Response to Cogent Question From Someone's Crazy Uncle

Kerr has received the following communication:

Someone's Crazy Uncle has left a new comment on your post "All Our Troubles Soon (and Best) Forgotten":

"And how do we educate the ignorant masses that repeatedly elect these traitorous criminals?"

Unfortunately, I do not believe we can. Codgers like me are battling to slow the decline to extinction of what remains of the republic that the founding fathers established and sought, with and by the Constitution, to protect against mob rule. They recognized unbridled democracy as a tyranny of the majority and thus a danger to freedom.

Many varied factors undermined the Constitution's protective barriers against the pandering that is the hallmark of any democracy and particularly one in which the mob is uneducated and unsophisticated, economically naive and ignorant, and addicted to unearned ease and instant gratification of any and all desires. First and foremost among the eroding factors was the apparently laudatory expansion of the right to vote, which now is virtually universal in the U.S. Even convicted felons are now close to being given the right to vote. Can hardly wait to see politicians courting the ex-cons' lobbyists and political action committees.

It is true that the right to vote initially was unduly restrictive in that it did not extend to women and blacks. However, the important thing about the initial restriction of suffrage to landowners is that landowners were the taxpayers at the time. Thus when the taxpayers voted for any program along with the attendant spending and taxes, their votes reflected a decision that the measure was worthy of the expenditure of their own funds.

Pandering became the path to success for politicians once the ballot was available to those consuming rather than providing public funds. The ambitious office seeker became able to promise benefits for a majority of his or her constituents at the expense of "the rich" or some other minority -- benefits on a grand scale for the many at the expense of the few. We now are reaping the inevitable results of this shell game.

Another protective barrier fell when U.S. senators became subject to election by the general voting public. Few today even remember that senators initially were selected by state legislatures. This was to insulate semators from transitory political passions. With the change to popular election of its members the U.S. Senate was transformed from what was widely considered to be the greatest deliberative body in the world to our current house of irresponsible gasbags.

I do not believe the process that has brought us to this pass can be reversed. My conclusion is based on our continued tolerance and constant election to offices at every level of politicians most eager to heap on their constituencies new and bigger benefits that their constituents are unwilling to payand/or cannot afford. They do this by deferring the attendant costs, which, as a practical matter, cannot be foisted onto "the rich," who truly have become a depleted resource. The result is an ever increasing mountain of debt to be passed on to and borne by future generations. We and our "leaders" will have left the stage before the bills for the largesses we have demanded and received from our governments are presented to those who currently have no vote or anything to say on the matter. A society willing to do this lacks the capacity -- the virtues, will, and energy -- necessary for a successful effort to save itself . . . and one is compelled to question whether such a society deserves to be saved or is worth saving.