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A power to advance the public happiness involves a discretion which may be misapplied and abused.



James Madison, Federalist 41



Saturday, February 26, 2011

The Demagogue’s Benevolent Disguise



The demagogues are out in full force. This elusive sort of species clings to a waning influence, covets a fleeting power, and boldly exploits unhinged passions. In the people’s name, they’re on a perpetual quest to seek out and destroy the multi-headed Hydra that will gobble up your fundamental rights and ancient privileges. Its flashy appearance is brilliant enough to even blind the most discerning eye. It descends from the lofty clouds in the sky, and freely dwells among mere mortals. It wears a benevolent disguise, holding all the answers, looking quite like a concerned patriot, but the garb that drapes this individual is patched together by an artifice of cynical sinews that reach out and encircle reason and logic until they are both confounded by an intricate design.


The human mind is fully equipped with the necessary capabilities needed to deconstruct the distorting devices hurled at it by external forces. It also has a unique ability to be stimulated by corrupting internal perceptions, and, finally, disgraced by corrosive actions. Every Liberty loving participant residing in this American Republic, possessing the requisite mental faculties, must engage in a rigorous and thorough effort to peacefully disassemble the demagogue’s self-interested subterfuge. Human history is filled with the manipulative engines of political profit, which wage an intractable and eternal contest to curry populist favor, and stoke public furor, for personal rewards, just at the right moment, when the time is ripe enough for the picking. All along the laborious path of human Liberty a wise and virtuous citizenry have persistently worn down the conniving charlatans that divide and conquer.

Every day the Sun shines across this great land of republican governments brings with it a new opportunity to seize upon. Opportunities are plentiful in America. Most citizens take full advantage of this natural resource that rejuvenates itself on a daily basis. A great majority of citizens engage in honest adventures for great personal advancement, with plenty of societal benefits for their family and friends. There are a few – very loud and visible - dishonest adventurers taking advantage of a large set of circumstances for personal gain, with no societal benefit attached. Opportunistic vagabonds are currently on a societal rampage across the nation. The diversity of exaggerated opinions, and outlandish assumptions, is truly outstanding, and the more moderate streams of consciousness is dangerously diluted in the process. We are constantly being subjected to extreme heresies that nurture doubt, coddle suspicion, and sour public sentiment. We cannot escape the daily bombardment of fallacious assertions and hasty generalizations that are fired indiscriminately in all directions.

Demagogue’s cherish a frenzied mass, obstruct due process, upset the rule of law, proper order, and republican principles, all the while gathering up a host of duplicitous flatterers that follow close by, waiting to be deployed on mass, fully exploited to fulfill nefarious enterprises that manufacture distracting sideshows to keep us busy. This crew of misdirecting partisan pillagers travel around America through various mediums, bringing with them a covered wagon filled up with ideal evils, ruinous frights, ghoulish specters, collusive connections, tortured conjectures, conspiratorial concoctions, destructive combinations, awful appearances, and malicious machinations that will be let loose, at a moment’s notice, amidst a chaotic atmosphere, if you dare disagree with them. Harrowing uncertainties always push human beings toward the quick and easy route. The false comfort zone of certainty finds shelter in counterfactual assertions, human invention, lazy dispositions, and utopian testimonies professed by vociferous personalities that cultivate civic unrest, and self-aggrandizement.

American history, and the history of humankind, is littered with the horrific claims of the end time, and the demise of America. Creatures of pending doom and the peddlers of prophetic disasters joyfully dance around reality, history, reason, and the truth, making you climb a mountain of woe, always engaged in a speculative endeavor that neatly conforms to future outcomes. Catastrophic visionaries and conjurers of condemnation possess their own truth, but are merely carnival curiosities left over from an ancient minstrel order, one that is as old as human imagination itself. Step right up and receive a fancied treat. The fortune tellers are handsomely paid. This celebrified breed finds a readied banquet of fears to feast on, and paranoid patrons to indulge. A highly vigilant, morally tempered, and enlightened citizenry is the only barrier that has a chance of containing the menacing wave of malignant marauders eroding the shores of Liberty, Justice, and Reason. When American citizens stand firmly united against profiteering plunderers of public trust, treasure, and republican virtue, will the demagogue finally be unmasked and seen for what it is; a corrupter of justice, defiler of truth, deceiver of perceptions, and, ultimately, a weaver of worrisome portents, one that will produce paralyzing and tantalizing conundrums that require exhausting efforts to expose.

We need to cast out our weir of reason and logic to catch the drifting diviner of devastating perplexities. We must have a tightly constructed fishing net, and utilize its full capabilities. You need to cast it often and far. Let it fall gently into the deep sea of human introspection to ensnare the bountiful prize that lurks below the surface. We need to haul our bounty to the surface, drag it to the craggy shore, empty the contents on the sandy beach, get on our hands and knees, and scrutinize the catch in the light of day, with a thorough examination, so it can be determined what is real or fake. Plenty of things around here look safe to eat, but what is actually safe to eat is another investigation altogether that shows itself in the future. This laborious task is necessary for the existence of a republican government. Every now and again, the swift currents of time and circumstance churn up scrupulous specimen from the darkened depths of humanity, who prosper during the agitated turbulence emanating from a tempestuous environment. These fraudulent figures thrive on the unsettled brew that is drawn up from the lazy sediment, which is heaped into the swirling eddies of tyranny and anarchy, with a determined thrust, easily captured, then cravenly carried and deposited in a fantasy land of mystical ideals. Those who remain on the sound and unified bedrock, resisting the vexatious updraft of disorder, have a strong disposition not to be torn asunder by the whimsical fancies of shrewd and cunning characters seeking influence, fame, and power. Denounce the demagogue at every turn with reason and logic, and unmask its benevolent disguise for all to see.