2016 ELECTION PLAN B: Is There A Morning After Pill for This?

 

 

2016 Election Plan B:  Is There a Morning After Pill?

 

ELECTION PLAN B AND THE MORNING AFTER

Early ballot counts inadvertently predicted the 2016 Presidential election outcome. In a nervous and surreal suspension of time, Hillary Clinton held three electors against Donald Trump’s 19 votes, flipping collective liberal stomachs.  Watching Trump’s unexpectedly potent challenge of liberal expectations became more than a bad date.  The blue condom literally broke, with no Election Plan B to prevent conception.

Rather than spending a sleepless night in conjecture, I joined the many who quit watching during the few minutes Clinton held a marginal lead. After months of foreplay, we (the previously mentioned collective of now exhausted liberals) purposefully skipped the media’s rhetorical attempts at explaining the flawed pundit predictions and Pew polls with Polly-Ana platitudes.  I awoke the next day to news of the Trump electoral win, took a Xanax, then went back to bed to ponder a 2016 election Plan B.  No morning after pill for this election night screw.  Canada, perhaps?

Metaphorically sticking my head in the sand seemed the best advice to avoid anxious apocalyptic scenarios.  Scenarios, such as a yellow fluff of hair and a screwed-up face, screaming bigoted vengefulness with a finger on the BIG button.

 

IS THIS ELECTION PLAN B OR HAS NUCLEAR WINTER ARRIVED?

Ironically, the day after the election was so dreary; even the Houston sky was sad.  Checking for signs of a nuclear winter, not a single ray of sun penetrated the overcast sky.  No apocalypse, just a grey sky in an eerie show of sympathy to Harris County’s blue feminist and minority constituency.

By late afternoon, I bravely crawled out of my sheet-tent and took the walk of shame to my computer.   Megamedia speculations analyzing the largely unexpected Trump win dominated my home page.  I searched the headlines for an implementable election morning plan B--some intelligent assessment of sheer stupidity. Radio host and author Garrison Keillor caught my attention with his Washington Post opinion. In "Trump voters will not like what happens next", Keillor analyzes the outcome and advises brooding liberals.

 

UNEDUCATED WHITE VOTERS JOIN THE PARTY

Keillor premises that The Donald's largely uneducated white male supporters joined the Trump movement for the party, small "p".  Caught up in the suddenly socially acceptable raucousness, they joined and enjoyed the madness. Let me even further surmise and clarify with a more accurate statement:  They were in it TO party.  Trump supporters were rolling on the actual festivities.  The beer, the hollering, the groping.  No one ever expected him to WIN the damn thing (2016).

Prior to the election, The New York Times reported a possible path to victory for Trump through the largest bloc of registered voters: uneducated white males. Their caveat to this hypothesis was that only half of this demographic failed intercourse with a ballot in the previous election, leaving 29 million sleeping votes. (http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/11/07/us/how-trump-can-win.html).  Assured of Clinton’s win, the opposing party brushed aside any such threat, without the protection of an election plan B.   After the Election Day results, The New York Times reiterated their claim, and excused their caveat: The pre-election polls were simply unable to anticipate the large turnout of rural, white, working-class voters in key states (http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/10/upshot/why-trump-won-working-class-whites.html), which begs the question, was it cognitive inability or technical inability? I boldly claim the former, positing that critical thinking processes were dismissed in favor of computer poll processing.

 

PLAN C: THE FAITHLESS ELECTORATE AND A RIGGED ELECTION

Now that he has won the Presidential election, let the Republicans deal with him, writes Keillor flippantly. Still, his benign words only temporarily comfort dejected liberals searching for an election Plan B to prevent implantation.

 “I’ll accept the election results,” Trump finally acquiesces in a pre-election stump speech, his followers clapping at the ghost of a change in his contentious “we’ll see” stance.  Then, after a long pause, Trump caveats his statement with celebrity theatrics: “if I win!”  The crowd roars as he rants of a “rigged” election process, possibly the only truthful slip of the tongue during his campaign.   That he and Putin share a bed is obvious; the depth of their affair is unthinkably unexpected.

By the first Monday after the second Wednesday in the month of December, the time for an election Plan B passed, and an intense campaign to court faithless electorates failed (http://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/05/opinion/why-i-will-not-cast-my-electoral-vote-for-donald-trump.html?_r=0).  Awaiting inauguration, Trump seems unconcerned that more than one-half of the country want's him aborted as he fills a nepotistic and conflicted cabinet with assorted billionaires. 

 

THE TRUMP CONSTITUENCY:  STUPID, SCARED OR BOTH?

