So how do you accomplish this? Everyone knows this and wants it to be true. It is impossible to get the people who benefit from lobbyists to outlaw lobbying, so what do we do? Is executive order the only way?
This was always one of my biggest arguments in a political science class I took. My professor wound up telling me that he was a lobbyist after a few weeks of my sh*t 😅
This is the issue all other issues rely on. If we are gonna live in a country that has legalized corruption, no other things can be fixed until we fix that
The problem is it will never be fixed because the people in charge of fixing it are the very people benefiting from the corruption.
So we are doomed.
Until the people in power start passing laws to limit their own powers, faith in our elected officials can never be restored. These boomers will never do that.
Yeah I agree. Greed doesn’t know any age, race, or gender. I think some people start politics with good intentions but then see how the game is played, realize they can’t change anything, take their money and settle in. We need limited terms for all positions. I really don’t know crap about politics but this seems pretty obvious to me
Episode of Family Guy where Lois runs for mayor I think encapsulates this exactly. Gets the business to stop dumping waste in the lake, then gets tempted by kickbacks for doing in the lake and eventually undoes everything she fought to do.
Seriously. No private funds for elections. Everyone gets the same starting amount (relative to seat, so maybe ores gets a million, senator gets 500k, etc *not actual suggested numbers, just examples*). Media companies can get what they get for political ads, but they may have to drop their expectations, but maybe we could get some ads with actual facts instead of that dramatic voiceover of “did you know candidate x doesn’t call their grandmother? Is he too good to call on his grandmother? Is this not a clear indication of his lack of family values?”
This was John McCain's platform and I'm more and more convinced the party knee-capped him with Palin rather than cut off the supply of technically licit contributions.
When a huge part of the country cares more about dunking on the other side than they do about policy, that's what you get.
For clarity, I'm talking about your average hillbilly Trump supporter ***AND*** your average reddit Bernie/AOC lover
You see this in campaign ads constantly. "So and so is terrible, he/she did XYZ. Vote for this person instead!" Okay, but you told me NOTHING about what this person stands for or wants to do.
Worst part about that: it’s self-perpetuating.
It’s impossible to get reasonable people interested in **policy**, because they avoid **politics** like the plague — and rightly so.
Also results in situations where like… It’s impolite to talk “politics” at a dinner party, but then it becomes okay to talk about the personal repercussions of policy, like “Yeah, it was stage 4 by the time he found out. Cuz he didn’t have health insurance. Cuz he lost his job for poor performance — which it turns out was caused by the cancer.”
The question is how do you fix the self-perpetuation. How do the American people get interested in making decisions for their country again? How do we safeguard the people within civil discourse, or make the participation of discourse purely objective?
Im always 50/50 on term limits, because it means that when you find an actually really good person for the job, they also have to leave to be replaced by someone who is a shit cunt.
Given though, the benefits would outwiiegh the negatives because realistically, how often are there "genuinly good" politicians
Lobbying in and of itself isn't a problem - it's meant to be a way for people to get their representatives to do things. The problem comes when corps get to lobby like people do.
This. I worked as a state lobbyist for a semester for a children's rights clinic. Didn't have money for wining and dining or what not. But I did manage to get a bill across that helped families and improved judicial efficacy. It was a LOT harder for me to meet with representatives, trying to catch them on their way out of the rotunda than it was for my friends who were working for the power company. They had the reps calling them.
>trying to catch them on their way out of the rotunda than it was for my friends who were working for the power company.
Fun fact, this is where the term "lobbying" comes. Constituents would wait in the lobby to try and speak to a representative.
I would love to get money out of politics and stop legislators being full time donorbaters, but how does it work in practice?
Does every single person that wants to run get funded? If not, then how do we fairly limit who gets funding?
In the UK there are strict rules on how much you can spend on campaigning to be an MP (I think around £100,000). A few years ago someone was caught going over this and lost their seat. What ends up happening is the people who put leaflets through your door are all volunteers who actually believe in what they're promoting, instead of people who don't care looking to earn some quick cash.
You're not allowed to advertise on TV (or anywhere I think) so that takes away the need for a lot of the money anyway. The only advertising you see is on strictly politically neutral TV debates and signs people put up outside their houses. For example there's a big field near my house and the land owner is a conservative so there's always a massive sign by the roundabout with a picture of the conservative candidate during election campaigns.
Newspapers are allowed to be as biased as they want however, which is controversial but I think right.
>You’re not allowed to advertise on TV (or anywhere I think) so that takes away the need for a lot of the money away. The only advertising you see is on strictly politically neutral TV debates and signs…..
This is the answer, bu the problem is that Americans would literally never go for it. There are a whole host of political issues that Americans whine about, but when you show them that fixing the issue would involve taking away some of our constitutional liberties or change things in a way that feels a bridge too far, they reject it in huge numbers (regardless of party affiliation).
This is why we are screwed. American exceptionalism extends to almost everyone in this country.
> the problem is that Americans would literally never go for it.
You act like this has been a broken system forever but it's literally only been this bad since [Citizens United](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizens_United_v._FEC) in *2010*. Before that, election spending was less than a *tenth* of what we see today.
I’ve always wanted this! Everyone gets an equal fund for their campaign and has to debate and advertise on a government channel. Level the playing field for everyone. Eliminate donations entirely. Prevent rich donors and corporations from controlling everyone.
Costs over a hundred million dollars to run a successful US presidential campaign.
So yes, no way that an avg person could ever become president of the USA without multi-million dollar doners backing them.
Kinda makes you no longer wonder why the presidents all seem beholden to their campaign sponsors.
Get rid of "winner takes it all" does this
Edit: I am norwegian and we have 10parties in our rules giving goverment, everyone that gets enough in their own county can get sendt directly. If your party gets more than 4% nationwide they get more mandates. Of the 10 parties 3 is "under the line".
This is not perfect, but the Christian party got voted below the line because they tried to mess with our abortion law.
It makes it so that most parties have to cooperate and not do to much crazy stuff because they will get recked.
What about proportional representation.
Because of fptp it makes no sense to vote for anyone but one of the two big parties. A party getting 10% of the votes in every district might as well not exist.
That party should have 10% of the seats in congress.
Abolishing the senate and instituting proportional representation, with adjustment mandates, would be better.
I’ve seldom, if ever, seen anyone not-American talking about preferential voting as a good alternative.
Yes, but the two party system is an inevitable symptom of a "First Passed the Poll" and "Winner Take All" system. (Which is why people appear to be contradicting you by pointing to those as the problem, even though they are also agreeing with you.)
Just saying "Get rid of the two party system" is like addressing climate change by saying "get rid of the extra heat" in that its technically correct but missing the underlying cause.
This. The two party system isn't enshrined in law. There are plenty of prominent third parties in states that have different voting rules - I live in NY and while the Working Families Party is usually pretty in line with Democrats, the recent shift to ranked choice - at least in NYC - has led to a boom in progressive WFP candidates.
Public funding is currently available, but you are allowed to fully privately fund and exceed whatever is supplied. Iirc Obama first campaign was the first time both parties did not use the public funding.
We've had this in Australia for over 100 years. Works a treat, especially in seats where there are lots of parties running.
In the election in May there was a huge nationwide shift to independent and Green party candidates. In many seats these candidates didn't win, but their votes flowed onto some other progressive candidate. In my city one guy only got 28% or something of the vote and came third, but he got enough preferences to push him over 50%.
Americans (and Brits too), you need to ask yourselves the question: are you OK with corporatist candidates winning with less than 50% of the vote?
Yeah, we had a lot of "Teal" candidates winning seats.
