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Comment by ddlatham | Hacker News Reader

I think you can definitely debate whether the Congress has done a good job addressing economic inequality and malaise. But Lessig's point is about more than that. It's that because Congress has become so dependent on campaign funds from a tiny portion they have become very unresponsive and unrepresentative to the interests they should be. In the video he mentions infrastructure, education, health care, climate change, the tax system. If they're spending half their time on the phone dialing for dollars, that is going to skew their interest and their votes.

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> It's that because Congress has become so dependent on campaign funds from a tiny portion they have become very unresponsive and unrepresentative to the interests they should be.

I think people get who they vote for. It's not like there's an exchange where you can literally buy votes for dollars.

I'm more upset with the electorate for having under-informed or unexamined political opinions.

I think the first step is for Americans to find a way to disagree about politics in a congenial way. As long as it's rude to talk about politics, people will continue to get their information from ads, talk radio, yard signs, comedy shows, and hack blogs.

I'm more upset with the electorate for having under-informed or unexamined political opinions.

This is unavoidable. Your vote doesn't matter - the probability of it altering the outcome are infinitesimally (read: too small to represent with a double) small.

Unless you derive entertainment value from informing yourself, why would you waste any time on informing yourself or thinking carefully?

> Your vote doesn't matter - the probability of it altering the outcome are infinitesimally small.

That's nice sounding cynicism, but it's not obvious that the math actually comes out that way. Consider: http://www.overcomingbias.com/2008/01/yes-it-can-be-r.html

They derive the "1 in 1 million" chance of your vote altering the outcome by assuming the distribution of votes is given by a uniform distribution on the possible vote outcomes.

I have no idea where this assumption comes from. To me the more natural one is to assume a binomial distribution - everyone else has a certain chance P of voting for Obama. Then do the normal approximation, and you realize the odds of your vote mattering are vastly smaller (i.e., exp(- delta^2) rather than 1/delta).

I agree that the uniform distribution is fishy. I could object to the binomial assumption too; it seems kind of question-begging. My point was just that the thesis "your vote doesn't matter" is not at all self-evident.

In Kantian ethics, there is a concept known as universalizability: "Act only according to that maxim by which you can at the same time will that it should become a universal law." If one subscribes to such a principle, and one believes that the world would be a worse place if everyone was willfully ignorant of important political issues, then one would hold that one has an ethical obligation to make an effort to become politically informed.

I guess I better not become a programmer, because if everyone became a programmer, there would be no one to farm the fields.

A much better rule is something like "act as if you are deciding for everyone who can be expected to make similar decisions for similar reasons". This avoids that particular pitfall, because everyone who might decide to be a programmer for similar reasons is still not too big a fraction of the total world population, while still giving the right answer re: voting

It's hard to talk about politics without challenging someone's beliefs or opinions. And then they get offended. And because we've nurtured this idea that people have some kind of right to never be offended no matter what beliefs they hold or espouse, you find that the discussion quickly turns into back and forth accusations of bigotry, homophobia, racism, or some other kind of hate-based motivation, as if hatred is the only reason anyone might disagree with you on e.g. how to improve the economy or what role government should have in health care.

> I think people get who they vote for. It's not like there's an exchange where you can literally buy votes for dollars.

People are unwilling to be the person others vote for. You can see this time and again on HN; every time someone points out, "This is a democracy; if you have a problem with it, you can run for office and do better," the response is a mindless, "Well, I can't afford it."

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> I think the first step is for Americans to find a way to disagree about politics in a congenial way. As long as it's rude to talk about politics, people will continue to get their information from ads, talk radio, yard signs, comedy shows, and hack blogs.

Agreed. One of the nice deliberative democracy ideas was that we would set aside time and space for discussing politics. I'd like to see more of that, even though I don't fully agree with the entire gamut of that philosophy.

> I think people get who they vote for. It's not like there's an exchange where you can literally buy votes for dollars.

Agreed. However, whether we like it or not, the evidence is overwhelming that money is extremely effective in garnering votes and winning elections.

> I'm more upset with the electorate for having under-informed or unexamined political opinions.

How much work does it take to become a well informed and reasoned voter? How much value will it garner someone to change their vote? It's hard to blame someone, especially people barely scraping by, from rationally choosing to spend their time in other ways. We do need to work on helping voters be better informed. But we should also work on pragmatic approaches that recognize the current influence that money has.

> the evidence is overwhelming that money is extremely effective in garnering votes and winning elections.

I wasn't disputing whether that's true. I was disputing that it's the money's fault and not the voters'.

> How much work does it take to become a well informed and reasoned voter?

One solution is to increase the information level of voters. Another is to lower the information requirements.

At a certain point, having complex tax codes, complex regulatory systems, and complex power structures becomes a justice issue because it's not fair to expect the average voter to be informed about how carried interest works or how one qualifies for social security disability.

The average voter does not care to keep their government local, accountable, and easy to understand. And I think it's perfectly fair to say they're getting what they voted for.

> However, whether we like it or not, the evidence is overwhelming that money is extremely effective in garnering votes and winning elections.

Actually there is very little evidence that more money correlates with more electoral success. For example the Sunlight Foundation found that outside spending had no discernible impact on election outcomes in 2012. And that was after the Citizens United ruling.

In politics there is an "ante"--an amount of money necessary to run a basic credible campaign--but beyond that, more money does not necessarily get you anything.

It's rude to talk about politics because it becomes a divisive issue.

It's often worse with smart people. It's similar to my ideas on how people want to do hiring[1], since I've witnessed this pattern in person dozens of times

1. I am a smart person.

2. I have political idea X.

3. Therefore, other smart people should also have idea X.

4. If they don't, they aren't smart, or I need to spend a lot of time fixing their ignorance.

I'm not blind enough to exclude myself. I have lots of beliefs that I think are true in things like the economy, health care, and so on, but lots of smart people disagree with me. They might be right, and it's easy to lose track of that.

For lots of people, politics isn't about finding the best policy, but rather about signalling group status.

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7515489

The point of this issue, campaign finance, is that it spans political issue and effects everyone. It's more about the type of government we want to have than any one particular issue.

Some people, even smart people, might disagree with your politics about campaign finance, and we're right back to square one of all political debates.

"No, this political debate is really super important!" is what you will hear from every single-issue voter.

The issue isn't campaign finance. It's regulation of speech about active political campaigns. The new money in politics does not belong to campaigns but superpacs.

Two solutions to that issue include:

1. Modify campaign finance laws so that people just give to candidates instead of third-party organizations.

2. Somehow restrict the funding levels or free speech rights of third-party organizations (and maybe campaigns too).

It's not really about what kind of government we want. It's about whether there's a right to buy a bigger megaphone.

My point above was that if people had normal conversations with normal people about politics, they would at least have more information about America and Americans outside of the giant megaphones of the world, helping to mitigate the effectiveness of cash in politics.

> I think people get who they vote for.

I don't think it's even that simple. The policies that are pitched by politicians who are voted into office are often different than the policies they end up supporting after pressure from moneyed interests is applied. Obama's 180 reversal on dozens of things is a perfect example (net neutrality being the most recent).

The reality is, it's almost impossible for politicians to do anything other than vote with the money (evidence shows this statement to be true). In such a system, the only solution is to remove the money. Lessig is attempting to do that.

I'd argue that Congress has not done a good job of anything (at least not anything that the majority of Americans would care about) because our motivations are not aligned. That's the point of this campaign - to remove the motivation for Congress to act in ways that our not in the best interest of the general public, by removing the financial incentives for them to do so.

This TED talk from Lessig gives more background: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mw2z9lV3W1g

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