A staff report of the APOC found that the Alaska anti-RCV group Preserve Democracy is not simply an educational organization but is working in support of a ballot initiative that would repeal RCV in Alaska.
The APOC commissioners will now decide if that is the case. If they vote in agreement with the staff report, Preserve Democracy will have to disclose funding sources and expenditures, which it has not yet done.
APOC staff is also investigating a claim from RCV advocates that Preserve Democracy set up a church in order to allow tax-deductible donations from its contributors.
Here is a story on this matter. Thanks to FairVote for the tip.
The real problem with the election law in Alaska is that parties have been deprived of the right to choose their own nominees.
NOOO PRIMARIES
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P-A-T
@WZ,
Why should the state organize and fund your political activities and advertise your candidates?
Max plan.
@Pat,
Alaska permits voters to register with a political group and have that label appear on the ballot. If a candidate ran on the Max Plan ticket they could use it as an opportunity to educate the public.
Peacekeeper is an elected position in Alaska?
“@WZ,
Why should the state organize and fund your political activities and advertise your candidates?”
The point is, the state should not steal your party’s label, and decide how your candidate gets chosen.
If a state wants an open primary, then at the very least NO party labels or designations should be placed on the ballot, unless the party consents to the candidate running under that label
That would also only help the bigger parties.
“If they vote in agreement with the staff report, Preserve Democracy will have to disclose funding sources and expenditures, which it has not yet done. APOC staff is also investigating a claim from RCV advocates that Preserve Democracy set up a church in order to allow tax-deductible donations from its contributors.”
You can tell a lot about a movement by its enemies and how they conduct themselves.
Walter Ziobro: “If a state wants an open primary, then at the very least NO party labels or designations should be placed on the ballot, unless the party consents to the candidate running under that label”
Agreed. The party label is a big asset for parties, and they should be allowed to control who gets to run under their label (no matter who big or small they are).
@FAM5*H,
Presumably to implement the Max Plan in Alaska you would need a political decision to convert the State of Alaska into several Communities, perhaps outside the United States.
The alternative would be for 100 Big Men to meet and assert that they were the legitimate government. This would likely lead to confrontation and many breathalyzer tests.
So what I would propose that candidates could run for the legislature as Max Plan candidates. Even if they did not win they could help educate the public.
I don’t think running for offices which I don’t think should exist is a particularly good path for developing my plans. I’ve laid out a number of starting points to start moving things in various directions I advocate in various discussions we’ve had here.
I understood Pat to be addressing AZ, since he addressed her.
While there are venues to discuss my plans, I don’t see elections for existing office as good places for that. Candidates for existing office should focus on short term agendas that they believe getting elected to such office would put them in a position to implement, or to block the nefarious plans of others. Those agendas and candidates should be plausibly electable.
While piecemeal directional movement towards various parts of my plan is possible on a number of fronts, discussion of the plans overall in a broader scope would be more theoretical or academic at this stage, not fit for practical politics. I don’t see campaigns for office as a great way to educate people about long range theory and goals.
@WZ,
Who is this “party” you speak of? Under Alaska law a “party” is made up of voters who state on their voter registration that they are members. In Alaska, the party label on the ballot is what the voter wrote on his voter registration. I suppose you could have Party Control Officers provide certificates to the state government.
If you want private political groups to be private, you don’t have the government granting recognition to the groups, and enforcing “decisions” of the parties. “The X Party chose Billy over Bobby, therefore Bobby can’t run” is what the political parties want to happen.
Voters shouldn’t write or check any party on their registration. A party belongs to the people who organise, fund, and do the work of the party. They should choose their candidates by whatever means they choose – executive committee, convention, privately run and administered caucus or primary, etc.
Parties which demonstrate sufficient support by signatures, filing fee, precinct captain and turnout at a caucus style general election, party supporters appearing at city halls or courthouses, past election results, attendance at party nomination conventions, or whatever means are chosen should have access to the election for their chosen candidates, as should independents who choose to run without a party. As far as the means for parties to qualify, Max plan sounds best to me, but it could be one or more of the others.
