Reply to the article: The Fall of Democracy in the United States
This is a fine article and the points made should concern all citizens that value the preservation of this great country.
We must however get at the root of the problem. The defect in our "Democracy" is that it is really more of an elitist money driven oligarchy than a Democracy.
We give our representatives ( or they have given themselves!) such substantial pay, power, perks and multimillion dollar retirement programs that most of them would kill their own grandmother to maintain their position of power and perks.
The result of this is that our representatives spend most of their time in the selfish pursuit of reelection rather than being statesman working on solving the nations problems. And reelection is dependent on big money to successfully market their candidacy and maintain their incumbency. And big money requires pandering to the organizations and individuals that have the big money.
Our representatives are not unlike the Lords of the old monarchies. They have power for life. A classic example is Senator Strom Thurmond of south Carolina who has been a professional politician for over 60 years and will not leave his office until he dies.
If we are ever to return this country to a functioning Democracy we must have a citizen legislature that serves one or two terms and returns to his district to be praised for his devotion to the democratic process instead of fund raising and his devotion to special interest to maintain his incumbency.