Whoa! Did Scott Adams just say the best government is no government at all? What a libertarian! :)

(BTW, your comment prevention system works well. Getting to your website and logging in after reading a piece from your RSS feed in Google Reader is such a pain that I only make a comment about once a year.)

It depends on what you mean by "problem" and "solution." I am personally dissatisfied with a lot of what happens in politics, but that's life. It's imperfect. It is impossible for even a majority of people to be pleased with a government system in which everyone has input. We simply disagree too much. As much as I believe that people should change, I don't want to force them to believe what I believe, simply because I don't want anybody forcing me to believe what they believe.

Hayek wrote in "The Road to Serfdom" that people will be so overwhelmed with displeasure in democracy that they eventually decide to grant absolute power to a man or an organization simply to "get things done." This is a dangerous situation. I don't want to cave into the dissatisfaction and allow it to eat me alive or create Hitler or Mao 2.0. I think that too many people desire some sort of radical change simply because they have so much pent up frustration in that they are unable to deal with the fact that the world doesn't work the way that they want it to. We all just need to calm down and step back.

If I was going to present a solution, I would suggest diffusion of power into smaller and more localized government power. This is why the EU method is flawed. We don't need a world government, we need a world of thousands of small, local governments. I believe that the most successful countries with big, active governments are small countries where the national government is the local government such as Sweden and Norway. Those countries have huge, active governments, but it doesn't seem to create mass dissatisfaction in those societies. Maybe California should succeed and become the leftist paradise that it always wanted. Maybe states like Texas could succeed and do what makes them happy. I know it is unpopular due to historical connotations, but succession seems like the only way the residents of a lot states will ever be happy. How is it fair that California has to be part of a country with no national healthcare system? How is it fair that Texas can be forced into a national healthcare system that they want no part in?

That's my solution: mass decentralization.

I don't find it that unbelievable that people will become smarter as time goes on either. I believe that society has already came a long way.

So do you think there's no problem, or that the problem is unsolvable, or do you have a solution in mind? I mean that doesn't involve somehow millions of Americans changing their behavior with no particular mechanism for making that happen. Or perhaps you believe it will solve itself over time as people start making better and better decisions?

Too much text, I'll stop.

I just haven't heard any good arguments that our system is corrupt in any way that couldn't be solved simply by voting better people into offices. Really, all that I've been hearing is excuses for why it isn't the voters fault that the government is dissatisfying. I just believe that the government is always going to be dissatisfying, but that is why we should limit it to the most essential functions and allow free individuals to solve most problems themselves. That was always the point of classically liberal government. The government was supposed to create an environment where nobody had to worry about being killed or robbed and get out of the way to let voluntary cooperation do its thing. Anytime the government gets too deeply involved in complex, personal economic issues, the system become more and more dissatisfying.

"any active government will be forced to rely more and more on "advisers," "experts," and run of the mill technocrats."

I don't know if this is obvious, but my point here was that such people are unelected. Basically, because politicians are so useless when it comes to technical subjects, the more active the government when it comes to planning, the more the government will rely on people we've never elected.

"I don't think it's broken because my preferred policies aren't being enacted. I think it's broken because policies, whatever ones are in place, are enacted for the wrong reasons. Namely, because lawmakers get paid to enact them."

I still think that this is a cover for people who are simply displeased with the state of government and too lazy to go about convincing other people to agree with them. "Surely the problem can't be that not enough people agree with me, it must be that the system is corrupt, because I'm awesome." WHat are "the wrong reasons?" This is also my point; who cares about why a politician is pushing one policy or another? Why can't we simply discuss the ideas and vote accordingly? Unless you can prove actual vote rigging, you can't really say that it is the systems fault when the fault clearly lies on the voters. Even in a system that was horribly corrupt and full of bribes, and I don't think that our system is.

"What about public campaign funding? We would have to give up the idea that campaign contributions are a form of protected speech, but I think it would be worth it. If everyone gets the same amount of money to run the campaign, then buying votes becomes much more dangerous, because everyone can go to prison for it. Maybe lawmakers would actually do their jobs. Now someone shoot holes in my theory, because I'm hoping it would work but it seems too simple."

