United states elections(part two); laughing from the outside

[billycop32]

for part one and those who ARE voting in the elections, please visit part 1 here:
https://ludeon.com/forums/index.php?topic=22351.0

This poll thread is for those on the outside, viewing in on this....situation. My question for you all in this-what do you see when you think about the united states? Please be honest,even if it means sounding rude or mean.(at the U.S. as a whole, but calling other users on the site rude or mean things is still not allowed-i'm just trying to "whitelist" calling political figures or the population as a whole things so you lot can be honest freely. if in doubt message me or a mod {try milion,dude is really nice} your response first.)

I've given each user 999 votes, so please vote once on each one that applies to you.

if you have a decent poll result you want added,please say so.

To those who are voting in the election but are still interested in part 2, please kindly follow these two rules
1)do NOT vote in the poll. it ain't for us Y'all.
2) feel free to ask good questions, but do not bash anyone for how they see us. you will only give us a even worse reputation.

[milon]

If I could participate in this poll, I would pick "the united states is doomed" and "the U.S. scares me". 

As a dual citizen, I really shouldn't have let my non-US passport expire...

[Kegereneku]

Editing your post seem to have closed the polls.
I would also have voted "The united states are doomed"

In my subjective opinion there is more to reform in the US to make "progress" than in many other countries, other countries swhich on their side are often too poor/weak/burdened to resist the ravage of ultraliberal capitalism and superpower dictatorship.

ps : I don't have much hope for all of Mankind either.

[KillTyrant]

haha I dont think the US is doomed. Every 4 years, this sort of question always pops up. This year isnt really all that different, despite what you may think/feel. Ronald Reagan was a showman more so than a politician and the country survived. Richard Nixon was a crook and the country survived that as well. So im not exactly too worried. The president can only do so much without support from congress and should he try to over step the powers of the executive branch than he may become the first successfully impeached president. That aside, Europe isnt really in much of a position to laugh. Britain is dealing with their own head aches and France has a leader telling his citizens to "learn to live" with terrorism. Each country is dealing with globalism in its own way. Just part of the growing pains of learning to live with technology that enables man to traverse the globe within a day and instantly communicate with anyone, anywhere. I for one am happy to exist at such an awkward time and be apart of it.

[Fluffy (l2032)]

just for the record, we should learn to live with terrorism. There's nothing that we can do to stop it completely, and efforts to do so will just make everyone's live slightly more miserable. in the mean time, terrorists in western countries kill a couple of hundred or so people yearly? Call me a cynic, but compared to the many, many times more whom die from obesity, smoking, acohol and traffic, terrorism is just a non-issue.

The problem is that terror attacks are generally very loud and bloody, and that's just the kind of thing the media & populists can use to scare us with, for various purposes.

As for the US, if Trump wins, you're kindof fucked. Not that it'll be the end of the world, but the US will likely stagnate on the global economy at best. Then again, maybe the experience of Trump as president will shock people into some sense and compromise.

Actually, the US is fucked anyway, simply because of increasingly polarizing public debate. When it gets hard to have a reasoned debate with someone you disagree with - and virtually impossible to compromise, it's pretty much the end of democracy as far as I'm concerned.

[buttflexspireling]

  I voted that 'the U.S. scares me'. Are libraries destined to become new monthly funeral home dress code inspection agencies or rent-a-cheerleader agencies for funerals/weddings? I mean, how can the U.S. government not reform the library system? They are profit generators but I fear that future children will have their 2nd amendment rights violated by future libraries at this rate.   

[keylocke]

i think most people think that elections is the only thing that ensures democracy, but i think it's what people do AFTER elections that is more intriguing.

i actually think there needs to be nationwide online forums where representatives of a government can discuss and debate legislation/projects/etc.. with their constituents and it would be fun to see pundits from all walks of life, gather into a single battle arena of ideas and be able to directly criticize the pro and con arguments of each legislation/projects/etc.. and be polled for it. this way, the discussions are out in the open, instead of backroom deals only for politicians and lobbyists. which should give more transparency.

i mean let's face it. the existence of benevolent rulers are like unicorns, so unless you're a fairy princess then you'd best curb your expectations and get a healthy dose of paranoia, and the best way to deal with the paranoia from the government is to introduce more transparency and accountability.

the moment that government representative's ideas and agendas can be easily challenged and criticized in a singular forum where ALL of the nation watches closely and can provide instantaneous feedback and suggestions.. then you'd get an aggregator mechanism that can easily compile the best and the worst ideas from the entire populace. (crowdsourcing feedback)

all that's left is to apply an efficient sorting mechanism to sort out that data to come up the best possible solution and then relay it to "experts" for review, then release the expert's info to the public to get more feedback, send it back to experts, etc.. it's a dynamic system that goes back and forth until the best solution is derived, that is feasible and gonna be fair for the majority.

it's better if the so called government experts are part of the convo so they can also debate the pros and cons of a topic as part of the entire feedback loop.

and the reason why this can be achieved now is coz technologies like smart phones and free wifi have created for us a new virtual agora. (ie : just think of discussions like newsfeeds that people can subscribe/unsubscribe to, etc.. to easily get in and out of relevant topics.)

i mean, just look at some of the other online political forums. the debates by some enlightened pundits can occasionally dwarf the arguments of elected politicians. (some of which aren't experts at all and were only elected due to popularity)

imagine if someone could devise a system that can combine and aggregate any or all useful info from all sources into an actual usable form that can aid in formulating legislation or policies..

this way, people would no longer be enthralled by the notion that.. people "NEED a very good leader, otherwise we're screwed" and rather transition it towards the notion that "politicians are just mere tools to enact the will of the people and are easily replaced the moment they are proven to be working against the common good of the people"

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edit :

also, to avoid tl;dr of long threads. the moderator in charge of a topic should probably update the OP to give a summary of all valid points of arguments between the pros and cons of the topic, to ease readability and to make it easier to disseminate the correct information to the populace.

(the forum could also act as the best source of information to keep the people updated and well informed so that majority of the people would no longer be considered as "ignorant masses". an enlightened population is the best and the easiest way to achieve that is to make it easier to access relevant information sans the jargon)