The Noble Pundit

Why Democracy Is A Bad Idea

Solvenia went to the polls today. On the ballot, a measure to restore the rights of ethnic minorities who were "erased" from the country's records following the breakup of Yugoslavia. The measure was overwhelmingly defeated with 95% of the voters voting to deny the existence of the minorities.

"It is a manifestation of racism, intolerance and extreme nationalism," said Tanja Rener, a sociologist. "The mere holding of the vote is a loss for democracy and human rights and a victory for those who preach about blood and territory."

Actually, Ms. Rener is wrong. The vote is an absolute victory for democracy. It is also proof of why democracy is a bad idea -in Slovenia, in Iraq, or America. Democracy is the tyranny of the mob.

The mob voted to deny basic rights to those different then themselves. They have voted to continue having a people without a nation living amongst them. This really is not all that unusual. It is part of human instinct. We tend not to trust those different than ourselves in any way. So given the chance to deny them, human nature will make it happen. America and to a lesser degree Western Europe are abberations in this respect, not the norm. The result of this vote should have been completely unsurprising to all but the ignorant.

This is exactly what will happen in Iraq if we were to institute a pure democracy. The Shi'ites would vote out of existence the Sunnis, the Kurds, the Christians, and anyone else within striking distance of their military. Pure democracy as a form of government is a failure.

What Iraq and Slovenia need, and America and Western Europe has, is a representative republic.

The matter of the rights of the "erased" never should have gone to a popular referendum. Instead, Slovenia needs the rarest of rare people: the Leader.

Not a leader like George Bush who can rally people in time of trouble. Not a leader like Tony Blair who can persuade his people to join an unpopular cause. Not a leader like Bill Clinton who gives the people what they want.

No. They need a Leader like a José Aznar or Yitzahk Rabin. Someone who will sacrifice his career in the case of the former or his life in the case of the latter to pursue a course he believes to be right, good, and in the best interest of his people - despite whatever beliefs they may, in fact, have themselves. True leadership involves making unpopular decisions, sometimes wildly unpopular ones. Real leadership has long term payoffs, not short term ones, which is why it is usually so politically distasteful. Voters have very short term viewpoints. Leaders must look beyond the noise and find the true calling.

The "erased" in Slovenia will never get their rights back through a popular vote or even a Parliament. If a Leader comes along who believes in their cause though, it might just happen.

But true Leaders are incredibly rare. Ronald Reagan came close, I might even be persuaded that he was a true Leader, but I don't think he quite made it. Winston Churchill was a Leader. Neville Chamberlain was not. Israel has had many Leaders in its short history, probably more than all other nations combined in the same time frame. Great leaders abound, but truly Great Leaders are a rare commodity indeed.

Democracy suffers because it is never able to spawn and benefit from such a Leader. Republicanism, whether it be the American model, the British Parliamentary one, or the Israeli model are all capable of taking advantage of the rare opportunities presented by such men. Therein lies their comparative strength as opposed to mob rule.

The ethnic minorites of Slovenia need a Great Leader, not a referendum.

Contrary to the statements of Ms. Rener, the vote in Slovenia was a triumph of democracy - and all that is wrong with it.

Opening Night

Tonight is opening night for Major League Baseball. The Red Sox are opening at Baltimore.

I watched exactly one at bat.

All I had to see was Johnny Damon to know that baseball should still be considered in critical danger of becoming the national punch line.

At the beginning of his career he was touted as such a clean-cut, upstanding, role model type player.

For some reason the bushy dreadlocks, scraggly beard, and general homeless look don't exactly inspire confidence that he is a decent role model. His Frisch's Big Boy look of a year and a half ago was almost as comical.

If he is still considered one of the best baseball has to offer then baseball is in pretty dire straits. He's a mediocre player, at best and a questionable role model on his best days.

My prediction for the Red Sox: Damon will start out well enough, but come mid-season when other considerations start to take over his attention, as they seem to every year, he'll pull off a year end swoon to make the Miami Dolphins proud. As soon as he's no longer getting on base for the guys behind him to drive in the Sox will implode and sputter to another year of failure.

And all over Red Sox country, people will be saying: just wait 'til next year. Again.

For me, Johnny is the epitome of all that is wrong with baseball. He's overpaid for average performance, swooned on like the next coming of Ted Williams, and portrayed as someone he is not. His appearance tonight just reinforces my belief that this year nothing has changed.

I can't wait for football season to start up again. At least I have NASCAR until those wonderous weekends of fall come about again.

Well, At Least I'm In Good Company

I've mentioned before my desire to see the Supreme Court look only to the US Constitution for guidance, not foreign court rulings. Apparently, Antonin Scalia feels the same way.

I like that we have at least one justice who recognizes that the Court should not "impose foreign moods, fads, or fashions on Americans" because "...the practices of other countries are irrelevant because their constitutions are not at issue. International 'notions of justice are (thankfully) not always those of our people.'"

If things continue as they are, I'm still standing by my earlier statement that it may be time to remove a few justices via Article III, Sec. I. Breyer and Ginsburg would be a good start.

Cultural Relativism

A few days back, Beth Donovan posted a list over at We The People, entitled What this convservative stands for. Jack at Random Fate has taken the list and posted his own point-counterpoint list: What this Centrist stands for.

All in all, I can both Beth's and Jack's points of view. But I did find Jack's counterpoint to Beth's point #4 about the superiority of Western culture and within Western culture of American culture interesting and also in disagreement with my own beliefs.

Now Jack eventually comes to the same judgment as Beth (and me, also), but he certainly goes about it in a much more roundabout way.

