Vulnerabilities of Liberal Democracies and Republics and What is Required of Citizens

It is very important to explain the historical and ideological context of the U.S. system. The U.S. system was not designed as a strict Roman versus English versus Athenian system. It is a mixed system. You may ask, what is really the difference here. Many people might still not understand.

1. Representative Government: Power exercised through elected officials with checks and balances.
2. Protection of Minority Rights: The U.S. with its Electoral College, Senate, and Supreme Court reflects a republican structure that tempers direct democracy to protect minority rights and stability, and its flaw is that liberal republicanism may limit direct participation, favoring representation and elite deliberation to ensure this “stability.”
3. Attitudes and Relationship to Ancient History, Golden Ages, Literature and Philosophical Influences: U.S. Republicanism is rooted in anti-monarchical traditions, attitudes of liberality towards knowledge and ancient history, and classical republicanism.
4. Civic Virtue: Citizens and leaders prioritize the common good over personal interests.
5. Rule of Law: Laws apply equally, ensuring accountability and protecting liberty.
6. Anti-Tyranny: Structures to prevent concentrated power, whether monarchic or populist.
7. Philosophers drawn from: Thinkers like Montesquieu, Madison, and Rousseau influenced this tradition, emphasizing institutional design and civic responsibility.

What defines Liberal Democracy can be seen as a political system that combines liberalism (individual freedoms, equality under the law) with democracy (rule by the people, typically through voting). It emphasizes broad participation, free elections, and protection of individual rights.

1. Majoritarian Rule: Decisions are often made by majority vote, either directly (e.g., referendums) or through elected officials. Modern Western democracies like the UK, Canada, or Germany, where elections and constitutional protections coexist.
2. Individual Rights: Strong protections for freedoms like speech, press, religion, and assembly, often enshrined in a constitution. Liberal Democracy prioritizes broad participation and majority rule while safeguarding individual rights.
3. It often encourages broader, more direct democratic engagement (e.g., referendums, frequent elections).
4. Universal Suffrage: Broad (ideally universal) access to voting and political participation. Liberal Democracy evolved later than the early American republican tradition, incorporating universal suffrage and mass participation in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.
5. Countries like Sweden or New Zealand emphasize broad democratic participation with strong legal protections for individual freedoms is an example.
6. Pluralism: Accepts diverse interests and groups competing within the system, with institutions mediating conflicts. Liberal Democracy leans more toward individual autonomy and pluralism.
7. Philosophers drawn from: John Locke, John Stuart Mill, and modern theorists like Rawls emphasize individual rights alongside democratic processes.

CONSTITUTIONAL REPUBLIC AND DEMOCRATIC HERITAGE, AND EXPLOITED VULNERABILITIES

Republicans in the U.S. keep saying this country is a Constitutional Republic though it is also a representative democracy. The same party Republican politicians are trying to institute laws to put the Ten Commandments in classrooms, but not the Beatitudes. Our understanding of our political system has devolved into a sports rivalry, but our system combines and embraces the heritage of Classical Republicanism, Democracy (though not pure democracy), Enlightenment era influences, liberality, and Carolingian Renaissance influence all into a neo-classical synthesis of its own. Ancient Greek and Roman Stoicism, Epicureanism and others influence the founders through their readings of the classical writers and through the classical republican statesmen. This zeal before liberalism became a political ideology (The Lost History of Liberalism) was the defining quality of the republican-minded, and the term liberal was not at first strictly applicable to a republican, since sometimes monarchists or aristocrats (elites or nobles) possessed this quality of being liberal. It described also one’s attitude towards education, learning, books, cultures, people and knowledge in general.

