There is an artificiality to representative government that doesn't make it the worst, because of all systems of government the potential of representative government to responsibly steward the public trust is realizable,
more so than autocracies characterized by oligarchic governments.
But.
Not being the worst is a low bar for potential. Notwithstanding, not being the worst is not an acceptable justification for leaning into broadly autocratic posturing in defense of increasingly oligarchic positions loudly and proudly welcomed by every branch of a representative government.
Seed Con
The 'seeds of the ruin of representative governments' are neither the idea of representative government itself nor the vulnerability of 'the people' to widespread manipulative programming nor the fragility of institutions that are 'stress-tested'.
Please.
It is far simpler than that.
The so-called 'seeds of the ruin of representative governments' are individuals (a) who either aspire to ruin representative governments or (b) whose aspirations tolerate the ruin of representative governments as acceptable collateral damage.
I
Such that there's much ado about 'the idea' of representative government.
Is a government of the people, by the people, and for the people serving us? Would an absolute sovereign serve us better? If we elect a public servant whose campaign boldly promises a reign that rules by decree, does this not prove the public's popular approval of a dictator-elect?
But this ado is a conceit.
That confuses an individual's aspiration with a public's false choice. If this choice is a public's only legitimate choice, then any vote for such choice cannot be understood as a wholesale approval for every campaign promise issued by such individual and nothing less.
I mean, really?
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Likewise, there's much ado about the vulnerability of 'the people' to widespread manipulative programming.
Where are people getting their information? How many purveyors of information lean into engagement and virality at the expense of robust fidelity to a factual reality? What if a de-facto state-media amplifies half-truths, lies-by-omission, unfounded-conspiracies, and baseless-alternate-facts?
But this ado is arrogant.
That assumes a people's credible interest in a factual-reality-based worldview. Such that if a people welcomes a fictional-narrative-based prism of experience, this cannot be understood as a meaningful 'middle ground' for information disseminating.
Seriously?
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Moreover, there's much ado about the fragility of institutions that are 'stress-tested'.
When a branch of representative government - condones explicitly criminal actions or revokes constitutional safeguards or issues dictatorial orders, for example - these are not acts of God.
These are acts of mortal public servants answerable to the people they serve.
While this ado demands a citizenry not fall asleep at the wheel,
with respect to the 'seeds of the ruin of representative governments', this ado invokes panic the way bulls are motivated to go along with a planned plot, without being in on their planned self-sacrifice.
In other words, when stress-tested institutions are criticized, this cannot be understood as a provocation that unleashes suffocating illiberal inflexibility.
I mean, come on.
II
A representative government does not need to be a paragon of democracy or the ideal republic, to mindfully preside over a flourishing nation.
It does not need to grimly quash unseen cabals, vicious algorithms, or lost causes of dominating purpose, for a people to appreciate the difference between being reasonably informed and being sold a hill to die on behind a line in the sand.
No more than it needs to harden institutions in order to safeguard them from us.
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Because the 'seeds of the ruin of representative governments',
which is to say, the problem
is not whether a government is not serving us, or how misinformation influences an electorate, or who or what institutions enrich and empower at the expense of a democracy or a republic.
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The problem is individuals who wreck representative governments when they would rather a representative government be corrupted - or hog-tied to the whims of powerful interested parties - or exploded into smoking rubble -
than steward the public trust.
Because individuals whose aspirations tolerate the ruin of representative governments as acceptable collateral damage - do not care
that the price, the cost, and the consequences of what they believe and who they follow -
harm
III
It is easy to know you are right and everybody else be damned. To harbor screeds of sanctimonious rage against diabolical fools. To be confident in the unqualified conviction that to the venal and mercenary, go the victories and spoils.
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It is inconceivable to know you are wrong.
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When a representative government becomes corrupted - when a democracy is hog-tied to the whims of powerful interested parties - when a republic is exploded into smoking rubble - this is not the will of a citizenry.
Instead, this is the will of individuals emboldened by the knowledge that their theft of the public trust is met by cooperation and appeasement by those for whom victories and spoils are for the taking.
