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But presumably Venezuela under Chavez would not be admitted to this for example? After all he's been described as a dictator by numerous commentators and US politicians including John McCain. So despite widening the democratic base of their country, having what amounts to fair and free elections which shames many western "democracies", and allowing dissent in the national media which would have journalists in other countries up for treason they would not be allowed because they are not following the policies of these countries. I think that's the opposite of democracy, so how could you have any legitimacy even as a so called league of democracies? You'd also be likely to end up with somewhere like Afghanistan being in it as long as they don't let new training camps for Al-Qaeda be set up.
So basically democracy as a concept is something that means different things to different people. And the person talking about this is part of a political structure which twists the fundamental meaning of democracy to serve its own interests.
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Al, spare us yet another Chavez hagiography. this one is of stomach churning proportions.
anyway, i see no reason for excluding venezuela if they can demonstrate fair electoral processes, and if they cease to assist really despotic regimes and terrorist outfits.
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The UN should basically be responsible for setting and enforcing international law imo. If you can outlaw dictatorships, go ahead and prosecute those countries which are dictatorships.
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the UN is in large part composed of dictatorships.
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The other UN roles (ie UNICEF, peacekeepers etc) could remain part of it, but these should be secondary roles. And the only way that you can do the primary role is by having as inclusive a body as possible. There is no way on earth that you are ever going to get complete agreement from every country in the world about anything, but getting a set of international principles which every country has to adhere to even if it is not popular to start with is the way to deal with this.
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the peacekeepers are a joke that's part of the problem. they're better at running prostitution rackets than intervening to help anyone.
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Which even Fukuyama has disowned as having been utter shite. Good for him, but rather pointless afaic. It is a bit like me writing something disagreeing with Hitler. I may be right, but it's kindae a bit pointless by now.
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i don't think it's pointless. there's much to be said for admitting where you've been wrong.