On 10/9/2021 8:51 AM, Quadibloc wrote:
> On Saturday, October 9, 2021 at 2:37:33 AM UTC-6, David Brown wrote:
>> Just don't imagine that the USA is a kind big brother looking out
>> for us little people in Europe - the USA entered WWII and NATO for their
>> own benefit.
>
> That is... _largely_ true.
>
> However, on December 7, 1941, it was _Japan_ that bombed Pearl
> Harbor. The United States _chose_ to issue an ultimatum to Nazi
> Germany to either declare war on Japan, or face war with the
> United States; presumably, it could have fought with Japan alone,
> and ignored events in Europe - or at least only insisted that Germany
> break its alliance with Japan, and not aid it in any way to avoid war
> with the U.S..
>
> When it comes to the Cold War...
>
> That was indeed a conflict between the United States and the Soviet
> Union, and preventing the latter from acquiring additional territory in
> Europe was to the United States' benefit.
>
> The Korean War, for example, was comparable to... World War II
> starting, with the involvement of the United States, within days of
> Mussolini's invasion of Ethiopia in 1935. Of course, _that_ didn't
> happen.
>
> Why was the course of the war against the Axis so different from
> the course of the Cold War? Anyone familiar with the Red Scare of
> the 1920s and McCarthyism will have no problem understanding
> the reason: business elites in the United States viewed Communist
> ideology as directly threatening, while other dictatorships conquering
> their neighbors was... their neighbors' problem, which the United
> States could safely ignore.

There was also the not so small matter of early WW2 activity could be
regarded by many in the US as "Europe's problem". One which we could
safely ignore. Once the Soviet Union developed nuclear weapons, we
couldn't ignore the threat as "only affecting far away countries".

> NATO was a response by the United States to something that was
> politically percieved as a threat, but not to a threat to the United
> States' own vital security interests.

I think WW2 showed the US that threats to Europe were threats to the US
vital interests.

--
- Stephen Fuld
(e-mail address disguised to prevent spam)

In article <5b31fbcb-20c9-4841-98a0-9b76b6717f19n@googlegroups.com>,
jsavard@ecn.ab.ca (Quadibloc) wrote:

> However, on December 7, 1941, it was _Japan_ that bombed Pearl
> Harbor.

OK so far.

> The United States _chose_ to issue an ultimatum to Nazi
> Germany to either declare war on Japan, or face war with the
> United States; presumably, it could have fought with Japan alone,
> and ignored events in Europe - or at least only insisted that
> Germany break its alliance with Japan, and not aid it in any way
> to avoid war with the U.S..

Citation? The usually accepted view is that Germany (and Italy) declared
war on the USA first, which responded by declaring war on them. They were
not obliged to declare war on the USA by any treaties or other
obligations to Japan.

John

On Saturday, October 9, 2021 at 10:34:08 AM UTC-5, Quadibloc wrote:
> On Saturday, October 9, 2021 at 4:08:00 AM UTC-6, David Brown wrote:
> > or you
> > accept that you have a poor quality but fair system and let (almost)
> > everyone vote equally.
> I do believe that we cannot stray very far from that principle,
> since the point of democracy is to hold the government
> accountable to the people.
> People may not be experts, but they can, and will, vote to
> protect their vital interests.
<
I gave up voting for things that would have cost me money about a decade ago
when the people of Texas continuously voted against their better interests
{better schools, better vocational training, better treatment by the police, and
higher <low> wage pay.} Instead they vote for Gods, Guns, and against Gays.
<
Some people vote for their better interests, others don't bother to pay enough
attention to decide is Pol[a] is pulling their leg or not as long as what Pol[a] say
superficially seems to be what they might have wanted if voter[v] had bothered
to look at the fine details.
>
> John Savard

On 10/9/2021 5:07 AM, David Brown wrote:
> On 09/10/2021 04:38, Quadibloc wrote:
>> On Friday, October 8, 2021 at 12:28:11 PM UTC-6, MitchAlsup wrote:
>>
>>> Only let those with an IQ above 120 vote !
>>
>> I suppose I *could* tell you to Google
>> "literacy tests" voting "United States"
>> for how that might work out in practice.
>>
>> Not that I don't share the sentiment, even if some might call it
>> elitist. I'd settle for something achievable, though:
>>
>> 1) Only let people who have graduated high school vote, and
>> 2) Ensure the high school curriculum once more educates
>> graduates to at least the level that was expected back in the
>> 1950s or 1960s.
>>
>
> The problem is not people's IQ or their general education. The problem
> is how much people know about the issues they are voting on, and how
> much of what they "know" is actually based on reality and objective
> facts (to the extent that objectivity can be determined).
>
> I think you either have to say that politics should be left in the hands
> of trained professionals, with a system of specific education, tests,
> accreditation, etc., such as you have for doctors and lawyers - or you
> accept that you have a poor quality but fair system and let (almost)
> everyone vote equally. Anything in between and you'll still have people
> voting based on "gut feeling", habit, or something they read on
> Facebook, and it won't even be fair or representative.
>

Yeah.

One has a tradeoff.

On one hand, one can have an autocracy / oligarchy / ...

Or, on the other hand, one can have a democracy which reduces down to
unfiltered public opinion. Whichever position can win over the masses
better, wins.

Arguably, a "representative democracy" is a reasonable compromise, as
one can assume that the representatives have at least some level of
merit to get into the position of being elected into a position of
authority.

Though, in the latter, one then has to distinguish between whether the
votes determine the results directly, or whether the votes are treated
more like public-opinion polls. People might get upset and consider
their vote useless if it is regularly ignored.

But, at the same time, if the representatives only act within the the
bounds of the public vote, then it reduces to a similar situation to the
direct democracy. In this case, the number of officials elected per a
given area and population may come into play, ...

Then one may end up with people in more densely populated areas
complaining that they have less representation than those in less
densely populated areas, since under this system, ...

....

So, at least, in these senses, the current system in the US would appear
to be reasonably sensibly designed.

Though one major flaw with a system like this:
It reduces down to two parties almost invariably;
At some point, an instability may develop, and one of the parties may be
effectively evicted from the system (reducing it to a single party system,).

Once it collapses to single-party rule, a march towards oligarchy seems
almost inevitable, short of being able to pull a "hard reset" on the
whole system.

It seems like the founders who came up with the system were aware of all
of this, though in this case it is unclear why they didn't specify the
use of a cumulative voting / weighted voting at all levels, which would
likely have been more stable over a longer time-frame than the use of a
"winner takes all" system.

....

Though, I will admit that, in any case, I am not terribly optimistic
about the longer term future. I suspect it may be partly a case of
"people don't realize yet just how badly everything is hosed...".

Or, metaphor:
"No! you can't save a sinking ship with little more than a sump pump and
a spare car battery!",
"Hahaha! Sump pump go brrrrr..."

