[MD] Is democracy intellectual?

[Joseph Bromley]

Hello all, I am new to the moq_discuss mailing list so forgive me if I do 
not make "contact".

The question is this, is any form of government Intellectual, be it 
democracy, monarchy, tyrany, dictatorship etc? For me its intellectual 
quality comes from those in the positions of power within the government not 
from the form itself. (Can anyone point out a country which is lead by a 
government which has intellectual quality? Aren't most of them just out for 
short term power, quick fixes and a love of the lime light?)

One of my doubts over the intellectual ranking of democracy ( stemming from 
a comment platt made earlier) is the soil from which it grew. Take Britain 
for example, it was the resentment of Pim and co. that set the axe a falling 
and charles' head a rolling. Resentment is a biological drive. To quote 
Nietzsche "resentment is too much bile in the stomach." There was no 
intellectual motive to resit the king, intellect was employed in arguing 
against him yes, but was not the driving force in turning it into civil war, 
that was biological and social values.
As a form of government democracy is the slowest because it has to make a 
show of pleasing the mob, it has to consult the mob, as such it is less 
dynamic than say a dictatorship. To quote churchill (as best as I can 
remember from one of his parlimentary speaches from "The Gathering Storm") 
"democracy is always two years behind a tyrant."
But any good governer knows that you have to keep the mob happy or risk the 
reaping the whirlwind, as such the motives remains the same regardless of 
convention employed to govern.
PLato's Republic and Machiavelli's The Prince are some of the most 
intellectual texts written on government and they are hardly in favour of 
democracy.
It is however the age of democracy, with that I can not argue, though its 
time at the top will pass away, the big wheel keeps on turning, we shall see 
kings again and if they can learn from the mistakes of the past they may 
reign for even longer next time round. In a world where everyone does what 
suits their natural dispositions best, now that would be a huge step 
forward.

About Saddam, one viscious bastard yes, but still more of a man then Blair 
and Bush put together! The only way to rule in the jungle is to be the 
biggest beast, Saddam was wise enough for that. We have our armed forces out 
there trying to force democracy apon people who have been ruled with an iron 
first for millenia. Democracy is a growth from the power, it is a tyrany to 
enforce it on others. It make take generations before the people of Iraq and 
Afganistan "assimilate" the values of democracy. Palistine is a different 
story, they came to the smart conclussion that a peaceful democracy has more 
of a chance of getting the West on side than a military state.
Worse yet we make a big song and dance when our soldiers start "absorbing" 
Iraq's culture for brutality. In an ideal world violence would not exist but 
this is planet earth and modern man is nowhere near growing beyond 
biological desires, all his social values are becoming disfunctional. I 
would be interested to see the mean number of deaths under Saddams regime so 
that it can be compared to post Saddam. I wonder if the difference would be 
that great, at least all the ammenities where kept in working order under 
Saddam, how long did it take the muppets to get there act together out 
there? Months?

A point to keep in mind when calling muslins barbarians, a cultrual 
perspective often calls other cultural perspectives Barbarian. We in the 
west have grown up out of christian value judgements, which basicly turned 
its back on biological morality, musslims tried to intergrate social and 
biological values. In a way they are more moral, they have less prejudice 
towards any level.

Yours sincerely J C Bromley.

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