What's
Wrong With US Democracy?
Donald
Trump's Presidential candidacy has been hilarious, but it's become
quite terrifying. The Presumptive Nominee of the Republican Party for
the Presidency of the United States of America, Donald Trump has
attacked American Veterans, Mexican Americans, Mexicans and Mexico in
general, Chinese businesses and lately Muslim Americans.
Sadly
all this is quite predictable. During difficult economic times
democracies usually turn to the radical far right for solutions. Of
course this has a very low success rate.
Many
of you I'm sure will be thinking that actually things are actually
not that bad in the USA right now, and you have the figures to prove
it. Lets go through them:
The
unemployment rate is now at 5%. That's quite low and down from a high
of 10% in October 2009. So why are we seeing this kind of political
instability in the land of the free?
One
factor is income inequality. I believe income inequality is the
number one driver of political instability in the USA. Income
inequality is a good and necessary part of the capitalist system.
However when wages in real terms have not risen since 1975, but
productivity has risen exponentially we are talking about the slow
undermining of the American middle class. The non partisan Pew
Research Center have studied this issue for a long time.
The
implications are bleak. In a world where your salary remains stagnant
in buying power, but productivity increases exponentially, I think we
need to ask where all the money is going. How is it that 40 year old
mothers and fathers are forced to work in the fast food industry,
where wages are eye-wateringly low and impossible to live on. How is
it that full time Walmart employees cost the Government $6.2 Billion
in food stamps, Medicaid and Public Housing?
The
answer is of course that all the money has risen to the top. That the
masters of the universe have never had it so good, while the ordinary
people struggle to put food on the table. Indeed one study has rated
America's inequality as higher than Ancient Rome.
My
next question to ask, what was the outcome of the high inequality in
the Roman times. The answer might sound depressingly familiar. The
Senate became highly polarized between a political party of capital,
the Optimates and a party of the common man, the Populares. (Not that
they were parties in the modern sense of the word.)
The
workings of the Government slowly ground to a halt as the constipated
Senate failed to do it's job and instead focused merely on members
careers and power. The Optimates rigged elections, and had reformers ultimately put to death to maintain the unequal status quo.
Such
legislative deadlock was ultimately unsustainable and ancient Rome
fell into a period of turmoil known as the social war. This was a
bloody civil war that set the stage for Julius Caesar to rise to
power in his own civil war. The Roman Republic did not survive Julius
Caesar.
Am
I saying that the USA is going the way of the Roman Republic. Well
no. Not yet. And it doesnt have to. However I would say that the
American electoral system needs a great deal of reform to avoid the
historical pitfalls of a great power with a massive and restless
underclass.
It's
very clear that the US Congress like the Roman Senate before it works
for no-one but it's members and the mega rich. Here is what I
propose:
A
Non-Partisan Electoral Commission.
Most
advanced democracies have one of these. They are impartial and draw
the districts for the lower house. The reason that most of the US
House of Representatives members are so batshit crazy is that they do
not fear the voters. Both Republican and Democratic Party interests
are served to have as few as possible seats in actual doubt. That way
they don't have to spend money on the race and can keep it for the
Presidential and Senate Elections. This is why although Barack Obama
won the 2012 election by a large majority by popular vote, in the
House of Representatives the Republicans were able to maintain power.
In effect most candidates are more afraid of the Primary elections in
their own party than that of the general election by the population
at large. Of course the people voting in the primarys are mostly the
most devoted and extreme. which is why we see government of the
people, by the extremists, for the extremists.
This
obviously won't remove the money from US politics, but maybe it won't
have to. We've seen that massive amounts of money spent by the Koch
Brothers and Sheldon Addleston have spectacularly failed to move the
electorate one iota. In fact the Citizens United decision of the
Supreme Court has more successful at moving the electorate to the left
than towards mainstream conservative ideas.
A
political body that doesn't fear it's electorate won't respond to the
needs of the people. The US district boundaries are broken due to a
corrupt and craven system controlled by the two parties for their own
needs, not the needs of the people.
A
legislative body elected to serve the needs of the people, not the
mega-rich would actually respond to the people on the street. The
ones actually hurting. Not the uber-rich, but the millions left
behind in a globalizing world.
Donald
Trump is the inevitable manifestation of the fear and anger of the
people. A people who have been ignored for too long by a political
system who doesn't understand them, and doesn't have the time or will
listen to them.
I
think Trump will actually lose this election. But don't for a moment
think that the issues he's tapping in to will magically solve
themselves. Things are going well in the economy but people are still
angry. They will remain angry until their issues are addressed.
I'm
not actually that afraid of Trump. He's an idiot. A second rate
narcissist-megalomaniac who has the gift of the gab. What terrifies
me is the next Trump. I believe a highly intelligent man (or woman)
is watching the freak show that is the 2016 Presidential election
with great interest. He is learning from Trump how to manipulate the
fear of the average American. He's the one I fear. The megolamaniacal
despot who is absorbing the lessons of 2016 and will apply them in
2020 or 2024.
The
way to prevent it is to reform Politics. Now. Don't wait, because we
don't have the time.
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