By John Brewer on April 27, 2011
“This democracy we have is a precious thing…” — Barack Obama.
I suppose I’d be hard-pressed to find a soul among us who hasn’t committed a substantial amount of our adult life watching the news, reading magazines, blog articles, newspapers, listening to talk-radio or chatting with sea-bound grobians among the citizenry. And, I suppose I’d come up empty-handed looking for a soul among us who hasn’t heard or read the word“democracy” kicked around more frequently than a hacky sack at a marathon Grateful Dead-Crosby, Stills, Nash, Young-Phish-Mamas and Papas-Doobie Brothers-The Birds-Simon and Garfunkel-Jefferson Airplane reunion tour. I suppose that, at the tender drinking age of double-decade-uno, had I decided to create a drinking game contingent on the usage of “democracy” among politicians and analysts and generally-untutored droids, I wouldn’t have the capacity to write this right now, as my body would be 10 years dissolved into the dirt and photos of my liver would be circulating among medical journals worldwide. How did he die? If Joe Biden were to answer, he’d say it all came down to a three-syllable word: Democracy.