@Max,
AZ did not address Pat. Even if she was addressing AZ, she was advocating for a particular political solution. Certainly FAM5*H thought that I believed the office of Peacekeeper existed in Alaska.
IIUC, you believe agrarian-based societies would be better suited for your ideas. So how can we make progress toward your utopian vision. Let’s say that a local community should be able to feed itself. They could still trade. A potato-growing community could trade with a citrus-growing community. A grain-growing community could trade with a fishing community.
So we could determine an ideal population for a given area, based on most persons (95%) engaged in agriculture along with climate and other factors.
So let’s take Manhattan as an example. Let’s say 5 acres is sufficient to feed a family, with 2 adults, and 5% of the population engaged in non-agrarian pursuits, that gives a carrying capacity of around 9100 persons.
The current population is just shy of 1.6 million. Let’s assume a modest 1% decline in population per year. That works out for 514 years to reach the ideal population for the Max Plan. We have a lottery to decide which 1% of the population must leave in the next year, the following years up through the next 20 years, and issue residency permits. Those who drew a 1-year permit must leave within the next year.
But the residency permits would be tradeable. If you wanted to maintain residence for a longer period then purchase a permit to stay longer from someone who is willing to leave sooner. People could will their permits, or they could be auctioned off with the proceeds paid to the estate. Each year 1% of those with a 20+ permit would be given a 20-year permit.
If someone owned 5 acres they would have permanent occupancy. Larger estates could provide permanent occupancy for farm workers, family members, etc.
After 514 years Manhattan would be ready for the Max Plan.
I always assumed AZ was addressing me when he calls out my name. I’m pretty sure FAM was being facetious in asking if peacekeepers are elected in Alaska, since you’d clearly know better.
Jim, rural areas are relatively more ideal, as well as currently socially, culturally, and politically healthier (no less true in Russia, the main difference here being in the socio-economics of center cities versus suburban/urban peripheral areas. However, this last part is less so than when I lived in the US, many center city areas there having experienced gentrification in the interim).
However, my plan is adaptable to urban areas. Significantly, until approximately 60 years ago, many urban areas in the US already incorporated many elements of my plan. Essentially, city neighborhoods were socially not much different than small towns, except situated right next to each other. Public safety levels were much higher, so neighborhoods had much more civic life and trust. Long term reliance on government “services” was relatively rare, while extended family ties and similar ties between neighbors were more well developed. Religious, charitable, and fraternal organizations filled in more of the charity gaps, and helped provide social cohesion. There was significantly more unanimity about social mores, and among immigrants there was a stronger work ethic and consensus around desirability of assimilation.
Secularism was not as pervasive, there weren’t nearly so many broken families, sexual immorality and drug addiction were not nearly so flaunted in most places, politics (particularly national level) weren’t nearly so all consuming, and children were generally not nearly so relentlessly subjected to cultural Marxism. Local businesses were widely patronized and constituted the bulk of local commerce and employment. In short, it was much healthier in terms of my objectives, even in big cities, and even in their slum areas. Neighbors did not isolate from each other out of fear.
More in a bit.
My vision is not utopian. You might say full scale implementation is a long ways off, but full scale implementation is just a hypothesis. I’m not a central planner; I’m for local variation and trial and error.
As for trade, it will hopefully soon largely be a thing of the past. 3D printing is currently still a long way from Star Trek replicators, but developing fast. Along with robotics and nanotechnology, it should hopefully be a matter of decades, not centuries, before any good in demand or agricultural commodities can be assembled locally from specifications at the molecular level. This cuts out most of the impetus for trade.
