Officials give Vladimir Putin 87% of the vote, in an election where no credible opponent could stand.
  • bigkahuna1986@lemmy.ml
    45·
    8 months ago

    I couldn’t get 88% of people to agree on which day of the week it was, much less who should be president.

  • IninewCrow@lemmy.caEnglish
    42·
    8 months ago

    GOP is just jealous because they have a hard time trying to pull off the same stunt in the US

  • naturalgasbad@lemmy.caOP
    31·
    8 months ago

    The only difference between the Russian and US system is that instead of having one big party whose interests are entirely separated from the public and which completely crushes any opposition parties, we have two big parties whose interests are entirely separated from the public and which completely crush all opposition parties.

    A sham democracy if there ever was one, but that’s because the purpose of indirect democracy is less to decide on policy and more to select a strongman leader that’s most appealing.

    The Russian election was “rigged” in that there was only controlled opposition… But this is also not an inherently unique feature. When was the last time a US President was neither Democrat nor Republican?

    • _haha_oh_wow_@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
      61·
      8 months ago

      The US needs ranked choice voting badly, but to say the only difference between the US and Russia is the two party system is just straight up incorrect. Opposition leaders and dissidents do not get regularly assassinated by the government in the US for starters.

      • naturalgasbad@lemmy.caOP
        18·
        8 months ago

        What opposition leaders? What dissidents?

        Two of the top university presidents in the country were taken down after daring to question the common narrative on the conflict in Gaza.

        A whistleblower for a government defence contractor was just assassinated in the middle of legal proceedings against that defence contractor.

        Whistleblowers are hunted after: Assange is struggling to avoid extradition and Snowden is stuck in Russia after being pressured to leave everywhere else.

        Meanwhile, even legitimate presidential candidates like Sanders are given every disadvantage, most notably in terms of (a lack of) funding and superdelegate votes in primaries.

          • Death to America@lemmy.ml
            4·
            8 months ago

            The son of someone involved in a literal fascist overthrow plot in the 30s became the head of the CIA which takes over governments then the President. His son then stole an election and allowed 9/11 to happen

              • Death to America@lemmy.ml
                2·
                8 months ago

                You live in a fascist country that the CIA literally overthrew the government of then instituted a crisis which ushered in a police state. Lots of people disappear and you don’t know because they run your media. Your country maintains black sites around the world including Guantanamo Bay. Your electrify the balls of people and say welp we tortured some folks. You don’t hear about it because whistleblowers regularly wind up dead. Consider yourself lucky that you are white passing enough or have enough money that you are protected from this and get to live in a bubble.

                Death to America

      • NeuronautML@lemmy.ml
        3·
        8 months ago

        Personally I’d say score voting would make the most sense. Essentially it works like this, you get a list of parties and you vote them 1-5 on how much you agree with them. This changes the whole dynamics as you now aren’t choosing who will rule, but how much you agree with each party ideologically and forcing you to research on their proposed mandate plans. It also serves as sort of an evaluation of how do you think each party has been addressing the country’s issues before the election.

        Mathematically, this may not ensure always the most happiness, but it ensures the least unhappiness compared to all current known voting methods (you can easily find research on how this was calculated in many papers on mathematics).

        Personally i would also propose returning to the old Roman and the first proposed French republic system of having 2-3 consuls of the most voted for parties and they take turns proposing legislation to a senate that’s a direct seated representation of the voting results.

        As an interesting tidbit, the reason we have a president/prime Minister with all the power in most western democracies, is because Napoleon altered the original proposed 3 consul system into a prime consul with all the power then minor ministers because he was aiming to become Emperor and wanted to centralize the power. Our democratic systems are strongly influenced by the first French republic post the French revolution.

        • A1kmm@lemmy.amxl.comEnglish
          2·
          8 months ago

          the most voted for parties

          Simple ‘first past the post’ systems like they have in the US are flawed. The biggest problem is that clones (candidates or parties with similar positions) split the vote. For example, suppose 10% of the population wants Evil Dictator, but the other other 90% each want one of 18 different candidates as their first preference, evenly divided on first preferences (so 5% on first preferences), but rank any of the other 17 higher than Evil Dictator. So Evil Dictator has 10% of first preferences, but is the last preference for 90% of the population. The other candidates have 5% each.

