Below (below this blog bit) is a message I received in my YouTube inbox.
I am inexperienced with American politics and am judging a lot of what I hope for America off the recent change from Liberal to Labor that occurred when Kevin Rudd was elected Prime Minister.
I believe it's all about balance. No candidate is perfect, but we are living in a Right Wing World which is not doing this nation any good, we need to tip back a bit, give those living in poverty a chance. It is not Obama's fault if people living on the middle ground have not saved or have suffered under the Republican government, they should realize, from History, that we (since I am in the middle too) will pull through and make it and will see a lot of our hopes and dreams (and bank accounts) come into fruition eventually.
We can't be rich all the time. People who live this way need to realize that their level of excess is not required for survival, and we should stop aspiring to live that way and instead appreciate the more beautiful things, like the native animals, the trees THAT GIVE US LIFE (I CAN'T BELIEVE SOME PEOPLE DON'T REALIZE THIS. WE DON'T GET OXYGEN FROM ANYWHERE ELSE!!!), the oceans and our fellow human being. Let's live for the sake of living. Let's cook a simple home meal, cheaper than mcdonalds, and sit outside with our parents and children and friends and watch the sunset. Honestly, what more could you want from life?
Anyway, let me know what points I got wrong. I'm currently studying both candidates campaigns and looking at the fundamental elements of Capitalism, Socialism and Communism so I can really understand what all the "name-calling" is about.
Here's to education (which Obama has a pretty good plan for by the way! ;D)
Subject:
american presidential race
Date:
Oct 12, 2008
Message:
hello! may name is jarred (pardon my lack of puctuation, i'm feeling lazy today). but my question is, why do you support barak obama? from where i am (florida, u.s.), his plan would increase our taxes, and restrict our private buisnesses. The very foundation of being american that not only I, but the rest of the world has relied upon, has been that our nation is a NATION... with a government, not vice versa. Our Democratic party in the united states believes that the government should help everyone, whether they are willing to work or not. Our expenditures from welfare alone have skyrocketed. But our democratic party is still willing to give handouts. Obviously, I'm a republican, I believe that Government should leave us to live our lives. I work over 40 hours a week, and make BARELY enough to support myself. Yet every week, I know that my tax money is going to people who don't deserve it. I know this, because i physically see it. Voting for barak obama (to me), is like giving my money away, he wants to give me college, he wants to mandate healthcare, he wants to research energy, but at what cost? i'm sure you get plenty of messages like this, but i want to tell you, that there are two people in this election, obama, democrat, andinexperienced well sponken individual. or mccain, quieter, republican person that knows what needs to happen.
My response: also quickly written, but hopefully still intelligible.
His idea is to help out the people behind the small businesses so that they can afford to actually use the small businesses services (that the middle class provide).
Spread it around, get the people who are living in poverty a better chance for a few years.
It's for 4 years dude. 4 short years of service. We just need to balance everything out for a few years, get on better terms with the other governments around the world, finish this war, take care of the little people so that the big people can eventually profit.
The rich should never always expect to be rich - it just doesn't happen like that. They have to learn to do with less and not live with such excess so that this country can better itself. Everyone has to stop being so selfish and think about their fellow neighbour.
Where I come from, the government is expected to help everyone. When did the government simply become a bunch of old men gathering together only to make "really important decisions", like, should we go to war or not? The government is MEANT to take care of everyone. I don't know why you think it is a good idea for them to not care? (ALSO: every issue regarding the American People should be important and fill the seats in Congress)
"Our expenditures from welfare alone have skyrocketed" - UNDER A REPUBLICAN GOVERNMENT!!!!
Who are you to say, these people don't deserve money to live? CAN YOU HEAR YOURSELF? How can you even think that way?
Do starving kids in Ethiopia and rape-victims in Darfur deserve handouts/donations from America? According to you, they aren't doing anything for our country, so we should just let them die right?
Do you support the war too? Why are you wasting your tax dollars on people who I'm sure you don't think deserve to live?
You've got to give people a chance to live better lives. You can't just give up, you've got to give them hope. If we give them a little encouragement, maybe there will be some improvement. I'm sure a lot of people will continue on their dark paths, but rich folks follow those paths too, that's just human nature. If you don't give people a chance to change, then nothing ever will and soon enough, YOU WILL BE LIVING IN A THIRD WORLD COUNTRY and your children and their children will be fleeing your homeland to get away from poisonous fumes and civic wars.
