4 ms·

> No way that is possibly true. People realised they didn't have tests. A bunch of people of a liberterian bent or systems thinkers would have picked the FDA as

> No way that is possibly true. People realised they didn't have tests. A bunch of people of a liberterian bent or systems thinkers would have picked the FDA as the problem very quickly. You didn't need a "libertarian bent" or special"systems thinking" to figure that out. The CDC was testing at most 50 people a day IIRC. Can 50 tests across an entire country get you detailed info? No. You need labs to run tests, CDC has limited lab space for testing. South Korea was capable of doing thousands of tests per day. No rational person though 50 was sufficient. They simply sat and waited for the CDC doing nothing. Who has labs? Universities, sure start there? Who does the testing for the population in general? Quest & LabCorp, have them run the test. > It wasn't going to work unless the executive happened by amazing luck of have an infectious disease specialist in a key role It doesn't require having "amazing luck" to see what was happening. Everyone on the internet looking at it did. Like the task force they killed? This is utter incompetence by the executive branch. In January, how do you see 700 million people on some form of lock down in China and not immediately spin up a task force to evaluate risks to the US? It's astounding levels of negligence. The administration let the country down enormously. And a lot of people are going to suffer because of it.

dominotw 7y ago
> The administration let the country down enormously. Is this a failing of current democratic system. Are there no check and balances for this sort of let down by the administration. How can we design a system that has nothing to check it if its making mistakes. Is that the job of the opposition or does opposition lack intelligence to find out in time.
- munk-a 7y ago
  I think so, I've emigrated up to Canada and comparing the parliamentary government up here to the system in the US has been interesting. Canada has had some majorly extreme parties over the years (including the PPC[1]) but there is room in the system for these parties to grow outside of the centrist parties. Currently in Canada the dominant party is the Liberal party it's a rather centrist but socially liberal party that's about equivalent of America's corporate Democrat types like Clinton and Pelosi - but in recent elections a more left leaning party has gained some ground and is challenging them from the outside. There is a lot of party loyalty in Canada, but since the political field isn't purely divided between Liberal and Conservative there's significantly more freedom when it comes to elections, the election system is still first past the post but most voters can vote their conscience rather than strategically. I think the failure of the democratic system is reducing elections to a binary vote, and I think that that reduction is impossible to avoid with direct election of the executive branch instead of being driven by the composition of the congress - additionally America's system is very vulnerable to having a minority party executive and while minority governments in parliamentary systems is a thing, it tends to be less damaging by still ensuring/requiring that a minority government is able to form a coalition government initially. 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/People%27s_Party_of_Canada https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/People%27s_Party_of_Canada

dominotw 7y ago

> The administration let the country down enormously. Is this a failing of current democratic system. Are there no check and balances for this sort of let down by the administration. How can we design a system that has nothing to check it if its making mistakes. Is that the job of the opposition or does opposition lack intelligence to find out in time.

munk-a 7y ago
I think so, I've emigrated up to Canada and comparing the parliamentary government up here to the system in the US has been interesting. Canada has had some majorly extreme parties over the years (including the PPC[1]) but there is room in the system for these parties to grow outside of the centrist parties. Currently in Canada the dominant party is the Liberal party it's a rather centrist but socially liberal party that's about equivalent of America's corporate Democrat types like Clinton and Pelosi - but in recent elections a more left leaning party has gained some ground and is challenging them from the outside. There is a lot of party loyalty in Canada, but since the political field isn't purely divided between Liberal and Conservative there's significantly more freedom when it comes to elections, the election system is still first past the post but most voters can vote their conscience rather than strategically. I think the failure of the democratic system is reducing elections to a binary vote, and I think that that reduction is impossible to avoid with direct election of the executive branch instead of being driven by the composition of the congress - additionally America's system is very vulnerable to having a minority party executive and while minority governments in parliamentary systems is a thing, it tends to be less damaging by still ensuring/requiring that a minority government is able to form a coalition government initially. 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/People%27s_Party_of_Canada https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/People%27s_Party_of_Canada