What is democracy?

One party is being accused of being a threat to it; the other is openly dismantling it

(source: Vox)

Background: Last month, I was invited to speak on an “Engaging in Democracy” panel at a Bay Area high school as the person representing a center/right political view. I was informed that the four other panelists were left-leaning and that the school culture was liberal if a required freshman course in systemic racism was any indicator. I agreed to participate since what’s democracy if people who disagree can’t have civil discourse?

Unfortunately, the organizers pulled the invite, saying they were changing the makeup of the panel, which can only mean all five panelists would have the same political views.

I posted this incident on Facebook and was met with disparaging Trump comments from “it’s difficult to make a case for Trump without lying to the kids” to “Can't support Trump unless you're racist, uneducated or a complete moron.”  These comments suggest that a conversation about democracy is not possible without first invalidating Trump and Trumpism. 

Therein lies the challenge to democracy: how to agree with one another when one side looks at the other as illegitimate or better said: the embodiment of evil? The Bible clearly states that evil isn’t the other side, but “from within.” In Mark 7:21-22: Jesus says “For from within, out of the heart of man, come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, coveting, wickedness, deceit, sensuality, envy, slander, pride, foolishness. All these evil things come from within, and they defile a person.” The Bible also warns us against judging others before inspecting ourselves. In Matthew 7:3 - “Why do you see the speck in your brother’s eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye?”

The Bible doesn’t mention the word democracy or how we should all get along and compromise. But Paul reminds us in Romans 13:1 - “Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God.” 

Therefore the discussion of democracy shouldn’t be opinions about who is evil, but what is our democratic system of governing that keeps evil in check. For all those who say Trump is a threat to democracy and would terminate the Constitution, my ask to them would be: Make the best argument that the Left’s stated plans to terminate democratic institutions isn’t alarming. And make the case that the Left’s current actions of censorship and deception strengthen our democracy. If you can’t, you should think about which party best represents democracy.

Since I wasn’t able to speak on the topic, I changed my notes into an essay. Here it is:  

In an August 2024 survey, the majority of adults said “democracy is on the ballot,” suggesting that one party represents democracy; the other does not. This is rather disturbing because it means democracy has become conflated with “things I agree with.”  

For instance, if you believe in climate change, you’re for democracy; if you don’t, you’re “undermining democracy.” If you believe voters don’t need an ID to vote, you’re pro democracy. If you disagree, you have engaged in “an assault on democracy.” If you criticize diversity, equity and inclusion, you are guilty of “attacks on democracy.”  

But democracy is premised on disagreement. It is a system that accommodates a diversity of ideas that are discussed. It is a governing edifice for which balanced views are essential to keep it from crumbling to the ground. It is also, as Abraham Lincoln referred to it in the Gettysburg Address, a “government of the people, by the people, for the people.” 

According to Miriam-Webster, democracy is: “government by the people; rule of the majority.” Brittanica’s definition of democracy is: “literally, rule by the people.” The U.S. is not a pure democracy, but rather a representative democracy, or republic, which means we vote in representatives who then engage in frequent voting to enact laws. Regular people just vote every couple years. To get even more granular, America is a constitutional republic, which means the government structure is bound by the Constitution. 

Therefore when we think about the word democracy, as it pertains to the U.S., it’s probably best to start by understanding that it is not a “like” emoji but a governing system with significant checks and balances to ensure power is decentralized. And if we’re going to talk about which party is a threat to democracy, we should take a look at what’s happening on both sides. 

Avoiding tyranny 

The American democratic system owes its success to the Constitution, which has countless checks and balances to ensure tyranny or “unconstrained exercise of power” is avoided. There are many procedures that put power in check, such as dividing government across three branches: executive, legislative and judicial. Other checks include the power of the president to veto a law passed by the legislative branch and then for the legislative branch to overturn that veto with a two-thirds majority. Then there’s the judicial branch which can basically deem laws unconstitutional. Anytime we reduce the powers in any of these branches or we combine these powers to take out the friction in lawmaking, this can be seen as backsliding.

Excessive use of Executive Orders can be seen as weakening our democratic systems. An Executive Order is as it sounds, a declaration of law by the president. President Clinton’s advisor Paul Begala characterized EOs as “Stroke of the pen. Law of the land.” 

The use of EOs, however, have become commonplace. Therefore when President Trump quips that he will be dictator on day one, he is making a reference to issuing Executive Orders to shut down the border and increase fossil fuel production. When people take this out of context to say Trump wants to be a dictator, we should keep in mind that issuing executive orders is not grounds for calling a president a dictator. President Biden issued a record number of orders in the first days of his office, and we don’t refer to him as a dictator. Nor do we consider Franklin Delano Roosevelt a dictator though he issued a record 307 orders a year, one of which was the forced evacuation and detention of Japanese-Americans, after Pearl Harbor. 

What can also be seen as weakening the checks and balances is changing rules around how laws get passed. One process is the filibuster, which is essentially the requirement for 60 votes in the Senate to pass legislation. Both President Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris have been criticized for saying they want to kill the filibuster. But while Republican senators have been pretty firm against removing the filibuster, Democrats, like Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and Senator Elizabeth Warren want to eliminate the filibuster, which aligns with Vice President Harris’ openness to do so as well. Not much of a check there.  

The Supreme Court is a third branch of government that keeps checks on the executive and legislative branch. Once again, it’s the Democrats that want to make changes here. President Biden wrote an Op-Ed saying he wanted to reform the Court by several measures, including term limits. Senator Adam Schiff of California and his Democratic colleagues want to make changes by expanding the number of justices on Court, a change that hasn’t been done since 1869.