McCain doesn't know what needs to happen. If he did, he wouldn't be supporting off shore drilling or supporting an inexperienced hack like Palin.
Obama knows that we need someone to lead us. Just because he hasn't shot someone does not mean he is inexperienced. He is far more intelligent and a guiding light for the majority of the people in this country who have to live here in the future.
You have to accept that we need change, even if it is for 4 short years, and then maybe we can tip it back to Republicans. It's just gone too far right. It needs to stay in the middle.
Good luck,
Caitlin
Was I wrong? Was I right? Most importantly, was I fair?
Feel free to criticize and educate, I would love to learn more.
-The Donkey Scholar and The Drill That Drilled Too Much.
15 comments:
I think your adding very valid arguments to the debate with individuals like this. These are issues that have always been at the core of American politics and always will be. The most noteworthy point you make however is balance. We need change because were on the verge of a complete meltdown due to that imbalance.
The issues that are brought up by this individual are important but completely irrelevant considering the dyer circumstances we are facing. Most people are blind to it and won't get it until there scrounging loose change to make a meal. The harsh reality is this, the Republican administration has implemented policies of deregulation that have allowed the wealthiest coorporations and people to run rampant and that greed has put us where we are. In addition they have given government contracts for billions to companies like Haliburton that have put there profits off shore and not paid taxes. George bush by via executive order has reversed 90% of the environmental policies Bill Clinton put in place. I can go on and on. Regardless of Mcains policies, hes a Republican and right now they might as well be the enemy because if they control the exeutive branch another 4 years things are going to get very ugly.
Caitlin,
"The government is MEANT to take care of everyone."
This might be the purpose of the Australian government, but it is not the purpose of ours. The purpose of our American government is to secure our natural rights as humans. That's it.
We give up a small subset of our rights in order to give the government (and I'm really talking State governments when I say this, not the national government) the power to be able to protect our natural rights.
Unfortunately, due to lots of things (that I won't get into because it's pretty complicated), it's been shifting away from something that had very limited power and left most of our citizens alone to live their lives to something that controls a lot of things in your life.
I'm not totally against government programs to help people, but they really have no business being at the Federal level. Individual states should be the ones to have these programs, because they each have different problems that they can address on a smaller scale with better success. 300 million people is a lot of people to manage in one place.
When you think about it, doesn't it make more sense to do most things at the most local level possible? People in Texas have much different needs from the people in New York City. Even people in New York City have different needs from those in western New York state.
As for your argument, it was pretty fair and you do bring up the point of being moderate. I think we would be in a much better situation overall if people didn't forget that compromise was one of the fundamental ideas that allowed our Constitution to be created and ratified. EVERYTHING in the Constitution is a compromise. Instead of name-calling and blindly considering all Republicans or all Democrats as idiots that can't manage anything correctly, we should focus on compromising using the good ideas that come from all sides. Contrary to popular belief, two perfectly good, rational people can come to a different conclusion on something, and they can both be right.
Let me know if you need me to clarify or elaborate on something.
Sorry this post is so long :)
-Brad
I think the closest you got to being unfair was a slight jump to the conclusion that jarred thinks Iraqis don't *deserve* to live, but he did give some indication that he feels that way.
Many Republicans don't have such a callous disregard for life, but they don't realize how the policies they support would ruin things, because the only sources they trust lie to them on a regular basis.
One more comment,
Brad is making excellent points on the general ideals and principals that government should stick to by direction of the constitution.
I would point out however that this current administration has not stuck to those principals unless of coarse it was regarding the upper enchalances of society. Federal control and spending has increased all accross the board to pay for a war the majority does not want. Individuals rights are systematically being dismantled so as to suppress our ability to stop them from robbing us blind bending us over and shoving it right up our ass.
Normally, I would agree that we should take the best of both sides and combine them however its gone to far.
The Republicans though some may be good have not done enough to combat there leaders, simply put, "bad ideas" and for that, they need to see the door!
Hi Caitlin,
Sorry this is well long, as with politics you have to dig deep and read between the lines to even be able discover or to gain any understanding of what is really going on. People just don't bother this is why we fail...
