The narrative I got from the 2016 election was that nobody particularly liked any of the candidates, but that Trump's messages on trade etc. were marginally better than Hillary's more-of-the-same platform. It's true that partisan Democrats and Republicans put little thought into their votes, but since they vote the same every election they're not really relevant to the outcome.
You can fool some of the people, all of the time
141–150 of 229 posts
Re: You can fool some of the people, all of the time
#142Earlier quoted context omitted.
The relevant word isn’t “force” it’s “consent”. All forms of government to some extent or another have to maintain a monopoly on legal violence and use force. The distinction with democracy is that the government secures and maintains the consent of those being governed.
I was born in a Democracy. Democracy was forced upon me. I never gave my consent. Note: I'm not talking about whether Democracy is good or bad, just about my "consent". edit: fixed typo
You gave your consent at democratic election, so now you have your representatives in government.
In democracy, your country is your property, so you were given your share of your country at your birth, with corresponding benefits and obligations.
In despotism, country, including citizens, is owned by despot, so citizens inherit obligations only.
Re: You can fool some of the people, all of the time
#143Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm not sure what the parent meant by consent, but you are in fact allowed to leave and resign your citizenship. So you aren't forced into the constitution.
This is an example of Hobson's choice[0]. It is not really a choice. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hobson%27s_choice
In this case you also have the right to vote and get equal representation. I'm not saying it's an amazing position to be in, but I can't think of any way to make things more consensual on all sides.
Re: You can fool some of the people, all of the time
#144Earlier quoted context omitted.
At least in the US, I think you’re mistaking controlled opposition in the form of a pseudo-left Democratic Party for things alternating. Post 1970s, the ideological continuity between the two parties (austerity for the people, largesse for the military, corporations, and ruling class) is quite obvious, but obfuscated in public discourse through various culture wars.
That is counterfactual. Since the 1970s, military spending has decreased as a percentage of government spending and as a percent of GDP, while "for the people" spending - social security, healthcare, etc. - have risen dramatically in both measures. See http://metrocosm.com/history-of-us-taxes/ and scroll down to the spending breakdown.
Pure spending numbers are a little misleading.
One reason is that spending is often dictated by need. Military spending, for example, is hugely influenced by the current political environment so a reduction in military spending from the levels of the 40s-80s is not really a "for the people" change as it is more a "we don't need to fight the Axis/Soviets anymore" change. Similarly spending on social security and healthcare is something that is hugely impacted by the age of the population.
The second big factor is revenue generation. "For the people" spending might not be a huge benefit to the middle and lower classes if that program is funded by revenue from the middle and lower classes. If you only look at that spending chart you do see a dramatic increase in social security spending, but there is also a large increase in the social security revenue side that helps pay for it.
Re: You can fool some of the people, all of the time
#145Earlier quoted context omitted.
There are plenty of people who don't consent on a daily basis. The actions range from peaceful protests to traitorous acts. How does a democracy deal with them? Force.
Also much of the consent is, as Chomsky would put it, manufactured.
Don't invoke Chomsky for this nonsense.
> What has been created by this half century of massive corporate propaganda is what's called "anti-politics". So that anything that goes wrong, you blame the government. Well okay, there's plenty to blame the government about, but the government is the one institution that people can change... the one institution that you can affect without institutional change. That's exactly why all the anger and fear has been directed at the government. The government has a defect - it's potentially democratic. Corporations have no defect - they're pure tyrannies. So therefore you want to keep corporations invisible, and focus all anger on the government. So if you don't like something, you know, your wages are going down, you blame the government. Not blame the guys in the Fortune 500, because you don't read the Fortune 500. You just read what they tell you in the newspapers... so you don't read about the dazzling profits and the stupendous dizz, and the wages going down and so on, all you know is that the bad government is doing something, so let's get mad at the government.
-- Noam Chomsky
Re: You can fool some of the people, all of the time
#146My pet theory is that democracy is more tolerable because it alternates between incompetent people fast enough to keep people's hopes alive.
An excellent primer on modes of Government, how they arise, and how this perpetuate is this CGP Grey video, Rules for Rulers:
Re: You can fool some of the people, all of the time
#147Earlier quoted context omitted.
Democracy is nothing more than a system that replaces swords/bullets with votes. That's it. The fight for power (aka. resources) it inescapable and the only thing that democracy did, was to change the field that this fight is fought on. Democracy is more tolerable because no people die (in the open) when the landscape of power changes. The only two benefits of democracy to "the people" are: (1) the fact that they hav…
> Democracy is more tolerable because no people die (in the open) when the landscape of power changes This isn't quite true. People are killed over regional political struggles in democracies. The difference is one of scale, not of absolutes.
But the point stands - the people in power, in most cases, are replaced with minimal deaths.
Re: You can fool some of the people, all of the time
#148Earlier quoted context omitted.
I was born in a Democracy. Democracy was forced upon me. I never gave my consent. Note: I'm not talking about whether Democracy is good or bad, just about my "consent". edit: fixed typo
You gave your consent at democratic election, so now you have your representatives in government. In democracy, your country is your property, so you were given your share of your country at your birth, with corresponding benefits and obligations. In despotism, country, including citizens, is owned by despot, so citizens inherit obligations only.
>You gave your consent at democratic election
No, you voted at the democratic election. There is no question on the ballot asking whether or not you consent to be ruled by the resulting government.
Re: You can fool some of the people, all of the time
#149Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Democracy is nothing more than a system that replaces swords/bullets with votes. That's it. > (...) >Democracy is more tolerable because no people die (in the open) when the landscape of power changes. Leaving rebuttal of your other points aside, can you see how that is not the same thing at all ? It's like claiming "a plane is nothing more than a system which can move through the air the same way a boat can move t…
> Compared to ruling by force, yes, democracy is inherently good for the people I don't understand why people here see democratic system as a replacement for ruling by a force. Democratic countries also rule by force in the end. Democratic countries also need polices, guns, armies, prisons, tax inspectors, prosecutors etc. Those same institutions are also the tools for dictatorships, they are just governed in a diffe…
> I don't understand why people here see democratic system as a replacement for ruling by a force.
I would hazard a guess that a lot of us, that see it this way, are from culture backgrounds that still have historical recollection of "not democracy".
The definition of state is it's monopolisation of violence. But the difference is if it uses violence to keep the specific section of the ruling elite in power ... or just to keep the state (i.e. the entirety of the ruling elite) in power.
Re: You can fool some of the people, all of the time
#150Earlier quoted context omitted.
Plenty of research supports this, for example this trying to find why so many new democracies result in civil wars: https://www.jstor.org/stable/20752195?seq=1#page_scan_tab_co... By comparison England lasted from 886 to 1642 without open civil war. At the extreme Harappan civilization seems to have lasted 2,000 years without an open civil war or really any major wars.
Except for the Hundred Year War, the War of the Roses, and the many other smaller English civil wars. But yes, if you exclude all the civil wars then England had no civil wars during that time period.
It’s a common terminology: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_of_succession#Terminolog...
Hundred Year War is hardly a civil war existing as it did between multiple countries.
Smaller conflicts like Buckingham's rebellion are excluded much the same ways as I ignored most of these: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_rebellions_in_the_Un.... Along with a host of unmentioned smaller slave revolts.
The War of the Roses was is arguable if it’s a civil war. I and many others disagree (see above Wikipedia link).