Democracy Now: Kevin Phillips on Roots of American Revolution, Future of American Politics

Source:FreeState Now

When you think of the United States of America, you think of a government that has separation of powers and checks and balances. And why is that, because the United States was founded on the notions that absolute power corrupts absolutely. Because America broke away from the United Kingdom of Britain. That had a king who was essentially a dictator and Americans for the most part are suspicious of centralized power. And having so much power in the hands of one government. One branch of government and most importantly, one person like a dictator. Whatever the title of the dictator is. We are a constitutional federal republic in the form of a liberal democracy. We are governed by our Constitution. Not by a Bible, or any other religious book. Which are some of the differences between a liberal democracy like America and a Theocracy like the Islamic Republic of Iran.

Because we are a liberal democracy, Americans have a lot of freedom and responsibility. Including a constitutional right to practice religion, any religion we want to practice. We also have the freedom not to practice religion if we choose to. But because we are a liberal democracy, we are not governed by religion. But our Constitution which is one thing that makes us different from Iran. We don’t have a central government religious, or otherwise, telling us what we can have and can’t have and how much of it that we can have. With a central government responsible for seeing that we get what we need and how much of that we can get. The Far-Right of the Republican Party, the Christian-Right, doesn’t like the Islamic Republic of Iran. But they like at least certain parts of their system. That their government is governed by religious views and policy. And would bring that to America, if only they could.

But again, what makes America better and different from Iran, or at least one thing, is that we aren’t govern by religion. Because our Religious, or Theocratic-Right, simply doesn’t have the numbers that it has in Iran, or Saudi Arabia, or several other countries in the Middle East and Central Asia. Richard Nixon’s Southern Strategy, was successful in bringing the South to the Republican Party and with it the Religious-Right. And people who want Christianity to become the official religion of the United States and for us to be governed by their views of the Bible and everything else. But again, the Religious-Right, is a large faction of one political party. That is losing numbers in the country and perhaps even in the GOP. Especially with the GOP’s growing Conservative Libertarian wing. And Christian Conservatives, will never have the success n America, that the Islamists had in Iran.