Broadcast to tens of millions of Americans, the presidential debates are the Super Bowl of politics. A good performance before the cameras can vault a contender to the front of the pack, while a gaffe spells national embarrassment and can savage a candidacy. The slim margin for error has led the two major parties to seek—and achieve, under the aegis of the bipartisan Commission on Presidential Debates—tight control through scripting, severe time limits, and the exclusion of third-party candidates. In No Debate, author and lobbyist George Farah argues that these staged recitations make a mockery of free and fair presidential elections.
Supposedly nonpartisan, the Commission on Presidential Debates (CPD) is controlled by the Republican and Democratic parties, its board of directors packed with powerful insiders who are beholden to the interests of big business. No Debate details how, with each election cycle, representatives of the two parties draft a “Memorandum of Understanding” and require the commission’s agreement before their candidates will participate. These memoranda typically exclude third-party challengers and prohibit candidate-to-candidate dialogue and cross-examination. Such rules moved former CBS news anchor Walter Cronkite to write in 1998 that “The debates are part of the unconscionable fraud that our political campaigns have become . . . the candidates participate only with the guarantee of a format that defies meaningful discourse.”
In No Debate Farah charges that the CPD acts as an effective screen for the two parties to evade citizens’ most pressing questions, and absorbs the political costs that would otherwise accrue to the parties. This function of the CPD, as an arms-length organ of the parties, amounts to a shocking institutional rigging of the electoral process that degrades our democracy and signals worrying bipartisan contempt for transparency in this country’s highest elected office.
The major party candidates could sponsor their own presidential debates if they wanted to control them. They could hold debates in their living rooms, exclude all third party challengers, employ dreary formats, and ignore difficult issues. Accordingly, if the major party candidates hosted their own debates, they would be held accountable for them. Voters would blame the Republican and Democratic nominees for the lack of authentic discussion, the exclusion of popular third-party challengers, and the avoidance of pressing national issues. The major party candidates would likely pay a price on Election Day. To avoid such accountability, the major party candidates participate in the CPD's deceptive debates.—George Farah with John Andersen, March 10, 2004 Knight Ridder syndicate
With urgency and clarity, this book reviews the history of presidential debates, the impact of the debates since the advent of television, the role of the League of Women Voters, the antidemocratic activity of the CPD, and the specific ways that the Republicans and Democrats collude to remove all spontaneity from the debates themselves. The author presents the complete text of a previously unreleased secret document between the Republicans and Democrats that reveals the degree to which the two parties—not the CPD—dictate the terms of the debates. In the final chapter, Farah lays out a compelling strategy for restoring the presidential debates as a nonpartisan, unscripted, public events that help citizens—not corporations or campaign managers—decide who is going to run the White House.
I Love your spirit<3
Try this site or sites like these you might get a purer insight on whats going on in the political field.
http://www.alternet.org/
I think your arguments were fair, personally i think Obama is a better bet.
Hey Caitlin
The more I learn about the American Government the more I realise how fundamentally different it is to our Government in Australia.
I think the thing I find most disturbing is the quite severe aversion of many Americans towards a welfare system. McCain supporters actually use the term socialist as an insult. Now I know that Australia is a lot smaller and a different country to America, but surely the health and welfare of the people of your own nation is important.
Governments should be there to help everyone and everyone earning a wage should help to support the nation as a whole. How can you call yourself a nation if it's just every man for himself?
I know if I had the choice I would rather have my taxes go towards supporting people without so many opportunities in my own country than blowing the shit out of other countries. And sure, some people do abuse welfare systems, but it's up to governments to ensure they're administered properly.
Another thing the Republicans don't seem to like much is regulation, but now after the major financial fuck up it seems that regulation may actually be necessary to keep the greedy bastards in check.
Politics is like ordering a pizza: not everyone will agree on the choice of toppings, can get a bit cheesy (and messy) and its freshness devalues after twenty-four hours.
Can you guess what I had for dinner?
First of all, "Jarred" needs to tell us how much he makes a year. There's a very good chance that he is misinformed about Obama's tax plan and that his taxes could actually LOWER under Obama. He says he just "makes BARELY enough to support" himself. If this is true, then he's making under $250,000 a year and would see a tax DECREASE. If he makes more than that and can barely support himself, perhaps he should sell his private jets and one of his Escalades.
""Our expenditures from welfare alone have skyrocketed" - UNDER A REPUBLICAN GOVERNMENT!!!!"
This was a good point. People need to remember that it was the REPUBLICAN President that was in charge while all this has happened, not a Democrat.
It's also interesting to see a Repub slam foreign aid, but be in favor for the Iraq/Afghanistan war. Very conflicting since one of the main missions there was to "spread freedom." Sounds pretty helpful to me too... Except the only difference between Ethiopia and Iraq is oil.. Ooops.
The "government is MEANT to take care of everyone" ticket is going to be hard to sell, especially to a conservative. It's even tougher when they make a lot of money. They hear "spread the wealth around" and panic. They think that that means they're going to have to share their money with a bunch of freeloaders. I'm not sure what you can do about this issue because when it comes down to it, the rich will have to help out and they don't like that. I think what you said, Caitlin, was fine. I don't think it'll win him over to our side, but it's probably the best anyone can do.
What keeps most conservatives from voting liberal is taxes(if they make a lot of money), and moral issues like gay rights and abortion. There's nothing we can do about that. You can't sweeten that and you certainly aren't going to change their opinion on that. So what I usually do is "drown" them with positives about Obama. Sure, he's for more gay rights but he has a stellar energy plan to get us off of foreign oil, he correctly wants to use a diplomatic approach to dealing with terrorism(look how well that worked with North Korea), more support for the middle class(of course, this is only a plus if they are in the middle), he's for net neutrality(most people don't know what this is, but once you explain it and that McCain is against it, this is a major plus to most people), etc etc. Also point out how the country has getting worse and worse under a Republican President, and another Repub in the White House is NOT going to fix it. When you're throwing oil on a fire, trying to extinguish the fire, and it's making the fire even stronger, you don't keep throwing oil at it hoping for a better result! It's time for a Democrat. It's time for change. It's time for some water. It's time for Obama.
Anyway, I think you did well. Keep fightin' the good fight.
Caitlin,
i would say that you were fair. but, all is fair in love and war. so, on to right or wrong. that i couldn’t say. what’s right for you may be wrong for another. there’s the problem. we seek middle ground in an attempt to please all and do what is best for the country. personally i don’t vote. before you, or anyone else, decides to judge or berate me, let me explain. i don’t vote because there is not a candidate that i feel would do well in office, for me. anyone who is in the running for the presidency is someone who wants to be there. they have a drive that they are not willing to admit to. that concerns me. they say it is to help the public and perform a service, but it is a more self serving agenda that they have. i don’t see the point in choosing between the lesser of two evils, so to speak. in not voting, i choose none of the above. neither. sure, i could write in a name, but that never really works, so in effect my vote wouldn’t count anyway. i guess i’ve lost faith in the process and in the politicians. no matter what i want, they do as they see fit. i just have to live with their decisions. if they choose to drill, ok. i work in the oil field, job security. if they choose to stop, then i find other work. life goes on. they choose to help educate the nation, awesome, too bad i already went to college. maybe i’ll go back and get another degree. i’ve spent the last few decades ignoring politicians, and they ignoring me. most of the policies they talk about do not affect me directly, or interest me often. if you feel the need to get involved, i applaud your energy and compassion. me, i’m burnt out on the whole thing. best of luck to you figuring it all out. it’s beyond me.
tired of reaching for the stars, guess i’ll reach for the lightbulb. so much more attainable.
right on sista, but u critisized him a bit,u can say what you said without questioning his beliefs so much. but on a whole i totally agree with u, thank goodness i'm an aussie!
