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Acting attorney general Sally Yates was fired, and Steve Bannon seems to be pulling the strings. Whither democracy?

Photo illustration by Slate. Images by Pete Marovich/Getty Images and Saul Loeb - Pool/Getty Images

When faced with a choice between a candidate with no vision and a candidate with a nasty vision, many voters will embrace the nasty vision. Even in times of peace and prosperity, perfectly decent human beings are willing to vote for candidates promising extraordinarily cruel policies. When a candidate who promises to inflict extraordinary cruelty on the despised and the abject wins high office, he will (surprise, surprise) use his new-won powers to inflict cruelty on the abject and the despised.

Yascha Mounk, a lecturer on government at Harvard University and a fellow in the political reform program at New America, isthe author ofStranger in My Own Country.

The last 12 months hold out many lessons such as these. But in the last days, Ive been thinking of another, more abstract takeaway. Before the election, most people I knew were saying that a Trump presidency would be extremely dangerousbut that this wasnt something to worry about since he could never get elected. After the election, a lot of those same people started to say that Trump was a nasty manbut that this wasnt something to worry about because our institutions would stop him before he could possibly do lasting damage.

What explains their change of heart? A rather trivial, but very dangerous, failing: the deep desire to believe that the world we live inwhich for most of us has been mostly decent for most of our livescould not possibly turn quite so dark quite so quickly.

And yet, it is increasingly difficult to shake the feeling that we are now descending into darkness. In less than two weeks, Trump has delivered one of the most divisive inaugurals in the history of the country and spread blatant lies from the Oval Office. He has ordered the construction of a border wall and threatened Mexico with punitive tariffs. He has barred permanent residents from entering the country and banned refugees.

I could go on. But any attempt at comprehensiveness would be tedious as well as futile: There is simply too much chaos and mean-spiritedness. The party in power, meanwhile, seems determined to stand idly by. So far, Republicans in Congress have proved shockingly willing to rubber-stamp Trumps policies and Cabinet picks. His more extreme actions have led to cautious grumbling. But when the time to vote on his agenda came, moderate Republicans have once again lacked the courage of their convictions.

So we seemingly have every reason to despairand yet I have actually found myself to be quite hopeful over the last days. The Womens March turned into the biggest political rally in U.S. history, and the executive order on immigration inspired spontaneous protests at airports all over this great nation. Courts stayed large parts of the executive order on immigration andthough their current numbers limit their ability to hamstring Trumps agendaDemocrats are putting up a dogged fight in Congress. Several high-ranking officials have publicly defied or criticized orders they found unconscionable and hundreds of bureaucrats are secretly leaking their broken hearts out.

Since Trump got elected, one of my great fears has been that most American citizens might cling to a false sense of security, brought on by decades of prosperity and stability, while the president slowly and surely subverts our democracy. But between Trumps spectacular assault on democratic norms and the furious response it has already unleashed, I no longer worry about a quiet death. The American republic wont go down without putting up a hell of a fight.

But will itwill wewin? There is no easy answer because there is no clear precedent. Countries that have as deep-rooted a democratic history or as active a civil society as the United States simply havent been in such dangerous territory before. As Francis Fukuyama explains:

Because our current predicament is unprecedented, the most eminent political scientists at work today strongly disagree on what comes next. Is Daron Acemoglu right to worry that the institutions of modern democracy were never designed to withstand a strongman like Donald Trumpand are now headed toward pliancy? Or is Fukuyama right to respond that the Constitution sets up so many robust veto points that many institutional checks on power will continue to operate in a Trump presidency?

Nobody can say for sure. But what has become clear over the last weeks is that the natural experiment both Acemoglu and Fukuyama invoke is more extreme than we might have suspected a few short weeks ago. The authoritarian tendencies of Trumps presidency are even more blatant than most pessimists had warned. But the opposition has also proven more powerful and determined than many optimists had dared to hope. While I remain unsure about the ultimate outcome, I am increasingly convinced thatto misquote Steve Bannona major war is brewing between the administration and the institutions it would undermine.

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It is still too early to tell the genre of the head-spinning movie in which we have been cast as bit players. It certainly isnt the farce some originally mistook it for. But do we find ourselves in a live-action thriller or a horror movie? And are we hurtling towards a heroic finish or a gory demise? I dont know. But after the past days, Im more confident than ever that unprecedented turmoil awaits us along the wayand that is why Ive been both deeply scared and increasingly energized.

I believe that the worst politics can inflict tends to weigh more heavily than the best it can achieve. For anybody who understands what it means when political tensions destroy the lives of ordinary people, turmoil is not something to be welcomed. But when the alternative is a certain descent into the abyss of authoritarian darkness, it may be the best we can hope for.

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Americans Are Putting Up a Good Fight Against Trump's Assaultsfor Now - Slate Magazine

Forbes

The U.S. Must Help Transform China Into A Democracy - Forbes Forbes China's militarism and territorial expansion threaten neighboring U.S. allies. This is consistent with a historical tendency in China to expand. For long-term ... and more »

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The U.S. Must Help Transform China Into A Democracy - Forbes - Forbes

The Economist last week released its annual global democracy index. Not surprisingly, Israel scored high.

