A Lesson to Learn From History

The axiom that those who do not learn from the mistakes of history are forever doomed to repeat them holds painfully true in the context of the events currently sweeping throughout countries that for decades have been governed under oppressive and dictatorial regimes. It appears that the American electorate is coming perilously close to repeating the historical mistakes of the past while attempting to remain the shining light of liberty we must be in the world.

A generation ago, people throughout South and Central America who were voicing their opposition to the tyrannical governments in the region were dealt with by those  regimes in a manner that resulted in those patriots collectively becoming known as “Los Desaparecidos” – ‘the disappeared ones’. Simply for speaking out, they were taken in the night – never to be seen again.

These people were simply asking for the right to vote in a democratic election. They gave their lives simply for the possibility that their children, their grandchildren , might one day have the right to vote, to have a say in the future of their country, to be given a political voice: to live in freedom.

Today, in a groundswell of populist uprisings, people are freely giving up their lives, on the hope that one day freedom may come to their descendants.  The regimes that came to power in those countries did so with the acquiescence of the populace – that permission given mostly by their silence.

In this new media saturation age, given the cable news networks, the internet, social networks and the like, the struggles and loss of life by peoples who have the yearning to be free are continually broadcast to our televisions, computers and portable devices. There can be little way of ignoring their plight, of seeing it all in real time. This country was founded upon the right to be free, and subsequent generations have willingly fought and died to protect the freedoms this country has come to stand for. It is troubling to think that were the American revolution held today, viewed in real time, that there would people who would opt not to fight to win the freedoms they today enjoy, that a consensus majority would choose to remain in silence.

The nature of that silence is the absence of, on average, more than forty percent of the electorate; their choosing not to give voice to their freedom by relinquishing their right, and more importantly, their responsibility to vote.

The presidential election of 2008 was termed ‘historic’ in terms of the percentage of the electorate that voted: it was approximately 63 percent of the voting eligible population. We have in recent memory been electing Presidents of this country, leaders of the free world, with less than a true majority of 30 percent of the country.

It is hard to fathom how the freest people in history can hope to spread that gift to the rest of the world if they make a conscious decision to not defend it.

So when we do not learn the lessons, that freedom cannot be gained without giving voice to that desire, and that it can be lost in the same manner we put into tenuous play our historical place  as the leading voice for democratic self rule in the world: we cannot, must not, remain silent in maintaining our own freedom.

Someone, somewhere, TODAY, is giving up their life for their descendants to have the possibility of our freedoms.

A lesson for and from  history we must learn and never forget.

The Political Act of Cowardice

The concurrent legislative tussles in Wisconsin and in Washington D.C. both this past week and undoubtedly in this upcoming week should be of grave concern to the citizens who have elected the individuals responsible for the current state of the nation, from both the state and federal perspectives.

First, a specific line from a speech given by Edmund Burke, a contemporary and political influence of the founders, to the electors of Bristol on November 3^rd, 1774 should give the electorate pause with respect to their representatives, as it is as relevant today as it was when originally delivered:

“Your representative owes you, not his industry only, but his judgment; and he betrays, instead of serving you, if he sacrifices it to your opinion.”

We are not a true democracy but a democratic republic, and as such, we elect representatives to engage in the business of government on our behalf. The populace at large need not concern themselves with the minutiae involved in such an enterprise: the social contract between the government and the governed is implicit in its foundation that the elected officials will do no harm to the country. There are of course many methods and manners to accomplish certain national goals, and therein should lay the debate.

This nation is now facing truly historic financial distress. Wisconsin has become the microcosm and prism through which these issues are viewed. The nation looks for calm, reasoned approaches to resolve this overriding issue of national security.  The Congress has the detailed information necessary to do this; the nation as a whole does not. The Congress has the authority to course correct the ship of state as needed. These individuals have been entrusted with the safety and security of this great nation, for ourselves and out posterity.

It is becoming evident that said trust may have been seriously misplaced.

The political rancor from Washington D.C. & Wisconsin this past week and for the week ahead has been nothing but diatribes eyed towards gaining political advantage and talk of a governmental shut down.

In both cases, however, the elected officials in question have opted to shun their responsibilities and flee, demonstrating nothing short of cowardice when leadership is mandated. The Congress will not be able to tend to these immediate financial concerns as this is the week they are closed for Presidents Day.

 The irony of that particular reality is not lost on the American people.

Concurrently, certain state senators in Wisconsin have fled the state, assuring the absence of a quorum, with the intent of forcing that the business of the state government be driven down to its knees: they have collectively taken their ball and gone missing.

