Abolish The Senate

[Türkisblau]

I have a feeling like left-wingers only want the Senate abolished because the Republicans won it this past midterm. Ya know, I never demanded the Senate to be abolished when Harry Reid was Majority Leader.

Have you read Sabato? This has been an idea for a long time, although I do agree that recent... developments concerning the composition of the Senate have sparked some debate.

[Türkisblau]

I have a feeling like left-wingers only want the Senate abolished because the Republicans won it this past midterm. Ya know, I never demanded the Senate to be abolished when Harry Reid was Majority Leader.

That's not the reason, but people like Cory Gardner and Joni Ernst aren't exactly ringing endorsements for keeping it. There is no reason to have two houses when one house can do all the work that needs to be done.

No, there are plenty of reasons to keep the Senate. Have you taken a class in government? Not to mention your extremely partisan calling out of Gardner (really? Gardner seems alright...) and Ernst.

[Türkisblau]

I have a feeling like left-wingers only want the Senate abolished because the Republicans won it this past midterm. Ya know, I never demanded the Senate to be abolished when Harry Reid was Majority Leader.

That's not the reason, but people like Cory Gardner and Joni Ernst aren't exactly ringing endorsements for keeping it. There is no reason to have two houses when one house can do all the work that needs to be done.

No, there are plenty of reasons to keep the Senate. Have you taken a class in government? Not to mention your extremely partisan calling out of Gardner (really? Gardner seems alright...) and Ernst.

Gardner supports personhood and went back and forth about his ideology during the campaign. He is not all right. No one in a blue state who support Mitch McConnell leading the Senate is all right, they are too far right.

What are the reasons for keeping the Senate? It's redundant to have two houses passing the same bills and lacks efficiency.

He seems to have "evolved" on the issue. I trust him about Personhood about as much as Obama on gay marriage
The Democratic Party failed in the midterms. It's our fault that McConnell is Majority Leader.

Yep... definitely not taken a class in government. Off the top of my head, it goes along with the theme of divided power in the United States government. Tyranny of the majority is prevented through the house, which is popularly elected, from gaining too much power, in essence providing moderation and a check on unbridled power from a too-powerful House of Reps. Imagine the 2010 wave but worse, with a radical congress that had the ability to override a veto. That's what our founders feared. To not understand the importance of the Senate is to not understand the layout of the government and the intent of the founders.
Now I know why mandatory classes in gov. are important.

[Türkisblau]

I have a feeling like left-wingers only want the Senate abolished because the Republicans won it this past midterm. Ya know, I never demanded the Senate to be abolished when Harry Reid was Majority Leader.

That's not the reason, but people like Cory Gardner and Joni Ernst aren't exactly ringing endorsements for keeping it. There is no reason to have two houses when one house can do all the work that needs to be done.

No, there are plenty of reasons to keep the Senate. Have you taken a class in government? Not to mention your extremely partisan calling out of Gardner (really? Gardner seems alright...) and Ernst.

Gardner supports personhood and went back and forth about his ideology during the campaign. He is not all right. No one in a blue state who support Mitch McConnell leading the Senate is all right, they are too far right.

What are the reasons for keeping the Senate? It's redundant to have two houses passing the same bills and lacks efficiency.

He seems to have "evolved" on the issue. I trust him about Personhood about as much as Obama on gay marriage
The Democratic Party failed in the midterms. It's our fault that McConnell is Majority Leader.

Yep... definitely not taken a class in government. Off the top of my head, it goes along with the theme of divided power in the United States government. Tyranny of the majority is prevented through the house, which is popularly elected, from gaining too much power, in essence providing moderation and a check on unbridled power from a too-powerful House of Reps. Imagine the 2010 wave but worse, with a radical congress that had the ability to override a veto. That's what our founders feared.

Gardner changed positions more than once, but that's up to Colorado to learn from since they elected him. But whatever you want to believe.

I've studied government for 20 years, you just started posting on this forum recently, so yeah, don't educate me. For one thing, all that talk about tyranny is pointless, since plenty of counties have one house and nothing bad has happened there. Even Nebraska has one legislative house and there has been no tyranny or unbridled power there. Cities only have one council and counties only have one board, and things work more effectively there than they do federally. Platitudes aren't a good answer, efficiency is the point and a unicameral Congress would be highly more efficient.

I believe that we share a fundamental difference in views here, then. It also nonsensical to try to apply the workings in somewhere like Nebraska or the country/local level with a nation of 300 million people. One thing you can't do is say there is no reason, as there are clear reasons to support the Senate whether you agree or disagree with them.
If efficiency is great, why don't we do away with it altogether and found a one-party state? Obviously division of powers is worthless, amirite?

[Türkisblau]

By representing every state equally, regardless of population, the Senate actually is representative of a pseudo-nation with different demographic characteristics than the actual country. The pseudo-nation represented by the Senate is more white (non-Hispanic), less black and less Hispanic than the nation at large. This is likely not surprising. I haven't dug that far into the rest, but it would be interesting to see what other trends there are in the actual population versus the population implied by the Senate.

And yet which chamber has actually passed a comprehensive bill on immigration?

The Senate was also the first chamber to pass the thirteenth amendment way back in the Civil War. Because of the Senate's nature, it is more willing to compromise because its purpose is as I said, designed to encourage states to join together to ensure each other's interests are protected and that instills a greater sense of comity then the majoritarian House has historically functioned as. The House is also far more partisan and far more political because it is up every two years instead of every six years.

Why does nobody understand this? This is basic Government 101 here.