I'm starting to think you don't know what democracy actually is. If we were a democracy, we wouldn't have a congress, or an electoral college. Democracy means everyone votes for everything, you don't have the middle man representatives. As the saying goes " democracy is doomed once people begin voting for bread and circuses." Well, we vote for beer and the Super Bowl, not what the nation actually needs.
I am absolutely sure of what democracy means, but do you know what democracy means and that there are several types of democracy? I am sorry to burst your bubble but a democracy often does have a congress. If you want to start a discussion you should specify which
"type" of democracy you want to talk about instead of using the general term of democracy and then become angry and testy if people do not miraculously read you mind as to what form you intended to talk about.
Democracy is not doomed by anything other than if you try to rule a country of 300 across several timezones with rules and laws that were made 250 years ago for a population of only 4 million of whom many would not have been allowed to vote who all lived in basically the same part of the US.
The problem that the US does not vote for what your nation actually needs has nothing to do with the concept or the practice of democracy but with the twisted electoral system the US has with 2 parties that are only about power and not about the good of the people and the country.
It has everything to do with the way our nation operates, and all the broken systems within it. Our leadership is ruled by popular opinion, getting reelected means pandering to, not only those who are versed and knowledgeable in how the nation actually functions, but everybody. That means our leadership has to appease the lower, middle and upper classes, the uneducated, the poor, the illiterate, the racists, the special interest groups, the unions, the gangs, Joe the plumber who only knows what the tv and his union rep tells him, Jesse the 3rd year college freshman who gets baked every night and thinks George Bush colluded with the Jews to bomb the World Trade Center with lasers and thermite, and the damned birthers and closet skinheads who can't believe we have a "nigger" for a president. We spend hundreds of millions of dollars appeasing these people because we have to. It's the only way to shut them up long enough so people who know what the **** is going on can focus on real issues, like the economy, or industry, or how we're going to end the war, or how to reform the tax system to make it more efficient, or even how to keep water flowing to desert towns in New Mexico and Arizona. That's exactly why we originally had restrictions on who could vote. Public virtue does not exist. People are going to vote for their individual needs and wants, not what's best for the nation as a whole, because the majority of people don't know what's best for the nation as a whole. An election isn't some piddly dick PTA meeting where soccer moms decide what the prom decor should look like, it's how we decide how we're going to continue being a nation.
Again, that is not down to the concept of democracy but with power hunger and the 2 party rule that is the American way.
In most democracies it is not about appeasement. In the US everything is down to special interests and your proposal is also for just a special interest.
Also, in most countries people elect their representatives for 4 year terms unlike the US congress which has to go through the electoral circus every 2 years. No wonder that the election has become a continual circus in which congressmen have to keep campaigning non stop instead of doing their job to the best of their ability. Because of the 2 year election cycle it is also very logical that everything is about immediate gratification for the people instead of actually working for the good of the people even if unpopular choices are needed to be made. Do not blame the failure to govern on the principle of democracy but on the failed US system that causes the politician to do only popular and partisan things.
In the Netherlands people get elected in principle for 4 years and they do not go for the instant gratification but for the honest story, even in the election campaign every party (except in part the populist parties in our parliament) this election told the honest story about the need for government cut backs and the only difference is that each party had it's own ideas about how much money needed to be cut back and how this would be achieved. Our politicians did not need to cater to special interest except their own voters and in the end the Dutch voter, which is just as a diverse a society as the US (or as you called it lower, middle and upper classes, the uneducated, the poor, the illiterate, the racists, the special interest groups, the unions, the gangs, Joe the plumber who only knows what the tv and his union rep tells him, Jesse the 3rd year student who gets baked every night).
Don't blame the US dishonesty in it's politicians on the voters, blame it on the politicians and on the electoral system. It is not the kind of people or the number of people that need to be changed to get a better election result but the system of the US electoral circus.
