Removing Tyranny from Democracy (Part II), was Democracy is thetrue enemy...

Many, beginning with de Toquivelle, have noted that democracy brings with
it the unhappy possibility of a tyranny of the majority.  The reasons for
this shortcoming are closely tied to the decision of whom within the
democracy receives the franchise and how in a representative democracy
officeholders are elected.

Our elections are corrupted by bribery - not the big money paid to
candidates by corporate donors, but the taxpayers' money offered to voters
by the candidates themselves.

For some reason, campaign finance reform always centers on private money,
as if it were perfectly OK to use public money to buy elections. Yet
critics of democracy, including friendly critics, have always pointed out
that the Achilles' heel of democracy is its tendency to turn the ballot box
into an instrument of plunder, as voters learn to vote for those who
promise them other people's money.

One of the justifications for democracy is that everyone's interest should
be represented in government. But there are interests and interests. The
homeowner who locks his door is looking out for his own interest just as
much as the burglar who picks the lock, but not exactly in the same way.
The voter who wants to keep his own money isn't seeking the same thing as
the voter who wants the state to give him someone else's money.

The darkest warnings of democracy's critics are being furfilled, precisely
because of entitlement programs that already exist, which are driving the
federal government into an abyss of debt.  Touching the big entitlement
programs - the ones available to the middle class - is "political suicide."
The president exploits this fact when he plays chicken with Republicans who
want to reform those programs. All of which shows that we really know that
democracy's critics were right. Too many voters are already bought - not by
corporate campaign donors, but by the government itself. Worst of all, we
accept this as normal, healthy politics even as it threatens to ruin us.

Curbing private spending is a superficial reform that may even backfire
eliminating the equalizing power of private money thereby increasing the
advantages of incumbency. The only reform that could really help would be
to curb the buying of votes with government money. That means following the
counsel of the philosopher John Stuart Mill, and limiting the franchise to
taxpayers who don't get income from the government.

This means that if you receive money from the federal (or state, or local)
government, you shouldn't be allowed to vote in the next federal (or state,
or local) election. This is no more an insult to the voter than dismissal
cause is an insult to a prospective juror. It's a precaution in the
interest protecting the integrity of the electoral process - and a
precaution we should have taken long ago, before fiscal responsibility
became "political suicide."

FYI, SS is quoting from a new book that I have mentioned on this
list on a prior date.


>Our elections are corrupted by bribery - not the big money paid to
>candidates by corporate donors, but the taxpayers' money offered to voters
>by the candidates themselves.

our elections are also corrupted by the fact that voters are not
expending any significant effort to decide whom to vote for. they
watch tv, and if an advertisement pushes their buttons in the right
way, it affects their vote.

another possibility in reforming our system is changing it away
from a *republic* in which we elect senators and representatives
to a true democracy. it is easier to bribe politicians than it
is to bribe the public in my opinion. in fact, that's what we
need, someone that bribes the public-at-large instead of smaller
constituencies to get elected. a single senator can be bribed,
but bribing the entire population is like ultimately serving them.

consider that products sold for less money are in a way a kind
of "bribe" on the public. (a coarse word to use here). but the
products are trying to buy favoritism. I propose this is mostly
a problem only when they are appealing to narrow audiences.
for example, a bill that supports only timber cutters is a 
small constituency, susceptible to bribery. a bill that benefits
the entire nation is contrary to this.

>The darkest warnings of democracy's critics are being furfilled, precisely
>because of entitlement programs that already exist, which are driving the
>federal government into an abyss of debt.  Touching the big entitlement
>programs - the ones available to the middle class - is "political suicide."
>The president exploits this fact when he plays chicken with Republicans who
>want to reform those programs. All of which shows that we really know that
>democracy's critics were right. Too many voters are already bought - not by
>corporate campaign donors, but by the government itself. Worst of all, we
>accept this as normal, healthy politics even as it threatens to ruin us.

the public needs to eventually learn that for every dollar they send
to washington, they get only a fraction back, no matter how lucrative
their own pork. the problem with our
politics is that voters have not realized that they are almost always
cheating themselves when they try to cheat their neighbors. it's a shell
game that they keep playing as long as they think someone else is paying.

I don't believe there are intrinsic flaws in democracy, so much as
there are intrinsic flaws in *human*nature* that are coming to light
after decades. government is a reflection of our human natures.
one cannot really expect a government to correct the flaws of its
users, any more than software could do the same.