See, you still see the level of campaign funding as the key element. I love how you act like the system is one giant cesspool, but somehow equal funding would be a key improvement. THat really only logically follows if you believe that the voters are mindless zombies who simply respond to campaign adds, making any one candidates financial advantage "unfair." Also, this kind of a system would essentially protect incumbents who already have the advantages that come already being cemented into the government system. Limitations on campaign funding and campaign speech have always limited the ability of newcomers to challenge incumbents (such as Mccain Feingold). Who would decide who gets money to run? Would you have to be one of the government's "approved" political parties? Would they just give a 10 million dollar check to anybody who can get a certain number of signatures on a petition or votes in a primary? The latter would still revolve around party machinery. Granted, this all might work for some technocratic ideal, but then you'd have to look at funding outside of direct campaign contributions. The real "problem" that politicians today argue is ruining politics is speech outside of the campaign itself. What if a corporate funded non profit group runs an add favoring one politician over his opponent? Is that speech or a campaign contribution? (I see it as both.) What if a newscaster goes live to a political rally where thousands of campaign supporters cheer for a specific candidate giving them more exposure? WHat about books and movies that are technically art but support some very specific causes? What about people who sell "obama" t shirts? Personally, I believe that if you think that voters are so stupid and brainwashed so easily, you'll never be happy with the way the system works. I simply believe that more speech is good no matter what. One person's ability to speak out doesn't take away from your ability to speak out. The responsibility still lies with the voters to educate themselves and vote accordingly.

True, public funding of campaigns might remove the power of the people that the politicians would normally have to rely on for campaign funds, but not entirely. Politicians listen to the votes first and the money second, anyway. ONce again, we're back around the circle to discussing whether or not the candidates use money to buy votes or whether or not money buys candidates. I'm sure that you'd argue it is both. I've already argued how I don't believe that money can buy votes unless you believe that the voting public is zombies, and earlier I argued that money doesn't really buy candidates either. Sure, the candidate who receives the most money usually does win, but not always, and that is simply because donors tend to donate to the candidate that they think will win. THis is why CEO's and corporate types who donated money to Republicans in one election cycle donated money to Democrats in another. If candidates could simply buy a politician and then buy votes, I'm pretty sure we'd be living in a permanent dictatorship by now. Anyway, limiting the ability of people to donate to campaigns effectively eliminates their ability to protect their private property from the public at large. Although, I think that is the goal of those who want to limit such donations.

"Congress members neither read nor write the legislation they vote on. At best, a staffer does both. At worst, an industry lobbyist literally writes the bill, passes it along, and nobody from the Congressperson's office even reads the whole thing before introducing it. I don't know how that can be considered a properly functioning system of government. Do you think it is?"

I personally believe that it is terrible that congresscritters don't even read the legislation a lot of the time, but it is still our fault for voting for these people. Of course, the bills are full of so much legalese that actually reading the bill wouldn't be that useful, but I still want a politician to at least know what they are voting for. This is why I actually supported Obama's campaign pledge to post new legislation online for 5 days so that crowdsourcing could get to work on translating bills into understandable english. What ever happened to that? In reality, I'm not so cynical, and I do believe that politicians at least know the gist of the bill that they vote for, but once again, any failures of "the system" are simply failures of the voter. We could all be voting for different candidates. I like how you completely scoff at that option and go straight towards re engineering the political process. Sounds a little bass ackwards to me when people think like that.


"Again, this goes back to the assumption about the problem starting with who is voted for. IMO the problem is much more fundamental than that."

Again, you have yet to really articulate this point. You simply say, "The current political process is dissatisfying to me, and money is involved in politics, so clearly the political system is broken under the weight of bribes and campaign contributions." So far, I have yet to see you prove this point, or even argue it effectively. Yes, a lot of money is involved in politics, and yes politics is often dissatisfying, but those two factors are not as simply related as you pretend.


"My problem is that the *legal* campaign contributions corrupt the system. BigCorp makes a perfectly legal campaign donation to Senator Scumbag, and in private tells him "you're going to vote no on SR xyz in exchange for this money." That private part is illegal, but there's no way anyone can prove anything, and you can be sure Congress is going to keep it that way. They're the ones making the rules, after all."

