Maybe democracy can't be fixed

In my article of September 1, "Fixing Democracy" (http://www.salem-news.com/articles/september012009/fixing_democracy_9-2-09.php) I overlooked one glaring point: Texas. That is one state that is surely sui generis. They would almost never accept any kind of cooperation from anyone else. Can you imagine Texans accepting legislators that had been elected by the people of Oregon? Here in Canada it would be the same: Alberta.

Winston Churchill said that democracy is the worst political system--except for all the others. That's the kind of thinking that short circuits progress. If such a great politician were to believe that, then there certainly would not be anything better than democracy.

We've got to think outside the box (Gad, I hate cliches like that), but here's a couple of ideas.

Let all the legislators be picked at random from the voter's lists and be appointed to two year terms. They would pick leaders among themselves.

Or, some form of benevolent dictatorship. Sounds like an oxymoron but find some random way for a person to be given virtually absolute power short of the power to execute or imprison people for a period of five to ten years.

Here's a direction to consider: One of the big problems of politics is corruption, usually financial. Make politicians incorruptible. Politicians could only have fixed terms of five to ten years at generous recompense of say a million dollars a year--tax free. At the end of their term the voters could vote on their performance. If they are voted to have done a good job, let them retire with a lump sum of, say ten million dollars and a generous annual pension--all of it tax free. Two advantages to this--it would make it difficult to bribe such politicans; and if they knew they had a fat retirement package in the future, they would be motivated to do well.

The downside to this, of course, is the same as under the current system: they would have to please the same rabble. As P. J. O'Rourke has commented: “No drug, not even alcohol, causes the fundamental ills of society. If we’re looking for the sources of our troubles, we shouldn’t test people for drugs, we should test them for stupidity, ignorance, greed and love of power.”

But it's hard to imagine anyone making fundamental changes to their existing political systems. The American people, for example, have been deluded into believing that they have a system set up by the most magical of beings, the Founding Fathers, and that to tamper with the system is to somehow invite disaster. Wait...the American people already have disaster!

As the system is set up now, greed rules and no one thinks about the ecological and financial buden they are passing on to their children and grandchildren. But as Thomas Homer-Dixon, Director, University of Toronto Trudeau Centre for Peace and Conflict Studies, poses it:

“What do we consider to be the good life? What kind of world do we want for our children? We’re not having that conversation.”