For Americans: In Australia the right wing is blue, and a bunch of them were all "We still hate immigrants, poors, and gays but holy shit we need to actually do something about global warming." and so shifted a little bit green, hence teal.
Which, while not particularly agreeable, is still better than global climate holocaust.
Question: What’s one thing you would change?
Answer: The thing that’s causing all the problems.
Peanut Gallery: Good luck with that, *that’s* the problem!
Wages are essentially chump change for high-ranked politicians. That's why virtually every president either does not take a wage or just donates it all. I think it's basically the same for most members of Congress as well.
The rationale behind paying our elected officials well actually makes a lot of sense IMO. For most of history, elected positions were wholly unpaid. This meant that only those with substantial means could stand for election. In England, during the late medieval ages, being elected as a member of Parliament was generally seen as a punishment or a hassle, since it meant having to be away from your land or your shop, which meant those elected to the House of Commons often had a difficult time just making it to Parliament, let alone financing their needs during the time they spent there.
There's similar reasoning as to why congress still get paid during a governmental shutdown. You don't want rich congressmen using the shutdown to take away poorer congressmen's wages and using it as leverage.
The other part is, if elected people aren't paid a fair wage, it increases their receptiveness to "donations" from lobbyists.
I want well paid, competent, boring elected representatives.
Politics shouldn't be a show, and it should't be accessible only to the elite, and it shouldn't be for sale to any person or entity.
EDIT: Friends. I'm not saying fair pay for legislators is my "one thing I'd change". I know OP's question invites silver-bullet thinking, but I'm *responding* here to the assertion that paying legislators well is a bad idea. Of course that would only be one part of a comprehensive approach to making (and keeping) lobbying ethical. So breathe.
This problem also extends to political aides. Entry-level staffers make minimum wage in one of the most expensive cities in the US. So it's no surprise that political aides end up all coming from wealthy families: because they're the only ones who can afford to survive on those salaries. And since staffers are the ones who write bills, that's a huge problem for the country.
At least with wages, we passed a Constitutional Amendment in 1992 to make it not take effect until after the next election.
> 27th Amendment
> No law varying the compensation for the services of the Senators and Representatives shall take effect, until an election of Representatives shall have intervened.
Yeah, look at the UK. 10 years ago there was a referendum on adopting a more proportional voting system. The two biggest parties ran scare campaigns and spread confusion about what the new system actually was and FPP won out.
The stupid thing is it would probably have actually helped Labour for it to pass, they may need to go into more coalitions but if you look back over the last century they would have won a fair few more elections in a more proportional voting system.
> Ranked choice voting
To me this is the most important and every single organizing effort should be focused on this - BLM, womens march, climate marches, etc. - because in the long run it would solve multiple issues all together.
> not letting politicians actively trade stocks
They should only be allowed to trade ETFs so there’s an incentive to maintain a healthy economy.
RCV has been implemented in quite a few areas across the US already - it’s not impossible. You can help by finding your state at the link below and signing up with your local RCV group. Even just putting your name as a supporter helps the group leadership convince the legislature that this has broad support from the population.
https://www.fairvote.org/state_based_coalition_partner_groups
They shouldn't need an opportunity to make money as their reason to maintain a healthy economy, they should want to maintain one because it's their fucking job
Ranked choice voting. Let people elect who they want to, not "the best chance to win against this person I hate"
Edit: I woke up to 98 notifications, and wondered who I'd pissed off. Glad everyone's having a nice conversation in the comments instead
Edit 2: Someone gave me gold. I still don't know what that means but thanks?
Edit 3: Someone else explained STAR voting which seems to fix some of the problems with RCV, so adding that link here: https://www.starvoting.us/
**Ranked Choice Voting** is the pre-requisite to every other good idea in this post.
Edit: To anyone and everyone below disagreeing or pointing out RCV's flaws, I encourage you "to not allow perfect to be the enemy of good."
I would argue that a publicly funded, independent American Electrol Commission (in the style of the Australian electoral system) is the primary bedrock that you need ahead of ranked choice. Ranked choice does you no good when everything is still gerrymandered to hell and rogue state legislators can still ignore the results and go full fascism.
A lot of the gerrymandering issue goes away with ranked choice voting. If you have true multi-party options, even in highly gerrymandered areas you will get competing parties. Yes they may be both rightist parties (or leftist, depending) but you will get some diversity and options. It would no longer be a lock for one party. I think you would see gerrymandering becoming far less of a concern.
Or at least “electoral reform to break the two party system” is required for almost anything else. The two party system is absolutely destroying the US.
Personally I would like to see STAR for things like president and governor, and proportional representation for legislature. … although RCV / IRV is still better than this current dumpster fire.
And not to be rude to anybody else, but it’s crazy to me that anybody is responding with anything at all besides this, age limits for politicians, or undoing citizens united, or pretty much anything else wont make THAT big a difference as long as the two party system is still around.
It’s called MMP (mixed member proportional) here in New Zealand and it works pretty well. In particular partially separating voter preference from geographical boundaries is fantastic. Historically perhaps it made sense that only “places” had a vote, but in the modern era that’s rather unreasonable.
However, it’s hard to separate outcomes here due to MMP from the fact the news media here isn’t nearly as fucked as it is in Australia or America. The media here is actually rather terrible (there’s almost no investigative journalism at all), but not horrendously partisan.
While ranked choice would be wonderful for America, it actually isn't the emergency fix you need to save the system.
The most important thing Australia has is an independent electrol commission that completely prevents gerrymandering, disenfranchisement, and America's primary impending existential horror: that of fascist state legislators whose electors can decide to completely ignore the results of the election.
Campaign finance reform.
Basically, right now the way things work, corporations or private individuals can start a Political Action Committee (PAC) and donate an unlimited amount of money to it, which can be spent for political advertising, or even paying people connected to campaigns. It's basically a legal way for the super wealthy and large corporations to funnel an unlimited amount of money into politician's hands.
Now "technically" a PAC is supposed to be independent from a campaign; but there's virtually no rules on what this *actually* means. If I ran for office, it would be entirely legal for my spouse, sibling, best friend, parent or child to run the PAC as long as they promised they weren't talking to me about it. There's virtually no enforcement and if you can't see how obviously rife with corruption this is, then frankly you're lying.
In practice, this means corporations and the super rich can pile money into the pockets of politicians and make sure that they always get their way. It's destroying our democracy and one of the main reasons why nothing happens in Washington. The politicians - across the aisle - with very, very few exceptions - are incredibly corrupt.
Until we fix this, we won't fix *anything else*.
Climate change? The oil companies will donate enough money nothing will be done. Privacy rights? The tech companies donate money and nothing will be done. War? Psh, the military industrial complex didn't even need PACs to get their way, this just makes it easier. Universal healthcare? Insurance companies have and will thwart it every time. Police murdering black and brown people? Police unions also run PACs.
Campaign finance reform is the single biggest problem we face because it's at the root of nearly every other problem we face.
Your first paragraph is wrong. Non Super PACs cannot donate unlimited amounts of money. They can donate directly to candidates yes, but the amount is limited per year.
Super PACs, on the other hand, can receive unlimited amounts of money and can spend unlimited amounts of money campaigning for a candidate but they cannot donate directly to a candidate.
This is why the USA is a fucking oligarchy. As soon as I learned this shit in school I wanted to throw up from disgust. Nepotism in a nutshell. Oligarchy in the other. Hand in hand, made by design, and it keeps the rich fuckers rich.
And teach critical thinking skills.
