trump has seized complete control of the Republican party there is no centre-right alternative any more.
Corneel:
Bill’s comment is worth reproducing here:
The cult mindset in action. Imagine looking at the full range of Trump’s actions and deciding that nothing he has done is as “egregious and immoral” as Biden’s immigration policies.
Kids, don’t let this happen to you. Just say ‘no’ to the cult Kool-Aid.
Erik:
Why are you so intent on treating Americans as a monolith? Here are some numbers from the latest Pew Research poll, in which Trump’s approval number is only 34%, with a 64% disapproval rating.
Percentage of people who agree that Trump…
If only a quarter of us think that Trump is a good role model, then the overwhelming majority of us obviously aren’t fine with his dishonesty and criminality.
Just shy of half of us did. That’s way too many. Hence my #6:
Some of them are finally waking up. If the presidential election were held today, Trump would lose badly.
The two-party system is an unavoidable consequence of single-member districts. The simplest alternative is to eliminate districts altogether (including states as districts) and select the candidates who get the most votes. That would be 538 for Congress, and one for President/VP (since they don’t run independently). For a smaller country, this would be difficult to manage; for the US, well, just imagine a ballot 20 feet long, from which you must choose 539 names, in order of preference, out of thousands of names to choose among, nearly all of whom you’ve never heard of!
So, let’s simplify – let’s say you are rank-ordering slates of candidates representing dozens of parties (mostly special interest groups). Presumably, you’d end up with a Congress populated by those representing multiple special interests, each in proportion to the percent of votes for each slate. If we emulate a generic European approach, the President would then be chosen by a Congressional plurality or, if you want a majority, some duct-taped together coalition.
Now, you would need some triggering mechanism to have an election. There are multiple possibilities here – term limits, votes of no confidence, new coalitions, etc. I’d love to read the new Constitution this would require.