@fgregg Thanks so much for reviewing this! Yes, I do think I could have worked to make that case a bit more. I own up to that failure a little in the intro. And there's some on "play" at the end of chapter 3.
I do think democracy can be joyful sometimes, but I don't think it needs to be all the time. A recent project of mine has been to argue for right-sizing the expectations it places on us.