Thinking Outside the Box

[This is a comment that I made on a guest commentary in the Boulder Daily Camera newspaper on Nov 6, 2011, titled " The Occupy movement and Prop. 103 ", which would have increased sales taxes slightly over the next few years in Colorado to help make up the budget shortfall in funds for public education, but which was defeated 2-1 in the Nov 1 election. I thought the author's analysis rather missed the point, and felt compelled to write this in response.] The entire point of this well deserved commentary is contained in the sentence: "The defeat of Proposition 103 should serve as a clarion call for all of us who believe we need more robust public institutions for our democracy to survive." I agree; but the author's argument contains some serious flaws, resulting in an incorrect analysis of what's wrong. We already have several institutions whose explicit purpose is supposedly to protect our democracy: namely, the US Congress, the US Supreme Court and