• This is a political forum that is non-biased/non-partisan and treats every person's position on topics equally. This debate forum is not aligned to any political party. In today's politics, many ideas are split between and even within all the political parties. Often we find ourselves agreeing on one platform but some topics break our mold. We are here to discuss them in a civil political debate. If this is your first visit to our political forums, be sure to check out the RULES. Registering for debate politics is necessary before posting. Register today to participate - it's free!

Democracy in Retreat

Why is that a problem? If people want a strong leader rather than the weak, ineffectual and un-responsive decision making of 'liberal democracy', then that's the point of democracy isn't it?

Otherwise your 'liberal democracy' becomes restricted to allowing people to choose whoever they want provided they are approved by the established elite? Which is of course less a democracy and more a sham choice between competing brands of the same thing, all of which perpetuate the interests of the broad establishment.


Far too many people assume that the preservation of 'liberal democracy' is an end in itself, which discounts the fact that millions of people do not benefit from the status quo, from the broad globalist corporate consensus which goes hand in hand with 'liberal democracy'.

You seem to be confusing democracy for mob rule, which is what populism promotes. In order for democracy to be an effective system of governance it needs checks and balances and respect for the rule of law and human rights and freedoms. What the people want may not be compatible with those ideals but ultimately society benefits in the end. Why do you think society is better off without those things?

For example look at Switzerland, quite possibly the most direct democracy in the world, but it is still has a robust system of checks and balances in place along with great respect for human rights and the rule of law. The populists have tried to change that but due to those checks they have not been able to. I am not saying it is perfect, it is far from it and produces some negative outcomes well but ultimately everyone benefits in the end, eventually.
 
Why is that a problem? If people want a strong leader rather than the weak, ineffectual and un-responsive decision making of 'liberal democracy', then that's the point of democracy isn't it? ...................~
No! It's the point of dictatorial rule.

You cannot expect Western mentalities of today to share into the somewhat Russian trait of finding the knout desirable, from Ivan Grosny via Stalin to Putin.

I say "somewhat" because one cannot apply this perverse longing to all Russians. I've met quite a few capable of original and thus independent thought.
 
Strong leaders are perfectly capable of operating within a democratic fold. People who talk of checks and balances seem to hold this out as a good in itself, but it's not clear why. There can be too many checks and balances such that nothing can get done. The US strongly exhibits that currently, and this democratic sclerosis itself undermines the credibility of the polity. That is bad governance and no leadership.

People who tell us that liberal democracies are healthy in the long run because they can self correct make some odd assumptions. It seems to me that liberal democracies are now in generally bad health because increasingly numbers of citizens are alienated from the system.

The turn to non system parties of both right and left indicates the failure of liberal democracy rather than any self correcting mechanism. If the systems functioned properly they would not have managed to create increasingly large groups of people who have no faith in either the system or its oligarchic elites.

There seems to be an almost religious love for liberal democracies as an end in themselves. For too many people, the self interested whims of mere voters are secondary to maintaining the system and the oligarch establishment who benefit from it. This devotion to the system, often a veil for defending self interest, is not democracy at all. It's about maintaining the status quo.

But the tendency of liberal democracies to stasis is deeply unhealthy. An unresponsive 'democracy' faces serious questions about what it really is.
 
Strong leaders are perfectly capable of operating within a democratic fold. People who talk of checks and balances seem to hold this out as a good in itself, but it's not clear why. There can be too many checks and balances such that nothing can get done. The US strongly exhibits that currently, and this democratic sclerosis itself undermines the credibility of the polity. That is bad governance and no leadership.

People who tell us that liberal democracies are healthy in the long run because they can self correct make some odd assumptions. It seems to me that liberal democracies are now in generally bad health because increasingly numbers of citizens are alienated from the system.

The turn to non system parties of both right and left indicates the failure of liberal democracy rather than any self correcting mechanism. If the systems functioned properly they would not have managed to create increasingly large groups of people who have no faith in either the system or its oligarchic elites.

There seems to be an almost religious love for liberal democracies as an end in themselves. For too many people, the self interested whims of mere voters are secondary to maintaining the system and the oligarch establishment who benefit from it. This devotion to the system, often a veil for defending self interest, is not democracy at all. It's about maintaining the status quo.

But the tendency of liberal democracies to stasis is deeply unhealthy. An unresponsive 'democracy' faces serious questions about what it really is.

The problem with that line of thinking is that, as our founding fathers understood well, power corrupts. Therefore, they designed a system of checks and balances in which no one person or entity had all of the power. So far, that system has worked well to keep America from becoming yet another autocratic state. Remove those checks and balances, and we could well find ourselves ruled by a strongman.

