The US congress as well as the UK House of Commons and the Indian parliament do often vote by voice vote. Furthermore, the voice vote method is often employed in other deliberative assemblies in the English speaking world, such as party congresses, non-profits as well as some assemblies in the corporate world. Actually, Robert's Rules of Order, one of the most followed rule books for deliberative assemblies, suggests

In this method, the chair of a meeting asks members to loudly say Yes or No, and determines which side wins by estimating which side is louder.

This method is rather error-prone, and in most rule books, if a majority is not clear, a rather complicated method - roll call, division of the assembly by entering two different lobbies, recorded vote by electronic voting machines, or a rising vote where members rise in favor or against.

Compare this to the method more common in Western Europe - the show of hands, or voting cards. Members of the assembly - whether small or huge - will rise their hands in favor or against, giving the chair of the meeting an easy estimate of the support of a motion. If the visual is inconclusive, votes can instantly be counted. If so desired, the chair can ask for active opposition for a motion expected to pass; if no assembly member demands a vote, the motion passes.

To change my view, I would like to see why voice voting is easier and more reliable than a show of hands.

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Part 0: Introductions

Hello and welcome to the first of (hopefully many) Spanish Progress Reports. My name is Vergara (vergara#7521), Lead Developer for Spain. I’d like to take the opportunity of this progress report to formally mention the updates and developments within Red Flood. As many have heard, Red Flood is changing, and for the better. With the small (and admittedly on-brand) slip up regarding our Discord server (the new one which you can find here), the damage done was severe. Yet thanks to our dedicated developers and administrators, we pulled ourselves up, reconstructing Red Flood with determination and resolve. In the process of rebuilding, however, we discovered reinvigorated spirits and a conviction that it had brought us together. Starting from scratch has given us a fresh view on many topics which troubled us. We know what Red Flood is and what isn’t, what we want and what we reject, how to work on it, and what to avoid. Red Flood isn’t a catalog of “funny people” to pick from, nor is it a parody of the “what if X won WW1?” genre. Red Flood is, first and foremost, a mod about a prolonged crisis of modernity. We present a scenario in which there was no “return to order” after the avant-garde experiments of the interwar era, a scenario where the entire planet has to face and answer to the death and failures of modernity. So said Antonio Gramsci, “The old world is dying, and the new world struggles to be born: now is the time of monsters.” The Age of Extremes, as it’s known in historiography, has given renewed strength to the millenarianism that dominated public consciousness before it was (tragically or thankfully) cut short in the real world. Our narratives, stories, characters, and direction will aim to reflect this mindset with skill and creativity, as we hope to deliver a product that we hope fans can enjoy and feel pride in.

Before I properly introduce the topic at hand, I will give a fair warning. The Spanish Civil War and its context is a delicate subject, for very good reasons. We aim to respect this and to not whitewash or blackwash. We will simply present the perspectives and narratives of the factions and paths involved.

This Progress Report will be focused on showing and explaining the new plans for the factions involved and that can arise from the Spanish Civil War. We have also made the following **[lore document](https://docs.google.com/document/d/1nnOPokEgLWqxn1Q9_PvyDdJIs4rOLCqH8D

So I'm a huge advocate of something known as sortition, where people are randomly selected to serve in a legislature. Unfortunately the typical gut reaction against sortition is bewilderment and skepticism. How could we possibly trust ignorant, stupid, normal people to become our leaders?

Democracy by Lottery

Imagine a Congress that actually looks like America. It's filled with nurses, farmers, engineers, waitresses, teachers, accountants, pastors, soldiers, stay-at-home-parents, and retirees. They are conservatives, liberals, and moderates from all parts of the country and all walks of life.

In a typical implementation, a lottery is used to draw around 100 to 1000 people to form one house of a Congress. Service is voluntary, for a fixed term, and well paid. Sortition gives normal people to examine the evidence and deliberate on issues as a way to scale up direct democracy. To alleviate the problem of rational ignorance, chosen members could be advised or trained by experts. Because of random sampling, a sortition Citizens' Assembly would have superior diversity in every conceivable dimension compared to any elected system. Sortition is therefore the ultimate method of creating a proportionally representative Congress.

