Electoral Victory Of Deplorables

I do believe Brittlestar has divined the mystery of why undesirables proliferate and prosper in public office:

What The Transcript Shows

 

My previous post addressed a concern that the media are writing narratives for us, telling us what to think, creating a consensus that may be at variance with reality. I cited the conclusions drawn about the Liberal loss in the Toronto by-election of Toronto-St. Paul and the debate between Joe Biden and Don Trump.

A producer of nine federal leaders' debates in Canada, Mark Bulgutch, offers his view of the American debate, observing that if one were just to read the transcript and not fixate on Biden's weak performance, one might come away with a different perspective.

Compare the content, not the performance, and then decide who should be president.

For example, when Trump spoke about abortion, he claimed that Democrats, “will take the life of a child in the eighth month, the ninth month, and even after birth — after birth.”

Biden responded, “He’s lying. That is simply not true.”

Trump: “Every legal scholar, throughout the world, the most respected, wanted it [abortion law] brought back to the states.”

Biden: “The idea that states are able to do this is a little like saying, we’re going to turn civil rights back to the states, let each state have a different rule.”

Trump on illegal immigrants: “We have the largest number of terrorists coming into our country right now. All terrorists, all over the world — not just in South America, all over the world. They come from the Middle East, everywhere. All over the world, they’re pouring in.”

Biden: “I’m not saying no terrorist ever got through. But the idea they’re emptying their prisons, we’re welcoming these people, that’s simply not true. There’s no data to support what he said.”

Trump: “And because of his ridiculous, insane and very stupid policies, people are coming in and they’re killing our citizens at a level that we’ve never seen.”

Biden: “Every single thing he said is a lie, every single one.”

As I said in my post, Biden did, despite his muddling performance, had policy on his side, while Trump relied on his usual strategy of total fabrication.

When Trump was asked about climate change, the best he could do was, “I want absolutely immaculate clean water and I want absolutely clean air, and we had it. We had H2O.”

Biden pounced. “The idea that he is claiming to have done something that had the cleanest water? He had not done a damn thing with the environment. The only existential threat to humanity is climate change. And he didn’t do a damn thing about it.”

Biden skewered Trump time after time. On Trump’s election denial: You’re a whiner. When you lost the first time, you continued to appeal and appeal to courts all across the country. Not one single court in America said any of your claims had any merit.”

On Trump’s accommodation of white supremacists: “What American president would ever say Nazis coming out of fields, carrying torches, singing the same antisemitic bile, carrying swastikas, were fine people?”

And finally, on why those who have seen Trump close-up now flee from what they saw: “His own vice president — look, there’s a reason why 40 of his 44 top cabinet officers refused to endorse him this time. They know him well. They served with him. Why are they not endorsing him?”

And I have nothing to add to Bulgutch's conclusion:

Yes, Joe Biden had some truly awful moments during the debate. But I’m not sure a president makes his toughest decisions in two-minute sound bites. Judge what he said, not how he said it.

 

 

Democracy Is Fine, Until It Isn't

 

I don't post on a daily basis anymore, partly because I have other things keeping me busy and partly because I do wonder if anything good can come from a frequent barrage of my deep-seated cynicism. I see little to inspire hope in the world, so why simply drive home the point again and again?

There are times, however, when what is being reported calls for denunciation, and my anger today emanates from the hypocrisy with which democracy is presented to us. On the one hand we are told that it is sacred, but on the other hand, when it results in things some don't like, they find their own ways of undermining and denouncing it, but in terms that are not so obvious.

Recent episodes come readily to mind.

In an effort to promote more moderate drinking, Ireland has passed legislation that will mandate cancer warnings be placed on all alcohol products sold in the Emerald Isle. While I have doubts about the efficacy of such labelling, I don't dispute the democratic right of a state to make and enforce health policy.

Not everyone agrees.

The United States and other countries have expressed concerns over Ireland’s plans for labels on alcoholic products that would warn of a link to cancer at a World Trade Organisation meeting on Wednesday, officials say.

The item was on the agenda of the Technical Barriers to Trade Committee of the WTO when it met in Geneva, a forum for the organisation’s 164 members to discuss and mediate potential disputes over regulations.

The US, Mexico, and the Dominican Republic raised concerns that Ireland’s new alcohol labelling requirements signed into law in May could present a barrier to trade at the meeting, according to a Geneva-based trade official.

Additional countries also spoke up in the meeting about the issue, some supporting the complaints made by others, including Japan, Colombia, Canada, Chile, Argentina, New Zealand, Cuba, Australia and Guatemala.

