My fellow Americans, 'tis with heavy heart ...

As my old friend Julius C. used to say, "alea iacta". For those of you who don't know Julius, "the die has been cast". The stage has been set for the 2016 US presidential showdown. It's all over but the shouting; that is, all the shouting can now begin.

Maybe it was having the measles in 1956 and suffering through the disease as well as the only thing on TV -- the Republican National Convention -- that put me off (TV for one, but presidential elections for another), or the mere fact that it really doesn't matter who runs or who is elected in the end -- let's face it, nothing really changes -- at least not for the better, but for whatever reason it was, in the end, I'm not excited about this year at all, maybe even less excited than usual.

Growing up I went through the same indoctrination as everyone else, but I couldn't get all excited about it. It just didn't make a whole lot of sense. All that talk about democracy and democratic processes, well, it just never really jibed with what I saw all around me. Theory is one thing, experience is another. To reconcile these inconsistencies, I told myself that one was the ideal, the other simply the reality that we were working on to eventually come up to the ideal. It didn't take all that long to realize that there wasn't a whole lot of working-on-the-reality going on. There are too strong interests in the status quo that were, and are, willing to let the little matter of democratic ideals get in the way.

Back in those measly days, the Republicans came across as liberals (fiscal responsibility, high taxes, support for Social Security and unions, etc.) and the Democrats looked like they couldn't get their act together (Jim Crow South, voter suppression, but support for social programs and a desire for some kind, maybe any kind, of change). Remember, this was prior to the long overdue Civil Rights Movement and the first shift, in my lifetime, of the political center in America. In many regards, it looks like the parties have switched places since then, but that's not all that surprising. We know that in everyday language words can exchange meanings (e.g., for 250 years or so, "awful" meant what "awesome" means and vice versa), but in the active world of reality in which we live, this could simply be a matter of becoming what you hate.

But none of that's important, really. The problems that were known then -- gerrymandering, excessively restrictive voting legislation, too much money in politics, the Electoral College, etc. -- are still with us today. That's half-a-century of awareness of very specific and very specifically undemocratic issues, and not a single one of them has been changed for the better. Oh sure, every now and then something cosmetic has been done, but nothing of substance. And, in some regards, the situation has gotten even worse. After all, we knew in which direction change-for-the-better lay, but that wasn't the direction in which we moved. And it's not as if it would be difficult to really change any of these things:

• a simple law outlawing gerrymandering could be passed
• another law designating a simple formula for determining representation (in the House of Representatives, for example), like "1 representative for every 500,000 people" and requiring fairer districting to reflect that could be implemented
• ending voter-registration requirements; attaining a certain age automatically gives you the right to vote

But none of that ever really comes up for discussion and I haven't heard anybody actually clamoring for that public discussion either (though you can find one neatly tucked away in innocuous corners of the internet). Granted, the Electoral College -- an institution that has certainly outlived its age, but certainly not its intent -- would be more difficult to tackle, needing a constitutional amendment and all (and we all know how idolatrously sacrosanct American holds its constitution), but that money-in-politics thing got changed the most: the US has shown -- and judicially upheld -- that certain forms of bribery are not only legal, but encouraged. How much more undemocratic can you get? Of course, most Americans don't get it, and are so caught up in their self-adoration that they don't even realize that most of the rest of the world has long caught on: America is really good at saying one thing and doing another. Sometimes I think they're trying to turn it into an art form. But it isn't and it's not going to become one.

It's not that people aren't thinking about how the system could be improved, or that it's all too difficult to understand the fundamental shortcomings of a two-party system But the system America has is the system an elite 200+ years ago wanted in order to keep "the people" in their place, so naturally, it's the system that the current elite are simply loathe to change. Why should they? It works very much in their favor. For example,

• 75% of Americans want terms limits for Congress, but there are none.
• 63% of Americans want to get rid of the Electoral College, but they've still got it.
• 58% of Americans want federally funded healthcare for all, but they've only got a system most of them don't want anyway.
• The vast majority of Americans support some kind of enhanced background checks for buying guns, but are they going to get any? You know the answer.

Let's face it, what the people want in America is hardly the issue. Any substantial, visible change has to go through Congress and it's obvious that Congress isn't about to do anything but work for its owners. The people just don't count. They're there for the show, and a show is what we're all about to get, once the real campaigns are launched. It may just be the worst show to be staged thus far.

