[jamesdsadler]

It seems to me like an accurate reflection of reality though. When governments and corporations propose legislation in secret it is never going to be in citizen's best interests. On the national and international scale democracy almost doesn't exist. We are being governed by the rich elite and being able to vote is just a sideshow.

Democracy as it is currently implemented is fundamentally flawed because it puts politicians and political parties in power. I mean, it fundamentally is about giving other's power. That is a freaking crude proxy to furthering citizen's interests. It's a blunt instrument. People in power can be influenced/corrupted/manipulated disproportionately by corporations and others with power. Citizens are disenfranchised and mostly powerless.

IMHO the ultimate expression of democracy would not to vote others into office, but to propose and collectively edit new legislation and vote on that. Skip the politician middlemen, go straight to the issues that matter. I imagine that citizens would be allocated a number of non-transferable expiring vote-credits that they can use to spend on pushing legislation.

In summary: until the very nature of democracy evolves we are destined to inhabit a dystopian world that serves only the interests of the elite.

[deciplex]

The basic idea of how we do democracy is more-or-less sound. Democracy is pretty robust to different implementations e.g. federal democracy, parliamentary democracy, etc.

If democracy has an Achilles's heel it is probably concentration of power. Democracy works better when power is diffuse, and you even see this expressed in the American constitution somewhat. However, although the framers of the US constitution implemented diffusion of power pretty well within government itself, they did nothing to secure diffusion of power across society more broadly[1], and as it happens that is kicking the shit out of many Western democracies now as wealth inequality (and imbalance of power, by proxy) approaches levels that have not been seen in many generations.

[1] Possibly they even did this, by restricting the vote to land owners initially (although I don't think that was their motivation to do so). There is no question limited suffrage sucks of course, but I suspect participants in American democracy early on were on a much more level playing field than what we have now. It would have been a good idea to try to preserve that diffusion of power in society somewhat, along the way to universal suffrage. We didn't, and now may be paying the price.

[Umn55]

"The basic idea of how we do democracy is more-or-less sound."

Sorry to tell you but... human beings are bad at reasoning:

Science on reasoning:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PYmi0DLzBdQ

On democracy

http://www.amazon.com/Democracy-Incorporated-Managed-Inverte...

[deciplex]

That book seems to be exploring in part the very concept I outlined in my post: that concentrated wealth will subvert a democracy.

[Umn55]

Except its much worse... it has always been so, you're just becoming aware of it.

You really need to bone up on your history...

http://williamblum.org/essays/read/overthrowing-other-people...

"I helped make Mexico, especially Tampico, safe for American oil intersts in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefits of Wall Street. The record of racketeering is long. I helped purify Nicaragua for the international banking house of Brown Brothers in 1909-1912. I brought light to the Dominican Republic for American sugar interests in 1916. In China I helped to see to it that Standard Oil went its way unmolested."[p. 10]

"War is a racket. ...It is the only one in which the profits are reckoned in dollars and the losses in lives." [p. 23] "The general public shoulders the bill [for war]. This bill renders a horrible accounting. Newly placed gravestones. Mangled bodies. Shattered minds. Broken hearts and homes. Economic instability. Depression and all its attendant miseries. Back-breaking taxation for generations and generations." [p. 24]

General Butler is especially trenchant when he looks at post-war casualties. He writes with great emotion about the thousands of tramautized soldiers, many of who lose their minds and are penned like animals until they die, and he notes that in his time, returning veterans are three times more likely to die prematurely than those who stayed home.

http://www.amazon.com/War-Racket-Antiwar-Americas-Decorated/...

[rhizome]

It seems to me like an accurate reflection of reality though.

The treaty hasn't passed yet; that reality doesn't exist. We don't yet know what the future will produce and who will have what effects on how it turns out. At any rate, pessimism is probably not the most helpful contribution to the process.