Now, on the surface this looks like a trade irritant. But if any thinking person peeks behinde the curtain, they may come to the conclusion that it is the affected corporations that are really calling the shots, and the state is essentially their 'beard'. In other words, the nation-state, as it often has, is doing the bidding of its corporate masters. This will not be a revelation to many, but that it is a fact should outrage all of us.

The Irish situation is reminiscent of something that occurred several years ago pertaining to the WHO's efforts to reduce global use of tobacco. The tobacco company Philip Morris lobbied intensively and extensively to weaken measures aimed at reducing the consumption of their very lucrative product. You can read all about their sordid tactics in the link, but this excerpt might provide a little flavour of what they were up to:

a goal of Philip Morris is to increase the number of delegates at the treaty conventions who are not from health ministries or involved in public health. That’s happening: A Reuters analysis of delegates to the FCTC’s biennial conference shows a rise since the first convention in 2006 in the number of officials from ministries like trade, finance and agriculture for whom tobacco revenues can be a higher priority than health concerns.

A WHO treaty to discourage smoking was successfully implemented, but, at the time of the report,  while the U.S, signed the treaty, it did not ratify it. So much for the freedom to enact democratic and life-saving policies, eh?

We can look closer to home for further illustrations of whose interests are served in our democracy. The Rogers-Shaw merger, despite the protracted political theatre and government hand-wringing over competition in the wireless industry, was, as I knew it would be, endorsed. Who benefits? I think you know the answer. Who suffers? The citizens, of course.

Then there is the federal government's apparent inability to recover billions of dollars in evaded taxes. Despite the revelations of both the Paradise and Panama Papers, the CRA seems strangely reluctant to go after the titans who hold those accounts, Much easier it is to go after small businesses, as evidenced by the fishing expedition the tax agency is going on for Shopify records.

Even closer to home is the absolute contempt Doug Ford and John Tory evinced in the mayoral race which Olivia Chow just won. Both men had vowed to stay out of the election, but neither did, the most egregious violation by Ford, who pronounced absolute catastrophe for the City of Toronto should a "leftie" like Chow be elected. But what else can one expect from someone whose loins are set atingle whenever a privatization plan is mentioned?

"The people are never wrong," goes the cry about democracy. True, unless they want something the people behind the curtain don't. 

So much for the voice of the people.

Why Bother To Vote?

Brittlestar has the answer.

The Best Way To Effect Change

H/t Michael De Adder

Should you need further encouragement, read the columns by Martin Regg Cohn and Susan Delacourt.

Says Cohn:

Decide for yourself who to vote for but whatever your decision, do not persuade yourself that your vote doesn’t matter. Nothing is more corrosive than cynicism at a time when so many citizens around the world crave the certainty and stability of our democracy.

Think of the citizens of Hong Kong who are protesting in the streets for a semblance of democratic rule that Canadians take for granted. Consider the people in the Middle East who dreamed of an Arab Spring, only to see it fade away. I lived in both places for a decade, covering the human rights movements where people risked bullets for ballots, and were prepared to die for democracy, then as now.

And, from my perspective, most importantly,

Even in so-called “safe seats” that seem predestined to favour the incumbent MP, every ballot contributes to the national popular vote tallies that are very much taken into consideration, historically, by a governor general in deciding which party (or combination of parties) has a mandate to govern.

As well, Susan Delacourt reminds us,

There is a point, though, in taking the time to vote, especially at this juncture in history. Look to the U.S. or Britain and the turmoil in politics there over the past few years. Democracy matters. Elections matter. Voting matters.

... I’m hoping that 2015 wasn’t a blip — that the upward trajectory in turnout continues on Monday, because we’re seeing how fragile democracy can be, even in nations with deep, democratic traditions, such as the U.S and Britain.

There are many ways to honour our citizenship. Participation in the voting process is one of the best.

Democracy's Fragility

To be sure, the elevation of the Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario to government redounds to everyone's shame. Led by a buffoonish thug, Doug Ford, it is a party that seems intent on debasing not only its proud history, but also all citizens of the province, whether they voted for him or not. And therein lies an object lesson: the fragility of democracy.

It is the theme of Rick Salutin's column this week, one I recommend everyone read. He observes how profound Ford's ignorance about democracy is in light of his reckless invocation of the notwithstanding clause of our Charter to get his way with the size of Toronto city council:

He doesn’t get and never will, that democracy isn’t just about votes. It includes rule of law, free press, minority and human rights — which can’t always wait four years. They take flight pretty quickly.