Real World Evidence

It would be absurd to try out a crazy new system without testing it. Fortunately, sortition activists have been experimenting with hundreds of sortition-based Citizens' Assemblies across the world. The decisions they have come to have been of high quality in my opinion. For example:

• In Ireland, Citizen Assemblies were instrumental in the legalization of both gay marriage and abortion in a traditionally Catholic country. These assemblies were used to resolve politically volatile subjects so that fearful politicians would not have to.
• Recent 2019-2020 Citizen Assemblies in Ireland and France reached consensus on sweeping, broad reforms to fight climate change. In Ireland taxes on carbon and meat were broadly approved. In France the People decided to criminalize "ecocide", raise carbon taxes, and introduce

Constitutionally founded by Mansa Sundiata Keita, the Gbara was Mali's general assembly. How much power checks did they have against the Emperor (Mansa)? How did such power dynamics change over time? Did the Gbara grow overtime as the empire's territory expanded? Did the subsequent Songhay empire try to create a similar deliberative body?

Housekeeping:

• HOW TO SUPPORT: I know we are all facing unprecedented financial hardships right now. If you are in the position to support my work, I have a patreon, venmo, and a paypal set up. No pressure though, I will keep posting these pieces publicly no matter what - paywalls suck.

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##Mueller report

The Justice Department is opposing the full release of a memo related to former AG William Barr clearing Trump of obstruction. After Special Counsel Robert Mueller wrapped up his investigation, the DOJ’s Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) provided Barr with an argument - serving as political cover - that Mueller’s report “could not, as a matter of law, support an obstruction charge” against former president Trump. Barr wrote a letter to Congress hours later misrepresenting Mueller’s findings and proceeded to withhold the report for three weeks.

U.S. District Judge Amy Berman Jackson ordered the OLC memo released last month, criticizing Barr for being “disingenuous” and misleading the court about the true purpose of the memo (PDF):

>...the redacted portions of Section I reveal that both the authors and the recipient of the memorandum had a shared understanding concerning whether prosecuting the President was a matter to be considered at all. In other words, the review of the document reveals that the Attorney General was not then engaged in making a decision about whether the President should be charged with obstruction of justice; the fact that he would not be prosecuted was a given…

>A close review of the communications reveals that the March 24 letter to Congress describing the Special Counsel’s report...and the “predecisional” March 24 memo...are being written by the very same people at the very same time. The emails show not only that the authors and the recipients of the memorandum are working hand in hand to craft the advice that is supposedly being delivered by OLC, but that the letter to Congress is the priority, and it is getting completed first...

>And of even greater importance to this decision, the affidavits are so inconsistent with evidence in the record, they are not worthy of credence...not only was

Principles of Church and State

Principally, one must make some modest observations in order to derive some principles that will guide us in considering the model after which a new Christendom will take.

One must notice that if man is indeed a person, then he has certain transcendent spiritual needs that all other concrete goods are subordinated to. If this is true, then it follows that there is a necessary subordination of the state and common good by consequence to the church because the spiritual power is ordered to man’s highest good. The common good takes on a religious specification because all goods are ultimately ordered to divine goods. There is no temporal good that is not ordered to the divine, and thus reality bears an essentially religious significance and a consequently a religious specification. “There is no distinction”, Maritain writes, “without an order of values. If the things that are God's are distinct from the things that are Caesar's, that means that they are better” (Man and the State, p. 152). Due precisely to the fact that “[. . .] the Kingdom ofGod is of a better and higher nature than the kingdoms and republics of the earth” (Man and the State, p. 153), we must understand the relationship of the Church to the political society in terms of the subordination of the body politic to the Church.

The Three Errors

The three errors in conceiving of the relationship between the church and state.

