democracy's unintended future

“A lot of focus gets put on places like Russia, the Middle East or China,” says Joan Hoey at the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) in London. “But the problem is here, in the heart of the most mature democracies in the West.”
Hoey's stark assessment is shared by many others.... Many deep thinkers about politics have worried about the vulnerability of pure democracy to the tyranny of the majority.

I guess "democracy" is getting to be a little like Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart's observation about pornography [I may not know what it is] "but I know it when I see it." Everyone has a heart-wrenching take on "democracy," but a pure and agreed-to definition is dripping away ... which nourishes a more convinced conviction that only war is going to wear out all the incivility.

Or, for the insistent ones, the trend certainly makers war a possibility that is less-plausibly deniable.

 

 On the other hand, the will of the minority has a tattered track record.