'How Much Longer Can America Survive an Ignorant Electorate?'
By JB Williams (08/10/07)
Can any representative republic survive a progressively ignorant electorate? Can freedom be sustained in any society hell-bent upon taxing its productive members out of existence, for benefit of its non-productive? Can people unable to successfully govern their own lives be entrusted with the power to govern others?
Not to be unkind, but we need to face facts here. So long as a republic represents the will of the brave, it will remain the home of the free. When it’s run by the productive members of society, it will remain prosperous. When it’s governed by the independent minded, it will not be dependent upon anyone. When run by those with a healthy respect for individual rights, special interests will no longer need special consideration.
But when cowards, thieves and thugs run things, those who believe that some progressive form of socialism is better than individual freedom and personal achievement, freedom is diminished. When those seeking to rob the rich in the name of the poor while stuffing their own pockets and growing their own political power run things, then the republic represents cowardly thieves, not the people.
When capitalism is attacked, socialism is automatically advanced. We can not afford to allow socialists to criminalize capitalism in the free enterprise capital of the world, unless free enterprise and economic freedom are things of the past.
While democracy is by far the most successful form of government on earth in the short run, it is once again proving to be unsustainable in the long run. In short, people who make a mess of their own lives and then seek government solutions to the mess they created, are about to make a mess of their entire nation. America has been on this course for some sixty years now and the self-destruction of the greatest nation on earth is accelerating.
In the best of circumstances, government is still the most evil of necessities. Societies inherently know this in the early stages of development. But generations later, few seem to remember.
Even when very limited by design, restricted by law, of, by and for the people, government is a deadly virus constantly eating away at personal liberty and individual freedom, first slowly, then at an accelerating pace as the progressive virus consumes that which it was originally supposed to protect.
The Double Edged Sword of Democracy
The very same democratic principles used to protect personal liberty and individual freedom can, and as history has proven, will eventually be used to attack personal liberty and individual freedom.
"The measures of the fair majority... ought always to be respected." --Thomas Jefferson to George Washington, 1792. ME 8:397
If a fair majority decides that individual freedom and liberty are to be protected, then that should be respected. However, if that same fair majority decides that a greater common good trumps individual freedom and liberty, then that must also be respected, yes? The absolute rule of a fair majority is by definition, a democracy, even when that majority chooses tyranny over freedom, collective socialism over individual capitalism.
I wrote about the dismantling of America in a recent column titled When 51-49 becomes 49-51.
In it, I talk about how freedom and liberty are protected only so long as at least 51% (the fair majority) desire personal freedom and liberty more than government solutions to personal challenges. I also describe what happens once those who only respect a greater communal good outnumber those who still desire personal freedom and individual liberty, when 51-49 becomes 49-51, swinging majority interests away from individual rights and towards the collective rights of the community at large.
2006 Election Result - The Greater Good of the Commune defeats Individual Freedom
Because one can not be allowed to fail, one can no longer be allowed the freedom to succeed either. Individual success must be penalized by progressive taxation, because it is the only way to eliminate, pay for or offset individual failure, once failure is deemed inhumane and unacceptable by the commune at large.
This is the basis upon which the new American majority now casts its vote.
Today, capitalism, free enterprise, profit, independence, individuality and personal achievement are scorned as dirty words in America. The successful are now referred to only as “the greedy”. They are targeted for revenge, taxed against their will, driven from the community like common criminals, through excessive governmental intrusion, taxation and regulation. Not even the very real threat of world wide terrorism or national bankruptcy can spawn as much fear and anguish in average American voters as evil “corporate America” does today. Not because corporate America is an equal threat, but because ignorant voters have been fully indoctrinated.
There are indeed criminal individuals working inside of corporate America today. But far fewer than you can find working in the halls of congress or your local union office. Criminals should be prosecuted no matter where they are found, at the head of a US company, in the union office or in Washington DC. However, an inanimate object, a corporation, a union, a governing body, is only a structure, in and of itself, neither good nor evil. It’s the individuals involved who are good or evil, their acts from positions of power which are right or wrong. But progressive thinking aims to take one criminal individual, criminalize the company he runs, and indict all of capitalism on this basis. Ignorant voters buy it…
The re-education process and development of an American proletariat voting bloc is complete, at least as a fair majority. Today’s Democrat Party exists on the basis of this voting bloc alone. It also operates on the governing principle, “from each according to his ability, to each according to his need”. This is the greater common good that drives the voters that drive today’s Democrat Party. It’s a very socially conscious sounding idea, isn’t it? It was written by Karl Marx, as the foundational principle for his governing system, Socialism.
