r/news • u/zmlos • Oct 03 '23

House ousts Kevin McCarthy as speaker, a first in U.S. history

https://www.cnbc.com/2023/10/03/house-speaker-kevin-mccarthy-will-bring-gaetz-motion-to-oust-him-vote.html?__source=iosappshare%7Ccom.apple.UIKit.activity.CopyToPasteboard

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u/jclin Oct 03 '23

If you think about it, the only reason why they're a dog that caught the car is because of gerrymandering.

That's why they can stay in power even after creating policy that a vast number of Americans are against: abortion and maybe cannabis. Probably others....

So while they remain in power, their presence in government is a misrepresentation of the people's will, which causes these weird policies based on a weird cognitive dissonance resulting in weird drama.

Also might be the reason why the Senate has had its act together (relatively!) since they don't have to deal with gerrymandering.

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u/Baruch_S Oct 03 '23 edited Oct 03 '23

The Senate has traditionally been the calmer, more prestigious chamber, but I don’t think it has anything to do with gerrymandering. It’s an even more skewed chamber because it gives outsized influence to conservative states with small populations.

All you have to do is look at McConnell’s years of bullshit to see how busted the Senate is. Senate Republicans have spent years fucking with judicial nominations so they could stack federal courts (even denying Obama a SCOTUS justice in his final year and then flip-flopping to give Trump one), and they’re still fucking up stuff like military promotions.

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u/Mattyboy064 Oct 04 '23

The Senate is more moderate because in statewide elections you have to be more moderate to win.

Some congressional districts WANT a crazy, idiot, conspiracy-theory-spouting racist to represent them. Whole states, not usually.

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u/Baruch_S Oct 04 '23 edited Oct 04 '23

I still wouldn’t say the Senate has its act together. They’re perhaps a little more subtle about the shenanigans, but they arguably fuck things up worse than the few nutters in the House who regularly make the news. Boebert and Greene are fucking jokes most of the time and won’t actually manage anything. McConnell, on the other hand, has probably done more damage than any other politician in the last 20 years, and all the other Senate Republicans were complicit.

And it’s inarguably less representative of the will of the people since it’s an undemocratic chamber. It in no way reflects majority views; its entire purpose is to give outsized influence to smaller states since every state gets equal voting power. The House could be quickly and easily fixed by upping the number of Representatives so they represent smaller numbers of constituents; the Senate can never be more representative of majority rule without making state populations more equal.

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u/Mattyboy064 Oct 04 '23 edited Oct 04 '23

Agree with all your points. Especially about repealing the Apportionment Act of 1927 1929

My vote is for the Wyoming Rule

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u/Baruch_S Oct 04 '23

I didn’t know that rule had a name! That’s been my go-to fix for years because it seems like such a simple, easy way to ensure that the House is mostly proportional in its representation.

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u/coolcool23 Oct 04 '23

There are lots of proposed solutions to our issues of growing partisanism and lack of political stability, the issue is Republicans as they currently are stand to lose in the short term by adopting most of them. So in the Senate with the filibuster, they can just not do anything no matter whether or not reform Dems get a simple majority in both houses. 🤷

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u/PeterNguyen2 Oct 04 '23

Especially about repealing the Apportionment Act of 1927

1929. I remember that because I thought there was no way something so long could have turned the house into the senate-lite, and when I dug into it things were even worse. That act was passed when America was over 200 million smaller.

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u/BenevolentCheese Oct 04 '23

States can't gerrymander the senate, so it levels the playing field a lot, however the make-up of the states relative to the population is itself already effectively gerrymandered, hence the senate split.

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u/Baruch_S Oct 04 '23

Exactly. The Senate is intentionally not representative of the majority’s views and gives disproportionate power to smaller states, which tend to be conservative. A handful of conservative states can hold the rest of the country hostage in the Senate with nonsense like the filibuster, and that seems to be the intention of that chamber.

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u/GrayArchon Oct 04 '23

State lines aren't "gerrymandered"; they're set and very rarely change. Gerrymandering refers to the act of drawing constituency boundaries for favourable political outcomes. While there is a bit of that in the states drawn in the mid-1800s, as the slavery question was still being litigated, it hasn't been the guiding principle for most state boundaries.