The first error makes the body politic purely the domain of Satan. Many Christians fall into this error because they mistake it for expressing the Christian attitude of humility and contrast this erroneously as the only alternative to the theocratic error. This error has the body politic rule actively in favour of perdition by refusing to accept the body politic can or should be vivified and made Christian. By subordinating the church to the state, or by failing to transform body politic at all, this error assumes the temporal order to be a closed system in which there is no vivifcation and no transformation, in which “[. . .] one refuses to the world its destination to grace and to the coming of the kingdom of God. One restricts redemption to the invisible empire of souls and to the moral order. It would be the extreme error of Western Christendom (when it loses the Catholic sense). It is condemned by the most fundamental and most simple formula by which the Christian faith expresses itself, when it gives to Christ the name of Saviour of

Do your worst!

For context I'm a Refuse Driver (Garbage man) & today I was on food waste. After I'd tipped I was checking the wagon for any defects when I spotted a lone pea balanced on the lifts.

I said "hey look, an escaPEA"

No one near me but it didn't half make me laugh for a good hour or so!

Edit: I can't believe how much this has blown up. Thank you everyone I've had a blast reading through the replies 😂

https://preview.redd.it/fn7iqyvrfa181.png?width=998&format=png&auto=webp&s=d588c9ae2ce2fe0ec1106d3f74adb51cb3349915

A fly-ball governor is a device connected to a throttle valve of a steam engine that regulates the flow of working fluid (steam) supplying the prime mover. As the speed of the prime mover increases, the central spindle of the governor rotates at a faster rate, and the kinetic energy of the balls increases. This allows the two masses on lever arms to move outwards and upwards against gravity. If the motion goes far enough, this motion causes the lever arms to pull down on a thrust bearing, which moves a beam linkage, which reduces the aperture of a throttle valve. The rate of working-fluid entering the cylinder is thus reduced and the speed of the prime mover is controlled, preventing over-speeding.

This small contraption is only a microcosm defining the current study of Cybernetics, the study of governing, its goal is known as "optimal control" where all mechanisms of a system work to produce an intended effect efficiently, consistently, over a long period of time. In the 21st Century, This optimal control is what many of us view as a good government. This idea of cybernetically-enhanced systems are found from the schematics to our smartphones to our Political Science classes in the form of Almond and Easton's models. The main question of my essay is simple, can democracies lead to optimal control? Can Democracies ever produce a good government?

Before I dignify this question with a response, we need to first talk about what democracy means. The normative depiction of a democratic system, especially in our country, is one in which the people vote their representatives and that is it. It is either a seismic shift to the agreed upon structure by the elites or a rubber stamp for the arrangement of the establishment. We have completely forgotten about knowing how to lobby our representatives that they go in blind or in their own personal interests causing chaos in the assembly floor. We forgot how representatives do their job. We leave it to the president to do something and when the president does something it is inevitable that one side will react almost violently to their propositions especially if it gets passed. This isn't democracy.

Another theory is the deliberative anti-monarch, the public person that the likes of Rousseau talk about that we sign away our natural rights to in order to have civic rights. This too is no

"Your Highness, Ambassador Rova'heon is on the line. Shall we patch him through to you now, or shall we keep him waiting for a few more minutes while you finish your business?" The voice rang clear through a protocol droids speaker, the only hint of synthesis in it's voice a small crackle at the end.

Almorus looked up from the drink in his hand. The meeting had gone... poorly, to say the least. But, it just reaffirmed that you cannot reason with people such as Severan. They were wild beasts, through and through. Maniacs craving nothing but their own pleasure and power no matter how they could gain it. Kuat would burn, and he would watch his adopted homeworld crumble under the rule of an Umbaran whelp with more connections and dark magic than sense.

