> Radio Habana Cuba on U.S. Democracy
>
> DEMOCRACY ... US STYLE
>
> The magnitude of the political scandal that has hit the world's only
> super-power has sent reverberations around the world. The nation that
> lectures the world on how to run a democracy - including elections - has
> been shamed into admitting that its problems are similar if not worse than
> those of many of the Third World countries whose electoral systems it
> criticizes. Tuesday's decision by the US Supreme Court took a full month
> after the nation's presidential elections took place. It has effectively put
> an end to the political battle, opening the way for the Republican candidate
> George W Bush to enter the White House in January. But it also helped put an
> end to any notion that the system was "Democratic".
>
> This is not the first time in the history of the United States that a
> candidate has won the election without gaining a majority of the popular
> vote. This time, however, the very credibility of US so-called Democracy is
> on the line.
>
> Democracy that involves a national voter absentee rate of 50 percent.
>
> Democracy that, consequently (and given the vote that Al Gore received),
> allows the man who takes over as president in January to do so with the
> support of less than 25 percent of the electorate.
>
> Democracy that refuses to allow a serious alternative contender for the
> presidency to publicly debate the other two principle candidates on national
> TV.
>
> Democracy that allows a state legislature such as Florida's to ignore the
> vote of its people and decide for themselves who will or will not be given
> the electoral votes so essential to win this election. Thus, for the first
> time in its history, a state legislative body of a little over 100
> representatives has effectively elected the US president.
>
> Democracy that allows two US Supreme Court justices to vote on such an
> important issue when they both have clear conflicts of interest in doing so.
> Justice Thomas's wife being directly involved in the Bush campaign, and
> Justice Scalia's two sons hired as attorneys for two law firms representing
> the Bush campaign in its arguments to the Supreme Court (and thus, their
> father) itself.
>
> Hardly the notion of the true democratic representational system Washington
> pundits and politicians are forever lecturing the rest of the world about.
>
> Most of the countries that Washington roundly criticizes for not having
> "democratic" elections have a second round of voting when the first is
> contested so closely - but not the self-proclaimed champion of Democracy.
>
> The U.S. Supreme Court is the country's highest judicial body and an appeal
> against any of its rulings has little chance of success. The electoral votes
> of the state of Florida have been stolen from the people by their so-called
> representatives and apportioned along strictly partisan lines in a
> winner-take-all system that defies every notion of Democracy.
>
> A new chapter of U.S. electoral history will begin with Bush's inauguration
> on January 20th 2001. It is too early to say if the status quo that passes
> for US Democracy will be maintained in the light of this election scandal,
> but most experts say that once the dust settles everyone will get back to
> living the same routine.
>
> However, there will be many who will nonetheless recall that the man in
> charge of what he calls the "Greatest Democracy on Earth" for the next four
> years, will have to come to terms with the fact that he won the election on
> the political whim of the legislature of his own brother's state without the
> support of the vast majority of his people.