The purest form of a democracy is direct, where a group of citizens vote and the victor becomes the leader. The opposite is an autocracy, where people have no real say, or an oligarchy, where a small elite rule.

If we look at people in government (Legislative, Executive, Judicial) with Power in degrees of separation away from a vote, it is quite remarkable:

1. Supreme Court Judge: 4 (You → Presidential Elector → President → Senate → Judge)
2. President: 2 (You → Presidential Elector → President)
3. Representative: 1 (You → Representative)
4. Senator: 1 (You → Senator)

Let's go deeper:

1. Federal Judge: 4 (You → Presidential Elector → President → Senate → Judge)
2. Cabinet Secretaries (e.g., State, Defense, Treasury, Homeland Security): 4 (You → Presidential Elector → President → Senate → Secretary)
3. Heads of major executive agencies (EPA, CIA, FBI director): 4 (You → Presidential Elector → President → Senate → Director)
4. Deputy Secretaries (e.g., Deputy Secretary of Defense): 5 (You → Presidential Elector → President → Senate → Secretary → Deputy)
5. Under Secretaries (e.g., Under Secretary of Treasury for International Affairs): 6 (You → Presidential Elector → President → Senate → Secretary → Deputy → Under Secretary)
6. Assistant Secretaries (e.g., Assistant Secretary for Health): 7 (You → Presidential Elector → President → Senate → Secretary → Deputy → Under Secretary → Assistant Secretary)
7. U.S. Attorneys: 4 (You → Presidential Elector → President → Senate → U.S. Attorney)
8. Ambassadors: 4 (You → Presidential Elector → President → Senate → Ambassador)
9. National Security Advisor: 3 (You → Presidential Elector → President → NSA)
10. Political Appointee Agency Heads (e.g., CMS Administrator, IRS Commissioner): 4 (You → Presidential Elector → President → Senate → Administrator)
11. Members of independent commissions (e.g., SEC, FTC, NLRB): 4 (You → Presidential Elector → President → Senate → Commissioner)
12. Senior Executive Service officials (e.g., Deputy Director of OMB): 6–8 (You → Presidential Elector → President → Senate → Secretary → Agency Head → SES)
13. Administrative Law Judges (e.g., within EPA or Social Security): 6–8 (You → Presidential Elector → President → Senate → Agency Head → Internal Appointment → ALJ)
14. Policy Directors and Rule Writers (e.g., EPA, HHS): 6–9 (You → Presidential Elector → President → Senate → Secretary → Agency Head → Division Director → Policy Staff)
15. Regulatory Enforcers (e.g., OSHA inspectors, IRS auditors): 7–9 (You → Presidential Elector → President → Senate → Secretary → Agency → Regional Director → Inspector)
16. Grants and Procurement Officers (e.g., USDA, NIH): 7–10 (You → Presidential Elector → President → Senate → Secretary → Agency → Division → Manager → Officer)
17. Federal Reserve Board Members: 4 (You → Presidential Elector → President → Senate → Fed Board Member)
18. Federal Reserve Regional Bank Presidents: 6–8 (You → Presidential Elector → President → Senate → Fed Board → Regional Bank Board → President)
19. Special Envoys or Czars (e.g., Climate Envoy, AI Czar D. Sacks): 3–4 (You → Presidential Elector → President → Direct Appointment or Senate)
20. Military Combatant Commanders (e.g., CENTCOM): 5 (You → Presidential Elector → President → Senate → SecDef → Joint Chiefs → Commander)

Even the greatest glazer of American democracy would agree that the more degrees of freedom from the people, the more the will of the people is degraded. It's a simple game of telephone.

The people that complain about the electoral college suppressing their vote never complain about the Executive branch bureaucracy with anything from 3 to 10! degrees from the American voter. That bureaucracy—or "Deep State?"—stays between administrations and only changes when the individuals transfer, retire, or are fired.

The Framers didn't believe in direct democracy since it doesn't work at scale. How would 3M to 300M (now) people come and vote all together for everything? Republics—which "refine and enlarge the public view" via representatives are meant for scale (Madison). Presidential appointments with confirmation are meant to prevent the president's "private inclinations and interests" from interfering with meritocracy (Hamilton). The Judiciary—the weakest power—is meant to be undemocratic, given lifetime appointments, since "nothing can contribute so much to its firmness and independence as permanency in office" (Hamilton).

Did they really expect a 5-10 degree deep separation though? An iron pentagon (probably) exists—with Congress, Interest Groups, Federal Bureaucracy, Press, and the Universities quid pro quoing each other. Totally beyond any sense of a direct democracy or slightly indirect republic (branches in order of degrees away from the People && increasing Power (the Framers' intelligent design): jud, exec, leg).

We would never think of ourselves as living in an oligarchy—imagine! The wealthy obviously don't wield disproportionate influence over policy. Lobbying organizations definitely aren't that effective, and they certainly don’t straight-up write legislation. The Press wouldn't make their business model political division, enforce certain narratives that almost seem Brownian in their arbitrariness, or be hereditary monarchies. The Bureaucracy doesn't enforce the status quo, despite whatever administration is in charge. Large corporations would never cozy up to power in exchange for lax regulatory oversight. And of course, there’s no revolving door between industry, government, and media. Everything is fine. Democracy is working perfectly.

Are we just in a declining democracy or an effective oligarchy? Washington's cabinet was small and stacked, with around 100 people with real power (President + Secretaries of State, Treasury, War + ~10 federal judges + 91 voting Congressmen). Lincoln—even in the temporary expansion of the Civil War—had around 300-500 people with power (President + Cabinet-level execs + ~10-20 senior military officials + ~50 federal judges + ~200 Congressmen). Today, it's ~15-20K people (conservative), with a lot of senior civil servants, independent agencies, and non-confirmed political appointees.

It would be impossible and braindead to run our country today with the size of Lincoln's government. But it would be more braindead to ignore this massive breach on the constitution. Most of this expansion seems to have happened with the 1930's Roosevelt New Deal administration, but I wonder why it hasn't been questioned. Maybe because "democracy only works in a growing economy. Without a return to economic growth, the democratic experiment will fail" (Sam Altman). Economic growth—with a power law distribution in big winners—isn't stopping anytime soon given recent events. But what happens when the cost of coordination drops to zero, but political power remains locked in a structure designed for scarcity and slowness?

We're running 21st-century complexity on a 20th-century bureaucracy built atop an 18th-century constitution. A return to constitutional minimalism isn't happening, even under "drain-the-swamp" Trump. The country will probably smoothly drift from our post-democratic managerial state to a more blatant oligarchy as the Power winners are made. Maybe superintelligence will equalize the distribution but any analysis of history would make that hard to believe.