Protecting freedom of speech

As outlined above, the Constitution is about preventing leaders from becoming tyrants and preventing the government from becoming a totalitarian or fascist regime. But another protection against tyranny involves individual rights. That’s why the Bill of Rights was added as a founding document because the constitution “lacked limits on government power.” The Bill of Rights ensures that individuals have power to make their voices heard (freedom of speech), to peacefully assemble and protest, to investigate the government through the press, to arm themselves, have protection from unreasonable searches, to be guaranteed due process, to know the nature of charges against them, to have a trial before a jury, to not have excessive fines imposed, and so on.

With the advent of social media and the internet, the area of contention has become the First Amendment in the Bill of Rights, which protects our freedom of speech. 

It’s so important, it’s worth writing it out: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”

With regards to this sacred right, it is largely voices on the Left that are more inclined to regulate it, under the guise of eliminating misinformation or hate speech. For instance, it was under the Biden administration that we had a ministry of truth, called The Disinformation Governance Board. It was soon dismantled when it was found that its director was in fact bias, labeling something to be false, when it was true. She called Hunter Biden’s laptop a “Trump campaign product” even though the laptop was genuinely Biden’s. Biden’s special climate change envoy John Kerry’s remarks in September 2024: the “First Amendment stands as a major block to the ability to hammer it [misinformation] out of existence.”

Also in that month, Hilary Clinton said we need to repeal Section 230, which gives social media platforms immunity from liability. “We need regulation…” otherwise “we lose control.” She also appeared on MSNBC, admitting that there should be consensus amongst journalists. “I don’t know why it’s so difficult for the press to have a consistent narrative about how dangerous Trump is,” she griped. 

In August, Governor Tim Walz on MSNBC said: “There’s no guarantee of free speech on misinformation and hate speech, especially around our democracy.”  In 2019, Kamala Harris said on CNN that social media companies have no “oversight or regulation and it has to stop.”

Now the Left will argue that regulating social media wouldn’t be censorship rather it would be moderation. But changing the word doesn’t change the action. Removing speech or hiding speech that one political party doesn’t agree with is censorship. 

What about Trump?

The Left states that Trump’s calls for media outlets (ABC, CBS) to be stripped of their licenses is more egregious than regulating social media. In the case of CBS, Trump is now suing CBS for election interference by editing Harris’ interview to make it sound more cohesive. This is not the same as regulating social media. Trump isn’t determining what is “truth.” He is pointing out what everyone saw. In the case of CBS, the outlet changed a video of Harris’ answer after the first video they put out was met with laughter at the expense of Harris. His critique against ABC is also unrelated to freedom of speech. His critique is that ABC moderators fact checked Trump but did not fact check Harris. In neither of these cases is he calling for censorship.  

The Left states that Trump said he wants to terminate the constitution. This accusation came in 2022, after Trump’s rant on his Truth Social media platform that he was enraged by the “revelation of  massive & widespread fraud & deception” by big tech and the DNC. He was referring to reporting called the “Twitter Files” which was a release of internal documents revealing numerous communications between Twitter and the DNC or FBI to suppress or take down news that were considered misinformation, some like Hunter Biden’s laptop, that turned out to be true. Trump suggested the magnitude of fraud “allows for termination of all rules, regulations, and articles, even those found in the Constitution.” Poor choice of words? Probably. Does he want to rip up the Constitution? Obviously not. 

The Left also says that Trump wants to stick the military on his political opponents - the “radical-left lunatics” and the “enemy from within” statements have been taken out of context. Trump said the military and national guard may be called to respond to outside agitators, should they begin to riot after the election. This was a question posed to him on Fox News: what to do about outside agitators? In response, Trump said “the bigger problem is the enemy from within”... then continued to say that it should be handled “if necessary by the national guard or the military.” Trump didn’t say he would get the military to attack his opponents. He said the military would be used if there are outside agitators and that a bigger threat than outside agitators are those in political power. Once again, this is a stretch and manipulation of his words. On the flip side, when Biden says that “We gotta lock him up” referring to Trump, these words are quickly corrected and put into context. NBC defended Biden’s words by quoting a White House spokesperson as saying, “Biden was speaking to how voters should think about the stakes of the election.”

The Left accuses Trump of inciting an insurrection to overthrow the election. The definition of an insurrection in legal terms is defined as “violent uprising against government authority… actively opposing the government’s power and lawful authority… intent to overthrow” a government.  If Trump incited an insurrection, he would have been charged with that. But he wasn’t because it would have been too hard to prove, particularly because his speech encouraged people to “peacefully” march to the Capitol. He was instead charged with conspiracy to defraud the U.S.; conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding; obstruction of and attempt to obstruct an official proceeding; and conspiracy against rights. Is “obstruction” enough to disqualify him? If the courts have any say, it doesn’t appear to be the case.  

Finally, if the so-called failed insurrection is a threat to democracy, how much more a successfully carried out coup d'etat? Democracy at its core is about the people having a choice. Government “of the people” as Lincoln stated. Or as defined in Britannica: “ruled by the people.” There was no one involved in Harris’ selection besides a handful of people in power. This is not only undemocratic, it’s abuse of power and fraud. So if we’re going to talk about one party being a threat to democracy, let’s also consider the other one currently trying to dismantle it, in the open.