#1460 The Growing Threat of Minority Rule
Best of the Left - Leftist Perspectives on Progressive Politics, News, Culture, Economics and Democracy
Jay Tomlinson
4.5 • 3.4K Ratings
🗓️ 12 December 2021
⏱️ 77 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Air Date 12/12/2021
Today we take a look at the many structures of American government that tilt to favor minority rule and conservatism which, in our case, is one and the same. Some structures like the Senate and the filibuster were intentionally designed to give extra weight to the minority while others like gerrymandering and the influence of large-dollar political donors were, well, I suppose they were designed for about the same reason but just in a different way.
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SHOW NOTES
Lawrence Lessig gives a talk on Unrepresentative Democracy
Ch. 2: Why Wyoming Has More Power Than California in the Senate - AJ+ - Air Date 10-14-20
The United States Senate is one of the least democratic institutions in the Federal Government. It shuts out millions of Americans and dilutes the votes of most of the country. And yet every law has to go through the Senate, and so do most federal judges.
Political scientist David Faris joins Amanda and Faiz to discuss how Republicans are using extreme gerrymandering, combined with their structural advantages in the Senate and electoral college, to subvert democracy.
The Humanist Report (THR) is a progressive political podcast that discusses and analyzes current news events and pressing political issues. Our analyses are guided by humanism and political progressivism.
Ch. 5: Andrew Perez on the Filibuster - CounterSpin - Air Date 6-18-21
The filibuster is the crucial backdrop to any conversation about the Biden agenda, though media don't always bring that point home.
Ch. 6: A To-Do List for Senate Democrats - Amicus With Dahlia Lithwick - Air Date 7-17-21
Dahlia Lithwick tackles one of the major challenges of this moment: how to fix American democracy. Dahlia is joined by the Nation’s Elie Mystal and former chief of staff for Sen. Harry Reid and author of Kill Switch, Adam Jentleson.
MEMBERS-ONLY BONUS CLIP(S)
Co-hosts Jared Yates Sexton and Nick Hauselman welcome politics writer for Salon Chauncey DeVega on the show to discuss a wide range of topics including the media's coverage of Biden, the Democrats' poor messaging, and what is happening to our democracy.
FINAL COMMENTS
Ch. 8: Final comments on public policy, human nature and Cold War talking points
MUSIC (Blue Dot Sessions):
- Opening Theme: Loving Acoustic Instrumental by John Douglas Orr
- Closing Music: Upbeat Laid Back Indie Rock by Alex Stinnent
Produced by Jay! Tomlinson
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | During today's episode, I'm going to be telling you again about a podcast I think you should |
| 0:06.6 | check out and the coffee that they sell. It's called Uneffing the Republic, so keep an ear |
| 0:12.5 | out mid show when I tell you all about it. And now, welcome to this episode of the award |
| 0:17.7 | winning a Best of Left podcast in which we shall take a look at the many structures of American |
| 0:22.8 | government that tilt to favor minority rule and conservatism, which in our case is one |
| 0:29.4 | and the same. Some structures like the Senate and the filibuster were intentionally designed |
| 0:34.9 | to give extra weight to the minority while others like Jerry Mandarin and the influence |
| 0:40.2 | of large dollar political donors were, well, no, I suppose they were also designed for |
| 0:45.5 | about the same reason, but in a different way. Clips today are from Network for Responsible |
| 0:51.6 | Public Policy, AJ Plus, Battleground, the Humanist Report, Counter-Spin and Amicus with an additional |
| 1:00.6 | members only clip from the Muk-Rake political podcast. |
| 1:10.2 | Now the idea behind a representative democracy is that the system is representative. It's |
| 1:15.4 | kind of built into the word, right? Representative democracy means we are represented equally. |
| 1:23.6 | Our system is unrepresentative because of the many ways in which it renders us unequal |
| 1:30.7 | as citizens. So think about a couple of dimensions of that. Do we as citizens have an equal |
| 1:37.2 | freedom to vote? The answer is we have no equal freedom to vote because states administer |
| 1:45.3 | voting systems to make it harder for the party that just doesn't happen to be in power. |
| 1:52.5 | That typically is African-Americans and states that have Republican administrations because |
| 1:58.2 | African-Americans vote primarily Democratic, but you don't have to see it as racism. It's |
| 2:03.0 | just politics. But what that means is that those who are in the party out of power find |
| 2:09.9 | it harder because of rules designed to make it harder for them to vote or inequalities |
| 2:16.6 | in access to voting machines or the capacity to vote. That inequality, that inequality |
... |
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