@Sid I can't even imagine what the US would be like had Gore won not Bush

Would he have been better? Or worse?

^ Had Clinton won, not Trump

It's just that they had very different ideas/ideals... Gore was and is very pro environment and fighting climate change, whereas Bush didn't care

Bush sent us into the middle east, not sure if Gore would have, then again 9/11 may have sent about any president to war

@GentlePurpleRain Two evils, not really sure which is better even now.

*Had Sanders won, not Clinton... :)

I actually feel that the US acted hastily after 9/11. Of course, the US can do anything and get away with it. So, it wasn't a big problem.

I would've loved Sanders... but alas rigged politics won out

@n_palum While I don't think Clinton is a shining model of presidential potential, I think there's no question that having a well-educated, experienced politician as president would have been better than the semi-literate, uninformed, and willfully ignorant buffoon that is currently in power.

@n_palum the elections were rigged?

@GentlePurpleRain I agree to an extent... I dislike them both, and she's got just as many negative qualities as he does.

The primaries or whatever that is called?

Just as many? Absolutely not.

(Also, we should probably move this to the friendly debate room.)

^^

while she may have been a more respectable/appropriate face for foreign leaders there's other things wrong with her

@Sid Yeah, the DNC (Democratic party) was rigged and pretty much set from the get go to hoist Clinton up as the runner

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Whoosh

I'm totally with Deusovi on this one. Clinton's no angel, but she would have been a way better choice for president than Trump.

Regardless, I don't really want to debate Trump vs Clinton as I was a Sanders and Johnson fan and dislike them both.

Apparently many of the Americans didn't feel so.

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Anyway, it's not like Trump is going to lget re-elected or anything..

I thought that about Bush, too...

I know how Deus feels about Trump. Although I will add if he does get impeached, which they're supposedly working towards, Pence is just as much of a homophobic nut job

If he gets impeached, the VP takes over? What if the VP gets impeached, too? :)

@n_palum I liked Sanders. Johnson, not as much.

The Speaker.

They take over.

Don't know who the Speaker is. Would they be a more reasonable choice for president?

Paul Ryan.

@Deusovi I only went to him when Sanders got booted because I couldn't support the other two options. I also feel other parties should have the opportunity to run not just this big money politics scheme of two parties

Paul Ryan won't be any more sensible than the other two above him.

@n_palum Come to Canada.

I'm about an hour away :P

Thought about it... There's game industry jobs in quite a few Canadian cities

We have three major political parties, and a few others that regularly win some seats in the House of Commons (= Congress).

It was impossible for Johnson to win because of the first-past-the-post voting system. A vote for Johnson was effectively not voting at all.

(And I wish it wasn't that way.)

Yeah I know, but if he had hit the 5% they'd be elligible to join debates and increase the awareness of other parties, because the public is oblivious if all they watch is the t.v

Again, I'd rather waste my vote on him than vote towards either of them. And against popular opinion, I ended up opting out of voting anyway.

In the last Canadian election, our now-Prime-Minister vowed to reform the voting system so that it's not first-past-the-post. Now that he's elected, he's reneging on that promise... :(

You guys have high standards of Politics if you feel that Clinton was just as bad as Trump. You should see some of our politicians. You would then, feel lucky that you actually have sane people.

Sid, where are you? India?

"Sane people"? I'm not sure I would describe Trump that way.

Yes.

Difference of the countries

And ditto, ^^^ neither are sane

...No, Clinton is sane. She's not perfect (not by a long shot), but she is mentally sane.

@Sid Our's is the world's biggest democracy, so, we have a lot of varieties.

Our politicians are as stupid as they get, though.

I can argue with that. As I said, they are running a huge country with a huge population. But, yes, on an average we do have silly people.

@GentlePurpleRain Promises make for good soundbites during elections. They then are conveniently forgotten by the leaders.

But, I think, it's only due to the media attention they get for being silly

That sounds familiar.

media.giphy.com/media/l0HlNcbVIbPVBSEYo/…

@Tech Don't agree with that. The power is divided between the states. The Parliamentarians don't run the states. So, it is not like the whole power is vested on one man(Though, it feels that way during these times).

Fun fact, Clinton tells the secret service to f off and that they are useless

@Sid But he actually did follow through on a good number of promises. Which made me hopeful that he would with this one too. It would have a significant impact on the future of politics in Canada.

@Sid How many politicians you know in my state? There are some good people working for a good cause. But, they need to show someone as a leader. And PM, so far, has proved to be a good leader. Is a leading face bad?

Likewise, every state has their own heroes.. Not all come across the media.

All politicians work for a cause. Some just speak too much and spew hatred everywhere. And no not at all, The PM has done well so far(maybe not as much as it was expected) and he is winning elections for his party. The thing is, there is a thin line between being decisive and being authoritarian.

Anyway, @Deus and @n_palum What are the possible advantages and disadvantages of Presidential democracy?

The reason why he is trying to win everywhere is to have a better control over the government, so that the country moves towards a common goal instead of breaking each other's legs.. Giving a very recent example - A new train was launched today. While moving it from Delhi to Mumbai, the windows were broken. Now, why is that? Same reason. To stop someone's good work.. This affects entire nation in some way.

@Sid Haha that's a really loaded question that you may want to ask, or peruse for an answer for on politics se

I mean, do the advantages outnumber the disadvantages?

Again, debatable

Most likely they do

why is it most likely that they do?

long-term democracies are roughly split between presidencies and prime ministerships I believe

Considering our nation's status in the world, but again, you can argue other's with other government formats are better off

Scandinavia knows what they're doing :P

@Tech Again, let's agree to disagree. Not all incidents need to be politicised. I mean, okay, some idiot decided to break windows. Doesn't mean that it was done solely to hurt someone's good work.

@Sid Now you are contradicting your own statement. stupid politics did that ;)

Only politics? Could even be some dumbo who had got hit on the head.

Hey techi if you wander to codenames we'll have 6

@Sid That example for just given just to explain the situation why majority is a good thing - better control.

@n_palum On phone... :(

Anyone here actually interested in pursuing a future in politics?

No doubt, majority is a good thing. I am saying that in a democracy, the majority shouldn't turn into authoritarian decision-making.

@MikeQ vomits in mouth no way

Er... No.

I sometimes feel like I should be, but I don't want to

Then what is a more effective way of affecting the system?

Blackmailing Rupert Murdoch?

^ or helping elect better politicians at a lower level and hope they move up

or waiting it out until all the old stubborn people are gone and no longer voting since they have no ability to change their mindsets (I don't hate old people)

@n_palum But by then the young people have become old people with no ability to change their mindsets... :P

@GentlePurpleRain I imagine if you grow up being able to see other people's viewpoints, and changing your mindset, and being able to move with the times in the directions that are necessary, then you can do that when you're older too. and hopefully that idea is instilled in younger generations too.

Would it be better if we had a supercomputer system to decide everything?

And instead of politicians, we vote system admins?

No. I've known too many system admins. Heck, I've been one.

IBM is making one :p

but WATSON wasn't born a citizen

It has quite a history though..