Both parties in their origin, represent ‘a fragment’ of this history, some of which is represented through this Timeline on the Crusades to Late Renaissance Occultism to Enlightenment Timeline (1075-1680), but there is much more context there on “the Roots of the American Order.” Now, both parties are not the same, yes; but “both” do represent one great indivisible fraternity, not one half. By fraternity, I mean the government of and by the people, not a group of executive chairpersons, plutocrats or financiers. It is important I flesh out all of this history in the manner and to the extent that I do, especially to shield against any kind of co-opting. Actual knowledge of this system immediately exposes the frauds. Republicanism is not Fascism but can slip in all kinds of directions. Republicanism does not represent techno-feudal, oligarchic interests and greed; and yet like roaches and rats, such corrupt interests under ideals of “human survival” and “human civilizational progress” (e.g. Musk) are able to exploit holes in the system, multiply and gnaw at a Republic from within.

A republic can become a totalistic system. A republic (e.g., whether we study Simon Bolivar or the U.S. empire) can become imperial and express imperial ambitions. The territorial boundary of a Republic is metaphysical. It is bound by human conception of the nature of Space-Duration, God, Logos, Destiny and Providence. The consequences of this lead inevitably to ideas of world policing and surveillance. Republics have never been perfect systems, and that is the entire point of the U.S. Republic. Instead of understanding this, citizens support drastic dismantling of “the system” to replace it with some other utopian and atheistic ideology.

The Founders were deliberately constructing this experiment with attentiveness to the historical mistakes past governments, empires and rulers have made. Does the detail, that they had slaves negate Republicanism? It doesn’t.

MY VIEWS ON SHIELDS OF DEMOCRACY AGAINST VULNERABILITIES AND WHAT IS REQUIRED OF CITIZENS

The U.S. Republic was and remains an experiment in governance, and it does not depend on artificial intelligence or high military technology. It depends at its basis on “the people,” and this necessitates the moral excellence, moderation and collective maturity of the people. It is not that the people of a civilization just exist to survive, consume, be merry, and make money to live the desires that are advertised to them. That is a manufactured society. This is the materialist secularism so many early republicans and monarchists warned against. The idea that an entire people, not merely individuals have to develop offends modern American sensibilities, due to its connections to the trauma of racism, but this is not about one race. Yet, older civilizations like China understand this well. It is a civilizational thinking and an understanding of duty, that has become lost.

The vision of REPUBLICANISM represented more than this (see Giuseppe Mazzini on the Divine Ideal of Republicanism) and does not merely define a form of government. It is a philosophical, sacred and political heritage; and in order to understand the system entirely, any zealous hatred of liberalism, of “the liberal,” or “democratic” is a crippling limitation. Also crippling to the people of such a system is the emotional and negative connotation ascribed to these words, because the parties that are named after these terms cannot live up to the word. Philosophy is not impractical and irrelevant to modern politics. The political party or politician first to understand the spirit of this mixed philosophical tradition beyond mere slogans and dead-spirited statements politicians usually make, will indeed find the most authentic and helpful vision for the country.

One must be a matured, morally excellent and disciplined character, and there are a couple with this temperament who could not meet the times but transcend it in a sense.

By Grand Old Party, you would think it would refer to the Grand Old Tradition and Wisdom of Republicanism. I remember being at a lecture of Rick Santorum, and Rick Santorum talked about his time in Law school and how he learned about and delved into the classical foundations of the United States. He also explained his relation to charity work and the poor, differently from what you’d hear from most Republican Party politicians. As a Republican politician, who is also Catholic, he spoke at a Catholic Vincentian university (DePaul) that heavily emphasizes these things and professes values and ideals of Catholic social justice and social change. However, some say this has sadly changed.

At the time when Trumpism arose, “social justice” was being demonized under the stupidly ignorant mocking term “social justice warrior.” I never heard Santorum really discuss any of the things he was explaining on a small stage to a group of professors and college students on the larger public stage.

Santorum told us, that this kind of complexity has to get sidelined often on the big stage in front of the American people, or you will lose your audience. It deeply frustrated me: the man within a small space of the public versus on-stage surrounded by weak men catering to Trump. Our fellow Chicagoan and Catholic Pope Leo XIV has set the mood and is leading the charge with the power and influence he possesses for good. This is an inspiration and mission for our times.

