I honestly wouldnt mind a society set up where there is a justice system for the market economy, and rules and laws very similar to how it is in america, but that at the top there is a class of elites who are not voted in and not truly beholden to the public except the pitchfork public, and remove the lie of democracy i just described. I think it would once and for all unleash the collective energy of america to focus on real problems in their life. Real problems that overlap their circle of influence. Honestly i think thats important for everyone on a small scale, but just look at how much time america spends on their circle of concern, especially when it lies outside of their ability to influence it

america has become somewhat of a corporatocracy at this point, in my view

a bit, but more so just dysfunctional

yea i'd agree

because of the election cycle, politicians cannot do long term planning

they can never make tough decisions that are unpopular

the "occams razor" of politics is: Is this popular? Will it get me elected?

How many important decisions overlap with such thinking?

that's a fair point. i wouldn't be against a wider election interval i guess, just to give officials more time to carry out their policies

but i don't think authoritarianism would solve it

give it to them for life, and then give it to their first son

lol

and voila, hereditary representative constitutional republic

is it really representative though?

in the old days if a regions representative was being a douche, the citizens got their pitchforks and worked out arrangements with someone new

the ultimate vote, if you will

I'd imagine doing that gradually, the peasants would vy for more and more suffrage

Personally I'm an absolutist, so I think anytime you frame meaning and power as derivatived from the individual, you will lack any basis other than utilitarian ones for which gradient between anarchy and monarchy one should stop at. Any democratic system necessarily implies that, and over time under those ethics, suffrage has increased more and more, as withholding it has no real moral basis.

oh absolutely, i guess the point i was making is that even rome had its praetorian guard to murder the emperor when he was being a douche

but yeah, more and more ive been noticing how lacking democracy is for a country. Pits individual against individual. No clear societal goal other than make money for oneself. Just kind of a sad system when you look at outcome

i mean

look how dysfunctional, objectively, america is right now. You had one dude (obama) who came to the stage and says that everything america had been doing is wrong, and now we are doing something else. 8 years later another dude comes along says yeah no that dude was wrong, now we do it differently. And on it goes every 4-8 years

doing something different

but why? can anyone really prove why? i surmise its just to pad a different set of buddies pockets

a literal kleptocracy

sad waste of potential

I mean the government clearly isn't unified in which direction they want us to go

The only way you can make a policy stick is if you can prevent the other side from overhauling it, so many policies that are implemented are focused on securing power, moreso than the common good.

I would argue that a major flaw of democracy or any multiparty system is that there rarely if ever is any underlying ideological foundation for what the parties are doing, rather there are multiple ideologies that are brought to the table constantly, and in the end the govorment represents literally nothing like toothlessjay said.

In order for a republic or democracy to work everyone must participate with the same underlying ideological foundation and work from there, say if nationalisms "The good of the nation, the people" is the underlying foundation then all decisions made nad all platforms proposed operate under the same goal, the same relative direction, even if the ideas or methods by which to get to that goal differ. As such the govorment then represents something, and that would be striving for the good of the poeple and generally their will. The issue then arises on how to maintain this ideologicla foundation, make sur eit doesnt slip from the public mind and dissapear into some nether realm where it waits silently for someone to dig it up and clean it of the cobwebs of history.

However authoritarianism is not an irrational position and may be required at times to rip a country from crisis with decicive and focused action which is the major benefit of authoritarianism. A military is hardly a democracy, at best it could be an oligarchy of advocates to a head ruler. However the military needs ot be decisive and as such, for example in times of strife, the people could elect a temporary dictator until stability is returned and a vote is cast to maintain the dictator or remove him from office.

authoritarian is not synonymous with totalitarian

Well, Totalitarianism is a bit hard to define. In its original meaning it was an intrinsically Fascist phenomenon.

Authoritarianism is absolutely necessary in the beginning stages of national rebirth, but within a few years it should dwindle down to federalism or confederalism.

Authoritarianism will always be necessary.

I think authoritarianism is necessary in waves, when leftism starts taking over an authoritarian reaction is required to bring things back into balance, its essentially a strongman jumping in on the right wing team every so often in the political tug of war. He does his job and out of exhaustion eventually leaves.

That wouldn't work, a strongman wouldn't just give up power like that. Furthermore, it is simply easier to suppress dissenters when they are fringe.

Thats why i mention of exhaustion, the exhaustion can be self induced or induced by his enviorment so his own team struggling for breath or desire to get back into the fray. The event of the strongman entering is catalyzed however his removal is not catalyzed so when he is removed I would expect there to be a lot of turmoil.

@everyone Daily Question 🔖

What is the primary purpose of government? What should the role of a nation's leaders be?

the protect the people

and like

make stuff easier for them