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On October 10 2016 07:07 Biff The Understudy wrote:
On October 10 2016 07:00 Dan HH wrote:
On October 10 2016 06:57 Mohdoo wrote: Just 3 more hours until we see a historic meltdown
I expect him to keep his cool, he is capable of following basic instructions after seeing the results of the alternative
He's had months to see the alternative but apparently he can't help it. The guy has the emotional maturity of an 9 years old. He must be incredibly upset and I also think he's gonna go berserk.
He was kept on a short leash for solid month after the Khan debacle, but eventually broke free. I'm assume that's what his staff will try now as well, though there's the small possibility that he will go on the attack and yell about Bill
That's certainly gonna be entertaining.
Also the Apprentice threatening his staff of lawsuit is basically implicitly admitting that there is a ton of horrendous material out there. Not great.
Clinton can bring up sexual assault, disrespect of women, defection of party members and being uninvited from what was essentially his own event. I can't imagine Trump responding any way that is effective. If he brings up Bill's conspiracy theories, he loses.
On October 10 2016 07:19 Mohdoo wrote: Clinton can bring up sexual assault, disrespect of women, defection of party members and being uninvited from what was essentially his own event. I can't imagine Trump responding any way that is effective. If he brings up Bill's conspiracy theories, he loses.
He's lost already.
I mean what can he do? If he does Le Donald material, he loses because people have lost patience with his crap. What he would need to do is not mention any scandalous crap, stay calm and positive and outclass Clinton with sound and solid arguments over their respective platforms. It will be a cold day in hell before any of that happens.
Clinton has a lot of things against her, the distrust she inspires, the gender bias, Bill's affairs, whatever you want, but at the real thing, meaning being articulate, smart, well prepared and well informed, she outclasses Trump by a universe and a half. His only chance has always been mud politics.
Now that mud politics is against him, I think he's essentially a goner.
On October 10 2016 03:48 GGTeMpLaR wrote: Guess that says something about the 'merits' of democracy when two shitty candidates are your choices.
Democracy isn't about having the best clothes. It's about doing the laundry regularly. It's about the theory that you never want a government that's too efficient, too professional, too powerful. That it is better to have 6 mediocre leaders over 40 years than one good one over the same time.
I don't think that's a good example. I'd definitely rather have a great leader for 40 years than 6 trumps/clintons over 40 years.
In that case, I think it's a great example... being in favor of democracy means being okay with the 6 mediocre leaders. That's the deal, that's the bargain.
On October 10 2016 03:48 GGTeMpLaR wrote: Guess that says something about the 'merits' of democracy when two shitty candidates are your choices.
Democracy isn't about having the best clothes. It's about doing the laundry regularly. It's about the theory that you never want a government that's too efficient, too professional, too powerful. That it is better to have 6 mediocre leaders over 40 years than one good one over the same time.
I don't think that's a good example. I'd definitely rather have a great leader for 40 years than 6 trumps/clintons over 40 years.
Two small problem with your line of reasoning:
1. "A great leader for 40 years" is called a dictator. There has never been anything great about dictatorship, therefore "a great leader for 40 years" is self contradictory.
2. Looks like half the country thinks one way the other half the other way. So who exactly gets to chose the great leader. In my book, Obama was a wonderful leader, so I assume you are ready to have him for 40 years, right? You'll find that fair and won't complain.
Damn... Looks like there is a reason why we invented democracy. Must have thought about that..
1. So when is the Dictator achievement unlocked? Is it right on the 40 year mark? 25 year mark? 12 year mark? Are people who want Obama for a 3rd time advocating dictatorship now? I don't think so. Was FDR a dictator? I don't think so.
"A great leader for 40 years" need not be a dictator. There's nothing contradictory about "A great leader for 40 years". You're just wrong here.
I don't think a dictator need be inherently bad or evil or wrong. The problem isn't with "A great leader for 40 years" or "a good dictator", but in general the problem with dictatorships has to do with the stability, and the nature of which we've seen them come into existence in history. In theory, it's great if you have an intelligent, fair individual at the top, but all too often history is correlated with Dictators being people who seize power through violence or intimidation, so we've come to associate 'dictatorship' with 'evil' in our culture. The way I see it is it's a much more volatile system of government than a democracy because it can quickly go from great with a great dictator to complete trash if you get a problem-individual holding office, since they have all the power. You're essentially putting all of your eggs in one basket.
