Joe: I not only detest Chumpsky's political views, but his professional ones! I was forced to take Computational Linguistics in grad school, and it is my considered belief that Chumpsky set silicon speech understanding back twenty years (although Amritas says 50)! Even as we speak the Incredibly Stupid Theory of Deep Grammer is being forced down the throats of college students everywhere! Posted by: twisterella on June 9, 2004 03:26 PM

Joe: Also this is a great example of memetic engineering--
Students of linguists use Chumpsky texts, Chumpsky disciples teach their courses-- We need to somehow change the established meme of (linguistics, (and therefore politics), IS Chompsky). Any suggestions? Here's my thought-- if Chumpsky Linguistics can be invalidated, won't that discredit his political views also?

A quote from Robert Reich's book: "Radcons simply refuse to accept that the sixties are over and that the left of those days has disappeared... Some of the student radicals became aging hippies and moved to ... leftie preserves. A few drifted to university faculties."

Same point I've made here several times before. You are raging against a strawman.

Oh, and if you want the Universities to be filled with conservatives, pay them $300,000 and give them stock options.

Actually, Josh, I seem to recall that last time we had this debate, your opponents were offering specific evidence and links, while you offered empty assertions and didn't want to read any of their material. Reich is just an empty assertion from another source.

You can continue to believe whatever fantasy you like. That doesn't mean the rest of us have to buy it.

I've never seen so many windmills being tilted at.

Good luck discrediting Chomsky's academic work, guys. There's a long line of dead people who've tried.

This is truly the sign of obsession.

Hal: Why? ANAL (I Am Not A Linguist) like Den Beste sez, but even i can see openings of attack-- Is Chompskian Linguistics really good, or just really entrenched?
And are you really Hal-2000? :-)

> Actually, Josh, I seem to recall that last time we had this debate, your opponents were offering specific evidence and links, while you offered empty assertions and didn't want to read any of their material.

Your memory is flawed. They were offering anecdotal evidence, I was offering statistical data.

I'd also suggest tapping Alan Dershowitz' long record of Chomsky-baiting.

And now that I think of it...

It's obvious that my party is more cautious about going to war - we do so more hesitantly.

I assert that I am motivated by simple prudence. You assert that we are being motivated by the doctrines of Noam Chomsky. Question: how can I ever prove anything about my motivations?

The best I can do is to point to the fact that 93% of us supported the Afghan war, and say "no true believer in Chomsky would ever support any war." But obviously, you guys don't consider that argument valid - you waved it away like it was some sort of illogical fluff. So now I'm supposed to prove something about my motivations ... some other way.

Well, what can I say. I know my own motivations, and Reich knows his. You can claim to know what motivates us better than we know, but that's mighty arrogant of you.

In the end, you can either take our word for it that we don't support the Iraq war because to us, it looks like a no-win situation. Or, you can decide that you know that we're being controlled by Chomsky's orbital mind-control lasers. Whatever, dude.

Wild extrapolations based on polls about Afghanistan, with no look at even the methodology, populations, etc. of those polls, =/= statistical data re: the New Left, or the measure of Chomsky's influence.

That's called "making stuff up," Josh, and A.L. called you on it explicitly.

The gentleman who cited a survey of which authors were read and noted by Democratic Party activists, on the other hand, had a pretty sharp piece of evidence about penetration of these ideas within a targeted and influential group.

Armed Liberals suggestion of several books by people who founded the New Left was also pretty trustworthy re: the movement's underlying orientation and motivations. Which was one of the key topics under discussion.

This is obviously an article of faith for you, Josh... why don't you just say so, and then we can leave it at that and move on.

Billy Graham doesn't control my thoughts, Josh, and neither does the editorial staff of National Review.

But to pretend that these people are therefore not influential and do not have significant influence on important political/cultural movements would be an act of purest denial and fantasy. Something like your act of purest deial and fantasy.

> Wild extrapolations based on polls about Afghanistan, with no look at even the methodology, populations, etc. of those polls

In the world of politics, 60% is a strong majority. 70% is an unstoppable force. Even if the poll is off by a few percentage points, it doesn't matter. The support was absolutely overwhelming.

> The gentleman who cited a survey of which authors were read and noted by Democratic Party activists, on the other hand, had a pretty sharp piece of evidence about penetration of these ideas within a targeted and influential group.

