{"version":1,"type":"rich","provider_name":"Libsyn","provider_url":"https:\/\/www.libsyn.com","height":90,"width":600,"title":"359. Maxwell Stearns with Mark Smith: Transforming America's Democracy","description":"Can a parliamentary democracy end America\u2019s constitutional crisis? It\u2019s starting to feel to some people that American elections aren\u2019t offering us much choice, instead compounding the continued issues of our outdated voting system and showing our lack of capacity to face common issues together. In Parliamentary America, Maxwell L. Stearns argues that the solution to these complex problems is a parliamentary democracy. Stearns considers alternatives such as ranked choice voting, the national popular vote, and congressional term limits, showing why these can\u2019t solve our constitutional crisis. Instead, three amendments\u2014expanding the House of Representatives, having House party coalitions choose the president, and letting the House end a failing presidency based on no confidence\u2014will produce a robust multiparty democracy. These amendments hold an essential advantage over other proposals: by leaving every member of the House and Senate as incumbents in their districts or states, the amendments provide a pressure-release valve against reforms threatening that status. Stearns takes readers on a world tour\u2014England, France, Germany, Israel, Taiwan, Brazil, and Venezuela\u2014showing what works in government, what doesn\u2019t, and how to make the best features our own. Genuine party competition and governing coalitions, commonplace across the globe, may seem like a fantasy in the United States, but Stearns offers an optimistic vision, explaining in accessible terms how to transform our troubled democracy into a thriving parliamentary America. Maxwell L. Stearns is the Venable, Baetjer & Howard Professor of Law at the University of Maryland Carey School of Law. He has authored dozens of articles and several books on the Constitution, the Supreme Court, and the economic analysis of law. Before joining the faculty at the University of Washington in 1997, Mark Alan Smith completed his undergraduate degree in economics at M.I.T. and earned his Ph.D. in political science at the University of Minnesota. He is Professor of Political Science and Adjunct Professor of Communication and Comparative Religion at the UW. Smith\u2019s research and teaching focuses on American domestic politics, including religion, public opinion, political communication, political parties, and public policy. He is the author of four books, most recently Right from Wrong: Why Religion Fails and Reason Succeeds. He is a regular commentator on national and state politics for various media outlets.    Buy the Book Parliamentary America: The Least Radical Means of Radically Repairing Our Broken Democracy ","author_name":"Town Hall Seattle Civics Series","author_url":"http:\/\/civicsths.libsyn.com\/website","html":"