Hmmmmm.....me thinks you're describing a democratic republic of decentralized power like that conceived of by the framers of - now what was that document??? - oh, yes! That pesky Constitution of the United States
I feel you. But I'll also say that this system- like the uprising of farmers in India - requires active participation, moment to moment, by a citizenry motivated by the vision of self-responsibility and self-governance *rather than* the adolescent awareness of victimhood and demands for service currently in fashion here in our USA. Throwing things thru plate glass is a useless tantrum. Getting down to rhe business of separating corporate interests and control from our governance process requires a focus and fortitude which might in fact all but disappeared from many corners of this amazing experiment in nationhood.
I can feel your strength and really appreciate it. It's time though to accept the experiment of the USA nationhood has failed. It is eating itself as it tries to satisfy a desperate starvation. The goal of unity and peace it was supposed to establish, no wait, let me rephrase that - the massive grab for power inspired by the vast riches the 'new' land had to offer the invading white people simply called too loud. It was and still is only about wealth and the power to keep it. The American Constitution is devoid of philosophical, human wellbeing based values and is all about tax and legal controls. Truly uninspiring. The founding fathers wanted to stop paying the British monarch taxes - and why wouldn't they. So they became their own monarchy, thinly disguised as a democratic nation. When the motive was pure greed, how could the outcome be anything other than it is today? What you see as a 'vision of self-responsibility and self-governance' by the farmers in India is actually the desperation of people who are suffering the next step coming for us all, homelessness, starvation and the loss of all power. Until we in the fat west stop being comfortably trapped in our homes with our online visions of revolution, nothing is going to change. We NEED to have everything taken away, the tubes of addiction need to be ripped, we must die to be reborn. Most days now, I struggle to hope for the latter.
I hear the pain and frustration and sadness and anger in your words - and I recognize them because I feel them too at times. I am no pollyanna nor deluded libertarian- but neither am I willing to give up on the ideals for this republic written into the founding documents. You speak of greed - and I see it daily, too, on so many levels of our society, near and far. But I offer this possible interpretation/context for it: might it be the inevitable yang to the yin of privation - both material and spiritual - that arrived to this continent in the bodies and souls of those waves of settlers, slaves and indentured servants and which still exists in the dna of their descendants? And isn't that story, that dynamic, as old as the wandering and warring nomads and subsistence level farmers that were humans over the millennia? I do not say this to excuse inexcusable behaviors or make light of atrocities committed, but to highlight what feels to me to be an inevitability of human interaction at this stage of our spiritual journey: wherever humans gather in their inevitable need to gather, the questions of how to distribute limited resources will always arise, as will the ways and means of falsely equating such challenges with a "morality" that can so easily conceal an authoritarian lust for power - a wolf in sheep's clothing, as it were. The question seems to me to be this: how do we flawed humans create the best possibility that most people will have their physical and spiritual needs met, each soul as they each see fit? And to limit the accumulation of power such that there might be fewer abuses of the weakest among us? The various expressions of centralized econmic and social authority - e.g. monarchy and feudalism or Soviet or CCP style communism or even hierarchical religious community - have not shown themselves to be any less rife with the human flaws.of greed or violence against the "other"-- and certainly have shown themselves to be less efficient at raising living standards and often far less likely to allow for self sovereignty over material and spiritual choices. Nor yet have they regularly allowed for those with less power to gather and express their grievances. The interesting challenge that are the ideals of the USA in its founding is that we were specifically hoping to keep a centralized authority out of the personal spaces, and we were hoping to keep such a dynamic tension among the holders of power that no majority could bully a minority that might have unpopular opinions... I can understand that the colonists no longer wanted to pay taxes to a far off monarch in order that he might use that wealth without their input. Is that truly greed? Or is that more like the Indian farmers, desperate - yes, as we all might be when we realize the technocracy kings hold all our value in the 1s and 0s stored in their servers - to keep the results of their labor out of the pockets of the elites?
People are flawed - at least for now - and so inevitably are their systems. So which ones allow for the best behaviors that we might each express, the best chance to be expressed...?
I offer these thoughts with gentleness and respect.
