I think the best thing is to cultivate some perspective, and not hold the political system to unrealistically high standards.
We live in a 236 year old democracy of 310 million people. Let that sink in. We have more people than there are lines of code in an entire Linux distribution. Think of the complexity of a human being, over a human being's lifetime, versus a line of code. We're an incredibly heterogeneous, diverse country that has never agreed on anything, not even on our founding documents.* We are, by virtue of our post-WWII status, the de-facto political and military leader of the world. We're the world's largest economy. We're the world's reserve currency. We have all of the responsibility that comes with that status.
We do not blink twice when we hear of a company like Yahoo (14,000 employees) or Nortel (86,000 employees at peak) becoming unmanageable basket cases. Yet we rail on the President for not getting more done than he does! We forgive Windows for being layers upon tangled layers of bug-for-bug compatible code, but complain endlessly about the complexity of a tax code designed to regulate 300m people acting together in a $15 trillion economy.
I am of the opinion that too many people, especially engineers who maybe have a particular love of simplicity, simply expect too much of the country they live in, and as a result become disillusioned with the whole system.
It is my opinion that these expectations are unreasonable and counter productive. The fact of the matter is that the US government is a paragon of virtue and efficiency compared to most others. Some of the western European countries may have better governments, but they also have far simpler and more homogenous societies to govern. We certainly have a better government than most any country in Asia. China, which has no particular love of anything American, has spent the last couple of decades trying to model their legal system after America's. Think about that: something that most Americans consider to be a broken part of our society, is a model for a country looking to cement it's place among the world's great societies.
So if you're frustrated by the system, take a step back and appreciate the fact that it probably doesn't get any better than it is now. As I've gotten older and this realization has sunk in, I have found politics far more enjoyable.
*) The more you learn about the Constitution, the more you realize it's ridiculous to ask "what does the Constitution mean?" The 40 signatories to the Constitution had 40 different opinions about the meaning of the document they were signing!
The more you learn about the Constitution, the more you realize it's ridiculous to ask "what does the Constitution mean?" The 40 signatories to the Constitution had 40 different opinions about the meaning of the document they were signing!
And yet, it is the oldest working constitution that still grants rights to its citizens rarely found elsewhere. It has provided for our prosperity for over two centuries. Whatever it means, it means well.
Absolutely. Scandinavia is often held up as an example of a set of ideal democratic states. After a friend moved there, I start poking around for details and the first thing I found was a mild warning that they were xenophobic. Visiting Sweden was the first time I had ever felt visible because of my race. It's not that they're racist (they're not); it's just that they're more homogenous so differences become quickly obvious.
> appreciate the fact that it probably doesn't get any better than it is now
I can't agree with this line, but mainly because you're talking about the future. I agree that it probably couldn't be better than it is now, but we can certainly improve it.
> The more you learn about the Constitution, the more you realize it's ridiculous to ask "what does the Constitution mean?" The 40 signatories to the Constitution had 40 different opinions about the meaning of the document they were signing!
There's an entire branch of government dedicated to answering that question on a daily basis, too. Established by the very thing they're interpreting. How's that for meta?
> I can't agree with this line, but mainly because you're talking about the future. I agree that it probably couldn't be better than it is now, but we can certainly improve it.
Oh, I'm not saying you can't improve it, even in the present. What I mean is "better" in a fundamentally different way. E.g. within the constraints of our existing society, you're always going to have partisanship, etc.
We live in a 236 year old democracy of 310 million people. Let that sink in. We have more people than there are lines of code in an entire Linux distribution. Think of the complexity of a human being, over a human being's lifetime, versus a line of code. We're an incredibly heterogeneous, diverse country that has never agreed on anything, not even on our founding documents.* We are, by virtue of our post-WWII status, the de-facto political and military leader of the world. We're the world's largest economy. We're the world's reserve currency. We have all of the responsibility that comes with that status.
We do not blink twice when we hear of a company like Yahoo (14,000 employees) or Nortel (86,000 employees at peak) becoming unmanageable basket cases. Yet we rail on the President for not getting more done than he does! We forgive Windows for being layers upon tangled layers of bug-for-bug compatible code, but complain endlessly about the complexity of a tax code designed to regulate 300m people acting together in a $15 trillion economy.
I am of the opinion that too many people, especially engineers who maybe have a particular love of simplicity, simply expect too much of the country they live in, and as a result become disillusioned with the whole system.
It is my opinion that these expectations are unreasonable and counter productive. The fact of the matter is that the US government is a paragon of virtue and efficiency compared to most others. Some of the western European countries may have better governments, but they also have far simpler and more homogenous societies to govern. We certainly have a better government than most any country in Asia. China, which has no particular love of anything American, has spent the last couple of decades trying to model their legal system after America's. Think about that: something that most Americans consider to be a broken part of our society, is a model for a country looking to cement it's place among the world's great societies.
So if you're frustrated by the system, take a step back and appreciate the fact that it probably doesn't get any better than it is now. As I've gotten older and this realization has sunk in, I have found politics far more enjoyable.
*) The more you learn about the Constitution, the more you realize it's ridiculous to ask "what does the Constitution mean?" The 40 signatories to the Constitution had 40 different opinions about the meaning of the document they were signing!