Time to Reclaim our Democracy

“The surface of American society is covered with a layer of democratic paint, but from time to time one can see the old aristocratic colors breaking through,” Alexis de Tocqueville

Could 2006 be the year that we reclaim our democracy?

It seems rather incongruent that a key component to the president’s war on terror is establishing democracy in an area that never had it at the expense of the oldest democratic state that was founded because of it.

As we begin 2006, reclaiming our democratic traditions seems to be a priority greater than even the war on terror.

In the four plus years since 9/11 we have methodically surrendered small pieces of our democracy for the illusion of safety. We acquiesced, as more and more power has been concentrated into the executive branch.

The understandable post 9/11 fear caused the nation to rationalize actions that conservatives and liberals alike would have abhorred otherwise.

Without much resistance the USA PATRIOT ACT became law, torture became a key ingredient in fighting the war on terror, and the president justifies wire tapping without the requisite due process or Congressional oversight.

Yet, the war on terror remains a war that only requires sacrifice from a few. The spigot is wide open with a ceaseless flow of tax cuts for the wealthiest, but has dried up when it comes to services for those most in need.

It is hard to imagine such policies being tolerated by a people committed to its democratic values.

Why send elected representation to Washington if the president believes he can unilaterally determine any policy that is remotely related to a war that has no definable end without regard for the rule of law or our democratic values?

We have long passed the point of moral self-reflection whenever the commander-in-chief can brazenly state publicly that he ordered wiretaps without oversight on US soil, justifying it by a notion supported only by a few, that the rule of law is trumped by the war on terror.

How long can we remain content believing that 9/11 changed everything? Was the impact of 9/11 so great that we now subliminally believe that the president is above the law?

If so, those of us in dissent owe the president and the vice president an apology. Moreover, we would also need to declare bin Laden the victor because he would have been successful in uncovering what Tocqueville observed in the 19th century.

Time is the only antidote to fear-based emotionalism. And the further away we are from 9/11 the clearer we can see how much of our own democratic traditions we have needlessly relinquished.

The collective burden is on the American people to reclaim the courage that is at the root of our democracy. Nowhere can one peruse the texts of the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, or the Federalist Papers and find justification for the bad intelligence leading to preemptive war, the torture policies, or domestic wiretapping without obtaining a warrant.

We must be prepared to remove any elected official, regardless of party, that is unwilling to put the country first. Since they are the party in power, any Republican, especially those that voted for the impeachment of Bill Clinton, must be held accountable for their unwillingness to hold the president’s feet to the fire.

This does not suggest that the Democrats have been anointed as the paragons of virtue. Sadly, they remain our only hope to reclaim the values that the present administration has arrogantly cast aside.

The post 9/11 experience should also remind us that a democratic nation never has the luxury of putting its values on autopilot. We entrusted the president with keeping us safe, and in the process, with few exceptions, promised not to question.

This may have been one of the great Faustian bargains in US history: absolute power in return for the perception of safety. That is not how democracies work. Unlike totalitarian regimes, they require a constant conciseness and commitment to the values it proclaims.

For in the words George Bernard Shaw, “Democracy is a device that insures we shall be governed no better than we deserve.”