{"id":192380,"date":"2018-07-29T00:00:11","date_gmt":"2018-07-28T18:30:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/?p=192380"},"modified":"2018-08-01T00:55:43","modified_gmt":"2018-07-31T19:25:43","slug":"trumps-antics-quicken-decline-of-the-american-empire-disarray-in-americas-political-universe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/trumps-antics-quicken-decline-of-the-american-empire-disarray-in-americas-political-universe\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump’s Antics Quicken Decline Of The American Empire; Disarray In America\u2019s Political Universe"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Kumar David<\/a> –<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Prof. Kumar David<\/p><\/div>\n

\u201cThose whom the Gods wish to destroy they first drive mad\u201d ~\u00a0Fragment attributed to Euripides<\/i> (c.\u2009480 \u2013 c.\u2009406 BC)<\/i><\/p>\n

\u201cFake News Media badly wants a confrontation with Russia that leads to war\u201d ~\u00a0Donald Trump on Twitter (19 July 2018)<\/i><\/p>\n

President Trump is a chaotic oddball; it is hard to think of a Twentieth Century parallel except the mad monk Rasputin, who was probably insane, drunk most times and suffered mystical delusions. The parallels are that Donald Trump<\/a> is unpredictable to the point of chaotic, obsessed with pussies and panties and suffers from inordinate narcissism flavoured with naivet\u00e9 and arrogance. These personal quirks would hardly warrant an essay, but the uproar in US media and Congress after his t\u00eate-\u00e0-t\u00eate with Putin, the pandemonium he has ignited among Western allies, the commotion of ripping infants and children from illegal immigrant parents, and lastly the threat to reforms won over decades that his Supreme Court nominee (Justice Brett Kavanaugh) poses is, literally, unprecedented. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Before getting into the thick of it I need to unwrap what may seem a puzzle. Those of you who have suffered the misfortune reading my etchings would have worked out that I am an unabashed Marxist pickled in modern science and dialectics. You will rightly ask: \u201cWhat the devil do you, Satan, care if Trump is ripping up Western society? Shouldn\u2019t you be dancing on the grave of capitalism? Have you degenerated into another liberal?\u201d Well true, but there is a conditionality and a point of theory that I plead. The conditionality: Run of the mill capitalism is better than fascism, Hindenburg would have been better than Hitler, an anti-Paksa option will be better than Gota, and US liberal democracy is better than bedlam. To link hands with Trump and dance is as ghoulish as to embrace Gota because Yahapalana<\/i> is a drifting eunuch. In simpler words, Trump is a menace to more than plain vanilla global capitalism; alt-right stimulated chaos can end in mayhem unknown.<\/p>\n

Secondly, the sorry state of the modern world reveals to the theorist the deeply complex processes mediating the decline and fall of prevailing society. Yes Trump must go, but that won\u2019t get America far unless it makes way, albeit gradually, for social-democracy. This essay, limited to the number of words that a weekly column can countenance, does not paint on this grand canvas. It is confined to a summary of the commotions I spoke of and it is presented from a perspective that abandons the interpretations of half-blind, self-righteous, holier than thou \u201cscholars\u201d and mainstream liberal bores. Trump has brought this system to a sordid climax, he is its candid pacesetter, its alter-ego. This is what elite, \u201cscholars\u201d, the media and \u201canalysts\u201d conceal! They are his demiurge, he their masked zeitgeist.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Consternation in the West<\/b><\/p>\n

I have to disregard domestic issues and focus on the international fracas \u2013 the Putin meeting, the standoff with NATO and the fire he lit under Theresa May\u2019s skirt. NATO is aggressive; its ideological raison d’\u00eatre disappeared with the collapse of the Soviet Union. It now serves the capitalist-West as an instrument to confront near-capitalist Russia. Since 1990 it has encroached ever closer to Russia\u2019s borders. I would be happy to see NATO dismantled, but since my enemy\u2019s enemy is not necessarily my friend, whacky Donald buggering NATO need not endear him to anyone except Putin. Trans-Atlantic military clout, the power underpinning imperialism is unravelling, cranky Donald is driving America\u2019s erstwhile allies up the wall, but that does not mean anyone need dote on the ugly lecher.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

First the factual background. Trump roiled NATO allies at a summit in Brussels on 16 Sept by berating them as free-riders on the back of US taxpayers \u2013 which is true. The US is one of just five of 28 members that meet their commitment to spend 2% on defence – at 3.73% of GDP it spends $700 million. The other four are Poland, Greece, Estonia and UK.\u00a0 <\/span>America whinges that it provides a disproportionate share of the funding and demands that others raise their defence budgets. He alarmed allies declaring \u201cwhat good is NATO\u201d. When he came out of the meeting he lied, escalating rhetoric at a press conference and claiming that NATO members had caved in to his demand that the 2% goal be met immediately not by 2024 as previously agreed.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The next day France\u2019s Macron issued a statement firmly stating that this was untrue and NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg refrained from confirming Trump\u2019s claim. Trump went further and dumfounded Germany saying \u201cGermany is totally captive to Russia\u201d pointing at the huge amount of gas Russia sells Germany. Angered German politicians are muttering \u201cEurope cannot depend on the US for security any longer; we must start planning independently\u201d. NATO will be kaput for sure if Trump wins a second term. That in itself is good; aggressive NATO is a threat to peace; but that\u2019s not to deny that Trump is a plague.<\/p>\n

