“Our Democracy”

Mainstream media cites “our democracy” so frequently… it ought to take copyright on the term.

Yet whose democracy is it? The prevailing media has its answer.

“Our democracy” includes the tens and tens of millions who would pull a lever for the Democratic candidate in November — whomever it may be.

“Our democracy” excludes the tens and tens of millions who would pull a lever for Donald John Trump in November.

We are informed Mr. Trump’s electoral victory equals democracy’s death. It would represent dictatorship’s triumph.

We do not exaggerate or stretch the facts. This is what we are told.

For example, by foreign affairs commentator Robert Kagan in the “democracy dies in darkness” Washington Post:

“A Trump dictatorship is increasingly inevitable.”

For example, by Salon‌.‌com:

“Trump’s path to dictatorship depends on our democracy working.”

For example, by The Guardian:

“It isn’t ‘anti-democratic’ to bar Trump from office. It’s needed to protect democracy.”

Here we cite but some examples. Here is yet another, by way of the Los Angeles Times:

“Scream it from the mountaintops, media — Trump wants to be a dictator.”

The question naturally arises: Do the deplorables who would elect this rascal… constitute a portion of “our democracy”?

If they do not, what do they constitute?

Assume they vault Mr. Trump into office — through democratic means. Is democracy itself… a threat to democracy?

It appears we have a fine conundrum on our hands.

Let us come out with it at once:

We pound no tom-tom for Mr. Trump. In critical respects, he is not our man.

In the years 2016–2020… for example… we often rapped him sharply across the knuckles.

We moaned about his self-destructive tariffs. We sobbed about his luxuriant government outlays.

We bellyached about his deficits.

What is more, we did not vote for Mr. Trump in the election of 2016. Nor did we vote for Mr. Trump in the election of 2020.

Nor will we vote for Mr. Trump in the election of 2024 — should he secure his party’s nomination.

Yet we did not vote against Mr. Trump in the election of 2016 or the election of 2020.

And will we not vote against Mr. Trump in the election of 2024 — should he secure his party’s nomination.

That is because we simply do not vote.

We do not vote partly on principle. But also on deeply practical considerations.

We maintain our being in the deep-blue state of Maryland. Its 10 electoral votes will unfailingly empty into the hip pocket of the Democratic candidate.

If we opt for the Democratic candidate, we simply pile on.

If we opt for the Republican candidate, we back an invariable loser.

Why — then — should we bother voting in the state of Maryland? Comes the objection:

“If everyone thought like you, no one would vote at all. If you don’t vote, you have no right to complain.”

Just so. Yet we do not complain. We merely observe.

And we observe that both parties are fiscal abominations. In nearly perfect complicity they have heaped upon the United States $34.2 trillion of debt.

We trust each of them as we would trust a dog with our dinner.

That is, not in the slightest.

We observe further that — in practical terms — we are rarely offered authentic electoral choice.

Assume an American football field, 100 yards in length. Now center your attention midfield, on the 50-yard line.

American politics rages largely within 20 yards of this 50-yard line — between one 40-yard line and the opposing 40-yard line.

Neither Democrat nor Republican bursts through the opponent’s 40.

Here we do not moan or sob. It is, in the main, conducive to American political health.

It promotes what is commonly labeled moderation. And moderation in politics equals stability in politics.

Meantime, an electoral loser can take solace in the capital fact that the winner is mired within 10 yards of midfield.

They cannot punch into scoring range. This arrangement prevents each team’s berserkers from seizing control of the contest.

Besides, there is always “next time.” The voters may hand the preposterous ball to the opposition in the following election.

Except — that is — if voters hand Mr. Trump the football this November.

For we are told we will never hand it back. He will exhaust the clock on American democracy to zero.

Thus the exercise of democracy is democracy’s death. It is dictatorship’s triumph.

“Hitler was elected too!” these theorists like to howl. “The German people elected a dictator! The American people are in danger of doing the same.”

Yet here we must file an historical caveat.

