Posted on Mar 1, 2020
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Background: The nation's more recent elections of 1960, 1980, 1992, 1996, 2000, 2008, 2016, 2018 and soon in 2020 were and will be seismic on a number of levels. Every citizen that is lawfully able to vote that is not exercising their responsibility as a citizen to in fact vote has failed at their own level and "...of there own free will and accord...to preserve protect and defend...the Constitution of the United States".
Yes, an imperfect nation, yet a nation that seems to still be willing to strive to be "...a more perfect union...." Our nation has gone through a shameful history of suppressing the votes of those that were once deemed "unworthy" to vote. Unworthy for reasons of color, creed, sex, etc. from the kind of "circular logic" that still infects thinking in some circles today. Yet, that suppression (aka oppression) has been from FEAR! Fear that those, deemed once "unworthy", who when they could exercise that right to vote would somehow tip the scales in ways that provide the kind imbalance they had once felt and now see the imbalance as a kind of 'justice', instilling 'silence' by instilling fear.
As many who participate on the RP platform know I am an Independent, born of Jewish father (an immigrant from WWII Europe, and later a naturalized citizen) and a non-Jewish mother (whose family has been in America since the 1700's living in New England). I grew up in the American South of the turbulent Vietnam War era not by choice, but because my father was discharged from the USAF with a 100% Serviced-Connected Disability thus forcing him to make a new life for a wife and two small children where he had been planted. While I was not of age to go to Vietnam I worked a 40-hr week in the early 1970's to help my family while attending high school and studied along side those different from yet very similar to me. I grew to believe as our Founders knew that healthy debate is at the core of those three words that start one of the most iconic documents in world history - The Constitution of the United States.
That is why this is the start of several posts over time to come - regarding voting. The brilliance of James Madison and our voting process cannot be under- or over-stated.
Discussion: A few short years ago I had the privilege of reading a book while working on a Master's degree that caused me to think deeper about a great number of issues! What follows are some quotes from this book that I offer here as food for thought. I'll tie these together as you continue sip on your favorite drink and consider their meanings. So, here goes:
Quote 01 - "...In the theory of antidialogical (e.g. none dialogue, aka not speaking with someone or some group about a matter) action, manipulation is indispensable to conquest and domination; in the dialogical (e.g. having dialogue or actually speaking with someone or some group about a matter) theory of action the organization of the people (aka "We the People...") presents the antagonistic opposite of this manipulation. Organization is not only directly linked to unity, but is a natural development of that unity."
In other words, anyone who hopes to gain and retain power is more than willing to manipulate a person or group of people when such manipulation allows them conquer and dominate a person or group of people; but, when a leader/leaders have the courage to speak the truth even when such truth is uncomfortable to them or other they can, from a position of 'honest strength', create a united sense of purpose to set the stage for lasting change that the person or group of people wants that is fair.
Quote 02 - "...The dialogical theory of action opposes both authoritarianism and license, and thereby affirms authority and freedom. There is no freedom without authority, but there is also no authority without freedom....Freedom and authority can not be isolated, but must be considered in relationship to each other....(The) hypertrophy of one 'provokes' atrophy of the other...."
In other words, leaders who have leaned toward being dictators, aka authoritarians, (e.g. King George III, Hitler, Stalin, Mao, Idi Amin, Kim Family of Korea, Castro, etc.) and take license 'with the emotions' of those they govern know that to achieve their authority they must first take license with the very tools that presuppose them to gaining and wanting to hold onto power when that power is 'not actually bestowed' by the people, except by fear and ignorance presented under guides of 'free speech' designed to deny a free voice by hostile rhetoric. True leaders 'derive' their genuine authority "...from the consent of the governed,..." and know full well that such 'consent' allows them the freedom to act and inf act grants freedom by which the true leader exercises such authority; especially, when such a genuine leader knows what is at the root-cause from those they govern when their people's "...certain unalienable Rights...(to)...Life, (to) Liberty and (to) the pursuit of (their own) Happiness...." are interfered with in such a way so as to make them slaves (aka force their dehumanization) in insidious ways to the language that so enamored them with the 'promise of utopia' without effort and most of all without mutual respect.
Quote 03 - The "...Antidialogical action explicitly and implicitly aims to preserve, 'within the social structure', situations which favor it own agents...Hence, this modality of action involves the 'conquest' of the people, their 'division', their 'manipulation, and 'cultural invasion'. It is necessarily and fundamentally an 'induced action.' Dialogical action, however, is characterized by the supersedence of any 'induced aspect'...."
In other words, as the famous song goes "Silence like a cancer grows...." As a cancer conquers each body system (heart, brain, liver, lungs, digestive, etc.) that cancer tricks the healthy cells into giving up their health to support the cancer that has invaded the healthy body. A body that can still fight to over come that insidious cancer when that cancer is exposed to treatments designed to rid the body of its harm. Cancers are not fought with just one therapy, rather they are fought and destroyed from a combination in proper measure of various therapies. If the cancer goes unnoticed or if noticed unaddressed it grows from within, making the external body look and feel weak, unable to fight any longer to rid itself of such disease.
