The Disgruntled American

“The government cannot be run successfully by substituting the power of entertainment for the power of accomplishment. The essential quality for the voters to require in their candidates is capacity for public service.” – Calvin Coolidge

Over the past thirty years, we have seen a terrifying phenomenon in this country. Besides the fact that people have become more and more hardlined politically, we see that recent presidents have started cult like movements. An easy example would be to look at the 2016 Democratic primary. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) had created a huge following and had it not been for the rigging of the election by democratic operatives, most likely would have won the nomination. His particular brand of followers were called “Bernie Bros” and used the phrase “Feel the Bern” as a mantra.

Easily enough by contrast is the current president, Donald Trump, and his cult of personality. Although I have been pleasantly surprised by what he has done, I do not follow him like a panting dog waiting to be pet, regardless, his particular brand included several phrases like “lock her up” (referring to Hilary Clinton), and the “Trump Train”.

Although campaign slogans have been used for centuries now to promote name recognition into the zeitgeist, never have they been used as chants or mantras. Mantras by definition are particularly dangerous, not only do they reform thoughts in the brain and have been used for centuries by authoritarian regimes to implant submissive thoughts into the citizenry, they also in a group setting allow for cohesion and bigotry (by dictionary definition, not social definition).

See, with entertainers, lights, effects, commercials, and speeches, the race to be a president is no longer about public service, but about popularity. In a world of instant gratification, followers, likes and subscribers to a person and not necessarily a service, can we really ignore that the same has happened to the presidency? Why do you think we are having discussions about the popular vote vs electoral college.

We have placed these men and women to such high of pedestals, we have pictures of them in our country offices and we revere them through dinners. We pay thousands to see tickets of them and pay for their merchandise. It’s no different than an entertainer, except this entertainer has influence, power and fame not only through their appointed position, but also by seemingly brainwashed followers as well.

The danger to a direct democracy isn’t majority rule, it really is majority turns into authority rule. We have literally set ourselves up by A.) allowing ourselves to be so involved with politics, we literally need therapists to cope with it and B.) defending our presidents and ideology at all costs, even resorting to threats and violence.

The terrifying thought is, if we don’t get ourselves out of this mess, who will?

Live Free // Die Free,

The Disgruntled American