The highbrow magazine ranked Israel very high for pluralism and political culture. It ranked Israel a bit lower for civil liberties mainly because of the Chief Rabbinates ultra-rigid control over Jewish marriage, divorce and conversion.

Indeed, Israel is more globalized, open and democratic than at any time in the states history. Over the past decade, Israels democracy scores have risen from 7.28 to 7.85 on a scale of 1 to 10, according to the Economist.

For comparison purposes, note that Belgium this year rated a score of 7.77, France 7.92, the US 7.98, Britain 8.36, and Canada 9.15. Greece was downgraded to the status of a flawed democracy at 7.23. Turkey is no longer rated a democracy, but a hybrid regime.

And yet, there is a steady drumbeat of warning about dangers to Israeli democracy being propagated these days.

You read it on the front pages of the left-leaning Yediot Aharonot and Haaretz newspapers. You get it from progressive academics in Israeli political science and sociology departments, and you are confronted with it by politicians seeking to unseat Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

The discourse goes like this: Israeli democracy is under attack by dark forces of ultra-nationalism, racism, fascism and religious radicalism. An ugly wave of hatred is washing across Israel, with fundamentalists leading a surging tide of extremism.

The purported evidence for this is kids who gathered this week to prevent Amona from being destroyed, and hooligans who threatened army leaders and judges after Sgt. Elor Azarias January 4 manslaughter conviction.

Adding to the list of alleged dangers to democracy is a series of nationalist legislative initiatives in the Knesset.

These range from cultural and educational issues (such as spending more shekels on arts communities in the periphery, high school curriculum changes in civics and Jewish-Zionist heritage studies, and keeping the Breaking the Silence organization out of the school system); to constitutional matters (the nation-state bill, and reform of the judicial appointments process); to political initiatives (crackdown on illegal Beduin and Arab building, tougher prosecution of terrorist family members); and so on.

But none of the above actually proves the charges of fascism or undermining of Israeli democracy. Not at all.

The noisy demonstrations and bullying of a few hundred radicals prove nothing, except that there fringe elements in our society that need to be kept in check on the extreme Left and Right. This holds equally true for radicals who threaten to upend Israel on behalf of the terrorist-abetting Arab MK Basel Ghattas, and for those who threaten military judges on behalf of the terrorist-slaying soldier Elor Azaria.

All zealots must be marginalized.

(But note: The right-wingers in Amona dont come close to falling into this category. They were mainly passive protesters, expressing outrage at flawed policy in legitimate fashion.)

IT IS CRITICALLY IMPORTANT how we approach the public policy debate.

It is wrong to portray Israeli society as bisected by two enemy narratives: that of a moral, liberal, democratic, universalist Israeli Left, versus an immoral, illiberal, isolationist, nationalist Israeli Right. This is a false dichotomy, and its an untrue picture of Israeli society.

Like Britain, France, Germany and the US these days, there is a real and worthy debate in Israel over important public policy matters, and there is a continuum of respectable views that defy simplistic categorization as democratic or anti-democratic.

Its important to acknowledge this, and to abjure accusations that every controversial policy innovation is motivated by hatred, moral insensitivity or authoritarianism.

Taking up one side of the debate, I will argue that neither hawkish Israeli foreign policies, nor conservative Israeli socioeconomic and cultural policies, automatically make this country less free, enlightened, noble, creative or exciting.

Lets say, for example, that the NGO funding transparency is passed by the Knesset, or that the judicial appointments process is altered to deny Supreme Court judges a veto over selection of their successors.

Is that the end of democratic Israel? Of course not!

Lets say that the Knesset breaks up the Labor Partys kibbutz-controlled food cartels, or that it passes a law mandating compensation for absentee Palestinian landlords for land on which Israelis have been living for 40 years (instead of expelling such Israelis from their homes).

Is that the end of democratic Israel? Of course not!

When the High Court of Justice ruled in favor of Netanyahu government policies on natural gas exploitation and on deportation of illegal African migrant workers (while circumscribing some aspects of the attendant legislation) policies that were strenuously opposed by the Left was that the end of Israeli democracy?

Or lets imagine that Elor Azaria receives a light sentence for his manslaughter conviction. Would that be fascist and undemocratic?

My point is that opposition to public policy should be debated on its merits without semi-automatic screeching about intolerance, repression, dictatorship, thought police and the crushing of democratic norms.

Over the top attacks make the political opposition sound just as crude and intolerant as the caricature of the government they are communicating.

Of course, no one should pooh-pooh civic challenges that do stand before Israeli society. The Israel Democracy Institutes 2016 Democracy Index found a significant drop in public trust of state institutions and politicians, and an increasing willingness to marginalize minorities, such as Israeli Arabs, ultra-Orthodox Jews, and settlers.

But we must beware a doomsday discourse about depredations in Israels democratic moorings. Israel is far more hale and hearty than some of its detractors would have you believe.

