');
The Unz Review •�An Alternative Media Selection$
A Collection of Interesting, Important, and Controversial Perspectives Largely Excluded from the American Mainstream Media
Show by ⇅
Entire ArchiveDemocracy Items

Bookmark Toggle AllToCAdd to LibraryRemove from Library •�B
Show CommentNext New CommentNext New ReplyRead More
ReplyAgree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments
AgreeDisagreeThanksLOLTroll
These buttons register your public Agreement, Disagreement, Thanks, LOL, or Troll with the selected comment. They are ONLY available to recent, frequent commenters who have saved their Name+Email using the 'Remember My Information' checkbox, and may also ONLY be used three times during any eight hour period.
Ignore Commenter Follow Commenter
The electorate in Romania chose Calin Georgescu as their president. But the West said NO! You see, Georgescu is opposed to US military bases on Romania’s border with Russia. So a Romanian judge was paid a bagful of money to cancel the election. The current president, whose term expires December 21, following Zelensky’s lead declared... Read More
Previously: South Korea: President Declares Martial Law for a Few Hours, Says “JK LOL” He seems really sorry. What a faggot. The Guardian: “Increased public anger and betrayal”? Was that machine translated from Korean? “The president’s very existence is the bi
Most people are stupid, and this is especially true for people on the internet. Sometimes, you have to talk to them like they are babies. I recently wrote an article about Tucker Carlson and other right-wingers claiming that America is a “fascist country,” while denying the reality that by every definition, it is in fact... Read More
Pakistan is the world’s most important Muslim nation. It has 251 million people, nuclear weapons, the world’s sixth largest armed forces, intelligent, capable people, vast lands and major sources of water. Yet Pakistan is a giant mess. Its current politics are a form of tribal warfare. Corruption engulfs almost everything. Disease, particularly diabetes, afflicts its... Read More
L E T M E S P E A K T O T H E M A N A G E R They were calling Starmer “The Starm,” and they quickly then started calling him “The Barn.” Shockingly, people started calling him “Starmwit,” and then “I thought Starmwit was the sparkle in your eye, but... Read More
screenshot-2024-11-22-at-5-24-17%e2%80%afam-310x165
Tucker Carlson finally did a long-form interview with Glenn Greenwald. It’s good and worth watching, but in the interview, he falsely claims that the US is a “fascist country.” This is a stupid lie he’s told several times. The US is what it says it is: it is a democracy. That’s what this system is... Read More
Previously: Venezuela’s Top Court Ratifies Maduro’s Victory After Reviewing Supposed “Fraud Evidence” At some point, people have to say: who the hell does the US think it is? No other country goes around telling people who their leader is. This idea that a country’s election is an international matter is total nonsense on the face... Read More
mikrofon_02-930x520
We see clearly the collapse of the manipulation that has confined discourse to within the various Washington villages. The Editor at Large for the Wall Street Journal, Gerry Baker, says: ‘We’ve been “gaslit’ and deceived” – for years – “all in the name of ‘democracy’”. That deceit “collapsed” with the Presidential debate, Thursday’. Baker continues:... Read More
It's been said(by Mark Twain?) that history doesn't repeat itself but rhymes. A notable historical rhyme is between the current Taiwan crisis and the Manchurian crisis of the 1920s/1930s. In either case, a non-Chinese, even anti-Chinese, imperialist power attempts to pry away a key Chinese territory under dubious pretexts. Japan coveted parts of northeast China,... Read More
The so-called “open society” is one that will by design eventually descend into chaos, for eventually the New World Order will use this to their advantage: ordo ab chao (“order out of chaos”). Every wedge is used to break apart the solid social structures from social cohesion to the family — consider “diversity,” “radical individualism,”... Read More
One thing that we know with certainty about our time is that no Western government represents the people it rules. Western governments represent the interests of those whose campaign contributions elect the government. The government is simply purchased by campaign contributors. It is not a government in the sense of the word used by Thomas... Read More
newyorkny-january72020formervicepresident-2
In his recent State of the Union speech, Joe Biden referred to “democracy” nearly a dozen times. Democracy, he said, was currently “under assault” and “under attack”; the January 6 riot put a “dagger to [its] throat” and was its “gravest threat.” As a result, democracy “must be defended”; and indeed, we must “embrace” it.... Read More
I don’t even think the US media would attempt to claim that this election is somehow “rigged.” They can whine about Navalny, but the reality is, all polls show that Putin has this much support. Reuters:
With a 75% voter turnout, 87% of the turnout voted for Putin. No, the election was not rigged. Americans are so accustomed to their elections being rigged that they think all other countries’ elections are rigged also. The whore American media instantly began the required chant: “a fishy election.” Of course, American elections are never... Read More
It seems democracy is not a process, but an outcome. Certain policies — even if citizens want them, even if previous generations took them for granted — aren’t allowed. Many people say that a true liberal democracy must protect certain liberties no matter what, for fear of tyranny. However, much of the world has no... Read More
