Death of Democracy

Here is a paragraph, taken verbatim from a book I am currently reading

"As there is nothing like clientship in modern Western society we are easily apt to underestimate the profound effect it had upon the whole development of Rome throughout its history. Clients came from the freed slaves and their descedants, immigrants and poor citizens unable to stand on their own feet and therefore needing help and protection. The almost feudal dependence of clients upon their patrons tremendously reinforced the political and social influence of the leaders of society. The patron would help his client by giving him small parcels of land, a few animals, food or small sums of money. He would speak for him or tell him what to do in his rare encounters with public authority. In return the obsequious client often called to pay daily deference to his patron and was expected to rally to his support if necessary with whatever powers he posessed. That he should support his patron politically and vote the way the patron wanted in the public assemblies was one of the client's least burdensome duties. No doubt the more independent and energetic of the free citizens preferred to fend for themselves but in Rome as in every other community, such rare spirits would be in a minority. Clients remained clients because they had no ambition or ability to shoulder the responsibilites involved in striking out for themselves so they hung like a dead weight upon their leaders and more enterprising fellow citizens."

Cowell, F R. Cicero and the Roman Republic. Pelican Books/C.Nicholls & Company: Middlesex, UK. 1962.

Unfortunately, Mr. Cowell wasn't a political scientist with the gift of clairvoyance. For if he were, he would've seen the introduction of wide-spread client-patron relationships permeate and aid in the destruction Western democracies from within. Canada is no exception. Large blocks of immigrants and their descendents from the 1960s have voted for their patrons, the Liberal Party of Canada, despite their agenda being in total conflict with the cultural and religious aspects of many of their clients. For example, and I do not mean for this example to be all inclusive, ask a Greek Orthodox Priest and Canadian Citizen if he is pro-gay marriage, pro-abortion and fiscally Liberal and he will answer "No". Ask him who he will support in the next election, "the Liberals". This point was highlighted during the brief and lackluster attempt by the Conservatives to topple the crime syndicate running the government in Ottawa by appealing to the moral beliefs of Sikh voters. If Mr.Harper wants their support, he should think about becoming a Liberal. In economically depressed areas of the nation, the people there claim they want jobs, but always vote for the easy way out: subsidies, programs, welfare.

Personally, I take what Mr.Cowell wrote originally in 1948 about the Grandeur that was Rome as a blueprint of how a stable and strong political system can be corrupted to the extent that it leads to despotism and the extinguishing of freedom. The blind clients will surrender away everything that was built up over the centuries for bread and circuses.

I strongly believe that the West is the last bastion of the "enterprising fellow citizen" and I sincerely hope that before the disasterous and cancerous patron-client relationship seriously infects points beyond Manitoba that the West will find a way to sever itself from its modern day Windsor-to-Quebec-City Rome.