What does
it tell us when we must consider that less than thirty percent of the American voting
public chooses to invite the representation
that our two-party political system makes available to us?
In view of the total number of votes that are cast, this means, roughly speaking,
that slightly more than fifteen percent of the voters determines how the remaining
eighty-five percent of us are to be governed for the next four to eight years.
Do these figures lie, or does this mean that the vast majority of our
citizens never actually get the kind of representation they would have chosen had they
been offered it. This is an ominous and
dangerous situation and one which I doubt many unconcerned non-voters pay much heed to.
In Russia and China, the people are given one choice, invariably evil. In America, our citizens are always presented with
a choice between the lesser of two evils. I
suppose this is a start, but isn’t it becoming obvious that to more than seventy
percent of our voting population, this just isn’t good enough? Isn’t it time we recognized that the two
party system simply does not suffice to provide the kind, or the quality, of
representation the majority of people in this country want and need?
Over time, the two-party system has served only to cause the
polarization, erosion and impotency of our ideals as a nation. It has become an enclave of reciprocating
conflicts and corruption that protects only the interest of a select minority. When it
becomes as obvious as it presently is that nearly three-fourths of our nations population
wash their hands of the “system” under which they live and do their days work,
then it is time to introduce a “third force”.
It is time to create a fulcrum upon which to bring a balance to the pairs of
opposites and their undesirable extremes. If
we do not the unstable and polarized forces now in control, or should I say out of
control, will tear us apart from the inside out.
We should ask ourselves, why our founding fathers in their inspiration,
created a tripartite system of governmental checks and balances, and we have allowed a
bi-partisan political system to clumsily undermine and destroy its protective functions? Clearly, a bi-partisan political system’s
greatest strength is its tendency to weaken a tripartite system of checks and balances. In other words, it gives power to those of dubious
authoritarian intent in government, those who were meant to have their powers limited. It
robs the people of their natural, God-given rights and independence from those who purely
seek personal power and gain.
What is needed then, as our founding fathers wisely foresaw, is a
“third force”, both in government structure and in political influence. We need only to model our political system after
our existing governing bodies for the American majority to regain control of their
country.
What is needed is a party of “values”; a grassroots party that
reflects and truly represents the values of mainstream America. That group represents
nearly three-fourths of our country who lie in quiescence, disillusioned with the present
political apparatus and refuse to be associated with it.
They are the real Americans, “the great silent majority” that one of our
former presidential leaders would have had us believe were “on his side”.
What this “great silent majority” needs is a voice, a platform
from which to be heard, an AMERICAN VALUES PARTY. We
need a party that will force the hands of the two existing parties who now represent the
minority, those who believe they benefit most from their insidious ingenuineness. It should be clear why those of us who have any
values left refuse to swim in the cesspool that American politics has become.
The power of this “great silent majority” is held in abeyance
simply because it has not yet found its own means of expression. We have seen this phenomena occurring with
Communism and Capitalism, which logically, in their interplay of extremes, reconcile
themselves into Socialism. (It may be prudent
to note that there is no similarity between “pure” Socialism and
“state-controlled” Socialism.
Emerging gradually in the midst of the traditional political chicanery is
the nebulously labeled Reform Party. What remains for the Reform Party to become
officially recognized (de jure) instead of provisional (de facto), is for the adherents to
embody the values of the mainstream majority of Americans.
Once these Americans realize they can trust this “third force”, and
realize that they can be heard by means of it, we can then effectively harness the
conflict and corruption which the two present extremes have engendered. To fail to do this
will empower the present two-party system to dissolve into oligarchy and fascist
dictatorship.
What I’m attempting to articulate is a preconceived inevitability; it
simply needs to be recognized, understood and accepted by those of us who are sufficiently
caring and concerned about the perpetuity of our American ideals, if not our very
nationhood.
This concept of a “third force” in politics has already been
noted by such rising stars as John McCain, Jesse Ventura and Ralph Nader. These men have identified keynote values that all
Americans still identify with, the first being honesty.