In the midst of a system that is as overtly corrupt and undemocratic as this one, we also have a certain mentality at work that gives me pause to wonder. It is in presidential election times that one gets to hear the truly bizarre. America is the only modern, allegedly democratic nation in which the phrase "a wasted vote" makes any sense. The very phrase oozes with undemocratic sentiment, but it is thrown about and used as if it were somehow meaningful. The mere concept should be enough to make all our hair stand on end, yet in America it somehow does make some sort of distorted sense: in a consciously designed and implemented two-party system, third parties are per definitionem outside the system; they don't count ... and they never counted, and as long as the system remains as it is, they never will count.

(As an aside: Bernie never stood a chance. Had he not tried to elbow his way into the Democratic Party, he wouldn't have gotten even the minimal media coverage that he got. Don't believe me? Ask Jill Smith or Gary Johnson. Now that we know he never stood a chance in the Democratic Party, what option did Bernie really have? First past the post wins, and that's that. Now his still recalcitrant supporters who know they have been more or less blocked out of the system are being harangued not to waste their votes in this oh, so important "historical" election. Go figure.)

In the end, though, because of the way in which the system has been set up and in light of the fact that for as democratically inclined most Americans like to think themselves, barely more than half of the voting-age population ever makes it out to cast a vote for their delegate to the Electoral College anyway (which I don't take as a sign of a particularly healthy democratic mindset). And when we consider that traditionally, around 4% of these will waste their votes on a hopeless cause, and that, at least in the last 10 elections the winner has garnered on average around a mere 51% of the vote, we have the, allegedly, most powerful person in the world being elected by about 25-27% of the US voting-age population. That, my fellow Americans, is minority rule. It takes a vivid and creative imagination to spin that into an exemplary model of democracy.

This is, however, how a two-party systems works (and how it was always intended to work). Moreover, the most fundamental assumption underlying the system, the one that should, at least in principle, make it acceptable or at least remotely viable, is that whoever is running is worth voting for in the first place. There was a time -- in my measly and post-measles days -- when I thought for a moment that such elections were about positions and policies. We're all allowed to be naive in our youth. In the meantime, as this latest presidential primary circus has shown, positions and policies apparently don't matter at all. The whole affair has degenerated into little more than a popularity contest. One party has no real policies and positions at all, just a lot of hate and fear, and the other has some, but they're the same, old same-old, regardless of how "progressive" the internal opposition was in the run-up to the nomination. I find it exceedingly interesting that there's more talk now about unity and togetherness than there is about anything substantial. Trump is being sold as anti-establishment, though he's anything but anti-elite; Clinton is being sold as a rallying point, because she's established in the elite. Somehow I'm still missing "the people" in this alleged democratic adventure.

What is more, one has to search far and wide to find actual engagement with and analysis of the Democratic Party platform, for more than anything, this election is already being pitched as "historic" because a woman is running (though not alone, nor for the first time, but it just so happens for one of the only two parties that count). Already we are being encouraged, in particular women are being encouraged, to vote for the woman, merely because she's a woman. I don't know about you, but that strikes me as a particularly weak political argument, and there's nothing democratic about it. There's a lot at stake in this election, that much I will concede, and that's all the more reason in my mind to think really hard about if you're going to vote; if you are, how you're going to vote; and most definitely what you are actually voting for. The spin-wheels are already squealing that anything is better than Trump, but not why it is that only Clinton is that "anything".

And so, my fellow Americans, he we are, a decade-and-a-half into the 21st century and we're about to witness what promises to be one of the most unreasonable, dirty, hateful, mean, confrontational and potentially violent presidential election cycle ever. Oh, how far we have come. Oh, how rich and reasoned is our understanding of democracy and the democratic process. Oh, how proud we must be. This, my fellow Americans, is apparently the best we can do.

Though disappointed in my measly days, along the way I had hoped that we would learn and grow, just as all my adult guides expected of me. In my youthful naivite, I thought that's how the world worked. It doesn't. Learning, apparently, is what others are supposed to do. Still, I'm older now, just a little bit smarter in spite of it all, but not necessarily wiser. What I have seen this year will certainly be more than enough for the next four years, to be sure. I shudder when I think of the short-term. I'm concerned deeply for all our futures.

What I have seen that pains me most though is that we have apparently, been forced into submission to a "system" which has come to exhibit and represent all that it was meant to overcome.