In theory is there anything wrong with "A great leader for 40 years"? No. Quite the opposite, it would be great - by definition. Unless you hold some sort of irrational reverence to a president not ruling for more than 2 terms in office. You really only go further with your critique here in your 2nd point, which is that what is great for some is not great for others.
2 then isn't so much a critique of dictatorship than it is the ever-present problem that will always exist in politics. You can't always make everyone happy, what is good for some is bad for others, etc etc. This isn't really a critique unique to dictatorships. The only critique you could make here is that the people have no say in the matter.
That isn't necessarily a critique of having a "great leader for 40 years".
What if the people democratically elected the same leader for 40 years and the country prospered? That's what "A great leader for 40 years" is.
You can't really justify wanting 40 years of Trumps/Clintons over 40 years of a single great leader unless you value the principles and ideas of swapping leaders more than utilitarian results.
I don't know how well this hypothetical question will work on you because I'm not sure to what degree you actually support and want Clinton to be president versus want Not-Trump to be president. But I pose the queston, would you rather have 40 years of Trumps/Clintons to elect from or 40 years of someone you think a great leader, like Obama?
On October 10 2016 07:19 Mohdoo wrote: Clinton can bring up sexual assault, disrespect of women, defection of party members and being uninvited from what was essentially his own event. I can't imagine Trump responding any way that is effective. If he brings up Bill's conspiracy theories, he loses.
So back when Trump had his first big Khan disaster, President Obama came out forcefully demanding that Republicans condemn Trump. Because it was Obama, and R's must oppose Obama at all times to stay good with the base, the Republicans chose to fall in line with Trump. At the time, Conservative commentators said this was a move by Obama to tie the Republicans to Trump so they couldn't escape (even tho Obama literally called on Republicans to dump Trump).
My guess: HRC goes total hands off and issues only a cursory denunciation. The Republicans are stampeding away, but their stampede won't get Trump off the ballot. This is the best of all worlds for HRC. If HRC says "Republicans should dump Trump", then instantly all the leaners will rally to Trump in order to show their anti-HRC bonafides. But if HRC lets this keep going, and waits for the next tape ... then the stampede continues.
On October 10 2016 05:23 biology]major wrote: That's the thing, I think it's pretty funny when Clinton was on stage with Bernie promising free public tuition for any family making less than 125k. LOL ok. She is going to do whatever the hell she wants, and trust me all of the promises she made Bernie will go down the gutter.
Unlike his supporters, Bernie isn't stupid enough to think this election cycle is the end of things.
He should very well know by now that for his progressive movement to gain steam, he needs political capital within the Democratic party. Negotiating with the party elite and leveraging his supporters puts his movement on the map as "people the Democratic party has to give a shit about". He has to prove to them that they're a voting bloc worth pandering to, not a bunch of immovable ideologues that they should just ignore because they'll never be satisfied anyway. That's going to matter in 2020 even if Hillary backs out on every single promise she made to him.
That's really where negotiating actually gets him. If his supporters are going to say that he sold out or got swindled, they're being short-sighted.
I expect Clinton to push for a few of the items on the platform fairly strongly. There are some things that have bipartisan support which she could probably get through - paid leave, immigration reform (of some sort), sentencing reform. I suspect she'll take a stab at healthcare or education as well, though not sure what sort of success she'll have on that front.
Even looking at her in the least charitable way possible, she knows she needs to deliver to get re elected, because she won't be able to run on being not-Trump.
On October 10 2016 07:03 Biff The Understudy wrote:
On October 10 2016 06:05 GGTeMpLaR wrote:
On October 10 2016 05:53 Yoav wrote:
On October 10 2016 03:48 GGTeMpLaR wrote: Guess that says something about the 'merits' of democracy when two shitty candidates are your choices.
