On 2004-08-27T13:14:47-0700, Steve Schear wrote:
At 04:12 AM 8/27/2004, you wrote:
On 2004-08-25T11:25:09-0700, Steve Schear wrote:
Like a shoemaker who only has hammers in his toolkit, Chaum is trying to fix the wrong problem. The problems with voting in the U.S. aren't current or even potential fraud at the ballot box its a complete lack of proportional representation.
Is this solvable? Chaum is solving a problem that evidently can be solved. Perhaps once those problems are solved it will be easier to direct public attention at other more fundamental problems with our representative democracy.
Why would u guess this? These problems have been around since almost the founding of the republic.
What? I just said that without the distraction of outright voting fraud, voters may become more aware of the more subtle and more serious issues with democratic voting systems.
You have a strange notion of what the Colonists meant by that phrase.
You do have representation. The fact that your representatives are not the ones you wanted is irrelevant.
The Colonists had representatives too, its just that they were chosen by King George :)
As I understand it (I wasn't there, but perhaps you were), their complaint was that their "representatives" weren't from the region they claimed to represent, and that they weren't chosen democratically. You and I have no such claim. I can't claim lack of representation just because my fellow citizens are idiots who subscribe to the Libertarian or Socialist or Zoroastrian platform yet vote for a Republican or Democrat.
The fact that 'my' representatives are not the ones I wanted nor any of the independent independent party voters wanted is paramount.
What you or I want has nothing to do with it. I don't get to redefine election procedure whenever my preferred candidate doesn't win an election. I'm not voting for either Bush or Kerry. Neither represents my views. No matter who wins, the winner is my president and my representative. I can't claim otherwise. The best I can do is blame all the idiot voters who cling to party-ID as if it were their only hope of survival.
Representation is about interests and ideology. If a significant segment of voters don't get anyone to represent these interests and ideologies bad things can happen (e.g., they can become radicalized). Representation can be an important outlet for these disenfranchised voters.
Well, one district in TX managed to elect someone who's decent - Ron Paul. It's possible. The fact that libertarians or fascists everywhere don't get their candidates elected has more to do with the fact that they vote Republican or Democrat "because a vote for a third party is a wasted vote." Blame the morons in the electorate for not electing representatives that mirror their views. That's where the blame lies. What do you want? Do you want everyone to vote Democrat, Libertarian or Republican, then apportion the House of Representatives and the Senate appropriately? Who picks the representatives? The reason we don't have any socialists or libertarians or fascists in Congress is that not a single district votes for one. The U.S. has this fixation on voting for one of the two major parties. Other countries do not; that's why some of them have multi-(3+)-party representation in their parliaments. Incidentally, some northeastern state allows each congressional district to pick one elector, and the State as a whole picks two. (Electors = Senators + House Reps). If you're complaining about presidential elector selection, that blame lies with the States; the States dictate how their electors are chosen.
IMO, your complaint about gerrymandering is valid. There are a variety of formulaic ways to ensure voting district compactness. See e.g. http://www.hmdc.harvard.edu/micah_altman/disab.shtml
Clearly, no matter what you do, there are problems. If the district size is 1 million, there's a city of 499k and a city of 1501k, what then? The city of 499k is screwed unless there's a nearby population center with similar culture. Even then, the numbers won't be equitable, and someone, somewhere will whine about "lack of representation."
The problem is that use of voting districts seems to have always resulted in gerrymandering in our political system. A proportional system can eliminate these geopolitical distortions.
State and Federal House of Reps. are proportional. (Yeah, I know Nebraska is unicameral, excuse the generalization). What part of the System isn't proportional other than most States' selection of presidential electors? -- "When in our age we hear these words: It will be judged by the result--then we know at once with whom we have the honor of speaking. Those who talk this way are a numerous type whom I shall designate under the common name of assistant professors." -- Kierkegaard, Fear and Trembling (Wong tr.), III, 112