Interesting thoughts on the failings of our system of government. I think we all grow up thinking about how exceptional and unique our system of government is but honestly I think its outdated and has really shown its problems over the past two years. http://globalpublicsquare.blogs.cnn.com/2011/08/17/does-america-need-a-prime-minister/
The problem is not our system per se. Its has to do with legislative rules like the filibuster and committee processes. Things don't even come up for a vote which is ridiculous.
Consider countries like Italy, Israel, Greece and Japan all that have parliamentary systems but all have historically had problems with stability and political grid lock. Also considering in our 235 year old history we've only had one civil war I think our checks and balances system has done quite well versus parliamentary systems.
The U.S. is a lot more like Great Britain than it is like Italy or Israel or Greece. Checks and balances is great at creating inaction and preserving status quo (you states keep your slavery, we won't have it, and everybody will be happy!), and making easy choices.... not so great when radical change is needed. Guess which situation we are in now.
No, what the US needs is a Cinncanatus, a dictator who can clean things up then step down afterwards. Unfortunately, I don't think Cinncanatus ever existed.
Would Kevin Martin still be a 20+ ppg scorer without all the free throws? Seriously, the definition of our three branches of government are so entrenched in the Constitution, the culture, the economy, the power interests, and everything else, that there is absolutely no way we could switch to a parliamentary system without first the total dissolution of our government. I think it is academically interesting to compare and contrast. Decisiveness would have been nice on the debt crisis, but I don't think it's always a good thing, even in times of radical change. Can you imagine if the Tea Party headed a coaltion? *shudder*
Language and culturally maybe but not necessarily in politics. We have quite a bit of divergent political views. Considering that small parties like Kahane Ch'ai, frequently compel Israel to make moves that much of the populace doesn't approve (expanding settlements) of I think inaction might not be a bad thing. Think about it this way. PM Boehnor would actually do things like privatizing Social Security to preserve his coalition and there isn't a President Obama to veto him.
Right but you're talking about the election system not the system of government. Great Britain and Canada use district systems similar to US congressional districts. People vote for specific candidates in assigned districts that are affiliated with particular parties. This by and large limits the vast number of parties found in list based parliamentary systems. Great Britain and Canada only have a handful of political parties (3 or 4 at best) whereas countries like India or Israel have dozens. You dont have any of the factionalism or extreme control granted to tiny parties in GB and Canada. Our system was designed to encourage compromise by sharing power between the presidency and the legislative branch but when power is split the way it is now and one side of the equation is uncompromising it leads to paralysis during a time when we need decisive action. Also in most cases (excluding Canada which for the first time in decades has a majority government), coalitions have to be formed in district based parliamentary systems. So that in and of itself moderates the ruling coalition since it always has the threat of a no confidence vote. The difference is that in Israel and India the coalitions are made up of so many parties thanks to their electoral system that tiny fringe groups/parties have disproportionate influence on the process since they can always threaten to collapse the government.
We need to kill entitlements, and force lobbyists out of the backrooms and into the daylight. Complete disclosure of lobbyists. DD
Good points about the Canadian and GB system Geeimsobored but as you note even in Canada there have been minority government which in that sense don't actually represent the will of the people but are just cobbled together coalitions. Also at the same time Canadian government has also suffered from periods of political gridlock too. Finally there is no guarantee that if the US were to switch to a parliamentary system it would be the GB system we adopt. It likely would be given history but adopting a parliamentary system is so far fetched anyway to begin with that we have no way of knowing for sure what form it would take. Bottomline for me at best a Parliamentary system is no worse than our current system and given the possibility of a PM Boehnor I will stick with our system.
But you're looking at this in a vacuum. Of course if John Boehner was vested with executive and legislative power I'd be terrified as well. The larger issue is non-competitive house races and reforming the election system of the senate. You have representatives that are wildly out of whack with governing bases but due to geographical divisions they're guaranteed seats in Congress. So in a properly drawn parliamentary system with competitive districts, this doesn't happen. (for that matter properly drawn American districts would mean that the far right of the Republican party would have less influence too. Additionally in a parliamentary system the tea party would have probably split off from the Republican party by now which means Boehner wouldn't even be representing the same group of people. The article isn't itself an indictment of the American system. The American system works just fine but it only works when the legislative and executive branch share power properly and compromise. When a part refuses to do that the whole system starts to fail and that's exactly what we have now. And if this type of partisanship and a refusal to compromise becomes the norm then the American system becomes a failure and a parliamentary system becomes preferable. In the end, if what we have now isn't the norm then by all means I'd prefer our system.
Not necessarily in politics? Uhh, really? So you see more parallels, say for example, between Berlusconi, the Northern League, the Papandreou family in Greece, Kahane Ch'ai, as you mentioned than you do between Bush, Blair, Clinton, Thatcher, Reagan, Tories, Labour, Republicans etc? Come on...that's just laughable. Both the US and the british systems borrow very heavily from each other - a lot more than you'll see them borrowing from other systems Who is smaller/represents a more minority view, Kahane Ch'ai? or John Roberts who pretty much singlehandedly rewrote election law in Citizens United?
In that case then we don't need a parliamentary system but just non-political redistricting. Something I am all for and doesn't need an overhaul of the US Constitution to do. In that case then the Republican party would be a minority (presuming we look at the US House as a parliament) but holding a plurality that would form a coalition government with the Tea Party. Except under a parliamentary system we could still have gridlock and when the government fails to get legislation passed then a new election is called. As we've seen with parliamentary system that often leads to an unwillingness to compromise at times when a minority party feels they can just hold out for a new election.
Actually I see quite a few parallels between Berlusconi and GW Bush and people like Rep. Joe Wilson and Kahane Ch'ai. Yes there are a lot of similarities to us and the UK there are also a lot of differences. I wouldn't expect a US parliamentary system to necessarily be like the UK. Sure there is borrowing. We were a former British Colony but in the subject of this debate we are fundamentally different and in that sense we are more similar to France and Germany than we are UK. John Roberts is Supreme Court Justice and since most Parliamentary systems have a separate judiciary I presume that would still remain even if the US were to switch to parliament. If you are saying Khane Ch'ai in a US parliament wouldn't matter since Roberts is already extreme you might have a point there but that isn't much of an argument for a parliamentary system.
...uh I see absolutely none. Their names both begin with B. So that's something. to France? Just because they have a "President" - I assume? A country with a proportioanl representation legislative system is going to be vastly different than one without one. Arguably Germany in structure, even though it uses some PR, but even then, the culture is so different, it's a bad comparison. I'm saying that small groups of individuals are already enabled to dominate the US system against the will of the majority in a way that a true national assembly with PR would be very hard to approximate.
