Re: RAT Gore, gosh darnit!

[john Bentz <bentzsj@juno.com>]

Oh Heck, I tried to watch the debates last night after having heard the other two over the radio.  A mistake to change mediums mid debate cycle really.  Both the gov and the veep seemed like liars and the issues discussed were not enough to keep me from watching Princess Mononoke instead.
   The sublime Mr. Sylvain is right about the level of happiness being a damper to the voting fire of the populace.  This  situation springs from the  continued acceptance of comfort instead of freedom by North Americans.  If we continue to confuse the two we will continue to be merely sated rather than alive.  Not a bad way to mark time here on earth but not even close to fulfilling our human destinies.
     So vote, vote for Bush Gore Nader your mother, my mother but vote to preserve the system until we can get it working better than it does right now.  It can work better and when we are not longer up to our hips in consumer goods leading the lives of unreflective members of the master class then the system, though having lain fallow, will still be there as a means to justice and good government.

------Original Message------
From: SylvainBBB@aol.com
To: rat-list@whirl-i-gig.com
Sent: October 18, 2000 12:12:18 AM GMT
Subject: Re: RAT Gore, gosh darnit!


I recently heard two provocative things that shook up my thinking about 
politics and I'd like to share them with y'all to see what shakes loose.

1. Most People don't vote not because they are turned off or angry but 
because they are apathetically happy. If the people in DC were really 
screwing up the country in a way that most people disagreed with, many more 
people would vote. The Silent Majority (that Nixon was speaking for) don't 
care all that much because they're pretty happy with the country. At least 
happy enought to not be very thoughtful about it.

This, obviously, doesn't apply to most people who are active in this debate. 
It doesn't apply to me. But it certainly applies to my father and many people 
I've met in my non-artistic life. 

2. Americans in general are frustrated by politics because politicians must 
compromise in order to get things done. Most people think that everyone else 
believes what they believe themselves. My wife, for example, thinks that only 
a few loonys are homophobic and that all Republicans are rich, selfish, 
bigots. Compromise is actually the way that democracy works. Bush Sr. lost 
because he compromised on taxes when he said he wouldn't. It's not that he 
compromised that was really the problem. The problem was he was dumb enough 
to promise over and over again that he wouldn't. I am not saying anyone 
SHOULD compromise, just pointing out that democracy works well when people 
do. That's what put the hex on Newt and the contract with America. He and the 
freaky freshmen of 1992 lost sight of what Congress actually is and how it 
actually works.

Finally a thought of my own. Change seems to come from the middle because 
when the middle changes that's when change seems inevitable. But without 
radicals rioting in the street and voting for Nader and so on the middle will 
never be moved. So vote for Nader if you want to. If you really want him to 
be president. Play full out.