Why are you curious to hear what other Americans think of my ideas, Danivon? Just out of curiosity. You've never been squeamish about putting your own opinions forth before.

At any rate, I think, as Hillary Clinton rightly (also hypocritically) suggested, that campaign donations are a problem. So, rather than use up this thread with allegations and patronizing remarks via the employment of one-word political slang [cough], can we actually seriously discuss things like this?

In a previous thread we spoke of campaign finance reform and someone [not mentioning names] made the incredibly silly comment that, by doubling the term of office of a member of the House of Representatives, one would thereby automatically halve the amount of campaign donations received which said member requires to stay in office.

Before we lower the IQ of the room [yet again] I have a question, for Danivon, or Sass, or anybody who cares to indulge me.

Is the exact amount of money raised by a politician necessarily the problem? If we indeed cut the amount of money raised by a congress[wo]man attempting to get re-elected in half, would that solve the problem? And how could this be translated into a constitutional amendment, which would be translated into actual progress, in turn?

JimHackerMP wrote:Is the exact amount of money raised by a politician necessarily the problem? If we indeed cut the amount of money raised by a congress[wo]man attempting to get re-elected in half, would that solve the problem? And how could this be translated into a constitutional amendment, which would be translated into actual progress, in turn?

I have been thinking about this. The truth is campaign contributions are probably less than half of the problem. The real issue is lobbying. There are always going to be "lobbyists" and there always have been. The difference between the early days of the republic and today is that "lobbyist" is now a profession and lobbying firms are now permanent fixtures of the DC scene. Even if you take much of the money out of elections per se, lobbyists will still have an imbalanced influence on our politics because they are there every day.

To the larger question, I don't fear a convention of states. It avoids Congress altogether, which I think is a good thing.

I also think a convention of states was a good thing to have put in the Constitution. But I just hope it doesn't get out of hand and--as did the convention which wrote it in the first place--exceed its mandate and scrap the constitution in favor of a new one.

Like I said, I argued with one other Redscaper that the idea of cutting campaign donations in half by doubling the terms of office of the House, was silly and mere conjecture. Half of 20 million dollars is still 10 million dollars and none of it came from me, or people like me. I used as a metaphor in that post the principle behind the Strategic Arms Limitation Treaties: if you have enough nuclear bombs to blow up the world 10 times over, and both superpowers sign a treaty cutting their nuclear arsenals in half, the world isn't really any safer since now you can still blow it up 5 times over. (In fact, it is more dangerous today, isn't it?)

So what can we do if we find it impossible to stop lobbying from penetrating Congress and keep special interests and wealthy personal (and corporate) donors from supplying candidates with millions of dollars (or hundreds of millions of dollars in a certain somebody's case, cough-Hillary-cough)? Simple: we create a legislature less easy for the special interests to penetrate.

How would we do that? In order to minimize infiltration by special interests, so that it would be impossible to corrupt all but a small percentage of them at a time, it would have to be very, very LARGE. Perhaps not quite as large as the Senate in the Star Wars prequels, but you get the idea. If that Senate was corrupt, it was for different reasons, and one must take into account that: 1) PACs like Big Oil or the Tobacco Lobby in the modern United States do not typically have their own droid armies capable of invading and capturing whole states; and 2) in the movies, the idiots voted emergency executive powers to the Dark Lord of the Sith [oops].

It sounds like a wild idea, but do indulge me here, comrades: I am merely floating this as a possible idea so do not take me too literally, OK?

Such a large legislative or governmental body is not unprecedented, believe it or not. One of Gorbachev's reforms in the endgame of the USSR was to create a Congress of People's Deputies consisting of 2,250 members, to weaken the Communist Party's control of the political process. I'm not sure what policy decisions the Congress was allowed to have over the Soviet government, but it was to meet twice a year in order to elect a smaller "permanent legislature" called the Supreme Soviet which was bicameral. Its total membership (both chambers) was about the same size as the present U.S. Congress (542 for the Supreme Soviet, 535 for the U.S. Congress). Certain decisions of the Supreme Soviet were not binding unless ratified by the full Congress of People's Deputies.

