Dick's question has been bugging me for weeks: Can we afford Democracy? Finally, after tossing it around in my head--because answers shouldn't be so hard to find--I have had a eureka moment. The US is no longer a democracy.

At the federal level, you have two parties from which to choose. They each do mostly the same things so it's not much of a choice. At the state level most incumbents win, I supposed based on the presumption that even though the elected representatives have done little good for average people they haven't ruined too many people, and those they did ruin likely deserved it for being poor or working-poor. At the municipal level things go to hell and people really don't give a damn because it isn't where they live--unless you are in Detroit I suppose.

I have arrived at the same conclusion I reached way back: what the country cannot afford is rich people.