Some war on terrorism, eh?

[scaeagles]

Originally Posted by Ghoulish Delight

If he's going to throw around terms like "mandate", he better have soemthing to back it up. He's supposed to be the ultimate representative of the people. He's acting as anything but.

The great debate of the representative republic.

Being that the country is closely divided on many issues, how is it possible to represent all the people? Even for a congressman to represent all of those within his/her district? It is not.

So what is an elected official to do? I have always been of the philosophy that when eleccted the official must then do what he/she thinks is best - it is not possible to represent the interests of all issue by issue. It is only possible to go by ones conscience and if enough voters do not like what you have done, they will vote you out.

As an example, Tom Daschle was repeatedly elected in South Dakota even though the state was massively in the republican column. A candidate finally got the populace to see that Daschle was not at all representing them as a majority, and they voted Daschle out. While in office, did Tom Daschle have an obligation to vote more "conservatively"? No. I would suggest he did not represent their more conservative leanings well at all. He finally paid the price at the polls.