US Politics

[TheMightyEthan]

No it's not, in order to get anything done you have to have 60 members in the Senate in favor of it. No one's had a filibuster proof majority in the Senate since 1979 (though admittedly the Democrats were really close in 2009-2011). 50 seats in the Senate is not "control" of the Senate.

 

The system in the Senate is just completely broken, making it really easy for the minority to just obstruct the hell out of any bill they want (both sides are guilty of this).

[Yantelope V2]

I fully favor getting rid of the filibuster. I think it's an unintended procedural exploit.

[TheMightyEthan]

Things Ethan and Yant agree on:

• filibuster is bad
  
• Burnout Paradise is a crime against humanity
  

[Johnny]

Can someone explain filibuster to a european? =P

[Yantelope V2]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fillibuster

 

Basically you talk and talk to stall a vote until a bill dies in congress.

[deanb]

Someone that destroys cream cheeses?

[TheMightyEthan]

The US Senate has 100 voting members, 2 from each state. It takes a simple majority (51 votes) to pass legislation. However, before a piece of legislation can be brought for a pass/fail vote there's a period of "debate". The idea is to give them time to discuss the bill, but in practice that may or may not actually happen. In order to end debate a super majority of 3/5 of the Senate (60) must vote to end debate. This means that if the minority has at least 41 seats they can simply refuse to let debate end, even though they couldn't actually defeat the bill in a pass/fail vote. If the debate never ends then the bill is never voted on so it is never passed.

[Yantelope V2]

There was some senator, Ethan would probably know his name, I forget, who took to reading long passages from the bible all night long to prevent a passage of a bill.

[CorgiShinobi]

Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, the best, if only the good part of U.S. Government class.

 

[Battra92]

Nobody forces people to take out school loans though and taking out a school loan for a degree which won't really ever pay for itself just seems like bad money management to me. The college tuition rates are rather high but I see it as a similar problem to health care where government intervention has separated supply from demand and as such costs are spiraling out of control. Not everyone should go to college.

 

Who owns a virtual monopoly on both student loans and the education system? Oh right, the government. Moron kids should direct their anger at the government that lied to them.

 

Also, I'm all for keeping the filibuster. I think it's yet another check and balance built into the system.

[Yantelope V2]

I believe the filibuster is an implied power and I believe it's unintended. I believe the original intent was for a simple majority to be enough in the senate and not being able to pass legislation with a simple majority is an obstruction to legislation in general. I am not a fan of implied powers like judicial review.

 

The other thing that needs to go away: Gerrymandering.

[TheMightyEthan]

@Battra: It's not "built into the system" though, it's just a Senate procedural rule. They could change it at any time. And arguably it subverts the principle that a majority of the legislature be required to pass laws.

 

I agree that some kind of system is needed to help ensure that bills are well debated before being voted on, but the filibuster as the current rules stand is completely over powered and needs nerfing.

 

*Edit* - It's not an implied power though. The 60-vote thing isn't in the constitution, it's just a self-governing rule made by the Senate (the constitution does give them the power to make rules governing their own procedure). Actually, a simple majority to pass bills isn't in the constitution either (though it is somewhat implied in several areas, especially the part where it says the VP gets to vote if the Senate is tied). I'd be interested to see what would happen if they just straight up made the rule that you need 60 votes to pass anything.

 

Ordinarily I don't like implied powers either, I'm fairly limited in my constitutional interpretation, though I do think the logic behind judicial review is pretty solid.

Edited May 2, 2012 by TheMightyEthan

[Battra92]

@Battra: It's not "built into the system" though, it's just a Senate procedural rule. They could change it at any time. And arguably it subverts the principle that a majority of the legislature be required to pass laws.

 

I agree that some kind of system is needed to help ensure that bills are well debated before being voted on, but the filibuster as the current rules stand is completely over powered and needs nerfing.

 

*Edit* - It's not an implied power though. The 60-vote thing isn't in the constitution, it's just a self-governing rule made by the Senate (the constitution does give them the power to make rules governing their own procedure). Actually, a simple majority to pass bills isn't in the constitution either (though it is somewhat implied in several areas, especially the part where it says the VP gets to vote if the Senate is tied). I'd be interested to see what would happen if they just straight up made the rule that you need 60 votes to pass anything.

 

Ordinarily I don't like implied powers either, I'm fairly limited in my constitutional interpretation, though I do think the logic behind judicial review is pretty solid.

 

Perhaps it needs to change but the idea of elimination is ridiculous. Tyranny is 51 telling the 49 what to do. Quite frankly I think the country would be a lot better off if we required a super majority to pass most things.