Oh, come on. That's like saying people who have read Machiavelli are like Machiavelli. Some authors, you read because they're seminal.

twisterella,

I actually have some background in linguistics, although not enough to make me a linguist (I minored). Noam Chompsky once guest-lectured in a class I took in college. Obviously, I have no wish to defend Chompsky's insane political views, but I'm certainly no friend of Amritas (Marc Miyaki) when it comes to the field of linguistics.

Some of the best description of modern linguistics that draws heavily from Chompsky's work has been written by Steven Pinker (The Language Instinct, How the Mind Works, Words and Rules). Chompsky's writing in the field is dense, technical, and practically unreadable by most standards, but Pinker's work is very user-friendly (he does have a tendency to recycle amusing anecdotes, though).

Hi Sam Barnes! I too have read Pinker, and I don't think he supports Chompsky at all-- You know my level of interest, the biochemistry of language is what I fancy! LOL, you disagree with Amritas? But he is a god (The Immortal)! I am enchanted with his theory of 'creationist' language because it aligns with evolutionary psychobiology so splendidly! :-)

Josh Yelon: In my experience with acadame, "hard science" professors tend to be more conservative-- Is this (in your opinion) because of some difference in brain conformation or because they know which side their bread is buttered on? This is anecdotal, of course, but I was thinking in particular of Ed Catmull and the Gods of Graphics, and Jacobsen and the robotic hand guys at U of SaltLake. All my professors in mathematics, physics, engineering, and comp sci were uniformly conservative, while my arts and humanities profs (including the idiot from computational linguistics) were fairly liberal. What do you think?

The goddess of fertility huh? What kind of memetic engineering are you trying to do again?

Josh Yelon says, speaking of "my party,": "In the end, you can either take our word for it that we don't support the Iraq war because to us, it looks like a no-win situation."

With respect, Josh Yelon doesn't speak for the Democratic Party. The defacto Presidential nominee of that party, Senator John Kerry, continues to emphatically support our military presence in Iraq, and the need for it to continue, with even more troops as necessary, until the job is done.

Obviously there are many members of the Democratic party who don't agree with Senator Kerry, but they don't speak for the party, aren't the "we" of the party, and are only reflective of part of the party. The presumptive Presidential nominee, the Democratic leadership in Congress, and to some degree the elected governors,insofar as they achieve consensus, are those who speak for the party; not random people on the street or in blogs.

Including me, of course.

Those who speak for the party have disagreements with the present leadership over the conduct of the war, and various other issues, but they have overall continued to support our continued presence in Iraq. This is frequently glossed over by people on both sides of the aisle.

With all due respect to Josh Yelon.

This suggests that the Pax Americana of the future is determined by capitalist interests which lead to a humanitarian disaster of unimaginable scale. So far, Bush’s argument for war represents the repudiation of international law in order to bring about the police state which has come to pass. Since the collapse of the Soviet Union, the unstated purpose of this war leads our attention to the final subjugation of the Middle East, beginning with the $90bn invasion of Iraq. It is quite remarkable that Colin Powell's parade of lies brings about the result of a pre-fascist atmosphere in America.

--
Creat your own Chompsky-rants today:

http://www.spinline.net/cy/lefterator.pl

Gary - my apologies for mischaracterizing my views as those of the democratic party. To be more accurate, I was making an assertion about those who didn't support the war prior to its launch - I was merely saying that for most of us, the reason we didn't support it was pragmatic, not ideological.

twisterella,

I'm pretty sure Pinker endorses the bulk of Chompsky's theoretical work in linguistics. They aren't in the same department (Pinker is a Brain & Cognitive Sciences professor; Chompsky is a professor emeritus in the Linguistics side of Philosophy & Linguistics), but the Linguistics professors use Pinker's books in class as the readable version of Chompsky's theories. It was always presented to me that Pinker and Chompsky differ on some points of detail and emphasis, but agree on the fundamental aspects.

I believe Pinker puts more emphasis on the lexical aspects of language storage. Chompsky goes more towards a rules-oriented, pure-structure theory, IIRC, and deemphasizes the lexicon. I tend towards Pinker's thinking more, but Chompsky's theoretical work is essential to the field. Just because he's a nut when it comes to politics doesn't mean he is wrong in every field of study.

