Notices by Truth Sandwich 🥪🇺🇸😷 (truthsandwich@mastodon.cloud)

@8124 @rameshgupta @ArenaCops @GreenFire
@marcelias

If that were the case, then Trump would be DOA, not frontrunner.

@8124 @rameshgupta @ArenaCops @GreenFire @marcelias

I used "DOA" to include all of the various ways that his candidacy *should* have been dead the moment he announced it.

For one thing, he should have been laughed off the podium by chants of "14th amendment stops traitors".

He should be in prison, many times over. Mobsters deserve to die behind bars, among their people.

@8124 @rameshgupta @ArenaCops @GreenFire @marcelias

What luxury? The courts are not stopping him on the basis of the 14th amendment. The only states that seem at all willing to do so are the ones he can't win.

@8124 @rameshgupta @ArenaCops @GreenFire @marcelias

That's true, but I don't really expect this to happen. Do you?

@8124 @rameshgupta @ArenaCops @GreenFire @marcelias

I would prefer that you were correct, but I don't bet on the basis of my preferences.

@GreenFire @8124 @rameshgupta @ArenaCops @marcelias

I wish I could agree, but the truth is that Trump has the best chance of winning because his supporters are not transferable to other fascists.

And once he does win, future elections become a non-issue.

@GreenFire @8124 @rameshgupta @ArenaCops @marcelias

To some extent, these numbers don't matter. The R's are going to cheat as much as they can, and if he still loses, they're going to throw another coup. Count on it.

@8124 @GreenFire @rameshgupta @ArenaCops @marcelias

Sure, but the executive branch does not begin and end at the White House. We know that various LEO/mil orgs are corrupted by fascists.

There will be violence. The question is how much and who wins.

@ArenaCops @GreenFire @marcelias

Yes, the real issue is that we're down to one party that's pro-democracy.

@rameshgupta @ArenaCops @GreenFire @marcelias

We have all of these factions, but they're not considered parties because the coalitions are formed in the primaries, not after the general.

@rameshgupta @ArenaCops @GreenFire @marcelias

Right, the electoral college is an outright flaw in our democratic system and it can be corrected without an amendment, but there are political reasons why this won't happen.

@8124 @rameshgupta @ArenaCops @GreenFire @marcelias

The alternative to an electoral college is for states to run elections but for every vote to count equally. You know, democracy.

The compact is a legally binding document, hence enforceable.

Moreover, once enough states join, the remainder no longer matter. In other words, if we get sufficiently above the 270 requirement then there's no motivation to try to violate it.

@8124 @rameshgupta @ArenaCops @GreenFire @marcelias

The counterpoint is that, because it's so old, all the other ones got to learn from our mistakes and could avoid repeating them.

The electoral college, in its initial form, was a huge mistake. The current version is still a mistake. The cap on the House is a mistake. The misrepresentation of the Senate was an intentional mistake, as was the infamous 3/5ths compromise. Lots of mistakes.

@8124 @rameshgupta @ArenaCops @GreenFire @marcelias

The problem with the Senate is that states aren't people. A state-centered assembly is necessarily undemocratic.

We have a similar but lesser problem with the House, because of the math used.

Removing the electoral college has nothing to do with whether states run elections, and there are plenty of other countries that seem to do just fine even with the federal government running all federal elections.

(1/)

@8124 @rameshgupta @ArenaCops @GreenFire @marcelias

The solution to Trumpism is to take a page from post-Nazi Germany, which has learned a lesson about the perils of too-pure democracy and gone for a defensive democracy, one that allows it to block popular but unconstitutional parties.

(2/2)

@GreenFire @ArenaCops @marcelias

The two-party system is not the problem.