Could an alliance of third parties be the way to push proportional representation, etc.?

Politics & Elections
101

You’ve shown that you don’t have an appropriate willingness to discuss an issue on its merits (the only intellectually valid way to participate in a discussion in GD / Elections) but I still think it’s worthwhile to point out the insane fallacy of your PR and minority argument. [As a quick caveat, I’m not in favor of PR.]

Firstly, optics is not an issue on this matter. I’d wager less than 5% of the minority population, (or of the entire population) of the United States could define anywhere close to accurately what proportional representation is. I doubt they could even define what “first past the post single member districts” means, and that’s our system. The biggest issue is definitely that no one knows about the alternatives, and the secondary issue is no one thinks it is important.

I think the minority argument then has nothing to do with optics, but is just your personal opinion. Because there is simply no way a large or even appreciable number of minorities think proportional representation is a way to undermine their power.

So to address you personal opinion on PR–it would give minorities far more power than they ever have had before, and more power than they could ever have in an FPTP system. Eventually America will be minority-majority, at which point there is not really a minority race or a majority race, just a multiracial country (it’s silly to say minority majority when there is no majority race, thus no minority race.)

Let’s say you have 40% whites, 15% blacks, 15% Asians and 30% Hispanics (these are not based on any projections or anything, just a hypothetical.) Posit that these minority groups all feel like the only way to counter the 40% white voters is to be in the same party, that basically disenfranchises every non-white voter who doesn’t actually agree with that party on most of the issues but feels they need to vote for it to maintain power for their ethnic group.

In the non-hypothetical, right now any Hispanic who is in favor of lower taxes, less regulation, loosening of labor laws, altering our entitlement programs and etc but who is vehemently opposed to anti-immigrant rhetoric and legislation is faced with a really shitty choice. They’re simply not going to be happy with many of the policies of the Democrats, but a vote for the Republicans makes them feel like they’re voting to have their cousin kicked out of the country, or stopped and interrogated for looking Hispanic. A PR system gives everyone more choices, and thus they can be much better represented not just on ideologies but on the issues that matter to them.

Single member districts currently disenfranchise a vast number of minorities, such that going to a PR multi-member system would give them so much more power that the power they now have through being in coalition with liberal whites in the Democratic party would seem laughable. Most of the Southern States have a few minority districts carved out and the rest are deep red, but sometimes as many as 20% of the voters in those deep Red districts are black, and do not support the Republican party. Single member districts have effectively disenfranchised them. It’s fairly irrelevant that blacks helped push Obama over the top in Ohio and Virginia when talking about whether someone is adequately represented in the legislature. In fact in terms of legislative representation things are still grim and not looking like they will improve for some time to minorities. I do not mean “number of minority congressmen” but rather “number of minorities in red districts in which they have no voice.” Ohio is a great example, at something like 15% of the voters in 2012 the strong black turnout and support for Obama helped him win that State. But most Ohio congressional districts are red, and all the black voters in all those districts are essentially unrepresented on a range of issues by their congressmen.

In Ohio’s 15th District, 8.4% are black, 3.8% are asian, and 3.7% are Hispanic. If we’re equating “minority” with “Democrat voter” and “minority Democrat voters” with minorities having political power, you have almost 16% of that district disenfranchised because the Ohio 15th, by a margin of 62-38 voted for Steve Stivers, a Republican.

There are valid arguments against PR, some made in this thread, but “minority disenfranchisement” is by far the worst, dumbest argument ever deployed against PR. That problem is practically the cornerstone of the justification for PR.

102

As I’ve said, you don’t need to convince me of your position, you need to convince minorities of your position.

Please stop haranguing me and go out and convince them to leave the Democratic Party at the moment of their ascension. Your success will prove me wrong.

103

They wouldn’t have to leave the Democratic Party. They could still vote for it. And if they don’t, it wouldn’t matter - they’d still be represented. In this system, they have no other choice. In a PR system, they could vote for anyone they want and be certain to have a voice that matches their views, perhaps even better than the Democrats do.

104

referring to Martin Hyde’s long recent post.

It certainly is mathematically possible for districts to be drawn in every state today such that if the only issue on the table is the race of the voter (whatever that might mean), all whites would be elected and no minorities.

To some degree, the current districts as drawn have some merit in ‘insuring’ some minorities in the offices being contested.

The goal should be to remove race as a factor. All parties should bring people to the contest of every persuasion and ethnic background.

today’s districts as drawn by Republican dominated legislatures, are designed to elect Republicans, and to disenfranchise Democrats, by lumping them disproportionately into very heavily Democratic districts.