Democracy isn't about having the best clothes. It's about doing the laundry regularly. It's about the theory that you never want a government that's too efficient, too professional, too powerful. That it is better to have 6 mediocre leaders over 40 years than one good one over the same time.
I don't think that's a good example. I'd definitely rather have a great leader for 40 years than 6 trumps/clintons over 40 years.
Two small problem with your line of reasoning:
1. "A great leader for 40 years" is called a dictator. There has never been anything great about dictatorship, therefore "a great leader for 40 years" is self contradictory.
2. Looks like half the country thinks one way the other half the other way. So who exactly gets to chose the great leader. In my book, Obama was a wonderful leader, so I assume you are ready to have him for 40 years, right? You'll find that fair and won't complain.
Damn... Looks like there is a reason why we invented democracy. Must have thought about that..
1. So when is the Dictator achievement unlocked? Is it right on the 40 year mark? 25 year mark? 12 year mark? Are people who want Obama for a 3rd time advocating dictatorship now? I don't think so. Was FDR a dictator? I don't think so.
"A great leader for 40 years" need not be a dictator. There's nothing contradictory about "A great leader for 40 years". You're just wrong here.
I don't think a dictator need be inherently bad or evil or wrong. The problem isn't with "A great leader for 40 years" or "a good dictator", but in general the problem with dictatorships has to do with the stability, and the nature of which we've seen them come into existence in history. In theory, it's great if you have an intelligent, fair individual at the top, but all too often history is correlated with Dictators being people who seize power through violence or intimidation, so we've come to associate 'dictatorship' with 'evil' in our culture. The way I see it is it's a much more volatile system of government than a democracy because it can quickly go from great with a great dictator to complete trash if you get a problem-individual holding office, since they have all the power. You're essentially putting all of your eggs in one basket.
In theory is there anything wrong with "A great leader for 40 years"? No. Quite the opposite, it would be great - by definition. Unless you hold some sort of irrational reverence to a president not ruling for more than 2 terms in office. You really only go further with your critique here in your 2nd point, which is that what is great for some is not great for others.
2 then isn't so much a critique of dictatorship than it is the ever-present problem that will always exist in politics. You can't always make everyone happy, what is good for some is bad for others, etc etc. This isn't really a critique unique to dictatorships. The only critique you could make here is that the people have no say in the matter.
That isn't necessarily a critique of having a "great leader for 40 years".
What if the people democratically elected the same leader for 40 years and the country prospered? That's what "A great leader for 40 years" is.
Not all dictators come into power via violence or intimidation. But they all end up using either one of those or some other form of strong arming to stay. There is no such thing as a benevolent dictator.
A dictator is someone who is not democratically elected. There are no limits to how much time they have to be in power. However effectively speaking anyone who is in power more than maybe 3 terms will start accumulating to much power for too long and whether the system allows for that or not, its not healthy.
Also the way you talk shit about dictators its pretty evident that you have not the first clue of what its like to live under dictators.
Im not sure where all this stuff about dictators become evil by association bullshit you came up with but thats not why people consider even benevolent dictators bad. It means that the system and the government apparatus does not know how to function under the will of its people. Thats bad.
And again the reason you dont keep "democratically" electing the same leader over and over again is because with enough power and influence it makes people lazy and not care because they dont have to worry about things and can just keep voting in the guy they like. Notice how there are no term limits on congress and what a shit show it is ? Yeah.. exactly.
On October 10 2016 07:03 Biff The Understudy wrote:
On October 10 2016 06:05 GGTeMpLaR wrote:
On October 10 2016 05:53 Yoav wrote:
On October 10 2016 03:48 GGTeMpLaR wrote: Guess that says something about the 'merits' of democracy when two shitty candidates are your choices.
Democracy isn't about having the best clothes. It's about doing the laundry regularly. It's about the theory that you never want a government that's too efficient, too professional, too powerful. That it is better to have 6 mediocre leaders over 40 years than one good one over the same time.
I don't think that's a good example. I'd definitely rather have a great leader for 40 years than 6 trumps/clintons over 40 years.
