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Election Reform, The Forward Party Part I

Andrew Yang announced America's new third party and biggest universal basic income advocate: the Forward Party. The party's entire focus through at least 2022 is on election reform though.

In 2022 the Forward Party will aim to pass ranked-choice voting and open primaries through ballot initiatives in as many of the 24 states that allow them as they can.

An open primary is one primary election including all parties that send the top five finishers, regardless of party, to a ranked-choice general election. With this method, voters rank their top three candidates out of the five primary finishers.

If no candidate reaches 50% of the vote, then the candidate with the fewest first-choice votes is eliminated, and that candidates' voters now have their second choices considered. This process is repeated until a candidate reaches 50%, at which point they win.

This empowers existing third parties--Libertarian Party and Green Party, notably--and takes the first step as a country towards reforming the two-party system that is keeping us frozen in place.

-MathnMarijuana

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Where Is Andrew Yang, a year and a half after he launched universal basic income on a meteoric rise?

In 2020, Yang rose from an unknown quantity to a political rockstar, taking universal basic income along from obscurity into an idea favored by over 50% of Americans.

Yang took a questionable turn that ended up poorly in his run for Mayor of New York City. His campaign was bogged down by elitist, establishment-type consultants who failed to grasp the core of Yang's appeal or ideology. They operated more like a risk-averse, pandering political machine than a populist champion.

Both his presidential campaign and his campaign in NYC were hampered by a hostile mainstream press reaction that sought to minimize his potential, misrepresent him and flat-out ignore him wherever possible. Tulsi Gabbard experience much of the same treatment in 2020, an Iraq veteran who was painted as a Russian asset by Hillary Clinton.

Now, there's rumors that Yang will launch a third party, identifying the two-party dichotomy as a core poison to American democracy. A third party would seek to liven the discussion, press the system to work for the people and hand power back to representatives fighting for liberty and justice rather than holding onto power to please corporations.

#universal basic income #andrew yang #late stage capitalism #yang gang #mainstream media #america #tulsi gabbard #hillary clinton #nyc 2021 #ubi #Youtube

President Eisenhower's Final Warning

America's 34th president left office in 1961 with a stark warning on what he called the military-industrial complex.

For the first time in American history, a permanent arms industry had been developed during peacetime. Eisenhower made no secret his intense fears surrounding the ever-growing potential for misplaced power into an industry that seeks to make war its business.

In 2021, a Vietnam War and a War on Terror later, Americans widely acknowledge the presence and power of the military-industrial complex. Prominent politicians talk about breaking it down, including Bernie Sanders. Tulsi Gabbard's 2020 presidential campaign revolved around that concept, as did Ron Paul's 2008 and 2012 campaigns.

The first step has come in President Biden ending the US military presence in Afghanistan, but many more steps are ahead

#military industrial complex #military history #eisenhower #bernie sanders #tulsi gabbard #forever war #afghanistan #afghan government #Youtube

An American Conspiracy: the Secret Society of Bohemian Grove

Bohemian Grove is a campground in California that, for over a hundred years, has been used as a yearly gathering spot for the wealthiest and most powerful people in the country.

What started as a religious reverence for nature and the arts, over decades morphed into a religious reverence for a right-wing, laissez-faire ideology that steered America towards the worst wealth inequality since the Gilded Age.

Every Republican president from Calvin Coolidge in 1923 through George W Bush in 2001 was a member of the Bohemian Grove, with Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan even having been pictured there together before either of them assumed the presidency. That line ended with Donald Trump, who has not attended the gathering.

Druid worship, religious ceremonies and heavy alcoholism dominate the two weeks a year the group meets.