
Facebook to Give Less Direct Support to Trump in 2020 Campaign - tareqak
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-09-20/facebook-to-give-less-direct-support-to-trump-in-2020-campaign
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craftyguy
There's a 'rule' that requires broadcast TV and radio to give equal airtime to
candidates[0], but no such thing exists for whatever facebook is (social media
news, maybe? _shrug_ ).

If congress folks actually cared, rather than ask 'tough questions' and put on
'we care' theater, they could work to make this rule a law and extend it to
cover whatever category facebook would fall under. But here we are, with all
theater and no substance.

0\. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equal-
time_rule](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equal-time_rule)

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topmonk
I'd like to agree with you here, but government moves slowly. Things might get
done in the future, if our representatives are pushed hard enough. You can't
expect a "move fast and break things" attitude because that will get you
kicked out of office really quickly.

Democratic style governance is pretty pathetic, but it seems to be better than
all the others so far.

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ergothus
> Democratic style governance is pretty pathetic, but it seems to be better
> than all the others so far.

Not to detract from your comment, which is all accurate, but this statement is
a pet peeve of mine: the same can be said of every other previous "best system
so far"

Just because we dont currently know a preferable alternative does not mean we
should give up on criticism of the flaws of what we have, nor should we just
assume that nothing will ever be better. We shouldn't ignore the good of what
we have, nor become crippled by anxiety, but surely there is a middle ground
between that and apathetic resignation.

(Steps off soapbox)

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Fjolsvith
Okay, so I'll bite. What's going to be a better form of government?

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ergothus
Do you always assume something is the best there can be until a new better is
created? I'm guessing not.

I don't have a solution, I'm simply saying we should expect that things CAN
improve instead of waving off all complaints. Sure, many of those complaints
we CAN'T fix without an alternative, and we do know that known alternatives
are generally worse, but there's a difference between "That is a legitimate
problem, but we don't know how to fix it yet" and "stop complaining because
there is no hope".

Why does it matter? Because if we aren't looking for change, we're unlikely to
find it. For example, here are few things we do know:

* first past the post voting is one of the worst options in a democracy, regardless of your desired outcome. Some systems are better if you want compromise candidates, some systems are better if you want the most supported candidates, some are better if you want to avoid terribly unpopular candidates, but FPTP is subpar across the board.

* an American-style system can invite crisis where two sides (Prez and Congress) are opposed...and both sides are directly (ish) elected by the people, whereas a Parliament system does not.

* a representative democracy does not give decision power to people, but instead defines the boundaries within which the govt operates. Within those boundaries lots of unpopular decisions will be made, but so long as the boundaries are not violated, those decisions will still happen (and largely without consequence, though that's far harder to be decisive about).

We know these things because people have cared to notice, people have bothered
to consider "does it have to be this way?" Even if the answer for now is
"Unless we want things worse", that should be the answer _for now_, not the
final answer.

