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Would you vote for this type of Amendment to the Constitution?

Would you vote for this type of Amendment to the Constitution?

  • Total voters
    31
Kal'Stang

Kal'Stang

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This amendment would ban all political parties from running for any federal or state political position. No more Democrats, no more Republicans, no more Green Party or Libertarian or Socialist or any of the other myriad other parties that are out there. You could be a part of a party, but you cannot run based on that party. IE: No D or R next to the name on a ballot. The person would also be denied any sponsership of a political party by disallowing them to even speak of any political parties what so ever in any capacity or situation.

Please note that these are not the exact words to be used obviously. This is just a gist.
 
Nope. Populist crap through and through.
 
a351 said:
Nope. Populist crap through and through.
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Why? Are parties really needed that bad? I think something like this would actually make people think instead of just voting for the person that is a part of the party they identify with, all without knowing a damn thing about the person they are voting for.

Wiseone said:
1st amendment, freedom of assembly
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This does not stop any politicians right to be apart of a party. It just stops them from saying that they are a part of any particular party. Hence the reason for that whole sentence that I put in there...

"You could be a part of a party, but you cannot run based on that party."

Not that it matters as this would be an Amendment to the Constiution and as such the 1st Amendment would be superceded in this particular instance.
 
Kal'Stang said:
This amendment would ban all political parties from running for any federal or state political position. No more Democrats, no more Republicans, no more Green Party or Libertarian or Socialist or any of the other myriad other parties that are out there. You could be a part of a party, but you cannot run based on that party. IE: No D or R next to the name on a ballot. The person would also be denied any sponsership of a political party by disallowing them to even speak of any political parties what so ever in any capacity or situation.

Please note that these are not the exact words to be used obviously. This is just a gist.
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Oh god no, that would make corruption even worse.
 
Kal'Stang said:
This amendment would ban all political parties from running for any federal or state political position. No more Democrats, no more Republicans, no more Green Party or Libertarian or Socialist or any of the other myriad other parties that are out there. You could be a part of a party, but you cannot run based on that party. IE: No D or R next to the name on a ballot. The person would also be denied any sponsership of a political party by disallowing them to even speak of any political parties what so ever in any capacity or situation.

Please note that these are not the exact words to be used obviously. This is just a gist.
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I don't think it would make a difference, and I dislike making new rules/laws that don't do anything, so I would oppose it.
 
Kal'Stang said:
Why? Are parties really needed that bad? I think something like this would actually make people think instead of just voting for the person that is a part of the party they identify with, all without knowing a damn thing about the person they are voting for.
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And are parties really that large a plague on the electoral process? Without going into too much detail as to the potential issues that would come along with banning such a thing, there's simply no pressing or apparent need for such an extreme reform.
 
Kal'Stang said:
How?


(this part added to acheive minimum post charactor limit)
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While parties do present some issues, they are also a stable mechanism for funding from the average citizen. If candidates had to go it alone with groups that they created during their campaign runs, they would need initial seed funding from somewhere to get their name out there for people to learn who they are. That seed money would come from moneyed interests, creating even more dependency on that than we have today.
 
i'd prefer relaxing the laws that control ballot access and ending gerrymandering nationwide by letting a computer draw the districts using census data only. districts would be redrawn automatically every ten years.
 
Kal'Stang said:
This amendment would ban all political parties from running for any federal or state political position. No more Democrats, no more Republicans, no more Green Party or Libertarian or Socialist or any of the other myriad other parties that are out there. You could be a part of a party, but you cannot run based on that party. IE: No D or R next to the name on a ballot. The person would also be denied any sponsership of a political party by disallowing them to even speak of any political parties what so ever in any capacity or situation.

Please note that these are not the exact words to be used obviously. This is just a gist.
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I would vote for an amendment that banned political affiliations on ballots.Instead of political affiliations there would be a short list of issues the candidate claims to be for and against and a short list of past votes that confirm or contradict that candidates stand listed underneath the candidate's name and a more thorough list on the voting booth walls and in precincts that have heavy turn out a booklet will be passed out to voters waiting in line.This way people vote for the issues the candidate stands for instead of the party.
 
