Reply #10: Hey, that's what the Founding Fathers thought too [View All]

Which is why they constructed a government via the Constitution in which massive attempts at abuses and breaking/disabling it were assumed to be standard behavior. (After all, just about all of them served in colonial legislatures and as governors of colonies and such.) That's why they had representatives elected in everywhere, not 'direct' democracy. It used to be that Senators were appointed by state legislatures, and the Electoral College is the most prominent obvious piece of the system.

It's not that they didn't believe in progress, it's that they knew how politically bloody it is if/when not physically violent, and how slow the net rate of it is. They didn't think highly of their fellow citizens as political creatures, but did believe that the average voter did assess the minimum necessary to live by fairly accurately. So this system is always too slow, never comfortable. But what it settles, it settles for all time, and due to the high cost seems to get it right- ultimately.