First and foremost: Under the Swamp tab, you will find 'Terminus', where you can publish your own journals, essays, your thoughts and ideas. Do not worry about style, it's content that matters. Use liberally!
The internet seems to be populated by politically ideological enclaves of all persuasions. The seriously ideological ones seem also to be the least engaged with the world. Instead, their members appear to find satisfaction in caressing their intellects with their tongues; they are, in all their serious intellectuality, given the current state of affairs, divorced from reality. Fun, and to a point edifying reading, nonetheless.
Then, there are political organizations of all sizes. For these, their north star, invariably reduces to pragmatic deference to the Parties in power, thus ensuring their eternal political irrelevance. That pragmatic approach, dictated by the notion of 'a bread crumb here, a bread crumb there, and before you know we'll have a loaf of bread', seems to have worked even beyond their expectations, having delivered cake instead.
But lately, I have been stumbling upon growing numbers of individuals, splintering away from their hard held convictions, recognizing that the enemy they perceive is driven by a deeper identity which can nimbly embrace either of the two political parties. Whether it be class, pathological greed, narcissism, megalomania, or any number of causations that drive these individuals, they are the ones whom we elect and to whom Aesop refers, when he says that: “We hang the petty thieves and appoint the great ones to public office.” They are the ones who pose the greatest danger to society, democracy and all that is fair and decent in this world. Because, these individuals, while having vague political preferences, are wholly unencumbered by them in their pursuit of self interested social advantage.
The latest Gallup poll shows a statistically even split in party identification of 30% each. I suspect that within a year they’ll be at 25% or less. So there it is: 50% do not relate to their government. They fly the middle finger eagle at the parties and, unbeknownst to themselves, when queried in an unbiased fashion about a number of major issues, no matter which political leanings they espouse, they’d find their differences to pale in contrast with the ones they perceive vis a vis the PTB. Since all that is needed to begin seriously changing this near terminally ill patient's condition is but one vote, considering both the popular sentiment of the electorate and percentages, eking one out no longer seems that far fetched. That, then, is the system's Achilles heal. Shaping the arrow, nocking it, drawing the bow, aiming, and releasing; these are the steps, and unsurprisingly – it will take a village.
January 7, 2011