How can the UK call itself a democracy when half its Parliament is unelected rich people?

Because the "unelected rich" cannot stop laws, only delay them. if the elected chamber wants a law passed, it gets passed. There's the answer.

It's a parliamentary democracy with a constitutional monarchy.

Find a google and use it.

You need to state your definition of a democracy. Then there can be a discussion. A lack of knowledge is not a sufficient point to question anything.

UK is becoming the new Alabama

[quote] Because the "unelected rich" cannot stop laws, only delay them.

Why should the unelected rich have any power at all in a democracy?

The UK is all about the class system.

[quote] It's a parliamentary democracy with a constitutional monarchy.

Just another way of saying, :We are dying to be known as a democracy but we have these vestiges of when we had nobility that we refuse to get rid of"

Their first-past-the-post electoral system is way more problematic than the House of Lords, which is pretty toothless anyway.

No. Not vestiges, r7, the Queen is head of state of the UK and 16 other countries.

R5: They don't. That's what I'm saying. They can delay a bill for a year, but after that, if the House of Commons want it into law, it goes into law. Got it?

The House of Lords is no longer made up of rich people there by right of birth. The Lords is now made up of political appointees, some are rich donors but others are former members of the commons. In a way it is worse, at least the nobility had an allegiance to noblesse oblige which gave them some concern about the public, the current members have no allegiance except to themselves and the parties that appoint them.

America's not a democracy either. We're a democratic republic

R12: Shut up. We're a representative democracy. Republic means you don't have a monarch. I don't care what republic used to mean, that's what it means in 2019.

Looks like I found the thread with all the smart people!

I agree OP im British and the future looks dire. The last 10 years since Cameron was elected have been a disaster. Vuts to many public services, not least the NHS which is on its knees belueve me. Now with the old bag Theresa gone we will probably get Johnson, no telling what damage that egomaniacal megalomaniac will do. It's just desperate over here.

And yet you can have an unelected president, strange?

What r16 said. Americas president is selected by these random electors who can supercede the will of the voters.

People in glass houses and stones and all that.

R17 They are not random electors. When you vote for president, you are actually electing the electors chosen by that candidate in that state. There has never been an election where the electors, superseded the will of the people. There have been faithless electors, but they have never changed the outcome of the election. I assume you are talking about a President losing the national popular vote and yet losing the electoral college. However, that is a childish view of our Presidential elections. We do not really have a national Presidential election, but 51 separate elections, held on the same day.

The USA isn't a democracy either OP. It's representational Republic.

True democracy would be exhausting.

If the US got rid of its electoral college, it would be much closer to a true democracy.

What's the point of the House of Lords if it apparently has little power? Why do Brits continue to pay taxes to keep that part of government afloat?

[quote] There has never been an election where the electors, superseded the will of the people.

If the will of the people means the majority of votes, this has happened twice in recent years: Gore and Hillary

[quote] We do not really have a national Presidential election, but 51 separate elections, held on the same day.

What idiots came up with that system?

R22 The electors are not supposed to represent the views or will of the nation as a whole, but the will of the people they represent. So they vote the will of the people of their state. I don't care what anyone says it is a great system that ensures that a President has to have a wide base of support, instead of just running up huge margins in a few over populated areas.

Because frankly they've been the only vaguely competent part of Parliament over the last 5 years.

[quote] The electors are not supposed to represent the views or will of the nation as a whole, but the will of the people they represent. So they vote the will of the people of their state. I don't care what anyone says it is a great system that ensures that a President has to have a wide base of support, instead of just running up huge margins in a few over populated areas.

Overpopulated means people live there. Yes, people who are being governed. Why should their votes count less just because they live in a major city?

r24 40% of the people who like Trump vs. 60% of the people who despise him is NOT a wide base of support. The American system was born out of a very dirty compromise - which was that the Southern states and the smaller states of the Northeast would not ratify the constitution unless they felt that they would get sufficient representation in Congress. One would think that that having 2 senators would be enough (since a state with 30 million people gets 2 Senators and a state with 600,000 people gets 2 senators). However, they also insisted on this electoral college nonsense, which has fucked us over TWICE in the past 20 years. One thing that everyone should ponder. The House of Representatives got 9.7 million MORE VOTES than republicans in 2018 and yet ONLY got 40 more seats. 8.7% more votes than Republicans, one of the largest spreads in history. Why didn't they get more seats? Because so many states are so severely gerrymandered that in many districts the Democratic candidates were getting 80% of the votes or more. Whereas in many districts won by Republicans, the vote split was more like 55% to 45% or even closer.

The defects in our system - A. Long electoral periods, with huge unregulated infusions of money from corporations and PACS. B. Extreme gerrymandering C. The electoral college system D. The limitation of the House of Representatives to 435 members, E. Giving the Senate too much power in certain scenarios. It is a far LESS representative body than the House of Representatives and yet is actually has been exerting more power - over budgets, over oversight, over judicial appointments - than it was ever intended to.

R27 I was talking about a geographically wide base of support.

At least the UK appoints the rich to their legislative branch in an open manner, whereas the US works with the 1% to pass laws in secret.

The American Legislative Exchange Council became the nation’s best-known "model"-bill factory over its four decades by providing more than fill-in-the-blank legislation.

The industry-sponsored group has weathered controversy and flourished because it also offers conservative Republican elected officials a social network, access to campaign donors and a blueprint for how to accelerate their political careers.

The electoral college is not a great system. What it does is ensure that every state that isn't a swing state is ignored in the general election. It allows for a candidate with less support to win. It shouldn't matter where the votes come from, because every vote should count the same. But the electoral college doesnt allow for that. Instead, less populated states are given a disproportionate number of electoral votes. Wyoming has more electoral votes per person than Texas. That's not fair.

R27 I will never understand people who think geography matters more than persons. If one candidate has more geographical support and the other more votes, the person with more votes should win.

R27, menluvinguy, I agree with you. Is there a candidate in the 2020 presidential race who you feel with fix any/some/many of the disparities you outline?