This is awesome. Encouraging potential voters to engage, understand, and participate in democracy is a good thing. Once registered, hopefully they will stay registered and participate for the rest of their lives.
Besides the big name top of the ballot Presidential election there are many down ballot elections to consider. There are house elections, senate elections (in some states), local elections, as well as propositions, etc.
With the wall-to-wall coverage of the Presidential election, it is easy to forget that the wheels of our democratic American system turn at multiple levels.
E.g.: Your local school board matters. Your judges (if elected where you live) matter.
Here are two summaries of California's propositions:
Not a criticism! Replace benefitting party as you wish.
It is interesting when these initiatives present themselves as non-partisan. If you target a demographic that polling suggests will go for your preferred party, plough tons of money to encourage them to vote, can it truly be described as non-partisan?
edit: And if so, should they be obligated to disclose their preference and intention?
First it encourages young people to vote. This is important because young people will be the most affected by policies enacted by the next president. This part is non-partisan, because it forces both political parties to take young people more seriously as a voting block.
Second it's clearly against Trump, because Trump's base consists of older white people with racial anxiety/anger. Young people lean democrat, but they don't get out to vote.
Arguably, YC leadership is overbalanced towards Trump [1].
As someone who has a preference, I wholeheartedly support more enfranchisement regardless of demographic or party. That's a race to the top, not the bottom.
> Second it's clearly against Trump, because Trump's base consists of older white people with racial anxiety/anger. Young people lean democrat, but they don't get out to vote.
If you honestly believe this, you are very out of touch with reality.
Young voters hate both major party candidates almost equally.
Yeah, 18-34 year olds are a lot more willing to support Clinton than Trump, and also the age group with the most Clinton supporters and the least Trump supporters. It's easy to get a different impression from the mainstream press sometimes because they're pissed off that young people aren't even more overwhelmingly supportive of Clinton and some of them are supporting third parties instead. They came to believe that young people's anti-Republican lean would mean automatic Democrat victory in future and now they're angry that it hasn't come to pass.
Recent polls (2014) say young people are strongly leaning democrat. This may not match your experience, but then again, I don't believe you can understand a country by extrapolating from your social circle.
It is clear whom they don't want them to vote but what's wrong in that. They are not forcing anyone - just enabling them. They want them not to sit this one out as this could make them regret for not voting when there was a chance.
This is a terrific initiative. Especially the part where you can take a picture of your driver's license and get everything taken care of. Everybody with a little bit of startup experience knows that removing signup friction makes a huge difference and yet voting in the US is way more complicated than it needs to be. This isn't an accident: legislators know low turnout doesn't affect all demographics equally. So I support projects like these that get people to vote.
> No one able to vote in the US should be sitting this one out
I disagree. People who haven't taken the time to thoroughly research the candidates should not be encouraged to blindly push a button, especially this year. Most of them will probably be persuaded by fear mongering or partisan mud-slinging.
It doesn't take a lot of research to choose when one candidate is comically unqualified.
The people voting is the entire point of democracy. Smart people and dumb people. Policy wonks and random button pushers. It doesn't matter, everybody gets one vote. That way whatever the outcome is, it reflects the will of the people. To oppose this is to oppose democracy itself.
Unfortunately, the comically unqualified candidate is up against an embarrassing demonstration of what exactly "qualifies" someone to be President in the US these days. Which mostly seems to involve support from Fortune 100 CEOs, involvement in ill-conceived military interventions abroad, and sounding exactly like a Republican whilst running on a Democrat ticket. Oh, and lots of friends in the press. Not to mention the kind of connections and sharp political skills that let her blatantly race-bait against Obama in '08, publicly accuse people who pointed this out of being the real racists, wrangle the Senator of State position out of him afterwards, and then pretend the whole thing never happened.
There is no doubt that Hillary Clinton is eminently skilled and effective at being a politician. That's the problem.
Yes, there is some truth to that. When Obama and Bush got elected they were very inexperienced (comparatively speaking) and therefore also less scuffed up by a life in politics.
She is literally the most qualified presidential candidate in a generation. She has the bipartisan support of all five living presidents today. That's unheard of. And she's running against a con man who scams his suppliers, scams students with his fake university, and who is utterly ignorant of foreign policy.
>>She has the bipartisan support of all five living presidents today. That's unheard of. And she's running against a con man
She has the bipartisan support of all five living presidents because she is running against a con man who has either directly insulted and indirectly embarrassed those presidents and their families.
