[extropy-chat] If the nonUS citizens voted in Nov 2 elections...

[Eliezer Yudkowsky]

Brian Lee wrote:
> I think one of the important priciples of democracy is that only members 
> of a given set vote as they have a vested interest. It's rather foolish 
> to allow non-citizens to vote as their concerns are unlikely to coincide 
> with the concerns of the society holding the vote.
> 
> We'd get all sorts of wackiness like landslide elections that 
> redistribute all wealth away from US/Europe into poorer countries, etc.
> 
> BAL

Would it be so terribly dreadful if the rest of the planet got 10 seats in 
the House of Representatives?  It might go a long, long way toward easing 
anti-American resentment, and maybe even bringing a faint tinge of sanity 
to this country's foreign policy.  I think at least 30% of the hatred out 
there is due to America's - no, Dubya's, let's give credit where it's due - 
way of appearing to just *completely not care* what the rest of the world 
thinks.

-- 
Eliezer S. Yudkowsky                          http://singinst.org/
Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence