Don’t Worry About Saving “Our Democracy”

Good explanation: (HT: Appalachian Renegades)

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8 thoughts on “Don’t Worry About Saving “Our Democracy””

  1. This is really excellent, standing the test of time. Especially good in its history. The conspiracy that met behind closed doors in Philadelphia the summer of 1787 was nearly united in its goal of fighting excess democracy.

    Starting in 1776, all state legislatures increased the number legislators (and thereby also lowered the proportion who were rich or aristocratic) and went to annual elections (SC may have gone to semi-annual?). Every citizen could easily know his representative. It was the most democratic the US has ever been. The result was paying for spending by printing money rather than taxing in accordance with spending and making it very difficult to collect honest debts. Indeed, the Founding Fathers thought they had via the Constitution outlawed paper money, a goal almost all agreed on. They sold it that way.

    I believe I once read that George Washington used the terms ‘mobocrat’ and ‘democrat’ interchangeably.

    1. Wow, I was unaware of Washington using that term, J. Sobran.

      It is very alluring for young people– and unwise people– to fall for the idealistic notion that democracy is the highest good. It is not. People will vote to take away your liberty, your property, your livelihood and your other assets in a heartbeat. We saw that here in North Carolina during Covid in full display when Cooper won re-election after locking down the state unjustifiably.

      1. Amen, Triad. Glorification of mob rule is really stupid. They festoon “democracy” as if it were some kind of religious sacrement, and then they pretend absurdly that is what the US has–an illusion to bolster the oligarchy’s legitimacy.

        The only virtue of democracy is that it provides more accountability of government to the people compared to an autocracy…in theory.

        Ivy Leagues studies have demonstrated that in the US there is virtually no correlation between what citizens want (measured by polls) and what govt does. Did anyone even ask American citizens if they wanted to pay for the killing of 10s of thousands of women and children in Gaza and Lebanon? If they wanted to turn Iran with its 93 million inhabitants into a wasteland?

        1. Of course not.

          And while there may be no correlation between what citizens want and what government does, there is at least somewhat of a correlation between what citizens ELECT and what government does. We often vote poorly.

          1. “a correlation between what citizens ELECT and what government does.”

            While we did get the border invasion stopped, almost none of the other promises we voted for have been kept. Spending and the deficit are worse, wars galore, RFK stymied at every turn, no one in the Swamp prosecuted, and all the evil CIA’s secrets are still secret.

            Crumbs like defunding PBS, tiny progress on DEI, and being able to call a woman a woman are not nothing, but close enough. Leviathan grows and strengthens, vote how you may.

          2. And yet, J. Sobran, we get what we elected– in the sense that we elect these members of Congress and the President himself, and get the sum product of what they do, and what they don’t do.

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