Now you can pick a new religion or choose no religion. You can change jobs. And we�re are becoming so many other things. So how do political parties represent people who are multiple beings, who have more complicated interests and demands than their parents? How can a political party claim to represent the needs of a group that is really fragmented by diversity? If we can change from a blue collar job, why would we want to be associated with the political party that claims to represent blue-collar interests?
Lee Atwater sought to make a �big tent� republican Party, including people who supported abortion rights and people who want to outlaw abortion. At some point the party has to choose, and at that point a large segment of the party no longer feels represented.
This is a heretical idea, but I think we�re going to have to go to a multi-party, proportional representation system. Too many people feel that nobody in the two major political parties represents them. If too many people feel left out, trouble is right around the corner.
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Again, this in not an original thought. I�m not looking in a crystal ball. I�m just looking at history and reading what other people have observed. Toffler published this observation twenty years ago. He pulled the idea from talking to other people who spent time listening to the public and thinking about the future.
So far we�ve been very lucly. We have no idea of how many problems of a social and political nature that have been glossed over by the fact that the economy has been so strong. On National Public Radio today there was a program about women who have been forced off of welfare and found jobs. Was it because Congress enacted welfare reform or was it because of the strong economy?
The answer to most of these types of questions is �Yes.� Both were important in getting women off welfare. Welfare reform pushed people to look for work, but without a strong economy, where would they have found jobs? Just providing training for work doesn�t make the job materialize. In fact, we needed those people to keep this economy expanding.
A lot f the social poltical stress has been absorbed by a strong economy. The crime rate has been dropping. There are any number of explanations for that, but certainly a booming economy contributed to it. Certainly, young people are less interested in hard drugs, especially crack cocaine, and that was a major part of the crime rate. Some of it was demographic. If there are fewr young men in the poupulation, there is less crime. That will change as the boomlet in children get older.
We locked up a lot of people, which took a significant number of people off the streets, thereby cutting crime rate.
Randi�s radio show is on 940 WINZ, Saturday from 7 to 8 p.m.
If you commit three crimes, three strikes and you�re out. What do you have? 70-year-old inmates who committed three break-in-and-entries. |
