It was designed to be specifically undemocratic in a couple of situations. The intent, of course, is that Congress could block populist or extremist candidates from the presidency. But that depends on the legislature not being composed of complete imbeciles.
We should think about it in the context of the US being the first modern democracy, and they had to fight off criticism from royalists that democracy would lead to mob rule by uneducated peasants.
That, plus the fact that at least half the people involved in writing it wanted to make sure the institution of slavery was protected.
It makes a lot more sense from those perspectives. Given that neither of these premises are true today, there’s a very good reason to question the validity of the whole thing.
Believe it or not, no. It could be a lot worse. The government is a thin layer protecting us from corporitocracy. It often fails, but getting rid of it isn’t going to make things any better.
It was designed to be specifically undemocratic in a couple of situations. The intent, of course, is that Congress could block populist or extremist candidates from the presidency. But that depends on the legislature not being composed of complete imbeciles.
We should think about it in the context of the US being the first modern democracy, and they had to fight off criticism from royalists that democracy would lead to mob rule by uneducated peasants.
That, plus the fact that at least half the people involved in writing it wanted to make sure the institution of slavery was protected.
It makes a lot more sense from those perspectives. Given that neither of these premises are true today, there’s a very good reason to question the validity of the whole thing.
Except that if we started over and wrote the Constitution from scratch, we’d be the United States of Walmart.
Aren’t we already there? We need to start over.
Believe it or not, no. It could be a lot worse. The government is a thin layer protecting us from corporitocracy. It often fails, but getting rid of it isn’t going to make things any better.
We’re still several steps above Russia, for now.