Although we cannot change America's 2016 choice without changing our country’s founding premise of free elections, we can ignore the 2016 electoral choice…at least for the moment.  Then, Americans must examine the decline in intelligence and the rise in fear of our populace; or more concisely, how Americans went stupid with fear.  This socio-political phenomenon, first defined by Thomas Hobbes in the 17th century, explains how a frightened and neglected citizenry will choose a despotic leader rather than enter into a “state of nature” (1651) [i].

This is not news, yet the news missed it.  Liberal politicians and the educated electorate missed it, too.  Statistical demographics of this election largely support the hypothesis that illiteracy, ignorance and fear rule too many American lives.  By capitalizing on the seething anger of under-educated eligible voters who suffered most in the 2008 recession, Trump re-enfranchised this previously quiet demographic with loud propaganda and undefined promises to "Make America Great (Again)".   

NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL FAILURE IS NO SURPRISE

"I am now going to pay more attention to teachers," Keillor writes in his concluding sentence, positing that Trump won the presidency through the unexpected turnout of uneducated white voters.  Keillor’s conclusion supports inductive reasoning of educational failure and fearful ignorance. Presently, there is plenty of support for this implicit claim.

Our educational system is broken, has failed us, and we know it.  American students rank 23^rd in math and 31^st in science compared to other industrial countries.  Greater than one out of every four adults read below a fifth-grade level (http://www.cnn.com/2012/02/09/opinion/bennett-stem-education/index.html). In September 2016, the Pew Fact Tank reported that uneducated white males preferred Trump over Clinton by 14 points. The same study found that educated white males favored Clinton by a 25-point margin. If the spread holds, researchers then prophesized, the 2016 election “…will be the widest educational divide in any election in the last several decades” (http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2016/09/15/educational-divide-in-vote-preferences-on-track-to-be-wider-than-in-recent-elections/)

But for now, let the Republicans in power worry about Trump; roll out your yoga mats, grow some heirloom tomatoes, and read Jane Austen one more time, Keillor advises.  Not necessarily the election Plan B that many would prefer, and so I caveat that advice with this thought: another election cycle is in four years.  Liberals, start now to secure impenetrable protection, and have a Trump Re-Election Plan B ready.

 

[i] Thomas Hobbes' (1588-1679) socio-political theory defines the "state of nature" as "the war of all against all

".  Only a strong, undivided political system could provide the social structure to prevent a "state of nature”, claims Hobbes. Hobbes explains this behavior by concluding that man’s greatest fear is a violent death at the hands of

 another [human being] (1651, Leviathan).  [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bellum_omnium_contra_omnes

]

*Title inspired by @MxTr3y social media comment.

 

GARRISON KEILLOR: Trump voters will not like what happens next 

 

 

 

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TED CRUZ AND THE 2013 DEBT CRISIS: Notes on The Right and Duty to Revolt

 

Photograph by J. Scott Applewhite/AP Photo

Senator Ted Cruz talks to reporters on Capitol Hill in Washington, on Sept. 25, 2013

 

The Right and Duty to Revolt

Have our elected representatives of the Goverment violated their Social Contract with the people who empowered them?

By Kimmarie Rojas

News Link on Debt Ceiling, Oct 2013

Once again news, editorials and pundits repeat claims with varying degrees of optimism that Washington is getting closer to a deal. It is generally agreed that any Senate "deal" will be a temporary measure to keep the government open until about January 15, 2014, and avert a global financial crisis.  Still, it places us in the same situation again in a few months.

On one end of the spectrum, Joshua Green of BloombergBusinessWeek writes that even if the Senate comes up with a deal, Ted Cruz (R-TX) could manipulate the Senate rules preventing the passing of any deal before the Thursday deadline[i]. Huffington Post[ii] contributors McAuliff and Siddiqui are cautiously optimistic that Congress can agree on a deal, but concerned that the legislative bodies will be unable to complete the complicated and fragile processes and procedures before the January 17th deadline on US borrowing capabilities. Also hopefully optimistic, Senator Schumer (D-NY) told Face the Nation that he believed a deal would be reached, citing the sequester cuts as a way to "spark a conversation", while Senator McCain (R-AZ) called the sequester a "sticking point" in negotiations.[iii]

Introduction

With government services closed and only days from reaching the Country's borrowing limit, President Obama has taken to the podium in an attempt to define the terms that have divided Congress and shut down the daily business of the government, specifically, the cryptic verbiage of the complicated US budgetary system. Our elected representatives appear flippant to the consequences of a financial default, each party, branch and faction blaming the other while meting out fallacious arguments. 

The most frequent fallacy that these professional persuaders present is that of the false dilemma, claiming only two possible outcomes to the current Congressional/Executive stalemate over funding the government.  Yet any debater worth their premise understands that truth is multifaceted, and few issues are dichotomous: There are as many possible outcomes to any situation as the mind is capable of considering. Although we've been offered only two choices, there are infinite possibilities.