I see this claim a lot, but I really don't get it. What is it that makes Hillary "comically unqualified"? She might not be your favorite, but unqualified seems like an exaggeration. Her opponent does seem unqualified (and dangerous). I'm not an American, so I might not follow it as close as you.
"Comically" is certainly an exaggeration. But her corruption, a resume lighter than GWB's, and dishonesty that makes other politicians blush (some with envy, others with shame), etc. make her qualifications at best questionable.
Neither candidate would be a candidate if we had a functioning democracy.
he didn't oppose the right to vote; he said not everyone should vote. and please, just because you think we'd never have heard of hillary if her husband hadn't been president does NOT make her "comically unqualified". let's leave the politics to the sensationalist 24/7 "news" machine, mkay?
I hate the current voting system. The mess of voting for a district, which votes for a state, which votes for an electoral college, which votes for a president is ridiculous and leads to only a tiny number of votes actually having the chance to determine the outcome of the election.
I worry that by voting, I give whoever wins a stronger appearance of a mandate. I would prefer not to give them this mandate.
This is why some people believe there should be a (nominal) cost to voting. If you have to pay to vote, you'll be much more motivated to research the candidates and issues. It will also be much more expensive for campaigns to "buy" unreliable voting blocs, a.k.a. "get-out-the-vote" targets.
"Some people" who support poll taxes have historically been Southern racists trying to prevent African Americans from voting. In fact, people were so disgusted with the idea that they passed a Constitutional amendment to prevent poll taxes from existing. I doubt we'll ever see them again (for good reason), the text in the Constitution is pretty straight-forward:
> The right of citizens of the United States to vote in any primary or other election for President or Vice President, for electors for President or Vice President, or for Senator or Representative in Congress, shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or any State by reason of failure to pay any poll tax or other tax.
The Democratic party targeting university students, and the Republican party trying voter-suppression efforts aimed at students (forbidding voting at the university where one lives, requiring photo IDs & banning college IDs as photo IDs) are nothing new.
I'm sorry but the guy said it is definitely a partisan endeavor, which I don't think it is. It is merely an effort to educate young voters for the need to register to vote. This demographic has been historically known to have a low voter turnout with only 46% of eligible voters[1] having voted in 2012 election.
Never wished I could downvote before today. Not even the (ridiculous) content of the post, so much as.. this is your contribution to the discussion? Spare us.
My point was moreso that in the US at least there is a pronounced difference in political affiliation based on age. Notably, that is an old quote, it just seems interesting it holds up.
It's saying that a 20-year old conservative is necessarily heartless, and a 50-year old liberal is necessarily stupid. I don't see how either of these follows; I know plenty of young conservatives who care deeply about other people, and old liberals who are very smart.
Not a lawyer, but as far as I know, the relevant statute would be 18 USC 597, which says: "Whoever makes or offers to make an expenditure to any person, either to vote or withhold his vote, or to vote for or against any candidate [...]"
Which I strongly suspect is why the language around the offer universally refers to "check[ing] voter registration status". And I'm sure somebody or other's legal team has reviewed this language and signed off on it.
> And I'm sure somebody or other's legal team has reviewed this language and signed off on it.
Not really related to this but I think you would be surprised how often this is not the case. I've been involved in many big contracts where I've realized no actual lawyers have been involved at all.
> YOU AND INDIVIDUALS TO WHICH YOU PROVIDE THE REFERRAL LINK DO NOT HAVE TO REGISTER TO VOTE TO RECEIVE ENTRY INTO THE SWEEPSTAKES. This Sweepstakes is non-partisan and open to all individuals who satisfy the eligibility requirements above. The number of unique individuals who check their voter registration using your link may impact the VotePlz leaderboard, but entry into this Sweepstakes is solely based on the steps provided above.
Odd that it shows I'm not registered - I wonder if it has trouble with permanent absentee ballots? That would be especially unfortunate since they encourage that option after registration.
This list of known browsers(cookies) would be worth well over $1mil to US advertisers right? I can only assume they're selling it, according to the privacy policy.
"The 2016 US Presidential election feels like the most important one so far in my lifetime." -sama
I'm the same age as Sam. But I must confess I don't see why he sees this one as the most important. Both candidates are terrible (for different reasons). It's quite damning of the entire political establishment.
I just want to get through the next 4 years and hope that either party can finally find one good candidate.
"I don't see why he sees this one as the most important."
This cycle realigns the USA. Like Reagan did in 1980, in reverse.