It's entirely possible, quite likely even, that some of the population would rather have that sort of a government. It would certainly make it easier to make the trains run on time. We'd no doubt have a more orderly society than we have now.

But there still are, fortunately or unfortunately, large numbers of Americans who value freedom over order.
 
The problem with that line of thinking is that, as our founding fathers understood well, power corrupts. Therefore, they designed a system of checks and balances in which no one person or entity had all of the power. So far, that system has worked well to keep America from becoming yet another autocratic state. Remove those checks and balances, and we could well find ourselves ruled by a strongman.

It's entirely possible, quite likely even, that some of the population would rather have that sort of a government. It would certainly make it easier to make the trains run on time. We'd no doubt have a more orderly society than we have now.

But there still are, fortunately or unfortunately, large numbers of Americans who value freedom over order.


That's a fair argument that has merit, particularly in respect of corruption. I accept that the US is probably relatively un-corrupt and that is an undoubted virtue.

But I don't think that liberal democracy is, of necessity, un-corrupting. Italy is a good example of how corruption can co-exist very happily with liberal democracy. It's also true that in Russia under Putin, corruption (whilst still far too common) has declined from the levels of the Soviet and particularly Yeltsin eras. Ironically of course, Yeltsin was the darling of the west for his liberal reforms - a period which also went hand in hand with the most astonishing growth in corruption as power was disseminated to a class of often criminal oligarchs. Putin is an interesting example of a strongman cleaning up corruption (at least to some extent).
 
Like I said liberal democracy is the foundation of the free world. Populism and right-wing forces as we have seen in Eastern Europe and places like Singapore seek to undermine electoral integrity, limit rights and freedoms, undermine an independent judiciary, remove checks and balances, etc. As someone who I have seen rail against the tyranny of the majority you should know as much.

You mean by using the electoral process to elect representatives to represent “their” needs, values, and hopes for they’re own nations?
 
You mean by using the electoral process to elect representatives to represent “their” needs, values, and hopes for they’re own nations?

What happens is they ride a wave of anti-elite sentiment to power then once there they cement it by gerrymandering, taking control of the media, suppressing freedom of speech, appointing supporters to courts, imprisoning opposition, etc. They undermine the foundation of a free society. How does that benefit anyone besides those in power?

Democracy is imperfect and inefficient by design, because it needs to be.
 
Freedom House | Freedom in the World 2019" Democracy in Retreat

170722-venezuela-violinist-459p-rs_d0581c2acb327b7d50b37727bf41ca56.fit-760w.JPG




The annual Freedom House analysis of the state of democracy and freedom. The global decline continues.

It�s declined precipitously here in the U.S..

We�ve had people beaten down in the streets for attending political rallies.



Riots in the streets protesting a legal election.

3d1ceea005ca3a03681c770cc742-anti-trump-riots-are-these-riots-moral-and-just.jpg


Political parties in collusion with foreign agents in an effort to subvert the election process

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opin...fa705927d54_story.html?utm_term=.3c85ccea2ce7
...By contrast, the Clinton campaign proactively sought dirt on Trump from Russian government sources. They did it through cutouts. In April 2016, Clinton campaign lawyer Marc Elias retained opposition research firm Fusion GPS to compile incriminating information on Trump. Fusion GPS in turn hired Christopher Steele, a former British MI6 operative with sources among Russian government officials. The result was the salacious dossier, whose sources included �a senior Russian Foreign Ministry figure� and �a former top level intelligence officer still active in the Kremlin.� Steele�s work was paid for by Clinton�s presidential campaign and the Democratic National Committee. That means a paid agent of the Clinton campaign approached Russian officials for damaging material on Trump....

And federal agents attempting a coup in an effort to overturn an election result they didn�t approve of.

https://canadafreepress.com/article...-doj-coup-detat-planned-to-oust-the-president



�Harvard Law professor Alan Dershowitz on Thursday said the Department of Justice�s discussions to employ the 25th Amendment to oust President Trump�if true�amounted to an attempted coup.
 
What happens is they ride a wave of anti-elite sentiment to power then once there they cement it by gerrymandering, taking control of the media, suppressing freedom of speech, appointing supporters to courts, imprisoning opposition, etc. They undermine the foundation of a free society. How does that benefit anyone besides those in power?

Democracy is imperfect and inefficient by design, because it needs to be.

Well, so far, the only people doing that.....are the elites.

Study: US is an oligarchy, not a democracy - BBC News
 
That's a fair argument that has merit, particularly in respect of corruption. I accept that the US is probably relatively un-corrupt and that is an undoubted virtue.

