# Time for a deep explanation! (Of the US Political System) **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [April 29, 2016, 10:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-deep-explanation-of-the-us-political-system/753462 "2016-04-29T22:50:09Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![wolfpup](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wolfpup/32/10618_2.png) [@wolfpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wolfpup)\ **Post date:** [May 2, 2016, 12:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-deep-explanation-of-the-us-political-system/753462/21 "2016-05-02T00:32:57Z")
> [@Shalmanese](#): > > This kind of relativism isn’t super helpful since of course no system is perfect but America’s falls on the far side of below average. > > IMHO, there’s two main causes which help explain not just the political system, but a lot of other things in American life. Firstly, America suffers a lot from first mover disadvantage. Americans are generally one of the first to adopt something which means we are making a lot of it up as we go along. Later countries can learn from existing examples and use the lessons to avoid the bad ideas but the first mover doesn’t have that luxury. In a way, you can think of America as running Democracy Alpha which has been heavily patched over the years while most other countries are running Democracy 2.0 or Democracy 3.0. > > Secondly, America is a relatively conservative country, not in the political sense, but in the sense that it resists change. The American system favors a consultative process where it’s far easier to make something stay the same than it is to change it. Along the process, there’s many points along the way in which a proposed change can be derailed. > > You see this in things like America still not getting rid of the penny and only finally implementing chip & pin cards or being the only developed country without universal healthcare. Well thought out, well said, and I agree completely. > [@Derleth](#): > > This is a feature, not a bug, and it’s a feature of literally every stable political system. Changes must be deliberated and everyone must feel they have a voice, because if enough people feel disenfranchised, you get a revolution. The fact that change must be deliberated is not an excuse for a system that intentionally makes change difficult or near-impossible just as a matter of principle. Sometimes failure to react to changing circumstances is far more risky than blocking change just on the general principle of distrust of change. On the matter of health care, for instance, every advanced nation on earth has implemented guaranteed universal health care. The UK did it in a sea change of social reform after the Second World War, Germany has had it since the time of Bismarck, and Canada caught up through a series of rapid reforms mostly in the 60s. The US has been arguing about it for a century, and aside from a few baby steps, has made virtually no progress in a hundred years. > [@Derleth](#): > > Chip and PIN is one thing, but, well, _which_ UHC plan should we adopt? I agree that _some_ plan is needed, but when you look at any _real, existing_ system, they all have serious criticisms lodged against them by the people who live under them. No, they all lack perfection, but [virtually any of them is far better](http://time.com/2888403/u-s-health-care-ranked-worst-in-the-developed-world/) and enjoys far stronger popular support than a system that costs more than twice as much as the OECD per-capita average, delivers substandard results, and leaves tens of millions of Americans with little or no meaningful health care or entirely uninsured. Most UHC systems have strong popular support and are also often strongly championed by the medical establishment which understands the tradeoffs and overall advantages to provider and patient alike. But in the US, what you have is a series of SCOTUS decisions – themselves a consequence of the political process – that now grant virtually unrestricted power to special interests like health insurers and their lobbyists. Combined with built-in legislative inertia, it pretty much guarantees that UHC cannot happen in any foreseeable future. But by God, you have your pennies and your paper dollars, both of which are needlessly costly to the treasury and serve no purpose whatsoever, just like the worthless uselessness of commercial health insurers. And you’ve successfully fought off the threat of the metric system, being one of three really special countries in the world – Liberia, Myanmar, and the USA – which hasn’t adopted the metric system. Kind of fits with the third-world health care strategy. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [May 2, 2016, 12:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-deep-explanation-of-the-us-political-system/753462/22 "2016-05-02T00:39:03Z")
> [@](#): > > Quoth **Derelth** : > > Chip and PIN is one thing, but, well, which UHC plan should we adopt? I agree that some plan is needed, but when you look at any real, existing system, they all have serious criticisms lodged against them by the people who live under them. As opposed to the current US system, which has _all_ of those serious criticisms at the same time. I challenge you to name any UHC plan from anywhere in the developed world that has any problem which is not shared by the US system. Long wait times? Surprises from things not being covered that the patient thought were? Death panels? We’ve got it all, for only twice the cost. ---
