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However, I have heard arguments against pure democracy (generally as it turns into an ochlocracy) because of mob rule and manipulation of voters.
While it is more difficult to argue in politics, in economics, people voting with their money have definitely voted in very stupid ways by way of manipulation. This is can be seen in the success of crap products that manage to sell themselves to consumers and survive against all odds of being entirely useless.
Not only that, but it's an act of cowardice on behalf of those who want to participate in the system. It's a symptom of spinelessness, moral weakness, and a failure to communicate with the constituency.
I personally have no idea, but the first step to finding answers is to have the question. I am reminded of a passage from "letters to a young contrarian" by Christopher Hitchens
"A man with a correct opinion out weights a majority with a wrong one"
"Lucius Cornelius Sulla Felix[1] (c. 138 BC – 78 BC), known commonly as Sulla, was a Roman general and statesman. He had the rare distinction of holding the office of consul twice, as well as that of dictator. He was one of the canonical great men of Roman history, included in the biographical collections of leading generals and politicians, originating in the biographical compendium of famous Romans, published by Marcus Terentius Varro. In Plutarch's Sulla, in the famous series - Parallel Lives, Sulla is paired with the Spartan general and strategist Lysander.
Sulla's dictatorship came during a high point in the struggle between optimates and populares, the former seeking to maintain the power of the oligarchy in the form of the Senate while the latter resorted in many cases to naked populism, culminating in Caesar's dictatorship. Sulla was a highly original, gifted and skillful general, never losing a battle; he remains the only man in history to have attacked and occupied both Athens and Rome. His rival, Gnaeus Papirius Carbo, described Sulla as having the cunning of a fox and the courage of a lion - but that it was the former attribute that was by far the most dangerous. This mixture was later referred to by Machiavelli in his description of the ideal characteristics of a ruler.[2]
Sulla used his armies to march on Rome twice, and after the second he revived the office of dictator, which had not been used since the Second Punic War over a century before. He used his powers to enact a series of reforms to the Roman constitution, meant to restore the balance of power between the Senate and the tribunes; he then stunned the Roman World (and posterity) by resigning the dictatorship, restoring normal constitutional government, and after his second Consulship, retiring to private life."
Wkipedia
Instead of records showing their name, they show a list of every lobby who ever contributed to their campaign, bought them a nice gift, winked at them in the hallway, kissed them in the stairwell, etc. and then it's up to the voters to guess who it is!!!
You can pretty much have all the freedoms under the Bill of Rights with a benevolent dictator.
II: The entire point of our Constitution is to guarantee that power stays within the hands of its people, not an individual person/group.
III: Are you high or simply incapable of understanding the what the word "dictator" means?
For this system to work in America, we would have to change some things: 1) Dictator does not take power whenever military action is needed. If that was the case, America would become fascist. Dictator would take power when Congress and the House vote that he does. 2) Dictators are not allowed to associate themselves with parties. This starts to cut down on political bullcarp that will ensue when we make change one.
noun
1. a person exercising absolute power, especially a ruler who has absolute, unrestricted control in a government without hereditary succession.
2. (in ancient Rome) a person invested with supreme authority during a crisis, the regular magistracy being subordinated to him until the crisis was met.
3. a person who authoritatively prescribes conduct, usage, etc.: a dictator of fashion.
4. a person who dictates, as to a secretary. Rome was a Republic not a Democracy. The plebs where represented by the Tribunes.
However, my argument is that, subjectivity aside, one may claim that a benevolent (for suitable definitions of "benevolent") dictator may be a better form of government than a democracy/republic like our own if the people have proven to be incapable of handling that power themselves either by making poor decisions as a whole or by consistently electing representatives that make poor decisions. Admittedly, the lack of truly long term benevolent dictatorships throughout human history has shown that this is not a realistic scenario. However, there have been short term benevolent dictatorships that managed to do the job -- a fairly recent example is Churchill during WW2. However, once the crisis of the War was over, he relinquished his dictator powers.
I'm not advocating that we scrap the Constitution in favor of a dictatorship, benevolent or otherwise (unless I'm the dictator j/k), I'm just bringing up the hypothesis that in certain scenarios one may argue that it can be a better form of government than what we have now. Then again, I also agree with Churchill when he said, "Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time."
"but even a benevolent dictator must eliminate choice, and what is freedom without choice?"
How would this "benevolent dictator" reconcile the ideologies of two groups of people. At the very least he would have to scrap the 2nd amendment and that alone would make people hate him.
In this case, let's assume the benevolent dictator, despite being in charge of everything, decides to only use his power to control things such as the budget and taxation, military policy, public services, etc., while leaving things such as freedom of speech, assembly, even to run your own business and get rich off of it if successful available to the general population -- in short, the only effective limit on choice he places is the choice in who is in charge. While he may have absolute power, in his benevolence he chooses to only wield it in specific situations for the benefit of his population.
Again, this obviously isn't particularly realistic, but it is an interesting thought experiment.
In the situation where the dictator only controls certain aspects that are deemed necessary, then what becomes of the other systems? Would the people rule them, and if so how, and what of the people who prefer that those things be controlled by the government. The largest issue, in my opinion, is that there is no aspect of "the government" that people could possibly agree on, and some group will always hate the dictator for whatever reason.
Although there is a possibility of multiple dictators dividing a state and the people voting to which regime they will live, but that would undoubtedly cause conflict between them.
Also, after consulting the Bill of Rights, all amendments can be guaranteed under the benevolent dictator -- because Amendment the Second gives the right to bear arms to a "well regulated militia" which brings into question a number of things about the existence of states under the dictator I don't think we want to get into.
If a government cannot enforce laws, then people can break those laws without punishment. Similarly, if people act in ways that are not socially acceptable, then they might experience stigma. Stigma isn't always enough to stop people from following social norms.
With complete freedom, you either have chaos and anarchy, or you have unenforced social contracts that people follow out of respect and fear of being ostracized. I have a difficult time believing any one person would ever truly appreciate or utilize complete freedom.