In a message dated 4/29/2002 9:54:28 AM Central Daylight Time,
gavgc@hotmail.com writes:
> platt,
> in a (real) democracy you *are* the government, which is another way of
> saying that you - in connection with your community, town, city etc - get
> to
> shape your own life to a much greater extent than if your power/freedom is
> reduced to a choice between pepsi or coke, either at the supermarket or the
>
> polling booth.
> cheers
> gav
>
I'd never presume to speak for Platt, but I'd venture to guess he'd say that
(America, anyway) isn't a "true" democracy. If you had to define it in
legalistic terms (and this last election proved how integral the legal system
is to our elections), you'd probably call America a constitutional republic.
"To the Republic for which it stands..." etc.
Indeed, our founding fathers and the first few generations of leaders in the
American government had a general aversion to the actual word "democracy"
equating it with "mob rule" which they abhorred just as much as
totalitarianism. I don't think the virtues we today commonly associate with
the word came into vogue until Woodrow Wilson, which aligns nicely in
Pirsig's timeframe of the Intellectual Level taking over.
Jon
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