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RuanGacho posted:With the existence of ALEC I'm fairly well convinced that we can destroy ourselves with national influence as much as we like. I dont know if this is sarcasm, but ALEC has started to invest a far higher amount of its budget into local and state elections because the return on value is even higher, and the feds are weak enough they can do what they want. The answer to your other question - Yes, but entire states have to change as well. My state has 6 months of open legislation followed by 18 months of it being closed. When I organized one of the larger medicaid expansion efforts in the nation LAST year and it failed, it failed until 2015. Local politics are so bad here that Ive literally sat on multiple Dem county meetings where we could not find out for the life of us when to register to vote (for local only elections). There is often a very short window to register and then one work day to vote.
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Aug 26, 2014 17:12
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RuanGacho posted:I can't give too many examples but one I was aware of was when the city of Tacoma WA, set up their own cable company, they seem to have prices generally lower than Comcast/Cox/Timewarner they offer an introductory rate of $17 a month for As an IT consultant of Tacoma,WA Click! network is awesome. Where Comcast response to outages is f off I will have the same rep that I have been dealing with for 10 years call me Nd preemptively say there is outrage and give me reasons behind. That extra 10$ a month to not have to deal with Comcast is worth every cent. I'm phone posting now but will effort post on how this works. We are one of the only cities in the country that does this and I for one am proud of the city even if it's not perfect.
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Aug 26, 2014 19:25
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BlueBlazer posted:As an IT consultant of Tacoma,WA Click! network is awesome. Where Comcast response to outages is f off I will have the same rep that I have been dealing with for 10 years call me Nd preemptively say there is outrage and give me reasons behind. That extra 10$ a month to not have to deal with Comcast is worth every cent. I'm phone posting now but will effort post on how this works. We are one of the only cities in the country that does this and I for one am proud of the city even if it's not perfect. That sounds pretty great. I think the issue I and others have is that the thread is essentially "Isn't it wonderful to live in a progressive state with a relatively well run state government?". Not eveyone has that luxury, and its not some extremely small minority.
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Aug 26, 2014 20:00
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mugrim posted:That sounds pretty great. I think the issue I and others have is that the thread is essentially "Isn't it wonderful to live in a progressive state with a relatively well run state government?". Not eveyone has that luxury, and its not some extremely small minority. My impression is that this thread is mostly about "hey, let's talk about local government because it's an underexplored issue in D&D, and in political activism generally". But maybe I misread the OP.
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Aug 27, 2014 01:09
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Canvassing at the very local level is fun, because everybody knows the local politicians even if they don't know they're actually politicians. I've gotten support from multiple people who've said "Wait, [opponent] is running? He's already the township clerk? He's a dick! Sure, I'll vote for you." The downside of very local politics is that there's no pre-election polling and I have no idea how the race is actually going. But it's fun! Mostly. Sort of. Didn't realize going in how much it'd cost to campaign even at this level.
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Aug 27, 2014 06:09
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Absurd Alhazred posted:My impression is that this thread is mostly about "hey, let's talk about local government because it's an underexplored issue in D&D, and in political activism generally". But maybe I misread the OP. This is my essential intent yes, also we need to start local if were ever going to make governments that suck, suck less.
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Aug 27, 2014 08:50
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RuanGacho posted:This is my essential intent yes, also we need to start local if were ever going to make governments that suck, suck less. This is the part that's really bugging me: for many causes, and many groups, starting local is not an option. You seem to be conflating the idea that the local matters a lot--which it totally does--with the idea that solutions flow upwards from the local. Again, if you're talking about things like civil rights, historically in the US top-down, at least at the state level but often at the federal level, is the way that change occurs. There are places where this is not true--sanctuary cities, as someone pointed out--but it's largely true. To put it another way: how are you going to 'start local' and improve things if the problem you're addressing is that in your 70% white 30% black town, the schools are segregated, landlords tacitly refuse to rent to black people in certain areas, no black people are ever appointed or elected to the government, etc? I think it's really valuable to talk about local government. I think it's foolish to beg the question and say that local government is the fulcrum for political change.
