themantis5000

Do you agree with the idea (Carl Sagan was a proponent) that humans should prepare to, one day, forever leave the surly confines of Earth? In other words, should we plan to colonize other planets?

TL;DR - The American system rewards representatives who band together as a bloc ("partisan politics"), and there are surprisingly few ways for American voters to hold the current members of the House of Representatives accountable for their actions. This creates conditions where legislative extremism, like holding hostage the US government's main budget (or the global financial system), becomes standard practice.

1. The House of Representatives is comprised of 435 members, each acting as the representative for people living in a "district," a piece of geography with, on average, 710,000 people. The person who gets the most votes in each of these districts in biennial elections is the Representative for that district.

2. Most of the district boundaries are determined by groups that try to protect incumbents and keep as many seats as possible in the control of one party. The boundaries were redrawn most recently in 2010, and Republicans had an advantage -- many district boundaries were drawn to protect Republican representatives.

3. In 2012 (the most recent election for every member in the House of Representatives), there were more votes for Democrats than for Republicans. However, because of the biased boundaries (mentioned in 2.), the Republicans have a large majority of seats in the House of Representatives.

4. The House of Representatives has the sole authority to create spending revenue¹ bills. Any federal government spending revenue* must be approved by the House first.

5. Because many Republican members of the House come from "safe" districts, these representatives believe that so long as they're acting to oppose Obama and the Democrats, they will not lose their election in 2014. They fear that if they appear to "give in," then their conservative districts will abandon them in 2014 and they will lose their jobs.

6. The Republican Party has, for years, described Obama's health care law ("Obamacare") as a serious threat to America's very existence. Many Republicans feel justified in taking extreme measures to prevent this law from actually taking effect (many Obamacare provisions begin in 2014).

7. Because they feel empowered by the biased districts (mentioned in 2.), the Republicans in the House of Representatives feel that they will not be held accountable for shutting down the government to oppose Obamacare -- even though the shutdown is very unpopular nationally.

edit: Thank you for the reddit gold.

¹ edit: /u/everycredit points out that the Constitution requires that revenue bills have to originate in the House. The current government shutdown could have been averted with a bill that originated in passed² the Senate. Any government spending must be approved by both the House and the Senate. As of this writing, the Senate passed a bill that would fund the government, but the House did not.

² edit: /u/The_Bard corrects me again to note that all bills technically originate in the House, although in practice they happen at the same time or "out-of-sync." My original point 4. mostly still stands. I wanted to explain the basics of why and how the House is the center of attention right now.

Last year, a top executive at Activision said that StarCraft II's huge sales were still probably "not worth it" from a business perspective. What do you think about that? Are you worried about the survival of the StarCraft franchise?

Link: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=218459

Thanks for your fantastic work. I love the game.

edit: link

Traditionally, legislators would make deals by trading votes.

"I don't want to vote for this Democratic bill on unions, but I will vote for it -- if you vote no on Obamacare. Deal?"

In today's House of Representatives, there are very few incentives for this kind of old-school deal-making. Instead, the incentives reward hostage-taking:

"Either you repeal Obamacare, or we'll defund the government."

"Either cut the budget, or we'll cause America to default on its debts."

Since at least 2011 (when the Republicans took control of the House), there have been several hostage negotiations in this manner -- situations where the Republicans made demands of the White House. The White House initially gave in to some of the Republican ransom demands (hence, the budget cuts known as the "sequester").

This time, the White House has refused to negotiate. And so we have a standoff.

Mr. Costa is in a much better position to answer this question, but from my observations, the opposition to Obamacare has three main components.

1. Partisan. The Republicans oppose it because the Democrats favor it.

2. Ideological. Conservatives oppose it because it will increase the role of the government in funding health care. By definition, conservatives oppose things that increase the role of the government.

3. Strategic. By drawing a line on Obamacare -- which is not popular nationally according to recent polls -- the Republicans believe they can gain an advantage on other issues, especially keeping in place the 2001 tax cuts for the wealthy ("Bush Tax Cuts").

Edited to add

(4) Substantive. There are some opponents of Obamacare who find fault with the substance of the policy. Even President Obama has admitted that the policy could use some revision. Conservative opponents of the law on substantive grounds often point to the lack of effective cost-control methods. Health care costs keep rising, and it's unclear that Obamacare will reverse that trend. There are other substantive criticisms, but I argue that the substance of the actual policy is far from the main reason why so many Republicans oppose Obamacare.