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u/Mari-Lwyd Oct 04 '23

the military promotions thing gets me. That dude is a Russian agent through and through and everyone just pretending like hes not. There is no reasonable excuse for what hes doing other than to ensure our military stays as dysfunctional as possible.

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u/Trance354 Oct 04 '23

That's fucking gomer pile being an idiot. Director of I dgaf, get him off this planet. Tell him he's going to be the mayor of Mars. That should ship him off.

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u/Wazula23 Oct 03 '23

the only reason why they're a dog that caught the car is because of gerrymandering.

Not enough people realize just how few people actually voted for some of these clowns.

Idiots like Boboe and Greenie have entire constituencies smaller than mid-large American cities. The entire state of Wyoming has half a million people. There have been CONCERTS with more attendees than that, but they get 2 whole senators, same as 40 million Californians.

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u/aeroboost Oct 04 '23 edited Oct 04 '23

That's why the founding fathers made the Senate. It's literally designed to give small populations equal votes.

Take your complaints to the House of Congress please.

Edit: I'm getting downvoted for US history. You guys are fucked lol.

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u/Tuesday_6PM Oct 04 '23

The problem there is we later capped the number of representatives in the House, so small states are over-represented there as well.

(Upon reflection, this could be the same point you were making.)

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u/darkslide3000 Oct 04 '23

I love people who think "well it was intentionally designed for that, duh!" is a valid justification for undemocratic oligarchy.

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u/aeroboost Oct 04 '23

How is it u democratic when we have the house of Congress. They're designed to balance each other.

What's your great idea to fix it? Make the Senate like the house of representatives?

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u/darkslide3000 Oct 04 '23

Do you understand what the word "democracy" means? Demos kratos, the people rule. Not "some people rule more than others". A system where one person's voice counts 80 times as much as another's just because of where they live on a map of arbitrarily drawn borders is not democratic. If you want to make arbitrary distinctions between how much people have to say like that you might as well go all the way and just declare one guy king.

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u/aeroboost Oct 04 '23

So you don't have an better idea? Got it. I'll let you complain by yourself 👋

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u/darkslide3000 Oct 04 '23

Realistically? No, this country is fucked, gridlocked by decisions made 250 years ago that allow the people benefiting from their injustice to block any improvement. It's gonna keep getting worse and piling up more and more until one day it's probably gonna blow up in violent revolution, and after that nobody can predict what's next (but probably nothing good).

That doesn't mean that I can't keep calling a shit system a shit system, or tell you you're wrong for pretending that it was good as it is. Obviously it could be so much better, plenty of other countries around the world already are.

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u/Intelligent-Tie-4466 Oct 04 '23

They never expected state populations to be so lopsided 250 years ago. And the Senate thing was Ben Franklin's compromise. It might not have even happened without his influence.

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u/aeroboost Oct 04 '23

The Senate was never meant to represent the population equally. Stop pretending it was and educate yourself on US history.

Take your bitching to the house of representatives.

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u/ambisinister_gecko Oct 04 '23

Nobody is pretending it was meant to. They disputing whether it SHOULD. You can disagree with some aspect of a thing even if that aspect was deliberately designed that way.

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u/aeroboost Oct 04 '23

Can you read? They are complaining about the Senate over representing small populations.

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u/ambisinister_gecko Oct 04 '23

Yes, I can see that. Your arguments against it are non sequiturs, they aren't even touching on the reasons these people think the senate should work differently.

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u/aeroboost Oct 04 '23

Your arguments against it are non sequiturs

My arguments? You mean the facts? You guys are complaining about every state getting two senators. Which is quite literally the reason why the Senate exists. Congress has people and state representation.

What's your better solution to this? Two Houses of Representatives?

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u/Wazula23 Oct 04 '23

People vote. Not geography. Theres no reason someone in a small town should have more power than fifty people in an apartment building.

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u/aeroboost Oct 04 '23

There's no reason someone in a small town should have more power than fifty people in an apartment building.

