The American democratic republic has died. It was 236 years old.

time to flee to the old world from prosecution and religious pressure lol

Name one year that the US was a democracy.

Imagine believing USA was ever a "democracy".
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_religion
- Neckbeard comment
- I think it's more important to realize the harm that's happening now than the 200+ year old technicalities, though being important themselves, aren't what's most vital at this current moment.

Aside from this being a little fucking melodramatic and defeatist, the thing that really bothers me is the implicit assumption that if only we'd all just vote blue no matter who we wouldn't have this problem, like the Democratic Party hasn't been kowtowing to and enabling those same oligarchs to undermine our democracy. It's like they're standing in the rubble of a bombing and saying, 'This is happening because you chose the short fuse on the bomb, if only you had chosen the long fuse we ~~wouldn't have noticed this happening quite so quickly~~ wouldn't be having this problem!'
Don't get me wrong, boom tomorrow is definitely better than boom today, but it's important to not forget that there was never not going to be a boom.
- What I don't get from the American people, who have always portrait themselves as champions of everything with this attitude now of "there was no way to avoid it because we are legless turtles and all we can do is vote blue or red and hope our daddies do right by us"
  True, the last election would not had saved you but anyone with a firing neuron saw this coming 40 years ago and you all did fuck all to avoid it while still making ignorant jokes about the French being cowards
  
  I'm so sick of these high tower pseudo-big brain "told ya so" comments. "I saw the end of the US before it's inception. I saw the end of the US when humans migrated from Siberia 16,000 years ago!" Well, you are so smart and I'm so proud of you, but you aren't adding a damn thing to the conversation.
  
  Indeed, although anyone who says they knew what shape this would take 40 years ago was either a liar or a time traveler, I've been watching it go to shit for my entire life. I too tried voting blue for 30 years only to watch them unwind and fall apart when the chips were down. Now I favor rather more extreme measures, but most Americans are like 'waah, I keep choosing the lesser evil, why do we keep getting evil?!'
  
  Take North Korean propaganda, paint it red white and blue and give it a specific set of "freedoms" and you'll have any answer of "how". We're literally made to be this way. Even those of us with a "firing neuron" are a result of this propaganda, granted just not in the intended way. Drowning and understanding why we're drowning ends the same way.
- I've been hoping to hear some sort of glimmer of a thought from someone that when America does wrestle control back from the fascists, and history says you will, one way or another, that you don't just rebuild the same system that produced Trump and his techno-fascist mates in the first place.
  This interview was the first time I've actually heard it.
  
  Buttigieg is establishment democrat. Actually listen to him instead of doing what most people do, which is stare at him and wait for him to "say something gay" and then be impressed that he's such a great orator. He's never advocated for the social and financial overhaul that the US needs. He's argued that the system is sufficient for our best outcomes, the same system that is currently on fire.
  This reminds me of Obama so much. On one hand it would be nice to have another leader who unites the country, but Obama wasn't necessarily good for our nation's long-term future. He was not a leftist or advocate for the poor, he was also establishment Dem/Liberal who passed every opportunity to create real and lasting change in the country.
  Buttigieg is currently touring the right-wing spaces and dropping his messages there without resistance because he's advocating for preserving the wealth in the country. He's tacitly being endorsed by the billionaire class. They want a return to normalcy, and Buttigieg may have exactly what the country needs to get there, which is clear messaging, hypnotic blue eyes and an appeal to many men's latent curiosity about what what a strong homosexual male even looks like... or if nothing else, an avenue for libs and neo-libs to feel performatively progressive by dropping his name. It's enthralling to the masses and we should all be terrified.
  He is going to be a strong candidate if we have elections again, and I would take him over Trump, but we need to understand what he is. He is NOT our leftist savior, he's barely more progressive than a liberal savior.
  I want to make it clear, if he's the final candidate against like, Mecha Trump or Don JR or Vance or someone equally absurd, we all better push Buttigieg's booty up that hill and I will wave that rainbow flag along with everyone else. But we have to understand that it's a band-aid on a massive infected wound that's bleeding out.
  
