Trump foreboding a radically new political landscape

Posted on by in Blog, Elections and tagged , , , , , , , , , .

 

So, here we are, over seven months into the Trump administration, and almost everybody feels unsettled and concerned. What people are unsettled and concerned about, however, greatly varies. Many, maybe even a majority if public opinion polls can be believed, either from the beginning considered Trump unsuited to be President of the United States or have come to this conclusion based on his execution of the office since inauguration. Others, at least representing a third of the electorate, however, believe that what has been transpiring since Trump assumed office, only confirmed their pre-election analysis that the Washington bureaucracy is deeply corrupt and self-serving, whether Democrats or Republicans, and is committed to preventing Trump from fulfilling his promise of “cleaning out the swamp.”

This third of the electorate, by political pundits often described as Trump’s electoral base, represents interesting demographics. Except for mostly southern Evangelicals, they do not represent traditional Republican voters. As recently reported analyses of the November elections discovered, Trump’s election victory was not only the result of, as widely reported, blue-color Democrats voting for him but, likely even more importantly and in even bigger numbers, new voters coming out to vote who, often, never before had voted.

Without even ever gaining a straight majority of traditional Republican voters in the Republican primaries and without ever having full Republican support in the general election, Trump, nevertheless, succeeded in winning the presidential election by attracting significant numbers of voters who traditional Republican candidates (i.e., Bush, McCain and Romney) never attracted in the past (except for Ronald Reagan who, like Trump, did attract good numbers of blue-color Democrats).

For the future of both major political parties and the country as a whole, this analysis of Trump’s win has, however, major political repercussions: We in previous columns during the latter parts of the second Obama administration noted that we suspected we were entering “revolutionary” times. What we are experiencing in these early months of the Trump administration further enhances our conviction that this is, indeed, the case because revolutionary times historically demonstrated a typical pattern of increasing radicalization on the left as well as the right of the political spectrum.

This is, indeed, what we have been witnessing for a good number of years under the two Obama administrations, and this development has, obviously, greatly accelerated since Trump ascended to the presidency. As a consequence, both major parties are veering, respectively, to the left and the right, with the acknowledged socialist Bernie Sanders basically dictating the Democrat’s party line, and the Republican Party having an even bigger problem, called President Donald Trump.

That Donald Trump was not a traditional Republican or Conservative had become obvious during the Republican primaries, and was a major reason why some leading Republican figures never jumped on the Trump bandwagon. A majority of the party’s establishment, however, finally did reluctantly do exactly that, once, to everybody’s surprise (including his own), Trump won the presidential election.

In many ways Trump’s victory, however, became pyrrhic for the Republican party, which now controlled all three branches of government, and a Trojan horse for the party establishment, which now, suddenly, faced a radically new Republican party, devoid of important conservative and economic principles and committed to a populism the Republican establishment basically despised. Add to that, considering his often bizarre and highly narcissistic public behavior, often-understandable personal dislike of Donald Trump by many establishment politicians, the Republican party, basically, is facing a schism between its traditional establishment and its newly acquired Trumpian populistic political philosophy.

Hoping to control Trump through the legislative process, the political party establishment severely miscalculated because Trump is not controllable. The product of a very dominant father who sent the “black sheep” among his three children to military school to get the necessary discipline for life, he succeeded in establishing a remarkable work ethic in his son but at the same time deeply wounded his self-esteem. Donald Trump psychologically never overcame the childhood experience of not being appreciated by his father. Overcompensating for his deepest insecurities, he, therefore, acquired the, by now only too familiar unpredictable, crass and narcissistic behavior, which the country to these degrees has, likely, never seen in a president before. Nothing is as essential for President Trump as constant self-reaffirmation. And if such self-reaffirmation is not received from others, he will produce it himself.

Baring impeachment, Trump, however, holds the better cards. The Republican party without an unimpeached Trump would be unsustainable; Trump without the Republican party may, however, still maintain a following of ca. 30-40% of the electorate, a large enough slice of the pie for establishment of a viable third party with, for the first time in U.S. history, real chances of maintaining the presidency in a three- or four-party race (see what happened in France with the election of President Emmanuel Macrone).

