There's no reason that technological progress from the US government couldn't be driven by NASA rather than DARPA. I suspect many peace-loving people would prefer to see that.
https://static.nationalpriorities.org/images/charts/2015/tot...
See that Science heading there on the chart? It's hard making the world a better place on a 0.7% budget. DARPA, however has access to that Military heading, 16.3%.
Not that that is ever going to happen.
If you were running a political party, the most logical assumption to make (in the absence of richer feedback) was that the people that voted for you did so because they liked your manifesto and/or believed you'd be more competent than your competition.
With that in mind, an election doesn't really allow any meaningful influence on policy, it has to come in a different form (direct democracy, for example).
I'm not a US citizen, but from what I've read the laws on direct democracy are set at the state level, is that correct? Are there any mechanisms in place to propose policy changes at the federal level (aside from lobby groups in Washington)?
In many states, there is an opportunity for direct democracy to have an effect. Specific initiatives are put on the ballot. In practice, though, specific ballot initiatives are still implemented by the same politicians that tend to bend things to their will anyway.