A New Party Dedicated to Implementing Public Voting

[Ed Pastore]

Agreed. The reason I define success as complete dominance of the political structure is because we're talking about, in essence, an anti-party. It has no political platform on issues; simply moving the issue debate into the hands of the people.

So as Rhett suggests, it's not meant to last for a particularly long time. It's meant to be a stepping stone: to open up people's minds to the reality that they don't have to be controlled by politicians. As they get used to that, eventually they'll realize that the representative is just a vestige of the old system and can be dispensed with altogether.


On Jun 12, 2013, at 7:43 PM, Rhett Pepe wrote:

> Hi Mike and Ed,
> 
> For me, at least to begin with, success looks like winning a local election next year. If I can't do that, I'll put my main focus on to launching a software company.
> 
> If I can do that, I'll stop my job and have four paid years to build up the voting system and hopefully get together with Ed and merge into one political effort. From this point, success will look like improving the party in terms of voting, membership, and winning elections. 
> 
> Eventually, perhaps, direct democracy will replace representative democracy all together. 
> 
> Best,
> 
> Rhett
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> On Wed, Jun 12, 2013 at 9:00 AM, Michael Allan <mike at zelea.com> wrote:
> Hi Ed,  (cc Rhett who's not subscribed)
> 
> > I see success as nothing less than complete dominance of the US
> > political system. Basically, it's a choice between one of the
> > authoritarian-minded parties or the party of true democracy. There
> > is no compromise there.
> 
> The competitive landscape is reduced to a single party that has
> complete dominance.  There is no actual competition among parties.
> This is the shape of success.
> 
> Would it be stable over time?  Or how long might it last?
> 
> Mike
> 
> 
> Ed Pastore said:
> > Hi, Michael.
> >
> > I'll be putting forward a call for input to Metagov and E2D soon, to see where I can take this idea (Rhett and I discussed off-list and don't really see any conflict between my plans which are more party-centric and his which are more candidacy-focused).
> >
> > I see success as nothing less than complete dominance of the US political system. Basically, it's a choice between one of the authoritarian-minded parties or the party of true democracy. There is no compromise there.
> >
> > In the particulars of legislatures in the US, they vary widely (and I am only thinking of legislatures; I think it would be impractical to try for executive offices until society has adapted to the legislative shift). Winning office is usually one of two possible methods. Either it's a simple plurality (whoever gets the most votes wins), or it's a run-off between usually the top-two candidates in cases where no candidate gets a majority.
> >
> > Control of the legislature varies somewhat, but I think the general rule (and certainly the rule in the US federal houses) is that a majority is needed for control of the house. So it would be possible for us to get 49% of the members of one house, but have the authoritarian parties band together in a coalition... something which currently never happens in the US because we are so locked into the 2-party system. So in any event, success in terms of numbers of seats means at least 51% of each legislature. Once we have control of a legislature, we can then start re-writing its rules to abolish some of the other party-entrenching/anti-democratic systems such as committees. Also, control of a house means we might potentially be able to switch from each member being a proxy for their district to all members being a proxy for all citizens in the aggregate... yet an additional step toward true democracy.
> >
> > Yes, I'm thinking big :) But again... given the choice between a corrupt authoritarian politician and a democratic proxy citizen, many people just might see the benefit of the latter, even if it is fraught with flaws. I'm half-seriously considering tying into the very-commonly-spoken American idea that voting currently entails picking the lesser of two evils -- and referring to the new party as "the least of three evils." ;)
> >
> >
> > On Jun 11, 2013, at 10:14 AM, Michael Allan wrote:
> >
> > > Thanks for answering Rhett, I have another question.
> > >
> > >> In general, I have to compete with the Democrats and Republicans.
> > >> They are well organized and have lots of money and people.  I have
> > >> one person and an idea.
> > >
> > > What would success look like in terms of this competitive landscape?
> > > Would there still be a duopoly?  Of which parties?  Or would the basic
> > > landscape be changed?  And how?
> > >
> > > Maybe Ed has some thoughts, too.
> > >
> > > Mike
> 

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