Other ways iguana's statement is pedantically incorrect: - Currently incarcerated prisoners, and some former prisoners - Minors
Democracy is not necessarily a yes/no binary question, it's a matter of degrees. Maybe there's a certain threshold to calling a country democratic or not (I would argue, the USA was not one prior to 1920), but not all citizens having precisely the same voting power doesn't necessarily make it non-democratic - only slightly less democratic than it could be.
All Iguana is doing is rejecting this definition of Republic as linguistically inaccurate. A Republic isn't merely a representative (or disproportionately representative) democracy. The Senate's bizarre role doesn't change this.
well they're clearly not going to leave are they. its just a new flavour of right-wing nutjob posturing.
I see your point, and I think it's a good observation. But all it shows is that the US is not a perfect representative democracy, not that it isn't a democracy at all. In fact, it can be argued (right or wrong, that's beside the point) that a upper house less beheld to fleeting popular sentiment (as the British House of Lords) or representing constituent entities of the countries instead of citizens (as the US Senate) might be a favourable feature of a democracy, to improve political stability or long-term planning. I'm not sure I agree (or at least, not completely). Self-determination is sovereign, but there is also an issue of size. Say, for example, Louisiana secedes from the US: what would happen if New Orleans wants to secede from the newly independent Louisiana (as an exclave of the US or its own city-state)? Should it be able to? The Greater New Orleans Area has more than 1 million people, about 1/4 of all inhabitants of Louisiana, so hardly a small community in comparison. I dislike making slippery-slope arguments, but this is something you have to consider.
That's just silly too, because everybody knows that I am Emperor of America - No Takebacks, Triple Dog Dare.
Actually, when the ofiicial name of a country contain both Democratic and Republic, it's suspicious. Now Corsicans are sad and violently angry.
Heh. I can't disagree, but I'm not sure how much "economic practicality" would be taken into consideration by a disgruntled and emotionally-charged electorate. That's food for populism and demagoguery. I also feel that "secession" is kinda an sore point for me, as Italy has its own "secessionist" movement (Lega Nord, albeit it swings wildly between full secession, federalism and fiscal self-administration, as in the end its only interest is money-grabbing). It irks me especially because it evokes a "culturally homogeneous" Northern Italy (Padania) that does not exist end never existed in the first place (unlike, for example, Scotland, that is definitively its own nation). It would be like the City of London, Northern England and Western Ireland seceding from the UK and Eire and forming a single country based on finance, industry, and cattle.
You get stories like this down and again. Staten Island has threatened to secede from NYC, and the town of Killington, VT threatening to join New Hampshire despite being 40 miles away and landlocked by Vermont towns. It's largely posturing on behalf of someone who wants to make a bold statement and get re-elected.
The British House of Lords can be overruled by the House of Commons by use of the Parlimanet Act of 1911. At it would be fairer to say that the House of Commons is more prone to popular sentiment.
My list wasn't meant to be exclusive, that was just all the examples I could think of spontaneously, so no need for Corsicans to be sad.
Yes, but the very fact that the Commons need to invoke such a strong prerogative, it should give them time to think about what they are doing, and maybe think again about it. I think we saw an instance of that in recent years, with a law about privacy (I think). One of our resident Brits might remember it better than me.
Here's an idea, have an interesting discussion here instead. Then we can discuss our own ideas, rather than read ideas from a site that has nothing to do with what we're discussing, save that it's in the same country as you!
The House of Lords usually acts to review potential acts that might not be in the best interest of the country/people. If they do add any ammendments it gets passed back to the Commons. To be voted on again. I don't think the PArliament Act is used that often.