I thought this was a democracy and I thought the democracy is based to the collective will of the people.

You are right about democracy and consent of the people.

Because democracy depends on an informed citizenship.

But in my view it very well captures part of the problem that we have with democracy in Europe these days.

Do not forget that fascism, communism, capitalism or other isms are all monetary systems.

As Norwegian social scientist Evelin Lindner has observed,

Before, revolutions used to have ideological names.

Communist, Nazi, fascist ...

People wrote in for reprints of that thing.

It's like a coin flip it doesn't count, really.

Communism, capitalism...

What do you mean by cultural relativism?

These have to be identified by scientific investigation.

On the contrary!

Objection.

The Limits of Democracy

The constitution's gone.

The more the universe seems comprehensible, the more it seems pointless.

(Laughter)

Soviet Union was Communist and it was totalitarian. Communism and democracy are not necessarily things that go against each other.

But the Soviet Union had neither a capitalist system nor a democracy.

So, I do not want the qualification to be used to name the opponents to the Malian regime

So what does this tell us?

A democrat is a free citizen who yields to the will of the majority.

If we look at Islamists, if we look at the phenomenon of far right fascists, one thing they've been very good at, one thing that they've actually been exceeding in, is communicating across borders, using technologies to organize themselves, to propagate their message and to create truly global phenomena.

Democracy Comes Second

Kuwaiti Democracy in Action

But, we can escape from this trap, these pincers, I think.

And what do we teach in these schools?

Is that democracy?

Aren't those just the foundations of xenophobia and authoritarianism and Puritanism?

We are actually going to define our own operators.

What cause was that?

And they have different properties.

We're not realists, us foodies we're lovers.

If you are a Republican, you can take a Democrat to lunch, or if you're a Democrat, think of it as taking a Republican to lunch.

You see, idealism detached from action is just a dream.

You a vegetarian?

Optimism leads to success in academia and sports and politics.

And equality?

But this is a democracy, Harvey.

I believe in democracy.

Shoot, bitch! Democracy's at stake.

Huh? Democracy time, y'all.

The framers gave us what they called a republic, but by a republic they meant a representative democracy, and by a representative democracy, they meant a government, as Madison put it in Federalist 52, that would have a branch that would be dependent upon the people alone.