They are beginning to identify and recognize a second, which is courage. The third, which we all need to work on, is
courtesy toward each other. A mature society
requires these qualities to thrive and survive.
When all three qualities are embodied as principles of political conduct,
we as citizens, will witness the “third force”, or our party coming into being. Our leaders will then reflect back to us the
values which all Americans, all human beings everywhere - respect, admire and respond to.
These keynote qualities also reconcile themselves into another potentially human condition
called decency.
What I am saying here, friends, is that when more enlightened leaders begin
to show their faces out of the present gloom we must offer them our recognition and lend
them our ears; the needed “third force” will arise in our midst when leadership
begins evidencing those qualities which most of us yearn for in ourselves.
We should, perhaps, be thankful that those who still participate
in the present political system now number less than thirty-percent, for they are the
ignorant minority who remain identified with the morally and ethically bankrupt, the
integrity deficient values that their leaders represent. When the moral majority finally
speaks through its representatives, this minority with its dubious leaders will become
like chaff in the wind, blown away by the simplest and most common virtues once known to
man, Honesty, Courage, and Courtesy, all of which add up to just plain decency!
Are these qualities so strange, so alien to us, so difficult to achieve in
modern society? Is it simply because we don’t see them much in evidence around us any
longer? Have our positive role models abandoned us? It
seems many people have a tendency to become like our leaders. That is, no doubt, why our
founding fathers chose to bequeath to us a republic rather than a democracy. They are
distinct even though the two terms are often used interchangeably in modern content. The United States is a republic for very sound
reasons. Democracies, as Plato revealed in
his classic tome, “The Republic”, and as also shown us in the novel, “Lord
of the Flies”, democracies inevitably deteriorate into oligarchies and fascism, and
self-destruct.
Read the following definitions that the U.S. War Department issued
in its 1928 military manual, in an effort to clarify to personnel who were confused as to
these distinctions:
DEMOCRACY: A government of the masses. Authority derived
through mass meetings or any form of direct expression results in mobocracy. Attitude
towards property is communistic - negating property rights. Attitude towards the law is
that the majority shall regulate, whether it be based upon deliberation or governed by
passion, prejudice, and impulse, without restraint or regard to consequences. Results in demagogism, license, agitation,
discontent, and anarchy.
REPUBLIC: Authority is derived through the election by the
people of public officials best fitted to represent them.
Attitude toward property is respect for laws and individual rights, and a sensible
economic procedure. Attitude toward law is
the administration of justice in accord with fixed principles and established evidence,
with a strict regard to consequences. A greater number of citizens and extent of territory
may be brought within its compass. Avoids the
dangerous extremes of tyranny or mobocracy. Results
in statesmanship, liberty, reason, justice, contentment and progress.
Once we become able to clarify these definitions for ourselves and
then compare them to the reality we witness
occurring around us in society, our vision, our understanding will become clearer. Then we will be able to use our own judgment and
discernment, (rather than always having to read from the lines of specious explanations
and outright deceptions percolating up in the media, and the mouths of our leaders), to
ascertain where this traditional and familiar political juggernaut is taking us.
Once we are able to scrutinize more closely the map and the
pending journey our present leaders have planned for us, then we can ask ourselves whether
we really want to go in that direction. Perhaps all we need is simply a new
blueprint; one that the great silent majority can relate to.
When enough of us are able to acknowledge sufficient realization,
reliance and responsibility as American citizens then the John McCains, the Jesse
Venturas, and Ralph Naders, can begin leading us to the America that was meant to be, the
America that we know still lives in our hearts.
When the “great silent majority”, whom I choose to
believe does have decent values if not a particularly strong sense of
determination, begins to will this “third force”, a Reform Party
embodying REAL AMERICAN VALUES will then be able to wrest the stranglehold the clever and
deceptive minority now have upon our entire nation. The
fundamental goodness of the American people once reawakened and given the leadership it
deserves will again offer the world a country which is capable of standing strong and
worthy.
