The flame of democracy fading

Times Online ^ | April 11, 2008 | Gerry Baker

[MtnClimber]

There's a nostalgic quality to the angry demonstrations that have greeted the arrival of the Olympic flame in Europe and the United States this week.

For some time now the modern wisdom that has brought young malcontents on to the streets of London, Paris and San Francisco has held the US and its dependable ally Britain to be the root of all evil. Governments from Beijing to Caracas could trample their citizens into the ground and you wouldn't fill a telephone box with people upset about it. But call for the heads of the warmongers Bush and Blair and a million pairs of brave feet would take to the streets to support you.

So it's a quaint departure for those same crowds, albeit in much smaller numbers, to protest loudly against the actions of men for whom tyranny is a chosen method of governing rather than a silly label attached by adolescent-brained politicians.

The mêlées this week actually have real historical resonance, an echo of the Cold War. They are a reminder of the days when the Olympics were a battlefield in the great ideological struggle of the time.

[MtnClimber]

Only a leftist could have thinking warped enough to think that the US and Britain are the root of all evil in the world.

[RightWhale]

Democracy, tyranny, Civil War, battlefield, historical. Hard to miss with big words no matter how much nonsense.

[steel_resolve]

steadily tightens its grip on the reins of political power as its business leaders exploit the lucrative opportunities of free global markets.

And there you have the problem in a nutshell. Without Capitalism, Autocracy dies on the vine.

[agere_contra]

The article is an odd mixture of right and wrong.

Here's a choice bit of crass mental debilitude:

Meanwhile, the global struggle against Islamism weakens the resolve, resources and unity of the West, while Russia and China deflect jihadism's ambitions through useful accommodations with its practitioners in Iran, Syria and Palestine.