America is designed for stalemate. So is the world. The democratic world, that is.

A long time ago, before I discovered op-ed writing, I wrote letters to the editors.  Even a letter published in The Hindu made my father excited enough to cut that piece from the newspaper and mail that across to me. In one letter, I recall making a point about the kingdoms of the past. In the old setting, the defeated king was killed, or exiled, or imprisoned.  The idea was to eliminate the possibility of the "loser" coming back--death of the opponent was, therefore, the best insurance there was, whereas with exile or imprisonment, well, the loser could always stage a comeback.

In democracies, the loser is not banished.  The loser is still alive. The loser is all the time plotting to wage the next battle and win it.  I noted in that letter that the more the loser sticks around, the more we can expect fierce opposition to the government and the party in power.

That must have been more than two decades ago.  Perhaps twenty-five years?  That newspaper cutting is somewhere in my archives--it was, after all, the pre-digital age and tracking down a piece of paper is far more laborious than searching in an electronic database.

On the one hand, I am surprised at myself, and happy with myself, that I had understood democracy that well when I was in the beginning stages of growing a beard, while having a full head of wild hair, and not merely now when I am with a balding head of grey hair that complements a face with white hair..

Where was I?  Oh, yeah, about democracy and intense opposition from the losing side.   On the other hand, it does frustrate me that it means stalemate, more often than not.

Francis Fukuyama, who famously commented that we were on our way to a dull and boring end of history with the triumph of liberal democracy, says we are into vetocracy:

the much-­admired American system of checks and balances can be seen as a “vetocracy” — it empowers a wide variety of political players representing minority positions to block action by the majority and prevent the government from doing anything.

I like the word that he has invented--itself a very Jeffersonian tradition!

Again, it is because the loser just doesn't admit defeat and sits quietly by the sidelines, as is often the case in some of the European democracies.

Fukuyama writes:

the system is designed to empower minorities and block majorities, so the current stalemate is likely to persist for many years. Obama has criticized the House Republicans for trying to relitigate the last election. That’s true, but that’s also what our political system was designed to do.

Exactly!

It is not the design of the system that worries me.  Nope. Not one bit.  It is the quality of the people using the system that gives me nightmares.  When a typical American doesn't know the basics of the governance system we have in place, and yet they passionately and loudly argue in favor of their political preference, I metaphorically shit in my pants that my future rests in their hands.

For instance, one can expect a whole bunch of people to like or dislike the Affordable Care Act, aka as Obamacare.  Disagreements like that are what democracy is all about. Yes, sir.  But, watch this video clip (ht) in which people are definitive about whether they prefer Obamacare of the Affordable Care Act, not knowing that they are both the same.  Watch, and weep that this is democracy as we know it!