And those rights are being violated, if the sad spectacle of protesting seniors being handcuffed in the legislature this week is any indication:

It’s been a grim reminder not just of the Charter’s fragility but of an entire edifice we grew up assuming was entrenched. It can blow away in a stiff breeze: democracy, civility, tolerance, and Ontario’s special target: law. Why are these venerable institutions going back centuries, so vulnerable? Because none of us, the living, go back that far. Each person is a new start on Earth.

It would seem that what we don't experience personally influences our perspectives:

It doesn’t take much to “forget” something you never lived through personally. True, history can lie on us like a weight, or blessing. Custom and tradition seem formidable. But only personal experience has a living grip — like the inequality and insecurity of the last 40 years, and especially the last 10.

The young for instance, have no experience of more hopeful times. For them, what’s so great about institutions that gave rise to this situation? No matter how far back democratic institutions stretch, in theory or history, none of us were there, we only heard about them after our arrival.

But there is a path to a more visceral appreciation of our democratic institutions:

Virtual Reality pioneer Jaron Lanier, says he once had an epiphany: every time we trust a traffic light, pay a bill, or “buildings don’t all fall down and you can eat unpoisoned food that someone grew” testifies to “an ocean of goodwill and good behaviour from almost everyone, living or dead.” We are, he says, bathed in a love that shows itself above all in “constraints” because they compensate for human flaws.

Never have those flaws been more obvious in Ontario than in the present situation, and it is time we once more recognize, right-wing cant notwithstanding, that as individuals, we are singularly vulnerable to the vicissitudes life has to offer; it is only through the collective that real hope is to be found:

Institutions like law and democracy rise (and rise again if they fall) through that sense of connectedness and need to trust each other, since there’s really no alternative. We’re nothing as individuals alone, though individuals can be damn impressive. It’s the human sense of solidarity, ultimately, that will (or may) save us and make us whole.

For All Those Who Consume Their News Online (And Free)

Here is the price journalists pay.

A Broad Canvas

If, like me, you are a retired senior to whom the fates have been reasonably kind, you have the luxury to contemplate the world around you at your leisure. If you are at all engaged in the larger world, however, that contemplation is rarely relaxing or enjoyable. You have seen too much in your lifetime.

A clear benefit and curse of advancing years is the context it confers. Without succumbing to mindless sentiment or nostalgia, I can remember earlier days when our society, although frequently roiled with major problems, was able to preserve and nourish something that now seems to be rapidly receding into the realm of the notionally quaint: the common good. People who ran for political office, it seems to me, more often than not, ran with a mind to represent the entire country or province, not a narrow or divisive constituency nursing some nebulous sense of grievance.

Today, that seems rarely the case. Nationally, of course, that 'narrowcasting' was most obvious during the foul reign of Stephen Harper, its main justification being to secure and retain power. His replacement, Justin Trudeau, while bearing the accouterments of a progressive populist, has disappointed deeply, purveying a neoliberal agenda and readily abandoning his election promises, an electoral reform that could have rejuvenated our waning democratic participation, and his pushing through pipelines without the 'social licence' he averred was sacred. Meanwhile, the Conservatives leader, Andrew Scheer, in true populist style in order to convince the electorate he is 'one of us,' dons a plaid short-sleeved shirt and bluejeans, while NDP leader Jagmeet Singh, courting the press, seeks to fashion himself as a Justin 2.0:



Here in Ontario, things are no better. We have a desperate Kathleen Wynne promising everything to everyone in a proposed spending spree which, should she be returned to power, would ensure at the very least another sale of public assets, the most likely immediate target being the LCBO. Her recent appointment of privatization czar Ed Clark as its chair was a barely concealed hint of a further implementation of the neoliberal agenda.

As a retiree, I am particularly offended at Wynne playing to the stereotype of the selfish senior by promising to remove the deductibles and co-payments under the Ontario Drug Benefit program, which provides seniors with free drugs. This will save the average person $240 per year. My vote really can't be bought, Kathleen.

Then, of course, there is the rise of the reactionary populist Doug Ford, promising to find 'new efficiencies' to save $6 billion with, wait for it, no job loss or government cuts! Shame on anyone who lived through the Mike Harris years for believing such patent malarkey.

Finally, we have the NDP's Andrea Horwath who, in a bald and venal play, gave up her balance of power leverage and triggered the last election, the same one that gave Wynne her majority, thereby allowing her to sell off 60% of Hydro One, a sale Horwath now promises to reverse by buying back the shares and lower hydro rates by 30%.

