Principles

All of us over here at selfdirectedsociety.com were just delighted beyond words at the election of Barack Obama to be the next President of the United States of America. His election not only shattered barriers of racial preconception; it restored the people’s faith in democracy, and gave us hope for the future of humanity.

No, I’m not just gushing here. There were many who had begun to have serious doubts about the reliability of the system. After all the ballot problems in Florida in 2000, followed by the voting machine tally discrepancies in Ohio in 2004, it began to seem as though the selection of one of the world’s most powerful figures was either at the mercy of an arbitrary process or perhaps more insidiously being controlled in the shadows by dark sinister figures like Tom Delay and Dick Cheney.

And indeed it is clear that there were many instances in 2008 where operatives spread misinformation in an attempt to prevent certain minority groups from voting, and it is my hope that some of those operatives may yet be tracked down and brought to justice; but though problematic, this issue was not systemic. The system functioned. It was a huge relief. There were some who had predicted all sorts of terrible things, an October Surprise of one kind or another that might allow the neocons to hold on to political power but at the expense of world security or even the principles of democracy itself. None of these came to pass, and around the world, the election of America’s first black President was hailed with cheers and tears of joy and gratitude.

Those who have read the book will know that it calls for the abolition of the Electoral College as well as campaign finance reform so drastic that it would change the very character of our elections. My position on these policies has not changed. Nonetheless, in this real world where we live in today, this critical election had the best possible outcome, and this is cause for celebration. Indeed, the Democrats seem to have learned some lessons, and may emerge tougher, in defiance of their historical reputation as the wimpy party. May they grow fangs and claws and get some work done in Washington DC.

There is much to do.

They will have to start with an overhaul of the disastrous economic policies that have held sway in our nation’s capital for nearly thirty years beginning with Reagan, economic policies that Clinton did not reverse but which his former advisers, in their new roles in the emerging Obama administration, may be able at last to end. The situation has come to such a head that the American public may at last be ready to get behind such initiatives as those outlined in the book: living wages, public education, public health care, public works projects for the unemployed, balanced by the repeal of the Bush tax cuts and a fuller restructuring of the tax code to reinstate the principles of progressive taxation and estate taxes as a tool of social justice.

(A taxation digression: Taxes are a contentious issue, understandably, but here is my perspective: I was not one of the 6% of children who moves up all the way through the income distribution by the time they reach adulthood.  [See section 8.1.2.1 "The Persistence of Poverty" on page 171.]  When I was born, my parents lived below the poverty line. Like most people born into the bottom quintile, my personal finances were still in the bottom quintile some thirty years later; when my son was born, our family was easily in the bottom quintiles of both income and net asset value. But my parents worked, and my wife and I are working, and we hope to work ourselves and our children into the top quintile one day; and if we do, I will then be proud to pay a higher tax rate than the people who only earn what I do now, I will be positively gleeful, because I will know that by contributing to a publicly funded social mechanism I will be making life better for people like me.)

Simultaneously, the incoming Obama administration will need to be orchestrating a troop drawdown from Iraq, a troop buildup in Afghanistan, and a re-posturing of American foreign policy globally. Those are all big jobs, on top of which, I am certain they are presently reviewing the security implications of the recent horrific terror attack in India and ongoing chaos in Thailand.

I wish them the best of luck, and to all you people out there in Internet land, have happy holidays.

Tags: Barack Obama, democracy, election, taxation, transition

This entry was posted on Saturday, November 29th, 2008 at 10:27 am and is filed under Discussion. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.