Log In
Or create an account ->
Imperial Library
Home
About
News
Upload
Forum
Help
Login/SignUp
Index
Cover Page
Title Page
Contents
Dedication
Acknowledgments
Introduction
The power of democracy
The threat to the commons
Democracy fights back.
Chapter 1: AMERICA'S DEMOCRACY IS ERODING
Bad for democracy, good for giant corporations
The loss of democratic participation
The rise of the new corporate feudal lords
The three threats
Chapter 2: WHAT IS DEMOCRACY, AND WHAT DIFFERENCE DOES IT MAKE?
Democracies don't attack each other.
How democracy is defined
Antidemocracies
The characteristics of a healthy democracy
The Goddess of Democracy
Beware: Tight control can look very good, at first . . .
Is this what the Founders fought for?
Chapter 3: PEOPLE AND EVENTS THAT INFLUENCED AMERICA'S FOUNDERS
Jefferson encounters ancient wisdom.
Native Americans
Tacitus on the natives of England
Paul de Rapin Thoyras on the history of England
The truth about the Tea Party
Chapter 4: WHEN DEMOCRACY FAILED
Sunset provisions and gradual increases in terror
Creating a new homeland security bureau
The lies that convinced the people war was necessary
Two nations take two different paths— in the 1930s.
Chapter 5: MYTHS ABOUT DEMOCRACY IN AMERICA
Myth: “Even our Founders knew democracies eventually self-destruct.”
Myth: “America was created by rich white men to protect their wealth.”
Myth: “The Founders wrote slavery into the Constitution.”
Myth: “A woman's place is in the home, and the Founders knew it.”
Myth: “The Republican Party has always been the party of big business and cheap labor.”
Myth: “The Founders thought the Constitution was perfect and should never change.”
Myth: “Government is an evil entity that's against the people.”
Myth: “The Founders and Framers were impractical, idealistic Enlightenment-era dreamers.”
Myth: “The Constitution offers no right to privacy.”
Myth: “Jefferson said it's wrong for the rich to pay more in taxes.”
Myth: “Working women are responsible for the loss of good-paying jobs.”
Myth: “Liberals wrote child labor laws to create a shortage and drive up wages.”
Myth: “Left to themselves, people would drain the Treasury.”
Myth: “Liberal democratic policies are socialism.”
Myth: “Free markets are nature's way of making the winner fit and strong (it's Darwin).”
Myth: “Taxes are an unfair burden and a waste of money.”
Myth: “Social programs are the liberals' way of buying votes.”
Myth: “Unlimited growth and concentration of power is nature's way and it's good for us.”
Myth: “Media conglomerates are just nature taking its course.”
Myth: “The media have a liberal bias.”
Myth: “There's too much regulation: Get government off the backs of big companies.”
Myth: “NAFTA/GATT/WTO ‘free trade' is good for all nations.”
Myth: “Unions harm economies by driving up wage expenses.”
It's time to set aside the myths.
Chapter 6: WHAT BECAME OF REAL AMERICAN CONSERVATIVES?
The modern conservative movement: Russell Kirk
The shift to pseudoconservative values
Awakening to the antidemocratic conservative damage
Chapter 7: DEMOCRACY, NOT DOMINANCE, IS THE WAY OF NATURE
The biology of democracy
Democracy in nature
Is democracy the same thing as enlightened self-interest?
But what about “survival of the fittest”?
Tribal democracy
Democracy always wins.
Chapter 8: WARLORDS, THEOCRATS, AND ARISTOCRATS RISE AGAIN
Warlord presidents use “national security” to grab power.
Theocrats attack democracy.
The new aristocracy: corporatism and monopolies
Chapter 9: MODERN DEMOCRACY: ITS HISTORY AND WHY IT WORKS
The oldest democratic cultures
Roots in Rome and Greece
Chapter 10: THE STATE OF DEMOCRACY IN THE WORLD TODAY
Democracy spreads across the world in a single century, 1920–2000.
Where we are now
Democracy is inevitable.
Chapter 11: A VISION FOR THE FUTURE OF AMERICA AND THE WORLD
Register and vote.
Return war powers to Congress and end nonwars.
Repeal the PATRIOT Act and other antiliberty laws.
Provide free high-quality public education for all—through college.
Require that any benefits Congress gives itself, it gives to all citizens.
Provide health care for all.
Require a living wage.
Support organized labor or organize your workplace.
Use tariffs and trade policy to balance labor's playing field.
Strengthen the social safety net.
Bring back the middle class by restoring the tax laws that created it.
Keep Social Security out of corporate hands.
Institute universal conscription.
Clean up the environment and public lands.
Strengthen the Sherman Anti-Trust Act and break up monopolies.
Bust up the media conglomerates and restore a robust free press.
Make the “revolving door” between industry and regulatory agencies illegal.
Use tax incentives and grants to jump-start alternative energy.
Reserve human rights for humans, not “aggregated capital.”
Keep church and state separate.
Make the United States more democratic in its elections.
Abolish the Electoral College.
Get corporations out of the voting process.
Make the UN more democratic.
Take action.
Chapter 12: WHAT WOULD JEFFERSON DO?
We can speak out.
Transforming democracy for the better
Endnotes
Afterword by Robert Wolff
Notes
About the Author
Also by Thom Hartman
Copyright Page
← Prev
Back
Next →
← Prev
Back
Next →