I know you do. :-). I have taken our collaboration of words and souls as an opportunity to do some research into the founding fathers. It is fascinating! John Adams seems to come up first on the list and in a whirlwind tour of Wikipedia, here's what kind of man I found - "I longed more ardently to be a Soldier than I ever did to be a Lawyer". He applauded the acts known as the Boston Tea Party, which interestingly was a revolt against the global mono-corporatism of the day (trade monopoly of tea) that America now excels in. In order to support and hasten the fight for independence, he armed ships, effectively founding that other pillar of American society - the Arms Trade, now also global of course. He seems to have lived a life fighting the European class system, which of course excluded him completely and developing a knack for diplomacy, claiming to King George III that the American 'People who, tho Seperated [sic] by an Ocean and under different Governments have the Same Language, a Similar Religion and kindred Blood,' while simultaneously asserting that '...nor any other relation that I know of, or care a farthing for, has been in England these one hundred and fifty years; so that you see I have not one drop of blood in my veins but what is American.' He was also a racist, calling Alexander Hamilton among others things, "...the Creole bastard." Adams defenders could say he said this sweet thing "I must study Politicks and War that my sons may have the liberty to study Mathematicks and Philosophy. My sons ought to study Geography, natural History, Naval Architecture, navigation, Commerce and Agriculture, in order to give their children a right to study Painting, Poetry, Musick, Architecture, Statuary, Tapestry, and Porcelaine." If only he had pursued this line of potential instead of trade and diplomacy issues. He clearly sensed that his life's pursuit did not lead to happiness. Both his sons had alcoholism that ultimately killed them. Instead, it smacks of its' modern incarnation - 'trickle down economics', a proven disastrous failure that does not deliver the milk and honey to the people it promises. He WAS the elite, don't you see? All the fathers were. The people have never stood a chance. There is no current system on earth that allows for success and freedom for all. Why do we have to have a system at all? Why don't we try not having a system but having a consciousness completely free from categorisation of any kind. Pure consciousness. Forgotten telepathy, wisdom, love, FREEDOM. Completely mad and incomprehensible, not practical or helpful at all, I know. I offer this with gentle sadness.
"There is no current system on earth that allows for success and freedom for all. Why do we have to have a system at all? Why don't we try not having a system but having a consciousness completely free from categorisation of any kind. Pure consciousness. Forgotten telepathy, wisdom, love, FREEDOM."
And I both agree - and disagree. I offer that the very specific words matter - just like in prayer and meditation - and all explorations of life and consciousness. On the level of the physical, I'd say were subject to the limits and laws of the embodied physical, which means among other things that we must work with all forms of embodied consciousness, including those who are still working out for themselves a relationship with the All That Is. The physical is the place where the illusion of separation exists - must exist - so that the paradox of the All can perceive Itself via the myriad perspectives. And this necessarily includes the frailties of greed and violence and the sense of lack and all that this entails. And I believe we humans can't force awareness to grow among other sovreign beings- we can only invite it. And so - yes - there must be a "system" and - no - it by definition cannot guarantee anything. It can only strive to offer opportunity and possibility and some safety to the weak. It can and should be a space holder, like a good parent or therapist or friend. All else risks falling into the sins of one holding power over another...
But in Spirit? I agree. No system should be necessary because on the level of pure consciousness we are already There and Here and All. It's only within the experience of the physical that we (still?) need guardrails and to struggle with limitations. But - I would suggest - we on some level have joined forces with the All to co-create all things, and so we can always *aim* for less struggle and more kindness and more opportunity to invite more of us along towards peace - but we sadly must also allow for those parts of Consciousness which disagree with "my" approach their space to live and explore their way, too...
There's always more to say on such things...! Thank you gor sharing the process with me - including the bio on Adams. It's partly what's reminded me of my belief that while we cannot necessarily achieve our highest ideals on Earth, we should nevertheless strive always toward them with equal parts conviction and humility.
The US constitution was engineered as a coup, which is why the "framers" met secretly behind locked doors in Philadelphia. With popular discontent against the rule of wealth like Shay's Rebellion fresh in their minds, they illegally overthrew the more decentralized, state-empowered Articles of Confederation, the original constitution, and imposed a federally centralized control over commerce and currency, military force and imperial expansion (which the British empire had curbed). Their right to private property, others be damned, was summed up the continued inclusion of slavery. They later had to include the Bill of Rights in order to obtain ratification - among the few who could vote - but as history has shown, the rights of us commoners are routinely observed in their breach (not to mention their abolition altogether with the current covid coup).
Yes, in most cases, nearly any random citizen would be an improvement for most government offices. It should be like national service and ideally go to those who have zero interest in power.
Good idea! Except that zero interest in power is difficult to gage. Especially so given that it is often totally unconscious and only manifested when said person is placed into a position of power.