**Author:** ![Dangerosa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)\ **Post date:** [May 2, 2016, 1:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-deep-explanation-of-the-us-political-system/753462/23 "2016-05-02T01:53:15Z")
A huge thing to understand is the tension between states and the federal government. When the country was founded, the states saw themselves as self governing entities. Our federal government had almost no power under the Articles of Confederation. But without some sort of federal power, the government was doomed, so we had the Constitutional Convention and came up with a Constitution. But we’ve been internally fighting over states rights vs. federal rights from day one. And a lot of what we are saddled with in government is a result of trying to compromise between the two - hence everything from the stupidity of the electoral college to the makeup of the House of Representatives and the Senate. Its actually not at all a total pile of garbage. Its been successful and fairly stable for a few hundred years - with the exception of our little foray into Civil War (over the states rights to determine if slavery was a thing or not - really about slavery, but under the banner of states rights). There aren’t many governments today that can say the same - and none that have the landmass and population. ---
**Author:** ![wolfpup](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wolfpup/32/10618_2.png) [@wolfpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wolfpup)\ **Post date:** [May 2, 2016, 2:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-deep-explanation-of-the-us-political-system/753462/24 "2016-05-02T14:07:36Z")
ISTM that “states’ rights” remains to this day a dog-whistle term for a state’s right to exercise some form of bigotry, whether it be the traditional target of African Americans, or more recently the LGBT community, Hispanics, or Muslims. Granted there are legitimate reasons for states to retain some level of administrative autonomy, but it’s striking how often “states’ rights” is just code for the aforementioned. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [May 2, 2016, 3:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-deep-explanation-of-the-us-political-system/753462/25 "2016-05-02T15:08:24Z")
I agree with the OP. How can the US be described as anything other than a abject failure. People are fleeing like rats from a sinking ship. NO ONE even wants to emigrate here anymore. Who do people go to when they needs some international effort to get organize and done? Not the US-- we’re at the bottom of the list. What was last real innovation that came out of the US? All the new technology is being invented elsewhere. We’re doomed. ETA: Thanks, **Richard Parker.** I’m often astonished when someone compares the US to a country like New Zealand. Nothing wrong with NZ (been there, loved it), but it’s 1/100th the size (closest order of magnitude). ---
**Author:** ![Dangerosa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)\ **Post date:** [May 2, 2016, 3:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-deep-explanation-of-the-us-political-system/753462/26 "2016-05-02T15:08:48Z")
> [@wolfpup](#): > > ISTM that “states’ rights” remains to this day a dog-whistle term for a state’s right to exercise some form of bigotry, whether it be the traditional target of African Americans, or more recently the LGBT community, Hispanics, or Muslims. Granted there are legitimate reasons for states to retain some level of administrative autonomy, but it’s striking how often “states’ rights” is just code for the aforementioned. Often, but it sometimes has come up in other areas. The ACA Supreme Court cases about the expansion of Medicare was not bigotry, it was a small government argument. Local control of schools - and the anti-Science movement - you can pin it on bigotry but its more complicated than that. Land use. Fights against the EPA. Abortion (again, you can chalk it up to bigotry, but its complicated). ---
**Author:** ![CarnalK](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnalk/32/486_2.png) [@CarnalK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CarnalK)\ **Post date:** [May 2, 2016, 3:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-deep-explanation-of-the-us-political-system/753462/27 "2016-05-02T15:29:15Z")
It’s also just not that legitimate a point to bring up. “Hey, ever notice that Free Speech complaints are most often brought up when Nazis are defending their views? Free Speech is just a dog whistle term”. ---
**Author:** ![wolfpup](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wolfpup/32/10618_2.png) [@wolfpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wolfpup)\ **Post date:** [May 2, 2016, 3:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-deep-explanation-of-the-us-political-system/753462/28 "2016-05-02T15:59:30Z")
> [@Dangerosa](#): > > Often, but it sometimes has come up in other areas. The ACA Supreme Court cases about the expansion of Medicare was not bigotry, it was a small government argument. It was _characterized_ as a small government argument. But if you add “poor people” to the list, it was flat-out bigotry against another underclass. The same crowd clamoring against “big government” has no problem with it when it suits their purposes, like corporate handouts or local pork spending on military projects. > [@Dangerosa](#): > > Local control of schools - and the anti-Science movement - you can pin it on bigotry but its more complicated than that. Land use. Fights against the EPA. Abortion (again, you can chalk it up to bigotry, but its complicated). Most of the stuff there except abortion is related to anti-science with regard to climate change denial, the school stuff also touches on teaching religion and evolution denial, and abortion arguments tend to be rooted in theocratic views of religious supremacy. So yes, I agree that those are not strictly bigotry except a kind of regressive anti-intellectual bigotry. States’ rights is not always about classical bigotry, but as I said, it’s striking how often it is. And the rest of the time it seems to be about something equally stupid where a divergence is desired from predominant national values. ---
