Declan McCullagh wrote:

Steve writes:

...

Democracy is not without its significant shortcomings. If you doubt this read Tocquevelle.

Or Hayek. Democracy, after all, is majoritarian rule. Living under a homogenous majority, with its whims and desires as law, would be more oppressive than living under a benign dictatorship.

I wish for once and for all someone would delineate this "democracy" thing from a true, distributed democracy, where every individual is required to participate equally, and no narrow interests can co-opt the vote the way they do in the kind of "democracy" Declan mentions. Wouldn't it be better when people mention a one-word political philosophy such as democracy, that they make the definition more precise by using two or three words instead?