Only proportional awarding of offices based on vote percentages across the state can possibly right this inequity, and racial background of the voters is something we should simply ignore.

105

To explain further - there would be no advantage to sticking with the Democrats or any other party, because your vote isn’t wasted if you don’t. You will be represented one way or the other.

106

If you’re referring to me, I’m actually not in favor of PR, but for very different reasons than you that would take this thread way off topic. I’m not particularly in favor of our current way of doing things either, though.

But my point was, you actually have not demonstrated whatsoever that PR disenfranchises minorities or even that any minorities would think that. As I said, your optics argument is just your own opinion, and not backed by any actual fact or even just random opinions expressed by a minority in the form of an editorial or etc. The fact that you’ve made an ascendant Democratic party synonymous with minority ascendancy as an argument against PR actually shows you do not understand PR or how it would work.

Further, anytime you’ve been called on your arguments and asked to support them with more than a few sentences of dismissal and rudeness, you just give more of the same. You aren’t making an argument, you’re making snide remarks.

Further, BrainGlutton who often posts threads I think are of low value with little personal opinion of his own provided, has fleshed out a decent argument here that should either be addressed on its merits if you choose to participate in the thread, or left alone otherwise. A reasonable argument deserves a lot more than a snide, unintelligent dismissal that does nothing but muddy up the thread and advance no discussion points whatsoever.

Finally, even BrainGlutton isn’t making the argument PR is going anywhere, in fact I doubt he thinks it is. So your focus on “prove me wrong by implementing it” is asinine.

107

I’m pretty sure what Exapno is getting at isn’t necessarily that he thinks PR will disenfranchise minorities, but that it will be portrayed as such by either kneejerk reactionaries or people deliberately trying to undermine the movement.

To wit:

For the first time in history, minorities have finally been making great influences in politics among the Democratic party, and now just as that happens the whites are trying to change the system on us to keep us down!

Sure, you can calmly explain all the benefits of PR and how they’re being more represented, but you have to admit that when viewed from the lens of “completely changing the political system right when minorities are becoming important” it could be used as easy ammunition against it, even if that objection isn’t technically valid.

I find people making that objection vocally and visibly quite plausible. Again, I don’t think it’s a valid complaint, but I’ve seen far dumber and less easily framed views on issues become mainstream.

108

I’m not sure, given his insistence that it’s not even worth discussing even as he continues to discuss it. But whatever, I’ll let you do it instead.

Sure, any radical change won’t be easy and will need explaining. No doubt. It wouldn’t happen overnight.

But I could go to leaders of minority groups and media outlets and explain how it works and why it’s good for them, and ask them to get on board. I’d explain how it really works. I’d point out that it’s the system used in post-Apartheid South Africa.

Convincing people that something is good is normal politics. It takes time but it’s not impossible at all. The squawking about it wouldn’t come from minorities per se, but from minorities heavily invested in the Democratic party, and the rest of the party.

This board is where we discuss the merits, though, not simply say “that will be hard to explain to people.” Yes, it would be.

109

I should mention that I agree with you, I was mostly just trying to suss out what I thought his point was.

110

I know. I was doing my part too. Thanks.

111

I don’t understand the question. What is unclear about center-seeking behavior?

But the thing is, the Tea Party isn’t being successful in controlling the agenda or achieving their results. With the Democratic-controlled Senate and the continuing divisions in the House, the main options are for the House and the Senate, as bodies in the aggregate, to seek the center, or face gridlock.

Right now, for the most part, the positions of the Tea Party and the unwillingness to compromise has resulted mostly in gridlock. And what I’m saying is, the more radical parties you bring into Congress, whether on the right or the left, the ability to seek the center is diminished, and the chances of gridlock expand exponentially. Radical parties by definition do not compromise, and I’m saying the Tea Party is just the tip of the iceberg.

Once again, I’m saying that having one radical faction in Congress today with perhaps 80 members is vastly preferable to having 15 radical factions with 150 members total. What is even more preferable is having very few members of radical factions with the vast majority of Congress being somewhere in the mainstream political spectrum.

And, once again, having many radical factions of opposing left-right views does not result in them cancelling each other out. It results in all of them voting ‘no’ for their own petty, zealot reasons and nothing getting done. Having a bunch of ideologues of opposing stripes in any decision-making body – from your company’s board of directors to your local PTA – is always a recipe for disaster, and legislatures are no different.

112

Well, wait until the sequester happens before you say that.

