With or perhaps without fanfare, the greatest circus on Earth since the now defunct Barnum and Bailey, will get underway in a few days. It will feature a handful of protection racketeers who will demonstrate how to play the farce known as Democracy in a vain effort to convince other dudes to join them.
Democracy
has become a protection racket that practices the code of silence when its
members commit evil acts, but sounds the horn of shock and dismay when others
commit a fraction of what the racketeers commit. When looked at with suspicion
by the good people of the Earth, the racketeers create a circus-like feel such
as the one they are about to stage, to try changing the world’s perception of
them.
Believe
it or not, there was a time when Democracy was practiced by individual nations
that adhered to stately principles, thus delivered good government to its
subjects. But when competition from other forms of governance began to pressure
the various Democracies, they banded together, believing in the saying: “united
we stand, divided we fall”.
However,
instead of helping them, the coming together of Democracies highlighted the
deficiencies of a system whose planks proved to be so fragile, no Democracy
could stand alone against a minimal pressure coming from the outside. This
became apparent at a time when the so-called Autocracies were braving the
pressure from the mightiest of Democracies and winning the battle for survival.
In
fact, the theory in circulation at this time, is to the effect that the staging
of the upcoming Democratic circus, was motivated by the realization that
Democracy is losing to other forms of government. In reality, these are new
forms in the experimental stage, but whatever they represent, they are
straightforward and simple forms that appear less hypocritical than the
Democracies, and more respectful of what the other nations decide for
themselves.
And
so, the circus will proceed even as people you might not expect are beginning
to voice suspicion that it will not do any good. Two of these people are Katie
LaRoque and Patrick W. Quirk who coauthored: “Is US Democracy Promotion
Credible After Afghanistan?” an article that also came with the subtitle:
“While the Summit for Democracy will issue a rallying cry for freedom and
democracy defenders, actions—not
rhetoric—are needed to rebuild trust and restore this administration’s
credibility in the eyes of those who risk their lives for democratic progress.”
It was published on November 25, 2021 in The National Interest.
Here,
in condensed form, is how Katie LaRoque and Patrick Quick expressed their
suspicion:
“The Biden administration is
convening its Summit for Democracy. The event
comes on the heels of America abandoning Afghanistan’s democracy advocates.
What is evident is that leaving Afghanistan’s populations to the Taliban regime
casts a dark shadow over the high-level gathering”.
As
can be seen, LaRoque and Quirk are not suspicious that America will push hard
to sell a discredited system of governance; they are suspicious of an America
that lost the drive to make a strong case for Democracy. They see this
happening as a result of the fiasco that took place during the Afghan pullout, and
fear that the consequence of the whole chain of events, is that the people of
Afghanistan will ultimately be left alone to defend themselves under the regime
of the Taliban.
The
two authors contend that America’s fundamental problem is that its leaders have
lost credibility in the eyes of the world. And so, they recommend that the
first thing America should do is address this problem. They suggest that restoration
of credibility can be done when America will talk less about democracy—given that talk is cheap—and
stand more firmly with those who risk their lives fighting for Democracy. To
that end, they say there are a number of steps that America should take to bring
about positive results.
The
first thing that America must do, say LaRoque and Quirk, is to go all out and
save Afghanistan’s freedom fighters, currently in the country. To motivate
President Joe Biden to do just that, they remind him of the words he uttered
when he said the following: “We will continue to work to help more people leave
the country who are at risk. And we’re far from done”.
Next,
the writers want to see the President of the United States do what they
describe as backing his words with forceful action. To that end, they begin by
saying that while economic sanctions should not be discarded, America must
consider more forceful measures to punish the regimes “that make their people
suffer”.
And
then, our dear authors say they want America to invoke the “Right to Assist,”
which is a self-serving principle according to which America and its
racketeering comrades could and would empower themselves with the right to
declare a regime that does not toe their line, as being non-democratic,
therefore a regime that lost its sovereignty.
With
that, the racketeers will open the door for themselves to proceed in any way
they see fit, including the limited use of force (that presumably will not
mission-creep,) the arrest of individuals they dislike (to do what with them,
they don’t say), and the cyberattack of the country’s infrastructure,
presumably to whip the population they try to save, and force-motivate it to
rise up and topple the regime that refuses to join the Democratic racket.
Finally,
reading the LaRoque and Quirk article with a critical eye, you’ll notice that
the authors spoke of “freedom” and of “democracy” interchangeably as if they
were synonymous without defining either or showing the nexus between them.
Had
they done any of that, the authors might have convinced the readers they made a
worthy contribution to the debate. But where things stand now, the readers will
most certainly ask: Does Democracy mean voting to choose between a racket of
the Left and one of the Right? Does Freedom mean kids organizing to smash and
grab stores?
If none of that. What exactly is Democracy? What exactly is Freedom?