Lazarus > Is there any country that has politicians you do like?
I'm not aware of any for the simple reason that everyone is trying to get more out of the system than he puts in -- and the politicians are there to enable that -- and, of course, to see that they, or their sponsors, get the most.
> In spite of what you may think of them, how DO you run a representative republic of 293 million without politicians?
That's a matter for considerable discussion. Briefly, as I see it, every political system ever devised has flaws. And indeed, as Polybius said, there is no constant political system, merely the one that's there for the time being. Nothing is cast in stone.
sms.org
>> For monarchy, he claims, inevitably degrades into tyranny. Tyranny is then replaced by aristocracy, which in turn degrades into oligarchy. Oligarchy then is overthrown by democracy, which ultimately falls into its own corresponding distortion, mob-rule (or ochlocracy). In Polybius’ analysis, the cycle then starts up again (monarchy, aristocracy, and democracy) since anarchy inevitably creates a void that some new demagogue will fill.8 'Anaku/klwsij, the sliding from one form of constitution into another, is unavoidable because of the inherent weakness of each simple form of constitution.<<
What I believe we are looking at today, certainly in the US, is the decline of democracy into oligarchy, where the power, although nominally in the hands of We the People, is actually wielded by cliques and lobbies, in other words, the elite, and far removed from view.
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