The contemporary canvas I contemplate is a bleak one. In Voltaire's Candide, Professor Pangloss avers "all is for the best in the best of all possible worlds". Notably, the work is a satire. Perhaps it is time for a new generation of readers.

If The Shoe Fits

For some strange reason, this resonates with me:

A Chill On Democracy?

I think it is indisputable that thanks to the online world of social media, civil discourse has been hobbled. If, for example, one reads comments in newspapers or in public Facebook posts, usually the second or third person will lapse into tired, unimaginative words and phrases such as libtard, social justice warrior, communist, cuck, etc. I, as I am sure many others, have received my share of such insults and even threats when voicing a view that inflames the rabid right. It is all part of the territory.

I have always shrugged off such 'commentary' mainly because I consider the sources of such reactionary vituperation unworthy of my time and emotions. What they lack in intellectual rigour and ideas they try to compensate for in juvenile disparagement. And I am also aware that when one writes publicly, one is 'fair game' for anyone with an opinion, no matter how benighted that opinion might be.

But what about those who allegedly serve the public, our politicians and journalists? Judging by what I read in the paper, the latter receive such abuse regularly and simply accept it, however odious it might be, as the cost of doing business. It appears, however, that the political class is starting to feel otherwise, and what they are considering, at least in Britain, should give us all pause.

The British Electoral Commission is suggesting a measure against those who harass or threaten politicians online. It is a suggestion with quite disturbing implications.

Banning social media trolls from voting could help reduce the amount of abuse faced by politicians, the election watchdog has said.

The Electoral Commission says legislation around elections should be reviewed and new offences could be introduced.

“In some instances electoral law does specify offences in respect of behaviour that could also amount to an offence under the general, criminal law. It may be that similar special electoral consequences could act as a deterrent to abusive behaviour in relation to candidates and campaigners,” it states.

Make no mistake about it. The abuse politicians are subjected to can be horrendous. Here are but a few examples:

Diane Abbott, Labour
The MP for Hackney North and Stoke Newington receives sexist and racist abuse online on a daily basis.

Writing for the Guardian, Abbott said she had received “rape threats, death threats, and am referred to routinely as a bitch and/or nigger, and am sent horrible images on Twitter”.

The death threats include an EDL-affiliated account with the tag “burn Diane Abbott”, she said.

Luciana Berger, Labour
The MP for Liverpool Wavertree has been subjected to repeated antisemitic and misogynistic abuse online.

A man who harassed Berger was in December jailed for two years after a trial at the Old Bailey. Joshua Bonehill-Paine, 24, wrote five hate-filled blogs about Berger, calling her a “dominatrix” and “an evil money-grabber” with a “deep-rooted hatred of men”. In one, he claimed the number of Jewish Labour MPs was a “problem”.

Stella Creasy, Labour
Creasy, MP for Walthamstow, has been subjected to repeated misogynistic abuse.

Peter Nunn, 33, from Bristol, was in 2014 jailed for 18 weeks for bombarding Creasy with abusive tweets after she supported a successful campaign to put the image of Jane Austen on the £10 note. He retweeted menacing posts threatening to rape the MP and branding her a witch.

None of the above assaults on public servants can be either condoned or countenanced. However, in my view, the suggested 'cure,' removing an offender's right to vote, is in many ways worse than the disease. And given that legal remedies already exist (fines, jail terms) for the worst offenders, it is an overreach of gargantuan magnitude.

I won't insult my readers by discussing at length the obvious here, but can you imagine such a sanction taking hold and spreading to other jurisdictions? I wonder how a demagogue like Donald Trump, for example, would feel about the voting rights of those who openly question his sanity or oppose his agenda? Would he deem them abusers who should suffer the ultimate sanction against democratic free speech? Or what about those who 'show disrespect for the flag' by taking a knee during the anthem?

In other jurisdictions, would those who oppose neoliberal government policies such as austerity find that their online criticisms have rendered them impotent citizens? Could environmentalists who oppose pipeline expansions be deemed 'enemies of the economy' and thus unfit to cast a ballot? One only has to use a bit of imagination here to come up with an array of scenarios that ultimately could render societies far more dystopian than many are today.

While such concerns as the above might be dismissed by some as ludicrous, just consider how badly real democracy has suffered in the last few decades before dismissing them out of hand.

Many say that creeping fascism is on the rise today. The suggested British initiative, if it ever takes hold in the western world, will surely take us down a path so dark that any sane person would seek to avoid it at all costs.