A future four-party race is entirely possible because the leaderless Democratic party also faces the risk of splitting into two. If the party continuous its current course toward the left by basically appropriating Bernie Sander’s domestic and foreign policies, it will turn into a European-style Socialist party, likely unable to elect a president for decades. If the party establishment, however, decides to triangle and swerve to the middle, we may see a Marxist-Social party to split off from the Democratic party, likely also frustrating future attempts of Democrats to again become a majority party.

We, therefore, predict that, unless the Republican party by year’s end has united behind President Trump’s legislative agenda and successfully passed a number of major legislative efforts, Trump will form a third party, which, as soon as in the 2018 congressional elections can radically change the political scene in the country. Paradoxically, both major parties face unprecedented survival risks, though from different directions: In the Republican party, Donald Trump beat the establishment in the primaries and has, against the will of the party establishment, made himself irreplaceable if the party wants to remain in the majority.

On the Democratic side, the party establishment supported Hillary Clinton and, likely, partially fraudulently deprived Bernie Sanders of an unexpected win in the nomination process. The well-deserved resentment about the election outcome last November, therefore, favors the party’s in a general election, likely, unelectable left wing. All that said, if not successfully impeached beforehand, Donald Trump in 2020 may be running for reelection at the head of a populist new right-wing third party, and win. He, therefore, is a potentially mortal threat for both major parties, – a reason why efforts to impeach him will only grow, whether he deserves it or not.

A new revolutionary period for the world

Posted on by in Blog, Foreign Policy, Psychology of Obama and tagged , , , , , , , , , , .
2

What does ISIS have in common with worldwide increases in terrorist attacks, Black Lives Matter and the recent killing of cops? More than has been appreciated so far by political scientist, politicians and the media! They all point toward a breakdown of civility, respect for the law and trust in universally accepted democratic societal governance covenants.

Such periods are not unprecedented in history. They, indeed, are fairly repetitive phases, characteristic of prerevolutionary times. Consider, for example, what led to the creation of the Magna Carta, a document that dates back to 1215, and was signed by King John, a rather unpopular ruler of England at the beginning of the 13th century, not because he believed in the promises of the document but because political circumstances left him no other choice. Or take the French Revolution, which, as is widely acknowledged by historians, was the ultimate consequence of the French monarchy in an international struggle for hegemony of its empire in Europe outstripping the country’s financial resources, increasing social antagonism between the aristocracy and the rising bourgeoisie (i.e., middle class), a highly ineffective ruler (Louis XVI) and increasing economic hardship, brought on by the agrarian crisis of 1788-1789. Similarly, The Bolshevik 1917 October revolution in Russia can be simply summarized in its causation by the revolution’s slogan, “Bread, Land and Peace,” thereby suggesting that Russia’s monarchy had provided none of the above and, therefore, very similar origins of this revolution to the French Revolution.

Following the worldwide devastation of World War II, mankind longed for stability and reconstruction. Stability was paradoxically further enhanced by the partition of the world into two principal regions of influence expressing opposing government ideologies, the Western world of Capitalism and the Eastern world of Communism, and the threat of mutual destruction in case of military conflict between these two blocks of nations. How important that balance was is now becoming increasingly apparent because history did not end, as at the time suggested by the prominent political scientist Francis Fukuyama (in his now infamous 1989 essay “The End of History” in the journal The National Interest and subsequent book “The End of History and the Last Man,” published in 1992) when the Soviet Union collapsed on December 25, 1991 and, with it, to a large degree the political ideology of Communism.

The U.S., the beacon of Capitalism, now the only remaining world power in a “flat world” (to quote Thomas L. Friedman), in the midst of a communication revolution (because of the Internet and more recently Social Media in general), and economic upheaval because of economic globalization, unfortunately, did not recognize the extent to which all of these changes would contribute to global instability. Like prior empires, starting from the Roman Empire, over the French Empire of Louis XVI, the Czarist Russian Empire but also the Soviet Communist Empire, instead of strengthening the nation’s economic health and, thereby, exerting influence, the U.S. empire economically overextended like all other empires before.