Urban agriculture, ranging from vacant lot gardens to indoor hydroponics to a variety of other means, is also significantly more advanced than in the past. Granted, there are some difficulties in raising traditional farm animals in walk up apartments, but even there, making vegetable based products taste like meat is more developed than in the past, our European cultural aversion to eating insects might fade over time, and less densely packed urban areas could have room for e.g. backyard chickens. Besides, I’m not necessarily opposed to any and all trade between government areas; I just want to minimize it and create incentives for commerce, employment, etc to be much more local.
I’m inherently against any such top down scheme as a lottery requiring x number or percentage of people to move out of Manhattan or anywhere else (other than, for example, illegal aliens and reviving exile as a punishment for crime – but those are separate matters).
While Manhattan (or central Moscow) wouldn’t be my ideal starting places, they could be ready much sooner than in 500 years, and could make significant strides fairly quickly, although not full scale implementation anything like immediately.
@Pat,
AZ wrote P-A-T underneath the cut line in his message. It is unlikely that it was directed at you personally, unless your last name happens to be Totsop.
As far as I know I’m the only Pat here. My apologies to Pat Totsop and any other Pats I missed.
@Windy,
If you live in a state such as Alaska which records the registration of party members, who does that party belong to?
Who determines what is a sufficient level of support? In most states it is the legislature. They are likely going to decide that their party has a sufficient level of support, and other parties do not.
Any independent candidate is going to be supported by an ad hoc group of supporters. They are indistinguishable from a group of supporters who may have been issued party membership cards.
@Max,
If the capability for local food production increases then the carrying capacity of the area can be increased. Manhattan might not need 514 years.
But I thought your scheme relied on families establishing multi-generational connections to the land. High demand for residential property forces agricultural uses out. The average Manhattanite only has an area 24 foot square. Initially Central Park could be cultivated, and rooftop gardens created. As traffic is reduced, parts of streets could be converted to gardens. Over time, reduced demand for housing could permit destruction of obsolete housing and conversion to cultivation or pasturage.
I did have an error in my calculation, since I used total area rather than land area. It turns out the entirety of NYC would be perfect for one of your community areas.
Connection to land is ideal. Connection to neighborhood, extended families, neighbors, local businesses and civic organizations, and property (even if it’s apartments) approximates the most important aspects.
The entirety of NYC would probably be about 80 governments (what I initially termed precincts before leaning more to the conclusion that they could also adequately handle defense from foreign attack, thus removing need for larger national defense units of government). They would approximately correspond to neighborhoods or police precincts.
I’m less convinced NYC will depopulate. Some people like to live closer to their neighbors than other people do. If replicators can create anything anywhere at the molecular level, work/industry probably won’t be the driving force behind what population density people choose, but there are various other reasons people have for different population density preferences.
A state’s unnecessary inclusion of party preference on voter registration doesn’t change my answer of who parties belong to. States should take that off voter forms. Parties should maintain their own rolls and conduct their own nominations by whatever means suit them and which they can afford. States can maintain records of party leadership. They will anyway if parties raise or spend any money.
Legislatures already determine what is sufficient level of support. In most cases they don’t completely shut out third parties or independents. For smaller parties, ballot or voting access by party makes a lot more sense. It’s actually probably the best method overall, although listing both candidates and their party (if the party is qualified and nominated them) is ok too. I like the Max proposal even better.
In the environment where multiple different offices are still elected, my proposal would be impractical for anything except voting for a party. Multiple separate counts throughout the night for each office would be a mess.
@Max,
I think your use of precinct is confusing to most Americans, who would tend to think in terms of election precincts. I have suggested that you use the term ‘community’ which has a sense of shared interest and locality.
How would these 80 communities be established in what is now NYC? IIUC, New York City and New York State and the United States would no longer exist in these areas. How would the 100 Big Men be identified?
You could identify possible community areas, and who the 100 Big Men would be. While you might conclude that conditions are not at this instant ripe for conversion you could measure progress. Different areas might switch at different times.
How would assets such as the airports and Brooklyn Bridge be handled?
