When I titled my book "Democracy May Not Exist, but We'll Miss It When It's Gone" I really did not anticipate how hard that phrase would eventually hit.
Comments
Log in with your Bluesky account to leave a comment
Democracy, it seems, has been around for a long time, but what we have now is a bunch of corrupt gangsters running things, they call democratic. Did we ever have a democracy?
You can't miss what you never had. Democracy is a sort of Santa Claus for the grown-ups and just like Santa, it doesn't exist. The most famous concept that doesn't exist.
Talk about chasing a fleeting illusion!
Me either, I'm still in grief. We handed our country to Billionaires and Corporations. It's going to take more years than I have left, to scratch it back.
Over the years I keep finding myself returning to it. I purchased the audiobook a few weeks ago and started listening. Maybe it’s the certainty with which you’re right about us — but it’s weirdly comforting in increasingly calamitous times.
U r correct. It most definitely is but Trumps election is going 2 affect many other countries as well even New Zealand. Think defense. Trump will make NZ pay 4 America’s protection as well as many other countries.
Definitely big geopolitical implications. NZ doesn’t actually have any formal defence agreements with USA. We are lucky to be surrounded by 1000miles of ocean in every direction + we’re not really strategically important to anyone. Traditional allies are Australia + UK. Trade will be a bigger factor
You are right, I stand corrected! But NZ only has limited participation in that treaty because of the countries nuclear free status - we were actually suspended entirely, or only bilaterally applied with regards to Au/NZ, for much of the treaties lifespan
Trump is transactional Pres looking 4 ways 2 squeeze countries whether through tariffs on trade like China or questioning the cost of their dependence on US 4 their defense. NZ is small enough he may not take notice but S. Korea, Japan, Phillipines, & Australia he most definitely will.
Yes, this is one of the subjects of my work. The democracy that we have nowadays is only an illusion of democracy.
It doesn't serve the common people, only the elite. 🐈🦓🐖🐘
I think we need to look inwards more than indulging in doom-spreading. We need to ask our elected Dems to fucking retire when the time is right. Pelosi got reelected again at 84! How many more RBG and Biden do we need in the progressive movement?
That would be ideal. Democratic party should have their own term limits.
I can only see Obamas being able to persuade enough folks inside the party to do it. But Democrats haven't been all about "democracy" past few primaries so not sure how it could work. Feeling pretty betrayed by Dem leadership
The status of democracy in some western countries has been questionable now for some time. US presidential elections and their oligarch choice of evils is an example, so too is the UK using an undemocratic voting system to ensure that two state embedded parties can forever share power.
I’d retweet, but I just got here an hour ago and have no more followers to retweet too.
I had my Twitter account for 10+ years and I miss my friends already!
Just like what the ally’s do in 1941,when the evil is unstoppable by ideological means ,but fight with pain and determination.
Actually we have a lot of means to prevent something more dangerous ,but that’s not just the stress-free and easy thing of voting and posting online.
I watched Idiocracy for the 1st time a week before the election and found it so funny how what was supposed to be hyperbole was so similar to real life...then you know what happened.
Hey Bluesky peeps! Glad to be here and out of the toxic muck of X. Unlike watching that dumpster fire, I want to be more active here and would appreciate a follow. Sane politics. Advertising writer. Husband. Madison co-creator. Somewhat funny, insightful. Occasionally both.
Democracy is nothing but just a tool to control people, it is bit soft than dictatorship. A great saying: if you want to see who control you just see who you are not allowed to criticize.
I look forward to reading your book, Astra! Sounds like what we need right now and going forward. I am looking for practical ways that I can keep democracy alive in the next 4 years!
To me it’s way beyond that. It’s a country that values meanness, cruelty, name calling, rudeness, all the things we teach our children not to be or do we exalt in the leader of half of our citizens. That is the statement American made to the world.
Democracy does exist, but in a modified fit to daily life kind of way because mob rule does not work. Representation only works if the representatives are honorable & we are seeing how that devolved here. I never thought I would see this country deteriorate so quickly. I grieve for us. I pray daily.
I read your book back in the day, and it made me think really hard about this thing we call democracy. This was in the UK pre Brexit (a wholly undemocratic event posing as a democratic one). Do you have a new book on the way?
It’s a good thing we live in a constitutional republic 💪🏼 those dominion machines if they worked just one more time would’ve destroyed that too or anything resembling democracy. Too big to rig is the only way.
Comments
Talk about chasing a fleeting illusion!
There are other civilisations though, and some of them are thriving liberal democracies.
It’s nearly summer down here in #NewZealand
Actually NZ is part of the ANZUS defense treaty along with Australia & the US. Ratified in 1952.
We have to make sure Democrats are held accountable for their mistakes this election and we do not submit to authoritarianism.
People, I know things are tight right now economically, but please start saving as much money as you can.
It doesn't serve the common people, only the elite. 🐈🦓🐖🐘
I can only see Obamas being able to persuade enough folks inside the party to do it. But Democrats haven't been all about "democracy" past few primaries so not sure how it could work. Feeling pretty betrayed by Dem leadership
Thanks for your time, love, dedication, and capability to publish 💙
A month out or so from the Inauguration, and people are still talking about the Mid-terms in two years.
They just don't get it.
A Direct Democracy is the only one I support.
Popular vote wins.
Nothing else is really democracy.
I had my Twitter account for 10+ years and I miss my friends already!
Just like what the ally’s do in 1941,when the evil is unstoppable by ideological means ,but fight with pain and determination.
Actually we have a lot of means to prevent something more dangerous ,but that’s not just the stress-free and easy thing of voting and posting online.
The election was stolen. Kamala was robbed of more than 3.5 million votes.
We've got the receipts.
The fact that not a single Dem has revealed this speaks volumes. >:(
From the benches
In the internet
In the podcasts and in the air;
We will never surrender!
Hey Bluesky peeps! Glad to be here and out of the toxic muck of X. Unlike watching that dumpster fire, I want to be more active here and would appreciate a follow. Sane politics. Advertising writer. Husband. Madison co-creator. Somewhat funny, insightful. Occasionally both.
a 4 year expiration date.” — Rachel Bitecofer
It should be required reading in every high school across the west.
• 3× the money
• 80% of the legacy media
• 99% of Hollywood
• 100% of federal institutions
Yet she lost by a landslide. Maybe you should ask yourself why, and what is that you don't know 🤔🤔
* It Actually Didn't Really
I had the same revelation when I realized that “Idiocracy" was really a documentary.