To start, keep in mind my view is a bit cynical. Our government looks great on paper. The Declaration of Independence and our Amendments look good on paper. Where our government deviates from what is on paper is when you have humans running things. Humans are flawed, we are emotional and impulse based beings. While we use higher level thinking to overcome our emotions and impulses we are and always will be a work in progress. In America we operate on the majority rules method. In contrast, Britain has proportional representation. This is why we have groups of people seeking power, Democrats and Republicans. Each American has the right to vote and those votes determine who rules the country, this means each group wants folks to vote for candidates that represent their group. Thus each group has a set of beliefs; often these beliefs oppose the other group. People will identify with one or more beliefs and vote with that group. The group with the most votes wins. So we have folks who often are loyal to Democrat or Republican. One problem is many times we will have one issue voters. Someone will vote on the basis of how a candidate stands on a single issue. The problem with this is, when we vote for a candidate we are pretty much saying we agree with all of their views on issues when we actually only agree on one. Another, but related problem is we have Americans who don’t vote, those who vote uneducated about the issues, and those who are simply vote party lines. While it is every Americans right to vote how they see fit, I feel that if someone who doesn’t vote, votes uneducated on issues, or votes party loyal is doing themselves a great disservice. Basically, if someone votes how I just mentioned they are gambling that who they vote for is going to serve their own or the country’s best interest. Being a more educated voter helps reduce that gamble. However, we have a huge population that doesn’t vote or votes uninformed. We need more people getting involved and becoming more informed. If folks don’t vote and don’t become informed we are subject to, “he who has the gold makes the rules” I know this is cynical but I feel it’s true. Those with wealth have resources to lobby and sway folks to vote for their interest. In the end we have a government that serves folks who get involved by voting or lobbying. If the majority of Americans were more involved and informed lobbyists would be less effective and fewer special interests would be served. The power lies with the vote for president, congress, senate, etc… Here’s an example of a problem. If I believe in small government (a republican view) and pro life (a democrat view) and I vote republican. That means I don’t get my pro life view served. Is the small government view worth the trade off of the pro life view? That’s an example of being somewhat informed, where as focusing on one issue and ignoring the rest is uninformed. This also shows the problem of being divided into two groups. One finds themselves having to side with Republican or Democrat even though they may not agree with all of the party's views. I mentioned earlier that humans were emotional and impulse based, this means that often they will not always make logical decisions and this applies to voting too. Humans can be greedy, spiteful, sympathetic, remorseful, etc… The problem is when these emotions cloud judgment and prevent rational thought while making a decision, like voting. This applies to politicians, they are human too. But it’s our job as voters to pick people that will serve all of us. Many folks will blame the government, however I believe the government is a product of its people. If we are unhappy with it, we should change it by becoming more involved and being informed voters. Perhaps my view is too cynical or idealistic but it is how I see it.
From a personal standpoint, I am Republican. However, I’m going to vote for Obama. Based on my research Obama’s plans will serve myself and the country better than McCain’s will.
Wow, Ms. Caitlin, you are suddenly blogging about such ponderous subject matter. There is quite a lot to be said about these subjects you are exploring.
First, I must take issue with you premise that things have swung too far right and the Republicans in the United States somehow have dominance. On what observations have you based this premise? It is a fact that the legislative branch of the United States Government is controlled by Democratic Party. My personal observation is also that the congressional leadership is not centered, but further to the left that perhaps the average American. In addition, the majority of state Governors are affiliated with the Democratic Party. Also consider that an objective analysis of the media in this country will indeed show a left of center bias. I am not simply talking about news media, but entertainment as well. Some might refute this point, but it is really easy to see if one conducts just a brief objective assessment. Finally, add in the observation that the Democratic Party is quantifiably larger than the GOP, and I have a really hard time understanding why you think we live in a “Right Wing World”.
This premise does not necessarily help the framing your following arguments. If it is indeed balance we seek, how is this to be achieved by having the entire central government as well as the majority of State governments controlled by one side?
You must remember that the United States of America is a federal republic. The understanding that we are a federation of sovereign states has a very large impact on the framing of national political issues. Our central government is controlled by a legislative branch, which consists of representatives of the individual states, and the executive branch, which is headed by the President chosen by the states. It is easy to forget that the President is actually chosen by the states and not a national popular vote. There are also the Supreme Court justices who have lifetime appointments.
It is thus easy to see that the power of the states plays a large role in the underpinnings of our political system. Indeed all powers not held by the central government are reserved by the States. Many conservatives tend to believe that the central government should have very little power, and most matters should be handled at the state and local level. It is entirely possible for someone to take this conservative position on national issues while being completely liberal with regard to state and local politics.
In any event, let’s look at another angle here. From by observation of your writings, I have come to the conclusion that we are sentimentally very similar. That is, we probably have similar ideals and emotional responses. However, I believe our civic philosophy, or politics, differ greatly. Please note that I do not affiliate with either political party in the United States and am an independent in that regard. However, my view on central government is definitely more conservative than yours. In my eyes, government is essentially a consolidation of power, and almost everything the government does, it does by force. This aspect is indeed what distinguishes it from other associations or organizations. While you and I might want the same things for this country and the world in general, we differ in how we believe force should be used to attain those ends. This distinction, I believe, ultimately boils down to an issue of philosophy. Many great works have been written on the philosophy of civics and government, and I would recommend that all civic minded people explore them. Personal choices of mine include the works of Thomas Hobbes, who thoroughly explores the foundations of government. Actually agreeing with his philosophy is not important. His discussion of the quintessential concepts upon which political thought is formulated truly helps focus your mind upon the proper questions to ponder when developing your own political thought process.
