Wouldn't a centrist win every election?

Which is a little funny. Black having the same rights as whites WAS a political issue. Same with homosexuals, same with Women. Lots of things were divisive political issues.....until they werent....

There are still parts of the country where being black or gay will get you run out of town or worse.

Alan

I am glad the US Senate problem is being mentioned. Our citizens do not realize that 18% of of the US population has 50 of the 100 Senate seats. It is ridiculous !!! The bottom 20 states in population should only have 1 Senator.

Concerned over 65 wrote:

I am glad the US Senate problem is being mentioned. Our citizens do not realize that 18% of of the US population has 50 of the 100 Senate seats. It is ridiculous !!! The bottom 20 states in population should only have 1 Senator.

That dang pesky Constitution and all its checks and balances, like a bicameral legislature!

OozmaKappa wrote:

Republicans are much closer to the center than democrats. They would win more if the democrat controlled media didnt do all the heavy lifting for democrats.

You and I have very different world views. I can’t remember the last administration that was truly progressive. FDR’s New Deal? The best Obama could do was push the GOP’s private health care solution that Bob Dole and Mitt Romney loved until a Democrat supported it.

$770 billion for defense (when we’ve just completely pulled out of Afghanistan and are supposedly no longer fighting an active war) but this administration can’t pass Build Back Better because of the Child Tax Credit?

The right runs this country, despite their minority stake in the population. They’re very well funded, their core will follow their leadership off a cliff and the imbalance Congress and the Electoral College give the less populated states disproportionate power over the more populated ones, giving the GOP outsized power relative to their popularity. In the last thirty years, we’ve had one GOP presidential candidate win the popular vote. All these efforts to restrict voting in traditionally GOP states comes from the fact that they know it’s their best chance to keep getting elected.

MelRnr wrote:

Concerned over 65 wrote:

I am glad the US Senate problem is being mentioned. Our citizens do not realize that 18% of of the US population has 50 of the 100 Senate seats. It is ridiculous !!! The bottom 20 states in population should only have 1 Senator.

That dang pesky Constitution and all its checks and balances, like a bicameral legislature!

When the Constitution was written, the most populated state, Virginia, had about 12 times the population of Delaware, the least populated state at the time (that’s without mentioning the number of people in each state that were enslaved and of course couldn’t vote, but still counted as 60% of a person for representation purposes).

Today, California has 66 times as many people as Wyoming. Whether or not James Madison and the Constitutional Convention foresaw a future where the power of the Senate was so unevenly distributed among the citizens or not, they did include a means of changing the Constitution to fit with the changing times.

Jeff Wigand wrote:

MelRnr wrote:

That dang pesky Constitution and all its checks and balances, like a bicameral legislature!

When the Constitution was written, the most populated state, Virginia, had about 12 times the population of Delaware, the least populated state at the time (that’s without mentioning the number of people in each state that were enslaved and of course couldn’t vote, but still counted as 60% of a person for representation purposes).

Today, California has 66 times as many people as Wyoming. Whether or not James Madison and the Constitutional Convention foresaw a future where the power of the Senate was so unevenly distributed among the citizens or not, they did include a means of changing the Constitution to fit with the changing times.

Imagine if we did not have the Senate to check the power of the extremists and populists on both sides in the House of Representatives. Senators are accountable to their entire state constituents, whereas Representatives just to their local district. It makes the Senate a more moderate and balancing force. The Senate is NOT the problem.

political guy wrote:

You've got the group of people who will vote republican no matter what, and the group who will vote democrat no matter what. The swing voters will choose the one that seems sane and reasonable.

THe problem is lack of principles.

Leftists will vote for their candidate, even if they hate every one of her or his policies.

See 2008 when the ‘Peace’ candidates voted for warmongering Obama, who never met a 3rd world person he didn’t enjoy drone striking.

The Senate is the Problem, when 18 percent of the population can prevent reasonable laws and policies to be passed ! Think about it ☺️

When you challenge the structure of the senate or EC, the response is always to explain how it works. We know how it works. That's why we think it should change. Should 20% of the population have as much representation as the other 80%? Should a person voting in one state have less voting power than a person voting in another state? We are really running our democracy off of arbitrary geography?

OozmaKappa wrote:

Flagpole wrote:

in the Bible Belt, in most elections, you'd better be Christian (and the right kind of Christian) and anti-abortion and pro gun, and I mean pro gun in a nutso no restrictions ever kind of way. In those places, a moderate would get destroyed by a far right-wing nutbar.

Same is true for very blue areas, though even very far left Democrats are much more reasonable and could be more accepting of a moderate than far right-wing crazies.

Your bogus designation of mainstream conservative positions as "far right" and general bias aside, you actually get to the point of why being a centrist isnt inherently advantageous.

You have a problem with reading comprehension. I didn't say those things I listed were far right-wing nutbar things. I said a moderate would lose to a far right-wing nutbar in those areas.