But that’s happening NOW, under our current system. It wouldn’t be any different in a PR system. The only difference would be that the Tea Partiers would be called “The Tea Party” instead of Republicans. They’d still be voting the same way.

In fact, voters would have more choices in a PR system so they wouldn’t have to take either a radical Tea Partiers or a Democrat, as they had to do in races where Tea Partiers won the GOP nomination.

Once again, I’m saying that having one radical faction in Congress today with perhaps 80 members is vastly preferable to having 15 radical factions with 150 members total.

But we already have lots of radical factions. We just lump them into two parties.

And when your only choice is between two parties, and you think they are both too radical, what’s a centrist to do? He must pick the less radical, or not vote. In a PR system, moderates would be able to pick moderate candidates. I think PR would do exactly the opposite of what you’re saying. It would reflect our electorate, and a large part of our electorate is somewhere in the middle, not polarized or radical.

113

Exapno, you say that you view this issue like you do those who deny the theory of relativity. But when someone starts a thread on this board to deny relativity, scientists like myself actually try to engage them, and explain why their ideas are wrong. If you long ago came to the conclusion that proportional representation is a nonstarter, that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t talk about it any more, but rather that you should talk about it, to explain your reasons to the rest of us.

114

Right, I mean, the “Does .999… = 1” thread is the biggest thread to date in GQ, and that’s certainly not due to mathematicians being content to refuse to argue with people who claim to find what is generally considered a simple fact false.

115

Especially since PR is used with success in many other countries.

116

Again, PR is a “process issue” and thus unknown outside of a small group of people. Typically, Republicans have favored older institutions like the electoral college while liberals favor a move to more direct and representative forms of democracy. It stands to reason if a move to PR ever became a serious move, it would start with liberal Democrats. I think there has been no compelling argument such a move would really be very racially exacerbating at all.

For that matter, in the real world if PR were to ever happen it would be grassroots and local first. Movements that do not, and probably will not until the very end, have the backing of the establishment by their nature do not start as Federal or national movements in this country. If PR was to come to pass, it’d be akin to things like prohibition or women’s suffrage. Perhaps a large city will do away with wards and districts and adopt a PR system for its city council. Professors would write about it, newspapers would print articles, a few reformers would latch on. In a progressive State prone to reform, maybe the lower house of the legislature changes to PR. Then another State, then another. Over time when a plurality of the States have adopted this new method of conducting elections, it then becomes a national issue, when it already has such broad based support at a grass roots, apolitical level that politicians of all parties, creeds, races etc have to give it deference and eventually succumb to its will.

That’s more or less how other anti-establishment issues have come to pass in the United States. The direct election of U.S. Senator got to a point where so many States supported it, while the Federal government and sitting Senators did not, that the States made a credible threat to convene their own constitutional convention (the second method of proposing amendments in our system, that has never been utilized.) The fear has always been if the States convene a constitutional convention, the first since our constitution was written, scary things could happen (like a dramatic rewriting of the constitution.) Thus imbued with fear of popular, widespread opinion, the Congress relented and passed an amendment, sent it to the States and it was quickly ratified.

Now, that’s a narrative of how things can happen of a nature similar to PR, I personally do not see that ever happening with PR in this country. But because of how it would happen, I think it would be such a local, non-national issue to begin with that by the time it was a national issue it would be well understood and widely supported by many people of many different backgrounds.

117

Today we see a good example of how the current system can screw minorities. In this case, to get one more district that would likely elect a black person (probably a Democrat), they’d give up four of give to Republicans.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/va-politics/black-delegates-tempted-by-gops-senate-map/2013/01/30/7612e074-6b0a-11e2-ada3-d86a4806d5ee_story.html

In a PR system, none of this would matter. Nobody’s vote would be wasted these conflicting goals.

118

Yep. All you need is one state, or even locality, to try it, and show everyone else how it works.

119

I’m pretty sure I have heard of some local governments using other third-party-friendly systems such as Instant Runoff Voting.

120

Actually, some have in the past – local level only, never state, and never very widespread. See this article, “A Brief History of Proportional Representation in the United States,” by Douglas J. Amy. It all began in the Progressive Era with its high-minded war on entrenched partisan political machines – and it all ended by the late 1950s, except in Cambridge, MA, which still has it. (Hahvahd commie-libruls, whaddaya expect . . .)

However, the reasons for the anti-PR backlash were mostly not such as would be considered defensible today.

Well, nowadays, not even straight-party-list-PR with no minimum-vote-bar would return very many Communists to any legislature state or local; and the presence of African-Americans in such bodies is no longer the shock it once was. Might be time to try again.