Yes, I understand that this is the bulk of your argument, but once again, we know who gets money from whom in these cases, and when we see a person vote for a specific bill, we can all determine for ourselves why they voted for said bill. Personally, I believe that campaign contributions are more of a foot in the door than bribes. Few candidates receive enough money from any one donor to actually give the donor that much power. Truthfully, as I've said before, money follows the winner more often than not, and in the case you described above, the politician would be able to tell the lobbyist to take a hike. Once again, this stuff is all public information and you can look it up online. No candidate is that dependent on any one donor. Even if they were, we should be discussing each candidates ideas based on the value of those ideas, not whose paying them to hold the ideas. Once again, it is the ideas that are the important thing. You care way too much about "why" a candidate is pushing a certain view. Personally, I'd rather discuss the actual topic at hand. You still aren't explaining how the responsibility doesn't lie with the voter.

"Does input have to include money though?"

Yep. Money represents resources, and people who have more money have more to lose. There is no way to separate money and speech. People who believe in markets have been talking for years about how free markets and free speech go hand in hand. If the government owns the news, the entertainment, and the advertising industries, there is no real free speech. You can't really argue that money isn't instrumental in one's ability to share their ideas, and therefore any limitation on money is a limitation on speech. It isn't really that money IS speech, the issue is simply that money is instrumental when it comes to sharing ones opinion, and if you limit it, you're limiting speech.

"You have every opportunity to educate yourself and vote accordingly."

That still assumes that the problem is the specific people in office (since the proposed solution is voting for others), which I contend is not the case.

"The majority of the population will hold your viewpoint that the system is broken, simply because they aren't getting THEIR way.... See, this is exactly my point. Just because you feel that the system isn't doing what you want it to do doesn't mean that it isn't "working." "

I don't think it's broken because my preferred policies aren't being enacted. I think it's broken because policies, whatever ones are in place, are enacted for the wrong reasons. Namely, because lawmakers get paid to enact them. Congress members neither read nor write the legislation they vote on. At best, a staffer does both. At worst, an industry lobbyist literally writes the bill, passes it along, and nobody from the Congressperson's office even reads the whole thing before introducing it. I don't know how that can be considered a properly functioning system of government. Do you think it is?

"Have you ever thought that maybe people are voting for the best possible candidates in their minds and maybe this is the result of aggregations of millions of adults from dozens of different backgrounds living in 50 different states with different geographies and histories voting the best that they can?"

Again, this goes back to the assumption about the problem starting with who is voted for. IMO the problem is much more fundamental than that.

"I agree, but I don't think that our system is any more susceptible to corruption than any other system."

Perhaps not more than any other system that currently exists, but perhaps it is. In any case, I hope there is a possible viable system that is less corruptible, and that someone finds it. Then maybe the people of other countries will demand the same thing.

"Democracy is a game of special interests. To remove special interests, you'd have to remove freedom of speech (Mccain-Feingold) or create a more autocratic oligarchy to run the show."

What about public campaign funding? We would have to give up the idea that campaign contributions are a form of protected speech, but I think it would be worth it. If everyone gets the same amount of money to run the campaign, then buying votes becomes much more dangerous, because everyone can go to prison for it. Maybe lawmakers would actually do their jobs. Now someone shoot holes in my theory, because I'm hoping it would work but it seems too simple.

"I'm really not seeing what makes our system more corruptible than any other."

Maybe it's not. I'm not really arguing that ours is *more* corrupt than another, just that ours is badly corrupted. If every other government is equally corrupt, that doesn't make me feel better. :-)

"Yes, every now and then we find out about a politician receiving campaign contributions illegally and undisclosed"

My problem is that the *legal* campaign contributions corrupt the system. BigCorp makes a perfectly legal campaign donation to Senator Scumbag, and in private tells him "you're going to vote no on SR xyz in exchange for this money." That private part is illegal, but there's no way anyone can prove anything, and you can be sure Congress is going to keep it that way. They're the ones making the rules, after all.

"If we simply educated ourselves and discussed ideas and voted according to our best judgment, the issue of who's receiving money from whom would be entirely irrelevant."

Seriously, you really think that would make all the problems go away?

"The real problem is that some people want the government to be one big apparatus for extracting value from the productivity of society and distributing to who they deem fit. As long as people see the system this way and use the system this way, the system will be entirely corruptible."

I hope you're wrong, because that is never going to change. I think we agree that some people are corrupt and will game any system to their advantage, and that is not going to change.

"As long as everyone has input, the system will never be satisfying, but a system that excludes some people from having input would create the opposite of a free society."

Does input have to include money though?

"I prefer to accept an imperfect world that still provides for my basic rights over a world that is perfect (according to the oligarchy's plan) with less freedom. "

Definitely.

