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It turns out that when the people who live in areas where fracking would be a profitable and valuable option, they vote in favor of it. In the local elections that were held just to the south of where we live here in Rochester, candidates who ran on an anti-fracking campaign appear to have been soundly thrashed in those elections. The majority of voters in the Southern Tier have exercised their democratic duty, indeed, their crucial sacred democratic right, to vote for candidates that will support the creation of the gas industry in Western, NY.

“The people have spoken!” “We have a mandate!” “Finally, we’ll get the real change we can believe in!”

Where are the anti-frackers, who clearly are among the world’s most ardent supporters of “the people” and “democracy?” Where are all of those folks celebrating the idea that the people have spoken, that we should now work together, now we should heal the divisions among us, and move forward? Where are the “serious people” who no longer have to worry about obstructive, reactionary, do-nothing opponents, who can now get on with the business of governing?

You know where they are.

What a bunch of low-life hypocrites. And I mean that. Democracy, you see, isn’t even for them about majority rules. Majority rule in any case should be solemnly accepted, admitting that it is prone to tyranny but really we can’t do much better when it comes to large collective action problems. You see, the folks who claim the mantle of “Democracy” have done to that term what the liberals did to the term liberal. It indeed has come to take on a meaning precisely the opposite of what you think it means. You see the term “Democracy” in some title, head for the exits – because that is a sure sign that totalitarian-crony-corporatist ideas are lurking behind the corner. Democracy, for most people like this, means that WE get they outcomes that THEY want. And only the outcomes that THEY want. That is far from what I thought democracy was supposed to be about.

So, as the pro-statist majority keeps telling us cranky small-government types to “deal with it” … we shall invoke the mantle of democracy here today in the same spirit. Deal with it. Choke it down. Endure the fracking and the end of the world that you think is going to come from it. And while you are choking down that fracking from your Hollywood Hills estate on the left coast or your swanky Central Park apartment on the East Coast, please do us a favor and remind us why you even think you have any right to have your uninformed opinions enshrined in policy on the matter in the first place when there is no conceivable way that fracking could adversely impact you? Or do you think a Marcellus Well explosion is going to cause the San Andreas Fault to split apart?

4 Responses to “The Real Meaning of Democracy”

  1. Common Sense says:

    Sue Rapp of Vestal Residents for Safe Energy, which opposes fracking, said pro-fracking groups should not take the election results as a referendum in favor of drilling.

    “All these election results mean is that big money is still a big factor in our electoral process,” said Rapp, who said the gas industry and related businesses supported Preston and other drilling boosters. “We believe that the majority of residents understand that we are not ready for fracking anywhere in New York state.”

    I feel sick.

    There you have it. Apparently, election results are no indicator of what residents do and do not understand.

    • Harry says:

      I feel your sickness, man (hugs).

      The anti-fracking folks are an amalgam of rich Sierra Club types ( with whom I once had great sympathy and camped with), Ralph Nader followers, and other anti corporate types, and their big money followers invested in, and remuniated handsomely directors. The idea is to make it more expensive to heat your home or run your car, which I have never understood the benefits of, while meanwhile enriching people with government connections, which is easy to understand,

      Remember that at one time , maybe until now, we admired Mussolini for his efficiency; well, not I, but FDR and Harry Hopkins. When Mussolimi fell out of
      favor and was hanged upside down, hisideas about economic efficiency went down the memory hole, along with Alger Hiss, the Rosenbergs, and every other error that might impinge on today’s idea of progress.

      I wonder whether any history, with basic facts, is taught today, and I have been through it myself, but that is not the problem for anyone being blessed with a liberal education,

      We can try, even with our children who are adults to supply with our imperfect guidance, suggesting reading. Mike and Rachel spend their every minute to bring up their kids as self -sufficient thinking adults, eventually getting off their payroll ,

      Somewhere there has to be an appreciation of liberty. which can be derived from pure reason? If you are Aristotle, or St. Thomas Aquinas, or John Stusrt Milll or Adam Smith or James Madison, who read them all and worried about factions.

      None of this is taught today by our government- run schools, not a single idea. Our government run schools are taught by the lowest rung on the academic ladder. Kutztown state. My opinion is that they think on
      a low cognitive level combined with ignorance of what in our parents’ days was an eighth grade education.

      Not that they are all dumb as rocks. My daughter had some great teachers in high school, but then there were a few big gaps, but none of them did enough damage.

      Good luck, WC. Given my faith that the dam and the sire will do whatever it takes to protect the herd ( the sire normally disinterested in the outcome, but we know WC is not bovine always ) I trust that the herd will be taught history .

  2. Speedmaster says:

    LOL on the crickets noise!

  3. […] this, and the excellent comment in the comments indicating that folks who don’t like the outcomes […]

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