And the reason it costs millions is also down to the US political system in which congressmen/women/parties have to win an election district by district. If for example California still keeps it's 55 congressmen but that they are divided between the parties by proportional voting it would make elections a lot less expensive because instead of 55 different elections with 55 campaigns there would only be 1 campaign for several parties. For example, if the democrats would get 70% of the vote they would get to choose 70% of the 55 congressmen/women from their state from their own ranks. And by then only having to do this once every 4 years these elected congress members could work for the good of their state and the nation instead of being embroiled in party politics, posturing and achieving special interest victories for their own little constituency because they need to be elected again in 2 years.
As I have said before, it is not the system of democracy that is to blame for the US problems but the system you use. Change that and everyone can keep their electoral rights.
Yeah, and other democracies don't have a landmass of 3.8 million square miles with a population of 300,000,000 and rising. The Constitution has nothing to do with our federal bureaus, except for the ones specific to the Constitution, such as the IRS, which is the arm of the US Dept of Treasury. What really slows progress is popular opinion.
I am sorry to burst your bubble here, but India has more than 700 million voters, the EU also has European elections for about the same number of people but also has to contend with different languages to boot. And still it is not like it is in the US. It still comes down to having an system which is not effective in serving the people but because of how everything is entrenched in how it always has been there is no possibility for a quick and comprehensive redress to those problems.
Again, all of this is not the fault or the failure of the democratic system but the US system.
There are many reasons why we only have two major political parties, the Constitution isn't one of them. The founding members of this nation didn't want political parties because they saw them in Britain, and they didn't like it. Political parties started because of the rift between what would become the Federalists and the Republicans, which is a very long story.
The US political system is the reason for having only 2 big parties. The way the constitution has been written is part of the reason why the US political system is the way it is.
Well, it has nothing to do with pragmatism. You don't understand the American People, or how our government functions. I don't understand how your people or government functions, either. Only difference is I won't tell you how to better run you country based on what I think is ideal based on my limited experiences. Direct democracy was never an ideal for us. It would never work, and it could quite possibly be the worst thing to ever happen to the US if it were put into effect.
It is pragmatism on my part. I can easily say that if it does not work it has to be changed, even if that means changing the constitution or better yet replacing it with a new one. I can easily say that but I would think a lot of Americans do not want to replace the constitution and replace it.
The US has a representative democracy, not a direct one. The system might have a few things of direct democracy in it but a direct democracy is as it says very direct and usually does not have a congres, something the US has had since the beginning (or at least the words congress are mentioned in the constitution). Direct democracy also does not work for such a big country (in people and landmass).
And please do not tell me what I do and do not know. I have been following US politics for about 25 years. I have watched most if not all presidential debates. I saw the vice presidential debate between Dan Quayle and Lloyd Bensen (very entertaining
). I watch/read more about US politics than I would think a lot of Americans do. Since 2000 I have also always taken the week off from work during presidential election cycles in the US. I saw Bush win in 2000 over Gore. Saw the debates, took off the week during the election and watch hundreds of hours of US television coverage of the election.
And I am not telling you what to do, but I am giving my opinion based on being able to make a reasonable comparison between the 2 political systems and the flaws of both systems (don't get me wrong, the Dutch system has issues too but different ones to the US ones).
This country started with only wealthy land owning freemen being allowed to vote. There's no reason why voting shouldn't be restricted to those who are educated, pay taxes, and have no record of criminal activities that equate to moral turpitude.
It started like that but thank goodness the US moved away from that to having a true democracy in which those limiting/discriminating limitations of electoral participation has been taken away. Again, the problem is not by who gets to participate in an election that is the problem but it is the US political system that causes a lot of the issues you describe.
A dictatorship is an autocratic form of government under the rule of a single party, which is not even close to what I'm talking about,
No, it is not that simple. Dictatorship is:
The most general term is despotism, a form of government in which a single entity rules with absolute power. That entity may be an individual, as in an autocracy, or it may be a group, as in an oligarchy.
Dictatorship can also mean that the single entity can be a group. Like by people who have decided for themselves that they are the only one worthy of deciding who rules.
Come back when you can spare me the pathetic hyperbole.
You might find it a pathetic hyperbole, I think it is the truth. Fix the problems instead of creating a system that is worse than the one it replaces.
So, and now I am going to enjoy the rest of the NFL game I am watching with one eye and go to sleep as it is already 4.30am here.
