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Hear me out on this for a second please.
I keep seeing this recurring nightmare in the US where a lone few congress members become the final arbiters of the fate of a whole democratic agenda. It doesn't matter how popular a legislative program is, in the end it's a matter of the final few votes that tip the balance. This, to my mind, leads either to a legislative victory that almost by definition comes at too high a cost or a noble defeat that can always be spun as ignominous defeat.
The example in my mind is covered very well here.
Parliamentary systems do not have these problems. If the government can't act it falls. It appears to be a very conservative system but I actually think it has a hidden evolutionary edge that is in the end very progressive: any mandate to mean anything must pass a threshold which ensures that it can be effected practically in the legislature. There may be some minor horse dealing but the thrust of the mandate survives.
The American system has the inherent conservative aspect (the two party system by accident or whatever) but not the institutionalised idea of a threshold of effective power that must be reached to form a government. The result seems to me to be a system that, like a top, loses momentum just when it's about to fall over. (There's something messed up with that analogy but I'll fix it later.) Maximum stress is met with maximum entropy. No wonder Americans hate government so much.
Is there not some way of increasing the power of party whips at the very least? This might seem counter-intuitive but I actually think that this would give representatives the cover they need to act in the public interest. Or at least in a coherent fashion. As it stands corporate or other private interests seem to be able to snipe key congressmen at will and right at the moment of truth and so somehow call the shots.
It's sheer madness viewed from the outside.
Is there nothing that can be done to fix this even slightly.
I keep seeing this recurring nightmare in the US where a lone few congress members become the final arbiters of the fate of a whole democratic agenda. It doesn't matter how popular a legislative program is, in the end it's a matter of the final few votes that tip the balance. This, to my mind, leads either to a legislative victory that almost by definition comes at too high a cost or a noble defeat that can always be spun as ignominous defeat.
The example in my mind is covered very well here.
Parliamentary systems do not have these problems. If the government can't act it falls. It appears to be a very conservative system but I actually think it has a hidden evolutionary edge that is in the end very progressive: any mandate to mean anything must pass a threshold which ensures that it can be effected practically in the legislature. There may be some minor horse dealing but the thrust of the mandate survives.
The American system has the inherent conservative aspect (the two party system by accident or whatever) but not the institutionalised idea of a threshold of effective power that must be reached to form a government. The result seems to me to be a system that, like a top, loses momentum just when it's about to fall over. (There's something messed up with that analogy but I'll fix it later.) Maximum stress is met with maximum entropy. No wonder Americans hate government so much.
Is there not some way of increasing the power of party whips at the very least? This might seem counter-intuitive but I actually think that this would give representatives the cover they need to act in the public interest. Or at least in a coherent fashion. As it stands corporate or other private interests seem to be able to snipe key congressmen at will and right at the moment of truth and so somehow call the shots.
It's sheer madness viewed from the outside.
Is there nothing that can be done to fix this even slightly.
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