democracy 
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SOURCE: Africa Is A Country
1/20/2021
Reflections On An Imploding Empire
by Russell Rickford
Progressive dissidents must meet the moment of Biden's inauguration by not settling for what liberal politicians offer on economic justice, human rights, environment, labor, and health.
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1/17/2021
The Free Press and Democracy in a "Murder the Media" Age
by Wendy Melillo
Journalism as a profession needs to embrace its historical role as a guardian of democracy and refuse to let objectivity work as a shield for authoritarianism; authoritarians won't accept a free press anyway.
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SOURCE: Slate
1/11/2021
The Only Way to Save American Democracy Now
by Richard R. Hasen
"We need bold changes to deal with the threat to democracy from an authoritarian wing of the Republican Party that appeared ready to abet Trump’s stealing of the election, as well as the separate problem that the Republican Party can continue to consistently win elections with minority support thanks to backward American election rules we have in place."
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SOURCE: New York Times
1/8/2021
How to Ensure This Never Happens Again
by Beverly Gage and Emily Bazelon
A menu of democratic reform initiatives ranging from strictly defining the electoral vote process to abolishing the electoral college: reforms needed to stop the temptation to undemocratic rule and authoritarianism.
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SOURCE: The Atlantic
1/7/2020
What Trump and His Mob Taught the World About America
by Anne Applebaum
"The images from Washington that are going out around the world are far more damaging to America’s reputation as a stable democracy than the images of young people protesting the Vietnam War several decades ago, and they are far more disturbing to outsiders than the riots and protests of last summer."
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SOURCE: The Atlantic
1/4/2021
We Can’t Let Our Elections Be This Vulnerable Again
by Richard L. Hasen
2020 is a warning: America needs to remove opportunities for political pressure, discretionary action, and deception in the counting and recording of votes.
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SOURCE: Made By History at the Washington Post
12/16/2020
The Republican Party Now Has More in Common with the Southern Minority of 1860
by Jeremy Tewell
Abraham Lincoln's first inaugural address warned of "the rule of a minority, as a permanent arrangement" as a path to ruin; the party he led to prominence is now embodying his warning.
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SOURCE: New York Times
12/13/2020
Why Getting the Most Votes Matters
Times Editor Jesse Wegman examines the unique absence of majoritarian principle in the election of the American president and argues it goes against the most basic understanding of political fairness.
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SOURCE: Washington Post
12/13/2020
Why Jimmy Lai and Hong Kong’s Democracy Advocates Need Biden’s Public Support Right Now
by Natan Sharansky
A former Soviet political prisoner and human rights advocate calls on the Biden transition team to make clear that the new president will not accept China's repression of democracy in Hong Kong.
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SOURCE: The Atlantic
12/2/2020
Minority Rule Cannot Last in America. It Never Has
by Kenneth Owen
When parties commit themselves to minority rule, the backlash can be severe, as has been shown repeatedly when ruling parties stood in the way of popular will.
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SOURCE: New York Times
11/29/2020
Trump Looms Large Now, but Maybe Not Forever
by Steve Inskeep
NPR's Steve Inskeep reflects on the prospect that historical distance will make Trump and Trumpism smaller (and not all-consuming) parts of a story about American society struggling with bigger questions of political, economic and social equality that became increasingly contentious during the Obama era.
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SOURCE: The Nation
11/17/2020
American Democracy Was Never Supposed to Work
by Richard Kreitner
"Merely ousting Trump is not enough without addressing more fundamental weaknesses in our political system, especially an outdated Constitution that continues to serve a minority of wealthy and white citizens and to curb any movements that might threaten their wealth and power."
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SOURCE: Boston Review
11/19/2020
Against Returning to Normal
by David Walsh
Liberal pleas to return to a "normal" defined by bipartisan consensus ignore the long legacy of ideological conflict and the pursuit of division as a political strategy by the conservative movement.
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SOURCE: The Yale Review
11/15/2020
The Wondrous Banality of Democracy
by John Witt
A professor of law and legal history volunteered as a ballot counting observer in Pennsylvania and offers a reflection on the unspectacular nature of democracy in action.
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11/15/2020
Why the Odds Are Good that Biden Can Reduce Our Political Polarization
by Walter G. Moss
A recent HNN essay took a pessimistic view of President-Elect Biden's ability to govern a polarized nation. Walter Moss takes a longer view and finds more cause for optimism.
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SOURCE: New York Times
11/13/2020
2020 Shows Why the Electoral College Is Stupid and Immoral
by Jamelle Bouie
The Times Opinion columnist contents that the electoral college infects American politics with uncertainty and the multiple opportunities to contest the result. This not only is undemocratic, it undermines faith in democracy.
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SOURCE: The Guardian
11/7/2020
Millions of Americans have Risen Up and Said: Democracy Won't Die on Our Watch
by Carol Anderson
Every maneuver by Trump and his enablers to block voting was met with a more powerful and effective counter-maneuver by citizens. It had to be.
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11/10/2020
Was This a Coup Attempt?
by HNN Staff
On January 6, Trump told a rally of supporters the election had been stolen and encouraged them to go to the Capitol. A mob then stormed the building, temporarily disrupting the verification of the Electoral College vote count. Historians discuss how serious the danger to democracy was and the possible consequences.
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SOURCE: Public Seminar
11/5/2020
Measuring the Health of Our Democracy
by Heather Cox Richardson
Donald Trump saw the fading of his power to control political narratives as news organizations labeled his charges of election fraud as baseless.
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SOURCE: The New Yorker
Is American Tolerance for Political Violence on the Rise?
by Bernard Avishai
Things get dicier when these attitudes bleed into opinions about the legitimacy of a government led by the other side. Only forty-four per cent of Trumpists said that they’d regard a Joe Biden victory as legitimate.
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