David Brown <david.brown@hesbynett.no> wrote:
> On 08/10/2021 19:34, MitchAlsup wrote:
>> On Friday, October 8, 2021 at 11:46:39 AM UTC-5, David Brown wrote:
>>> On 08/10/2021 17:47, Stephen Fuld wrote:
>>>> That group is a truly tiny proportion. The people who don't want to
>>>> address the problem because it will cost them money or restrict their
>>>> freedom are a bigger problem. But fortunately, as I said above, that
>>>> proportion is shrinking.
>>>>
>>> I hope you are right.
>>>
>>> The politics of actually getting something done, however, is often
>>> harder (in all countries, not just the USA - I'm just using it for
>>> examples here). In the USA, the solid majority of people want hugely
>>> stricter gun control and they want a public health service and public
>>> education system in line with most of Europe. I realise the path to
>>> getting there would be long and difficult, but there are no American
>>> politicians willing to take the first step despite public opinion. The
>>> majority of people want the government to "do something" about climate
>>> change. What makes you optimistic that politicians will handle this one?
>> <
>> There is the problem of that second amendment thing:: first one has to
>> pass the amendment to amend the 2nd amendment, then 2/3rds of the
>> states have to ratify. Right now there is no chance of even getting 25 states
>> to ratify, let alone 34.
>> <
>> Secondly, right now the supreme court will not allow, and this will continue
>> to be the case for another 30 years.
>> <
>> So, even though 70%-odd want stricter/better gun laws--it is not realistic
>> to assume anything in this direction will happen for decades.
>
> I appreciate that changing gun laws for the better is difficult and
> time-consuming. Some kinds of laws take a long time to change, and you
> also have to change practices - you'd be greatly reducing a significant
> industry and retail system, and you have to figure out how to get guns
> out of criminals' hands, not just how to stop them getting more so
> easily. Yes, it would be a matter of decades to get the USA into a more
> civilised place with respect to guns.
>
> But the point is, it will take decades from the time the process is
> started - and no politician will start it.

Here is the gun constitutional carry map of the US, scroll down and you can
see the history over time as as right to carry has swept over the US
leaving just a tiny handful of gun control states.

https://www.gunstocarry.com/ccw-reciprocity-map/

>>>> While I agree that our current political situation is very harmful, if
>>>> that were the cause of lack of progress in nuclear power, you would
>>>> expect lots of new nuclear plants in other countries. Not only isn't
>>>> that happening, but some European countries are shutting theirs down.
>>>>
>>> A lot of European politicians are totally spineless when it comes to
>>> nuclear power - the USA does not have a monopoly on political problems
>>> or navel-gazing policies. Some countries /are/ making progress in
>>> nuclear power - India and China, in particular.
>> <
>> A bit more than a decade ago the world thought the Japanese had Nuclear
>> power under good control.......
>
> I recommend learning from mistakes - our own and other peoples' - rather
> than panicking and throwing out the baby with the bathwater. It's
> important to note that Japan's massive over-reaction to the Fukushima
> disaster killed a lot more people than the reactor did.

On Saturday, October 9, 2021 at 3:55:49 PM UTC-5, BGB wrote:
> On 10/9/2021 5:07 AM, David Brown wrote:
> > On 09/10/2021 04:38, Quadibloc wrote:
> >> On Friday, October 8, 2021 at 12:28:11 PM UTC-6, MitchAlsup wrote:

> Yeah.
>
> One has a tradeoff.
>
> On one hand, one can have an autocracy / oligarchy / ...
>
> Or, on the other hand, one can have a democracy which reduces down to
> unfiltered public opinion. Whichever position can win over the masses
> better, wins.
>
>
> Arguably, a "representative democracy" is a reasonable compromise, as
> one can assume that the representatives have at least some level of
> merit to get into the position of being elected into a position of
> authority.
>
> Though, in the latter, one then has to distinguish between whether the
> votes determine the results directly, or whether the votes are treated
> more like public-opinion polls. People might get upset and consider
> their vote useless if it is regularly ignored.
>
Consider my positions on things:: given the top 4 things that "get" of
"discourage" my vote on an issue or politician or political party--
exactly NONE of then have been available for me to VOTE for or
against in my entire <voting> lifetime !!
<
I am not being represented by anyone {local, county, state, country}
on any of the topics that actually sway my vote--and I think that the
parties have carefully set up the scenario that way.
>
> But, at the same time, if the representatives only act within the the
> bounds of the public vote, then it reduces to a similar situation to the
> direct democracy. In this case, the number of officials elected per a
> given area and population may come into play, ...
>
> Then one may end up with people in more densely populated areas
> complaining that they have less representation than those in less
> densely populated areas, since under this system, ...
>
> ...
>
>
> So, at least, in these senses, the current system in the US would appear
> to be reasonably sensibly designed.
>
> Though one major flaw with a system like this:
> It reduces down to two parties almost invariably;
<
Something the founding fathers warned us against.
<
> At some point, an instability may develop, and one of the parties may be
> effectively evicted from the system (reducing it to a single party system,).
<
Many would argue that we have already achieved this.
>
> Once it collapses to single-party rule, a march towards oligarchy seems
> almost inevitable, short of being able to pull a "hard reset" on the
> whole system.
<
What happens when BOTH parties want to march to oligarchy--just
different versions of oligarchy ?
>
> It seems like the founders who came up with the system were aware of all
> of this, though in this case it is unclear why they didn't specify the
> use of a cumulative voting / weighted voting at all levels, which would
> likely have been more stable over a longer time-frame than the use of a
> "winner takes all" system.
<
They had seen the conflicts of Parliamentary election systems and did
not want to repeat.
>
> ...
>
>
> Though, I will admit that, in any case, I am not terribly optimistic
> about the longer term future. I suspect it may be partly a case of
> "people don't realize yet just how badly everything is hosed...".
>
Unlike last time {North versus South}: this time it is Urban versus Rural.
<
Urban is winning the population count,
Suburban are "somewhat" aligned with Urban,
Rural has no where to draw new resources*.
<
You cannot have a "civil war" with cities against rurals. There are no convenient
boundaries that can be drawn.
<
Rural would have great opportunities to increase their ability to attract new
resources, if they merely accepted refugees and immigrants........Oh Well.....

On 10/9/2021 1:55 PM, BGB wrote:
> On 10/9/2021 5:07 AM, David Brown wrote:
>> On 09/10/2021 04:38, Quadibloc wrote:
>>> On Friday, October 8, 2021 at 12:28:11 PM UTC-6, MitchAlsup wrote:
>>>
>>>> Only let those with an IQ above 120 vote !
>>>
>>> I suppose I *could* tell you to Google
>>> "literacy tests" voting "United States"
>>> for how that might work out in practice.
>>>
>>> Not that I don't share the sentiment, even if some might call it
>>> elitist. I'd settle for something achievable, though:
>>>
>>> 1) Only let people who have graduated high school vote, and
>>> 2) Ensure the high school curriculum once more educates
>>> graduates to at least the level that was expected back in the
>>> 1950s or 1960s.
>>>
>>
>> The problem is not people's IQ or their general education.  The problem
>> is how much people know about the issues they are voting on, and how
>> much of what they "know" is actually based on reality and objective
>> facts (to the extent that objectivity can be determined).
>>
>> I think you either have to say that politics should be left in the hands
>> of trained professionals, with a system of specific education, tests,
>> accreditation, etc., such as you have for doctors and lawyers - or you
>> accept that you have a poor quality but fair system and let (almost)
>> everyone vote equally.  Anything in between and you'll still have people
>> voting based on "gut feeling", habit, or something they read on
>> Facebook, and it won't even be fair or representative.
>>
>
> Yeah.
>
> One has a tradeoff.
>
> On one hand, one can have an autocracy / oligarchy / ...
>
> Or, on the other hand, one can have a democracy which reduces down to
> unfiltered public opinion. Whichever position can win over the masses
> better, wins.
>
>
> Arguably, a "representative democracy" is a reasonable compromise, as
> one can assume that the representatives have at least some level of
> merit to get into the position of being elected into a position of
> authority.
>
> Though, in the latter, one then has to distinguish between whether the
> votes determine the results directly, or whether the votes are treated
> more like public-opinion polls. People might get upset and consider
> their vote useless if it is regularly ignored.
>
>
> But, at the same time, if the representatives only act within the the
> bounds of the public vote, then it reduces to a similar situation to the
> direct democracy. In this case, the number of officials elected per a
> given area and population may come into play, ...
>
> Then one may end up with people in more densely populated areas
> complaining that they have less representation than those in less
> densely populated areas, since under this system, ...
>
> ...
>
>
> So, at least, in these senses, the current system in the US would appear
> to be reasonably sensibly designed.
>
> Though one major flaw with a system like this:
> It reduces down to two parties almost invariably;

Lots of counter examples show this to be incorrect, e.g. Israel,
Germany, Italy. You can easily end up with lots of parties, so the
government is invariably a coalition.

