Presidency...

[PowerpuffKue]

Ok, I have noticed threads about how a president can be elected when they don’t have the majority, so I quickly came up with a few ideas in my head:

Every party nominates 1 person for the “presidency”.

The amount of votes earned by each canidate would be their power in office. It would be required to have the top vote-getter be overrulled, unless a canadate got %50+ of the votes, then they alone get the office. If a tie could mathamatically happen, then the next down would be admitted in also.

Example 1:
Mock Election Results: Gore 40% Bush 35% Nader 14% Buchanan 6%

So when a bill is sent to them, they each decide what way they want the bill to go. Whichever % is higher wins. So lets say on bill 1 Gore, and Nader want to veto it, and Bush and Buchanan want to pass it, it would be vetoed because Gore and Nader have more % of the population votes.

Example 2:
Bush wins the election with 55% of the votes, it would be pointless to have anyone else in office with him, so he gets the office alone, and he decides on accepting/vetoing alone.

Example 3:
Mock Election Results: Gore 43% Bush 35% Nader 8%

There’s a possible tie (Bush and Nader agreeing and Gore dissagreeing). The next top vote getter would be admitted in. Let’s say it was Buchanan, no matter what % of the votes he earned, he is assigned a percentage at least 3% but smaller than the above vote-getter(Nader). To decide how much he gets, you put all the possibilities(3%, 4%, 5%, 6%, 7%) and take the median(Middle number) in this case, 5%. If there are 2 median numbers, take the larger.

I know it sounds complicated, but would you support a system similar to this?

[obfusciatrist]

I wouldn’t support it, but the English might (or maybe the Canadian, or the Germans, or the Indians, or the . . . ).

You’ve pretty much described a parliamentary system, but I don’t think it is used anywhere for a directly elected executive.

[PowerpuffKue]

*Originally posted by obfusciatrist *
**I wouldn’t support it, but the English might (or maybe the Canadian, or the Germans, or the Indians, or the . . . ).

You’ve pretty much described a parliamentary system, but I don’t think it is used anywhere for a directly elected executive. **

I honestly never thought of parliment when I came up with it, I tweaked with our current “Electoral Votes” system, but I do see the resemblance to a parliment.

[friedo]

But what if one wants to drop the bomb, and one doesn’t…

The point is we already have a legislature, two in fact, so what do we need a parliamentary executive office for? Since the President gets to decide things like whether or not to blow up the world, and those decisions need to made instantaneously, beaurocratic tomfoolery can’t get in the way. So ultimately there needs to be exactly one person. Both a curse and a blessing I suppose.

[fredicus]

I vaguely recall someone ( possibly R Heinlein ) suggesting that a benign dictatorship was the most efficient form of goverment.

Nice idea, but how can one ensure that the dictatorship is benign ?