Democracy, The Most Dangerous Religion
民主，最危险的宗教
7. Chapter 7 – The Theology of Elections
7. 第7章 – 拣选的神学
By Larry Romanoff
拉里•罗曼诺夫
译文：珍珠
CONTENT
目录
7.1. The Tyranny of the Majority
7.1. 多数人的暴政
7.2. Democratic Legitimacy
7.2. 民主合法性
7.3. How Do We Choose a Corporate CEO
7.3. 我们如何选择公司首席执行官
7.4. Freedom from Responsibility
7.4. 免于责任
7.5. Free Elections – The Freedom to Meddle
7.5. 自由选举——干预的自由
In its simplest form, democracy is the members of a group using some decision-making process to demonstrate their preference on a course of action, as opposed to a leader deciding for the group. In the West, a voting process is the preferred method for group decision-making. No rationale is offered for this preference, but supporters would likely claim it to be fair in some way, legitimate, and of course, a universal value and the will of God. Voting is sometimes used as ratification of an agreed decision, but most often it is just a method of terminating an unresolved dispute in favor of the more powerful majority.
最简单的民主形式是，一个团体的成员使用某种决策过程来表明他们对行动方针的偏好，而不是由领导者为团体做出决定。在西方，投票过程是团体决策的首选方法。这种偏好没有提供任何理论基础，但支持者可能会声称它在某种程度上是公平的、合法的，当然也是普遍的价值观和上帝的意志。投票有时被用作批准一项商定的决定，但最常见的情况是，它只是一种终止未解决的争议的方法，有利于更强大的多数。
But why would we vote at all? Why resort to this method of decision-making? In small groups it is pointless, and in large groups it is not only seriously flawed but endowed with an illusory legitimacy, and is nothing if not transparently unfair. If only a few of us are discussing whether to go out for a beer or play snooker, we wouldn’t put that to a vote. We would discuss options until we had agreement. That agreement would not have to mean all persons are 100% in favor, but no persons are 100% against – meaning everyone will be more or less pleased with the outcome.
但我们为什么要投票？为什么要采取这种决策方法？在小团体中，投票毫无意义，在大团体中，投票不仅存在严重缺陷，而且具有虚幻的合法性，而且如果不透明地不公平，那就什么都不是。如果我们中只有少数人讨论是否出去喝啤酒或打斯诺克，我们就不会投票。我们会讨论各种选择，直到达成一致。这种一致并不一定意味着所有人都100%赞成，但没有人100%反对——这意味着每个人都会或多或少地对结果感到满意。
If 100 people in our company want to select a location for a sales conference, under what circumstances would we put this decision to a final vote? Normally, we would raise and discuss options, discard the unsuitable, and consider the few remaining. We expect our debate will produce an alternative acceptable to all – to some more than others, perhaps, but still acceptable. No strong dissension. If, at the end, we decide to vote on the matter, it is only because two segments of our group stubbornly oppose further negotiation and refuse to consider new alternatives. Both have simply dug in their heels.
如果我们公司有 100 个人想要选择一个地点召开销售会议，在什么情况下我们会将这个决定进行最终投票？通常，我们会提出并讨论各种选择，放弃不合适的选择，考虑剩下的少数选择。我们希望我们的辩论会产生一个所有人都接受的替代方案——也许有些人比其他人更接受，但仍然可以接受。没有强烈的异议。如果最后我们决定投票表决，那只是因为我们小组的两个部分坚决反对进一步谈判并拒绝考虑新的替代方案。双方都只是固执己见。
The proposed method of solving the impasse, the vote, is simply an admission of our failure to negotiate satisfactorily, and of our refusal to consider the welfare of all group members. More than this, the request for a vote will always come from the majority group who want to terminate the discussion in their favor. We want to have our own way; nothing more than that. On the other hand, if we do have an effective discussion and negotiation process, the general will of the group will emerge. We can ask if all are sufficiently content with our solution, if there are any strong dissenting voices. So long as we genuinely consider the wishes of all, a vote would be unnecessary and pointless.
解决僵局的拟议方法，即投票，只是承认我们未能圆满地谈判，以及我们拒绝考虑所有团体成员的福利。不仅如此，要求投票的总是希望终止讨论以有利于自己的多数群体。我们想走自己的路；仅此而已。另一方面，如果我们确实有一个有效的讨论和谈判过程，那么团体的普遍意愿就会显现出来。我们可以问是否所有人都对我们的解决方案感到满意，是否有任何强烈的反对声音。只要我们真正考虑所有人的意愿，投票就是不必要的和毫无意义的。
With government house votes in Western democracies, we have two parties who have dug in their heels long before the discussion began, solely on the basis of party ideology, which means I reject any suggestion you make, even if it’s a good one. In government debates and policy discussions, it’s a foregone conclusion there will be no negotiation, in good faith or otherwise, that there is seldom any hope of finding a solution acceptable to all. So, we put the matter to a vote. In the West, with its black-and-white culture, the preferred option for solving differences of opinion is to force a termination of discussion. In the East, including China, the shades-of-grey culture will delay, re-convene and rediscuss until a consensus appears that everyone can live with.
