Elections are fine. We the people get to choose who leads the country, city, county, school board and so on. And yet many of us don't like where we end up. The country is going in the wrong direction say some. Complaints about the city, county or other organization or entity that is run by an elected body are ever present.
The situation is complex. People vote for a candidate but ultimately may be unhappy with some of that person's actions once they are in office. These actions can sometimes have life changing or even devastating effects on others. Therefore, they have a right to be upset.
Let's say that a person is elected and does something that the public does not like. The only real remedy that can come from the people is to vote in the next election. And if in that next election, the options are such that the other choices are worse. And so, an elected person can potentially see no consequences as a result of his undesirable act.
Would you throw out your congressional representative if the alternative was much worse? Of course not. A congress person in a safe district can therefore do whatever he pleases. He does not really have to represent his constituents at all.
What would be interesting is having some means to punish elected people while they are in office without having to vote them out. I'm not sure how it would work. But I would like to see a way to pressure them while in office. And this feedback mechanism should be solely voter initiated. If you are or have been elected to something, then you cannot participate.
Perhaps the repercussion is to fine them the way the NFL fines players after the fact for various transgressions. And the money would go to a charity.
This way, when elections come along, we can focus on ideas for moving forward knowing that said person running for office had already paid for debt back to his voters.
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