My fellow Americans, thanks for the extra load of crap

It's not like I have nothing to do, nor that there aren't things I'd rather be doing. But, I'm not getting to them, because I have to spend way too much times "explaining" things that can't really be explained.

This week, the allegedly impossible happened: Trump was nominated by the Republican Party as their candidate for president. It's their good right. In contrast to lots of people I know, I'm all for democracy, even though I also know that it means you may get more than you bargained for or that you end up places you never wanted to be. I can live with that, but I don't want to have to live with trying to explain how things like this can happen ... in supposedly the most advanced country on earth ... in allegedly the greatest country the world has ever known ... in purportedly the zenith of Western culture.

My fellow Americans, you know and I know, even if the rest of the world hasn't caught on yet, that there is a massive disconnect between the marketing of a product and the actual product itself. After all, we grow up with exaggerated claims about everything. It's part and parcel of being American. The Greeks may have invented the word "hyperbole", but we filled it with life, everyday life. America is -- let's face it -- non-stop hyperbole.

It's hard to get that if you're not American. It's hard to understand that what is said has little resemblance to the reality it's supposed to describe and that what's shouted at the world shouldn't be taken all that seriously, for the most part. Words mean little in America. We're born pragmatists. It's in our blood: it's not what we say that makes a difference, it's what we do, and when you look at what America has been doing to the world since the last big war, well, you realize there's a reality there that lots of other peoples are having trouble living with. But that's a subject for another day.

Let's face it: the Donald -- the very moniker gives it all away -- is not presidential, and his wife isn't very first-lady-like at all. Oh, I'm not saying anyone else in the eventual race is cutting better figures here, far from it. You just have to realize that cute charm has worn off the American facade. Melania should have done her homework. I know students who almost lost their degrees for less plagiarism than she aired in her very short speech. In today's world of intellectual property, stealing others' words has become a mortal sin. Feigning ignorance, sloughing it off as cavalier, allowing for that much sloppiness at such a critical juncture is, well, inexplicable at best, but trust-eradicating at worst. Why do Americans expect so little of those who are going to represent them to the rest of the world?

And yes, the Donald ... sorry, I got side-tracked ... he's everything we imagine a leader of the free world is not. (OK, he's now got a Boris Johnson from that other wannabe empire flitting through the world distracting attention from serious issues, but that too is another story for another day). He is unstatesmanlike, vitriolic, incoherent, uninformed, and ignorant of history; he is unaware of his own effect on others, easily manipulated, insensitive to others, and of questionable ethics and beliefs. Yes, yes, I know that even the most seasoned politician can be any of these things on a bad day, but this is Trump on his good days. I used to think it was cute and somewhat funny when people made jokes about a senile Reagan getting to close to the nuclear button, but I have to tell you, I'm not the only one in my personal environment who is worried about Mr. I-don't-have-to-think-anything-through-because-I'm-great having such serious access.

You know, and I know, and I've said as much before, you don't live in much of a democracy, but given the wide range of more-than-life-threatening issues on the table, it is really not too much to expect that you'd at least offer someone up for office who gives you the impression he could be taken seriously. Too many of my Trump-supporting Facebook friends are tying to push his "outsider honesty", but a billionaire is never an outsider to elites and having no tact is not the same as being honest. There are too many Americans who simply don't know the difference, and this is the behavior we have come to expect from pubescing adolescents, but not from office holders whom we are supposed to be taking seriously and whose words and actions can cause major upheavals in financial markets or peace negotiations.

A lot of people I know once did -- and still want to -- have a high opinion of America, but between the apparent increase in good old police brutality, the lost-the-plot gun stuff being reported, the obvious über-aggression of US-led NATO, and now the Trump spectacle, it's getting harder and harder to explain to them why they should be taking American seriously. I certainly can't explain it to them, even if I wanted to, because my own head wags and my own jaw drops on a regular basis, but apparently Mr. Trump is what some people envision as the "most powerful person on earth". I get shivers.

