[fakedang]

That's representative democracy for you. Heck, even China faces the same issue, but they get to make it a competition between provinces, on who can win the favor of the emperor. Helps for them that the emperor has supreme authority though.

[patmorgan23]

No, that's the incentive this specific system creates. There are democratic systems which do not suffer from such hyper localism. Such as the German mixed member proportional system.

[detourdog]

Can you describe how the German system works around this issue?

[detourdog]

Sounds like a narrow interpretation for representative democracy:) Maybe I'm stretching/mangling the golden rule but "do unto others as one would like others to do onto Mainers."