Philosophy Now Forum

O say can you see, the U. S. Oligarchy?

The U. S. is on sale. Buy it while it’s hot.

O say can you see,
by the dawn's early light,
what so proudly we hailed
we now proudly renounce.
democracy

http://blog.ted.com/2008/09/17/the_real_differ/

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-14SllPPLxY

Plato theorized that democracies, as they matured, evolved into oligarchies or plutocracies. We are witnessing exactly that.

When the new political election funding laws came into effect, the U. S. democratic system became an oligarchy or plutocracy. Billionaires are now buying political candidates and are in fact buying the leadership of the nation. They are now the power behind the throne and control the government and thus the people. Now, instead of working 9 to 5, Americans are working 24/7.

When did the U. S. devolve from the leading democracy of the West, to a tyranny up for sale?

Regards
DL

I don't know why you are complaining. If you read Plato, he said quite clearly that democracy always-always-descendes into Tyranny. It is part of the kyklos. Democracy is built on extremes and therefore is quite unstable. It breaks down into faction.

By the way, I thought the FFofA founded a "republic"! Can Americans make up their minds. Is it a "republic" or is it a democracy"?

On another vein, democracy can not truly exist. It never can. The Law of Nature is that all things are combined. A democracy is never "according to nature". Nature will have her ways.

Communist Russia that was democratic (all socialism is democratic, i.e. 'by the people, or for the proletariat), mimic classical republics that the dictator, Stalin, was a pseudo-monarch, and the Communist party was the pseudo-aristorcracy.

Again, Nazi Germany was also democratic (it was socialist and 'by the volk'). It also mimiced a classical republic. Hitler was a pseudo-monarch with the National Socialist party members a type of pseudo-aristocracy.

All human organizations form this tripartite paradigm. You may say 'democracy' but in all democracies there is a ruling oligarchy, or middle managment. Even in the birth of democracy in Athens, Pericles ruled as a sort of a pseudo-monarch. One can not evade this. There is always an organizing group in a democracy; it becomes a pseudo-aristocracy since democracies don't recognize true aristocracy. Either one accepts the truth, or one accepts the lie, the pseudo-aristocracy.

America does have a ruling aristocracy, albeit a false one. Democracy never can truly exist. So you fool yourselves into thinking it is.

What we live in is a close to a true democratic state as can be had from what I can see.

We have collectively decided to add some socialistic programs to it but they are worthy of inclusion. Social medical and welfare systems lead these.

The new difference today is that the rich have taken direct control of our governance.

I agree that all Governments systems have a hierarchy. Ours were determined by the population at large but that is no longer the case. Billionaires now rule us from behind a mouthpiece politician who is no longer free to do his will. They were always manipulated to some extent by public backers but now one billionaire can rule.

Regards
DL

I think you cannot have a real democracy before its members are not afraid to loose.

That's the problem of democracy, it lasts as long as the majority of power rules (often partly equal to the majority of the people).

Fear is the greatest threat to democracy. If you ain't afraid, you'll take any challenge to the test, and the public forum will be open for all, including those disliked for any reason by the majority. There is a consensus among many high-profile people here in my country that the best way of dealing with sensitive topics like racism, extreme nationalism, illegal toxins, paedophilia, fanaticism and extreme religiousness, any extreme left or right political views, as well as related topics, are only cleared on by public forum open debate.

Closing a debate or forcing it out of public forum will only lead to sect-formations, hatred, resentments, behind-the-curtain pulling of strings, and other ways of secrecy and fragmentation of the population. In other ways: if society wants to have a common purpose with things and avoid conflicts of interest based on miscommunication it should deal with things openly and thoroughly. The problem with any extremities or shunned abnormalities is that many of them are basically ambiguous unless you got any specific upbringing (they are not naturally common truths, like the need for food and shelter which are understood by appeal to own experience and then any possible empathy), and are only understood through analysis, research or logical clarification.

There are no natural reasons (reasons formed by commonly held experience and basic understanding) why any European country should take immigrants for instance. Proofs of this must be made with appeal to above-mentioned methods, and likewise disproved with above-mentioned methods, in the case, for instance, that the country is being overwhelmed by immigration.

Thanks for this.

Regards
DL

I think you might be better off asking when was it ever a democracy?
For the first 100 years no more than 5% voted in elections.
Vote for women is only about 100 years old.
The black vote was rather tardy too and it is still patchy at best.
Then you have to look at how many presidents are from minorities/ working people/ women etc..

99.9% of blacks voted for Obama, and the same percentage would have voted for Satan if he were black. So much for fair and balanced voting!

I thought you said the next second coming will be a black man named Tor. Will you be following him?

How many voted against Obama just because he was black?

At no other time in history have the U S people shown the type of disrespect for the office of President as they have for this administration.

Just because he is black.

Regards
DL

Don't be such an ignorant ****. Not even 90% of blacks are even registered you fucking moron.

The worst statistic is that only 64% of the registered voters even bothered to turn out - and that is seen as a fucking record.
How disaffected do you think the average person is at this pathetic and unrepresentative system?

Despite the poor show Obama got 10 million more votes that the rightard moron.

Israel’s right-wing government, though especially its PM and defence minister, so eager to be the sole nuclear power in the Middle East, are getting too used to successfully bullying its neighbouring nations—even regarding those nations’ right to self-determination—Iran was destined to be but one of Israel’s sitting-duck targets, albeit with the required military/monetary/political aid of its most potent lapdog, the U.S., and (though mostly politically) Britain.
As it collectively continues to waste trillions of dollars over the years appeasing Israel’s and some other nations’ nuclearophobia, the Western world could act progressively by establishing a global anti-missile defence shield, ASAP.
The anti-missile defence shield that the U.S. is already planning to establish in four European, NATO-member nations, should eventually become one that would destroy all confirmed-hostile, airborne projectiles regardless of their origin. Its computer system would monitor the planet’s entire air space and be in control (with fail-safe mechanisms in place, of course) of launching anti-missile defensive measures; it would have to function independently of any one, or group of, nation(s) but rather operate in the protection of all nations.
But it seems that there are too many self-serving interests that counter establishing such a global shield, interests to be gained/maintained by continuing the West’s corrupt foreign policies, bullying other nations around (soon to be by bombing Iran to hell), and too much fodder about which the planet’s hungry, major metro-daily news-media to write.
All the more of humanity’s disgrace yet-again exposed.

Israel’s right-wing government, though especially its PM and defence minister, so eager to be the sole nuclear power in the Middle East, are getting too used to successfully bullying its neighbouring nations—even regarding those nations’ right to self-determination—Iran was destined to be but one of Israel’s sitting-duck targets, albeit with the required military/monetary/political aid of its most potent lapdog, the U.S., and (though mostly politically) Britain.
As it collectively continues to waste trillions of dollars over the years appeasing Israel’s and some other nations’ nuclearophobia, the Western world could act progressively by establishing a global anti-missile defence shield, ASAP.
The anti-missile defence shield that the U.S. is already planning to establish in four European, NATO-member nations, should eventually become one that would destroy all confirmed-hostile, airborne projectiles regardless of their origin. Its computer system would monitor the planet’s entire air space and be in control (with fail-safe mechanisms in place, of course) of launching anti-missile defensive measures; it would have to function independently of any one, or group of, nation(s) but rather operate in the protection of all nations.
But it seems that there are too many self-serving interests that counter establishing such a global shield, interests to be gained/maintained by continuing the West’s corrupt foreign policies, bullying other nations around (soon to be by bombing Iran to hell), and too much fodder about which the planet’s hungry, major metro-daily news-media to write.
All the more of humanity’s disgrace yet-again exposed.