Got this via email, with the following message:
Sir,
I am a european citizen still trying to coming to grips with what happened 2 days ago. I have just read your "Still Standing, Still Fighting, Still Here" and appreciate it, because it reminds me that there are americans beyond the fatidic 58 million. I know, there are 55 million, but my frustration is still too fresh, and I have not (alas !) been struck by a cobblestone lately.
You will not take it too personally I hope, as you'll notice that my frustration is very specifically aimed to a subset, albeit sizeable, of your fellow citizens.
Please keep up the spirit you show on your article. For good or bad, the US elections are never just an internal matter !
kind regards
manamba
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http://mapage.noos.fr/manamba/openletter.htmlOpen letter to 58 million americans
Ladies and gentlemen,
By electing Mr Bush as your White House Spokesman you have pulled quite a feat.
Consider :
you have given this previously unelected leader the legality he had lacked thus far
you have explicitly given your support to the policies of his team
you have ensured that the mechanisms perpetuating terror around the world will remain in place
you have reacted exactly as planned by Mr Laden to his tape
you have mandated your administration to bankrupt your country
you have offered yourselves a see-saw of green, yellow, amber, red alerts, for your unique enjoyment.
While you should seriously feel ashamed and reflect on the state of your country, I know full well that you will bask in a self-congratulary amber-alert feast : enjoy it while it lasts.
To help you keep a sense of perspective about the much-vaunted greatness of the USA, please note that while there are 58.000.000 of you, there are 5.800.000.000 of us.
Goodbye, and be damned.
manamba
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To the rest of the world
Now that the circus is over, it may be worthwhile trying to understand how this happened.
Quick brainstorming brings the following possible causes to the forefront :
The daftest electorate on Earth
This actually implies a number of factors :
lack of depth < unwillingness / inability to research any given subject >
actively misinformed by the Administration
sloppily or actively misinformed by the independent media
Decades of TV addiction :
has TV filled the cranial vacuum with analog void, or has it simply fried the grey matter in the cranial cavity ?
This is purely speculative as in any case the results are identical.
Blindness to the monetary aspects of life :
"The Show Must Go On" attitude to current lifestyle, to hell all the rest denial of the state of the country's accounting
In fairness, experience shows that playing to the security fears of any electorate pretty much ensures victory to the "Law and Order" camp (France, April 2002; Italy, May 2001; et al).
But very little was fair in this election : the campaign was spent attacking the opponent rather than tackling the serious problems the USA faces as a country.
That this serious political fault has gone unnoticed for the american electorate tells much about the electorate itself.
The word "accountability" seems to have become an abstract term.
Indeed, terms themselves seem to have been devoided of their intrinsic meaning : are politicians forced to reduce complex issues to catch-phrases because the average voter is unable to grasp the issues, or are the politicos themselves too small for the job ?
To conclude, while in 2000 the american voter could be excused for casting the vote for Mr Bush as he was a little-known candidate, in 2004 the same voter has spent four years watching Mr Bush labouring to construct sentences in plain english on the TV screen. That 58 million people decided this man was fit for the job says a lot more about the voters than about the candidate.
Lessons to be drawn
There are many, but I'll stick to one : the greatest weakness of a democratic system is not the bad-intentioned or incompetent individual politician, it is the generalised ignorance of the electorate, which translates into non-accountability, opening the door to misuse of power in its many shapes and forms.
Regards,
manamba