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Aug 27, 2014 12:34
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Obdicut posted:This is the part that's really bugging me: for many causes, and many groups, starting local is not an option. You seem to be conflating the idea that the local matters a lot--which it totally does--with the idea that solutions flow upwards from the local. Again, if you're talking about things like civil rights, historically in the US top-down, at least at the state level but often at the federal level, is the way that change occurs. There are places where this is not true--sanctuary cities, as someone pointed out--but it's largely true. Of course one would need a large body to coordinate the revolution globally, but to change your immediate surroundings local government certainly has an advantage. In the case of a local institution, such as the school, church, or police station down the road, the degrees of separation between policy maker and voter are fewer. The poster above mentioned voters knowing the candidates personally. I would suggest that this gives the elected official a greater standard of responsibility and accountability. Of course, you could turn this around by arguing that there exists local institutions today that aren't moving towards the final utopia, and that (in your specific example) segregation is still possible in smaller communities. However, if a free flow of communication were to be shared between fellow communities (for example these very forums), it could prevent local areas from stagnating policy wise.
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Aug 27, 2014 14:24
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asio posted:
How would that flow of information prevent local areas from stagnating 'policy-wise'? How would this information transform into actual political change in that town?
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Aug 27, 2014 14:40
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Obdicut posted:This is the part that's really bugging me: for many causes, and many groups, starting local is not an option. You seem to be conflating the idea that the local matters a lot--which it totally does--with the idea that solutions flow upwards from the local. Again, if you're talking about things like civil rights, historically in the US top-down, at least at the state level but often at the federal level, is the way that change occurs. There are places where this is not true--sanctuary cities, as someone pointed out--but it's largely true. By the same token though, a lot of policies from the civil rights movement have failed, specifically because they were identified as a top-down solution. Obdicut posted:
That's not a situation that's actually present in major cities. Houston is 25% non-Hispanic White, Chicago is 32% non-Hispanic White, hell even Phoenix Arizona is only 46% white. The entire point is that large cities or even just county governments have substantial powers that aren't being focused on. Or to use another example - The problems with Ferguson right now is not that a 75% white town is oppressing minorities, it's the exact opposite.
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Aug 27, 2014 14:47
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computer parts posted:By the same token though, a lot of policies from the civil rights movement have failed, specifically because they were identified as a top-down solution. I'd say it's a lot more complex than that. Some policies from the civil rights movement have succeeded despite local resistance, others--like desegregation--have failed despite the top-down approach; this doesn't mean that a local approach would have actually succeeded, though. That doesn't follow logically. quote:That's not a situation that's actually present in major cities. Houston is 25% non-Hispanic White, Chicago is 32% non-Hispanic White, hell even Phoenix Arizona is only 46% white. The entire point is that large cities or even just county governments have substantial powers that aren't being focused on. This is my point: Comparing small town 'local' government to big city 'local' government is silly. Large cities tend to be far less homogenous and more resemble 'non-local' politics in many ways. quote:Or to use another example - The problems with Ferguson right now is not that a 75% white town is oppressing minorities, it's the exact opposite. Indeed it does. That's why I talked, in the beginning, not about actual sheer numbers of people but in terms of their actual political power and buy-in. I have no idea if the lack of black government people in Ferguson is due to incredibly low voting rates among blacks there, or a lack of black candidates, or what have you. If the problem is just lack of voting, that is something potentially addressable through grassroots organization, but the natural reaction to seeing a place like Ferguson shouldn't be "Local government is responsive and its easier to vote the bums out". The reason I'm using the minority example in general is because it's easier to think about, and I don't know the specific reason why the local government of Ferguson is so unrepresentative.
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Aug 27, 2014 14:55
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Obdicut posted:
Small towns are becoming increasingly irrelevant as time goes on (even if you include suburbs those are going to be depopulated in the near future due to gas prices and the like).
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Aug 27, 2014 15:02
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computer parts posted:Small towns are becoming increasingly irrelevant as time goes on (even if you include suburbs those are going to be depopulated in the near future due to gas prices and the like). Suburbs aren't gong to be 'depopulated in the near future'. Where are all the people in the SF peninsula going to go, for example?
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Aug 27, 2014 15:04
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Obdicut posted:Suburbs aren't gong to be 'depopulated in the near future'. Where are all the people in the SF peninsula going to go, for example? San Francisco is an entirely unique circumstance. Houston suburbs are going to be depopulated, Chicago suburbs are going to be depopulated, Phoenix suburbs will be depopulated, etc.
