Sounding like a Quaalude Savior, President Biden teased foreign leaders on Wednesday about how he would save world democracy.
Affected by a chilly, Biden recited a cliche concerning the “inflection point of history” he introduced at the primary Summit for Democracy in December 2021.
Biden promised that “we’re seeing real indicators [sic]that we’re “turning the tide” for democracy all over the world.
Virtually nobody who is not on Biden’s payroll agrees.
Democracy last 12 months “declined globally for the seventeenth 12 months in a row,” in line with Freedom House.
Twice as many countries lean towards “authoritarianism” than towards democracy, The economist says.
Most shocking: America is now ranked as less free than Mongolia, Mauritius and 56 other countries, by Liberty House (funded by the US government).
Despite Biden’s outcry, even US government officials fear the summit will be “irrelevant talk.” reports The Washington Post.
Council on Foreign Relations president Richard Haass sneered: “The Summit for Democracy is a nasty idea and will not go away.”
Team Biden believes the massive problem with democracy is that politicians haven’t got enough power – “weak state capability.”
The truth is, elected rulers all over the world are turning into dictators who’re increasingly repressing their residents.
Biden’s limitless edicts set a terrible example for other democratic leaders.
Federal judges, all of the method to the Supreme Court, have struck down Biden’s moratorium on tenant evictions, his cancellation of $400 billion in federal student debt, his “climate change” executive order shutting down power plants, his mandate to wear masks for airline passengers, and his edict forcing all employees of enormous firms and federal employees to receive injections of the COVID vaccine.
However the “politicians leash” is not on Biden Bingo’s card for saving democracy.
The American Bar Association recently warned that “the rule of law is collapsing all over the world,” but “that is not the US government’s primary focus” on democracy.
Three-quarters of nations — representing nearly 85% of the world’s population — “have experienced a collapse of the rule of law,” in line with the World Justice Project.
As an alternative of “government by law,” Team Biden offers a “Declaration and Call to Motion by a multilateral cohort based on people-based justice.”
How about Biden-style censorship to save democracy?
Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas will deliver a sermon on the “Countering the Rise of Digital Authoritarianism” panel.
He will be joined by YouTube CEO Neal Mohan, who boasts like Washington censor him canal.
An internal DHS document reveals plans to crack down on “inaccurate” information on “COVID-19 vaccine effectiveness, racial justice, US withdrawal from Afghanistan” and other topics. Any facts that confuse Biden’s team are routinely “inaccurate” and amenable to cover-up.
As a part of the summit celebrations, the Biden administration announced recent crackdowns to make it “harder for corrupt actors to cover their identities, assets and criminal activities.”
Unless their last name is Biden.
Despite guarantees of reforms at the primary summit, this has happened not everywhere in the world progress. America ranks twenty fourth within the international corruption index – even worse than France, in line with Transparency International.
But one other reference material will solve this problem. Team Biden funds foreign journalists to fight “kleptocracy” – a government of thieves. There may be even an outreach program called “Strengthening Truthsayers.” (Julian Assange need not apply.)
The Biden administration claims to support “independent media”, effectively placing foreign journalists on the US payroll.
Is there no shame?
Also, America is not a job model: it ranks a pitiful forty second within the Reporters Without Borders World Press Freedom Indexworse than Moldova and Guyana.
A Biden-style democracy requires limitless diktats and interference within the lives of Americans.
White House Fact Sheet on “Enduring commitment to democratic renewal at home and abroadclaims Biden protects democracy with “prolonged rights and protections for trans Americans”, “by undertaking the discredited practice of so-called ‘conversion therapy'”, and “empowering resources and protecting LGBTQI+ children in American public schools.”
What does allowing teenage boys compete with girls in sports must do with democracy?
Biden presents himself and his administration as a job model for global democracy. He boasted that within the November elections, “voters loudly and decisively rejected the voices of extremism attacking and undermining our democracy.”
Aside from Biden’s own speeches denouncing Republicans as “semi-fascists” and alluding to the colourful themes last seen on the Nuremberg rally?
Unfortunately, the Pentagon missed the memo on democracy. Since 2008, foreign soldiers trained within the U.S. military “have attempted at the very least nine coups (and succeeded in at the very least eight) in five West African countries,” reports journalist Nick Turse.
The Pentagon denies responsibility for the disasters.
But as Congressman Matt Gaetz (Florida) stated in a congressional hearing last week, “I believe we should always at the very least understand how many countries we’re training coup plotters in.”
Will the comic redeem the height?
The State Department wants Americans to make hashtag short movies #SummitForDemocracy shouting “What has democracy made possible in your life?”
Like falling living standards, rising inflation, the occasional financial panic, and a bewildered commander-in-chief who doesn’t know if he’s in Canada or China?
One other world summit will not restore the legitimacy of elected rulers who trample on their laws and constitutions.
“Democracy should be greater than two wolves and a sheep voting on what to eat for dinner,” as I wrote way back in Clinton’s Golden Age of Democracy.
James Bovard is the creator of 10 books and a member of the USA Today Board of Contributors.