--
- Stephen Fuld
(e-mail address disguised to prevent spam)

On 10/10/2021 12:59 AM, Stephen Fuld wrote:
> On 10/9/2021 1:55 PM, BGB wrote:
>> On 10/9/2021 5:07 AM, David Brown wrote:
>>> On 09/10/2021 04:38, Quadibloc wrote:
>>>> On Friday, October 8, 2021 at 12:28:11 PM UTC-6, MitchAlsup wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> Only let those with an IQ above 120 vote !
>>>>
>>>> I suppose I *could* tell you to Google
>>>> "literacy tests" voting "United States"
>>>> for how that might work out in practice.
>>>>
>>>> Not that I don't share the sentiment, even if some might call it
>>>> elitist. I'd settle for something achievable, though:
>>>>
>>>> 1) Only let people who have graduated high school vote, and
>>>> 2) Ensure the high school curriculum once more educates
>>>> graduates to at least the level that was expected back in the
>>>> 1950s or 1960s.
>>>>
>>>
>>> The problem is not people's IQ or their general education.  The problem
>>> is how much people know about the issues they are voting on, and how
>>> much of what they "know" is actually based on reality and objective
>>> facts (to the extent that objectivity can be determined).
>>>
>>> I think you either have to say that politics should be left in the hands
>>> of trained professionals, with a system of specific education, tests,
>>> accreditation, etc., such as you have for doctors and lawyers - or you
>>> accept that you have a poor quality but fair system and let (almost)
>>> everyone vote equally.  Anything in between and you'll still have people
>>> voting based on "gut feeling", habit, or something they read on
>>> Facebook, and it won't even be fair or representative.
>>>
>>
>> Yeah.
>>
>> One has a tradeoff.
>>
>> On one hand, one can have an autocracy / oligarchy / ...
>>
>> Or, on the other hand, one can have a democracy which reduces down to
>> unfiltered public opinion. Whichever position can win over the masses
>> better, wins.
>>
>>
>> Arguably, a "representative democracy" is a reasonable compromise, as
>> one can assume that the representatives have at least some level of
>> merit to get into the position of being elected into a position of
>> authority.
>>
>> Though, in the latter, one then has to distinguish between whether the
>> votes determine the results directly, or whether the votes are treated
>> more like public-opinion polls. People might get upset and consider
>> their vote useless if it is regularly ignored.
>>
>>
>> But, at the same time, if the representatives only act within the the
>> bounds of the public vote, then it reduces to a similar situation to
>> the direct democracy. In this case, the number of officials elected
>> per a given area and population may come into play, ...
>>
>> Then one may end up with people in more densely populated areas
>> complaining that they have less representation than those in less
>> densely populated areas, since under this system, ...
>>
>> ...
>>
>>
>> So, at least, in these senses, the current system in the US would
>> appear to be reasonably sensibly designed.
>>
>> Though one major flaw with a system like this:
>> It reduces down to two parties almost invariably;
>
> Lots of counter examples show this to be incorrect, e.g. Israel,
> Germany, Italy.  You can easily end up with lots of parties, so the
> government is invariably a coalition.
>

But, those countries, in their current forms, have governments which are
a lot younger than the US.

Also, none of those countries seems to use the same voting system as the
US ("first past the post" + "winner takes all"). Which was the point I
was getting at here. Namely, that a system like the one the US uses is
prone to almost invariably collapse down to two parties.

So, I don't think these countries can be counted as counter-examples.

On 09/10/21 16:02, Stephen Fuld wrote:
> I certainly agree with that.  And, as I said elsewhere, we are far from
> perfect.  But I don't want to lose sight of the fact that e.g. western Europe
> with its US "influence", was far better off than eastern Europe with its Soviet
> "influence".  And just ask the people of Hong Kong about Chinese "influence". :-(

Yes indeed.

But it is equally keeping sight of the fact that the USA wasn't
"in Europe" for solely altruistic reasons.

Europe gave the US an unsinkable aircraft carrier, mobile missile
sites, and listening posts, a few hours/days to mobilise while
the Soviets were rolling across Europe, and markets for their
trade goods.

On 10/10/2021 5:19 AM, Tom Gardner wrote:
> On 09/10/21 16:02, Stephen Fuld wrote:
>> I certainly agree with that.  And, as I said elsewhere, we are far
>> from perfect.  But I don't want to lose sight of the fact that e.g.
>> western Europe with its US "influence", was far better off than
>> eastern Europe with its Soviet "influence".  And just ask the people
>> of Hong Kong about Chinese "influence". :-(
>
> Yes indeed.
>
> But it is equally keeping sight of the fact that the USA wasn't
> "in Europe" for solely altruistic reasons.
>
> Europe gave the US an unsinkable aircraft carrier, mobile missile
> sites, and listening posts, a few hours/days to mobilise while
> the Soviets were rolling across Europe, and markets for their
> trade goods.

Of course, that is true. The US benefited as well as the western
European countries. But contrast that with eastern Europe, where the
Soviet Union benefited, but the countries no so much. :-(

--
- Stephen Fuld
(e-mail address disguised to prevent spam)

On 10/10/2021 12:02 AM, BGB wrote:
> On 10/10/2021 12:59 AM, Stephen Fuld wrote:
>> On 10/9/2021 1:55 PM, BGB wrote:
>>> On 10/9/2021 5:07 AM, David Brown wrote:
>>>> On 09/10/2021 04:38, Quadibloc wrote:
>>>>> On Friday, October 8, 2021 at 12:28:11 PM UTC-6, MitchAlsup wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>> Only let those with an IQ above 120 vote !
>>>>>
>>>>> I suppose I *could* tell you to Google
>>>>> "literacy tests" voting "United States"
>>>>> for how that might work out in practice.
>>>>>
>>>>> Not that I don't share the sentiment, even if some might call it
>>>>> elitist. I'd settle for something achievable, though:
>>>>>
>>>>> 1) Only let people who have graduated high school vote, and
>>>>> 2) Ensure the high school curriculum once more educates
>>>>> graduates to at least the level that was expected back in the
>>>>> 1950s or 1960s.
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>> The problem is not people's IQ or their general education.  The problem
>>>> is how much people know about the issues they are voting on, and how
>>>> much of what they "know" is actually based on reality and objective
>>>> facts (to the extent that objectivity can be determined).
>>>>
>>>> I think you either have to say that politics should be left in the
>>>> hands
>>>> of trained professionals, with a system of specific education, tests,
>>>> accreditation, etc., such as you have for doctors and lawyers - or you
>>>> accept that you have a poor quality but fair system and let (almost)
>>>> everyone vote equally.  Anything in between and you'll still have
>>>> people
>>>> voting based on "gut feeling", habit, or something they read on
>>>> Facebook, and it won't even be fair or representative.
>>>>
>>>
>>> Yeah.
>>>
>>> One has a tradeoff.
>>>
>>> On one hand, one can have an autocracy / oligarchy / ...
>>>
>>> Or, on the other hand, one can have a democracy which reduces down to
>>> unfiltered public opinion. Whichever position can win over the masses
>>> better, wins.
>>>
>>>
>>> Arguably, a "representative democracy" is a reasonable compromise, as
>>> one can assume that the representatives have at least some level of
>>> merit to get into the position of being elected into a position of
>>> authority.
>>>
>>> Though, in the latter, one then has to distinguish between whether
>>> the votes determine the results directly, or whether the votes are
>>> treated more like public-opinion polls. People might get upset and
>>> consider their vote useless if it is regularly ignored.
>>>
>>>
>>> But, at the same time, if the representatives only act within the the
>>> bounds of the public vote, then it reduces to a similar situation to
>>> the direct democracy. In this case, the number of officials elected
>>> per a given area and population may come into play, ...
>>>
>>> Then one may end up with people in more densely populated areas
>>> complaining that they have less representation than those in less
>>> densely populated areas, since under this system, ...
>>>
>>> ...
>>>
>>>
>>> So, at least, in these senses, the current system in the US would
>>> appear to be reasonably sensibly designed.
>>>
>>> Though one major flaw with a system like this:
>>> It reduces down to two parties almost invariably;
>>
>> Lots of counter examples show this to be incorrect, e.g. Israel,
>> Germany, Italy.  You can easily end up with lots of parties, so the
>> government is invariably a coalition.
>>
>
> But, those countries, in their current forms, have governments which are
> a lot younger than the US.

