The Proliferation of Division: Can We Fix Our Elections?

The election has grown to such a heightened level that not only has most of America picked a candidate, but they despise the other candidate. It is not the first or the last time this happens. But is this good for our country to revisit these old wounds every four years? Does the problem lie in the binary natural of the choice, where one is chosen and the other is discarded? Could the problem be solved with more options within the choice where one candidate no longer becomes the punching bag and the other becomes the messiah?  No matter how you feel about your candidate there has to be some inkling into the problems that have and inevitably always do arise within these elections. The problems of these elections drive a stake into a country that prides itself on unity. We have serious issues on the horizon where we need the great minds of our greatest asset, our own citizens, to engage in healthy debate and discourse to solve them rather than squabbling over who sits where in government.

The divisive nature of our elections is something that we need to investigate. First we saw the divisiveness in the primary campaigns where the sentiment grows to heated levels within one’s own party. Then the victor proceeds to the national stage where some wounds are healed and others are reopened. It seems very little positive outcomes adjoin the actual winning of the seat. In the wake of this win is shattered relationships that sometimes never can be repaired. This is not what a democracy is sought to embody.

One of the biggest problems is the narrowed choice of two people. With our hard charging media cycle, it is too easy to see ratings rise when negativity reigns. Would it not be more productive to hear more than two campaigns’ views on fixing our economy? What would Hillary Clinton do to solve these problems? What ideas do Mitt Romney have that could contribute to the discourse? I think having four people in the national election would not only broaden the discourse but would lessen the hateful attacks. When forced with limited time tables, candidates would not expect to keep the public’s attention while they systematically attack the other three candidates. Instead they would focus on their own merits for the office and wage war on the issues. This would be a painless way to lessen the serious problems arising from our two party system.

In addition, the timeline of the elections has to be shortened. These elections drag on for ages, and maybe the extended length was necessary when information traveled so slowly. But with the dawn of the “information age”, the world is at our finger tips. Not only is the information just one click away but our attention span has gotten shorter. The length of these campaigns are not only exhausting, they are unproductive. During its yearlong duration, our country has endured a financial crisis and global meltdown that could have used the attention spans of some of our great leaders. Instead they are fixated on this election.

Another major problem is campaign financing. There must be enacted a cap on campaign financing in order to level the playing field. The financial disconnect cannot be more prevalent now than in any other time. The amount of money that is spent on what is a glorified job interview is obscene. We elect these leaders to hold the highest office in the country and to do so we require that they ride a wave of money and interests that they must spend their tenure catering towards. This is the bump in the road the founding fathers could not have forecasted. Something must be done to update our system for it to run as efficiently as it has in the previous 200 years.

Outside of these problems, only one of the two candidates is going to win on November 5^th. So we must begin healing the wounds now in order to get this country back on track. 

More Info on the Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae Debacle

This is an interesting read:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/27266607/

Chuck Hagel is a part of the Obama team and was considered a very serious contender to be his vice presidential candidate. It turns out he is one of the few people who is documented as trying to regulate the Fannie and Freddie mess.

I think also it highlights a theme of dual personalities of John McCain, pre-presidential candidate and post. He fought against this bill getting squashed (when it was nearly dead), which is admirable, and then hired the same people who squashed it to run his campaign. Unfortunately, he let the devil come over for dinner and he is paying the price now because of it…

Re-Entering Our Ecosystem -August 19, 2005

I was asked to write an essay summarizing the idea of green building back in 2005 when I was in my second year of architecture school. I stumbled upon it last night and thought it might make an interest read. I think its relevant to our time in history as a whole:

 

What is the importance of building green? Where does the idea of sustainability fall into our fast paced, business-oriented world of profits and losses? The definition of sustainability is three-fold when researched in a dictionary. They unveil the meaning of a word that should be close to an architect’s heart: to keep in existence; to provide with necessities or nourishment; and finally, to support the spirits, vitality, or resolution of, to encourage. The multi-faceted definition strike chords for all architects who go to sleep every night with these very same thoughts. Sustainability is why children dream of becoming an architect and why grown men wish they had become one. The fact that we leave the earth with examples of our competence, our insight, our bravery, makes architecture a noble profession. Sustainability means only that these examples will stand the test of time. The only way to stand the test of time is to emulate that which time stands still: Planet Earth. Buildings that cater to the natural gifts that are bestowed on us by our ecosystem are to advance the building beyond merely our lifetime or the next. It is to allow the building to function cleanly, efficiently, harmoniously with that which comprises its foundation, the Earth.

