Last week, I promised a sweeping diagnosis of our cultural drift. Turns out, that promise was waaaay too big for one episode! So I’m breaking it up into several. Okay—many. Uh, Fine—a lot of episodes!
If you recall, I laid out forensic proof—through anecdotal evidence—that we, specifically Americans (or more accurately, “United States-ians,” since “Americans” technically includes Canadians, Central Americans, and South Americans), have veered far off from our ‘ODP’ — originally designated path. I hereby coin, “ODP” and will use that in future examples of the path we should have — and did, travel.
One of the flaws that helped derail us is pride. It’s why we rejected the clunky but accurate “United States-ians” in favor of the sleeker “Americans.” Pride also explains why Republicans don’t get the same linguistic treatment as Democrats—when Democrats win, it’s a “Democratic” action. But when Republicans prevail, no one calls it “Republicanic.”
Let’s reset. There are seven deadly flaws that, working in concert, drove a promising union of thirteen colonies off those golden rails of freedom and self-governance—rails carefully laid by some of the most learned men ever to build a nation from just thin air!
They drew from thousands of years of wisdom—the Magna Carta, the Bible, and the hard lessons of history—to avoid the traps these flaws have presented. One trap they deliberately avoided was the pure democracy!
On September 17, 1787, when Elizabeth Willing Powell asked Benjamin Franklin, “Well, Doctor, what have we got—a republic or a monarchy?” he famously replied, “A republic—if you can keep it.”
Why not a democracy? Because no purely democratic society has ever survived! History shows that democracies enjoy a brief period of euphoria—freedom, celebration, unchecked license—before collapsing under the weight of their own flaws.
Why is pure democracy so dangerous? Because it empowers myopic majorities to legislate based on emotion, fads, and vengeance! Imagine a government where 48% of citizens are ignored and laws only benefit the remaining 52%. That’s not governance—it’s mob rule.
In a pure democracy, a whipped-up crowd can make life-altering decisions. One party could declare the other “fair game” and legislate their imprisonment—or worse!
Sound familiar? That’s because one of our major parties believes the United States is a democracy. Their actions should serve as a warning: this misunderstanding is one of the tools that has derailed us!
Our Republic—yes, for which it stands (sorry, I just had to say that)—was designed with guardrails to prevent emotional fads from becoming permanent retribution. Today, we’re witnessing the backlash against attempts to weaponize the Department of Justice. Even though the DOJ sits under the Executive Branch, it must remain apolitical and fair.
Which brings us to this week’s theme: Justification.
What makes good people go bad—and bad ones worse? Justification. Once someone feels justified, anything becomes actionable! It’s a weapon of mass destruction, embedded in religions, governments, media, and movements. Presidents, prime ministers, oligarchs, senators, mayors, protesters—all wield it.
Justification, fueled by one or more of the seven deadly flaws, guarantees unrest and eventual destruction. Without it, there would be no swamp—no unelected actors claiming their actions serve the “greater good” while really serving self-preservation!
Empaths, too, fall prey. Some justify unrest—bottle-throwing, car-burning, assaults—because their echo chambers reassure them it’s righteous. Algorithms, media, manipulators—they all reinforce the illusion of moral clarity.
How does this happen? Simple: flawed justification. People assume they’re right, supported by many, but without concrete evidence. When a suspect is publicly vilified, harassed, and driven to suicide—only to be proven innocent—how do you justify that?
Today I heard of a father who lost his 17-year-old son to fentanyl poisoning. The dealer had already killed another customer with the same single, lethally-dosed pill — far over the deadly 2mg limit, yet received a suspended ten-year sentence. The judge felt justified in letting him walk free.
Indictments are landing on powerful figures who used clearly illegal surveillance against sitting members of Congress and even the occupant of the White House! If you gave them truth serum, they’d say they were justified—because they believed a policy shift would destroy the government as they knew it.
But here’s the rub: they don’t get to decide what’s acceptable. In a Republic, that’s done through procedures. Lots and lots of procedures. These actors should spend years in their prison cells reflecting on that—because they are the problem, not the solution.
Oops, my dyslexia struck me between the eyes in the invitation for comments! It should read:
"..share it with friends, family, and all of your secret society, ‘ODP’ members,.."
not OPD! Sorry! ODP is my newly coined term for our "Originally Designated Path" that we need to be made aware of, so we can get back there, from this dystopian, alternative reality we have chosen.
Justification. You can pretty well justify anything, every thing that you did today you can justify. Look at Hitler, Stalin and Mao Ze Dong.In their mine they were justified.Look at the crusades, for 200 years and justified in the name God. How does a defence lawyer justify getting a really bad person off when he knows the person is really guilty. I asked one and was told, you are not guilty until the jury pronounces you guilty. So it's like you said flawed justification. How to stop it. To me it doesn't look like you can.