Mëds wrote: ↑Thu Nov 12, 2020 1:13 am
And the Democrats plans to stack the supreme court, nix the filibuster, and make broad sweeping changes to the US electoral system and constitution, would NOT be the end of democracy in the USA?
The SCOTUS thing is a sore thumb. Either you do fill a seat in an election year, in which case the Republicans stole a seat from Obama, or you don't in which case they stole a seat from Biden. But Moscow Mitch and Lying Lindsey don't play fair and change the rules as they see fit. Anyway, that's water under the bridge now.
Now, the constitution does not say how many judges there should be on the Supreme court, so technically that number could be changed. But that would be opening up Pandora's box. If the democrats would do that, they could count on the republicans to add even more judges when they get the chance. I'm pretty sure Biden will not go that route. A lot of left wing democrats want to, but that would be a very short sighted and stupid move.
As I said, it would not be unconstitutional, but it would be stupid, because it would set a dangerous precedent.
The filibuster is actually not a thing that has anything to do with democracy. On the contrary, it is a method to obstruct democracy to have its due course. I do not know of any other country than the USA that allows for this type of obstruction in decision making. Good riddance if it goes away!
Broad sweeping changes to the electoral system and the constitution?
They can't do that. It would have to pass the supreme court first, and that court is stacked with conservative judges.
That being said, as these elections show, the electoral system in the USA is far from perfect.
I'm not saying they will do this, or even actually try to do this, but those are things that some of their members are all for.
Yeah, the radical left wing are in favour of most of those things, but the moderates aren't.
I'm not sure how it works in Sweden, but here we don't get much say after the election takes place. Governments just make changes as they see fit. Personally I think a true democracy would require that the passing of any major law, or changing to rights, etc., should be done via national referendum. Literally let the people decide, not the elected representatives who don't actually represent their constituents.
I have to disagree. Referendums is one of the favourite tools of dictators. They are easy to manipulate and lend an aura of respectibility to their trampling of democracy and human rights.
The Soviet Union held referendums in Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia during occupation, whether those nations wanted to join the Soviet Union, and they of course did, with more than 90% of votes cast presumingly in favour of joining.
Ask any Latvian, Estonian or Lithuanian if they think those referendums were fair.
The Russians now did the same thing in Crimea. They occupied the peninsula, then held a referendum in which more than 90% of the Ukrainians living there supposedly voted in favour of becoming Russians. Or so they say.
Only the Russian military of course had access to the ballots during counting.
Hitler became Chancellor after a democratic vote, in which the Nazis gained 33% of the vote and became the biggest party. He then banned half of the parties in parliament, to get a solid majority, and then held a referendum in which the German people, presumedly, granted him the right to lead the country for life.
I prefer a system of checks and balances, where the present majority in parliament (or congress) is held in check by a constitution and its safe guards (eg a Supreme Court) that makes sure whoever is in charge at the moment can't tear things up completely.
To make changes in the Swedish constitution you need a two thirds majority in parliament twice, with a general election held in between.
Works for me.
Not like the British that let a 52% majority in a referendum, where less than 80% voted, completely blow up the entire economy.