True. Whether they, and countries like them, will move toward fewer
parties in the future remains to be seen.

> Also, none of those countries seems to use the same voting system as the
> US ("first past the post" + "winner takes all"). Which was the point I
> was getting at here. Namely, that a system like the one the US uses is
> prone to almost invariably collapse down to two parties.

I think a bigger difference is that they don't have the people vote for
the leader directly. They are Parliamentary systems where the people
vote for a local candidate of a particular party, and the parties, not
the people choose the leader. I do believe the local elections are
"first past the post".

One effect of this when discussions with single issue voters happens.
In the US, each party has views on many/most issues, and prior to the
elections, individual voters choose the party whose "bundle" of
positions most closely allies with their own. In their systems, a party
can be organized around primarily a single issue, and the "bundling"
happens in the negotiations to form the government which occurs after
the elections.

Of course, as with most such discussions, there are advantages and
disadvantages of both systems.

--
- Stephen Fuld
(e-mail address disguised to prevent spam)

On Saturday, October 9, 2021 at 10:14:53 AM UTC-6, John Dallman wrote:
> In article <5b31fbcb-20c9-4841...@googlegroups.com>,
> jsa...@ecn.ab.ca (Quadibloc) wrote:

> > The United States _chose_ to issue an ultimatum to Nazi
> > Germany to either declare war on Japan, or face war with the
> > United States; presumably, it could have fought with Japan alone,
> > and ignored events in Europe - or at least only insisted that
> > Germany break its alliance with Japan, and not aid it in any way
> > to avoid war with the U.S..

> Citation?

I'm pretty sure I read this somewhere. I could not find it quickly in
a Google search, however - it does not appear to have been in
Roosevelt's address to Congress on December 8 or his Fireside
Chat of December 9.

> The usually accepted view is that Germany (and Italy) declared
> war on the USA first, which responded by declaring war on them.

Yes, that is true. Germany declared war on the U.S. on December 11,
1941.

> They were
> not obliged to declare war on the USA by any treaties or other
> obligations to Japan.

Supposedly the Tripartite Pact would contradict that, but I won't
try to debate the details of that.

John Savard

On Saturday, October 9, 2021 at 11:59:48 PM UTC-6, Stephen Fuld wrote:
> On 10/9/2021 1:55 PM, BGB wrote:

> > So, at least, in these senses, the current system in the US would appear
> > to be reasonably sensibly designed.

> > Though one major flaw with a system like this:
> > It reduces down to two parties almost invariably;

> Lots of counter examples show this to be incorrect, e.g. Israel,
> Germany, Italy. You can easily end up with lots of parties, so the
> government is invariably a coalition.

How are _they_ counterexamples? Those aren't countries that
use "the current system in the US", they're countries that use
the Parliamentary system instead.

John Savard

According to Quadibloc <jsavard@ecn.ab.ca>:
>However, on December 7, 1941, it was _Japan_ that bombed Pearl
>Harbor. The United States _chose_ to issue an ultimatum to Nazi
>Germany to either declare war on Japan, or face war with the
>United States; ...

Sorry, but that is completely untrue. Germany had been pushing Japan
to expand the war in the Pacific, although they were surprised
that Japan attacked the U.S. when they did. The Tripartite pact
obliged Germany to come to Japan's aid if they were attacked, but
not if Japan attacked first, and Ribbentrop tried to talk
Hitler out of what was even at the time an obvious huge mistake.

The Wikipedia article on this item is pretty good:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_declaration_of_war_against_the_United_States

--
Regards,
John Levine, johnl@taugh.com, Primary Perpetrator of "The Internet for Dummies",
Please consider the environment before reading this e-mail. https://jl.ly

Stephen Fuld <sfuld@alumni.cmu.edu.invalid> wrote:
> On 10/8/2021 6:16 PM, antispam@math.uni.wroc.pl wrote:
> > Stephen Fuld <sfuld@alumni.cmu.edu.invalid> wrote:
> >> On 10/8/2021 1:56 AM, David Brown wrote:
> >>> On 08/10/2021 03:31, Branimir Maksimovic wrote:
> >>>> On 2021-10-08, MitchAlsup <MitchAlsup@aol.com> wrote:
> >>>>> <
> >>>>> Greed is what got all those industries into China !
> >>>>> What motivation will get us out ?
> >>>>
> >>>> Not needed. As greed drives China as well, there would
> >>>> be no interrest conflict except that China firms as
> >>>> China firms are not welocome in the west :P
> >>>
> >>> Don't mix up "the west" and "the USA". Most of the west is happy to
> >>> work with China, albeit carefully and with quiet mumblings about "human
> >>> rights" as long as the complaints won't affect business too much.
> >>>
> >>> The USA likes to define itself as "the good guy" in the world, and that
> >>> means that they always need a "bad guy" - an enemy worthy of them. The
> >>> real threat - military, economic, diplomatic, etc., is less important
> >>> than the image of threat they can conjure in people's minds.
> >>
> >> Or, to look at it the other way, Europe tends to ignore real threats
> >> until they get really bad, then rely on the USA to "bail them out". See
> >> Nazi Germany, or ask the many former communist block countries if the
> >> Soviet Union threat was real or only an image.
> >
> > If you look at actions threat was USA. In period of 1950-1990 USA
> > conducted several military interventions:
> >
> > Korean War
> > Gwatemala 1954 intervention
> > Bay of Pig invasion
> > Dominican 1965 intervention
> > Wietnam War (with bombing of neigbours)
> > Grenada 1983
> > Panama 1990
> >
> > In that period I know of 4 soviet intervention:
> >
> > Soviet air force in Korean War
> > intervention in Hungary 1956
> > intervention in Czechoslovakia 1968
> > Afganistan War
>
> If you want to say that the US is far from perfect; that we sometimes
> don't act in ways consistent with the image we have of ourselves and try
> to project to others, and that we make mistakes, then I certainly agree.
>
>
> > And while USA happlily threatens and attacks other countries to this
> > day,
>
> I disagree with the characterization of "happily". And I don't think we
> have attacked any country in the last say 15 years (Since Iraq, which
> was a bad blunder for us). And I think we really aren't threatening
> anyone today who isn't threatening us or our allies.

