Americans do not believe in the common good. (unemployment, Congress, wage)

[Pyewackette]

Originally Posted by Vallombrosa

Both the individualism of the "right", and the identity politics of the "left", indicate to me that Americans do not believe in the common good, or if they do, it is subordinated to their individual/tribal interests.

Questions:

1. Is it possible to have a functional country without a shared belief in the common good, and a consensus about what it should look like?

2. Does the sheer size of the United States make the common good an impossible task? Would breaking up the country help things?

Really. I'm pretty sure you would consider me a lefty bleeding heart librul. And I'm a STRONG believer in individualism. I'm also going to take umbrage at your use of the term "identity politics". Or maybe not. I identify with the whole human race, so that makes that term sort of useless. At best it is a pejorative term used by right-wingers to denigrate everybody who isn't a right-winger.

Wait a minute. Just WHO were you accusing of using "identity politics"? LOL!

So back to individualism. I do believe very strongly that every human being has the right to self-determination. That is, that individuals should be free to pursue their goals without hindrance due to their gender, gender identity, sexual preferences, religion, skin color, educational/economic status, or anything else, as long as said goals don't involve things that are demonstratively harmful to others - say, serial killing. That's not a valid life-goal. However, being able to walk around without being shrouded in yards of flapping black cloth IS a valid goal. I don't care HOW much someone else thinks that is going to "harm society" or if it is disrespectful to your delusional religion (and ALL religions are delusional. There is no nice white man in the sky with a long white beard who will grant your wishes if you rub his tummy properly)

However, the sole and ONLY reason to bother to have a society at all is so we can band together and increase our chances of survival. That means helping each other. So yes. I do also believe that we as individuals who chose to join society thereafter have an obligation to actually help each other to achieve our goals.

Your questions are specious but I'll answer them anyway.

1) Of course it is possible. On both counts.
2) No, the size of the US doesn't make this impossible. Why would it? And NO, it would not "help things" to break up the country. Balkanism is always a bad thing.

Ok. Go away now.

[Pyewackette]

Originally Posted by WannabeCPA

Seems like you're talking about collectivist vs individualist cultures. America is definitely an individualist culture compared to other areas of the world. I don't think either culture is superior to the other, just different, both with their good and bad features. Belief in the "common good", however you define common good, runs on a spectrum. It isn't an absolute. Ex. Would a billionaire who donates to charity be categorized as believing in the common good? Your questions are subject to a lot of interpretation.

1. What's a "functional country"? Does every single person have to believe in exactly the same things to qualify as a shared belief in the common good? Consensus means there is no dissent. There is no country on Earth that fits this definition. Everything's relative so my answer to your first question would be a definite YES.

2. Again that "common good" statement. I'll say that the diversity, not really size, of the US makes it a lot more difficult for everyone to work for the common good in countries that are less diverse. Tribalism seems more prevalent in the US than in more homogeneous societies. Breaking up the country? I think it'll help certain areas but not others.

The idea that you have to be one or the other extreme - either dog-eat-dog individualism or Big Brother style collectivism - is ludicrous.

Both are necessary. Act individually for those issues that concern your immediate life - such as choosing whether/where to go to college, what profession to train for, who you will marry - or not.

But act collectively for those things that we cannot do effectively on our own as individuals. Such as making sure there are safe roads, maintaining said roads, providing free public education. These are COMMON GOOD items. Where you go to school (or not) is not. How you dress has nothing to do with the common good. What color your dye your hair or if you just snatch yourself bald - nothing to do with the common good.

So stay out of our lives when we act as individuals. But band together for mutual benefit for all the things we as a society today need but cannot provide or get for ourselves when acting as individuals.

[Mircea]

Originally Posted by tijlover

I've long been a proponent of breaking up this country, at least into 4 parts, given California is the size of Germany and Texas is much bigger than France, and those countries stand alone. By splitting the country up we'd have 4 choices of government to choose from. It would also be more democratic rather than mobocratic. Otherwise, common good will never be achievable.

That's the best possible outcome.

Culturally, California, Oregon and Washington should be one block
Texas, New Mexico and Arizona another
Florida and Louisiana
the New England States
New York, New Jersey and Connecticut
Rhode Island and Massachusetts
Pennsylvania, Maryland and Delaware
Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Tennessee, Kentucky, Arkansas, Oklahoma and Missouri are culturally similar
the Virginias and Carolinas
Ohio, Michigan, Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin and Minnesota
Iowa, the Dakotas, Kansas and Nebraska
Nevada, Utah and Colorado
Idaho, Montana and Wyoming
Hawaii
Alaska

Originally Posted by OhioJB

Breaking up the country not an option.

It's always an option, and the next civil war will do exactly that.

Originally Posted by Vallombrosa

I tend to agree with you. Democracy on a scale of 300 million is frankly absurd.

