@wood5y

Probably because the US was the first modern democracy, one that invented itself from first principles. They thought they'd got it right but in fact it was badly flawed, and more modern democracies have greatly improved the idea. There's an implicit cultural arrogance about being the first that makes Americans ignore the dangers. I remember the sense of triumph when Obama won in 2008, as if after the Civil Rights acts and a Black president, the US couldn't regress to the bad old days.

Sigh, @riggbeck. The United States was designed to be NOT a democracy.

Read the Federalist Papers. The lack of democracy is not a bug. It's a carefully-designed core feature.

And @wood5y, the lack of democracy is not some sort of recent flaw. It is undemocratic ab initio.

A significant number of states ran overt apartheid until the 1960s. Now, the #WarOnDrugs pursues the same goals.

A claim that the #USA has ever been a democracy relies on igmoring apartheid, which is a racist stance.

@2legged @wood5y

You must be thinking of 'democracy' in absolute, idealistic terms. All institutions are created within certain existing power structures. The US designed as much of a democracy as it could allow itself. Hence the improved models in other countries.

I'm more interested in what we can do now.

@Freedman @2legged @wood5y

Those with PR systems, minimum restrictions on voter eligibity, expanded methods of voting and so on. The Scandinavian and European models are pretty good in general. Almost any are better than the US system. I also like how Australia makes it a legal requirement to vote.