How republicans Chose democracy

yup…..people keep talking about threats to our democracy…hell, democracy went out the window at least 20yrs ago….surreal to have an ex-president(carter) tell people this straight up, and it just sails right over their heads…..

friend, from FB comment

Friend, you know I love you but this sentiment is both highly offensive and highly corrosive to the health of our community and nation. Perhaps if one defines the word 'democracy' with fanatical rigidity, your statement could be true. And in fact we do not and never have had a true democracy. We have a 'republic.' So, OK - you are technically correct. But the statement is still both offensive and corrosive. A republic has a government chosen by the 'citizen body' which rules according to law. Your statement implies to me that you are suggesting the 'citizen body' has been deprived of its duty to choose the officials who rule. Please correct and elucidate if I mischaracterize. I hear in your statement a loss in faith that we have a republic (rather than a democracy which has never existed). I could not disagree more. Who chooses our leaders? They are still chosen by the 'citizen body.' The citizen body is a very complicated interconnected network of relationships which spasm on election day with the decision of who our elected officials will be - these persons chosen by the citizen body that day are entrusted with ruling the country. These officials then operate under the rule of law. They make law and are also required to live within it. Is this all clean and tidy - hell no. Do special interests of all sort exercise influence? Hell yes! Can things get out of balance? Of course they can. But in the US, the citizen body selects leaders who have responsibility for ruling the country but only within the rule of law. This makes what we have inherited through centuries of blood and toil very special - and also worth fighting to preserve. To suggest there is no difference between the freedoms and rights we enjoy and the conditions of human liberty experienced elsewhere is both ludicrous and damaging. I have spent sleepless nights hearing the gurgle of endless torture at the hands of secret police who brutalize and execute with impunity. I have traveled through villages devoid of girls where the state forces abortions on all but one child. I have walked streets where women are stoned (like with rocks; been on plenty of streets where everyone was stoned the other way); places where hands and heads are removed. You and I have enjoyed blissful days in areas where more blood has been poured into the sand over drug turf than our dead poured into Vietnam. Our cities do not look like Allepo. Journalists are not gunned down or poisoned. I have touched the tattooed skin of death camp survivors. Your comment seems to suggest that what we have is so tainted and rotten and spoiled that we are no different from, say, Russia. I have seen the fear and the poverty and the addicted madness of Russia and what we have as citizens is different. To imply that what protects us and makes possible that which we enjoy has been lost is offensive and destructive to what we love and value and enjoy. It' commonly called 'democracy' but isn't, truly. It's truly a republic. But we call it a democracy because in the days of yore, as now, no self respecting person who wishes to couple would be caught dead being a republican, so we stick with democracy.