Two small problem with your line of reasoning:
1. "A great leader for 40 years" is called a dictator. There has never been anything great about dictatorship, therefore "a great leader for 40 years" is self contradictory.
2. Looks like half the country thinks one way the other half the other way. So who exactly gets to chose the great leader. In my book, Obama was a wonderful leader, so I assume you are ready to have him for 40 years, right? You'll find that fair and won't complain.
Damn... Looks like there is a reason why we invented democracy. Must have thought about that..
1. So when is the Dictator achievement unlocked? Is it right on the 40 year mark? 25 year mark? 12 year mark? Are people who want Obama for a 3rd time advocating dictatorship now? I don't think so. Was FDR a dictator? I don't think so.
"A great leader for 40 years" need not be a dictator. There's nothing contradictory about "A great leader for 40 years". You're just wrong here.
I don't think a dictator need be inherently bad or evil or wrong. The problem isn't with "A great leader for 40 years" or "a good dictator", but in general the problem with dictatorships has to do with the stability, and the nature of which we've seen them come into existence in history. In theory, it's great if you have an intelligent, fair individual at the top, but all too often history is correlated with Dictators being people who seize power through violence or intimidation, so we've come to associate 'dictatorship' with 'evil' in our culture. The way I see it is it's a much more volatile system of government than a democracy because it can quickly go from great with a great dictator to complete trash if you get a problem-individual holding office, since they have all the power. You're essentially putting all of your eggs in one basket.
In theory is there anything wrong with "A great leader for 40 years"? No. Quite the opposite, it would be great - by definition. Unless you hold some sort of irrational reverence to a president not ruling for more than 2 terms in office. You really only go further with your critique here in your 2nd point, which is that what is great for some is not great for others.
2 then isn't so much a critique of dictatorship than it is the ever-present problem that will always exist in politics. You can't always make everyone happy, what is good for some is bad for others, etc etc. This isn't really a critique unique to dictatorships. The only critique you could make here is that the people have no say in the matter.
That isn't necessarily a critique of having a "great leader for 40 years".
What if the people democratically elected the same leader for 40 years and the country prospered? That's what "A great leader for 40 years" is.
Jesus tap dancing christ. I don't ever know where to start.
Democracy needs the renewal of its leaders, which is why almost every democracy doesn't allow more than a certain amount of mandates. Of course, on theory you could have a democratically elected leader reelected for 40 years in a perfectly functional democracy that would allow an unlimited amount of mandate. Of course also, it doesn't work that way, and that has never happened anywhere.
You don't see the problem with dictatorship. I was not expecting you do so, considering what I know of your political views. But let me try to explain you why democracy has some merit.
So, we have agreed on the fact that you can't make everyone happy. That means that "a great leader" for some is always "an awful leader" for others because people want different things. "A great leader" is subjective, and a question of point of view. There is no such thing as "great leader" per say.
How do we solve the problem? The only way to make things fair is that the leader (great for some, awful for other) is chosen by the people he or she governs, and that people have the right to chose who they are ruled by. And if they think their leader is awful, well, they know that on election day, most of their co-citizens thought differently.
As for "the country prospered" that means nothing. What you and I mean by prosperity is probably completely different, and if I lived in a country ruled by a leader that you would find great that I wouldn't have had a chance to vote against, I would take a riffle and start a revolution.
On October 10 2016 07:03 Biff The Understudy wrote:
On October 10 2016 06:05 GGTeMpLaR wrote:
On October 10 2016 05:53 Yoav wrote:
On October 10 2016 03:48 GGTeMpLaR wrote: Guess that says something about the 'merits' of democracy when two shitty candidates are your choices.
Democracy isn't about having the best clothes. It's about doing the laundry regularly. It's about the theory that you never want a government that's too efficient, too professional, too powerful. That it is better to have 6 mediocre leaders over 40 years than one good one over the same time.
I don't think that's a good example. I'd definitely rather have a great leader for 40 years than 6 trumps/clintons over 40 years.
Two small problem with your line of reasoning:
1. "A great leader for 40 years" is called a dictator. There has never been anything great about dictatorship, therefore "a great leader for 40 years" is self contradictory.
