Quote Originally Posted by Idaho View Post
The significant element of a democracy is that the public are consulted. If you exclude significant parts of that public, it ceases to be legitimate consultation. The existence of some old lady with the job of rubber stamping laws makes no significant difference to this. Consultation of the public is key.
Surely there's more to it than that - when the consultation is choosing one pre-selected person from a list where generally 3 or less have a hope and run on a "manifesto" which neither the individual nor the party they represent have to follow in the slightest, and there are even people called "Whips" to coerce party members to vote the "right" way; independents can of course stand, but the system is basically designed that party backing is required and to get a winnable seat requires doing what the party wants, not the populace. Parties never have more than one option in a given area, and rarely replace the current candidate, rendering this a weird permanent job with a 5 year farce.

Only in the last few years was there any way to recall any politician by the people - and even now this is extremely difficult to do, and viewed with horror by politicians.

And this is apparently the populace being "consulted"...? Well, yes, if only to exclude them from any meaningful choice as far as humanly possible.