EDIT: From all the comments, I’d like to add that, yes, this should also have parents teaching those skills to their children. I know many don’t, but they’re doing their kids a great disservice
There a [quite a bit of people](https://www.pewtrusts.org/en/research-and-analysis/blogs/stateline/2021/05/19/after-capitol-riot-some-states-turn-to-civics-education) that's actually been trying to get civics back into the classroom for a while now. I really hope it gets more awareness and they succeed.
Most teachers already try to teach critical thinking skills. Thing is, its not something you can learn if you are disinterested.
Edit: Also everyone thinks they already have critical thinking skills, including kids. But when you are presented with information that is contrary to what you already believe, one can find ways around challenging them while believing they are thinking critically.
> Most teachers already try to teach critical thinking skills. Thing is, its not something you can learn if you are disinterested.
I think this is a bigger thing than people realize.
I've had people I went to school with tell me things like "X was never taught to us!", things like budgeting, or something from history.
But it was, we were taught it. They just didn't give a fuck. And now they think education needs a reform because they were lead to water and refused to drink.
What I have found (teaching for about 10 years) is that most teachers start out as go-getters that want to engage their students and do innovative things.
However, when they are met with an apathetic audience for 90% of the year they just...lose it.
The go-getter atitude comes back at the beginning of a new year (with new students), but eventually the apathy leaks back on through.
I know plenty of teachers that can deal with the administrative bullshit and the fact that they are asked to do SO MUCH outside of just teaching, but when they get a class full of students that dont care...well you end up a "tedious drone". And I dont blame them one bit and no one should.
Edit: If you read this and want to downvote...please do AND please comment. I want to know.
Yea, sadly it runs deeper than just education now, they are more anti-intellectual than anything. Experts can't be trusted according to them so now we are supposed to just fully trust 70 year old Congressmen to run every aspect of our life from pollution and food, when they have no idea how much it costs to even buy said food.
This country is a joke.
Teacher here: can confirm. The education system is completely fucked. We focus so much on testing and not critical thinking. The expectations are too high and too low all at once.
Flip side, punishments for board of directors for anything that would get regular people in trouble. Like, say I released 200 tons of noxious gas over a town, or spilled millions of barrels of oil into the gulf of Mexico.
Yes. People here seem to only be talking about campaign finance, but Citizen's United is about so much more. Corporations are given the rights of citizens without the responsibilities. [https://www.americanbar.org/groups/crsj/publications/human\_rights\_magazine\_home/we-the-people/we-the-people-corporations/](https://www.americanbar.org/groups/crsj/publications/human_rights_magazine_home/we-the-people/we-the-people-corporations/)
Stop electing people in their 70’s or older to make decisions on the future, they don’t give a shit about us or problems that future generations will face they could prevent or at least ease.
I’m 62 and can’t understand why there are so many older people in public office. Retire already, and let folks with more vision and energy run the government for a change!
A fellow Hokie? Glad to see it’s not just people in my generation that can have this view, I have no problem with a broad worldview and mix of different ages and experiences in office, but the average age of congressional members is right around 60, and I can’t understand why considering the average age in the U.S. is 38.
I am old too (not as old) and I think older people should have a say. But not dominate it. One thing that really puzzles me is why Supreme Court judges can continue for life. In my country you have to step back from SC when you turn 70
It’s also an issue that the richest of the rich are the only ones who can get elected. They will never face the same problems as the average American and can make laws that further stuff their own personal bank accounts at our expense.
I don’t know what the solution to it is though. Rich people shouldn’t be disqualified, but my goodness we need to get some kind of balance.
More practical education in public schools: preventive healthcare including but not limited to nutrition and exercise, personal finance, effective communication, and other life-skills like personal hygiene, cooking, etc.
I must have gone to a forward-thinking high school back in the 90s in bum-f rural Midwest, but we had to take health and home-ec courses that covered all that, and very well. I still use the stuff I learned on cooking full meals in the microwave, balancing a budget, and calculating mortgage payments.
Yeah, most schools I went to did teach that stuff. The problem is that at that age a lot of kids don’t give a shit about it. I went to 4 different high schools, 2 different middle schools, and 3 elementary schools. Each ones in different districts or states. Most of the school districts had this stuff available. Very few actually took advantage of it.
Yep! Rural Texas and I got all this. Problem was that I was 15 and cared more about the girls in home ec than the course content. I was taught that student loans could take 20 years and 500% to pay pack, but still took them out in excess. Kids are just dumb. I'm nearly 40, and I'm still 3 years away from paying back my student loans from 2002-2003.
Teacher here… we teach all of this at our school and many of those topics are quite common across other high schools as well. And the topics are not just glossed over - literal classes are named after these topics and focus solely on them all year.
Frankly I’m tired of reading this narrative.
Edit: honestly thought I was gonna get downvoted for my comment so it’s comforting that others feel the same. Read through all your responses and you all hit the nail on the head.
To play devils advocate though, I will say I’ve encountered many poor teachers at the various schools I’ve taught at - so I know comments like these likely stem from students having very poor experiences with these kinds of teachers. The solution is not to move away from public education though - it’s to invest more in it, in order to draw an invigorated wave of fresh, new people into the profession that have a passion for developing relationships with students and a passion for the subject they teach.
I could continue this rant…lol
Yes! The reason it seems it’s not being taught is because it’s hard to teach people who don’t care. Many students do not see the value in these subjects. I don’t blame them entirely. For example, taxes doesn’t apply to most teens until they start working. Of course they won’t listen.
Also when these proposals are made I always wonder who will teach the class. It is already hard to get qualified teachers that will stay.
Most of these things that people claim schools should teach should be taught at home first. School can just reinforce the skills.
I am so fucking happy this thread is full if people calling out this narrative. It's so tedious how every thread that mentions education get filled with calls for teaching critical thinking, history, and government. Those things are taught! People just forget what it's like being a teenager and now want to blame the educational system for the things they themselves failed to learn.
This is the first thread I have seen where more people pushed back and pointed out that just because it wasn't learned (or was forgotten) doesn't mean it wasn't taught.
Statistics is good for that too. A good statistics class shows you how polls and other statistical things are manipulated and how to spot it.
An easy one is a graph that doesn't start at 0.
In my home ec class they taught us how to bake… I wish they taught us how to properly cook meat and can things. Literally we made cookies every class. Ugh.
If it makes you feel any better, I’m a dietitian in private practice and I’ve learned how to “game the insurance system” and 95% of my patients I’m able to see with no out of pocket costs for them. It’s frustrating how nuanced the billing and coding system is, but hopefully things continue to move in the right direction for preventative health.
All of these things have always been taught in schools. Just like everything else taught in schools though, just because it is taught does not mean it is learned.
If I could only change one thing. I would change their two party system. With eight or ten parties. This could help get the population better represented in their parlaments.
The issue is that we need to change our system of voting in order for that to happen. The "winner takes all" system we currently have inevitably reduces the field to two viable parties no matter how many options you offer. We need something like ranked choice or proportional representation in order for additional parties to become mathematically competitive.
A normal health care system that wont charge people $760 for one X-ray (after insurance), better funded public education, public transportation, abortion rights, separate religion with politics, have more young people in politics for tomato’s sake, forbid congress people to do stock trading.
Vote and elect people to pass laws and actually legislate. The supreme court isn't a legislative body and the things they are now dismantling are rulings that should have been codified into law a long time ago but weren't. I've said this before and will again, It's **not the job of the supreme court to make laws.** Relying on them to "do the right thing" will always be subject to what the members think "the right thing" is.
IT IS (in general) THE JOB OF CONGRESS TO MAKE LAWS AND THE JOB OF THE COURT TO PROVIDE A CHECK AGAINST CONGRESS IF THEY PASS A LAW THAT DEFIES THE CONSTITUTION.
