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Your three points comes down to the old `people are too dumb to vote' stance that every democratic movement had to fight through history. And the `elite' optim

Your three points comes down to the old `people are too dumb to vote' stance that every democratic movement had to fight through history. And the `elite' optimizes locally as well, directly at the expense of the weakest.

TeMPOraL 11y ago
I don't see the two statements being wrong, and definitely not mutually exclusive. With non-elected elite there's at least a chance that said elite has any actual qualifications instead of just being popular. To be clear - I'm not that big on authoritarianism. I just don't see the value proposition of democracy being actually realized. Given the points I mentioned previously, we are still ruled by elite, except that it is constrained to choose their options only based on popularity, and unable to make hard decisions in areas that matter[0]. About the only thing democracy delivers as promised is bloodless government transition. Even the actual work in democractic country's administration is done by unelected officials. At this point I've given up hoping that democratic governments will help solve climate change or energy problems. Private companies may be able to, but that's only because they're capable of behaving in inherently undemocratic ways, like releasing a new technology upon the world (nobody asked us to vote whether we want to have Facebook or not) or projecting the will of single individuals onto the society ("you will drive electric cars, whether you want it or not", said Musk, and proceed to burn as much money as it took to make electric cars compete with ICE ones[1]). [0] - even if such decision wouldn't immediately piss of half of the electorate by itself, your political opponents will make sure it will render you practically unelectable [1] - yes, there were electric cars before, but it took Tesla to basically force the market into accepting them as an option, and they did that on purpose
- JoeAltmaier 11y ago
  Lets not paint all Democracy with the 'US Federal Election' brush! My local county Attorney is very qualified and dedicated.
  - TeMPOraL 11y ago
    Please clone your Attorney and send the copy to my city. We need more honest, qualified and dedicated people. Alas, the whole system is tuned to actively eliminate such people and replace them with ones that can pander to the public. That's what I'm complaining about.
    - JoeAltmaier 11y ago
      I understand completely. But many public officials are there because they believe strongly in something. At the local level at least, in Iowa at least, there is a lot of good-will and honest intent.
      - TeMPOraL 11y ago
        My sympathy to the system is probably inversely proportional to the scale at which it operates. I've also noticed that at local levels you tend to have greater amount of honest people who believe in something and are willing to push for the ideas based on merit. I think a big part of it is that they have a much bigger personal connection with the issues and the citizens. Such people have my utmost respect.

TeMPOraL 11y ago

I don't see the two statements being wrong, and definitely not mutually exclusive. With non-elected elite there's at least a chance that said elite has any actual qualifications instead of just being popular. To be clear - I'm not that big on authoritarianism. I just don't see the value proposition of democracy being actually realized. Given the points I mentioned previously, we are still ruled by elite, except that it is constrained to choose their options only based on popularity, and unable to make hard decisions in areas that matter[0]. About the only thing democracy delivers as promised is bloodless government transition. Even the actual work in democractic country's administration is done by unelected officials. At this point I've given up hoping that democratic governments will help solve climate change or energy problems. Private companies may be able to, but that's only because they're capable of behaving in inherently undemocratic ways, like releasing a new technology upon the world (nobody asked us to vote whether we want to have Facebook or not) or projecting the will of single individuals onto the society ("you will drive electric cars, whether you want it or not", said Musk, and proceed to burn as much money as it took to make electric cars compete with ICE ones[1]). [0] - even if such decision wouldn't immediately piss of half of the electorate by itself, your political opponents will make sure it will render you practically unelectable [1] - yes, there were electric cars before, but it took Tesla to basically force the market into accepting them as an option, and they did that on purpose

JoeAltmaier 11y ago
Lets not paint all Democracy with the 'US Federal Election' brush! My local county Attorney is very qualified and dedicated.
- TeMPOraL 11y ago
  Please clone your Attorney and send the copy to my city. We need more honest, qualified and dedicated people. Alas, the whole system is tuned to actively eliminate such people and replace them with ones that can pander to the public. That's what I'm complaining about.
  - JoeAltmaier 11y ago
    I understand completely. But many public officials are there because they believe strongly in something. At the local level at least, in Iowa at least, there is a lot of good-will and honest intent.
    - TeMPOraL 11y ago
      My sympathy to the system is probably inversely proportional to the scale at which it operates. I've also noticed that at local levels you tend to have greater amount of honest people who believe in something and are willing to push for the ideas based on merit. I think a big part of it is that they have a much bigger personal connection with the issues and the citizens. Such people have my utmost respect.