> Josh Yelon: In my experience with acadame, "hard science" professors tend to be more conservative-- Is this (in your opinion) because of some difference in brain conformation or because they know which side their bread is buttered on?

Well, Republicans have a few major consituencies:

1. Wealthy Wall-Street types.
2. Fundamentalist Christians.
3. Average Joes who believe that Republicans are going to seriously cut their taxes.
4. People who value aggressive foreign policy over their economic interests at home.

So which of the four consitutencies would you expect professors to be a part of?

When it comes to Constituency #4: under normal circumstances, most people value domestic issues over foreign. After 9/11, it might be different, so you might see a change. But most professors were hired before 9/11.

I wouldn't expect a professor to be part of constituency #3. Professors know a little history, they know that Republicans have no plan to shift the tax burden away from the middle class. They also know that Republicans aren't going to cut spending: let's face it... if you control the presidency, both houses of congress, and have a 75% approval rating, and you still don't have enough power to cut spending, then you're never going to have enough power to cut spending.

I doubt that many professors would be a part of constituency #2, either. Not sure why, but ... I don't know. Maybe this is bias, I don't know. I have to say, I wouldn't want many of my professors to be fundamentalists, unless they could keep their mouths shut about it.

That leaves constituency #1. Some professors, specifically the hard-science ones, are fairly well paid, and could fit into this category.

5. Those of a more libertarian/meritocracy bent. Where else are they gonna go?

6. Law and order, through 'em in jail types.

Josh Yelon: "To be more accurate, I was making an assertion about those who didn't support the war prior to its launch - I was merely saying that for most of us, the reason we didn't support it was pragmatic, not ideological."

I don't know what the percentages of reasons for coming down against the war, before the war, were, but I've said many times, and now on the blog a couple of times, and I will maintain, that I believe the question of the intervention was sufficiently ambiguous, as were the question of the results of several possible alternative scenarios, that fair-minded, intelligent, people, could rationally and reasonably, and morally, come down on either side with good cause.

This is an opinion many firm of opinion on either side strongly disagree with, and I congratulate them on the surety of their knowledge, and oracular vision. I'd find it a great comfort to have such clear foreknowledge, myself.

I do think there's an immense amount of lumping done by many on the right of the beliefs of those on the left (and, in general, the favor is commonly returned), including, specifically, lumping together, and attributing to all, reasons for disfavoring the invasion, of which there were, in my opinion, reasons and reasoning both good and bad.

As it is, I came out, with much trepidation, in favor of the invasion; I've recently grown further doubts as to whether a delay might or might not have been a perhaps slightly or significantly better alternative, but since we are where we are, I continue to hope that matters will turn out for the best for Iraqis, and all of us. I think there remains a strong possibility of that, but I, as well, think it's also possible it might go into civil war, bloodshed, chaos, and death; that is, as the British sometimes say, it might all end in tears.

I, unlike some, have hopes and preferences, but no sureties in this.

"Well, Republicans have a few major consituencies:"

People on the left and right commonly fail to understand each other, fail to understand each other's core axioms, and fail to understand each other's reasoning, if I might indulge in generalization.

Your summary neglects to include all those Republicans who hold to various ideals, some shared, some not, but including valuing, as they see it (and one may disagree with any of their axioms or reasoning while still, valuably, understanding them), valuing liberty over security, valuing democracy, and in many cases wishing to see it spread (which is, of course, a liberal ideal, as well), believing that government and regulation is more of a problem for people than a help, and so on.

I'll leave it to actual Republicans, or others, at least, to attempt to define and encapsulate their constituencies, but I do think your list has significant omissions.

Sam Barnes: I confess to no deep knowdge of chompskian linguistics-- I will have to research it! As I said, my initial experience with his computational linguistics text did not leave me salivating for more. I have been reading some of the Theory of Deep Grammer stuff, but that postdates The Language Instinct. I see I need more study. :(

> Your summary neglects to include all those Republicans who hold to various ideals... [such as] valuing democracy

In your mind, what does it mean to value democracy?

For me, "Democracy" means "A government that executes the will of the people." The mechanism by which it executes that will is not important. Representatives, direct voting, whatever - as long as the actions taken by the government match what the people want.

