this post was submitted on 09 Dec 2023
480 points (97.4% liked)

Technology

59366 readers
4779 users here now

This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.


Our Rules


  1. Follow the lemmy.world rules.
  2. Only tech related content.
  3. Be excellent to each another!
  4. Mod approved content bots can post up to 10 articles per day.
  5. Threads asking for personal tech support may be deleted.
  6. Politics threads may be removed.
  7. No memes allowed as posts, OK to post as comments.
  8. Only approved bots from the list below, to ask if your bot can be added please contact us.
  9. Check for duplicates before posting, duplicates may be removed

Approved Bots


founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[โ€“] piecat 7 points 11 months ago (1 children)

"checks and balances" theoretically protects us from tyranny.

Also allows cronies to protect their own interests by blocking any proposed changes.

[โ€“] [email protected] 5 points 11 months ago

Yes and no. Yes, normally you do have a series of institutions overseeing different parts of the government and making sure it acts within the laws but in USA this system is simply broken. In normal countries constitution is the ultimate guarantee and the judiciary 'check's if laws are in accordance with it. The judiciary functions as a independent branch with judges being selected by other judges to the most important roles. In USA supreme court judges are directly selected by the president which totally invalidates the entire system. At the same time, in every other country, it's assumed that party with the majority in the parliament simply has the mandate to govern and (surprise) does govern. They use this majority to do reforms and pass laws. In USA not only the system is designed in a way that does not let the party with majority support actually control the government (electoral college, the senate, election cycle), they also came up with fictional mechanisms to further weaken the ruling party (filibuster). As a result the 'checks and balances' make sure that no true reforms are possible while weakening the judicial oversight and constitutional rights. Worst system you could think of.