![](/static/253f0d9b/assets/icons/icon-96x96.png)
![](https://lemmy.ml/pictrs/image/gWmVEUZ94Z.png)
Okay, and I’m telling you that’s not something you can do quickly. There’s a reason new dictators usually stand up a separate force.
Okay, and I’m telling you that’s not something you can do quickly. There’s a reason new dictators usually stand up a separate force.
Eh, not exactly. That would be telegraphed literal years in advance as they would have to entirely rebuild the officer corps to be loyalists to them specifically. Right now the military leadership puts a lot of stock in the Constitution, so much so that the last time Trump tried to order them to go after BLM protestors, they not only refused the order, they then sent a memo to the entire force reminding them of the exact wording of their oath.
Tell me what year exactly the Soviets or Chinese practiced the workers owning the means of production?
It’s a cold calculus but letting them kill someone first means the army has the moral and narrative high ground when the Army Rangers black bag these guys at 3 in the morning.
I was just giving a general run down. I could start in on jungle primaries and caucuses too
To participate in the party’s election of a candidate. So you select a candidate within the party and then select the winner from the candidates each party selected.
Technically you don’t have to be affiliated to run for office. But once you’re talking about federal offices that route is functionally restricted to billionaires. And voters who are unaffiliated just don’t get the first round of voting. So it’s highly incentivized to affiliate.
Less restrictive on Asylum seekers? They can’t just cross the border anymore. The BP lets a small number in every day, leaving thousands of people at the mercy of Mexican drug cartels while they wait to cross. They wait to cross because Biden didn’t restore the international standard of declaring asylum on the soil of the country in which you want asylum. Instead he’s trying to force asylum seekers to use an app and visit American consulates in the country they need to flee. And forcing them to stay in the country they need to flee until we tell them it’s okay to leave.
Nothing about this is humane or legal under our own laws or international treaties which we’ve signed and ratified.
Biden undid the covid order in a way he knew would be struck down by the courts. The exact same way we got Trump’s muslim ban struck down. Unlike Trump’s Muslim ban he did not try again until he also made the asylum policy above where anyone availing themselves of the old way gets summarily denied and deported.
He did all of this in plain view and you can’t be assed to find the actual actions, just their PR releases.
Nah they’ll blame the people he alienated. They did it for Hillary, they’ll do it for Biden. They block anything remotely progressive and then wonder why progressives don’t run to the polls for them.
Or, and this is crazy, he could go ask the left for votes instead of trying to pull us all even further to the right.
He’s literally continued Trump’s border policies with the exception of family separation.
That’s not how that works. The seniors being exploited are not the well retired ones with the free time and health to go vote. And what happens when we become seniors? Are we to be punished for the sins of a particular subset of one generation?
Okay this isn’t a topic that you can do a tiny take on. You’ve had the Tl;Dr already above so before I tell you why Term Limits are a bad idea let me tell you some good ideas. I’ll do my best not to write a whole paper though. :)
So Term Limits. They create three massive problems. The Party becomes the brand instead of the politician. Cycling legislators too often creates an experience issue that can be exploited by lobbyists and party officials. Finally, rich donors and think tanks have more money than the current system has excess legislators. There’s more than this but these are the big three poison pills.
When we go to vote we vote based on a politician’s brand. It’s an American thing among western democracies. Other countries have recognizable party leaders but we’re fairly unique in voting by individual name. This makes name recognition the number one hurdle any aspiring politician must get over. And the reason ads use the name they support 10 times in 30 seconds, while almost never mentioning the opponent. And when they do it’s in audio/visual scare quotes. It’s why incumbents have such an advantage. They’ve been on your news feed for years building their brand.
Term Limits turns that on its head. As we cycle through politicians there will be very little incumbent advantage. There will be far more people vying for your attention. Which means money. It’s very expensive to get your name out there. So whose going to pay that bill? If the candidate isn’t wealthy enough then it has to be PACs or the Party. (99% of us are not wealthy enough) Yes candidates can ask for donations, but unless they’ve got an independent source of name recognition, like being a renowned football coach, people aren’t going to be very forthcoming. So we discover the method by which the Party becomes the brand. People need a familiar face to give money to. It’s the same reason corporations use well known actors in their ads. Now this means another thing though. If the Party controls the branding, because it’s how the money comes in, then the Party controls the money. And this also means they control who the money goes to. They get to pick the party candidate without ever interfering in the vote. This actually already happens to an extent. But Term Limits would pour gas on the fire, making this effect much worse.
So now we have Party chosen legislators we need to move on to the next problem, experience. Career politicians know who to call for technical advice, or at the very least they know when they should seek it. Those connections don’t exist with freshmen and junior representatives. They’re completely at the mercy of experienced staff, lobbyists, and the party that likely provided their staff. (You want our money, you use our people) For example, with Term Limits, they’d be getting forced out right around the time they figured out which military officer they could rely on for a no bullshit assessment of a weapons program. Then there’s experience in crafting legislation.
Just recently SCOTUS had a case about releasing inmates with drug convictions and the eligibility terms. The case hung on the proper English grammar of a list. Only it’s SCOTUS so it’s actually an exercise in making the grammar twist their way politically. And that’s with experienced legislators. We already know how the parties would solve this problem though. Pre-written legislation is a thing in most of our state legislatures. The lobbyists actually write the bill, complete with [insert state name here] type entries. One such example, the HOPE act made it harder for people to get food stamps. The exact same wording, in nine states. This kind of rubber stamp legislature will only get worse with Term Limits. Because politicians need to get re-elected, or at least until they reach their lame duck period. And anyone who doesn’t toe the line doesn’t get their campaign funded.
Which brings us to point three. Why would a lame duck Representative or Senator keep toeing the line? Because they’re human, they probably have a family, and they’d like to get paid to stay in the game doing what they know. It’s a lot better then the uncertainty of a career switch, and the Party is always hiring. In fact maxing your term with good behavior could become a pre-requisite for higher party positions. Don’t worry there’s always an exception for the inordinately wealthy. It’s that wealth that’s going to pay for the cushy landing of ex legislators in board rooms, think tanks, and party positions across America. The only difference is it might become a time limited deal instead of an actual sinecure like it is now. But it would still be life changing money and networking for most people. The important part here though is you must remain loyal to the party, you must vote the way they tell you to vote, and you must stump for your pre-selected replacement.
The two major parties already have way too much influence in our system. And the natural competitor stops being independent candidates or third parties. It becomes the lobbyists themselves. After all if campaigns become even more aligned with money, then who has more money than private multi national corporations?
No. For two reasons, one you don’t want to force the people to give up an actually good representative. Two, term limits for Representatives and Senators actually creates more corruption and entrenches the party as the entity instead of the politician.
We can always push it back more if that’s true.
Term limits for representatives and Senators are actually very toxic. It’s a great way to make the parties monolithic and entrench party patronage systems even more.
They’re doing that anyways.
That comes out to around 62. And forbidding seniors from voting is a great way to have them be exploited more than they already are.
Not at 60,000 dollars they don’t. But too bad, between the IRA and the Chinese EV tax the administration is making sure we aren’t ever burdened with EVs cheap enough for mass adoption.
And now you won’t. They don’t have to work their prices down now.
We’re fast approaching the point at which there are no more bad ideas. But yeah for now, it’s best to try and prevent any major incident while not letting the authoritarians win. Countries do not come out the same way when either of those things happens. And the chance that it’s a change for the better is remote.