But I don't think that liberal democracy is, of necessity, un-corrupting. Italy is a good example of how corruption can co-exist very happily with liberal democracy. It's also true that in Russia under Putin, corruption (whilst still far too common) has declined from the levels of the Soviet and particularly Yeltsin eras. Ironically of course, Yeltsin was the darling of the west for his liberal reforms - a period which also went hand in hand with the most astonishing growth in corruption as power was disseminated to a class of often criminal oligarchs. Putin is an interesting example of a strongman cleaning up corruption (at least to some extent).

No doubt a government can become corrupt even with an intact balance of powers. What a separation of power accomplishes is keeping any one person from being the government.

Which French president was it who said "L'etat c'est moi"... I am the state? If we can keep an American president from becoming "the state," then that will be a big step away from corruption and autocracy.

So far, so good. The Constitution is mostly intact. There are some issues that need to be addressed, like the president having been given the de facto authority to declare war unilaterally, and the state's new ability to seize property without due process of law. That's the sort of thing an alert and freedom loving people need to address.
 
No doubt a government can become corrupt even with an intact balance of powers. What a separation of power accomplishes is keeping any one person from being the government.

Which French president was it who said "L'etat c'est moi"... I am the state? If we can keep an American president from becoming "the state," then that will be a big step away from corruption and autocracy.

So far, so good. The Constitution is mostly intact. There are some issues that need to be addressed, like the president having been given the de facto authority to declare war unilaterally, and the state's new ability to seize property without due process of law. That's the sort of thing an alert and freedom loving people need to address.


Agreed.


But the US is something of a unique case due the degree to which power is devolved through the federal structure. Many other states operate federal models, but largely the power of the constituent units is weak because the federal governments tend to aggregate power to themselves. This is particularly so in Europe where big government from the center is much more popular.
 
Agreed.


But the US is something of a unique case due the degree to which power is devolved through the federal structure. Many other states operate federal models, but largely the power of the constituent units is weak because the federal governments tend to aggregate power to themselves. This is particularly so in Europe where big government from the center is much more popular.

Yes, that's yet another way power is disbursed, the states have some of it as well. The problem is, state governments can become corrupt as well.
 
that was no president ;o)

Louis XIV of France - Wikipedia

my opinion on that matter out of german perspective: been there, done that. Never again


edit: and it was as you said Westphalian: very effective in all matters :(

Yes, that's it! Funny how you can remember statements, but who made them? Good old Louie XIV. He and Trump had a lot in common.
 
Unfortunately, fewer and fewer of us seem willing to pay the price of freedom, which is eternal vigilance. Even here in the US, liberty is under attack and has been for a while, and few of us are speaking out about it. From the OP article:



"even here"?

The US surrendered true freedom with the Patriot Act.

The US is rated 12th in the most generous of studies...


Country Rankings: World & Global Economy Rankings on Economic Freedom

And appears not to be even on this list of 27

Countries in the world with the most freedom - Business Insider
 
Does Freedom House include the decline of democracy in the United States of America, too?

The sore losers of the 2016 election now want to abolish the Electoral College and to pack the Supreme Court with their guys and gals.
 
No doubt a government can become corrupt even with an intact balance of powers. What a separation of power accomplishes is keeping any one person from being the government.

Which French president was it who said "L'etat c'est moi"... I am the state? If we can keep an American president from becoming "the state," then that will be a big step away from corruption and autocracy.

So far, so good. The Constitution is mostly intact. There are some issues that need to be addressed, like the president having been given the de facto authority to declare war unilaterally, and the state's new ability to seize property without due process of law. That's the sort of thing an alert and freedom loving people need to address.

Aside from the points you mentioned in your last sentence, our government has seen fit to nullify the 4th Amendment and Habeas Corpus. Given that, how can you say the Constitution is mostly intact? It seems to me it is "mostly nullified".
 
Aside from the points you mentioned in your last sentence, our government has seen fit to nullify the 4th Amendment and Habeas Corpus. Given that, how can you say the Constitution is mostly intact? It seems to me it is "mostly nullified".

While I'm aware of the attacks on the Fifth Amendment, I wasn't aware that they had nullified the 4th. and Habeas Corpus. It must be worse than I thought.
 
While I'm aware of the attacks on the Fifth Amendment, I wasn't aware that they had nullified the 4th. and Habeas Corpus. It must be worse than I thought.

It is.

The USA Patriot Act (gotta love that name, similar to Operation Iraqi Freedom) nullified the 4th with its National Security Letters, and besides the ACLU, the only people to call the government out was librarians around the country.

The Military Commissions Act and a slew of NDAA amendments since have made Habeas Corpus go the way of the horse and buggy.

These facts show that the domestic enemies of the US Constitution are far more dangerous and successful than any foreign enemy.
 
The problem is that populism seeks to implement popular opinion no matter what and often leads to strong-man dictators who use the claim they "represent the will of the people" to implement discriminatory policies and remove checks and balances, undermining liberal democracy. This is what we have seen in Poland and Hungary.

