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@EwanMacKenna I side with German democracy over Russian autocracy. You of course are free to back the Kremlin if you so choose, but we are part of the west whether you like it or not. The vast majority of our people want it that way. #GermanDemocracy #RussianAutocracy #WesternValues #DE #RU

We need to trust our own democratic institutions to take decisions on our behalf. It’s as simple as that. Sadly, UN SECCO is no longer fit for purpose. I don’t see us deploying forces outside of Ireland but we ought to have the right to do so without asking permission from #Democracy #Sovereignty #InternationalRelations

“Socialism Was Good in Theory” That sentence assumes the theory was never seriously challenged. It was. Long before the Soviet Union existed, before Lenin seized power, and before socialism had been tested on a national scale, major thinkers were already attacking its foundations—from very different directions. Five of them stand out. Tocqueville: Equality Can Become Servitude In 1848, Alexis de Tocqueville drew a sharp distinction between democracy and socialism. Both spoke about equality. But Tocqueville believed they pursued it in fundamentally different ways. Democracy, in his view, sought equality while preserving individual freedom. Socialism risked achieving equality by expanding the power of the state over the individual. His warning was essentially this: equality is not automatically liberty. A society can pursue equality so aggressively that it begins sacrificing the independence that makes political freedom meaningful. Bastiat: Follow Where Redistribution Leads Two years later, Frédéric Bastiat attacked socialism from a different direction. His question was deceptively simple: What happens when the state acquires the authority to take from some people and give to others in the name of justice? Bastiat called this “legal plunder.” His concern was not merely that redistribution might be expensive. It was that once government becomes the instrument through which competing groups obtain benefits from one another, politics can turn into a permanent struggle over who controls the machinery of redistribution. The problem, therefore, wasn’t simply how much the state redistributed. It was the principle that made redistribution legitimate in the first place. (bastiat.org⁠) Nietzsche: Equality Can Become Resentment Nietzsche approached socialism neither as an economist nor as a constitutional theorist. He attacked its psychology. He saw modern egalitarian movements as part of a much older moral impulse: resentment toward exceptional individuals and suspicion of strength, ambition and hierarchy. For Nietzsche, the danger was not simply that everyone might become economically equal. It was that a culture could begin treating excellence itself as something morally suspect. The goal would cease to be lifting people upward. It would become bringing the exceptional downward. Böhm-Bawerk: Challenge the Economics Then came Eugen von Böhm-Bawerk. In 1896, he turned his attention specifically toward Marx’s economic system. His criticism was not primarily moral or political. It was technical. Böhm-Bawerk argued that Marx’s theory of value did not adequately explain how the labor values developed in Capital could be reconciled with the actual prices Marx subsequently needed to explain. In other words, he attacked socialism where it claimed to possess a scientific economic foundation. The argument became one of the central criticisms of Marxian economics and helped launch a debate that would continue for generations. Mises: The Calculation Problem Then, in 1920, Ludwig von Mises attacked an even more fundamental question: Even if socialism is morally desirable, how would a socialist economy actually know what to produce? A functioning economy has millions of competing uses for scarce resources. Build a bridge or a hospital? Use steel here or there? Produce more machinery or more consumer goods? Under private ownership and markets, prices for capital goods provide information about relative scarcity and opportunity costs. Mises argued that abolishing private ownership of the means of production also removes the genuine market prices necessary for rational economic calculation. The problem wasn’t simply that socialist planners might make bad decisions. It was that the system deprived them of the very economic signals required to systematically compare those decisions. (Mises Institute⁠) And that was the sequence. Tocqueville challenged the political premise. Bastiat challenged the moral and legal mechanism of redistribution. Nietzsche challenged the psychology behind egalitarianism. Böhm-Bawerk challenged Marx’s economic theory. Mises challenged the possibility of rational central economic calculation. Five different thinkers. Five different objections. And all of them came before the Soviet Union had demonstrated what large-scale socialist government would actually look like. So “socialism was good in theory, but bad in practice” is not an argument. It is a historical claim that requires you to explain why these theoretical objections were wrong. The interesting question isn’t whether socialism had critics. It did. The interesting question is whether socialism ever adequately answered them” - ChatGPT

As the great Indian writer Arundhati Roy said - "The carcas of European Liberal Democracy is under the rubble in Gaza" When will the Europeans garner the courage to say No to the US/Israel Axis of Evil...? #AtalantaBologna https://t.co/yhgY2eC3dP #Gaza #ArundhatiRoy #USIsrael #IN #EU #US #IL

A close vote and a clear democratic verdict, and it has our full respect. Like NATO, the EU is built by and for democracies. Through the EEA, Iceland stays inside our single market and close to Brussels. That partnership isn't going anywhere. #Democracy #EU #Iceland #IS #EU #NATO

🇸🇦🇪🇺🇺🇸 A NEW GRAND BARGAIN FOR SAUDI ARABIA — JOIN THE FREE WORLD Europe and the United States should make Saudi Arabia a historic strategic offer: anchor the Kingdom firmly inside the economic and security architecture of the democratic market economies and make Saudi Arabia a https://t.co/xp6W9BvT6v #SaudiArabia #GlobalEconomy #Democracy #SA #EU #US

🇮🇸❤️🇪🇺 ICELAND IN THE EU 2028 Europe is not only a market. Europe is a family. Iceland already shares so much with us: democracy, freedom, peace, prosperity, Schengen, the Single Market and a deep commitment to the European way of life. Now it is time for Iceland to take its https://t.co/WOnzAhEddb #IcelandInEU #EuropeanFamily #UnityInDiversity #IS #EU

