[exmadscientist]

The direct legislation initiatives we just had here in WA were a total crapshow and I hope we never see their like again. They got tarred with the same brush because they came from the same sponsor (which is somewhat reasonable), even though they were not all equally popular or even sane. Then some were written in the negative and some were written in the positive, so it was very difficult to figure out what you were actually voting for. And one of the special interest groups figured out their favorite position was "all no", which is really easy to advertise, even if many voters in that block would have actually preferred yes on one of the initiatives.

And of course the Legislature had gone in and muddled with them even before they made the ballot (which, to be fair, is explicitly the Legislature's job in the WA initiative system, but it didn't help the confusion).

It was not a pretty election. I am convinced that direct democracy is not the answer, and that was with just four relatively inconsequential initiatives.