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Notes -
OK, to be super explicit:
Yes, this would be ideal if it could be accomplished on exactly the terms that you lay out.
The obvious problem (and come on folks, you're not really this dumb not to get this) is that if you empower any actual institution composed of human beings with the ability to quickly hang criminals, then control of that institution becomes a key locus of power which ends up being used, as power always does, to take spoils and entrench itself. This is such a recurring pattern in historical record as to be a meme -- oh, look, the body for public safety turning to infighting and executing its founding members -- lol.
This is especially true when building a machinery that can then be turned around when someone decide that "hate speech" is now criminal and starts sending journalists and others to jail (happening right now over the.pond) or whatever-it-is-they-are-on-about-today.
Look, I'm not actually here to preach soft on crime bullshit or to suggest that punishment should be slow or that criminals shouldn't fear the law. But things are the way they are for a very good reason. This isn't even a plausibly-useless fence! It's a fence coated in innumerable layers of blood.
Of course. This is essentially impossible to prevent. Power cannot be destroyed. And it's always absolute, however many lies it hides itself behind.
I am simply demanding that whoever holds power act as a responsible steward and punish criminals. A sovereign that doesn't have the power or inclination to do so deserves to be deposed. Which is why many a dysfunctional democracy turn to dictatorship. Not in a tragic bout of madness, but in a quite pragmatic demand for a ruler, any ruler, that will take his basic duties seriously.
If the political system of your nation is designed so as to prevent the consolidation of power to a degree that it becomes impossible to rule, then it is ripe for a coup.
Americans should know this, since this is how their constitution was instituted, in exactly this kind of a coup against the articles of confederation.
That's not quite true. Power cannot be destroyed, but the utility of power is, at some point, super-linear and so dispersal of power functions in practice to dampen and diminish it. This was figured out (at least) as early as the Roman Republic.
Moreover, power can be bound up into systems of formal ritual and circumstance that act as a similar dampener. Again, the Romans stumbled upon this, as did many other effective ruling structures. Even in absolute rule, the emperor would exercise it from a specific place and in a specific manner.
And likewise I am demanding that whoever holds power also refrains from using it against the innocent and, in particular, against threats to their political power.
These are not incompatible goals, but you're kind of glossing over the insane difficulty of it. Creating a system that punishes the guilty and not the innocent with any kind of accuracy/speed and that is resistant to corruption remains an unsolved problem. You're posting here saying "I demand they do it" doesn't actually solve anything.
Of course, within the three goals of accuracy/speed/fidelity, there is a tradeoff margin, and it's totally fair to say "they should prioritize X over Y or Z over X". But that doesn't appear (?) to be the case.
It is better to be unruled than to fall into dictatorship (or worse). I'm reminded of the last part of this book review in terms of the tradeoffs between ungovernability and ability to slip into collective psychosis.
It was "figured out" by every republican form of government and subsequently refuted every single time by circumstance. As in the case of the Roman Republic which died precisely out of a need to split power which necessarily coalesced interest onto two rival factions with no choice but escalation, ultimately leading to a winner take all struggle and a return to monarchy that neither side wanted.
It turns out however fancy your rituals are, the incentives of consolidation are simply stronger.
Republics try to pretend that they can bound power in ritual. But a keen observer of their inner workings will notice that this is a sham. In the state of exception, they act as arbitrarily and beyond the spirit of their own rules as the most temperamental of personal tyrants.
I'd like to remind everyone we personally witnessed this a few years ago.
I'm tempted to point to the obvious that this place doesn't capture the sum total of my political action.
But if you understand how power works you know that making this demand often and publicly is the only way to get a good ruler if you are not an elite yourself.
The mistreated masses cannot solve this problem. They need a counter elite to form and their best bet is therefore to loudly advertise that they will pledge undying loyalty to their would be saviour. I believe this is called "populism".
But I understand your objection is that I'm not engaging in the liberal game of making sophisticated chains for the State.
All I can really tell you is that it is a fool's errand because the nature of power escapes all such chains, that the separation of powers is a myth that has never been instantiated, that politics revolves around group coalitions, not rituals, that every single political regime ever is a totalitarianism in waiting and that you'd understand this if you had considered politics as it is instead of how it ought to be.
Freedom is not to be found in establishing lasting rules to constrain power, it is found in the cracks that exist when it has no need to consolidate itself at one's expense.
A secure ruler can be far less tyrannical than a feckless one. Consider, for instance, how the gridlock of the US parliamentary system has reemerged as vast executive power and legislation from the bench, the total opposite of the intention. Meanwhile laissez faire is a maxim coined under absolutism.
I don't mean to imply that I hate republics. They are perfectly serviceable. But their political formula is fiction, in no less true a sense as divine right is. Acting as if setting up rules will change political reality is a kind of magical thinking. As above, so below. But that's not how it works. It's the incentives and the people that matter ultimately, not the written rules.
This is simply not true and the only way you can even have this opinion is because you have never set foot in true lawlessness.
I beg you to actually visit a country that is experiencing it, as I have, and you will see what manner of horrors humanity can produce when it is left to mob rule. I hear Libya is nice at this time of year.
Not that the desirability of government is a matter of any import, since it's restoration is inevitable. Feudal rulers start out as successful bandits after all. But chaos can last for a while, and I happen to value my life and property, so the maintenance of public order is a concern.
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The problem is that what is also happening right now is rapists being let off with a slap on the wrist, so I don't quite see how being soft on crime is supposed to protect anyone from this.
I think you are conflating being soft on crime in a policy sense (e.g. some knob that increases or decreases the relative punishment) and adopting procedural guardrails (e.g. some knob that tradeoff accuracy(x)specificity).
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