So, you might be from another country, and you wonder, well then, “what the hell is with your Republican Party then?” Well, the same can be said the world over and in Canada and Western European countries, where the terms are oppositely understood from the U.S. party terminology. Many people use these terms democratic and republican. We should just focus on the word “REPUBLICAN” here.

The Republican Party, while named after this tradition, and founded in 1854 with roots in anti-slavery and republican ideals, has evolved into a broader and delineating coalition with priorities that sometimes diverge from CLASSICAL REPUBLICANISM. However, we cannot say, that this merely began with Trump or even Bush. Trump is just a worst unpolished liar than previous administrations. The U.S. since its very inception has had a very hypocritical relationship to the heritage it claims.

CLASSICAL REPUBLICANISM prioritizes deliberative governance and institutional stability over mob rule. However, we have observed the decades long trends in the Republican Party, particularly since the rise of figures like Donald Trump toward populism, emphasizing direct appeals (mere manipulations) to “the people” and distrust of elites, universities and institutions. This immediately begins to conflict with republicanism’s focus on checks and balances and civic deliberation, such as advocating bypass of institutional norms, e.g., challenging electoral processes or pressuring courts, which contrasts with republicanism’s emphasis on rule of law. This administration is aware of this and has studied the trajectory of this country particularly since the Patriot Act, and expanded powers the chief executive or President can do and get away with, especially with complicit courts and spineless frightened law firms.

An important concept that has become lost in modern culture in general, is that in Republicanism it stresses “civic duty” and the common good, but the modern Republican Party often prioritizes individual liberty (often appearing and acting as a front) for oligarchic capitalist ideals, though again to the public, they portray themselves as prioritizing market-driven policies (e.g., tax cuts, deregulation) and connecting with their voters through libertarian or capitalist ideals. While individual liberty is part of republicanism, the neglect of true solidarity and collective responsibility on issues like public health or infrastructure sharply diverge from its civic focus.

Republicanism values consensus and the common good, but the Republican Party’s current infantile polarization through culture wars and co-opting Third Positionism often prioritizes partisan loyalty over national civic unity. Civic nationalism is categorically rejected by the ethno-nationalists. The factionalism that comes from this can undermine the deliberative spirit of republican governance. Gerrymandering or voter suppression tactics, sometimes supported by party strategies, may prioritize power over equal representation, clashing with republican principles.

INFLUENCE OF SPECIAL INTERESTS, FACTIONALISM AND THE REAL REPUBLICANS

Republicanism demands representatives and leaders to serve the public good, not private interests or manipulate and exploit the public for the gain of a few. However, the influence of corporate lobbying, super PACs, and donor-driven habits within the Republican Party, as in much of modern politics, conflicts with this ideal. Policies favoring specific industries like fossil fuels do often reflect donor priorities more than the broader public interest, and this has become increasingly evident.

The Republican Party’s founding was tied to republican ideals such as opposing the “tyranny” of slavery, but its modern platform is shaped by twentieth and twenty-first century concerns: conservatism, free markets, social issues, believing their political adversaries are literally demonic then whine about being demonized is a deliberate tactic of misdirection on the political stage. These priorities do not embody the things I have learned about on historical Republicanism and its focus on civic virtue and moderation or institutional balance.

When Trump took control of the GOP suddenly everyone not with Trumpism is associated with the term RINO (Republican in Name Only). The RINOS label is typically used by more conservative or populist Republicans to criticize moderates or those seen as insufficiently loyal to the party’s current ideological bent of Trump-aligned policies. Those labeled RINOS, e.g., Mitt Romney often support traditional conservative principles like fiscal restraint, strong defense, or institutional integrity but diverge from the party’s populist or nationalist wing. Romney understands classical republicanism’s emphasis on rule of law and checks on power, but when he speaks of this to his party, he is met with criticism. The populist wing, which often drives the RINO label, deviates from republicanism by prioritizing loyalty to a single leader or undermining institutions. This can resemble the “tyranny of the majority” or cult of personality that republicanism historically guards against.

