

Petition to Get Rid of Petitions.WhiteHouse.Gov - atuladhar
https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/get-rid-petitionswhitehousegov/DLBvj7Vh

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caseysoftware
Bread & Circuses.

You've finally realized this is yet another circus, what are you going to do
differently?

(And remember, this was from the hope & change guy in favor of transparency
who now "personally signs off" (his words) on drone strikes on American
citizens, extended & expanded the PATRIOT Act, and made indefinite detention
an actual law.)

~~~
mitchi
I remember Bill Maher being very critic of Obama, then completely switching
into full Democrats-must-win mode because the Republicains were way worse =/

~~~
joshAg
Is it not possible to realize the lesser of two evils while still calling out
the lesser evil on its faults?

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electic
I agree. I can't recount one serious thing that has come out of this petitions
site. The only thing concrete to come out of this site is that they are not
going to build a Death Star. Great. I can't believe they wasted money to
answer that question. That being said, the Death Star question showed everyone
that this site is a joke and likely won't result in any useful change.

~~~
fusiongyro
I agree, though I'm not especially fired up about the death star question. If
the site were taken more seriously it would have been nice to see a lighter
side. Instead that seems to be the only side.

One sad thing is that this is one of the few petitions I've seen that actually
should be addressed to the White House.

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IvyMike
I think I'm a cranky old man, because here's how I read most of the complaints
about this website: "I care a lot about our democracy, but not enough to leave
the house, do anything, or spend any money. Why doesn't anyone respect my
opinion?"

There are a lot of ways to get involved in our democracy, but most of them are
harder than tweeting.

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generalseven
Clever, despite the flippant title, they make a point:

"It is clear that this annoying and utterly useless website is designed to
nothing more than channel political activism into a cul-de-sac, and therefore
we request you stop this irritating sideshow and shut down
petitions.whitehouse.gov."

I misread the UI and thought they had a lot more signatures.

Another somewhat similar petition cleared the 25,000 sig threshold in October.
Here is what the White House said:

[https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/response/were-listening-
ser...](https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/response/were-listening-seriously)

~~~
jcoder
I think you misread the UI. It currently has ~270 signatures, and needs the
remaining 99730 to reach the threshold.

~~~
generalseven
Yes, I originally misread it, and edited my reply.

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ekianjo
Petitioning to get answers from your government on all kinds of subjects is a
ridiculous idea in the first place. It assumes that the Government is like
your Mom or Dad and should have an answer to anything as long as enough of the
kids ask the same thing. It is a sign that people are willing to delegate
their responsibility to someone else making decisions (or answers, if you
prefer, but that is the very same thing in the end) for them.

You do not need this. This is garbage site to entertain people in thinking
they have a say in Power, while they clearly do not.

~~~
Firehed
> It is a sign that people are willing to delegate their responsibility to
> someone else making decisions (or answers, if you prefer, but that is the
> very same thing in the end) for them.

This is basically the entire premise behind a representative democracy, is it
not?

~~~
ekianjo
Yes, and I do not, personally, condone the current state of representation.
There are several ways on how to manage decision-making in large communities
and this is not the only one possible, especially in the 21st century with the
communication tools we now possess. If the internet changes the way we shop,
we travel, we connect with our friends, the way we entertain ourselves, why do
we keep doing politics the same 18th century way ? (rhetorical question)

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anon987
You know which site I check when I want to read about politics?

Hacker News.

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benatkin
I didn't think anyone could come up with a "petition" on this site that I
would sign. I am delighted to be proved wrong.

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jrockway
This inspired me to finally sign up and read some of the other popular
petitions. I am now vehemently in favor of this one.

(I like the one that wants to repeal the Bill of Rights so that you can't make
fun of Moses, Mohammed, or Jesus. What? Who let these people onto the Internet
anyway?)

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zoowar
The flaw of democracy is that the people can vote to end democracy.

~~~
hugh4life
No, the flaw of democracy is that people can't vote to end democracy.

~~~
jlgreco
Or perhaps, after the initial generation, nobody in the democracy voted to
have democracy in the first place. We are slaves to the whims of men long
dead.

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greghinch
Oh come on, the whole thing was worth it for that Death Star petition
response.

;)

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duaneb
Is this really necessary for Hacker News to stoop to this level (politics)?
Come on. The only relation the petitions site has to Hacker News is that it's
on the internet. And, frankly, it's a childish gesture.

We can do better than this.

~~~
mxxx
to be fair, of all the different petition.whitehouse.gov links that have
popped up in the past couple of weeks, this is the only one i care about.

~~~
duaneb
This I can understand.

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gonzo
so.. meta

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vincefutr23
yes

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huhsamovar
I should start a petition to end petition posts petitioning to end petitions.

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huhsamovar
Wow. Just, wow.