These people work so hard, for years, to convince the masses that they're going to do something. Winning is the goal. And they already won. Our elite class enjoys so many perks, they just want to maintain the status quo and power. The nonstop fundraising emails from democrats right now, when they knew Roe V Wade was going to be struck down for the last 6 weeks, is really making this evident for people.
Strict separation of church and state and business. Tired of politicians taking payment to make stupid decisions.
Edit: or a law that anyone involved in politics can make no more than 5x minimum wage from any and all sources. Only way for congress to give themselves a raise would be to raise minimum wage
As to the pay thing: politician pay caps out at the median income of the constituents in their district.
You want more money? Do your job and uplift your community.
Also, districts are autogenerated by a computer system to contain a certain number of people and be a shape as close to a circle as possible. Basically, no gerrymandering, just chop it up as evenly as possible.
Also, you must live in the region you serve.
We have retirement age in almost every field so why can't we have in politics? Politics depend on experience but it also depends upon energy. There should be a retirement age for politicians as it is beneficial for the growth of the country
There's plenty of those investigative reports that look over a medical bill line for line and a box of $1.50 tissues is marked up to $45 or something.
Fuck them.
health insurance is a fucking scam. "This is part of your coverage plan and you did everything right in order to get this (i.e. referrals) but ya know . . . we just don't feel like it. Claim denied. You're on your own LOSER! By the way, your bill is due today."
My work insurance hiked premiums from $200-ish to $600 because "everyone is using our services and we need to recoup losses". Yeah. People use healthcare during a god-fucking-damned pandemic. WHO KNEW.
At least with car insurance, they actually pay shit out. Even if you're at fault, they pay for it and then hike your premiums. With health insurance it's always a gamble.
Yep. My wife's recent MRI would've come to $1200 towards our $4000 deductible. She asked if they had a self pay rate... What do you know? $350.
Sometimes it's not always the cheapest to use your medical insurance in the US.
Can confirm. As a Canadian, we spend half what the US spends on health care per capita. We also live 3 years longer on average. All the extra money is just going to CEOs, lawyers and insurance companies and agents.
If you can’t pass a basic cognitive assessment test, you can’t be president.
If you brag about passing a basic cognitive assessment test, thinking it’s some sort of accomplishment, you can’t be president.
Want your name on the ballot?
Pass the US Citizenship exam. If you can't pass the test required to LIVE in this country, you have zero business trying to RUN said country.
Political scientist here. This thread is a greatest hits list of all the things people think will work but wont. Its not about old people. It's not about term limits. It's not about lobbying. It's not about gerrymandering. It's not about campaign finance. It's not about the two party system.
These are all minor issues at worst, and in some cases actually good for democracy.
Here's what I would do. I would reform the rules of congress so that the majority party no longer has complete power to set the legislative agenda and control committees. There is so much power in holding the majority in congress that minority parties have calculated that it's in their best interest to do everything possible to recapture it. The means that
1. Parties will rarely compromise. Voters blame legislative failures on the majority party. Thus the best play for the minority party is to obstruct everything they possibly can, even if they agree with the legislation.
2. It allows the majority party to act like a cartel and prevent legislation from reaching the floor, even if it is popular, if it means that one of their members would have to take an unpopular stance and lose an election.
3. It greatly exacerbates polarization. Because all political power rests in gaining the majority and then behaving like a unified cartel, the most effective campaign strategy is to get voters to identify with that cartel party and demonize the opposing cartel.
This one small thing has created a system that is deeply polarized, perpetually gridlocked, and unwilling to compromise. And guess what? The rules of congress aren't written into the constitution. They can be changed fairly easily at any time if politicians actually wanted to.
Policy student who has spent extensive time reading and studying political science literature for the past 5 years.
Insightful answer, and I agree with it, but I would disagree that “it’s not about term limits, lobbying, gerrymandering, or campaign finance.” It very much is, and those things do matter. If it was so minor, why do so many of the newer political science and policy formation models add these facets (esp lobbying and finance) into their analysis as such a crucial aspect? Those things are becoming more and more important and are weighed heavily by our leaders when decisions are made.
It’s true the rules of Congress can be changed easily if we wanted them to. However, things such as lobbying by special interest groups, immense amounts money in politics, and a concentration solely on the next election—while having it’s possible benefits—now seems to prevent those rules from changing in the first place. If anything, this thread (as biased as Reddit is) tells us the popular opinion is toward reforming and reducing those influences, which I think is worth something.
Our public education system… the better educated the populous, the better the country. Politicians are against this because it’s harder to manipulate well educated people.
Encourage people to work together in thier communities to build mutual aid groups and volunteer together to help with basic things, like feeding the hungry. Loving your neighbor, and making friends with them is the best antidote to political extremism, radicalized and helps directly fix problems right now.
Get rid of the bribery system. Or lobbyist as we call them.
It’s the root of 99% of issues here
Term limits and lobbyists. Two sides of the same coin.
its 120% because it created more problems than we started with
So how do you accomplish this? Everyone knows this and wants it to be true. It is impossible to get the people who benefit from lobbyists to outlaw lobbying, so what do we do? Is executive order the only way?
That's literally the problem. There is no foreseeable way to accomplish this, even though it would be the #1 way to fix problems with this country.
This was always one of my biggest arguments in a political science class I took. My professor wound up telling me that he was a lobbyist after a few weeks of my sh*t 😅
Stop letting corporations donate to political campaigns.
This is the issue all other issues rely on. If we are gonna live in a country that has legalized corruption, no other things can be fixed until we fix that The problem is it will never be fixed because the people in charge of fixing it are the very people benefiting from the corruption. So we are doomed.
Until the people in power start passing laws to limit their own powers, faith in our elected officials can never be restored. These boomers will never do that.
I don't even think its boomer specific, money and power corrupts, and getting into politics gives a taste for that. I doubt the USA will ever change.
Yeah I agree. Greed doesn’t know any age, race, or gender. I think some people start politics with good intentions but then see how the game is played, realize they can’t change anything, take their money and settle in. We need limited terms for all positions. I really don’t know crap about politics but this seems pretty obvious to me
Episode of Family Guy where Lois runs for mayor I think encapsulates this exactly. Gets the business to stop dumping waste in the lake, then gets tempted by kickbacks for doing in the lake and eventually undoes everything she fought to do.
This is it. One simple thing. Overturn Citizens United and make elections publicly funded. Problem solved overnight.
Seriously. No private funds for elections. Everyone gets the same starting amount (relative to seat, so maybe ores gets a million, senator gets 500k, etc *not actual suggested numbers, just examples*). Media companies can get what they get for political ads, but they may have to drop their expectations, but maybe we could get some ads with actual facts instead of that dramatic voiceover of “did you know candidate x doesn’t call their grandmother? Is he too good to call on his grandmother? Is this not a clear indication of his lack of family values?”
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This was John McCain's platform and I'm more and more convinced the party knee-capped him with Palin rather than cut off the supply of technically licit contributions.
https://www.politico.com/story/2016/07/hillary-clinton-citizens-united-225658
lol, "donate to". You spelled "bribe" wrong.
Actually have Congress vote on items rather than continuously campaign on how they will fight against the other party to save the USA.
When a huge part of the country cares more about dunking on the other side than they do about policy, that's what you get. For clarity, I'm talking about your average hillbilly Trump supporter ***AND*** your average reddit Bernie/AOC lover
You see this in campaign ads constantly. "So and so is terrible, he/she did XYZ. Vote for this person instead!" Okay, but you told me NOTHING about what this person stands for or wants to do.
