…Yet it seems safe to say that the world no longer trusts U.S. promises, and perhaps no longer fears U.S. threats, the way it used to. The problem, however, isn’t Biden; it’s the party that reflexively attacks him for anything that goes wrong.

Right now America is a superpower without a fully functioning government. Specifically, the House of Representatives has no speaker, so it can’t pass legislation, including bills funding the government and providing aid to U.S. allies. The House is paralyzed because Republican extremists, who have refused to acknowledge Biden’s legitimacy and promoted chaos rather than participating in governance, have turned these tactics on their own party. At this point it’s hard to see how anyone can become speaker without Democratic votes — but even less extreme Republicans refuse to reach across the aisle.

And even if Republicans do somehow manage to elect a speaker, it seems all too likely that whoever gets the job will have to promise the hard right that he will betray Ukraine.

Given this political reality, how much can any nation trust U.S. assurances of support? How can we expect foreign enemies of democracy to fear America when they know that there are powerful forces here that share their disdain?

  • chaogomu@kbin.social
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    1 year ago

    Vote splitting is just a way of describing the phenomenon where it is harder to start a third party in a FPTP system.

    You misspelled impossible. See Durvurger’s Law.

    See video, after video, after video.

    And a load of different sites.

    https://www.britannica.com/topic/Duvergers-law

    https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duverger%27s_law

    https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/ps-political-science-and-politics/article/why-just-two-parties-a-voting-game-to-illustrate-duvergers-law/31740530FD6AE83819083E3AF956BFFC

    https://www.oxfordreference.com/display/10.1093/acref/9780199207800.001.0001/acref-9780199207800-e-382

    https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-0-387-09720-6_5

    We can then divert into Arrow’s Impossibility Theorem, but that’s a bit outside this conversation.

    The point being, Durvurger laid this all out. Plurality voting will strongly preference two-party dominance.

    As to local politics. Again, you run into the two party system. I will admit that it’s not impossible to win as an independent in local races, but the fact that we as a species are very team orientated makes it harder.

    • centof@lemm.ee
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      1 year ago

      impossible

      No you are misrepresenting it.

      From the first sentence of wikipedia

      Duverger’s law holds that in political systems with only one winner (as in the U.S.), two main parties tend to emerge with minor parties typically splitting votes away from the most similar major party.

      Tend does not mean impossible.

      Heck, you even contradicted yourself. First you say its impossible. Next, you say it will strongly preference two party dominance. It can’t be both.

      You are also conveniently ignoring that most local races only have one candidate. That makes said ‘law’ irrelevant.

      All you are doing is repeating the same thing over and over again even if it is in no way relevant to the discussion. You are clearly just arguing for the sake of arguing. Therefore, I will disengage.

    • Jeremy [Iowa]
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      1 year ago

      It’s interesting that you continuously link-drop with no ability to speak to the subject beyond “just trust me bro, watch this video, it says it all”.

      It’s the behavior I’d expect of the flat earthers and QAnon folk.

      As a side-note, you are aware those videos do nothing but restate the same baseless nonsense in different ways, right?

      • chaogomu@kbin.social
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        1 year ago

        I explained it several times, then linked to videos, and websites, and scholarly articles that all explain it better because the guy I’m arguing with doesn’t seem to want to understand.

        Hell, his own preferred third party makes voting reform a priority, because otherwise they cannot win.

        • Jeremy [Iowa]
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          1 year ago

          You reiterated yourself several times and linked to videos which you seem to be doing nothing but parroting. The sources you’ve linked to are a paywalled study you don’t seem to actually have any reference for and a wikipedia article you seem to have failed to cite which has directly disagreed with multiple of your claims.