The USA is the only Democratic Country in the World. Discuss.

[KrazyHorse]

He must have said that in another thread. I see 3 posts from him on this thread, and none says he wants to get rid of electoral college. Some posts imply he wants to change voting for Senate, and make electoral college based strictly on pop.

[Ned]

Days of the idealic past:

Two people unite to take all the property of a third. Democracy is born!

Add that they did it in the name of the people. Socialism is born.

Kill the third person. Communism is born.

Having a court order compensation, constitutionalism is born.

Think about it.

Pure democracy is not a good in and of itself. A constitution that protects minority rights against the majority is a lot better.

[Clear Skies]

Originally posted by Ned
Days of the idealistic past:

Two people unite to take all the property of a third. Democracy is born!

Add that they did it in the name of the people. Socialism is born.

Kill the third person. Communism is born.

Having a court order compensation, constitutionalism is born.

Think about it.

Pure democracy is not a good in and of itself. A constitution that protects minority rights against the majority is a lot better.

Slightly one-sided...
Doing something just 'in the name of the people' isn't socialism. Socialism is doing it for the direct benefit of the people. Also, the first quote depends on you defining 'democracy' - a liberal democracy such as Britain's would have measures in place to protect the third person (the minority) from such abuses of their rights.

[Arrian]

Dino,

I'm from Connecticut, by any definition a small state, and I want the electoral college gone. To say your vote would count less than Boris' is silly. You know damn well that isn't true. You are 1 person, and you get 1 vote. Boris is 1 person and he gets 1 vote. It just may happen that a few million other New Yorkers will vote the same way, and MS doesn't have the numbers to offset that. Too bad. The 2-senators per state system is plenty of redress for the smaller states, including mine.

Let's look at it from a different angle:

When I went to vote in the last election, I knew for sure that Gore was going to win CT comfortably. This was a foregone conclusion. In that situation, the electoral college essentially takes away any reason for my vote, because my vote has no meaning outside of CT. Yet, if there was no electoral college, and the election was very close (oh, say... 200k votes nationally), my vote suddenly means something. The national vote was closer than the CT vote.

I ended up casting a "strategic" vote for Nader, hoping to boost a 3rd party (any third party, excepting nazis or communists). I'm so fed up with both major parties.

Ozzy,

Trolls tend to get a discussion (if you can call it that) going, true enough. But that doesn't mean trolls are good.

-Arrian

[MikeH]

Originally posted by Ned


Mike, If you and many others outside the U.S. actually believe your characterization of the U.S. election, I would just like to point out that not even Gore would agree with you.

Ned

Well that idiot wasn't even clever enough to cheat as much as Bush did to win.

Seriously, having a politically appointed court getting involved with the election is ludicrous and having an electoral system where people can't work out how to vote properly like that is just crazy.

I'm quite interested to know what changes are being made for the next election to prevent another highly embarassing disaster like this one?

[DinoDoc]

Originally posted by MikeH
Seriously, having ... an electoral system where people can't work out how to vote properly like that is just crazy.

Is it our fault that we forgot to take into account the wishes of the stupid people when designing a ballot? The only thing that I can say in our defense is that we had people standing by to help them. They just didn't want to avail themselves of the help.

[Caligastia]

Originally posted by MikeH
I'm quite interested to know what changes are being made for the next election to prevent another highly embarassing disaster like this one?

Probably none. Its the american way.

[MikeH]

Originally posted by DinoDoc


Is it our fault that we forgot to take into account the wishes of the stupid people when designing a ballot?

Yes.

[DinoDoc]

Originally posted by MikeH
Yes.

Even when we provide help to allow the ignoramus population to figure things out?

[S. Kroeze]

Originally posted by Ned
I too have wonder why more countries have not adopted the U.S. model. It was well thought out by very well educated men trying to perfect government. They obviously used the Roman Empire/Republic as its basic structure, but corrected some its obvious flaws. The glue that holds the whole structure together, though, is the Supreme Court. Though co-equal in theory, it is really the most powerful institution in the U.S. because it "interprets" the Constitution, the supreme law of the land.

Ned

Dear Ned,

I have no problem with someone defending the idea that the USA is a democracy.
But suggesting that the Roman Republic did in any way resemble a democratic structure, does raise the suspicion that your knowledge about the Roman polity is inadequate.

Two questions:
Which public body was dominant in the Roman Republic?
How was it decided who would be member of this public body?

Sincerely,

S.Kroeze

[MikeH]

I don't know about in the US but here people get embarrassed when they have to ask for help to do something that should be simple, especially if they are men. Also if the ballots are misleading like some I saw in the Florida case people might make mistakes and think they are right so therefore not need to ask for help.

[Caligastia]

Havent they thought of using computer touch-screens? Get into the 21st century already!

[Arrian]

I'm with Dino on the ballot thing. It wasn't that hard to figure out. I do hope they make the ballot more idiot-proof in the future, though, just so I don't have to read and hear all about someone who meant to vote Democratic and somehow voted Nazi... err, for Pat Buchanan.

I do think the states should invest a bit more money in their elections, and have updated equipment. Even CT uses very old (80 yrs or something like that) machines. But no chads are involved, thankfully.

-Arrian

[MikeH]

What's wrong with a simple X in the box next to the candidates name?

[Caligastia]

Originally posted by MikeH
What's wrong with a simple X in the box next to the candidates name?

Too confusing.