Should the United States have a sort of "intermediary" kind of legislature, with certain duties different than its day-to-day legislature? Could this lessen the influence over electoral process by special interests and lobbyists and money? Or should the House of Representatives itself be doubled, or even tripled, to achieve the same goal?

Part of the handicap of the political process in America (I said "part" OK?) is our present population, just over 320 million (U.S. Census Bureau, http://www.census.gov). In 1910, Congress fixed the membership of the House of Representatives at about its current number (it was subsequently raised after the admission in 1912 of AZ and NM to its present 435 voting members). The following book I read (quite a while ago) gave a ballpark figure of 90,000 constituents to every congressman at the time.

http://www.amazon.com/More-Perfect-Constitution-Revised-Generation/dp/0802716830/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1430605039&sr=8-1&keywords=a+more+perfect+constitution

Not a great book, but interesting ideas, certainly. I don't agree with most of them, however. Anywho: I have no clue what the present exact electoral quotient is, but if you divide 308,745,538 by 435, you get 709,760 citizens per congressman; or about eight times as many constituents as in 1910, according to the Sabato book. (That's the "official" 2010 census population courtesy of: http://www.census.gov/2010census/.)

With the population of the United Kingdom presently estimated to be 63,742,977 (https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/resources/the-world-factbook/geos/uk.html), each of the 650 members of the House of Commons has approximately 98,066 constituents. I know it does not work exactly like that, but until I can find the exact website online where I'd find the electoral quotient, that will have to do for a ballpark estimate.

To give a member of the U.S. House of Representatives the same constituent base (ballpark consideration again) as a member of the House of Commons (U.K.) there would have to be 3,148 of them!!!!

Besides the need to reconstruct the entire Capitol Building (and Americans, being a conservative lot, would never, ever stand to see it torn down, rebuilt, or superseded by a new building, as did the Australians) to accommodate a Congress composed of 3,148 representatives and 100 senators, it would strain the limits of parliamentary procedure to allow that many people to speak and introduce legislation.

So here's a thought: this intermediary body could elect members of its various committees to be members of the "floor" who can speak and vote on the legislation that comes out of their committee. But how you would do that in a fair way, and in a way respecting the principles of "one person/one vote" typical of "the People's House" is anybody's guess.

But it's just a thought...and keep in mind, once the population of the USA reaches, say, 400 million, it'll be even harder for a congress[wo]man (or senators in some states) to "know" his/her constituents. And that's at least ONE of the reasons why they listen to money and lobbyists more readily than they listen to their constituents: there's too many constituents. A larger body, even if it was a sort of "intermediary" body like the Congress of People's Deputies was for the USSR, would be harder to infiltrate, and easier for each of its members to "know" more of their constituents...at least a little easier than a congressman who has to take care of >700,000 of them, or a pair of senators whose flock totals at least 38 million (referring to CA's Boxer & Feinstein).

JimHackerMP wrote:Why are you curious to hear what other Americans think of my ideas, Danivon? Just out of curiosity. You've never been squeamish about putting your own opinions forth before.

Well, not always. There's a whole bunch of my opinions I keep to myself for all kinds of reasons

I was actually curious to see what other Americans on here think of the whole thing, as well as your ideas.

At any rate, I think, as Hillary Clinton rightly (also hypocritically) suggested, that campaign donations are a problem. So, rather than use up this thread with allegations and patronizing remarks via the employment of one-word political slang [cough], can we actually seriously discuss things like this?

We can, indeed.

In a previous thread we spoke of campaign finance reform and someone [not mentioning names] made the incredibly silly comment that, by doubling the term of office of a member of the House of Representatives, one would thereby automatically halve the amount of campaign donations received which said member requires to stay in office.

One easy way to test it would be to compare spending in states with a single Representative, between their elections, and the ones for the Senate. Does a senate candidate spend 3x as much in one cycle as the others?

Before we lower the IQ of the room [yet again] I have a question, for Danivon, or Sass, or anybody who cares to indulge me.

