ONE LAST LONG WORD

Nothing more after today about the gift of democracy’s elections; and the obligation to use and preserve that gift.

Before I give some statistics from this year’s local  primary election; I would reprint two consecutive paragraphs from an article(not op-ed) that appeared in Thursday’s 6/5/14 Times titled: In Elections Across the World, Democracy Is a Matter of Definition by Alan Cowell:

Anyone, it seems, can hold an election, and the list of the countries that 

have girds the globe, from Zimbabwe to Kazakhstan. But in dictatorships, elections are not so much the fruit of democracy as the emblem of its perversion; the act of voting is intended only to create a chimera of legitimacy, not what Abraham Lincoln called “government of the people, by the people, for the people.”

“Elections are a necessary component, but not a sufficient condition, for democracy — or more specifically, a liberal democracy,” said Hisham Melhem, a senior journalist with the Arabic news channel Al Arabiya. “A modern democracy cannot exist without free, fair and transparent elections, but elections alone do not a democracy make.”

The writer was motivated by the recent Syrian election in the throes of a bloody civil war recently re-elected Assad to as president with “88.7 percent of the votes and a turnout of 73.47 percent. More than 10 million people, the Syrian authorities said, had voted for him.”

Colwell remarked on the Egyptian elections Sissi received the same overwhelming 97% majority that former President Murbarack always received.

In Putin’s Russia the recent election’s results were the same as in the old Stalin’s USSR; 95+% for the winner. The teachers are encourage to print the party line or go to the equivalent of “Siberia

Thus elections by themselves mean little. Only when the people are willing to use the freedom of power given by the Constitution can we make sure that we have a Democracy not an autocratic and most often abusive government.

That is why the figures from the election are so important. Here in Plainfield they showed little willingness to save our society.

In the first ward there are 5238 registered voters of which 3051 register to vote as Democrats. Only 773 voted of which Toliver received 491 votes. That is less than 10% who could vote as Democrats and if we included the frozen Unaffiliateds the number who voted in that ward was just below 9.5%.

Taylor the winner in the 3^rd ward received about 15% of the total registered voters approval; or about 9% if the UAs chose to vote.

Williams the 2 & 3 wards winner received only about 15% of the registered Democrats in those two wards or about 9% if you included the UAs.

It is a sad that an election that will for the next four years determine this city’s fate attracted the same number of voters as a BOE election. Our future has been determined  not by the desires of a small  "committed" group, but  by the lack of interest of 75% of the people who do  not care for the rare gift they have had. 

Obviously the majority of residents do no care what happens where they live. They are no more than squatters who would set fire to their domicile.

We will have to live this coming year with the results- the same old same old.
Constant public pressure may expose those in office to the evil of their ways and make them back off. Perhaps the prayer they falsely utter at the beginning of the meeting might be answered; let us pray so to our own God.

Thus endeth the 2014 election that is important locally; in November it will be County, State, and National and no one should be bound by strict party lines.

My next post will be on other subjects; the VA health care scandal and relationships to ACA, or the next Council agenda. I might not post on the weekend but still check.