[geeks] Glad I don't live in Texas!

[Tim H.]

On Wed, 12 Jun 2002 08:15:58 -0700
"Peter L. Wargo" <pwargo at basenji.com> wrote:

> On Wednesday, June 12, 2002, at 07:55 , Tim H. wrote:
> 
> > First of all, elected officials are not supposed to follow the will of 
> > the people.  They are supposed to follow their own convictions.  We are 
> > (nominally) a republic, as opposed to a democracy.  If we were a 
> > democracy we would all get to vote on every law.
> 
> Ah, you and I differ on this.  I see it as "vote by proxy" as, while we 
> do elect someone to represent us, we are responsible for letting them 
> know how we wish specific issues to be addressed.  They are responsible 
> for ensuring that the will of the people is carried out.  However, we 
> have the special-interest lobbies that tend to distort this, and the 
> ever-present lure of ready $$.  IF I had my druthers, every Senator and 
> Congressperson would be provided with government housing, a stipend, and 
> not allowed to profit *at all* from their public service.
> 
Interesting, we do have differing ends, but our means would be surprisingly similar.  If only we could disenfranchise organizations without disenfranchising the individuals in them.  That's the problem with freedom, people always do stuff that other people wish they wouldn't.  It would be nice though if we could somehow find a way to remove the "rights" of corporations, since corporations are all either a dictatorship or an self perpetuating oligarchy, and never representative of the employees/shareholders.

time out, my littlest dictator just woke up and needs changing/feeding. :-)

Tim