The reference to feudal titles reminds me of how Hillary received a coronation at the 2016 DNC, which was carefully structured to count none of the votes so as to suppress how closely she had run against Bernie Sanders. Actually the same was true in 2008, when Obama beat Hillary; the Clinton campaign had run an intense "count every vote!" effort against the Obama campaign, but at the DNC she agreed to not count any of the votes cast by primary election voters, but have Obama nominated by acclamation in return for being appointed his Secretary of State. Counting the votes is never important in a contested DNC.
The clear effort this year too is to avoid letting the delegates get the idea that they should vote independently. The primary election this year was aggressively managed to avoid giving voters an option except for Biden, excluding even Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., from the Democratic primary so Biden would get all the delegates. Now that they need a new candidate, the attempt to endorse Kamala is to prevent any sort of a democratic process from being involved in the leadership succession.
Coronations might be enjoyable spectacles for a certain sort of person -- even some Americans shamefully enjoy watching British royal pageantry, as if we hadn't expelled that by force of arms hundreds of years ago. They are neither American nor, especially, "Democratic" in character. It's shameful what the party has become that was founded by Jefferson and once housed great defenders of that old American ideal.
As the example of the strictly managed primary you highlight demonstrates, the Democratic party is the least democratic party in America. The power that party gives to "super delegates" is another example of its lack of democratic principle.
ReplyDeleteThat said, I have to take issue with your claim that there was something shameful for Americans to "enjoy watching British royal pageantry." Why? As a student of history, I was fascinated with the history and symbolism of the recent coronation. On no level does that mean I want to import that sort of thing here to America or that I want to replace our republic with a monarchy. I can enjoy observing any number of cultural or political rituals and spectacles from other countries without wanting to endorse such things for Americans. What is shameful about that?
Hi Joel. Always nice to see you come around.
DeleteI am also a student of history and can enjoy historic symbolism. I’m not intending to denigrate that. What I find shameful is the celebrity of royalty, and especially British royalty, among Americans. There is no reason I should ever have heard of Princess Diana, but even decades after her unfortunate death I still see celebrations of her come across my screen, made by and for Americans. Charles, her husband, deserves celebrity even less. Nor do I care to receive lectures from their royal family about their political preferences; they’re as free as anyone else to have views, but it’s shamefully subservient that so many American journalists treat their views as newsworthy simply because they’re voiced by someone allegedly of “Royal birth.”
In fact I’m not sure what that means even if one is actually English; as a student of history you know that there hasn’t been an English royalty in centuries. Why one would agree to treat a foreign family as your rightful sovereigns for generations and centuries is lost on me. As the Declaration of Arbroath says, if your king gives over to foreign domination, choose another. You can coronate him in better conscience.
I'm less a fan of the UK monarchy than I once was.
ReplyDeletehttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2019_British_prorogation_controversy
If the Queen or King is -- somehow -- restricted from exercising one of the very few roles of governance assigned to the throne, why have a throne at all?
Ya know, you don’t have to be a life time dem voter….. you can leave the plantation.
ReplyDeleteI completely agree with you regarding the celebrity of British royalty. It is unseemly for Americans to be infatuated with any celebrities, especially royal celebrities.
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