Exactly. That's why China is the way it is.

Originally Posted by Vallombrosa

But how to accomplish this?

A new Constitution.

Reduce the power of the federal government and limit it solely and exclusively to defense, diplomacy, treaties and coining money.

Create the regional blocks I've listed above, and transfer all remaining powers of the federal government to the governments of those blocks.

The individual States retain all powers defined in the current Constitution and the people retain all powers in the current Constitution.

Effectively, you have one federal government, 15 regional governments and 50 State governments and powers are divided between all three.

That's a better alternative to civil war.

Originally Posted by silibran

I disagree about cultural cohesion.

Do you understand culture?

Originally Posted by silibran

Most Americans do use similar vocabulary for many things, including our rights.

Language is merely one facet of many facets of culture, and note you have people pushing Ebonics, so your claim doesn't hold water.

Culture is not just language, it's customs, values and mores, religion, ethnicity, cherished heroes, holidays observed, shared history and music, prose and poetry, to name but a few.

Is Beowulf one of your heroes, shared history and epic prose?

If you were Norse, it would be.

I'm not Norse, so I don't give a damn about Beowulf, it's not part of my shared history and never will be, and never read it (even though I was supposed to -- I relied heavily on Cliff Notes).

See how that works?

I don't observe the holiday Cinco de Mayo, but many Hispanics and even some non-Hispanics do.

Because I'm Romanian, I observe holidays and respect heroes that you wouldn't.

I was raised Orthodox, which is different than Catholicism, and we hate Catholics for the horrors they visited upon us, and it's really different than Protestantism, but I'm Atheist.

The point being there's no homogeneity in religion in the US.

Democracy only works when you have a homogeneous population.

The US was never homogeneous and never will be.

In spite of pathetic attempts by Liberals to make people believe Native Americans are one happy group of peace-loving people, that was never true, and still isn't.

You have 567 tribes that speak 567 different languages, have 567 different cosmogonies, 567 different myths, 567 different sets of gods and goddesses, 567 different customs, 567 different sets of values and mores, 567 different heroes, 567 different shared histories and on and on.

China might appear to be homogeneous, but it isn't.

The Han Chinese are by far the largest ethnic group, but there are more than 100 other ethnic groups that are culturally different than Han Chinese. And, there are 5 distinct dialects spoken by Han Chinese, and there are in fact eight different linguistic groups giving rise to lots of languages.

I speak a Romance language. It's mutually intelligible with southern Italian dialects, but not northern Italian dialects, since they incorporate a large number of Germanic words in their dialects, and more or less with Portuguese, but it's not mutually intelligible with dialects of French or Spanish.

Homogeneity lends itself to consensus, because of uniformity in culture, but heterogeneity does not.

Where you have diverse cultures, you have diverse thoughts, ideas and beliefs, and while that doesn't preclude the possibility of achieving consensus, extreme diversity, which is what the US is, results in extreme diversity of thoughts, ideas and beliefs, and consensus is rarely possibly, more often than not being impossible.

For example, there is a consensus that something must be done with healthcare.

What must be done? That's a different matter entirely and the diversity of opinion is so extreme there's no way to reach a consensus.

The only way to achieve homogeneity, is to subdivide the political boundaries in a way that creates homogeneous populations.

Why didn't China do that?

For the same reason the US didn't.

The colonies as independent States were no match for France or Britain, but united they were.

However, that's not an issue today.

Today, every State could function as an independent country without fear of foreign conquest.

Originally Posted by silibran

In other words, there was not respect for the other viewpoint.

One cannot respect a viewpoint that is just plain wrong and not only wrong, but detrimental politically, socially, economically and culturally.

Would you respect the viewpoint of NAZIs?

Well, there you go.

[AlaskaErik]

Define "common good". To some people it means "From each, according to their ability; to each, according to their need".

[boxus]

I really think a lot of opposition from common good programs is due to two things;

-the constant demonstrating by the gov at all levels that they waste and waste money, and often provide poor services in exchange for the money they get. From pet projects, to actual projects, to simple customer service entities, it has been sub-par for many people. Yes the private sector has issues, but guess what, can go to a competitor if needed. Even the regulated monopolies got issues. It seems it is just the culture of the US, it is ingrained, just as some S. American country forever has corruption and is almost expected.

-real and perceived issues of leaches, people taking advantage of the system for whatever agenda, but all leads to wanting a lifestyle but not to work for it. Expansion of the greater good will just give more opportunities for these people to engage the system more.

[in_newengland]

Originally Posted by Vallombrosa

Both the individualism of the "right", and the identity politics of the "left", indicate to me that Americans do not believe in the common good, or if they do, it is subordinated to their individual/tribal interests.

Questions:

1. Is it possible to have a functional country without a shared belief in the common good, and a consensus about what it should look like?

2. Does the sheer size of the United States make the common good an impossible task? Would breaking up the country help things?

