Comment by r053bud
Comment by r053bud 16 hours ago
We voted for this! This is “democracy” at work
Comment by r053bud 16 hours ago
We voted for this! This is “democracy” at work
Less than 30% of voter age Americans voted for this
The majority that did vote, voted for this. The participation rate has always been low in rich western countries. Given the standards of media literacy and civics education, there's no evidence that a higher participation rate would have changed the outcome.
Everybody votes in Australia (not sure how rich, but in top 20 for sure). If you don't you have to show cause or pay a AUD$50 fine. I know some think this is anti-freedom, but it does prevent farces like the current USA. Historically there have been problems in the past (30 years ago) but these days the Australian Electoral Commission (Independent from government) revise electoral boundaries to ensure no more gerrymanders.
Correction: those that don't enter a polling station. What you do in there is up to you. You can cast a vote, spoil the ballot, cast a "donkey vote" (numbering the options in the order printed), leave the ballot empty, as long as it goes in the box.
There’s also no evidence that increased turnout would have had the same result.
What seems to be overlooked in these conversations is the skill with which American voters have been disenfranchised by partisan forces.
It’s easy to blame people for not voting if you ignore the real difficulties in actually casting a vote for many Americans.
<< It’s easy to blame people for not voting if you ignore the real difficulties in actually casting a vote for many Americans.
I hesitated while reading this part, because I wholly agreed with the first 2 sentences. Do you mean physically difficult in terms of barriers to voting or making a less direct comment about the usefulness of that vote? If the former, I think I disagree compared to other countries ( and the levels of paperwork needed ). If the latter, I would be interested to hear some specifics.
That an enormous sample size. Statistically a complete participation should be very close, so the burden of proof lies with those who claim it would be different. Regardless of whether Trump would have won or not, that is a clear indication of evenly split public sentiment. So we still get to justly reap the fruits of our collective choices. There is no exoneration by whimsically dreaming of improbable alternatives.
I don't think it is was that hard to vote. That is a straw man to avoid facing the hard truth of American apathy. Now next election, perhaps we can have a conversation on that point. Things a trending rather poorly right now.
In fact there was an extensive analysis of the election by Democrat pollster David Shor, who found that 100% turnout would have resulted in an even larger Trump win, by 4.8 points: https://www.vox.com/politics/403364/tik-tok-young-voters-202...
This has been the pattern for awhile now. The pool of politically unengaged people are especially Trumpy compared to regular voters: https://abcnews.go.com/538/vote-back-trump/story?id=10909062...
Arguments based on voter participation overlook that voting is a statistical sample of the population. The people who don’t vote broadly break down roughly the same way as the people who do vote. And even to the extent they don’t, it’s risky to make assumptions about how they would have voted.
If you can generalize about non-voters, it’s that they’re broadly more anti-institution than voters—which is what causes them to put less stock in the institutional practice of voting. In the U.S. in the Trump era, that has meant that non-voters or infrequent voters support Trump somewhat more strongly than regular voters.
For reference, informal votes were around 5% in our last federal election:
https://results.aec.gov.au/27966/website/HouseInformalByStat...
This article contains a fun breakdown of the types of informal votes including a category for "the usual anatomical drawings" (0.7% of informal votes):
https://www.crikey.com.au/2025/04/22/2025-federal-election-p...
> The majority that did vote, voted for this
Nitpick: Trump got less than 50% of the votes (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2024_United_States_presidentia...)
More importantly, I think quite a few who voted for Trump didn’t vote for this extreme version of Trump.
100% of voter age Americans made a decision. That includes not registering to vote or not voting.
Pretend I want a snack, I can choose between a cookie and an apple. If I dislike both then I also have the option to not get a snack. Neither is selected.
This is different from not voting because a candidate still wins.
If the US wanted voting to be more popular, there would be a Federal Holiday to promote it. There is no incentive when there are known costs...at least since the wild inflation of the 80s when it got prohibitive to lose a shift and the slow dissolution of union jobs. This is the result of the tyranny of indifference. Those that benefit continue to promote and benefit, those that do not, are disenfranchised. It's a common theme in history.
>If the US wanted voting to be more popular, there would be a Federal Holiday to promote it.
I agree but it doesn't actually matter. 97% can vote by mail, early, or another method besides election day according to this article https://www.cbsnews.com/news/map-early-voting-mail-ballot-st...
>There is no incentive when there are known costs... is the result of the tyranny of indifference.
What is the cause of the Indifference in your opinion ?
stop. Voting is incredibly easy. Voting by mail is incredibly easy. Theres no reason you cant vote by mail. The reason people arent voting is because they dont want to/cant be assed
Voters who do not vote say "I'm fine with all winners", like "What pizza do you want?" - "I'm fine with every pizza".