Hi. Joe Biden here, asking for more money for Ukraine and Israel. Many Americans are asking: Why, while millions of Americans are unemployed and getting evicted and starving and homeless, should we ignore our own people and send billions of dollars to foreign countries instead? The answer is: democracy. We have to defend democracy. Ukraine... Read More
article-lead-image
By the time the Battle of Arginusae trials purged the best generals, and Socrates drank the hemlock, and Plato wrote his “Republic,” Athenian democracy had metastasized into a corrupt sham. A sizable number of US citizens currently view the American republic (now empire) with the same disgust that Plato viewed Athens’ failed democracy. In what... Read More
In the recent mid-term elections (this is being written in December of 2022), Democrats, apparently with a good amount of success, charged Republicans with being no less than a threat to American democracy. My goodness—I guess hyperbole goes over big in this text-and-Twitter-depth age. Whatever its success as a campaign tactic, a great deal has... Read More
Fascism is a political ideology fundamentally authoritarian in character, with a strong nationalism and an essentially belligerent militaristic outlook. Fascism carries primarily a corporate perspective as opposed to a socialist view, directed to satisfying the needs, values and objectives of finance and corporations, organising both the economy and the political system according to this agenda.... Read More
Americans often fervently and unquestioningly attribute a kind of divine origin for their treasured democracy with claims that it originated centuries ago in Greece, promoted by some of the world’s greatest thinkers like Plato and Socrates, and is the natural and permanent state of man. But once again the Americans are simply displaying their ignorance,... Read More
The People are in Charge Alexander Tytler wrote that all governments are essentially a monarchy, and indeed there is no lack of quotations available from elected officials stating in one form or another the conviction that they were “elected to rule”. Nor is there any lack of evidence that their behavior corresponds well to this... Read More
chinademocracylr
I have written earlier that the multi-party electoral system (“democracy”) is the only form of government designed to be controlled by outsiders, naturally leaving it open to corruption and fraud. The Chinese, listening to the Americans, discovered all the proof of this in their own back yard. China has experimented with small-scale introductions of Western-style... Read More
The Multi-Party Political System We often credit ancient Greece for the conceptual creation of what today we term “democracy“, but that ancient form is not what manifests itself today and, as you have read earlier, the Greeks themselves – pointedly including Plato and Socrates – despised it. The transition from the European monarchies to a... Read More
In its simplest form, democracy is the members of a group using some decision-making process to demonstrate their preference on a course of action, as opposed to a leader deciding for the group. In the West, a voting process is the preferred method for group decision-making. No rationale is offered for this preference, but supporters... Read More
This is a serious discussion, so let’s be sure we are on the same page by ensuring we apply the same meanings to our words. “Democracy” is NOT government. It is not freedom, it is not human rights, it is not universal values, it is not free speech or free press. It is not capitalism... Read More
Defining our Terms We should all feel sorry for democracy, this one word carrying on its back the heavy load of almost the entire Oxford English dictionary. This poor little noun, descriptive of almost nothing in particular, has been saddled with so many unrelated and irrelevant connotations that it should have collapsed from exhaustion or... Read More
lottocracy-1024x641
One of the greatest things about the United States of America is that it is truly a land of unlimited political opportunity, a country where a man with no education, training or experience, a man bereft of both intelligence and ability, a man with a character eminently corruptible, can rise to become the President of... Read More
We often read in the Western press that China has a “rubber-stamp” parliament. That isn’t true, and I will deal with it below but, if we want a genuine example of a real rubber-stamp parliament, we can look much closer to home – Canada. In Canada, the leader of the party that wins the election... Read More
to-sustain-the-moral-posture-that-democracy-demands-we-must-refuse-to-see-partisan-affiliation-as-the-defining-trait-of-our-fellow-citizens-argues-robert-talisse
Having been raised in a Western democratic political environment, Americans (and yes, others as well, but most especially Americans) have been by design infused from birth with a conviction that some form of a multi-party electoral system – which we can loosely term “democracy” – is, even with the occasional flaw, the right way, the... Read More
American Democracy was never what it claimed to be, but it's gotten far worse since the end of the Cold War. For democracy to work at least halfway, the Power has to be named and criticized. US had that at least that degree of democracy for most of its history. WASPs were in control, and... Read More
“We going to build back so much better, you’re going to get tired of building back better. You’re going to say ‘Mr. Biden, please, we can’t keep building back better,’ and I’m gonna say ‘sorry, we have to keep building back better.’ We gotta do it, folks. Gotta do it.”