2. Looks like half the country thinks one way the other half the other way. So who exactly gets to chose the great leader. In my book, Obama was a wonderful leader, so I assume you are ready to have him for 40 years, right? You'll find that fair and won't complain.
Damn... Looks like there is a reason why we invented democracy. Must have thought about that..
1. So when is the Dictator achievement unlocked? Is it right on the 40 year mark? 25 year mark? 12 year mark? Are people who want Obama for a 3rd time advocating dictatorship now? I don't think so. Was FDR a dictator? I don't think so.
"A great leader for 40 years" need not be a dictator. There's nothing contradictory about "A great leader for 40 years". You're just wrong here.
I don't think a dictator need be inherently bad or evil or wrong. The problem isn't with "A great leader for 40 years" or "a good dictator", but in general the problem with dictatorships has to do with the stability, and the nature of which we've seen them come into existence in history. In theory, it's great if you have an intelligent, fair individual at the top, but all too often history is correlated with Dictators being people who seize power through violence or intimidation, so we've come to associate 'dictatorship' with 'evil' in our culture. The way I see it is it's a much more volatile system of government than a democracy because it can quickly go from great with a great dictator to complete trash if you get a problem-individual holding office, since they have all the power. You're essentially putting all of your eggs in one basket.
In theory is there anything wrong with "A great leader for 40 years"? No. Quite the opposite, it would be great - by definition. Unless you hold some sort of irrational reverence to a president not ruling for more than 2 terms in office. You really only go further with your critique here in your 2nd point, which is that what is great for some is not great for others.
2 then isn't so much a critique of dictatorship than it is the ever-present problem that will always exist in politics. You can't always make everyone happy, what is good for some is bad for others, etc etc. This isn't really a critique unique to dictatorships. The only critique you could make here is that the people have no say in the matter.
That isn't necessarily a critique of having a "great leader for 40 years".
What if the people democratically elected the same leader for 40 years and the country prospered? That's what "A great leader for 40 years" is.
Not all dictators come into power via violence or intimidation. But they all end up using either one of those or some other form of strong arming to stay. There is no such thing as a benevolent dictator.
A dictator is someone who is not democratically elected. There are no limits to how much time they have to be in power. However effectively speaking anyone who is in power more than maybe 3 terms will start accumulating to much power for too long and whether the system allows for that or not, its not healthy.
Also the way you talk shit about dictators its pretty evident that you have not the first clue of what its like to live under dictators.
Im not sure where all this stuff about dictators become evil by association bullshit you came up with but thats not why people consider even benevolent dictators bad. It means that the system and the government apparatus does not know how to function under the will of its people. Thats bad.
And again the reason you dont keep "democratically" electing the same leader over and over again is because with enough power and influence it makes people lazy and not care because they dont have to worry about things and can just keep voting in the guy they like. Notice how there are no term limits on congress and what a shit show it is ? Yeah.. exactly.
I don't think you're interpreting my post correctly. I am positing that it isn't theoretically impossible to have a dictator who is a good ruler.
Most historical examples of dictatorships involved violence/intimidation. I don't think we disagree that they use it to maintain power either.
I don't think there's anything that prohibits a dictator from having been democratically elected prior to becoming a dictator. There might not be any cases in our history where a dictator for life was 'democratically' elected, but there is nothing contradictory about the theoretical idea of a Presidential Dictatorship.
I am 'talking shit' about dictators because the vast majority in our history have been 'shitty'. You are right - I have no idea what it's like to live under a dictator. That is why I'm not basing any of my claims on personal experience.
It's quite simple to understand my association of dictatorships with evil point. The vast majority of dictators, as we have noted, have used power, intimidation, and violence to obtain and/or maintain power as a dictator. This is generally considered evil. Hence, our culture associates dictatorship with evil. This is why I think most people don't even consider the idea of a 'benevolent dictator' being possible. I'm not saying dictatorship is flawless form of government since you can have benevolent dictators. That is just stupid. All the flaws of dictatorship exist independently of whether or not you have a 'good' or a 'bad' dictator.
