Democracy is THE Isuue in 2008

1/14/2008

With the primaries and election campaigns dominating the news I feel that the time is ripe for us as a society to critically analyze our system. We pride ourselves for being a democracy and yet we suffer from one of the lowest voter turnout rates of any democracy in the "developed" world. It seems ever more difficult to consider our system a democracy when candidates are required to raise millions of private dollars just to gain access to the mainstream media. How democratic is our system when the corporately owned networks, like NBC and Fox, can decide which candidates will and will not be invited to television debates? Keep in mind that these are our publicly owned airwaves and merely licensed to private companies so long as they provide public service.

I would strongly urge citizens who respect democracy to demand free and fair access to the airwaves for all candidates. Not just in the primaries, but also for the general elections, where both major parties as well as minor parties and independents will be running. Perhaps a correlation can be drawn between the political apathy among nearly half of the population who does not vote and the general feeling that the two parties are essentially the same and the election turnout will not effect our daily lives. Common sense leads me to believe that more options can only make democracy stronger by increasing participation. The status quo is and always has been in the interest of those who benefit the most from it.

There is a lot of vague talk about change this year with an incumbent-free presidential election, but I'm not hearing the voices of the candidates that actually plan to change things. Discussion and debate are healthy and indeed an essential part of a democratic system. When the debate is controlled and limited, so too is democracy. The beauty of the American democratic system has been it's ability to protect the minority from the tyranny of the majority... but I would strongly argue that modern media has flipped the coin and subjected the vast majority to the tyranny of a very small minority of power-elites. So, in the name of democracy, please consider contacting the FCC, the networks and your congressional representatives to demand equal media access for candidates. It can only expand the discussion of the issues that we are all facing collectively in 2008 and help to heal our wounded democracy.