Posted on 02/14/2010 3:26:24 AM PST by Scanian
You don’t have to be a C-SPAN junkie to see that our government is just plain broken. You get the feeling that more substantial work gets accomplished at a high school’s model UN.
But what if it’s not just government that’s broken? What if democracy itself doesn’t work? After watching “Jaywalking,” or, God help us all, an episode of “Jersey Shore,” it’s hard to argue that We the People are best equipped to make the important decisions of state. As Winston Churchill once said, “The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter.”
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
Democracy is a fairly good system for governing a fairly homogeneous group of people with shared values and ideals. It was never intended to be a system for sharing power between two or more groups of people who basically despise and hate each other, and which have little or nothing in common. At that point, all you really have is a contest to see who can do the better job of gaming the system, which is basically what we have now.
Watching TV will make anyone think we should all die.
Well, for starters, America isn’t a democracy...
http://www.albatrus.org/english/goverment/govenrment/democracy%20versus%20repubblic.htm
Democracy Versus Republic
These succinct definitions of what is Democracy and what is a Republic was produced by the US Army in 1928, These definitions have been quietly withdrawn since, soon after.
Democracy:
A government of the masses.
Authority derived through mass meeting or any other form of “direct” expression.
Results in mobocracy.
Attitude toward property is comunistic-negating property rights.
Attitude toward law is that the will of the majority shall regulate. whether it be based upon deliberation or governed by passion, prejudice, and impulse, without restraint or regard to consequences.
Results in demagogism license, agitation, discontent, anarchy.
Democracy is the “direct” rule of the people and has been repeatedly tried without success.
A certain Professor Alexander Fraser Tytler, nearly two centuries ago, had this to say about Democracy: “ A Democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of Government. It can only exist until the voters discover they can vote themselves largess out of public treasury. From that moment on the majority always votes for the candidate promising the most benefits from the public treasury with the result that Democracy always collapses over a loose fiscal policy, always to be followed by a Dictatorship.”
A democracy is majority rule and is destructive of liberty because there is no law to prevent the majority from trampling on individual rights. Whatever the majority says goes! A lynch mob is an example of pure democracy in action. There is only one dissenting vote, and that is cast by the person at the end of the rope.
Republic:
Authority is derived through the election by the people of public officials best fitted to represent them.
Attitude toward property is respect for laws and individual rights, and a sensible economic procedure.
Attitude toward law is the administration of justice in accord with fixed principles and established evidence, with a strict regard to consequences.
A greater number of citizens and extent of territory may be brought within its compass.
Avoids the dangerous extreme of either tyranny or mobocracy. Results in statesmanship, liberty, reason, justice, contentment, and progress.
Is the “standard form” of government throughout the world.
A republic is a form of government under a constitution which provides for the election of:
1.
an executive and
2.
a legislative body, who working together in a representative capacity, have all the power of appointment, all power of legislation all power to raise revenue and appropriate expenditures, and are required to create
3.
a judiciary to pass upon the justice and legality of their governmental acts and to recognize
4.
certain inherent individual rights.
Take away any one or more of those four elements and you are drifting into autocracy. Add one or more to those four elements and you are drifting into democracy.
Our Constitutional fathers, familiar with the strength and weakness of both autocracy and democracy, with fixed principles definitely in mind, defined a representative republican form of government. They “made a very marked distinction between a republic and a democracy and said repeatedly and emphatically that they had founded a republic.”
A republic is a government of law under a Constitution. The Constitution holds the government in check and prevents the majority (acting through their government) from violating the rights of the individual. Under this system of government a lynch mob is illegal. The suspected criminal cannot be denied his right to a fair trial even if a majority of the citizenry demands otherwise.
I saw the title of this article and was just about to launch into my favorite “Democracy vs Republic” lecture, complete with Platonic references, but I guess I’ll settle for:
“What you said.”
Never heard of them, I assume these are tv shows.
We are a Constitutional Republic.
We can fix what is wrong.
Either repeal the 17th Amendment or enact term limits.
As for our our form of Government it is not dead.
Just that our government is not practicing our form of government.
What kind of government are they not practicing you say?
A LIMITED GOVERMENT.
As the article tries to imply:
Life is too painful.
So what is left?
Death?
As for Democracy being dead what is the alternative?
A Monarchy, Marxism / Communism (pretty what is causing the trouble anyhow), or a dictatorship?
Those have been tried with disastrous results.
Lets fix what we have. Because there is nothing better.
The choice may be between increasing numbers of elections like the one which put Al Franken into the US senate, or splitting the country up.
Then we need to repeal the 17th Amendment
If and when America gets back on it’s feet the first thing that should go is any full time legislature at the state & federal levels. At best it’s a part time job that should meet once in awhile to solve a problem rather then a full time job that does nothing but create problems.
Since we are not a democracy but a representative republic I will consider the writer one of the idiots not fit to represent me!!!
Yes, and fairly popular ones at that.
I agree...professional politicians must go - term limits are the way to go.
The other thing that has to happen is the permanent, useless bureaucracy needs to be cut down to size as well. Voting in a Reagan clone wouldn’t accomplish much if he had to contend with the bloated federal bureaucracy that gets bigger and more oppressive every day.
Thanks for the link, it’s the best explanation I’ve seen so far!
Thank you. Saved me my rant and instead I get to post one of theirs...lol.
THE GREATEST AMERICAN
Back in 2005, the Discovery Channel had the bright idea to ask citizens whom the greatest American of all time was. We citizens took a deep breath, accessed the deep well of our historical knowledge and confidently chose . . . Ronald Reagan?
Really? More important to this nation than Thomas Jefferson and Abe Lincoln?
- - - - -
BWAAHAHAHAHA
I WANT MY REPUBLIC BACK!
LLS
“At that point, all you really have is a contest to see who can do the better job of gaming the system, which is basically what we have now.”
Right. And the winners get to control access to the cookie jar for as long as they can manage.
Citizenship must be Earned
My Preference, by honorable service to country
- CCC / Military / “Peace Corp” - examples
- Available to any who has given, say 3 years, to commanded task
- Must complete service “Honorably”
Only Citizens given full Protection and Service of the Government
- Social Security / Medicare / Police / Fire
Citizenship must be maintained
- Submit self to public service when called
- Those Called to service, randomly assigned from pool
— Of those who have Shown “Merit” in the past
— Consider mandatory test in leadership capability
— The higher the “score” of leadership capability,
-— the higher the level in government assigned to serve
Release those who serve back to their prior life, no repeats
Children of Citizens are also Citizens until some age, say 21
Children of Non-Citizens are not Citizens,
- until they, themselves have served
- Powerful incentive as Public schools only for Children of Citizens
— unless it is paid for, at real cost
Those not Citizens, not given full support of Governance
- No such thing as “Illegal Aliens” as
— Citizenship is not assigned as birthright
— Protection of Government not given to Non-Citizens
Two Tiered Justice System, Police, Fire, etc.
Obviously, the “Devils in the Details”
Confucianism is one example
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confucianism#Meritocracy
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imperial_examination
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