Is the exact amount of money raised by a politician necessarily the problem? If we indeed cut the amount of money raised by a congress[wo]man attempting to get re-elected in half, would that solve the problem? And how could this be translated into a constitutional amendment, which would be translated into actual progress, in turn?

Well, you could easily Constitutionally double House terms. But you are not convinced that would have the desired effect (and neither am I).

But how to phrase an amendment that would restrict spending or donations is exactly the problem. The Constitution does not mention amounts of dollars except in two places - a clause regarding the slave trade that expired in 1808, and the value of a suit ($20) above which in common law a jury trial is a right. The value of the dollar has changed significantly, and could well do again. I suppose you could tie a limit to GDP, or average earnings, or some such measure, but of course then the question is who measures it. Similarly using an index for inflation - which one?

An easier way to do it would be to explicitly revoke the equivalence between a 'person' and a body made up of people. But that would have wide ranging consequences beyond the application of donations and free speech. Another would be to deny that "spending" is the same as speech, or to caveat free speech during election campaigns. But I can't see any of those being easy to sell.

This is like the second goddam time I have tried to post something here and when I hit "submit" or "preview", Redscape asks me to log in. Not happy. So I'm sure you're all relieved to hear me say I am going to make this post as short as possible.

Instead of ooohing and aaahhhhing over the dollar-amount, we should concentrate on the exactitude of the crime. What are we really talking about here? The integrity--and democracy--of the very political office held is being debased, and the people's interests and voices thwarted in favor of a few people behind closed doors, when politicians accept bribes or large campaign donations from lobbyists, PACs or other special interests take their eyes off the ball (us) and make them responsible to people (or organizations) that are not their rightful constituents.

Some say that Spiro Agnew's crime was getting caught. I agree. He got caught for accepting $100,000 in bribes over a 12-year period (six years as Vice-President, two as Governor of Maryland and four as Baltimore County Executive). What douchebag cannot hide an [average] annual bribe of $8,333.33? Most small businessmen could write that off their taxes lacking a good reason to do so, with the IRS none the wiser. And that idiot got caught....right next to politicians the likes of Hillary Clinton (different time frame, but I doubt our political elite were any more honest in 1974 than today [!!!!])

But whether Spiro took 100 grand in bribes, or 100 million in campaign donations, the crime is still exactly the same. It's not unlike rape: I've heard it said that it is a crime not of sex, but of POWER. So is the campaign finance scam, as well as outright bribery (the line between the two is fairly weak in some places mind you). It's not a crime of money, it is a crime of power or, rather, taking power away from someone. (Us, the general public). We need to keep our eyes on the ball, here. I do not care whether Congressman Smith and Congresswoman Jones are given donations of 10 million or 10 cents. The crime is the same. Putting caps on it, whether you index it for inflation or other factors, or not, will only lower their minimum bribe level, to put it mildly. There needs to be a more practical approach to the problem rather than equating this particular sin with a minimum amount of money.

Glad you agree about not doubling the term of office for a member of the House. I think I had a ferocious argument with Sassenach and [gulp] Rickyp about that subject, and they didn't seem to get it that it will have no effect on campaign donations & fundraising, one whit. S. seemed surprised that I think a two-year election cycle is reasonable. I guess that's because you guys are used to five years, now. Good luck with that fixed-term parliament! You'll be begging for a congress soon enough!

One easy way to test it would be to compare spending in states with a single Representative, between their elections, and the ones for the Senate. Does a senate candidate spend 3x as much in one cycle as the others?

Good question. But there are other factors involved, and do not forget, that the congressmen from one-congressman-states (one hit wonders?) have low populations spread out over a large, geographical area (ex, Wyoming, N. Dakota, S. Dakota, Alaska, Montana...however Delaware & Vermont are small states, just boring ones).

But I reckon you will find a bunch of other factors in play that may be unrelated. Like which senators are elected during which years, how long they've been there, and do not forget that you cannot gerrymander a representative's district when it's the whole state, itself (though I suspect that is the reason you mentioned one-congressman-states: that factor cannot figure in the calculations comparing its senators to its single congressman).