在西方民主国家的政府大楼投票中，我们有两个政党在讨论开始之前就已经顽固不化，仅仅基于党派意识形态，这意味着我拒绝你提出的任何建议，即使这是一个好建议。在政府辩论和政策讨论中，毫无疑问，不会有任何谈判，无论是善意的还是恶意的，很少有希望找到一个所有人都接受的解决方案。因此，我们对此进行投票。在西方，黑白文化中，解决意见分歧的首选方法是强制终止讨论。在东方，包括中国在内，灰色文化会延迟、重新召集和重新讨论，直到出现所有人都能接受的共识。
7.1. The Tyranny of the Majority
7.1. 多数人的暴政
Those who founded the US republic clearly understood the dangers of a democracy. Edmund Randolph of Virginia described the effort to deal with the issue at the Constitutional Convention:
创建美国共和国的人清楚地认识到民主的危险。弗吉尼亚州的埃德蒙·伦道夫在制宪会议上描述了解决这一问题的努力：
“The general object was to produce a cure for the evils under which the United States labored; that in tracing these evils to their origins, every man had found it in the turbulence and follies of democracy. These strongly held views regarding the evils of democracy and the benefits of a Constitutional Republic were shared by all the Founders. For them, a democracy meant centralized power, controlled by majority opinion, which was up for grabs and therefore completely arbitrary. These are the basic concepts of the tyranny of the majority.”
“总体目标是找到一种方法，消除美国所遭受的苦难；在追溯这些苦难的根源时，每个人都发现，这些苦难源于民主的动荡和愚蠢。所有创始人都对民主的恶果和宪政共和国的好处有着坚定的看法。对他们来说，民主意味着权力集中，由多数意见控制，这种权力可以争夺，因此完全是任意的。这些是多数暴政的基本概念。”
One of the most persistent and foolish myths flogged to create the illusion of the sanctity of democracy and of the legitimacy of the resulting political body, is that voting is “fair”. The hell it is. Voting is nothing more than bullying by a majority. There is no system of decision-making that is less fair than putting something to a vote. It is an arrogant decision-making process deliberately designed to disregard the wishes and best interests, to disenfranchise half of the population whose welfare is at stake. Whichever side obtains less than a majority is totally sidelined, their wishes and welfare ignored because they are the “losers”. By what twisted standard can a decision-making process be considered fair or legitimate when – by design – it ignores the express wishes of perhaps half the population? On what basis can you claim that your 51% majority entitles you to 100% of the rewards while my 49% minority entitles me to zero? That’s just individualistic, selfish, bullying, law-of-the-jungle Social Darwinism. In many so-called democratic elections, my “minority” often comprises much more than 50% of the population. But you ‘win’, so it’s ‘fair’. Where is the fairness and equity in such an all-or-nothing system that produces only winners and losers?
为制造民主的神圣性和由此产生的政治机构的合法性的错觉而大肆宣扬的最顽固和愚蠢的神话之一是，投票是“公平的”。地狱般。投票只不过是多数人的欺凌。没有比投票更不公平的决策制度。这是一个傲慢的决策过程，故意无视人们的意愿和最佳利益，剥夺一半福利受到威胁的人的选举权。无论哪一方获得的票数低于多数，他们的意愿和福利都会被忽视，因为他们都是“失败者”。当一个决策过程被设计成无视可能有一半人口表达的意愿时，它还能被视为公平或合法吗？你凭什么声称你的51%多数有权获得100%的奖励，而我的49%少数有权获得零？这只是个人主义、自私、欺凌、弱肉强食的社会达尔文主义。在许多所谓的民主选举中，我的“少数”通常包括超过50%的人口。但你赢了，所以这是“公平的”。在这种只有赢家和输家的全有或全无的制度中，公平和公正在哪里？
De Tocqueville wrote extensively about the tyranny of the majority in a democracy, which he said came from “the absolute sovereignty” involved, saddling the governors with a belief in their omnipotence which gave them “the right to do anything” and, in their self-righteousness, ensured that the minorities (which might mean the entire population) were brought to heel and into an oppressive and “forced conformism”. It is difficult to argue against the thesis that this is where the US and all Western democracies are today, the “standard narrative” now assuming such power that to contradict it will lead not only to forceful censorship but to jail sentences. He stated that once the “majority public opinion” is determined (by the controllers of the Deep State), it is “irrevocably pronounced and everyone is silent”, that free thinkers needed to be normalised. We, the people in these democracies, have lost the freedom to contradict what we are told to believe. De Tocqueville claimed that dissention would inevitably lead to “a bureaucratic despotism” which would be the final harm of democracy, observing that the democratic state had “an immense and tutelary power” that would destroy any possibility of joint action by the population against the dictatorship of the oligarchy and tyranny, that the people would lose the use of their will and mind and no longer be able to withstand that tyranny. There is also the issue of deviant foreigners pulling the strings from the darkness behind the throne.
托克维尔在民主国家中广泛地论述了多数人的暴政，他说这是由于涉及“绝对主权”，使统治者相信他们的全能，这使他们“有权做任何事情”，并且，在他们的自以为是中，确保少数人（可能意味着全体人口）屈服并陷入压迫和“被迫顺从”。很难反驳这样的论点，即美国和所有西方民主国家今天都是这样，现在“标准叙事”拥有如此大的权力，以至于反驳它不仅会导致强有力的审查，还会导致监禁。他指出，一旦“多数公众舆论”确定（由深层国家的控制者确定），它就是“不可撤销的宣布，每个人都保持沉默”，自由思想家需要正常化。我们这些民主国家的人民已经失去了反驳我们被告知要相信的自由。托克维尔声称，异议必然导致“官僚专制”，这将是民主的最终危害，他观察到民主国家拥有“巨大的监护权”，会破坏民众对寡头统治和暴政采取联合行动的可能性，人民会失去意志和理智，不再能够承受这种暴政。还有一个问题就是，外国人从王座背后的黑暗中操纵一切。
7.2. Democratic Legitimacy
7.2. 民主合法性
Another common myth is that voting makes decisions legitimate. No, it does not. There is no law, no gospel, no philosophical principle, to dictate that a 51% majority is “right”, thereby rendering its decisions legal, justified and legitimate, and which should therefore be imposed on the minority. This legitimacy is an illusion concocted by those who believe that “might makes right”, and promulgated as a theological virtue to silence the bullied minority into submission. It is a repugnant philosophy supported by extensive propaganda and brainwashing to ensure the minority fail to realise what is happening to them. And what has happened, is that the minority have been duped into participating in a system that ignores their wishes, strips them of their rights and benefits and gives everything instead to the majority. And that’s considered fair and legitimate in a Western democracy.
