Democracy Is a Fragile Thing

(FOR THOSE OF YOU WHO HAVE READ WHAT I HAVE WRITTEN ELSEWHERE, THIS MAY BE OLD NEWS)

I’m going to start by acknowledging that we in the USA don’t live in a democracy, and that our government is really a republic, not a democracy.

Now I’m going to use the word Democracy a whole lot to describe our government. Let’s just swallow that word for this conversation.

We, as Americans, have experienced something of a miracle: a 200-year-old mega-power of a nation that has been a democracy since day one (since Independence, at least). This is a feat that is completely unique in the world: no nation can boast such a thing.

Many people attribute this to our morality or tenacity or superiority in regards to other nations or cultures, when, in fact, the total success the USA has experienced comes down to three things:

Luck, good planning, and people who have fought to defend our nation.

As for luck. The settlers were lucky in that England was embroiled in several overseas conflicts at the time they came here. They were lucky in that the people living here did not possess European technologies, and that those people were not organized, governmentally, so meticulously as the settlers. These factors made it easy to conquer the natives. The settlers were lucky that England possessed no swift or ingenious way to govern the Americas, and they were lucky in that they happened upon a land that was full of untapped natural resources. They were lucky in that they had brilliant political philosophers working at the founding of the nation, and they were lucky that, in those early stages, no other nations strongly contended England’s rule in the Americas (I guess you could say Spain did, but they didn’t go marching into Virginia or anything).

As for good planning. The thing our founding fathers knew (or at least sensed) about our form of government is that it is not an easy thing to maintain. They were terrified of England and the power England could abuse, and they were terrified of death. Nearly all of them had been declared traitors by the throne, and Thomas Paine himself was fleeing arrest for writing Common Sense. these thinkers planned out a government that could never abuse its power without direct permission from the people. They planned a system that protected its people from corruption in the highest ranks, and they planned contingencies for such things. They planned and planned and planned and planned, and created a thoroughly well-thought-out government. Most new nations do not get this amount of time to bat around ideas: most new nations are formed fitfully in a rush. Planning.

As for freedom fighters. The obvious things I to which I am alluding here are our armed forces (army, navy, air force, marines), but I’m actually more talking about A) our National Guard, B) lawyers and politicians, and C) regular people (who could be regarded as social activists, but usually don’t think of themselves as such). Our national guard stands within each state to defend it in the face of whatever it needs protection from and to aid it in case of disaster or chaos. Various lawyers and politicians have fought in courts and committees and caucuses for our legal rights. And then numerous people have stood up throughout our history against oppressive, fascist, or careless leaders. These people are often accidental heroes, and, as far as I am concerned, they are the most important of the lot, because they are democracy made flesh: the will of the people rising up to be heard and, sometimes, obeyed.

Our country as it stands now owes nearly everything to these three aspects. Democracy is not an easy government. In terms of maintaining a just and functioning government that is (mostly) free from corruption, democracy is maddeningly difficult.

I think, due to our overwhelmingly positive track record as a successful democratic nation, people take all that for granted.

And I think that is what has happened to bring us to where we are with our current establishment.

Before I run down a list of big issues, let me say that I have reevaluated my feelings regarding the Long War (Iraq), our invasion of Afghanistan, and other Bush Administration policies and practices. I now see more clearly why we invaded Iraq, and while I still do not agree with the decision, I have no bones with the choice.  It was an incredibly scary time where we, the American people, allowed our fears to usurp our aspirations.

Furthermore, I have come to see the Bush administration as an administration of big thinkers and idealists who have sought to bring peace and prosperity to the whole world via salvation from the USA as the superpower it was in the first half of the 1900’s. There is a warm, fond place in my heart for this administration.

But then. There are the massive failures, mishaps, and misappropriations of money, time, and manpower. And all of this makes a sad, tragic state in which we are now living.

BASIC ISSUES OVER WHICH PEOPLE SHOULD BE SCREAMING

- our government runs secret prisons where it tortures and imprisons people who have never been issued with any formal charges (I won’t say this violates habeas corpus because, so far, these people are not American citizens, but it certainly reimagines habeas corpus)
- our government can now mobilize our state militias internationally and nationally, a move restricted by the second amendment of the constitution
- our government performs domestic spying without due process from the judicial branch
- our executive branch denies necessary power to other branches, completely undermining the system of checks and balances that has protected us from oppression since the inception of our nation
- our executive branch threatens treason on many journalists who report on exploitative or secretive practices (many of these reporters do not reveal key details)

and these are the easily noticeable big betrayals. These are not the tiny little details that pepper the state in which we find ourselves (new laws and practices regarding habeus corpus and declarations of states of emergency, specifically).
All of this came to a head for me when I watched a film this past Christmas.  It was a fairly senseless horror film with a great audience, and partway through the film, someone said, “The government is lying to us. they are not going to pick us up,” and someone said in response (in the film), “Our government doesn’t lie to us.”

I don’t know how the filmmakers intended that line, but it was received like this: with uproarious belly laughs. The entire audience laughed raucously at the statement that our government does not lie to us. This moment restored in me huge huge gobs of faith in American citizens, and I felt childish for thinking I see things no one else sees. This moment demonstrated to me that just people other people aren’t shouting and screaming like I may be does not mean they don’t feel the way I do.

Americans, please do not allow this government to hedge back our rights any longer. Be the best kind of freedom fighters and let your voice be heard. Please let’s remove partisan and hot topic issues from this discussion and face the facts: this administration has encroached upon our constitution way too much, even if they have done so legally and with our permission.