Now, I'm fully aware that the other half of the gruesome twosome to be running for office in America has yet to be officially nominated. It's a done deal, though, we all know that. And no one should think it is any easier explaining Hillary to my fellow, questioning-asking German citizens. Yes, they know she's Bill's wife, they know she held political office, they know she was Secretary of State, but it's not like she left a lasting impression on anyone around here. Well, maybe on the politically elite, but I'm talking about everyday people with every problems who have an everyday understanding of international politics. But they know what Wall Street is, and they know what Goldman-Sachs is and they who has close ties to big money and who doesn't and, well, that just raises a whole lot of other questions that, to be quite frank, I have little desire to try and explain, even if I had a coherent explanation to offer.

No, my fellow Americans, you have and you are about to make my life much more difficult than it need be. I can't explain how Americans think, because I'm not convinced myself that a whole lot of thinking is going on over there, at least politically. I don't understand the gun fetish, even if there is an alleged constitutional amendment supporting it. I don't get the massive police violence that we're seeing on the news so often. I don't understand the too numerous killings of unarmed civilians. I don't understand how corrupt and manipulated allegedly democratic processes have become, be they the passing of simple legislation, the refusal to nominate a supreme-court justice, or the curtailing of voting rights, or the circuses you call the primaries. I don't get any of that, and neither do my German friends and neighbors, but I can't explain it to them either.

Personally, I have no vested interest in who you decide to have run or who you decide to field as presidential candidates. One thing I do understand, though, is something I can't explain to them anyway, namely it really doesn't matter in the end who is finally elected president in America: nothing is going to change anyway. Not only do Americans not elect its own president, as the primaries showed this time around, they really have nothing to say about who ends up being candidate. But it doesn't matter in the end. Yes, we all like to act like and think that the President of the United States has something to say, but other than little decisions, like who gets X'd off the kill list or which tie to wear to the press conference, the real decisions, such as whether there's a drone-kill list at all, are made by others. What everyone here knows and has no trouble saying is how badly money has corrupted America's political system, and my only real recourse is to affirm that they're right: America is not politically driven, it is money driven. If the right people or enough people stand to make a profit, it will be done, regardless of the politics of the situation.

Unfortunately, they really don't understand that either. Well, to be honest, I think they don't want to understand it. Nobody wants to think that at bottom it's all about money. My mother taught me, though, that if it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, well ... I can understand that, even if I have trouble sympathizing with it. But we truly have to ask ourselves what real options do we have?

When you've run out of explanations, the best you can do, I think, is to motivate people to ask questions for themselves, so all I can do is repeatedly admonish my fellow German (and other European friends) to ask the only really relevant "political" question we have: cui bono? (Who benefits?) And that's the question I'm asking myself post-Republican National Convention: cui bono? That's the question everybody should be asking.

We should learn from tragedy, but somehow we can't

Very early on while learning to write, I was given some sage advice and learned a valuable lesson: don't write about something if you're too emotionally involved. You should know I'm not heeding that advice right now.

What happened in Nice two days ago was a shocking, horrific, abhorrent, gruesome, atrocious, and terrible act, but it was not an act of terror, try as we might to make it one.

Terror, for those of you who may have forgotten, is the use of excessive, random violence for political ends. And as things stand at the moment, there is no political connection to be found, regardless of how badly the authorities and media want us to believe there is.

A foreign-born, but French, petty criminal with more personal and family problems than most of us can begin to imagine takes a truck and drives amok into a family event, wreaking unimaginable harm, injury and death upon everyday men, women, and children -- families and friends who wanted no more than a bit of joy in their lives. This is a tragedy. You can't know how deeply I grieve for victims, their families and their friends. France was not attacked. Families were attacked. And you can't believe how irate I am that this tragedy is being instrumentalized for other, much less honorable, purposes.

The perpetrator is dead. He can never tell us what motivated him to commit such a brutally horrendous act. There is no mention of the situation in the socially volatile and disadvantaged hot spots in most large French cities. It doesn't matter that we've imposed an economic system that is more exclusionary than capable of meeting even the most basic human needs. And what is more, there are questions about the level and types of security being provided for the event, especially in light of the fact that France is essentially living under marshal law. But all of that is merely brushed aside.

The French prime minister has already declared an Islamistic connection, without offering even the merest shred of evidence. Without claiming responsibility, Daesh is thrilled with the result. Why is that surprising but how is that even newsworthy? The media has been abuzz with one special report after another parading out an endless stream terrorism experts in blatant disregard for the known facts of the case. Even Hollande promised in his initial remarks to increase military retaliation in Syria, and civilian deaths that will result will be the consequence of real, not imagined, terror.

