

Why Doesn't Our Government Actually Do Anything? - apsec112
http://rationalconspiracy.com/2012/06/03/why-doesnt-our-government-actually-do-anything/

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glenra
The fundamental problem here is demosclerosis - any low-hanging fruit have
long since been plucked. Essentially every plank in the Socialist Party
Platform of 1928 has already been enacted into law. Nowadays many of the
issues government tries to address were _caused_ by the _previous_ round of
government efforts to solve problems.

But the longer you apply patches on top of patches, the more rickety the whole
structure becomes. Eventually you reach a point where you'd be better starting
over with a complete rewrite from scratch. It happens for software languages
and OSes; it happens for governments too.

As for what to do about it, I always liked Heinlein's suggestion (in The Moon
is a Harsh Mistress) that there should two houses of congress: one whose job
is to pass new laws, another whose job is to repeal old ones. Without that
second house, the legal code invariably becomes a cancer or an impenetrable
thicket.

Another idea is Seasteading. Basically there needs to be _some_ way that brand
new from-scratch ideas of how to govern can be tried out and demonstrated. The
same way stodgy old companies can learn by stealing ideas (and people) from
tiny new startup companies, the stodgy old governments need a way to learn by
stealing ideas from tiny new startup governments. Any change that helps big
old countries break up into smaller new ones or allows brand new smaller ones
to come into existence would be a big help. Seasteading (forming new societies
in international waters) is one such option; another is the "charter cities"
movement, where existing governments are convinced to voluntarily allow other
legal systems to flourish in small areas that would otherwise be in their
domain.

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iterationx
>>\- Eliminated all gold, and replaced it with unredeemable “greenbacks”

They confiscated the gold. The war on terror is a new phenomenon and it should
meet the criteria for a significant undertaking.

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zdw
The reason is that government has valid things to do, but these have been
frozen in place since the mid 70's.

Right now, the big debate appears to be a 5% taxation difference on the top
10% of wage earners.

The only other things that change are fear-based, such as the creation of
"Homeland Security".

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alexhaefner
Well, I'll try to keep my point simple. Our constant need to complain is
corrosive. Visionary thinkers shaped our society for the next generation.

I didn't enjoy reading this since it was a large complain fest, and that is
the corrosive thing that has made our government do nothing. If you imagine a
future in which you have a government that is effective, that "does" things,
somehow you are able to accomplish that goal. You need visionary thinkers, not
complainers. And you have to offer up some idea of where you see the future of
government, instead of complaining about how it does not do anything. The
people who shaped our societies future knew the kind of society they wanted to
live in. We rarely talk about what we want our society to look like, what we
value as a society. Start talking about these things.

~~~
mattgreenrocks
What should society look like? I'll take a stab at it.

We should value compassion and authentic relationships, rather than talking in
the language of power. We should get the f over ourselves, and especially
value those that do, as they're more likely to be trusted with positions of
power since they have a level of self-knowledge that many do not. We should
stop obsessing over meaningless things like money and get on with doing what
we, personally, need to do. We should stop accepting the disgustingly low
level of national discourse that pervades the mainstream media and move
towards talking like adults. We should stop living in a reactionary, fear-
based mode, especially with regard to terrorism. We should stop being obsessed
with work in a vain attempt to define ourselves.

In short, we should take responsibility for our lives as humans and the impact
we have on everyone around us. Currently, there's too much of an incentive to
act like an asshole.

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rsanchez1
Why doesn't our government actually do anything? Because no one can agree on
anything to do. The examples provided all were projects with widespread
approval. But today, there isn't a lot of agreement. It will take more
visionary politicians than what we have today to convince people their policy
is the policy to follow. Yesterday, we had politicians that envisioned a
future where Americans could drive across the country or put a man on the
Moon. Today, what?