I agree that not all values/cultures/morals are equal, but I also get angry when people proclaim how superior Western culture is when a very short examination of even very recent history will show how many of the things we decry about fundamentalist Islam were very much a part of Western culture even within the last 100 years. (PLEASE NOTE: I am NOT saying here what Beth believes, do not think I am speaking about her views in any way here, I am referring to a general trend I have observed in the blogosphere.) It is still less than 50 years since people were lynched for being the wrong color in the wrong place at the wrong time. It is still less than 50 years since we had laws enforcing the relegation of people to the back of the bus or to certain water fountains because of the color of their skin. It is less than 100 years since Western civilization unleashed chlorine gas on a battlefield to indiscriminately kill enemies. It is less than 65 years since a significant part of Western civilization had a program to kill Jews, a program that was set up by an elected government that turned murder into a horror on a mass-production scale with the acceptance and active participation of the population. Women did not have the right to vote in the United States until 1920, well into the twentieth century, and even now in the twenty first century women are not treated completely equally as men. You don't even have to look back 10 years to find an instance in Texas where a black man was chained and dragged behind a truck by two white men because of the color of the victim's skin. If we are going to argue cultural relativism, we should look to our own history and how our culture evolved before we pronounce the death sentence on another culture. I do believe Western civilization has evolved and is now better than it was before, and I believe it is better than fundamentalist Islamic culture.

There is nothing wrong with Jack's analysis. Everything he says is true (although I would argue that the despicable actions of two men in a pickup truck a culture does not make). I just think that there was a lot of extraneous thought that went into his determination.

All of the evils he speaks of did happen here. All of the evils spoken of here, have been, generally, evolved out of our culture. We don't treat women like property. We don't indiscrimiately gas people anymore. We don't lynch or execute people for being the wrong religion, color or creed. This things simply are not a generally accepted part of our culture anymore. Can we say the same about the fundamentalist Islamic cultures? Of course not.

See, I believe that there is a certain threshold of civility that a civilization should have to achieve before this kind of analysis is warranted. The French have achieved this minimum threshold, which means that we could justifyably debate the relavtive merit of their culture. Islam, which hasn't evolved in the few centuries does not meet my minimum threshold. Therefore, I find this kind of examination superfluous.

For cultures that are constantly changing and evolving, a kind of relativist examination of similar cultures can be an important part of the process of evolution. It is how we examine new ideas that might make our own culture better.

But relativism only works to better culture when the two cultures being compared are on a similar plane. Medieval western society could be legitimately compared to modern Islamic fundamentalism, but modern western culture has discarded so many of its less desirable traits that it is no longer on the same plane. It is superior, without question or need to defend, than Islamic fundamentalism.

It is really telling when in comparing the plight of inequality towards women, we discuss the ownership of women against unequal pay. Abortion rights vs. honor killings. How much more divergent can you truly get?

Again, I have nothing against Jack's assessment, I just believe that such an assessment vis-á-vis Western culture vs. Islamic fundamentalism is unnecessary. Until such time as Islamic culture moves into at least the late nineteenth century, I don't see even a modicrum of a need for a relative comparison.

All cultures are not equal, and for some, there is simply no question of their inferiority.

What do Moroccans Have Against Spain?

Spain is holding 15 people, most of them Moroccan, over the March 11 attacks.

Plus, a least one of the four to partake in today's group suicide was Moroccan. And several other Moroccans are being sought in connection with 3/11. Starting to sound an awful lot like Morocco is becoming Spain's Saudi Arabia. My question is why?

Are they still upset about the whole expulsion of the Moors thing? The Inquisition? The failure of the Spanish Armada to defeat Britain, thereby allowing the British to expand their dominion through dominance of the seas which in turn allowed for the establishment of the American colonies which after a revolution became free and eventually the world's sole surviving superpower which humiliated the vanguard of Islamic zealotry in Afghanistan?

I really don't know the reason. At least I know that the Saudi's hate us because we saved their collective butt from that pious Muslim, Saddam. But why do the Moroccans apparently have such a problem with the Spanish?

Maybe they insist on speaking Spanish in the supermarkets of Casablanca. That's certainly put some unstable people in Florida on edge....

Negotiation Is The Best Alternative - Always...

Is it really possible to negotiate with everyone? Think these folks would understand any sort of negotiating or "examination of the root causes of their anger"? You got to be out of your mind if you think so. Some negotiation is best handled by talking and the process of give and take. Other negotiation is best handled by B-52s, AC-130s, the M1A1 and the business end of the M-16.

Some people are in need of having our position explained in terms they might be able to understand. Talking obviously isn't working.

For more pictures, many of them absolutely offensive and infuriating, go here. It's all in Arabic, but as they say, pitcures are an international language....

And, just for kicks, here is another article that makes me wonder about the validity of attempting verbal negotiations. (link requires registration) "Who cares?," indeed.

The American Western Phalanx

I always find it interesting how over time, some things simply remain as effective today as they were thousands of years ago. Today's example is a formation the Greeks used to protect themselves from archers during the initial approach to confrontaion. If I recall correctly, it is called the Tortoise or Turtle:

Thousands of years, and it still serves to protect soldiers from the effects of incoming non-explosive projectiles very effectively. Personally, I think that there are much more effective, albeit violent, ways to deal with the troublemakers, but it's not my call. At least our men are finding effective ways to protect themselves against the threats facing them.

However, if this actually would work like advertised, I'd much rather see it used instead.

UPDATE: Name changed after Andrew pointed out in the comments that the soldiers probably aren't Americans. I honestly don't know, hence the change in the name of the post. I still think that it's interesting anyways.