Comments by "k98killer" (@k98killer) on "US Elections Ukraine Russia" video.

America is not a democracy. The United States are a republic of federated States, each of which is a sovereign entity. The legitimacy of the federal government primarily and historically exists as a product of the voluntary association between the States. I hope that the convention of states project will soon hit the threshold to pass new constitutional amendments constraining the size of the federal government, because currently its parasitism knows no boundaries. I propose the following: 1) Except in times of war to defend against invasion, the federal deficit for a year will be no greater than 10% of the previous year's tax revenues. 2) The federal government will not employ more than 10% of the number of adults as determined by the most recent census. 3) The maximum federal taxation rate on anything other than a tariff will be 10%. Every non-tariff tax rate in excess of 10% at the time of ratification of this amendment will reduce every year for twelve years until it reaches the 10% threshold. Taxation rates for anything other than a tarrif cannot be changed by more than five percentage points per year. 4) Every federal law will expire and be automatically repealed after 24 years. All federal laws passed before the ratification of this amendment will expire and be automatically repealed after 12 years. These ought to be enough to fix the financial fustercluck, and the fourth one will prevent ossification. Edited for typos
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Mark, I recommend the Dune series. I know the hero's journey resonates strongly with most people, but it is an incomplete model; Dune contains a better commentary on human society.
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The USA are not a democracy. We are a federal republic. That being said, the electoral system is completely screwed up. First-past-the-post/plurality/choose-one voting is the worst. Score voting would be much better, and we could use it without amending the US constitution: each state votes on the candidates using score voting; the vote tally is used to produce an ordered list of candidates; electors then vote in the electoral college according to the ordered list. The electoral college itself should then be changed to use either a preferential voting system or score voting, but that does not have to occur before the states begin adopting score voting.
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@jmanakajosh9354 it's okay to have unlimited deficits and debt...if you're Zimbabwe. If you want your sovereign debt to be the world reserve asset, you can't issue an unlimited amount in exponentially increasing rates. The interest expense is currently higher than the military budget; if we can't credibly threaten to bomb anyone who wants to sell oil for gold like we did in Libya, how can we maintain this reserve asset status? And if the debt continues growing at this unsustainable rate, we will require outright debt monetization just to maintain the debt level, and so it will cease to be an attractive reserve asset. The federal debt to GDP ratio is well above 100% and is projected to climb like a rocketship. Who in their right mind would want to hold an asset like that?
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@vicmontes7314 I said score voting, not ranked voting. Ranked voting sucks.
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@vicmontes7314 I don't think it takes more than a room temperature IQ to understand the concept well enough to fill out ballots. If your opinion of the average voter is so low, then you should advocate for more entry barriers to prevent them from voting since they are so stupid.
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@vicmontes7314 if you want "a high voting population", give them weed brownies. Honestly, your comment is indecipherably nonsensical. Maybe spend a bit of time reading up on election systems rather than taking the most shallow glance and espousing an opinion based entirely upon ignorance.
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@vicmontes7314 wtf is the "SD spectrum"? "I don't need knowledge to voice an opinion. Self-education is elitism. Have a great day!"
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@eric_a_ Being factually correct in one's beliefs is not correlated with being good in one's actions or intent. Every religion makes truth claims that are incompatible with other religions, and they can't all be right, but there are good people in every religion who do what they think is good. If you don't want people to be allowed to say "this is a republic, not a democracy", you would first have to make America into a democracy and then get a slim majority to agree with you. The purpose of a republic is that the wants of the people are balanced against rights that cannot be overruled by a slim majority as in a democracy.
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@delos2279 the convention of states legislation has been passed by 19 states and is in the process of being passed by another 11. If those 11 complete the process, that will be 30. According to Article V, it takes 34 states to call the convention. I wouldn't call that "going nowhere". There is growing discontent with the corruption in DC, and the Constitution provides a way for the states to use their sovereignty to fix it because this is a republic, not a democracy.
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@Trumpulator I guarantee I've forgotten more about social choice theory and election science than you'll ever know. We're just disagreeing on the definition of a word. Some would not classify a country in which a large plurality of the population cannot vote as a "democracy". The fact remains that the historical structure of America is a "republican form of government", as explicitly defined in Article IV, section 4. The expansion of suffrage has been a movement towards democracy, but it is arguable whether or not we have actually achieved it, and I would argue that America is more structurally more of an oligarchy than a democracy.
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