The distinction in such specialized brand of elitism lies merely in its sophistication, not in its essential contempt for the citizenry.
The roles of such mandarins as Lippmann accelerate the regression of democracy. Contrast that with the democratically constructive roles of people (whistleblowers, participants in labor/antiwar/civil rights movement etc.). There is no impossibility theorem proving that people cannot socially organize into functioning democracies. Slavery looked like an inevitability at some point, and certainly Lippmanns in that era were enagaged in theorizing about effective slave-ownership rather than about ways to abolish slavery.
The "farce" becomes more farcical as power keeps getting concentrated more and more into the hands of the elites, a trend that is facilitated in no small ways by the mandarins. And farcically, they do not stop calling it a "democracy" even then.
The reps and bureaucrats are meant to be (public) servants. There can be and should be efforts to effectively organize such roles in bottom-up fashions, and to keep them in line with their stated roles. If the supply water is found to have impurity in it (some large ppm), the next step is to improve it, rather than taking sewage line as its alternative.
The roles of such mandarins as Lippmann accelerate the regression of democracy. Contrast that with the democratically constructive roles of people (whistleblowers, participants in labor/antiwar/civil rights movement etc.). There is no impossibility theorem proving that people cannot socially organize into functioning democracies. Slavery looked like an inevitability at some point, and certainly Lippmanns in that era were enagaged in theorizing about effective slave-ownership rather than about ways to abolish slavery.
The "farce" becomes more farcical as power keeps getting concentrated more and more into the hands of the elites, a trend that is facilitated in no small ways by the mandarins. And farcically, they do not stop calling it a "democracy" even then.
The reps and bureaucrats are meant to be (public) servants. There can be and should be efforts to effectively organize such roles in bottom-up fashions, and to keep them in line with their stated roles. If the supply water is found to have impurity in it (some large ppm), the next step is to improve it, rather than taking sewage line as its alternative.