**Author:** ![wolfpup](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wolfpup/32/10618_2.png) [@wolfpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wolfpup)\ **Post date:** [May 2, 2016, 4:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-deep-explanation-of-the-us-political-system/753462/29 "2016-05-02T16:03:37Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > I agree with the OP. How can the US be described as anything other than a abject failure. People are fleeing like rats from a sinking ship. NO ONE even wants to emigrate here anymore. Who do people go to when they needs some international effort to get organize and done? Not the US-- we’re at the bottom of the list. What was last real innovation that came out of the US? All the new technology is being invented elsewhere. Somewhere in there a phrase like “in spite of, not because of” is badly needed in reference to US politics. Like how a country with such boundless natural resources can have such staggering national debt, or how the wealthiest country in the world has so much abject poverty, or how the wealthiest country in the world still cannot manage to have basic universal health care. ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_Ace](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/6bbea6/32.png) [@Johnny\_Ace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_Ace)\ **Post date:** [May 2, 2016, 4:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-deep-explanation-of-the-us-political-system/753462/30 "2016-05-02T16:30:01Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > I agree with the OP. How can the US be described as anything other than a abject failure. People are fleeing like rats from a sinking ship. NO ONE even wants to emigrate here anymore. Who do people go to when they needs some international effort to get organize and done? Not the US-- we’re at the bottom of the list. What was last real innovation that came out of the US? All the new technology is being invented elsewhere. > > We’re doomed. Voting Republican, are you? Sorry, no Chicken Little on the ticket this election. ---
**Author:** ![Buck\_Godot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/buck_godot/32/6573_2.png) [@Buck\_Godot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Buck_Godot)\ **Post date:** [May 2, 2016, 5:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-deep-explanation-of-the-us-political-system/753462/31 "2016-05-02T17:14:43Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > As opposed to the current US system, which has _all_ of those serious criticisms at the same time. I challenge you to name any UHC plan from anywhere in the developed world that has any problem which is not shared by the US system. Long wait times? Surprises from things not being covered that the patient thought were? Death panels? We’ve got it all, for only twice the cost. Actually I can see that universal health care would very likely lead to significantly longer wait times than we have now. The problem is that complaining about it is very much akin to complaining that after Rosa Parks it is much harder for a guy to find a seat at the front of the bus. The increase of wait times from short to long for those with insurance is the natural consequence of others’ wait times decreasing to never to long. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [May 2, 2016, 6:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-deep-explanation-of-the-us-political-system/753462/32 "2016-05-02T18:21:47Z")
Didn’t Belgium spend a year without a government recently? ---
**Author:** ![Derleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Derleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Derleth)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2016, 8:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-deep-explanation-of-the-us-political-system/753462/33 "2016-05-04T08:43:48Z")
> [@wolfpup](#): > > The fact that change must be deliberated is not an excuse for a system that intentionally makes change difficult or near-impossible just as a matter of principle. Almost every system makes change nearly-impossible; those which don’t, make it absolutely impossible. The rest of your post is mostly uncited nonsense, especially the bit about UHC being absolutely impossible to achieve because the Supreme Court is in the pockets of Big Business. Do you really think the UK has ever been that different? And yet they did it. ---
