Democracy and the U.S. Story

[Timber Loftis]

Email, I received, edited a bit to at least bring a little clarity to it:

At about the time our original 13 states adopted their new constitution, in the year 1787, Alexander Tyler (a Scottish history professor at The University of Edinburgh) had this to say about "The Fall of The Athenian Republic" some 2,000 years prior.

"A democracy is always temporary in nature; it simply cannot exist as a permanent form of government. A democracy will continue to exist up until the time that voters discover that they can vote themselves generous gifts from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates who promise the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that every democracy will finally collapse due to loose fiscal policy, (which is) always followed by a dictatorship."

"The average age of the worlds greatest civilizations from the beginning of history, has been about 200 years. During those 200 years, these nations always progressed through the following sequence: From Bondage to spiritual faith; From spiritual faith to great courage; From courage to liberty; From liberty to abundance; From abundance to complacency; From complacency to apathy; From apathy to dependence; From dependence back into bondage."

Professor Joseph Olson of Hamline University School of Law, St. Paul, Minnesota, points out some interesting facts concerning the most recent Presidential election:

Population of counties won by: Gore=127 million Bush=143 million
Square miles of land won by: Gore=580,000 Bush=22,427,000
States won by: Gore=19;Bush=29
Murder rate per 100,000 residents in counties won by : Gore=13.2 Bush=2.1

Professor Olson adds: "In aggregate, the map of the territory Bush won was mostly the land owned by the tax-paying citizens of this great country. Gore's territory encompassed those citizens living in government-owned tenements and living off government welfare..." Olson believes the U.S. is now somewhere between the "apathy" and "complacency" phase of Professor Tyler's definition of democracy; with some 40 percent of the nation's population already having reached the "governmental dependency" phase.

"Some very truthful and sobering information here."

[Chewbacca]

Nice piece of right wing proganda.

What is really sobering is how much of that is not true :

SNOPES

[Night Stalker]

Actually, there isn't much either way on what is true or not in that snopes accounting. There are some accurate numbers, and facts. There are some in contention, and supposedly there are debunked items. Note though, that the parts in question come from an unauthenticated email from a guy who claims to have spoken with another guy.

It doesn't lend much strength to debunking anything. Also, there is no raw data provided from a trusted source (refering to the murder rates number) for either arguement.

I am not advocating the validity of the piece or it's detractor. I am just saying that the email from a guy does little to proove or disproove the supposed internet legend. Snopes is usually more thorough.

[Davros]

POpulation is important - Bush won that - fair argument that settles things for me. Square miles and states are an irrelavence that reflect population distribution and not a right to the moral high ground of a right to governance. Yes I am aware (at least on enough of a rudimentary level) of how your elecroral college works with respect to the states, but the use of these stats weakens the argument. You have to break those factors down further to make any useful points, and at least the professor did that in making his 4th point about economic and social status. So I score that as two good points for Bush and a bit of wind bagging as if he thought he had 4 good points.

[Davros]

Mind you - Jed still stole that election from Gore and handed it to GDubbya . That is a point against .

[Ronn_Bman]

From Jed to Dave... [img]graemlins/whackya.gif[/img]

[Sir Taliesin]

Jed didn't do anything. If you want someone to blame try SCOTUS.

[Night Stalker]

And SCOTUS didn't do anything other than remind FL to follow their own election laws, rather than try to change them when the out come didn't come as wanted by certain parties. The problem with the FL election was that the margin of error was greater than the margin of victory. That's it.

A more troubling problem with US elections is the media reporting them in real time. No reports should be released until the last voting booth is closed. With a country that spans three time zones, it just means that those impatiant schmucks just have to WAIT. Otherwise, there is the real danger of the media swaying an election.

[Timber Loftis]

The problem with the FL election was that the margin of error was greater than the margin of victory. That's it.

Yep.

As for the media... well, let's just say I went to a local bar to watch the results myself that night.