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Democracy in Action

Entry 277, on 2006-01-31 at 19:19:16 (Rating 3, Politics)

We all want democracy, don't we? I mean, I know it has its faults, but as Winston Churchill said: "Democracy is the worst form of government... apart from all the rest". What he was saying (in a very clever way) was that no matter what faults we see in Democracy, there doesn't seem to be any reasonable alternative.

So how can this idea be applied when a democratically elected government is unacceptable in other ways to many countries? I am referring, of course, to the problem many major countries have with the recent election of Hamas in Palestine.

The western world, in particular the US, has been saying how important democracy is. So why aren't western governments happy when, in elections which seem to be have accepted as fair, such a strong result has been achieved?

The statement that Hamas wants to eliminate the state of Israel is the major problem, of course. But its still a democratic government, and it should be accepted now, so that pressure can applied to it to try to reduce some of its more extreme policies. And while we are at it, can we apply some pressure to the American government to try to moderate some of its more aggressive foreign policies as well?

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