“It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble. It’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so.“
I would deem your brand of democracy as the type that reflexively regards any challenge to your way of thinking as a "threat to democracy" or voters being "tired of democracy." Our Founding Fathers formed what is universally regarded as a democratic republic (ie a democracy) and considering that the Founding Fathers were all waaaaaay more conservative than even the furthest right wing of any national party in the EU, I would presume there is plenty of room in a democracy for the present day parties which prevailed in this weekend's elections. Only a totalitarian would behave as though there isn't.
I can't speak for the europeans, obviously, but as for this country, the more I read, the more I'm compelled to remember the fact that we have only been a multiracial democracy for about 40 years, and it pretty much effectively ended in 2011. There has been violent authoritarianism and coup d'etats throughout our history. Just read about this one. In Eufaula, members of the White League killed an estimated 15-40 black voters and wounded 70, while driving away more than 1,000 unarmed black people at the polls. In attacking the polling place in Spring Hill, the League effectively hijacked the elections. They turned all Republicans out of office and Democratic candidates took a majority of offices up for election. The recent bout of US authoritarian sentiment is much more consistent with most of our history than most want to realize. Election Massacre of 1874 - Wikipedia.
Voters in the EU are tired of 2 things - monetary socialism and immigration. You have to understand that before Obama, the EU was made up nearly 95% of natural-born citizens. Then since 2008, many of these countries took on quite a few immigrants and these immigrants were given a life on the backs of them. It's like here - if you worked 40 years to get SS and an immigrant walks in and gets the same benefits, you are going to take issue with it. Many democrats in Congress have for years tried to pass bills that would allow immigrants to get SS based on the years they worked in their home country. The other issue related to socialized benefits is that in recent years, some of it has been pulled back while still paying the same amount into it.
There is room for just about anyone in (broadly speaking) democratic systems of government. When have I said there isn't room for you? I have several friends that vote just like you. It's not like I excommunicated them from grilling day at the pool lol. So - thanks - this just clarifies that you don't know anything about me.
It is certainly upsetting the monoculture that is the strength of many. I suspect that a lot of propaganda is in play over there too.
You're the one that said the EU voters are "tired of democracy" simply because they didn't vote the way you'd prefer. It's not what you say after I point out your absolutism to you. It's what you say before that leads me to point it out.
It really started with their interventionist foreign policy. The liberals championed the Arab Springs and the ensuing chaos in the Middle East, and then felt obligated to take care of the immigrants driven from their homes by war. They could just create chaos and then looking the other way like the colonial days, but people tend to be comfortable admitting their past mistakes when they're in a seemingly unassailable position like they've been in the recent past, and they've spent a lot of time the past few decades admitting their past atrocities. So what you have now is a bunch of European evangelist liberals who are out to change the world in their image, and take on the burden of the cost that comes along with it, against a rising bunch of European isolationists who don't want anything to venture into the world nor for the rest of the world to venture into Europe. Make a mess and take care of it, or don't make a mess at all. I suppose it's better than the colonial days of making a mess and then just leave it. You see similar things happening in this country. The liberals who want to interfere everywhere in the world and take on the cost of doing so, and the conservatives who want to just leave the world alone in exchange for the world leaving us alone. There probably should be some sort of balance between the two, but alas we live in a super polarized the world, and it seems like either we're on the side of neo-evangelism or the side of isolationism.
This will be Obama's legacy. He went all in on the arab spring and the opposition in Syria paid the price. He went all centralized disbursement of all funding and gave the shiite full control of US funding in Baghdad. That fueled abuse and sunni rebellion / isis and sent millions of Iraqis to europe. Two bad decisions resulted in a massive immigration wave and demographic shift away from the monoculture that had dominated much of europe. lots of good muslims have assimilated, lots of others have chosen not to even try.
Far right has been openly authoritarian - what else am I supposed to assume? We have a guy in this thread openly owning it. You yourself are constantly cheerleading for Putin.
Some of the people escaping hunger and terror are not assimilating. Why is a big question that needs to be answered because they aren't going to deport them. Unemployment, language barriers, are problems. Some just won't ever work out in western culture and those need to be identified through criminal records and deported. you can't put all immigrants in the same boat
People who immigrate because they have to tend to have different motivations from people who immigrate because they want to. Most people get complacent and fear the unknown, those who conquer that to move to the west do so because they're brave and aspire to something great. They often admire the west, and want to be a westerner, so of course they'd be easy to assimilate. The complacent and fearful ones driven to the West by an even greater fear due to war/hunger/etc. have different motivations, especially if they blame the west for causing them having to move.