All-in-all, these quotes written in 1960's, can be transported in time to periods where freedom and tyranny, as they are now, competing for the souls of not just nations but of individuals.
Implications: These words "When in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another..." remain profound nearly 244 years after they were first penned. These words did not know parties such as Democrat, Republican, etc. as we have today, the knew only one meaning, one direction - FREEDOM! To have free thought to act in a responsible manner, one cannot call themselves a democrat or a republican or even a socialist. Such titles are too narrow and too restricting to the true 'free thinker'. This is why many in our nation are starting, in growing numbers, to call themselves - Independents, because they don't like or appreciate labels that force upon them limited thought or limited options.
From women's rights, to civil rights, to voting rights, to human rights and other rights the capacity of a 'free people' to become and remain responsibly free is a price paid in the struggle for that responsible freedom for themselves, without at the same time denying the freedoms they desire for themselves to others. Because, to take for yourself freedom and at the same time deny freedom to others is the yoke that the 'essence of subtle and later overt tyranny' places upon the necks of all human beings. When the freedom from hate, freedom from want, freedom from ignorance, freedom from fear, and freedom from so many things that chains a person's heart goes unchecked it is a time that the truth of the FREEDOMs a people seeks are the tools that break those bonds of linguistic and emotional slavery that can make such people - truly free.
Perhaps it is this poem by the immortal American poet, Langston Hughes, entitled - "Freedom's Plow", I first read in the early 1970's and again most recently:
https://www.poemhunter.com/poem/freedom-s-plow/.
That is why the two graphics are attached:
- Voting in 2018, organized by US Census Regions.;
- Voting in 2018, organized by Age Group.
It is because we are asked to '...hang on...' and 'Keep our hands on the plow of - FREEDOM' by being engaged and exercising not just our RIGHT to vote but more importantly our RESPONSIBILITY to VOTE, by not being swayed by heated rhetoric, rather, by the facts in hand of - results, of those asking for our precious - VOTE!
So, the question is this...:
Do all who inhabit the boundaries known as the United States of America, truly understand the history and reasoning behind our two-step voting system (popular vote followed by the electoral vote)? YES or NO!
Yes, an imperfect nation, yet a nation that seems to still be willing to strive to be "...a more perfect union...." Our nation has gone through a shameful history of suppressing the votes of those that were once deemed "unworthy" to vote. Unworthy for reasons of color, creed, sex, etc. from the kind of "circular logic" that still infects thinking in some circles today. Yet, that suppression (aka oppression) has been from FEAR! Fear that those, deemed once "unworthy", who when they could exercise that right to vote would somehow tip the scales in ways that provide the kind imbalance they had once felt and now see the imbalance as a kind of 'justice', instilling 'silence' by instilling fear.
As many who participate on the RP platform know I am an Independent, born of Jewish father (an immigrant from WWII Europe, and later a naturalized citizen) and a non-Jewish mother (whose family has been in America since the 1700's living in New England). I grew up in the American South of the turbulent Vietnam War era not by choice, but because my father was discharged from the USAF with a 100% Serviced-Connected Disability thus forcing him to make a new life for a wife and two small children where he had been planted. While I was not of age to go to Vietnam I worked a 40-hr week in the early 1970's to help my family while attending high school and studied along side those different from yet very similar to me. I grew to believe as our Founders knew that healthy debate is at the core of those three words that start one of the most iconic documents in world history - The Constitution of the United States.
That is why this is the start of several posts over time to come - regarding voting. The brilliance of James Madison and our voting process cannot be under- or over-stated.
Discussion: A few short years ago I had the privilege of reading a book while working on a Master's degree that caused me to think deeper about a great number of issues! What follows are some quotes from this book that I offer here as food for thought. I'll tie these together as you continue sip on your favorite drink and consider their meanings. So, here goes:
Quote 01 - "...In the theory of antidialogical (e.g. none dialogue, aka not speaking with someone or some group about a matter) action, manipulation is indispensable to conquest and domination; in the dialogical (e.g. having dialogue or actually speaking with someone or some group about a matter) theory of action the organization of the people (aka "We the People...") presents the antagonistic opposite of this manipulation. Organization is not only directly linked to unity, but is a natural development of that unity."
In other words, anyone who hopes to gain and retain power is more than willing to manipulate a person or group of people when such manipulation allows them conquer and dominate a person or group of people; but, when a leader/leaders have the courage to speak the truth even when such truth is uncomfortable to them or other they can, from a position of 'honest strength', create a united sense of purpose to set the stage for lasting change that the person or group of people wants that is fair.
Quote 02 - "...The dialogical theory of action opposes both authoritarianism and license, and thereby affirms authority and freedom. There is no freedom without authority, but there is also no authority without freedom....Freedom and authority can not be isolated, but must be considered in relationship to each other....(The) hypertrophy of one 'provokes' atrophy of the other...."
