The Matrix

We live in a broken political system. Sure, there is room to discuss to what degree the system is broken, but it is still broken nonetheless. One of the contributing factors to this is that many people don’t know this simple truth. Many people don’t think about politics on a day to day basis. They don’t think about how the government operates and what they do, and some even go to great lengths to protect the broken aspects of our political system. In many ways, it is like the movie the Matrix. Many people live in essentially total ignorance of the political system we are a part of, just batteries to machine overlords. Some people even go a step further to defend their position as batteries.

The Electoral College is a good example of broken relic still present in our political system. The Electoral College of course could be the subject of many blog posts, nethertheless it serves as a good example. Does it make sense that an individual's vote in Wyoming is worth 3.6 (source) times more than the vote of someone in California? No. All votes should be counted equal, this is a fundamental principle of democracy. Now there are potentially many criticisms to what I just said. Some assert the electoral college was an important addition by the founding fathers as a protection against the (unrestrained) will of the people. Not to ad hominem here, but the founding fathers also allowed slavery to exist, which clearly conflicts with the ideals of democracy. I think the argument that the founding fathers wanted this nation to be a republic governed by white landowners is a poor excuse to keep such an archaic voting system in place.

Some people seem to enjoy fighting on the wrong side of the field, and I can understand that. After all, this blog fights against a lot of current establishment. Some people took it upon themselves to argue along side of the ISP in the battle of net neutrality. And, sure, the argument that the free market should rein can be a good one, but not when it would give ISP monopolistic power over what truly is a utility, which for me, is nearly on par with electricity. (After all, if I had no internet, what would I even do with my electricity?) The influence that large corporations have in politics is truly frightening at times. Surely we will talk about Citizens United, but not in this post.

A final point to look at is global warming. The climate is changing, that is a fact. There may be some legitimate discussion about how much of this change is manmade, and how much is nature (Google Milankovitch Cycles), but ultimately, there are two sides of the debate. Science on one side, warning humanity of the path it is on, and big oil on the other, which makes money today buy killing tomorrow. Sure, big oil tycoons may destroy the Earth, but that will be the problem from another generation to deal with. What confuses me most is the ordinary people that side with big oil. I mean, sure, it may be tempting to be a shill if I were to be paid, but some people seem to be willing to do it for free. It simply amazes me.