Recent elections show that Kos is wrong in opposing ballot initiatives. Instead of bewailing their misuse, smart activists are using them to accomplish FAR more than begging representatives for mercy. Legal marijuana has ONLY been passed by initiative, in AK, CO, OR, DC and WA. Once farmers get hemp (also legalized) planted on a large scale, we'll be saving paper, plastic and gasoline as well as sequestering greenhouse gases. Speaking of which, my friend and Congressman Jared Polis, a supporter of NATIONAL ballot initiatives (see http://spryeye.blogspot.com/... ) cites this poll showing that Americans wanted to reduce greenhouse gases no matter what other countries did -way back in 1997!: http://Vote.org/...
Ballot initiatives in RED states AK, AR, NE and SD just raised minimum wages -all that tried, just as 6 did in 2006. In 2012 gay marriage was legalized in ME, MD and WA.
Maybe by now you've seen the Open Letter to Dems by 26-yr-old Carl Gibson (founder of US Uncut) http://www.dailykos.com/... He says, "The few of us who did show up to vote largely did it to support state ballot initiatives that actually mattered in our daily lives." Research shows "On average, turnout in presidential elections increases by 0.70% with each initiative on the ballot, whereas turnout in midterm elections increases by 1.7%, all else equal." (It's online but you must pay. Google it.) Democrats SHOULD love this!
Here in Colorado, ballot initiatives have a stellar record, and our one problem initiative illustrates one easy way to improve the initiative process: http://spryeye.blogspot.com/...
My website http://Vote.org was the first direct democracy site, since 1995. It has oodles of theory and practice about ballot initiatives.
I worked for famed former Senator Mike Gravel on his project for better and NATIONAL ballot initiatives. I got people including Patch Adams, Noam Chomsky, Daniel Ellsberg, Julia Butterfly Hill, Ralph Nader, Pete Seeger, Cindy Sheehan and Howard Zinn to endorse it. Here's Nader's video: https://www.youtube.com/... and Seeger's postcard: http://spryeye.blogspot.com/... As Pete often said, "Participation, that's the salvation of the human race." Participatory democracy, direct democracy, ballot initiatives. It's all good! Use them -or the fossils and retrograders will.
UPDATE: iT'S PRETTY EASY TO FIX EXISTING PROBLEMS WITH INITIATIVES:
1. Citizen Initiative Review, used in Oregon since 2008. has randomly-selected citizen "juries" hold public hearings and deliberations and report on initiatives so that voters get the kind of info legislators get. This greatly reduces the power of ad $. http://HealthyDemocracy.org
2. Allowing petition signing by internet, as Utah did for awhile. This reduces the $ needed to hire petitioners who harass you outside stores, any possible misrepresentation they might make of the initiative, and encourage people to read the entire initiative at leisure.
3. A in famed former Sen. Mike Gravel's national initiative proposal, limit the length of initiatives to 5000 words. This reduces the possibility that "poison pills" hidden in back pages might go unnoticed.
Decision scientists largely agree on these, they are constitutional and simple.