This Is Why Journalism Is Vital To Healthy Democracies

At a time when traditional journalism is weathering both economic and political storms, we should all take a moment to reflect on the vital role it plays in healthy democracies. The following story, about a joint investigation by The Toronto Star and The National Observer of FINTRAC, (Canada’s money laundering and terrorist financing enforcement agency), is illustrative of this truth.

As I previously wrote, FINTRAC chose to keep secret the identity of a bank that it penalized for failing to report a suspicious transaction and committing hundreds of other violations in its dealings with a controversial client. Thanks to journalism's dogged determination (which is not cheap, by the way), the mystery is over.

It took 10 months of media scrutiny and public outrage before Canadians learned Manulife Bank of Canada was the mysterious financial institution behind a $1.2-million fine for money-laundering violations.

The decision to confer anonymity upon this giant financial institution was puzzling, given that the same day in April, a handful of much smaller companies — facing far less severe fines — were publicly named by FINTRAC. This is all part of a pattern:

Over the past eight years, FINTRAC has named 40 companies for violating the law while keeping secret another 55.

Left unanswered is the reason for this double-standard, especially disturbing given the scope of Manulife's malfeasance:

-Manulife’s fine, which was reduced twice from an initial $1.8 million, was for five different types of violations of anti-money laundering and anti-terrorism financing law, involving a failure to report transfers totalling at least $12.2 million.

-The bank failed to report one suspicious transaction to FINTRAC — labelled a “very serious” violation that experts say undermines Canada’s system to detect financial crimes and trace dirty money.

-Manulife also failed to report 1,174 outgoing international electronic transfers of $10,000 or more, 45 deposits of $10,000 or more in cash and four incoming international electronic transfers of $10,000 or more.

-The bank was also fined for failing to “develop and apply compliance policies and procedures.”

Curiously, for much less serious violations, FINTRAC showed no such penchant for secrecy. Those named and shamed included one whose misdeeds seem relatively minor:

Mahdi Al-Saady, CEO of Altaif Inc., an Ottawa-based money exchange and transfer company, was hit with a $42,600 FINTRAC fine — and publicly named — in 2014.

The violations for which Altaif was fined included failing to report the sending and receipt of money transfers of more than $10,000 — two of the same violations the unnamed bank was found to have committed.

The fact that Altaif was named is, of course, not the issue. The real question is why all who run afoul of FINTRAC are not treated the same, with the rules rigidly applied.

I have my own suspicions, but I leave it to informed readers to draw their own conclusions.

The Lifeblood Of Democracy - A Guest Post By Pamela MacNeil

In response to my post yesterday on rebellion, Pamela MacNeil had this commentary, which I am featuring as a guest post:

Rebels Lorne, especially intellectual rebels, are the life blood of democracy.

From the time we are born or at the very least from the time we start school, we eventually learn that conformity is much more valued than independence, particularly independent thinking.

In almost every area of our society, education, work, relationships, sexual identity, etc. we are pressured to conform, to be like everyone else. It's like there is an underlying code everyone absorbs that, when translated, means keep your mouth shut and your mind closed.

Every great advancement and change in humankind has been instigated by a rebel. Men and woman who question the established concepts can mean speaking out against racism, as did Martin Luther King. Speaking out against the accepted norms of women's very identity: Betty Friedan. The earth does revolve around the sun: Galileo. The origin of the human species is evolutionary: Charles Darwin. Hiding Jews from German Nazis: anyone with courage and integrity, even at the risk of losing their own lives.

Conformity breeds obedience. Once a person has abandoned critical thinking, all they have left is obedience. Conformity also creates a power dynamic.This dynamic consists of those who want to rule and those who want to be ruled.The independent person wants neither to rule nor be ruled. Ultimately they just want to live their life in freedom. They do not recognize anyone having authority over their life.

Men and woman like Chris Hedges speak out against power and are an inspiration to all of those, especially the young, who are starting to question the accepted ideas of their day.

The anti-intellectualism that so permeates American culture today has been evolving for over 50 years. The U.S. is in the final stages of that evolution, so much so that one no longer need ask why Johnny can't read, but rather more fundamentally why Johnny can't think.

The intellectually bankrupt wasteland called American culture has reached its pinnacle. The battle for ideas, such as freedom and democracy, will be left for the rebels to fight, because with Donald Trump in the Oval Office, there will be no right to peaceful protest, no freedom of speech, and there will be no due process. Trump will double down on dissent, permitting his military and police forces as much violence as needed to stop the American people from saying NO.