  I.. I'm conflicted. Buttigieg talks a great game, I like much of what he has to say, but at the same time when he was in the 2020 primary I read an article that talked about how he had the most corporate/PAC support of any candidate and I wonder.. does he actually believe what he's saying, or is he just charismatic enough to pull off seeming like he does and he's just like every other career politician? And also even if he's 100% sincere and he wins the white house in 2028, he doesn't have a free hand because the money required to win a national election comes with rather sturdy strings attached, so I don't think he can accomplish what he claims to want.
  But it is, I will admit, rather refreshing to find a Democrat who does in fact have some good-sounding ideas about how to make things better instead of just 'vote for me or the world will literally blow up!11'
- So cute copium, but it's over. You can discuss what we can do with the next empire? I'm over this one and good riddance honestly it was cringe at the end.
  
  Here's a radical idea: let's not have one. Let's instead have a society that is committed to ensuring that the needs of all of its citizens are met instead of just those of the capitalist class. Voting (blue or not) will never get you there though, because both parties are on the same corporate dark money IV drip. This shithole is the way it is because the people with all the money and power want it this way, and if you think voting will dig you out of it you haven't been paying attention.
- enabling those same oligarchs to undermine our democracy.
  Oh you didn't hear? You can't say oligarchs because American simpletons need to hear "king" instead because we have a long history of fighting kings and definitely not because the term oligarch applies to more than just Trump but instead better describes the cozy relationship between money and power in this country and illustrates that the rich have captured the government.
  
  better describes the cozy relationship between money and power in this country and illustrates that the rich have captured the government.
  That's exactly why I use it.
- The d’s had 50 years to come up with their own plan. And they did nothing. We had a choice of different sides of the same coin and here we are.
  
  Bullshit. If Gore won, there'd be compost powered cars and shit. Hilary was pushing for Obamacare since her husband was in office. Biden was all about stimulus to working families. We've been living if the New Deal over half a century.
  
  Even if they had the time frame that Republicans had with drafting and promoting Project 2025, they could have had their own. They knew it existed, only Trump pretended it never existed and was a hoax.
  If the DNC had its own Project 2025, something like "Project End Fascism" it could have worked. Instead we got "Maybe 100K for new home owners. Not gonna go after the corporations buying every home."
  
  Yup, they have no positive vision for the future anymore since they're so far up the oligarchs' asses they can't see past the end of their nose. And people still choose the 'lesser evil' and then act like they're somehow surprised that what they got was still evil.
  
  If we strip-mine all the social programs before Republicans get the chance we can do it in a way that keeps the most important part of the system in place. Checkmate fascists!
- Aside from this being a little fucking melodramatic and defeatist, the thing that really bothers me is the implicit assumption that if only we’d all just vote blue no matter who we wouldn’t have this problem, like the Democratic Party hasn’t been kowtowing to and enabling those same oligarchs to undermine our democracy. I
  Reminder that Clinton pushed for Trump to be the nominee as she thought she would win easier with him. Trump is a non-zero amount of Clinton's fault.
  Don’t get me wrong, boom tomorrow is definitely better than boom today, but it’s important to not forget that there was never not going to be a boom.
  Playing hot potato with a bomb, passing it along between various administrations and congressional members, and none of them were going to get hurt. It was always going to explode with the victims being the 99%.
  
  Trump is a non-zero amount of Clinton’s fault.
  Hillary should never have been the candidate. The only rationale for choosing her was that it was her turn. Anyone who expressed admiration for Henry Kissinger like she did is unfit for office.
  
  Indeed, on both counts.
- Melodramatic and defeatist?
  On Lemmy?
  Literally at this point I feel like that sentiment is the product of a successful psyop.

Inch by inch, in play at little games.

It differs by state but America only became a democracy by modern standards in the 1960’s. There was arguably a brief period after the Civil War before Reconstruction ended but women couldn’t vote so I give it a C- on my Democracy-O-Meter (patent pending).
Also, a Gentleman’s C is a term for a reason. That’d be an F at a commuter school. Only private schools put up with polite rich kids who are dumbasses but come from a “good” family.
- give it a C- on my Democracy-O-Meter (patent pending
  Are you grading on a curve? Where was there a more functional democracy in the mid-19th century?
  
