As IF Times

On a long enough time perspective, you would notice that throughout recorded history, very small groups within a given society controlled the vast majority of their populations.  There have always been hierarchies of influence and power and if you were lucky enough to have been born on the right side of this power dynamic, your life was pretty good.  If you were not so lucky, your life was spent under the dictates of those born on the fortunate side of fate.

So that was how life was for centuries.  This changed in the late 1700’s when a group of British men went across the Atlantic Ocean to eventually create an entirely new nation, completely different in structure to their old political system.  This was the genuine, “no kings” movement that occurred 250 years ago.  This was pretty radical because it was the first large scale repudiation of the entitled, hierarchal system of governance in place everywhere throughout history.  When the old colonial masters in Britain demanded that the new colony pay taxes to support the old regime, the upstart colonies banded together and declared, “nah, we’re good, we’ll keep our money here instead”.

This didn’t sit well with the British colonial empire and thus a war was declared to rein in the upstart colonies.  In the aftermath, a new nation was born, completely separate from the old colonial masters with a distinctly different type of governance.  There truly were no kings and instead a republican form of governance was formed with individuals able to express free will to create laws.

As you’d expect, this rather novel environment of freedom and liberty to choose your own life-path became quite popular and the new American colonies became the desired place for those with ambition and drive.   The United States came to represent the new world of individualism and aspiration as opposed to the old world regimes of collectivism and subjugation.  This new style of government gave rise to the incredible ascent of the United States within only a short time to become the most powerful and influential nation in the world, both economically and socially.   To paraphrase an old cliché, a chain is only as strong as its weakest link.  In the new United States, there were multitudes of strong links unleashed to make a very strong larger chain.  In the old colonial nations, the strength of the chain was dictated by the monarchs at the top. Thus, nations could only progress as much as the rulers permitted.

To this day, even in the 21^st century, many of the old imperial empires cling to the traditions of Kings and Queens presiding over their subjects.  Parenthetically, this dynamic also exists in the Church, but that’s another discussion. Granted, most of these roles are ceremonial, but nonetheless, such people still occupy positions of wealth and prestige within their nations.  However, most of these nations have adopted the democratic model of the United States so that their government leaders are nominally elected by their citizens.  Still, the transition hasn’t been as robust as in America because of long national traditions and sensibilities.  Whereas the US started from a clean slate, the old imperial powers still wrestled with their legacy influences. For example, the acceptance of collectivism as a mindset is quite strong on most European countries even as they pretend to admire individualism.

In the 1960’s, a few European nations, notably West Germany, France, Italy, Belgium, Luxembourg and the Netherlands mused that a federation of states would be more effective in countering the continued strength and influence of the United States.  In essence, they began to create the idea of the United States of Europe, or as it was finally called, the European Union, complete with a common currency and laws amongst all members.

It seemed like a great idea….at the time.

There’s an old saw that says “people get the government that they deserve”. The reason that old saws reflect wisdoms is that they are proven to be correct again and again through time. This is to say that while times change, people and the predictability of human nature does not.  In our current modern era, it’s conspicuously evident that a large contingent of heretofore ‘free and democratic’ states are experiencing situations which are anything but free and democratic.

If you observe the nations where the populace is most strongly at odds with government policies, it happens to be in the nations which were once most revered for their attitudes towards personal rights and freedoms. This includes France, The United Kingdom and Canada which have all devolved into states which oddly resemble those totalitarian regimes that they notionally abhor.  They resemble Orwellian states where freedoms are vaunted but not really allowed.

One may argue that all of these governments were democratically elected and thus, must represent the collective will of their people. This would be a specious argument since in the majority of cases, the selection of political parties is usually restricted to either a bad choice, or a worse one. As discussed in a previous commentary, the choice of political parties is really created by a very small contingent of political operatives.  Thus, the choices are for the people to be democratically oppressed by villain party A or by incompetent party B.

Recently in Canada for example, there were at least 2 representatives of the opposition party not in power who crossed the floor to side with the party that is presently in power.  This was probably not how the democratic process was designed to work.  Thus, if you had cast your vote to have someone represent your views, you’re out of luck.  Welcome to the Uniparty. We shall see if this finally engenders real outrage in a docile Canadian public.

But how do politicians push policies that are so out of sync with the wishes of their constituents?  We can all guess of course.  The usual influence of money and power are probably always at the root, that’s Occam’s Razor.  But no one votes to have their lives oppressed by excessive taxation, by restriction of their movements and speech and by curtailment of their activities.  I’m pretty sure no one votes to have their online activities monitored under threat of jail, for removal of long term property rights, for wanton taxation and for cancellation of legal protests.  Unless of course you’re a New Yorker.  Say what you want about their new Mayor Mamdani, but he was at least explicit on what his agenda and platform. He may be misguided, but he is not a liar.  He got the people to believe him.  Thus, the people got what they wanted; or deserved.

In the case of the other nations mentioned above, it’s pretty certain that no one ran on the platforms that they’re trying to enforce today. Politicians learn pretty quickly what works and what works is that you pander to soft sensibilities, promise everyone a chicken in every pot and then instead give them an old shoe once elected.  Thus is perpetuated the age-old game of bait and switch.  They promise to rid your home of pests, which sounds good, but then they kill your pets too,

Recently, nations with lesser traditions of ‘democracy’ have moved en masse against their oppressive overlords, with great effect.  We saw this in Nepal, Madagascar, Bangladesh, Indonesia, Peru and now recently in Bulgaria. The fact that this hasn’t been replicated in the West is because of their traditions of lawful conduct.  Of course, the goalposts of ‘lawful conduct’ are moved all the time by Western governments, thus it may be just a matter of time.

The idea of democracy was that people in given society were to be given a voice in how the underlying society would be run. Thus, people who had a long term stake in a society would have people represent their views.  Somehow, this model has perversely turned the other way with elected people enacting programs directly at odds with their own constituents. This can be remedied if the populace decides that it must.  As is the case with any task that you hire someone to do, politicians must be made to explicitly state their goals and strategies.  ANY contradiction of these goals MUST be grounds for removal from office, not by the end of the term, but immediately. The people themselves must DEMAND this.  They cannot expect things to just work out.   Otherwise, they really do get the government they deserve.