Quote Originally Posted by reaper239 View Post
there are no "leaders" per se, the representatives don't make the decisions, they relay the will of the people and the majority rules. they wouldn't be disparate communities of people walled off from each other, they would commune together and work together for the colony, the only differrence is that one man would be elected to represent so many people to the colony, as a means of maintaining order.

one final thing on guns (which are very relevant to the end of the world), more people may be shot in the US, but home invasions are much higher in the UK. here, if a man comes in my home by force, i can shoot him, in the UK you can be charged with murder for killing an intruder in your own home. you also look at the number of murders, but what you don't look at is defensive gun use, which some estimates put as high as 2.5 million per year. that's people using guns to defend their lives, even if it's something as simple as drawing down (most defensive gun uses never involve firing a gun and so go unreported).
No leaders sounds like a very easy way to create in-efficiency etc. Possibly the population should vote on a leader with elections every six months (as a start). For major issues eg changes to the law the electorate are consulted but minor things are handled by the leader + cabinet. people would be assigned positions based on experience. So there would be a place for an agricultural minister whom would be elected for a fixed period as well as a defence minister etc etc.

As far as final gun comments go, invading america (assuming you could defeat the military juggernaut) would be near impossible due to its citizens being armed and ready but thats not how you sink the country. Insurrectionism and economics are the tools. if you can turn those internal arms against each other or cripple the infrastructure via economics then you may cause enough chaos that you no longer need to invade in the first place. We rely on our police forces for dealing with crime.If the citizen does not feel safe relying on the police alone he can be trained in unarmed combat at his own cost. Cross bows are quite legal.