Voting is a right that we have as members of a democracy; it is part of the fundamental belief that adults in a democracy should have some say in how his/her country is ruled. Thus, it is not something earned or conferred ; it is part of our contract with the state that we retain control, however small , over it. Setting up any sub- set of rulers, no matter how good that sub-set may be, is contrary to that fundamental belief. Well, one might argue what's the big deal about that ? Aristocracy somewhat ended after WW I, after so many British and French generals were careless with the lives of their soldiers. Would they have done so if they thought those soldiers were their equals? Why would we attempt to set up a superior caste within society , given that we know the dangers of marking anyone else not in the class as being inferior?
In any case, you could largely get to where you want to go by simply mandating universal military service, as some democracies already do.

I might add that "Consent of the governed" and "no taxation without representation" were two important principles animating the American Revolution.

John Stuart Mill's argument against one man, one vote:

"If it is asserted that all persons ought to be equal in every description of right recognized by society, I answer, not until all are equal in worth as human beings". He thought a laborer should get one vote, a foreman three, and a lawyer or physician five or six. Hmm, maybe that's not such a bad proposal

Anyway, let's not go backward in recognizing political equality, even if some do not use their vote wisely.

bbauska wrote:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Godwin%27s_law

"As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches 1"[2][3]—​ that is, if an online discussion (regardless of topic or scope) goes on long enough, sooner or later someone will compare someone or something to Hitler or Nazism.[/b]

If we were discussing knitting patterns, fine.

But we are discussing proposals to reduce democracy, and also whether military veterans make better leaders. We'd discussed Churchill (a democrat, a veteran and a great wartime leader - less great in peacetime, IMO). We'd discussed US Presidents both veterans and non- and good/bad. So mentioning Hitler? not inappropriate...

let's run that last part again with a different emphasis:

Although falling foul of Godwin's law tends to cause the individual making the comparison to lose his argument or credibility, Godwin's law itself can be abused as a distraction, diversion or even as censorship, fallaciously miscasting an opponent's argument as hyperbole when the comparisons made by the argument are actually appropriate.[9] Similar criticisms of the "law" (or "at least the distorted version which purports to prohibit all comparisons to German crimes") have been made by Glenn Greenwald.

Can Hitler be cited as having military experience as a sort of word association from Churchill be justified because there is a discussion about military experience of US presidents? That appears to be a stretch. I think Brad made the right call. Sorry Owen!

It was more than a 'word association', and I was assuming (perhaps falsely) that we could discuss a wider arena that just US Presidents - as the Original Post is about the story in which the Terran Federation (a global system) distinguishes between citizens (veterans) and civilians (everyone else), I didn't realise it was all that outré. Or in any way irrelevant.

I find it frustrating that sometimes people on Redscape just can't seem to get out of a US mindset.

I guess the Wiki wording needs to be adjusted to meet your definition.

No, I think the wording is fine:

Godwin's law itself can be abused as a distraction, diversion or even as censorship, fallaciously miscasting an opponent's argument as hyperbole when the comparisons made by the argument are actually appropriate.

bbauska wrote:I guess the Wiki wording needs to be adjusted to meet your definition.

Nope. The part I attempted to underline (and have now corrected) is the same part that Sass quoted, and is what I meant.

Perhaps you should have read what you were quoting before using it as some kind of proof...

To be clear, the fact that Godwin can sometimes be inappropriately invoked doesn't necessarily mean that it was in this case. I do tend to side with dan on this occasion though. What we were discussing was the contention from Hacker that military veterans are more likely to make better political leaders, and particularly his claim that vets are less likely to send young men to their deaths in needless wars, having experienced war themselves. In this context it's perfectly valid to point out that in actual fact Hitler was a military veteran himself, and was elected in no small part thanks to the support of other veterans. Mussolini was also a veteran of course. Hugo Chavez was a former army officer, as was Idi Amin. I don't think I really need to cite many more examples to illustrate the point.