I often think that politicians start out well-intentioned and then …. we’ll, we know the rest!🙏🏻
Yep and not for the money, actual people who want to make a difference who have the skill but not imbedded in the culture of the government and the 1%. I’m not sure about the states but in Nz at election time only the top 2 or 3 parties got to participate in live debates, where is the voice of the minorities who have excellent ideas? Also and campaigns should be on an equal field like they all get the same amount of coin to get there policies across not millions for one and fundraising by the other type thing.
Exactly. A friend of mine who spent decades in Costa Rica said there are about 26 different political parties there. So election time is a sort of a grab bag. Works for them.
I've often thought a rotation of citizens, (some would be granted exceptions as needed) instead of elections would be far preferable. With clear limits on time served. It would certainly group citizenship to service across the board and require we know what's going on, since we could soon be serving. Is this possible? Sure - but much has to come down first.
We have to get over the Game A/winner-take-all mentality of the party system and move towards consensus. There can be no peace when a mere majority (often voted in by 25% or less of the population) believes that power allows them to tell others how to live. That system has to go.
How about the example of the J-6th protesters? Because the media and establishment were both against their cause, they are set up by federal agents who let them in and painted as insurrectionists by the media. Now many are in jail in solitary confinement without basic human rights like personal grooming, medicine, food that won't kill them (for celiacs), clean water. Kept for months in solidarity without charges, they are then given court appointed lawyers who don't see them before trial and work with the opposition to prosecute them. One prisoner was beaten so badly by guards (who invoked his race at the time) that he lost an eye. Some prisoners are losing a great deal of weight as they are not allowed to buy additional food. One committed suicide. These are people without criminal histories who were employees and business owners before the eff bee eye decided to destroy them. If this is what happens to protesters in the US, democracy is DEAD.
well regardless of how they got in, and mind you many did storm through barriers, people who try to take down a government (right or wrong depending on your views) are going to put themselves at stake... for jail or worse. They made the choice. If this was a different country, they more likely would have been killed.
If you are in a democracy that says it is decent, you do not ever treat people who have differing opinions or even those that have committed a crime in such a demeaning way... It actually points to the reasons why they felt compelled to do what they did - the country had lost its way...
I am not a US citizen - I am in Australia so cannot comment from place of knowledge on this but from the out side this treatment looks like evidence of the problem...
In Australia in Melbourne Australia during the world's longest lockdown one woman was arrested after suggesting that it might be time for people to protest this lockdown; she was jailed in solitary confinement for 22 days as she would not meet the draconian bail requirements to turn over all her computers, passwords and data bases (exposing her followers) as well as take down any of her personal websites... seems Australia is acting as indecently as the US - a supposed decent modern democracy.
No person should be treated in such a way as she was and those mentioned in this sub-thread, modern democracies are supposed to be moral states that are not supposed to dish out such sort of punishments, no matter what the crime!
I think you don't understand that it is ILLEGAL to storm a government building AND they killed people. Did you see the footage? Many had guns and had they gotten to a few specific people, I do believe our VP would have been killed. It's one thing to protest and quite another to break into a federal building with intent to do harm and actually do harm.
Looks good. Like democracy may be something that cannot be instituted. My mentor said it may be messy but we'll learn a lot. Looks like your article provides a lot of examples. I do want civility and the greater good as values. My preference. Not a fan of domination. What if we saw democracy as a living mutual endeavor...for the greatest good not the few? We actually are not a democracy. A republic. Not a fan of representatives of wealth. Many thanks. Participatory. Engagement. Good will.
Governments need to be far more transparent and the media needs to learn how to be proper journalists and cover stories with no bias. Imagine if trump had become dottery like Biden is, the media were very hard on trump and he could take it, Biden can’t even work out what he’s doing on stage half the time, yet only a few outlets mention it, mostly in other countries.
How can we make informed decisions about anything when the media is just a government puppet pushing propaganda.
We do not need a democratic government. We need a DISCERNING one. That means that everyone is humble enough to admit that we don't know how to solve the enormous and complex problems we are facing but that the Invisible Forces that brought us this far will see us through, just as in the past. This takes letting go of our own agendas, getting quiet, listening deeply to the "other," in trust that we are all in this together and only together will we come through. Eventually, with this "Spirit of poverty/unknowing" in conversation with one another we will begin to see not necessarily the solution but the next step in the right direction. There truly are invisible forces at work for our good.
Yes, thank you. The invisible forces at play in every moment, always for good. In Ecuador and India the people know and still listen within, to the unknown intelligence which gave us life, living within us, it still the core of their culture. It’s always there, guiding to have and respect integrity of living, bringing about connective Power for good, and not lost to the delusion and destructive illusion of force.