The cantankerous Austrian corporal was not elected. He was appointed. Appointed, that is, by German president Herr von Hindenburg.

The old Prussian appointed him chancellor to ringlead a coalition government in 1933.

But let us come back…

In practical terms the odds of Trumpian dictatorship are very, very slender — for reasons we cite here.

Yet if Mr. Trump wins election this fall or if Mr. Trump loses election this fall… we confront a distressing conundrum… concerning American democracy itself.

Below, we republish our article addressing the inescapable tragedy of democratic politics… in the American context. Read on.

The Inescapable Tragedy of Democratic Politics

By Brian Maher

No man can avoid politics. All are in siege. No rival field of human enterprise approaches politics’ ferocity. War is the extension of what by other means… in Mr. Carl von Clausewitz’s grim telling?

The answer of course is politics.

Politics disunites, divides, disrupts, discombobulates — as war itself disunites, divides, disrupts and discombobulates. Democratic politics offer no exception. They in fact constitute the very proof of the rule. Assume a democratic election…

In one corner you have Candidate X. In the opposing corner you have Candidate Y…

The Essence of Electoral Politics

Each candidate is little more in this world than a liar, jackleg and rogue. Yet both fellows appear before the voters, hopeful of election. Both roar their flubdubberies before eager and attentive crowds. Both shout their propagandas and thump their chests.

Each denounces the other as a very arm of Satan. Amazingly, both are often correct. Come the election. 50.1% of voters yank a lever for X. 49.9% pull one for Y. Thus X claims the laurel. He proceeds instantly against the desires, hopes and interests of the vanquished 49.9%.

Each day they live they cringe, wither and chafe beneath X’s atrocities… helpless as worms on fishermen’s hooks. Only upon some distant November can voters heave this jackal out. This, happily, is one such November. Assume voters do heave him out…

Y — or perhaps even some Z — comes in.

X’s voters must then endure their own parallel hells until the following election. The same pitiful calculus applies to elections at any level of American government… down to canine-catcher.

In Politics, Smaller Is Better

The higher the office… the greater the menace. The mayor of Why, Arizona, may impose his torments upon his outvoted victims — as may the mayor of Whynot, North Carolina. Yet these victims are free to jump the fence.

The bordering hamlet might run to saner and more tolerable settings as the outvoted sees them. And so the oppressed can flee, refugees from oppression. The same asylum-seeking applies to states.

Has a California or an Oregon or an Illinois gone lunatic? For many they have. But a Texas or a Tennessee or a Utah holds out its beacon. Meantime, alienated Texans, Tennesseeans and Utahians can flee to California, Oregon or Illinois. These local competitions form a severe brake on the natural rascalities of politics, especially in the American system.

These local competitions, in fact, form the crowning glory of the American device of government.

But to escape a president? A fellow must jump the Rio Grande to the south, the 49th parallel to the north or cross oceans east and west to get away. If he chooses to linger on, he must rot down four years until he takes another go at the vote booth.

And if the scalawag wins reelection? Our poor wretch must endure another four years under occupation — for a total of eight. Now contrast the political system with the market system…

Voting in the Marketplace Is Entirely Different

Free markets — authentically free markets — lack entirely the violent combats central to politics. They are scenes of peace, tolerance… and justice.

Let us once again present a parallel case to our previous electoral bout, our political bout…

A Coca-Cola holds itself out before the American people, for example. It is Candidate X in our market race.

“Vote for me,” yells this candidate. I’m the “real thing.” Behind another podium stands a Pepsi-Cola — Candidate Y. “No. Vote for me,” counters this fellow. Drink me “for the love of it.”

The fickle and capricious voter proceeds to choose. Out comes his wallet, containing his vote for the one or the other. Yet does his individual vote injure, usurp or ruffle the opposing voter? Does he club the other voter over the head to enforce his wishes… as he does in politics? He does not.

Satisfied Voters

A voter for either Coca-Cola or Pepsi-Cola is a satisfied voter. Crucially, neither would deny the other his soft drink of choice. Multiply this one example countless times and in countless directions. What emerges is a picture of majestic electoral peace and serenity.

