The Founders' fears realized

For many years, most Americans rolled their eyes when the political-science minded pointed out our system of government is a republic, not a democracy... and that is by conscious design.

It was not merely an esoteric, academic distinction.

Thousands of protesters pushed past security, climbed through windows and flooded the Wisconsin Capitol on Wednesday night after Senate Republicans pushed through a plan to strip most public workers of their collective bargaining rights. Within an hour and a half of the vote, the protesters had seized the building's lower floors,
creating an ear-splitting free-for-all of pounding drums, screaming chants, horns and whistles. Police gave up guarding the building entrances and retreated to the third floor. The state Department of Administration, which operates the building, estimated the crowd at about 7,000 people.

Police addressed protesters repeatedly over the building's public address system, warning them the building had been closed for hours and they had no right to remain inside. No one could hear the warnings over the din as protesters banged buckets, blew whistles and shouted "This is what democracy looks like!" and "Who's house? Our house!"

Now, what prompted this flash mob? The audacity of the remaining Republican State Senators at using a procedural method to finally vote through a bill adjusting worker's pension plans and reducing collective bargaining privileges (note that I do NOT use the word "right"). They did this after nearly three weeks of waiting for AWOL Democratic representatives to return and form a quorum. Obviously, the crowd took offense to this:

As word spread that the vote was coming, hundreds of protesters moved into the
building before its official 6 p.m. closing time and jammed the corridors in front of the Senate chamber, chanting "shame." Protester Damon Terrell, 19, called Senate vote a "despicable travesty." ((and of course he's old enough to know... Jemison)) "They know what they're doing is wrong," he said. "Which child hides what they were doing: the one doing their homework or the one that was messing around?"

If we're going to talk childishness and shame, the real question is: who's more childish -- those who seek to implement legislation they actually campaigned (and won) on, or those 'officials' who flee the state in order to gum up the machinery and prevent an outcome they don't like? For all those who think the Democrats who did the latter are right for doing so, I have but one question: would you have felt the same way if Republicans had denied a Congressional quorum when it came time in 2009 to vote on Obamacare?

As even Obama points out, "elections have consequences." And if the minority side on any given issue simply gets to withdraw and not participate, we don't have governance; we have anarchy. This is where liberals have an advantage over true conservatives; the latter generally respects the system even when they disagree with the outcome. That is true less and less of the left... which can only set a precedent even they come to regret.

This is not the nostalgic 1960s. Vietnam is over, Watergate long resolved, and Jim Crow is dead. Those may have been issues worth "taking it to the streets" over -- the system had failed to live up to the ideas upon which it was based. But can anyone seriously argue that in a time of bankrupt government, hiking state workers' contributions to their own pension plans comes anywhere close to that level of moral peril?

The Founding Generation clearly feared development of mob rule. Our generation seems determined to prove their fears well-grounded.