As said by many, even by Donald Trump himself, the
next presidential election in the United States is of historical importance,
even world historical.
The world continues to behave roughly as I and others
have predicted. So why do I keep complaining? As I said in an earlier general
prologue to this blog: through internal and external chaos the world is moving
towards global dictatorships under emperor-like figures. The goal must be to
reduce the resulting and accompanying suffering and the oppression as much as
possible. Accordingly the national and international conflicts must be kept
at a minimum.
Of course this is my personal opinion. You may disagree
with my opinions and instead embrace the new world (dis)order and regard it as
a welcome liberation from old outdated rules and habits. You may also disagree
when I express more specific opinions on concrete actions by and conflicts
between the powers of the world.
Also a couple of my interpretations of events may be
disputed. BUT the overall theoretical framework: that each of the big
civilizations has its own distinct character, but that they develop along
parallel courses, just displaced in time, this framework cannot be
questioned. To mention a few examples, by now you must either be blind or in
denial or simply lack historical knowledge if you don’t see the striking
similarities between the Warring States period in Old China, Hellenism, the
first centuries of the Abbasid caliphate, the Chinese Song Dynasty and our
present modernity of the Western civilization (1). Or more specifically the
ominous similarity between the present United States and Rome in the last
century of the Republic.
Careful use of such parallel developments can lead to
predictions of the coming developments in our civilization, at least if we
repeat the errors of our predecessor civilizations. Unfortunately it seems as
if we do. But as often said, even though the broad path of development by now
seems predetermined, we can still affect how the exact course will be. And that
is why events like the presidential election in a powerful nation matter.
Right now it looks as if leaders all over the world
are splitting their countries through polarization. They are increasing
tensions between societal groups and between nations, and they are
strengthening their personal power through a systematic destruction of
democracy.
As said in earlier posts, a certain strengthening of
executive powers can be a remedy against the chaotic results of the political
decline. But in many cases it looks more as if it happens to satisfy personal greed
for power. And when the strengthened executive is itself a part of only one of
the sides in a polarized country and even increases the polarizations, the
tensions can become dangerous. Representing only one part of the nation and
nullifying the influence of the other can only lead to extreme bitterness and
revolutionary upheavals.
A good current example is the effective seizure of the
US Supreme Court by conservatives. Obviously this is an attempt to prevent
that the other side of the polarized nation will ever get their policies
enacted even if they win elections. A such seizure will only increase tensions
further. The breakdown of the American Constitution moves closer.
Of course not only the United States is characterized
by the political decline. Many other countries can be mentioned. Turkey,
Hungary, Poland, India, the UK, Brazil just to take some prominent examples.
That this decline would come was easy to predict when
one looks at historical comparisons, not least the mentioned parallels between
the Roman Republic in its last century and the present United States. But
also without such historical knowledge the results of present policies in the
United States can be predicted using simple extrapolating common sense. It is
certainly not rocket science!
It is important to underline that this discussion is
not about praising one wing in the United States and criticizing the other for
their views on politics per se. It is not about politics, but about the modus agendi.
For the time being it is clear that the Republicans are leading on the track
towards the political decline, but it could instead have been the Democrats or
both parties in parallel.
This asymmetry between the parties adds a dimension to
the political polarization in America. The polarity is left-right yes, and
because of radicalization, this divide is already more extreme than
normal. BUT the polarization is also along the dimension between mature
modernity, where the Democratic Party still is situated, and the declined
modernity, where the Republicans have arrived.
By their own will and aided by the leadership of
Donald Trump the GOP is moving as an express train further into the decline,
further than necessary historically seen. With a time lag the Democrats can be pulled
in the same direction, not least through undemocratic attempts at extending
conservative control using nominations to the Supreme Court or even limiting
voting or counting in elections. Bitterness on the other side will
radicalize the Democrats, who in turn will resort to similar means.
Thus the historical importance of the US presidential
election on the national level is that it can either limit or continue the
trend of the last four years, a trend of adding to the general decline. Under
Trump and the GOP we can talk of a excess decline. An excess of downward
movement, which was not necessary.
Thus the choice between Trump and Biden
is the choice between two courses of development. Four more years
under Donald Trump will result in the decline being deeper and lasting longer.
Choosing Biden can counteract this development by ending and limiting the
precedence set by the last four years.
You may welcome a liberation from old rules. Just know
that like in Rome 2100 years ago this implies promoting the decline of
politics and the descent of your nation into polarization and conflicts and
chaos. A condition of violent conflicts alternating with periods of
dictatorship is approaching. Partly unconsciously and partly deliberately
leading members of the proud old Republican Party are moving their country more
and more away from democracy.
As said countless times, the United States
will be harmed by such developments. It is no wonder that the weakest of
America’s two rivals supports four more years.
(1) To add a couple of arguments supporting the theory
of parallel developments of civilizations:
- In these and other civilizations we see a ruling
estate starting as feudal knights, developing into high nobility and
then loosing its political importance in the phase of modernity to be
replaced by an estate of the educated and the capitalists.
- It is very telling that the three last-mentioned and
well-documented civilizations (the Orient, China II and the West) roughly seven
centuries before the start of their modernities entered periods of strikingly
similar religious Gnosticism and scholasticism.
