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Leaders in the world must see that democracy still exists.

There has been an exchange of thoughts over at 1loneranger’s blog

http://1loneranger.wordpress.com/2007/05/14/senator-gravel-offers-a-plan-guaranteed-to-end-the-war-in-iraq/#comments

between Anticant and myself that has made me write this new post.

It is known by all of us that democratic styles emerged from oppressive regimes, unions were formed in reaction to ultra-capitalist attitudes and the pseudo-democratic system was set up almost everywhere in the world. And it all came to happen because the peoples of our part of the world were subjugated by a few .

When democracy became the most praised system of government, it was done so by authors at the beginning of it all, but in actual fact I am starting to believe that Democracy is another weapon in the hands of those who have always controlled the fate of the Earth. In actual fact if you look carefully into it you will no doubt observe that Democracy divides instead of uniting. Political parties whose leaders are never chosen by their affiliates but imposed on them by their top brass who in turn have been “advised” to take them by others higher up. And this chain originated by the power and need of money.

The system of proposing a trio of persons for a particular important post is rife everywhere, the three that are presented for consideration have previously received the approval of those who are “really” interested in the ruling of that particular country where the particular post is open for a replacement. The media take care of the rest.

Then another political party does the same with its rank and file. And…there! you have the two candidates - or more - opposing each other - that is completely divided and antagonistically rivals - throwing at each other all the worst epithets and disqualifications, libels and slanders, truths and lies that may be conceived by a human mind. In sum the onset of a deeper division and antagonism among their followers. Among almost all the inhabitants of that particular country.

Which, it will not escape you, is another form of control, of dictatorship. No matter how much you shout - it was proved with the Iraq war - what has been decided up there will be carried out.

What has made people to unite is nothing else than a common sense of oppression. It did with unions - which later on were decaffed, too, by the diversification that took place when different activities started to create new unions -; and it does today with political parties. People have forgotten that there is a common interest in that Democracy be applied to please us all, not to divide us all. We must not yield to the temptations offered by those who can tempt us and which normally lead us to separate ourselves in the main body of the electorate.

Ideologies have emerged that have also been suppressed, Marxism and Communism are examples of this in our ultra-capitalist world, because those who had the obligation to uphold them did not want or could not make that this happened. Once Communism became “conservative” in the USSR it also became oppressive giving way to the present ultra-capitalist ruling the Russian Federation now exhibits. Long standing regimes give way to protests among people and therefore to changes. The concept of ruling will nevertheless be always prevalent. China is another example of what I say.

This situation leaves me with some questions :

1. Is it necessary for Democracy to work properly that a dictatorial regime be previously established in a country? You know reaction to oppression.

2. How can people uphold the democratic system once it has been attained.

3. Is it necessary that people go through a situation of oppression for them to realise that attaining Democracy - being important as it is - is as much important as upholding it? I mean does upholding Democracy need random periods of absolutism?

4. What must be done for us to uphold that democracy we enjoy in much better conditions than there exist at the present time?

Yours faithfully.

Your attention is drawn to the development of discussions in 1loneranger’s blog in respect of “The Anti-war movement and its discontents” initiatives for a world agreement.

The link to that discussion is

http://1loneranger.wordpress.com/2007/05/02/a-blog-project/#comment-1834

Contributions there will be much appreciated.

A new post has been opened at 1loneranger’s blog which we think should be the object of contributions from our friends. It is a question of discerning which system of government is more convenient to the interests of the public in general and which steps should be taken to the consecution of that target.

I recommend the reading of these ideas at 1loneranger’s whose link is

http://1loneranger.wordpress.com/2007/05/02/a-blog-project/#comment-1746

I am certain that many excellent ideas from our friends will eventually get us to reach the most adequate conclusions to the topic.

Thanks.

We have been reading and hearing continuously these days about the degradation of the climatic conditions in our planet. Scientists warn states that continuous dirtying of the atmosphere will result in an irreversible status where the Earth might afford the worst habitable conditions for human beings and the rest of living organisms.

And this has made me think whether everything is true or deceitful in this rotating mass where we have been allowed to coexist.

Why can it not be that old theories of glaciation, of the Ice Age, be true? Let us imagine for a moment that conditions on the Earth trillions of years ago were the same as they are today. Warming of the planet ended most of life on it, the seas grew as a consequence of full thaw of the ice, the air became unbreathable. The Earth was practically dead.

Once the human beings disappeared,  contamination disappeared with them giving way to a period of recovery that lasted again trillions of years. The micro-organisms that could save themselves because of their innate conditions of resilience started again what scientists call evolution. This does not mean to say that creation did not exist, but it might have started aeons ago, cycles of death and evolution destroying and recreating life respectively. A game where living beings played an endless role, emerging from simple cells up to exceptional intelligent aptitudes. And again that very same intelligence being responsible for another destructive period.

