r/politics • u/sweatycat New York • 1d ago

California to Negotiate Trade With Other Countries to Bypass Trump Tariffs

https://www.newsweek.com/california-newsom-trade-trump-tariffs-2055414
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u/myadsound California 1d ago

CA is always the one leading

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u/pomonamike California 1d ago

It’s kinda crazy that we are a second-level political division when by ourselves we would be one of the economically biggest nations on the planet.

It really doesn’t make practical sense when we have to bend the knee to certain senators that were voted in by fewer people than live in say… Riverside.

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u/AndyVale 1d ago edited 1d ago

I remember discussing this with an American acquaintance saying I didn't get the electoral college. For many millions of Californians their vote is worth less than someone in one of the smaller states.

He retorted "so the farmers in Wyoming shouldn't be listened to over the liberal techies in California?"

Because I had recently read some stuff on the topic, I pointed out that California actually has an enormous amount of agricultural workers. I couldn't remember the exact stats but it was a sizeable amount.

They immediately pivoted to that being why Californians' vote shouldn't count as much, because they didn't understand as much about other issues.

You can't win when somebody makes up the rules as they go along 🤷‍♂️

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u/9793287233 North Carolina 1d ago

Also if the farmers in Wyoming are only about 12 people compared to thousands of "liberal techies in California" then YES we should prioritize the desires of the liberal techies

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u/JugdishSteinfeld 1d ago

Apparently there are 33,000 farm workers in Wyoming. California has over 400,000.

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u/not-my-other-alt 1d ago

Subway employs about 100,000 people.

If 'Wyoming farmers' are a constituency worth a Senate seat, then Subway sandwich makers should get three.

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u/Brawkoli 1d ago

Welcome to Costco, I love you.

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u/bschott007 North Dakota 1d ago edited 1d ago

The U.S. Constitution, specifically Article I, Section 3, mandates that the Senate be composed of two senators from each state. The Founding Fathers' intent behind this came from a compromise reached during the Constitutional Convention to address the concerns of both large and small states, ensuring that smaller states wouldn't be overshadowed by larger ones in the legislative process. Without a Senate, some of the states wouldn't have joined in the Revolution...and to be perfectly frank, just because we may live in a small state, doesn't mean we follow the same political views and we know without a doubt the large states would definately abuse the small states if they were allowed to. People in those large states would totally vote for only their own interests and never give a second thought to us living in the rural areas. Large states would dam up a river even if that would utterly destroy the farming of people living down stream in a smaller state and never give a second thought to it because "more people here, more power here. You should all pull yourselves up by the bootstraps and live in a city, not digging in the mud and playing with plants!"

Sure, we all should have equal representation, and that's what the HOUSE is for.

The Senate is supposed to be there to prevent the large states ruling over the small states and treating them like District 9's, which 1000% would happen. People living in these less populated states would become 2nd class citizens and all the rules and laws would be made by those in the large cities.

The issue you have is with the House of Representitives. The House has 438 members (435 are voting members). Under the 2020 census, House should actually have about 692 representatives.

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u/SwimmingPrice1544 California 6h ago

Never, never has the more "liberal" leaders voted in nationally ever done anything to hurt those red states, & certainly would never treat them like "District 9" & you know it. In fact, ALL states & rural areas always do better under Dem national control. Your "slippery slope" crap doesn't stand up on the Dem side & never has, while it does & IS happening on the republican side. Your projection doesn't work.

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u/bschott007 North Dakota 5h ago edited 5h ago

As a Democrat from a small red state, the number of dismissal comments, insults, blanket assumptions, and snide remarks simply because of where I reside isnt a city with over a million residents has given me insight that the people, such as yourself, would 1000% vote in a way that would hurt those in smaller states. You immediately assumed I was republican just for taking a stance on this one topic that opposed yours and you probably saw my state flair.

You proved my point without even intending to. Just because someone disagrees with you, or lives in a different location than where you live, doesn't make them part of the opposite political spectrum.

Also, you seem to not know the history of this county and "The Great Compromise", and without it, there wouldn't be a single country but 50 independent countries.

That said, what you want is a pipedream. There is no way the Senate will be removed ( and even if it did, the House numbers are still capped so true representation wouldn't happen)

An amendment may be proposed either by:

1) The Congress with a two-thirds majority vote in both the House of Representatives and the Senate. (you can see that you'd never get the Senators to agree to dismantle the Senate so this is a non-starter)

OR

2) A constitutional convention called for by two-thirds of the State legislatures (34 states). None of the 27 amendments to the Constitution have been proposed by constitutional convention, but this could happen. There are only 13 small states so 34 of the 37 large states could call this.

A proposed amendment becomes part of the Constitution as soon as it is ratified by three-fourths of the States (38 of 50 States) regardless of the method it was purposed, and that is where the trouble is in this method...one of the 13 small states would have to vote against their own interests.

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u/Dmienduerst 1d ago

To make a devil's advocate case on why the electoral college and Senate system exists and is positive. There is always going to be a give and take so the design of the government gives the will of the populous three different representatives to vote for. The techies in California in theory should have more representation in the house and have bigger weight in the presidential election due to them controlling a big chunk of electoral votes. The Senate exists so that the more populus states can't control the three major governing bodies through vote count alone. It gives a state like Wyoming a singular avenue where their voice and will has greater or equal to weight as California. If the Senate system was more populus in nature then Wyoming representatives would have to form coalitions to even bring any conversation of changes to the table. Now they can create a discussion in the Senate that can't easily be tabled by the will of the more populated states alone.

Devil's advocate argument over.

What has happened though is that the system hasn't been updated for modern times. The Senate system I still think mostly works though I do think the Senate having more natural powers vs the House is leaning into the idea that we let the Elites run the country. The updates I'm talking about are two main things. The all or nothing nature of the electoral college has always been a disaster and should do a better job of representing "THE WILL OF THE PEOPLE" and stop gamifying the presidential race. Red voters in California are just as disencetivized to care about voting as the blue voters are when it's a bunch of swing states deciding the election for the blue voters and the red voters never get represented in the electoral college.

The second major issue is the house having a cap of the number of people along with gerrymandering of states like Wisconsin has massively influenced the house majority. The power of the house is that the populus should have its will represented. Instead a state like Wisconsin which is basically as 50/50 as they come is sending 6 Republicans and 2 Democrats to the house. Do that enough times across the 50 states and either party could coop control from the populus.

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u/ActOdd8937 1d ago

*Populous--has a lot of people in it.

*Populace--the people in question.

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u/Dinkleberg2845 22h ago

"populus" is just the latin word for populace (a spelling which doesn't make any sense to begin with)

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u/viviolay 1d ago

Fr, I never understand why this was a gotcha for some. Like yes, I think the people of larger quantity‘s desires should matter more. Theoretically, that’s how voting should work.

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u/HenchmenResources 1d ago

That sounds great until you run into a situation where its 12 people educated about a subject against thousands of idiots that are somehow allowed to vote and you end up having a trade war against fucking penguins.

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u/PaulTheMerc 1d ago

Now make it race...

Ready for round 2?

Yeah. That's the problem.

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u/Krisosu 1d ago

That's how it's always been for race in any country since the beginning of time.

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u/1of3destinys 1d ago

The electoral college is DEI. 

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u/HorlicksAbuser 1d ago

At worst 1 farmer vote per 10 techie votes