One of the issues we have in the West is that none of the 'leaders' function as champions of the people. They're managers, intended to keep us just docile and confused and apathetic enough to avoid dislodging the parasite class.
Mass movements are one strategy for pushing back when things get egregious, but they have their limitations. They only trigger when conditions get really bad; otherwise, the pathocrats just carry on doing their thing. They're inherently disorganized. They're also fairly easily crushed: see the yellow vests, the Canadian truckers, or Occupy. They take a lot of energy, involve a lot of disruption, and only sort of work sometimes. I'm sure Modi or his successor will try the same thing in a few years under a different name, with better public relations, and perhaps moving piecemeal rather than all at once in order to diffuse opposition.
Traditionally, societies have been organized with a chieftain or king, who acts as a rallying point, and keeps the peace between the peasants and the nobility by acting as the champion of the former. Perhaps our problem is that we don't have that.
I look at politics as the people deciding on policies within groups small enough for the consequences of their decisions to come back around. Electoral (or even by-lottery) representation is 'personalitics'. We think that someone else should take responsibility for thinking about what we should do. In small enough groups, we can learn from our mistakes and government can just be the functionaries carrying out our decisions.
I've changed my mind so much about energy since realizing how the green agenda is being used by the WEF. Germany is in real trouble with oil and gas cut off, 3/6 nuclear plants shut down (with the others slated at the end of 2022) and even hydro from Sweden and Finland slowed to a trickle. They're telling them to gather wood from the forests, while wood burning stoves and cut wood is gone.
So while Modi has Operation Green Hunt to get everyone off the land so they don't interfere with mining concessions, I've begun to wonder if indigenous protests against mining are being allowed to succeed. Cynthia Chung has a very good article looking at this as part of a depopulation effort. It's worth checking out:
In case it hasn't fell on your radar, Of By For is a non-profit advocating for exactly what you mentioned: democracy by lottery. I recently watched their documentary (in tears at the beauty), which is soon to be released, about a citizen's panel on covid in Michigan. Beautiful to withness the beauty of human nature when given the right context: people universes apart truly listening to each other.
Sounds profound as always Charles - but maybe democracy or at least the word democracy has passed its due date. You are a great wordsmith- can you call your new understanding of democracy something different??
I have always thought a lottery system like they choose the jury in a court case. We send ordinary citizens to made decisions at all levels- municipal, provincial and federal. They set the course and have very smart researchers do the work of figuring how to implement. This precludes that we have adjusted the money system to work equally well for all, which might mean just completely change the value system like Captain Kirk said, on Earth we no longer use money, we want people, individuals to be the best they can be. (paraphrase).
"A truly democratic future cannot rely on incorporating democracy into systems and institutions of governance. These always become anti-democratic."
I like to distinguish between governMENT and goverNANCE. Government is what happens within the constraints imposed by the state (See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_(polity) Governance can refer to any group of people who voluntarily self-assemble to regulate their own affairs using, ideally, democratic means of doing so. Of course, democracy does not imply majority rule.
GoverNANCE itself need not become anti-democratic. It is goverMENT which tends always to become anti-democratic.
It's unlikely random citizens would perform better than the last two presidents. Trump was among the best in terms of performance for things that matter to the citizens. Biden is among the worst. Administering a large bureaucracy is not a matter of "doing the right thing" but of skilled management of the bureaucracy that actually runs things. Trump's failure was he didn't understand the bureaucracy well enough, and the swamp drained him. Biden's failure is because he's been a swamp creature for decades and his corruption has produced his downfall. There are experienced administrators with enough integrity to perform adequately, although necessarily angering half the population while pleasing the other half. Our main problem is a neurotic population who demand a perfect existence as they've been trained to expect. Until more people learn they can't have it their way, we can expect continued hostility and occasional violence. Presidents have little influence over that. They do have opportunities, as Barry predicted, to screw things up.
" Maybe democracy resides in unofficial, informal civic structures, extra-legal vernacular institutions, and place-based communities."
Yes. This is what we need. I follow Russell Brand and this is what he is saying, too. How do we convince others?
