Democracy – you have to want it real bad

Our astute British friend Roger has penned an excellent piece on the difficulties in maintaining a democracy (see link below). There is a great line from the climax of the movie “The American President,” where Michael Douglas’ character says during a speech “Democracy is advanced citizenship; you have to want it real bad.” Roger’s piece compelled me to think of this line and write this comment which I have copied here.

One of the greatest challenges of democracy is it requires the citizens to be well-informed. There are three missiles being fired at our ability to be informed, the worst one is the first one.

1) we care more about entertainment and sports news than more serious news. I have long referred to my country as the United States of Entertainment. We just don’t care to know.

2) we have candidates and a one party, in particular, attacking the media and institutions, where the truth might exist. The strategy is, if all sources are perceived as lying, then it gives more impunity to the real liars.

3) the misinformers, disinformers and conspiracy nuts are having a field day getting read with the two above occurrences. To someone like Putin, it is shooting fish in a barrel.

The truth matters, in general, but especially to a democracy. The people who want to squelch the democracy are the ones who believe in an unstated but real cause – give more money to rich people and help them keep it. It is easier to do that in a more autocratic environment. Yet, what these folks fail to realize is until it is too late, their ability to keep it will depend on how obsequious they are to the autocrat.

Democracy – The Quantum Arrangement

My browser seems like a gossip column with the tribal BS – where is the news?

With all of the tribal BS going on, the folks who are supposed to report on the news seem to spend a lot of time correcting others. It has grown commonplace for very biased sources to make things up and watch the more legitimate news sources report on the lack of veracity of the biased source. To be honest,, news reports of the lack of veracity of some opinion hosts is not really news to me.

It should be noted this is all by design, as it gets people talking about nothing important overlooking the fact that things are not getting done. The other unfortunate objective is to discredit the whole news process. If sources with lots of followers lie often, and more reputable news sources get caught in a lie, it defames the news credibility. We just witnessed almost six years of a former candidate and president routinely claim that all negative news about him was “fake news.” Just because he said it was fake, did not necessarily mean it was not true.

But, this also impacts other politicians. As a group, politicians are not known for their truthfulness. And, some are well known for not being consistently truthful. This former candidate called an opponent “Lyin’ Ted” and was not far from the truth, yet he failed to look in the mirror when he made the accusation. Sadly, if a politican says something, check other sources. The body politic has earned this requirement.

So, if I see things in my browser that are he said/ she said stuff, I pass. Nowadays, if I see a picture of the former president who is not known for his veracity, I pass. The same goes for certain opinion hosts and politicians, as their words are usually less than truthful, so I pass.

I heard that…

Misinformation abounds, in general, but especially regarding the coronavirus. And, it is easily passed along, not just by politicians whose mission may be self-serving more so than altruistic, but by people who are trying to be helpful.

Listen and read what people in the public health or medical profession are saying. My previous post spoke of living our lives, but we still need to heed cautions.

People are reacting in various ways. A crisis brings out the best and worst instincts in people. It also reveals their insecuritues and other imperfections. But, at the heart of the matter, it shows how vulnerable we are.

Our friend Jill focused today on several folks doing good things in this time of crisis. A link to her post is provided below. Our friend Roger and I spoke of those who are hoarding, price-gouging and taking advantage of the crisis.

Quite simply, social distancing does not give one license to be a jerk. We can still be friendly and meet and greet from six feet away.

Yet, let’s not pass along misinformation. Facebook is attempting to pull down such posts. A key rule of thumb is if it sounds incredulous, it most likely is. It is like the countless bogus conspiracy theories, why questions can help diffuse them.

Finally, sources of information known to be less than truthful or factual are not suddenly going to be more accurate. If they appear that way, it is based on the knowledge they can no longer mask their lies.

Good People Doing Good Things — Helpers In These Trying Times