Baring an Act of God, Hillary has already won. Ignore the polls. Everyone has their own reasons to pretend its close. Media wants a horse race and more advertising dollars. If Hillary's base thinks the election is in the bag, they might stay home. Donald is Donald.
Hillary's campaign is pushing hard, to flip as many states as possible. The races to watch are down ballot, especially state houses and judges. This election is the set up for the 2021 redistricting, to win back the US House for a generation. REDMAP in reverse.
The GOP "establishment" (business friendly moderates) might even be okay with that. REDMAP worked too well. They probably want to wrest control of their party back (from the Tea Party).
Aha. Thank you. You helped me figure out Trump's angle.
After he loses (badly), Trump will claim the election was rigged, stolen, whatever. Because the returns won't match the polling. An argument well worn by the left when Gore beat Bush in 2000.
Please recall that Romney was surprised he lost. He too thought too much of the polls. But whereas Romney had a decent campaign, posing a credible threat, he faced the most sophisticated campaign in history, with an amazing ground game (GOTV).
Comparatively, Trump has nothing resembling a campaign. A twitter account. Some campaign stops. No volunteer organization. And certainly no ground game. Rather, Trump's effort is solely about enriching Trump, a play book he's copying from Giuliani, Grigrich, and a host of other faux GOP candidates.
There's also a rumor going around that he plans to start a media company if he looses because he has some very strong supporters and he think his campaign should have been covered differently.
Same. I'd argue the 2000 election was far more important especially given the creation of the PATRIOT act and the decision to invade Iraq, both of which were coincidentally voted for by one of the current candidates.
But not knowing what is going to happen is part of being President. You have to choose the candidate that you think will best represent you in the best of times, the worst of times, and every possibility in between.
> The PATRIOT Act itself was written by Sen Joe Biden ffs.
This is pretty misleading. The Patriot Act was written by Jim Sensenbrenner, a Republican from Wisconsin (which makes sense since the R's had majority control of the House in 2001).
Joe Biden wrote an anti-terrorism bill in 1995 in the wake of the Oklahoma City Bombing that had many similar provisions regarding Federal jurisdiction over acts of terrorism, financial controls, etc. In one of Joe's wonderful bits of rhetorical flourish while debating the Patriot Act in 2001, he said that Ashcroft basically sent up his bill. So you could say that he wrote a precursor to the Patriot Act, but he's also voted against expanded wiretaps and the Habeas violations at Guantanamo so it's not like he's a neocon.
The same course of action? War with Afghanistan was certainly inevitable after 9/11 (assuming Gore, like Bush didn't follow up on the warnings, and the attacks still happened). The Iraq War, on the other hand, would not have happened.
Regime change in Iraq was the official policy of the Clinton administration, President Clinton initiated frequent air strikes and other military action against Saddam, Vice President Gore criticized George HW Bush for not removing Saddam in 1991 when he had the chance, and Sen Hillary Clinton voted to authorize the war in 2003 (while she is certainly an independent person, they have been very closely aligned in policy, both Hillary and Gore were/are self-styled continuations of Bill Clinton's Presidency), and there was broad support for removing Saddam from power even before 9/11.
Getting more people to vote is nice, but ultimately you're still stuck with the duopoly [1] of parties. Why isn't there a big push to change the voting system to something that would allow better representation in Congress?
A whopping 49% of Americans are registered as Independents, which leaves only half of Americans that truly feel like they're represented by the only two choices they're given every 2/4 years: the Democratic and Republican parties.
That almost seems criminal to me. How can the only two viable parties (with the current voting system) represent only half the country at any given point in time? And the number of people that are registered as Democrats and Republicans drops every election. This is a democracy crisis, and people need to start treating it like one.
If Sam Altman and the others in YCombinator really care about democracy, they should also support organizations such as FairVote.org and help them change the voting system city by city, and state by state, until it eventually happens everywhere.
Oh, and just one of the many benefits of switching to a proportional representation voting system[2], or at least a single-winner ranked-choice[3] one? It gets more people to vote because they now feel better represented by the available viable candidates.
Yes, almost 100% in agreement with you. My only quibble is that we take care to really know about who is running the various vote reform efforts and initiatives. The Democrats and Republicans will do whatever they can to get reform in name only under the guise of more choice. See California's "top two" primary system as an example of how one party more or less locks up exclusive access to the ballot in more cases than one should be comfortable with. If we aren't careful, vote "reform" efforts will look more like that than PR.
