Skip to main content

Majority Rules!



Majority Rules - Really!      Gerry O'Shea


In the presidential election in 2000 Al Gore won the popular vote but he lost the election. We had a similar story in 2016 when Hillary Clinton polled close to three million more votes than Donald Trump and again came in second. The Gore and Clinton defeats had enormous consequences for the country. Think the disastrous invasion of Iraq in 2003 and the current daily chaos in the White House.


Why not simply have a majority rule system, the candidate who gets the highest number of votes wins, which is what most people understand by democracy?


In the late 18th century as America was asserting its freedom from Great Britain, the Declaration of Independence stated that "all men are created equal," but  the revolutionary leaders didn't really mean these words in their clear meaning because, to begin with, non-whites and women were not included.


In addition, the American revolutionaries also gave considerable credibility to a common prejudice of the European aristocracy, namely that while the common people could be relied on to fight bravely in their many wars, they believed that the ordinary folk lacked the intelligence and breeding to elect good rulers.


To guard against the imagined excesses of the rabble making mistakes and electing radical leaders, James Madison and company built a system of checks and balances with two main protections for the status quo in America. First they introduced the Electoral College to act as a kind of screen of the popular results in presidential elections, and then they initiated a second chamber, the senate, where the smallest states have the same representation as California or New York. Today, for example, twelve states with 4% of the total population of the United States account for 24 - almost 25% - of the 100 votes in the senate.


Democracy was circumscribed for the benefit of those writing the rules - a statement that still prevails today. Consider the following examples which demonstrate that the wishes of the people often don't carry much weight in Washington.


All polls show that a big majority of Americans want restrictions on ownership of firearms, including a requirement that citizens should have to get a police permit, similar to a driver's license, before being allowed to own a gun. However, the National Rifle Association, a very rich and powerful lobbying group, opposes any such restriction, and nearly all Republicans - and a few Democrats too - get a big campaign check from the NRA which ensures that any progressive proposal for new legislation in this important area is stymied from the beginning.


 Despite the popular outcry for change in the laws governing firearms possession after every school shooting, there has been no meaningful legislation in this area for many years and zero prospect for a new proposal by this congress.


Another example of Washington's unresponsiveness to an issue where a broad consensus for change exists among the American people concerns access to adequate healthcare. It is shameful that the United States, alone among Western democracies, doesn't provide this basic benefit for millions of its citizens.


The most recent push for health-care reform happened in 2010 when the Affordable Care Act was proposed. Initially it included a "public option" whereby ordinary Americans could purchase their insurance directly from the government at a considerably lower price than private insurance companies were charging for similar policies.


Needless to say, the private insurance companies viewed this new law as cutting into their profits and they lobbied very forcefully against it. In the Senate, Joseph Lieberman, an independent senator from Connecticut who usually supported the Democrats, provided the vital vote that killed the bill in that chamber.


 There are dozens of insurance companies in Connecticut and they donated big bucks for the Lieberman campaigns over many years. That is the shameful way that the "public option", which would have been so beneficial for millions of Americans, was defeated.


The Affordable Care Act ended the ability by insurance companies to refuse coverage for pre-existing medical conditions. Polls show that more than three quarters of Americans support the current law guaranteeing coverage for pre-existing conditions. Still, Republicans, prompted by their big money supporters, are promising to ditch it when they get a chance.


 It is significant that for every $100 spent lobbying in favor of progressive legislative changes that benefit the poor and working class, about $600 is spent to move the economic  needle even more in favor of those who are already affluent. Money talks every day in Washington on most issues with a far more powerful voice than the opinions of the majority of  people.


Gerry O'Shea blogs at  wemustbetalking.com

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Child Rearing in Ireland in the 20th Century

 Child Rearing in 20th Century Ireland       Gerry OShea  It is a truism accepted in most cultures that children thrive in a supportive family and in a community where they feel valued and encouraged. The old Irish adage “mol an oige agus tiocfaidh se” (praise young people and they will blossom) contains  important wisdom from the ancient Celts. However, for most of the 20th century in Ireland, this advice in Shakespeare’s words  was “more honored in the breach than in the observance.” There were two important considerations that underpinned Irish child-rearing practices throughout most of the last century. First, contraceptives were not available until late in the 1980’s mainly because of opposition by the Catholic Church, so big families were an important feature of Irish life. Think of parents in a crowded house rearing eight or ten kids and obliged to maintain order in the family. Anyone who stepped out of line would likely be slapped or otherwise physically reprimanded. According
Post a Comment
Read more

Reflections of an Immigrant

  Reflections of an Immigrant             Gerry OShea I came to America on a student visa in the summer of 1968. I travelled with a college friend, Ignatius Coffey, who hails from Labasheeda in County Clare. We were attending University College Dublin (UCD) after completing a second year studying the Arts curriculum. As evening students we were making our way by working in various jobs because our parents could not afford to cover our living expenses. So, we arrived in New York on the last day of May with very few dollars in the back pocket wondering if this new country would give us a break. I had uncles and aunts in New York who were a big help in providing meals and subsistence. A first cousin’s husband, who worked in Woolworth’s warehouse in Harlem and who was one of about six shop stewards in the Teamsters Union there, found us a job in his place, despite the line of American students knocking at the door. The pay was good and we worked every hour of overtime that we could
Post a Comment
Read more

A Changing Ireland

  A Changing Ireland         Gerry OShea “ You talk to me of nationality, language, religion ,” Stephen Dedalus declared in Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. “I shall try to fly by those nets.” In response, one of his nationalist friends asked Stephen the bottom-line question “ Are you Irish at all?” According to the most recent Irish census that question is answered in the affirmative by no less than 23% of citizens who identify as non-white Irish. The number of Irish citizens born abroad, increased in 2022 and now accounts for 12% of the population. The biggest non-native groups come from Poland and the UK followed by India, Romania, Lithuania, and Brazil. In 2021, the year preceding the census, over 89,000 people moved to live in Ireland, with India and Brazil leading the way. How do the people feel about the big infusion of foreigners into the country? A 2020 Economic and Social Research Institute study revealed a gap between the public and private perceptions and a
Post a Comment
Read more