Attention Deficit Democracy

Saturday, April 15, 2006

I just finished reading James Bovard's latest book..."Attention Deficit Democracy"...and...were it not due back at the library and were it renewable...I would want to reread this volume at least one more time. There is SO MUCH here to peruse...I will leave it up to the reader to get a copy and sit down and gain some illumination.

I will say that much of the premise falls right in line with MY way of thinking...QUESTION AUTHORITY...do not buy into the myths and lies that government is selling. It is our civic duty to THINK and we, the public at large in these United States of America, have allowed ourselves to fritter away any reponsibility we may have assumed previously. We have become a "baby sitter" nation...we want to be cared for, our every need catered to and we have made the concept of personal responsibility obsolete...who needs responsibility when it is assumed that everything government does is for our own good!!

For whatever it is worth...and this is something that bears further examination, this abrogation of civic responsibility is NOT what the founding fathers had in mind. One of the greatest impediments in ratifying the Constitution was a pervasive fear of government and the understanding that, left to its own devices, government would ALWAYS devolve to a self serving
fattening of the rich and powerful at the expense of everyone else.

Let it be mentioned that there was no "what the founding fathers had in mind" singular concept. this is a myth promulgated by those who conveniently call themselves strict constitutional constructionists when it is convenient. The understanding that they COULD rebel against the King George domination brought them together, but their inate fear of big government was evident in the contentiousness and devisiveness of the constitutional convention. It was a myriad of compromises that finally led to the Constitution as we know it today...and...before its ratification, and after its intial dissemination...it must be recalled that there was no "Bill of Rights" and that until one was drafted and included, there was very little chance of the Constitutition EVER being ratified.

Which brings me back to "Attentiion Deficit Democracy", in which Mr. Bolton shows us just how and where we have let those "Bill of Rights" rights be abridged, negated and apologised away. It is time we started demanding that we be protected FROM government rather than BY government because it is in government's VERY NATURE to abridge individual rights whenever and wherever possible.

trickster108