alt Hacker NewsA very widespread belief among political scientists is that parliamentary systems are superior to presidential systems in terms of stability and quality of governance. In fact, even the US State Department's own "nation-building" advisors tell other countries not to copy the US system (or at least they did prior to Trump, I'm honestly not sure if the Trump admin is sustaining that line or not)
Presidential systems have had a terrible run if you look at Latin America. The US seemed to be an exception to the rule, but maybe recent events have shown that the US got away with a substandard political system for so long because they had so many other advantages to make up for that, now their other advantages are weakening and the US is slowly converging with Latin America
I’m aware of the history, but my point is that as a specific reform to pursue, it’s noise.
If California moves to a Parliamentary system but maintains the popular ballot initiative that has undermined legislative power and allowed legislators to disclaim & dodge responsibility, or maintain the system of term limits I originally called out, then it doesn’t matter whether it’s our current bicameral legislature plus 5 Constitutional officers in the Executive branch or a full on Westminster Parliamentary system or anything in-between: you’ll still run into a lot of the same issues because there are no silver bullets.
So I’m not saying it should never be up for consideration, but as a list of changes to make go? It’s too far down the list of serious considerations for me to view it as anything other than noise right now.