另一个常见的误解是，投票使决策合法化。不，不是这样的。没有法律、福音书或哲学原理规定51%的多数是“正确的”，从而使其决策合法、合理和正当，因此应该强加给少数群体。这种合法性是那些相信“强权即公理”的人捏造出来的，并被宣传为一种神学美德，以压制被欺负的少数群体屈服。这是一种令人厌恶的哲学，得到了广泛的宣传和洗脑的支持，以确保少数群体无法意识到他们正在发生的事情。而事实上，少数群体被欺骗参与了一个无视他们的意愿、剥夺他们的权利和利益，并把一切都交给多数的制度。这在西方民主国家被认为是公平和合法的。
But it’s all a cruel hoax. “The People” are lured into choosing sides, engaging in battle, then forced into a patently unfair resolution by voting. The losers have been browbeaten, bullied, propagandised and hoodwinked into believing and accepting that, because they are the losers, their wishes, rights and welfare are now irrelevant and they must remain silent. To the victor goes the spoils. You lost the war; I set the terms.
但这一切都是残酷的骗局。“人民”被诱骗选择立场，参与战斗，然后被迫通过投票做出明显不公平的决议。失败者受到恐吓、欺凌、宣传和蒙蔽，相信并接受这一点，因为他们是失败者，他们的愿望、权利和福利现在无关紧要，他们必须保持沉默。胜利者得到战利品。你输了战争；我设定了条件。
It is one more tribute to the power of propaganda that the minority, who may comprise more than 50% of our population sample, will abandon their own self-interest and surrender their fate to a hostile majority on some contrived moral principle of fairness and legitimacy. So effective has been the propaganda that it apparently never occurs to either majority or minority that a system designed to disregard half the population is neither moral nor fair, and that legitimacy is being conferred only by a perverted theology. On what planet do I, by virtue of being part of a minority, surrender my wishes and my best interests, and turn over control of my welfare to an essentially hostile group who happen to constitute an opposing majority?
少数群体可能占我们人口样本的50%以上，他们将放弃自己的利益，并将自己的命运交给敌对的多数群体，这是对宣传力量的又一致敬。宣传如此有效，以至于多数群体或少数群体似乎从未想过，一个旨在无视一半人口的制度既不道德也不公平，合法性只能由歪曲的神学赋予。我作为一个少数群体的一员，在哪个星球上会放弃我的愿望和我的最大利益，并将我的福利控制权交给一个本质上敌对的群体，而这个群体恰好构成了一个反对的多数群体？
The Western political system has taken the patently unjust and sociopathic process of Social Darwinism and re-branded it as theology. The Western Right-Wing individualistic nations, the former and present imperialists, invaders and conquerors, those following the winner-take-all law of the jungle, concocted this system because it fits their belligerent personality and Christian moral supremacy. They didn’t choose it because it was fair or legitimate; they chose it because bullying comes naturally to their Social Darwinism. The only way to claim legitimacy for such a process is to silence the minority by forcing them to accept the theological premise that minorities have no rights and deserve no consideration because they really are losers. This philosophical treason is the job of propaganda.
西方政治体系采用了社会达尔文主义这一明显不公正的反社会过程，并将其重新命名为神学。西方右翼个人主义国家，无论是过去还是现在的帝国主义者、侵略者和征服者，都遵循弱肉强食的丛林法则，他们炮制了这一体系，因为它符合他们好战的性格和基督教道德至上的原则。他们选择它不是因为它公平或合法；他们选择它是因为欺凌行为是他们社会达尔文主义的自然产物。为这一过程声称合法性的唯一方法是迫使少数群体接受神学前提，即少数群体没有权利，也不值得考虑，因为他们真的是失败者。这种哲学上的背叛是宣传工作。
And this propaganda is driven almost entirely by the twisted American version of religion. It is here, rooted in a primitive evangelical Christianity, that the victors, the winners of the game of a democratic election, celebrate not only their victory but their presumed moral superiority over the losers who now acquiesce in their own misery. The losers are sidelined because they deserve to be sidelined; by virtue of their election loss, their moral inferiority is now public knowledge. And it is a “moral inferiority”; make no mistake about this. In the victory celebrations after every Western election, the winning parties and candidates are celebrating not only a win for their team as with any sport, but are in fact cherishing and eulogising the moral import of that victory, secure in the theological certainty that not only their political ideology but all future actions are now justified by their having higher moral values than do their opponents, exemplified by their “victory”. And it is this religious conviction that justifies the sidelining of the other 50% of the population and intentionally disregarding their wishes and welfare. The losers get what they deserve.
