They are just coming out and saying it now
The ruling elite is having trouble manipulating us into voting against our interests, and it's going to cost them a share of their ill-gotten riches, so let's just scrap this democracy thing.
The WashPost seems to have gotten a lot of backlash because of that op-ed, so they renamed the article.
A better primary system would empower elites to bargain and make decisions, instructed by voters.
...
For decades, the conversation about nominations has been about the conflicts between party elites and everyone else. Today, that conversation is counterproductive. A better approach is to think about how voters and elites could best play their different roles: to make their political parties more representative while ultimately narrowing the nomination choice down to one person. And the best way to do that would be through preference primaries.Preference primaries could allow voters to rank their choices among candidates, as well as to register opinions about their issue priorities — like an exit poll, but more formal and with all the voters. The results would be public but not binding; a way to inform elites about voter preferences.
See? All the process of democracy, but without any actual democracy.
It's perfect!
However, in sticking with the theme, the paper of Bezos put out other articles with an interesting titles.
>"Democracy dies in darkness"
>"Do people actually want more Democracy in their lives" pic.twitter.com/p7fPf5dFVX
—(@ProjektVayo) February 19, 2020
Comments
hmmm ...
I see that McBargle is still out there, blathering at the hoi & the poloi, in her widely-acknowledged, on-going effort to muddle everything --
When Cicero had finished speaking, the people said “How well he spoke”.
When Demosthenes had finished speaking, the people said “Let us march”.
This is considered a "hidden plot"
Ahhh! Scary Democracy!
The betrayal!
Feh. Bernie thought about it and then didn't do it.
We're not supposed to punish thoughtcrime....
There is no justice. There can be no peace.
Conversly...
... we could replace the entire caucus/primary/convention process with a single, nationwide primary with mail-in paper ballots only, perhaps in March of an election year. Ballots are sent in February to anyone registered as a Democrat, or who requests a Democratic ballot by a particular date. The candidate who gets the most votes nationwide wins, states have no impact. Everybody else takes a Greyhound bus home. This would have the effect of removing elites from the process entirely.
I wonder why I don't have a job writing op-eds for national media outlets?
"The greatest shortcoming of the human race is our inability to understand the exponential function." -- Albert Bartlett
"A species that is hurtling toward extinction has no business promoting slow incremental change." -- Caitlin Johnstone
This would guarantee an elete would always win
Whoever has the most name recognition on Feb 1 wins. For the obvious example In 2016 Hillary would automatically have won, as neither Bernie nor Trump would have had the time to campaign for themselves. The emails would still have come out, but would not have stopped Hillary, just enraged her. Then President Hillary would have found an excuse to start WW3 and we'd all be dead.
Great idea.
On to Biden since 1973
the reason you don't have a msm media job
too damn honest
they don't support your type
it's about the bucks
not the truth
whose elites get to choose the elite choice?
I'd be fine with it if the people choose the elites that do the choosing. Unfortunately their idea of elite is based on one thing, money as the metric. I am afraid people like the Dali Lama and Einstein, Abe Lincoln, etc. could never be considered elite. My idea of elite is someone that never got filthy stinking too rich to burn it all, because obviously they were gouging everyone all along.
Leave it the Democratic party to take the democracy out of being democratic. Leave it to Jeff Bezos to promote it as the next great thing.
We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.
Look deep into nature, and then you will understand everything better.
both - Albert Einstein
not me
They've been proven to not have my interests in mind.
I didn't say what I meant well
Sorry gj, (and doh below) I did not say what I meant very well... by 'the people', what I meant was US, you and me. IF WE THE PEOPLE decided what metrics made one an elite to lead a society. Not they the money mongers.
We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.
Look deep into nature, and then you will understand everything better.
both - Albert Einstein
We tried that
membership in the Electoral College started out as an elected position - we didn't vote for the President, we voted for the people who chose the President. That was changed for Andrew Jackson. Take that for what it's worth.
On to Biden since 1973
"Democracy Dies in Darkness"
Not JUST a catchy masthead slogan.
It's also WaPo's ultimate goal.
The current working assumption appears to be that our Shroedinger's Cat system is still alive. But what if we all suspect it's not, and the real problem is we just can't bring ourselves to open the box?
Wait a minute kissinger
are you trying to tell us
the media has something against democracy?
Hear tell, they are all about 'murican values...
land of the fleed and home of the bereaved.
surely you jest? Tell me it ain't true.
Not just the media
Capitalism has something against democracy.
Eventually we are going to have to make a choice - Capitalism or democracy?
I'm betting that we'll pick capitalism.
Which will quickly bring up the next choice - Capitalism or freedom?
That's when it gets interesting.
You know what they say about repeatedly choosing the lesser
of two evils..........you end up with a whole lot of evil!