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Aug 27, 2014 15:07
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Obdicut posted:I'd say it's a lot more complex than that. Some policies from the civil rights movement have succeeded despite local resistance, others--like desegregation--have failed despite the top-down approach; this doesn't mean that a local approach would have actually succeeded, though. That doesn't follow logically. That's a good question. I guess you could have a lot of threads where you would talk about the nation-wide aspects, while here you would be focusing on why these constituencies are not represented, and whether there are any local ways of resolving that. If that fails, well, up the ladder you go. v  vLocal politics is also much easier to get into as an elected official, so it seems like a good practice run if you want to end up changing national politics that way. And unfortunately the easiest way to get into national politics is to convince a local constituency that you can represent them (and somehow either get a lot of donors behind you to pump that message, or succeed in spite of it) through a run to Congress. It's a big blind-spot for people from outside the US, and seems to be so for a lot of activists locally, as well.
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Aug 27, 2014 15:07
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computer parts posted:San Francisco is an entirely unique circumstance. Houston suburbs are going to be depopulated, Chicago suburbs are going to be depopulated, Phoenix suburbs will be depopulated, etc. This isn't true either, and I'm not sure why you think it is. Your claim for this is solely based on gas prices? What are you defining as a 'suburb'? Is Cicero a 'suburb' of Chicago? Why would it depopulate? Even if we grant your argument, are you basically saying that there will no longer be any significant local government below the level of 'city'?
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Aug 27, 2014 15:13
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Obdicut posted:This isn't true either, and I'm not sure why you think it is. Your claim for this is solely based on gas prices? What are you defining as a 'suburb'? Is Cicero a 'suburb' of Chicago? Why would it depopulate? My claim is that suburbs which are primarily connected to cities by roads (as opposed to rail, etc) will become cost prohibitive due to the price of gas and the like. Seeing this, the rich (white) people will move into the city, perhaps the city center, and displace the residents therein. I guess what I'm calling suburbs a lot of people call "Exhurbs" but it's the same idea. quote:Even if we grant your argument, are you basically saying that there will no longer be any significant local government below the level of 'city'? On a technical level there is no local government below the level of city, at least from the state perspective.
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Aug 27, 2014 15:27
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computer parts posted:My claim is that suburbs which are primarily connected to cities by roads (as opposed to rail, etc) will become cost prohibitive due to the price of gas and the like. Seeing this, the rich (white) people will move into the city, perhaps the city center, and displace the residents therein. I can give an example where this is both true and not true. Recently it was suggested by our county that they were accepting a permit application for a marijuana warehousing and processing facility in a single industrial zone surrounded by residential housing. The population density of this area is roughly 100 people per sq mile. They really don't like that this facility is being considered but ultimately the only say they have is an environmental impact study which by the time they found out they had roughly 15 days to organize and officially comment on. These people are represented by a council set up by county which coincidently was set up at the exact same time the city incorporated and has a motto of "keep rural [city name] rural" and generally just exists to say nuh uh! To the city council. They have no real chance of stopping whatever county wants to do as they have no real legal standing to say no as they are unincorporated so they cant claim to really represent anyone on a basically volunteer body but if they had not spent the last 15 years opposing any city influence the cities ordinances and resolutions woudlnt have allowed what the county is now considering. You will be governed, it is better to have a goverment you potentially have a say in than to pretend you're a sovereign nation and no one will dare cross your desires.
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Aug 27, 2014 15:51
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computer parts posted:My claim is that suburbs which are primarily connected to cities by roads (as opposed to rail, etc) will become cost prohibitive due to the price of gas and the like. Seeing this, the rich (white) people will move into the city, perhaps the city center, and displace the residents therein. This is happening to some extent. However, rich white people aren't the only people in existence, so I'm really not sure why you're just talking about them. But there's tons of places where this isn't going to happen, either because the public transport network is up to the job, or the compensation levels are high enough to offset the high gas prices, etc. If you want to walk back your claim to a more modest one that re-urbanization is occurring, I'd agree: it's also a nearly completely irrelevant point to the topic. quote:On a technical level there is no local government below the level of city, at least from the state perspective. Great nitpick! As was clear from the context, I wasn't talking about the technical level. To restate the question so you can take a stab at answering it, are you saying that there will no longer be any 'cities' that have under a hundred thousand people? Everyone in the greater Chicago area will just cram into Chicago, Aurora, Elgin, and Joliet? Or are you just talking about rich (white) people?
