Governance without representation…

The American Revolution was fought on the basis of “taxation without representation.”  The Boston Tea Party was among the early acts of that revolution:  They didn’t want tea taxed by a far off, out of touch, greedy, out of control, unresponsive government entity which happened to be England.

Today we have a broader problem beyond mere “taxation” without representation.  We have “governance without representation.”

Sure, we tell ourselves we are being represented.  But are we, really? At least half our population believe we are not.

I submit that we are taxed and governed by a far off, out of touch, greedy, out of control, unresponsive government every bit as much as the colonist considered England to be.  The fact that the governing authority happens to be on the same continent headquartered in Washington DC is irrelevant.  The government might as well be in England or Mars.

The results are the same:  Governance without real representation.  Let’s call it what it is:  Fake representation; in many cases, NO representation.

The problem is a matter of scale.  We as a nation have gotten too big to have any real representation. There is no way effective representation can be provided on the scale we now have.  England and the colonies had a greater potential for real representation than the 50 states and Washington have. Washington is as much a distant authority to the states as England was a distant authority to the colonies.

The additional problem we have is more than a state/federal divide.  Our current political and cultural divide is not regional as much as it is between urban and rural.  In every state, whether in the northeast, south, Midwest, or west coast, there is an urban/rural divide.

Politics, policies, taxation, and regulation in cities of all sizes tend to range from liberal, to socialist, to communist. Politics, policies, taxation and regulation in suburbs and especially rural areas tend to range from moderate to conservative to libertarian.

How could greater representation than what we are currently subjected to be achieved?

There would need to be two federal governments set up. Such governments could not be formed on a regional basis because the interests of urban and rural/suburban would remain in conflict.  The two governments would need to be on the basis of cities in one nation and non-cities being another nation.

The impracticality of that arrangement highlights the difficulty of our current state of non-representation. Thus we have the seeds of revolution sown in our current form of non-representative, “representative” government.