Posted on 06/12/2005 9:35:01 PM PDT by quidnunc
Once there was a farm located by a tranquil river. One day a duck from the river bumped into a chicken from the farm, and they immediately fell head over heels in love with each other. Sadly, no one else in the barnyard community could appreciate their romance, and both were mocked by all the other animals. "Ducks and chickens were not meant to fall in love," guffawed the cows and the dogs and the roosters — especially the roosters. Deeply mortified by the ridicule, the duck told his beloved hen, "We will flee these narrow-minded bigots. Come, let us find a place free from such ignoble prejudice." And with these inspiring words on his beak, the duck plunged into the river, followed by the love-stricken chicken, who, of course, promptly drowned.
We are not told what lesson the duck learned from his tragic experience. Being a duck, he may not have learned one at all. He may even have gone to other farmyards and urged other love-smitten hens to follow him to their watery graves. Perhaps he thought, one day I will find a chicken that can swim.
Ever since our miraculously successful revolution in 1776, other countries, falling in love with our democracy, have tried to follow in our webbed footsteps, only to drown miserably in the misadventure, as France would do in its revolution of 1789, and as nations like Mexico or Venezuela would come to do after the collapse of the Spanish Empire in 1808. Sometimes we have, like the duck in the fable, cheered on the chicken to her aquatic death; sometimes we have merely been the inadvertent inspiration. Yet, in case after case, the chicken always ended up dead, while the duck went happily quacking down the river.
Why is this?
It is because Americans take to democracy, so to speak, like a duck to water. It is our element. We thrive in it and prosper in it. It is our refuge and haven. But, like the duck of the fable, we too often forget our natural element may not be the natural element for other peoples, whose history, culture, and ways are radically different from ours. We forget that, just as the duck has evolved to survive in the water, so America has evolved to survive in the midst of democratic bickering and dickering.
-snip-
At least it's not the dreaded PORK!
Here's a good place to start...
The parliament system that other countries have is far inferior to America's, with our term limits and a directly elected president.
I am speaking about water logged chickens.
If that chicken did die trying to swim, we know for certain that it did so screaming, "Give me liberty or give me death!"
"I thought the story was supposed to teach us that its okay for ducks and chickens to intermarry."
If the chicken had gotten an operation to change it to a duck then everything would have been ok.
Exactly! To say that America's have different human nature that other nationalities is silly. Humans are Humans. And Humans in a democracy will eventually vote in Socialists, and then kill each other.
Humans in a Republic fare better.
It's a silly proverb, like the old Chinese one about a Frog and a Scorpian. The Scorpian needed help crossing the stream, a frog volunteers and midway across the stream the scorpian stings him and they both sink to their deaths..
Frog "I helped you, why did you sting me, now we will both die"
Scorpian "I'm a Scorpian, this is what I do"
It's typical apallogetics for Matieralism, which means idiotic. It excludes the Cowboy (American/Spiritualism).
Cowboy (scraping scorpian from bottom of his boot) "Son of a B' Scorpian!"
I could go on for a 1000 paragraphs on that topic.
I'll spare you. No point repeating what every body knows.
Yes, we are. The anti-authoritarians (ducks) take to water (freedom) naturally, whereas their cousin (chickens) don't. We are at a point where the chickens are about to drain the lake.
>>>>The Scottish Jurist and Historian Sir Alex Fraser Tyler published a collection of lectures in 1801. He advanced a theory of democracy based on historical observation: "A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can exist only until voters discover that they can vote themselves largesses from the public treasury.
From that time on, the majority always votes for the candidate promising the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy, always followed by a dictatorship.
"The average age of the world's great civilizations has been 200 years. These nations have progressed through this sequence: From bondage to spiritual faith; from spiritual faith to great courage; from courage to liberty; from liberty to abundance; from abundance to selfishness; from selfishness to complacency; from complacency to apathy; from apathy to dependency; from dependency back again to bondage."<<<<
While it's difficult to imagine our country headed toward dictatorship, perhaps we'd simply invent a 'new' form...minus the Musolini(sp?) figurehead.
My hope is that a state (any state) will take the feds on, over an issue that will clearly expose their (feds) over-reaching powers. Once that happens, their house of cards would begin to fall. Barring that, the threat of secession should remain an option, as we retain that right. Our children deserve at least this much and our legacy should not include the shameful lack of resolve to make it happen.
Trouble-shooting what's wrong with this country isn't a problem. Getting people to wake up and vote for the solutions is.
If the two major parties are enthralled with communitarianism/huge central governmentalism, in the belief that it'll buy them votes (see: robbing the community chest above), then the only answer is to introduce a different party and expose them for what they are. Perhaps an even more radical idea: Propose that all state and federal employees be banned from voting in elections as a safeguard against 'porkerism'.
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