Neither set of elected officials are demonstrating nothing but that they are charlatans to the offices they hold.

The second point is a simple one for the electorate to weigh as they ponder the wisdom of electing those individuals currently in office: with minor variations, elected officials take the following oath:

‘I do solemnly swear {or affirm} that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter. So help me God’.

Given their conscious decisions to forgo their sworn obligations and responsibilities, can it be fairly argued that they are fulfilling their oath of office?

The Ongoing Lessons of Liberty

The Declaration of Independence begins with the words “When in the course of human events…”; these are profound and prophetic words that gain more relevance as the world increasingly becomes a smaller and more interconnected place. The recent events in Egypt continue the need to remain vigilant of the intent of the founders when they began what was deemed the ‘grand experiment’ – the democratic institution of American self-rule.

It must be made clear that what people around the world are clamoring for is far more than what is being defined as ‘democracy’, purported to be realized as attaining the right to vote. This past century saw a historic number of dictators and despots hold what were deemed ‘elections’, elections in which they invariably won almost unanimously, sometimes with but token opposition. Declaring that elections will be held is not freedom and it is not what should be heralded as a successful end unto itself. We declared our independence in 1776; it took a war with England and thirteen years hence before we established a functional government. It took much debate and great thought and compromise to establish the Constitution that would bring life to the idea of self-rule. The point cannot be overstated – we are not a democracy. We are a democratic republic.  We do not as individuals decide the course of our country. We choose representatives to act on our behalf within the government. We fought a civil war and won two world wars to protect and preserve those principles, and we should never be dismissive of those realities.

We should encourage American-style self determination  wherever we can; we must avoid choosing ‘democracy’ and ‘elections’ as the terms of a belief that such exportation of the American ideal has been successfully transmitted.

When a society declares its rights to self determination, we should hold ourselves up proudly as a country that has for more than two hundred and twenty years been the defining beacon and role model for free peoples everywhere.

We cannot present ourselves as ‘humbled’ by the actions of a people demonstrating and demanding their inalienable rights; we should stand proud and remind ourselves that we as a country are the first and best example of how self-determination and self-rule can succeed, flourish and prosper.

If we choose to in any way diminish that standing, we shall put into peril the true declaration of those yearning to be free:

“…in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity”

These are the lessons we should understand from what has happened in Egypt and what will invariably spread throughout the oppressed people of the world.

Beware the Baneful Effects of Party

There is an axiom that holds that if you repeat something often enough it will become accepted as a truth, regardless of its actual veracity. One of the more glaring examples of this, in the context of American democracy, is the general belief that this country is based upon a two-party political system.

This perpetually perpetrated fraud of fact is simply not true.

President Washington, in his famous farewell address, addressed his concerns to the young nation of the “baneful effects of the spirit of party… it serves to distract the Public Councils, and enfeeble the Public Administration”. Our first chief executive feared for the embryonic republic; he had seen first hand the splintering among those in his administration as they had jockeyed for positions of political power.

There is no language, explicit or implicit, delineating that the United States government will be divided between and amongst merely two political parties. The impending danger to our nation is that the two dominant parties have so ensnared the election process to their advantage that any viable alternative is deemed a “third party” candidate, and they decry the populace of ‘throwing away their vote” on such candidates. They have developed and maintain an election system so byzantine and outright ridiculous they have in effect inoculated themselves from any real assault on their political power.  In a country of 300 million plus, it is ridiculous to believe that there are but two elective options from which to choose a representative leadership. A thriving democratic republic must embrace the full spectrum of ideas, and people to speak in support of those beliefs.     We cannot accept that we must choose from a menu which consists only of one item from column A, and only one item from column B.

The founders specifically wrote the Constitution to be free of and to avoid all manner of political dogma; we engage in it at our own peril.  

The Constitution speaks only that each chamber shall choose its officers. It makes no mention of political appointees; yet we blindly accept that ‘majority leaders’, ‘minority leaders’ ‘whips’ and such are and should be part of the official government. They are not, but are compensated for these additional ‘duties’, responsibilities that serve only the party, not the people.

If we are to “secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our posterity” we must be ever vigilant against accepting blindly what we are told is fact about our democratic republic. The Constitution is available to any citizen to read and comprehend. Democracy needs to be thought of as a verb; to accept it as a passive term is to risk    falling into a default form of two party political autocracy.

This is what President Washington expressed concern over, and the warning we must heed.