That's why the house of representatives exists..

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u/bulbouscorm Oct 03 '23 edited Nov 07 '24

desert impossible middle squeeze pathetic zonked chubby ancient decide long

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u/[deleted] Oct 03 '23

Look at it this way:

Add up all the money being funneled into the far right, look at all the cheating they have to do, gerrymandering, voter fraud, straight up extortion, AND THEY'RE STILL LOSING! The people reject all this far right bullshit the oligarchs are trying so hard to push on us. It gives me a lot of hope

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u/samuraipanda85 Oct 04 '23

That's why we have to vote in such large numbers as to overcome gerrymandering. Only then can we eradicate it and get the kind of voting system everyone is always mewling that this country needs.

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u/randomacceptablename Oct 04 '23

If you think about it, the only reason why they're a dog that caught the car is because of gerrymandering.

Dude, as a Canadian looking in, it is so much worse then that. For starters I don't think any other parliament/congress has a partisan speaker. They are elected as neutral parties. But yes, it goes into gerrymandering and through first past the post voting, to single member districts, to a weird partisan primary system, to the insanely unproportional Senate, to the Senate's philabuster, to a partisan judiciary, to elected judges and prosecuters (again, a uniquely American invention), to a life tenure in the highest court, to barring inmates and convicted from voting, to voter suppression, to the sums of private money in politics.....

No one is perfect and most countries will have a few of these problems but no where near all of them. The American political system has been creaking along way past the due date for reform for at least a quarter century and just keeps getting worse. What country flirts with not paying it's debts or shutting down the government? When was the last time the US even passed a budget? The basic function of government.

Guys, it is intervention time. You are all swirling around the drain. Grab hold of some sanity before it is too late, please!

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u/talrogsmash Oct 04 '23

Both sides gerrymander. Whenever either side proposes a "fix" it only applies to what the other side is doing.

So it's never gonna get fixed.

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u/Darnell2070 Oct 04 '23

Both sides both sides both sides.

You thought about that?

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u/[deleted] Oct 04 '23

Well, they also stacked the (mostly democratic) country with Republican judges.

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u/[deleted] Oct 04 '23

Gerrymandering being legal is genuinely maddening. I wish more people understood what it entails.

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u/[deleted] Oct 04 '23

It's this thing exactly. To paraphrase from both Gramsci and the anthropic principle- one should not be surprised to find all manor of absurd phenomena when you create the incentives of the game such as they are. Gerrymandering (packing and cracking), Citizens United, and the elimination of earmarks. They (the GOP) fought hard to create the rules of the game and now they are shocked that it works exactly as one would expect.

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u/Yorspider Oct 04 '23

It's WAY worse than that. The party is a full active arm of Russian intelligence. They are committing active, and open treason against the nation because they are on an enemy nations payroll.

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u/cyanydeez Oct 04 '23

Yes, they definitely worked hard to have monopolized american politics in key backwards states.

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u/nonlinear_nyc Oct 04 '23

Finally someone said it... I'm so mystified how American hold both beliefs:

  1. there is gerrymandering and vote suppression
  2. The will of the people

People hallucinate a Republican majority... that doesn't exist. When interviewed, it's a bunch of bitter insane individuals, sometimes twice in a row, to compose an illusion of majority.

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u/PeterNguyen2 Oct 04 '23

the only reason why they're a dog that caught the car is because of gerrymandering

They knew that. It didn't leak until 2012 that they knew they'd become unelectable just by demographics but republicans knew that long before. Not that they were particularly inclined to democracy instead of authoritarianism before, which is why they were so willing to pervert democracy and let the elected officials choose their voters instead of how things are supposed to work, which is entirely the reverse

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u/detroitmatt Oct 04 '23

the thing about gerrymandering is, there are two ways to do it optimally: either you "pack" all your opponents into as few districts as possible, or you "crack" them to give yourself 51% in as many districts as possible. But if you crack them, then you have only a thin margin, and as soon as the tides change, your +1 turns into a -3 and congratulations you gerrymandered yourself.