Re: [WDDM] Democracy axioms

[Joshua N Pritikin <jpritikin(at)pobox.com>]

On Fri, Aug 13, 2010 at 05:20:43PM +0200, Jiri Polak wrote:
> Concerning "practically possible", we mean that some oligarchies
> raise obstacles that make referenda possible in theory, but not in
> practice. (too many signatures required, too short periods etc.).

Right

> Qualification by public opinion is in fact included in the term
> "legally possible" We wanted to make the text as concise as  seemed
> adequate.

I attended the 2010 Global Forum in San Francisco. NI4D sent a video
team there. We did a lot of 1-on-1 interviews. I asked many people about
"qualification by public opinion poll". You would think that among this
pool of people, many would be familiar with the idea and be in favor,
especially since we spent at least a whole day discussing problems with
gathering signature petitions. I was surprised that only John Matsusaka
and Paul Jacobs were unambiguously optimistic about the idea. Everybody
else was either skeptical or confused as if they had never considered
the possibility of qualification by public opinion poll. Therefore, I
suggest adding something like "initiatives may be qualified by public
opinion poll". I understand you want to be concise, but omitting this
might tend to exclude it from consideration.