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Aug 27, 2014 18:01
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Obdicut posted:This is happening to some extent. However, rich white people aren't the only people in existence, so I'm really not sure why you're just talking about them. But there's tons of places where this isn't going to happen, either because the public transport network is up to the job, or the compensation levels are high enough to offset the high gas prices, etc. If you want to walk back your claim to a more modest one that re-urbanization is occurring, I'd agree: it's also a nearly completely irrelevant point to the topic. Your claim was specifically about racists taking over a city because they're the clear majority. My point is that that's becoming more and more of a rare occurance as people move (back) into the cities. quote:Great nitpick! As was clear from the context, I wasn't talking about the technical level. To restate the question so you can take a stab at answering it, are you saying that there will no longer be any 'cities' that have under a hundred thousand people? Everyone in the greater Chicago area will just cram into Chicago, Aurora, Elgin, and Joliet? Or are you just talking about rich (white) people? They'll become less and less common, yes.
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Aug 27, 2014 18:05
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computer parts posted:Your claim was specifically about racists taking over a city because they're the clear majority. My point is that that's becoming more and more of a rare occurance as people move (back) into the cities. No, it wasn't. It was a claim that there are already-established places where this is true, and they're not large cities. I explicitly said this isn't true in large cities, which are more diverse. What you seem to be saying is that cities are going to get whiter as white people flee the suburbs and exurbs (something which has really obvious limitations to it). quote:
Again, if your claim is that the white people will go into the cities and displace the residents, where are those residents going to go? And why, if 'city' is a completely arbitrary designation with no inherent meaning for population or geography, are you saying that cities under a hundred thousand residents will become less common? For example, Boston-Cambridge-Newton has 94 cities, most of them under a hundred thousand people, many of them already about as dense as can be: Sommerville, for example, is the 15th most densely populated city in the country. I think that you may be ignorant about just how many independent cities and towns already make up what you think of as a 'city'.
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Aug 27, 2014 18:19
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Obdicut, you're really maxing out the smug contrarianism meter here.
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Aug 27, 2014 19:15
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Discendo Vox posted:Obdicut, you're really maxing out the smug contrarianism meter here. I'm not being a smug contrarian, at all. Instead of assuming I'm arguing in bad faith, look at what I'm actually saying. The same things that make local government, in some cases, more responsive, also make it less responsive to minority interests. In a city or town with a political plurality that's homogenous, they never have to give a poo poo about the minority vote. They can just not give a gently caress, and it won't hurt them. Nobody in Provo has to give a poo poo about the non-Mormon vote. Nobody in Colorado Springs has to give a gently caress about the black vote. Etc. The larger the political demesne gets, the less homogenous it becomes and the more important minority groups become. This is why many of the civil rights solutions, no matter how inadequate, have come top-down. To blithely talk about voting the bums out and local politics being more reactive is foolish; it is true for some local politics, but if we're going to talk about local politics we really ought to also address the problems of the many 'local' places in the US where minorities (or majorities who are minorities in terms of political power) are shut out of the political process. This is true regardless of who moves where. We don't have any sort of actual system whereby a 'city' is actually defined: as I said in my first post, there is very little comparison between the 'city' of New York and the 'city' of Sommerville or the 'city' of Jackson, Wyoming. They have almost nothing in common on any level. As was pointed out above, the state that you're in also matters a ton: some 'local' governments are nearly entirely dependant on state funding, others have a greater measure of independence. There is very, very little that you can be sure is common between one 'local' government and another. They resemble each other even less than the state level of government, and that, of course, is also wildly varied. If you have any problems with any point I've raised, go ahead and state them and I'll try to address them. Just smugly announcing that I'm a contrarian doesn't really do much.
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Aug 27, 2014 19:31
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People weren't disagreeing with you about pretty much any of that. You parachuted into the thread and all of your contributions have been "responsive local governments? good luck, Polyanna  " RuanGacho, this is more or less exactly why this would be better suited to ask/tell. You're going to get people construing the OP as a position they need to oppose for ideological reasons.
