WHAT KIND OF AMERICA?

    

     I loathe the nostalgic appeals to a mythic America that only served the interests of elites whether democrat or republican. I repulse the perspective that says anything to get elected, erasing history in route while forging a route toward an ideal that will repeal democratic safeguards and human rights. I marvel at the people who fear the evil of President Obama (or Governor Mitt Romney) because they believe that we need to “take our country back.” From whom and to where, that’s what I wonder when I hear voices thunder from political platforms around the nation. President Obama was elected through democratic standards and republican process. The same can’t be said about the previous administration’s last term. Even so, what kind of America indicts all republicans as morally depraved because of the wave of insidious slander coming from a few loose cannons? What kind of America are we creating because of our political leanings?

     That's what I ask with each insult that insists only one party cares for and is capable of leading America. That's why I find it troubling when citizens aren’t bubbling over the insolence that has defiled President Obama’s reign and previous campaign, whether through outbursts by an angry Congressman or via a retort by a party cohort --Bill Clinton’s comment. In referencing President Obama, President Clinton blurted, “Just think, a hundred years ago he would have been getting us coffee.” Where is the outrage about these remarks and similar reminders, which suggests some people think that America only belongs to one kind or class of people? Where is the outrage over Michelle Obama recently being depicted as a slave on the cover of a French magazine? I’ve experienced more disgust over a bad call at a sporting event than I have over these neo-American politics, the sentiments of which we inevitably export.

     What kind of America (and American) gives a consensual silence to the growing practice of linguistic violence, which no other Administration has faced, because of its fears and misguided loyalty to a party? Why have alternative parties when we have the same kind of willfully blind people perched therein? We need new people more than we do new parties as far as I’m concerned. But it all depends upon what we have learned from history, whether contemporary or ancient. That’s why I strive to tread lightly because I want to pledge rightly my allegiance. Maybe that’s also why I’m neither democrat nor republican, libertarian or independent.  I reject any wholesale allegiance that requires me to abandon my duty to reason. Else my support merely supplants those principles we claim to hallow. What kind of America would this yield –one that is admittedly shallow.

LIMBO

Today there is much that remains in limbo, namely, where do we go from here. These concerns cause downturns in times of uncertainty and anxiety in times of incredulity, when we can’t believe the enormity of the challenges we face. Yet it is then that we must be brave and embrace with confidence what causes dissonance in our lives. Else we will seek to connive what should be confronted forthrightly however frightened we may be. Yet so many people consider themselves unequal to the threats they face and thus turn their face the other way. Characteristically, they lack the courage to be and the self-esteem indicative of maturity and the willingness to assume responsibility. They surrender to inevitability instead, as if what is is irreversible. In doing so, they exalt fate and double the weight they unwisely carry because they are wary of themselves.

THE URGE TO REGULATE

The urge to regulate represents a diversion of democracy and usurpation of the autonomy entrusted to citizens by reason and sanctioned by law. Thus “red-tape” has become the red-herring enabling governments to galvanize their efforts to prevent the emergence of truly free markets by manufacturing amorphous mechanisms that suppress the growth of cottage industries (and contrary ideas), which would ultimately enhance our ability to build a genuinely liberal and liberating society. If, however, this society sees itself as complete, then it is compelled to create oppressive protocols that stifle citizen’s efforts to implement their unique ideas.

This claim neither denies the need nor denounces the value of regulation as a means of managing public safety (e.g. Borders' attempts to retail his barbecue). However, it does substantiate his sentiment and sustain his argument that the regulatory state is effectually and efficiently becoming a new form of totalitarianism wherein only certain avenues are open to certain people with access to powers and persons that grant permits and permission for them to pursue their projects unimpeded.

Borders, however, launches a logical fallacy in his fertile comparison of over-regulation with applying for welfare, which is an equally arduous process. I also reject his reductionism, saying that, “In the end, all I wanted was to sell barbecue sauce.” In this regard, the relationship between ends and means are malleable. One feeds the other and informs both because of their bond. We just have to be Spartan to limit special interests from suppressing our pursuits which, unfortunately Borders wasn’t.

Characteristically, democracy and capitalism are constructed on contradictory, ambiguous and occasionally conflicting concepts supported by prescriptions and tempered by provisions designed for quality control. Concern with over-regulation, however, as expressed by Borders can become a form of “paper terrorism” whereby citizens are subverted by processes that require conformity to regulations multiplied beyond reason and without regard for commonsense. Perhaps a concept co-opted from philosophy might diminish the dominion of these mandates, namely, a revised version of Occam’s Razor, which would prevent “regulations from being multiplied unnecessarily in efforts to protect public interests.”

If this principle prevailed, the ability of special interests to suppress the emergence of entrepreneurial ventures by their vulturous actions would erode significantly. More important, such an approach would impugn the intellectual parochialism that imperils the progress of democracy, domestically and internationally. In this progressive climate oppressive provisions would cease to prevail, and yield rather to the rule of reason and the right of persons to pursue their peculiar projects in a climate of least resistance. Such a change, however, would require revision in the contemporary demeanor of American democracy, which routinely lets itself be bullied by global events that ultimately hinder citizen’s ability to exercise greater degrees of self-determination because of being deterred unjustly and illegitimately. Moreover, our allegiance to the logic of a flattened world seems to require inflexible systems that suppress rather than serve social interests and citizen needs, threatening freedom in the process.



References

Paper terrorism is the use of false liens, frivolous lawsuits, bogus letters of credit, and other legal documents lacking sound factual basis as a method of harassment, especially against government officials.[1] It is popular among some anti-government groups and those associated with the redemption movement. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paper_terrorism)