这种宣传几乎完全是由扭曲的美国版宗教推动的。在这里，植根于原始福音派基督教，胜利者，民主选举游戏的获胜者，不仅庆祝他们的胜利，而且庆祝他们假定的道德优越感，优于现在默许自己痛苦的失败者。失败者被边缘化，因为他们应该被边缘化；由于他们的选举失败，他们的道德自卑现在是公开的。这是一种“道德自卑”；毫无疑问。在每次西方选举后的胜利庆典中，获胜的政党和候选人不仅庆祝他们团队的胜利，就像任何体育运动一样，而且实际上珍惜和颂扬这场胜利的道德意义，在神学确定性方面有保证，不仅是他们的政治意识形态，而且所有未来的行动现在都被他们所具有的更高的道德价值所证明，以他们的“胜利”为例。正是这种宗教信念证明了其他50%人口的边缘化，故意无视他们的愿望和福利。失败者得到了他们应得的。
In any sane society it would be reckless to ignore the wishes of 49% of the population; that is an almost sure formula for a revolution. But in Western democracies, the 49% minority whose party “lost” the election, are forced to recognise and accept the theological moral superiority of the winners and remain silent while the wishes and ideology of the victors are forced upon them.
在任何理智的社会中，无视49%人口的意愿都是鲁莽的；这几乎是革命的必然公式。但在西方民主国家，政党“输”掉选举的49%少数群体被迫承认并接受获胜者的神学道德优越性，并在胜利者的意愿和意识形态强加于他们时保持沉默。
The reason that Asian societies do not naturally resort to a voting process for dispute resolution or for the selection of leaders – and the main reason that Western democracy is so foreign to them – is that they have not (1) been divided by conflict-ridden political ideologies and (2) have not been infected with primitive Western Christianity or Judaism, so therefore do not view differences of opinion in moral terms. You cannot sideline and ignore 49% of your population on the basis of moral superiority if your society does not moralise, and Asian societies do not moralise. Because they have not been infected by religion and therefore do not live in a black and white all-or-nothing world, they do not view dispute resolution as a process where morally righteous winners are entitled to 100% of the spoils of war while the morally decrepit losers are entitled to nothing.
亚洲社会不自然地诉诸于投票程序来解决争端或选举领导人的原因，也是西方民主对他们来说如此陌生的主要原因，是他们没有（1）被冲突不断的政治意识形态所分裂，也没有（2）受到原始的西方基督教或犹太教的感染，因此不从道德的角度看待意见分歧。如果你的社会没有道德化，你就不能以道德优越感来排斥和忽视49%的人口，而亚洲社会并没有道德化。因为他们没有受到宗教的影响，因此他们没有生活在非黑即白、非此即彼的世界中，他们不认为争端解决是一个道德上正义的赢家有权获得100%战争战利品而道德上衰败的输家什么也得不到的过程。
The US Congress voted numerous times to refuse to enact child labor laws. It voted to launch a totally unjustified war on Vietnam, one based entirely on lies. It voted to create the privately-owned US FED, an act of outright treason guaranteeing the financial enslavement of the nation to a small handful of Jewish European bankers. Congress voted to remove all banking regulations to permit the FED and the bankers to launch a major offensive on the American middle class prior to 2008, shifting fully half of them into the lower class in only a few years. In what way did these ‘democratic’ votes make the decisions “legitimate”? In what way were these majority decisions “fair”, or either good for the nation or morally righteous? In what way was it legitimate that members of Congress voted themselves permission to profit with impunity on insider stock trading? Where were the psalms to ‘democratic values’ when these same members of Congress saw their total assets rise by more than 25% in the first two years of the 2008 economic collapse, while virtually the entire US population watched their own assets depreciate by 50% or more.
美国国会多次投票拒绝制定童工法。它投票决定对越南发动一场完全没有根据的战争，这场战争完全基于谎言。它投票决定创建私有化的美国联邦储备委员会，这是彻头彻尾的叛国行为，保证国家金融被一小撮欧洲犹太银行家奴役。国会投票决定取消所有银行监管，允许美联储和银行家在2008年之前对美国中产阶级发动重大攻势，在短短几年内将其中一半人转变为下层阶级。这些“民主”投票以何种方式使决策“合法化”？这些多数决定以何种方式“公平”，或对国家有利或道德上正当？国会议员以何种方式投票允许自己在内幕股票交易中获利而不受惩罚是合法的？当这些国会议员看到他们的总资产在2008年经济崩溃的头两年内增长了25%以上，而几乎整个美国人口都看到自己的资产贬值了50%或更多时，“民主价值观”的赞美诗在哪里？
7.3. Voting and Elections
7.3. 投票和选举
Westerners generally look on politics as a team sport where everybody should be able to participate in the selection of a nation’s most senior officials. But even well-educated people have little knowledge of economics or social policy, of foreign affairs, of diplomatic concerns, of monetary policy or international trade. Few people in any nation have the knowledge or experience to assess or evaluate the credentials of high-level executives, understanding neither the jobs nor the requirements. It is one of those inconvenient truths that the great majority of any population is simply not competent to intelligently guide decisions in any of these areas. However, democracy afficionados apparently see no deterrent in this.
西方人通常将政治视为团队运动，每个人都应该能够参与国家最高级官员的选拔。但即使是受过良好教育的人，对经济学或社会政策、外交事务、外交关注、货币政策或国际贸易知之甚少。任何国家中很少有人具备评估或评价高级管理人员资格的知识或经验，既不了解工作也不了解要求。这是一个令人尴尬的事实，即绝大多数人口根本无法明智地指导这些领域的决策。然而，民主爱好者显然对此并不感到害怕。
Let’s try to flush away some of the mindless nonsense that is so often parroted about the sanctified democratic process. The hiring and selection of people, including the process we call ‘elections’, involves the assessment and evaluation of the ability and competence of those applying for the job.
