Tag: Democracy

After a particularly contentious June, America settles into the 4th of July holiday – and with it, an opportunity to reflect on the privileges of living in a free society. Thomas Gilligan, the Tad and Dianne Taube Director of the Hoover Institution, discusses the individual, economic and political freedoms that are quintessentially American – and Hoover’s mission as the Stanford-based think tank approaches its centennial anniversary.

On this AEI Events Podcast, AEI’s Roger F. Noriega hosts the new US ambassador to the Organization of American States (OAS), Carlos Trujillo, for a conversation on President Trump’s strategy in the Americas.

In the conversation, Amb. Trujillo introduced himself to the audience and discussed how his busy first few weeks in the Trump administration have progressed. He recently returned from the eighth Summit of the Americas, where he and Vice President Mike Pence met with leaders from around the hemisphere and reenergized the efforts of civil society groups that have been working to restore democracy in challenging political environments.

No Feminist Fanfare for Gina Haspel

 

Etched into the wall of the main lobby at the CIA is a Bible verse: “And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.” John 8:32

I watched the well-covered grilling by Congress of Gina Haspel for CIA Director but struggled to find headlines when she was confirmed as the first woman to lead the CIA. The media gave it barely a token of coverage. I winced as some members of Congress zeroed in on her regarding the interrogation of suspects involved in 9/11. Ms. Haspel repeatedly stated that while she was chief of the Thailand site where enhanced interrogation of three 9/11 suspects occurred, her role was that she ordered tapes destroyed that were leaked to the press, showing the identities of undercover officers that she wanted to protect. Any interrogation methods were approved by the president. A written documentation remained for the record.

Where was their memory? They say the masterminds behind the attack, where thousands lost their lives that day, and during which Democrat Bill Clinton was president, took five years to implement. George W. Bush had barely been in office eight months, after a hotly contested election where the transition period was deliberately made difficult. Back up….

[Member Post]

 

I (and many others) have been saying for a while now that America is set to enter a “hell period” sometime around 2018-2022, as the so-called “demographic mismatch” between a large cohort of retiring white Boomers and an electorate that is trending less so really starts to bite. To my knowledge, most countries do not […]

⚠️ This is a members-only post on Ricochet's Member Feed. Want to read it? Join Ricochet's community of conservatives and be part of the conversation.

Join Ricochet for free.

[Member Post]

 

In the dramatic closing moments of 2017, the following has happened: United States President Donald Trump declared Jerusalem the Capital of Israel. Jerusalem, the heartbeat of the Jewish people, was described in the Old Testament as a gift from God. In the same week, the UN declared it null and void. One hundred and twenty-eight […]

⚠️ This is a members-only post on Ricochet's Member Feed. Want to read it? Join Ricochet's community of conservatives and be part of the conversation.

Join Ricochet for free.

Quote of the Day: Democracy

 

“The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter.” — Winston Churchill

Yes, he also said democracy is the worst form of government, except all others, but watching the votes this Tuesday makes me sympathetic to what I chose as a quote today. As H.L. Mencken said: “Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard.”

On this AEI Events Podcast, experts convened at the American Enterprise Institute to celebrate Pew Research Center’s new report on global public opinions of democracy.

In his introductory remarks, Pew Research Center’s Richard Wike outlined the main findings of the report, which collected data from 38 countries to explore international support of democracy and attitudes toward nondemocratic forms of government. He explained that while the report’s data suggested broad support for representative and direct democracy worldwide, significant minorities endorsed nondemocratic alternatives.

In this AEI Events Podcast, AEI’s Michael Barone hosts Cass Sunstein, author of “#Republic: Divided Democracy in the Age of Social Media” (Princeton University Press, March 2017). Mr. Sunstein’s book explores how the internet once promised to be the great equalizer, removing barriers between people and fostering the exchange of ideas. However, today’s internet is driving political fragmentation and polarization.

Mr. Sunstein offers some possible solutions for social platforms which would allow users to see varying opinions. He discusses that exposure to opinions different that one’s own are essential in fostering a healthy democracy.

[Member Post]

 

There is a Khmer saying that translates to “a mountain cannot be ruled by two tigers.” And that saying manifested in a coup d’état in Cambodia twenty years ago. It all started with the result of the UN-backed Cambodia’s general election in May 1993. The country elected the royalist FUNCINPEC, led by Norodom Ranariddh. But […]

⚠️ This is a members-only post on Ricochet's Member Feed. Want to read it? Join Ricochet's community of conservatives and be part of the conversation.

Join Ricochet for free.