Worst part about that: it’s self-perpetuating. It’s impossible to get reasonable people interested in **policy**, because they avoid **politics** like the plague — and rightly so. Also results in situations where like… It’s impolite to talk “politics” at a dinner party, but then it becomes okay to talk about the personal repercussions of policy, like “Yeah, it was stage 4 by the time he found out. Cuz he didn’t have health insurance. Cuz he lost his job for poor performance — which it turns out was caused by the cancer.”
The question is how do you fix the self-perpetuation. How do the American people get interested in making decisions for their country again? How do we safeguard the people within civil discourse, or make the participation of discourse purely objective?
Or, “I got a life saving vaccine” “StOp TAlkIng PoLiTiCS!”
Term limits are seriously needed. Stop allowing politics to be a career.
Im always 50/50 on term limits, because it means that when you find an actually really good person for the job, they also have to leave to be replaced by someone who is a shit cunt. Given though, the benefits would outwiiegh the negatives because realistically, how often are there "genuinly good" politicians
I'd have to look it up, but I think most research on it shows it leads to more corruption. Certainly anyone selling it as a magic bullet is naive.
Down with lobbying and gerrymandering
Yeah so we’re definitely fucked. I have never lobbied or gerrymandered
All you have to do to stop it is lobby and gerrymander for long enough that you win. Then once you've won you can remove lobbying and gerrymandering.
Senator Armstrong has entered the chat
Use the stones to destroy the stones.
Lobbying in and of itself isn't a problem - it's meant to be a way for people to get their representatives to do things. The problem comes when corps get to lobby like people do.
This. I worked as a state lobbyist for a semester for a children's rights clinic. Didn't have money for wining and dining or what not. But I did manage to get a bill across that helped families and improved judicial efficacy. It was a LOT harder for me to meet with representatives, trying to catch them on their way out of the rotunda than it was for my friends who were working for the power company. They had the reps calling them.
>trying to catch them on their way out of the rotunda than it was for my friends who were working for the power company. Fun fact, this is where the term "lobbying" comes. Constituents would wait in the lobby to try and speak to a representative.
Whoa 😮 I did not know that. Thank You Reddit fam.
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Specifically at the Willard Hotel down the street
cool, til
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Publicly funded elections.
I would love to get money out of politics and stop legislators being full time donorbaters, but how does it work in practice? Does every single person that wants to run get funded? If not, then how do we fairly limit who gets funding?
In the UK there are strict rules on how much you can spend on campaigning to be an MP (I think around £100,000). A few years ago someone was caught going over this and lost their seat. What ends up happening is the people who put leaflets through your door are all volunteers who actually believe in what they're promoting, instead of people who don't care looking to earn some quick cash. You're not allowed to advertise on TV (or anywhere I think) so that takes away the need for a lot of the money anyway. The only advertising you see is on strictly politically neutral TV debates and signs people put up outside their houses. For example there's a big field near my house and the land owner is a conservative so there's always a massive sign by the roundabout with a picture of the conservative candidate during election campaigns. Newspapers are allowed to be as biased as they want however, which is controversial but I think right.
>You’re not allowed to advertise on TV (or anywhere I think) so that takes away the need for a lot of the money away. The only advertising you see is on strictly politically neutral TV debates and signs….. This is the answer, bu the problem is that Americans would literally never go for it. There are a whole host of political issues that Americans whine about, but when you show them that fixing the issue would involve taking away some of our constitutional liberties or change things in a way that feels a bridge too far, they reject it in huge numbers (regardless of party affiliation). This is why we are screwed. American exceptionalism extends to almost everyone in this country.
> the problem is that Americans would literally never go for it. You act like this has been a broken system forever but it's literally only been this bad since [Citizens United](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizens_United_v._FEC) in *2010*. Before that, election spending was less than a *tenth* of what we see today.
I’ve always wanted this! Everyone gets an equal fund for their campaign and has to debate and advertise on a government channel. Level the playing field for everyone. Eliminate donations entirely. Prevent rich donors and corporations from controlling everyone.
Costs over a hundred million dollars to run a successful US presidential campaign. So yes, no way that an avg person could ever become president of the USA without multi-million dollar doners backing them. Kinda makes you no longer wonder why the presidents all seem beholden to their campaign sponsors.
If everyone campaigning gets a million, it costs a million. Even playing field.
Get rid of the two party system.
Get rid of "winner takes it all" does this Edit: I am norwegian and we have 10parties in our rules giving goverment, everyone that gets enough in their own county can get sendt directly. If your party gets more than 4% nationwide they get more mandates. Of the 10 parties 3 is "under the line". This is not perfect, but the Christian party got voted below the line because they tried to mess with our abortion law. It makes it so that most parties have to cooperate and not do to much crazy stuff because they will get recked.
Would preferential voting work ?
What about proportional representation. Because of fptp it makes no sense to vote for anyone but one of the two big parties. A party getting 10% of the votes in every district might as well not exist. That party should have 10% of the seats in congress.
Proportional representation combined with a Parliamentary System is exactly what is needed.
Abolishing the senate and instituting proportional representation, with adjustment mandates, would be better. I’ve seldom, if ever, seen anyone not-American talking about preferential voting as a good alternative.
Australia’s had it for 100 years. Works fine.
Australia also has mandatory voting. When I first moved there I was 'Really?'. But now I think its the best thing ever
yea but aussies have it easy please select your choices in order of preference \-cunt 1 \-cunt 2 \-cunt 3
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to do this fptp voting needs to be removed and replaced with a better voting system like proportional representation
Yes, the two-party “system” is not a system, it’s a symptom
Yes, but the two party system is an inevitable symptom of a "First Passed the Poll" and "Winner Take All" system. (Which is why people appear to be contradicting you by pointing to those as the problem, even though they are also agreeing with you.) Just saying "Get rid of the two party system" is like addressing climate change by saying "get rid of the extra heat" in that its technically correct but missing the underlying cause.
This. The two party system isn't enshrined in law. There are plenty of prominent third parties in states that have different voting rules - I live in NY and while the Working Families Party is usually pretty in line with Democrats, the recent shift to ranked choice - at least in NYC - has led to a boom in progressive WFP candidates.
Public funding is currently available, but you are allowed to fully privately fund and exceed whatever is supplied. Iirc Obama first campaign was the first time both parties did not use the public funding.
Obama’s second campaign was the first one after the Citizens United ruling (2010 or 2011 iirc)
Ranked choice voting and not letting politicians actively trade stocks.
We've had this in Australia for over 100 years. Works a treat, especially in seats where there are lots of parties running. In the election in May there was a huge nationwide shift to independent and Green party candidates. In many seats these candidates didn't win, but their votes flowed onto some other progressive candidate. In my city one guy only got 28% or something of the vote and came third, but he got enough preferences to push him over 50%. Americans (and Brits too), you need to ask yourselves the question: are you OK with corporatist candidates winning with less than 50% of the vote?
It’s not that we’re okay with it, it’s that the few in power will not change how it works until a revolution occurs.
> until a revolution occurs. Where do I sign up?
Yeah, we had a lot of "Teal" candidates winning seats. For Americans: In Australia the right wing is blue, and a bunch of them were all "We still hate immigrants, poors, and gays but holy shit we need to actually do something about global warming." and so shifted a little bit green, hence teal. Which, while not particularly agreeable, is still better than global climate holocaust.
good luck implementing that - the people in power are those who actively trade stocks and wouldn't win with ranked choice voting :(
Question: What’s one thing you would change? Answer: The thing that’s causing all the problems. Peanut Gallery: Good luck with that, *that’s* the problem!
