Picking Up in the Middle of the Argument...

[DanaC]

yesman, it doesn't matter how bad a government is, if its the choice of the nation concerned. If we the 'enlightened' ones attempt to impose our systems, no matter how good, well meaning or fair, that system will be seen as imposed and will be resented. Self government is better than good government.

[yesman065]

Dana, If by Self government you mean a simple democracy, then I wholeheartedly agree. If not please expound.

[DanaC]

Define a 'simple democracy'.

Self-government is the government a nation chooses/develops/evolves without external impositions. Time and again strong nations have tried to decide what is best for weaker nations and time and again it results in problems. Just because we see democracy as the best possible system of governance, does not mean it is the best system of governance. Even if it is the best system of governance, it is denuded if it is externally imposed on a nation which either does not want it, or where their history and national tendencies subvert it into something else. Democracy works when it is a system arrived at by the people it serves in the natural course of their development or in the wake of great changes. It does not work as an externally imposed system.

Self government is better than good government.

[Urbane Guerrilla]

I disagree: we should be creating them. All of humanity's troubles come from overweening power. Autocracy makes this.

Societies that are largely democratic, generally libertarian are the only cure to this disease that I know.

[DanaC]

The second those same democracies become the unwelcome and overweening power in the world at large, then they become part of the disease and are no longer the cure.

Besides which, we in the 'enlightened' West are less interested in creating/installing actual democracies than we are in creating/installing sympathetic governments.

[Griff]

Originally Posted by DanaC

The second those same democracies become the unwelcome and overweening power in the world at large, then they become part of the disease and are no longer the cure.

I agree Dana.
Chile under Allende/ Venezuala under Chavez

Two assholes who were elected and were both targeted for removal by the US. Pro-democracy? Get real.

[Urbane Guerrilla]

Originally Posted by Griff

I agree Dana.
Chile under Allende/ Venezuala under Chavez

Two assholes who were elected and were both targeted for removal by the US. Pro-democracy? Get real.

Griff, I hope you don't believe either Allende or Chavez are any kind of democrat.

[Urbane Guerrilla]

Originally Posted by DanaC

The second those same democracies become the unwelcome and overweening power in the world at large, then they become part of the disease and are no longer the cure.

Not to pooh-pooh, Dana, but are there any examples of this? Ever? I ask because democracies simply don't make trouble for other democracies. The occasional trade tiff is about as nasty as it ever gets.

Besides which, we in the 'enlightened' West are less interested in creating/installing actual democracies than we are in creating/installing sympathetic governments.

Is not the former naturally going to be the latter, and the latter unlikely to be actually sympathetic enough without being the former? Too, is not the art of politics the art of the possible?

Times of great excitement tend to be those times somebody tries to recast just what is possible. Lincoln, Kennedy, and Reagan come to mind. Edmund Burke on the other side of the pond.