**Author:** ![Beware\_of\_Doug](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/278dde/32.png) [@Beware\_of\_Doug](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beware_of_Doug)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2016, 8:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-deep-explanation-of-the-us-political-system/753462/34 "2016-05-04T08:55:57Z")
> [@Shalmanese](#): > > This kind of relativism isn’t super helpful since of course no system is perfect but America’s falls on the far side of below average. > > IMHO, there’s two main causes which help explain not just the political system, but a lot of other things in American life. Firstly, America suffers a lot from first mover disadvantage. Americans are generally one of the first to adopt something which means we are making a lot of it up as we go along. Later countries can learn from existing examples and use the lessons to avoid the bad ideas but the first mover doesn’t have that luxury. In a way, you can think of America as running Democracy Alpha which has been heavily patched over the years while most other countries are running Democracy 2.0 or Democracy 3.0. > > Secondly, America is a relatively conservative country, not in the political sense, but in the sense that it resists change. The American system favors a consultative process where it’s far easier to make something stay the same than it is to change it. Along the process, there’s many points along the way in which a proposed change can be derailed. > > You see this in things like America still not getting rid of the penny and only finally implementing chip & pin cards or being the only developed country without universal healthcare. in addition - we’re proud. Too proud to take cues from other democracies. ---
**Author:** ![up\_the\_junction](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/f1d935/32.png) [@up\_the\_junction](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/up_the_junction)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2016, 9:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-deep-explanation-of-the-us-political-system/753462/35 "2016-05-04T09:04:49Z")
Not proud, generationally propagandised. ---
**Author:** ![foolsguinea](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foolsguinea/32/14751_2.png) [@foolsguinea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/foolsguinea)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2016, 1:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-deep-explanation-of-the-us-political-system/753462/36 "2016-05-05T01:36:59Z")
> [@Captain\_Amazing](#): > > Didn’t Belgium spend a year without a government recently? It’s a parliamentary system; it happens. That doesn’t mean the civil service didn’t show up to work. The USA has a strong presidency to avoid that; yet we still have “government shutdowns” where most of the civil service gets laid off, and seats on the federal bench (I guess I have to specify that that means judgeships) that go vacant for several years on end. Strong presidencies can be dictatorships, where the President has the authority to tax & to make law; they can fall apart in short order; or, just this once, one, ever, in all of history, made it about 200 years before finally falling apart in utter impotence. The next generation of Yanks are going to have to write a new constitution. ---
**Author:** ![up\_the\_junction](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/f1d935/32.png) [@up\_the\_junction](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/up_the_junction)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2016, 1:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-deep-explanation-of-the-us-political-system/753462/37 "2016-05-05T13:24:11Z")
Do what 120 other countries did, take an off-the-shelf Parliamentary system and play around with it some. What you have now is like Windows Millennium Edition or something. ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_Ace](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/6bbea6/32.png) [@Johnny\_Ace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_Ace)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2016, 10:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-deep-explanation-of-the-us-political-system/753462/38 "2016-05-05T22:05:39Z")
> [@up\_the\_junction](#): > > Do what 120 other countries did, take an off-the-shelf Parliamentary system and play around with it some. > > What you have now is like Windows Millennium Edition or something. And the upgrade to ME was Vista. Not a good analogy. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2016, 1:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-deep-explanation-of-the-us-political-system/753462/39 "2016-05-06T01:18:18Z")
> [@Derleth](#): > > First, it’s only terrible compared to systems which have the distinct advantage of not existing. No, it is also terrible compared to most other existing industrialized democracies. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2016, 1:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-deep-explanation-of-the-us-political-system/753462/40 "2016-05-06T01:44:42Z")
> [@Shalmanese](#): > > Firstly, America suffers a lot from first mover disadvantage. Americans are generally one of the first to adopt something which means we are making a lot of it up as we go along. . . . > > \ > > You see this in things like America still not getting rid of the penny and only finally implementing chip & pin cards or being the only developed country without universal healthcare. Not so first-mover after all, then, [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-deep-explanation-of-the-us-political-system/753462.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-deep-explanation-of-the-us-political-system/753462.md?page=3)