Comments on Significant Trends in the Direction of the World.

The election of a comedian to run the government of Ukraine is a significant signal of frustration among the public. This follows the election of a clown in Italy. People are angry with the failure of the British government to carry out their mandate with Brexit and Canadians are at the end of their rope with the Trudeau government. The anger and frustration are not new. A paraphrase of graffiti for an election in Pompei 2000 years ago said. “If we get rid of this bunch of scoundrels, we will just get another bunch of scoundrels.” There are two major issues implied in these actions. First, they know they need a government, but their vote indicates that they don’t know how much. Second, they are tired of the traditional political parties. Their votes indicate that they understand that virtually anybody can be a leader. This reinforces why the media and professional politicians are so angry at Trump. Not only can he do the job, but he is also doing it better than them – his existence exposes their fraud.

The original concept of selecting people to lead a nation meant they chose proven leaders with experience. That was the situation across the world until approximately 171 years ago. In 1848, Karl Marx published The Communist Manifesto a work that became the foundation for the political ideology of socialism. Purists will argue that communism is not socialism. The reality is that they, along with progressivism, and liberalism, are all varying forms of total government control. Just 11 years later in 1859, Charles Darwin published Origin of Species, which included Spencer’s comment about the survival of the fittest, a complete synopsis of capitalism.

Over the next 171 years, these ideologies became the basis of political parties with various names but distinctly divided between the socialists who wanted more government and conservatives who wanted less. Like those who voted for clowns, they knew you needed some government. The question they all ask and can’t answer is how much. The default practice to date is to allow the government to grow almost without restriction. People understood what Edith Hamilton meant when she said,

“When the freedom they wished for was the freedom from responsibility, then Athens ceased to be free and never was free again.”

Or as Abraham Lincoln asked,

“Must a government of necessity be too strong for the liberties of its people or too weak to maintain its own existence.”

The question was bypassed until recently by the evolution of social parties. That is coming to an end, so the question is back on the table.

Another change occurring worldwide is the end of the trend to larger and larger government regions. It began after World War I with the League of Nations. That died with the claims of colonial powers to their territory, the most challenging was Italy’s claim to parts of North Africa. After WWII the attempt at internationalism was revived, led by the efforts of socialist Eleanor Roosevelt. Other regions amalgamated for economic reasons such as the East African Free Trade Area and the European Economic Community. This trend continued through most of the latter half of the 20th and into the 21st century.

Politics became increasingly narrow. Leaders were originally people chosen from among the elders because of their experience and their desire to give back to society by serving, were gradually replaced by professional politicians. These were people who never held jobs but entered politics at the lowest level and gradually worked up. Meanwhile, the media began vicious personal attacks, so natural leaders were not prepared to step forward. Unfortunately, this left a gap that was filled by people with nothing but ambition.

This combination of people who sought election solely to get elected and an electorate who wanted local problems resolved brought us to the current situation. People know something is wrong and change is required. They also sense that these are more substantial changes and take time, but, meanwhile, it is necessary to keep the basic system going. It is like a business posting a science during a renovation that it is business as usual.

The impact of the global village and the access to information through the internet are not expanding the world as people, that is the so-called experts, predicted. Instead, people are overwhelmed and working to limit their concerns to leaders they know and to familiar regions.

Over the next few years, political parties will become empirical parties that make decisions using common sense. They will represent small cohesive regions tide by cultural values like language, religion, or history. The world has learned that bigger

is not automatically better and that we need leaders not politicians to cope with issues of local concern.