American Democracy - Awesome

On my way to the polls this morning in Crown Heights, I was flagged down by a slow-moving, elderly, black lady. "You go vote," she called out, "Everybody gets a vote!" How awesome is it that I live in a country where on the street on election day an old black woman reminds a young white woman of the representational democracy they share. How awesome is it that her vote and mine are counted equally according to the law of that democracy. (Yes, it took years of struggle so that the two of us could have the vote, but at the heart of that effort was the belief in the legitimacy of America's representational democracy.)

I got my usual thrill as my ballot went through the scanner, and my vote was counted. Although I do miss the curtained voting booths, which always reminded me (fondly) of the Catholic confessional. After all, my vote is between me and my God.

Funny thing about your vote being between you and your God. It turns out that "secret voting" is a relatively new invention (I posted this in another thread so sorry if you're reading it again).

For a long time, voting in America was public. In other words, you'd vote and everybody knew how you voted. In some eras, they made the ballots gigantic and in different colors for different parties.

This was a big help for "shoulder strikers" -- the thugs who got paid to hang around polling places and intimidate, beat up, stab, brick, or otherwise harass anyone attempting to vote for the wrong guy.

i personally think they should hold elections in port-a-potties so we can truly express our feelings on the candidates

Subject: Re: American Democracy - Awesome

krowonhill wrote: How awesome is it that her vote and mine are counted equally according to the law of that democracy. (Yes, it took years of struggle so that the two of us could have the vote, but at the heart of that effort was the belief in the legitimacy of America's representational democracy.)

And what an awesomely misplaced and misguided belief it continues to be! Between the gerrymandering, the reactionary anachronism that is the electoral college, the winner-takes-all elections, and the other bastions of so-called two-party system, we have more in common with a parliamentary monarchy (or even communist China) than with any system resembling democracy.

Yes, concessions were made, and so we have a Bill of Rights, women's suffrage, civil rights, labor unions, etc, but these concessions were always made ultimately by the ruling parties and classes in order to hold on to power, not to give it up.

And so today, I still have the choice of two wings of the same party, who pretend for the sake of riling up their electorate for the illusion of a mandate to disagree vehemently on socially intractable issues like abortion and gun rights, but are indistinguishably medieval when it comes to matters like individual rights (privacy issues, drug war, other victimless crimes), military spending and interventionism, and the unfettered continuation of the two-party monopoly.

Vote all you want, but it doesn't mean you have representation, unless you've managed to convince yourself that these contrived platforms accurately reflect your views.

How do Benevolent Dictators rise to power?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benevolent_dictatorship

Can I help?

easybloc - you and MHA should go have a coffee. You sound a lot alike.

Personally, I am very happy to have citizenship in a country where I still have a small say in which candidate gets selected to receive favors from big business.

Did I say I wasn't happy? I'm just not deluding myself that we have an open democracy here.

krow seems to think that by voting, we become one of the many authors of our history books, but it's really more like we're flipping through the pages of a "choose your own adventure" novel:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Choose_Your_Own_Adventure

And FYI, there are elections in lots of places. Doesn't make them democracies. In China, you have real elections, with candidates with platforms and positions and so forth, and practically anyone can run. You just can't use them to vote the Communist Party out of power, or install any political agenda out of the scope of acceptability set by the establishment. (Sound familiar?)

I'm quite happy with the United States. It's a very liberal (in the good, old sense of the word) Republic we have, that values rule of law, individualism, and entrepreneurial spirit. The general progression has been towards ever greater liberties, multiculturalism, and equality before the law. Social mobility is high for all members of society, probably higher than most places. And the system is very stable.

So my quip is not an expression of dissatisfaction, but of wry bemusement at the notion that your vote has a substantial effect on how the country is run.

so true eastblock, so true.

And, a short message from now people who think about such things all the time:

http://www.aecf.org/upload/publicationfiles/fact_sheet10.pdf