            Why build green? For someone who has investigated what green building is, the answer would seem to be intuitive. I would have to think that inactivity in this cause is only out of ignorance. If a person is creating something, anything, would it not be in their best interest to have this creation achieve its purpose in the most efficient and harmonious way possible? This is the basis for green building. The antithesis of green building would seem to be a product of only our greed, a belief stemming from seeing nothing else of value on earth except for our own creation. The practice of green building should seem to be a process worth any costs if it results in a situation where the owners have a more valuable piece of property, the inhabitants experience a more enjoyable space, and the environment is treated with the respect and care it deserves.  Even further, when green building becomes a product not of expensive design but of smart, insightful, cost effective design it would seem ludicrous not to gravitate towards it and build a practice around it.

            Architecture is a heroic practice. No other profession serves to touch lives as uniquely as being an architect. That extraordinary power can touch as few as a handful of people or can swell to the world.  Structures that define a country and instill pride and patriotism can touch a multitude of lives. So too buildings that pollute the environment, whether from a standpoint of health, energy, or even aesthetics, can touch as many lives with an equally corrupting effect. When taken in these terms, being an architect approaches a stature that is heightened from all else and the weight of our actions becomes even more elevated.

            Building a site that adds meaning and emotion to one’s life is a practice that should be approached with a delicate and purposeful mind. One can easily be consumed by so many decisions that affect so many people. With the ability to greatly improve the population’s everyday dreary life with something that is moving and inspirational, the architect moves beyond purely a builder and becomes a sculptor of lives.

            This delicate and purposeful approach stems from an understanding of who are and where we are from. We are a product of the earth and function within the parameters of an ecosystem, consuming and producing to contribute to the overall health of the whole; or at least theoretically contributing to the health of the whole. The human growth patterns within a modern context have been startling. Words are hard to find to describe some of the horrendous repercussions of our civilizations on our neighbors of organisms in the environment. Displacement, contamination, and extinction are just some of the vivid terms used to describe the unfortunate effects of some of our more irresponsible behaviors.

            But this grim picture can just be a chapter in the novel rather than the conclusion, if we act to reverse some of our more regretful actions. Never before have we had the technology to manipulate the environment in ways to benefit our entire ecosystem. Everything from our cars to our computers to our wristwatches can use the earth’s natural gifts that we so often take for granted. This is not to mention our buildings, which can reenter an ecosystem that has been begging to be treated with the respect it deserves.

            If we truly understand our origins and understand our place in the world, we are better equipped to live our lives in harmony with our surroundings. This is the true meaning of being an architect and this is the fundamental principle with green building. It is sad that our profession needs to distinguish a special movement, a special group of people to delineate how this is done. This should be how all architecture is done, how all builders are educated, and how all work is carried out. It has become my life’s goal within the profession I have chosen to have this fundamental idea thrust into the spotlight and rise to the proper stature it should be in the design process. 

Last debate Wednesday night…What is still left to be heard?

What are some issues you would like to hear about in Wednesday’s debate? Is there time left for McCain to regain the ground he has lost? Will attacking Obama win over people that are on the fence? Can Obama cruise by keeping everything down the middle and carry the momentum he has built up over the past couple months to the White House?

Are there any topics we have not heard about in the last year of grueling presidential campaigning, that you would like to see addressed?

Well this is news, mudslinging to gasp at power…

By: Jimmy Stringer

If it seemed like you were interested in the election about a month ago and now you are turned off, there is one change to the landscape that might have been the cause: Karl Rove and his chronies decided to turn up heat on an election that is going south.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/10/03/AR2008100303738_pf.html

Those following the news (any news, even Fox & Friends) have heard this story before but it bears notice and further inspection. It seems to the casual viewer that this is politics as usual and to some degree it is. Both sides jump into the action and exhibit their long, expensive research campaigns to dig up everything and anything that can be turned into a boldfaced headline. 

Most of the time it is finger pointing and dismissing that goes on in response to these tactics with one party familiar with the other’s slippery tactics and ready for revenge. “You dont hear about it because of the liberal media!!!” or “the right wing sure knows how to spin out some mudslinging,” are the cries that are evoked. 

But upon investigation of these tactics and their place in presidential elections, one need not to look very far to find some glaring events.

