#Nine Passengers

[H2O Man]

11. That's curious.

I've yet to hear the quote that you attribute to him, though I have no doubt that it has been used. For the very nature of political protest rallies always invludes the most extreme saying such nonsense.

I did not intend my comment to be snarky or insulting. I respect you as a good forum member. But some things seem obvious to me ...... for example, why did the Founding Fathers include citizens' right to gather publicly to protest against those government policies they disagree with with? And why is it in Amendment 1 in the Bill of Rights, indicating they recognized it was so important?

You appear to be focused exclusively on Gaza. I suspect this may be due to your getting your primary information from the media.This is why I recommend talking with politically active young people. In doing so, I recommend not viewing politics only as a graph on a flat surface, but rather, as a solid sphere graph -- for this allows us a more accurate view than does limiting everything to Democrat versus republican, which was the most common view in my youth.

It's interesting to consider what Sean Wilentz wrote in his introduction to his classic "The Rise of American Democracy" (2005). This country was, for some time, a republic, and definitely not a democracy. He notes that a republic translates to "res publica" ..... a "public thing" ..... in this case to be run by rich white men, who believed themselves most capable of doing so. Democracy comes from "demos krateo," or "rule of the people," which the rich white men considered dangerous. By Lincoln's time, of course, there were a handful of political parties, including some advocating for democracy.

Now, we are at a very different point. Obviously, the republican party is run by the most capable liars and thieves, backed by the ignorant willing to violently overthrow the government. The Democratic Party has more members, thank goodness. But the growth of independent voters has certainly changed the balance. And that is extremely unlikely to change in the near future, when we consider the current registration trends among young voters.

What do the young people want? We know what young republicans want, which is distinct from what they would reap if successful. So let's skip them. The majority of the political rallies I am aware of on the East Coast involve young Democrats and independents. At this time, obviously the torture of children in Gaza is central to the rallies, yet they involve voters who have a variety of things they are advocating for. Most are saying the same general thing that Senator Chuck Schumer recently said about events in Gaza.