Valid points, Sass but the Churchill reference was a distraction, I think. Perfectly valid to say that Hitler was one of the worst tyrants in history and was a military veteran and since Owen says that was his intent then that's fine.

That's how Ricky. But what does the money itself BUY?

You brought up Hitler/Nazism. That meets the criteria set forth in the first paragraph of the link on Godwin's Law.
Godwin's law (or Godwin's Rule of Nazi Analogies)[1][2] is an Internet adage asserting that "As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches 1"[2][3]—​ that is, if an online discussion (regardless of topic or scope) goes on long enough, sooner or later someone will compare someone or something to Hitler or Nazism.

This is indisputable. You did bring up Hitler/Nazism.

As to intent... Your word is fine with me as to what your intent was/is.

Forgive my absence over the last day or two. Otherwise, I would have been quicker on the trigger with this one.

Without getting into Godwin's law too much: Sassenach, I do not believe that *necessarily* they will make better leaders simply due to their military training. That's not what I said, in fact, I even said two years in the jungle via the Peace Corps would be (if I were in charge of writing the new constitution) a perfectly sanctioned option, besides just the Armed Forces/Coast Guard/etc. And, you're perfectly correct to bring up Hitler and Mussolini. Military veterans, elected by other military veterans, who cost the human race millions of lives (including those of their fellow military veterans, not to mention a shitload of innocent civilians). So I agree with freeman: perfectly valid point, indeed.

Except for one thing: Hitler, Mussolini did not usurp a republic of veterans (whatever you want to call Heinlein's ideal government of citizen-veterans ruling the Terran Federation). They usurped DEMOCRACIES. Furthermore, they were ABLE to usurp those democracies because of the inherent flaws in them. Now, I would agree with anyone who said, wait a minute, those flaws in the German Reich in 1933, and the Kingdom of Italy in 1920, were not universal among democracies. The same month Germans went to the polls and elected the NSDAP, Americans chose Franklin Roosevelt. Two years later, Baldwin became PM in the UK, and King, PM in Canada. So clearly there may have been (and certainly was) some aspect to German democracy in 1933 or Italian in 1920, that was not present in the UK, Canada or the US. But will it permanently remain that way?

See, Heinlein mentioned that a massive military defeat (which almost always does it if you look back through history) coupled with unrest at home triggered this uprising of veterans. And most of the civilians, craving order over chaos and the ineptitude of their current governments, sat still while the veterans wrote themselves into power via new constitutions. Notice I said, sat still. Kind of like how somewhere in the neighborhood of 100 million otherwise eligible Americans sat still in 2012 during a "normal" but controversial presidential election. (100 million is an estimation of 58.2% turnout and a total of 129,085,403 votes cast for presidential candidates. I had to sort of "eyeball" the math on that one.) I have to admit if there's only one principal flaw in our system, it's us, not our constitution, not our congressmen, not even our president---us...because somewhere around a hundred million of us sat on our asses, totally disinterested, and let someone else decide. That's how it starts.

In other words, the citizen-federation [whatever] Heinlein imagined only became possible during a "perfect storm" of political factors. And he did not hesitate to mention, at least in the book Starship Troopers, what those factors were. He blamed a lot of things that would eventually cause democracy to fail in his estimation. So far, not all of them have come to pass, but enough to make someone like me, a perfectly loyal (former) Republican actually support the general idea in this particular Heinlein novel. I'm not ready to help a bunch of veterans overthrow the government and replace it with one that they like...whether it's a junta or a veteran-republic. But I do sympathize with Heinlein's general idea about democracy and some of the problems in our society that may lead to its ultimate demise. I hope that clears things up because so far, some of you seem to think I'm going to lobby Congress to have the three-fifths compromise reinstated.

Sassenach mentioned a laundry-list of problems that have occurred in the United States military, on a previous page. I will have to look back to remember exactly what you said, but for now I will agree that these are unacceptable problems in our military. Admirals and generals alike have screwed up, not just politicians. But is it at least remotely possible that, if the U.S. Congress were currently occupied by politicians who hurdled a requirement to do military (or even peace corps, as I said ten times!!!) service before becoming voters and/or politicians, they may have responded better to such problems, maybe even FIXED them? The "fixes" to these problems by Congress/the CINC may be ineffective because they have originated from a group of politicians who have no ******* clue in the world how the military works, and, therefore, how such problems need to be dealt with. Also, Heinlein did not hesitate to level some criticism at the military itself, remember?

