Random thoughts on democracy
January 31, 2005 @ 11:09 AM"He’s fat and he don’t run too fast, but he’s faster than me…"
Woo! My iPod has returned! For those keeping track of the iPod watch, it technically was delivered on Saturday. Not a horrible turnaround time!
I’m seriously hungry. I’ve got some good left-overs at home though, so I’ll probably head out of work here soon.
Democracy is something you DO…
Did you guys watch any coverage on the Iraq elections? Can you believe I just said that? "Iraq elections"? It’s absolutely incredible. It’s amazing to me how we can take something so for granted that other parts of the world are experiencing for the first time. Democracy isn’t perfect. Even less so the procedures set up to facilitate democracy. (Take for example, the Washington State governor’s race. More on THAT in a minute.)
But democracy at it’s core is a beautiful thing. Though I haven’t yet figured out exactly what democracy IS. I used to think it was "consent of the people". But that’s not really true. At 51%, Bush being reelected was FAR from consent of the people. Furthermore, even if some massive majority of the population agreed on a particular position, AND consented to have any opposition to that position silenced or outlawed, that would not be democracy. (For a living example of that, consider the battle going on between Intelligent Design Theorists and Evolutionists.)
At the same time, simply protecting the rights and speech of the minority – or those not in power – is not democracy. Consider the current happenings in Russia, where they are allowed to protest all they want, but Putin continues to diminish democracy there in spite of the protests. I have to admit with a bit of a shrug that democracy has got to be a combination of all those things. Consent of the people and freedom of vocal descent.
I had a whole paragraph on the Washington State elections here, but after re-reading it, I realized it was just venting, and would likely be offensive to some readers. So all you need to understand is I’m very unhappy with the way our state governor election was handled, and we’ll call that good. :)
And now, the less profound…
OH, a friend of mine whom I’ve mentioned before and will refer to as The Squire has resumed posting on his blog! Hopefully he will post regularly, as I think you will all enjoy what he has to say from time to time. He’s much more philosphical with his blog. I’m a drive-by blogger.
... which reminds me, I’m still hungry…