Any government that performs any action that is contrary to the will of the people is anti-democratic, even if that government has the trappings of democracy.

For example, poll after poll show that people believe that the poor are paying too much in taxes, and the wealthy too little. If the US government shifts the tax burden in the opposite direction, then something has gone wrong, the system has ceased being Democratic.

Poll after poll show that the majority of Americans favor access to abortion. If somehow, access to abortion is denied, then the will of the people has not been executed. Democracy has been trumped.

But surely, a leader shouldn't lead by polls alone, right? That's true: a leader should also lead. He should shape public opinion using speeches and by setting examples. That is the only truly legitimate way that a leader in a democracy can take part in the process.

When a democracy dies, the trappings live on. And when even the trappings begin to die, you know that democracy itself is long gone.

"Any government that performs any action that is contrary to the will of the people is anti-democratic, even if that government has the trappings of democracy."

Josh, this is facially untrue. Your definition of an "anti-democratic" government is ridiculously over-broad. I'll also note that your "poll after poll" claims are both dubious and unsourced. I believe there are at least a few polls that show the reverse on both counts, but as your original claim is entirely chimerical as to the facts, I don't feel the need to document my disbelief of it.

Are you actually trying to claim that democracy in America is long dead, and that we are only now noticing the death of the "trappings" of democracy, whatever that's supposed to mean? Or are you just trolling for controversy?

what does it mean to value democracy?...The mechanism by which it executes that will is not important. Representatives, direct voting, whatever - as long as the actions taken by the government match what the people want. Any government that performs any action that is contrary to the will of the people is anti-democratic, even if that government has the trappings of democracy.

Josh (12:09pm), consider instead the problems posed by the 1991 Algerian elections: "one man, one vote, one time." Elections were leading towards an Islamist (FIS) victory, so the military/FLN cancelled the final round and took over. Leading to a brutal civil war with >100,000 dead, mostly at the hands of the GIA.

So--if it's all about the electoral process, should the FIS should have won? Have had their chance to turn Algeria into another Sudan or Iran?

"Consensual government" is more than elections and more than the will of the people, expressed. It's elections and politics played out within a civil society. I can spot a few tired cliches in your post, and it makes me wonder if you appreciate what's right about our free-market democratic republic. Can one build on strengths if one doesn't recognize them?

> Are you actually trying to claim that democracy in America is long dead, and that we are only now noticing the death of the "trappings" of democracy...

By the "trappings" of democracy, I mean the separation of powers, trusted elections, and so forth. I call them "trappings" because there are many governments in the world that have at least a semblance of these things in their constitutions, yet they are in no way democratic.

Truthfully, no ideal can ever really die. They can only fade out for a while. No matter how bad things get, ideals can be reinstituted. So, no, Democracy is not really dead, it's just lost in the woods.

> I'll also note that your "poll after poll" claims are both dubious and unsourced.

From Gallup: "As I read off some different groups, please tell me if you think they are paying their fair share in federal taxes, paying too much, or paying too little. How about [see below]?"

"Upper-income people"
Fair Too Too No
Share Much Little Opinion

4/04 24 9 63 4
4/03 24 10 63 3
4/99 19 10 66 5
4/96 19 9 68 4
4/94 20 10 68 2
3/93 16 5 77 2
3/92 16 4 77 3

Sorry, I don't have the link. As for the abortion data, I'll dig it up if you really want it.

So anyhow, if you don't agree with my definition of Democracy, what would yours be?

Well, if democracy is always about majority rules, then count me out. Maybe we should consider what AMac says, and add that liberal to democracy. Without the rule of law, seperation of powers, the Bill of Rights, and respect for minorities, you're really not talking about democracy at all. I believe the term is Dictatorship of the Majority.

I am much, much happier that the majority is thwarted much of the time. Josh, you should be too.

When the majority thwarts itself by rule of law, as far as I'm concerned, that's still a democracy. For example, let's say the majority agrees that we should have a constitution, and that it should grant freedom of speech. Then, let's say that the majority agrees that we should punish flag-burners. Then, the courts say "you've told us two contradictory things, but 2/3 of you agreed to the freedom of speech bit, and only 1/2 agreed to the flag-burning thing, so the freedom of speech takes precedence." In my mind, it was the majority that made that decision, not the courts, even though the courts intervened. The majority still has the power to change that decision.

