Our political system is totally broken. Can it be fixed or are we doomed?

a reply to: gortex

Dark forces making a clown dance on stage while their mouthpieces throw tomatoes at him.

a reply to: Riffrafter

You are assuming the political system is broken. Maybe it's working just as it is intended to.

It keeps people divided through various fracture lines: race, religion, sex, age, class, geography, etc. All the while government chugs along, doing what is best for government and lobbyists instead of what's best for the people.

Ever notice how we (the people) keep having the same problems no matter which political party is in the majority?

Did most Americans want the bank bailouts in 2008? Well, Bush did and so did Obama, so the banks got the bailouts.

All Americans want affordable health care. What do we get? Insurance company bailouts that don't lower health care by a single dime. We get schemes to increase the pool of money available to pay for health care, but health care costs continue to rise.

Whether it's Republicans or Democrats in office, we will spend hundreds of billions of dollars to invade countries that don't have Rothschild controlled central banks while homelessness and drug addiction continue grow here at home. The cost of higher education continues to rise beyond the reach of middle class Americans, and we still hand out foreign aid to other countries. Is that what the majority of Americans want?

Republicans and Democrats both get their chances to right some of these wrongs, but somehow these problems never get fixed. Instead, they keep us focused on fighting each other over any emotional issue where people can have different opinions.

originally posted by: underwerks

originally posted by: thedigirati
when the USA first instilled a Government, Dueling was still a thing, a man stood for his convictions.

they were considered "Gentlemen"

Today that are no standards and no gentlemen and no dueling

of course the Government wont work.

( I still think dueling should still be a thing, would love to see Trump and Schiff at 20 paces or even Deniro and Trump)

Link

Thanks for the window to what gets injected into the brain of a typical Democrat. Nice to see you all still focusing on the relevant issues...

a reply to: spiritualarchitect

Here is my 2 STEP solution on how to begin fixing it before 2024.

Step 1 ~ ONE TERM ONLY
Step 2 ~ REVOLVING PRESIDENTCY

That's an interesting approach.

#2A ~ EACH TERM WILL HAVE A PRESIDENT FROM A DIFFERENT PARTY.

I think a lot of people will push back on this one. What if one party has a good general platform from which their candidates can then have their own ideas (hopefully good ideas) on how best to implement that philosophy and the other party has nothing but the SSDD (same sh#t different day) platform?

IMO - At its core, a party ought to represent a philosophy on how to govern rather than a hard and fast set of rules. That gives candidates some room in which to present the best and most effective ways to implement that philosophy. Two often, the party dictates everything from an overarching philosophy down to the nuts & bolts of how to govern - and that's wrong.

a reply to: lakenheath24


Ummm...if it were that easy...then we wouldn't be in this mess...

So blame it on all those personages that keep voting these asshats in...

That's why we need term limits...two terms and GTFO...

< Mod edit to remove reply to a removed post >






YouSir

a reply to: JustJohnny

The present dems are not hard left...

Most are corporate “status quo “ stooges..

Ha! No argument here.

The right has its own issues though too - primarily their philosophy is essentially "Hooray for me and the hell with everybody else". That kind of selfish, capital-driven approach doesn't take into consideration things like sound ecological policies that may cost some money in the short term, but may save our asses in the long term. Bottom line - they are very short sighted and not nearly enough "looking out for the other fella" policies as Jimmy Stewart says in that great movie - Mr. Smith Goes To Washington.

And if not looking out for the other fella - how about doing things that are simply in the interest of the greater good?

It's not that hard...the voices are out there - we just need to take a second and listen once in a while.

a reply to: Nickn3

Neither system is broken but it is badly bent. I long for the days of fist fights in the house.

Talk about a ratings booster for C-Span!

originally posted by: olaru12
a reply to: Riffrafter

Our political system is directly linked to Capitalism.

We have the best government money can buy!!

I agree 100%!

And therein lies the problem at the core of our current system...

Until we get the special interest and even private money out of the system, it will remain as broken as ever and we will continue to decline as a civilization. It will continue to be an ever accelerating race to the bottom.

