He was a good writer and a solid philosopher. Less focused than Clarke or Asimov, less wacky than Dick, and less manipulative than Hubbard. He presented ideas in a clear way.
DagwoodIII@piefed.social 18 hours ago
Robert A. Heinlein like to throw out different ideas to improve politics.
Two of my favorites. “Starship Troopers.” In order to vote you have to do two years of service. In the book it’s explicitly stated that most people are physically/mentally unsuited for actual combat and that they spend their time cleaning streets while being harassed by tough bosses. If a blind person in a wheelchair wants to serve they’ll find them a job commensurate with their abilities.
In “Double Star” all representatives are elected by self identified groups. Instead of representing New York or London, they represent ‘farmers’ or ‘small business owners’ or ‘gamers’ or whatever group has enough members to qualify. And the same way you can move from California to Idaho you can change your group.
Endymion_Mallorn@kbin.melroy.org 17 hours ago
DagwoodIII@piefed.social 17 hours ago
Allow me to introduce you to Ross Thomas.
He was a WW2 veteran who became a Washington political reporter. His crime novels always have an interesting political slant.
“The Porkchoppers” is about a Nixon era Union election. Giant cast of characters and slime by the tankerload.
“The Fool’s In Town Are On Our Side” is about an ex-CIA agent’s sttempts to clean up a small Southern city by making it ‘so corrupt even the pimps will vote for reform.”
SubArcticTundra@lemmy.ml 14 hours ago
some countries already have the second one, they’re called non-geographical constituencies
DagwoodIII@piefed.social 13 hours ago
Could you provide some examples?
I tried a search but couldn’t figure out how to filter all the information into a usable form.
SubArcticTundra@lemmy.ml 9 hours ago
The Hong Kong LegCo had some back when it was still democratic
en.wikipedia.org/…/Legislative_Council_of_Hong_Ko…
Also, the City of London (the small historical core of London which is politically independent from the greater London aglomeration) still retains its ancient voting arrangememt, and lets local businesses vote
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/City_of_London_Corporation#…
Conveniently, much of the London global financial hub falls within its perimiter.
mech@feddit.org 17 hours ago
The second one just describes political parties, in countries with voting systems that don’t enforce 2 camps.
Janx@piefed.social 18 hours ago
I wasn’t familiar with either, and I now love them too. However, you think you’ll be horribly executed and shunned for them!? I doubt we’ll see a more popular idea in this post…
DagwoodIII@piefed.social 17 hours ago
A lot of people here will hate on Heinlein for being a fascist.
He went to Annapolis and was strongly promilitary and anti-Stalinist.
He also had some of the first trans characters in science fiction. [ “…All You Zombies” and “I Will Fear No Evil."]
Endymion_Mallorn@kbin.melroy.org 5 hours ago
"... All You Zombies" is really about his connection to his dead sister.
wildncrazyguy138@fedia.io 18 hours ago
We have the second one already, we just call it lobbying.
mech@feddit.org 17 hours ago
In Europe, we call them “political parties”.
Germany has a party for punks, one for satire, one for senior citizens, one for animal rights, one for vegans, one for people of Sorbian origin, etc.