Congress can't pass a law unless the House and Senate agree. Even if one party has a majority in both houses of Congress, minority party can still stop any law if they have at least 41 Senators. And even if a party has a majority in the House and a super-majority in the Senate, President can still veto a bill. Basically, unless both parties agree on compromise, nothing gets done in the USA. We've been seeing this over the last few years, and its HORRIBLE!!! what's the solution: Parliamentary democracy. Winning party has to form a majority coalition, which will vote for all bills. If a bill cannot be passed, that means the majority coalition has failed, and new elections can be held to make a BETTER majority that can get (*)(*)(*)(*) done. Is this what we need?
I wold support a US parliament (but we would need like 5K members to keep up with the UK's level of representation)
This viewpoint sounds interesting for an Italian, since Italy sees a parliamentary system like you describe [Italy is a "parliamentary Republic" while US are a "presidential Republic"]. The chief of the executive is not elected directly by the electorate, but we have adopted the British tradition [UK is a "parliamentary Monarchy"] to leave to the party with the majority to chose the premier [and usually it's the secretary of the party to become Prime Minister]. The coalitions indicate to the electorate who are their candidates to govern before of the elections. As you had said, in Italy, if the majority fails the parliament can vote "the trust" to the government, if the parliament takes the trust off of the government, the government falls and elections are near. But pay attention that in a parliamentary democracy elections are not automatic, there could be the case [in Italy this happens and not rarely] that the parliament substitutes a government without a new general election.
In Australia we have a federal parliamentary democracy. There are two houses of parliament, the representatives(lower house) & the senate(upper house). The representatives elect the prime minister & drafts laws & the senate acts as a house of review in theory. In practice if one side of politics has control of both houses the senate tends to act as a rubber stamp. If the electorate gives control of the lower house to one side & the senate to the other often very little can get through. If true independent parties gain control of the senate or there is a split on an issue within the ruling party then the senate can act as a house of review & impose checks & balances on the government. For Australia our system of government does more good than harm but for a country as powerful as the US you might be better off finding ways to make the system you already have work better. Freddy.
This is how we would to modify our system in Italy. Our Constitution has built an institutional system which is quite "slow" and which tends to delay legislation: it's a "perfect parliamentary system", that is to say the two chambers [Chamber and Senate] have both to approve a law [and without modifications] to promulgate it. If one of the chambers changes something in the draft ... it has to go back to the other chamber to be voted again. In theory this process could even be without end!
Works that way in Australia to except that if the same bill gets rejected twice by the senate within a single term of government the the government of the day has the right to call a double dissolution election. In a double dissolution election both houses stand for election at the same time & the term of office for the senate is aligned with that of the representatives so that all new legislators can all take their seats at the same time. After being sworn in if the government now has control of the senate it can then get it's bills passed the normal way but if it still does not have control of the senate the government can then hold a joint sitting of both houses with a single vote of all legislators & get the bills passed. The proviso with the double dissolution election is that the electorate has the power to throw the government out or leave it with such a small majority that a joint sitting won't work. The government also can also hold a referendom but they tend not to be passed unless supported by both sides of politics here. Freddy.
Parliamentary democracy is great if there're only two big parties. In this case that which wins election governs until next election. If there're more than two big parties, major party could don't have majority in the Parliament. Sometimes two minor party can govern without win election because they have majority in the Parliament together. Even worse, a very minor party can hold the balance of power and rules administration. You imagine an election wherein two bigger parties have both 49% and smaller party has 2%. Smaller party decides who wins election! We often have these problem in Italy. Someone often propose to became a Presidential democracy like France. It's the same old story: no one is happy with what he has
We miss that mechanism about the dissolution of the chambers. Anyway it has often happened that the parliament hasn't reached its natural end, in many legislatures to say all. - - - Updated - - - Well, it seems that Renzi is accelerating also about reforms ... let's see if this is the right time to do something for real!