Why is it that only Republican-type voters come up with these ideas?
Especially when they're out of power?
Just like with term limits in 1994 and 2010?
Ring a bell?
The two times the House changed hands !

Kal'Stang said:
This amendment would ban all political parties from running for any federal or state political position. No more Democrats, no more Republicans, no more Green Party or Libertarian or Socialist or any of the other myriad other parties that are out there. You could be a part of a party, but you cannot run based on that party. IE: No D or R next to the name on a ballot. The person would also be denied any sponsership of a political party by disallowing them to even speak of any political parties what so ever in any capacity or situation.

Please note that these are not the exact words to be used obviously. This is just a gist.
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jamesrage said:
I would vote for an amendment that banned political affiliations on ballots.Instead of political affiliations there would be a short list of issues the candidate claims to be for and against and a short list of past votes that confirm or contradict that candidates stand listed underneath the candidate's name and a more thorough list on the voting booth walls and in precincts that have heavy turn out a booklet will be passed out to voters waiting in line.This way people vote for the issues the candidate stands for instead of the party.
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How long do you think the voting lines will be in states like Florida and Ohio that already had 8-hour lines with your idea?
Not to mention the further cutbacks in early voting and number of voting locales and number of voting machines?
And now we have Florida closing bathrooms, even to disabled, in the very same counties with the chad problem .
 
Kal'Stang said:
This amendment would ban all political parties from running for any federal or state political position. No more Democrats, no more Republicans, no more Green Party or Libertarian or Socialist or any of the other myriad other parties that are out there. You could be a part of a party, but you cannot run based on that party. IE: No D or R next to the name on a ballot. The person would also be denied any sponsership of a political party by disallowing them to even speak of any political parties what so ever in any capacity or situation.

Please note that these are not the exact words to be used obviously. This is just a gist.
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I see no benefit to this. Amendments are not something that should be done lightly.
 
NIMBY said:
How long do you think the voting lines will be in states like Florida and Ohio that already had 8-hour lines with your idea?
Not to mention the further cutbacks in early voting and number of voting locales and number of voting machines?
And now we have Florida closing bathrooms, even to disabled, in the very same counties with the chad problem .
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Increase the number of booths and or polling places in high turn out precincts. Is it the board of elections in that city or town that determines where and how many polling places that place has?
 
No, it is the Republican party in states like Texas, North Carolina, Wisconsin, and especially Ohio and many others that are now doing it.
Why do you think there has been a hit campaign on AG Holder for 5+ years?
These legislatures have been bankrolled by the Koch brothers.
Texas has been on Federal watch since 1990 .
jamesrage said:
Increase the number of booths and or polling places in high turn out precincts. Is it the board of elections in that city or town that determines where and how many polling places that place has?
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Kal'Stang said:
This amendment would ban all political parties from running for any federal or state political position. No more Democrats, no more Republicans, no more Green Party or Libertarian or Socialist or any of the other myriad other parties that are out there. You could be a part of a party, but you cannot run based on that party. IE: No D or R next to the name on a ballot. The person would also be denied any sponsership of a political party by disallowing them to even speak of any political parties what so ever in any capacity or situation.

Please note that these are not the exact words to be used obviously. This is just a gist.
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It is a colossal infringement on the principle of free speech and more to the point it wouldn't change anything. Do you think the electoral process would suddenly become less partisan or purer because candidates wouldn't have an R or D next to their name? People aren't stupid it would be palpable which candidate is 'the' Republican candidate and which is 'the' Democratic candidate. All it would do is force people to walk on eggshells to avoid tripping up the regulations and increase reliance on surrogates and third party advocates. Its populist hullabaloo.
 
jamesrage said:
I would vote for an amendment that banned political affiliations on ballots.Instead of political affiliations there would be a short list of issues the candidate claims to be for and against and a short list of past votes that confirm or contradict that candidates stand listed underneath the candidate's name and a more thorough list on the voting booth walls and in precincts that have heavy turn out a booklet will be passed out to voters waiting in line.This way people vote for the issues the candidate stands for instead of the party.
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I'm doing this from memory, so bear with me. Plus, this may be state specific to the state I lived in at the time, not sure. Enough of the disclaimers...

