But (too much of) America will still be Trump country — with all the political strife and civil unrest that portends.
As of this writing, Joe Biden leads Donald Trump in the race for 270 Electoral College votes 238 to 213. But outstanding mail-in ballots in “uncalled states” favor Biden – based not on speculation but on raw numbers.
Unfortunately, Trump is doing exactly what he threatened to do, namely declaring victory and calling for the counting of those outstanding ballots to stop. Of course, no matter his dictatorial declaration of himself as the winner, all votes will be counted. Not least because even his judicial appointees have already rebuked the legal challenges he’s now threatening to refile. And this includes rulings by the Supreme Court.
But this suspended animation could’ve been avoided if Democratic leaders had heeded the plea I made in “PSA: Vote Early in Person to Prevent Trump Throwing a Monkey Wrench in Biden’s Win,” on August 6, and again in “Please, Forget Mail-in Ballots. Vote Early In Person!” on October 24. If they had, the votes of millions of (predominantly Black) voters – particularly in Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania – would have already been counted. Yet it is perversely fitting that this racist president is attempting to throw out their votes.
I picked Biden to win “early and easily.” I was wrong. Nonetheless, Biden will eventually win this presidential election. But the Republican members of Trump’s cult performed so well that Trumpism will live on, flailing across the political landscape like a chicken with its head cut off.
By the same token, a President Biden with a Republican-controlled Senate will be little more than a figure head; you know, like the queen of England with a Parliament over which she wields little to no influence. Because down-ballot results mean that Trump will continue to control every Republican member of Congress, functioning like a shadow president. Except that, as it was with so many of his high crimes and misdemeanors, he’ll be doing so in broad daylight (well, on Twitter at any rate).
Incidentally, not so long ago, everyone had to kiss talk-show host Rush Limbaugh’s big fat ass as baptism for membership, and to remain in good standing, in the Republican Party. Now everyone has to kiss not only Trump’s big fat ass but his brass ring too. Indeed, reports are that he is already planning to launch a Cable-TV station to supplant Fox News as the party’s propaganda machine. This, as soon as Biden kicks him out of the White House – by noon on January 20, 2021.
But truth be told, what the presidential elections of 2016 and 2020 say about America has truly shaken my faith in American democracy. And, as I’ve stated elsewhere, it will take New York state prosecutors trying and convicting Trump – on everything from tax evasion to sexual assault – to restore any measure of that faith. Because, unless they do so, Trump will be able to marshal forces to undermine Biden’s presidency 100 times more than Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell did so infamously to undermine Obama’s.
Whatever the case, the point is that America today is a country as divided against itself as it was in the years before the Civil War. Its enemies need only stand by and watch the fall. Significantly, those enemies are nominally communist countries. Because they are poised to reap the fulfillment of Karl Marx’s maxim about capitalist countries containing the seeds of their own destruction.
But think about this folks, nearly half of the American people are perfectly happy with a plainly mendacious, narcissistic, sexist, heartless, xenophobic, incompetent, reckless, homophobic, racist, covid-denying con man as president. (Otherwise, I’m sure he’s a nice guy.) And, even if they fail to re-elect him, they seem hell-bent on injecting his dystopian values in the American DNA – the welfare of the country, to say nothing of the offense to their fellow Americans, be damned.
So much for the restoration of normalcy hoped for. It’s give me tribalism, or give me death!
Accordingly, it behooves the leader of Germany or France (or both – as leaders of Europe) to fill this breach to become the leader of the free world for the foreseeable future that American presidents have been since World War II. As it happens, I presaged and hailed this prospect in “France’s Macron: NATO Is Dying; Germany’s Merkel: Don’t Be So Quick to Surrender.” November 8, 2017.
It includes this prescient quote about German Chancellor Angela Merkel:
Speaking at a beer hall rally in Munich on Sunday, Merkel suggested that the era when Europe could rely on the United States may be coming to an end. …
‘I experienced that in the last a few days, and therefore I can only say that we Europeans must really take our fate into our own hands … we have to fight for our own future and destiny as Europeans.’
The dramatic announcement came after contentious meetings with Trump, who had used his first official trip to Europe to criticize German trade, scold world leaders about their NATO spending and refuse to commit to the Paris agreement on combating climate change.
(The Washington Post, May 29, 2017)
But God help America.
Related commentaries:
PSA… forget mail-in ballots… Biden will win… American tribalism… Macron, Merkel NATO…
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