In other words, leaders who have leaned toward being dictators, aka authoritarians, (e.g. King George III, Hitler, Stalin, Mao, Idi Amin, Kim Family of Korea, Castro, etc.) and take license 'with the emotions' of those they govern know that to achieve their authority they must first take license with the very tools that presuppose them to gaining and wanting to hold onto power when that power is 'not actually bestowed' by the people, except by fear and ignorance presented under guides of 'free speech' designed to deny a free voice by hostile rhetoric. True leaders 'derive' their genuine authority "...from the consent of the governed,..." and know full well that such 'consent' allows them the freedom to act and inf act grants freedom by which the true leader exercises such authority; especially, when such a genuine leader knows what is at the root-cause from those they govern when their people's "...certain unalienable Rights...(to)...Life, (to) Liberty and (to) the pursuit of (their own) Happiness...." are interfered with in such a way so as to make them slaves (aka force their dehumanization) in insidious ways to the language that so enamored them with the 'promise of utopia' without effort and most of all without mutual respect.
Quote 03 - The "...Antidialogical action explicitly and implicitly aims to preserve, 'within the social structure', situations which favor it own agents...Hence, this modality of action involves the 'conquest' of the people, their 'division', their 'manipulation, and 'cultural invasion'. It is necessarily and fundamentally an 'induced action.' Dialogical action, however, is characterized by the supersedence of any 'induced aspect'...."
In other words, as the famous song goes "Silence like a cancer grows...." As a cancer conquers each body system (heart, brain, liver, lungs, digestive, etc.) that cancer tricks the healthy cells into giving up their health to support the cancer that has invaded the healthy body. A body that can still fight to over come that insidious cancer when that cancer is exposed to treatments designed to rid the body of its harm. Cancers are not fought with just one therapy, rather they are fought and destroyed from a combination in proper measure of various therapies. If the cancer goes unnoticed or if noticed unaddressed it grows from within, making the external body look and feel weak, unable to fight any longer to rid itself of such disease.
All-in-all, these quotes written in 1960's, can be transported in time to periods where freedom and tyranny, as they are now, competing for the souls of not just nations but of individuals.
Implications: These words "When in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another..." remain profound nearly 244 years after they were first penned. These words did not know parties such as Democrat, Republican, etc. as we have today, the knew only one meaning, one direction - FREEDOM! To have free thought to act in a responsible manner, one cannot call themselves a democrat or a republican or even a socialist. Such titles are too narrow and too restricting to the true 'free thinker'. This is why many in our nation are starting, in growing numbers, to call themselves - Independents, because they don't like or appreciate labels that force upon them limited thought or limited options.
From women's rights, to civil rights, to voting rights, to human rights and other rights the capacity of a 'free people' to become and remain responsibly free is a price paid in the struggle for that responsible freedom for themselves, without at the same time denying the freedoms they desire for themselves to others. Because, to take for yourself freedom and at the same time deny freedom to others is the yoke that the 'essence of subtle and later overt tyranny' places upon the necks of all human beings. When the freedom from hate, freedom from want, freedom from ignorance, freedom from fear, and freedom from so many things that chains a person's heart goes unchecked it is a time that the truth of the FREEDOMs a people seeks are the tools that break those bonds of linguistic and emotional slavery that can make such people - truly free.
Perhaps it is this poem by the immortal American poet, Langston Hughes, entitled - "Freedom's Plow", I first read in the early 1970's and again most recently:
https://www.poemhunter.com/poem/freedom-s-plow/.
That is why the two graphics are attached:
- Voting in 2018, organized by US Census Regions.;
- Voting in 2018, organized by Age Group.
It is because we are asked to '...hang on...' and 'Keep our hands on the plow of - FREEDOM' by being engaged and exercising not just our RIGHT to vote but more importantly our RESPONSIBILITY to VOTE, by not being swayed by heated rhetoric, rather, by the facts in hand of - results, of those asking for our precious - VOTE!
So, the question is this...:
Do all who inhabit the boundaries known as the United States of America, truly understand the history and reasoning behind our two-step voting system (popular vote followed by the electoral vote)? YES or NO!
Office of the President (POTUS)
Voting
Freedom
Congress
Edited >1 y ago
Posted >1 y ago
Responses: 7
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I think the responsibility of citizens is to be knowledgable about the candidates and their positions. Far too many vote for who their circle thinks is trendy. A real examination of the candidate and their positions would generally reveal who the responsible person to vote for is.
(4)
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The best process a group of intellectuals, that were prescient, could have formulated. Even the process to modify it, when approved by majorities.
(2)
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unfortunately, many elections turn out to be nothing more than glorified popularity contests. much of the electorate is woefully ignorant and will vote based on emotion instead of an informed intellect.
(1)
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CPO Nate S.
LTC (Join to see) Unfortunately I and many others like SFC Casey O'Mally agree about the ignorance that abounds regarding the Electoral College.
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