Jimmy Carter: US "has no functioning democracy"

reply to post by Gazrok


Whats funny is last night I watched a long documentary on Prohibition in the 1920's. The cops used illegal wiretaps on the phones to try to catch the bootleggers. No warrant no court order nothing strictly illegal - BUT they courts decided it was legal to use transcripts of these very illegal wiretaps in court - i'm like WTF !

So yeah this corruption is nothing new. Government does what it wants to do, what it thinks it can get away with no matter if there are laws against it or not.

He should have said no functioning representational form of government.

Originally posted by Thorneblood
Why is that even a concern any longer?
In all honesty. What does Snowden know that is so important?
If America is no longer a democracy then what is it? And more importantly, does it really matter?

I think you're missing the point.

There is no functioning democracy because there is an unelected and unaccountable group of people more powerful than your elected government.

It's really quite simple. The most powerful group of people in a democratic nation SHOULD BE the elected representatives of the citizen. There should be no group more powerful than the elected government and the high courts.

When there is a group of people with more power than the elected, it is not a democracy. This is what happens in a military coup. An unelected group seizes control of the systems of government, and uses it to their own ends. The people no longer have elected representatives.

This is what has happened in the USA, your elected no longer have dominance, therefore the people no longer have a democratic representation.

I am really surprised that so many people don't understand this very basic idea. Democracy is the operation of a nation by those elected by the people. The moment you have people who are unelected running things and with more power than those you elected, there has been a coup and you no longer can call yourself a democratic nation.

It's really as simple as that.