Yeah I hope, if we do have a national convention, no idiot gets the idea to double the term of office. But there must be a way to make politicians less...grease-up..able...(for lack of the right intelligent word) and to put it in the correct legal language. I still think changing the structure of the legislative branch might be the way to go.

danivon wrote:Well, you could easily Constitutionally double House terms. But you are not convinced that would have the desired effect (and neither am I).

I would be against this only because the idea of the HoR is to more adequately represent the mood of the people. Extending their terms would defeat this.

But how to phrase an amendment that would restrict spending or donations is exactly the problem.

Here's a very rare moment when I agree with you. I am appalled at the lack of "democracy" in our republic. The lobbyists get what they want and "we" don't. For example, most Americans are in favor of school vouchers. It will never happen because of union lobbyists. Most Americans favor some kind of program for legalizing illegals under some restrictions, but only if the flow of illegals is stopped. However, lobbyists on the left and for corporations want the illegal flow of immigrants to continue, so . . . it doesn't really matter what "most" Americans want.

An easier way to do it would be to explicitly revoke the equivalence between a 'person' and a body made up of people. But that would have wide ranging consequences beyond the application of donations and free speech. Another would be to deny that "spending" is the same as speech, or to caveat free speech during election campaigns. But I can't see any of those being easy to sell.

I've been thinking about this a lot. I can't think of a balance. I can't figure out how to limit political spending without limiting free speech. Some on the Left are in favor of limitations, but they exclude unions. That's ridiculous and won't pass.

The singular thing Bernie Sanders will ever say that mattered to me: when he announced he was running for President he said something to the effect that he wanted to see if someone who did not have the support of billionaires could get elected.

That's a pretty good question.

Doctor Fate wrote:

danivon wrote:Well, you could easily Constitutionally double House terms. But you are not convinced that would have the desired effect (and neither am I).

I would be against this only because the idea of the HoR is to more adequately represent the mood of the people. Extending their terms would defeat this.

However, the FPTP system that you have (and we do too) does not accurately reflect the mood of the people. A more proportional system would be better, and perhaps allow different 'wings' of the two behemoth parties to compete for direct places in the House, rather than running off to be the one candidate in a 2-horse race. STV would allow for more variety, but one issue would be those states too small to currently generate more than a few representatives.

This might also reduce the need to spend quite so much. Possibly.

I just think 2 years is a very short cycle - it means that as soon as the election is over, House members are having to think about getting re-elected. Now that may make them responsive to electors, but it could instead mean they are more responsive to crucial donors and sections of the electorate rather than the whole.

The singular thing Bernie Sanders will ever say that mattered to me: when he announced he was running for President he said something to the effect that he wanted to see if someone who did not have the support of billionaires could get elected.

That's a pretty good question.

Yep. Who was the last President who wasn't supported by billionaires? (probably the last one when there weren't many billionaires...)

However, the FPTP system that you have (and we do too) does not accurately reflect the mood of the people. A more proportional system would be better, and perhaps allow different 'wings' of the two behemoth parties to compete for direct places in the House, rather than running off to be the one candidate in a 2-horse race. STV would allow for more variety, but one issue would be those states too small to currently generate more than a few representatives.

This might also reduce the need to spend quite so much. Possibly.

I just think 2 years is a very short cycle - it means that as soon as the election is over, House members are having to think about getting re-elected. Now that may make them responsive to electors, but it could instead mean they are more responsive to crucial donors and sections of the electorate rather than the whole.

As they say in your country: "Not bloody likely, mate." I am not sure how single transferable vote works (if that's what you mean by STV) but I disagree about the proportional representation. You'll essentially transfer power from one group of people who shouldn't rightfully have it to another, just the same. And instead of individuals raising too much money for their [and our] own good, it'll be a party machine doing the same. What's the difference between one smoke filled backroom and another, where sunshine cannot penetrate? That is the concern I have about a legislative assembly partly based on FPTP and partly on PR lists. Proportional representation and that sort of thing look more democratic for the reasons you stated...on paper. But in reality it hands power to party machines and so forth, and would still be penetrable by special interests. It might actually make it worse because then the power-corruption would be less visible. If it weren't so visible and so obvious we wouldn't be talking about it right now, would we? PR, etc., would just shove it right under the rug.

