New Mars Forums

I'm not sure if this has been mentioned yet, but cotton will very likely be the fabric of choice for the clothes of early Martians, as it is made from plant matter as opposed to such fabrics as wool or silk. Even suits can be made from it, such as seersucker suits (of course, such suits would remain rather informal, but it's unlikely that formality would be the early Martians' main concern). The capabilities of one bale of cotton are given by https://www.cotton.org/pubs/cottoncount … u-make.cfm.

Assuming a colony of 100, and assuming that each person would want 7 pairs of (men's, for the sake of defensive pessimism) briefs, 2 (men's, ditto) dress shirts, 10 T-shirts, 5 pairs of Jeans, 2 pillowcases, 7 pairs of socks, and 2 bedsheets, that would be:
-700 pairs of briefs
-200 dress shirts
-1,000 T-shirts
-500 pairs of Jeans
-200 pillowcases
-700 pairs of socks
-200 bedsheets
Which would all combined need around 5 bales of cotton, or per the same source 2,400 lb. According to http://www.cotton.org/econ/cropinfo/cos … ns/usa.cfm, 1 acre of cotton yields ~700 lb, so a colony of 100 would need around 3.5 acres of cotton fields to satisfy it. According to that same source, cotton costs around $0.61 a pound, so the total cost of the cotton items (assuming no inflation between now and this settlement) would be around $1,464, or around $15 per person, though import costs might drive this up a bit.

Some thoughts about this thread and government.

With First Past the Post, I think many people, especially those comparing it to Proportional Representation (not necessarily anyone in this thread), tend to confuse it with the concept of having single-member constituencies in general. This is what is done in the US, UK, and Canada, with each single-member constituency electing its representative via First Past the Post (which refers to the simple-plurality voting system). While I agree First Past the Post is flawed as a voting system, I do not think we should be like the Dutch and put every Martian in a single blender superdistrict for the purposes of Proportional Representation. I think we should keep single-member constituencies (however they would be divided) and elected each representative via another method. This is what is done in Australia with its House of Representatives using Instant-Runoff voting, although I myself am a fan of Condorcet methods. But I digress, and the details of the electoral system would be best left to the colony/colonies.

Regarding administrators of the planet, whether appointed or elected, I think the term "President of Mars" is perfect. It sounds like an actual head of state/government, doesn't sound too colonial or small in scope compared to the planet. And it can fit regardless of what broad constitution is being adopted, whether it be a presidential, semi-presidential, or parliamentary republic. It's short, simple, and to the point.

Regarding Louis's big issues post-settlement, particularly about settler selection and religion, I do for the most part run with Musk's vision of, so to speak, Mars for the Common Man. I can see why one would have doubts about it, but on the other hand I also think that in the early days of settlement costs would be prohibitive enough to weed out the less devoted and/or undesirables (RobertDyck has speculated in the past about homesteaders spending their life savings to get a ticket and homesteading tools) and that by the time transit to Mars would be cheap/easy enough for the undesirables to come in the society as a whole would be big enough to accommodate them, however begrudgingly. I also have some worries that a screening process could turn discriminatory and it does seem a bit authoritarian in principle. That being said, I do realize that border controls, especially if Mars is self-governing, are a characteristic of all sovereign entities, so it doesn't seem too terribly out of place. I could see some restrictions on, for example, convicted felons from being granted citizenship/residency. With respect to religion I'm having trouble grasping how the influx of any given religion would be problematic given due application of separation of church and state. If anything, the rapid influx of, for lack of a better word, cultists to Mars might in fact aid and expand development, much like the Mormons with Utah. Nonetheless, I do recognize the threat of Mars devolving into a Theocracy, although as said before if precaution is taken this can be sidestepped.

This, and while I do respect Scott's concern of exploitation the presumption would be that the Board of Directors of the company would maintain a rather laissez-faire view on the day-to-day operations of the planet other than appointing the President until the planet gets big enough for elections, and mostly if not entirely deferring to the elected Government.

Ah! Duly noted, thanks.

Let's assume the Terran Corporation subsidizes the Martian National Government for the first few decades, prior to self-sufficiency, and that such a subsidy would include all employees. I guess a certain "salary" for the following officials, in USD/Earth year, would be in order (the actual salaries would probably be decided by the Legislature from the money, but this is an estimate at large).

President of Mars: $125k/year plus perks such as an Executive Mansion in the Capital City with maintenance worth $25k/year
Other Cabinet Members: $90k/year for 5 cabinet members excluding the President* = $450k/year total
Legislature: $80k/year for 15 legislators = $1.2M/year total
Federal Tribunal (sole national court): $80k/year for 3 justices = $240k/year total
Minor government worker: $60k/year for 100 workers = $6M/year total
*The only Cabinet positions I see needing to be filled would be a Surveyor General, Secretary of Defense and the Interior, Postmaster General, Treasurer, and Attorney General

Using these numbers, which admittedly are rather ex culo and likely not the most realistic, gives a total cost of $8,040,000 a year for 124 employees. While this seems expensive, the US House of Representatives alone has 435 members and it apparently costs American taxpayers $1.4 billion alone to maintain the Presidential Household.

