On 5/11/2012 6:32 PM, Larry Jaques wrote:
On Fri, 11 May 2012 12:42:33 -0500, Leonlcb11211@swbelldotnet
wrote:

On 5/11/2012 12:24 PM, Just Wondering wrote:
On 5/11/2012 5:42 AM, dadiOH wrote:
Leon wrote:
On 5/10/2012 9:14 AM, Han wrote:
Someone said we should go back to administration as was done in
ancient Athens (I didn't look up the details). The names of all
vote-eligible citizens would be put into a pot and someone would
blindly draw names to be assigned administrative jobs. A new
lottery would be done every so often, so there wouldn't be
entrenched administrators. The only criterion was that they had to
work for the benefit of Athens. The US is too averse of
professional administrators for fear of corruption, but corruption
by congress is allowed almost unfettered, alas. Something needs to
be done so the people will benefit eventually.
I once mentioned to my son that there should be a lottery and or a
requirement that government officials are not elected rather they are
randomly chosen. Not totally unlike jury duty.
I've been advocating the "ransomly drawn" idea for years. When I lived in
Hawaii I knew many of the legislators, bounced the idea off them. To a
man,
they thought it was a rotten idea which confirms my belief that it is
a good
one.

That might be OK if the random drawing picked, say, Cliff Huxtable. But
would you want a legislature full of Archie Bunkers?
Then it would not be random would it. And as far as I am concerned we
have worse than Archie Bunker now, Archie Bunker would be an improvement.
I'd bet a crazy, drunken, homeless man would do less damage to our
country (and more good) than some of the existing demigods posing as
CONgresscritters today.

And I'd bet a crazy, drunken, homeless man would be more susceptible to
lobbying and influence peddling than the worst sitting Congressman you
can presently name. Putting such a person in Congress would just be
handing his vote over to those influence peddlers.