"All over the world (except in the UK), voters are choosing discipline over messiness, authoritarianism over democracy." I have to disagree with this. The UK did deliver a decisive and welcome blow to Sunak's Conservatives. However, Sunak was no authoritarian personality, by any stretch.

More to the point, democracy has pulled off some surprising victories. Take a look at my analysis of India, for example (davidsalzillo.substack.com/p/imagining-…). Modi tried to use the trappings of strongman government (political prosecutions, etc.) to secure his party a historic victory, but his BJP actually ended up losing ground in what were once considered his greatest strongholds.

Modi's party was not the only one to vastly underperform expectations and exit polls. Europe's far-right generally underperformed public polling as well (see hopiumchronicles.com/p/european-right-u…). France was the exception because of Macron's ill-advised decision to call snap elections without any heads-up to anyone IN HIS OWN PARTY. It was a monumentally stupid decision from a man who maintained an unpopular CENTRIST agenda. Think back to his efforts to raise the retirement age in France.

If there is any clear lesson we can take from 2024, it's that a politician should think twice before calling snap elections like Macron and Sunak did.