In your article, Joanna, you said Hillary’s supporters look to her:

“experience, voting record, and concrete policy plans to defend their candidate — in other words, they point to the content of her speeches”

I have two small objections to this. 1) Her experience- her resume and what other said of her, and her voting record are not just a part of “the content of her speeches,” they are found and known elsewhere. 2) And for many, the content of her speeches in irrelevant. For many, it’s just her appearance, the way she looks, sounds and “feels.” And many come to her speeches so prejudiced, feeling so bad or angry, they sustain that throughout every speech, no matter what she says.

And these things are all that are possible in our political system. Something else is possible, though. Real accountability. The kind that can only come from adding a new kind of communication to our political system, and extending our political system past the elections.

Imagine that we could continue voting on approval, on different policies, after the election. Imagine the president and members of Congress had a real record of approval. And not one done by polls that involve less than 1% of people. But one that let everyone who cares about an issue rate their judgment of their officials every month.

For instance, most red staters would rate Obama very poorly about Obamacare. But before Obamacare, would they have rated poorly wanting to end denying insurance to people with pre-existing conditions? Would they have rated poorly making health care affordable to all? The Republican congress refused to work with Obama on healthcare. Would the American people have refused?

Your article was great about how we judge people when they speak. But more interaction is possible. And this is what’s missing from our whole cultural conversation about politics.