What I like about this idea is that it amounts to bilateral disarmament in our political arms race.
It's understandable that federal elections have become a hyper partisan obsession.
Every four years since at least 2004 when G.W. Bush got his second term, people/the media have said: "THIS IS THE MOST IMPORTANT ELECTION IN HISTORY!"
In a sense that can't be true. They can't all be the most important. How would they even know?
But in a sense they're right. Because there's been a upward trend the federal government's size, legislative penetration, interference in local affairs, federal regulatory accretion limiting local initiatives, etc. More and more every year. So by definition, those who control the federal government are the most powerful people to have ever held those posts, and that only increased every four years. How could we not be deeply concerned about who controls this beast we've created?
By letting some air out of the federal government and limiting it more to its original role of arbiter of trade, defense, interstate commerce, etc, and giving a lot of the power back to cities and regions, who controls the federal government will just matter a less. Hopefully, people won't be as concerned about who runs it if its role and and resource gathering ability is circumscribed.
The federal government is sucking all the oxygen out of the room. Time to let the a 35,000 city states take a breath.
It's a good point about de-escalating the rhetoric around elections. I agree it's gotten pretty absurd. The "lesser evil" approach got us where we are...
What I like about this idea is that it amounts to bilateral disarmament in our political arms race.
It's understandable that federal elections have become a hyper partisan obsession.
Every four years since at least 2004 when G.W. Bush got his second term, people/the media have said: "THIS IS THE MOST IMPORTANT ELECTION IN HISTORY!"
In a sense that can't be true. They can't all be the most important. How would they even know?
But in a sense they're right. Because there's been a upward trend the federal government's size, legislative penetration, interference in local affairs, federal regulatory accretion limiting local initiatives, etc. More and more every year. So by definition, those who control the federal government are the most powerful people to have ever held those posts, and that only increased every four years. How could we not be deeply concerned about who controls this beast we've created?
By letting some air out of the federal government and limiting it more to its original role of arbiter of trade, defense, interstate commerce, etc, and giving a lot of the power back to cities and regions, who controls the federal government will just matter a less. Hopefully, people won't be as concerned about who runs it if its role and and resource gathering ability is circumscribed.
The federal government is sucking all the oxygen out of the room. Time to let the a 35,000 city states take a breath.
I'm so with you!
It's a good point about de-escalating the rhetoric around elections. I agree it's gotten pretty absurd. The "lesser evil" approach got us where we are...