"Anytime you have an active government, in the realm of economics especially, reaching beyond a point of true majority agreement, you are going to have widespread satisfaction."

Dang should be "widespread dissatisfaction." I'm sorry, it's getting late.

For some reason, my keyboard has a hard time typing s's, so a lot of words that should be plural end up singular. Dang.

"This can involve holding two apparently conflicting ideologies in your head at the same time. "

I don't have a problem with the majority of what you said, but is this not the essence of "doublethink?" I mean, it is the exact definition taken from 1984. I would argue that believing in a free market and a safety net at the same time is not truly doublethink, and not even truly the same as holding two " conflicting ideologies." It is simply the ideology of interventionism. Nothing terribly wrong with that. I myself believe in some basic safety nets, although I don't really defend them as such. To me, it seems like there are always going to be people who need a little extra help, and maybe a moral society does give them a hand, but our current system which is trying to be all things to all people technocratic, redistributionist, and corporatist at the same time is almost self defeating. If the government truly focused its efforts on simplification and a real game plan for achieving some specific goals at the expense of other goals, it could get something positive done. However, sociologically, it is more likely that we'll end up with a coalition rule of pluralities constantly fighting eachother for resources that can be extracted through taxation, which is pretty much the system that we have now. Limiting the government to basic and essential function so that it can actually perform them well is the only viable solution in my mind.

Oh yeah, and I hate technocrats. They are the new utopianists that want to yoke everyone to their grand design. Technocrats have a role to play, but it is in a dark room with a computer, not making public policy.

Darn profanity filter that filters out non profanity. And darn my grammatical errors. I could proofread more, but I choose not to.

"tkwelge: so just vote the bums out, huh? Yeah, that's working great so far, isn't it? "

I'm not even saying vote the bums out. Maybe the bums we have are superior to alternative bums. Why do people interpret their displeasure with the state of the world to be "evidence" that the system is evil. I don't see it that way. You have every opportunity to educate yourself and vote accordingly. Everyone has that opportunity. Nobody is stopping you. Personally, I believe in the words of Hayek when he wrote in The Road to Serfdom that democracy can often become displeasing. Lots of people disagree about many issues. There are usually more than two schools of thought when it comes to most issues, especially economic issues, and so the idea of "majority rule" becomes laughable whenever the government gets seriously involved in economic planning. You might get 12 opinions about the same issue. How can any policy possibly please anywhere near a majority of the citizens under these !$%*!$%*!$%*!$ The majority of the population will hold your viewpoint that the system is broken, simply because they aren't getting THEIR way. And yes, people who hold this opinion are children. ALso, since politicians are usually completely uneducated outside of the area of law or maybe business management (business management experience is completely different from having an economic understanding of the way the world works) any active government will be forced to rely more and more on "advisors," "experts," and run of the mill technocrats. Democracy itself become a sham. Agreement and harmony become a forgotten dream.

"if telling people to vote for better candidates were a viable strategy for fixing the problem, it would have worked already. It clearly doesn't work."

See, this is exactly my point. Just because you feel that the system isn't doing what you want it to do doesn't mean that it isn't "working." Have you ever thought that maybe people are voting for the best possible candidates in their minds and maybe this is the result of aggregations of millions of adults from dozens of different backgrounds living in 50 different states with different geographies and histories voting the best that they can? Anytime you have an active government, in the realm of economics especially, reaching beyond a point of true majority agreement, you are going to have widespread satisfaction. Sure, I'm dissatisfied with the current government, but it's not the system's fault, it's simply our own fault.

"What system would those new people step into? The same one we have now that is susceptible to corruption. What would be solved? Nothing."

I agree, but I don't think that our system is any more susceptible to corruption than any other system. Democracy is a game of special interests. To remove special interests, you'd have to remove freedom of speech (Mccain-Feingold) or create a more autocratic oligarchy to run the show. I'm really not seeing what makes our system more corruptible than any other. Human beings are corruptible and many are simply corrupt. It is up to the voter to be conscientious and vote good people into office. Yes, every now and then we find out about a politician receiving campaign contributions illegally and undisclosed, but who receives money from whom is public information. Frankly, I'd rather discuss the ideas at hand rather than who receives money from what interest group. If we simply educated ourselves and discussed ideas and voted according to our best judgment, the issue of who's receiving money from whom would be entirely irrelevant.