Lets take a look at the 2000 Republican primary between George W. Bush and a much younger John McCain. John McCain ran as the maverick (heard that before?) and experienced some early success. He won the New Hampshire primary and continued on to South Carolina. South Carolina was seen as a momentum shifter. If McCain could take it, many feel he would have rolled onto the nomination. But Karl Rove, George W. Bush’s chief strategist, had other ideas. He developed a rumor based on lies to extinguish John McCain’s nomination. He put together a story that McCain’s adopted daughter from Bangladesh was actually Cindy McCain’s illegitimate daughter from an affair. Not only did this story come out in the media but a shadow organization actually called residents of South Carolina and asked if their vote would change if they knew this new horrific rumor about McCain’s adopted daughter. Most conservative South Carolinians (shockingly) proclamed that it would. And the rest is history. George Bush went on to win South Carolina and become our 43rd President.

http://www.thenation.com/doc/20080128/banks

http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2004/03/21/the_anatomy_of_a_smear_campaign/

Now if that isnt horrifying enough, McCain had to retreat from his position as the “maverick” and support Bush as President in the Republican National Convention. But 8 years later, McCain was so impressed with Rove’s tactics that he decided he needed to bring him on as a strategist for his campaign in this election. And now we are all subject to his slanderous, dirty approach to politics. It is a shame. 

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0308/8911.html

So to all those people who find it strange that Obama, after being in the national spotlight for 4 years and pricked and prodded by Hillary Clinton, is being attacked by his opponents attempting to preach character and honesty, lets give Karl Rove another attempt at running our country. He was so successful as “Bush’s Brain” the last time, good lord, we easily could squeeze out another 8 years in Iraq and the remaining 50 percent out of the stock market. 

http://thehill.com/a.b.-stoddard/mccain-fails-himself-2008-09-17.html

But honestly, we need to talk about how our country is going to get off the mat and make a comeback. The sooner this election is over the better, in my opinion. If you dont want taxes and want a strong foreign policy and feel more comfortable with John McCain, well that is sound reasoning. If you want change and fresh leadership, and really like Barack Obama, awesome go for it. But do we need to hear about McCain’s falsely illegitimate daughter? Not in my opinion, the very same way, we dont need to hear about Obama’s relationship with a leader in school reform. We need to make a decision based on the issues at hand. We need to get back to making and selling things again. To pushing the world to have freedom of speech and religion. To leading the environmental crisis that our country carries a huge amount of blame for. 

We can only do this if everyone is on board.

Guilty by Association?

By: Patrick Williams, contributing author

I am posting some articles that I think raise a serious question about Barack Obama and his continuous ties to radically liberal groups and people throughout his political career.  I figure supporters will respond with their typical exclamation that this is nothing but typical right wing smear tactics….but as the SNL skit says, “Really?!”  There has been link after link after link of Obama to these groups or people.  I agree maybe one or two may have been a stretch but the majority of these are not, and I think its time for people to stop being blinded by the hype and start looking at these seriously.  It is a question of judgment, leadership trust and flat out integrity.  He has used these groups to help shape his political career and now that he is on top, he has renounced them claiming its “guilty by association”.  I know people are mad about the economy and I think a lot of anger is driving the polls, but I think our leader needs to be open and honest about his relationships with radical and dangerous groups or people. 

The first link is a CNN investigation on Obama’s ties to Bill Ayers.  The rest are about his ties to a very dangerous group called ACORN which will do anything to help shift an election in their favor.

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uIF2NDY0Ixc

 http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/10/09/acorn.fraud.claims/index.html

http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=NDZiMjkwMDczZWI5ODdjOWYxZTIzZGIyNzEyMjE0ODI=&w=MA==

 http://michellemalkin.com/2008/06/25/the-acorn-obama-knows/

 http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2008/09/acorn_obama_and_the_mortgage_m.html

    

 

 

 

U.S. Politics: Two Parties and a Hangover

By: Todd Hayes, contributing author

Not sure if everyone watched the debate Tuesday night, but it appeared to be more of the same rhetoric that we’ve been hearing lately.  McCain portraying Obama as a Tax and Spend Liberal, Obama protraying McCain as a Mini-Bush War Monger.  Instead of recapping the debate, I thought I’d provide a little commentary on what I feel is the underlying cause of the back and forth bickering: the power and influence of our two party political system.