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Aug 27, 2014 19:35
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Discendo Vox posted:People weren't disagreeing with you about pretty much any of that. You parachuted into the thread and all of your contributions have been "responsive local governments? good luck, Polyanna Yes, that is my disagreement with the OP, particularly this part: quote:All too often we get wrapped up in the national politics, ruled by corporate media and profit motives. But the thing you can most easily change and cause seismic shifts in the discourse with is just in your backyard, your local government. And this part: quote:. When bums get in office you actually can typically get the bums thrown out. For the reasons that I've said: These things aren't true if you're part of a minority group. And I also have a problem with the general lumping together of all 'local' politics into one group, because I don't think you can meaningfully discuss the 'local' politics of LA and the 'local' politics of Point Reyes Station as though they have anything to do with each other. But that, at least, can be interesting in the compare and contrast. quote:RuanGacho, this is more or less exactly why this would be better suited to ask/tell. You're going to get people construing the OP as a position they need to oppose for ideological reasons. I agree with this, though obviously not the 'ideological positions' laffo part, since my objections aren't in the least bit ideological. If you want to talk about how to enact political change in local governments where there's enough of a middle ground to actually effect political change, I think an A/T thread would be good, though you should make it clear you're talking about that special circumstance and not local politics in general. If, on the other hand, we want to debate and discuss local politics in the US, then we should also discuss the ways that local government obstructs, as well as enables change. Again, if you have any actual problem with any point I've raised about why local governments aren't necessarily more responsive and why you can't 'usually' throw the bums out, go for it.
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Aug 27, 2014 19:44
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Obdicut posted:If you want to talk about how to enact political change in local governments where there's enough of a middle ground to actually effect political change, I think an A/T thread would be good, though you should make it clear you're talking about that special circumstance and not local politics in general. I don't see why you would want to do this filtering outside of the thread in question. I think a poster should be able to come to this thread not just to find ways to affect change where it's possible, or just to see why that can't be done, but to gain better insights into how one can more quickly realize which scenario is the relevant one for their hometown. The OP has a lot of comparative stuff in it for starters, and I think that would be a valuable resource and point of discussion. Maybe strategies that work in a "better" municipal situation could also be adapted to a "worse" one, or the reasons one succeeds could point to the specific failings in where it wouldn't be able to succeed. As for whether this is better for D&D or Ask/Tell, that I don't know. But I don't accept your restriction of the conversation, and you're coming off as needlessly antagonistic.
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Aug 27, 2014 19:58
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Absurd Alhazred posted:I think a poster should be able to come to this thread not just to find ways to affect change where it's possible, or just to see why that can't be done, but to gain better insights into how one can more quickly realize which scenario is the relevant one for their hometown. I agree: The OP, however, didn't acknowledge that there were many situations--like atheists in Provo, black people in Colorado Springs--where there would be gently caress-all you can do at the local level. In general, the smaller the political unit, the more homogenous it is, and the less moveable the politics actually are. The OP presents kind of the opposite: that local politics is the ideal fulcrum for political change. In general, I'd argue that the local level is harder to change unless you happen to be part of the majority political group pushing policies acceptable to that majority political group. If you want to stop your local school board from using textbooks that deny evolution and you live in a town where 75% of the people are creationists, you're almost certainly not going to be able to change that through engagement with local politics. quote:As for whether this is better for D&D or Ask/Tell, that I don't know. But I don't accept your restriction of the conversation, and you're coming off as needlessly antagonistic. I don't know what you mean by the 'restriction' of the conversation. What I'm saying is there is very little that you can say about 'local' politics that actually holds true. If what you mean by restriction that I'm saying that you can't really compare the local politics of a small town to the politics of a big city, that's just a true thing. I don't see it as a bad thing if the thread meanders around and is sometimes talking about the 'local' politics of New York City or the 'local' politics of Whitfield, Maine. However, there's going to be pretty much no similarity between those two discussions.
