>Even the US is experiencing unprecedented attacks from its own president on the country’s (((media, courts,))) and law-enforcement institutions.
Not even close. FDR did far worse, Lincoln too not including his suspension and gerrymandering, so did Jackson and many others, these same precedents in particular Lincoln's was the ground basis for Bush's and Obama's attorneys to do all the unconstitutional and illegal things they did. It's more surprising that Donald Trump is not doing more with all the precedent in existence but of course he's still on his first term or only a year into his first term so he might do so in the final years.
Democracies are reactionary, they fell once already for the same reasons and history repeats itself. It seems the Oracle of Delphi was right that nobody was wiser than Socrates, he and Plato and Aristotle warned all about the dangers of democracy and its inevitable failure. He turned out to be right and just as the Roman Republic fell so too will the American and all Republican Democracies of the world.
That is not to say I do not respect Voltaire, some of my favourite quotes of his
"Why are the Jews hated? It is the inevitable result of their laws; they either have to conquer everybody or be hated by the whole human race…"
"The Jewish nation dares to display an irreconcilable hatred toward all nations, and revolts against all masters; always superstitious, always greedy for the well-being enjoyed by others, always barbarous - cringing in misfortune and insolent in prosperity." (Essai sur le Moeurs)
"You seem to me to be the maddest of the lot. The Kaffirs, the Hottentots, and the Negroes of Guinea are much more reasonable and more honest people than your ancestors, the Jews. You have surpassed all nations in impertinent fables in bad conduct and in barbarism. You deserve to be punished, for this is your destiny." (From a letter to a Jew who had written to him, complaining of his 'anti-Semitism.' Examen des Quelques Objections…dans L'Essai sur le Moeurs.)
"You will only find in the Jews an ignorant and barbarous people, who for a long time have joined the most sordid avarice to the most detestable superstition and to the most invincible hatred of all peoples which tolerate and enrich them." ("Juif," Dictionnaire Philosophique)
"I know that there are some Jews in the English colonies. These Marranos go wherever there is money to be made…But whether these circumcised who sell old clothes claim that they are of the tribe of Naphtali or Issachar is not of the slightest importance. They are, simply, the biggest scoundrels who have ever dirtied the face of the earth." (Letter to Jean-Baptiste Nicolas de Lisle de Sales, December 15, 1773. Correspondance. 86:166)
"They are, all of them, born with raging fanaticism in their hearts, just as the Bretons and the Germans are born with blond hair. I would not be in the least bit surprised if these people would not some day become deadly to the human race." (Lettres de Memmius a Ciceron, 1771)
It is a serious question among them whether the Africans are descended from monkeys or whether the monkeys come from them. Our wise men have said that man was created in the image of God. Now here is a lovely image of the Divine Maker: a flat and black nose with little or hardly any intelligence.
-Voltaire