Every Democrat vote is cast based upon this principle today. Every penny poured into the Democrat Party is intended to advance this agenda. Democrat leaders know well that their party now represents the principles written by Karl Marx, the father of Marxism, Socialism, as the transitional stepping stone on the road from capitalism to communism. But few in the proletariat voting bloc recognize what they are supporting today or where they are headed. Human regression sounds very progressive to ignorant voters. Need an example?
The Hairline Difference between Universal Healthcare and Socialized Medicine
Just as socialism is but a stepping stone on the road from capitalism to communism, Universal Healthcare is but a stepping stone on the road from private medicine to Socialized Medicine.
The case for Universal Medicine is made on the basis that private medicine is failing to meet the needs of the people. Medical costs are too high, as are insurance costs. The idea is that a “single payer system” (the single payer being the federal government) will solve the problem by simplifying the process and bringing down the cost of medical treatment and insurance by way of “collective bargaining” on behalf of the people.
On the surface, the case almost makes sense, as long as you don’t ask any important questions about any of the details regarding how such a program might work, or bother to notice that the same principles have been tried in many other parts of the world with disastrous results.
Other countries have similar “free” medicine already. Yes, people in these countries can get “free” (paid for by others) substandard medical treatment, if they can live until their appointment six to eight months from now. Never mind that their nations are going bankrupt doing it or that freedom long ago ceased to exist in order to rob the productive members of society who pick up the tab.
Once Universal Healthcare is installed, the federal government will soon cut out the inconvenient middle-man, the health insurance company, collect the insurance premiums itself to stay afloat and begin to administer medicine and medical decisions from the hall of congress directly. This, my dear ignorant fellow Americans, is socialized medicine and there is only a hairline difference separating Universal Healthcare from socialized medicine.
When the people vote themselves gifts from the treasury in every election, politicians must run on government growth and spending.
Our federal government has never reduced its own size, scope or reach and it never will. Though every election cycle is filled with promises to reduce the size, scope, reach and expense of the federal government, and both liberals and conservatives claim to desire personal freedom and liberty, politicians are instead elected on the basis of just the opposite. They are elected on the basis of where they intend to grow government, not shrink it.
Many conservatives want a bigger, better, stronger military and that will increase the size, scope and cost of government. Most liberals want bigger, better social programs and this too will increase the size, scope and cost of government. Nobody is running on the basis of reducing the size, scope and reach of all of it and if they did, they would never be elected today.
Can you even imagine America electing politicians truly committed to reversing the hundred year old trend of growing government today? Reversing the trend of growing the federal government means reducing government spending, cutting government programs, eliminating government waste, ending special interest funding of all sorts of special interest projects and retreating from those who aim to vote themselves favor from the treasury. Would any Democrat voter support such things today? There is NO evidence that they would…
Getting fat is easy. Losing weight is ten times harder, whether as an individual or as a nation.
As a result, no Democrat politician would ever run on such notions today. Even Republicans feel the need to pander just to stay in the game.
The end result of the people’s choice – is the slow but certain death of America
America may have already passed the point of no return on the road to self-destruction. Only the people had the power to stop it. The fair majority was given the power to choose personal freedom and individual liberty and for almost 200 years, they did. Today, they are choosing a collective communal good instead.
But for almost 100 years now, since the 1940’s in particular, those seeking the interests of the community at large, the commune, in opposition to individual rights of freedom and liberty, have grown to become the new American majority. 51-49 in favor of freedom is now 49-51 in favor of a “universal collective right” to free (paid for by others) stuff.
Few in modern America understand that individual freedom and liberty can not co-exist with socialism or communism. Few recognize that they are systematically destroying the greatest nation on earth with every attempt to vote themselves or others gifts from the treasury. Few would knowingly vote for socialized medicine, but most now support universal healthcare. Few want socialism, but many now believe it serves the people better than capitalism, otherwise known as economic freedom.
In yet another effort to awaken the average American voter, I wrote Anything Goes in America, If you know what to name it! It turns out Americans will buy anything if you name it right. Socialism no, but progress, sure.
The people have chosen.
The new American majority is indeed willing to trade individual freedom and personal liberty for free (paid for by others) stuff, a false sense of temporary security, the greater good of the common politician always in search of political power over the burgeoning proletariat voter bloc and the end of America as many of us once knew it.
What’s their defense? “A little socialism can be a good thing. We don’t like the term “socialism,” we prefer the term “socially conscious democratic progress.” Learn to like it, you greedy capitalist pig!” It’s here to stay!
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