Let's say that 70% of the people in the country disapprove of a president. Still nothing being done. Let's say that only ~20% of the eligible population voted in the primaries. Are you going to blame the 80% of the people who didn't vote, who didn't have a say in their government?
**** yes I'm going to blame them.
Ever heard the phrase "The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil, is for good men to do nothing"?
It appears however that you wish to say that people shouldn't be blamed for doing nothing even though in your own example 50% of the country did **** all to prevent a president they disapprove of from getting power. Even though all that was required was for them to get up off their fat arses and vote.
You can't say "oh, they could've voted, blame them" because the fact is they didn't vote and nothing will change that.
**** yes I can. Are you seriously trying to claim that no one should ever be held responsible for actions they failed to take? Even when warned that they should do something?
You can't blame anyone in this situation because 1) "Abstaining" is a legitimate vote, which is what they essentially did.
So? It's legal, yes. But no one is claiming that the American public acted illegally. The point being made is that by their action or inaction the electorate of the US acted stupidly in electing GW Bush.
2) Blaming accomplishes nothing.
Not if it results in the idiots who abstained and then complained about the results actually getting off their fat arses and voting next time.
3) Even if they did vote, it's not a guarantee that the results wouldn't have been different, or for that matter better. Too many unknowns.
Which isn't actually much of a point at all. Either they wouldn't have voted for Bush or they would have. If they had your country would have been viewed as even more stupid than it currently is. If they hadn't then the world would have thought "Maybe those American aren't quite as idiotic as we thought" But instead they did nothing. And in this case doing nothing was stupid.
Most are understandable and somewhat logical responses, so I'll just elaborate on some previously unspoken thoughts:
First off, voting people voting specific leaders into office isn't the primary cause of America's ill situation. Once elected to office, politicians don't have to keep to what they campaigned for. In fact, given their relatively invisible individual work within the chambers, senators and representatives are pretty much forgotten about weeks after election. The fact is no one really knows specifics about the behaviors of the senators and reps. unless they watch C-SPAN or some show like that, and I doubt that even some of the smartest people watch that channel regularly.
Right now the extreme majority of politicians in the US are either very right handed or very left handed (referring to the political spectrum), however, most voters are themselves moderate. This is where the main friction is created between government and population, which I'll explain why: You can vote for your leaders in the US. Strictly on the federal level, you got representatives, senators, and the president. Unfortunately, as stated earlier, most politicians do not share most of the same opinions as the voters.
On top of all of this, there is the things unaccounted for during elections - lobbyists. Sure, we can get a bit of a taste of how some people will act during debates and similar events, but that still doesn't purely correlate to what they will do once elected as a rep/senator/president.
In short:
1) Once elected to office, politicians aren't obligated to any promises they made while campaigning.
2) There really is a shortage of good politicians/leaders, at least in recent years.
3) Moderate candidates (and thus ones that more accurately represent the citizens) for office are more often than not independent, and only take away votes from similar candidates that are in one of the two major parties.
4) Lobbyists and other contributions to candidates in return for a chunk of public policy skew the otherwise good intentions of many congressmen.