Democracy thrives best when the ethnic majority is market capable,
Venezuela is a prime example of where democracy fails. In some multi-ethnic
diverse states democracy becomes a toxic cocktail. Victor Orban of Hungary
does not want Hungary to enjoy the 'wonderment of diversity' and neither do
Hungarian citizens

Hungary & Poland are homogenous countries & want to stay that way.
Hungary & Orban:
Here it is folks the essence of pride in country, with a real statesman leading the way.
Countrymen en mass forsaking the elitist arguments that potential GDP growth due to
immigration simply does not matter, For the vast majority of the population,
immigration being a threat to the cultural identity of the country matters most of all.

Péter Szijjártó Orban's right hand man makes a terrific case for ethnonationalismi:

“What we don’t want is a massive illegal influx coming from the south to us.
We want to keep Hungary a Hungarian country. And we don’t think multiculturalism
is by definition good,” he explained. “I understand that the liberal mainstream
doesn’t like our laws. But it is the Hungarian voters whose expectations
we have to fulfill.”
 
Democracy thrives best when the ethnic majority is market capable,
Venezuela is a prime example of where democracy fails. In some multi-ethnic
diverse states democracy becomes a toxic cocktail. Victor Orban of Hungary
does not want Hungary to enjoy the 'wonderment of diversity' and neither do
Hungarian citizens

Hungary & Poland are homogenous countries & want to stay that way.
Hungary & Orban:
Here it is folks the essence of pride in country, with a real statesman leading the way.
Countrymen en mass forsaking the elitist arguments that potential GDP growth due to
immigration simply does not matter, For the vast majority of the population,
immigration being a threat to the cultural identity of the country matters most of all.

Péter Szijjártó Orban's right hand man makes a terrific case for ethnonationalismi:

“What we don’t want is a massive illegal influx coming from the south to us.
We want to keep Hungary a Hungarian country. And we don’t think multiculturalism
is by definition good,” he explained. “I understand that the liberal mainstream
doesn’t like our laws. But it is the Hungarian voters whose expectations
we have to fulfill.”

Fidesz and PiS. Little different than today's GOP and Proud Boys.
 
Democracy thrives best when the ethnic majority is market capable,
Venezuela is a prime example of where democracy fails. In some multi-ethnic
diverse states democracy becomes a toxic cocktail. Victor Orban of Hungary
does not want Hungary to enjoy the 'wonderment of diversity' and neither do
Hungarian citizens

Hungary & Poland are homogenous countries & want to stay that way.
Hungary & Orban:
Here it is folks the essence of pride in country, with a real statesman leading the way.
Countrymen en mass forsaking the elitist arguments that potential GDP growth due to
immigration simply does not matter, For the vast majority of the population,
immigration being a threat to the cultural identity of the country matters most of all.

Péter Szijjártó Orban's right hand man makes a terrific case for ethnonationalismi:

“What we don’t want is a massive illegal influx coming from the south to us.
We want to keep Hungary a Hungarian country. And we don’t think multiculturalism
is by definition good,” he explained. “I understand that the liberal mainstream
doesn’t like our laws. But it is the Hungarian voters whose expectations
we have to fulfill.”

So you subscribe to Hitler's ideal of Germany as well?
 
So you subscribe to Hitler's ideal of Germany as well?

Orban was the first European ruling leader who was willing to protect historic heritage population and national identity
of his country from the ethnc suicide of Europe and the historic European races & he's accumulated many allies along the way.
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán stood firm on mass migration during a meeting with German Chancellor
Angela Merkel in Berlin last year, saying that his country would refuse to allow Germany to send migrants back to Hungary.
After a huge electoral victory that saw his party win a two-thirds super-majority, Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orbán
has announced tougher immigration rules and his vision of a Hungarian future.

If you really feel Orban is the new Hitler you're crazy Ethnonationalism is not resurgent it never died.
It continues to be & nearly always has been the world in which we live in the most powerful movement.
You're swimming upstream, that's a backbreaker.

It outlasted Marxism tearing apart the USSR. Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Belarus, Ukraine, Moldova & the Caucusus followed suite
& then went the 5 nations of Central Asia. That was not the end only the beginning, minorities inside the new nations wanted their
place in the sun & the Caucasus became the 20th century Balkans. This is just the primary example of many other breakups throughout
the world demonstrating the pull of ethnonationalism.

Always it's Sameness that dominates! People favor friendships with those of similar backgrounds,
interests & values. Despite some exceptions the urge is almost universal, it's human nature!' Czechoslavakia, the Soviet Union
& Yugoslavia were held together by a police state when the police state
disintegrated new nationalistic nations were formed.
 
Last edited:
Back
Top Bottom