让我们试着消除一些关于神圣民主进程的鹦鹉学舌的无稽之谈。人员的招聘和选拔，包括我们称之为“选举”的过程，涉及对申请工作的人员的能力和资格的评估和评价。
I am competent to hire a cleaning lady for my home. I can do this because I understand the job. I have cleaned my own kitchens, ironed my own shirts, mopped my own floors and scrubbed my own toilets. I know how to do every part of every job, and I know how to tell a good job from a bad one. I am competent to hire a secretary or personal assistant, on the same bases as above. I am competent to hire a colleague for my business, including someone up to my own level, again for all the reasons above. I know the job intimately, I know what needs to be done, and I can tell a good job from a bad one. In all of these, nobody is likely to fool me, at least not for long.
我有能力为我的家雇佣一个清洁女工。我能做到这一点，因为我对这份工作有所了解。我打扫过自己的厨房，熨过自己的衬衫，拖过自己的地板，洗过自己的厕所。我知道如何做好每一项工作的每一部分，我知道如何区分好坏。我有能力雇佣一个秘书或私人助理，基于上述同样的原因。我有能力为我的生意雇佣一个同事，包括和我水平相当的人，同样基于上述所有原因。我非常了解这份工作，我知道需要做些什么，我能区分好坏。在所有这些方面，没有人能骗我，至少不会骗我太久。
And that, like it or not, is where it ends. I am competent to assess, evaluate and hire those at my level and below. As a Vice-President of a corporation, I am not competent to hire a new President, for the same reasons as above, in reverse. I do not understand the job well enough, and therefore cannot even specify, much less evaluate, credentials. I do not have the ability or experience to evaluate those who are senior to me or whose jobs I do not completely understand. No secretary in the logistics department would believe in her capability to select a new CFO for the company. And no president of a delivery service would presume ability to recruit a V-P of Marketing for a movie studio. In these instances, we don’t know the industry or the job requirements, nor what credentials would be most valuable and are hopelessly lacking in both experience and skills.
不管你喜不喜欢，这就是它的结束。我有能力评估、评价和雇用与我同级或更低级别的人。作为一家公司的副总裁，我不具备雇用新总裁的能力，原因与上述相反。我对这份工作了解不够，因此无法指定，更不用说评估证书了。我没有能力或经验来评估那些比我年长或工作我不完全理解的人。物流部门的秘书不会相信她有能力为公司选择新的首席财务官。没有一家快递公司的总裁会认为自己有能力为电影公司招聘营销副总裁。在这些情况下，我们不知道这个行业或工作的要求，也不知道哪些证书最有价值，在经验和技能上都无可救药地缺乏。
During my career, I have served as a senior Regional Executive for a major international management consulting firm, have built and owned international trading businesses, served as CFO of an oil company, carried responsibility for major urban planning projects and have done international consulting in fields ranging from finance to tourism to foreign policy. I have taught EMBA classes on Foreign Affairs and geo-politics at an outstanding Business School. I would say I have accumulated at least a small share of competencies.
在我的职业生涯中，我曾担任一家大型国际管理咨询公司的高级区域执行官，建立并拥有国际贸易业务，担任一家石油公司的首席财务官，负责重大城市规划项目，并在从金融到旅游到外交政策的各个领域进行国际咨询。我在一所优秀的商学院教授过关于外交事务和地缘政治的EMBA课程。我想说我已经积累了至少一小部分的能力。
But I am not competent to evaluate and select a finance minister for the US cabinet, nor the governor of Arkansas, nor the Mayor of LA, nor even the few hundred senior government officials in smaller cities. No discredit to me or my abilities, but I have no experience in those areas. I have never done those jobs and, while I have a general appreciation of the duties and responsibilities, I have no adequate understanding of the demands or requirements of those positions. And without that, I am incompetent to evaluate and choose. And in truth, only a small fraction of 1% of the people in any nation have the credentials to do such evaluations.
但我无权为美国内阁评估和选择财政部长，也无权为阿肯色州州长、洛杉矶市长，甚至为小城市的数百名高级政府官员评估和选择。这不是对我的否定或我的能力，但我在这些领域没有经验。我从未做过这些工作，虽然我对这些职责和责任有大致的了解，但我对这些职位的要求或要求没有足够的了解。如果没有这些，我就没有能力进行评估和选择。事实上，任何国家只有1%的人有资格进行这样的评估。
But in a “democracy”, this is apparently of no concern. Anyone has the right to apply for the positions and everyone has the right to choose among them. The strikingly obvious reality that the great majority of political candidates are unqualified to stand for election and that the great majority of voters are unqualified to evaluate them, is apparently not so strikingly obvious.
但在“民主”中，这显然无关紧要。任何人都有权申请这些职位，每个人都有权从中选择。绝大多数政治候选人没有资格参选，绝大多数选民没有资格评估他们，这一显而易见的现实显然并不那么显而易见。
One American, posting his comments to an online article, wrote the following: “I think that in the future, we ought to evolve a system of vetting our presidential candidates in terms of experience and leadership ability. Being popular, using teleprompters, having charisma, and being endorsed by movie stars and sports heroes, should no longer hold sway with the American People.” He then proposed a list of questions to be asked in evaluating candidates for the office of President of the US, as follows:
一位美国人在网上发表评论时写道：“我认为，未来我们应该建立一个审查总统候选人的制度和经验以及领导能力。受欢迎、使用提词器、具有个人魅力以及被电影明星和体育英雄认可，这些不应该再主导美国人民。”然后，他提出了一个评估美国总统候选人时应该问的问题清单，如下：
1.) How many jobs have you held in your life?
1.）你一生中从事过多少份工作？
2.) Did you work your way through college or did you get a free ride?
2.) 你上大学是自费还是免费？
3.) Who is paying for your campaign?
3.)谁为你的活动买单？
4.) What guarantee can you give the American People that you will actually carry out your campaign promises?
- 你能向美国人民保证你会切实履行你的竞选承诺吗？
5.) Are you able to overcome your own personal bias that you bring to the job as President, and work for the common good?
