The Sunshine Empire

With the onset of acute Obama derangement syndrome over the last 10 months, the most curious side effect I’ve found is the sudden conservative disdain for “democracy.” Now this is always crouched with quotes from various founding fathers stating what seems like their disdain for “democracy” in favor of the true form of government, the “republic.” After spending the years leading up to the Democratic congressional victories in 2006 and 2008 stating their opposition to tyranny by the minority, congressional Republicans and conservatives across this great land have found a new found love of the defense of the minority. Democracy has gone from that shining city on a hill to being nothing more than mob rule. Yet the evolution of and timing of this undercurrent in conservative thought is fascinating.

Those who now decry democracy as some kind of ill force against freedom are an intellectual enigma. Those people are curious first off for their belief that a democracy and a republic are two distinct forms of government. To think of them as such is an apples to oranges comparison. Any country that does not have a monarch as head of state is a Republic. So in that vein Iraq under the rule of Saddam Hussein was a republic, but not a democracy. Along those same lines Great Britain is not a republic but is in fact a democracy. A democracy is the direct election of a representative form of government, and the congress and president of The United States are elected according to who garners the majority of votes in the country or that particular state or district. Therein lies the problem that conservatives have. The timing of their sudden disagreement is also telling.

The real root of the sudden conservative distaste and nuanced attitude toward American democracy is that sometimes the electorate votes in candidates that they don’t agree with. Wherein prior to the 2006 election Republican senators were pushing to remove the filibuster as a tool for the minority to use for judicial confirmation, they now pray at the altar of filibustery. Parliamentary maneuvering and the use of the filibuster by congressional democrats were portrayed by Republicans as the tyranny of the minority. Today conservatives, unhappy that the country has rejected their ideas as failed, now refer to the majority as nothing more than mob rule. The equivocation among conservatives with regards to democracy has grown exponentially in the three years since the Republican revolution died. Where was their affection for the minority’s rights during the push for the “nuclear option?” Now armchair conservative historical revisionists take a series of quotes from various founding fathers talking about the failures of democracies prior to the American revolution as direct indictments of modern democracy. Never mind that the discussions are among learned men who were attempting to construct a representative democracy that did not suffer the same drawbacks and faults that they found in previous attempts at democratic government. That would be too liberal a reading of historical fact.

It’s little wonder that the country continues to register a deep disdain for the Republican party even after the struggles of the young Democratic president. It further proves the modern conservative movement is engaging in a political scorched earth policy. Better to tear down democracy all together if the will of the people goes counter to their discredited and rejected ideas.