Hmm, bombing of Kadafy army in Libia, and rockects fired at Assad
does not count as attack? (One can argue that those were right,
but this does not affect if it was an attack or not). And killing
of Suleimani? Commesurate answer would be Iraninans killing
Mike Pompeo. I think that USA would consider such killing as
attack on USA. So by USian logic killing of Suleimani was attack
on Iran.

And now there is beauty of modern technology: drones. AFAIK US
drones regularly kill people in Yemen and several other countries.

> > soviet system collapsed after (and partially due to) Afganistan
> > War: important part of "soviet package" was preserving peace.
> > With Afganistan war this was broken and caused significant drop
> > in popular support for sovoer regime.
>
> Agreed.
>
>
> > Of couse, soviet block had plans to attack "west". But realistically,
> > west and USA in particular always had much stronger forces.
> > And reality of modern war is that army which refuses to attack
> > looses. Soviet block could hope that in case of war western
> > losses would be high enough to deter attack and that apparently
> > worked, we had peace in Europe for long time.
>
> I'm sorry, I don't understand what point you are making here. Clearly
> the deterrence of NATO prevented the Soviet Union from expanding their
> dominance in eastern Europe to western Europe.

You are procjeting USA attitude here. Soviet Union was not in business
of conquering other countris and turning them to communism. They
supported communist movements around the world, but that was for
local people to "build communism". And if any western Europe
country would turn to comminism, I do not think that this would
be Soviet Union dominance. Rather, such a county would be
important independent member of communist block, the same as China
had completely independent policy.

> > In Poland, where I live we do not have much sentiment for Soviet
> > Union, it was percevied as foreign force exploiting Poland and
> > forcing Soviet interest on Poland.
>
> OK.
>
>
> > But now we replaced this
> > by USA forcing their interest on Poland.
>
> In what way is the US forcing its interests on Poland? I confess to not
> a lot of knowledge about the subject. My impression, drawn mostly for
> western media, is that Poland, after a period of growth of democracy and
> its economy, is experiencing a period of more populist, anti democratic
> positions, and that both the US and western Europe are "concerned".
>
> You are obviously much closer and more knowledgeable about the
> situation, so please tell us what we should know.

If you look at politics, Poland had no reason to go to Iraq, except
for pleasing USA. More recently ruling coalition made a bad law,
penalizing critique of Poland. There were many voices against the
law, but ruling coalition presed forward. They made U-turn only
after intervention of US ambassador...

Concerning elections, ATM we seem to be in better position than
US. Nobody questions validity of elections, voting went smoothly
(without queues, etc). During voting everbody has to present
photo ID and this is not a problem because everybody has photo ID.
Prisoners have voting right and there are arrangements to that
they can vote. So no problem that somebody was illegally
allowed or rejected vote: all have voting rights.

We have legal mess: government tries to control courts.
That was partially blocked by EU, but where they can
government nominates judges on party line. And after
they packed constitutional court with their people we
have juggements like one which says that essentally all
abortions are unconstitutional, another one which says
that state law take precedence over EU law (this could
block appeals to EU courts and is intended to block
EU legal directives).

> > Of couse, dependence
> > on USA has some advantages compared to dependence on Soviet
> > Union.
>
> How is Poland dependent on the US?
1) Like large part of world: USA can put sanctions on given
entity. AFAICS ususaly this is applied transitvely: US
companies are not allowed to trade with banned entity,
US companies are not allowed to trade with companies trading
with banned entity etc. In interconnected world it means
that either (normal case) victim is left without help and
hit as hard as US wishes or (did not happen up to now)
the rest of world unites against US.
2) Poland has position in the middle of Europe, deemed
strategic by Russians. Due to Russian pressure we
either agree to Russian dominance or need strong
support. ATM US promises such support, but clearly
there is price: agreeing to US dominance.
3) During communist time most weapons for Polish army
was manufactured in Poland (some where original Polish
designs, majority was Russian constructions manufactured
under licence). When Poland left soviet block, we
were able to cover most needs of army by local production.
This is no longer the case. AFAIK we lost technical
ability to make old constructions and new one mostly
are imports (mainly from US).

> > but USA policy is not so nice as USA propaganda tries
> > to claim.
>
> I wouldn't doubt that, but I don't have much knowledge. What are we
> doing that isn't "nice"?
A lot. Simple example involving Poland is Stare Kiejkuty. CIA
had secret prison there and tortured prisoners there.
> >>> Currently,
> >>> China is the favourite enemy of the USA. I don't mean that China does
> >>> /not/ pose a threat, economic, diplomatic and military, to the USA or
> >>> other countries - merely that the USA exaggerates it for its own purposes.
> >>
> >> Or, conversely, Europe downplays it for its own purposes. It's a matter
> >> of perspective.
> >
> > I read recent article about increase of China naval forces. According
> > to ariticle China is a threat because now US Navy no longer is stronger
> > in sees surrounding China. In other words, USA can no longer
> > realistically threaten China with naval intervention on China shores,
> > so China is a threat to USA.
>
> I don't think anyone in the US is worried about naval intervention on
> China's shores, unless they attack Taiwan. On the other hand, there is
> evidence that Australia is worried about China's navy. Clearly China is
> building up its Navy. The question is why and what are they planning?

