Politicians and centralisation

Politicians seem to love centralising power.

As one example, most politicians have completely disregarded the costs involved following a possible accident in an atomic energy generator. These costs should have been included in the electricity costs for this type of generator, but have been ignored in most countries by politicians transferring the costs for any such accident from the generating company to the taxpayers. They managed to do this because the taxpayers did not realise that they were spending so much of their money. I think the taxpayers have still not realised it, but they have at least realised that atomic energy is far too expensive. The reason that politicians did this was to centralise, and therefore increase, their power. This can been seen by the campaign by German politicians, now that they have lost the argument for nuclear power, to build wind generators that are far too big and expensive, instead of letting capitalism, and in particular small, competitive companies, decide what size of wind generator is the most economic.

A second example is the constant campaign by whichever party is in the government in the United Kingdom to avoid even the slightest improvement in allowing the voters more say, the current case being the introduction of the alternative vote (in which a voter can number the candidates in order of preference) instead of the first-past-the-post system (in which a voter can only choose one candidate and if that one is not elected then that's it). This year's campaign has consisted mainly in personal attacks, although even this small change is a huge improvement for democracy.

A third example is the bailing out of big banks, instead of protecting the small investors and letting the bank be liquidated. Politicians protect large companies instead of creating a level playing field because they have more power when economic power is more centralised.

In my opinion, these scandals can only be avoided in future if there is much more participation in politics by the taxpayers, and I think that this is best achieved by increased use of referendums, because it has been shown that voters discuss policies more when they can vote on them directly.

If this deficiency is not solved in the coming decades, I would expect there to be a great danger of democracies turning once again to dictatorships. So, it is not just a matter of keeping a few politicians in their place.

Death of a Terrorist

Since my childhood I have thought that it is simply not right to be pleased when someone dies. A few days' ago, I was confronted with many images in news items of people rejoicing because a particular terrorist had died. So, I thought it best to allow a few days to pass to collect my thoughts.

Many of his relations wanted nothing more to do with him, but still I can imagine that they have mixed emotions following his death, similar to but much more intensive than mine. However, what shocked me somewhat is the fact that his 12-year-old daughter saw him being killed. One rather hopes that any 12-year-old does not have to experience anything like that. At least the children were taken away in an ambulance, so that they are presumably receiving the help they now need.

I am well aware that it is not really possible to plan a raid to arrest a terrorist of this sort, and I do not reject the possibility that the plan may have been the best one possible. However, I think we need to respect fellow human beings even when we are sure that they have acted in far too an extreme manner. It is now more important than ever to seek dialogue between people with different religions and with none, and having parties to celebrate anyone's death does not seem to me to be the most constructive way towards World Peace.