&gt; When math says it&#x27;s impossible for your representative to represent you...<p>That&#x27;s not at <i>all</i> what I said, and it&#x27;s a <i>dramatic</i> misinterpretation of my words. There are <i>substantially</i> better mechanisms available to us to figure out what people <i>want</i> and what they <i>need</i> than for a decision maker to ask them, one-on-one.<p>From what I understand, there&#x27;s a whole <i>raft</i> of <i>really</i> good, <i>reproducible</i> research on how to tease out what people mean from what they <i>say</i>; people are <i>surprisingly</i> bad at both knowing what they want, and -even if they <i>do</i> happen to know- surprisingly bad at expressing that information coherently. It&#x27;s <i>trivial</i> to structure queries in such a way to give different answers to what is effectively the same question. [0]<p>&gt; ...perhaps at that point we realize that the system has reached the end of its shelf life.<p>This is narrow-minded. Based on this comment, you appear to be proposing that we <i>dramatically</i> increase the number of Federal representatives per citizen. [1] Go pick a country that you think is well run at the highest levels. Go look at their representative to constituent ratios. If they&#x27;re like 10x or 100x greater than the US&#x27;s ratios, [4] then you might have a point. If they&#x27;re only 2x or 5x greater, you <i>probably</i> don&#x27;t.<p>[0] A researcher wishes to discover what Presidential candidate a given person <i>intends</i> to vote for. He asks them &quot;What Presidential candidate do you intend to vote for?&quot;. Most of the time, the answer to <i>that</i> question does not match what candidate that person <i>actually</i> votes for. The question to ask to get that information -most of the time- is <i>actually</i> &quot;What Presidential candidate do you expect that <i>most people</i> will vote for?&quot;. Polling is <i>full</i> of crazy pitfalls like this!<p>[1] The other possible interpretation is either advocacy of voluntary expatriation of people who disagree with their Congressional representatives [2], or dismantlement of the Federal government. [3]<p>[2] Okay, sure. You do have the trouble of both finding a country that&#x27;s governed in a way that you agree with, <i>and</i> will accept you as an immigrant, though.<p>[3] Ha. See the rest of the paragraph to which footnote #1 is attached.<p>[4] I&#x27;m fairly sure that&#x27;s in the right direction. Again, I&#x27;m sick, sorry if my math is off.