Depending on how low you put your bar for what passes for "democracy", I would very much disagree. Countries like Nazi Germany, USSR, North Korea etc all had/have elections. Of course, you can argue that this does not qualify for a democracy, but then one can argue that neither did the "bad" monarchies in history qualify for proper "monarchies".
To me democracy is also the failed form of it, you cannot just pretend that democracy is that part which you like. And also, you have to consider what better things it prevents us from having. Also, you cannot compare things out of their historical context. Of course democracy is not very bad when we have food and iphones, but you don't have to look very far (North Korea, Venezuela, Africa - you will be surprised how "good" democracy some of these countries have, yet they do not prosper) to see what happens when we don't have them.
One good book on the topic is "Democracy: The God That Failed" by Hans-Hermann Hoppe. It goes into massive amount of details and is not a pleasant read. Still, probably the best book in existence, for someone to understand what is wrong with our world.
If you argue North Korea to be a democracy, that is a whole different vocabulary, not changing any bar. In that case you are correct I guess.
On the contrary I think Hoppes criticism falls apart at empirical evidence like the cases you mentioned and his ideas of freedom will inevitably result in feudalism, not even a monarchy because the ruler would lack legitimacy and would face constant challenges. Monarchs as government can only exist if constituents can live completely removed from state influence. But that isn't possible in the world of today.
Elections != democracy. In particular, elections where only one party can run do not make a democracy. Elections where only one party can campaign do not make a democracy. And elections where only one party can win (because of who counts the votes) do not make a democracy.
"Having an election" does not make it a democracy. The people choose who rules makes it a democracy.
Yeah, it's much better when one party pretends to be 2 parties and practically nothing changes regardless if you choose one or the other. I am sure people in the US choose who rules - that's a REAL democracy.