When it comes to voting, Americans don't do complicated. The electoral college is just complicated enough for us to swallow. Anything more, any such electoral innovations deviating too far from FPTP, are typically unacceptable in the United States. The paltry voter turnout would plummet.

And of course many people abroad may find our two year cycle curious and raise the exact same objection, but I prefer it to a five-year (or even four year) fixed parliament. I wish the Maryland Constitution would be amended to at least have one of the two chambers of the General Assembly elected for two year terms. Having a fixed term of four years for governor and other executives is fine. But not for everybody all at once. But as far as Congress, I agree with your agreement that a four year term would not change much and only defeat the intent of the two-year term in the first place.

JimHackerMP wrote:

However, the FPTP system that you have (and we do too) does not accurately reflect the mood of the people. A more proportional system would be better, and perhaps allow different 'wings' of the two behemoth parties to compete for direct places in the House, rather than running off to be the one candidate in a 2-horse race. STV would allow for more variety, but one issue would be those states too small to currently generate more than a few representatives.

This might also reduce the need to spend quite so much. Possibly.

I just think 2 years is a very short cycle - it means that as soon as the election is over, House members are having to think about getting re-elected. Now that may make them responsive to electors, but it could instead mean they are more responsive to crucial donors and sections of the electorate rather than the whole.

As they say in your country: "Not bloody likely, mate."

Well, that's more Aussie than Brit - only parts of England would use that idiom.

I am not sure how single transferable vote works (if that's what you mean by STV) but I disagree about the proportional representation.

Yes. How it works is that you have a set of seats up in one area. It's the system used in Ireland:

Say there are 3 (X) seats up for grabs, and 9 (N) candidates. Voters rank the candidates 1..N (or less if they want to ignore the ones they really hate). If any candidate gets over 25% of the vote 100/(X+1) + 1 vote, then they are elected, and the next choices of their voters are re-allocated. If that doesn't happen, then the least popular candidate is dropped and the next choices of their voters are reallocates. Each round of counting will do one or the other until you either have three on >25%, or four left (in which case the one with lowest votes is dropped).

Basically, Alternative Vote is the same but with only one election winner.

It seems complicated, but to the voter it's just a case of ranking candidates from favourite to least favourite. I'm not sure that is all that complicated.

You'll essentially transfer power from one group of people who shouldn't rightfully have it to another, just the same. And instead of individuals raising too much money for their [and our] own good, it'll be a party machine doing the same. What's the difference between one smoke filled backroom and another, where sunshine cannot penetrate?

Well, with STV, even if the party decides its lists (and nothing stops them running open primaries before they get to their list), voters decide which of them is more likely to win. So, if for example the Republicans put up a Libertarian leaning candidate, a RINO candidate and a Social Conservative, and they are only going to win 2 out of three seats, voters will be choosing, by their rankings, which one.

That is the concern I have about a legislative assembly partly based on FPTP and partly on PR lists. Proportional representation and that sort of thing look more democratic for the reasons you stated...on paper. But in reality it hands power to party machines and so forth, and would still be penetrable by special interests. It might actually make it worse because then the power-corruption would be less visible. If it weren't so visible and so obvious we wouldn't be talking about it right now, would we? PR, etc., would just shove it right under the rug.

I see the attraction with top-up lists, and also the danger of party control. However, sometimes it works out that parties (particularly the larger ones who are more centralised and also more likely to win the FPTP races) don't get any top-up seats, or very few. The smaller parties (who are less likely to win FPTP, but also less likely to be 'machines') tend to get the top-ups.

The other thing with PR is that it would give smaller parties a better chance to get some representation and increase the power of each vote - so that would hit the power of the large centralised parties. If they are too controlling, people can punish them by voting for an alternative (and if politicians are rejected by the machines, they can see about forming such alternatives.