"No. I've kept our good friend waiting than more is reasonable. Patch him through." He tipped the wineglass up to his lips and finished his fourth of the... morning? Yes. It was 06:16 Local Time, but the Ambassador had recently returned to Pho Ph'eah with news of an election from the Planetary Deliberative. The individual had a habit of voting in person. A strong sense of civic duty, which he found to be an admirable trait.

"Ambassador. It is a pleasure to see you, how is home treating you?" Almorus spoke as the Holoprojector sparked to life and revealed the image of a single Pho Ph'eahian staring back at him. Former Consul, now Ambassador with the opening of greater diplomatic ties in the form of a fully fledged embassy between the two worlds.

"It goes well, Count Almorus. Very well. The Deliberative has settled on seatings for the next eight years, and so I can return to Serenno once everything is ratified and the new government can reconfirm my position."

"New Government?" Almorus raised an eyebrow at that. The internals of Pho Ph'eahian politics were somewhat of an curiousity. Not many of their kind left their homeworld, due to a variety of reasons, but most primarily due to a desire to maintain a somewhat strong presence in their home system. "And, if I may ask, what exactly has changed?"

Rova'heon's head nodded in affirmation, before speaking after Almorus. "The Unitary Bloc, alongside the Centrists have in a coalition acquired the majority of seats upon the Deliberative. They have been the most... reactionary, in light of the advances of the Velmerians, especially with their recent conquest of the former Atrivis sector. Indeed, considering the Alliance has, once again, pushed our request for negot

Pilot on me!!

Hi!! Do you know what is diet? Diet is a formal deliberative assembly of princes or estates. And veganism is a formal deliberative assembly of princes and estates! Therefore veganism is a diet.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diet_of_Hungary

As you see, Hungary is a diet too. Hungary consists of vegetables, fruits, beans, Beyond Meat, meat of Viktor Orban, anti-abortion propaganda and goulash.

According to James Fishkin there are four modern ideals of democracy:

Ideals of Democracy

1. Competitive democracy -- Democracy is a place where parties compete on people's votes. As long as multiple, competitive parties exist, a marketplace can be established. The "will of the people" is a delusion, the key of democracy is to establish a mechanism for peaceful transitions of power and alternation between the elites in control. Democratic reform entails improving conditions in party competition. This model was advocated by economist Joseph Schumpeter.

2. Participatory democracy -- Democracy can be achieved only through mass participation and direct decision making. Democracy is necessary as a means of expressing actual consent. Moreover, democracy is necessary as a "educative function" to teach citizens how to be citizens, by doing, and creating a sense of "public spirit". The modern cost has been a "sound bite democracy" where the public uses shortcuts to attempt to approximate having informed preferences they do not actually have. Participatory democracy is typically associated with Progressive Movements.

3. Elite deliberation - Championed by American Founding Fathers and James Madison, elites represent and decide for the people. Elite deliberation avoids any commitment for the larger public to participate but instead emphasizes "indirect filtration" of mass public opinion, refined by representatives. Such elites in their wisdom would theoretically be capable of controlling and suppressing the majority, and also be able to suppress the development of party factions. Madison's predictions on suppressing factions obviously did not pan out.

4. Deliberative Democracy - A form of democracy where normal people are given a forum to deliberate with one another face-to-face, a kind of "democracy when the people are thinking". To construct such a forum, in modern times sortition must be used to scientifically randomly sample the people to construct a representative body. Political equality is achieved not by being able to participate, but by equal probability of being chosen. Like with Madison's "Elite Deliberation", the passions of the people are filtered away through a deliberative process (and there is substantial empirical evidence that such deliberation works as intended). In modern times, deliberative democracy is being t

Dad jokes are supposed to be jokes you can tell a kid and they will understand it and find it funny.

This sub is mostly just NSFW puns now.

If it needs a NSFW tag it's not a dad joke. There should just be a NSFW puns subreddit for that.

Edit* I'm not replying any longer and turning off notifications but to all those that say "no one cares", there sure are a lot of you arguing about it. Maybe I'm wrong but you people don't need to be rude about it. If you really don't care, don't comment.