Back in the 90s, incumbent politicians had always been listed as such on ballots. Ballots would list the party and occupation of each candidate. When the alleged incumbent backlash started many incumbents didn't want to be listed as incumbent or sitting Representative, or whatever. They wanted to be listed according to their supposed real occupation, i.e. lawyer, farmer, accountant, etc. Theoretically this would confuse voters into not knowing who the evil incumbent was and improve their chances of being re-elected. In reality, the alleged incumbent backlash never materialized as such and incumbents stopped worrying about it.
 
CRUE CAB said:
I would be in favor of an amendment making voting mandatory.
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No. I don't want people who don't care enough to get out on their own influencing policy. We have too many uninformed voters already. If a person doesn't care enough to go vote I'm fine with that, but I won't listen to their complaints later.

I also do not support "get out the vote" campaigns for this same reason.
 
radcen said:
No. I don't want people who don't care enough to get out on their own influencing policy. We have too many uninformed voters already. If a person doesn't care enough to go vote I'm fine with that, but I won't listen to their complaints later.

I also do not support "get out the vote" campaigns for this same reason.
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If we keep our voting rate at about 30% on average, we will continue to get the same problems. Over and over and over.
 
CRUE CAB said:
If we keep our voting rate at about 30% on average, we will continue to get the same problems. Over and over and over.
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I don't think the voting rate/percentage is relevant. It's the (political) education and interest of those who do vote. That would apply at 30% or 60% or 100%. Right now we have a roughly 90% disapproval rate of Congress in general and a roughly 90% re-election rate for Congress. THAT's the problem, the disconnect.
 
radcen said:
I don't think the voting rate/percentage is relevant. It's the (political) education and interest of those who do vote. That would apply at 30% or 60% or 100%. Right now we have a roughly 90% disapproval rate of Congress in general and a roughly 90% re-election rate for Congress. THAT's the problem, the disconnect.
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The problem is gerrymandering. People tend to love their personal representative.

I say we come up with some sort of randomized algorithm that only responds to roughly equal population sizes and one approved by all parties with at least 2% of the national vote (that should include libertarians, maybe 1% or something) and the justice department. That code should also be the subject of state public referendums to ensure its nonbias.
 
tacomancer said:
The problem is gerrymandering. People tend to love their personal representative.

I say we come up with some sort of randomized algorithm that only responds to roughly equal population sizes and one approved by all parties with at least 2% of the national vote (that should include libertarians, maybe 1% or something) and the justice department. That code should also be the subject of state public referendums to ensure its nonbias.
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Gerrymandering is a HUGE problem, I agree, and it needs to be addressed. Problem is, the people who would address it are the ones benefiting from it.

People do vote their interests. And that's not automatically wrong, but people also need to understand that their interests lie beyond their own front door. You can't like what your representative is doing because he "brings home jobs" to your area then criticize other people's representatives for doing the same thing. For all the whining and complaining, people's votes indicate that they are just fine with pork and earmarks and bloated government spending.
 
Kal'Stang said:
This amendment would ban all political parties from running for any federal or state political position. No more Democrats, no more Republicans, no more Green Party or Libertarian or Socialist or any of the other myriad other parties that are out there. You could be a part of a party, but you cannot run based on that party. IE: No D or R next to the name on a ballot. The person would also be denied any sponsership of a political party by disallowing them to even speak of any political parties what so ever in any capacity or situation.

Please note that these are not the exact words to be used obviously. This is just a gist.
Click to expand...

I would have no issue with not allowing "Democrat" or "Republican" to appear on the ballot next to them.

I would have significant issue with passing an amendment that directly limits an individuals speech. It's similar to my issue with banning gay marriage. It's a limitation of a right that does not directly protect another persons right in the process; that is not the type of thing I believe the constitution should be used for.

I would vote against said amendment
 
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