When this country was founded most people were of one religion, most had come from Europe, most held the same beliefs and values. Things have changed since then--probably too much and too fast.

Right now we're almost totally divided and if we have to wait for everyone to agree on things and assimilate for once and for all, it could take a few hundred more years.

One solution (but I don't like it) is to break up into regions. I think we had a pretty good list a few posts back. Those who want to share universal health care can join together and those regions who selfishly want their citizens to suffer, can stay out.

Those who want illegals can have them. But other states will stick to traditional immigration rules.

Those who want really low taxes and low quality of life, bad schools, can have it.

That would be really complicated though. Would regions have trade deals with other regions? What happens when someone from a no health care state moves to take a job in a health care state? Would they have to buy into it since they have never paid in?

Maybe we could have about 3-4 very large regions, not a lot of little regions. Some sacrifices would have to be made when you joined a region though, it won't be perfect.

Either split the country up or let's move a little bit forward by putting an end to the hatred whereby we hate seeing any poor person get any help, the poor hate the rich, the religious cults try to rule over other people, etc. Stop the hatred. We didn't have that when this country started out and we held together. Now we have a great disparity between very rich and very poor and downtrodden in the middle.

The hatred will be our undoing. Democrats have to stop with the silly identity politics that only serve to remind us of our differences. Republicans have to stop serving the needs of the very rich. If only we had a moderate government--it might be our saving grace. But if the right keeps staying to the right and the left keeps staying to the left, this country is gone. The next election is crucial. If we get another Trump type government, it's over for the country. If we get some far left loon, it is also over for the country.

We need a moderate who will remind us that we are all one and that we all exist for the common good.

[Vallombrosa]

Originally Posted by in_newengland

The hatred will be our undoing.

Indeed, the rising level of hatred in this country, on all sides, is a thing to behold. I've never seen anything like it.

Originally Posted by in_newengland

Democrats have to stop with the silly identity politics that only serve to remind us of our differences. Republicans have to stop serving the needs of the very rich. If only we had a moderate government--it might be our saving grace. But if the right keeps staying to the right and the left keeps staying to the left, this country is gone. The next election is crucial. If we get another Trump type government, it's over for the country. If we get some far left loon, it is also over for the country.

We need a moderate who will remind us that we are all one and that we all exist for the common good.

I don't really see the solution in terms of right, left, center, extreme, or moderate. Rather, the solution is a minimal consensus on what constitutes a Good Society, and that consensus needs to be rooted in permanently sound principles. Some of those principles will look "conservative", others "liberal", but they will not be the pet projects of ideologues (right or left), grievance mongers, or special interests. Historically, religion provides the basis for a healthy social consensus. This consensus doesn't need to be absolute. It can be the overlapping agreement of various religious traditions, just minimal enough for a cohesive and functional society. Substitutes are hard to come by, and tend to be short-lived.

[djsuperfly]

Originally Posted by boxus

-real and perceived issues of leaches, people taking advantage of the system for whatever agenda, but all leads to wanting a lifestyle but not to work for it. Expansion of the greater good will just give more opportunities for these people to engage the system more.

But, that's the thing with "common good."

Do many of us know some people that "abuse" the system? Sure. Do many more people tell some anecdotal stories they heard somewhere that have no basis in reality? Absolutely. Does this idea of "system abusers" have a deep root in Reagan's "Welfare Queen" anecdote, that was designed to manipulate the American public. Again, absolutely.

To me, common good means we try to help as many as we can. If that means 10 people abuse the system for every one genuine person we help, so be it.

[Vallombrosa]

Originally Posted by djsuperfly

To me, common good means we try to help as many as we can.

I think you're on the right track, but the real question is: help people do what, exactly? It matters. If the answer is "do whatever they want to do", then we're really not talking about the common good after all.

[silibran]

Originally Posted by silibran

We really have never had a democracy. What was established by our founders was a representative democracy.

I disagree about cultural cohesion. Most Americans do use similar vocabulary for many things, including our rights.

I think political parties contribute to the divisiveness of governing. The farther to the right Republicans go, the farther to the left the Dems pull back. I listened to Elijah Cummings' statements after the Cohen testimony this past week. What he said was good, and had profound moments. The Republicans got up and left at some point after their ranking member made his final statement. In other words, there was not respect for the other viewpoint. This is the kind of stupid, disrespectful conduct we see, coming from both sides now. I personally think we have Newt Gingrich to thank for this, but certainly others have participated happily in this divisive behavior.

Twitter feuds, and nasty twitter attacks by either side are another symptom of our loss of civility and respect for different opinions.

The thing is, we need the left and the right. You have balance when you have two sides pulling back. You lose balance, when one side gets too much power.

Aaaagh! I meant to write in the first sentence: What was established by our founders was representative republic. I plead a senior moment.