I think that the executive has two ways to steal power from the majority: by usurping dictatorial power, and by deceiving the electorate.

But 2/3's that approved the constitution are long dead. Why should they constrain the contemporary majority?

> Well, if democracy is always about majority rules, then count me out... Without the rule of law...

Come to think of it, I didn't express myself fully in that last post. What I'm saying is: I strongly support the rule of law - I don't think rule of law is anti-democratic. The law is merely a written form of the will of the majority. True, it's not the three-minute microwaved will of the majority, it's more like a slow-cooked will of the majority, but there's nothing wrong with that. What's wrong is when the will of the majority is overruled by a few individuals.

"Any government that performs any action that is contrary to the will of the people is anti-democratic, even if that government has the trappings of democracy."

I think that's a tad strong. Of course, no, I don't favor pure democracy. A pure democracy is mob rule, and endorses lynchings and similar events, has no restraint upon power, and no separation of powers.

I am pleased to live in a democratic republic, with a tripartite system of government, where each branch constrains the other two, and in which the powers of government are restrained by a Constitution, and a Bill of Rights, guaranteeing individual rights. The framers of this system were well aware of the horrors of pure unadulterated democracy, which are no less than those of a dictatorship with all powers in a single person. Dictatorship is dictatorship whether led by a single person or a mob.

Sometimes those checks and balances -- of which the tripartite system is only one, of course -- fail. Then we get such democratic results as rounding up all people of Japanese descent and putting them in concentration camps. Yay, democracy! Down with constitutional constraints on it and a bill of rights!

"By the 'trappings' of democracy, I mean the separation of powers...."

Separation of powers are, by your definition, anti-democratic. And, in fact, they are. That doesn't make them bad; democracy is not the only virtuous aspect to good government, and pure democracy is not virtuous. The Supreme Court is extremely un-democratic, is it not?

Incidentally, your use of capitalized "Democracy" and "Democratic" is usage inclined to lead to confusion with "Democratic," as in the party. Pray cease and desist.

The goddess of fertility huh? What kind of memetic engineering are you trying to do again?

LOL! It is all one! :-)

"Any government that performs any action that is contrary to the will of the people is anti-democratic, even if that government has the trappings of democracy."

"When the majority thwarts itself by rule of law, as far as I'm concerned, that's still a democracy."

I'm sorry, you cannot logically hold to both these statements, save through the following out. The only logically permissible solution, if you choose to, is to accept as a corallary to your usage the statement that "some democracies are anti-democratic."

That would be within the bounds of logic, but not, I suggest, lending itself to clear discourse.

I suggest that withdrawing your first statement to a far more limited form would be more useful, but that's up to you.

"When the majority thwarts itself by rule of law, as far as I'm concerned, that's still a democracy."

So I take it you object to Brown vs. Board of Education? And to banning official state endorsement of prayer, and to banning state-led prayer in schools? You object to every Supreme Court decision that could not win a majority vote of the citizenry, and would prefer a system where the Supreme Court could be over-ruled by national referendum?

Personally, I do not share these values, or the upholding of mob rule uber alles, but you may disagree, of course.

"The law is merely a written form of the will of the majority."

This seems to only be true in an extremely attenuated sense, the sense that the majority of people don't find it sufficiently objectionable to, say, engage in armed rebellion against it, or otherwise sufficiently moved to, at least, agitate for a new constitutional convention.

For better, for worse, I believe we'd find that a great many laws, whether as written by Congress, the states, or the courts, would not gain majority support if put to a vote. Would you disagree?

I think, Josh, that you're torturing logic attempting to hold simultaneously to the belief that the will of the majority is the only proper value, and yet the U.S. system (I'm carefully avoiding discussing the merits of other democratic systems) is, in ideal, at least, properly democratic. But, in fact, the U.S. system is not a pure democracy, was specifically designed to avoid suffering the terrible injustices of a pure democracy, and I thank $DEITY (and more properly, the writers of the Constitution) for that.

"...rounding up all people of Japanese descent and putting them in concentration camps."

Gary, this statement is truly offensive, as the moral equivalency it implies is staggering. There were worlds of difference between the Nazi concentration camps of the Holocaust and the internment camps here in the U.S., and yes, the difference IS of a magnitude that it must be distinguished.

