as seen on tv
Senator
Photo above - former president Bush, caricatured by democrats as a chimp
Not shown - similar caricatures of Obama by racists
Disclaimer – I'm okay with "living in the US of A" (song lyric). But not completely thrilled. That said, I tried to come up with a test that could help me to determine if a nation is in a political death spiral . . .
Something here to trigger everyone, no doubt . . . score your results at the bottom . . .
- You invade your next-door neighbor to “liberate” it”. But your troops instead begin looting tractors and other farm equipment as soon as they cross the border.
- Your leader regularly goes to Moscow or Beijing for “consultations” and “aid discussions.”
- Elections are chaotic; examples: troops at the polling places, long lines, confusion as to dates/places, and incessant charges of voting irregularities
- Your leader has several “body doubles” who substitute for him in remote regions/provinces.
- Your former head of state is on trial for paying money to a woman of ill repute. While your current leader's son has fathered a child out of wedlock with one.
- Social media shows a government building being burned to the ground by an angry mob. But there is no subsequent discussion of arrests . . .
- Disfavored religions are mainly depicted in your nation's films and TV as murderers, rapists, and child molesters.
- Your government urges citizens to avoid specific foreign owned social media platforms, and threatens to ban them.
- It is a crime (resulting in imprisonment) to depict your nation's head of state as a famous cartoon character, a simian, gay, or hilariously short.
- Your nation has offshore (or remote interior) “dark prisons” for confining men captured in battle, kidnapped from their homelands, or "needing re-education".
- Zero - either you're lying, or a state sponsored troll.
- 1-3 - you live in civilized Europe. And the disenfranchised are only a rumor wrapped in an enigma to you.
- 4-7 - the majority of countries. You're not the worst, not the best. You hate the idea of the opposing party having media access and any role in government.
- 8-10 - flee to another nation. But please - not to the USA. People here are already sleeping on the streets. Hey - should that have been one of the indicators of impending political collapse?