Every dictator rules by force. Donald Trump is no different.

Guest Post: An Incompatible Marriage

In response to my post the other day featuring some stellar letters from Star readers on inequality, regular commentator Pamela MacNeil offered an insightful analysis of the fundamental incompatibility between democracy and neoliberalism. Here is that analysis:

Governments who value Democracy, Lorne, will govern in the interests of people according to democratic principles. They will also add legally or otherwise to their country's democracy. They will do this to make their democracy stronger and more accessible to their citizens. This is what Nation Building is all about. Creating The Charter of Rights and Freedoms is a good example of strengthening democracy while further entrenching Nation Building.

The stronger the legislative roots upon which Democracy rests, the freer the country.

The more a government seeks to create policy without a democratic process, the greater the chance of that government becoming authoritarian.

Our present government and our previous governments have embraced neoliberal policy domestically and globally. "Neoliberals require a strong state that uses its power to create and enforce markets and prop them up when they fail." Their vision is a state governed by market transactions and not democratic practices. This is what Canadians are now witnessing.

Neoliberalism came later to Canada than to the U.S. and Britain because of the re-election of Pierre Trudeau in 1980. How ironic that it should be his son who is continually promoting neoliberalism and has made it the fundamental driver of his domestic and global policies.

Neoliberalism breeds inequality. Most progressives would defend democracy as a basic right. In neoliberalism "financial markets survive existenial crises only through state bailouts."

The economic inequality can best be seen in the decline of union memberships, the decline in the share of middle class income and the rise in the share of income taken by the top 10%. The goal of neoliberalism is to chip away at union power until it no longer threatens the realization of the market state.

How unequal and insignificant does your government consider you to be, when they, without public consultation, take billions of your dollars to bail out the corporate and financial elite who were the cause of one of the most major financial crisis in history?

There is nothing more important then freedom, freedom ingrained in law. Without democracy there is no freedom. Our government, which has already severed ties with Canadians, is busy trying to find ways to circumvent our constitution or dismantle our democracy in order to implement their neoliberal policies.

Neoliberalism and Democracy cannot survive together. It will be one or the other and right now neoliberalism, at least in Canada, appears to be winning.

How relevant is our democracy to Canadians? The battle ahead is a battle of ideas. Freedom and democracy or Neoliberalism and Tyranny. Will Canadians fight to take their country back or will they do nothing?

The choice is ours, and our time is running out.

"The Cancer Of Inequality"

In a recent post well-worth reading, The Mound reflected on the decline of support for liberal democracy. Today, Star readers respond to an article carried by the paper entitled, How Stable Are Democracies? ‘Warning Signs Are Flashing Red’. Their message is clear: inequality is at the root of the problem, fostered and promoted by the neoliberal agenda:

Re: For democracy, ‘warning signs flashing red', Dec. 11

The graphs for the seven countries in this article show the first real dip in democratic trust by people born in the 1960s and with each generation '70s and '80s trust declines. The pattern of distrust is universal across the democracies; therefore it seems logical that the cause is universal and progressive.

The universal event during the survey's time period of 2005-14 was the Great Recession of 2008 and with the slow recovery it is a progressive event affecting all people, but especially the millennial generation. They and their parents feel cheated; they did what was expected but now face unemployment.

However, is feeling cheated by society the total reason for the decline in democratic trust? I say something else going on: First, the three countries with the largest decline in trust — U.S., U.K. and Australia — consistently show the highest rate of inequality. Second, the country with the lowest decline in trust, Sweden, consistently has the lowest rate of inequality. The remaining three countries — Canada, Germany and the Netherlands — are all middle of the road for decline in trust and for inequality. There seems to be a link between decline in democratic trust and inequality, but the work of Mounk and Foa did not link democratic decline to inequality, as Mounk says more research is required.

Whilst waiting for the research we should consider the work of Wilkinson and Pickett who covered 10 components that make up the social fabric of 23 countries and clearly showed how inequality was bad for everyone, from the wealthy to the pauper.

In the U.K. and U.S. since 1980s, when Thatcher and Reagan condoned Greedism as an economic model, inequality has grown to the point where these two countries are near the top on the list. Both recently experienced quasi-social revolutions that shocked the world: Brexit in the U.K. and the Trump election in the U.S. Both events were rightly tied to trade deals and globalization because both exacerbate Greedism and inequality.

Inequality has been insidiously creeping up on us for the last three decades. In the U.S., the poster child for inequality, it gets little attention; in Canada we do not understand the damage it is doing to our democracy.

