“It is not me, it is Bush” stuff is not going to fly any more

[kalazh]

Recently I have heard the slogan “It is not me, and it is not American people, it is Bush and his government”. Well, to be honest I don’t buy that and none of my friends in Europe. The simple reason is that USA is a representative democracy. And it means that all of us and every single of us are responsible for electing G. W. Bush as "our president". Yes some of you might argue saying that I didn’t vote for him. That is true, however the majority or close to the majority voted for him. Yes the Supreme Court had to intervene but it had to intervene only because the vote was too close. It means half or close to the half of the American people voted for him. True it might not be any of us voted for him but almost half of representative democracy voted for him and his “compassionate conservatism” stuff. Sorry it means that almost half of US people are nothing but sheep. So folks what I am saying is a Chinese person can say “it is not me, it is just my government” because they don’t have a representative democracy and they can't vote to elect their government. Here in USA we have no right to say that. On a side note, after Bush was appointed never mentioned “compassionate conservatism” stuff. What do you think? Thanks

This is a link for a good reading and good picture.
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0878401474/104-0730775-3051132?v=glance

[MSchreader]

1. If you think the USA is a representative democracy

I have a bridge in Brooklyn I'd like to talk to you about.

Martin

[kalazh]

3. Well Marty if I may be

truth but for the outside world we are still a democracy

[MSchreader]

9. Bzzz! Sorry, wrong answer

The limited "democracy" that existed once has been gone now for more than two years. Real democratic forms disappeared a long time ago.

Martin

P.S.: Only my friends call me "Marty".

[kalazh]

13. I am sorry I didn't mean

to offend you Martin

[TennesseeWalker]

2. Well, sort of.

In our hearts we don't want bad things to happen to other people. However, we are kind of tuned out. It's the "me" generation over here.

[kalazh]

4. well still

the majority voted for the man

[roughsatori]

6. More Americans voted for Gore then for AWOL-Chimp NT

[regnaD kciN]

10. LIKE HELL HE DID!!!!

...unless you consider less than 50% (and more than half-a-million votes less than the Democratic candidate) to be a "majority."

[kalazh]

14. Less than 50% is still

close to almost half so...........

[MSchreader]

29. Less than 50 percent voted. Period.

Even basic parliamentary procedure demands a quorum (50%+1) to operate. Decisions based on anything less is inherently undemocratic. Of that less than 50 percent, less than half of them (i.e., less than 25 percent) voted for Bush.

Thus, only about 24 percent of the population wanted this shitbag as president. And, when they couldn't do it themselves, they relied on the Supreme Court to set aside the vote and install who they wanted.

Martin

[IronLionZion]

5. this is a republic, the majority voted for Gore,

but we can't just recall Bush now can we? We have to elect someone else in order to get rid of him. If you understand how the electoral votes work, you would know that a candidate can and did win without winning. Bush drove a wedge down the middle of America. Sure DU will happily roast him alive, but if the pro-Bush half is larger he will still win.

yes kalazh, there are a lot of sheep in America. We just need the right shepherds to come along.

And don't you EVER forget the Establishment! They have a huge hand in every election.

[tritsofme]

16. Gore won the largest plurality,

No candidate won a majority of votes in 2000.

[JackRiddler]

7. I live in Germany...

and I can assure you, an increasing number of people here are losing any illusions they may have had that the U.S. is a representative democracy.

That the people are in some way consenting, through apathy and inaction and ideology, to being plundered and having their country go down the path of self-destruction?

Sure.

That the U.S. a representative democracy? I expect a majority of Germans and Europeans generally no longer believe that.

[karlschneider]

11. Jawohl. You have memories and knowledge of what we are just beginning

to experience. (I'm of German descent, as you might discern from my name, but never managed to visit there...been to 52 other countries.)

Apathy is the easiest road for despots.

[kalazh]

20. That is an absolute truth

You are absolutely right.

[IronLionZion]

8. Arnold may be a compassionate conservative

because he stands up for gay rights while calling them fags.
(that's a joke)

So far for Bush:

Conservative: 100
Compassionate: 0

[Cleita]

12. Yes and attacking women was harmless fun and

he didn't mean to hurt anyone. :puke:

[kalazh]

25. I thought he is going to

dismiss that claim

[hlthe2b]

15. Wow, what planet did you wake up on?

We may be in transition; dreams of democracy may not be dead.... But se sure as hell are not in a functional democracy under the Bushies.

Short of what we are doing, I can only think of violent options; I don't think too many of us want to go that route.


It is NOT me; It is NOT my country doing this; It is GW Bush and his arrogant,evil, cronies.

