To hell with ideals, gasoline costs a lot here! This is the clear message that a large section of the American electorate is sending to their leaders with an interesting Morning Consult/Politico poll. In short, 62% of Democratic voters surveyed believe the US should relax its policies toward some of the governments most hated by Americans (the governments of Iran, Saudi Arabia and Venezuela) as long as this leads to lower gasoline prices. Which currently travels at an average (oh my god!) one euro per liter in the US. On the other hand, Republicans, at 41%, “sell” themselves less easily under these circumstances. Perhaps it is only because they are more skeptical that oil prices have much to do with sympathy between countries and have less hope that: “If we treat them better, they might give us a discount…”.
Meanwhile, half of Europe is at war with Vladimir Putin, but it does not hesitate to go to Moscow to flatten a few liters of crude oil or a few more cubic meters of gas. You can see in the surprising result of the American poll an indication of how both of the country’s mass parties are slowly beginning to abandon Baci Perugina’s comfortable vision of what democracy is, and no longer the pride of high morals and the common good. A satirical tool for knowing the true will of the people, so that it can be judged in the interest of “the common good of the greatest number of people.” For a few decades politics everywhere has been dominated by a kind of enduring moral theater, the competition for respect between the parties. We felt we could afford the luxury of selling the luxury of the majority to the benefit of small minorities and very distant geographic problems, and even label this lopsided generosity as “democratic.”
Sure, idealism is a great thing, but perhaps not when tangible and immediate needs get in the way. The idea behind democracy (a strong idea) is that people, by voting, will vote narrowly for their own interests and personal advantages. Instead, we have discovered in the last decades of prosperity that when the population is on average well, it is perfectly capable of choosing to neglect its own interest and spending the vote in favor of decidedly noble causes and ideals, even if it is far from everyday life: for the welfare of polar bears. Or to promote sexes that are not yet known.
Then comes the social or financial accounts, and the population remains unhappy with policy choices…Treating democracy as if it were perfect (and all democratic options as if it were perfect) is a recipe for general discontent when voters stop taking their interests into account and instead They preferred others who swallow resources without generating new interests. Only gaps in state budgets remain, like other gaps we meet in bad ways… For the good of all we can agree paradoxically that we are becoming less generous, less global, less ideal, more mean and less merciful, even at the cost of having To do charity to find money in our pockets instead of the pockets of the stagnant state.
diplomatic note
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