5.) 你能否克服作为总统带给工作的个人偏见，为共同利益而努力？
6.) What is your religious affiliation and what does your congregation believe?
6.) 您的宗教信仰是什么？您的会众信仰什么？
7.) What is your view of the world and what is your view of life?
7.) 你对世界的看法是什么？你对生活的看法是什么？
8.) Are you willing to be a servant of the people or a servant of your own lust for power?
8.你愿意成为人民的仆人，还是你自己的权力欲望的仆人？
The man’s sincerity is obvious, but so is his ignorance. We can see that he knows something is wrong, and his opening statement is sound, but he lacks the knowledge and experience to proceed. He is hopelessly out of his depth to perform the vetting that he only dimly understands is needed. How, in the light of this, can we blindly pretend that democracy with its universal suffrage is the best of all systems? When “the people” are so woefully lacking in the fundamental competence to evaluate candidates much senior to themselves, on what basis can we defend a system where everyone votes?
这个人的诚意是显而易见的，但他的无知也是显而易见的。我们可以看出他知道有些事情是错误的，他的开场白听起来是合理的，但他缺乏继续进行审查的知识和经验。他无可救药地缺乏执行审查的能力，他只是模糊地理解到需要进行审查。在这种情况下，我们怎么能盲目地假装民主普选是最好的制度呢？当“人民”严重缺乏评估比自己年长很多的候选人的基本能力时，我们有什么依据来捍卫一个每个人都投票的制度呢？
Why would anyone deliberately design a system where totally uninformed people, those with little education and no applicable experience, could not only have the power to choose senior government officials but to actually become one of them? This is not being elitist; it is a matter of intense practicality. What do we do in our corporations? Do we let the rank and file, the young and uneducated on the shop floor, those with no experience in hiring even a janitor, choose all the management, officers and directors? Of course not. A corporation is a serious thing, and these choices are left to those who are most competent to make them.
为什么有人会故意设计一个系统，让完全不知情的人，那些受教育程度低、没有适用经验的人，不仅有权选择高级政府官员，而且实际上可以成为其中一员？这不是精英主义；这是一个非常实用的问题。我们在公司里做什么？我们让普通员工、车间里年轻和没有受过教育的人、甚至没有雇佣过看门人的经验的人，选择所有的管理层、官员和董事吗？当然不是。公司是一件严肃的事情，这些选择留给那些最有能力做出这些选择的人。
7.4. How Do We Choose a Corporate CEO?
7.4. 我们如何选择企业首席执行官？
To select officers for a large corporation, normally we retain an executive search firm to source the most likely candidates with a proven track record of success in management. The firm might produce a short list of three candidates, all of whom might do the job but who have different profiles to offer. In this context, who among us will claim to be competent to interview these people, to examine their credentials, to assess their competence, and to make the best selection? Could you do that? Not likely. Few of us could make such a claim. Indeed, if you were tasked with interviewing and assessing candidates for the CEO of Boeing, you would probably wet your pants. But if almost all citizens are hopelessly incompetent (and they are) to choose a CEO for a large corporation, how can they claim with their next breath to be perfectly competent to choose a CEO for their country? We need only think. For a corporation, this would be the “democratic” option:
要为一家大公司挑选高管，通常我们会聘请一家猎头公司来寻找最有可能的候选人，这些候选人要有在管理方面取得成功的记录。该公司可能会列出三个候选人的短名单，所有候选人都可以胜任这份工作，但他们的个人背景不同。在这种情况下，我们当中谁会声称有能力面试这些人，审查他们的证书，评估他们的能力，并做出最佳选择？你能做到吗？不太可能。我们中很少有人能做出这样的声明。事实上，如果你被任命为波音公司首席执行官的面试和评估候选人，你可能会尿裤子。但是，如果几乎所有公民都无可救药地没有能力（他们确实没有能力）为一家大公司选择首席执行官，他们怎么能声称自己完全有能力为国家选择首席执行官呢？我们只需要想一想。对于一家公司来说，这将是“民主”的选择：
Anybody who wants the job, credentials unimportant, just get someone to nominate you and you’re in the running. Convince enough staff to vote for you, and the job is yours. The easiest way is to promise higher salaries, longer vacations and free beer. It doesn’t matter if you give away the farm because you will be long gone before the bankruptcy lawyers arrive.
任何想要这份工作的人，证书并不重要，只要有人提名你，你就可以参加竞选。说服足够多的员工为你投票，这份工作就是你的了。最简单的方法是承诺更高的薪水、更长的假期和免费的啤酒。如果你放弃农场也没关系，因为你在破产律师到达之前就已经离开很久了。
Why is it that corporations and institutions follow the Un-Democratic Model? It must surely be apparent that our large corporations are successful only because they are NOT democratic, but authoritarian. If they were democratic, they might all be bankrupt. I’m not aware of any valid reason it wouldn’t be the same for a country. If being a democracy would condemn a company to mediocrity or worse, it must be similar for a nation. And if running a company as a one-party dictatorship is the overwhelmingly favored worldwide model, then it should be applicable to governments as well. I would remind you here of Samuel Huntington‘s observations that “democracy” has failed in every situation where it has been tried, but then somehow believed it was magically “appropriate” for government.