I don’t want to sound like some hippy that whines about our politics and offers no solutions, so I apologize in advance if that’s what this sounds like.  I just think we should be more aware of the political machines on both sides that have control over our candidates, our elected officials and consequently, our everyday lives.  Clearly, each party has an enormously powerful base that largely determines the Democratic and Republican nominees.  These groups make sure their candidate will support not their own beliefs, but the beliefs of the party.  Take a look at our candidates right now: John McCain used to be the “Maverick” of the Senate — opposed to the Bush economic policy and defiant on the Republican view of immigration.  Then primary season came around, McCain’s popularity among the “base” fell, Rush Limbaugh peed his pants,  and all of a sudden the Maverick changes course to be more in line with Republican views.  The Democrats certainly aren’t completely innocent either: Barack Obama, devout Christian, family man and personally Pro-Life doesn’t stand up to his party and denounce the horrors of abortion. 

I’m not personally blaming the candidates — if I were in their shoes, I would likely do the same thing.  I just think these Right Wing and Left Wing extremists have way too much influence over those voters who may be somewhere in between the hardcore Democratic and Republican doctrines.  The way I see it, there are a LOT of people who are either Moderately Liberal or Moderately Conservative.  However, when everyone is forced to choose between two candidates who gravitate towards the party’s base, these voters have to support one side of the spectrum or the other.  The result is a winner takes all competition of Red state vs. Blue state, Anti-war vs. Finish the job, Save the Whales vs. Drill Baby Drill.  Its no wonder why the nation seems so divided on critical issues.

What’s worse is that all candidates do everything in their power to sway the moderates one way or the other.  This is why Sarah Palin tries so hard to sound “folksy” — the average mother trying to breakthrough for all of  womankind.  This is why Hillary Clinton shoots whiskey with Coal Miners before the Pennsylvania primary.  Now I’m not going to pretend that Hillary is my drinking buddy, but I have a crazy suspicion that she’s a little more Cabernet, a little less Car bomb.  These are just two examples of politicians trying to convince voters to join their cause — you’re on one side or the other…..you’re either an Elephant or a Donkey, no middle ground, no Elephonkeys allowed.  

So what’s the solution??  This is definitely no quick fix — the current political landscape is deeply embedded into the fabric of our society.  I feel we can’t just wait around and hope for a different kind of presidential candidate; change has to come from the bottom up.  I think that people need to make their voices heard in politics at all levels: local, regional and national.  Hopefully, in due time, a new kind of politician will emerge.  One that isn’t a slave to the NRA or to the other powerful Washington lobbies.  One that will clearly assess what the people want, what this country needs and how to best serve her.  I know doing this may be a long shot, it may be wishful thinking — but I fear the alternative solution of doing nothing will just give us more of the same.

Health Care: Human Dignity Must Be Restored

Unfortunately, we cannot depend on the candidates to combat each other on the issues anymore since both are too concentrated on deflecting and returning the dirt being thrown at them. It is a shame, because until recently it was a compelling election landscape. The issues were on the forefront and the candidates and their running mates were front stage center. Now we are digging up dirt from sometimes 30 years ago and trying to make it relevant. Whatever your feelings are on each candidate, you have to fight this as the unfortunate place where our politics inevitably stumbles to and thus loses sight of its most important task of making our lives better. So since we should be educated about all issues concerning this election, health care is something that I think many people know surprisingly little about and something that can make a very personal impact on their lives. 

I had the unfortunate experience of seeing our health care system up close and personal. My mother was diagnosed with stage 3B lung cancer about four years ago and over the short course of six months, her life was claimed but this horrible disease. During those six months, my family saw the health care industry rear its ugly head. Dreadfully exhausting emergency room wait times, distant oncologists, overworked nurses, and an overall lack of respect for human dignity were the prevailing themes from the six month period. There is absolutely no doubt in my mind that our health care system is broken. But the solutions to fix the problem are difficult and complex. 

We are all familiar with wait times at the emergency room. If you have ever broken a bone or incurred a cut that needed stitches, you know the time allotted to fixing that problem will not be quick. It may take the better part of 24 hours. My poor mother had life threatening ailments and she waited up to 18 hours to get to a room. On top of that, she visited the same hospital, with the same staff, and still had to wait sometimes very dangerous stretches of time to see her current doctor. I remember going to hospital one time when her oxygen levels had dropped to dangerous levels (aka suffocating) because the cancer had occupied the majority of her lungs and she needed the machines that only the hospital could provide to pump oxygen into her body. She had to wait 12 hours, most of which was in an emergency room hallway, to get attached to those machines by the doctor she had seen earlier in the week. 