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Aug 27, 2014 20:13
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Obdicut posted:I agree: The OP, however, didn't acknowledge that there were many situations--like atheists in Provo, black people in Colorado Springs--where there would be gently caress-all you can do at the local level. In general, the smaller the political unit, the more homogenous it is, and the less moveable the politics actually are. The OP presents kind of the opposite: that local politics is the ideal fulcrum for political change. In general, I'd argue that the local level is harder to change unless you happen to be part of the majority political group pushing policies acceptable to that majority political group. If you want to stop your local school board from using textbooks that deny evolution and you live in a town where 75% of the people are creationists, you're almost certainly not going to be able to change that through engagement with local politics. Honestly I don't see the difference between what you're saying applying at the local or national level. You will always have a minority marginalized if the majority isn't sympathetic or at least being coerced into admitting policy is unfair. It seems like most of your objections could be overcome if I just stopped using the word "local" because ultimately we have large swaths of government that are largely ignored by citizens, function more like each other than not and as far as the public is concerned, completely undocumented. The reason I say that these parts of the government are ripe for personal influence is because while we have organizations like ALEC and their ilk steering the national discourse we can play ball with them in city councils and town halls. Every two weeks I walk into a city council meeting that has less than 5 citizens (whom aren't also staff) attend. The city council asks twice a session "We are now opening the floor to public comment" and 9/10 no one has anything to say. This is a city council that refuses to consider any kind of change in revenue collection or tax expenditure without first having a public hearing, which the last time it happened literally no one showed up to because no one cares about if the traffic light gets built now or two years from now if it's not seen as a public safety issue. On the other hand tell the public you're going to change garbage collection after a non partisan blind selection process and you'll suddenly have every lobbyist from a 200 mile radius trying to tell you why you should actually spend $300,000 a year more on the their company that didn't offer as many services or bids and have people wailing about their 3 year old daughter not growing up to see their favorite garbage man?! As I tried to lay out with the Huston example these governments all largely run on the same structure but not scale. You keep insisting that big Cities and Small have nothing in common and I will very politely assert to you, again, that they have far more common than any other governments and we can't as a society, or a dumb little thread figure out how to improve things until we at least understand where we are now. Today there was a story that the big difference between the Washington and Colorado marijuana legalization passed is that Washington has many more public health and saftey metrics built into their laws, this means that for the first time ever there will be metrics being recorded on how pot seems to effect driving safety, crime, a whole slew of economic factors due to medical still being largely unregulated. We need that data for the whole country to know and learn things about recreational pot policy. My OP didn't start with how minorities of any flavor may be oppressed by a local government because I thought this was self evident and obvious and secondly that we as a culture have so little cataloged information and interest in our governments we can affect as individuals that it seems silly to start with "See how Spot overthrew the Bourgeois Mob" than "See Spot Run" Ultimately you either believe you can change government through participation or you don't. D&D has a high proclivity for sipping from it's canter nodding sagely about how wise it is about how nothing can be done and we might as well just drown our sorrows of our future being ripped from us by our elders or the ruling class. I don't believe we are without influence or hope. I work in local government in part because this belief is a fundamental part of my being, and while I've had to learn to expect change and influence to stretch into time spans of months and very often years, I can see my work actually changing things for the better. I propose that if you think there is something wrong with government its your obligation to get involved and try to change it. This is not specific to Obdicut, if you are unsatisfied with the way things are going in the US, the UK, Belgium, Australia, Canada, Thailand and the obvious other hundreds countries, what are you doing about it?  Govern or be governed, the price of liberty is responsibility and it's our duty to make sure that when the disenfranchised and financially weak are tread upon by their oppressors that it's intolerable for it to stay that way, that starts where you live. I have no real patience for people who whine about what government is or isn't doing when they can't even be bothered to find out if they agree with how their hometown is run.
RuanGacho fucked around with this message at 21:14 on Aug 27, 2014 |
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Aug 27, 2014 21:10
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RuanGacho posted:Honestly I don't see the difference between what you're saying applying at the local or national level. You will always have a minority marginalized if the majority isn't sympathetic or at least being coerced into admitting policy is unfair. It seems like most of your objections could be overcome if I just stopped using the word "local" because ultimately we have large swaths of government that are largely ignored by citizens, function more like each other than not and as far as the public is concerned, completely undocumented. The difference, as I said, is that as you get a larger and larger political demesne, you get a less and less homogenous population. For example, the GOP can do perfectly well at the local level addressing just the white racist vote, but it can't win the presidency by addressing the white racist vote. So I'm saying that your claim from the OP is exactly the opposite for certain, distinguishable groups: it is harder to enact change at the local level, but easier to do it at the larger level because