When it comes to voting, Americans don't do complicated. The electoral college is just complicated enough for us to swallow. Anything more, any such electoral innovations deviating too far from FPTP, are typically unacceptable in the United States. The paltry voter turnout would plummet.

I think you misunderestimate your fellow countrymen and women.

And of course many people abroad may find our two year cycle curious and raise the exact same objection, but I prefer it to a five-year (or even four year) fixed parliament. I wish the Maryland Constitution would be amended to at least have one of the two chambers of the General Assembly elected for two year terms. Having a fixed term of four years for governor and other executives is fine. But not for everybody all at once. But as far as Congress, I agree with your agreement that a four year term would not change much and only defeat the intent of the two-year term in the first place.

No, that's not my whole statement - I was saying that a combining it with a more proportional system would offset the time period issue by increasing the actual popular representation.

Also, if it alternated with the Presidential elections, then it would also provide a focus for those elections, and avoid the issue where a President can 'pull' the election through their popularity in November. Of course, that would also mean it would be more likely that the opponents of the President would use it to try and block the President, but that happens now, doesn't it?

Explain that statement a bit more. And I'm not sure I totally understand your example of the STV in Ireland. They can vote for three candidates per district: out of how many will be on the ballot? And they get to number those preferences one through three. In Maryland, 38 out of the 47 legislative districts (for the state Senate) elect not only one state senator, but three delegates to the House of Delegates; wherein the ballot says "choose no more than three" and the top three win. Is that sort of the same thing?

I do not underestimate my fellow Americans. It's just the truth, "complicated" or "innovation" in voting systems just isn't our thing. I guarantee you no constitutional amendment would ever be approved that changes congressional elections from FPTP to STV or PR, or even some combination thereof. To me that sounded complicated and I'm reasonably intelligent myself. Should the national convention propose any such change to our electoral system, I will eat my hat. And if 38 states ratify such a proposal, pass the salt, because I'll swallow my own shirt as well.

The problem is that, if we did what Ireland does, we'd need to have larger (more populous) districts for the House (and I think you admitted the single-member states would present a difficulty, right?) since each district would have to contain three representatives. Unless of course you plan to triple the size of the House? And since Article II says that each state shall appoint a number of electors to the Electoral College equal to the number of senators plus representatives to which it is entitled to elect to congress, that would bring extra complications (if you tripled the size of the House).

In fact, I must admit that my own "intermediate" sort of assembly would present great difficulty in getting ratified (or even proposed by a majority of the members of the national convention in the first place!)

Also:

No, that's not my whole statement - I was saying that a combining it with a more proportional system would offset the time period issue by increasing the actual popular representation.

I cannot see how.

JimHackerMP wrote:Explain that statement a bit more. And I'm not sure I totally understand your example of the STV in Ireland. They can vote for three candidates per district: out of how many will be on the ballot?

Well, I looked up a seat. It had 4 deputies elected (I think 3 is the minimum size and some go up to 5). The main parties put two candidates up. Some just 1. There were 4 independents. A total of 14 candidates.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D%C3%BAn_L ... l_election

Why only two candidates? Not too sure - it may be to avoid diluting the vote. In earlier elections in Dun Laoghaire the area had 5 deputies, and some parties (but only really Fine Gael and Fianna Fail) put three candidates up.

And they get to number those preferences one through three.

No, they get to number 1 to 14 in the case above.

In Maryland, 38 out of the 47 legislative districts (for the state Senate) elect not only one state senator, but three delegates to the House of Delegates; wherein the ballot says "choose no more than three" and the top three win. Is that sort of the same thing?

No, what that is is a multi-seat FPTP election. You get three votes, and the top 3 candidates win. We have those in some council areas which elect every 4 years, or after boundary changes in local elections. Of course, three candidates from the most popular party are likely to win all three seats, unless there is a close election or popular/unpopular candidates.

I do not underestimate my fellow Americans. It's just the truth, "complicated" or "innovation" in voting systems just isn't our thing. I guarantee you no constitutional amendment would ever be approved that changes congressional elections from FPTP to STV or PR, or even some combination thereof. To me that sounded complicated and I'm reasonably intelligent myself. Should the national convention propose any such change to our electoral system, I will eat my hat. And if 38 states ratify such a proposal, pass the salt, because I'll swallow my own shirt as well.