Most of the Western world, indeed, did the same, with ever increasing government debt, accrued by spending, which was not based on what represented economically the best investments and would achieve strongest returns on these investments for the country but on what buys most votes in future election campaigns. Since such deficit spending can go only so far, and last only so long, the Great Recession of 2008, in retrospect, does not surprise. What also cannot surprise, since the U.S. to a disproportional degree was responsible for the recession, is that both, U.S. policy and the economic and political concept of Capitalism, in large parts of the world, including among longstanding friendly nations, suddenly lost credibility.

And this is when Barak Hussein Obama was elected the 44th President of the U.S., an election, which in itself to an important degree has to be viewed as a revolutionary act. The reason is that at no earlier time in U.S. history would a candidate like Obama have had even the slightest chance of being elected. The Canary in a number of previous essays, based on his upbringing, offered a very detailed psychological analysis of this president. While we do not wish to be repetitive, it is important to note that even before his election it was obvious to anybody who only wanted to know that Obama’s history unquestionably defined him in his political ideology as an Afrocentric Marxist Socialist (to be differentiated from a European-style Social Democrat). Supported by very liberal major media organizations, the country, however, simply did not want to know! (Readers interested in more detail we refer to our earlier series of essays on President Obama.)

Obama’s governance, therefore, did not come as a surprise to The Canary; indeed, we predicted his “sympathy” for revolutionary movements around the world, his distancing from traditional friends of the U.S., like the U.K and especially Israel. We, however, also predicted his racial divisiveness within the U.S. at a time when most of the country assumed that his election for all practical purposes represented an end of most racial conflicts. Most importantly, we, however, pointed out that Obama in the deepest levels of his soul was a revolutionary who, as his ultimate political goal (from his days as a community organizer in Chicago on) was seeking a revolutionary overthrow of current power structures in this country.

We now have to acknowledge that he succeeded beyond even our predictions. His foreign policy of non-intervention in the Middle East unleashed the biggest refugee streams since World War II in Europe, thereby dividing local populations into radically opposing camps of left and right, like not seen since the 1930s, a devastating period for Europa, which ultimately lead to Hitler’s rise and World War II. Here in the U.S., America’s first Black president has, in a very underhanded and seemingly “cool” way, championed Afrocentric notions over and over again, with the result that population surveys consider race relations at the lowest point since the 1960s. In doing so, he has followed classical Afrocentric and Marxist dialectic by attacking law enforcement first because a revolution can only succeed if law enforcement is weakened first.

Helped by the incompetence of preceding administrations, the acquiescence of most of the media and even some of the Republican opposition, he, thus, has almost singlehandedly succeeded in bringing large swaths of the world into prerevolutionary times, like not seen in since the 1930. As a consequence, over half of all college students in this country currently believe that Capitalism is evil. Though he, himself, denied during his first election campaign being a “Socialist,” he has made it possible for Bernie Sanders, an openly declared Democratic Socialist to become a serious presidential contender. Who would ever have thought this possible prior to Obama’s two presidential terms, and who would ever have anticipated that the Democratic Party would move further to the left of most traditional European Social Democratic parties. But this is exactly what we have been witnessing over the last seven plus years, as so well demonstrated by the recent unprecedented illegal sit-in of the Democratic caucus in Congress.

All of this demonstrates the increasing break down of civility and deference to the law not only in Congress and politics but in the nation. As we have witnessed, it is only a small step from Black Lives Matters’ offensive verbiage during demonstrations and the targeted killing of law enforcement officers. It is probably an even smaller step between targeted cop killing and race riots or even worse.

The upcoming presidential election in November, therefore, matter more than anybody can, possibly, imagine. For everybody who favors evolutionary rather than revolutionary change and abhors the anarchy and violence of revolutions, casting a vote is, therefore, more important than probably in any election since the Large Depression before World War II. And then we can only pray that a new administration has the wisdom of pulling us back from the brink of revolution.

