The rule, exactly. Before an election each citizen chooses: to vote — or to take a payment and not vote in that election. The payment is a percentage of the median income, set by referendum; there is no fixed sum. One ballot is one vote, with no multiplier in the count; the vote is amplified only in that each ballot's share grows as others step out. The budget pays under law; a candidate never pays. Only a referendum of all citizens — simple majority, no quorum — introduces, changes or repeals the rule.
The protocol has been introduced nowhere and no pilot has been run: shares, turnout and outcome figures in the chapters are estimates, and the protocol promises nobody an election victory. If a chapter says otherwise, Exact Answers and the Charter are correct. For a candidate: ten questions and ten steps. For a citizen, a mayor, a finance officer, a donor, a journalist, a scholar, a lawyer: answers by role. Everything in force in one file: llms-full.txt.
25. Georgia and Saakashvili: Why a Reformer Without AB-EXIT = a Future Dictator¶
Chapter: 05 File version: v1 Date: 2026-06-11 Source: v6.53 §45
45.1. The reformer's trap — two options with no third¶
Saakashvili 2003–2012: sacked 30,000 police officers in a day, corruption −95 %, trust in the police 5 % → 84 %, GDP +9–12 % a year, Transparency International from 133rd → 51st place. A genius. Then: dispersed protests (2007, 2011), shut down opposition TV, political arrests. A dictator. Then: lost in 2012, fled, returned, prison. Why? Not lust for power — FEAR. Ivanishvili = an oligarch with $2.7–7.8B from Russia, created Georgian Dream in six months on his own money, populism + "normalisation with Russia" + an uneducated majority (villages, pensioners) = 55 % and victory. Exactly the scenario Saakashvili feared. By 2024: Saakashvili in prison, Georgia drifting towards Russia, a "foreign agents" law, 85 days of protests, EU accession suspended. Every fear came true.
Two options without AB-EXIT: A) let the populist win = lose the country. B) suppress = lose democracy. Both = lose EVERYTHING. Universal: Lula (Brazil) = prison, Park Geun-hye (Korea) = prison, Zuma (South Africa) = prison, Fujimori (Peru) = prison. Each began a hero, each ended in prison.
45.2. AB-EXIT = the third option¶
Georgia with AB-EXIT (X = 3.5 %, D = $105/year = a month's village wage). Cost: $184M/year (8.7 % of the budget, cheaper than the army at $392M). Ivanishvili's audience: poor villages take $105 (a month's wage > promises), pensioners take $105 (medicine > nostalgia), union members 5,000 → 800 (70 % took $105). Ivanishvili: 55 % → 14 %. At 14 % suppression is pointless. Nobody to disperse (the paid ones left for the dividend), no reason to close TV (TV for apathetics who do not vote = advertising to penguins), arrests are absurd (8 % = a fly vs a nuclear bomb). Dictatorship = not forbidden but POINTLESS. Like a horse in the age of the car: you can ride it, but why.
Russia through Ivanishvili: $50–100M per campaign. AB-EXIT: $184M × 4 years = $736M. The budget is infinite (taxes), the oligarch is finite. And deceiving the deceivers: a Georgian takes $50 from Russia for a rally + $105 from AB-EXIT = $155, or takes $50 and votes for Saakashvili in the secret booth. Of 10,000 "bought": 75 % deceive the deceiver. Russia pays $500K and loses 1,000 votes. Vote-buying = a loss-making business under AB-EXIT.