On Mon, 8 Sep 1997, Vladimir Z. Nuri wrote:

> our elections are also corrupted by the fact that voters are not
> expending any significant effort to decide whom to vote for. they
> watch tv, and if an advertisement pushes their buttons in the right
> way, it affects their vote.

After the current elections, we ended up with a more complex tax code, a
new entitlement, more budget sophistry, increased spending, less
soverignity, etc.

Assuming a 50 member difference in the house either way (and a similar
proportion in the Senate, or Beltway Bob instead of Beltway Bill), would
any of these things be substantially different?

And those that expended effort in things like ballot initiatives only saw
them overturned by the courts.

I can expend all the effort I want, but nothing will change.  Most people
have figured this out and don't bother voting.  The ones who do vote
simply vote for the one who promises them the most visible subsidy since
for little effort, they might get a benefit.

The corruption derives exclusively from the ability of government to
redistribute wealth.  As soon as it does this to any degree, the logical
thing to expend effort on is getting a greater share of the transfer.

If I vote to deny myself, everyone else gets the benefit.

You might disagree with the results, but I think greed, sloth, and
corruption are perfectly representative of those who vote - democracy
still works in that way.

> the public needs to eventually learn that for every dollar they send
> to washington, they get only a fraction back, no matter how lucrative
> their own pork. the problem with our
> politics is that voters have not realized that they are almost always
> cheating themselves when they try to cheat their neighbors. it's a shell
> game that they keep playing as long as they think someone else is paying.

David Freedman described this perfectly (my paraphrase from memory):

100 people sit around the table with 100 pennies each.  Someone starts
with the first and takes a single penny from each and dumps 50 back at the
first person.  This process is repeated for each person.  Everyone ends up
with half the wealth, but are happy because the 50 cents in bulk is easier
to spot than the single pennies being removed.

Except for Harry Browne who asked would you give up your favorite subsidy
if it meant you never had to pay taxes again, the tax cuts are separated
from the subsidies.  If the recipient lobbys for the subsidy, he gets
$500, but if I get it cut, I may save $0.50.  A few beneficiaries will do
whatever it takes because it is many times more important to them to have
the subsidy than the millions who would have to pay more for postage or
the phone call to oppose it than they do in taxes for that one program. 

You learn that it costs far more to prevent spending than to lobby for
your own share.  It is not a problem with politics, but with any system
that has concentrated benefits but dispersed costs.

[and that is why the internet is such a threat to our current way of doing
things - it disperses everything making it impossible to concentrate
benefits - routing around political subsidies as it does everything else.]

With tax rates going up (a concentrated cost), the money is coming from
the unborn generations who will have to pay back the principle on the long
term debt.  They don't vote - and when they do it will be too late to do
anything about it - which may be now. 

> I don't believe there are intrinsic flaws in democracy, so much as
> there are intrinsic flaws in *human*nature* that are coming to light
> after decades. government is a reflection of our human natures.
> one cannot really expect a government to correct the flaws of its
> users, any more than software could do the same.

But then the question is whether democracy (which needs more definition) 
is the best system to compensate for the flaws.  For example: Markets turn
selfishness to utility.  What virtue is promoted or vice limited or
converted by democracy per se?

--- reply to tzeruch - at - ceddec - dot - com ---

> the public needs to eventually learn that for every dollar they send
> to washington, they get only a fraction back, no matter how lucrative
> their own pork. the problem with our
> politics is that voters have not realized that they are almost always
> cheating themselves when they try to cheat their neighbors. it's a shell
> game that they keep playing as long as they think someone else is paying.

Agreed.

> I don't believe there are intrinsic flaws in democracy, so much as
> there are intrinsic flaws in *human*nature* that are coming to light
> after decades. government is a reflection of our human natures.
> one cannot really expect a government to correct the flaws of its
> users, any more than software could do the same.

No intrinsic flaws in democracy? 

Surely you jest. 

Democracy is 2 wolves and a sheep getting together to decide what's for 
lunch.

Please feel free to peruse Article 4, section for of the U.S. Constitution 
at http://www.geocities.com/CapitolHill/7500/const.htm#cIV4 
The authors of this document "guarantee" only one thing, that is a 
republican form of government. When I hear congresscritters and media 
whores singing the praises of "democracy", I want to puke.


