Re:Denmark confirms US sent rendition flight for Snowden
by rm_-rf_slash on Friday February 05, 2016 @10:57AM
(#11042207)
I'm the last person to ignore or undervalue the power of propaganda, yet I believe it is necessary for people to be active citizens who think for themselves. By outsourcing our entire political thought process to representatives (who are more in need of wealthy donors than individual voters) we deny ourselves the chance to think for ourselves.
Besides, even Edward Bernays, the founder of public relations, understood the ambiguous relationship between those who craft public perception, and those who are affected by it.
Re:Denmark confirms US sent rendition flight for Snowden
by cgriswald on Friday February 05, 2016 @08:17PM
(#11046010)
I agree that we need a thoughtful and active citizenry, but I am skeptical that even the most thoughtful and active citizenry can keep abreast of all developments which may affect their lives and remain un-fooled 100% of the time.
In contrast, I think a thoughtful and active citizenry can elect an intelligent, honest, and dedicated individual to office once every 2-6 years to represent their interests and to evaluate the job that individual has done during that term; even if they do not necessarily know or keep abreast of every issue which may affect them personally or collectively.
The California proposition system reveals, IMO, both the strengths and the weaknesses in direct democracy. On the one hand, when representatives are not doing their jobs, the people can perform an end-run around them and pass any legislation they want.
On the other hand, it's easily manipulated.
Imagine I'm a lawnmower manufacturer. My bought and paid for representatives are concerned, because their constituents are very concerned about the safety of squirrels and want their representatives to pass a law requiring a new type of (more expensive, less efficient) lawn mower. They can't not act, or they won't get re-elected, but they also know they have to do what I want or they won't get my contributions. What to do?
We write a bad law and have someone submit as a proposition. We wage a campaign against it (while our representatives speak out in favor of squirrels), pointing out the very flaws we had put into it and some sob stories about lawn mower factory employees losing jobs and how much more expensive it will be to cut your grass. If it passes, no big deal; we've put enough weaknesses into it to make it largely ineffective. If it doesn't, great! The people have spoken: they don't care about squirrels; and it's not the representatives fault. We probably don't have to worry about it again.