The real problem is that some people want the government to be one big apparatus for extracting value from the productivity of society and distributing to who they deem fit. As long as people see the system this way and use the system this way, the system will be entirely corruptible. This is why limited government that seeks only to enforce property rights and rule of law is corruption proof. Just by asking for special favors, an interest group would be stepping outside of the bounds of good government, and everybody would recognize it. If people recognized it and chose to accept it, that would be their decision.

As long as everyone has input, the system will never be satisfying, but a system that excludes some people from having input would create the opposite of a free society. I prefer to accept an imperfect world that still provides for my basic rights over a world that is perfect (according to the oligarchy's plan) with less freedom.

tkwelge: so just vote the bums out, huh? Yeah, that's working great so far, isn't it? In other words: if telling people to vote for better candidates were a viable strategy for fixing the problem, it would have worked already. It clearly doesn't work. The people in power use all kinds of techniques to make sure they stay in power. You think incumbents almost always win because everyone loves them so much?

Beyond that, let's just say for the sake of argument that every incumbent could get voted out of office, either all at the same time or over the course of a couple of election cycles. Who would get elected in their place? People who want to be in power. Nobody else would even be on the ballot. What system would those new people step into? The same one we have now that is susceptible to corruption. What would be solved? Nothing.

Voting for someone else is fine, but it is not an effective solution to the systemic problems.

I have enjoyed everyone's comments. Lots of good stuff. I made one myself earlier but I'd like to make another; this time standing "much further back" and with a bit more cynicism.

Let's assume:
The system can't be changed.
The behavior of the politicians can't be changed.
The country bumbles along with things getting worse but nevertheless keeps going. (I believe it will.)

What's going to happen?
Democracy will work the way it usually does. At first the ideologists rule. Left and Right. The electorate jumps from horse to horse and tests their ideologies. If that doesn't work then the pragmatists ascend.

Unfortunately this process can take 10 to 20 years. The crucial thing is to hold your nerve and keep trying things.

I am of the pragmatist school. This can involve holding two apparently conflicting ideologies in your head at the same time. If you can ignore the buzzing, it goes like this. I believe in individual freedom and the free market economy and in there being a safety net for those who are not fortunate. This philosophy may seem whimpy but I assure you it requires great courage as you end up being spat upon by both sides.

All the ideologists fondly imagine that they are pragmatists as well but, as you wander out to the ideological wings and the ideology becomes ever more "pure", you wander further and further from human nature. Communism didn't work because people act out of self interest. The opposite doesn't work because most folks consider their self interest to include not having to step over losers in the gutter. The answer lies in a chimerical mixture of the opposing ideologies. That being the case it would be helpful if the two sides would stop trying to suggest that they have all the answers and realise that demonising the "enemy" just delays thrashing out the inevitable compromises.

Fire when ready and please leave my mother out of this.

In the cases where special interests are bribing politicians it's pretty obvious. Why can't you just educate yourself and vote accordingly? I'm sorry, but this all sounds like a lot of whining cause the world isn't immediately implementing what you believe into policy.

"Ah, I see. The problem is that the ones in a position to meaningfully define the difference between "corrupting politicians" and "defending oneself from an over-regulatory government" are the ones accepting the campaign contributions (or bribes, if you prefer)."

Um, i'm pretty sure that anybody with a functioning brain can determine whether an industry is trying to stack the deck in their favor or just trying to retain personal property rights. Take some responsibility for your vote. Are politicians the only ones in a position to make an observation? This stuff is all public info. We know exactly who is getting money from whom.

"No, I would not be okay with corrupting politicians for the sake of an industry. Anything that would benefit a corporation or a specific industry over others would be bad. For a truly free market to work, NOBODY can have special privileges. My point was that I don't consider it "corruption" to use resources to defend oneself from an over-regulatory government, but using money and resources to get special privileges for one company or one industry at the expense of everyone else is bad."

Ah, I see. The problem is that the ones in a position to meaningfully define the difference between "corrupting politicians" and "defending oneself from an over-regulatory government" are the ones accepting the campaign contributions (or bribes, if you prefer).

"I'd much rather watch two or three candidates verbally duke it out in front of an audience and moderator who calls them on inaccurate statements and demands factual verification rather than the constant stream of unverified BS that we see in the form of plitical ads nowadays."

