Re: FPTP vs ranked choice/condorcet/instant runoff/etc
In US elections, any alternative voting system would essentially require computers. With all the complexity, problems and mistrust that they bring. Also those alternative systems are subject to gamification as shown in recent elections in Alaska and France. No fraud or illegality, but the will of the people was arguably thwarted by introduction of confounding candidates.
Re: parliamentary vs US representation
US was designed to have a true republic (not a democratic republic) but with a democratic lower house as a counterbalance to a non democratic upper house. The 17th amendment screwed us as it made sure that all the drama from the lower house spread to both houses, and now our congress is entirely captured by lobbyists as every legislator now has to worry about financing campaigns. It wasn’t supposed to work that way.
The US was not supposed to be one big country with uniform laws. It was supposed to be N number of mostly independent states with a common currency + a common defense + a safeguards against states taking advantage of each other. The basic assumption is that most laws are not one-size-fits-all, and that each state should be largely autonomous and figure out the laws that work best for that state’s citizens.
The more people you try to put under the same set of laws, the more likely it is that the weak will be taken advantage of by the strong. Take California water management- the populous cities, in true democratic fashion, determine what farmers can do with the water on and under their land, and special interests can contribute to campaigns for favor and end up getting water rights to water on your land, because democracy!
But all these are the “why” of the US election system, which is kinda orthogonal to how we vote and count.
> US was designed to have a true republic (not a democratic republic) but with a democratic lower house as a counterbalance to a non democratic upper house. The 17th amendment screwed us as it made sure that all the drama from the lower house spread to both houses, and now our congress is entirely captured by lobbyists as every legislator now has to worry about financing campaigns. It wasn’t supposed to work that way.
That's a pretty rose-tinted description. The 17th amendment came about because the Senate was cartoonishly corrupt under the previous system. It should tell you something that it was ratified by the very state legislatures whose power it diminished.
In US elections, any alternative voting system would essentially require computers. With all the complexity, problems and mistrust that they bring. Also those alternative systems are subject to gamification as shown in recent elections in Alaska and France. No fraud or illegality, but the will of the people was arguably thwarted by introduction of confounding candidates.
Re: parliamentary vs US representation
US was designed to have a true republic (not a democratic republic) but with a democratic lower house as a counterbalance to a non democratic upper house. The 17th amendment screwed us as it made sure that all the drama from the lower house spread to both houses, and now our congress is entirely captured by lobbyists as every legislator now has to worry about financing campaigns. It wasn’t supposed to work that way.
The US was not supposed to be one big country with uniform laws. It was supposed to be N number of mostly independent states with a common currency + a common defense + a safeguards against states taking advantage of each other. The basic assumption is that most laws are not one-size-fits-all, and that each state should be largely autonomous and figure out the laws that work best for that state’s citizens.
The more people you try to put under the same set of laws, the more likely it is that the weak will be taken advantage of by the strong. Take California water management- the populous cities, in true democratic fashion, determine what farmers can do with the water on and under their land, and special interests can contribute to campaigns for favor and end up getting water rights to water on your land, because democracy!
But all these are the “why” of the US election system, which is kinda orthogonal to how we vote and count.