Demonstrate its efficacy
Hmmmmm.....me thinks you're describing a democratic republic of decentralized power like that conceived of by the framers of - now what was that document??? - oh, yes! That pesky Constitution of the United States
Look how that's turned out
I feel you. But I'll also say that this system- like the uprising of farmers in India - requires active participation, moment to moment, by a citizenry motivated by the vision of self-responsibility and self-governance *rather than* the adolescent awareness of victimhood and demands for service currently in fashion here in our USA. Throwing things thru plate glass is a useless tantrum. Getting down to rhe business of separating corporate interests and control from our governance process requires a focus and fortitude which might in fact all but disappeared from many corners of this amazing experiment in nationhood.
I can feel your strength and really appreciate it. It's time though to accept the experiment of the USA nationhood has failed. It is eating itself as it tries to satisfy a desperate starvation. The goal of unity and peace it was supposed to establish, no wait, let me rephrase that - the massive grab for power inspired by the vast riches the 'new' land had to offer the invading white people simply called too loud. It was and still is only about wealth and the power to keep it. The American Constitution is devoid of philosophical, human wellbeing based values and is all about tax and legal controls. Truly uninspiring. The founding fathers wanted to stop paying the British monarch taxes - and why wouldn't they. So they became their own monarchy, thinly disguised as a democratic nation. When the motive was pure greed, how could the outcome be anything other than it is today? What you see as a 'vision of self-responsibility and self-governance' by the farmers in India is actually the desperation of people who are suffering the next step coming for us all, homelessness, starvation and the loss of all power. Until we in the fat west stop being comfortably trapped in our homes with our online visions of revolution, nothing is going to change. We NEED to have everything taken away, the tubes of addiction need to be ripped, we must die to be reborn. Most days now, I struggle to hope for the latter.
I hear the pain and frustration and sadness and anger in your words - and I recognize them because I feel them too at times. I am no pollyanna nor deluded libertarian- but neither am I willing to give up on the ideals for this republic written into the founding documents. You speak of greed - and I see it daily, too, on so many levels of our society, near and far. But I offer this possible interpretation/context for it: might it be the inevitable yang to the yin of privation - both material and spiritual - that arrived to this continent in the bodies and souls of those waves of settlers, slaves and indentured servants and which still exists in the dna of their descendants? And isn't that story, that dynamic, as old as the wandering and warring nomads and subsistence level farmers that were humans over the millennia? I do not say this to excuse inexcusable behaviors or make light of atrocities committed, but to highlight what feels to me to be an inevitability of human interaction at this stage of our spiritual journey: wherever humans gather in their inevitable need to gather, the questions of how to distribute limited resources will always arise, as will the ways and means of falsely equating such challenges with a "morality" that can so easily conceal an authoritarian lust for power - a wolf in sheep's clothing, as it were. The question seems to me to be this: how do we flawed humans create the best possibility that most people will have their physical and spiritual needs met, each soul as they each see fit? And to limit the accumulation of power such that there might be fewer abuses of the weakest among us? The various expressions of centralized econmic and social authority - e.g. monarchy and feudalism or Soviet or CCP style communism or even hierarchical religious community - have not shown themselves to be any less rife with the human flaws.of greed or violence against the "other"-- and certainly have shown themselves to be less efficient at raising living standards and often far less likely to allow for self sovereignty over material and spiritual choices. Nor yet have they regularly allowed for those with less power to gather and express their grievances. The interesting challenge that are the ideals of the USA in its founding is that we were specifically hoping to keep a centralized authority out of the personal spaces, and we were hoping to keep such a dynamic tension among the holders of power that no majority could bully a minority that might have unpopular opinions... I can understand that the colonists no longer wanted to pay taxes to a far off monarch in order that he might use that wealth without their input. Is that truly greed? Or is that more like the Indian farmers, desperate - yes, as we all might be when we realize the technocracy kings hold all our value in the 1s and 0s stored in their servers - to keep the results of their labor out of the pockets of the elites?
People are flawed - at least for now - and so inevitably are their systems. So which ones allow for the best behaviors that we might each express, the best chance to be expressed...?
I offer these thoughts with gentleness and respect.
