Good points, Vin.

I tend to prefer a republic, myself.

However, I'm very concerned that the concept of electing wise decision makers is being undermined by the skyrocketing cost of running elections and the accompanying huge campaign contributions.

You get to the point that only those topics which are generally acceptable to the corporations (and to a lesser extent, the unions) even get to the floor. In particular, you find that issues such as abortion and the personal income tax (which have little effect on corporations) take over the debate.

That's when democratic measures like ballot initiatives become popular because they bypass the entrenched interests. Of course, then the entrenched interests spend tens of millions of dollars to defeat the initiatives.

I might also point out that in no other country are there two evenly balanced parties with no effective competition. What's worse, these two parties are becoming increasingly partisan and distrustful of each other.

That's a recipe for gridlock.

Peter