Democracy is promoted to John Q. American Public as almost sacrosanct—almost holy but not quite. Actually our version of democracy is really a democratic republic, but it was inspired by the original democracy in Athens, Greece nearly 2500 years ago. When the Founding Fathers put together the constitution and finally got it ratified they had succeeded in putting together the closest thing that had existed in the 2200+ years since the original Athens democracy. So really what we have today is a highly modified version of a dusted-off prototype that had not been in active use for quite awhile. It was and still is a very liberal idea that has not stood the test of time to anywhere near the degree of say, the Roman Empire or the feudalism of the Dark Ages. That is not to say that the Roman Empire and feudalism passed the test, but they did stand long enough for it. In view of this it is rather inappropriate to see Democracy as near holy. A better attitude would be something akin to the attitude of a development and testing team towards a new prototype that shows promise but is expected to require tuning and modification and maybe even an overhaul.
Here are some major flaws I see in the style of “democracy” we have today in the USA:
1) It is generally not understood that for a democracy to work, at least the majority of the electorate needs to operate in the analytical band of thought, and not in a group think or mob mentality mode. To allow for this there needs to be available a set of practical philosophical principles regarding the mind, its analytical and non-analytical components, and principles of group dynamics and health.
a. Did the Founding Fathers even give a thought to giving women the right to vote?
b. We could considerably raise the average level of analytical thought in the electorate just by revoking the 19th amendment.
2) Elected politicians do not have as foremost the purpose to do what is right. They are primarily focused on maintaining or gaining approval .
a. Will any elected or electable politician ever take the position that we should go from an unbacked paper currency to a gold (or other metal) standard? Our economy will not last backed by printed paper.
b. Will any politician ever mention that the “War on Drugs” could be won if Americans would simply stop using the drugs?
3) In the original Golden Age of Greece version of democracy a citizen that stood for election would have his personal and public life thoroughly gone over. They definitely believed in character. Nothing was overlooked. Today we trust the press to do this for us, for the most part, and this gives them the opportunity to factor in their own bias.
4) The weak under-belly of the USA today is the inability of John Q. Public to think for himself, or at least to do a good job of it. He trusts the news media to evaluate and summarize for him.
a. Mr. Limbaugh, a leading conservative voice, does not want his listeners to think for themselves. He wants to think for them.
5) The place an enemy wants to be is where you want to look for him the least , or where he is least likely to be questioned, but yet has much influence.
a. In recent years we have had the idea of our “God-given rights” promoted to us. Is this a set up? What God gives, God takes away, right? I thought we had to fight the British for our rights.
b. America is now “under God”, according to the Pledge of Allegiance. Many Americans do not realize this is a relatively new development that occurred during the McCarthy era of the 1950s, which was a classic case of rampant mob mentality in the public arena. Who is going to look closely or question an individual or group standing behind the G-O-D word? We got along all right for our first 160+ years without being “under God”, which is easily translated as “under those who purport themselves to be representatives of God”.
i. If the normal fabric and supports of our country were disrupted would the influence of the Christian Church expand to the proportions of a virtual governing body? Christianity has historically promoted the “Who band”, or bottom of the scale of group causation. If this did occur it would be a major braking action on the progress towards civilization.
c. Cadets in the Air Force Academy have been encouraged to see themselves first as part of “God’s Army” . Non-Christian cadets have been discriminated against.
i. Is something similar happening in the academies of the other services of the military?
ii. Is someone planning to use the military in a way that would require officers to see themselves as something other than American citizens first?
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