I know you do. :-). I have taken our collaboration of words and souls as an opportunity to do some research into the founding fathers. It is fascinating! John Adams seems to come up first on the list and in a whirlwind tour of Wikipedia, here's what kind of man I found - "I longed more ardently to be a Soldier than I ever did to be a Lawyer". He applauded the acts known as the Boston Tea Party, which interestingly was a revolt against the global mono-corporatism of the day (trade monopoly of tea) that America now excels in. In order to support and hasten the fight for independence, he armed ships, effectively founding that other pillar of American society - the Arms Trade, now also global of course. He seems to have lived a life fighting the European class system, which of course excluded him completely and developing a knack for diplomacy, claiming to King George III that the American 'People who, tho Seperated [sic] by an Ocean and under different Governments have the Same Language, a Similar Religion and kindred Blood,' while simultaneously asserting that '...nor any other relation that I know of, or care a farthing for, has been in England these one hundred and fifty years; so that you see I have not one drop of blood in my veins but what is American.' He was also a racist, calling Alexander Hamilton among others things, "...the Creole bastard." Adams defenders could say he said this sweet thing "I must study Politicks and War that my sons may have the liberty to study Mathematicks and Philosophy. My sons ought to study Geography, natural History, Naval Architecture, navigation, Commerce and Agriculture, in order to give their children a right to study Painting, Poetry, Musick, Architecture, Statuary, Tapestry, and Porcelaine." If only he had pursued this line of potential instead of trade and diplomacy issues. He clearly sensed that his life's pursuit did not lead to happiness. Both his sons had alcoholism that ultimately killed them. Instead, it smacks of its' modern incarnation - 'trickle down economics', a proven disastrous failure that does not deliver the milk and honey to the people it promises. He WAS the elite, don't you see? All the fathers were. The people have never stood a chance. There is no current system on earth that allows for success and freedom for all. Why do we have to have a system at all? Why don't we try not having a system but having a consciousness completely free from categorisation of any kind. Pure consciousness. Forgotten telepathy, wisdom, love, FREEDOM. Completely mad and incomprehensible, not practical or helpful at all, I know. I offer this with gentle sadness.
You write:
"There is no current system on earth that allows for success and freedom for all. Why do we have to have a system at all? Why don't we try not having a system but having a consciousness completely free from categorisation of any kind. Pure consciousness. Forgotten telepathy, wisdom, love, FREEDOM."
And I both agree - and disagree. I offer that the very specific words matter - just like in prayer and meditation - and all explorations of life and consciousness. On the level of the physical, I'd say were subject to the limits and laws of the embodied physical, which means among other things that we must work with all forms of embodied consciousness, including those who are still working out for themselves a relationship with the All That Is. The physical is the place where the illusion of separation exists - must exist - so that the paradox of the All can perceive Itself via the myriad perspectives. And this necessarily includes the frailties of greed and violence and the sense of lack and all that this entails. And I believe we humans can't force awareness to grow among other sovreign beings- we can only invite it. And so - yes - there must be a "system" and - no - it by definition cannot guarantee anything. It can only strive to offer opportunity and possibility and some safety to the weak. It can and should be a space holder, like a good parent or therapist or friend. All else risks falling into the sins of one holding power over another...
But in Spirit? I agree. No system should be necessary because on the level of pure consciousness we are already There and Here and All. It's only within the experience of the physical that we (still?) need guardrails and to struggle with limitations. But - I would suggest - we on some level have joined forces with the All to co-create all things, and so we can always *aim* for less struggle and more kindness and more opportunity to invite more of us along towards peace - but we sadly must also allow for those parts of Consciousness which disagree with "my" approach their space to live and explore their way, too...
There's always more to say on such things...! Thank you gor sharing the process with me - including the bio on Adams. It's partly what's reminded me of my belief that while we cannot necessarily achieve our highest ideals on Earth, we should nevertheless strive always toward them with equal parts conviction and humility.
Yes!
The US constitution was engineered as a coup, which is why the "framers" met secretly behind locked doors in Philadelphia. With popular discontent against the rule of wealth like Shay's Rebellion fresh in their minds, they illegally overthrew the more decentralized, state-empowered Articles of Confederation, the original constitution, and imposed a federally centralized control over commerce and currency, military force and imperial expansion (which the British empire had curbed). Their right to private property, others be damned, was summed up the continued inclusion of slavery. They later had to include the Bill of Rights in order to obtain ratification - among the few who could vote - but as history has shown, the rights of us commoners are routinely observed in their breach (not to mention their abolition altogether with the current covid coup).
Yes, in most cases, nearly any random citizen would be an improvement for most government offices. It should be like national service and ideally go to those who have zero interest in power.
Sort of like a 12 Step program for governance. No profit, no personalities. Peer to peer ingrained with a system of self sponsorship.
Good idea! Except that zero interest in power is difficult to gage. Especially so given that it is often totally unconscious and only manifested when said person is placed into a position of power.