On Sunday, October 10, 2021 at 4:05:09 PM UTC-5, anti...@math.uni.wroc.pl wrote:
> Stephen Fuld <sf...@alumni.cmu.edu.invalid> wrote:
> > On 10/8/2021 6:16 PM, anti...@math.uni.wroc.pl wrote:
> > > Stephen Fuld <sf...@alumni.cmu.edu.invalid> wrote:
> > >> On 10/8/2021 1:56 AM, David Brown wrote:
> > >>> On 08/10/2021 03:31, Branimir Maksimovic wrote:
> > >>>> On 2021-10-08, MitchAlsup <Mitch...@aol.com> wrote:
> > >>>>> <
> > >>>>> Greed is what got all those industries into China !
> > >>>>> What motivation will get us out ?
> > >>>>
> > >>>> Not needed. As greed drives China as well, there would
> > >>>> be no interrest conflict except that China firms as
> > >>>> China firms are not welocome in the west :P
> > >>>
> > >>> Don't mix up "the west" and "the USA". Most of the west is happy to
> > >>> work with China, albeit carefully and with quiet mumblings about "human
> > >>> rights" as long as the complaints won't affect business too much.
> > >>>
> > >>> The USA likes to define itself as "the good guy" in the world, and that
> > >>> means that they always need a "bad guy" - an enemy worthy of them. The
> > >>> real threat - military, economic, diplomatic, etc., is less important
> > >>> than the image of threat they can conjure in people's minds.
> > >>
> > >> Or, to look at it the other way, Europe tends to ignore real threats
> > >> until they get really bad, then rely on the USA to "bail them out". See
> > >> Nazi Germany, or ask the many former communist block countries if the
> > >> Soviet Union threat was real or only an image.
> > >
> > > If you look at actions threat was USA. In period of 1950-1990 USA
> > > conducted several military interventions:
> > >
> > > Korean War
> > > Gwatemala 1954 intervention
> > > Bay of Pig invasion
> > > Dominican 1965 intervention
> > > Wietnam War (with bombing of neigbours)
> > > Grenada 1983
> > > Panama 1990
> > >
> > > In that period I know of 4 soviet intervention:
> > >
> > > Soviet air force in Korean War
> > > intervention in Hungary 1956
> > > intervention in Czechoslovakia 1968
> > > Afganistan War
> >
> > If you want to say that the US is far from perfect; that we sometimes
> > don't act in ways consistent with the image we have of ourselves and try
> > to project to others, and that we make mistakes, then I certainly agree.
> >
> >
> > > And while USA happlily threatens and attacks other countries to this
> > > day,
> >
> > I disagree with the characterization of "happily". And I don't think we
> > have attacked any country in the last say 15 years (Since Iraq, which
> > was a bad blunder for us). And I think we really aren't threatening
> > anyone today who isn't threatening us or our allies.
>
> Hmm, bombing of Kadafy army in Libia, and rockects fired at Assad
> does not count as attack? (One can argue that those were right,
> but this does not affect if it was an attack or not). And killing
> of Suleimani? Commesurate answer would be Iraninans killing
> Mike Pompeo. I think that USA would consider such killing as
> attack on USA. So by USian logic killing of Suleimani was attack
> on Iran.
<
It was !
>
> And now there is beauty of modern technology: drones. AFAIK US
> drones regularly kill people in Yemen and several other countries.
>
> > > soviet system collapsed after (and partially due to) Afganistan
> > > War: important part of "soviet package" was preserving peace.
> > > With Afganistan war this was broken and caused significant drop
> > > in popular support for sovoer regime.
> >
> > Agreed.
> >
> >
> > > Of couse, soviet block had plans to attack "west". But realistically,
> > > west and USA in particular always had much stronger forces.
> > > And reality of modern war is that army which refuses to attack
> > > looses. Soviet block could hope that in case of war western
> > > losses would be high enough to deter attack and that apparently
> > > worked, we had peace in Europe for long time.
> >
> > I'm sorry, I don't understand what point you are making here. Clearly
> > the deterrence of NATO prevented the Soviet Union from expanding their
> > dominance in eastern Europe to western Europe.
<
A long time ago.
>
> You are procjeting USA attitude here. Soviet Union was not in business
> of conquering other countris and turning them to communism. They
> supported communist movements around the world, but that was for
> local people to "build communism". And if any western Europe
> country would turn to comminism, I do not think that this would
> be Soviet Union dominance. Rather, such a county would be
> important independent member of communist block, the same as China
> had completely independent policy.
>
> > > In Poland, where I live we do not have much sentiment for Soviet
> > > Union, it was percevied as foreign force exploiting Poland and
> > > forcing Soviet interest on Poland.
> >
> > OK.
> >
> >
> > > But now we replaced this
> > > by USA forcing their interest on Poland.
> >
> > In what way is the US forcing its interests on Poland? I confess to not
> > a lot of knowledge about the subject. My impression, drawn mostly for
> > western media, is that Poland, after a period of growth of democracy and
> > its economy, is experiencing a period of more populist, anti democratic
> > positions, and that both the US and western Europe are "concerned".
> >
> > You are obviously much closer and more knowledgeable about the
> > situation, so please tell us what we should know.
>
> If you look at politics, Poland had no reason to go to Iraq, except
> for pleasing USA. More recently ruling coalition made a bad law,
> penalizing critique of Poland. There were many voices against the
<
This is a good place to point out the vast difference between a
critique and a criticism. One can be bad or good, the other is universally
bad from at least one side.
<
> law, but ruling coalition presed forward. They made U-turn only
> after intervention of US ambassador...
>
> Concerning elections, ATM we seem to be in better position than
> US. Nobody questions validity of elections, voting went smoothly
> (without queues, etc). During voting everbody has to present
> photo ID and this is not a problem because everybody has photo ID.
> Prisoners have voting right and there are arrangements to that
> they can vote. So no problem that somebody was illegally
> allowed or rejected vote: all have voting rights.
<
Our voting problems over here are completely artificial, and up
until the previous election, nobody EVER questioned the result
of the result.
<
However, both parties are losing membership, and there are
more people not associated with either party that are in either
party {25%-40%-25%:: roughly}. One party is attempting to
maintain control by Gerrymandering voting districts. I have 4
rent houses within 4 miles of each other. They are in 4 different
voting districts (state senate) !?!?!
<
Much of the stupidity of American politics could be solved by
having a viable 3rd party. One side says:: blah, the other retorts
with:: "oh yeah", the 3rd could simply stand up and say "both
are poor directions for the country to go."
>
> We have legal mess: government tries to control courts.
> That was partially blocked by EU, but where they can
> government nominates judges on party line. And after
> they packed constitutional court with their people we
> have juggements like one which says that essentally all
> abortions are unconstitutional, another one which says
> that state law take precedence over EU law (this could
> block appeals to EU courts and is intended to block
> EU legal directives).
>
> > > Of couse, dependence
> > > on USA has some advantages compared to dependence on Soviet
> > > Union.
> >
> > How is Poland dependent on the US?
>
> 1) Like large part of world: USA can put sanctions on given
> entity. AFAICS ususaly this is applied transitvely: US
> companies are not allowed to trade with banned entity,
> US companies are not allowed to trade with companies trading
> with banned entity etc. In interconnected world it means
> that either (normal case) victim is left without help and
> hit as hard as US wishes or (did not happen up to now)
> the rest of world unites against US.
> 2) Poland has position in the middle of Europe, deemed
> strategic by Russians. Due to Russian pressure we
> either agree to Russian dominance or need strong
> support. ATM US promises such support, but clearly
> there is price: agreeing to US dominance.
> 3) During communist time most weapons for Polish army
> was manufactured in Poland (some where original Polish
> designs, majority was Russian constructions manufactured
> under licence). When Poland left soviet block, we
> were able to cover most needs of army by local production.
> This is no longer the case. AFAIK we lost technical
> ability to make old constructions and new one mostly
> are imports (mainly from US).
>
> > > but USA policy is not so nice as USA propaganda tries
> > > to claim.
> >
> > I wouldn't doubt that, but I don't have much knowledge. What are we
> > doing that isn't "nice"?
>
> A lot. Simple example involving Poland is Stare Kiejkuty. CIA
> had secret prison there and tortured prisoners there.
>
> > >>> Currently,
> > >>> China is the favourite enemy of the USA. I don't mean that China does
> > >>> /not/ pose a threat, economic, diplomatic and military, to the USA or
> > >>> other countries - merely that the USA exaggerates it for its own purposes.
> > >>
> > >> Or, conversely, Europe downplays it for its own purposes. It's a matter
> > >> of perspective.
> > >
> > > I read recent article about increase of China naval forces. According
> > > to ariticle China is a threat because now US Navy no longer is stronger
> > > in sees surrounding China. In other words, USA can no longer
> > > realistically threaten China with naval intervention on China shores,
> > > so China is a threat to USA.
> >
> > I don't think anyone in the US is worried about naval intervention on
> > China's shores, unless they attack Taiwan. On the other hand, there is
> > evidence that Australia is worried about China's navy. Clearly China is
> > building up its Navy. The question is why and what are they planning?
>
> Great Britain and later US have tradition on navel blockades:
> they send navy to block or limit trade they do no like. Clearly
> China has legitimate interest in protecting its trade (which is
> mostly via see). Concerning Taiwan, it is clearly artificially
> (by extrnal force) separated from China. Regardless of political
> system on Taiwan China has legitimate interest in ensuring
> that Taiwan is not used as military base against China.
<
Sure but the rest of the world has legitimate interests in keeping
the semiconductor output of Taiwan from falling into the hands
of the Chinese. {Or we have to rebuild our own semiconductor
industry--which is not a bad idea, BTW}
>
> Concerning Australia, I do not know what their worry is.
>
> > BTW, I am aware that this is all very OT for comp.arch. I am willing to
> > pursue it further, (I enjoy learning other's perspectives.) but if
> > others object, I understand and will stop.
>
> The same here. Normaly I avoid political topics, but this
> time I gave up to temptation. Let me say that running joke
> in communist Poland was "In America they are beating Negros"
> (sorry for non-PC word, but I am trying to be faithfull to
> original wording). Meaning was that communist propaganda
> was taking about western problems, but was silent about
> problems that affected people in Poland. However, from
> distance I can see that a lot of that propaganda were
> true. And some problems that seemed abstract/impossible
> came or are coming to Poland after fall of communism.
> US propaganda and many folks from US say "we are right".
> Some people outside find a lot of wrong in US actions.
> I could write more, but enough for today.
>
> --
> Waldek Hebisch

