Thursday, December 10, 2020

Teen advocates that you should know


"If the fires that innately burn inside youths are not intentionally and lovingly added to the hearth of community, they will burn down the structures of culture, " just to feel the warmth." - Michael J. Meade, D.H.L..




Joseph Bronski:



Articles:



















Troubled teen industry:

Organisations and resources:



Articles:








Wednesday, July 15, 2020

Upcoming edits for my constitution 1



A Voter ID is required to vote.

I plan on using a mixed voting system for representation, something like Mixed Member Proportional. 
Single-winner elections would be range/score, STAR, or Borda.
Aliens may become citizens if they speak they can fluently speak, read, and write the official language, pass a test, and prove that they're integrated into society. Congress shall regulate the details of this process.
One may gain automatic citizenship if they were born raised from childhood by a citizen.
Work permits are required for Aliens who wish to be employed within the Nation. Criminals and illegal aliens should be deported.
Residents have the same status as Citizens in every way except for the right to work, vote, hold office, or have government security clearances.
Federal Department of Foreign Affairs.
Responsible for handling the nation's relations with foreign states.
Federal Treasury.
. Responsible for creating and issuing currency. Also responsible for keeping and handling money taxed by the Federal Government.
The Federal Department of War. The services shall be;
. Federal Navy.
. Federal Air Force.
. Federal Army.
. Within the Federal Department of War, shall be the Combined Intelligence Command, which combines and coordinates intelligence activities by each branch.
. Each service may be called upon to support another's mission as appropriate for the environment and circumstance.
. The Federal Air Force shall lead the mission of intercepting and, if deemed necessary, shoot down aircraft that disobey air traffic control and/or are suspected to be a threat, including containing a threat, to the nation.
. Measures should be taken to eliminate or, if not possible, minimize, duplication of effort.
Federal Navy responsibilities:
. Providing military power on bodies of water.
Federal Air Force responsibilities:
. Providing military power in the air and space, unless the latter function has been taken over
by a dedicated Federal Space Force.
. Providing strategic airspace defense.
Federal Army Responsibilities:
. Providing military power on the ground.
. Providing tactical airspace defense.
The Federal Department of Law Enforcement And Civil Defense. The services shall be:
. Federal Police.
. Federal Coast Guard.
. Federal Corrections.
. Federal Civil Defense Service.
Federal Police responsibilities:
. Protecting and controlling the nation's international borders.
. Jointly enforce import and export laws and regulations with the Federal Coast Guard.
. Investigate and combat transnational criminal and terrorist activity.
. Ensure that employers are not employing non-citizens who do not have work permits or work visas.
. Protect the nation from terrorist attacks.
. Deter and combat human and animal abduction, trafficking, and smuggling.
. Protect the nation against foreign intelligence operations and espionage.
. Protect the nation against cyber-based attacks and high-technology crimes.
. Combat government corruption at all levels.
. Protect constitutional, human, and civil rights domestically. This includes against state and local governments if they fail in their duties.
. Combat transnational/national criminal organizations and enterprises.
. Combat major white-collar crime.
. Combat significant violent crime.
. Support federal, state, local and international partners.
. Upgrade technology to enable, and further, the successful performances of its
missions as stated above.
Federal Coast Guard responsibilities:
. Augmenting and assisting the Federal Navy, particularly doing non-combat tasks and acting as the rear guard.
. Guarding maritime and marine related infrastructure and locations of interest during war.
. Law enforcement, including coastal security, port security, waterways security,
protecting natural resources, and enforcing marine safety regulations.
. Search and rescue.
. Combating fires on the water.
. Other emergency and general maritime and public safety services.
. Ensuring navigation safety, which may include maintaining aids to navigation.
. Escorting and assisting civilian watercraft flying the flag of the nation while on or transiting
through disputed waters.
. Controlling pollution off the nation's coast.
Federal Corrections responsibilities:
. Operating and maintaining Federal Prisons, other than prisons maintained by Military Police of Federal Department of War services.
. May handle prisoners of war if Federal military forces are unable to do so alone.
. Providing oversight, reporting and gathering information on sub-national level jails/prisons and secure psychiatric hospitals on behalf of the Federal Government.
Federal Civil Defense Service responsibilities:
To protect people from military, paramilitary and terrorist attacks, disease breakouts, and natural disast
Prisoner of war definition:
Any individual who has surrendered themself to the military and is unarmed as of the time of surrendering themself, or is captured by the military, or is unarmed and is being held against their will by the military. Prisoners of war shall not be deprived of water, food shelter, clothing, or medical care. Prisoners of war shall be permitted to maintain contact with family members, however, their communications may be censored as deemened necessary during military operations or actions. Prisoners of war shall only be required to give their name, date of birth, rank and service number (if applicable).
Prisoners of war may be quarantined if doing so is deemed necessary to prevent the spread of serious, communicable diseases.
This is inclusive to individuals who are captured by law enforcement or paramilitary groups when conducting any operation or action with Federal military forces.
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Private law enforcement must be held to the same standards as government law enforcement as far as regulations, Freedom Of Information, public disclosure of information, and law enforcement credentials. Private law enforcement are held liable for damages or illegal behavior.
All elections are nonpartisan, and there will be open caucuses.
Electoral college:
Voters will vote based on ranked preferences.
Ballot acess:
A candidate shall be entitled to appear on the official ballot at the next election if:
A candidate shall be entitled to representation on the official ballot at the next ensuing general election upon filing with the relevant state officer, no later than 60 days prior to the next ensuing general election, a petition signed by a number of qualified electors equal to not less than the lesser of (1) one-third of one percent of the total votes cast for the office sought in the last preceding general election at which such office was elected or (2) 10,000 electors.
Voters may also write-in the names of candidates.
Tax code will be copied from FairTax.
Only sales tax may be used by sub-national governments if FairTax is not used.
No constitutional limit on the sales tax on animal products, but it is recommended, not required, to tax it at 25%-28% of price.
Tariffs may be used to protect the national economy against foreign countries with unfair protectionist policies, and/or otherwise government supported industries.
Individual rights preempt state and local laws.
There shall be no government sector unions, as that they bargan against taxpayers.

