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Comment by meepmorp | Hacker News Reader

> For example the guy after Obama could win by a 90% landslide, then immediately launch an all-out war against Iran, Syria and say Jordan

Or, to turn that around the other way, something happens just after the election which causes 80-90% of the electorate to support an attack on Iran, Syria, and Jordan. The president after Obama, after some consideration and discussion with people in her/his cabinet decides to not attack.

With the threat of death over his/her head, might the president decide to make a decision, not based on deliberation and careful consideration, but just as a way to pander to the public lest s/he get killed. Is that a desirable outcome?

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An excellent point. I've always assumed that most people don't want to expend dollars and lives on wars but that doesn't necessarily hold true.

Personally I'm more interested in the nugget of insight than necessarily the exact methods he outlines.

For all the million little ways that the government involves itself in our daily lives there is huge asymmetry and thus plenty of opportunity for injustice.

For the really big things there is also huge asymmetry. If something is a really big deal and even 10% of the US population went to Washington to protest you'd probably see a swift reaction. That's a really good thing and it's one of the reasons that many systems of representative government do work.

The question in my mind is: What is the price for big freedoms in terms of little freedoms, and is this a good bargain? Personally I'd like to have my big freedoms AND my little ones too. So any kind of thought along those lines is interesting even if it's not ultimately good.

The thing I took away from the article most is that there probably are ways to give the people more freedom on the little things without necessarily compromising on the big ones. Not necessarily via Assassination Markets, but SOMEHOW.

Anyone who finds the concept potentially appealing really needs to read up on pre-WWII Japanese politics, where a culture of political assassination, plus a major flaw in their constitutions, couldn't form a government without the Army and Navy's assent/membership, pretty much made the following ugliness inevitable. You really, really don't want to let such a culture develop.

Paul Johnson's Modern Times devotes a chapter to this: http://www.amazon.com/Modern-Times-Revised-Edition-Perennial...

This was a very enlightening chapter in Modern Times. I truly enjoyed Johnson's work, despite his clear (if transparent) bias towards British colonialism.

In general, private armies, political assassinations, and other forms of political violence seldom lead to good outcomes: other examples would be Lebanon during and prior to the civil and (not to Godwin this) Weimar Germany with government-funded but ruthless and private and political Freikorps, as well as KPD/SPD/NSDAP/etc... paramilitary organizations. Finally, if a government enacts and enforces laws and decrees contrary to the constitution and human rights in general (i.e., it is no longer a constitutional state), introduction of political gives government forces both an excuse and the means to start acting fully extra-judicially.

I'll note that I'm saying this as a individual with classical liberal/libertarian political leanings and as a strong supporter of a right to bear arms. My view is shared with by David Friedman, an anarcho-capitalist (a view that I don't subscribe to, but respect): http://econlog.econlib.org/archives/2013/07/in_case_of_revo....

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