On 10/10/2021 12:02 PM, Quadibloc wrote:
> On Saturday, October 9, 2021 at 11:59:48 PM UTC-6, Stephen Fuld wrote:
>> On 10/9/2021 1:55 PM, BGB wrote:
>
>>> So, at least, in these senses, the current system in the US would appear
>>> to be reasonably sensibly designed.
>
>>> Though one major flaw with a system like this:
>>> It reduces down to two parties almost invariably;
>
>> Lots of counter examples show this to be incorrect, e.g. Israel,
>> Germany, Italy. You can easily end up with lots of parties, so the
>> government is invariably a coalition.
>
> How are _they_ counterexamples? Those aren't countries that
> use "the current system in the US", they're countries that use
> the Parliamentary system instead.

My point was responding to the earlier part of BGB's post (that you
snipped) about "this" being a "representative democracy"

Parliamentary and Presidential are two different ways of implementing
representative democracy.

--
- Stephen Fuld
(e-mail address disguised to prevent spam)

On Sunday, October 10, 2021 at 6:13:45 PM UTC-5, Stephen Fuld wrote:
> On 10/10/2021 12:02 PM, Quadibloc wrote:
> > On Saturday, October 9, 2021 at 11:59:48 PM UTC-6, Stephen Fuld wrote:
> >> On 10/9/2021 1:55 PM, BGB wrote:
> >
> >>> So, at least, in these senses, the current system in the US would appear
> >>> to be reasonably sensibly designed.
> >
> >>> Though one major flaw with a system like this:
> >>> It reduces down to two parties almost invariably;
> >
> >> Lots of counter examples show this to be incorrect, e.g. Israel,
> >> Germany, Italy. You can easily end up with lots of parties, so the
> >> government is invariably a coalition.
> >
> > How are _they_ counterexamples? Those aren't countries that
> > use "the current system in the US", they're countries that use
> > the Parliamentary system instead.
<
> My point was responding to the earlier part of BGB's post (that you
> snipped) about "this" being a "representative democracy"
<
As I stated above:: for the entirely of my ability to vote for or against
parties, people, and policies, not once have I been presented with
something to vote on that in any way represents my view on that thing.
<
I ask you:: In what way am I being "represented" ?
>
> Parliamentary and Presidential are two different ways of implementing
> representative democracy.
<
It is only representational if something in your life you get to vote on
something that represents your feelings about that subject.
<
Otherwise it is not much more than a coin flip:: and benevolent dictator
would likely generate a better outcome.
> --
> - Stephen Fuld
> (e-mail address disguised to prevent spam)

Stephen Fuld <sfuld@alumni.cmu.edu.invalid> wrote:
> On 10/10/2021 12:02 AM, BGB wrote:
>
> > Also, none of those countries seems to use the same voting system as the
> > US ("first past the post" + "winner takes all"). Which was the point I
> > was getting at here. Namely, that a system like the one the US uses is
> > prone to almost invariably collapse down to two parties.
>
> I think a bigger difference is that they don't have the people vote for
> the leader directly. They are Parliamentary systems where the people
> vote for a local candidate of a particular party, and the parties, not
> the people choose the leader. I do believe the local elections are
> "first past the post".

AFAIK most countries use "proportional representation". How does
it work? In Poland in 2015 we had 41 voting districts and 460
places in parlament. That is on average sligthtly more than 11
members of parlament per districts. Each candidate represented
some party. There were voting thresholds: party which get less
than 5% of votes were disqualified. Parties could form
coalition and then coalition needed at least 8% of votes.
In each district places were distributed using D'Hooft rule.
Basically, there is "price" (number of votes) for place. Each
party gets as many places as its votes allow. Within party candidates
are sorted according to number of votes they obtained
and places available to party are allocated starting from
higest scoring candidate. Normally description of this
procedure is much more complicated, but effect is that
"price" is set at level so that all parties together get
exactly places allocated to disctrict.

District of size 11 has strong bias against smaller parties,
normaly to get any place in a district party needs of order
9% votes or more, which is more than national threshold.
Due to regional variation party that gets say 5.1% of votes
in the country ususaly gets some place in parlament, but
order of magnitude less than 5%.

AFAICS main advantage of such system is that it removes most
incentives to gerrymandering: by gerrymandering party can
get at most 1 place per district and would need extremally
accurate estimate of voting pattern for any gain.

My impressing is that original idea of D'Hooft rule was
to apply it in scale of country, then it would produce
reasonably accurate representation of voter preferences
to parties. As above, with threshold and districts
of order of 15% of voters are without representation and
next 10% gets tiny representation. OTOH big parties
end up with higher proportion of places than votes.

Disadvantages are that party system with threshold means
that there are no independent candidates. Also,
candidates are strongly connected to party and only
weakly to voters in their district: personally unpopular
candidate has basically warranted place in parlament
when allocated to district where party is strong and
party does not provide enough alternative candidates.
On voter side, D'Hooft rule means that voter looks
more at party membership and less at personal qualites
of candidate.

Anyway, this system is quite different than "first past
the post".

As an extra thing, when there is single position (say
president or city mayor) normal system is two phase
one. In first phase there may be many candidates,
it one gets majority then he/she is declared a winner.
Otherwise there is second phase between two highest
scoring candidates.

BTW: There were various proposals to improve representation
of minority views. Thinking about this I came to
scheme that may be new which I call "random voting".
It should work as follows: first there is normal
voting and votes are counted. Then candidate is
chosen randomly, with probablity proportional to
received number of votes. In this scheme expected
number of places is exactly proportional to number
of votes. In scale of country random variation
would create some deviation from proportionality,
but smaller than most existing schemes. Also,
this scheme removes most incentives for "tactical
voting": voting from somebody different than most
preffered candidate has no advantages. Of course
from point of view of ruling class this is very
bad: results of election would represent views
of population and argument of sort "most voters
support our position" in many cases would be
shown false.

--
Waldek Hebisch

> It is only representational if something in your life you get to vote on
> something that represents your feelings about that subject.
>
> Otherwise it is not much more than a coin flip:: and benevolent dictator
> would likely generate a better outcome.

In my experience, the most important aspect is that the government
shouldn't suck and for that it needs to satisfy two criteria:

- It shouldn't be too corrupt.
- It should avoid groupthink.

Both of those tend to be naturally satisfied by spreading the power
among enough people who don't trust each other yet have to agree with
each other to make decisions.