  The United States in the mid 1800’s is famously known as a place and time of peace and harmony where gentlemen-scholars voted in free and fair elections.

Imagine counting the first four score and seven years as democratic.
- we count ancient Greece as a democracy, don't we?
  Last I checked, democracy didn't mean "fair," it ment that the leaders were voted into power.
  
  we count ancient Greece as a democracy, don’t we?
  In the same way we count the Wright Flyer as the first airplane, sure.
  democracy didn’t mean “fair”
  I have heard more than a few people discount the existence of democracies in US adversary states - such as Cuba and Venezuela and Russia - precisely on the grounds that their democracies aren't "fair".
  Broadly speaking, "democracy but its a rigged election" is just dictatorship with extra steps.
  
  we count ancient Greece as a democracy, don’t we?
  We? No. But they gotta keep the bar as low as possible to justify this fantasy.
  
  By this standard, the US is still a democracy. Leaders are still voted into power and that isn't going to change.
  Will they let everyone vote? Obviously not, but you seem to think it's democracy when only white men can vote so...
  
  I guess this means that Russia is a democracy.
- By contrast to literally every other country. Yes very much in that time period. Believe it or not, most monarchies were also completely fine with slavery and plantations. And their citizens had even less political power.
  
  By contrast to literally every other country.
  One of the proximate causes of the American Revolution was British abolitionism leaking into colonial politics.
  You had ex-military ultra-wealth planation owners defecting to the revolution in drovers following Dunmore's Proclamation.
  most monarchies were also completely fine with slavery and plantations
  They were completely fine with collecting rents off their subjects - slave or free. But quite a few of them had strong reservations against chattel slavery (the Spanish Catholics, most notably). And more simply could not stomach the expense of policing transatlantic trade from piracy.
  That is what ultimately lead to the outlawing of the practice across Europe.
  
  Democracy isn't defined relative to other countries. Only property-owners could vote, and only white men could own property, so that means the vast majority of the population couldn't vote. That doesn't sound like a democracy to me, that sounds like an aristocracy. I will grant you it was more democratic than monarchies and such, but even some of them (like the UK) had a parliamentary system so the king's power wasn't universal. They were deeply unequal, of course, but that's just the pot calling the kettle black, because so was (and is) the US.
- Only recently has everyone above the 18 had the ability to vote, excluding those who are slaves as per the 13th amendment. For most of American history, women couldn't vote. Black people weren't considered people. We kicked out anyone Chinese. We locked away Japanese Americans because they were ethnically Japanese.
  America was maybe a democracy for 56 years, since the Voting Rights Act of 1968. That's a stretch at best, as the country never healed for being an Apartheid for 200 years.
- Right? Someone clearly hasn't read Howard Zinn's A People's History of the United States.

In a couple thousand years historians will call us the Merkin Empire
- I sure hope not
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merkin
  
  That's exactly what he means. An artifice, a facade.
  
  Bruh put a NSFW warning on this.
- 54-40 or fight

Yep... it was good run, but we need to renew the plant of freedom with the blood of tyrants

The U.S. is survived by a country of the same name, the United States of America, now a presidential dictatorship.
This gets an eye roll from me. The USA is certainly in a lot of danger but anyone who calls the current situation a dictatorship is ignorant of what a dictatorship is.
Here's a hint for the author: you wouldn't be getting an article like this one published in a dictatorship.
- There were still protesters in Nazi Germany.
  
  Yeah, but they were kidnapped off the street and shipped into camps oversees
  ...wait
- Here’s a hint for the author: you wouldn’t be getting an article like this one published in a dictatorship.
  It's still a WIP just give them a couple years.
  
  That's my whole point. Might things be a lot worse in a couple of years? Yes. Are things as bad as this article is all about saying they are right now? No, clearly not.
  "The American democratic republic is in danger of dying" is true.
  "The American democratic republic has died" is histrionics, and histrionics are particularly counterproductive at a time when what's actually going on is so serious.