Is the parliamentary system superior to the presidential system? In Holland, you have the government resigning over the neglect of the army to prevent a Bosnian slaughter. In the US, I think that what would surely result is denials, stonewalling, dissembling, and dirty tricks until the head of the government was forced out by the courts…if it came to that.

This is in addition to the other obvious advantage of the parlimentary system--that the official head of state and the working head of state are two different people, and thus some of the scandal-laden nature of our elections is avoided.

Of course, the downside is that a parliamentary government cannot do anything radical enough, decisive enough or risky enough to risk being given a “no confidence” vote. If I’ve misrepresented the parliamentary system, or if you think I'm being too hard on the US, please let me know by email.