Tuesday, June 9, 2020

Electoral System Comparison

I support either mixed proportional representation or proportional representation in a umtlicameral legislature. The proportional aspect gives minority voters in a territory more of a voice, while the localized districts gives voters who live in sparsely populated regions (rural areas for example) a voice and does not make them essentially serfs to more populated regions (coasts and especially urban areas for example).


Wikipedia on Mixed Member Proportional Representation

So it seems that Mixed Member Proportional representation (with the Macanese "d'Hondt method", which "greatly favors small parties") or Dual Member Proportional are the best options.

I do lean towards an open list, because I feel that it gives smart people the most power in politics and are not limited to being members of some political party.

I lean against closed party lists and closed primaries because it limits the power of smart individuals to influence who gets to represent them. Let me elaborate.

What if I vote for the Republican party. What if I am a Jeffersonian who wants Ron Paul, Thomas Massie, and Thomas Sowell, not an Evangelical Neoconservative who wants John McCain, Rick Santorum, and Mike Huckabee.

What if I vote for the Democratic party. What if I prefer, say, Tulsi Gabbard, Ralph Nader, and Dennis Kucinich, and not, say Hillary Clinton, Joe Liberman, or Bernie Sanders.

What if I vote for the Libertarian party. What if I want, say, Tom Woods, Ryan Dawson, and Robert Nozick, not Gary Johnson, Bill Weld, or Vermin Supreme.

Do you see where I am going here?

As Ryan Dawson once said in his video "The problem with voting is dumb people", "the intelligent are always a minority to the stupid/politically ignorant."


Though this is likely because of the USA's First-past-the-post voting system, which creates two large "big tent" parties.


Anyways, I am looking at proportional non-majoritarian party-agnostic multi-winner methods:




Universally liked candidates?: Yes.

Warren's Multi-Winner Participation Criterion?: No.

Monotone?: Yes.

Consistency?: No.

No favorite betrayal?: No.

Semi honest?: No.


Universally liked candidates?: No.

Warren's Multi-Winner Participation Criterion?: Yes.

Monotone?: Yes.

Consistency?: Possible/unknown.

No favorite betrayal?: No.

Semi honest?: No.


Universally liked candidates?: Possible/unknown.

Warren's Multi-Winner Participation Criterion?: Yes.

Monotone?: Depends on tiebreaker used.

Consistency?: Possible/unknown.

No favorite betrayal?: No.

Semi honest?: No.


Universally liked candidates?: Yes.

Warren's Multi-Winner Participation Criterion?: Possible/unknown.

Monotone?: No.

Consistency?: Possible/unknown.

No favorite betrayal?: Possible/unknown.

Semi honest?: Possible/unknown.


Universally liked candidates?: Yes.

Warren's Multi-Winner Participation Criterion?: Possible/unknown.

Monotone?: Possible/unknown.

Consistency?: Possible/unknown.

No favorite betrayal?: No.

Semi honest?: No.


All of them fail "no favorite betrayal" and "semi honest" criteria, with the exception of Bid voting, which is Possible/unknown for both and everything else except for Universally liked candidates.

So Schulze STV is safest if you value Universally liked candidates, Psi/Harmonic is safest if you value Warren's Multi-Winner Participation Criterion, while Monroe's and Bid voting are wildcards, especially the latter.

So my first option would be Schulze Single Transferable Vote, followed by Psi/Harmonic.


But that's not all of the options.
has more options.

By process of elimination, by eliminating the previously mentioned Monroe's and predecessors to modified systems (such as Single Transferable Vote, which is not monotone, Sequential Proportional Approval and Reweighted Range, both of which fail Warren's Multi-Winner Participation Criterion, and Sequentially Spent Score, which has worse free-riding than Sequentially Shrinking Quota), and narrowing down to score voting methods (also called cardinal, evaluative, rated, graded, or range).


There's also Sequential Phragmen, which has "perfect representation". And there's Proportional STAR voting, but as far as I know, it's a partisan system.

Unlike the other systems of voting that was previously listed, I do not know which criteria these systems succeed or fail in.


Some alternate systems that are honorable mentions but I'm not considering, with one exception, would be PAL representationPLACE voting, and PAD voting.

PLACE voting is only semi-proportional if there are more than two parties, and both PLACE and PAL incentiveise forming coalition governments (which I oppose for my system, though others have opposite leanings).

I'd only support PAD voting for small towns (like for a Board of selectmen like in New Hampshire to oversee the day-to-day operations of the government) or specific government agencies (like a police board, for example).





For single-winner elections, there is score/range, STAR, and Borda count.


More articles and Quora answers:






Maybe the Federal Government could adopt one system, ie,  and state/local governments will adopt their own systems. Maybe MMP, DMP, and party-list proportional representation.


I have my own system, called "Threshold Voting". It's a voting system for legislatures, in which anyone with 10,000 signatures or more can become a legislator. It may work for a minarchist system.


So what do you think? Please comment below.