You might be saying to yourself that I should be angry. Well trust me, I was. And for those who know me, know that I am not afraid to voice those opinions. I remember during one of the wait times looking around the hallways of the emergency room and thinking to myself that it looked like a war was waging outside the hospital’s doors. Hallways filled with hospital beds. People writhing in pain in sometimes dangerously unsterile environments. This is not health care in a developed country. This is not health care in arguably the greatest country in the world. This is not what my mother deserved. This is not what we deserve.

The reason the emergency room waits are so long is because the hospital is being run as a business. The business model they use employs the idea that there is only one way to enter the system, no matter the extent of your injury or repetitive visits, and that is through the emergency room. It is the equivalent of a six lane highway converging to one lane. This dynamic is disatrous. In an ideal world, we would have wheeled my mother to the oncology wing of the hospital where her doctor could evaluate her and give her the care she needs. Instead we had to travel with her medical records, so that we could communicate to an emergency room doctor what ailments and conditions she had before she could proceed to her care provider. In between those two were a series of hospital gateways to pass through in order to enter the system correctly. In all, the experience is lengthy, complicated, expensive, and painful. Does it have to be this way?

You might be thinking to yourself, well that might just be one hospital that is poorly run and the problem is not that widespread. We unfortunately visited them all in our hometown of Miami, FL. We settled on Baptist Hospital because it is rated as one of the best in the country. And to be fair, the people involved in the system are not at fault. The doctors and nurses did their best to administer the care they deemed necessary. But it does highlight that running a hospital like a business is a terrible policy. Everyone suffers from this, doctors, nurses, and patients, and everyone in between. 

The knock on doctors and nurses is that they are distant and not emotionally involved in the patient’s care. But if you look into their schedule of duties you find that they are so overextended, it is out of the realm of possibility that they could cater to these needs. It is a miracle that nurses are able to give pills, shots, take blood, check on fluids, check vitals, and the million other responsibilities they account for in caring for sometimes 30 different people with different ailments. Doctors with schedules that allot no more than 10 minutes per patient because they have 25 and have two surgeries scheduled in the afternoon and have not been off duty in almost two days cannot be to blame.

Sadly, there are many of us who have horror stories about this problem. My mother was not the first person to be mistreated by the system and will surely not be last. We must change the system. Treating the sick as customers is not a product of “free enterprise working.” It is a product of a very few profiting at the immense expense of the many. We must spend our time and effort to restoring human dignity to administering health care. If caring for the sick and poor are not priorities of a government then I no longer call it a country, I call it a business.

Personally, I am insulted and you should be too.

I try my best not to be partisan. I hear as many sides of the story as humanly possible before placing my stamp on an argument. I feel the way I do about the world not because of a particular party or group of people but because through my experiences, and my admittedly small point of view, that is the way I see the world.

But I am insulted.

I am insulted by the fact that we, as citizens of the United States of America, are being treated as stupid. We are the decendents of Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, Benjamin Franklin, Martin Luther King, and Abraham Lincoln. We are descendents of great human beings who looked at the face of the world and said there is a just and free way to live our lives, together in harmony.

We are the citizens that stormed the beaches of Normandy, stamped out facism, eliminated nazism, ended the holocaust, and fought for world peace. We are the people who advocated and perfected a free enterprise business world, where anyone and everyone is free to succeed or fail based on their own merit. We developed free speech, freedom of religion and a judicial system that gives every single person the right to a fair and just trial. But all that is getting swept under the carpet.

We are allowing ourselves to be treated as morons. This political regime is treating us in a way that you would treat a small child when you want it to conform to your orders. “Well Johnny, I will give you back your toy once you let go of your sister’s hair…” or “Sit in the corner for five minutes then you can come back to recess…” So we get talked to like the ADD afflicted, pill popping, celebrity obsessed population they want us to be. All we hear is hockey moms and catch phrases from this ridiculously insulting republican party. I am convinced they believe the American population is made of a vast majority of people who cannot put simple logic together in the form of a thought.

I dont wholy blame Sarah Palin for this. I think she is a guinea pig, like our armed forces, like our economy, like our foreign policy. These are the weapons these misplaced, misguided human beings are wielding. Sarah Palin has only made the fault of not understanding the importance of her position. Our precious armed forces have only made the mistake of showing up for work and doing their job as they have been ordered. Our economy has only propagated in the direction it has been allowed to by its own inertia. These are not blame worthy. We must seek the source.

