@Xin Prussia: Starting all the way at the top of your first post, once again.
You noted that the president would be disliked by people in some regions and liked in others. My point was that nobody you elect, in ANY way, is going to be disliked by some people. No matter if you use proportional or majority voting, whoever is elected WILL have opponents; that's a given, whatever system you use. Furthermore, and more importantly, you are assuming a set of rules that are by no means unchangeable. For one, you are assuming that, due to the IWU's larger population, it will have more active people and thus more voters. That is incorrect, because the IWU has about 15 active people, while the INU has over 25. That means that, in a vote, the INU would have a larger say than the IWU. Furthermore, you are assuming that the INU's population will always be subordinate to the IWU. That too is incorrect, given the current rates of recruitment for the INU and the IWU, comparatively, especially since the interregional gov't won't go into operation for at least another month. The term length is also 4 months long--that's enough time for a good recruiter to pull in 200 people. Influences can change rapidly within a term, which means it is almost impossible for the IWU to hold more than the first term or two, unless everyone in all the regions likes their candidates. Next, you are also assuming a proportional trend in regional voting, that almost everyone in a region will vote for their region's candidate. That too is rather unlikely; while the majority will probably choose someone from their region, it won't be anywhere near all of them, because every candidate will have opponents in their region. That means that, say, an IWU candidate might get 15 of 25 votes from their region. But say that the IWU voters really like the INU candidate, who has 10 of 15 votes. Say that 6 of the remaining IWU voters like the INU candidate--that would put the INU candidate ahead, without a large majority even at home. Vote results are fluid--they don't always move the same way, which means that the IWU will likely win a similar number of presidencies to any of the other regions.
Second, tell me this.. if the legislature has ultimate power over the president, how does he/she become a dictator? The only influential power he really has is to say "No, I don't like this bill, vote on it again." And the legislature can put the bill back on the table and override the veto if it's popular enough. The president has NO authority to order around regional leaders or anything--the most he can do related to that is tell a region "Hey, this law's not being enforced. Do something about it." The only way that would become a dictatorship would be if all the regions liked the president so much they decided to make him in charge of everything, which would be a virtually impossible event. You are ALSO assuming that ridiculous orders by the president will be followed mindlessly--if the president abuses power, it's already been proposed that he can be recalled, and if not that, then nobody's going to listen to him if he goes bad. On top of that, you seem to be assuming that every president is going to be a power-hungry dictator. There are bad people out there, no doubt--but you forget that people are electing them, which means they are responsible enough to earn the majority approval of 200 people.
About the veto being beneficial, it is, for the reason I stated: it weeds out the less-popular bills and protects the more-popular ones. I will give a real-life example, as well, for you. I served in the IWURC, the IWU's first legislature, when Fenburg was president. We passed two bills, one to expand the intelligence group and the other to modify what the ambassadorial committee could do. On, we had 6/10 votes for, the other, we had 7/10 votes for (a simple majority was require for their passage). They were passed together--however, Fenburg vetoed them. We needed 8/10 to override the veto; we had a quick debate, then voted to try and override the veto. The first bill went all the way to 8/10 and the second to a full 10/10. Vetoing does not neuter legislation unless the legislators have no motivation to do their work and persuade others to approve of the bill. Those that are approved by the president or his/her veto was overridden for are appreciated enough that more people will like them--those that fail, should have, because it means they wouldn't have been accepted widely enough in the regions themselves.
About morphing opinions, I never said everyone can always change everyone else's minds--but if someone is dedicated enough and the idea they support is LOGICAL enough to make sense to others, then others will change their minds. Also remember that everyone doesn't need to change their mind for the legislation to override the veto--only a few are needed, which, if the bill is good, wouldn't be hard to achieve. For another example, I took a sample opinion from the IWU about the defense organization from 8 people before I wrote the defense plan to see what I was up against regarding public opinion. All of them were against the idea. Then I wrote the plan and presented it to them--it was logical, thorough and complete, and it convinced half of them to change their minds in favor of it. The same thing can be done for ordinary legislation.
About the president having the right to veto, you miss the point. You are against it, Xin, because you fear the president will abuse authority. You retain that idea because you think that the president is always going to be corrupt and abusive; I've never seen a single abuse of power my entire time in NationStates. I'm not saying it doesn't happen, no--but, first, it is rare enough to where we shouldn't chain up the president because we fear him, and second, we have Othelos' proposal of recalling the president, which essentially fully cuts the possibility of a successful abusive term.
Regarding legislation being popular, as I've stated, legislation that has a power check and is forced to be reviewed and thought out is by default more complete and thorough than legislation without. If the president cannot veto, there's no motivation to really debate, to think critically, to challenge, and to analyze. That means that the legislators only need to come up with something enough to convince half the legislature--it needn't be any better. However, when there is another authority who can analyze, review and order the legislation be redone, it makes the legislators more thorough and thoughtful. Anything that is produced by a system of review will be a better law than something without any review.
About my scenario, once again you assume that opinions are rigid and cannot be changed. People can be persuaded, and if an idea is worthwhile, it isn't hard to do. For example, I LED the opposition when we voted on political parties in the IWU; I was strictly against it, and I was successful--we voted them out. After being here, though, my mind changed, and I supported the idea. Another good one is the defense organization--I thought it would be risky whenever it was first proposed on the INU's RMB two months ago, but now I am a fierce supporter of it and have devoted hours to writing the 15-page plan and a 3-page speech of sorts to present to the IWU to convince the region to join it. Going back to my scenario, just like I said--if the legislature votes 70% to pass the bill but it's vetoed by the president, it's easily possible for someone to convince that 10% needed to override the veto with 80%.