This. The US will likely influence Mars far more than most other countries on Earth and American culture might very well provide the basis of Martian culture (to the extent that that's homogeneous), but saying that it will be the US like saying that the US is the UK or that Mexico is Spain. Mars will very likely develop its own culture and governance, especially if the corporation doesn't overstep and dictate day-to-day government.

This is off-topic, but if I'm not mistaken the answer is mainly because the US Constitution predates the full formation of the Westminster System outside of Britain into the other colonies. Royal Governors had their Executive Councils and Legislative Councils and could appoint them as they pleased, and the convention of responsible government, which compels Governors/Lieutenant Governors/Governors General to fill the Executive Councils with MPs of the majority party and demands that they report to the local rather than imperial legislature, was not set in stone (which led to friction and many of the grievances in the Declaration of Independence). Basically the American Model is that same "proto-Westminster" system, but with an elected head of state, which bypasses the need for responsible government, and the ability of the Legislature to override executive veto (akin to withholding Royal Assent) with a supermajority. The Latin American countries upon independence from Spain were heavily influenced by the US and copied that system.

I'm not necessarily disagreeing with you there, and admittedly I did neglect to explain that this would be the system, at least in its full form, when the planet is mature, w/ dozens of settlements with at least 100 people but before a significant amount of patriation occured. Basically this is an implementation of RobertDyck's main idea of a corporate government, which is stated in the OP of that thread:

I did add in a third layer of the corporation, which is still presumed to be Terran, at least during the initial wave of colonization. The distinction between the corporation and the federal government is probably more artificial than I make it out to be, as by virtue of subsidies the Feds (so to speak) would be simple employees of the corporation.

Do note that I insisted that the Terran corporation subsidize most of the Martian Government in the early years, leading to lower taxes, something RobertDyck seems to agree with:

Perhaps, I still think there should be some Federal overarching surveying plan to prevent conflicts between different municipalities if/when they expand and meet each other, especially if for example one municipality uses metric and another uses imperial for land measurement.

I think that RobertDyck's idea of having a corporation having ultimate sovereignty over Mars can work when put into a system of restraint from day-to-day governance and gradual patriation to Martians loosely analogous to the United Kingdom and its Dominions prior to and ultimately leading to the Statute of Westminster. The corporation's Board of Directors would probably appoint a President/Governor General and a few other key officers to stay on the planet throughout their terms and keep things operating smoothly while taking care of most of the areas of foreign policy on behalf of the nascent state. From the beginning land owners would inherently be shareholders in the company, and as the planet becomes bigger and more self-sufficient officers start becoming elected. I can get into more detail on such an idea if people want.

Faithless electors are a bad thing in that they throw an unnecessary wrench into the works, especially in such a polarizing election as this, and Donald Trump being Donald Trump doesn't make them any less a bad thing. I completely agree with Wayne Williams and John Kasich on this issue. One could certainly argue that it's undemocratic to have the Electoral College Vote not line up with the popular vote, but it'd be even less democratic to have electors not even beholden to their state citizen's votes.

29 states have laws against faithless electors, and those states warrant 136 electoral votes for Trump and 145 for Clinton. These laws aren't generally enforced, but if they alter the outcome Trump would almost certainly sue given his character, and the entire case would be brought before the Supreme Court. Laws against faithless electors are admittedly of dubious constitutionality that's never been tested given the rarity and usual insignificance of the phenomenon, but electoral pledges can be constitutionally required, so one could argue that following on these pledges can also be constitutionally required.

In any case the numbers don't seem to add up:
-34 faithless electors would be needed to alter the election result, and 38 to swing it to Clinton outright. The historical average is 2.75 per election, and the all-time high is 23, in 1836, when all of Virginia's delegation abstained from voting for the running mate that year because of his relationship with a slave girl.

-I'm getting the impression that these faithless electors aren't going to vote for Clinton, but rather another Republican such as McMullin or Kasich.

-If neither candidate gets the magic 270 by some electoral lightning-strike the matter moves on to the House of Representatives, which is controlled by Republicans (and which, unlike the Senate, doesn't have a filibuster, thus pretty much rendering the Democrats powerless here), who wouldn't in their right minds vote for Clinton. All other Republican potential candidates would probably concede on behalf of Trump like Kasich has de facto, thus sealing the House vote for him.

So basically, barring the absolutely catastrophic, Donald John Trump will be inaugurated as President of the United States on January 20th, and even with the catastrophic, it would be another Republican.

I'm inclined to agree with this, which is why I usually ignore them. Religion, Politics, and Sex are traditionally considered the three taboo topics for conversation with anyone not a close friend in the States.

Perhaps rather than having a single wire around the Equator, we could have 4 wires from the Geographic North to the Geographic South Pole, each equally spaced out from one another (along the longitudes of, for the sake of naming, the Prime Meridian, 90 West, 180, and 90 East). It would mean that each wire would have to have only a fourth of the current for the same magnetic field, and it would allow a compass to work on Mars much like it does on Earth.