The source is this faction of horrific people that no longer carry any respect for the American people. Placing a person like Sarah Palin as the next vice president is the most dangerous proposition any group of people have placed before the American people. It has been the final blow of a regime of people that have no conscience for the well being of the American people. This group of people believes they are placing figure heads in the government to which they can manipulate. How else can you describe it?

It is a known belief throughout the world that America is full of morons. Videos after videos of people parading the streets asking simple questions and getting back blank stares. “Can you name a country starting with the letter U?”….pause….”Yugoslavia?” Is this what we are relegated to? I can sleep at night when those uneducated poor souls are inhabiting the streets, but I draw the line when they are inhabiting the White House.

I have many issues with John McCain. But I cannot get away from the fact that his choice of Sarah Palin as a running mate is an absolute slap in the face of every American citizen. I can give him the benefit of the doubt that someone stepped into the campaign to convince him that she gave him the best chance to beat Barack Obama. But the person or persons who convinced him of that fact is part of the regime that I have taken issue with. These people cannot be in charge of our politics any longer.

These people were the same masterminds that were behind George W. Bush. They saw they could elect someone who was clearly unfit to be President. We have seen the results of this human being in office. Our country is at the saddest, lowest point in its existence. We are fighting wars for selfish reasons at the cost of our own brave citizens. We are the dead weight of the world economy because of our own greed and corruption. We unilaterally refuse to speak to our adversaries and many of our allies because we believe they are not worthy of our presence. We are the laughing stock of the developed world for our lack of basic knowledge about our country and the world. We pretend to be the world’s keeper and watch some of the worst cases of genocide go unnoticed. We have hit rock bottom.

I am insulted and I am fed up. I cannot take this anymore. I love this country, our people, and our history too much to stand on the sidelines and swallow my pride. We cannot allow this to continue. I dont think Barack Obama is perfect. I know for a fact he isnt. But by placing him in charge of our government we abolish this regime that has been the direct result of the near downfall of our great society. We can be prosperous again. But we must unite against this regime and banish them to the backwash of our great nation. It isnt too late.

America

I love history. As an architect, I have had to study every walk of life and how they have responded to the environment around them. Through their architecture, I have studied people building walls and defending themselves, building into the ground to escape the sun, building into the air to portray their greatness. Every age is unique because of different stimulus that impacts their lives.

Through this research it becomes apparent that we live in an age that defies most others. There is no real imminent threat to our lives and our livelihood. No cancerous empire, no ruthless dictator, no devouring plague, no serious threat to our homeland to defend our lives against. Over 7,000 years of modern history and very few breaks in time where the standard of living has been so high and people have experienced such an extended period of prosperity.

What is to thank for this aberration of human existence? Democracy.

The basic tenet is that human beings are prone to make informed decisions about the preserving their well-being. Our system is not without flaws, of course, but for the most part, it thrives. For centuries before, these decisions of our well being consisted of grabbing a weapon and taking to battle. Now it is a game of intelligence, of negotiating, and of economy to prosper above your peers. We should be so lucky to live in this world, in this time period, and in my humble opinion democracy is to thank.

In order for democracy to work it needs two things and two things alone. First is information. The citizens of a democracy must have the ability to read, say, feel and believe anything they so desire. Without this ability to procure knowledge, a true democracy will never exist. The second thing is a conscience. Democracy, I would argue, was based on the belief that human beings are inherently good. The checks and balances within the system are to temper that belief, but the basic idea that the power of the government lies within its citizens says that people will make correct decisions when given the ability. With the presence of a conscience comes an unflappable dedication to the truth. With information and conscience, democracy can exist unfettered for eternity.

What has gone wrong with arguably the most prolific democracy in the history of the world? A blurring of the information and an absence of conscience. This can and will lead to the end of the democracy. We cannot have this present in our government and in our lives and expect to be prosperous.

This is the major difference between our grandparent’s generation, arguably the golden age of American civilization, and where we find our country today. They fought the tyrannies of the world for the greater good. Their conscience bled red on the beaches of Normandy. Their dedication to the prosperity of all those on earth, not just ourselves, was apparent in the wounds of their defense of these principles.

We need to return catering to these two ideals. The constitution protects the availability of our information. It does not however make the government be forthright on all occasions. Our conscience is inherent in our ancestors but can be easily forgotten when we get wrapped up in the minutia of our lives. We must return to a dedication to the preservation of democracy and in doing so, a dedication to truth.