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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Hawkmoon who wrote (272504)	1/3/2010 2:59:09 PM
From: Maurice Winn	1 Recommendation Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

The history of humans has been "them" and "us", so religion has just been part of that identifying mechanism. Survival comes first as all biological entities know, and the theological ruminations come AFTER the consciousness to contemplate them is secure and well up Maslow's hierarchy of needs. While scrabbling on the lower rungs of the ladder to enlightenment, it's not surprising that all tools including religious ideology are used to egg on the goodies versus the baddies. George W Bush would pray for guidance and of course Osama was doing the same and manifesting God'- will. But really, they, the Iranians, and Saddam were just alpha males striving for supremacy. King George II won, defeating both Saddam and Omar in Iraq and Afghanistan. Democratic countries do seem to do better, in general, than the alternatives. But it's still a very ugly business with winner takes all democracy. Slavery is not out of the question with democracy, even if the slaves can vote. Big government and spending OPM is the big weakness of democracy. Women voting are qualitatively different from men and they seem to have far stronger collectivist instincts leading to socialism and highly restrictive individual liberties. Giving women and young people votes certainly changed society, not necessarily all to the good either. Giving the indigent who contribute nothing a vote also was not a neutral effect. They, unsurprisingly, vote to help themselves to the wealth of others. I can see a movement to a democratic system in which he who pays the piper calls the tune. Some would say, "Unfortunately, we already have that system and the USA has the best politicians money can buy". Tradable citizenships is the way to improve things. People owning their own citizenship rather than being merely state-owned serfs which is the current system everywhere. If people don't like it, they could sell their assets including their citizenship and move elsewhere. Once people have a stake in a community other than a serfdom role, then they'd take a greater interest in what creates increased value in a community and their share of it. If a politician came up with a dopey idea which made the tradable citizenship share price go down, the politician would soon be looking for a job more suited to their talents. Mqurice