Are we ever going to learn anything? I have my doubts.

When people snap mentally, they go on killing sprees, be it when they used to "go postal" as we referred to it America (because it seemed to happen more often to postal employees than others) and shot up their co-workers or be it when they drive a truck into a crowd of people out for a celebration. Until 9/11 no such event would have labeled as terrorism, but since then there is no killing spree that is not.

9/11 didn't change everything. We changed. We became frightened and fearful and allowed our rights and civil protections to be taken away because of an unavoidable event. We packed it up in the package of terrorism and we've been terrorized ever since. We've dug ourselves in so deeply that we can't see anything anymore without it having a terrorist tint. And if it doesn't have one, we're more than willing to give it one. We're so concerned with what might possibly, perhaps, unexpectedly happen to ourselves that we don't have it in us, it would seem, to stop and mourn for those who need it.

We're in the process of making this about us, when it has to be about those who have been killed and those who have been left to suffer.

Listen! Enough is enough, and enough is too much

Sometimes enough is just too much.

Sometimes you just can't find the words.

I don't know about you, but life even as a dispassionate, detached observer is getting hard to take. It makes you wonder. Well, it makes me wonder, I can tell you that.

Back in my carefree days, I studied literature and was amused by the Theatre of the Absurd. It was crazy, but insightful, purposefully not making sense to entertain. OK, I was young, naive, and a good portion stupid, I'll admit: Beckett and Pynchon weren't writing to entertain, they were rubbing our noses in our own stuff; they weren't just insightful, they were brutally honest; they weren't crazy, we are.

Most of you, dear readers, didn't even stumble over the "carefree" in that last paragraph. You all knew what I meant and most of you smiled inwardly and waxed nostalgic about those days. Truth be told, the vast majority of human beings on this planet never had a carefree day (let alone years) in their lives, but we're too sheltered, too pampered, to out-of-touch to know that. All right, add ignorant to my list of non-virtues.

One day, you (possibly) wake up (and I think most of us have) and you realize this isn't some silly play on the stage that you're watching: damn! Shakespeare was right, all the world is a stage, and every last one of us is a player. Are we just screwing up our parts, or are we really playing our roles? And therein lies the rub, as Bill would also say.

Falcon Heights, Baton Rouge, Dallas -- just the popper on a long, long bullwhip of absurdity. Thoughtless, needless, senseless, feckless, heartless murders, every one of them, and all I can see and hear are tongues wagging, fingers pointing, and knees jerking. We'd might as well face it: we can't fix it. No, it's not because the situation is so broken it can't be fixed. No, it's not because "they" are to blame. No, it's not that "we" are to blame. The reason we can't fix it is simple: we don't want to. All the yelling, screaming, and wailing is just as thoughtless, needless, senseless, feckless and heartless as the murders. There is so much hot air and heated passions being projected into the world that we may die of heat exhaustion before we gun each other down.

For the record -- not as if it will matter -- the vast majority of cops are honest, hard-working, dedicated people who are just trying to make their communities safe. We shouldn't condemn them all for the actions of a few. The vast majority of our fellow black citizens are decent, hard-working, dedicated people who are trying to make the best of their lives in the situation in which they find themselves. We shouldn't condemn them all for the actions of a few. The vast majority of protesters are honest, concerned and active citizens who are trying to make those who are still unaware of some of the issues involved more aware. We shouldn't condemn them all for the actions of a few. But that's precisely what we do in all cases. The rotten apples spoil the barrel, and the few give the many a bad name, but it never occurs to us that what we decry in others 9 times out of 10 is merely what we ourselves do all the time. It takes one to know one.

One thing is for sure: this most recent absurdity is truly American. it's American because it's happening in America, not everywhere else; it's being perpetrated by Americans, not some vague foreign agents. No, the problem's as homegrown as you get; you're simply reaping what you have sown, and you're going to keeping on reaping till you own up to the fact that you've got no one to blame but yourselves, collectively, of course, but personally as well.

Yes, we're all to blame, and it's time that we all just face up to it. Did it ever occur to you that you are never part of the problem, it's always"them", or at least someone else. Did it never occur to you that you are always right and "they" (or at least someone else) never is. My Facebook and Twitter feeds have been overflowing with one-breath analyses, one-line conclusions and zero solutions. I don't know what is more absurd, to tell the truth: what's going down or what's being said about it.