From a classical republicanism perspective, those accusing others of being RINOS may themselves be “RINOS” if their actions prioritize factionalism or personal loyalty over civic virtue and institutional integrity. However, within the modern Republican Party’s context, the RINO label is an ideological purity test and has nothing to do with any adherence to philosophical republicanism.

The term “RINOS” is used to define party orthodoxy rather than fidelity to REPUBLICANISM as a philosophy. Both populists and moderates claim to embody aspects or fragments of the party’s heritage, but neither collectively nor actually capture the republican and democratic tradition. It is even more diluted in quality than it was envisioned by the founders and those that inspired them.

THE U.S. REPUBLIC’S VULNERABILITY THROUGH COMPROMISED PARTIES AND A DISTRACTED PUBLIC

Many Republicans still uphold republicanism’s core tenets, like representative government (res-publica meaning government “owned by the people”) and checks on executive power, through support for constitutional frameworks, but there is a deep philosophical misalignment. The name “Republican” was chosen for the party to evoke anti-monarchical, anti-slavery and anti-despotic governance, but today’s party often prioritizes ideological battles over civic unity. the party’s name suggests a commitment to republican principles that doesn’t consistently uphold, especially when partisan loyalty or special interests such as corporate lobbying overshadow the common good. The name is misleading, but it remains important when influencing the public to vote for their representatives.

I am told, changing the name would be impractical, given its entrenched brand and voter recognition; and that no party perfectly embodies its philosophical namesake in practice.

Also, it is true that some of these representatives do in a sense still maintain some historical continuity with the term, and the party still has mechanisms that adhere to republican principles. This is the basics, but this is eroding and as cyclic as the nature of republics itself.

The party’s name reflects its nineteenth-century origins, when it championed republican ideals like liberty and opposition to concentrated power as with slavery. Retaining the name honors this legacy, even if priorities have shifted, and the name can serve as a reminder for reform and course-correction. There are few Republicans who still uphold republicanism’s core tenets, like representative government and checks on executive power, through support for constitutional frameworks. The Democratic Party, for instance, doesn’t fully embody classical DEMOCRACY either, yet its name persists. The name “Republican” is a historical and cultural touchstone tied to the party’s role in shaping the U.S.

Every day that Americans get trapped in despair about the things this administration does, the more their hopes, aspirations and creative spark dwindle. I know there are people interested in this history, but I know there is some apathy, even in the face of your predicament against your political foe. To win against your political foe will require a grand vision that can capture the hearts and intellect of the people in whatever daze or haze they may appear to be in. At the time, we are in the fog of Trump, Vance, Miller, Vought and the harbingers of increasing AI totalitarian surveillance systems and oligarchic religious feudal technocracy.

The country cannot truly function or be a truly healthy Republic on the back of one singular party, or any compromised party. It is the voters that need to become wiser, because your politicians come from among you and your classes. Yes, the Republican Party will need to be reformed. Someone would have to clean house, just like Trumpism cleaned house. If it is replaced, simply the next iteration will be a tool of even more rich and powerful interests. The U.S. is weak and vulnerable, even as this administration portray the illusion of strength. This is not a Republic, as say Cicero envisioned. These are the old habits and flaws developed within White European culture and Anglosphere notions about nature, its machinations and ideas of force in the world. This administration claims an idealistic White heritage for example, and yet reveals the most immature aspects, more larpy and pseudo-intellectual than anything, with complete ignorance of the spirit of the system, its tradition and progress to be made.

It serves the interest of several people that perspectives like mine remain hidden in some niche corner of digital space. If the people carried the true flame of its civilizational, scientific and philosophical roots, it would become the most powerful tide against the corrupt leaders with their money, tech and plans in the night while we sleep and labor and break our backs for this economy, hiding as our country’s salvation for years to come, not merely for the next general election. We must continue to plant the seeds for future causes and generations.