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Political parties must go in order to bring back democracy
By Roland Michel Tremblay (about the author) Page 2 of 3 page(s)
No one can now compete freely in the political arena. If I were to present myself tomorrow as an independent, I will most certainly lose. If I were the standard bearer of a political party, I could win, but all for the wrong reasons.
RESIST PROPAGANDA
So first, eliminate political parties. Second, eliminate the right to publicise in any way thinkable political ideas and representatives. No one should ever be allowed to accept money from anyone or any corporation for a political campaign. No one should be able to win an election simply by injecting billions into a PR and publicity machine. It is too corrupt and unjust.
As soon as you hear one guy on the radio or the TV talking about this or that, no matter what he talks about, you are probably very likely going to vote for him, because you will recognise his name on the election ballot, when the others will seem not to even exist. What's a name after all? I won't even talk about negative publicity in order to destroy one's opponent, a common practice nowadays, where a mistake in the life of your opponent is all you need to win an election.
So now that we have eliminated the political parties which elect the wrong type of people, and that we have finally eliminated the big brainwashing publicity machine that will most assuredly influence everyone to vote for this or that, all for the wrong reasons, whilst preventing anyone without the money to be heard, and so speaking destroying democracy, what do we do?
Simple. Who pays for the publicity campaign? The government, meaning, and we forget it all the time, the people pay for it. A few pages about each candidate distributed locally to everyone, so we can find out about these people we're about to elect outside of party lines, and hopefully with the thought that they can think for themselves, that they can be heard and that they can make a difference. An hour here and there on local TV and radio, for each of them, space available in local newspapers, all paid by the people. Cheaply done, no more millions and billions spent on politics and publicity machines. It must remain at a local level, never national. As soon as a political election is national, it defies democracy; it elects the wrong people.
So now that the elections are over, and that people have won for the right reasons, without being a drain on the economy, without bribes and corruption, who's going to be the leader? It has always been the leader of the political party who took ultimate power, and the leader of the opposition being the leader of the second most popular party. This needs new thinking.
Well, I feel we need to work towards a more democratic process where no one is so clearly an all powerful leader, able to veto everything, or unilaterally make decisions with huge impacts upon the country and the world.
Either the leaders are decided after the elections by the people you elected, or in parallel you also vote for anyone who presented himself or herself specifically as leader. The opposition should be everyone else in the assembly.
The idea is that no one should win a seat in an election based on that one man or woman alone who runs for President or Prime Minister, since all the representatives should be independent. So no one will win for the wrong reasons, and no leader will be capable of obliging half the government to vote on any new law or policy. Following the party line will be something of the past.
In the end, there should never be a strong leader in charge of any country or any other government or council, or else, it eliminates the voice of everyone else, and so, your voice. It cancels the idea of an election and of democracy. Only after, should it be decided who is the leader, or independently from anyone else. And that leadership should never be permanent for the whole mandate; it should change every so often.
This should not stop there. The ministers or whatever they are called in the US should not be decided by the leader. They should also be voted by the whole of the assembly based on merits and who they feel should be in charge of certain departments. Or else it is too easy for the leader to get all his little friends there in power, and then it becomes dangerous, because the leader can do whatever he or she likes without fear of being stopped.
I hope my observations might help us move toward a truly functional democracy. The wrong people will be less likely to obtain power, and no leader will be able to dictate how most or all members of a party should vote on any issue. It could get rid of corruption, bring back democracy, and avoid costly elections. It would certainly solve a few of the biggest problems in politics today.
Let's debate whether we need political parties or not, and let's find solutions, so we can have a better democracy, or even, so we can have a real democracy.
This article is an excerpt of the book Destructivism, The Path to Self-Destruction, written by Roland Michel Tremblay. It is available online for free on his website, it also contains all his previous political articles:
www.themarginal.com
The views expressed in this article are the sole responsibility of the author
and do not necessarily reflect those of this website or its editors.
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