Democracy - A Process that Works
Is it okay for US Senators to excuse and downplay anti-democratic (authoritarian) behavior and a Coup? For me, it’s a hard NO!
As I’ve said before, there might be all sorts of policies or directions we can agree with the current administration on (and I’ll add that we can even celebrate wins that benefit the American people along the way), but taking away the will of the people or the ability for our elected officials to do what we have empowered them to do is not an acceptable way to get them done. This “taking away” is by matter of fact what has happened by way of 7 unauthorized private citizens forcefully seizing control of the Treasury’s payment system. Whether this is only the second attempt in a series of many more to lead this country by means of dictatorship (the first being the attempt to unilaterally freeze all payments) or the last, it is not acceptable and should not be for any of our elected officials – unless (as previously stated) you prefer a dictatorship over a democracy.
Senator John Kennedy said several things in an interview on Fox News last night that should concern all of us regardless of where we stand on the political spectrum or how we voted. The largest of the two is his statement that people complaining about what these 7 people committing a crime are doing are “only concerned about process.” He was seemingly trying to make a point that what’s happening is okay because “all that these 7 people are doing is looking at data” and that we have to do this in order to see where there is government waste, fraud, etc. Okay – as I’ve stated before – I am 100% behind a thorough investigation and implementation plan of Government efficiency and waste, but how the information that is gathered is interpreted and decided upon is legally the job of those we have voted to represent us – not 7 private citizens or even POTUS. That’s the way Democracy works! Democracy is a “process,” and processes matter. Laws are processes. Innocent until proven guilty is a process. Elections are processes. Processes matter, and Senator Kennedy (apparently along with many others) are willing to simply justify the illegal taking away of your rights and abandonment of the democratic process. If you are a Patriot for American Democracy, this should bother you. More than that, it should not be acceptable. If our elected representatives chose to discuss and then decide to give these 7 individual citizens the data or even the power to evaluate the data and make recommendations. that would be okay (whether or not everyone agreed to that route). That would be adhering to the law of our land and the democratic process. What’s happening now is a literal crime and literal authoritarian process. According to Senator Kennedy people should “call someone who cares.” (No spin. Not taking anything out of context. It’s literally what he said about people being concerned that the Democratic process (without which Democracy doesn’t exist) has been completely avoided. Well – I think we should all take him up on his advice and do so. Call someone who cares about Democracy and demand that this stop immediately. How far does it have to go for it not to be okay. It’s already passed that point for me, because I care about the Democracy that we’ve inherited and that so many have fought and died for.
Separately, in what seemed to be a defense of abandoning the democratic process and using an authoritarian process instead, Senator Kennedy used the metaphor of making an omelet in which “you have to break some eggs.” I get the metaphor, but details matter. What are the eggs in this one? Is the egg the democratic process? Are you okay with that? Not to mention that it’s apparently all fine and good until you’re the egg that’s getting cracked.
Let's not be fooled by this empty rhetoric.