It is clear to me that the majority of people in this world have difficulty sacrificing comfortable short term solutions for the sake of achieving potentially painful, yet more sustainable and beneficial, long term goals. Unfortunately, this notion seriously diminishes my faith in our Democracy's ability to handle the global issues of the 21st century.
Any thoughts?
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
I Love You Dustin!
ReplyDeleteGrandma
I think that's a rather negative view of this great country. America and it's democracy have weathered a number of great storms and done quite well in the long run. I believe the one thing that holds us back is that the basic framework of our democracy with term limits for our politicians require them (our politicians) to think only as far as the next election day. Don't misunderstand me, however, i am very much in favor of term limits. We left king George a long time ago! In speaking about the American People however, they have always been willing and able to make the necessary sacrifices to achieve greatness. Simply look at every aspect of our short history; civil war, depression, two World Wars and now surviving the "Bush disaster".
ReplyDeleteJeff
P.S. Grandma says: "We Will Rock Again!"
People love simple answers to comlex issues. Any time a country is faced with serious challenges, the politicians who win, offer simple answers that simply don't work: "build a wall between the US and Mexico to stop illegal immigration" go to war in Iraq to overthrow a dictator and breed a democracy to control the future of oil resources, and the list goes on and on. Unfortunately no simple solution works for complicated problems. These often require long term vs. short term strategies, personal and collective sacrifices and investments vs. individualistic and narcissistic behaviors, planning and patience. Patience is something few contries possess. And my biggest concern for our next president, is that few will have the patience to wait for fundamental changes to happen and most will soon be disillusionned and revert to the wish of short term, simple answers. He will be tempted to make short term promises that he won't be able to meet. And there lies the biggest flaw of our democracies. To be elected one needs to promise and implement short term answers that eventually fail and slow down progress because they are the only ones people understand and have the patience for. Rome and the Great Pyramids weren't built in a day nor in 4 years. But despite these flaws, it does seem that democracy is the only political system that seem to work in the long term even if it is not, in first sight, the most effective.
ReplyDeleteHi, Dustin!
ReplyDeleteLooking forward to your commentary.
Every generation worries about democracy's imperfections, then works to try to lessen them--which is never more than half successful.
But Obama's inauguration is a time for joy, not morbid reflection.
Onward!
Dustin,
ReplyDeleteJ'aimerais consulter les premiers jours de ton blog mais je ne sais pas comment procéder. Peux-tu m'indiquer ce que je dois faire.
Quant aux commentaires, ils viendront un peu plus tard lorsque j'aurai compris exactement ce que tu exprimes.
Luc
hilarious story about the cab ride!!! Scary too. Great blog Dustin. It's a lot of fun to see the pictures. Thanks for keeping it going.
ReplyDelete