The early nod to Agora Institute mission of “building stronger global democracy” Followed by bemoaning USAID cuts makes me wonder if the author is deliberately missing one of the most glaring examples of this.
This is all debatably valid, except for the fact that the entrenched system produced massive fraud, money laundering, wagging-the-dog and worst of all, a decade of domestic propaganda and anti-democratic schemes in an attempt to protect the machine from widespread exposure.
On the contrary ... we LOVE the perennial underdog who stays in the fight. Like the British, once you start winning consistently you quickly earn our contempt.
Out of respect for your effort to keep it civil, I'll answer some of that:
I'm a liberal as defined up until 2012 or so.
Never been socially conservative at all. I'm not a libertarian, as I do support some social safety nets. That being the case, I am strongly against open borders and unchecked fraud.
You're actually right about a lot of the rest (minus the snark.)
If you don't recognize the patterns of incuriosity, groupthink and misguided confidence that have permeated western society in the last ten years, nothing I say here is going to enlighten you.