---------------End of Original Message-----------------

------------------------
Name: amp
E-mail: amp@pobox.com
Date: 09/09/97
Time: 09:26:22
Visit me at http://www.pobox.com/~amp
==
     -export-a-crypto-system-sig -RSA-3-lines-PERL
#!/bin/perl -sp0777i<X+d*lMLa^*lN%0]dsXx++lMlN/dsM0<j]dsj
$/=unpack('H*',$_);$_=`echo 16dio\U$k"SK$/SM$n\EsN0p[lN*1
lK[d2%Sa2/d0$^Ixp"|dc`;s/\W//g;$_=pack('H*',/((..)*)$/)
==

'Drug Trafficking Offense' is the root passphrase to the Constitution.

Have you seen 
http://www.public-action.com/SkyWriter/WacoMuseum
------------------------

On Sun, 7 Sep 1997, Steve Schear wrote:

> Many, beginning with de Toquivelle, have noted that democracy brings with
> it the unhappy possibility of a tyranny of the majority.  The reasons for
> this shortcoming are closely tied to the decision of whom within the
> democracy receives the franchise and how in a representative democracy
> officeholders are elected.

I don't think it is so much of the franchise as to the problem of whoever
the enfranchised are voting themselves largess at the public trough (also
noting how few of the franchised actually exercise the right today).  If
no one would consider voting for subsidies, the country is safe.  As soon
as the first subsidy is passed, a mob will form to lobby for a similar one
to benefit them.  This will occur even if the enfranchised group is small
- absolute power corrupts absolutely, even when it is every citizen who
can wield it, or an oligarchy.

Moreover, property ownership does not make for any better selection except
that it is probable that one of your ancestors had to acquire wealth.
Then the property owners simply vote to prevent transfer of property or
some other means of freezing the franchise, and can still cause all the
problems of tyranny.

It would be preferable that everyone wanting to vote have to pass a test
which had as a major component the fate of all democracies that use
majority power to destroy minority rights and to vote themselves
subsidies.  At this point, the democratic right to commit societial
suicide at least becomes an informed decision.

Democracy is as tyrannical as any other system if rights aren't respected.
In those cases where limited government might have to make a decision
concerning all, and there is time to debate the issue, democracy (either
representative or direct) is the most just method.

> The darkest warnings of democracy's critics are being furfilled, precisely
> because of entitlement programs that already exist, which are driving the
> federal government into an abyss of debt.  Touching the big entitlement
> programs - the ones available to the middle class - is "political suicide."

You should finish the story (or is there a Part III coming out)...

Democracies bankrupt themselves because this voting of largess eventually
turns into a pyramid scheme that collapses when there is no one left
creating wealth, only those trying to redistribute it.  After wealth can
no longer be distributed, the attempt is made to transfer more power to
government (because they can't believe that the reason for the problem is
their own greed - it must be the Jews, Corporations, Immigrants, Right
Wing Radicals, Gold Hoarders - pick your favorite group). 

And we end up back with a tyranny - from a totalitarian democracy, to a
dictatorship when everything breaks down.

All it will take is one stock market crash (read: correction that restores
dividend yields and price-to-book values to historic normalcy) - and the
following recession to bankrupt the pay-as-you-go government (watch for
20%+ interest rates on government securities during a deflation!).  The
unemployed riot demanding something other than scrip and seinors refuse to
pay taxes unless their social security is in cash - volia, we have
marshall law.  Remember what Roosevelt got away with before the current
method of expressing displeasure - burning your city to the ground -
became popular.

Probably before the congress is through investigating the campaign
irregularities in the 1996 elections.

--- reply to tzeruch - at - ceddec - dot - com ---

At 12:54 PM -0700 9/8/97, Vladimir Z. Nuri wrote:
>FYI, SS is quoting from a new book that I have mentioned on this
>list on a prior date.

Part II wasn't quoted from Soverign Individual.

--Steve

>At 6:16 PM -0400 9/8/97, nospam-seesignature@ceddec.com wrote:
>On Sun, 7 Sep 1997, Steve Schear wrote:
>
>> Many, beginning with de Toquivelle, have noted that democracy brings with
>> it the unhappy possibility of a tyranny of the majority.  The reasons for
>> this shortcoming are closely tied to the decision of whom within the
>> democracy receives the franchise and how in a representative democracy
>> officeholders are elected.
>
>I don't think it is so much of the franchise as to the problem of whoever
>the enfranchised are voting themselves largess at the public trough (also
>noting how few of the franchised actually exercise the right today).  If
>no one would consider voting for subsidies, the country is safe.  As soon
>as the first subsidy is passed, a mob will form to lobby for a similar one
>to benefit them.  This will occur even if the enfranchised group is small
>- absolute power corrupts absolutely, even when it is every citizen who
>can wield it, or an oligarchy.

