Democracy
Democracy is two wolves and a sheep voting on what’s for dinner. I’d quote it, because it isn’t original, but I’ve heard it more than one time and I don’t know who the original opiner was. I agree entirely with the concept. Majority rule is mob rule. This is generally not a good thing.
The United States of America is NOT a democracy. It was not intended to be a democracy. It is a Constitutional Republic. Quickie recap for those of you who slept through Civics class in High School: it is a system of democracy that is voted on by representatives of a district, democratically elected, but restrained by a constitution regarding the laws they are allowed to pass.
It’s Mob Rule with some rules.
When any politician says that our job is “to promote democracy”, he is full of shit. That is the worst thing we can do. Our job (if we have one) is to promote individual freedom and capitalism.
Democracy in the Middle East has given us Hamas, the first democratically elected terrorist organization in the history of civilization. We can do better than this.
I don’t mean to bash Bush, because most of his policies are effective (despite the crap reported by the mainstream media). However, his “bring democracy to the world” bullshit is dead wrong. If America operated under a democracy, without a Constitution, this would be a horrible place to live. Just imagine, for example, that the majority had its way on the estate tax. What would happen to the inheritance of the top percentage of successful people? The mob would say that anyone who leaves more than $1,000,000 to his heirs should forfeit the remainder to the “greater good”. This would decrease to become whatever is only slightly more than what 50% of the voters expect to pass along to their own families. This is total Mob Rule.
A democracy will not protect individual rights, because most people don’t believe in universal individual rights. If they did, we wouldn’t have Democrats. The political issues of today would not exist if a majority of people believed individuals have the right to life, liberty and property. Republicans are guilty of infringing upon this territory too.
Human nature is what it is. However, it is good to be aware of that before promoting democracy in and of itself. A civilization needs to protect people from the human tendency to take from others without consent. A constitution that limits government power is a way to accomplish this.
When there isn’t a strong consensus within a society on the boundaries of a constitution, then it takes a war.
The United States of America is NOT a democracy. It was not intended to be a democracy. It is a Constitutional Republic. Quickie recap for those of you who slept through Civics class in High School: it is a system of democracy that is voted on by representatives of a district, democratically elected, but restrained by a constitution regarding the laws they are allowed to pass.
It’s Mob Rule with some rules.
When any politician says that our job is “to promote democracy”, he is full of shit. That is the worst thing we can do. Our job (if we have one) is to promote individual freedom and capitalism.
Democracy in the Middle East has given us Hamas, the first democratically elected terrorist organization in the history of civilization. We can do better than this.
I don’t mean to bash Bush, because most of his policies are effective (despite the crap reported by the mainstream media). However, his “bring democracy to the world” bullshit is dead wrong. If America operated under a democracy, without a Constitution, this would be a horrible place to live. Just imagine, for example, that the majority had its way on the estate tax. What would happen to the inheritance of the top percentage of successful people? The mob would say that anyone who leaves more than $1,000,000 to his heirs should forfeit the remainder to the “greater good”. This would decrease to become whatever is only slightly more than what 50% of the voters expect to pass along to their own families. This is total Mob Rule.
A democracy will not protect individual rights, because most people don’t believe in universal individual rights. If they did, we wouldn’t have Democrats. The political issues of today would not exist if a majority of people believed individuals have the right to life, liberty and property. Republicans are guilty of infringing upon this territory too.
Human nature is what it is. However, it is good to be aware of that before promoting democracy in and of itself. A civilization needs to protect people from the human tendency to take from others without consent. A constitution that limits government power is a way to accomplish this.
When there isn’t a strong consensus within a society on the boundaries of a constitution, then it takes a war.
posted by BoiseJag at 5:16 PM
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