为什么公司和机构遵循非民主模式？很明显，我们的大公司之所以成功，是因为它们不是民主的，而是专制的。如果它们是民主的，它们可能都破产了。我不知道一个国家是否也是如此。如果民主会令一家公司平庸甚至更糟，那么对一个国家来说也一定是这样的。如果将公司作为一党专政来经营是全世界最受欢迎的模式，那么它也应该适用于政府。我在这里要提醒你，塞缪尔·亨廷顿的观察表明，“民主”在尝试过的所有情况下都失败了，但不知何故，它被认为对政府来说是神奇的“合适”的。
7.5. Freedom from Responsibility
7.5. 免于责任
Again, it is one of those inconvenient truths that the average ‘man in the street’ is simply not competent to select leaders at almost any level. No offence to us average people, but we don’t have the experience or ability to make these judgments. So, the real question is why a government, the operation of which is far more serious and demanding than that of any corporation, has become a simian team sport. There is no sensible explanation for this development, and no rational justification to continue it. If I insist on my right to vote, and then cast that vote for a self-serving and incompetent politician who makes numerous bad decisions, what responsibility do I carry for my poor and uninformed choice? None whatsoever. One of my rights in a democracy consists of the right to fully absolve myself of any responsibility for the outcome of my selection. In what way does this make sense? The Western multi-party political system is astonishingly free of such responsibilities for those voters who choose incompetent, corrupt and self-serving politicians, and this is equally true for the politicians themselves. In fact, if there were personal responsibility in any “democracy”, there would be no candidates and few voters. And yet we are told this method was ordained by God, is a universal value and a human right, and represents the true yearnings of all mankind. I harbor grave doubts.
同样，这也是一个令人难以接受的事实，那就是“普通人”根本不具备选择各级领导人的能力。我们对普通人的冒犯不会导致任何后果，但我们没有做出这些判断的经验和能力。因此，真正的问题是为什么一个政府，其运作比任何公司都要严肃和苛刻，却变成了一场猿猴式的团队运动。对于这种发展，没有合理的解释，也没有合理的理由继续下去。如果我坚持我的投票权，然后投票给一个自私自利、能力不足、做出许多糟糕决定的政客，我对我糟糕和不知情的选择负有什么责任？完全没有。我在民主制度中的权利之一是充分免除我对自己选择的结果负有任何责任。这有什么意义？西方多党政治制度对那些选择无能、腐败和自私自利的政客的选民来说，是令人惊讶地免除了这种责任，这对政客本身来说也是如此。事实上，如果任何“民主”都有个人责任，就不会有候选人和少数选民。然而，我们被告知这种方法是由上帝指定的，是一种普遍价值，是一种人权，代表了全人类的真正渴望。我对此深表怀疑。
7.6. Free Elections – The Freedom to Meddle
7.6. 自由选举——干预的自由
One American wrote, “The openness of the American system certainly makes it much more attractive than other, less democratic methods for selecting a leader.” My response was to say, Yes, indeed. The “openness of the American system” is what the US wants so badly to have in China. The reason is that this open system is open to meddling, interference, and all manner of external influence. The US cannot influence China’s present form of government: China is “closed” in the worst possible sense, at least from the US point of view. In China, the US cannot buy votes; it cannot finance the political campaign of the candidate who will do its bidding and bring China into subservience. In China, the CIA cannot pay Chinese newspapers to print articles favorable to the US political point of view. You can appreciate what a handicap that is. How can you convince people to overthrow their government when you have no access to the media? In China, the CIA “sock puppets” cannot easily organise a “Jasmine Revolution” because Twitter and Facebook are blocked.
一位美国网友写道：“美国制度的开放性无疑使其比其他不那么民主的领导人选举方法更具吸引力。”我的回应是，是的，的确如此。“美国制度的开放性”是美国非常希望在中国实现的。原因是这种开放制度容易受到干预、干涉和各种外部影响。美国无法影响中国目前的政府形式：中国是最糟糕的“封闭”状态，至少从美国的角度来看是这样。在中国，美国无法购买选票；它不能资助将听命于它并使中国屈服的候选人的政治活动。在中国，中央情报局不能付钱给中国报纸刊登有利于美国政治观点的文章。你可以体会到这是一种多么大的障碍。当您无法接触到媒体时，您如何说服人们推翻他们的政府？在中国，中央情报局的“傀儡”不能轻易组织“茉莉花革命”，因为Twitter和Facebook被封锁了。
All political elections in all countries enjoy the receipt of helpful “assistance” from the US, to ensure that voters make ‘the right choice’. It happens every time and it isn’t even much of a secret. The US State Department now has Google creating “domestic information” websites for all nations conducting elections, to help ensure the local populations know the issues that are most important to the US, and which US-funded candidates will support these positions.
所有国家的所有政治选举都享有来自美国的帮助“援助”，以确保选民做出“正确的选择”。这每次都会发生，甚至不是什么秘密。美国国务院现在让谷歌为所有进行选举的国家创建“国内信息”网站，以帮助确保当地民众了解对美国最重要的问题，以及哪些美国资助的候选人将支持这些立场。
The US government has batteries of people whose job it is to ensure that voters in all countries select a government that will be most amenable to protecting and promoting the US ‘national interest’. It is an open secret that the US interferes heavily in every election in every country on earth, sometimes spending more money in a country in influencing an election than is spent by the parties and the candidates themselves. The Americans spend enormous amounts of money in other nations, financing those candidates they can control or who are pro-American. They will also infiltrate and try to incite to violence the parties they don’t like, to discredit them in the eyes of the nation and the world. In the past, the CIA has frequently purchased or funded a major newspaper, using that as a platform to discredit socialist parties and promote those parties and candidates the US can either control or purchase with money and favors. Consider this extract from a US document titled, “Covert Propaganda as Part of US Foreign Policy”.
