On (maybe) repairing a disunited nation
Commentary by Dick Dorworth
By DICK DORWORTH
Dick Dorworth
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There is no question that George Bush and his administration have the consent of a majority of the people. Bush has the mandate that he did not have in 2000, but on some levels the results of the election are of less import than its illumination of the depth of the fracture lines running through the citizenry. The country is not united about very much, and its divisions far surpass political affiliations and social ideologies. Anyone who follows the issues and who has tried to carry on a civil discourse with someone on ?the other side? knows the chasms are deep and wide and still growing, bridges are few and far between, and visibility is obscured by the smoke of hot feelings and the mirrors we all provide each other.
The terms ?reality based? and ?faith based? have been used to explain the two sides of America?s current schizophrenia. As by some counts fully one third of Americans are Evangelical Christians, they are as good as any description and better than most. Any reader of this column knows I?m of the opinion that one reality in the hand is worth ten thousand faiths in the bush, so to speak, but that only illustrates which side of the abyss I?m on. It does not change the sad reality that the U.S. is a disunited nation within itself, and, more troubling, feared but not respected, admired or trusted by most of the world. It seems to me that some of the major issues that divide the country--Iraq, social programs, taxation, environment, separation of church and state, suspension of civil rights and legal protections, and others too numerous to fit in this space--are the consequence, not the cause, of the failure of our government to do its job. Those failures are primarily systemic, rather than personal, or even personnel, (Bush/Kerry), political (Republican/Democrat); religious (don?t pray in my school and I won?t think in your church) or philosophical (empire/republic).
There are some obvious actions the American people could insist on to (maybe) repair its system of government and unite the people. They include but are not by any means limited to:
Dismantling or completely changing the Electoral College. This dinosaur of democracy is neither democratic nor functional. It has undermined representational democracy from the beginning, allowing several presidents to win the election when they had lost the popular vote (for both good and bad, in my opinion). These include James Buchanan, Abraham Lincoln (his first term, not the second, truncated one), Rutheford Hayes, James Garfield, Grover Cleveland (twice), Benjamin Harrison, Woodrow Wilson, Harry Truman, John Kennedy, Richard Nixon (his first, not the second, truncated one), Bill Clinton in 1992 and George W. Bush in 2000. Because of the Electoral College twelve of our presidents served when they had lost the popular vote. This is not democracy in action, opens to question America?s oft touted claim to being the world leader of democracy, and it needs changing.
Campaign finance reform. Campaigns are financed by and, therefore, beholden to those with the most money. I haven?t heard of any major politician in American who doesn?t finance campaigns with money from large corporations and/or groups representing big business interests. (If anyone knows of such a public servant, please pass on the pertinent information.) Though all politicians squeal like stuck porkers when their integrity is questioned and it is suggested that their votes are for sale, it is impossible not to note the correlation between the voting record and the interests of the largest campaign donors of---(pick any member of Congress, for instance, your favorite and your least favorite; the correlation will be clear). And it?s not the individual politicians? fault that corruption is built into the system. The very politicians who are charged with the care and maintenance of America?s democratic process cannot get elected without, at the very least, the appearance of corruption; and appearances are not always deceiving. That is, elections are decided and driven by money as much as by popular issues, and that needs changing.
The FCC needs an overhaul. With the approval of Congress, the FCC has allowed all of the major media to be controlled by just a few of the huge corporate conglomerates that finance and control the election process that chooses the Congress that has allowed all of the major media to be controlled by ? ad infinitum. The head of the FCC, Michael Powell, son of Secretary of State, Colin Powell, is s symptom, not a cause, of this closed circuit from which most Americans get their news, their information about the world and many of their opinions, and from which most Americans are excluded. Independent, privately owned media entities are, unfortunately the exception in America. (The Idaho Mountain Express is, proudly, one of these exceptions.)
Term limits is a good idea. The professional politician (not to be confused with a statesman), by the nature of his profession seeks to perpetrate his hold on power, and, as Henry Adams said, ?A friend in power is a friend lost.? Professional politicians are more dangerous than beneficial to the citizenry.
The system needs repairing before it breaks down and gets itself stuck in some quagmire or another.
