* Democracy = the vote.
* The vote = the citizens control their leaders.
* Citizens having control of their leaders = freedom for the citizens.
Don't tell me to "wake up"? You wake up.
I will keep democracy. I want my freedom.
Are you some kind of fascist or something?
I live in Switzerland where the people have the right to popular initiative at all three levels of power - federal, cantonal, communal- and where both the (bicameral) Parliament and the presidential cabinet represent a wide range of political views through at least seven political factions, with some fringe views winning a seat here and there. Although there is an official president, the position is mostly representative to the outside world, the presidency being rotated each year between the seven heads of each departments. While the State has the competence to rule over several domains (civil, penal), the canton retain a lot of freedom to manage others (mostly administrative). Our democracy is both balanced and robust.
Yet, despite all this freedom, the people are still routinely mislead and manipulated, voting on matters they don't grasp fully but ending up being remorseful about it. Unfortunately, it's usually too late as once a law is enacted, it is very hard to change it again. One example of laws enacted through the will of the people is our equivalent of the Brexit, a tough immigration law that is bound to have numerous repercussions on our relationship with our big European cousins. Another example are extremely severe traffic regulation that end up destroying peoples lives, robbing them of their jobs or making them pay astronomical fines or even having them do prison for simple violation of traffic rules.
Both these two laws and many others were voted through politicians pulling at the people's emotional strings. They've been had, they got swindled. No amount of democracy can save them, it's up to the executive and judiciary branches to either diminish the range of these laws or propose amendments.
It's true, the people should retain control over their country. But control over what, exactly? Since most of the population don't have the necessary time nor knowledge to make well-informed decisions on specific, technical matters, the people should only be the moral compass of a nation. All other topics should be managed by a group of highly skilled individuals provided they be under full scrutiny of the entire population.
Let those that want the privilege of serving a nation surrender their own freedom. No more politicians puppeteered by shady interest groups or putting their friends and family in positions of power or simply serving their own interests. No public servant thusly defined should go about having breakfast, taking a sh*t or buying flowers for his mistress with the entire population knowing about it.
The people should be able to trust that those they selected to lead them have only their best interest in mind. This, in my opinion, is true democracy, not the ersatz politicians want you to believe in.