Your mention of oligarchy helps introduce Part III, which like Part I is
excerpted from the Soverign Individual.

--------------------

The conventional way to treating the role of democracy assumes that it
brings violence-using and violence-producing enterprises "increasingly
under the control of their customers. This is certainly the politically
correct conclusion. But is it true?

...democratic governments typically spend only a bare fraction of their
total outlays on the service of protection, which is their core activity.
In the United States, for example, state and local governments spend just
3.5 percent of their total outlays on the provision of police, as well as
courts and prisons. Add military spending, and the fraction of revenues
devoted to protection is still only about 10 percent.

Most democracies run chronic deficits. This is a fiscal policy
characteristic of control by employees. Governments seem notably resistant
to reducing the costs of their operations. An almost universal complaint
about contemporary government worldwide is that political programs, once
established, can be curtailed only with great difficulty.

...you would look in vain for hints of competitive influences on tax rates
according to which government services are priced. Advocates of lower taxes
sometimes have argued that government revenues would actually increase
because rates previously had been set so high that they discouraged
economic activity.  They did not argue that because tax rates in Hong Kong
were only 15 percent, rates in the United States or Germany must be no
higher than 15 percent. To the contrary. Tax debates have normally assumed
that the trade-off facing the taxpayer was not between doing business in
one jurisdiction or doing it in another, but between doing business at
penal rates or taking a holiday. You were told that productive individuals
subject to predatory taxation would walk away from their in-boxes and go
golfing if their tax burdens were not eased.

Customers would scream bloody murder if a telephone company attempted to
charge for calls on the same basis that income taxes are imposed. Suppose
the phone company sent a bill for $50,000 for a call to London, just
because you happened to conclude a deal worth $125,000 during a
conversation. Neither you nor any other customer in his right mind would
pay it. But that is exactly the basis upon which income taxes are assessed
in every democratic welfare state.

Government in many respects appears to be run for the benefit of employees.
For example, government schools in most democratic countries seem to
malfunction chronically and without remedy. If customers truly were in the
driver's seat, they would find it easier to set new policy directions.
Those who pay for democratic government seldom set the terms of government
spending. Instead, government functions as a co-op that is both outside of
proprietary control and operating as a natural monopoly. Prices bear little
relation to costs. The quality of service is generally low compared to that
in private enterprise. Customer grievances are hard to remedy. In short,
mass democracy leads to control of government by its "employees."

But wait...there are many more voters than there are persons on the
government payroll. How could it be possible for employees to dominate
under such conditions? The welfare state emerged to answer exactly this
quandary. Since there were not otherwise enough employees to create a
working majority, increasing numbers of voters were effectively put on the
payroll to receive transfer payments of all kinds. In effect, the
recipients of transfer payments and subsidies became pseudogovernment
employees who were able to dispense with the bother of reporting every day
to work.

When the magnitude of coercive force is more important than the efficient
deployment of resources, as was the case prior to 1989, it is all but
impossible for most governments to be controlled by their customers. When
returns to violence are high and rising, magnitude means more than
efficiency. Larger entities tend to prevail over smaller ones.

How did inefficiency fostered by democracy become a factor in its success
during the Age of Violence? The key to unraveling this apparent paradox
lies in recognizing two points:

1. Success for a sovereignty in the modern period lay not in creating
wealth but in creating a military force capable of deploying overpowering
violence against any other state. Money was needed to do that, but money
itself could not win a battle. The challenge was not to create a system
with the most efficient economy or the most rapid rate of growth, but to
create a system that could extract more resources and channel them into the
military. By its nature, military spending is an area where the financial
returns per se are low or nonexistent.

2. The easiest way to obtain permission to invest funds in activities with
little or no direct financial return, like tax payments, is to ask for
permission from someone other than the person whose money is coveted. One
of the ways that the Dutch were able to purchase Manhattan for twenty-three
dollars' worth of beads is that the particular Indians to whom they made
the offer were not the ones who properly owned it. "Getting to yes," as the
marketing people say, is much easier under those terms.... In fact, we
would be far more persuasive if we could rely instead upon the consent of
several people you do not even know. We could hold an ad hoc election, what
H. L. Mencken described, with less exaggeration than he might have thought,
as "an advanced auction of stolen goods." And to make the example more
realistic, we would agree to share some of the money we collected from you
with these anonymous bystanders in exchange for their support.


