"It's the end of the world as we know it
and I feel fine"
On Friday the 20th January Donald Trump will be sworn in as the 45th President of the United States. On that day will madness commence.
Choosing Donald Trump as President of the United States of America is bizarre.
Trump has campaigned on an openly racist platform, he's has bragged about sexual harrasment, tax evasion and bankruptcy to name just a few. His connections to the Kremlin were deeply troubleing even before the words "golden shower" were introduced and his refusal to separate his business from the business of the Presidency are reason enough for his claim on the Presidency to be forfeit.
Where did it all go Wrong and who's to blame?
1) William Jefferson Clinton
To blame the husband of Trumps opponent might seem counter intuitive, but Bill Clinton was responsible for the repeal of the Glass-Steagal act.
The Glass-Steagal act of 1933 (devised during the great depression to prevent anything like it happening again) basically told banks they had to make a choice. Either they were an investment bank. Economic gamblers who could take risks to maximse profits, or they were a commercial bank whith whom the public could hold their savings. A bank could not be both.
Bill Clinton signed the repeal of the Glass-Steagal act, leading to the retail banks also becoming investment banks. There is debate about whether this caused the Global Financial Crisis of 2007-2008, but most economists believe repealing Glass-Steagal at least exacerbated the crisis.
2) George W Bush
When Al-Qaeda flew those aircraft into the World Trade Centre and
the Pentagon the world changed.
Future historians will look at September 10 2001 as the very zenith of American power and influence. They will mark September 11 2001 as the beginning of the end of the American hegemony.
The sad thing is that it didnt have to be this way.
The Bush administration was populated by ideologically motivated half wits. Men like Paul Wolfowitz and Donald Rumsfeld.
I hold Bush responsible for two poor decisions.
The first regards the invasion of Afghanistan.Bin Laden's plan was to draw the USA into a protracted war in Afghanistan. It's not for no reason that the country is known as the "graveyard of Empires". Britain and the USSR both suffered humiliating defeats when they brought the great game to Afghanistan. This should have given the Neo-Conservatives pause for thought. Sadly it did not.
The response to 9/11 was to demand Afghanistan turn over Bin Laden. All in all it was quite a reasonable request. The Taliban (in charge of Afghasnistan at the time) agreed. With one caveat. Bin Laden must be tried in an Islamic court. This was rejected out of hand, mostly because Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld et.al were spoiling for a fight.
So a long, bruising, expensive war began in Afghanistan. A war which still continues.
I often wonder if the USA had set up a show trial under the auspices of the UN whether the USA would still be in the dominant position economically it was in 2001.
The second decision was the war in Iraq. The Bush administration chose to wage a second war in Iraq.
After so much blood and treasure was being spent in Afghanistan, the White House chose to start a second war. They claimed Saddam Hussein harboured "Weapons of Mass destruction".
It turns out he didnt. Also Iraq was broken as a nation and may never be put back together. Isis formed out of the ruins of the Sunni faction in Iraq. The war continues in Iraq and has spread to Syria. So I'd call that an unadulterated failure.
3) Alexander Hamilton
Alexander Hamilton was one of the founding fathers of the United States. One of his worst ideas is that a body of learned men should actually vote for the President and not the nation. He regarded the Electoral College as a way to stop mob rule. However it's effect in the 21'st century has been to hinder the democratic process. In the five elections since 2000 only three have been given to the candidate with the highest popular vote. That's a 40% failure rate of the United States Democratic system.
Hamilton wrote that the electoral college was to weed out demagogues and those under the influence of foreign powers.
In truth no electoral college elector in the modern age could vote against their allocated candidate. So we get the situation we had both in 2000 and again in 2016 where the winner of the popular vote loses the electoral college. The electoral college is a failure. It ensured the very outcome it was intended to avoid.
A Perfect Storm
History is always more complex than just what's on the page. there are many more issues, but combining these three issues brings us to January 20 2017.
Clinton laid the foundation of a fundamentally unsound financial system which was unable to deal with the financial shocks of 2007-2008.
Bush bled away blood and treasure in attricional wars which proved both fruitless and useless. Indeed Iraq is far worse than it was on september 10 2001.
Hamilton laid down the undemocratic system which would enable the Demagogue and foreign agent he was afraid of.
The Voter
However purile and uneddifying Trump is, people voted for him by the millions. He may have lost the popular vote, but he won in the states that counted. People are angry. Trump votors (and all Americans) were lied to about going to war, lied to about how safe their financial system was and worried their children were going to have a worse life than their parents.
The Tyranny
Demagogues have always prospered when democracy fails the people. Will Trump inaugurate a tyranny on Friday?
I don't know. But I do know I wouldnt want to be an American to find out.