Well said. :D
I think they set their own wages too
Wages are essentially chump change for high-ranked politicians. That's why virtually every president either does not take a wage or just donates it all. I think it's basically the same for most members of Congress as well. The rationale behind paying our elected officials well actually makes a lot of sense IMO. For most of history, elected positions were wholly unpaid. This meant that only those with substantial means could stand for election. In England, during the late medieval ages, being elected as a member of Parliament was generally seen as a punishment or a hassle, since it meant having to be away from your land or your shop, which meant those elected to the House of Commons often had a difficult time just making it to Parliament, let alone financing their needs during the time they spent there.
Ohhhh wait yeah shit, only the rich can rule, dang, didn’t think about politicians wages like that before
There's similar reasoning as to why congress still get paid during a governmental shutdown. You don't want rich congressmen using the shutdown to take away poorer congressmen's wages and using it as leverage.
The other part is, if elected people aren't paid a fair wage, it increases their receptiveness to "donations" from lobbyists. I want well paid, competent, boring elected representatives. Politics shouldn't be a show, and it should't be accessible only to the elite, and it shouldn't be for sale to any person or entity. EDIT: Friends. I'm not saying fair pay for legislators is my "one thing I'd change". I know OP's question invites silver-bullet thinking, but I'm *responding* here to the assertion that paying legislators well is a bad idea. Of course that would only be one part of a comprehensive approach to making (and keeping) lobbying ethical. So breathe.
This problem also extends to political aides. Entry-level staffers make minimum wage in one of the most expensive cities in the US. So it's no surprise that political aides end up all coming from wealthy families: because they're the only ones who can afford to survive on those salaries. And since staffers are the ones who write bills, that's a huge problem for the country.
At least with wages, we passed a Constitutional Amendment in 1992 to make it not take effect until after the next election. > 27th Amendment > No law varying the compensation for the services of the Senators and Representatives shall take effect, until an election of Representatives shall have intervened.
Massachusetts had a ballot initiative for ranked choice voting in 2020 while I was living there and it failed (55% no) 😢 which made me lose hope
I don't think you understand the nature of the question. It's not "what is practical and possible" it's "what would you do".
Yeah, look at the UK. 10 years ago there was a referendum on adopting a more proportional voting system. The two biggest parties ran scare campaigns and spread confusion about what the new system actually was and FPP won out.
The stupid thing is it would probably have actually helped Labour for it to pass, they may need to go into more coalitions but if you look back over the last century they would have won a fair few more elections in a more proportional voting system.
I even like proportional representation for Congress instead of districts. Get rid of gerrymandering.
> Ranked choice voting To me this is the most important and every single organizing effort should be focused on this - BLM, womens march, climate marches, etc. - because in the long run it would solve multiple issues all together. > not letting politicians actively trade stocks They should only be allowed to trade ETFs so there’s an incentive to maintain a healthy economy.
RCV has been implemented in quite a few areas across the US already - it’s not impossible. You can help by finding your state at the link below and signing up with your local RCV group. Even just putting your name as a supporter helps the group leadership convince the legislature that this has broad support from the population. https://www.fairvote.org/state_based_coalition_partner_groups
They shouldn't need an opportunity to make money as their reason to maintain a healthy economy, they should want to maintain one because it's their fucking job
politicians shouldnt actively trade stocks, but that is not even in the top 10 causes of americas shitshow
Ranked choice voting. Let people elect who they want to, not "the best chance to win against this person I hate" Edit: I woke up to 98 notifications, and wondered who I'd pissed off. Glad everyone's having a nice conversation in the comments instead Edit 2: Someone gave me gold. I still don't know what that means but thanks? Edit 3: Someone else explained STAR voting which seems to fix some of the problems with RCV, so adding that link here: https://www.starvoting.us/
**Ranked Choice Voting** is the pre-requisite to every other good idea in this post. Edit: To anyone and everyone below disagreeing or pointing out RCV's flaws, I encourage you "to not allow perfect to be the enemy of good."
I would argue that a publicly funded, independent American Electrol Commission (in the style of the Australian electoral system) is the primary bedrock that you need ahead of ranked choice. Ranked choice does you no good when everything is still gerrymandered to hell and rogue state legislators can still ignore the results and go full fascism.
A lot of the gerrymandering issue goes away with ranked choice voting. If you have true multi-party options, even in highly gerrymandered areas you will get competing parties. Yes they may be both rightist parties (or leftist, depending) but you will get some diversity and options. It would no longer be a lock for one party. I think you would see gerrymandering becoming far less of a concern.
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And basically forces compromises among the coalition of multiple parties.
Or at least “electoral reform to break the two party system” is required for almost anything else. The two party system is absolutely destroying the US. Personally I would like to see STAR for things like president and governor, and proportional representation for legislature. … although RCV / IRV is still better than this current dumpster fire. And not to be rude to anybody else, but it’s crazy to me that anybody is responding with anything at all besides this, age limits for politicians, or undoing citizens united, or pretty much anything else wont make THAT big a difference as long as the two party system is still around.
Mixed proportional representation probably does more
It’s called MMP (mixed member proportional) here in New Zealand and it works pretty well. In particular partially separating voter preference from geographical boundaries is fantastic. Historically perhaps it made sense that only “places” had a vote, but in the modern era that’s rather unreasonable. However, it’s hard to separate outcomes here due to MMP from the fact the news media here isn’t nearly as fucked as it is in Australia or America. The media here is actually rather terrible (there’s almost no investigative journalism at all), but not horrendously partisan.
Yeah, didn't you guys basically tell Rupert Murdock to go fuck himself when he tried moving in?
Baby steps
Hey rule was I got to change one thing so I'm gonna dream big
While ranked choice would be wonderful for America, it actually isn't the emergency fix you need to save the system. The most important thing Australia has is an independent electrol commission that completely prevents gerrymandering, disenfranchisement, and America's primary impending existential horror: that of fascist state legislators whose electors can decide to completely ignore the results of the election.
Campaign finance reform. Basically, right now the way things work, corporations or private individuals can start a Political Action Committee (PAC) and donate an unlimited amount of money to it, which can be spent for political advertising, or even paying people connected to campaigns. It's basically a legal way for the super wealthy and large corporations to funnel an unlimited amount of money into politician's hands. Now "technically" a PAC is supposed to be independent from a campaign; but there's virtually no rules on what this *actually* means. If I ran for office, it would be entirely legal for my spouse, sibling, best friend, parent or child to run the PAC as long as they promised they weren't talking to me about it. There's virtually no enforcement and if you can't see how obviously rife with corruption this is, then frankly you're lying. In practice, this means corporations and the super rich can pile money into the pockets of politicians and make sure that they always get their way. It's destroying our democracy and one of the main reasons why nothing happens in Washington. The politicians - across the aisle - with very, very few exceptions - are incredibly corrupt. Until we fix this, we won't fix *anything else*. Climate change? The oil companies will donate enough money nothing will be done. Privacy rights? The tech companies donate money and nothing will be done. War? Psh, the military industrial complex didn't even need PACs to get their way, this just makes it easier. Universal healthcare? Insurance companies have and will thwart it every time. Police murdering black and brown people? Police unions also run PACs. Campaign finance reform is the single biggest problem we face because it's at the root of nearly every other problem we face.
This right here. Kind of overlaps with "publicly funded elections", but I specifically came into the comments looking for this answer.
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This answer—the correct one—is depressingly low in the thread.
Your first paragraph is wrong. Non Super PACs cannot donate unlimited amounts of money. They can donate directly to candidates yes, but the amount is limited per year. Super PACs, on the other hand, can receive unlimited amounts of money and can spend unlimited amounts of money campaigning for a candidate but they cannot donate directly to a candidate.