@Windy,
Of course political parties could keep track of their membership just as garden societies and social clubs do.
But there is simply no reason to distinguish political parties from other groups that likely have more direct social goals.
The Pickleball Association could assist a candidate for mayor in the same way that the Republican or Democrat Party might.
We disagree. There are numerous reasons. Party labels give voters useful information, especially about less well known / well connected / well financed candidates. They give candidates without adequate other means to reach sufficient numbers of voters their best chance to communicate something beyond a meaningless name to a larger percentage of the electorate. And they are a much more plausible way for people who want to advance a set of ideas but don’t have a lot of money, time, supporters or connections to do so by running as candidates in elections, even if they have microscopic chances of winning.
Jim, please read more carefully, as we’ll get nowhere if you speed read or skim. The message that you are replying to already says I’ve moved away from using the term precinct for that very reason. In point of fact, I termed the precincts to begin with because I meant election precincts.
A subsequent question about what percentage of present voters would likely be qualified under my proposed voting criteria led me to estimate perhaps roughly one in a thousand. Of course, that’s a very rough estimate, but I reasoned that applying that to current electoral precincts would yield areas with too few voters (and consequently too few eligible peacekeepers) to be functional.
At this point I came up with 100k plus or minus one order of magnitude as a rough guesstimate for my (then smaller government unit) population size, with 100 plus or minus an order of magnitude as the number of qualified voters / potential peacekeepers. At the time I hypothesized that a larger unit of government would be needed for military defense purposes, but subsequent conversations have led me to lean towards the idea that government units of the size I propose can adequately protect their citizens from both foreign attack and local crime.
As for what to call them, government areas or government units will have to do for now. Community is potentially confusing in that in low population areas it tends to refer to villages or hamlets, of which an area of around 100k population would have a number.
In NYC, I would start with police precincts, rather than voting precincts, as a basis for division. From what I’ve researched, they tend to be divided along natural neighborhood boundaries. There are 77, and all except Central Park fall comfortably within the population size margin of error. Central Park Precinct has 25 official residents, of whom 11 are in state penitentiaries as of a recent year when the data was compiled. Presumably, these are homeless bums, as there are no residence buildings within the park boundaries to my knowledge. Central Park could therefore be divided among its neighbors.
More responses to your query in a bit.
Jim, part of my response to your query would also overlap this comment in another discussion here:
https://ballot-access.org/2023/08/30/no-labels-asks-its-supporters-to-express-preference-for-how-presidential-nominee-should-be-chosen/#comment-1173242
Specifically, it addresses your question about transportation infrastructure, among other possible related questions.
The only question I see not addressed here is specifically voting criteria, which we’ve gone over before. It was a bit of a laundry list, I don’t have it saved or memorized, and in any case it would be subject to local variations and would be arrived at in the final form through trial and error. 100, like all numbers I use, is a very rough guesstimate of how many men in a population of 100k would qualify under criteria previously discussed in past discussions.
In any case, as previously discussed as well, the standards of those who qualify for peacekeeper duty would be widely understood, including being heads of locally prominent families, extensive training and testing, tests of moral, physical, and intellectual fitness as well as practical experience, proficiency with and adequate stores of various weapons, ammunition, equipment etc., being married with at least two children and never divorced or remarried, membership in good standing in a local church recognized as legitimate by a local council of churches, etc. Voting qualifications would be the same as peacekeeper qualifications. There would be a substantial poll tax, and voting would be public and on the record.
Society would evolve towards these standards over several generations. I hypothesize that it’s a natural order of things if society is allowed to evolve without excessive government. As I’ve mentioned, I’m not looking to centrally plan anything or for any one size fits all solutions, particularly in the absence of step by step testing and adjustments. I’m merely hypothesizing optimal directions to evolve in.