“Democracy” is a spook. I am philosophically anti-intellectual, but some of these concepts, you really do just need to understand. I am not a post-Hegelian individualist anarchist, but the Max Stirner spooks meme is useful in basic discourse. Spooks are useful and necessary abstract concepts needed to structure a human social order. Even the most... Read More
americanflagpaintedoncrackedconcretewall
When you live in a 200-year-old house, you would do well to give it a thorough inspection every few years. Rap on the walls, pull down some old wallpaper, climb into the attic, and get down into the crawl space. Check the roofing, check the exterior walls, check the foundation. You are looking for signs... Read More
"I've known Xi Jinping for a long time. ... He doesn't have a democratic -- with a small 'd' -- bone in his body," said Joe Biden in his first press conference as president, and then he ambled on: "He's one of the guys, like (Russian President Vladimir) Putin, who thinks that autocracy is the... Read More
shutterstock_716498572xx
It may have been President Bill Clinton who once justified his wrecking of the Balkans by observing that liberal interventionism to bring about regime change is a good thing because “Democracies don’t start wars with other democracies.” Or it might have been George W. Bush talking about Iraq or even Barack Obama justifying his destruction... Read More
The Author
2020 was GloboCap Year Zero. The year when the global capitalist ruling classes did away with the illusion of democracy and reminded everyone who is actually in charge, and exactly what happens when anyone challenges them. In the relatively short span of the last ten months, societies throughout the world have been transformed beyond recognition.... Read More
In the United States democracy was destroyed by democracy. Read on and you will learn what I mean. When I refer to the US as a democracy usually a couple of readers will inform me that the US is a republic, not a democracy. They are behind the times. The US was born as a... Read More
golden_dawn_greece_ap_img-680x430
Thousands of communists, anarchists, and international NGOs have descended on Athens to celebrate a Greek court's decision to declare nationalist opposition party, Golden Dawn, a criminal organization. The ruling is a historic departure for post-war liberalism, which traditionally frowns upon putting members of parliament in prison for their beliefs. All 18 elected MPs, including Golden... Read More
Let's see. We're having a birthday party and half of the children want to go to the zoo and half to the park. So we separate the two groups, give them sticks and let them fight it out. Whichever group wins, can make all the decisions. Would you do that? Well, why not? That's multi-party... Read More
shutterstock_1724345986
Totalitarianism for Dummies
The genius of America’s totalitarian system of government is that it is not totally total, and sometimes not very totalitarian at all. It is just total enough. Truly total government--"Your papers, citizen," stop-and-frisk, permission needed to travel from city to city--might spark revolt. By contrast, a sufficiency of totalitarianism, but not an excess, keeps the... Read More
This is a serious discussion, so let’s be sure we are on the same page by ensuring we apply the same meanings to our words. “Democracy” is NOT government. It is not freedom, it is not human rights, it is not universal values, it is not free speech or free press. It is not capitalism... Read More
Fascism is a political ideology fundamentally authoritarian in character, with a strong nationalism and an essentially belligerent militaristic outlook. Fascism carries primarily a corporate perspective as opposed to a socialist view, directed to satisfying the needs, values and objectives of finance and corporations, organising both the economy and the political system according to this agenda.... Read More
[Clip: Scourby, "Behold now behemoth …"] That's the fine sonorous voice of Alexander Scourby reading the King James Bible, Book of Job, Chapter 40, verse 15. I just wanted to be sure I got the right pronunciation of "behemoth." It's not a word I use very often. It's a curious thing that the two big... Read More
What happens when democracy fails to deliver? What happens when people give up on democracy? What happens when a majority or militant minority decide that the constitutional rights of free speech, free elections, peaceful assembly and petition are inadequate and take to the streets to force democracy to submit to their demands? Our world may... Read More
From the riffs of outrage coming from the Democrats and their demos over “our democracy” betrayed, infiltrated even destroyed—you’d never know that a rich vein of thinking in opposition to democracy runs through Western intellectual thought, and that those familiar with it would be tempted to say “good riddance.” Voicing opposition to democracy is just... Read More
endofdemocracy
Introduction One cannot speak too highly of Christophe Buffin de Chosal’s The End of Democracy. In a fast paced, readable, yet scholarly fashion, Professor Buffin de Chosal* demolishes the ideological justification in which modern democracy rests while he describes the disastrous effects that democratic rule has had on Western societies. He explodes the myth of... Read More
chinadata-1
Data-Driven Democracy
In Roman politics, citizens lost control of politicians after electing them. It’s one of the system’s greatest weaknesses and it is no wonder that, like our Roman forebears, we regard government as our biggest problem[2]: we cannot compel them to keep their promises. Imagine that, instead of hiring eloquent amateurs, we hired professionals–sociologists, statisticians, political... Read More
How does the West get away with its pretense of being an alliance of great democracies in which government is the servant of the people? Nowhere in the West, except possibly Hungary and Austria, does government serve the people. Who do the Western governments serve? Washington serves Israel, the military/security complex, Wall Street, the big... Read More
The European peoples whose governments were paid to sell out the sovereignty of their nations to the EU are experiencing great difficulties in being permitted to govern themselves. As the result of Italians’ frustration with the self-serving elite who have ruled Italy for decades, the recent democratic elections in Italy brought to power two anti-establishment... Read More
shutterstock_674354101
One of the most complicated and frustrating aspects of operating a global capitalist empire is maintaining the fiction that it doesn't exist. Virtually every action you take has to be carefully recontextualized or otherwise spun for public consumption. Every time you want to bomb or invade some country to further your interests, you have to... Read More
shutterstock_381358726
On Monday, the Monmouth University Polling Institute released the results of a survey that found that "a large bipartisan majority... feel that national policy is being manipulated or directed by a 'Deep State' of unelected government officials.....[1] According to the survey:"...6-in-10 Americans (60%) feel that unelected or appointed government officials have too much influence in... Read More