You got conned. He was never interested in helping democracy and the rule of law in Venezuela or anywhere. He is dismantling democracy and the rule of law in the US. Why would he be interested in them in other countries? He always wanted the oil. #Democracy #Venezuela #OilPolitics #VE #US

How Did a Democracy Vote Itself Out of Existence? — The Birth of “Streitbare Demokratie” One of the most important questions in modern democratic history is: How can a democracy use democratic procedures to destroy itself? This question became central in Germany after the collapse of the Weimar Republic. Founded in 1919, Weimar Germany was a democratic state with universal suffrage, including voting rights for women, and strong civil liberties. Yet, within fourteen years, democracy had been replaced by Adolf Hitler’s dictatorship. The Nazi rise to power was not simply a military coup. The Nazi Party gained influence through elections, propaganda, and political negotiations. In 1933, Hitler became Chancellor, and his government used legal mechanisms, including the Enabling Act, to remove parliamentary control and dismantle democratic institutions from within. The lesson for post-war Germany was clear: a democracy can be destroyed not only by external enemies, but also by political movements that use democratic freedoms to eliminate democracy itself. When West Germany created its new constitution, the Basic Law (Grundgesetz), in 1949, its founders developed the concept of “Streitbare Demokratie”—a democracy capable of defending itself. The idea was that democracy should not be completely neutral toward forces that seek to abolish democratic rights. A democratic majority cannot legitimately remove the foundations that make democracy possible. Therefore, the Basic Law introduced several safeguards: Political parties that seek to undermine the democratic constitutional order can be banned. The Federal Constitutional Court was given strong powers to protect constitutional principles. Core values such as human dignity, democracy, and the rule of law were given special protection and cannot easily be removed. “Streitbare Demokratie” reflects a difficult balance. Democracy requires freedom of speech, political competition, and tolerance of different opinions. However, history showed Germany that unlimited tolerance toward movements committed to destroying democracy can allow democracy itself to disappear. The central question remains: How tolerant should a democracy be toward those who are intolerant of democracy? Germany’s answer after 1945 was that democracy must defend the principles that make freedom possible. A democracy is not preserved only through elections; it is preserved when citizens and institutions protect the foundations that allow free elections to exist.

The Three Words Democracy Borrows Democracy is often praised as inherently good, but Aristotle, Plato, and Socrates saw serious flaws. A better view: rule by one, few, or many each has tradeoffs. A healthy society ideally combines a strong leader, a competent elite, and a virtuous citizenry—because, as Thomas Sowell said, “there are no solutions, only tradeoffs.” Democracy promises three virtues it can’t guarantee: freedom, wisdom, and consent. **Freedom:** Nozick’s thought experiment shows how slavery can be disguised by changing vocabulary—when power gradually shifts from overt domination to rules voted on by others, at what point is it “freedom”? A society can talk endlessly about freedom while restricting rights through taxes, regulations, and suspensions. **Wisdom:** Socrates doubted democracy produces wisdom. If a voyage were dangerous, you wouldn’t let every passenger vote equally on navigation. Yet political voting gives equal weight regardless of knowledge, inviting manipulation by those skilled in fear, emotion, and flattery. **Consent:** “Government of the people, by the people, for the people” can be an illusion. If the state is treated as “us,” coercion can be reframed as self-government. But representatives don’t truly follow your instructions the way a genuine agent must. Freedom, wisdom, and consent are real virtues—democracy just borrows their language, and the biggest risk is believing that choosing rulers collectively makes the ruled free, wise, and consenting.

Madness The Tisza government has created an asset-confiscation super-authority whose powers should never be concentrated in the hands of a single institution in a democracy governed by the rule of law. The NVVH can open an inquiry without any established suspicion that a crime https://t.co/rmGCUNRX6B #Democracy #RuleOfLaw #Accountability #Nospecificcountrycodescanbeidentifiedinthetweet.

Madness The Tisza government has created an asset-confiscation super-authority with powers no institution in a rule of law based democracy should ever possess. It can open an inquiry without any established suspicion that a crime has been committed. It can compel banks to https://t.co/9KLupGZKyy #TiszaGovernment #AssetConfiscation #RuleOfLaw #Nospecificcountriesarementionedinthetweet.Therefore #therearenocountrycodestoreturn.

The future of Ireland will be decided by the people of Ireland, not whoever occupies Downing Street. Andy Burnham’s comments on a referendum on Irish unity were anti-democratic & completely at odds with the Good Friday Agreement. Sinn Féin made that clear to him directly this https://t.co/ufDMW7clIf #IrishUnity #GoodFridayAgreement #Democracy #IE #GB

PAKISTAN IS NOT ETERNAL. #ExPakistan must become part of the international debate. Pakistan already broke apart once in 1971 when Bangladesh won independence. Today, deep national, ethnic and constitutional conflicts remain unresolved. I support the democratic right of the https://t.co/FTO4oqYZUH #ExPakistan #Pakistan #Democracy #PK #BD

Ahead of BRICS Summit India is rasing pressure on Skihs rights activists in USA This is how Modi works He acts nice to West when he wants FTAs and tariff relief one day while inviting Putin and Xi to India next and claims to be a democracy while issuing threats to Sikhs #BRICSSummit #SikhRights #Modi #IN #US #RU #CN

🇸🇾 EX-SYRIA: 5 DEMOCRATIC STATES — A NEW FUTURE FOR THE SYRIAN PEOPLE Syria in its present form has produced dictatorship, war, foreign occupation, ethnic tension, terrorism and millions of refugees. I propose a serious debate about a new political order based on five democratic https://t.co/cG9QIFz0te #Syria #Democracy #NewFuture #SY