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Comment by dragonwriter | Hacker News Reader

There is a big excluded middle between "all government officials are directly elected" and "the general public has no agency in government policy".

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So are you going to vote for the guy who opened Guantanamo and started illegal wars that cost thousands of innocent lives of the guy who won't close Guantanamo and uses robots to kill thousands of people with no oversight who end up being classified as enemy combatants as long as they are male, Arab, and of fighting age? Or maybe the leader who illegally spies on all the citizens of his country or the other guy who will do exactly the same thing. Decisions decisions...

I voted for the guy who pushed a lousy healthcare bill through the system, because if the other guy had won, I still wouldn't be able to afford health insurance as a freelancer.

I also voted for the guy who's been pushing, feebly, for better conditions for workers, rather than the guy who joked, "I like to be able to fire people. Hey, nice ponchos, you garbage-bag-wearing peasants!"

Did I get everything I wanted? No, of course not. Is any politician perfect? No, of course not. Is there a difference between the two major US parties? Oh yes.

I love your perspectives here. Very reasonable. I voted for that guy too, but I lost a ton of respect for him (never had full respect anyway) when he refused to recognize the absolutely clear fact that Ed Snowden is a whistleblower and not a traitor.

Anyway, the real answer to electoral issues is Score voting (see http://rangevoting.org/ ).

Also, since you're interested in economic democracy, have you seen the in-progress stuff at Snowdrift.coop ?

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