----- Original Message ----- > From: "Andy Driscoll" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > > Short of a ban, no business that allows smoking can protect employees from > second-hand smoke. > > Libertarians want no "government" intrusion into private lives. > "Government" is us. > > We are the government. That is the truism that separates us from many > other systems, including the dictatorships the current administration is > committed to supplanting with "our" form of "democracy." I won't go > there on this list, except to note irony in this argument against > "government" - which, in a democratic republic, is representative of > the majority of those voting.
Which is true, but it doesn't necessarily follow that government--"we" or not--should intrude into the individual lives of its citizens. A majority can tyrannize just as easily as a dictator and often does. Add to that, since leading the way to democratic government for large nations, America has fallen behind in the degree to which its democratic government is truly representative. We've cleaned up some glaring inequities, but we are still burdened by the arcane electoral college; we elect our highest national office state-by-state instead of a nationwide popular election; the two-party system has become a burden enforced by the lack of instant-run-off voting; the judiciary is mostly appointed; and a second bad aspect of the two-party system means we end up voting for personalities instead of issues. I happen to think, for the reasons I've already posted to this forum, that a workplace free of the risk of cancer and heart disease should be enforced by law, but not because the "we" of government in a limited representative democracy can do no wrong. Guy Western the West Side _____________________________________________ NEW ADDRESS FOR LIST: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To subscribe, modify subscription, or get your password - visit: http://www.mnforum.org/mailman/listinfo/stpaul Archive Address: http://www.mnforum.org/mailman/private/stpaul/