[kalazh]

17. yes but sorry

the majority elected him

[BurtWorm]

26. kalazh, the majority of Americans who voted voted for Gore

by half a million votes, officially. Please stop trying to assert an untruth. The majority did not vote for Bush.

Evidence is also strong that the majority in Florida did not vote for Bush. It is certain that the majority who tried to vote in Florida on Nov. 7, 2000, went to vote for Gore. Thousands of them were unable to because their names were illegally purged from the voter rolls. Other thousands were confused by the Palm Beach butterfly ballot and wound up voting for Buchanan by mistake. Still more thousands in one county (I forget which) had their votes discounted when they mistakenly voted for more than one candidate because their idiotic party leaders gave them the wrong instructions and told them to be sure to vote on each page of a multipage ballot. And finally there were those whose legal votes were counted by machine as overvotes and those votes were not counted by hand until the NORC study was conducted nearly one year later. The NORC study, commissioned by a consortium of news organizations, concluded that Gore would have won in four of six standards. The only two standards he would have lost were his own and Bush's--the two loosest of all standards and the only two in violation of Florida's state constitutional standard, aka the "Florida standard," which requires every ballot on which the voter registers his or her clear intent to be counted. What the Bush and Gore standards did not count were the overvotes--including legal ballots on which the candidate's name is punched correctly and his name is written in below and the write-in slot is punched. In Florida (and most other states, I believe) that ballot, because it makes clear the voter's intent, counts. But none of those did in Florida in Election 2000, because the Bush team stubbornly, brazenly, and successfully refused to allow the votes to be counted. Bush, therefore, was not legitimately elected, if the mark of legitimacy in elections is that all the votes that can be counted are counted.

[kalazh]

27. That is the case

however for 290 million 500,000 is a mere tocken in difference. Listen, my point is that if almost half of USA voted for this bafoon then we might deserve what we got.

[sweetheart]

18. The veneer is different than the structure

It is painted as a representative democratic republic. It is a functional plutocratic timocracy run by a corporate-military-media complex that runs highly censored media where target marketing databases are used to customize that media to every demographic set. Also, as the election districts are not grids like in a modern democracy, the gerrymanders actually create uncompetetive "safe" seats in all but a very small number of districts across the nation... that no choice is actually involved in elections... the country has a million elections every 4 years that the voters are soooo spammmed with choice, that the result is no choice at all.. like getting 100,000 emails a day, and saying that email is effective... how could it be.

A brilliant insight into how databases are used to control public opinion and how information spam is used to break all concept of unity and democratic choice, read "data smog".. google for the author... i forget... likely it is not published in america, so search a foreign amazon like canada or britain. Also another book to give you eloquent background and insight in to the american conundrum is "the world we're in" by will hutton, also not available in the US... but is on www.amazon.co.uk ... the best democracy money can buy also shows how undemocratic things are.

Its easy to see how bad american government is from abroad with the aid of healthy news media... but inside the country, there is a "data smog" of irrelevant media that no truth is available, or if it is, it is one needle in a haystack of messages one gets every day... to the point where americans shut down and give up trying. The country is very much like china... with a politbureau of rich plutocrats behind the scenes purchasing the interests of wars so they can sell more weapons and american products to nations they conquor.

The country is dangerous now, and i believe it needs a new constitution to recover any of what you call "representative democracy"... likely first, it will collapse like the hapsburg empire, rotting away until it breaks up in a giant fiscal disaster. So, no, i did not vote for the bushaviks, and i have left the country because this has been clearly coming for years now. America has long lost its democratic traditions to the federal reserve system and unregulated electronic media. It is a totalitarian state ruled by an evil autocrat and by the huge military forces that are unelected but support only those who give them more money and support their adgenda to keep bases in every nation and break any force that threatens the imperial hegemony.

[kalazh]

24. That is one of the

greatest thoughts I read
Thanks

[Hippo_Tron]

19. It's not our fault that Bush won the election, but...

It is very much our fault that we lost the midterm election.

[kalazh]

21. I think we

we need to admit the sad truth first

[Scott Lee]

22. We are in fact a cronyist marketocracy

The "representative democracy" stuff went out the window long ago. What puts people in power today is a coordinated effort of big businesses and the power elite already there. To claim that those who did not vote for Bush are somehow responsible for putting him there, is quite crazy.

Thi$$$ is what rules the USA. Not "representative" anything.

[kalazh]

23. Where did you get

that definition "marketocracy"
I love it

[incapsulated]

28. Only about 50% of eligible Americans voted

So that makes Bush the elected representive of about 20-25% of the voting age population.