Westminster Style of Government?

Flaja
You are one of the few who make sense on this thread. Its true that more representation by more legislators would make then responsible to fewer voters which would make it easier to contact our representatives and hold them responsible for their votes. The cost factor may make a difference also.

India has a Westminster system of Parliament and they have a population 1 Billion +, the system works well for them and they are an emerging super power along with China. Where there is a will there is a way.

flaga wrote-



rabel wrote-



What does "likely" mean? What does "cost less" mean? And PR runs the risk, high at present, of paralysis of government or a handful of independents holding out for best offers.

flaga makes no sense at all I'm afraid.

I live in a congressional district that stretches about 400 miles from end to end for the sake of having a gerrymandered safe minority Democrat district. Other local CDs hardly stretch for even hundred miles. Merely having to travel 400 miles to campaign in all parts of a CD increases a candidate's cost. At the same time this gerrymandered district extends over something like 4 TV/Radio markets- again more cost to a candidate to campaign.

Also the mass media market that I live in covers 3 or 4 CDs, meaning that candidates will place an advertisement here to reach part of their CD. But it also means that their advertisements reach several other CDs as well- which wastes money.

You don't seem to be in touch with reality very well.

I'm getting there though.

I hadn't previously thought that Americans understood the elementary aspects of gerrymandering never mind the subtler techniques.

I came on A2K to improve my education. Thanks.

Have you explained it to Bernie yet?

Are you kidding? The Republican and Democrat politicians are so bad they trade off districts with whichever party that controls the legislature of a state getting a few seats more than the other party. They even have software that can draw districts based on census data- so the gerrymanders don't even have to do the math needed to guarantee safe seats.

Traded seats also sees to it that no party can gain such an overwhelming majority in the U.S. House that they can actually get something accomplished without the other party using parliamentary tricks to obstruct the legislative process.

Of course gerrymandering would be next to impossible if we didn't have restrictive ballot access laws that effectively exclude non-Democrats and non-Republicans from the ballot. In Florida you have to either pay a fee (something like 2% of a year's salary for the office sought) or submit petitions from something like 2% of the registered voters in the district where the election will be held to get an automatic place on the ballot. For a statewide office like U.S. Senator or governor this means around 200,000 signatures. Then if the candidate doesn't want to submit an affidavit saying he is too impoverished he has to pay ten-cents each to have the government verify the signatures- then campaign opponents can always go to court and claim that there are not enough valid signatures to give ballot access.

Also in Florida you cannot even cast a vote for a write-in candidate that hasn't registered with the government as a write-in candidate. It is impossible in Florida to draft a candidate with a legitimate grassroots effort.



I don't know if we've met.

The scales are dropping from my eyes.

Thanks. Tell us more. That's real politics.

When I turned 18 I registered as the first Republican in my family. I always voted the GOP ticket in every election through 1998. But I changed my voter status to "no party" the day that Bill Clinton was acquitted with 10 Republican votes in the U.S. Senate. Since then I have voted for only 3 Republican candidates: Bill McCollum for the U.S. Senate in 2000, out of respect for his leadership in the impeachment and GWB in both 2000 and 2004- out of fear of the Democrat alternative and I have regretted my vote both times.

In 2002 I offered my support to a Republican woman who was going to challenge the (highly corrupt) Democrat incumbent in my CD. But the GOP harassed my candidate to the point that she left the race without even qualifying for the ballot. The GOP big wigs in Florida didn't want a high minority turnout in my CD to hurt Republicans in other races- namely Brother Bush. But then the GOP's failed challenger from 2000 announced that she would leave her appointed state job on the last day of the candidate qualifying period. I then registered with the state as a write in candidate to insure that the incumbent did face a general election challenge. My entire campaign consisted of a free website that I set up since I couldn't travel and I don't have the ego necessary to make me want to ask people for campaign money. But still I received about 100 votes- as near as I can tell considering the fact that the votes were tallied in each of the counties included in my CD and the state didn't bother to compile the write in totals for the entire CD.