I don't now what your gripe is here exactly. We already hold debates. You want somebody to call the politicians out on "inaccurate statements" during a debate? Who can do this? Who has encyclopedic knowledge of EVERYTHING? I'd rather everyone be allowed to say whatever they want, and if people are really so inclined they can do their own fact checking. Most people don't watch the debates anyway. To me, most of the real analysis happens online in secret corners where intelligent people debate issues amongst friends as well as ideological enemies. I don't like the idea of a moderator being the truth police. Nobody, and I mean NOBODY can really be trusted to be the truth police. It all depends on who you want to believe and who you trust. Of course technocrats don't want to hear they. They want to believe that there is some sort of sacred TRUTH that if only everybody acknowledged, a utopia would fall into place effortlessly. This just isn't true. Even when "the truth" is known, agreement across the board, hell even majority agreement is impossible.

The fact of the matter is that we already have a system where all ideas have exposure. Anyone can fact check anybody at any given time, and information is almost completely democratized. The discussion of every subject never ends, and anyone who cares to put in even a minute level of effort can access whatever knowledge that they seek. Too bad that whiny losers want to cry and moan endlessly about how people are being "brainwashed" or controlled by evil people. It's simply a comfortable belief system for tragic manicheanists who simply want to feel comfortable in their own delusion. I'm sure that somebody will point to some example of someone who has used bribery at some point and succeeded to "prove" that I'm wrong and that all government is corrupt and that the average voter is a zombie being pushed back and forth by special interests.

You know what, Scott? If you really feel that our system is so awful simply because team red and team blue can't come up with good solutions, maybe you should recognize that there are other "teams" and there are more than two choices. Of course people like you will simply say that voting for a third party or an independent is useless, but that's simply a self fulfilling prophecy. I'm sorry, but I don't see how tweaking the system anymore will every improve anything. Every form of government that people can even imagine has existed at some point, and nowadays all governments are simply one form or another of oligarchy. The truth is that the system is good enough and even malleable enough that if you can dream it, it can be a reality. The problem is that people themselves have no initiative, no imagination, and no ideological responsibility.

"I'd much rather watch two or three candidates verbally duke it out in front of an audience and moderator who calls them on inaccurate statements and demands factual verification rather than the constant stream of unverified BS that we see in the form of plitical ads nowadays."

I don't now what your gripe is here exactly. We already hold debates. You want somebody to call the politicians out on "inaccurate statements" during a debate? Who can do this? Who has encyclopedic knowledge of EVERYTHING? I'd rather everyone be allowed to say whatever they want, and if people are really so inclined they can do their own fact checking. Most people don't watch the debates anyway. To me, most of the real analysis happens online in secret corners where intelligent people debate issues amongst friends as well as ideological enemies. I don't like the idea of a moderator being the truth police. Nobody, and I mean NOBODY can really be trusted to be the truth police. It all depends on who you want to believe and who you trust. Of course technocrats don't want to hear they. They want to believe that there is some sort of sacred TRUTH that if only everybody acknowledged, a utopia would fall into place effortlessly. This just isn't true. Even when "the truth" is known, agreement across the board, hell even majority agreement is impossible.

The fact of the matter is that we already have a system where all ideas have exposure. Anyone can fact check anybody at any given time, and information is almost completely democratized. The discussion of every subject never ends, and anyone who cares to put in even a minute level of effort can access whatever knowledge that they seek. Too bad that whiny losers want to cry and moan endlessly about how people are being "brainwashed" or controlled by evil people. It's simply a comfortable belief system for tragic manicheanists who simply want to feel comfortable in their own delusion. I'm sure that somebody will point to some example of someone who has used bribery at some point and succeeded to "prove" that I'm wrong and that all government is corrupt and that the average voter is a zombie being pushed back and forth by special interests.

You know what, Scott? If you really feel that our system is so awful simply because team red and team blue can't come up with good solutions, maybe you should recognize that there are other "teams" and there are more than two choices. Of course people like you will simply say that voting for a third party or an independent is useless, but that's simply a self fulfilling prophecy. I'm sorry, but I don't see how tweaking the system anymore will every improve anything. Every form of government that people can even imagine has existed at some point, and nowadays all governments are simply one form or another of oligarchy. The truth is that the system is good enough and even malleable enough that if you can dream it, it can be a reality. The problem is that people themselves have no initiative, no imagination, and no ideological responsibility.