Democracy is best explained by five words: “The will of the people.” Looking at Canada I do not believe this is the will of the people. No good jobs, precarious work rising, children living in poverty, loss of self respect and dignity, half a billion dollars in tax forgiveness for 70 CEOs, 80 per cent of the economy fruits goes to one per cent, foodbanks grow.

The cancer of inequality is destroying the fabric of our society and governments must act before rips apart.

Keith Parkinson, Cambridge

This article was important yet frustrating. It missed the obvious connection between economic inequality and dwindling support for democracy. The people of Venezuela, Cuba and other nations give up on democracy when they are economically marginalized. The freedom of the few to accumulate disproportionate wealth and power makes democracy seem useless to many.

Laws that increasingly favour the wealthy at the expense of the poor and middle class deprive most citizens of genuine political power. The citizens become irrelevant, so democracy becomes irrelevant to them.

The histories of Athens, Rome and countless other political systems show that democracy dies this way. It has been written about many times, yet we appear incapable of learning how to stop it.

Paul Bigioni, Pickering

Democracy's Shortcomings*

“Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the others.”

― Winston S. Churchill

The above is clearly not in accord with the thinking of our 'betters,' aka the corporate elite, who are now lamenting the terrible things that democracy can bring about.

Billionaire CEO Steve Schwarzman first sounded the alarm in January at the annual World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.

"I find the whole thing sort of astonishing, and what's remarkable is the amount of anger, whether it's on the Republican side or the Democratic side," he said, in a slow cadence that served to highlight his confusion. "Bernie Sanders, to me, is almost more stunning than some of the stuff going on on the Republican side. How is that happening? Why is that happening? What is the vein in America that is being tapped into, across parties, that's made people so unhappy?"

"Now," he concluded, smiling, "that's something you should spend some time on."

Schwarzman's bewilderment gave way to introspection and analysis, leading some to conclude there is too much democracy, thereby paving the way for demagogues like Donald Trump, who 'prey' on the emotions of the masses.

James Traub, writing in Foreign Policy, goes further:

It is necessary to say that people are deluded and that the task of leadership is to un-delude them. Is that “elitist”?

Such an assertion provoked a strong response from Jake Johnson:

It is elites — including Traub himself — who have for decades cloaked devastating wars in the soaring rhetoric of "humanitarian intervention." It is elites who have forced upon crumbling economies austerity that has served to prolong and worsen already dire circumstances. It is elites who have peddled the fantasy of neoliberalism, which has created a system that lavishly rewards the wealthiest while leaving everyone else to compete for the rest. It is elites, political and corporate, who have devastated the environment in the name of profit. It is elites who have crashed the global economy.

The masses, for their part, are always there to pick up the costs.

And they're sick of it.

Writing in Rolling Stone, Matt Taibbi says,

"Voters in America not only aren't over-empowered, they've for decades now been almost totally disenfranchised, subjects of one of the more brilliant change-suppressing systems ever invented.

People have no other source of influence ... Unions have been crushed. Nobody has any job security. Main Street institutions that once allowed people to walk down the road to sort things out with other human beings have been phased out. In their place now rest distant, unfeeling global bureaucracies.

Elites, by forcefully eliminating avenues for democratic progress, have cultivated the environment in which anti-establishment sentiment now thrives.

And the major political parties of the wealthiest nations on earth, in order to curry favor from big business, have pushed aside the needs of the working class, often disregarding workers as racists unworthy of attention. And the punditry has dutifully followed suit.

And so the schism between the elites and the masses continues. What is left unspoken, however, is the role that all of us can play in counteracting this alleged debasement of democracy.

We have a choice. We can choose to go along our merry way, content and narcotized by the trivial diversions available to us, or we can speak forcefully whenever the occasion demands that we do, and we can refuse to cede authority to the uninformed and the ignorant by turning out in droves during elections, debates, etc.

There is nothing inherently wrong with our democratic institutions. It is its potential participants who need to be regularly reminded of their responsibilities in facilitating their effective discharge. To say that there is no real choice in our political leadership may be true to some extent. But to use that as a reason for withdrawal will only serve the interests of a minority at the expense of the majority.

Anger is justified, but it must be tempered with reason. Otherwise, all will indeed be lost.

*Thanks to Kev for bringing this to my attention.

This Gift From Montreal Simon

I have to admit I was feeling rather discouraged the other day when I read this CBC report in which an EKOS Research poll found that only 27 percent of respondents were familiar with the 'Fair' Elections Act. Then I read Montreal Simon's post this morning and felt a little better.

