33 Comments

Thank you for this report on the latest battle in the global war on democracy. I just got my latest list of voters in my neighborhood to call, to remind them: we MUST vote the radical republicans out of office - they cannot be trusted with any amount of power in our local, state, national governments. We each have A Good Work we can do

Expand full comment

Ruth, I love your writing and appreciate that you have brought some attention on to Latin American. Could you please recommend some more reading about Chile’s or Latin America’s political history. Way behind on the subject.

Expand full comment

Defeat of Chile's new constitution was surprising to me, but reading Ruth's well-researched hot links led me into the weeds to understand the various forces at play in Chile. The defeat of the constitution was on the heels of CNN's six part series titled Patagonia. Patagonia is the vast area, extending thousands of miles between Chile and Argentina. Upon viewing this series, with its presentation of the abundance of nature in that area, one understands why the defeated constitution highlighted the protection of nature. Finally, I must say, subscribing to Lucid is an intellectual adventure!

Expand full comment

Thanks for lucidly providing all this background. Do you have a sense of whether Boric expected to refine the proposed constitution or did this catch him by surprise?

Expand full comment

I have been following this. Chile, is quite a country. Exceptional people. Boric, is really a representation of all that went right there. Last read, they are working on the "Pinochet" constitution. I think it important that we realize, not all democracy's fit one size. People, around the globe, don't respond the same. Some interpretations are different. There is black and white, there is also a whole lot of cultural gray. Oppression, is oppression, yet, there are variations. Advanced democracies don't pop up, they evolve. According to Sir John Glubb, "Fate of Empires", they also implode. Freire is a huge influence in S America, young democracies gravitate towards that. Boric knows this. America, is an aging one. Our "War on drugs", our power, our might, did nothing to support emerging southern democracies, nor, did it do anything for drug addiction. Hence, starving, dying people, walking north. Still, we blame them. Ruth talked about a "Laboratory for policy". I think, given history, we all live in one. I would suggest Chile for an evolving democracy, the US for a declining one and Liechtenstein for a pinnacle. Just my opine.

Expand full comment

That is significant that a 2020 referendum in Chile asked if a new constitution should be drafted and 78 percent agreed! And then Ruth states, "If any country can craft a constitution that looks like the anti-authoritarian future we dream of and need, it is Chile." Yes indeed but how should it be written and by whom and for how long and that is the struggle currently for Chile. And constitutions also need updating and need to be looked at as works in progress which is currently a significant struggle for the U.S involving democracy, reproductive rights, gun violence, energy, the environment etc..

I look forward to the upcoming Friday Q&A where guest journalist, Anne Nelson, presents some issues from her latest book entitled, "Media, Money, and the Radical Right." Issues currently wreaking havoc in the U.S.!

Expand full comment

Hi Ruth, thanks again for the outstanding links. I'd be interested to know the difference between the writing of our Constitution (1778?) and the.multiude of Chilean constitutions. Was ours written in a fashion that was looser and thereby able to flex with the times? Has this, if true, caused us difficulties now with someone or a party trying to misuse it? Did Chileans need to challenge their documents because perhaps they were more rigidly constructed? It's just such a marked difference between the two countries. I have always admired the American founders' writing of an instrument that flowed with foresight into the future (loosely written) but solidly written and grounded in values. Maybe that is why it is so challenged right now, that a segment of the populace would like to steer it off the road due to a completely different value structure? I'd say go find a different country with that set of values, just kidding of course. But values and principles are usually timeless, a foundation. We have extremists looking not only to crack but implode the foundation here on such quick order. Wondering how the wording, language or intent of the two documents (ours & the Chilean original) differed.

This essay broadens my global knowledge and I have a new appreciation for the Chilean people and their fortitude, and realize we have many brothers and sisters in what surely is a just and natural attainment for humans -- democracy.

Expand full comment

The US involvement in Chile was all about imperialism, both economic and political. We were going to push neoliberalism on them because we could not tolerate economic systems that differed from our own. Neoliberal economics was capitalism on steroids. Milton Friedman went down there to show them the path forward for this concept. But neoliberalism is even more of a feudal system than capitalism, from which it sprang. To me, neoliberalism seems like a stepping stone between capitalism and a fascist cartel economic system, which was used by Hitler. For the US, I believe that our move away from 1950's capitalism to a more authoritarian neoliberalism is a sign of a well orchestrated corporate power grab. What is their end game? Fascism? Neoliberalism didn't do well in Chile or Argentina and it is not doing well here either.

Expand full comment

Thank you also for highlighting social media into the context. I am grateful the Democrats were onto to this, even globally.. thank you for highlighting that hopefulness in these fraught times.. The rapidity by which disinformation is intentionally and unintentially distributed, especially through sm, is one of the new weapons indeed. Truth is the new warfare.

Just this week I've received what now appears to be a (fascist-type) weekly 8-page newspaper in my postal mailbox, a dreary accounting of all that is going wrong regionally in my county. Headline, by headline, negative semantic slant. Interestingly enough, we have a gubernatorial race in November and I live in a decidedly blue region of my state. It just looks like undermining to crack the blue-foundation. Expertise in the science of communication, along with the critcal underpinnings of psychology, are the new battleground to dominate, in truth, if we are to prevail. A chess match in truth and persuasion.

Expand full comment

I've been away for 2 weeks but missed Lucid Friday's so much. Anne Nelson? Fantastic. Regarding Chile...I'm totally convinced that the revolution begins with radical change to social media. I was obsessed with FB for a long time. I struggled with letting go. It took starts and stops but I did it and replaced it with Twitter. Then, overtime I noticed the impact of doom scrolling on Twitter and with starts and stops I finally kicked that as well. I still know more of what is going on in politics than most. But, I am not saturated with the addiction of second to second messaging and links. I still have to pace myself. Regarding Chile. President Obama just won an Emmy for his narration of national parks and innovation around the world. He featured Chile's transformation from farms which had reduced the puma and Andean deer populations to the return of the original wilderness reversing the decline of both. What in 'mother earths' name are we doing? Chile, the Amazon, Denali, wildfires and floods... sigh

Expand full comment
founding

Ohio Down Ballot Races

Marcy Kaptur (D-OH-09) is the longest serving woman in U.S. House of Representatives history. She used to be my U.S. House Rep (Toledo area) until she was gerrymandered out of and connected along a strip extending to Dennis Kucinich’s district so the two liberals would become one in 2013! Marcy Kaptur won but I did always like Dennis Kucinich as well. I always supported Marcy and still to this day she sends me a Constitutional Calendar that I always hang in my university office! Since then, I’ve been gerrymandered two more times (I believe) and my current U.S. House Rep is Bob Latta (R-OH-05)……………and Bob Latta is up for re-election this November 2022!!!!

Just in 2022 alone our ??Representative??:

**Bob Latta voted against the bipartisan CHIPS and Science Act of 2022 [an act from which Ohio will benefit greatly].

**Bob Latta voted against the Inflation Reduction Act (Climate Bill) of 2022.

**Bob Latta voted against the Assault Weapons Ban of 2022.

Furthermore, Bob Latta’s “Democracy Score” as part of the Republican Accountability Project was an F (very poor) Why?

**Bob Latta voted against impeachment or conviction of Trump for inciting an insurrection!

**Bob Latta voted against creating an independent commission to investigate the Jan 6 attack!

**Bob Latta voted against holding Steven Bannon in contempt of Congress!

Sheesh….

Craig Swartz (Democrat) from Cleveland is running against Bob Latta in November 2022……..more later…..

Expand full comment