Voting advice from Dr. Fleming

From the comments to his current post on the presidential election:

I would suggest, however, not that people don’t vote but that they take a serious look at the principle and practice of mass democracy. Within coherent communities, political institutions are always based to some extent on consent, and it does not matter whether the system is monarchical, oligarchical, or democratic. Tyrannies learn how to manufacture consent and to manipulate it. To take part in such a system, without a clear understanding of what it is, is to collaborate with one’s oppressors. I vote from time to time when a candidate seems to present a decent alternative–I don’t ask for perfection, only an alternative. But a wise man chooses not to be a fool for anyone. This is neither cynicism nor despair. Some good can often be done in the political arena, and God bless those who try to do it. But there are other, far more important arenas of life where we can do good, and if political interests cause us to neglect our families, friends and the duty to cultivate ourselves, then it would be better to abandon politics entirely. Read Tacitus. Like most of us in this discussion, he was a disgruntled republican, dissatisfied with even good emperors. However, he also expresses a good deal of disapproval of the Stoic extremists who deliberately insulted Vespasian–far from being a bad rulers-and had to commit suicide. Tacitus seems to suggest that for all their undoubted nobility, the Stoic senators were playing a game they could not win, unlike the younger Cato who had half a chance of preventing Caesar from establishing his permanent dictatorship. Cato lost, fighting a good fight with desperate odds. But what did Helvidius Priscus hope to accomplish? It is up to every man to decide whether he lives in 50. BC or 70 AD, but a wise man knows that his life is too precious to throw away in futile resistance.