[Member Post]

 

Years ago, I worked for a consulting firm in an administrative capacity. We were worldwide, and consulted to the following: Automotive, Chemicals and Process Industry, Electronics, Energy, Financial Series, Healthcare and Pharmaceuticals, Semi-conductor, Telecommunications, Manufacturing, Aerospace and Defense, and other markets. If you can imagine any leaders in these fields, we consulted to them, including […]

⚠️ This is a members-only post on Ricochet's Member Feed. Want to read it? Join Ricochet's community of conservatives and be part of the conversation.

Join Ricochet for free.

Undermining Our System

 

Hillary ClintonBecause of what came later – Donald Trump’s refusal to say whether he’d accept the results of the election – Hillary Clinton’s similar, if somewhat less incendiary remark about our system’s legitimacy went nearly unnoticed.

Right out of the box, responding to a query from Chris Wallace about the Supreme Court (and let me add my voice to the general hosannas for his mature and professional conduct), Hillary Clinton implied that a Supreme Court decision she disliked, Citizens United v. FEC, “undermined the election system in our country because of the way it permits dark, unaccountable money to come into our electoral system.”

In this, she is echoing others in the Democratic Party. Sen. Bernie Sanders, put it this way:

[Member Post]

 

What makes a government legitimate? What does legitimacy mean in regard to politics?  I have been wondering, again, about the conditions which require obedience to unjust laws. The question of legitimacy seems the most fundamental form of that ethical conundrum. Laws express authority. Before one accepts the laws of representatives or rulers, one must accept […]

⚠️ This is a members-only post on Ricochet's Member Feed. Want to read it? Join Ricochet's community of conservatives and be part of the conversation.

Join Ricochet for free.

How Do Dictatorships Fall?

 

Asked about Obama’s foreign policy achievements, his defenders always trot out Cuba as a historic diplomatic success. In their minds, the re-establishment of relations with that small, impoverished, long-suffering dictatorship falls somewhere between Commodore Perry’s breaking down the door to Japan in 1853 and Nixon’s China gambit on the Richter scale of statesmanship.

The mantra of our Cuba policy objectives is “a rapid, peaceful transition to democracy.” According to our State Department:

[Member Post]

 

Allan Bloom says somewhere that Americans are the funniest people, because nowhere else will you ever hear someone say Mr. Aristotle. I think that is meant to show how good manners are mostly a matter of innocence. I came to think of that today. I teach kids how thinking works, grammar, & language. You know […]

⚠️ This is a members-only post on Ricochet's Member Feed. Want to read it? Join Ricochet's community of conservatives and be part of the conversation.

Join Ricochet for free.

Does Marco Rubio Know What He’s Doing?

 

Maybe saying Marco Rubio is clueless is a little harsh, but the most recent did debate did confirm a lot of my fears about him, even if his chief critic was blatantly hypocritical.

The issue of readiness to be the president came up, leading to an exchange between Marco Rubio and Chris Christie in which Christie intimated that Rubio is just a Republican version of Obama. But what really sunk Rubio was his endless repetition of the same talking point. He even responded to Christie pointing that out by repeating the same canned lines again. I imagine it must have been very painful to strong Rubio fans. But pretending it doesn’t bring a serious flaw to light won’t make that flaw vanish.

[Member Post]

 

Akira Kurosawa is the most famous of the Japanese directors & one of the directors with an acknowledged, plausible claim to title, greatest director. This is a difficult thing to decide. We have to consider that & why he admired John Ford. If people who admire Kurosawa are right about him, that would suggest John Ford […]

⚠️ This is a members-only post on Ricochet's Member Feed. Want to read it? Join Ricochet's community of conservatives and be part of the conversation.

Join Ricochet for free.

[Member Post]

 

Some of my fellow Ricochetti know I am of the opinion that we do not have enough comedy. What follows is an utterly accurate account of an utterly accurate bio-pic verified by many scrupulous scholars & consulted upon by many key witnesses, all people who were sober at the time. While Hollywood has moved away from bio-pics […]

⚠️ This is a members-only post on Ricochet's Member Feed. Want to read it? Join Ricochet's community of conservatives and be part of the conversation.

Join Ricochet for free.

[Member Post]

 

When the Cambrian measures were forming, They promised perpetual peace. They swore, if we gave them our weapons, that the wars of the tribes would cease. But when we disarmed They sold us & delivered us bound to our foe & the Gods of the Copybook Headings said: “Stick to the Devil you know.” That’s […]

⚠️ This is a members-only post on Ricochet's Member Feed. Want to read it? Join Ricochet's community of conservatives and be part of the conversation.

Join Ricochet for free.