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Comment by RcouF1uZ4gsC | Hacker News Reader

>Democratic Republic of the Congo has GDP per capita below 1000 USD per year and is one of the least developed countries in the world -- affected by unfortunate tropical diseases and civil war. (2) Republic of the Congo

Reminds me of the heuristic, the more modifiers a country's name has, the more likely it is to have economic or political issues. See for example, Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea vs Republic of Korea.

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I mean it’s really down to the number of times “people” is in the name.

You could rewrite “The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea” in English to “The People’s Rule People’s Concern of the People of Korea”. Like any good lie, repetition doesn’t make it more true, and looks desperate.

My rule of thumb:

One use indicates a dark past the people would like to get away from with citizens, not subjects; two an authoritarian regime the people are subjects of and told they are citizens; three an authoritarian regime without any hope of redemption and the people are property of.

So what you're saying is we should change the name of The United States of America to something with only one word?

Just like the name "Liberia" and "Democratic Republic of" hint that they have no liberty and democracy respectively, the "united states" prefix hint that the states in america aren't that united (and european union isn't really a union). I remember, this was a joke from the "warlord" movie with Cage.

The Holy Roman Empire is neither Holy, nor Roman, nor an Empire - Voltaire.

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