We The People... Are Bad at This
A Declaration for Better Judgement about Power, Promises, and ProgressBy Robert Bates
Length10h 58m
About this audiobook
You care about safer communities, better schools, freedom, fairness, and a future that feels less fragile. Someone offers a plan. You give it your support. Then the results arrive—and the original promise becomes harder to find.
In We the People… Are Bad at This, Robert Bates follows political promises from the podium to the receipt: what happened, who benefited, and where the costs went. Drawing on research and public records across parties and national borders, he examines tax cuts, high-speed rail, education, homelessness, and public-health crises with patient analysis and dry humor.
The book offers practical questions for better public judgment: How is the plan supposed to work? What has the institution already demonstrated? What evidence should make us change course?
Democracy gives us the power to choose. Getting better at it means learning how to reconsider—while preserving what made us care.
Audiobook details
GenrePolitics and Government
Length10 hrs 58 mins
Narrated byListen with 1,000+ voices
FormateBook with Audio
Publish dateOct 2, 2026
LanguageEnglish
Table of contents
1A Better Version of Us
2Introduction
3Part One: The Story We Buy
41. Material Promise. Emotional Experience
52. Every Politician Sells A Future
Show all chaptersShow less
63. Good Intentions Make Excellent Cover
7Name What Matters
8Part Two: The Pattern We Ignore
94. Promises Are Hypothetical. Patterns Are Demonstrated
105. Character Is What Repeats
116. Watch What Happens When The Rules Hurt
12Look For The Pattern
13Part Three: The Power We Hand Over
147. Power Doesn't Improve Character
158. Loyalty Is A Terrible Oversight System
169. The Emotional Salary Of Politics
17Follow The Power
18Part Four: The Receipt We Avoid
1910. Did It Work?
2011. Doing Something Is Not Solving Something
2112. Who Got The Benefit?
2213. Where Did The Cost Go?
2314. When The Scoreboard Changes
24Ask For The Receipt
25Part Five: The Excuse We Accept
2615. Their Failure, Our Explanation
2716. The Enemy Did It
2817. Did They Learn Or Improve The Excuse?
29Keep The Value. Question The Method.
30Part Six: The We That Can Learn
3118. The Best Version Of We
3219. Take Back The Permission
33Close The Loop
34Copyrights
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