[subego]

The Executive has a lot more power, and is elected for life.

There is some mechanism whereby a no confidence vote can be called. Should the executive lose, they are stripped of all assets, have their citizenship revoked, and are exiled.


Edit: maybe prison instead.

[Snow-i]

Originally Posted by subego 

The Executive has a lot more power, and is elected for life.

There is some mechanism whereby a no confidence vote can be called. Should the executive lose, they are stripped of all assets, have their citizenship revoked, and are exiled.


Edit: maybe prison instead.

You think an executive with that kind of power would give it up - much less go to prison just because of some lousy vote? Would allow it fall into anyone else's hands besides a handpicked successor or even an heir?

Subego, you're describing a dictatorship. The "vote of no confidence" you're talking about is civil war. Nobody would give up that power without first using against those who seek to remove them from it without bloodshed or a coup of some sort. Source: the history of human civilization.

The idea behind this country is that centralized power corrupts, or at least gives a vehicle to corruption innate to human nature. It was designed to ensure that power never became too centralized and remain squarely in the hands of the people (for the people, by the people), but unfortunately through a long campaign of erosion even the Bill of Rights today is merely just a suggestion for the powers that be. With enough spin and a good PR campaign, you can get the masses to jump right off a cliff after robbing them blind. At the very least, now, the government and the public are two different entities - one with authority over the other. This is a massive problem, as the world's most powerful military and most developed nation is no longer completely in the hands of it's people - the same people that created the nation to begin with.

This is why the One Ring had to be destroyed and, as a wise people, must ensure that our analogue to a One Ring must never come into existence.

[subego]

Well, there's this guy. He sits in on all the cabinet meetings, but isn't officially in the cabinet. He doesn't say much. He tends to just intently watch the executive.

The executive always finds this a little disconcerting. What is this guy thinking?

If that guy is doing his job, he's thinking which of his hand-picked cadre of assassins will get the medal should the executive decide the no-confidence vote is the place for shenannigans.

[Snow-i]

Originally Posted by subego 

Well, there's this guy. He sits in on all the cabinet meetings, but isn't officially in the cabinet. He doesn't say much. He tends to just intently watch the executive.

The executive always finds this a little disconcerting. What is this guy thinking?

If that guy is doing his job, he's thinking which of his hand-picked cadre of assassins will get the medal should the executive decide the no-confidence vote is the place for shenannigans.

The executive is thinking "Am I paying this dude enough to stay in power or is someone else going to pay him more? Are the women I'm providing him hot enough? The coke pure enough? The parties lavish enough?"

All you'd have to do to keep power is convince one man (or even one small group of men) to let you live? Shit if I were the dictator I'd just grab a few billions and be done with it. That or hire my own hand-picked cadre of assassins. Who's gonna stop me? It'd be much easier to get that guy to go along with you than it would be for that guy to single handedly reinstall democracy. If the elections were found to be rigged and somehow we were able to assassinate the dictator there'd surely be a civil war to decide who gets to fill that power vacuum. Humans kind of suck when the shit hits the fan and they have nothing to truly unify them.

The type of government you're describing very closely resembles what's happening right now in Russia. Is this what you're gettin at?

[subego]

Oh, make no mistake, that guy knows if it comes down to it, he's going down. It's the perils of such a patriotic job. The question is how well he's picked and hidden his cadre.

Unlike most government gigs, that guy is very well paid, gets government issue prostitutes, and the CIA hooks him up with much better blow than the baby powder the executive tries to pawn off as "the shit".

[subego]

IOW, a perk of being the Secretary of Assassinations is people feel it's in their best interests to give you stuff anyways.

[Shaddim]

- find a patriot loyal to you who resembles your watchdog
- have him altered to look exactly like him and then have him learn the watchdog's habits and routines
- have him kill your watchdog (replacing watchdog), maybe while he's busy with the prostitutes (kill prostitutes too)
- and then when he goes to report, use him to kill the SoA and other targets of interest when they're most vulnerable
- take over Bureau of Assassinations, killing all political enemies, use information gained for BoA to blackmail everyone else

[subego]

Originally Posted by Shaddim 

- find a patriot loyal to you who resembles your watchdog
- have him altered to look exactly like him and then have him learn the watchdog's habits and routines
- have him kill your watchdog (replacing watchdog), maybe while he's busy with the prostitutes (kill prostitutes too)

You get this far, and hope you realized the watchdog has a GPS implant. If you don't, they know something is up the instant you're not where your implant says you are.

Ultimately irrelevant. You don't know the watchdog's fail-safe codes. The double doesn't check in with those...

BOOM! HEADSHOT!

[Snow-i]

Alright. Shotty first dictator!

[subego]

That's for the double. Dictator gets dogpiled by Secret Service Agents.

Who in this universe also get prostitutes.

Oh, wait...

[Shaddim]

Of course we get the GPS implant and use the latest interrogation drugs to retrieve the codes before killing him. Sheesh!

[subego]

Once he realizes you even know about the fail-safe codes, that's what the cyanide tooth is for.

Or alternately, you won't know if he gave you the fake fail-safe code until it's too late. You only get one chance to use it.

[andi*pandi]

you people are scary.