[Peace-discuss] Democracy

[Bob Illyes]

I don't care which party you work for, Robert, as long as you work to make 
the party more accountable to the people. Your criticism of the Democrats 
has some merit, but you conclude that the Republican Party is the promised 
land. It is not so simple.

For Nick, I have a longer answer.

I gather that you have not met Durbin. He is doing the best job that he can 
given the constraints of the Senate, which are severe, and his 
understanding of those constraints. I criticize him from time to time, but 
this is friendly criticism.

I understand why serious thinkers such as Zinn and Chomsky are attracted to 
anarchist models, but when tried they have so far not worked out well. The 
city states of classical Greece were tiny. There was a common government 
that met at Delphi, but it had about as much power as the UN. The result of 
this relatively anarchic arrangement was war, off and on. When Lincoln and 
his supporters established that there was no right to succeed, that we were 
all in the same boat and had to work together, they ended the possibility 
of further wars between the states.

Churchill put it aptly when he pointed out that democracy is the worst 
possible form of government, except for all the others. War will be with us 
until the world is one republic. We're nowhere close to this being the 
case. The UN is scarcely the answer. The Security Council is so 
ill-conceived that it should more properly be called the Insecurity Council.

Bob