DIYbanter - Make-believe Democracy

zadoc wrote:
Make-believe Democracy
Sunday 16 October 2005

Summary
Lewis Lapham is the long-time editor of Harper's Magazine in the
United States, as well as being a writer of political and satirical
essays. In this address, given in May this year for the opening of the
Sydney Writers' Festival, Lewis Lapham delivers a stinging and
trenchant critique of contemporary America.

His country, he says, has become a make-believe democracy because
political debate and dissent is stifled, the media is compliant, and
the population under-educated. His fundamental concern is with the
loss of the democratic liberty to disagree and to question.

Ramona Koval : Throughout this month on Big Ideas, I'm bringing you a
range of writers and their perspectives on contemporary world affairs,
politics, and culture. Today, a critique of American democracy from
Lewis Lapham. He's the Editor of Harper's Magazine and he was in
Australia earlier this year to deliver the keynote address that opened
the Sydney Writers Festival. It's this address that we're hearing
today.

Lewis Lapham was born in San Francisco in 1935. He began his career as
a newspaper reporter for The San Francisco Examiner, and The New York
Herald Tribune. He's been the Editor of Harper's Magazine for the past
thirty years and as well he's written several books of essays,
including Money and Class in America, Theatre of War, Thirty Satires,
and Gag Rule: On the suppression of dissent and the stifling of
democracy. So you'll get a sense from those titles of where he's
coming from. His fundamental concern is with the loss of the
democratic liberty to disagree.

Of course he's speaking about the United States of America, but plenty
of what he's saying has resonances for democratic societies around the
globe right now. So here's Lewis Lapham from the Sydney Writers'
Festival. [Applause...]

MORE at
http://www.abc.net.au/rn/bigidea/stories/s1481032.htm

I'm listening to this live on ABC Radio National, people can listen on
the internet or read/download a transcript at the above link.

Cheers,

Added alt.machines.cnc,rec.crafts.metalworking
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Cliff