And if voters decline both offerings, each plunges into bankruptcy… and goes away.

In this instance the voter has also delivered his message, and thunderously. Do electoral politics grant him such power?

McDonald’s versus Burger King, Honda versus Ford, Nike versus Adidas, Walmart versus Target… it is all one. A vote for any of them is peaceful as a dove. The voter on the free and open market holds no gun against any ribs. Yet when he steps into the vote booth on Election Day— conversely — the gun goes against the ribs.

To pull a lever is to pull a trigger.

Red State vs. Blue State

Chain a red-state American to a blue-state American. Compel them to vote between any product on the free and open market. The blue-state voter may razz the red-stater’s ghastly and barbarian tastes. The red-state voter may in turn razz the blue-stater’s effete and supercilious tastes.

Yet neither attempts to dragoon or bayonet the other. Each concedes the other’s freedom to vote his own way, as he might, unhindered. And so peace prevails between them. But give them the choice of Trump versus Hillary or Trump versus Biden…

They will fall into savage combat, Hatfield versus McCoy. That is because the loser understands he must endure his sufferings for the following two years, four years or six years.

We must therefore conclude the free market’s voting system is vastly superior to political voting.

A vote in the marketplace is a “win, win” deal, as our co-founder Bill Bonner styles it. Both the purchaser and the producer gain from the transaction.

What is politics then but a colossal “win, lose” deal? What is more, market voting improves the world in ways large and small…

Voting in the Free Market Improves the World

On the unimpeded market each business must compete for the consumer’s vote. That vote injures no one and menaces no one — as we have established. It also benefits the many. It benefits the many because a vote sends a signal. It tells the outvoted producer to field an improved product — else take the consequences. And an improved product lifts this world that much higher.

If a business fails the market’s harsh and ruthless voting, the voters may yank its candidacy altogether. It goes the way of the Whigs. Yet here is perhaps politics’ greatest crime, its most scarlet of sins:

It has drained away “social power”… and channeled it off into state power. That is, politics has stripped society’s power and liberty… and placed them in the state’s hands.

Social Power vs. State Power

Albert Jay Nock, dates 1870–1945, was a gentleman and thinker of deep and penetrating insight.

Nock sobbed about the loss of social power during the New Deal:

If we look beneath the surface of our public affairs, we can discern one fundamental fact: namely, a great redistribution of power between society and the State…

Every assumption of State power, whether by gift or seizure, leaves society with so much less power. There is never, nor can there be, any strengthening of State power without a corresponding and roughly equivalent depletion of social power…

Heretofore in this country sudden crises of misfortune have been met by a mobilization of social power. In fact (except for certain institutional enterprises like the home for the aged, the lunatic asylum, city hospital and county poorhouse), destitution, unemployment, “depression” and similar ills have been no concern of the State but have been relieved by the application of social power.

As the frog in its pot acquiesces to the gradually warming water… the citizen has acquiesced to his gradual loss of social power:

New generations appear, each temperamentally adjusted — or as I believe our American glossary now has it, “conditioned” — to new increments of State power, and they tend to take the process of continuous accumulation as quite in order.

The lingering vestiges of social power are in the state’s sights. And many voters, it appears, are hot to sign these away.

Is There Any Alternative to Politics?

Do we propose an alternative to the political arrangement? No — not earnestly. We merely diagnose a disorder. We do not prescribe a fix. We have previously held out the relative virtues of monarchy. But this we did largely to take razzes at cherished democratic theories and their silly drummers.

We certainly do not expect — nor do we propose — a return to monarchy. You say the system under which we wallow is the best on offer in this fallen world of sin and evil. Let us not make the perfect the enemy of the good.

Just so. You may very well be correct. You are very likely correct. Yet as old Ben Franklin never said: Democracy is two wolves and one sheep voting — voting on which will appear upon the lunch plate.

What if you are the lamb?