Here is the short video he posted that beautifully and very succinctly shows why voting is so important. Enjoy and send it to whomever you think might benefit:

Mandatory Voting And Social Cohesion

The Toronto Star recently featured the 2013 Atkinson Series: Me, You, Us, journalist and author Michael Valpy’s investigation into social cohesion in Canada — what binds us together, what pulls us apart.

In its final installment, given the decline in voter turnout, one of the suggestions put forth to advance the cause of social cohesion was mandatory voting. It is a notion that I don't personally favour, my reasoning being perhaps reductionist and simplistic: in a mandatory system, the element of resentment would be strong, and some would blithely check off the first name on the ballot just to get out of the polling station. An uninformed vote (and yes,I know there are all ready a lot of them) is worse than no vote, in my view.

Two letters from Star readers offer some interesting perspective on the problems extant in today's democracies:


Fixing the tears in our social fabric, Dec. 22

It isn’t young people not voting that’s pushing democratic legitimacy to a crisis stage, it’s the systemic failure of the political class to address our problems.

Since the triumph of global capital after the fall of the Soviet Union, all political parties fell in line with the neoliberal narrative. Free trade (really a bill of rights for corporations), privatization, offshoring, destruction of the social safety net, ad nauseam, became the bedrock of every political party.
It’s almost funny watching the Liberals and NDP desperately trying to find an issue they disagree with the Tories on. It’s a class consensus. By its nature it excludes an increasing majority.

Michael Valpy’s “solution” of mandatory voting is a pathetic attempt to ignore the cause of this democratic crisis and shoot the messengers. We should be demanding that our political class give us something substantive to vote for.

John Williams, Toronto

............................................................

The following letter makes reference to a piece that George Monbiot wrote for The Guardian. If interested, you can read it here.

Voting is not the root cause of our crisis, but out of control corporate power may well be. George Monbiot, in the Guardian, makes this case in, “Nothing will change until we confront the real sources of power.”

Monbiot begins, “It’s the reason for the collapse of democratic choice. It’s the source of our growing disillusionment with politics. It’s the great unmentionable. Corporate Power. The media will scarcely whisper its name. It is howlingly absent from parliamentary debates.

“Until we name it and confront it, politics is a waste of time. The political role of corporation is generally interpreted as that of lobbyists, seeking to influence government policy. In reality they belong on the inside. They are part of the nexus of power that creates policy. They face no significant resistance from either the government or opposition, as their interests have been woven into the fabric of all three main parties.”

Monbiot describes the U.K. situation and supports his views with 15 listed references. He ends with, “So I don’t blame people for giving up on politics,” and “when an unreformed political funding system ensures that parties can be bought and sold, when politicians of the three main parties stand and watch as public services are divided up by a grubby cabal privateers, what is left of this system that inspires us to participate?”

The U.K. situation described by Monbiot is not unique; it is the same for most countries.

Frank Panetta, Welland

A Good Question

But what is the answer?

Re: ‘Golden age’ for Poland caps 500 years of pain, Dec. 22

Seeing the statement “communism’s iron grip” was too much. What about capitalism’s iron grip? Communism has come and gone in Poland, Russia and many other countries. But we have endured capitalism for centuries and it shows no sign of abating.

It tells us that we live under democracy, when in fact we can do nothing to stop the actions of mean and disgusting people like Stephen Harper and Rob Ford, when binding treaties are negotiated without our knowledge, when we are not permitted to know when we are eating genetically modified food, when the poor get poorer while the rich get richer. Capitalism has resulted in climate change, of which there is no end in sight, other than the destruction of the world.

Our so-called “democratic” structures were set up centuries ago by the rich and powerful to attempt to make capitalism run smoothly, and, above all, to guarantee the system’s persistence. It has not run smoothly, but it has stayed in place.

How do we extricate ourselves from the iron grip of capitalism?

Ken Ranney, Peterborough

H/t The Toronto Star

What If

....everything you thought you knew about our democracy was an illusion? The following video, made before the last U.S. election and directed toward an American audience, will doubtlessly resonate with Canadians who despair of our current state:

UPDATED: Russell Brand's Frustrations

Although I do not subscribe to the 'tactic' of refusing to vote, much of what comedian Russell Brand says in this BBC interview with Jeremy Paxton is worth listening to as he articulates the frustrations that are felt by millions of us:



UPDATE: The Globe's Elizabeth Renzetti has an interesting commentary on Brand's expostulations.