One of the most critical aspects of political thought centers on the definition and treatment of liberty. What is liberty and how important is it? How important is it to be able to make choices freely? Let’s look at the extreme example consisting of a total lack of liberty, that of slavery. A slave has no choice about anything. Does it matter if the slave happens to agree with everything his master chooses for him? In other words, the actions of the slave are not impacted by the fact that he is a slave. In this case, does the lack of liberty actually matter? I believe it does because the lack of choice is what strips a person of his or her humanity.
Perhaps the slave gets to choose his master. The slave thus chose the person to whom he would surrender power over his life. Even so, the lack of liberty and the surrender of power present a troublesome problem. The slave master still posses discretionary power. Thus, the master can make choices that are totally outside the slave’s expectations when he chose his master.
Considering these factors, it is my belief that a complete lack of liberty is something to be avoided. Translated to civics, I do not believe a totalitarian form of government is desirable, whether it is supported for a time by the people or not. Yet on a personal level, I might consider submission to a totalitarian government if I knew with certainty that it would cause no hardship to others and it would make the world a better place. From experience, however, I know that neither of these conditions can be met due to the very foundations of human nature.
For a historical perspective on this matter, we can look to Marxist Communism and Socialism. In its pure and ultimate form, Communism as an economic system does not look that bad. The ultimate form of a communist society is actually stateless. At this point, government has dissolved and liberty is guaranteed. However, Marxism requires a period of socialism before the Communist ideal is met. A revolution must happen after which the power over the means of production is transferred to the state, which is now controlled by the revolutionaries. Examine the rise of the Soviet Union after the events of the Bolshevik Revolution. Those to whom power was handed ultimately betrayed the very principles of their revolution, and from some perspectives, this seems to be an inevitable conclusion. Read “Animal Farm” for an excellent allegorical treatment of these events. Actually, that book is pretty much mandatory reading for anyone interested in the actualization of Marxism. The ultimate lesson to be learned is that while the ideal of Communism and the ideas of Marxism and Socialism are not inherently bad, the execution presents problems that have never been overcome. If one believes that a transfer of power is necessary to achieve positive change, there will never be any guarantee that those to whom the power is transferred will ultimately make the right decision regarding the use of that power. They are, after all, only human. The socialism and social democracy we see in the world today only include limited amounts of state control and integrated democratic processes, which lessens but does not eliminate the problem of the misuse of power.
Indeed, all of this could have been predicted by the founders of the United States Government who implemented the system of checks and balances. James Madison scripted a famous line in the Federalist No. 51, which he wrote in 1788:
“If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself. A dependence on the people is, no doubt, the primary control on the government; but experience has taught mankind the necessity of auxiliary precautions.”
This statement embodies the basis upon which the mechanisms of checks and balances were constructed. The very fact that we need government to impose controls on us means that we are flawed. In turn, this condition means that those who lead the government are ultimately flawed also, and while a democratic system is useful for keeping the government under control, it is not sufficient in itself. Even in a democracy the fundamental problem remains. The more power the government has, the greater the danger that it will not be used properly. Even if those wielding it have good intentions, they can still make poor decisions. While in a democracy it is possible to change the makeup of the leadership without the use of force, power, once given to the government, is difficult to take back.
Essentially, the checks and balances in our system of government relies on the notion that the various leaders of government will continually be contention with one another, and that there will indeed be the same kind of balance that you seem to be in favor of.
While there is no doubt that the consolidation of power can lead to great changes, it is always a dangerous prospect, and the very existence of the necessity to use force to effect a better world means that our fundamental flaws have not been addressed. In the end, we all have to decide how much of our own liberty and how much of the liberty of our fellow citizen we are willing to surrender to the government, and how much power we are willing to put in the hands of our leaders with the knowledge that such power will be used to effect change through force.
There are, of course, many other discussions to be had regarding the reasons for the existence of government in the first place, how this relates to human nature, and how this impacts social interactions as well as the interactions among nations, but I believe I have written quite enough for now.
I hope this gives you some insight into how I and others may feel about the general role of governmental power. Basically, I am wary of the consolidation of power.
-James
Well, I've learnt a fair bit today. :o)
every being is
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