US democracy needs to be practiced, if it is to have a positive future, and not a declining one.
On the surface that may sound like a ridiculous statement for a country that thinks it invented democracy. However, the current movement towards autocracy, if not dictatorship, means that blunt, unashamed realities must be faced, before a slide into ignominy gains too much momentum.
Eighty-five per cent (85%) of the U.S. population, and more than seventy per cent (70%) of republicans, want changes in the gun laws. However, the politicians are obviously incapable/disinterested/antagonistic to any such changes. As I have said previously, they have been bought and paid for. Not all of them, to be sure, but sufficient numbers in critical positions to ensure any movement towards gun control is nipped in the bud, and killed.
I’ve always considered that the definition of stupidity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different outcome. Expecting our “bought and paid for” politicians to come up with a decision that is based on the will/wishes of the electorate is an exercise in frustration AND STUPIDITY.
We need to start practicing US democracy. Kick the bastards out who refuse to put the future of the country ahead of their own pockets/re-elections/sponsors. We actually do have the power, at least for the moment, although that power seems to be diminishing as we move towards autocracy and dictatorship.
This is not paranoia, this is real. State legislatures all over the country are in the process of enacting laws to restrict voting rights. Many are in the process of passing laws to give themselves the power to overturn any election result they don’t like, and many are paying homage to an egotistical maniac who want to be President-for-life…..or perhaps emperor. How blind can we be, and what will it take to wake us up.
We all know what will happen as a result of the massacre in Uvalde, Texas…..NOTHING.
Perhaps this is an opportunity to re-stablish the fact that we are supposedly a US democracy.
Why not publish, in graphic detail, preferably on television but also in the print media, pictures of the beheaded elementary school kids in Uvalde. To hell with the media heads who will scream that they can’t show such horrible pictures. We need that shock, and this would be a significant way of getting one. It will take a very courageous family from Uvalde to offer public scrutiny of their mutilated child, but that courageous act may just help stop our slide into autocracy and dictatorship. They could lay the blame firmly on the “bought and paid for” politicians, and promote the ouster from public office of anyone associated with the gun lobby.
This would not only stand the chance of forcing major changes in the gun laws, it might also be the start of a movement to re-establish “the will of the people” rather than “the will of the politicians”. In other words, the re-establishment of the basic tenet of democracy.
Yes, it’s a horrible way to do it, but drastic action by the people would seem the only hope of achieving change. Almost everyone would be against such a horrific strategy. I can just hear the media crying/screaming/even cowering from being forced to promote such scenes. But, tough shit, the survival of the country may well be at stake, and the media can become heroes if they could only see beyond the next sound bite and their sponsors’ wrath. In many ways they are as “bought and paid for” as the politicians.
Time to stand up for what we all think the United States should be – a US democracy.
