A republic or a democracy?
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Historically at MPR, our talk shows shy away from periods where guests argue with each other. Perhaps it's unseemly, or maybe it's the whole Minnesota Nice thing. At times, I think it's refreshing, but I'm from back East.
Today on Midmorning, we were in the middle of a conversation on flip-flopping (I live-blogged it here) when the question of when politicians should vote their principles, and when they should vote what their constituents want, even if it's against their better judgment. This is a version of the "we're not a democracy, we're a republic" argument.
That's when guests Allan Lichtman (political historian at American University) and David Sirota (political reporter and syndicated columnist) got into a fascinating exchange.
I promised to provide audio of the bit earlier today and then forgot. But here it is (Listen). The first voice you hear is Lichtman's.
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