Never too late . Never . Welcome aboard . <| sep |> Shit , knew my mental math was out . Blame tiredness after a long day . And not the kind which has plagued this site the last 2 days or so ! My bad . <| sep |> Trump ' s narcissism is so extreme I would argue that he is quite out of touch with reality . Truly , the man is insane . <| sep |> I feel you man <| sep |> How is this conversation different from speculating over the prospect of aliens arriving to fix all our problemsThis is something that could actually work if implemented somehow vs your suggestion which is simply something that will never happen . The best means of determining what they are andor who has them would probably be a vote . Last I checked , the American people are quite divided with regard to what characteristics a leader needs to haveI personally do not think that people vote based on the characteristics of the leader . They vote for self interest on specific issues . That ' s categorically incorrect . Right now , if we don ' t like our political leaders or the choices they make , we have all kinds of recourses . We can protest , we can engage in civil disobedience , I dont see how this would be any different people could still protest and have their voice heard . But at the end of the day , the armypolice effect the changes that government put into place even with these methods of protest . Thus it really is the same . Your oligarchy only functions if we have unwavering faith and trust in the oligarchsThere is always the possibility of any oligarchy refusing to give up power . Again with just a rudimentary idea in place and no specifics set , I am not positive how the checks would be in place to limit this possibility . Regardless , it will always be a possibility which is a valid point . However , I think the way that the current government system makes decisions results in what I would call uninformed decisions . The politicians do not fully understand the issues or their long term implications . Furthermore , their decisions are based on what will get them votes again when they are up for reelection not what they think is actually right . Thus decisions are partially based on what the American public thinks which is even scarier simply because the majority of the public has no idea what the implications are from any given action not because they are not capable , simply because they do not put the time in to figure it out and research effectively . Therefore I personally believe that the risk from the oligarchy potentially keeping power is worth it so that we can start making truly informed decisions with the good of the people in general in mind rather the good of any one individual . Things like whether or not climate change exists and needs to be addressed should NOT have any discussion with the amount of research behind it . Instead the discussion should be how are we going to go about fixing it . But the current system produces stagnancy and politics that stops any form of progress towards an extremely significant issue . why would you bother retaining any semblance of democracyYou are probably right just eliminate the idea of the vote and try to put other types of checks in placeI very directly addressed this point . Money doesn ' t buy votes in almost any caseExactly . Money doesn ' t buy votes . But politicians are willing to align their values to what will get them votes . This is an issue as the voting public votes in terms of self interest . They do not look at the big picture . They avoid the long term implications of many decisions . Thus this is a bad thing as it perpetuates further uninformed decision making . It is a form of corruption . Politicians are willing to change their views and what they decide on to align with something else . Your examples of lobbying with money literally have nothing to do with what I am saying .