Is there still a common good?

[kpete]

Last edited Sun Jan 9, 2022, 10:20 AM - Edit history (1)

ROBERT REICH:
Is there still a common good?
Yes. And I'll tell you where to find it, and how to preserve it

We’ve gone through the shameful first anniversary of the attack on the U.S. Capitol and of the refusal of 147 members of Congress (all Republicans) to certify all the electors from states that voted for Biden, on the basis of no evidence of fraud. So far, no political figure has been charged with any criminal wrongdoing. We’ve seen 34 voter-suppression bills enacted by 19 Republican state legislatures; at least 8 give state legislatures the power to disregard election outcomes. More than 400 additional voter suppression measures are now being prepared. And we are now witnessing a struggle in the Senate to reform the filibuster so that voting rights legislation can be enacted. All of which raises a basic question: Is there still a common good?

.................

Our central obligation as citizens is to preserve, fortify, and protect our democratic form of government. We must defend the right to vote and ensure that more citizens are heard, not fewer. We must require that presidents be elected by the will of the people, and prevent political parties and state legislatures from disregarding the popular vote. We must get big money out of politics so the moneyed interests don’t have more political power than the rest of us.

Democracy doesn’t require us to agree. It requires us to agree only on preserving and protecting democracy. This meta-agreement is the essence of the common good.

Those now attacking American democracy are attacking the common good that binds us together. They are attacking America.
...........

MORE:
https://robertreich.substack.com/p/common-good?token=eyJ1c2VyX2lkIjo2OTk1NDIsInBvc3RfaWQiOjQ2NzgyOTc4LCJfIjoiTk1OSU8iLCJpYXQiOjE2NDE2NDcyMzIsImV4cCI6MTY0MTY1MDgzMiwiaXNzIjoicHViLTM2NTQyMiIsInN1YiI6InBvc3QtcmVhY3Rpb24ifQ.AiAjsWJEJbk_AAzUoMsA1BAPpfqJjyJbcSdnqm4QQQA

[bucolic_frolic]

1. I wanna believe

but life has become so transactional. Even Republicans who are willing to share the wealth believe the common good to be a summation of individual private interests. They barely believe in regulating commerce.

[Freddie]

2. I can just hear the morons now

“We have a republic not a democracy!”

[rampartc]

3. "two wolves and a lamb voting on the lunch menu"

these guys are ridiculous.

[Martin Eden]

5. two wolves and three lambs

but the wolves have more votes in the electoral college

[Klaralven]

4. The US has always been a stew of competing interests

The melting pot has always been full of lumps instead of a uniform alloy.

[Martin Eden]

6. The common good is intrinsic, but ...

... unfortunately it is not acknowledged or embraced by enough people to make a difference.

[Firestorm49]

7. And then there was "We the People"

[Irish_Dem]

8. The GOP is destroying the social contract and common good.

It is about preserving and increasing their power and wealth.