[Yantelope V2]

Ordinarily I don't like implied powers either, I'm fairly limited in my constitutional interpretation, though I do think the logic behind judicial review is pretty solid.

 

I figured you would Mr. Lawyer.

[TheMightyEthan]

What I'm about to say only applies with a constitution like ours that's written as a legal document.

 

I think everyone can agree the job of the courts is to apply the general law to specific situations. Before they can do that, they have to determine what law applies, and sometimes multiple apparently applicable laws will be in conflict with each other. Example: municipal ordinance saying black people aren't allowed in public parks vs. state law saying municipalities can't discriminate against people based on race. To deal with that you have the principle that higher laws trump lower laws, so you apply the higher law. In my example, if the city tries to prosecute a black person for entering a public park the judge should throw out the case because the city doesn't have the legal authority to do that.

 

The constitution is the founding legal document of this country, from which all legal authority flows. So if a government entity attempts an act forbidden by the constitution it stands to reason that in cases brought before them the courts should apply the higher law, the constitution, and refuse to enforce the forbidden action as being invalid. Just like they would if a city attempted an act forbidden by state law.

 

To take an obviously extreme example, what if congress made a law saying that if someone refused to answer police questions on the basis that the answers would be self-incriminating (Fifth Amendment) they could be charged with obstruction of justice? Should the courts allow those prosecutions to go forward? I think everyone would agree that they should not.

 

It should also be noted that the federal courts at least will not take hypothetical questions. It's not enough to say "this law is unconstitutional", there must be a specific person alleging that their rights specifically have been violated. And more often than not the court will simply say "it's unconstitutional to apply the law in this instance", rather than that the law as a whole is unconstitutional.

 

Without judicial review there's nothing stopping the federal government from just completely seizing all legislative authority over all subjects.

[Thorgi Duke of Frisbee]

Media sharing seems broken, so here's the YouTube link

Edited May 3, 2012 by Deanb
it still works, just pick it from drop down list for now.

[Mister Jack]

I'm not exactly the world's biggest Romney fan but this is just uncomfortable.

[Johnny]

Tyranny is 51 telling the 49 what to do. Quite frankly I think the country would be a lot better off if we required a super majority to pass most things.

 

And 41 people telling 59 what to do is better?

[deanb]

Tyranny is 51 telling the 49 what to do. Quite frankly I think the country would be a lot better off if we required a super majority to pass most things.

And 41 people telling 59 what to do is better?

See I figured tyranny to be when the 1 person tells the other 99 people what to do. And 51 telling the other 49 what to do is a democracy.

[Thursday Next]

Even if it's ninety nine people telling one person what to do it's still a form of tyranny by that definition. It would be great if we could all do whatever the hell we wanted and that magically happened to mean that everything got done but until we all operate as some sort of hive mind we'll have to stick to being told what to do by some people and telling other people what to do.

[Thorgi Duke of Frisbee]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/05/02/north-carolina-gay-marriage-amendment-1_n_1470956.html

"Protect the Caucasian race"? What the fuck are you people on?!

[TheMightyEthan]

To be fair, that's pretty bad hearsay.

 

...writer and campaigner Chad Nance spoke to a pollworker who told him that Jodie Brunstetter said, "The reason my husband wrote Amendment 1 was because the Caucasian race is diminishing and we need to uh, reproduce."

 

The reporter who submitted the story to Yes! Weekly spoke with a pollworker who told him that that's what she said. This is not a direct quote.

 

*Edit* - The Yes! Weekly article has a transcript of a video that's supposedly to show the words aren't being taken out of context, but the video is just of the pollworker telling the reporter that's what Brunstetter said, not of her actually saying it. For all we know the pollworker is intentionally twisting her words, or just flat out making shit up.

 

*Edit* - On the other hand, for all we know the pollworker is quoting her perfectly verbatim. The point is you shouldn't take it as fact that she actually said it.

Edited May 3, 2012 by TheMightyEthan

[Thorgi Duke of Frisbee]

Good point. I mean, that can't really be something someone said, can it? No one would say something that stupid.

[Mister Jack]

Never underestimate the stupidity of politics.

[Yantelope V2]

It's kind of amazing really how the media smeared the Tea Party despite having very little evidence of any wrongdoing and accusations of racism and yet Occupy is supposedly a grassroots movement of the highest pedigree despite being filled with criminals and lowlifes.

 

http://www.cleveland.com/obrien/index.ssf/2012/05/occupys_image_blown_to_smither.html