Rascals! Skunks!

Scoundlers! Rascals!

Rascals, thieves!

Cute little rascals.

Those children are rascals

Hurry up, damn rascals!

We were rascals, weren't we?

Little rascals, I finally caught you!

What are you doing? Rascals! What are you doing?

You miserable rascals! You haven't heard the last of this!

After we've fired on the Yankee rascals at Fort Sumter, we've got to fight!

Democracies, of course, allow people to use their reason to make choices based on the evidence of their own eyes. When you don t like a government, you can turn the rascals out without overthrowing the whole system.

But, whatever the failures of particular British legislators, the issues go further than merely allowing voters to throw the rascals out. There is also a question of how successful leadership is taught and learned in a democracy.

Our national politicians, increasingly powerless to cope with serious crises, are suspected, often with good reason, of simply looking after their own interests. All we can do is vote the rascals out, sometimes by voting for candidates whom we would not take seriously in more normal times.

In a democracy like India s, the politically well connected benefit from skewed growth, thus increasing the resentment of those left behind. The opportunity to throw the rascals out in each election cycle helps to let off some steam, but it does not resolve the problems that are generating it.

While that may change, the credit for social peace must go to institutions such as elections ( throwing the rascals out is a non violent way to vent popular anger), responsive democratic legislatures, and effective judiciaries. All of these institutions have successfully mediated political conflict during a time of great adversity in advanced countries.