It reminds me *so* much of the fall of Rome. Rome didn't die due to outside influences - it killed itself with debauchery, self-dealing and an astonishing lack of foresight for a civilization that initially grew so large because it had foresight and didn't always go for the "easy fix".

Talk about terrible irony...

a reply to: Riffrafter

that acutually sounds like a good Idea

Body checking the podium

then even More folks would get interested in politics.

Body checks during Vote counts

Body checks during speeches

Body checks on the streets oh wait thats a mosh pit sorry

after reading You Sirs post my body checking Idea takes on a whole new meaning 😍😍😂😂😲

originally posted by: Masterjaden
a reply to: JustJohnny

Wrong. If you think unions aren't the same thing, you're on crack.

Jaden

Excellent point!

Same beast it just wears a different set of clothes...

originally posted by: JAY1980

originally posted by: underwerks

originally posted by: thedigirati
when the USA first instilled a Government, Dueling was still a thing, a man stood for his convictions.

they were considered "Gentlemen"

Today that are no standards and no gentlemen and no dueling

of course the Government wont work.

( I still think dueling should still be a thing, would love to see Trump and Schiff at 20 paces or even Deniro and Trump)

Link

Thanks for the window to what gets injected into the brain of a typical Democrat. Nice to see you all still focusing on the relevant issues...

You're welcome. It's nice to break up the lie you believe in every once in a while.

a reply to: JustJohnny

I personally do not really see the benefit in shortening term limits..

If you actually run across a truly good leader, why would you want to roll the dice again?

Good point. No system is perfect but maybe we could improve on the term limits law by saying 2 terms then you're done for at least one additional full term. A candidate can run again at the end of that period.

Would that work?

I think we are doomed, eventually .

a reply to: Riffrafter

One, it's a Constitutional Republic and was never a democratic anything.

Two, yes there is always a way to correct the government.
It was written into the founding documents.

Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government

We the People, are the government. Those elected officials are representative of our will, not their own.

Bin the electoral college, it has to go.
Shouting Communist and Socialist still being a vote winner to the uneducated rubes is a signal education has failed a huge section of the electorate too dumb to actually find out or understand how silly those statements are, especially now with the internet. Saying Capitalism is Socialism allows the world laugh at you.
You need a party that is Socialist, America is the only country on the planet where both major parties share identical political ideologies, their socially different but saying Democrats are to the left of Republicans is like saying mussolini was to the left of hitler.
A Socialist party with different ideas to what the masses are engineered to vote for might take a generation or two to start seeing results but, it's better in the long run than throwing support blindly behind Democrats for, reasons, every election.

Socially, its down to education and/or religion. But this threads title is about politics so...

originally posted by: contextual
Bin the electoral college, it has to go.

Can't do that without scrapping the Constitution or amending it.

Most political writers and thinkers of the "Founders" era viewed the words republic and democracy as basically interchangable in meaning, and both were used to refer to the systems of Athens and Rome (by the way, the Founders based our current Constitutional government upon these systems).

For those who claim that Jefferson hated democracy, we might remember that Jefferson's party was called the Democratic-Republicans, later shortened to Democratic.

Ironically, almost all the founders agreed that the two biggest threats to the young nation was factionalism (political parties) and standing armies at the command of the Federal Government.

NOTABLE EXCEPTIONS: The Federalists ... Hamilton, Adams, Madison, etc.

Everyone of you that want to axe the EC would be screaming the opposite if the large cities were run by Republicans. You know it and so does everyone else in this country. Not a single one of you on the Left can dispute it because you know it's true. I do not want to live in a country where the largest population areas decide for everyone. We're the only country on earth that has such a large diversity in people and geography. No one else comes close. As such we have different needs. We do not need the Left running the show forever.

Our founders were so much smarter than most people alive today because they lived through generations of religious oppression and few individual rights. People today have no idea (me included) what it was like back then and could be again if socialists and communists get their way. Once those rights are taken away it WILL take another revolution to get them back.

I am not in favor of abolishing the Electoral College unless it is done by the Constitutional means provided.

However, the argument that "the popular vote allows urban centers to control the county" is extremely flawed.

The outcome of the EC (with one exception) has always relied on the popular vote. Yes, the Electors can vote differently, but rarely have.