Cool theory, but I’m more concerned with saving America by electing Trump by a margin the dims can’t cheat their way out of and Trump style candidates up and down the ballot. If we get over that hump, we can start thinking about the dark enlightenment, restoring neofeudal order and patriarchy and theocracy, etc. If evil senile Dementia Joe or any other commie fascist gets in next year we can kiss it all goodbye. Not only will they completely finish wrecking whatever economic activity they didn’t already wreck. They’ll probably molest and genitally mutilate every kid in America (no child’s behind left!), make it illegal to be White, seize everyone’s guns, and start WWIII with Russia over Ukraine or pronounce us a province of Red China or both. This is not the time for academic circle jerks. We need all hands on deck to keep the devil rats from chewing through the hull and sinking our ship!!!!!
Relax. Everything is going according to plan, and it will all be fine.
@Windy,
It is unlikely that a voter who first encounters a party name on a ballot will learn anything about the party.
@Max,
I am skeptical that society will evolve to a point where 100 Big Men will meet and select peacekeepers, and the other 99,900 persons in the community will accept or not notice the change.
What would be done with the massive poll taxes? What would the money be spent on?
If I understand how transportation infrastructure would be handled, the Brooklyn Bridge could be sold.
I’m also skeptical that a voter who first sees a party name on a ballot is likely to learn about it, any more than some random individuals name they see. It’s the cumulative efforts of all the party’s candidates in multiple years, races, and locations that establish some connection between party name and public policy direction in the minds of some significant slice of voters. Of course the party name itself might do that, for example prohibition of alcohol was a widely debated public policy question before it happened. Party names like libertarian, green, constitution etc build their brand over time.
I can identify with Bankrupted by Bidenomics frustration. But it’s the very prevalence of such sentiments among the general public that ensures that Burning Man Cannibalism is correct. Presidents don’t get a second term when 80% plus of the public think the economy sucks. That’s even more true when their family corruption and senile dementia becomes increasingly difficult to hide with every passing day, an expensive and unpopular war drags on sucking up tax money into a bottomless pit, the VP is even more unpopular than POTUS, their original election was super sketchy, and woke psychosis gets worse and worse every day.
Under those circumstances, election theft can’t change the outcome without starting a revolution. Of course there will still be massive leftist election fraud, but it will be limited to trying to make their loss seem less abjectly and overwhelmingly embarrassing in its massive proportions.
Jim Riley, regarding “100 big men,” in addition to what I wrote above, see
https://ballot-access.org/2023/08/30/no-labels-asks-its-supporters-to-express-preference-for-how-presidential-nominee-should-be-chosen/#comment-1173278
You fundamentally misconceive the role I see peacekeepers and voting to select them playing in my over all scheme of things in my proposals.
Regarding transportation infrastructure, I provided a reference link above. As I said, we will get nowhere if you don’t slow down and read rather than skim, speed read, and always try to summarize. My comments already summarize my thoughts. Scrapping outdated infrastructure is perfectly fine. Privately owned barges could easily handle whatever remaining traffic.
@Max,
There are 59 community districts in NYC. If you divide the CD larger than 150,000 by neighborhoods there would be 91. Is your range from 10,000 to 1,000,000? Police precincts appear to non-stable. If you look at a map the precincts are numbered going north in Manhattan, but numbers are missing: 1,5,6,7,9. I infer that precincts 2,3,4, and 8 have been consolidated.
The reality is that in 2023, NYC and NY state are established political entities. In some distant year, we’ll assume 2137, that your communities will have been established in that area. Infants born this year will likely be dead by then, but some of their children will be alive, most of their grand-children, and their great-grand-children will be your big men and peacekeepers. I don’t mean big men in any sort of pejorative sense. But there is no reason that they will have a title such as baron etc. But the bulk of the population will refer to them informally as “big men”, which is somewhat akin to bigwigs or muckety-mucks. The big men are likely to be taller than average in stature due to selective breeding.
While you have suggested that this will be evolutionary, which I take to mean gradual change, if we compare 2023 and our hypothetical 2137, the change is radical and revolutionary.