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Know comment: Israeli democracy is not at risk - Jerusalem Post Israel News

Wall Street Journal

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Merkel Presses Erdogan on Freedom, Democracy - Wall Street Journal

Michael Fallon said Russia was responsible for creating what we might now see as the post-truth age. Photograph: Maxim Zmeyev/Reuters

Nato must begin to compete on the cyber-battlefield to counter Russian hacking, which is weaponising misinformation to create a post-truth age, the defence secretary, Sir Michael Fallon, has said.

In his hardest-hitting comments yet about Russia, Fallon said that in the past two years it had targeted the US, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Bulgaria and Montenegro, which becomes a full Nato member this year. He blamed Russia for helping create the fake information age.

Today we see a country that, in weaponising misinformation, has created what we might now see as the post-truth age. Part of that is the use of cyber-weaponry to disrupt critical infrastructure and disable democratic machinery, he said.

His rhetoric contrasts with that of Donald Trump, who appears to be moving towards rapprochement with Moscow and has described Nato as obsolete.

In a speech on Thursday night at St Andrews University, Fallon said there had been a step-change by Moscow last year that brought a rise in cyber-attacks. Russia is clearly testing Nato and the west. It is seeking to expand its sphere of influence, destabilise countries, and weaken the alliance. It is undermining national security for many allies and the international rules-based system. Therefore, it is in our interest and Europes to keep Nato strong and to deter and dissuade Russia from this course.

He added: President Trump has spoken about the need for engagement with Russia. Hes right. Great nations like the US and Russia will talk. Indeed, they must talk to preserve the rules-based information system underpinning our security and prosperity. The UK too needs to engage with Russia, including military to military. Yet President Trump is a realist. He knows engagement is an equation of risk versus reward, with the outcome decided by a nations deeds, not its words.

There were areas where the west did cooperate with Russia, Fallon conceded. But he went on: Above all, we must not accept as any kind of new normal Russias propaganda, whether overt or covert, its easy disregard for hard facts and numbers, or its blatant distortions and evasions.

Fallon said Russia, having opted to become a strategic competitor to the west, could not expect business as usual. Part of our response is for Nato and the west to do more to tackle the false reality promoted through Soviet-style misinformation. Whatever else we do on deterrence and dialogue, we must counter Putins Pravda with faster truth We need to call out messengers such as RT [the Russia Today television channel].

Although Fallon portrayed the Kremlin as the aggressor in terms of hacking, Americas National Security Agency and Britains GCHQ hack targets in Russia on a regular basis.

Fallon insisted Trump was 100% backing Nato, as Theresa May said after meeting the US president in Washington, and that his grievance was over the failure of most Nato members to contribute more towards defence costs.

In a speech a fortnight ago, the chairman of the Commons defence committee, the Conservative MP Julian Lewis, was less sanguine than Fallon and described Trumps comments that the US might abandon Nato as radical and reckless.

Fallon also accused the Russian government of routinely lying. There is a special Russian word for this. Not maskirovka, the old deception perpetrated by its intelligence agencies, but vranyo, where the listener knows the speaker is lying and the speaker knows the listener knows he is lying but keeps lying anyway.

There is no certainty among senior officials at the Ministry of Defence and elsewhere around Europe that Trump is indeed 100% behind Nato. They are waiting for a visit by the new US defence secretary, James Mattis, in a fortnight to the Nato headquarters and the Munich security council in the hope of clarification.

Previous US presidents and defence secretaries have repeatedly called on Nato members to raise defence spending to at least 2% of GDP but, unlike Trump, they have always combined it with assurances that Nato forms the bedrock of US and west European defence policy.

Fallon said that 19 of Natos 28 members did not even spend 1.5% on defence. Only five members meet the 2% rule, including Britain, albeit through creative accounting. So President Trump is right to challenge Nato to raise its game, Fallon said. That means not five but all members meeting the 2% commitment. It means supporting reform to make Nato more agile, resilient and better configured to operate in the contemporary environment including against hybrid and cyber-attacks.

As Fallon was preparing to deliver his speech, which praised the imposition of US and European sanctions on Russia, the US Treasury announced it was adjusting sanctions imposed last year by President Obama on the Russian intelligence agency, the FSB.

A report by the Commons public accounts committee today says a skills shortage is undermining confidence in the governments ability to protect Britain from high-level cyber-attacks. Ministers have taken too long to consolidate the alphabet soup of agencies tasked with protecting the country, the public accounts committee said. The role of the Cabinet Office, responsible for coordinating information protection across the government, remained unclear.

Meg Hillier, the committee chair, said the government approach to handling personal data breaches has been chaotic and does not inspire confidence in its ability to take swift, coordinated and effective action in the face of higher-threat attacks.

The threat of cybercrime is ever growing, yet evidence shows Britain ranks below Brazil, South Africa and China in keeping phones and laptops secure. In this context it should concern us all that the government is struggling to ensure its security profession has the skills it needs.

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Nato must defend western democracy against Russian hacking, say Fallon - The Guardian