What presidential elections are you comparing it to?
David Schor’s analysis found that if everyone had voted, Trump would have won by 4.8 points: https://www.vox.com/politics/403364/tik-tok-young-voters-202...
And a minority of those who did vote voted for this.
I mean yes? Democracy is a pretty poor model for governance. IMO peak enlightenment happened circa the 17th or 18th century when classical liberalism decided government should be based on individual liberties and anything outside of that is decided democratically not because it is a good system but because votes are roughly a tally of who would win if we all pull knives on each other because we didn't like the vote.
Democracy is not 2 parties doing voter suppression and gerrymandering as a filter to pass the result to an electoral college.
The US system was never designed to be fair to individuals in the first place, pointing at it as a failure of democracy is IMHO pulling the actual issues under the rug.
It’s basically impossible to engage in meaningful voter suppression in a country where election results can be cross-checked against high-quality polling.
“Gerrymandering” also has no effect on Presidential elections. And in 2024, Republicans won a larger share of the House popular vote than their share of House seats.
Voter suppression is the act of limiting the pool of voters. That includes putting large swaths of the population behind bars or flagged as non eligible to voting, putting barriers to voter registration etc.
It can never be 0 and every country will have a minimum requirement, but the degree to which it is done in the US is far ahead of most western country.
Gerrymandering has an effect on the criteria for voter eligibility, the voting rules in the state etc. It's not direct but who's in power has a sizeable effect on who will have an easier time voting.
How can someone talk about democracy peaking when the franchise was extended to a tiny minority of the population. You don't give a damn about individual liberties, you only care that the "right" people have liberty.
Your right. I stand corrected. They don't give a damn about democracy or individual liberties.
Hmm. What if I told you that the parent was clearly in favor of the republic? Would that change your disposition? If not, why not.
Ah yes, the wonderful time of enlightenment when all straight white Christian land-owning men's rights became recognized, not just the nobility's. Just a few short centuries from there, the rights of poorer white men, children, women, people of any other skin color, non-Christian, and LGBT people would be recognized too.
You jest, but skin in the game is argument is not irrelevant. It is called a franchise for a reason after all. You want a slice of the pie, you should be able to prove that you know what you are doing. Owning land was a good enough proxy then. We can argue what would be a good proxy now.
Having the laws of the nation apply to you means you have skin in the game when it comes to deciding what those laws are. Owning something, land or whatever else, doesn't give you even one iota more "skin the game" than those that don't.
I disagree, but lets for the sake of argument assume that I buy into your premise. In terms of degrees, do people who own land and have the laws of the nation apply to you ( which is a fascinating distinction by the way, which you may have not fully thought through, but I will leave it as a tangent unless you want to explore it further here ) have more skin in the game than those who only have laws of the nation apply to them?
Whatbexactly are values you consider enlightened and did you ever bother to read history, specifically the parts about how society functions not just where armies went?
I assure you French prior, dueing and after French revolution was not pinacle of great governance. More like, the low.
I know that Harris put up zero fight about it. I infer that she believed it to be legitimate.
That's not definitive, to be sure. But it's sufficient for me to believe that we did this to ourselves. Now all we can do is figure out how we're going to get through it.
Maybe I'm too optimistic, but I think actual election fraud, big enough to steal an election, would be too big to miss.
Yes, it might only take a small number of votes in the right place, but either you somehow know the right place, or you have to move a lot of votes.
There's a reasonable discussion to be had along the lines of 'these guys seem to be doing everything they whine about', but could they get a big operation done without a) bragging openly about it, b) leaving a big trail, or c) having a falling out with a conspirator who then tells all.
Adding on, certainly gerrymandering and voter supression laws affect voting results, but I have trouble calling that stealing an election.
Trump did thank that "very popular guy. He was very effective. And he knows those computers better than anybody. All those computers, those vote counting computers, and we won Pennsylvania in a landslide." If Biden or Obama had said something like that the nation would be in uproar.
https://www.youtube.com/live/kdvpXxXVyok?si=XALuK7No9-PLQBAr...
Democracy built lies, decide, and rejection of facts through propaganda.
Really need a viable means to fight it, say allowing an elected official's constitutes being able to sue them for no less than $10,000 for incidence of bearing false witness. Help erode the dark money networks.
Also having a 4th branch of Governments, the people with State and Federal binding resolution, would help. Only way to overrides those in power is to unionize the will.
Good luck relying on a court of law when the President suspends courts and arrests judges. The latter is happening right now.
Sure, but you also voted for a system of checks & balances, laws, and separation of powers - whatever happened to all these laws and stuff from the Cold War where even a hint that you may have ties to Russia would get you a Visit?