As I understand your plan, in an autonomous community of 100,000 there will be a group of around 100 men who will meet and appoint peacekeepers for the following year. They might also update their membership, to reflect those that have died or become disabled, or otherwise could not perform duties. New members might be added.You haven’t addressed the issue of multiple members of a family serving – perhaps it would be desireable to have a representative of each of the 100 leading families.
As I understand it there would no other functions. Streets and sidewalks and sewers and parks would be privatized?
I think you indicated that these autonomous communities would be sovereign. They would no longer be part of New York City or New York State or the United States. If I have misunderstood, please explain.
Barges!!!?!!! We don’t need no sinking barges!!!
I thought it was bridges, we don’t need no stinking bridges. Yes, I know it was actually badges. But out of the two I like mine better.
Jim,
59 or 91 would be adequate numbers. 10 k to 1 million is, yes, an idea of what I’m shooting for. But don’t get too hung up on the numbers. All of these are just very rough guidelines. How unstable are police precincts? It’s quite possible some have been consolidated over time, but what I read is that they generally follow traditional neighborhood lines. NYPD was established in 1845. Perhaps consolidating took place decades ago?
Regardless, I would not get too hung up on details. It would take several generations to devolve political government to that scale. I think the lines will sort themselves out. I just gave one suggestion of a possible starting point.
Again, I don’t see peacekeepers as the topmost people in society, although they would likely be from a top echelon. It’s likely the topmost economic and social echelon would be too old for voting or peacekeeper duty, or have aged out of it. On the other hand, these calculations may be thrown off by advancements in life extension.
I agree, full implementation would be “radical,” or perhaps reactionary. But then, much of current government is quite radical by standards of a century or two ago. Additionally, I’ve indicated that my full implementation is a hypothesis of where the directions of change I propose may end up. Reality may be different. Change might stop short of that. It could even reverse course if I’m completely wrong. I’d be quite happy to see smaller steps in directions I suggest. And again I see local variations and trial and error. If I don’t answer some of your questions, I may not have an answer, or the answer might be “we shall see” or “let’s get the ball rolling and see what happens.”
Regarding the final two questions, yes and yes. Other functions of government would be privatized, and these units would be autonomous. Again, this doesn’t have to happen all at once, and unless some great disaster happens, would not. Devolution might initially involve devolving some functions of government to more local levels, privatizing some, and greater local autonomy, as well as simplifying laws and government structure, etc. There are many first steps to take, not all of them political.
@Max,
I found a web site that had old photographs of NYPD precinct station houses. Some had been torn down, but others had gone under repeated renumbering. When established, few people had cars, and Manhattan was crowded with garment workers living in multi-story walk-up cold-water apartments. Effective policing could be by officers walking their beat checking in with shopkeepers.
You can check for community districts at http://popfactfinder.planning.nyc.gov and https://communityprofiles.planning.nyc.gov These would be ideal candidates for your autonomous communities. They have around your hypothetical population size and have a correspondence to actual communities.
Each community district has a district committee consisting of 50 members. They are appointed by the borough president and are advisory. They apparently have to approve zoning changes – but I don’t know whether they could block a change. It appears that they have some problem getting members to participate.
In your original proposal, you said that the big men and peacekeepers be white males, but another said it would just be the dominate group. The dominate group varies quite a bit across NYC, so would the big men be of the dominate group in each area?
Perhaps you didn’t digest my response about police precincts.
Interesting question at the end. I am mulling it. I don’t have a ready answer. Off hand, I think majority nonwhite areas existing within larger formerly White nations would need their own governments. It’s possible that the determinative factor for micronation population size could be the number of qualified voters rather than the overall number of people, but there are areas where this is impractical. I don’t see government of nonwhites by non Whites as necessarily a fatal defect, if the other voting criteria remain generally stable. There might be some racial sorting of the population in the earlier stages of implementation.