But, in all the din of accusations, counter-accusations, blame-fixing no one is listening.

That's the biggest problem of all: no one is listening.

Of course, there are two other problems that play in here that we cannot afford to ignore: The first is America's race problem. It's there, and it's deep-seated, that's for sure. Very deep-seated. It's so much a part of the culture that not a thing is going to change until we own up to it. This isn't a matter of artificially construed and inappropriately applied statistics. Having a race problem, is all the more absurd, of course, now that we know there is no such thing as race, but the label used is the right one because it's the one we can connect with. It was apparent in the fake debate about the flying of the Confederate flag. It's to be found in the the voter restriction laws being passed. It's in the simple, fact that in the year 2016 the KKK is making a comeback. How can that even be? It's time to own up to the fact that no where on earth do people of color have so much working against them as in America. Oh, I know the excuses; I was brought up with them. The ideal is a land of equal opportunity but the reality is an unequal as you can get. The ideal is equal rights under and before the law, but the reality is anything but. Stop screaming, accusing, blaming and start talking ... openly (for a change), honestly (maybe for the first time), directly ... but more than anything else, start listening.

The other problem is the violence problem: There are more murders, more violent crimes committed in American than just about anywhere on earth, and this doesn't take into consideration how many actual deaths were caused, for example, by the wrecking of the economy by capitalist speculators. Ball-point pens can be as deadly as any gun. Just this week we saw murders committed by those within and those outside the law. Americans, it would seem, are more willing to accept all sorts of violence as legitimate, but there is no such thing. There is legalized violence, as when the state allow itself to execute those it deems undesirable, but legitimate violence doesn't exist. It should always be the last resort, not the first one, as we are seeing.

And by the way, this isn't a gun issue, folks. Guns are a red herring. The absurdity we're dealing with is a simple, fundamental and deep-seated acceptance, if not love, of violence. Guns are tools, nothing more. They complicate the matter, but they don't define it. Yet physical violence, while the most obvious, is probably the least of the problem: the everyday psychological violence perpetuated on the populace, both collectively and individually, is mind-boggling to say the least: the unbridled, gloves-off brutality of business competition, the cold, calculating oppression of social-service recipients, the wielding of debt as weapon of suppression, be you a home-owner down on your luck or a student trying to make a better life for yourself. Get on the wrong side of the system and you'll be crushed, mercilessly. There is no mercy for losers. Fear is the prime motivator and threats the weapon of choice. But of course if that doesn't work, there's always physical violence as a last resort. It's just around the corner ... or in your face. You see it in its favorite sports, you see it in political campaigns, you see it in the rapaciousness of casino capitalism, you see it in its foreign policy, and you hear it in everyday language. It's time to start listening to what's really being said.

It's enough already. Really. It's time to stop accepting this absurdity as the way things are. None of this has to be the way it is. Things are as they are because we have either made them this way or allowed them to become that way. And while you personally may never have been shot at, while you personally may not have suffered injustice, it is time to wake up to the fact that there are too many who have and too many who do. When are we going to get it? When are we going to see that we are involved whether we like it or not? When is this absurdity going to stop? Well, it can't stop until you do everything you can do to make it stop. It's your move.

It's no wonder the world's in such bad shape

For all the wailing and gnashing of teeth that has gone on in the last week, we've got damn little to show for it. That little fiasco did, however, make a number of things clearer than most would like to admit, but they're not necessarily the ones we like to think.

You may not want to admit it, but Emma Goldman was right: If voting changed anything, they'd make it illegal.

Great Britain said they wanted out of the EU. There's not even the slightest hint that the process is even being seriously considered. The Tories apparently have to get their house in order. Why? What as it in before? It wasn't this vote that split it. The pranks and psychoses that were there before are now simply going to involve other people. None of this has anything to do with sovereignty or immigrants or lack of democracy on the Continent. The Brits have just as much democracy as anyone else: none. We're simply back to business as usual.

Believe me, I'm not picking on the Brits. They merely brought a couple of issues to the surface. As I noted recently, the US can't even pretend to have a democracy in any meaningful sense of the word. Though that doesn't stop them or their pundits from piping up. Both Juncker and Merkel this week have shown they have absolutely no intention of getting democratic about anything. Even people who think they did things right get to do them over again if the right people insist on it. Nothing to see here: it's just business as usual.

