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“Think Right or Wrong, Not Left or Right” Is Live

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The eBook version of “Think Right or Wrong, Not Left or Right: A 21st Century Citizen Guide,” is live! Thank you to all who preordered; you should have received an email from Amazon that it’s available for downloading (check your junk folder or eBook library if you haven’t seen it).

If you missed the preorder notice a month back, you can head over to Amazon to get your copy at the outstanding-value-for-money price of $4.99 + tax. And if you’re in Amazon territory outside the U.S., it is most likely available as well (in English).

The paperback version will follow.

I think you will find the book a quick read. If you consider it worth your time after finishing, I’d love a review on Amazon.

As an additional incentive, I’m including another excerpt below—the chapter on Democracy.

Cheers!

Anders

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Democracy

Perhaps you find the term “democracy” conspicuously absent from the discussion so far except for indirect mentions of “social democrat” and “democratic socialist.” The original meaning of democracy is unlimited majority rule; it is a statist social system where the majority is the ruling collective to which the rights of the individual are subordinated.

Isn’t America a democracy? Yes and no. Constitutionally, the United States is not a democracy. It is a constitutional republic with checks and balances intended to prevent any collective or group, a majority included, from violating the rights to life, liberty, property, and the pursuit of happiness that every one of us has. The framers intended U.S. constitution to protect us against all forms of statism, including unlimited democracy. They knew their history and explicitly tried to avoid the fate of ancient Athens and other Greek city states where democracy descended either into mob rule or totalitarianism—or both.

However, the United States of the past century or so has more and more become a democracy. Statists on both the political left and right have chipped away at the constitutional checks and balances through a combination of legislative and judicial action.

For example, the constitution established election to the U.S. House of Representatives by popular vote every two years and election to the U.S. Senate by the state legislatures every six years, with 1/3 of senators elected every two years. The idea was that the direct “will of the People” would be represented in the House with its shorter terms, and that the Senate would balance this with its indirect election of senators for longer terms. Rash legislative action by the House would be checked by the less-populist Senate.

However, the 17th amendment ratified in 1913 established the direct election of U.S. senators by popular vote. This meant that both the House and the Senate were now elected directly by the people, removing some of the checks that the Senate had previously provided.

Because a popular vote is democratic in nature—the candidate with the most votes wins—the balance tilted towards democracy, opening the door for coordinated majorities to violate individual rights by popular vote. This, together with many other shifts toward more direct democracy over the past 120 years, contributed to paving the way for welfare statist programs such as Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, and the massive regulatory state that we currently live with.

Democracy and welfare statism are not synonymous, but, for the purpose of our discussion, we’re largely aligning them with one another under statism in the illustration:

Copyright © 2020 Anders Ingemarson All Rights Reserved

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If both the political left and right subscribe to welfare statism, where do we find a social system that is an ally of individualism? Is there a social system that leaves you completely in control of your life? A system of limited government protecting and respecting your individual rights? The answer may surprise you.


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