COMMENTARY: Greatest danger to democracy is the system itself

The greatest danger to U.S. democracy is our political system itself. Among the greatest problems are the practices of gerrymandering and the passage of the Citizens United legislation. Both practices are counter to the idea of a democratic government as intended by our constitution. They are counter to the idea of one man, one vote. A third problematic and counterproductive part of our political system is the absence of term limits.

Gerrymandering allows for politicians to keep themselves in power to serve themselves and their political donors’ interests, not all citizens. Our Constitution call for citizens to select whom they want to represent them in government. Gerrymandering works the opposite, the politicians controlled by big money pick what special interest group they want to represent.

Citizens United makes it legal for our political system be controlled by a small group of billionaires, millionaires and giant corporations. They can legally bribe politicians to pass legislation that benefits their self-interests regardless of what is good for the country’s citizens. To further make things worse, the long-term effects of Citizens United on our electoral system will make big money more entrenched, more powerful, and cement their grip on our political system and eventually destroy our representative form of government. No term limits allow politicians to become so entrenched in their positions that the power goes to their heads and they forget they are supposed to represent all citizens. Term limits reduce corruption and open government to new people with new ideas. How many times have we seen politicians who have been in office for decades who are still promising the same solutions they promised decades ago but never fulfilled them? Without term limits, they forget what they were elected to do, which is governing, and instead resort to self-serving personal agendas funded by their controlling donors. Recently it has come to light that Supreme Court justices are also taking legal bribes from billionaires who benefit from their court decisions. With lifetime appointments some of them have traded honesty and ethics for expensive favors. Shameful!

More problems have recently come to the surface in a very public way with what is happening in the House of Representatives. Their constitutional duties to serve the country by proposing legislation to improve the lives of all citizens has come to a complete halt. Today they are embroiled in infighting pitting egos, power grabs, personal agendas, ideologies and revenge against their fellow legislators in the same political party. This chaos in the House of Representatives is exposing our government to the rest of the world as being grossly incompetent. America’s leadership in the world is being jeopardized by petty infighting and chaos. There are two major wars in the world on top of our domestic problems like passing a budget resolution that call for a fully functioning U.S. government. There are some members of the House whose sole intention is to disrupt everything, putting a stop to any meaningful legislation. Supporting a campaign based solely on revenge only serves to promote more hate and division.

The disrupters, the bomb throwers, the unprofessional conduct, the corruption, the baseless conspiracy theories are poisoning our democracy. For our government to function as it’s supposed to, there needs to be accountability, cooperation and compromise, starting with the House of Representatives getting down to do the job they were supposed to be doing all along.

As long as these problematic matters are a part of our government, our democratic system of government will continue to deteriorate. At this point, voting these people out of office is the first step. Voting for honest, dignified candidates is the second step to return sanity to our government and democracy. Elections are just around the corner.

Beto Conde lives in Rancho Viejo.