Well, that's not the public, but the political class, really. And they love to underestimate the people. Often they bank on it.

The problem is that, if we did what Ireland does, we'd need to have larger (more populous) districts for the House (and I think you admitted the single-member states would present a difficulty, right?) since each district would have to contain three representatives. Unless of course you plan to triple the size of the House? And since Article II says that each state shall appoint a number of electors to the Electoral College equal to the number of senators plus representatives to which it is entitled to elect to congress, that would bring extra complications (if you tripled the size of the House).

it would be an issue. There are ways to deal with it, such as only apply it in States which are large enough.

So the 7 states with one House member keep theirs as is. (you could move them to AV, which is STV for one seat, where basically at each stage you eliminate the lowest placed remaining candidate and reallocate their voters to the next preference until the one at the top has 50%+1 of the votes)

Then the 5 States with two house members could either keep their single seats or have STV over 2 seats in one at-large district (which does kind of still work as exceptions).

The 12 States with 3-5 Hose members could have one at-large STV district

And the remaining 26 States would have fewer districts with 3-5 members.

Trebling the size of the House would not be a good idea. not sure how much larger it would have to be to give the smallest state 2 representatives. Larger districts would also be harder to gerrymander.

In fact, I must admit that my own "intermediate" sort of assembly would present great difficulty in getting ratified (or even proposed by a majority of the members of the national convention in the first place!)

I expect you would need a constitutional crisis to trigger any real move for change.

As it happens, we might get one soon in the UK.

No, they get to number 1 to 14 in the case above.

FOURTEEN? You mean, you have to sit there and rank a list of candidates between one and fourteen, based on how much you like a person that you make him/her No. 1, and you hate so-and-so's guts so bad, that you number him/her no. 14? And, worse, you have to decide between 2 and 13, in varying degrees of which candidates you prefer slightly more than the last one? (If you get what I am asking...)

Does the average Irishman, I wonder, have a perfect understanding of exactly how this works statistically? Do they really get it any better than I seem to be getting it? (Which as it turns out I would have to describe as "barely" understanding it.)

Human beings tend not to do things about a problem until they stand at the edge of a precipice, about to fall headlong into the chasm of disaster. Then they do something about a problem. Constitutionally I cannot see us actually doing anything concrete about campaign finance and what is essentially the buying and selling of an otherwise democratically-elected Congress, until the government possesses not even a shred of the ability to respond to public opinion or protect individual liberty. Then we'll rise up and do something---if it's still possible at that point. I just thought of this, otherwise I would have said it more than several posts ago.

JimHackerMP wrote:

No, they get to number 1 to 14 in the case above.

FOURTEEN? You mean, you have to sit there and rank a list of candidates between one and fourteen, based on how much you like a person that you make him/her No. 1, and you hate so-and-so's guts so bad, that you number him/her no. 14? And, worse, you have to decide between 2 and 13, in varying degrees of which candidates you prefer slightly more than the last one? (If you get what I am asking...)

No, you don't have to. You can just put "1" against your only preferred candidate.

Does the average Irishman, I wonder, have a perfect understanding of exactly how this works statistically? Do they really get it any better than I seem to be getting it? (Which as it turns out I would have to describe as "barely" understanding it.)

Well, they seem to manage to vote in large numbers without much clamour for change.

Human beings tend not to do things about a problem until they stand at the edge of a precipice, about to fall headlong into the chasm of disaster. Then they do something about a problem. Constitutionally I cannot see us actually doing anything concrete about campaign finance and what is essentially the buying and selling of an otherwise democratically-elected Congress, until the government possesses not even a shred of the ability to respond to public opinion or protect individual liberty. Then we'll rise up and do something---if it's still possible at that point. I just thought of this, otherwise I would have said it more than several posts ago.

Some might say you already passed that point (a bought Congress) but haven't noticed yet.