@Lamasutra: Now tell me how much rulers each of those countries had to chose. Mine had 10 last time and it's considered almost a dictatorship by the rest of the world.

@Anonymous: because "europe has a president?" is a nonsense question. Every european country has his own.

@Anonymous: >India + Europe = 1.5 billion people who democraticly choose their president and live in a capitalist demcoracy.

@Anonymous: Just trying to help anon improve his ability to write out a proper thought.

@Anonymous: It was a nonsense question that was following a nonsense statement.

Well, only 2 options and not necessarily the most voted politician win.
It´s doesn't looks like democracy for me...

@Anonymous: He has nothing comparable to the power of the american president. Obama is for America what Berlusconi (sigh) was for Italy, Sarkozy for France and Merkel for Germany.

@Anonymous: We're not all native english speakers, you know...

@Anonymous: So you should be glad you're being offered help.

@Anonymous: grammar nazi

@Anonymous: or real racist?

@Meander_Thralls: I thought everyone that would bother to learn anything knew that we do not live in a direct democracy. As far as I know there are no true democracies... that would be a nightmare in logistics, that's for true.

Having said, plenty of states hold open voting for various laws and statutes. I remember when I was a senior in high school the state I lived in (Tennessee) had a vote whether or not to legalize gay marriage on the ballot. It did not pass.

@TrueBlue: in Italy we've something called "food". Never heard about it? It's kinda cool.

@urial: Referendums are up or down votes. Your body of representatives still decides on the text, and if it gets to a referendum, it means the representatives didn't want to vote on the matter directly themselves. It's a form of passing the buck, and it is a small percentage of all law that is passed. You certainly can argue it is a form of democracy, just not much of one and certainly not characteristic of the system as a whole.

@urial: Your state hasn't allow gays to marriage? That's very undemocratic of your people to vote no to this law!

@Anonymous: ... Okay...

@Anonymous: From the OED: "Government by the people; that form of government in which the sovereign power resides in the people as a whole, and is exercised either directly by them (as in the small republics of antiquity) or by officers elected by them. In mod. use often more vaguely denoting a social state in which all have equal rights, without hereditary or arbitrary differences of rank or privilege."

The first part of the definition was in common use back to 1531. The second part (after the "or") of the definition doesn't come into play until 1836. Interestingly, this is around the same time people started pushing for direct democratic elections of U.S. senators, so perhaps people were trying to indicate a democratic tendency that gave rise to terms like "representative democracy". And the modern usage further bastardizes the word so it can mean, more or less, anything you want it to mean.

"You're trying to limit the meaning of 'democracy' to 'a system of government where voters can vote on every law.' This is absolutely false, this is not the meaning of democracy, and I can't believe people fall for this."

Democracy means everything before the "or". If you want to include those things after the or, then you start getting into weird ground, e.g., corporations can be called democracies because they have democratically elected officers (understanding that stockholders are "the people"), installing dictators with rigged elections is "spreading democracy", or that the U.S. of A is a democracy, etc.

But, I think that's the point. People want to delude themselves, and sloppy, vague use of language is an excellent way to do it. So, carry on, just try not to experience too much butthurt when people pop your bubble of delusion.