Just a suggestion.
Instead of repeating this debate, let's all go and read the Federalist Papers again.

I've noticed a misconception floating through the comments on this thread. The United States is not and never has been a democracy. It is a republic. There is no federal constitutional requirement that any state be a democracy. States must be republics, however.

I'll stand mute right now on whether the U. S. should be a democracy.

Josh Yelon: Ummm, coming from a science background, I hope this question isn't too abysmally ignorant for this discourse, but the government we have, wasn't it explicitly designed not to be a democracy, but a republic? Was it Plato or Aristotle that said, "...these are three forms of government and their perversions....and the perversion of a republic is a democracy..."? Isn't the Age of Reason where the Founders drew their inspiration?
Consider the abortion issue. The US is the only industrialized nation that has had abortion rights imposed by judicial fiat, rather than by legislation. Does this conform to the rule-of-law?

Wow! What Dave said! :)

"There were worlds of difference between the Nazi concentration camps of the Holocaust and the internment camps here in the U.S., and yes, the difference IS of a magnitude that it must be distinguished."

Of course. The Nazi camps were death camps, as well as labor camps. They were genocidal. The American camps were none of those things. That is why we do not refer to them as "death camps," nor the internment and relocations as a "Holocaust," or anything remotely like that.

Are you confused as to what "concentration camp" means? It was invented by the British for use in concentrating the Boers during the Boer War. It means "a camp where people may be concentrated." That's all. It was neither invented by the Germans, nor connotates what they went on to further do.

You may, perhaps be not well versed in the history of the American camps, which were, at the time, called by many, including the President of the United States, "concentration camps." Clearly you are not familiar with the newspaper stories of the time. I'm sorry if this history offends you. It offends me, as well.

See here, for example, and here, and here.

See also here.

"I'm for catching every Japanese in America, Alaska, and Hawaii now and putting them in concentration camps. . . . Damn them! Let's get rid of them now!"

CONGRESSMAN JOHN RANKIN, Congressional record, December 15, 1941

"In an experience of nearly three decades I have never found it harder to arouse the American public on any important issue than on this. Men and women who know nothing of the facts (except possibly the rose-colored version which appears in the public press) hotly deny that there are concentration camps. Apparently that is a term to be used only if the guards speak German and carry a whip as well as a rifle."

NORMAN THOMAS, Christian Century, July 29, 1942.

In response to a reporter's question about the West Coast "evacuation," the President called Nisei "Japanese people from Japan who are citizens," and went on to state ". . . it is felt by a great many lawyers that under the Constitution they can't be kept locked up in concentration camps."

PRESIDENT FRANKLIN DELANO ROOSEVELT, Press Conference, November 21, 1944, FDR Library, #982.

"I have made a lot of mistakes in my life. . . . One is my part in the evacuation of the Japanese from California in 1942. . . . I don't think that served any purpose at all. . . . We picked them up and put them in concentration camps. That's the truth of the matter. And as I look back on it--although at the time I argued the case--I am amazed that the Supreme Court ever approved it."

TOM CLARK, Associate Justice of the Supreme Court, San Diego Union, July 10, 1966.

"They were concentration camps. They called it relocation but they put them in concentration camps, and I was against it. We were in a period of emergency, but it was still the wrong thing to do."

PRESIDENT HARRY S. TRUMAN, Interview with Merle Miller, 1961.

"The United States is not and never has been a democracy. It is a republic."

It's both a floor wax and a dessert toping. There's no contradiction between the two. The U.S. is, of course, a democratic republic.

Thanks Gary (2:43am). But... we all kinda know what Sam Barnes (2:25am) meant. Your Truman quote is interesting because it's dated 1961. For the most part, after 1945, people stopped using the term "concentration camp" to describe same. The connotations of the euphemistic Nazi usage are too strong not to derail many discussions.

Um...

Me: "Any government that performs any action that is contrary to the will of the people is anti-democratic, even if that government has the trappings of democracy."

Me: "When the majority thwarts itself by rule of law, as far as I'm concerned, that's still a democracy."

Gary: "I'm sorry, you cannot logically hold to both these statements..."

