Government: As We Know It!
Government: As We Know It!
To our most patient readers. Relax, this is not about deficits, budgets, the economy, or Washington, home of the free, the brave, the befuddled! No. This is ViewPoint's concern about the way governments manage to survive.
In a moment of oversimplification, we start by thinking about government as a choice between Dictatorship (one man rule!) - and Democracy (which includes all forms of government wherein citizens, the people, have a voice in the management of their homeland). Now, we move quickly to observe the current demands by millions of North African citizens who live under Dictatorship of one form or another, and their urgent cry for change. What remains to be seen is the outcome of the rebel challenges and the dramatic shift from one man rule, to government by committee.
And this is really where this ViewPoint begins. It is as clear as a bell that any decision making body, be it local, or national, must face disagreement on any topic, at any time they are in formal session. There is simply no way for a group of members of the body in session to immediately agree on the topic before them. It is as certain as the conundrum of the ultimate force vs the immovable object. Or, as you must have learned long ago, a horse under discussion can turn out to be a camel!
Thus, it should be no surprise to any voter in these United States that the dead lock in Washington over financial matters is not only inevitable - but quite natural! The differences are as unique as the speakers who put forth their own rationale for resistance. It could be as remote from the topic on the table as the unknown group that finally compromised in designing the horse as a camel! Never mind that the country is about to go into default, or that the enemy fleet is only hours away, or that furious citizens are massing for an attack on our Congress. No. The hold outs, the deep thinkers, the true believers who have only one link to the brain - and it's my way or no way!
As long as committees are formed and and perform with humans as the body in question, we shall have dissension. Juries face that truth every day. School boards know it well. And the Congress of the USA has lived with the problem for every
session irregardless of Party, or President.
Readers of this column are more likely to be voting citizens than elected officials.
Both know that there is only one way to deal with the dissent. Vote the individual OUT in the next election! Sure, that may mean the conditions facing the country, or even the local voter, have to wait - months, perhaps years, before new members takes their seats and demonstrate a different attitude more to the satisfaction of the voters. It is the ultimate test of democracy as we know it!
So, advice from the soothsayer on this page. Make your opinions known by any means available. But grit your teeth, hold tight to the reins you hold, and remember that the dissension you hear and hate, is essential to a functioning government that relies on voters. If there is a better way, it has been tried and failed every time.
If the day ever comes when all voters arrive at the same conclusion at the polls and elect govern, and move forward in unanimous lockstep - that'l be the day all horses will turn into camels and the miracle of government will have arrived and all citizens will have a new way to survive called the Dictatorship of The People!
Richard Carlton
July 17, 2011
Issue No 16
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