Once Upon A Time ...

[Cyrano]

... a totally unthinking, amoral, ignorant man got to be "The Leader." And as you can imagine, things didn’t turn out well.

Those who possessed much didn’t mind since they got to possess a whole lot more. But as the suffering of the peasants grew, few grasped the fact that it was "The Leader" and his henchmen who were to blame for their lot in life.

This “Once Upon A Time” has happened far too often in the tragic history of the human species. But after millennia of oppression, who could have imagined that so many wouldn’t have grasped this ongoing con game that continues until this very minute?

Don’t the peasants ever learn? Are there never enough human beings who “get it” and are willing to do something about it? Are we forever destined to submit to the whims of would-be opportunists, tyrants and madmen?

Every once in a while, a knight on a white horse comes along to save us from the destiny of our own ignorance. But all too quickly, the knight is gone and a new tyrant is once again pillaging, plundering, and perhaps engaging in some modern-day definition of a “final solution.”

Today, we are looking forward to “salvation” in this November’s election. Perhaps it will come about, perhaps not. But what will happen four, eight, or twelve years after that?

I fear we will all too quickly lose sight of the ultimate goal. And here’s my definition of that goal:

“Once upon a time, human beings learned to recognize the difference between leaders and tyrants. And they discovered that neither was necessary. All that was needed was a populace that was educated, intelligent, empathetic, curious, dedicated to knowledge, and with an absolute determination to protect and endorse free thought.”

[FlyingSquirrel]

1. I am afraid this will sink like a stone, but I'll kick it once

(and you're probably preaching to the choir, with the possible exception of some battlers in GDP who have temporarily lost all sight of reason - so easy to get sucked in and get tunnel vision.)

[Cyrano]

3. Thank you, FlyingSquirrel. I've done many posts like this that have

"sunk like stones." But I'd rather that one or two people who "get it" read it. To me, it's preferable to two or three hundred K&R posts that people respond to because others responded to it.

Put another way, quality trumps quantity every time. (Jeez, did that sound arrogant, or what?)

[Selatius]

2. Our population is drugged up and propagandized to the point of ignorance.

A democracy cannot long endure when people are uninformed to make major decisions.