I.e. you want to start with a scheme which avoids concentration of power
in the hands of a single (or very few) party and which ensures some
regular churn.

Maybe you won't get great bold decision making from that, but you'll
avoid most of the big blunders.
For that reason, I think such a governing system would deserve the name
"conservative" and it's a kind of conservative I could support.

Stefan

PS: No, I don't think such a system would work well to handle climate
change :-(

Stefan Monnier <monnier@iro.umontreal.ca> schrieb:
>> It is only representational if something in your life you get to vote on
>> something that represents your feelings about that subject.
>>
>> Otherwise it is not much more than a coin flip:: and benevolent dictator
>> would likely generate a better outcome.
>
> In my experience, the most important aspect is that the government
> shouldn't suck and for that it needs to satisfy two criteria:
>
> - It shouldn't be too corrupt.
> - It should avoid groupthink.

- It should not be able to change major things easily.

antispam@math.uni.wroc.pl wrote:
> Stephen Fuld <sfuld@alumni.cmu.edu.invalid> wrote:
>> On 10/10/2021 12:02 AM, BGB wrote:
>>
>>> Also, none of those countries seems to use the same voting system as the
>>> US ("first past the post" + "winner takes all"). Which was the point I
>>> was getting at here. Namely, that a system like the one the US uses is
>>> prone to almost invariably collapse down to two parties.
>>
>> I think a bigger difference is that they don't have the people vote for
>> the leader directly. They are Parliamentary systems where the people
>> vote for a local candidate of a particular party, and the parties, not
>> the people choose the leader. I do believe the local elections are
>> "first past the post".
>
> AFAIK most countries use "proportional representation". How does
> it work? In Poland in 2015 we had 41 voting districts and 460
> places in parlament. That is on average sligthtly more than 11
> members of parlament per districts. Each candidate represented
> some party. There were voting thresholds: party which get less
> than 5% of votes were disqualified. Parties could form
> coalition and then coalition needed at least 8% of votes.
> In each district places were distributed using D'Hooft rule.
> Basically, there is "price" (number of votes) for place. Each
> party gets as many places as its votes allow. Within party candidates
> are sorted according to number of votes they obtained
> and places available to party are allocated starting from
> higest scoring candidate. Normally description of this
> procedure is much more complicated, but effect is that
> "price" is set at level so that all parties together get
> exactly places allocated to disctrict.

Norway is similar but not exactly equal. We just had a nation-wide
election that resulted in a new coalition taking over this week.

The election system is based on the old 19-county division of the
country and 169 delegates to the parliament: 150 of them are distributed
to the districts, using the "each person gets one vote, while each
square km gets a bit more than one vote" in order to make sure that
rural, lower population districts gets a stronger representation.

Within each district the representatives are distributed proportionally
to the number of (human) votes.

At the end of this process each party which have received at least 4% of
the total vote count takes part in the final proportionality equalizer,
where 19 additional representatives, one from each district, is handed
out so as to make the total representation level as close to
proportional as possible. In effect this means that a party which gets
3.8% can end up with one or two representatives, while hitting 4.2% gets
them six or seven.

The math used for that final stage usually results in some candidates
getting in or not with hair-thin margins, since the actual person
selected depends both on the local district vote count and the total
vote counts for each party.

The nicest part is that today the exiting cabinet is delivering the
budget for next year, while the new prime minister and cabinet takes
over the responsibility for it later this week. :-)

Terje

--
- <Terje.Mathisen at tmsw.no>
"almost all programming can be viewed as an exercise in caching"

Thomas Koenig wrote:
> Stefan Monnier <monnier@iro.umontreal.ca> schrieb:
>>> It is only representational if something in your life you get to vote on
>>> something that represents your feelings about that subject.
>>>
>>> Otherwise it is not much more than a coin flip:: and benevolent dictator
>>> would likely generate a better outcome.
>>
>> In my experience, the most important aspect is that the government
>> shouldn't suck and for that it needs to satisfy two criteria:
>>
>> - It shouldn't be too corrupt.
>> - It should avoid groupthink.
>
> - It should not be able to change major things easily.
>
Which is why you require a 2/3 majority vote in two separate election
terms, i.e. with 4+ years between them.

This is also the reason why several countries have given up on gradual
changes to their main laws and instead decided to start from scratch,
even if that isn't really legal according to the existing rules.

Terje

--
- <Terje.Mathisen at tmsw.no>
"almost all programming can be viewed as an exercise in caching"

On 10/10/21 15:55, Stephen Fuld wrote:
> On 10/10/2021 5:19 AM, Tom Gardner wrote:
>> On 09/10/21 16:02, Stephen Fuld wrote:
>>> I certainly agree with that.  And, as I said elsewhere, we are far from
>>> perfect.  But I don't want to lose sight of the fact that e.g. western Europe
>>> with its US "influence", was far better off than eastern Europe with its
>>> Soviet "influence".  And just ask the people of Hong Kong about Chinese
>>> "influence". :-(
>>
>> Yes indeed.
>>
>> But it is equally keeping sight of the fact that the USA wasn't
>> "in Europe" for solely altruistic reasons.
>>
>> Europe gave the US an unsinkable aircraft carrier, mobile missile
>> sites, and listening posts, a few hours/days to mobilise while
>> the Soviets were rolling across Europe, and markets for their
>> trade goods.
>
> Of course, that is true.  The US benefited as well as the western European
> countries.  But contrast that with eastern Europe, where the Soviet Union
> benefited, but the countries no so much. :-(

As someone that went through the E/W Germany borders 6 times
in the 1970 (and again in Nov 89 less than a week after the
fall!), the differences were /very/ apparent :)

I also knew someone that trotted around the USSR determining
reception of the BBC radio, and he confirmed all the propaganda
stories we were brought up on.

On 2021-10-08 17:43, MitchAlsup wrote:
> On Thursday, October 7, 2021 at 11:33:30 PM UTC-5, Quadibloc wrote:
>> On Thursday, October 7, 2021 at 6:21:49 PM UTC-6, MitchAlsup wrote:
>>
>>> Has anyone given a thought to where all the electricity is going to
>>> come from once we transition completely away from carbon based
>>> energy sources (excepting for airplanes) and dump all those EV cars
>>> onto the grid ??
>> Yes. It is claimed that new energy storage technologies will make it
>> possible to meet our power needs from wind and solar.
> <
> So, what has grown to 2%-5% will be able to run at 130% in 20 years !?!
> (130% provides for the growth in energy consumption as population grows
> and as industries consume more energy.)

Not sure if it can reach 130% in 20 years, but we can surely do better.

Solar is actually quite cheap, and a very safe investment (near zero
maintenance costs and guaranteed power delivery for a few decades). The
only real problem w.r.t. investment in solar is that the price of panels
are dropping so fast ;-) OTOH that means that you can just keep ramping
up at a faster pace...

A simple trick that can be done with solar (that can't really be done
with any other energy source) is to subsidize solar panels for homes.
This was done in Germany, and they're up at 10% solar (that's excluding
wind, which is at some 25%).

>>
>> Personally, though, I think that if we _really_ want to stop global
>> warming, we need to have a solution that's acceptable to... more
>> conservative Americans. (Including some who still wouldn't vote
>> for Trump.)
> <
> If no more carbon was emitted into the atmosphere starting tomorrow,
> the earth will continue to warm through 2300 !! probably close to 5ºC.
> {Science news a few weeks ago}

Yep. We're pretty much screwed. Stopping global warming is not going to
happen (but it does not hurt to slow it down to give people and cities a
chance to adapt to new water levels etc).

/Marcus