          First Past the Post would elect Evil Dictator in this circumstance. Better electoral systems (e.g. the Schulze method) would elect one of the other candidates.

          This applies still if you elect a plurality of people - e.g. there could be two Evil Dictators, who 90% of the public oppose, but who have the highest vote because there are fewer of them to split the vote. Better systems like the better STV variants ensure proportionality (it avoids a landslide where the same voters determine all the representatives in a winner takes all approach). A larger parliament means more representation of the perspective of smaller minorities - so they are at least heard.

          A “score” based voting system, if it is just a ranking of parties, could work like this. But if you are suggesting adding up the votes (so, for example, a 5 is worth 5x as much as a 1), the problem is tactical voting. People will, in practice, vote to make their vote count them most.

          Let’s say, for example, there are three candidates, Racist Evil Dictator, Racist, and Progressive. Let’s say we know for granted almost everyone is going to score Racist Evil Dictator as 1. If a progressive was voting honestly, they might vote Progressive as a 5, and apart from the racism Racist might have been doing well, so they’d get a 3. The racist supporters, however, if they were being honest, would give Racist a 5 and Progressives a 3. Let’s say there are 1000 progressive voters, and 600 racist voters. If voting honestly, the scores would be Progressive = 5 * 1000 + 3 * 600 = 6800, Racist = 5 * 600 + 3 * 1000 = 6000, Racist Dictator = 1 * 1600 = 1600. Now the problem is, you can’t really get people to vote honestly. So let’s say Racist riles up their followers to instead vote Progressive as a 1 to, even if they don’t really think that. Now the scores are Progressive = 5 * 1000 + 1 * 600 = 5600, Racist = 5 * 600 + 3 * 1000 = 6000. Racist wins.

          In practice, when a system allows people to vote tactically and have an advantage, it becomes a race to the bottom. That’s how you end up with dynamics like the two-party system. A good voting system works by removing incentives to vote tactically - if you put your true preferences down, you will not be disadvantaged in your influence on the election, even if other people attempt to vote tactically. That means that genuine third parties have a chance if the people like them, even in the absence of coordination.

    • rdri@lemmy.world
      4·
      8 months ago

      The Russian election was “rigged” in that there was only controlled opposition

      Incorrect. They were rigged pretty much completely, as some data shows. Something about 30 million fake votes.

    • FluffyPotato@lemm.ee
      2·
      8 months ago

      US politics is absolutely retarded but at least you aren’t going to fall out of a window for criticizing the president.

        • FluffyPotato@lemm.ee
          2·
          8 months ago

          Oh yea, true but that less about politics and more about capitalist creed. The US also has a police system that seemingly runs on the ritual sacrifice of innumerable black folk and pets but that is also not relevant.

          • ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆@lemmy.ml
            2·
            8 months ago

            How can you possibly separate politics from capitalist greed. The government represents the class that holds power, and US it’s the capital owning class.

            • FluffyPotato@lemm.ee
              3·
              8 months ago

              In Russia the olicarchs are directly ruling the country so you can’t criticise them without endangering your life. In the US the capitalist class heavily influences the politics but isnt the one directly ruling the country so you can criticise the politicians all you want. That’s the difference I was pointing out.

  • rustyfish@lemmy.world
    26·
    8 months ago

    As stupid and fucked up the US elections are, that doesn’t give you the right to do something objectively worse. Shit up.

    Edit: I decided to not correct that typo.

  • ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆@lemmy.ml
    18·
    8 months ago

    I love how all the western polling in Russia before the election shows that Putin has over 80% approval, and now all the western media acts like it’s shocking that he got around that in the election. For example, here’s an example from CNN just a few days ago

    But Putin undoubtedly has reaped the rewards of a political landscape tilted dramatically in his favor. The Levada Center, a non-governmental polling organization, consistently reports Putin’s approval rating at over 80% – an eye-popping figure virtually unknown among Western politicians, and a substantial increase on the three-year period before the full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

    https://www.cnn.com/2024/03/14/europe/putin-russia-election-explainer-update-intl/index.html

    Absolute clown shit.