A close look at the political system here in the U.S. exposes many significant ways in which policy is protected from voter intent: Electoral college, gerrymandered districting, a first-past-the-post system that is hostile to third parties (the main parties control the national debate process, for example). It is indeed possible for a policy to be widely popular with the voting public, but NOT on the ballot in any meaningful way. This is without even dipping into the fear-mongering toward more egalitarian policies in healthcare, taxation, workers rights, etc.
Yes, but can you make the defence of the converse?
Suppose that (democratic) minorities need a little extra weight -- then you'd need an electoral college?
Suppose the 'dripping fear-mongering' is a dislocation of a certain other emotion: discontent, pershaps? disagreement?
Suppose you make a defence that the situation is indeed a healthy one. What would you say then?
I am not saying it is -- but to get beyond this ideological analysis we need to engage with, say, 'the horror of the health of policitics' -- that the thing we most dispise may well be a symptom of what we, ourselves, prescribe