美国政府有一群人，他们的工作是确保所有国家的选民选择最有利于保护和促进美国“国家利益”的政府。美国对地球上每个国家的每次选举都进行大量干预，这是一个公开的秘密，有时在一个国家花费的选举影响比政党和候选人本身花费的更多。美国人在其他国家花费了大量资金，为他们可以控制或亲美的候选人提供资金。他们也会渗透并试图煽动他们不喜欢的政党暴力，在国家和世界的眼中抹黑他们。过去，中央情报局经常购买或资助一家大报，以此作为抹黑社会主义政党、宣传美国可以控制或用金钱和好处购买的政党和候选人的平台。考虑一下美国文件《美国外交政策中的秘密宣传》中的这段摘录。
“Classic examples [of interference in the elections in other countries] include providing funding to a favored party, supporting agents to influence political affairs in another nation, engaging in psychological warfare, disseminating disinformation about a disfavored party, or deceiving a disfavored party. Specific [covert and surreptitious] actions include:
“[干涉其他国家选举的]经典例子包括向受支持的政党提供资金，支持代理人影响另一个国家的政治事务，参与心理战，散布关于不受欢迎的政党的虚假信息，或欺骗不受欢迎的政党。具体的[隐蔽和秘密]行动包括：
- Funding opposition journalists or newspapers that present negative images of a disfavored party in power
- 资助反对派记者或报纸，以呈现不受欢迎的执政党的负面形象
- Paying intelligence agents or party members to make public statements favorable to U.S. interests
- 向情报人员或党员支付报酬，以发表有利于美国利益的公开声明
- Providing financial support to opposition civil society groups and helping them set up international networks
- 为反对派民间团体提供财政支持，帮助他们建立国际网络
- Advancing conditions for economic disruption in disfavored countries
- 为受歧视国家的经济破坏创造条件
- Bolstering leaders favorable to the US who could plausibly fill a power vacuum once the party in power is ousted
- 支持有利于美国的领导人，一旦执政党被推翻，他们可以填补权力真空
- Funneling money to a favored party through legal or illegal means
- 通过合法或非法手段将资金汇集到受青睐的一方
- Instigating a fight or discord between two adversarial, disfavored parties
- 煽动两个敌对、不受欢迎的党派之间的斗争或分歧
- Influencing an election
- 影响选举
- Disseminating propaganda”
- 传播宣传”
The American Government’s basic approach to the world is entirely underlaid with cunning, deviousness, and lies. It is astonishing to see the US government accusing China or Russia of interfering in US elections. There has never been any evidence presented that any country, at least in the past 50 years, has actually attempted to interfere in a US election, but the Internet contains literally thousands of articles and papers documenting that the US invariably interferes in every election in every country that has a multi-party electoral system. During the last election, Moscow had “protests” against Putin, against “the fraudulent election of a hated leader”, but then Russian TV filmed the “protest leaders” filing into the compound of the US Embassy afterward, no doubt to collect their pay. But we never hear this side. All we know is that Russia wants to “influence” American elections. And of course, the Americans today are sponsoring “democracy rallies”, i.e., an independence movement, in Taiwan. The US government is world-famous for accusing others of sins that it commits.
美国政府对待世界的基本方针完全是以狡猾、狡猾和谎言为基础的。看到美国政府指责中国或俄罗斯干涉美国选举，令人震惊。从来没有任何证据表明，至少在过去50年里，任何国家实际上试图干预美国的选举，但互联网上确实有数千篇文章和论文记录，美国总是干预每个拥有多党选举制度的国家的每一次选举。在上次选举期间，莫斯科对普京进行了“抗议”，反对“一个令人憎恨的领导人的欺诈性选举”，但随后俄罗斯电视台拍摄到“抗议领导人”随后进入美国大使馆大院，毫无疑问是为了收取他们的报酬。但我们从来没有听到过这一面。我们所知道的是，俄罗斯想“影响”美国的选举。当然，今天的美国人正在台湾发起“民主集会”，即独立运动。美国政府因指责他人所犯下的罪行而闻名于世。
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Mr. Romanoff’s writing has been translated into 32 languages and his articles posted on more than 150 foreign-language news and politics websites in more than 30 countries, as well as more than 100 English language platforms. Larry Romanoff is a retired management consultant and businessman. He has held senior executive positions in international consulting firms, and owned an international import-export business. He has been a visiting professor at Shanghai’s Fudan University, presenting case studies in international affairs to senior EMBA classes. Mr. Romanoff lives in Shanghai and is currently writing a series of ten books generally related to China and the West. He is one of the contributing authors to Cynthia McKinney’s new anthology ‘When China Sneezes’. (Chapt. 2 — Dealing with Demons).
罗曼诺夫先生的作品已被翻译成32种语言，他的文章发表在30多个国家的150多个外语新闻和政治网站以及100多个英语平台上。拉里·罗曼诺夫是一名退休的管理顾问和商人。他曾在国际咨询公司担任高级管理职位，并拥有国际进出口业务。他曾是上海复旦大学的客座教授，为高级EMBA课程提供国际事务案例研究。罗曼诺夫先生住在上海，目前正在写一系列十本书，通常与中国和西方有关。他是辛西娅·麦金尼的新文集《当中国打喷嚏》的撰稿人之一。(第2章——与恶魔打交道)。
His full archive can be seen at
他的完整文章库可以在以下看到：
https://www.bluemoonofshanghai.com/ + https://www.moonofshanghai.com/
He can be contacted at:
他的联系方式：
2186604556@qq.com
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本文可能包含受版权保护的材料，其使用未经版权所有者特别授权。此内容根据合理使用原则提供，仅用于教育和信息目的。此内容没有商业用途。
Copyright © Larry Romanoff, Blue Moon of Shanghai, Moon of Shanghai, 2024
版权所有 © 拉里·罗曼诺夫、上海蓝月亮、上海月亮，2024
