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In a way I agree with green_meklar that it is a broken education system that rears an ignorant and undereducated population. However, I don't think that the government actually tries to do this; it just is a hopeless failure at fixing the education system.
It would be nice to think so. But unfortunately, as we know, the government has a lot to gain from keeping people stupid and ignorant. Additionally, there are some very good education systems which the government has failed to address for decades, despite overwhelming statistical evidence for their effectiveness.
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Bush didn't do much good to the school with the No Child Left Behind Act, but he didn't hurt them much either, and it was clear that he personally did care about the schools.
Maybe that's exactly what he wants you to think. This is the problem with believing stuff like this: What if someone wants you to believe that for their own twisted agenda, and you just don't know it? I'm sure there are lots of other things politicians have 'personally cared' about but which never really got fixed.
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Every other year a crackpot scientific article is published alleging that while America students fail in comparison to, for example, Japanese students in any standardized measure of test, American students are "more creative", "under less pressure", and "have higher self-esteem".
Again, where are these reports coming from? Someone has to be paying for them to be written up and published, which means someone with lots of money has something to gain from publishing BS. Whether it's the government or some set of sadistic corporations, we can tell all is not right with the world, so to speak.
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So if the democratic system in America is failing, then what shall we resort to? Communism? Anarchy?
Communism is an economic system rather than a political system, so it is not relevant in deciding what we should change representative democracy into. Personally, I would suggest starting towards meritocracy. At the very least, knowledgeable, intelligent people should get more votes than ignorant, stupid people. If this isn't enough, we should probably go beyond voting completely and just put society's most intelligent (and moral) people in positions of power, based on psychological tests rather than votes from the general public.
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And if the people here are stupid, then my what are we going to do? Shoot them all? Deport them to another country? Spend billions of dollars trying to make education stricter, thus making school not enjoyable but excruciating?
Making education stricter is not necessarily a result of improving it. There are many things that could be done to educate people without harming them.
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Oh that's right, our rights! We're being deprived of our daily rights everyday aren't we? So that means journalists and newsreporters are being controlled by the government and are not free to say whatever they desire to say? Oh and all the Churches, Synagogues, and temples here; are they being shut down by our Government? Is our government forcing religion/secularism upon us?
The media being allowed to say whatever it likes? Well sure, of course it's allowed to say whatever it likes. And what it likes to say is what people with money and agendas pay it to say.
Religious organizations being shut down? On the contrary, they're being allowed to stand around pretty much untaxed while all other organizations have to pay the government to remain in existence. If anything, the government is biased
towards religion.
Forcing religion on us? They're coming close enough. From what I've heard, government officials and court witnesses in the United States both still have to swear somethingorother 'under God'. And of course, there's all this teaching creationism in schools nonsense.
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0. Voter apathy is a problem because it means when, for example in the UK's last General Election, that the turnout was about 60% and 50% of them voted for the Labour party, that only 30% of the electorate voted the ruling party in.
No, they did it with the help of all those people who decided the Labor Party wasn't bad enough to vote against.
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2. It might not be truly Libertarian, but it is far more so than it has been in the past. I don't see any mass movements for nudism, for example.
Uh...what? How is that
not an example to the
contrary?QUOTE
3. I disagree - perhaps in the US it's like that, but not here. Besides, I'm sure that a biased media encourages voter cynicism anyway, unless the electorate is composed of morons (which is perhaps the problem).
It's part of the problem, anyway.