you can make common cause with other minority interests. Are you arguing that this isn't true, or do you think it's not important, or what? You now say: quote:My OP didn't start with how minorities of any flavor may be oppressed by a local government because I thought this was self evident and obvious and secondly that we as a culture have so little cataloged information and interest in our governments we can affect as individuals that it seems silly to start with "See how Spot overthrew the Bourgeois Mob" than "See Spot Run" But that really doesn't address the point: The claim that you can change local government more easily than national government is specifically and demonstrably not true for many minority groups. I'm not saying you start with "see how Spot overthrew the Bourgeois mob", but one key part of local politics is that they can be utterly monolithic and nearly impossible to change without a court ruling. You're presenting the opposite, that they're usually the most malleable and approachable area of politics. quote:As I tried to lay out with the Huston example these governments all largely run on the same structure but not scale. You keep insisting that big Cities and Small have nothing in common and I will very politely assert to you, again, that they have far more common than any other governments and we can't as a society, or a dumb little thread figure out how to improve things until we at least understand where we are now. And I really fundamentally disagree with this. The government of NYC is not trying to solve a set of the same problems, it doesn't have the same resources, and it's structure doesn't really resemble the government of, say, Nashua, New Hampshire. There are a few things that are similar, but even then, scale affects structure--quantity has a quality all of its own. Large cities are not similar to small towns. They may be 'more similar' than to any other political entity but that doesn't mean that they really have anything in common. Furthermore, if you're talking about effecting change, how to go about doing that in NYC is entirely different from doing it in Nashua. I think there is a lot of value in talking about the small-scale local politics. For example, in NYC, there are 12 different Representatives; Nashua is just under one particular rep. So you have to balance 12 different agendas instead of just consulting with one guy and his office. The media market of NYC is not comparable to the media market of Nashua. I think there's a lot of value in talking about local politics, but I don't think that local politics is that easily comparable--I don't think state politics are that easily comparable, either. I think there's value in talking about how to effect political change at the local level, but that conversation will be completely different if you're talking about a big city or a small city or a big town or a county. And that many times, unlike what you said in the OP, the best--only--way to get local change is by taking the case outside the local area, like so many civil rights cases have done. quote:This is not specific to Obdicut, if you are unsatisfied with the way things are going in the US, the UK, Belgium, Australia, Canada, Thailand and the obvious other hundreds countries, what are you doing about it? As I thought I made clear earlier, I do work in local politics.
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Aug 27, 2014 22:06
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Raun, ALEC is pouring poo poo tons of money into state level and local elections and even publically announced it. In my state they fund most of both houses. Im phone posting but im sure you can find the info. They all but made a press announcement saying their focus is now on local level because its better bang for your buck.
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Aug 27, 2014 22:36
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mugrim posted:Raun, ALEC is pouring poo poo tons of money into state level and local elections and even publically announced it. In my state they fund most of both houses. Im phone posting but im sure you can find the info. They all but made a press announcement saying their focus is now on local level because its better bang for your buck. This is partially a weird side-effect of the gridlock in Congress; ALEC's clients actually like the government to do a lot of stuff, but they've partially-cockblocked themselves on the national level by supporting GOP obstructionism. In other words, if the logjam clears and the GOP returns to being a party that actually does this 'governance' thing, then I'd expect ALEC's focus to go back to the national level as more bang for your buck.
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Aug 27, 2014 22:52
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Obdicut posted:This is partially a weird side-effect of the gridlock in Congress; ALEC's clients actually like the government to do a lot of stuff, but they've partially-cockblocked themselves on the national level by supporting GOP obstructionism. http://www.governing.com/topics/politics/gov-alec-goes-local.html Phone post, article detailing the local change.
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Aug 27, 2014 22:54
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Obdicut posted:How would that flow of information prevent local areas from stagnating 'policy-wise'? How would this information transform into actual political change in that town? Local governments, and the people who vote for them, can see how other places do things differently. Your example is top-down civil rights legislation. Certainly in the racist town of Whitesville, Out Back the impoverished minority will have a more difficult time with their self determination than Friendly Town, Inner City. But if you place those national laws and then leave it with a strong community legislature it would be far more difficult for racist policy makers to ignore. I am thinking of the example where Australian defence force personnel left the country ready to capture some towels in the middle east for their linen cupboard and came back with a strong respect for the people of the countries they fought in. I realize that it is an ideological argument: fewer degrees of separation between power and voter will give the voter greater strength. The only evidence I could provide would be anecdotal. But I do think it must be a given that people are more likely to be honest when they have a close connection to the people they are responsible for. And in the information age, local councils are very close to each other in ways other than geography, which I think is a point in their favour.
