Like all other political systems, ours in flux. Also, all past democracies (Greek, Roman, etc.) have eventually failed...usually by becoming totalitarian regimes. Russia was changing into a democracy when the Soviet Union disintegrated but Putin et. al. turned it into another totalitarian dictatorship. Greece has recently been changed into a totalitarian regime. Ours will eventually meet the same fate...true democracies have seldom lasted very long and ours seems to be currently at risk.

Libertarianism for the win. Give responsibility back to the people and allow them to choose their own path.

I am also in favor of the idea of Guilds which operate like local councils within their districts. Make them compete against each other by working to improve their communities using the money they earn from taxing their people. The more tax a community generates, the better the community.

It means there's an incentive for politicians to do a good job, the more they improve the community then more people will want to live their and they get more money from tax which they can use to improve the community and also earn more money for themselves.
As long as the politicians don't embezzle too much then it should be a good system as it will give councils/communities more control over their districts.

No, it would just validate all the gun nuts.

I wasn't a good college student, but I enjoyed cultural anthropology. Primitive societies (tribes) have rational, realistic discussions . Every stupid plan we could come up with could use input from them.

I find your thinking disturbing and dangerous. Benevolent dictators NEVER stay benevolent.

A good portion of today's issues are caused by private control over resources. I think we should democratize the economy.
No gods, no masters!

I'm fairly happy with the UK's system, but I would like to see a shift from parliamentary to representative democracy, and using proportional representation instead of first-past-the-post. Downsizing the House of Lords would also be a good idea. So not from the ground up, but a couple of reforms wouldn't go amiss.

If we had the opportunity... a social democracy is a good option, and something we could do right away.

Another good idea, but would take a few more years to be able to implement - almost like your benevolent dictator but people get enough say-so in how things work out for them that it feels like freedom - is program an artificial intelligence with unconditional love of humanity, wanting what is best for us - which would include as much freedom as we can responsibly handle (which doesn't mean we'd never be allowed to make a mistake, as people learn from mistakes, but we'd be prevented from doing anything seriously counter-productive or harmful).

We would vote for end-goals, one kind of general set for the entire country, and more individual types of goals for each state (I don't know how many states would be optimal, or what their construction or distribution should be. They could even be virtual states, such that like-minded people could all be in the same state - but people wouldn't have to put up with an environmental climate that didn't suit them. There could be clusters of people the sizes of towns, cities, or counties throughout the nation, but there could be 5 towns of state A in what used to be Florida, a county in what used to be Arizona, a city in what used to be Tennessee, a county in what used to be Alaska, etc. but all would be parts of state A. Right next to those parts could be parts of state B with a city in what used to be Alaska, a town in what used to be Vermont, a county in what used to be New Mexico, etc.

At a national level, AI would control food production and distribution, the structure of access to healthcare, national transportation infrastructure, national levels of safety and security, etc. States would adjust their rules according to the unique philosophy of everyone in the state (state A wants a natural environment? Okay, let all of your yards overgrow, and the only human interference would be cleaning up enough natural debris to not encourage forest fires. State B wants low-key order? Okay, make suburban type areas. State C wants all high-tech - you got it). And each state division (the county in ex-Alaska, each of the 5 towns in ex-Florida) would vote on what rules they want for their specific area (you're both in state B but you want chickens to manage lawn care and pest control, but you want miniature robots to handle yours? Okay, one town gets chickens and another town gets robots. You're in state R and you want lots of developmental opportunities for children, but you are in state R and you don't want a bunch of screaming kids running around disturbing the peace? Okay, here's a great city and a county with every opportunity for children, and there are the towns for childless, elderly, and people with over-excitable sensory stimulation conditions).

If you don't agree with your local rules - move. AI on the national level will handle how you can keep working at a reasonable level for you (that AI would determine how much work actually needs to be done so that people aren't doing wasteful or counterproductive work, and determines with the help of the national healthcare system, how much each person should work (maybe one person gts maximum fulfillment at 30 - 35 hours a week, while someone else has enough medical conditions that between the medical state and the amount of time spent going to appointments, they can only put in 3 hours of work - but they can put in those 3 hours).