Hell, the only people I can see trying to make a point at all are the French, and we can't won't hear a thing about it because the European Cup (the European Soccer Cup for my American readers, and believe me, it's a big sports deal, in all senses of the word) is being played and the media isn't about to ruin such a fine sporting event. After all, there are advertisers to consider on the one hand, and ... well, you know, that is even more business as usual.

It's not really my place, but I have to tell you: democracy has nothing to do with voting or elections. Nothing. They like to tell us that the term "democracy" comes from the Greek and means "rule of the people", but you should know that ever since the term has been coined, the demos was considered a "mob" and there is no self-respecting elite in the world who is going to put up with mob rule.

Personally, and I'm as about as far away from an elite as you can get, I see their point, and I also see how well they can turn us into a mob when it suits them. Just look at the Brexit fiasco. Don't get me wrong, it's the not the end result I'm calling into question, it is the process of getting there that stunk to high heaven. We really need to think twice about getting into bed with racists and bigots (with a wink here to my American friends supporting Trump) if you don't want to be lumped in with racists and bigots. Voting, though, referendums, elections ... all those nice respectable outlets we're allowed to have ... they're just games were allowed to play to get us to think we have something to say. We don't. If we did, why are the French out in the streets? They have every reason to be: their government doesn't listen to them any more than yours listens to you. They have also experienced -- up real and personal -- just how much difference an election makes.

My question is: just when are we going to get it? just when are we going to realize that all of this "working within the system" is just a rather underhanded way of keeping all of us under their thumb?

Oh, I know what a lot of you are thinking ... especially the more paranoid and those of you who consider yourself smarter and more critical than the average mob person: he's seeing conspiracies, this one; maybe we ought to get him a tinfoil hat. That's OK. You are allowed to think whatever you want regardless of how silly it is. I'm not saying that there is some organized cabal planning the oppression of the rest of us, some nefarious and shadowy group plotting our enslavement. Here is what I do know, however:

• There is not a Western government that isn't dominated by special interests.
• There is not a Western politician who isn't influenced -- for or against -- by those interests.
• There are large corporations who are willing to spend a pittance on lobbying knowing full well their return-on-lobbying-investment will be worth every penny.
• There are very, very rich people who aren't going to share a penny with anyone else if they can help it.
• Those powerful corporations driven by profit and those rich folks have much more in common with each other than the rest of us think we have with each other, even if it is only their love of money.
• Neither of these groups is what we might call "democratically inclined".

But that's "the system", as we all know it. But, you should know that I know this as well:

• The last thing they want is for US to think we might be able to do anything about it.

And they succeed, not in some grandiose, concerted, focused effort at suppression, but because it is simply too easy to get us quibbling amongst ourselves, to get us angry at each other, and to have us at each others' throats. It's so easy because they have convinced most of us that we're nothing more than individual egos seeking our own self-interest, and that we're really nothing more than losers if we think otherwise.

I'm sorry, folks, but it is really not any more complicated than that.

If change is going to come ... that is, change that in any way, shape and form is, or may be beneficial for ourselves or our children or our grandchildren ... we've got to wake up and not smell the coffee, but smell the stench of deceit, distrust and defeat that they shower upon us.

There are times when the bravest thing you can do is to just say "no". Now is one of those times.

If you don't like the world as you find it, if you don't like the world as it's being shoved down your throat, if you don't like the world that others have made for you, then it's your move. No political candidate is going to "work for you"; they're going to work for whoever pays them enough to get re-elected. No elected official is concerned about you; they are concerned about their constituencies and getting re-elected. Am I saying that there are no elected officials or politicians who are trying to make a difference? Not at all. What I am saying is that "system" is broken, so let's stop trying to fix it, but instead try setting up something new that works. What does that "something new" look like, how does it work? I have no idea, but it doesn't matter. Since when do you need me telling you what is good for you?

If you don't like the world as you find it, stop whining (or whinging, as my British friends might say) about lost opportunities and wasted votes. Get informed, get smart, get active. Most of all, start talking: to family, friends, neighbors ... figure out what is important to you and find like-minded people to help you achieve your common goals. Think big and start small, but start. And when in doubt, ignore the system. It wasn't set up for your benefit, that's for sure.

There is no one that can make a difference in the world other than yourself. Like it or not, it all starts with you. It's time you realized that and did something about it.