I wasn't advocating we elect the same leader over and over again either. However, if forced to choose between electing a good leader consecutively over and over versus electing new bad leaders purely on the principle that we don't allow anyone to hold a position for too long, I would take the former every time.
On October 10 2016 07:39 Biff The Understudy wrote:
Democracy needs the renewal of its leaders, which is why almost every democracy doesn't allow more than a certain amount of mandates.
Your definition of "almost every democracy" is very interesting. I guess there arent many democracies in Europe.
Presidential system with an unlimited amount of possible mandate?
Prime ministers of parliamentary systems (such as the UK) are not directly and nominally elected, and usually don't have as much of a strong position. They can be simply overthrown by the parliament. I don't know any case of a prime minister having lasted 40 years in any functional democracy.
But anyway that's not the point, we are talking about the US and similar systems (France, Russia...) where the leader of the nation is personally elected by the people.
On October 10 2016 07:58 Plansix wrote: Are we in Star Wars episode 2 having the debate if dictators are a good because democracy is slow and cumbersome?
Star Wars episode 2 was more believable than this campaign season, somehow
On October 10 2016 07:58 Plansix wrote: Are we in Star Wars episode 2 having the debate if dictators are a good because democracy is slow and cumbersome?
Star Wars episode 2 was more believable than this campaign season, somehow
I don't like sand. It's coarse and rough and irritating, and it gets everywhere.
On October 10 2016 07:58 Plansix wrote: Are we in Star Wars episode 2 having the debate if dictators are a good because democracy is slow and cumbersome?
Star Wars episode 2 was more believable than this campaign season, somehow
I don't like sand. It's coarse and rough and irritating, and it gets everywhere.
That was episode 1, I think. Episode 2 was the one with the strangely shoehorned love story... wait that was all of them. It was the one with dooku and grevious
On October 10 2016 08:16 Biff The Understudy wrote:
On October 10 2016 08:14 Nevuk wrote:
On October 10 2016 07:58 Plansix wrote: Are we in Star Wars episode 2 having the debate if dictators are a good because democracy is slow and cumbersome?
Star Wars episode 2 was more believable than this campaign season, somehow
I don't like sand. It's coarse and rough and irritating, and it gets everywhere.
That was episode 1, I think. Episode 2 was the one with the strangely shoehorned love story... wait that was all of them. It was the one with dooku and grevious
On October 10 2016 07:03 Biff The Understudy wrote:
On October 10 2016 06:05 GGTeMpLaR wrote:
On October 10 2016 05:53 Yoav wrote:
On October 10 2016 03:48 GGTeMpLaR wrote: Guess that says something about the 'merits' of democracy when two shitty candidates are your choices.
Democracy isn't about having the best clothes. It's about doing the laundry regularly. It's about the theory that you never want a government that's too efficient, too professional, too powerful. That it is better to have 6 mediocre leaders over 40 years than one good one over the same time.
I don't think that's a good example. I'd definitely rather have a great leader for 40 years than 6 trumps/clintons over 40 years.
Two small problem with your line of reasoning:
1. "A great leader for 40 years" is called a dictator. There has never been anything great about dictatorship, therefore "a great leader for 40 years" is self contradictory.
2. Looks like half the country thinks one way the other half the other way. So who exactly gets to chose the great leader. In my book, Obama was a wonderful leader, so I assume you are ready to have him for 40 years, right? You'll find that fair and won't complain.
Damn... Looks like there is a reason why we invented democracy. Must have thought about that..
1. So when is the Dictator achievement unlocked? Is it right on the 40 year mark? 25 year mark? 12 year mark? Are people who want Obama for a 3rd time advocating dictatorship now? I don't think so. Was FDR a dictator? I don't think so.
"A great leader for 40 years" need not be a dictator. There's nothing contradictory about "A great leader for 40 years". You're just wrong here.