The best thing about the Westminster parliament model is that the head of state has to be in the legislature and defend their policies -- not in a white house ... which can easily become a detached ivory tower.
while DC is certainly frustrating I don't see a parliamentary system changing that. Our populace is very divided and congress represents the status of our people very well...unfortunately.
Yeah, but I think he want to remain with a Parliamentary democracy, only faster to make law thanks to Chamber stronger than Senate. It would be funny if he want a Presidential democracy, it always was an idea from conservative right (National Alliance) or extreme-right (Italian Social Movement*) * yes, my American friends, it was an extreme-right party and it had "social" in his name... it's a long story
Eh, there is a curious difference between "social" and "socialist" in our political history ... overall considering that Mussolini was a Socialist leader! [Even director of the newspaper of the party ...].
I live in a Parliamentary democracy and it is not at all any better. The MPs are effectively coerced into voting in favor of the leadership's bills. What I like about the US's system is precisely that representatives can (and do, regularly) vote against their party's interests. We are not used to that. Of course, the benefit of the parliamentary system is that it's majoritarian: the executive obtains near-absolute power. That provides a fair bit of stability, and prevents the government from being stalled through disagreement. But this is not at all worth the cost. Any day of the week I'd take the variety of opinion offered by the Presidental system over the stability of the Parliamentary one. Especially when the stability is so fragile - just look at Australia! We had 4 PMs within 3 years because of all the infighting. [hr][/hr] There are problems with the US system. Those problems stem from the Constitutional Convention and the 17th amendment. A confederate system of government is preferable. Absolute sovereignty should be present at the most local level possible, and those sovereign bodies should voluntarily come together to form a compact for the common defense. ie: blame Madison and Hamilton.
Members of the House rarely ever vote against the Party. They have a rule called the Hastert Rule, saying that unless a bill has the support of the majority of the ruling party, it will not come up for a vote. The House Speaker does infrequently allow such a bill to come for a vote if he thinks it will pass with help from the minority party, but this is rare.
The question is what do you want here? As designed, the people house, the House of Representatives needs only a simple majority and can pass any knee jerk type of legislation it wants or those in charge of the House wants. The Senate was designed to slow things down and represent the states. Although now having senators elected instead of appointed by the state legislatures make them more represented of the political parties than the states. The idea was you can take an extreme piece of legislation and by compromise tone it down so it can pass with deliberations and debate. A bit of compromise by the majority party can usually break any filibuster. The problem today is both parties have dug in their heels, making the senate my way or the highway type institution. Both parties view compromise as a four letter word. We did not have this problem when we had adult leaders in the senate instead of party first hacks. We didn't have the problems with the senate we do today when Byrd and Baker were the leaders, when Mitchell and Dole lead their parties in the senate or even when Daschel and Lott were the leaders. Todays problems boil down the political party loyalty and polarization over the last 10-15 years.
The House and Senate regularly conflict. Often, a lack of support within the party in the legislature results in the executive's favored policies being moderated or rejected - the ACA is an obvious example. You were the one saying that the Presidential system leads to gridlock. I'm saying that's a positive rather than a negative.
Long story short, Mussolini was deposed and arrested in 1943, Hitler broke him out and they established the Italian Social Republic which survived until the Nazis pulled out. The Italian Social Movement derived its name from the ISR.
Gridlock isn't positive. You're just hoping that the negative of gridlock is a counter to the negative of other factors. There are parliamentary features that I do like. For one, it allows for more than two parties - something our own system can not sustain. For another, I don't see much that is constructive about our presidential nomination and campaign methodology.
That's correct, but I intend to say that European far-right is different from Anglo-Saxon far-right. Anglo-Saxon far-right like Tea Party or UKIP support free trade, lowing taxes, reducing State interventionism. European far-right is a kind of socialism with a national view (and not international like communism)
No, the chances are very high that he wouldn't have been prime minister in the first place. It's unlikely that the party bosses would have selected him. It's far more likely that we would have had Reid or Pelosi.
gridlock is WONDERFUL .The less Congress does, the better off we all are. if we have a Republican majority in Congress, vote for a democratic prez(and vice versa)
