Take a look at http://www.zope.org/ for an example of what can be done with Python. Zope is a good example of a large scale project done it Python. Python makes it easy to develop large, distributed application projects on the Web. A paper titled "What's wrong with Perl describes some of the flaws of Perl which will eventually cause it to loose out to Python. http://www.stud.ifi.uio.no/~lmariusg/download/arti kler/perl.html
Calling the complexity of Perl a powerful feature that makes it better than Python is like calling a gasoline engine superior to a Jet engine because it has more parts. Tools are best applied based on how well the perform a function. Perl's initial advantage was the great regular expression capabilities it supported. This capability was added to python in the re module. Some may say the Python implementation is better because an expression is a first class object in Python.
The U.S. is not a pure democracy because the leaders who wrote theConstitution feared the tyranny of the majority even more than they feared King George.
The original laws governing who could vote in the U.S. effectively limited voting to a group of "respectable wealthy white males". They wanted to limit who had a say in running the new country to conservative land owners who had a vested interest in establishing a stable government. Knowing who would have a vote may have resulted in some ommisions in the Constitution. For instance, there were few limits on government spending in the Constitution because the group that would be voting was the same group that would be financing the operation of the country and they were a frugal bunch. Had they imagined a future in which anyone-breathing-can-vote they would certainly have limited laws governing taxation and spending since the absence of such laws would allow the majority (poor) to pass laws to take the money of the minority (wealthy).
The limitations on who could vote also tended to also limit the voting to people who were relatively informed on who was running and what their politics were. The character of the voting population has certainly changed over the last 200+ years. Today any uniformed and ignorant person who is of voting age has as much power at the polls as a person who has carefully researched and understands the issues and the candidates.
Voter turnout is currently reduced because of the need to register. The need to visit a polling place also provides a barrier to marginally interested voters. Reducing the barriers and increasing turnout will not improve the election results if the added voters are randomly selecting candidates based on which candidate had the best commercial on television.
The Internet could provide the opportunity to improve the process of selecting a candidate, but not if it simply makes it easier to cast a vote. If voting on the Internet were to be made possible I would hope it also required a competency test prior before voting. A simple test of 10 questions per candidate would be required. Only those who could score an 80% on a test would have their votes count. There would be no time limits on taking the test and you could take the test over again if you failed but each time the test is given it would have new questions.
Before someone starts flaming the message as being unfair please remember everyone as an equal opportunity to learn about all the candidates. The goal of requiring a test is to have well informed voters, it is not to restrict voting. In fact, the ballot test could include links to all the online documentation about each candidate. The only requirement this test would have is that someone would have to make an effort to learn a little about ALL the candidates on the ballot. Doesn't it seem that knowing the candidates is much more important than being of a certain age or having registered in time for the election?
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Take a look at http://www.zope.org/ for an examplei kler/perl.html
of what can be done with Python. Zope is a good example of a large scale project done it Python.
Python makes it easy to develop large, distributed
application projects on the Web. A paper titled
"What's wrong with Perl describes some of the flaws of Perl which will eventually cause it to
loose out to Python. http://www.stud.ifi.uio.no/~lmariusg/download/art
Calling the complexity of Perl a powerful feature
that makes it better than Python is like calling
a gasoline engine superior to a Jet engine because
it has more parts. Tools are best applied based
on how well the perform a function. Perl's initial advantage was the great regular expression capabilities it supported. This capability was
added to python in the re module. Some may say
the Python implementation is better because an
expression is a first class object in Python.
The original laws governing who could vote in the U.S. effectively limited voting to a group of "respectable wealthy white males". They wanted to limit who had a say in running the new country to conservative land owners who had a vested interest in establishing a stable government. Knowing who would have a vote may have resulted in some ommisions in the Constitution. For instance, there were few limits on government spending in the Constitution because the group that would be voting was the same group that would be financing the operation of the country and they were a frugal bunch. Had they imagined a future in which anyone-breathing-can-vote they would certainly have limited laws governing taxation and spending since the absence of such laws would allow the majority (poor) to pass laws to take the money of the minority (wealthy).
The limitations on who could vote also tended to also limit the voting to people who were relatively informed on who was running and what their politics were. The character of the voting population has certainly changed over the last 200+ years. Today any uniformed and ignorant person who is of voting age has as much power at the polls as a person who has carefully researched and understands the issues and the candidates.
Voter turnout is currently reduced because of the need to register. The need to visit a polling place also provides a barrier to marginally interested voters. Reducing the barriers and increasing turnout will not improve the election results if the added voters are randomly selecting candidates based on which candidate had the best commercial on television.
The Internet could provide the opportunity to improve the process of selecting a candidate, but not if it simply makes it easier to cast a vote. If voting on the Internet were to be made possible I would hope it also required a competency test prior before voting. A simple test of 10 questions per candidate would be required. Only those who could score an 80% on a test would have their votes count. There would be no time limits on taking the test and you could take the test over again if you failed but each time the test is given it would have new questions.
Before someone starts flaming the message as being unfair please remember everyone as an equal opportunity to learn about all the candidates. The goal of requiring a test is to have well informed voters, it is not to restrict voting. In fact, the ballot test could include links to all the online documentation about each candidate. The only requirement this test would have is that someone would have to make an effort to learn a little about ALL the candidates on the ballot. Doesn't it seem that knowing the candidates is much more important than being of a certain age or having registered in time for the election?