American Politics and Government - Essay Example

By examining and addressing these particular issues, we will be able to gain a much more informed and understanding viewpoint on the subject matter at hand, and as well, we will be able to get a better grasp in regards to the matter of the context of political issues today in general. The aim of this paper is to do all of this, and as well address any key and related issues that exist. This is what will be dissertated in the following. When it comes to the issue of the features of American political culture which are used to help balance democracy and elitism in the United States, there are many different features which are present here, and one of the most major is that of the views of political thinkers and historians such as Alexis de Tocqueville, Samuel Kernell, and Robert Goldwin, for example.

Tocqueville in particular, as he has discussed in detail - particularly in his work Democracy in America - about such issues as the New World, for instance, and about its burgeoning democratic order. Tocqueville was able to do this properly and efficiently by writing of his travels through American in the early 19th century, and by pointing out several times about how he saw democracy as being a sort of equation, one which balanced liberty and equality, concern for the individual as well as that of the community.

Tocqueville points out throughout most of his work Democracy in America that he believes that democracy in America lacks many things, including not only that of the "soundness of judgment which is necessary to select men really deserving of their confidence, but often have not the desire or the inclination to find them out. It cannot be denied that democratic institutions strongly tend to promote the feeling of envy in every human heart, not so much because they afford to everyone the means of rising to the same level with others as because those means perpetually disappoint the persons who employ them" (Tocqueville, 1835).

The issue of democracy possibly being in danger of disappearing in the United States is one of incredible significance and one which although has had many doubts along the way as well, has caused an incredible amount of fear and disparagement as well. One of the biggest explanations as to why democracy is considered as being in danger of disappearing in the United States is due to the fact that the freedom of speech is slowly being 'crushed', and it has been considered that the founding fathers of the United States of America themselves would be genuinely concerned in regards to this matter, and about these recent developments in American democracy, and that surely they being who they are would feel that the United States as a country is absolutely facing a clear and present danger, one which is so serious that it has the potential to be able to completely threaten the future of the American experiment.

It is considered by some that the biggest threat to democracy in America is actually not terrorists, which is what many people seem to automatically