The plague then crossed the Channel and violated Theresa May. \u201cShe messed up Brexit, Boris Johnson who quit her Cabinet a day earlier would make a better PM, she made a mess by not taking my advice etc.\u201d Meanwhile London saw its largest demonstration (tens of thousands) since 2003. Trump could not enter the city by land (he was ferried by helicopter) and I was amused to see Londoners declare on BBC \u201cwe ran him out of town\u201d. There are plans afoot to use London as seeding ground for another Balmy-Army to follow and evict Trump from every foreign capital he visits.<\/p>\n

The Putin-Trump press conference on 16 July after the one-on-one meeting (at Trump\u2019s request) ignited an explosion. It was wall to wall, every broadcasting mega-byte consumed on American media for five days and still in full cry. \u201cSiding with the enemy against America\u2019s own interests – treason!\u201d blared former National Security Director John Bannon. \u201cIt\u2019s impossible to avoid the conclusion that Putin has something on Trump\u201d opined Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (Maybe crooked property deals in Russia, money laundering or shady investments). Republican elder statesman John McCain thought \u201cToday\u2019s press conference the most disgraceful by a US president. The damage inflicted by Trump\u2019s naivet\u00e9, egotism and sympathy for autocrats is difficult to calculate\u201d. Those who follow US politics should read McCain\u2019s statement<\/a> in full.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Trump, usually an obnoxious windbag was bereft of gas; weak and submissive in Putin\u2019s presence prompting a wag to ask \u201cWas Trump giving Putin a foot massage in the private chamber?\u201d The anger is that \u201chaving thrown NATO under the bus and disembowelled our allies\u201d, the US media claimed, \u201che sided with Putin against our Joint National Security Agencies, and Senate and House investigation reports on Russian interference in elections\u201d. There is overwhelming evidence that Russia intervened in the 2016 US presidential election, but whether it affected the result is moot. America, Britain, France and Russia, all have a finger in other nations. China financed Mahinda Rajapaksa\u2019s presidential campaign to the tune of hundreds of millions of rupees funnelled through the China Harbour Engineering Company.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Given the overwhelming evidence, Russian meddling is incontrovertible, so it is unsurprising that the establishment, the media and the public (except \u2018Trump base\u2019) are aghast at a President, foresworn to uphold the constitution and ensure the security of the nation, turning \u201ctraitor\u201d. MSNBC, CNN, the New York Times, the Washington Post, in fact the whole liberal jingbang are milking the story for all it is worth. Thanks to Donald Trump advertising revenues have risen several fold.<\/p>\n

Has the Trump-Base wavered?<\/b><\/p>\n

The plain answer is NO! There is no evidence that the Base is troubled, turned against Tump or concedes that he has betrayed the national interest. Faith springs eternal in the alt-right chest: \u2018Trump will make America Great Again, drain the swamp, stop Chinese and foreigners stealing in the name of trade and stem the tide of Muslim and Hispanic illegals\u2019. It is early days and faith remains unshaken. His reputation as a sexual predator has done little to disillusion the Base. A reason for complacency is that the economy is growing and the \u201creal\u201d unemployment is at a 17 year low. How much longer the economy will hold up is outside the scope of this essay.<\/p>\n

But there is a deeper reason why the Trump-Base will not easily fracture; the failure of powerful elites and businesses (capitalism) to stem exploding inequality in the last three decades, or to address fear, resentment and alienation in the hearts and minds of numerous Americans. Of that the white working class in the rust-belt (Michigan, Pennsylvania, Ohio, West Virginia and Illinois) and red-neck rural parts of Kentucky, Georgia, Alabama, South Carolina, Mississippi, and Louisiana constitute the Trump-Base. Numerically the hard core is 25 to 30% of the electorate. Another 25% is conservative, reactionary, gun wielding, Christian fundamentalist or racists and devoted to the Republican Party. Trump\u2019s ratings have fluctuated, rarely falling below 38% and at times rising to the mid-forties. The ratings have flattened out at about 40% which is not good news for Trump but not disastrous either. The callousness of America\u2019s elite, class demographics and America\u2019s ideological backwardness firm up anger in the Base.<\/p>\n

Furthermore, the Base says \u201cLook how tough Trump has been on Russia; expelling diplomats, arming Ukraine against Russia\u2019s friends, bombing Assad\u2019s bases in Syria, imposing sanctions against Russian enterprises and Putin acolytes and applying tough economic sanctions. Those who claim that Trump is in Putin\u2019s pocket need to explain away all this. Is an \u201cI say Vlad, you know that for credibility\u2019s sake I need to be seen to be tough on Russia\u201d explanation adequate?\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The damage Trump is doing America\u2019s global hegemony, the economic downturn his loony trade wars will engender, his rubbishing deep-seated liberal and democratic values that underpin how America sees itself, all capped by his crankiness and narcissism, are too much to get away with. While the densest part of the hard-core will stay loyal, history will eventually bury this American Mussolini. The first test will be November\u2019s Congressional elections. Congressional Republicans are burying their heads in the sand and play ostrich because they reckon that without the Trump-Base they will lose seats.<\/p>\n

[If you have time to spare and need titillation, read a lengthy extreme-conspiracy-theory piece<\/a> in the New Yorker<\/i> by Jonathan Chait.<\/b><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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