You know, the very idea of "will of the majority" isn't even well-defined. I could go out on the street and ask 101 people "do you support the Iraq war", and I'd get an answer. Then, I could go out and say "I'd like you to go home and research the Iraq war on the Internet, and decide whether you support it. Here's my phone number, call me back tonight." They might not produce the same answer. Which is the democratic answer?

I think the correct answer is: both, even if you get two different answers. And the second one is democratic even though some web authors have some indirect influence. The criterion is that in both cases, the key decisionmaker is the majority.

By that logic, any process of consideration is valid, as long as the major actor is the majority.

So if the majority creates the first amendment, and if the majority then decides it's bad to burn the flag, then you've got two contradictory decisions, both created by the majority. As I've explained, that's quite possible: the majority is quite capable of holding multiple contradictory opinions. You've also got a resolution procedure, which was also created by the majority - the use of the supreme court. They key point is: the decision making power ultimately rests with the majority.

And, as you point out, there are times when this is violated in the US. In Brown vs Board, the key decision was almost certainly made by a few old men. That was not democratic.

And, like you said, a great many laws would not gain majority support if put to a vote. That, I think, truly reflects the corruption of our democracy. A law should reflect the will of the majority, for at least some definition of the will of the majority.

And yes, if the majority chooses to elect a representative, and the representative passes a law, then there exists a sense in which the majority supported the law --- unless the representative lied about his platform to get into office.

To those who say the US is a republic, not a democracy:

In my mind, the word "republic" has one meaning: it's a system of governance.

In my mind, the word "democracy" has two meanings: it can indicate a system of governance (ie, Greek-style direct voting on laws), but it can also mean the ideal that the people control their government. I mean democracy in the latter sense. That's why I say the mechanism isn't important.

Josh, I respect your sincerity, but you aren't addressing the questions posed in the thread (similar to the ones the Founders struggled with). Your example, Brown v. Board, or racism more generally: A large majority of the US population was quite comfortable with racist bigotry from the end of Reconstruction through, say, the '40s. Cheerful lynching postcards and all.

So...presumably you approve of the Brown outcome (et al). Yet you concede it was 'undemocratic' ("a few old men"; 3:00pm).

Are you engaging in post hoc reasoning? Or is there a deeper choice you may face:

--Is democracy as expressed by majority rule not (nearly) adequate for a civil society?
--Should protection of minority rights trump majority will?
--Should we have the rule of laws, or men?

Answer carefully lest you unwittingly start on the road to the John Stuart Mills definition of liberalism. It's happened, you know...

Josh,

"In my mind, the word "democracy" has two meanings"

Alerting readers to that fact in the initial instance of usage may have a favorable impact on their view of your ability to communicate.

"In Brown vs Board, the key decision was almost certainly made by a few old men. That was not democratic."

No, it was not. Was that good or bad? (I actually think this is a rather complex question, but setting that aside for a simple answer....)

Do you support the decision, or decry it because it was undemocratic?

"That, I think, truly reflects the corruption of our democracy. A law should reflect the will of the majority, for at least some definition of the will of the majority."

If so, why do we let stand Marbury v. Madison, and allow the Supreme Court, and the lesser courts, to rule on the legality of laws? Is that "corruption of democracy"? It's certainly not democratic. Is that bad? Is democracy the only value? You seem unenthusiastic about answering this question. Do you believe the right of review of U.S. laws should be removed from the court system because it is, of course, "undemocratic"?

Which is more important, Josh? Democracy, or justice and protection of rights?

I vote "b," if it isn't clear.

> Consider the abortion issue. The US is the only industrialized nation that has had abortion rights imposed by judicial fiat, rather than by legislation. Does this conform to the rule-of-law?

No.

Which raises the interesting question, "would I support it, if I were there?" On one hand, I'm certainly glad that it turned out the way it did. On the other hand, it's unfortunate that it bypassed the rule of law.

I think the answer is, no, I wouldn't support it.

Right...

[1] This thread long ago drifted way, way off its subject into stuff that is at best deeply marginal to the topic of this post. As of about noon.

[2] The last set of surreal idiocy with meaningless comments just got deleted en masse. IP bans have been made.

[3] This thread is now closed to further participation.

I find this more than disappointing, as I do not have the time to play babysitter on all of the blog's threads.