American politics

Why does American politics matter so much? Why do people around the world hang on the news of US elections and personalities with more interest than they show for those of their own country?

The basic reason is that in the absence of a genuine global governance system (like the UN is supposed to be) global leadership falls by default to the world’s biggest economic and military power. This is, and will remain for a couple of decades at least, the United States.

So it really does matter who the US President is and who the congresspeople and senators are. Recently perhaps the most inept president in US history presided. He was replaced by the oldest incoming president in history who is showing definite signs of dementia. Is this the best the greatest nation on earth can do?

The outgoing president, despite his manifest failure as both an American and global leader – indeed, he did not seem to understand his responsibilities as global leader at all – got over 72 million votes in the 2020 election. What were these people thinking?

I suggest that there are basically two reasons why people voted for Donald Trump. One reason was utterly shameful; the other was quite reasonable.

The bad reason was that Trump allowed Americans to vent their worst sentiments, most notably racism, sexism and militaristic patriotism  These are the knee jerk responses of uneducated people with little life experience who feel aggrieved about how their own lives are going.

With his whole ‘Make America Great Again’ shtick Trump promised he would return America to the 1950s when it clearly dominated the world. In those days racism was quite open, as was sexism. The US military, fresh from winning the greatest war in history (with the unacknowledged help of a few other nations, like Russia, Britain and China) was unquestioned, pursuing a madcap ambition to destroy Communism or the world. The economy was driven by huge military expenditure.The President for much of the decade was an-ex four star general, who warned about the rising  power of the ‘military-industrial complex’ in his final speech.

The corporate sector, meanwhile, bloated on wartime profits and unfettered by any real regulation on things like environmental costs, was taking over the whole country, a process led by mass advertising and abetted by tame unions. The mass media, including movies and television, lauded American power and the American way of life.

The 1950s was a time of unprecedented material wealth – huge cars and glistening white goods – and absolute socio-cultural stagnation. Life lacked all meaning except for reflexive   patriotism, gross materialism and petrified religiosity. All the while everyone lived in terror that World War Three would end it all. No wonder the children of this decade rebelled in the 1960s.

Nostalgia is a powerful thing, but to actually want to go back to those not so good old days is a sign of failure.

The other main reason why so many Americans voted for Trump is the fear that they are losing out. Basically, they were protesting the rise of new global civilisation that has no time for individualism of any kind. It consists of globalisation, big government, corporate control, and runaway technology. No wonder they are afraid of this.

But of course, while Trump sometimes spoke against these things, he was really a part of them and never intended to counter them. He was a multimillionaire, he was a creature of the mass media, and when he ran for president he became a denizen of the Washington swamp.

For America, and the world, to move on it must confront the existential threats of environmental collapse, hi-tech arms race and runaway digital technology. It must confront the corruption of government and public life generally, it must confront the corrupt and myopic mass media, and it must confront the unfettered structural power of corporations “too big to fail”.

Perhaps as important as anything, it must regain a sense of meaning, of trust, and respect the rights of all to live according to their own inclinations, as long as they do not harm others

With such a close vote, Trump supporters will likely continue their ructions, and President Biden, and likely care-taker President Harris, will be sorely tested to hold the country together. They can only do this by bringing those who voted for Trump back into a national debate about where the country is going.

Americais the greatest nation on Earth, its creation, so tested by the Civil War, was one of the most extraordinary events in world history. For the first time human beings attempted to work out their own fate without reference to a divine being, which started a whole trend that eventually gave us all a chance to live a just and peaceful life. This was never going to happen while kings and aristocracies ruled the world. A stable America remains essential to global efforts to overcome global warming, end the nuclear arms race, and control technological advancement, just to begin with.

It is the American people who must grasp the nettle, let slip their selfish ideas and prejudices, and elect genuinely capable leaders of whatever gender, race and creed. Their country is now dominated by huge institutions who think they own everything and are increasingly unwilling or unable to provide adequate basic services like health and education. Americans must claim their country back, for themselves and for the rest of the world.

Democracy in the age of corporate money and ubiquitous technology is a tricky prospect, but there are good signs in the rise of women in politics and the growing presence of the young in the streets. The whole world needs these trends to continue to transform politics, to wash out the staid vested interests and wash away the false hope of neo-fascism.