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Aug 28, 2014 00:59
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A big thing is also the ABILITY to vote in local elections. Unless there is a major election attached it is often extremely difficult to know how/when to register to vote and often city members aren't huge into that being public knowledge. I live in a district where the fallout of the supreme court voting rights act repeal has hit us hard. Despite actually being involved in local politics, being an advocate, being part of the local party, and actually knowing most local politicians, I registered to vote a week early for a local election and was kept out of voting in the Election. Also, anyone who says their Federal Rep is difficult to reach either has one of the few A-listers (in which case your district is doing pretty loving good usually due to what they can get you), or is a complete idiot. Most are VERY easy to access (even some A-listers). Whether they listen to you is another story, but they do get scared shitless of losing power and because their elections don't follow presidential cycles they can really give a poo poo if it's an off year. The only real advantage the US has over a general party system is that it's tied to geography (though I would trade it in a second). In my district, I have a pretty prominent Congressman who is easier to reach than some of our council members and state officials because they literally have to have a day job. Do not be fooled into the belief that local minority representation is inherently superior. I've seen more than my fair share of lovely politicians try and ride their minority status to do terrible things to sell out their constituency on the local level in ways no national figure could ever get away with. The bigger the spotlight is, the harder it is for you to do crazy poo poo. Local politics are great if you live in a relatively well run and/or progressive area because then you have the freedom to do what you want, but in many places it's a stacked deck and you're better focusing on the state or federal elections. What if your system has fundamental issues that can't even begin to be addressed? City funding based on property taxes but your rich members create cities literally in the middle of a larger city so they have a tax shelter? Your representatives earn 2500/a year and need a day job? Your governor destroys local unions that are vital to your city? Your city relies on a sales tax and voters refuse to increase it no matter the gains? These aren't uncommon problems by any stretch.
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Aug 28, 2014 04:18
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I mainly dabble in local government, having run for office and have extensively covered local (and to a lesser extent, state government) on my blog and some freelance editorial writing I've done. My grandfather was a long time city-county council rep, a moderate Republican who loved parks (his district included Eagle Creek Park, one of the largest municipal parks in the country). He always told me that all politics is local. But the more I've learned about local government, the more I believe it has been completely hijacked by the blood suckers who just want to get their fat government contract work or do nothing government job so they can hand out no-bid contracts to their buddies. The complete fire-sale of public resources that the Mayor of Indianapolis has done has been absolutely astonishing, and the lack of push back from most Democrats (or really, Democrats who have power and influence) have been minimal, at best. I'd also argue that local government might be some of the hardest to reform because the people who run for these positions and the people who participate in those elections are going to be more politically aware and likely more partisan. I mentioned above that the Republican mayor has had a lot of support from Democratic councilors (or at least not the resistance we've seen in, say, the relationship between Obama and House Republicans). But if you talk to these people about more state wide or national issues, the Democrats are some of the most blue, liberal people you know, and the Republicans are your Republican's Republican who would fit right into a caucus meeting of the House GOP. I think my city of Indianapolis is the new Chicago. Except in Chicago, there is an aggressive US Attorney and DOJ operation to put away some of the public corruption. In Chicago, there is the Tribune and Sun-Times to hold government accountable. But in Indianapolis, the former US Attorney is now running for Mayor and the daily paper in town is a cheerleader for every pinheaded idea that comes out of the Mayor's office.
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Aug 28, 2014 11:19
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Not to interrupt, but someone with more know-how than me should consider starting a state government thread, that way this lowly intern at the governor's office could participate.
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Aug 29, 2014 01:26
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FOXDIE posted:Not to interrupt, but someone with more know-how than me should consider starting a state government thread, that way this lowly intern at the governor's office could participate. I would also like to learn about State politics. Although I guess that's also a very wide scope. I imagine State politics in New York is very different from that in North Dakota.
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Aug 29, 2014 04:00
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I would consider state politics local, a lot of the players move back and forth between the two levels. It's also similarly ignored compared to national. In many states, the physical geography is so small that there's even less reason to distinguish those differences.
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Aug 29, 2014 05:48
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I'll concede my lack of imagination about larger cities compared to smaller ones, it's probably best to lay out the differences in interactions between government entities when talking about them. Having said that I don't know that it really matters too much as while a lot of people live in those cities I think I am correct in thinking just as many people don't so there's room for both points of view here. Today a story about cities versus big telecom was run by the center for public integrity. I obviously am biased in favor of their opinion. quote:That’s when Joelle Phillips, president of AT&T’s Tennessee operations, leaned toward her across the table in a conference room next to the House caucus leader’s office and said tersely, “Well, I’d hate for this to end up in litigation,” Bowling recalls. Arstechnica re-ran the story and it turned into a libertarian crap fest in their comments, I'd be curious to what people here make of it.
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Aug 29, 2014 06:06
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Tony Jowns posted:Yep. Many local councils in Australia grant votes to businesses as well as residents in an area (and if you own two businesses? You get a vote for one each!). And then of course you get the occasional comedy option of an LG failing so miserably in the corruption and/or dysfunctionality stakes they have an inquiry that ends up in the State Government firing the lot of them 
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Aug 29, 2014 06:52
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