So we should not be worried that our planet’s life be destroyed, because there again the history will repeat and everything will re-start as it did on the last cycle of its existence. Or will it?

The human being considered the most intelligent of the living beings is not capable of discerning what is true and what is not. We keep carrying on our existence as though nothing were going to happen, in such a state of dumbfoundedness that we are not able to react before the awful existence that looms in the not too distant future. We might not suffer from it because we might already be dead by then, but our descendants will and it is our unavoidable duty to watch over their future now and not let them try to solve the problem when it will not be easily solvable.

I cannot stop thinking about it.

The almighty unions of old have been reduced during the course of time to practically powerless organisations relying on the benevolent attitude of the state and its monetary contributions. In actual fact unions have the power that the state wants to give them. It is convenient that to consolidate the impression that unions are of use to the workers, the state turns a blind eye to certain minor strikes that confirm the rule.

Laws that prescribe minimum services decaff totally the importance of a strike that otherwise could be really disruptive of the smooth going of the economy. Our capitalist world rests solidly on the “good-will” of workers and the states have seen to it that this “good-will” be firmly encouraged, but there is still something that unions could do: intervene in politics. For the time being they are the only organisations with capacity of unity existing in the “democratic” world of the deeply lobbied political parties.

There is a hope for the people in strikes, much that our comfortable way of living detests those strikes that may discomfit the usual routine in our lives. We have reached a point in our existence that we are deeply divided in everything. The “divide and conquer” of old has served the capitalistic system, too. Whoever wishes to talk about democracy finds her/himself at a loss to understand how the democracy that we have does not allow for the full, progressive strikes that much did for the labour world. Its excesses, though, also paved the way for a perfection of technology which meant the loss of countless jobs and the institution of unemployment. And when this technology is not enough, then the big companies decide moving to another country where the political conditions do not permit preponderance in workers, the costs of exploitation are considerably lower than those in what we call the civilised world and tax exemptions further pamper the powerful multinationals.

I am not against capitalism as an economic system, in my opinion it is for the time being the best chance that we have to exist, otherwise I wonder what today any other system will do other than return us to our primitive conditions of food for living and cover ourselves in skins and rags. But capitalism must also have its limitations. There must not be excesses in capitalism as there must not be excesses in labour.

There is a chance for the unions to recover their old influence and this chance in my opinion is politics, intervening in politics needs unity and the unions are just the only organisations with a possibility to achieve that unity in our world, not Marxist or Communist unity, not that but the unity necessary to use common sense in all the aspects of our lives.

Which ought to be moderate not aggressive. Understanding not adamant.

After saying all this I’m ready for the stake.

When a person must abandon his home for whatever the reasons, the drama has been set up for them. Leaving family, friends, routine ways of living is not an easy decision, the more so when this decision is in the minds of the affected persons one of life or death.

Millions of people have come to Europe from faraway places and continents, this displacement with a lot of meanings to them: integration in new cultures - civil, religious, educational, etc - and above everything the need to earn a living for themselves and their families that have been left behind in infrahuman circumstances.

Millions of people have gone to the US, both from the very American continent and also from far away. The millions of ill-called Hispanics are a living proof.

Millions of people have found the urgency of moving in the Middle East from their original places of residence to safer ones. If they knew - which they don’t - Iraqi refugees should be clamouring against the recent scandal dramatised by the President of the World Bank who has been one of the main planners of the chaotic situation to which they have been subjected for three years now.

And what can I say of the Palestinians that is not already known? They were and are still being pushed out of their legal homes by invaders who appear to have a free charter to do and undo at will in that territory.

But the real problem of all these displacements is not with the refugees and emigrants themselves, the real problem lies with us in the countries they have chosen to live in, what do we think of it? What do we do in that connection?

I am afraid the only reaction the problem receives from us is just one of distaste, of having to cope with a situation that we are reluctant to accept because that situation distabilises our way of living. We have been very tranquil until those people “dared” to intrude in our lives.

But we are also partially responsible. We have supported governments that have made it possible for the migrations to happen, for the refugees to seek asylum, and we have remained deaf and dumb, many because of ignorance, many because of passivity.

Many years ago people from our countries had to emigrate to or seek refuge in others, mainly American, and History has not wanted that we reflect on that human terrible decision. Our countries have intervened in the economic life of those which now send emigrants to us in a very significant manner: exploit of their human and natural resources, but history has not wanted that we all know about these circumstances.

And the outcome of all those interventions is the present problems in immigration. As the outcome of the problems in the Middle East is the refugees.