Why Customers Could Not Dominate

Those who paid for "protection" during the modern period were not in a
position to successfully deny resources to the sovereign, even acting
collectively, when doing so would simply have exposed them to being
overpowered by other, possibly more hostile states. This was an obvious
consideration during the Cold War. The customers, or taxpayers, who bore a
disproportionate share of the cost of government in the leading Western
industrial states were in no position to refuse to pay hefty taxes. The
result would have been to expose themselves to total confiscation by the
Soviet Union or another aggressive group capable of organizing violence.

Industrialism and Democracy

In 1760, the Polish national army comprised eighteen thousand soldiers.
This was a meager force compared to the armies commanded by rulers of
neighboring Austria, Prussia, and Russia, the least of whom could control a
standing army of 100,000 soldiers. In fact, the Polish national army in
1760 was small even in comparison with other units under arms within
Poland. The combined forces of the Polish nobility were thirty thousand men.

If the Polish king had been able to interact directly with millions of
individual Poles and tax them directly, rather than being limited to
extracting resources indirectly through the contributions of the powerful
Polish magnates, there is little doubt that the Polish central government
would have been in a position to raise far more revenues, and thus pay for
a larger army.

...the military disadvantage of failing to circumvent the wealthy and
powerful in gathering resources was decisive in the Age of Violence. Within
a few years, Poland ceased to exist as an independent country. It was
conquered by invasions from Austria, Prussia, and Russia, three countries
with armies each of which was many times bigger than Poland's small force.
In each of those countries, the rulers had found paths to circumvent the
capacity of the wealthy merchants and the nobility to limit the
commandeering of their resources.

During the Industrial Age prior to (the fall of the Belin Wall), democracy
emerged as the most militarily effective form of government precisely
because democracy made it difficult or impossible to impose effective
limits on the commandeering of resources by the state. Not only did
(citizens) face the aggressive menace of Communist systems, which could
produce large resources for military purposes since the state controlled
the entire economy. But true taxpayer control of government was also
impractical for another reason.

Millions of average citizens cannot work together effectively to protect
their interests. Because the obstacles to their cooperation are high, and
the return to any individual for successfully defending the group's common
interests is minimal, millions of ordinary citizens will not be as
successful in withholding their assets from the government as will smaller
groups with more favorable incentives.

Other things being equal, therefore, you would expect a higher proportion
of total resources to be commandeered by government in a mass democracy
than in an oligarchy, or in a system of fragmented sovereignty where
magnates wielded military power and fielded their own armies, as they did
everywhere in early-modern Europe prior to the eighteenth century.

Thus a crucial though seldom examined reason for the growth of democracy in
the Western world is the relative importance of negotiation costs at a time
when returns to violence were rising. It was always costlier to draw
resources from the few than from the many.

A relatively small, elite group of rich represent a more coherent and
effective body than a large mass of citizens. The small group has stronger
incentives to work together. It will almost inevitably be more effective at
protecting its interests than will a mass group. And even if most members
of the group choose not to cooperate with any common action, a few who are
rich may be capable of deploying enough resources to get the job done.

To summarize, the democratic nation-state succeeded during the past two
centuries for these hidden reasons:

1. There were rising returns to violence that made magnitude of force more
important than efficiency as a governing principle.

2. Incomes rose sufficiently above subsistence that it became possible for
the state to collect large amounts of total resources without having to
negotiate with powerful magnates who were capable of resisting.

3. Democracy proved sufficiently compatible with the operation of free
markets to be conducive to the generation of increasing amounts of wealth.

4. Democracy facilitated domination of government by its "employees,"
thereby assuring that it would be difficult to curtail expenditures,
including military expenditures.

5. Democracy as a decision-rule proved to be an effective antidote to the
ability of the wealthy to act in concert to restrict the nation-state's
ability to tax or otherwise protect their assets from invasion.

Democracy became the militarily winning strategy because it facilitated the
gathering of more resources into the hands of the state. Compared to other
styles of sovereignty that depended for their legitimacy on other
principles, such as the feudal levy, the divine right of kings, corporate
religious duty, or the voluntary contributions of the rich, mass democracy
became militarily the most potent because it was the surest way to gather
resources in an industrial economy.