Armistice 110610

It's a little early to commemorate the eleventh month, eleventh day, eleventh hour but any silence after a final furious cannonade is no less welcome.  Unlike the bombardment that signaled the end of World War One, today's random shots and the floating wisp of gun smoke signal maneuvers for the coming 2012 battle.

No sooner had the polls closed on this year's viscous election campaign than the victors fired their first shots in search of glorious greater victories.  The minority party victors claim they now have a mandate to rewrite history taking the country back to a fundamentalist ideal, continue the war to victory, cut taxes, drive out immigrants and abandon the Bill of Rights.

What the victors chose to ignore is that neither the minority nor the majority party have enough votes to elect their candidates.  Even within the parties is there no consensus for radical platforms.  While their extremists are the loudest and have capture the parties' agendas much of their membership is more reasoned.  The real power however, lies with the largest body of the electorate, independents that are quite and still free of partisan demands of party loyalty.

It was the independents that carried the bi-election.  They didn't vote radical change rather they voted for a hoped for better and more secure future.  When campaign cannons fire salvos of hate and fear the independents drag their feet at blind trust.  Their vote was for change, but changes that improved their conditions.  Improvements that have been to long in arriving, “lets give the other guys a shot.”

A shot is not a mandate, it is an opportunity.  If the victors become hung up on the barbwire of radical ideology they will face disenchanted and hostile independents in another two years.

The two party system has been institutionalized in American elections, but it is not written in stone or the constitution.  What has happen is that the two parties cooperated on one issue, legislation and procedures that make it virtually impossible for any third party to succeed at the polls.

What the silent independent majority must do is fire shots across the bow of both parties.  The independents have the power to demand good candidates that will serve the people not radical party platforms.  Candidates committed to oppose corruption and vested interests and serve the people.  The independents must exercise their power before the parties lock in on candidates and platforms not in the interest of the whole country.

The independent must find spokesmen of reason and compromise in the interest of the country.  Care must taken in choice of leadership for charismatic leaders are often borderline dictators in search of power.

The independents fired a broadside in this election.  It is a step forward but not enough to just vote incumbents out of office.   Independents must also insure that the applicant pool contains the very best candidates for future election.  The founding fathers never envisioned career politicians; rather wider participation by qualified citizens.  They knew that government was too important to trust to politicians.
Independent must bombard candidates and elected officials with the third way of reasoned government.

If the parties continue to fail, then independents must fire a their big gun barrage each election voting the incumbents out of office until they recognize the peoples interests.