Problems & Passion Valid. But Solution DOA
All of what you say about Trump and election are valid. But trying to alter electors is DOA. When the country was founded the claim supporting our system’s design was a fear of tyranny of the majority. However, there has NEVER been a political system in history where the majority were in control to support this assertion (Plato’s pique aside).
The fact is that EVERY political system, including ours, has been a tyranny of minority, invariably propped up by a plutocratic base. The specifics of our system’s design was to coop the plutocrats controlling the states legislatures under the Articles of Confederation.
Thus, across the board, the system of checks and balances in the design of our system is intended to protect the plutocratic minority from the rest of us in at least four ways:
- Representation preempts democracy (i.e., we have a republican form of government, not a democracy. The word democracy is NOT in the Declaration of Independence or the Constitution). (see my article, One Story the Media Ignores Completely)
- Electors equal the number of representatives each state has plus two senators. Problem is that nine states now equal 51 percent of the population but have only 18 senatorial electors, while 41 states with 49 percent of the pop. have 82 senatorial electors (see my article, What Made This Election Really Funny). Change that and HRC wins both popular and electoral vote.
- Then there’s the Supreme Court, which, as with Bush v. Gore in 2000, can always be counted on when things get electorally sticky to intervene in a partisan manner.
- Finally, the truly frightening part of our system’s design, where your real fears rest, is that so called “representatives” are able to make all the rules governing their behavior, campaigns and elections (yeah, I know Supremes can intervene but usually they do so on behalf of plutocrats as with Citizens United). It’s your basic schoolyard game, “whoever makes the rules wins.”
Contrary to your assertion Trump’s “ethos of might-makes-right…is undeniably a rejection of the very principles upon which America was founded,” might makes right (physically, legally and financially) is the ONLY principle that has ever governed any political system (see my article, Civilization’s Anti-Human, Not Machines).
As to your statement, “If we do not recognize fascism when it appears on the horizon, all of our democratic systems and institutions are rendered meaningless,” the problem is far deeper than you imply (see my articles, Doc Says — Our Emotions, Institutions and Technological Capabilities Are Mismatched, and the longish, but detailed, Macroscopic Evolutionary Paradigm).
Finally, before his untimely death, I was working with someone you may have heard of — Harry Chapin. He and I saw the situation as needing new institutions independent from, and outside of the control of, the political system to act as a true, modern democratic check on it. You can find numerous articles addressing this on my Medium publication, A Passion to Evolve.
Sorry to rain on your parade. But, as you fear, the situation can get much worse. This is an OLD game that needs to be played to win, not only now but for generations to come.
Doc Huston
