- Published on
Another election over, bipartisan pendulum swings again
- Authors
- Name
- Shaun Hutchins
The pendulum swings back and forth. I can’t think of many monumental things done by politicians over the course of my life. But there is one action having the potential to change everything. That could help humans live on Earth for many more generations, cutting greenhouse gas emissions and fully embracing sustainable development efforts.
The proposed 40% cap on greenhouse gas pollution from electricity generation is a pretty big deal. Sometimes I’m afraid science bashing politicians will screw it up though. A recent Duke University Study provided some important insights on how avoiding actions on scientific facts occurs if the solution impacts some of political ideologies.
“A new study from Duke University finds that people will evaluate scientific evidence based on whether they view its policy implications as politically desirable. If they don’t, then they tend to deny the problem even exists.”
TLDR: People deny scientific reality if they implications will result in more or less government intervention.
I dislike both major parties in the US. Democrats and Republicans. Republicans and Democrats. I hate the idea of the majority of a person’s political ideologies aligning with one party over another. It’s so polarizing and destructive to think of the world as only having good and bad, black and white, up and down. Imagine all the thoughts you feel on the issues of today, human rights, environmental, economic growth, sustainability, and so on, could be decided with confidence in one group. It just can’t.
The electoral college and dual political party system we have in this country is horrible. It makes it impossible to get anything reasonable done that will significantly move things forward.
I just wish I could go vote but with more parties. A system where people believe voting for an alternate party is not a wasted vote. The electoral college should either be scraped or reformed. With the electoral college it feels like no independent or 3rd party candidate will ever be president, except George Washington.
I can see its use for the primary ticket, the president. But for the Senate and House it should be mixed up a bit. I would rather a percentage of the seats commensurate with the votes for that political party be used to establish the composition of the Legislature.
People would vote from the respective parties, (multi-party-ship would be allowed) for candidates they would like to represent them in the Senate and House. This could be ranked within the party. Then based on the amount of popular votes they get those individuals would be chosen to represent their constituents. So if California has 40 Million people and each member of the house requires a million votes, if Dems get 15 Million votes Republicans 10 million Independent 10, and Green 5. The number of seats allocated to a party would be consumed based on the ranks of politicians established by the people during the primaries. In this case 15 Dems, 10 Repubs etc. The list would have 40 politicians on it, the maximum number of seats available. The politicians ranked the highest up to the limit of votes would become be chosen to represent constituents. This could be based on prior projections for the party too, so instead of having a list of 40 politicians per party is could be 20 if projections show 50% of votes are likely to go towards Dems. If it exceed projections you could have runoffs to select the next set of members. Sort of like a
Voting feels like such a chore for most people. It isn’t just the process of getting to the voting booth or reading up on the propositions, it’s how tiring and futile it feels to try to align all of an individual’s beliefs towards one party. The most important thing we could do for the climate, and to also fix the gridlock in Washington, would be to empower the representation of a varied constituency.
We change perceptions by allowing people to embrace a multiparty system. We give everyone a real voice that matches multiple parties and is more unique then a left and a right, a Democratic or Republican. People are worth more than that.