Not the VotePlz sweepstakes form directly, as far as their privacy policy seems to state, but if you actually register to vote, then your information will become part of the public record along with everyone else on a voter registration list.
FYI, at first glance the name looked very spammy. If I didn't see the samaltman.com domain I wouldnt have clicked. I'm glad I did though, good luck with that initiative.
I think you hint at another point -- this phrasing has been coming from everywhere, and the fact that it continues to come from people who tend to support one particular candidate makes me weary of it: "The 2016 US Presidential election feels like the most important one so far in my lifetime" seems like it really is just a euphemism for "Candidate X is really scary, so despite what you think about Candidate Y, we must fall in line and vote for him/her"
Every presidential election is important. Unless the President somehow gained newfound apocalyptical powers, I don't think it is any more or less important than before. You should vote because you want to exercise your right to vote, not because everyone is compelling you of how "important" (a.k.a super duper scary) it is. Telling everyone to "get out and vote" is hardly helpful. We have security experts telling us electronic voting machines are just plain not safe, we have laws that disparage minorities and low-income people from not voting, and worst of all, we have a majority of the population who is completely ignorant or lackisdasical of the numerous blunders and legitimate concerns over both major candidates (at least in my view its the only way to explain the vehement support they continue to receive -- nevermind how awful my person is -- look at how awful yours is! I know you are but what I am! I am rubber you are glue!) These are the real issues we should be trying to address.
This has been the absolute worst election season I have ever experienced on my short time on earth, and everyone older and wiser than me concurs. There has been more mud slinging by both parties, and every side of the media that they make Fox News look "normal".
I am terrified of the choices either candidate is going to make in the near future. Either one will be able to push the supreme court to its most extreme position in history. You may think that be a victory, but life has taught me extremes in one direction or the other are aways bad.
Neither of these two deserve anyone's vote. If anything we should be voting for a constitutional amendment to be able to vote to redo the whole thing and get two new candidates, whatever, anything besides these two.
I know, I know, "vote third party", which is all great and fun, until you get blamed later for being the reason the other party won. Just ask anyone who ever voted for Ralph Nader.
Sorry I am not sorry for posting this rant here. I just am so fed up with our current state of politics.
At least they eventually replaced the "Gen Y" placeholder with an actual name...
You know that word that Gen X hates, because the media constantly uses it to refer to us? Yeah, neither do I.
Just be glad that your generational cohort is large enough that people will actually pay attention to you as an advertising demographic or voting bloc. Even when the Boomer-controlled media is ridiculing you as special snowflakes in your safe spaces, at least they're talking about you.
I am also in the target demographic, and agree that it doesn't appeal to me. I would imagine that it would appeal to others our age. Most people I know aren't like you (presumably) and I, but I try hard to meet people with different interests and I could see some/many liking the simple message.
So, Sam, who do you support? Why is this election bigger than any other presidential election?
Also, is there a strong correlation being registered to vote and actually voting? If you aren't motivated to even register to vote already, will entering a contest making you register really affect your desire to go out and vote?
$1M VotePlz is too little too late of that's the impetus; keep the cash and do something useful with it Sam, like fixing the DNC so they run a competent candidate next time.
You have been the victim of the conservative spin machine if you think one of the most experienced candidates that either party has fielded in decades isn't "competent".
If the DNC was as neutral during the primaries as they should have been, do you think Hillary would still be the nominee? Maybe, but there is a much better chance Bernie would have made it through. I say this as a person who has voted in the past 4 presidential elections, but never for a Dem or Repub.
Victim? Conservative spin machine? I watched Hillary and her operatives steam roll over Bernie Sanders in the Primary, and her lies are simply too much. To let her win the presidency would be a validation of her methods.
She's a neoliberal who is just as bad as Obama (if not worse!) when it comes to military policy, US entitlements, environmental policy, trade policy, and so on.
of course you don't. romney's probably the single most experienced, best qualified candidate for president the nation's ever seen. that you believe a woman who's ridden the coattails of her husband to office is somehow more "experienced" is telling.
Besides the big name top of the ballot Presidential election there are many down ballot elections to consider. There are house elections, senate elections (in some states), local elections, as well as propositions, etc.
With the wall-to-wall coverage of the Presidential election, it is easy to forget that the wheels of our democratic American system turn at multiple levels.
E.g.: Your local school board matters. Your judges (if elected where you live) matter.
Here are two summaries of California's propositions:
https://ballotpedia.org/California_2016_ballot_propositions
http://www.latimes.com/politics/la-pol-ca-november-ballot-pr...
Vote.