I don’t like changing words for political ends and I see this a a attempt of the left to change a term for their benefit.
In short I am anti- PC speak, and I see this PC speak - so I oppose it on that ground.
So you’d rather stick to an archaic, narrow definition of the word. Well, that is very conservative of you. I also congratulate you on your ability to define anything you oppose as being “PC.” Well done. :rolleyes:
However, in your attempt to eradicate political correctness, you may have to look at the conservative end of the political spectrum if you wish to arrest the notion that the United States is a democracy
-George W. Bush (from here.)
Oh, Dubya, you PC thug! You liberal shill! You tool of the communists!
OK, what benefit does the left get from describing the USA as a democracy? Is it solely to encourage people to vote Democrat, or do they have other motives?
Again, what would a declaration that the USA isn’t a democracy enable you to do, or prevent the left from doing?
In reality I suspect not much expect confusing many people who won’t know what one means when one uses the term.
Perhaps on a subconscience level, but I think that it is more due to their sense of ‘fairness’ that is behind the motivation.
As pointed out above, it prevents changing the language in a way that adds confusion. I also find people use that when they want to do something that a (true) democracy would allow, but a republic may not, so by pointing this out it helps gound them into reality.
Going further on the PC line, I think is has gone so far that we have a reached a 2nd generation, where people actually think the US is a democracy, and that term defines what we have.
On a side note, one version of Civilization (ironically a PC game)had Democracy represented by the statue of liberty, and Republic by some old Greek thing. Is it now correct that ancient Greece had a Republic, you know where the citizens voted directly for laws?
This thread is already sufficiently acrimonious without introducing uninformed hostility.
It has already been pointed out (by the language purists, no less) that references to the U.S. as a democracy are well over 50 years old. (Of course, it was then attributed to “the press,” an entity that was fully populated by folks on “the right” as well as “the left” throughout the period from 1920 through 1950–(elements of) “the press” were quite happy to support the Palmer Raids, the rise of Mussolini, then Hitler, Franco’s efforts in Spain, union busting, HUAC, and Joe McCarthy throughout that period.) Unless you have a citation demonstrating that this change in language was a deliberate effort undertaken by “the left” over thirty years prior to the concept of “political correctness,” it would be appropriate to leave such odd claims outside this thread.
- What “old Greek thing” was portrayed?
- Why are you claiming that a Republic means citizens voting directly for laws? (And I hope you are aware that Athens had a very limited franchise and was not the whole of Greece if you actually were referring to Democracy.)
- How does some illustration on a game indicate anything more than the whim of some artist connected to display and sales rather than actual political philosophy?
The language will change, has changed, is changing no matter what we do. We all have to deal with that. Blame whoever said that “We must make the World safe for Democracy” or something that sounded a lot like that, c. 1917.
(Maybe that was part of the problem – it’s not simple to rouse the masses with a battle cry of “Let’s make the world safe for Consitututional Representative-Participative Responsible Government subject to Rule of Law!” 
)
Because these fringe political groups don’t want to admit that they’re fringe political groups. These groups have to explain why their pet program - whether it’s rounding up all the Jews or eliminating all private property - isn’t gaining widespread support and taking effect throughout the country. They reject the obvious answer - because their political ideas are nuts - and come up with an alternate explanation: the people support their ideas and would follow them if they could, but they can’t because we’re a republic not a democracy.
(my paragraph break)
Oddly, I had precisely the opposite opinion. (Although it’s not one to which I’m especially invested.) That is, the people wrongly oppose their ideas, believing the US to be a democracy, when in fact it is a republic. And properly should be governed by &etc…
The end results are the same - my theory of how the country should be run will work perfectly, except the system is aligned against me, blocking my plan. The excuse works whether the “alignment” is too much democracy (people are stupid sheep and won’t vote in their own best interest) or too much republicanism (the arrogant power structure will never accept my plan, despite the people’s will).
It covers all sins.
Yeah, yeah, they said all those bad things about democracy. Have you considered the possibility they might have been wrong?
Good for him. What’s your point?
When someone gave examples of the UK and Canada, I thought of that. In the UK, we elect MPs who are representatives of their electorate and its the MPs who vote on issues in Parliament that become law. Canada and Switzerland have forms of direct democracy where the populace at large has more direct input into laws that are passed.
Disclaimer; A lot of my own notions of the meaning of democracy and republic come from the manual for Civilization on the PC :o 
Aside from the occasional referendum on major constitutional issues, not really.
I think the “old Greek thing” is in fact an old Roman thing. The Romans pretty much being the original republic, though with a definition very different from any modern one.
We do?
Canada’s system is fundamentally the same as the United Kingdom’s, except that we do it at a provincial level too.
We are a Republic in that we are not a Monarchy.
We are a Democracy in that we get to vote.
That’s basically It. Anything more is commentary.
Thought you did for some reason 
Lets just scrub that and leave it at Switzerland. I’m really not sure why I mentioned Canada :dubious:
As has been sufficiently explained, the confusion about the main question is mere semantics. But since we are playing the quote game, how about this one?
Just John Marshall’s 2¢
Ancient Greece had no national or general government of any kind. From the Trojan Wars to the Roman conquest, it was divided into independent cities, with various constitutional forms. Sparta might be characterized as an “aristocratic republic”; there was a public assembly and elected officials, but the laws (purportedly written by the legendary Lykurgos) were practically unchangeable, and there were two hereditary kings who mainly functioned as war-leaders. In the Athenian democracy – on which many other democracies were modeled, but Athens gets most attention from historians simply because it is the one about which most is known – the citizens did, indeed, vote directly on law and policy decisions. Of course, “citizens” means only free adult males of established Athenian families. There were also women, slaves, and “metics” (resident foreigners, including non-Athenian Greeks), who could not vote. Unlike in the Roman republic, there was no procedure for extending Athenian citizenship to newcomers. At that, political participation in Athens was rather broader than in Sparta. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Athenian_democracy.
Many Greek cities were democratic in form, but in fact ruled by a political strongman or “tyrant” – just like many modern “republics.” The tyrant would sometimes use the title of “archon” (ruler), implicitly a democratic and constitutional one (just as Saddam Hussein styled himself “president”). Except in Sparta, no Greek ruler of the Classical period used the ancient title of “basileus” (king). Athens did have an “archon basileus,” drawn from the city’s ancient royal family, but his authority was limited to religious matters.