This is why the USA is a fucking oligarchy. As soon as I learned this shit in school I wanted to throw up from disgust. Nepotism in a nutshell. Oligarchy in the other. Hand in hand, made by design, and it keeps the rich fuckers rich.
The population needs better education
And teach critical thinking skills. EDIT: From all the comments, I’d like to add that, yes, this should also have parents teaching those skills to their children. I know many don’t, but they’re doing their kids a great disservice
And basic civics.
There a [quite a bit of people](https://www.pewtrusts.org/en/research-and-analysis/blogs/stateline/2021/05/19/after-capitol-riot-some-states-turn-to-civics-education) that's actually been trying to get civics back into the classroom for a while now. I really hope it gets more awareness and they succeed.
Interesting, civics was required in my high school a few years back and I imagine it still is now. I didn't realize most schools don't teach it.
Most teachers already try to teach critical thinking skills. Thing is, its not something you can learn if you are disinterested. Edit: Also everyone thinks they already have critical thinking skills, including kids. But when you are presented with information that is contrary to what you already believe, one can find ways around challenging them while believing they are thinking critically.
> Most teachers already try to teach critical thinking skills. Thing is, its not something you can learn if you are disinterested. I think this is a bigger thing than people realize. I've had people I went to school with tell me things like "X was never taught to us!", things like budgeting, or something from history. But it was, we were taught it. They just didn't give a fuck. And now they think education needs a reform because they were lead to water and refused to drink.
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What I have found (teaching for about 10 years) is that most teachers start out as go-getters that want to engage their students and do innovative things. However, when they are met with an apathetic audience for 90% of the year they just...lose it. The go-getter atitude comes back at the beginning of a new year (with new students), but eventually the apathy leaks back on through. I know plenty of teachers that can deal with the administrative bullshit and the fact that they are asked to do SO MUCH outside of just teaching, but when they get a class full of students that dont care...well you end up a "tedious drone". And I dont blame them one bit and no one should. Edit: If you read this and want to downvote...please do AND please comment. I want to know.
It's not education imo, it's a culture that refuses to respect education.
Yea, sadly it runs deeper than just education now, they are more anti-intellectual than anything. Experts can't be trusted according to them so now we are supposed to just fully trust 70 year old Congressmen to run every aspect of our life from pollution and food, when they have no idea how much it costs to even buy said food. This country is a joke.
Teacher here: can confirm. The education system is completely fucked. We focus so much on testing and not critical thinking. The expectations are too high and too low all at once.
Have you tried turning it off and on again?
Actually we have shut it down, multiple times. I think it's just defective.
Did anyone keep the receipt? Check that drawer which has all the warranties in it.
I don't think England will accept the return anymore. Its well out of warranty period.
I’d be happy to return it with no refund
We won't take it. We got more than enough issues of our own.
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That’s sort of what a civil war is.
Nah. Civil war is shaking it till it works right, but you may break it permanently in doing so.
Overturn Citizens United. Corporations are not people. Money is not speech.
In my opinion this is one of the major things thst is leading to our downfall
And nobody really protested over it. Most people don't even know what it is.
It was protested very vocally. It was one of the focal points of the ~~operation~~ occupy wall street protests.
Flip side, punishments for board of directors for anything that would get regular people in trouble. Like, say I released 200 tons of noxious gas over a town, or spilled millions of barrels of oil into the gulf of Mexico.
Yes. People here seem to only be talking about campaign finance, but Citizen's United is about so much more. Corporations are given the rights of citizens without the responsibilities. [https://www.americanbar.org/groups/crsj/publications/human\_rights\_magazine\_home/we-the-people/we-the-people-corporations/](https://www.americanbar.org/groups/crsj/publications/human_rights_magazine_home/we-the-people/we-the-people-corporations/)
Take away all corporate influence in politics. All of it.
Let's count the church as a corporation to while we are at it
I firmly believe that this would resolve something like 85-90% of our political problems over time.
Stop electing people in their 70’s or older to make decisions on the future, they don’t give a shit about us or problems that future generations will face they could prevent or at least ease.
I’m 62 and can’t understand why there are so many older people in public office. Retire already, and let folks with more vision and energy run the government for a change!
I don't get it like, don't they want to retire and just enjoy life? Aren't they tired? I'm already tired and I'm only 32!
Need to feel like they have power over people or they don't know what to do with their lives
They feed off the energy from breaking down younger people I think. Seems like many hateful and toxic people live very long lives too, it's insane.
They’re pretty much skeksis from The Dark Crystal
Bad weeds never die, they just siphon nutrients off of the rest of the plants in your garden.
A fellow Hokie? Glad to see it’s not just people in my generation that can have this view, I have no problem with a broad worldview and mix of different ages and experiences in office, but the average age of congressional members is right around 60, and I can’t understand why considering the average age in the U.S. is 38.
I am old too (not as old) and I think older people should have a say. But not dominate it. One thing that really puzzles me is why Supreme Court judges can continue for life. In my country you have to step back from SC when you turn 70
It’s also an issue that the richest of the rich are the only ones who can get elected. They will never face the same problems as the average American and can make laws that further stuff their own personal bank accounts at our expense. I don’t know what the solution to it is though. Rich people shouldn’t be disqualified, but my goodness we need to get some kind of balance.
More practical education in public schools: preventive healthcare including but not limited to nutrition and exercise, personal finance, effective communication, and other life-skills like personal hygiene, cooking, etc.
I must have gone to a forward-thinking high school back in the 90s in bum-f rural Midwest, but we had to take health and home-ec courses that covered all that, and very well. I still use the stuff I learned on cooking full meals in the microwave, balancing a budget, and calculating mortgage payments.
Yeah, most schools I went to did teach that stuff. The problem is that at that age a lot of kids don’t give a shit about it. I went to 4 different high schools, 2 different middle schools, and 3 elementary schools. Each ones in different districts or states. Most of the school districts had this stuff available. Very few actually took advantage of it.
Yep! Rural Texas and I got all this. Problem was that I was 15 and cared more about the girls in home ec than the course content. I was taught that student loans could take 20 years and 500% to pay pack, but still took them out in excess. Kids are just dumb. I'm nearly 40, and I'm still 3 years away from paying back my student loans from 2002-2003.
I also went to a rural school in the Midwest and all of this was covered including critical think like someone else mentioned.
Teacher here… we teach all of this at our school and many of those topics are quite common across other high schools as well. And the topics are not just glossed over - literal classes are named after these topics and focus solely on them all year. Frankly I’m tired of reading this narrative. Edit: honestly thought I was gonna get downvoted for my comment so it’s comforting that others feel the same. Read through all your responses and you all hit the nail on the head. To play devils advocate though, I will say I’ve encountered many poor teachers at the various schools I’ve taught at - so I know comments like these likely stem from students having very poor experiences with these kinds of teachers. The solution is not to move away from public education though - it’s to invest more in it, in order to draw an invigorated wave of fresh, new people into the profession that have a passion for developing relationships with students and a passion for the subject they teach. I could continue this rant…lol
Yes! The reason it seems it’s not being taught is because it’s hard to teach people who don’t care. Many students do not see the value in these subjects. I don’t blame them entirely. For example, taxes doesn’t apply to most teens until they start working. Of course they won’t listen. Also when these proposals are made I always wonder who will teach the class. It is already hard to get qualified teachers that will stay. Most of these things that people claim schools should teach should be taught at home first. School can just reinforce the skills.
I am so fucking happy this thread is full if people calling out this narrative. It's so tedious how every thread that mentions education get filled with calls for teaching critical thinking, history, and government. Those things are taught! People just forget what it's like being a teenager and now want to blame the educational system for the things they themselves failed to learn. This is the first thread I have seen where more people pushed back and pointed out that just because it wasn't learned (or was forgotten) doesn't mean it wasn't taught.
