Letters to the Editor
Goedel
Published Letters: 104 Editor's Choice: 6
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Walter Shapiro's faith in "democracy"
[Read the article: The godawful GOP debate ]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Either Mr Shapiro is more naive than a columnist ought to be, or he is unwilling to tell us what he really thinks.
To call what we have a democracy is a flight of wishfulness. That we have elections is true, but we have only two real choices, which is hardly a choice. We don't have a multiparty system. We don't have run-off elections. We don't even have election by popular vote for president.
We have elections for president which are winner take all of the electoral votes of each state. In 2000, this system gave us a president who lost the popular vote. He was installed by the US Supreme Court in violation of the Consitution's provision that each state shall control its own elections.
We have campaigns financed by big-money interests. They are the real constituents of our system of congressional and presidential elections.
It is about time that reporters and commentators stopped refering to our political system as a democracy. What we have is a sham! It is a corrupt, dishonest system and does not even resemble a democracy.
We need a constitutional convention and a transformation to a parliamentary, multiparty system. It is not going to happen, but that would be the only fix. Reporters should tell it as it is rather than contribute to the illusions of democracy.
Don't vote! Send a message that we, the people, know we do not have an imperfect democracy. We have no democracy at all!
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Believers are doubters needing crutches for their faith
[Read the article: The atheist delusion]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]"God" is so bereft of meaning (except emotionally for believers) that theists need endlessly to provide themselves with persuasions to feel comfortable. I don't notice non-belivers trying to persuade the faithful to give up their confused notions. Perhaps we should. We just don't have the time for such nonsense. We are too busy doing and thinking in ways that are productive.
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A non-voter opines
[Read the article: Which Democrat is a winner?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Someone who gratuitously returned his voter registration to the local election-board may not be qualified to offer an opinion, but I shall briefly. None of the six offers a departure from the empty centrism of the present Democratic Party.
Joe Biden, the "knowledgeable" foreign policy candidate, voted for the war. That was not only a mistaken judgment but also an indicator that he did not do his research on aluminum tubes and other Bush claims.
Dodd and Richardson represent big business, banking (remember sub-prime?) and energy (remember climate change?)
Clinton represents herself, an ambitious self-promoter, whose word is not reliable on her 2002 vote for war-powers and who is comfortable with insurance industry lobbyists.
Obama wants to bring us together, an appealing but meaningless goal when the US Humpty-Dumpty has already been knocked off the wall by religious zealots and don't-tax-me patriots.
Edwards seems the most sincere of the half-dozen, but his professed concerns for the poor do not overcome his "lite" policy initiatives.
What I find distasteful about all has been their exclusions of Gravel and Kucinich from the Democratic debates.
What I find curious about all is not a single Democrat's voice has been raised to abolish by amendment the electoral college and have a direct national election of the president.
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I don't want to be "united"
[Read the article: Barack Obama's nouvelle vague]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I don't want to be "united" with other Americans! That message of Obama's worries me. Too many other Americans hold opinions and attitudes that I find reprehensible. They want to make our country into a Christian country, not just as one whose majority are Christians, but as one in which non-Christians - indeed, non-believers - are outsiders. Too many Americans are comfortable with our country as an imperial power, projecting its will by military force all over the world. A large number of my fellow citizens hold racist attitudes, not so many as in the 1950s, but a substantial number still do discreetly. Too many when confronted with the serious defects of our poliitcal system, the electoral college for example, will respond that this is not a democracy; this is a republic. Too many are willing to accept a government that is run by politicians corrupted by their need for campaign funds. Too many are willing to be dependent for information on media that are owned by only a handful of conglomerates with interests other than journalism.
I have not been specific about the numbers who hold such to me unacceptable opinions, but I know they are not small and I do want to be divided from them. I don't see how any politician could bring together a country with such incompatible attitudes towards what we ought to be, and I think it is dishonest to present oneself as aspiring to do so.