Politics/Democracy: A Way of Life?

Somewhat idealistic in his political centered arguments, Ian Angus has some worthy and, to say the least, questionable opinions. Though he does raise the question of apathy among Americans, he isn't sensitive to the reasons why Americans are the way they are. From a rhetorical approach, and looking back at the readings of Lippman, Angus may take on a different stance which is more or less probing at different American ideals and involvement. For example, he raises the point that, "We call other countries non-democratic when they don't have an institutionalized system of elections like ours, but do we ever look closely at why we call this democracy?" Here he is arguing that since we (apparently each of us shell out money for campaigns) run such competitive and demanding campaigns, we cannot, and are not a democracy, however, if this is how candidates feel they should run, then it is their money (for the large part) they are spending.

To elaborate on his idealized arguments I would like to try at least to form some counterpoints. When he is pointing out ways we "the people," need to get more involved in our government in order to make it a functioning democracy he omits some important ideas. First, he says that "widespread access to relevant information" must become available to the public. Though this would be great, I don't believe the public, by and large, would care. Second, he says, the public needs to be given the opportunity to "decide what is important politically at a given time." Again, we could simply argue that people wouldn't care because they aren't empowered. Though this may lead to empowerment, we are still, as Angus purports, "subjects" under the "public sphere." So, in a way he contradicts his beliefs in calling the apathetic American "subjects," especially when he says that, "Citizens have this double role--they both originate the law and are subject to it." I understand that he is calling for change, which is a good thing, but he doesn't account for the simple needs Americans must receive before fully immersing their lives in politics.