For me a authoritarian regime (dictatorship) is a place where the leader can order opponents murdered, without consequences. Russia and Saudi Arabia in 2020, for example.
The Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) scores countries on five categories: electoral process and pluralism; civil liberties; the functioning of government; political participation; and political culture.
Nations are then classified under four types of governments: full democracy, flawed democracy, hybrid regime and authoritarian regime.
Under Trump the USA became a flawed democracy.
Obviously, the main goal of the GOP under this egocentric toddler is to make the rich richer. Which they’ve done.
Nations still ranking high as democracies include Norway, Iceland, Sweden, New Zealand and Denmark. Canada and Ireland are up there, as well.
Recently a Republican Senator claimed that “democracy isn’t the objective” any longer. Knowing that his Party was likely to lose the 2020 election, it’s part of the GOP plan to contest the results.
That Senator was bored, at home, COVID-19 positive at the time. #loser
I want people to be able to easily un-elect bad leaders. To have more influence in governance, even when they get it wrong. When wrong, they should be able to later easily change again.
Rick McCharles 
Dear Rick Mc,
Hello! I concur with you. 2021 is nearly half gone and the GOP is still on trial and has fared no better and perhaps worse.
One of the bullying behaviours of Trump (and other similar rulers) is demanding loyalty, attention and/or contribution from victims and allies alike.
Before Biden was elected, instead of “Flattening the Curve”, the USA under Trump was “Steepening the Curve”, so much so that the MAGA tagline “Make America Great Again” should have been changed to MASA: “Make America Sick Again”!
2020, the Year of the Rat, has brought us not the plague (black death) but Covid-19. And 2020 also brought out the worst of divisive politics and demagogic incitement across many places and regions in the world. What a day it was to unfold with sedition, insurrection and coup d’état on the 6th of January 2021!
It is very plain that the USA has been plagued by ignorance, dogma, falsity, blind faith, spiritual stagnation and epistemological impasse . . . . .
In any case, we can agree that the ongoing chaos inflicted by the Trump presidency finally culminated in the infamous riot in the Capitol. You and I can be justified for being cynical, snide, snarky and facetious in characterizing Trump as the symbolic messiah who is going to lead his misguided supporters to glory on Earth and the promised land! It is often futile to reason with such misguided folks. Perhaps only when the country truly becomes autocratic or fascist will they wake up, but then it will be too late.
Needless to say, due to misinformation and disinformation, 2020 had been a difficult year, not to mention having to deal with the pandemic. It was all quite surreal, perhaps in some ways more bizarre than ghosts and the paranormal (not that I believe in such things). One could say that we live in interesting times indeed, but often for the wrong reasons. I have had to coin a new term: Viral Falsity.
It is going to be a very tall order for the Biden presidency (or any presidency for that matter) to turn things around. It would have been much easier if some Republican senators had been far more honest and incorruptible, for they have been very greedy, uninspired, cowardly and lack criminal, moral and political accountabilities. It is all quite a big mess in danger of getting bigger still. Even a global pandemic still cannot unite folks in the USA and wake them up. Perhaps it will take an even bigger crisis to do so, such as a series of dire climate change disasters.
Whilst some of us may take some comfort in our living somewhere else, there is the danger that oppressive politics may spread elsewhere or be mirrored by other corrupt politicians outside their origins. Democracy is not a given. It can be quite fragile, can fail rather badly, and often is approximately as good and benevolent (or bad and malevolent) as the members who practise, control and/or legislate it. We all need to do our parts in contributing to the smooth and equitable functioning of a civil country and democratic society. I have done mine in highlighting many of the most fundamental causes through my writings, and I hope that you will find more answers and solutions to these thorny issues in my latest and recently expanded post entitled “Misquotation Pandemic and Disinformation Polemic: Mind Pollution by Viral Falsity“.
I am very keen and curious to know what you think or make of it regarding the increasingly pressing issues that many of us are facing, worsened all the more by mental pitfalls (or even mental health), social media, digital globalization, populism, illiberal democracy, and other behavioural and sociopolitical factors.
I am very keen and curious to know what you think or make of it regarding the increasingly pressing issues that many of us are facing, worsened all the more by mental pitfalls (or even mental health), social media, digital globalization, populism, illiberal democracy, and other behavioural and sociopolitical factors.
This post of mine now contains twelve sections (plus a meticulously annotated gallery), all of which are instantly accessible from a navigational menu.
Please kindly inform me if or when you think that I should include or incorporate some piece(s) of information, findings, statistics, critique and/or analysis into certain section(s) of the said post.
May you find the rest of 2021 very much to your liking and highly conducive to your writing, reading, thinking and blogging whatever topics that take your intellectual fancy or tickle your emotional delight!