<div dir="auto">I don’t know who Larry Elder is, but I believe he is incorrect. The right wing of today in the USA believes, or at least says, that liberals are both misguided and really, really bad people. God told them so. </div><div><br><div class="gmail_quote"><div dir="ltr" class="gmail_attr">On Mon, Aug 9, 2021 at 1:40 AM Pieter Steenekamp <<a href="mailto:pieters@randcontrols.co.za">pieters@randcontrols.co.za</a>> wrote:<br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex"><div dir="ltr">Steve,<div><br></div><div>Your "The Wrong (formerly Right) Wing in the US" </div><div>reminds me of the quote by Larry Elder: </div><div>"Conservatives consider liberals well-intentioned, but misguided. Liberals consider conservatives not only wrong, but really, really bad people."</div></div><div dir="ltr"><div><br><br>P</div></div><br><div class="gmail_quote"><div dir="ltr" class="gmail_attr">On Mon, 9 Aug 2021 at 06:06, Steve Smith <<a href="mailto:sasmyth@swcp.com" target="_blank">sasmyth@swcp.com</a>> wrote:<br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex">
<div>
<p>Jochen -</p>
<p>Thanks for the original article reference. It lead me to seek
out and find another interesting /relevant introductory/survey
article:</p>
<p> <a href="https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1361-6404/aaeb4d" target="_blank">Stability
of Democracies: A Complex Systems Perspective<br>
</a></p>
<p>In regards to your original question, my own biased intuition is
that it is a vicious (rather than virtuous) cycle. Our various
corrupt leaders with notable presidents such as Harding (Teapot
Dome), Nixon (Watergate++) and DJT-45 (Tax, Emoluments, Election,
Sexual Misconduct, etc... many left to be exposed I suspect)
definitely undermine the confidence in and commitment to our
imperfect Democracy, driving it further away from any ideal it
might aspire to. </p>
<p>I personally wasted half of my voting life in reaction to Nixon
and the next several cycles following. Watching the shenanigans
of 2000 and then 2016 and worse 2020, I expect there will be
entire new generations as disaffected as I was. It is hard to
maintain a legitimate participatory Democracy with that level of
disaffection and confusion. <br>
</p>
<p>The Wrong (formerly Right) Wing in the US seems nearly dead-set
on leveraging this to the extreme. In hindsight, the rhetoric of
the Wrong Wing has been playing at this for my entire adult life,
but it is acutely worse this past 1-5 years. From Trump's
embrace of nearly every right wing dictator he could find to
Tucker Carlson in Hungary this week, it seems to be happening
entirely in plain sight!</p>
<p>- Steve<br>
</p>
<p><br>
</p>
<div>On 8/8/21 2:09 PM, Jochen Fromm wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote type="cite">
<div dir="auto">Good example. Like the USA South Africa was a
former British colony. And both countries had to struggle with
racism in the past. But the development of democracy was
different. The rise and fall of democracy is an interesting
topic</div>
<div dir="auto"><a href="https://press.princeton.edu/books/hardcover/9780691177465/the-decline-and-rise-of-democracy" target="_blank">https://press.princeton.edu/books/hardcover/9780691177465/the-decline-and-rise-of-democracy</a></div>
<div dir="auto"><br>
</div>
<div dir="auto">I wonder what the essential factor is: do immoral
presidents cause the collapse of democracy in a country by
undermining democratic institutions or is it the other way
round: the economy (and therefore the country) is already broken
and institutions are weak, which enables immoral authoritarian
rulers to grab power? Or a combination of both? </div>
<div dir="auto"><br>
</div>
<div dir="auto">-J.</div>
<div dir="auto"><br>
</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div dir="auto" style="font-size:100%;color:rgb(0,0,0)" align="left">
<div>-------- Original message --------</div>
<div>From: Pieter Steenekamp <a href="mailto:pieters@randcontrols.co.za" target="_blank"><pieters@randcontrols.co.za></a>
</div>
<div>Date: 8/8/21 20:26 (GMT+01:00) </div>
<div>To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
<a href="mailto:friam@redfish.com" target="_blank"><friam@redfish.com></a> </div>
<div>Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Moral collapse and state failure </div>
<div><br>
</div>
</div>
<div dir="ltr">Well, I'm from South Africa, and we have been close
to moral collapse and IMO that could have led to our state
failing.<br>
<br>
If you ask ten South Africans you'll get maybe twenty opinions,
below is just my very brief view of what has been and what is
happening in South Africa.<br>
<br>
South Africa became democratic in 1994 with Nelson Mandela the
president. With him at the helm we had the moral high ground.
His immediate successor Thabo Mbeki also did well. But between
2009 and 2017 Jacob Zuma was our president. He looted very
seriously from the state and unfortunately under him many people
in all state organisations started to also loot. The corruption
became very deep. He is in jail now.<br>
<br>
We now have Cyril Ramaphosa as president and it's anybody's
guess, but at least I'm very confident that Cyril is leading us
again towards the moral high ground and away from state
failure. <br>
<br>
</div>
<br>
<div class="gmail_quote">
<div class="gmail_attr" dir="ltr">On Sun, 8 Aug 2021 at 19:18,
Jochen Fromm <<a href="mailto:jofr@cas-group.net" target="_blank">jofr@cas-group.net</a>> wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex" class="gmail_quote">
<div dir="auto">
<div dir="auto">This paper from last year argues that moral
collapse and state failure are linked. Would you agree?</div>
<div dir="auto"><a href="https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpos.2020.568704/full" target="_blank">https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpos.2020.568704/full</a></div>
<div dir="auto"><br>
</div>
<div dir="auto">-J.</div>
<div dir="auto"><br>
</div>
<div dir="auto"><br>
</div>
</div>
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