If there is any problem with Heinlein it's that he is---surprise surprise---an idealist. This form of veteran government is, for him, the ideal. He's no Thomas Jefferson---who, by the way, said that democracy would never work---but he had a point to get across. However, I do not at all believe he was advocating going backward in political equality. If we look at the American republic, at least before the voting rights act of 1965, it excluded people based on RACE, either literally or by gerrymandering them out (or using the rural-controlled upper houses of state legislatures to do the same, which they cannot do today). If we go back before the XIX Amendment (ratified 1920) it also excluded people based on SEX. If we go back a little earlier, it was excluding people based on their lack of ownership of a certain amount of land and/or annual income (and sex...and race....). So this form of government would have its flaws. But certainly no more flaws than Democracy does.

In Heinlein's imaginary future, men and women alike sign up to do federal service. As do different races, religions, and so forth. One of the recruiters is a Sikh. His high school teacher, and ex MI Lt.Col, is French. Juanito Rico (main character) is himself Hispanic (from Latin America). His family is loaded, but his friend's isn't at all. In the first chapter, when the company chaplain offers prayer, he mentions a slew of different religions participating, including Judaism and Islam. The captain or pilot of the spacecraft leading the raid in chapter one, is a woman. When the book was written, the majority of drivers (men) didn't trust most women to drive a car, let alone pilot spacecraft. Take note that NONE of the Mercury, Gemini, or Apollo, astronauts were women; not until Sally Ride...in 1983.

Writing in 1959 United States (remember I said our Voting Rights Act was passed in 1965) he was being quite liberal in recognizing political equality, freeman; not conservative (or reactionary). I would not be surprised if this book was banned in high school or public libraries across the South (& other places regrettably)...by white people. Many people at the time the book was written may not have been comfortable with a future in which citizenship can be earned regardless of race, sex, religion, or other factors. For this reason, I am glad Barack Obama at least tipped his hat to the people who truly enabled the events leading to his presidency by giving the surviving Tuskegee Airmen front row seats, especially considering that they (and others) enabled his presidency to happen.

I find it frustrating that sometimes people on Redscape just can't seem to get out of a US mindset.

Well if you remember correctly [though I'm sure this charge isn't leveled at me, I'd hope], I did mention military service done by previous British and Canadian prime ministers, not just US presidents. And I did mention "western democracies". If I otherwise mentioned the United States, it was not meant exclusively, nor chauvinistically, but because I live and vote here.

And my last post, was a response to:

Because there are no spending limits.
Because campaign financing is private, not public.

There are alternatives .

My next question would be: what exactly is this money being raised buying?

Influence
Or in some cases out right control of elected officials.

Koch Industries Inc. and Exxon Mobil Corp. (XOM) are among companies that would benefit from almost identical energy legislation introduced in state capitals from Oregon to New Mexico to New Hampshire -- and that’s by design.

The energy companies helped write the legislation at a meeting organized by a group they finance, the American Legislative Exchange Council, a Washington-based policy institute known as ALEC.

The corporations, both ALEC members, took a seat at the legislative drafting table beside elected officials and policy analysts by paying a fee between $3,000 and $10,000, according to documents obtained by Bloomberg News.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-07-2 ... -laws.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_L ... ge_Council

Influence
Or in some cases out right control of elected officials.

Influence of whom?

Are they not also trying to use their vast war chests to come out and advertise in favor of one candidate or another?

hacker

Influence of whom?

are you being purposefully obtuse.?

I obviously mean influence the legislators. The elected representatives.
And ALEC, which I linked, not only influences legislators, they actually provided written legislation which is submitted by the legislators they "influence" word for word as bills to become the law or regulation they want.