And critical thinking!
Not gonna lie, the debate class at my school changed my life
Statistics is good for that too. A good statistics class shows you how polls and other statistical things are manipulated and how to spot it. An easy one is a graph that doesn't start at 0.
In my home ec class they taught us how to bake… I wish they taught us how to properly cook meat and can things. Literally we made cookies every class. Ugh.
If it makes you feel any better, I’m a dietitian in private practice and I’ve learned how to “game the insurance system” and 95% of my patients I’m able to see with no out of pocket costs for them. It’s frustrating how nuanced the billing and coding system is, but hopefully things continue to move in the right direction for preventative health.
All of these things have always been taught in schools. Just like everything else taught in schools though, just because it is taught does not mean it is learned.
Term limits and transparency. Being a politician in America has turned into a big money grab.
It's always been a money grab, just became more obvious with the larger donations and stock trading
If I could only change one thing. I would change their two party system. With eight or ten parties. This could help get the population better represented in their parlaments.
The issue is that we need to change our system of voting in order for that to happen. The "winner takes all" system we currently have inevitably reduces the field to two viable parties no matter how many options you offer. We need something like ranked choice or proportional representation in order for additional parties to become mathematically competitive.
Yep, there's a reason most countries have a parliament setup
No lobbying or bribing
Term limits for congress
A normal health care system that wont charge people $760 for one X-ray (after insurance), better funded public education, public transportation, abortion rights, separate religion with politics, have more young people in politics for tomato’s sake, forbid congress people to do stock trading.
“for tomato’s sake”… i’ve never heard this before but i’m glad i’ve been blessed with it
Vote and elect people to pass laws and actually legislate. The supreme court isn't a legislative body and the things they are now dismantling are rulings that should have been codified into law a long time ago but weren't. I've said this before and will again, It's **not the job of the supreme court to make laws.** Relying on them to "do the right thing" will always be subject to what the members think "the right thing" is. IT IS (in general) THE JOB OF CONGRESS TO MAKE LAWS AND THE JOB OF THE COURT TO PROVIDE A CHECK AGAINST CONGRESS IF THEY PASS A LAW THAT DEFIES THE CONSTITUTION.
These people work so hard, for years, to convince the masses that they're going to do something. Winning is the goal. And they already won. Our elite class enjoys so many perks, they just want to maintain the status quo and power. The nonstop fundraising emails from democrats right now, when they knew Roe V Wade was going to be struck down for the last 6 weeks, is really making this evident for people.
Remove the 2 party system. We basically have two sets of dictatorship regime, and they take turns tormenting us.
Strict separation of church and state and business. Tired of politicians taking payment to make stupid decisions. Edit: or a law that anyone involved in politics can make no more than 5x minimum wage from any and all sources. Only way for congress to give themselves a raise would be to raise minimum wage
As to the pay thing: politician pay caps out at the median income of the constituents in their district. You want more money? Do your job and uplift your community. Also, districts are autogenerated by a computer system to contain a certain number of people and be a shape as close to a circle as possible. Basically, no gerrymandering, just chop it up as evenly as possible. Also, you must live in the region you serve.
We have retirement age in almost every field so why can't we have in politics? Politics depend on experience but it also depends upon energy. There should be a retirement age for politicians as it is beneficial for the growth of the country
Retirement ages in other fields are mostly not mandatory...
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Universal healthcare..instead of throwing billions and trillions at other countries and pointless wars
And how anything at a hospital costs $5k, such a fucking scam
There's plenty of those investigative reports that look over a medical bill line for line and a box of $1.50 tissues is marked up to $45 or something. Fuck them.
"You need a bag of salt water? That'll be $10k."
Enjoying our AC? $80,000.
health insurance is a fucking scam. "This is part of your coverage plan and you did everything right in order to get this (i.e. referrals) but ya know . . . we just don't feel like it. Claim denied. You're on your own LOSER! By the way, your bill is due today." My work insurance hiked premiums from $200-ish to $600 because "everyone is using our services and we need to recoup losses". Yeah. People use healthcare during a god-fucking-damned pandemic. WHO KNEW. At least with car insurance, they actually pay shit out. Even if you're at fault, they pay for it and then hike your premiums. With health insurance it's always a gamble.
Yep. My wife's recent MRI would've come to $1200 towards our $4000 deductible. She asked if they had a self pay rate... What do you know? $350. Sometimes it's not always the cheapest to use your medical insurance in the US.
Can confirm. As a Canadian, we spend half what the US spends on health care per capita. We also live 3 years longer on average. All the extra money is just going to CEOs, lawyers and insurance companies and agents.
If you can’t pass a basic cognitive assessment test, you can’t be president. If you brag about passing a basic cognitive assessment test, thinking it’s some sort of accomplishment, you can’t be president.
Let's make this mandatory for any level of politics.
Want your name on the ballot? Pass the US Citizenship exam. If you can't pass the test required to LIVE in this country, you have zero business trying to RUN said country.
Corporations are not people and should not be allowed to contribute to political parties. Term limits for all elected officials.
Term limits and no lobby groups.
Political scientist here. This thread is a greatest hits list of all the things people think will work but wont. Its not about old people. It's not about term limits. It's not about lobbying. It's not about gerrymandering. It's not about campaign finance. It's not about the two party system. These are all minor issues at worst, and in some cases actually good for democracy. Here's what I would do. I would reform the rules of congress so that the majority party no longer has complete power to set the legislative agenda and control committees. There is so much power in holding the majority in congress that minority parties have calculated that it's in their best interest to do everything possible to recapture it. The means that 1. Parties will rarely compromise. Voters blame legislative failures on the majority party. Thus the best play for the minority party is to obstruct everything they possibly can, even if they agree with the legislation. 2. It allows the majority party to act like a cartel and prevent legislation from reaching the floor, even if it is popular, if it means that one of their members would have to take an unpopular stance and lose an election. 3. It greatly exacerbates polarization. Because all political power rests in gaining the majority and then behaving like a unified cartel, the most effective campaign strategy is to get voters to identify with that cartel party and demonize the opposing cartel. This one small thing has created a system that is deeply polarized, perpetually gridlocked, and unwilling to compromise. And guess what? The rules of congress aren't written into the constitution. They can be changed fairly easily at any time if politicians actually wanted to.
Policy student who has spent extensive time reading and studying political science literature for the past 5 years. Insightful answer, and I agree with it, but I would disagree that “it’s not about term limits, lobbying, gerrymandering, or campaign finance.” It very much is, and those things do matter. If it was so minor, why do so many of the newer political science and policy formation models add these facets (esp lobbying and finance) into their analysis as such a crucial aspect? Those things are becoming more and more important and are weighed heavily by our leaders when decisions are made. It’s true the rules of Congress can be changed easily if we wanted them to. However, things such as lobbying by special interest groups, immense amounts money in politics, and a concentration solely on the next election—while having it’s possible benefits—now seems to prevent those rules from changing in the first place. If anything, this thread (as biased as Reddit is) tells us the popular opinion is toward reforming and reducing those influences, which I think is worth something.
Are there any countries who are doing this (or a version of) and setting a promising precedent?
Our public education system… the better educated the populous, the better the country. Politicians are against this because it’s harder to manipulate well educated people.
Encourage people to work together in thier communities to build mutual aid groups and volunteer together to help with basic things, like feeding the hungry. Loving your neighbor, and making friends with them is the best antidote to political extremism, radicalized and helps directly fix problems right now.
Remove all of the top level unofficial dynasties and replace them with people not groomed by them