I often think that politicians start out well-intentioned and then …. we’ll, we know the rest!🙏🏻
Yep and not for the money, actual people who want to make a difference who have the skill but not imbedded in the culture of the government and the 1%. I’m not sure about the states but in Nz at election time only the top 2 or 3 parties got to participate in live debates, where is the voice of the minorities who have excellent ideas? Also and campaigns should be on an equal field like they all get the same amount of coin to get there policies across not millions for one and fundraising by the other type thing.
Exactly. A friend of mine who spent decades in Costa Rica said there are about 26 different political parties there. So election time is a sort of a grab bag. Works for them.
I've often thought a rotation of citizens, (some would be granted exceptions as needed) instead of elections would be far preferable. With clear limits on time served. It would certainly group citizenship to service across the board and require we know what's going on, since we could soon be serving. Is this possible? Sure - but much has to come down first.
We have to get over the Game A/winner-take-all mentality of the party system and move towards consensus. There can be no peace when a mere majority (often voted in by 25% or less of the population) believes that power allows them to tell others how to live. That system has to go.
How about the example of the J-6th protesters? Because the media and establishment were both against their cause, they are set up by federal agents who let them in and painted as insurrectionists by the media. Now many are in jail in solitary confinement without basic human rights like personal grooming, medicine, food that won't kill them (for celiacs), clean water. Kept for months in solidarity without charges, they are then given court appointed lawyers who don't see them before trial and work with the opposition to prosecute them. One prisoner was beaten so badly by guards (who invoked his race at the time) that he lost an eye. Some prisoners are losing a great deal of weight as they are not allowed to buy additional food. One committed suicide. These are people without criminal histories who were employees and business owners before the eff bee eye decided to destroy them. If this is what happens to protesters in the US, democracy is DEAD.
well regardless of how they got in, and mind you many did storm through barriers, people who try to take down a government (right or wrong depending on your views) are going to put themselves at stake... for jail or worse. They made the choice. If this was a different country, they more likely would have been killed.
If you are in a democracy that says it is decent, you do not ever treat people who have differing opinions or even those that have committed a crime in such a demeaning way... It actually points to the reasons why they felt compelled to do what they did - the country had lost its way...
I am not a US citizen - I am in Australia so cannot comment from place of knowledge on this but from the out side this treatment looks like evidence of the problem...
In Australia in Melbourne Australia during the world's longest lockdown one woman was arrested after suggesting that it might be time for people to protest this lockdown; she was jailed in solitary confinement for 22 days as she would not meet the draconian bail requirements to turn over all her computers, passwords and data bases (exposing her followers) as well as take down any of her personal websites... seems Australia is acting as indecently as the US - a supposed decent modern democracy.
No person should be treated in such a way as she was and those mentioned in this sub-thread, modern democracies are supposed to be moral states that are not supposed to dish out such sort of punishments, no matter what the crime!
I think you don't understand that it is ILLEGAL to storm a government building AND they killed people. Did you see the footage? Many had guns and had they gotten to a few specific people, I do believe our VP would have been killed. It's one thing to protest and quite another to break into a federal building with intent to do harm and actually do harm.
Looks good. Like democracy may be something that cannot be instituted. My mentor said it may be messy but we'll learn a lot. Looks like your article provides a lot of examples. I do want civility and the greater good as values. My preference. Not a fan of domination. What if we saw democracy as a living mutual endeavor...for the greatest good not the few? We actually are not a democracy. A republic. Not a fan of representatives of wealth. Many thanks. Participatory. Engagement. Good will.
Governments need to be far more transparent and the media needs to learn how to be proper journalists and cover stories with no bias. Imagine if trump had become dottery like Biden is, the media were very hard on trump and he could take it, Biden can’t even work out what he’s doing on stage half the time, yet only a few outlets mention it, mostly in other countries.
How can we make informed decisions about anything when the media is just a government puppet pushing propaganda.
We do not need a democratic government. We need a DISCERNING one. That means that everyone is humble enough to admit that we don't know how to solve the enormous and complex problems we are facing but that the Invisible Forces that brought us this far will see us through, just as in the past. This takes letting go of our own agendas, getting quiet, listening deeply to the "other," in trust that we are all in this together and only together will we come through. Eventually, with this "Spirit of poverty/unknowing" in conversation with one another we will begin to see not necessarily the solution but the next step in the right direction. There truly are invisible forces at work for our good.
Yes, thank you. The invisible forces at play in every moment, always for good. In Ecuador and India the people know and still listen within, to the unknown intelligence which gave us life, living within us, it still the core of their culture. It’s always there, guiding to have and respect integrity of living, bringing about connective Power for good, and not lost to the delusion and destructive illusion of force.
