Scott Ritter is prolific. He is a former United States Marine Corps intelligence officer, and he has written a lot of books. He also writes for Consortium News. Ritter is also, according to Wikipedia, a convicted child sex offender.
EuroNews suggests that Ritter "is an example of a typical disgraced American – often a man – who discredited himself in the US and now wants to be perceived as a source of 'honest analysis' in Russia as a means to achieve renewed or increased glory."
In a relatively recent article in Consortium News, Ritter opined that "today is the gravest danger of nuclear war than at any time in the nuclear era." I am not sure whether he is right about that (though I take that that threat very seriously, myself). Whether Ritter is right, or not, about an incipient nuclear war between the United States and Russia, Ritter does say something in the article I have linked that I think is absolutely correct:
Congress can be somewhat intimidating to the uninitiated—a literal shining house on a hill, where the empowered elite gather in chambers to debate the finer points of issues that impact our daily lives.
What is sometimes overlooked by the average citizen is that the vehicle of empowerment that allows these anointed lawmakers to take their seats in these chambers is themselves — every two years these representatives of the people must stand muster before their respective constituents and convince enough of them to cast a vote in their favor.
If they win a majority of votes, they can remain in Washington, D.C. If not, they return home unemployed. Because of this electoral reality, the men and women who populate the House of Representatives are very responsive to the will of the people, especially when confronted with numbers they simply cannot ignore.
This phenomenon holds true for Senators, too, although they only must face the crucible of the voter once in six years (emphasis added).
In fact, what Ritter is describing is the essence of representative self-government. Our elected representatives do owe their employment (which is pretty short term, generally two years is all that is guaranteed) to the fact that voters have entrusted them with the right to vote on the most important issues that the voters care about. Where a majority of the voters has a particular point of view - when there is something that they care about - the voters will be able to throw their representative out of office if the "representative" is not, actually, representing the people who sent him there.
At least.... that's the "theory," right? Many, many people, having read what I just wrote, will say that this is a system that only "theoretically" works. Why do they say that? They say that because for representative government to work the way it is supposed to work, the people being represented have to be (1) paying attention and (2) have to be organized so as to be able actually to throw someone out of office, if the representative isn't doing what the majority wants.
These two prerequisites to effective self-government are not impossibilities. Quite the opposite, actually. However, it's not "easy" to make self-government work according to plan. To make the system work as it is supposed to, those being represented actually have to spend their own, personal time and money to do the two things necessary: (1) follow what's going on, so they know what their representative is doing, and (2) getting organized with others in a way that will actually allow the voters to mobilize a majority of voters to throw a non-representing "representative" out of office when that representative is not doing what the majority want.
In other words, we can, in fact, have an effective self-government, prevent nuclear war, improve our health care system, deal with Global Warming, begin eliminating the massive income inequality that has so distorted our society.... ETC. We can do all that.
Ritter is right about that!
But that won't happen if we don't get involved in government ourselves. We won't change the world by watching what is happening on TV, or online - or not even paying any attention at all, except at election time when we bemoan the fact that the "Deep State" is just not representing us.
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