“ …and when we destroy nature, we diminish our capacity to sense the divine,and understand who God is, and what our own potential is and duties are as human beings.- RFK jr. 8/26/2024
Wait a minute
gee, they want MORE say in who selects the president? Gee, who the fuck selected Trump in the first god damn place? The electoral college of course, who is composed of un-elected, appointed members of the fucking ELITES!
At some point the cognitive dissonance is going to become overwhelming, and society is going to crack like a fucking egg, and it will be NeoFeudalism on steriods.
"It is not light that we need, but fire; it is not the gentle shower, but thunder. We need the storm, the whirlwind, and the earthquake." - Frederick Douglass
It will take a storm (dissent), a whirlwind (disobey) and a earthquake (disrupt), to make the Oligarchy feel the heat of poverty or death.
Anything less, and we'll get only get “access” to “affordable” what ever, that truly isn't affordable at all.
It's economic strangulation I tell ya...can't pay to live, then die. That's Mini-Mike's view anyway. If you reach a certain age, and get cancer, he says we just need to tell them, sorry. (I think Jamal Thomas has a video about it, but I've since unsubscribed from him because he takes like 20 minutes to get to the point)
The only way we are going to "changes things" is by disrupting their economic stranglehold they have on us. If voting worked, it would be illegal.
C99, my refuge from an insane world. #ForceTheVote
This line from the block quote says it all
"A better approach is to think about how voters and elites could best play their different roles". Translation: you uppity voters need to learn your place.
I'm great at multi-tasking. I can waste time, be unproductive, and procrastinate all at the same time.
"voters and elites can best play their different roles"
Voters and elites, eh? Those Bezos bros are gettin' downright unAmerican, aren't they?
https://usconstitution.net/xconst_Am14.html
Hoping Jonathan Turley weighs in on this one.
Lurking in the wings is Hillary, like some terrifying bat hanging by her feet in a cavern below the DNC. A bat with theropod instincts. -- Fred Reed https://tinyurl.com/vgvuhcl
What kind of comments are they
Getting in response to this article, I wonder?
the top three comments on the list
and further dowwn...
Good
I sure agree with those comments.
Hum...
Well then, no need to change a thing! This is the current system in a nutshell.
Maybe the writer of that Wa-poo editorial missed the court case after 2016 when the Dem party said openly that they can (and will) choose their own candidate, regardless of any pesky voting and whatnot.
Wash Poo misses the point
What we have, Trump, is the exact result of the Elites controlling the system. Trump as President is because these alleged (neolib Dems in this case) elites fixed and gamed the primary system in 2016. But they really don't see that??? Do I smell gas?
We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.
Look deep into nature, and then you will understand everything better.
both - Albert Einstein
Here's an alternative proposal.
Instead of apportioning congressional representatives and electoral votes geographically, let's do it socioeconomically. Divide the electorate into 400 x 0.25 percentiles according to their net wealth.
Each such constituency is then entitled to elect 1 member of the house, FROM THEIR OWN RANKS (or maybe +/- 1 group -- i.e., the 1.25 - 1.499 quadricentile could elect anyone from 1.00 to 1.749 ...)! And yes, if while in office an incumbent representative's wealth grows beyond that of the rep's constituency, that rep will not be allowed to run for re-election in that original constituency. And yes, an individual's "net wealth" includes trust funds and spousal wealth.
The constituencies are then grouped into 100 x 1.0 percentiles, each of which is entitled to elect 1 senator, FROM THEIR OWN RANKS!
During Presidential elections, the constituencies are grouped into 10 x 10.0 percentiles (deciles). Each constituency is entitled to nominate a candidate for President, via some process not-yet-determined, but which does not involve any official recognition of the existence of political parties. (I'm agnostic as to whether nominees should be constrained to be members of their nominating constituency. Maybe.) "Swing voters" -- people who sit within 1 percentile of a decile boundary, can opt to nominate in the neighboring constituency. After the nominations are complete, ALL voters vote as individuals, using ranked-choice voting, for their preference among the ten candidates.
Let Jeff Bezos and these other fucking elitist fucks fucking chew on that fucking idea for a while, the miserable motherfucking motherfucks.
The earth is a multibillion-year-old sphere.
The Nazis killed millions of Jews.
On 9/11/01 a Boeing 757 (AA77) flew into the Pentagon.
AGCC is happening.
If you cannot accept these facts, I cannot fake an interest in any of your opinions.
voting blocks determined by wealth
a sound idea, if our thinking is correct.
If 90% of the voters ching in at $50K on average,
then the 10% wouldn't have many votes
averaging $500M. Not quite capitalist but
sensible. How to get the word out?
The Romans did this
in the Centuriate Assembly. The catch was that the rich voted first.
We can’t save the world by playing by the rules, because the rules have to be changed.
- Greta Thunberg
It's a good thing WaPo has a paywall
Otherwise, I might actually read some of the crap they print.