The blatant takeover of Ukraine by Russia seems close to reality.  Will this lead to China doing the same to Taiwan?  Donald Trump opened the door to both and Joe Biden and the European Union seem powerless to say don't.  While the Scandinavian countries are united for freedom and democracy, many elective democracies, including the USA, show signs of fraying. The  Democracy Index  shows that we are a FLAWED Democracy. The 2021   Economist Intelligence Unit   Democracy Index   map   Full democracies    9.01–10    8.01–9 Flawed democracies    7.01–8    6.01–7 Hybrid regimes    5.01–6    4.01–5 Authoritarian regimes    3.01–4    2.01–3    0–2.00 The U.S. shows a score of 7.85 and ranks #26, with Norway #1 at 9.75.  Russia is #124 (3.24) and China #148 (2.21).  Afghanistan is #167 (0.32), Myanmar is #166 (1.02) and North Korea is #165 (1.08). The  shift to democracy  is shown here from 1816:   File:Democracy_peace_theory_gif.gif .   Democracy is a political system in which all members

The oldest person in the world today is Kane Tanaka at the age of 118 years.  That's her when 20 in 1923. The USA is more than twice as old, for today we celebrate our 245th birthday.  Mind you, this is not particularly elderly, for the  top six  are: #1  Egypt  8000 years old #2  India  5300 #3  Afghanistan  5000 #4  China 4091 #5  Georgia  3700 #6  Ethiopia  3000  ( their  monarchy  lasted more than 700 hundred years until 1974 when Haile Selassie was overthrown in 1974) the British monarchy is going strong at 1200 years so is the one in  Japan for 2700 years The USA is also not the first democracy.  Five thousand years ago  Mesopotamia  invented written language and had a primitive form of democracy.  Some say that around 3000 years ago  India  actually formed republics which practiced democracy.  Greece had that Athens versus Sparta rivalry 2600 years ago, where the story is that democratic Athens lost to war-like Sparta.  Turns out that  Sparta  might actually have been more d