One and all, these individuals dissemble and deceive and distort and disinform, so as to clothe themselves in a narrative of being the will of the people represented fairly and obediently. Never mind the transparent fiction of pretense and imposture.
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When pretense and imposture are - through amplified half-truths, lies-by-omission, unfounded-conspiracies, and baseless-alternate-facts - championed as decisively popular - this is not the voice of an electorate.
Instead, this is the voice of individuals emboldened by the knowledge that their theft of the public trust is predictably met by silence, performative inaction, indifference, and exhausted overwhelm.
Because who would dare challenge the will and voice of the people?
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Who?
The people
from whom is exacted the price, the cost, and the consequences of what such individuals believe and who such individuals follow.
Because the welcoming of broadly autocratic posturing in defense of increasingly oligarchic positions by every branch of a representative government
is no more harmless to real people living real lives in the real world than it safeguards democracies and republics from seeds that birth the poisonous fruit of ruin in the name of the will of the people.
More or Being Better Angels
Sure. It's a little weird. To choose somebody.
To 'run' a representative government of people, by people, for people.
I mean.
How many of you really know what it takes to 'run' such a representative government. So actual few of you that many of you think millionaires and billionaires are 'exceptionally' and 'inherently' qualified to do the job.
As if having millions and billions of dollars to 'show' for themselves, means they have 'what it takes'.
Jesus.
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It's more than a little weird. To trust somebody.
Not only to be your voice and your will - but also to be their voice and their will.
I mean.
A representative government of all, by all, for all is not of few, by few, for few.
But. A few is who decides a lot. From the tickets to the platforms to the allocation of funds for down ballot races to the public appearances at traditional and nontraditional circuses, here, there, but not everywhere, for example.
Never mind that everywhere is where all of us are.
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So, there is an artificiality, a being better angels, to the potential of representative government to responsibly steward the public trust being realizable.
But autocracies characterized by oligarchic governments that responsibly steward the public trust?
That is not weird.
That is a con.
M
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Annotation or Addendum
To the extent that this topic is impossible to thoroughly address, I've included a few notable, but not exhaustive, annotations, below.
M
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(i) "unseen cabals", "vicious algorithms", "lost causes of dominating purposes"
are not without influence but when any influence is "grimly [quashed]" per "provocation that unleashes suffocating illiberal inflexibility"
this is less to do with "being the will of the people represented fairy and obediently" than with control;
see Annotation (vi) from Imaginary Guardrails (December 4, 2024, tvfs);
(ii) "whether a government is not serving us, or how misinformation influences an electorate, or who or what institutions enrich and empower at the expense of a democracy or a republic"
are often what are grandiosely decried: "the problem"
such that "[corrupting]" government, "[hog-tying it] to the whims of powerful interested parties", "[exploding it] into smoking rubble" are "loudly and proudly welcomed"
as solutions;
as if "amplified half-truths, lies-by-omission, unfounded-conspiracies, and baseless-alternate-facts - championed as decisively popular" are not concomitantly "[invoked]"
"the way bulls are motivated to go along with a planned plot, without being in on their planned self-sacrifice";
(iii) "what they believe and who they follow"
as to "what they believe",
see The Keys to the Kingdom and Other Nonsense (September 27, 2024, tvfs), etc.;
as to "who they follow",
see The Hypothetical Parrot King (April 20, 2020, tvfs), etc.;
(iv) "by cooperation and appeasement by those for whom victories and spoils are for the taking" and "by silence, performative inaction, indifference, and exhausted overwhelm"
in the end, "individuals who wreck representative governments" do not do so alone;
they do so with the "cooperation and appeasement" of the "you are right and everybody else be damned", the "confident in the unqualified conviction that to the venal and mercenary, go the victories and spoils";
they do so with "a citizenry... asleep at the wheel";
see Addendum from Whose Deciding Opinion Is Just (January 4, 2022, tca);
(v) "Who? The People"
as to "who would dare challenge the will and voice of the people?"
etc.
M