I know many have protested against the illegal wars in the Middle East, our governments have given us a deaf ear, our governments give an avid ear to those who designate, but not elect, them.

Is there a way for us to deal with this problem? If we thought how much these people are suffering, if we placed ourselves in their shoes, perhaps that will be the first step towards a pacific coexistence in our countries. These immigrants feel themselves marginalised and, believe me, that is the main problem we have to contend with.

The other, the basic problem, is for our governments to agree to appoint the “right persons” whose main worry be that of improving the living conditions in their countries of origin, of facilitating their access to education.

But as we have seen the “right persons” have proved  to be not so right.

Difficult task, isn’t it?

Have been trying to post two comments on your anticant’s arena blog unsuccessfully. I’ll do it here if you don’t mind.

To your post about Love I must say I find it an excellent essay which shows the quality of your thoughts.

To your last comment at “Peace” I couldn’t agree more.

Perhaps it is a question of technicalities in the blogs. I’ll try to do it later on in the day.

Tomorrow a Sunday of all days, the Power Plant  - by the way owned by Endesa - will cut supply from 08 to 13 hours (GMT + 1), due to technical reasons. Return to normality will be after 13 hours or before if anything goes alright for the corporation.

From the Greek: Ploutos = wealth + kratia = power. In day-to-day terms, Rule By The Rich.

A tour de force between the Socialist government and the opposition Partido Popular (Right Wing) is taking place these days in Spain regarding the purchase of the energy Company ENDESA and a Public Purchase Offer (PPO) presented by the multinational corporation E.ON, which is apparently supported by the opposition party, and another PPO from the multinational corporation ENEL together with the Spanish Building Company ACCIONA which, also apparently, have the sympathies of the government. I am not going to deal here with the technicalities of both offers nor am I going to step into, figuratively speaking, the positions held by both opposition and government, although my inclinations tend to be more favourable to the government’s.

I am going to deal here about my every day firmer conviction that the world is not ruled by political parties, be them democratic or not, nor is it ruled by the people in democratic terms. I firmly believe that the world is ruled by the rich people through a system which I would like to name Corporatocracy. I do not think I am coining any new term because I am sure many people in the world think like I do.

In the epoch of the last dictatorship the energy companies in Spain were owned by the state which controlled them through a sort of state holding : the Instituto Nacional de Industria (the National Institute of Industry). When the democracy(?) appeared in Spain after the dictator’s death, there were very important changes in the economic panorama, and little by little, with the shy opposition from the unions, the big companies changed hands from public to private, which was called privatisation.

It may not escape to anybody’s comprehension that the energy industry holds one of the safest positions in the world’s economy, particularly in the developed countries. Nothing can be done in terms of economy without the active intervention of energy, and it is in the energy sector which the avid eyes of those thinking with their purses stare continuously.

The offer presented by E.ON has been advised (?) by the following financial advisors:

BNP Parisbas S.A. - Citigroup Global Markets Ltd. - Deutsche Bank AG, London Branch -

J.P. Morgan Plc - Lehman Brothers (Europe) Ltd. - Merryll Lynch Capital Markets España S.A. -

You may find details about these companies in http://en.wikipedia.org because given that including in any post more than one link may make me the victim of cyber hackers I am not going to oblige them by doing so. In any case in future comments I’ll be pleased to include more links that are convenient to the issue under analysis.

I think it was Richard who suggested somewhere else that without the energy suppliers we would have nothing to do, and I think he was right. They have so much power, if you think carefully about it, that I would not be able to write these simple ideas today if I do not pay them their bill every two months. The energy suppliers are fundamental for everything: house building, car making, domestic appliances, clothes, shoes, combs, pins, post stamps, etc, etc., weapons of all kinds, aircraft, ships, nukes, you name it!

And I ask at this point: do any of you believe that with these assets and the political system that rules all of us is there anyone that dares to challenge the power of an Energy Corporation?

And in practical terms, although these corporations are ruled by a wealthy elite aided by super-intelligent persons who are not permitted to wholly integrate in their social layer, the public in general with money to participate in the property of those corporations by simply buying their shares in the Stock Exchanges, also benefit from the initiatives which at all times are directed to earn more money. Only that the latter cannot effectively participate in the decisions that are concocted by the real owners of the entities, you know those holding the majority of the shares.

In any case these extra shareholders are in no way a cause of worry to the top brass of the corporations.

Nor, of course, are they a majority among the public in general of whom they are members.

And believe it or not, the SEC has also something to do with these Public Purchase Offers. Do you know what the SEC is?

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.

In the first comment to this post, I will give you a link to check this information about the SEC.