Are we nearing our expiration date? My sister reminded me of an argument we had when we were in our bar-hopping age. I had been influenced to believe democracy couldn’t last beyond 250 years, she thought that was crazy talk.
Today she reminded me of that argument and says she sees how its possible for America to fail, now that our politicians are power hungry and becoming ultra wealthy from their “service”. With the media telling half stories and opinions, and Politicians on both sides pitting us against each other, it’s getting easier to smell the rancidness coming.
So I looked up the history of democracy. Turns out this topic has already been under review. And this bit often attributed to Alexander Fraser Tytler was prophetic.
“A democracy will continue to exist up until the time that voters discover that they can vote themselves generous gifts from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates who promise the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that every democracy will finally collapse due to loose fiscal policy, which is always followed by a dictatorship.”
Currently we have (on both sides of the political field) people who run on promises someone else wrote. We have rules and Healthcare that applies differently for them than it does the people whom they allegedly serve. (From an article posted below) “In the age of mega-expensive politics, candidates depend on sponsors to fund permanent campaigns….Power has been sucked out of the constitutional system and usurped by actors such as PACs, think tanks, media and lobbying organizations.”
Personally, I wish we the people really would run our country. Each person working for a couple months in the service of each other so no one is benefiting from the laws and provisions anymore than the rest. Almost like jury duty, but so much more important. And since we are pulling together to run our country, we each have real jobs we return to (like our American forefathers) rather than making our service a full time job. This would also mean a lot of positions we have in government today would not need to be filled, since many were created for want of money, not need for the positions.
Here’s the article that was quoted from: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/is-american-democracy-headed-to-extinction/2014/03/28/f8084fbe-aa34-11e3-b61e-8051b8b52d06_story.html
Annie Harmon 