"The bounds of possibility, in moral matters, are less narrow than we imagine:  it is our weaknesses, our vices, and our prejudices that confine them" wrote Jean-Jacques Rousseau, an 18th Century philosopher whose ideas were set down in his political treatise "The Social Contract" (1769).  

"Clear them out and start over!" is an oft heard sentiment these days as the publics' frustration with their elected leaders grows.  The Congressional approval rating is under twenty five percent, and the majority of the Country is dissatisfied.   While Washington makes a weak attempt to reverse a self-created crisis, the public is becoming increasingly vocal for change. 

But how do we, the people, determine the course of action that would create a revolutionary change of political and economic power and policy?  How do we agree that the government has become untenable and undeniably broken? 

An understanding of the philosophies of free and democratic nations is essential, as is examining how other major paradigmatic changes have come about in the past. After more than Two Hundred and Twenty years, it is a generally accepted warrant that our Constitution is a brilliantly viable document that has proved its ability to create the greatest nation in the world. A cursory review of modern and contemporary political thought reminds us of the contentious and often bloody history of western democracy. Yet the paradigms of government by consent and the equality of man, delineate both a right and a duty to revolt against an unjust body politic. 

Fair and open elections combined with universal, unencumbered suffrage is the most effective, democratic, moral and nonviolent method for changing the members of the government.  On October 14, NBC News questioned if fair elections were even possible, claiming that assignment of districts have been Gerrymandered (manipulated to ensure specific party dominance), assuring re-election of the ultra-conservative minority.  Add to that voter apathy and the chances of electing an entirely new Congress becomes even more challenging.   

 Hobbes and Locke

Thomas Hobbes (b.1588-d.1679) is considered a founder of modern political philosophy, proposing his philosophical discourse on civil society and authoritarianism in his analytical work Leviathan. This, probably his most famous work, established much of the foundations of western politics. Leviathan also developed liberal democracy fundamentals, such as the right of the individual and the natural equality of all men. Hobbes' concepts supported representative government at the will of the people.

Hobbes believed that individuals entered into a social contract and civil society to avoid a state of war, with the instinct of self-preservation. The civil society described by Hobbes begins with the "state of nature", which Hobbes describes as "solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short".  Hobbes supports this under the premise that men, being rational beings, desire both power and their own preservation; and, that men's greatest fear is a violent death at the hands of another human. To reconcile these axioms with the state of nature, Hobbes claims that man must relinquish his power to an authoritarian government.

The fallacy of this claim is ironically familiar to our present day Legislative-Executive standoff.  Hobbes gives citizens only two choices: either subjugation or a state of nature (anarchy).

Although Hobbes prescribes absolute authority to governments, he believed that the government derives its original authority from the people, and maintains this power only so long as it successfully keeps peace.  There is no place in Hobbes' society for revolution; however failure to adhere to the social contract voids it and returns society to a state of war.

By not providing for the financial solidarity of the Country, has today's Legislature voided their vow and larger contract to defend the Constitution, and their personal contract with those States they were elected to represent?

English philosopher John Locke (1634-1704) claimed in his Second Treatise of Government  that people have a duty to revolt against an unjust government. The right of a people to dissolve their government has been a generally accepted concept especially within the liberal democracy discourse.

Locke describes two ways in which governments can be dissolved. The first is from without, as when a nation is conquered by a foreign force and the society is dissolved. The purpose of a government is to protect the society from dissolution. If it does not, a breach of the social contract has transpired because it "ought to have preserved them from violence.”[iv]  

A second way that government can be dissolved is from within.  Locke claims that when the condition exists that has altered the legislature in some way, the government is then dissolved.  According to Locke’s principals, government can be dissolved when the legislature is no longer acting according to the rules it has set for itself, such as when a government refuses or neglects its executive powers and fails to enforce the laws in effect. Has the legislature voided the government by withholding the necessary elements for the executive branch to function effectively?

All members of Congress take a vow of loyalty to uphold the Constitution against enemies, "foreign or domestic".  What of the dissolution of society by a FACTION, foreign or domestic?  A domestic faction which has found its way into an elected body may be even more poised to dissolve the society without direct violence by influencing and blocking the necessary business of the Administration, causing widespread disruption and changes in the workings of the legislative process.

According to Locke, individuals have a right to prevent such happenings:  "The reason why men enter into society is the preservation of their property".  A government that has failed the duty it was engaged for puts itself into "a state of war with the people and are left to...force and violence" (qtd in Locke’s 2^nd Treatise of Government).