MelRnr wrote:

Imagine if we did not have the Senate to check the power of the extremists and populists on both sides in the House of Representatives.

How has that worked in the UK, where the House of Lords can’t stop a bill from the House of Commons from becoming law?

MelRnr wrote:

Senators are accountable to their entire state constituents, whereas Representatives just to their local district. It makes the Senate a more moderate and balancing force. The Senate is NOT the problem.

That’s what Madison wanted but that isn’t reality today. A small percentage of Americans will be electing a majority of the Senate. In 1789, there’s no way they foresaw this current landscape, with 40% of our population being represented by 14% of the Senate.

That’s not even considering the US citizens in Washington DC, Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands who have no voting representatives in Congress at all.

What will it take for someone to say, “even if they’re not going to vote for me, I support their right to vote?”

political guy wrote:

You've got the group of people who will vote republican no matter what, and the group who will vote democrat no matter what. The swing voters will choose the one that seems sane and reasonable.

I would vote 3rd party but since 3rd party candidate is never even close enough to make a difference it always feels like a throw-away vote. And in this most recent election, I knew the only chance of not having Trump was voting for Biden. I didn't want to, but felt it was necessary.

Bad Wigins wrote:

Centrists are wishy-washy, flip-flopping, unprincipled, neither-here-nor-there chicken hearts who choose the middle because they think it's safest.

Generally being in the middle means they're surrounded by people who hate them, and they deserve it. They're garbage! Sleazeballs like McCain.

Ahh haa, The thinking that has this country in the state that it is.

Only the most ignorant vote a long party lines. It's brainless and it gives politicians unnecessary power. If your congressman or governor or president is a horse's a$$, hold them accountable. Don't accept the nonsense just because they are a liberal or a conservative.

Most of us operate in and around the middle. Which means we should be looking for compromise. With the exception of the few truly special clowns posting in this thread, it seems a vast majority of us want something more than just being left with democrats and republicans to vote for.

So who's the candidate for President that we can all get behind?

It still works today. The Senate still provides the steadying arm of Congress to the House's more reactionary and extreme elements. Also, less populous states do have less representation... in the House. It's working as the founding fathers intended even with today's demographics.

We are and have always been a confederation of states. This is not a Democracy. If you want true Democracy then live somewhere else.

States rights still matter. That is why we have the Senate. The Senate stands for equality between the states since each state has the same vote. This is never changing.

The word of the people matter too. That is why we have the House. The House more directly represents the word of the people. The problem with the House is gerrymandering.

As we become a more minority majority the GOP continue to lose the ground they lost under Bush.

As voting becomes more and more restrictive the Democrats lose ground.

Do you want a country where everyone eligible actually votes? Or do you want less people voting? Voter IDs need to be FREE and Election Day needs to be a National Holiday.

Alan

guess which ones wrote:

MelRnr wrote:

Imagine if we did not have the Senate to check the power of the extremists and populists on both sides in the House of Representatives. Senators are accountable to their entire state constituents, whereas Representatives just to their local district. It makes the Senate a more moderate and balancing force. The Senate is NOT the problem.

When you challenge the structure of the senate or EC, the response is always to explain how it works. We know how it works. That's why we think it should change. Should 20% of the population have as much representation as the other 80%? Should a person voting in one state have less voting power than a person voting in another state? We are really running our democracy off of arbitrary geography?

I missed this comment before, so...

Your statement is incorrect. 20% of the population doesn't have the same representation as the other 80%, because we have to consider BOTH Houses. The structure is important.

MelRnr wrote:

It still works today. The Senate still provides the steadying arm of Congress to the House's more reactionary and extreme elements. Also, less populous states do have less representation... in the House. It's working as the founding fathers intended even with today's demographics.

I disagree. The Senate does not function as it was intended. Low population areas over-empower a minority of the country. This happens as well in the House, given the cap on House membership. Wyoming’s lone House member represents fewer people than the average California house member.

We’re ending up with an entrenched reality where 30% the country is overruling the wishes of 60% of the country.

MelRnr wrote:

I missed this comment before, so...

Your statement is incorrect. 20% of the population doesn't have the same representation as the other 80%, because we have to consider BOTH Houses. The structure is important.

Why isn’t Merrick Garland on the Supreme Court and why is Amy Coney Barrett on the Supreme Court? Where’s the people’s fair representation there?

It’s a ridiculous system where some votes are worth more than others. Residents of early primary states and swing states get far more attention than a solidly liberal or solidly conservative state. There are millions of Californians whose votes for President don’t functionally matter. A conservative Californian and liberal Alabaman are wasting their time voting for president in this situation.

Direct election of the President is fair. That Republican in Orange County and that liberal in Birmingham will have their votes matter just as much as everyone else’s. But the GOP in this country will never support that, because they know their positions are more unpopular than they are popular and they know it will end their chances of winning the White House for the foreseeable future.

But if you make voting day a holiday don't republicans run the risk of losing every single election?