I don't think a dictator need be inherently bad or evil or wrong. The problem isn't with "A great leader for 40 years" or "a good dictator", but in general the problem with dictatorships has to do with the stability, and the nature of which we've seen them come into existence in history. In theory, it's great if you have an intelligent, fair individual at the top, but all too often history is correlated with Dictators being people who seize power through violence or intimidation, so we've come to associate 'dictatorship' with 'evil' in our culture. The way I see it is it's a much more volatile system of government than a democracy because it can quickly go from great with a great dictator to complete trash if you get a problem-individual holding office, since they have all the power. You're essentially putting all of your eggs in one basket.
In theory is there anything wrong with "A great leader for 40 years"? No. Quite the opposite, it would be great - by definition. Unless you hold some sort of irrational reverence to a president not ruling for more than 2 terms in office. You really only go further with your critique here in your 2nd point, which is that what is great for some is not great for others.
2 then isn't so much a critique of dictatorship than it is the ever-present problem that will always exist in politics. You can't always make everyone happy, what is good for some is bad for others, etc etc. This isn't really a critique unique to dictatorships. The only critique you could make here is that the people have no say in the matter.
That isn't necessarily a critique of having a "great leader for 40 years".
What if the people democratically elected the same leader for 40 years and the country prospered? That's what "A great leader for 40 years" is.
Jesus tap dancing christ. I don't ever know where to start.
Democracy needs the renewal of its leaders, which is why almost every democracy doesn't allow more than a certain amount of mandates. Of course, on theory you could have a democratically elected leader reelected for 40 years in a perfectly functional democracy that would allow an unlimited amount of mandate. Of course also, it doesn't work that way, and that has never happened anywhere.
You don't see the problem with dictatorship. I was not expecting you do so, considering what I know of your political views. But let me try to explain you why democracy has some merit.
So, we have agreed on the fact that you can't make everyone happy. That means that "a great leader" for some is always "an awful leader" for others because people want different things. "A great leader" is subjective, and a question of point of view. There is no such thing as "great leader" per say.
How do we solve the problem? The only way to make things fair is that the leader (great for some, awful for other) is chosen by the people he or she governs, and that people have the right to chose who they are ruled by. And if they think their leader is awful, well, they know that on election day, most of their co-citizens thought differently.
As for "the country prospered" that means nothing. What you and I mean by prosperity is probably completely different, and if I lived in a country ruled by a leader that you would find great that I wouldn't have had a chance to vote against, I would take a riffle and start a revolution.
Do you enjoy posting stupid insults like this underlined part up top? The idea that someone doesn't understand the faults of dictatorships if they support Trump over Clinton makes zero sense. The two are not related. I am sorry you are incapable of distinguishing what I say on this forum from -supports trump over clinton viewpoint- but that's a testament of your own failings not mine.
I fundamentally disagree with your assertion that "a great leader for some" is always "an awful leader" for others. I think a truly 'great leader' is someone who is going to best consolidate the interests of everyone and work for the interests of all they are responsible for serving. It might seem impossible in our current political situation that we find solutions that make everyone happy because politics is so polarized now, but it doesn't have to be impossible. That's literally the job of the president.
Your idea that the leader being chosen by the people is the only solution to making as many people happy as possible is just naive. There is nothing inherently accurate about the idea that people wanting 'X' means that 'X' is in their best interests. This is the fatal flaw of democracy - that sometimes people vote in such a way that is contrary to their interests. Every government has flaws, this is democracy's great flaw.
I'm not saying dictatorships are better than democracies.I'm saying a good dictator is preferable to a completely dysfunctional democracy.
The original thought experiment posed was 'would you rather have 6 mediocre leaders over 40 years or 1 great leader over 40 years? The answer is rather simple. The only case you choose 6 mediocre leaders over 1 great one is if you have a religious reverence for the principles of democracy in-of-itself, even if it is to the detriment of the well being of the nation. If you want to bring up relativism bullshit and how 'but what's good for some is bad for others', then you're missing the point of the thought experiment. It's to question what you value more, the deontological principles of maintaining a democracy versus consequences of giving up some principles of democracy for the sake of having a more competent government better act in the interests of the people.
a truly great leader who is going to consolidate the interests of everyone - a recipe for disaster. A great leader is someone with a genuine vision for the country, and the capacity to get it done. It's up to the people to decide if that person's vision lines up with theirs.
EPT
