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Jay Evensen: Americans want democracy but can be apathetic
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A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves largesse from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates promising the most benefits from the public treasury with the result that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy, always followed by a dictatorship. The average age of the world's greatest civilizations has been 200 years.
Great nations rise and fall. The people go from bondage to spiritual truth, to great courage, from courage to liberty, from liberty to abundance, from abundance to selfishness, from selfishness to complacency, from complacency to apathy, from apathy to dependence, from dependence back again to bondage.
The issue that Jay brings up is voter apathy. Why are Americans so apathetic about their governments? I think it's because it takes more time than they care to commit to. And government officials aren't helping any, either. The really good politicians are experts of misdirection. Voters have become frustrated when they attempt to make sense of it all, so most of them just give up trying. Which is just fine with the politicians.
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It is true that we have a democratic republic form of government. It is also true that the founding fathers didn't trust the citizens to vote in their own best interests. The third truth is that the founding fathers didn't trust the majority to take care of minorities. Therefore the founders largely circumvented majority rule were possible.
Through amendments to our Constitution we have substituted majority rule were it wasn't originally allowed. This leads me to believe that our current citizenry and government believes that the public has the right to self-governance.
So your comment: "Utah, for good reason, has made it harder to pass citizen initiatives." is not in spirit with the laws and beliefs of the United States.