At Stardate 20030629.0253, Steve Sloan wrote:
> I think it's rather odd that you have such mistrust of your > government. After all, the people in your government are > there because you *elected* them into those positions. Why > do you vote for people you don't trust?
Because otherwise, we wouldn't have *any* government. You can't trust *anybody* to always be a valuable public servant.
If you don't trust a candidate, why don't you get together with other people who also don't trust that candidate, and bring forth an other candidate from your own ranks, someone you do trust? According to www.census.gov, at this very moment the US has a population of 291,368,325 people; surely you aren't saying that your country is made up of over 291 million untrustworthy people?
Power corrupts, so it's possible for even the nicest, most heroic politician to become corrupt or power-hungry.
True, but of the millions of politicians that have served your country over the centuries, how many have actually been proven corrupt or have been proven to have otherwise abused their powers?
If you work from the basic assumption that nobody can be trusted, you'll turn paranoid. It's always possible that a politician becomes corrupt, but that's why you have checks and balances, and elections. When a politician is suspected of being corrupt, the public will demand that he'll be investigated. If he's found guilty, he'll be convicted and that will be the end of his political career. Even if there only a strong suspicion among the population, his political career will be over at the next elections. That's exactly why politicians are elected for a limited number of years, rather than being appointed for life.
With politicians you have to start with either trusting them to perform well in the position you just voted them into, or at least give them the benefit of the doubt. Should they betray their trust, then they'll be punished for it in the next election.
How would *you* feel if you'd get a management job but nobody in the company would have even the tiniest bit of trust in you? Wouldn't you at least expect to be given the benefit of the doubt?
Further, *anyone* can turn bad, not just politicians. Does that mean you don't trust *anyone* and that you're constantly looking over your shoulder? Can you even trust your own parents?
Can others even trust *you*?
We need safeguards in place to keep it from causing too much damage, when it happens.
If you don't mind me saying so, given what the Bush regime has been doing in the last few years, I get this uncanny feeling that your safeguards aren't working anymore... :-(
> Likewise, I don't believe you speak for all Americans. FREX, > you have stated earlier that Americans are supertolerant, but > I know of a mailing list whose archive is full of examples of > Americans being anything but tolerant towards other Americans > and to non-Americans.
Please don't dredge this old stuff back up, if you want this list to stay pleasant.
It is definitely not my intent to "dredge it back up", I was only using it as an example to show why I don't believe Jan to be speaking for the entire US population.
Jeroen van Baardwijk
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