Presidential and Parliamentary Systems

Rishi wants to know how I can claim that the Presidential System underdelivers change, and Ritwik angrily objects to my claim that in the Parliamentary System, the Prime Minister can handpick legislators. Both of them have missed an important qualifier: popular.

Change is rare in any mature democracy. This is as it should be. Obviously, I prefer change in the direction of less government and limited powers and others may prefer otherwise, but whatever the direction of your preferred change, I think that we should be wary of a system where a Chief Executive can, on the basis of just one election, bring about fundamental and drastic change in the structure of the polity.

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Not Just Survivorship Bias

VK points out, quite correctly, that survivorship bias doesn’t completely explain our perception that things are getting worse. He is right. There are many other reasons; some have to do with perception and some with reality.

Actually, in the first place, I don’t just find the idea that home appliances have gotten worse incorrect – I find it incredible. From my point of view, it is so obvious that things have been  better in the past 15 years than they were in the 15 years before that, that I question the honesty of those who claim otherwise.

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Huh?

Ganti says

Lets give it an honest thought. Imagine a situation where gunmen/terrorists had taken a chawl in Bombay hostage instead of the Taj. What do you think would have been the nature of media coverage ?

If he is talking of the Indian media, then yes, they would have covered it almost as breathlessly as they covered the Taj and Oberoi standoffs. 

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