Be the Change, and a bit on Democracy

I cannot imagine the horror our fellow citizens experienced in Tucson this weekend.

We must continue to offer prayer for the families and most importantly, for our nation.

Ringing in my head all weekend were the words of President Kennedy…”ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country.”

This quote brought home for me an unfortunate, but expected, result from all of the hate speech, political vitriol and intolerance our country is inundated with right now.

We can’t be surprised at this outcome, nor can we blindly declare that no one is to blame for seeding this type of behavior.
We must take responsibility for where we are as a country right now, and we need to take drastic steps to put an end to all of this madness that is crippling our country.

I was recently accused of not knowing that we live in a republic and not a democracy.

I say this—granted, the primary definition of the term ‘republic,’ in most contexts today, means a system of government which gets its power from the people rather than some other form (i.e. heredity or by divine right) of governing.

But in all my years of interest in our government and the activities of our elected leaders, the only time I have heard that we live in a ‘republic’ was during the Pledge of Allegiance and over the last two years when newly identified political factions were expressing their resentment for the new administration.
But being referred to as a democracy is the most common and widely used term to describe our nation.

Anyway, didn’t we go to war in the Middle East to establish ‘democratic’ forms of government? I don’t recall the battle cry being “we are going to help these countries become a ‘republic.’

The people of the United States live under the ‘political’ form of government known as a democracy, guided by our Christian values and operating on the consensus of ‘all’ citizens having equality before the law.

We are therefore allowed to participate in the democratic election of our representatives and democratically agree that, in good sporting fashion, we accept that a legally voted into power winner is in fact the winner, and can do his/her job for the assigned periods they are to govern without the threat of death.

Yes we live in a democracy and a vast majority of the world’s governments identify themselves as democracies as well.
Are there things we could change to make our country better? You bet there are.

Can we bring about the change with good old fashioned debate and respect for ideas and human life? I’d like to think we can.