I sometimes have some very futuristic visions! www.interfluidity.com/v2/9069.html 1/

But in the near term, I'd be grateful just to adopt approval voting for the Senate and President, and proportional representation for the House, to encourage multiple parties and a more consensus-building rather than screw-the-other-party form of politics. /fin

if you think this, you think the United States won’t survive, at least not as a democracy. a country cannot remain as structurally misgoverned as we now are (under either party, though more flamboyantly under MAGA) and survive as a meaningful democracy. 1/

arguably this is just a historical statement rather than a speculative one. 2/

under contemporary communications tech and nationalized politics, the FPTP countries (including the UK and Canada but most egregiously the US) are not functioning democracies (where they once may have been when politics was more local). 3/

(if you haven’t read it, i recommend @leedrutman.bsky.social’s book on this stuff.) bookshop.org/p/books/brea... /fin

Republicanism is just limited and representative rather than direct democracy. The “republic not a democracy” claim is incoherent. 1/

Constituent services is not a legislative role. It’s a corrupt and corrupting form of incumbency bias (which doesn’t mean i won’t use it, we live in this world). That’s not to say there shouldn’t be roles in government for citizen advocacy. 2/

But the quality of that service shouldn’t depend on who your Rep is, and what their tenure has been, and how much good PR they can get from helping you. 3/

Constituent services “represents” a tiny, tiny fraction of individuals, but a good reputation their can be used to overcome deficiencies in the legislative role, representing the interests and values of the full body of constituents. 4/

A good representation in constituent services that you can play up and tout buys legislators the freedom to cater to their donors, rather than serve their constituents. 5/

The dual role of legislator and ombudsman, again, introduces tradeoffs that mean citizens don’t get the best legislators, in terms of vigorously representing their values and interests. And legislator is far, far more important a role than ombudsman. /fin

Constituent services speaks to power, and she had a lot of that. But constituent services is not a legislative role, it’s a weird, kind of disturbing, add on to our system. 1/

From my perspective, her values and priorities, as a legislator, were far from mine, and I don’t think representative of SF. 2/

But incumbency bias meant she faced no meaningful challenge, and a big part of that bias is why would you not want a figure so powerful as your representative, do you really want to be represented by a freshman? /fin

The problem is in the US we don’t have real political parties that stand for particular interests and values. Yes, relying on this Democratic Party would be relying on air. But this is not a functioning democracy. 1/

In a functioning democracy, political parties represent a cohesive set of interests and values, and the expertise that stands behind those interests and values lives within the party. 2/

Bernie is himself effectively a political party in the US, and yes, his long incumbency made that possible. San Francisco could elect no one but Nancy Pelosi because she too had a lot of expertise and capable staff. 3/

When power or capability attaches to seniority, voters can no longer vote their values and interests. They have to trade off the “market power” introduced by incumbency against their “representative’s” increasing deviations from constituent priorities. 4/

There’s no democratic check. You can vote yourself entirely out of power in order to perform your values, or you can vote for the incumbent. Almost always, you vote for the incumbent, who is now largely a free agent. /fin

I’m with you in the corruption concern, but securing reelection is in practice often an encouragement to corruption as is securing and exit gig, given the role of monied interests in our system. 1/

I’m not with you in the legislative expertise concern. Legislative expertise properly belongs in parties and their staff, not electeds. Relying on electeds for expertise creates a strong and pernicious incumbency bias. 2/

We end up torn between candidates who earnestly advocate for our values and interests but would lack effectiveness for lack of experience and incumbents who are less beholden to our values and interests but are more competent and effective. 3/

I oppose any role of seniority in Congressional promotion or influence for this reason. /fin