as gore vidal famously said a long time ago, america is ruled by the wealthy for the wealthy. any person who votes for the status quo who is not truly wealthy is voting against his own interest.
a lot of conservative votes seem to be based on a kind of faith-based thinking, ideologically driven rather than employing a pragmatic understanding of both the global situation and the personal. this is maddening. one cannot reason with a voter who is not voting based on reason.
this was not the situation (quite) when i was young. in the US nixon proposed a negative income tax in the early seventies; in canada stanfield proposed it in the sixties. both these men were old-fashioned conservatives who just believed in going forward with changes to governance cautiously. they did not resist all change. sadly, they have little in common with what passes for conservatism in the present political climate.
looking for solutions to the present malaise, in north america at least, suggests ridding ourselves of the influence of money in elections especially and in governance more generally. whether the fault lies with individuals or corporations (who are also made of individuals) is not important to discern — the solution is the same in any case; elected representatives of the people need to represent all the people and political parties need to renounce absolute control of both the system of governance and its elections in favor of temporary coalitions based around shared beliefs in solutions to specific problems as they arise.
that we can identify these problems and so easily conceive solutions is the best, maybe the only, sign of hope for a viable and sustainable future on this declining little orb. that we seem, so far, unable to implement these changes is the worst.
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