By this argument, North Korea is democratic (Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea). Of course what people call themselves does not define their position if they act in opposition to it.

> It is my opinion that the general public has shifted so far to the left in the past 10-15 years

US voters still vote to the right of what they did during the Reagan years. It's not that long ago that Obama would have fit solidly in the Republican party. The idea that the general public in the US has shifted far to the left is just bizarre.

Consider that e.g. Obamas healthcare policies are not far off from policies proposed by Nixon 40 years ago, and that the level of horrified response to any kind of tax rises of Republicans these days would have had them up in arms over people like Reagan (and it's quite funny to see them try to explain away Reagan's various tax rises).

> "standing so far left that even the left looks right"

Except that it's the US that pretty much represents the big aberration in terms of what is considered left and right today. In part because it's in the US what almost everyone else considers their left wing was pretty much crushed from the 20's onwards, back when there were actual socialists running for office on a regular basis. The political centre in US politics slid to the right by virtue of your actual left disintegrating and never recovering, followed by the big democrat/republican switcheroo on civil rights.

Of course, these are all subjective measures, since by the original left/right measure, the split would be bizarre today (the original split was between supporters and opponents of the monarchy in the French national assembly).

> Even I can see the conservative slants on talking points in Fox news.

Meanwhile, most European conservatives would be embarrassed by being compared to the kind of stuff spouted on Fox News. Their talking points are in line with the kind of right wing populists that regularly gets compared to fascists here, even by many on the right.

The 21st century Washington Post is pretty strongly right-leaning, and in 2014 visibly shifted farther to the right, so I'm not sure that says much.