On the cabals, you didn't answer what I pointed out--nobody will vote for someone who is irresponsible enough to form a coalition to rule the government. You, for example, would be a prime candidate. Your standard of responsibility and activity would be that of a presidential candidate. So, then, Xin, would YOU form a cabal and cheat on 200 people? I don't think you would, unless you wish to argue against that. You are also assuming that those elected to the legislature would be irresponsible enough to join such a group, enough so for a fifth to jump in. So imagine you are president and Othelos is in the legislature; the other legislature candidates would be like Othelos. They'd be active, responsible and involved, like he is. So would Othelos join a cabal? I don't think he would. Those who are trusted and approved of by 200 people aren't going to be underhanded, corrupt dictators--they won't form cabals. They know they need to work cooperatively and responsibly, and that's what they'll do if they are, once again, responsible enough to have the majority of 200 votes.
About the officials being corrupt, there can and may be elected people who become corrupt. But you are assuming that a whole FIFTH of them is going to turn rotten. You may have 2 or 3 bad officials in the lot, but you aren't going to have a whole 15 of them teaming up to rule over everybody.
On to the password protection, that is something we agree on. It isn't the president's job to lock up the regions. We founders may or may not be on often, but since the delegates will likely do a bit more later, we focus on them. It's more fair to the regions as well, since the founders are based in the IWU.
With regards to the president representing everyone, what I meant by the fact that he didn't represent everyone was that he does not impose his ideas on them. The legislature's job is to be the thinktank that makes the laws for the people--the president is there to ensure that the legislation is acceptable.
On the fact that the IWU will hold all the presidencies, I will refer to what I said earlier. Assuming the IWU will always control the others is assuming a truckload of other trends that are not even currently true, all of these I spoke of near the top of this post.
About the activity levels, the reason the INU is so active is not due to the fact that it's new--it's due to the way I recruit. Take the IAU and ISU, for example. The ISU seldom has two people that do anything, and it has nearly 35 people. The IAU's active people comprise of two puppets from the IWU and a nation founded in 2005. The INU, by sharp contrast, has an active population of almost 50%; again, this is due to the fact that I only send my invitations to involved, active, and large nations. It's a trend that will continue provided I continue with my strategy.
Moving on to the population comparison, yes, there is no way to prove that--just the same way that you cannot prove that they will not. I am basing what I stated from the rate of recruitment right now; the INU has grown 10 nations in population in the past two days, while the IWU has lost two. The ISU and IAU didn't change, but they will because the negotiations won't start until they are large enough. The IWU will need at least 120 nations, but that's assuming we lose a large chunk of the INU's population. Each of the three sister regions needs at least 40 nations, but given the INU's growth rate, we will likely have closer to 65 by that point, which pushed the number up to 145. Given that nobody is doing any recruitment whatsoever for the IWU, that number isn't going to be achieved.
About who I would vote for, that would depend. My idea is that the presidents will give a personal statement, which would allow the people to see their positions before voting. That would give voters at least a considerable idea of who is up for candidacy. And, also, you are assuming that I would vote for someone just off my knowledge of them. Here's yet another example: my political rival in the IWU, Vizindolf, will almost certainly run for the presidency. He's responsible and trustworthy, but I disagree with a lot of his opinions. As a result, since I will vote via GROSS Independency, I would almost certainly vote for a candidate of one of the other regions, even though I've worked with Vizindolf for nearly a year now.
Now, you stating that the fact that people can be convinced is "factually untrue" is simply... untrue. Here's another good example of this. In the 2012 US presidential election, the state of Ohio was going to vote for Mitt Romney, the Republican candidate. Ohio is currently almost 80% Republican, and by default one would assume the state would certainly go for Romney. However, Barack Obama, who won the election, gave several speeches in Ohio, and he received 60% of the votes from Ohio and won the state. Obama turned 40% of the opposing votes in his favor. After that short story, how is it factually untrue that a candidate cannot sway the opinions of the opposition?
On proportional voting, that means that whoever has the highest percent majority of their region gets the presidency. In standard voting, the winner will always have more the 50% of the total votes. For proportional voting, here's another example. Say the IAU has 20 members, and the IWU has 200. In the presidential election, the IAU candidate gets 18 of his region's 20 votes. But the IWU candidate receives 150 votes. The IAU candidate has the higher proportional percentage, so he wins the presidency. How is that fair? Sure, it improves representation of the tiny IAU, but what about those 150 people who voted for their person? The IAU candidate will only have received 8% of the total votes but still won the presidency over the IWU candidate, who had 68% of the votes. That is denying the voice of the 150 people in favor for the 18. By contrast, in direct voting, the IWU candidate would have won, because he fairly earned the approval of 68% of the total population. THAT is fair.
Regarding your experiment, if Region A voted entirely for Candidate A, he would have 50 votes, right? Being generous, we'll assume the Region B gave Candidate B all of its 45 votes and Region C gave Candidate C all its 40 votes. Not allowing candidate A to win would be unfair, because although he doesn't have over half the total votes, the other candidates have fewer than he does. That means he was more accepted than the other two were. In proportional voting, by contrast, Region C's candidate could win in a different situation with even LESS of the total vote, because more of his region liked him than the candidates of the other two. Even though more people approve of, say, Candidate B, he can't win because the percentage of his region wasn't more than Candidate C's. That boosts the representation of Region C, sure, but at the same time it slashes the representation of Regions A and B.