A longstanding point of pride in America’s system is that, rather than being a mob-rule democracy, it is a constitutional republic with safeguards of liberty and checks and balances that prevent political domination by any one person. Onetime Bill Clinton adviser James Carville, however, recently attacked that, going berserk over Republicans saying that America is a republic rather than a democracy.
Those comments came when Carville, on his show “James Carville Explains,” attacked those Americans who recently were caught on camera by CNN speaking about America being a republic rather than a democracy. His berserk tirade came despite Article IV, Section 4 of the Constitution guaranteeing the states in the union a “republican” form of government, along with comments and writings from the Founding Fathers about America explicitly being designed as a republic.
What drew Carville’s ire was a recent interview in which CNN reporter Donie O’Sullivan spoke to a collection of Trump supporters who were adamant that America is not a “democracy,” as many now claim, but rather a republic. O’Sullivan clutched his pearls and described those comments as an “attack on democracy.” Carcille said much the same thing,
Speaking about the video and listing off horrid countries that included “republic” in their name, he said, “They did this thing and they’re interviewing these people. And he says, ‘We’re not a democracy, we’re a republic. We’re not a democracy, we’re a republic.’ An so finally, the guy says, ‘What is a republic?’ And of course, there I am. Let me name a republic for you: North Korea, okay? Iran calls itself a republic. Remember the DGR, the German Democratic Republic?”
Ignored there was that the GDR and the DPRK both include the word “democratic” in their name as well, which would seem to discredit his already bizarre claim that the concept of America as a republic rather than democracy is bad because various enemy nations or nations with evil regimes include the word “republic” in their names,
In any case, Carville continued, defending the idea of democracy generally and angrily saying, “And so, about all it means, to the extent other than just people referring to themselves and I don’t think North Korea is approaching a democracy. Of course it’s not, or Iran, or remember the USSR? What was the ‘R’ in the USSR?”
Still not done, Carville added, “Alright, so it’s colossally stupid. It doesn’t even account for anything and these people are giant fools.” He continued, “And of course, you read or study this in ninth grade … it’s a representative democracy, not a participatory democracy. And they’ll point to some town in New Hampshire where the whole town votes on something.”
He then accused the people who describe America as a republic of not knowing what they’re talking about, saying, “But just people have no idea what the fuck they’re talking about and they just blabber the stupidest shit that you can imagine. And that is the big talking point: ‘Well, we’re a republic, we’re not a democracy.’ What the fuck is a republic? Anybody can call themselves a republic. I give the Brits credit, at least they don’t try to pretend.”
Watch him here:
Featured image credit: screengrab from the embedded video
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