Fascinating..... Article The First

[The Village Idiot]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Article_the_First

We should have 6,000 Representatives??

Imagine no pensions, no benefits, no perks, short sessions, and an end of the power of the 2 big parties. Imagine if every neighborhood knew their representative personally.

Back to a citizen legislature.

I could dig that.

[Chris_]

A citizen legislature with part-time sessions, and no perks, as the founders intended would be a great improvement right now......but 6,000 representatives would result in chaos........

doc

[DumbAss Tanker]

Interesting, a certain parallel to the French Etats-general of the time.  Also a certain parallel to the theoretical system of 'Soviets' (Councils) in the defunct USSR which failed dismally to deliver democratic reform, but not actually by reason of the structure of nested councils from the lowest worker groups of 10 to the Supreme Soviet.

[SSG Snuggle Bunny]

Too close to parliamentary coalition building for my tastes.

I prefer the winner-take-all, moderated by filibuster, system we have here.

Although anything to hack out the careerists is always a step in the right direction.

Maybe a law that says, "Whosoever having won their third campaign to elected office shall be waterboarded for a period of time no less than 15 minutes but not to exceed 48 consequetive hours every second Tuesday of the month."

But that's just me.

[The Village Idiot]

A citizen legislature with part-time sessions, and no perks, as the founders intended would be a great improvement right now......but 6,000 representatives would result in chaos........

doc

6,000 is probably too many but its an interesting idea.

[The Village Idiot]

Too close to parliamentary coalition building for my tastes.

I prefer the winner-take-all, moderated by filibuster, system we have here.

The system would be the same, we'd just have a lot more members of the Prople's House.

[NHSparky]

The system would be the same, we'd just have a lot more members of the Prople's House.

And if the level of idiocy we currently see in the House with 435 members hurts (think Hank Johnson, for example), think of what we'd have with 6000 members.  Sorry, NH has a 400-member House, and it's a very narrow slice, in that only the retired or independently wealthy can serve, based on the fact members only get $100/year.