Guardian - Still no votes in Leipzig

[Book Lover]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uselections2004/comment/story/0,14259,1309890,00.html

Still no votes in Leipzig
US policy now affects every citizen on the planet. So we should all have a say in who gets to the White House

Jonathan Freedland
Wednesday September 22, 2004

The Guardian

<snip>

Anyone who doubts it need only look at the last four years. The war against Iraq, the introduction of the new doctrine of pre-emption, the direct challenge to multilateral institutions - chances are, not one of these world-changing developments would have happened under a President Al Gore. It is no exaggeration to say that the actions of a few hundred voters in Florida changed the world.

So perhaps it's time to make a modest proposal. If everyone in the world will be affected by this election, shouldn't everyone in the world have a vote? Despite Bob Dole, shouldn't the men who want to be president win the support of Liverpool and Leipzig as well as Louisville and Lexington?

It may sound wacky, but the idea could not be more American. After all, the country was founded on the notion that human beings must have a say in the decisions that govern their lives. The rebels' slogan of "No taxation without representation" endures two centuries later because it speaks about something larger than the narrow business of raising taxes. It says that those who pay for a government's actions must have a right to choose the government that takes them.

Today, people far from America's shores do indeed pay for the consequences of US actions. The citizens of Iraq are the obvious example, living in a land where a vile dictatorship was removed only for a military occupation and unspeakable violence to be unleashed in its place. The would-be voters of downtown Baghdad might like a say in whether their country would be better off with US forces gone. Perhaps John Kerry's Monday promise to start bringing the troops home, beginning next summer, would appeal to them. But they have no voice.

<snip>

Wacky or revolutionary?

[David Dunham]

1. European companies can urge their US workers to vote for Kerry.

[Book Lover]

2. Well, I'd hate it

if my boss told me who to vote for. After sleeping on it, I am thinking this is more a horrible reaction to the reality that America is a global empire with no endgame plan. Maybe it's time for my family to go back to Europe.