The Contemporary Manifestation of Revolution

These philosophies, consent of the governed and the duty to revolt against an unjust government have been manifested in American contemporary politics as non-violent, passive-resistant direct action.  While the right and duty of revolution in modern history (16th-19th C.) reflects the violent dissolution of societies and their governments, contemporary thinkers harbor the concepts of social contracts and the duty to revolt as necessary to bring about non-violent political modernization of laws that are unjust and governments that have become unreasonable.

Henry David Thoreau

In 1848, Henry David Thoreau listed grievances against the American Government, not the least of which was the issue of slavery.  Thoreau claimed in his famous pamphlet Civil Disobedience that the current situation required "at once a better government" and reminded the American public of their right to refuse allegiance to a government which has become "unendurable".  Distinct in Thoreau's approach to the right of revolution however, was the concept of passive resistance. 

It is not a man's duty to eradicate "even the most enormous wrong", writes Thoreau of the issue of slavery, "but it is his duty not to give it practically his support." 

Martin Luther King Jr.

Thoreau's concept of revolt through non-violence was the cornerstone of Martin Luther King Jr.'s leadership in the Civil Rights Movement and contemporary manifestation of the duty to revolt without violence.  From a jail cell in Birmingham, Alabama, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. advocated "direct action", a non-violent form of resistance, against Southern segregation laws. In Letter from a Birmingham Jail, King admonishes the white clergy for failing to support his organized resistance movement to illegal and unjust segregation laws in Alabama, and lists in graphic detail the suffered wrongs, this time by the Negro in the status quo government of Alabama.  King justifies his belief in non-violent direct action as the best recourse for righting civil wrongs by creating a crisis situation and establishing "creative tension" to force the Birmingham authorities to recognize their wrongful deeds and enter into negotiations. Letter was not only a call for support of the passive resistant movement, but also came to be a prescription for the implementation of a non-violent revolt.[v]

The Great Society Days

               The late 1960's and the early 1970's saw a great outpouring of reform literature, much of which called for a restructuring of administrative government. Social philosopher John Rawls had much in common with early philosophers, with an added emphasis of liberal democracy and the challenge of creating a "just society".  Like Hobbes, Rawls also believed that people act on self-interest; however, according to Rawls they are capable of acting rationally through planning.  Rawls' theories were presented just after the "Great Society" days begun by President Lyndon B. Johnson. During this period, the administration created and funded many new social programs, such as MediCare and Welfare. The repercussion of the Great Society programs was one of the most wide-spread anti-statism movements in history. Thus, his philosophy was criticized for supporting the foundation of the Welfare State, during the politically conservative era following the Great Society days. 

Contract with America

               The 1994 "Contract with America" was another symptom of a decline in the integrity of the American civil society and their social contract with the American Government.  Presented by then minority leader Newt Gingrich and Representative Richard (Dick) Armey, this ten-point legislative program promised reform in many federal programs, reversing the efforts of "The Great Society" days.  Based on a State's Rights argument, the Contract awarded large block grants in place of Federal programs into the jurisdiction of individual states. Presented six weeks before a Congressional election, the document laid out specific legislative actions it would take to reform the government, should the Republicans win the majority in the House of Representatives.  When the GOP took over the 104th Congress, they gave credit to the Contract with America, and chose Newt Gingrich as the new Speaker of the House.

 

Conclusion

Has our government become unendurable? Does the Legislative Body represent the American ideal?   Has there been a breach in the Government's constitutional and statutory compact with U.S. citizens?  Does a default of the Government's global contracts constitute a state of war among the populace and void authority?  How does a society agree on unjust laws and government? (See How does a society agree that a law is unjust?)

History proves the ability of a social contract to resolve or dissolve the creation of a political order. Review of political history and infrastructure reminds us of the fluidity of the political body and the issue of trust in those who have been granted power over the masses. Once again, the conversation surrounding government reform is growing. Yet for most, the workings (or non-workings) of the Federal government creates more questions than it does answers.

 

 

 

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[i] Green, J. (2013) http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2013-10-14/ted-cruz-could-force-a-debt-default-all-by-himself#!

 

[ii] McAuliff, M and Siddiqui, S. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/10/14/senate-budget-deal_n_4099135.html

 

[iii] Kaplan, R.  ://www.cbsnews.com/8301-3460_162-57607281/sen-schumer-optimistic-that-senate-negotiators-can-end-the-government-shutdown/

[iv] Locke, John, The Second Treatise of Government, chapter 19, paragraph 211.  Orginially publshed in 1690.  Reprinted by Prometheus Books: New York. 1986

 

[v] King, Martin Luther, Jr. (1963) Letter from a Birmingham Jail.

 

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