One of the issues we have in the West is that none of the 'leaders' function as champions of the people. They're managers, intended to keep us just docile and confused and apathetic enough to avoid dislodging the parasite class.
Mass movements are one strategy for pushing back when things get egregious, but they have their limitations. They only trigger when conditions get really bad; otherwise, the pathocrats just carry on doing their thing. They're inherently disorganized. They're also fairly easily crushed: see the yellow vests, the Canadian truckers, or Occupy. They take a lot of energy, involve a lot of disruption, and only sort of work sometimes. I'm sure Modi or his successor will try the same thing in a few years under a different name, with better public relations, and perhaps moving piecemeal rather than all at once in order to diffuse opposition.
Traditionally, societies have been organized with a chieftain or king, who acts as a rallying point, and keeps the peace between the peasants and the nobility by acting as the champion of the former. Perhaps our problem is that we don't have that.
YES! "Maybe democracy is less about the nature of government than it is about the ungovernability of the people."
As an archetypal astrologer, this so resonates with the image of a coming "Aquarian Age." Thank you for this, Charles.
I look at politics as the people deciding on policies within groups small enough for the consequences of their decisions to come back around. Electoral (or even by-lottery) representation is 'personalitics'. We think that someone else should take responsibility for thinking about what we should do. In small enough groups, we can learn from our mistakes and government can just be the functionaries carrying out our decisions.
I've changed my mind so much about energy since realizing how the green agenda is being used by the WEF. Germany is in real trouble with oil and gas cut off, 3/6 nuclear plants shut down (with the others slated at the end of 2022) and even hydro from Sweden and Finland slowed to a trickle. They're telling them to gather wood from the forests, while wood burning stoves and cut wood is gone.
So while Modi has Operation Green Hunt to get everyone off the land so they don't interfere with mining concessions, I've begun to wonder if indigenous protests against mining are being allowed to succeed. Cynthia Chung has a very good article looking at this as part of a depopulation effort. It's worth checking out:
https://cynthiachung.substack.com/p/the-eus-fit-for-55-farm-to-fork-and-0ff
Dear Charles (and fellow readers). Please have a look at https://joinofbyfor.org/
In case it hasn't fell on your radar, Of By For is a non-profit advocating for exactly what you mentioned: democracy by lottery. I recently watched their documentary (in tears at the beauty), which is soon to be released, about a citizen's panel on covid in Michigan. Beautiful to withness the beauty of human nature when given the right context: people universes apart truly listening to each other.
Update: this is the webpage you may want to see: https://goodbyeelections.film/
Sounds profound as always Charles - but maybe democracy or at least the word democracy has passed its due date. You are a great wordsmith- can you call your new understanding of democracy something different??
I have always thought a lottery system like they choose the jury in a court case. We send ordinary citizens to made decisions at all levels- municipal, provincial and federal. They set the course and have very smart researchers do the work of figuring how to implement. This precludes that we have adjusted the money system to work equally well for all, which might mean just completely change the value system like Captain Kirk said, on Earth we no longer use money, we want people, individuals to be the best they can be. (paraphrase).
"A truly democratic future cannot rely on incorporating democracy into systems and institutions of governance. These always become anti-democratic."
I like to distinguish between governMENT and goverNANCE. Government is what happens within the constraints imposed by the state (See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_(polity) Governance can refer to any group of people who voluntarily self-assemble to regulate their own affairs using, ideally, democratic means of doing so. Of course, democracy does not imply majority rule.
GoverNANCE itself need not become anti-democratic. It is goverMENT which tends always to become anti-democratic.
Sometimes the best thing to do with governments is to just ignore them and go on doing what we want to do in our neighborhoods. See: https://rword.substack.com/p/can-a-leopard-change-its-spots
It's unlikely random citizens would perform better than the last two presidents. Trump was among the best in terms of performance for things that matter to the citizens. Biden is among the worst. Administering a large bureaucracy is not a matter of "doing the right thing" but of skilled management of the bureaucracy that actually runs things. Trump's failure was he didn't understand the bureaucracy well enough, and the swamp drained him. Biden's failure is because he's been a swamp creature for decades and his corruption has produced his downfall. There are experienced administrators with enough integrity to perform adequately, although necessarily angering half the population while pleasing the other half. Our main problem is a neurotic population who demand a perfect existence as they've been trained to expect. Until more people learn they can't have it their way, we can expect continued hostility and occasional violence. Presidents have little influence over that. They do have opportunities, as Barry predicted, to screw things up.