What did 0 say to 8 ?

" Nice Belt "

So What did 3 say to 8 ?

" Hey, you two stop making out "

I won't be doing that today!

You take away their little brooms

This morning, my 4 year old daughter.

Daughter: I'm hungry

Me: nerves building, smile widening

Me: Hi hungry, I'm dad.

She had no idea what was going on but I finally did it.

Thank you all for listening.

There hasn't been a post all year!

So I'm a huge advocate of something known as sortition, where people are randomly selected to serve in a legislature. Unfortunately the typical gut reaction against sortition is bewilderment and skepticism. How could we possibly trust ignorant, stupid, normal people to become our leaders?

Democracy by Lottery

Imagine a Congress that actually looks like America. It's filled with nurses, farmers, engineers, waitresses, teachers, accountants, pastors, soldiers, stay-at-home-parents, and retirees. They are conservatives, liberals, and moderates from all parts of the country and all walks of life.

For a contemporary implementation, a lottery is used to draw around 100 to 1000 people to form one house of a Congress. Service is voluntary and for a fixed term. To alleviate the problem of rational ignorance, chosen members could be trained by experts or even given an entire elite university education before service. Because of random sampling, a sortition Citizens' Assembly would have superior diversity in every conceivable dimension compared to any elected system. Sortition is also the ultimate method of creating a proportionally representative Congress.

The History of Sortition

Democratic lotteries are an ancient idea whose usage is first recorded in ancient Athens in 6th century BC. Athens was most famous for its People's Assembly, in which any citizen could participate (and was paid to participate) in direct democracy. However, the Athenians also invented several additional institutions as checks and balances on the passions of the People's Assembly.

• First, the Council of 500, or the Boule, were 500 citizens chosen by lottery. This group developed legislative proposals and organized the People’s Assemblies.
• In addition, lottery was used to choose the composition of the People’s Court, which would check the legality of decisions made by the People’s Assembly.
• Most government officials were chosen by lottery from a preselected group to make up the Magistracies of Athens. Athens used a mixture of both election and lottery to compose their government. Positions of strategic importance, such as Generals, were elected.

The Character of Democracy

Athenian democracy was regarded by Aristotle as a “radical democracy”, a state which

So I'm a huge advocate of something known as sortition, where people are randomly selected to serve in a legislature. Unfortunately the typical gut reaction against sortition is bewilderment and skepticism. How could we possibly trust ignorant, stupid, normal people to become our leaders?

Democracy by Lottery

Imagine a Congress that actually looks like America. It's filled with nurses, farmers, engineers, waitresses, teachers, accountants, pastors, soldiers, stay-at-home-parents, and retirees. They are conservatives, liberals, and moderates from all parts of the country and all walks of life.

Practically, a lottery is used to draw around 100 to 1000 people to form one house of Congress. Service is voluntary and for a fixed term. To alleviate the problem of rational ignorance, chosen members could be trained by experts or even given an entire elite university education before service. Because of random sampling, a sortition Citizens' Assembly would have superior diversity in every conceivable dimension compared to any elected system. Sortition is also the ultimate method of creating a proportionally representative Congress.

Real World Evidence

I've made some claims, but how would democratic lotteries work in the real world? Fortunately, sortition activists have been experimenting with hundreds of Citizens' Assemblies across the world. The decisions they have come to have been of high quality. For example:

• The BC Columbia Citizens Assembly was tasked with designing a new electoral system to replace the old first-past-the-post (FPTP) system. The organizers brought in university experts. The organizers also allowed citizens, lobbyists, and interest groups to speak and lobby. Assembly members listened to all the sides, and they decided that the lobbyists were mostly bullshit, and they decided that even though the university experts had biases, they were more trustworthy. This assembly ultimately, nearly unanimously decided that Canada ought to switch to a Single-Transferable-Vote style election system. They were also nearly unanimous in that they believed FPTP voting needed to be