 

The Left’s Increasing Trend toward Authoritarianism

Posted on by in Domestic Politics, Psychology of Obama and tagged , , , , , , , .
CANARY IN THE MINE BLOG - The Left’s Increasing Trend toward Authoritarianism

The world was easy to understand during the Cold War: The evil power of Nazism had been defeated, but the other evil ideology of Bolshevik Communism had to be dealt with. While Stalin did not murder innocent people as viciously as Hitler did, his regime was still responsible for the death of millions, as was Mao Zedong’s in the People’s Republic of China, and as were other Communist leaders’, from Cambodia to North Korea and Cuba. For half a century, the struggle between Western democratic-capitalism and Soviet-style Communist dictatorship defined the two principal eco-political options in the world.

With the dissolution of the Soviet Union on December 26, 1991, the ideology of Communism appeared largely defeated. In 1992 the prominent political scientists Francis Fukuyama published his now infamous book The End of History and The Last Man, in which he concluded that Western liberal democracy had “won” the culture war and likely “represented the final form of human government.”

Only 14 years later, it appears rather obvious that his conclusion was as premature as Karl Marx’s prediction that Communism would replace capitalism in his version of the end of history in his book Das Kapital, between 1867-1894.

During the years of Communist-capitalist ideological confrontations, Western capitalist societies were anything but homogenous. While united in support of a capitalist economic model, liberal democracies developed distinctly different social ideologies from the left (democratic socialism) to the right. Indeed, clearly influenced by Marxist principles, left-leaning, social-democratic parties all over Europe very quickly entered mainstream politics, establishing themselves as alternatives to right-leaning conservative/religious political parties.

In the U.S. a similar constellation evolved, with the Democratic Party representing the left and the Republican Party the more conservative and/or religious right. But until relatively recently the Democratic Party maintained a broad variety of opinions, including a distinctive “right wing” of the party. Since Bill Clinton’s presidency, this right wing of the party has progressively shrunk, and completely disappeared with the ascendancy of President Obama and his allies. As a consequence, the Democratic Party of today is practically indistinguishable from Europe’s social-democratic party model, with different degrees of Marxist leanings.

As long as Communist regimes ruled a significant part of the world, social-democratic political parties found it essential to differentiate their Socialist-Marxist ideologies from dialectic Communism/Marxism. With the defeat of Communism, this distinction became less important and less relevant for political success at the ballot box. As memories of Communist-run nations faded into history, the public’s short historical memory allowed for a rebirth of Marxist utopianism, especially among the young, who have never witnessed the catastrophic failures of the Socialist/Marxist economic model.

Even in the U.S., Socialism is no longer considered a “dirty” word, as so well demonstrated by the surprisingly successful current campaign of Bernie Sanders, a declared Socialist from Maine, for the Democratic presidential nomination. Other examples demonstrating a clear shift to the more radical left are very obvious all around the world in the election of Jeremy Corbyn, a radical Marxist outsider, as new head of the British Labour Party, and by explosive growth of radical leftish political parties in Greece, Spain and elsewhere in Europe.

Shifts toward the Marxist left are, however, rarely only dialectic. Indeed, likely the crucial step for Karl Marx’s transition from Socialism toward Communism was his conclusion that the world will not change simply based on ideas, and that any desired change requires proactive interventions. In other words, an inherent component of Marxist Socialism is the forceful intervention into the democratic process, because setbacks in personal freedoms are a small price to pay for the ultimate “good” of a Socialist utopia. An example of this is Castros’ Cuba, admired as a model for Socialist states across the globe.

So, any shift toward Marxist dialectic will automatically be accompanied by increasing trends toward authoritarianism. And this does not only apply to what we observe in third world countries, like Venezuela, where the political shift toward Marxism has led to a de facto dictatorship. Increasing authoritarianism can also be seen in democracies like Argentina and even in the U.S., where President Obama attempts to legalize hundreds of thousands of illegal aliens by decree, even though, as a constitutional lawyer, he must have known that such a step without Congress’s approval is likely unconstitutional (he, indeed, had made statements to that effect in public, and a judge’s temporary restraining order has halted the process).

An even more authoritarian political step was the agreement that the Obama administration signed with Iran, in which Obama circumvented Congress by inappropriately declaring it an Executive Agreement between governments rather than a “treaty” (only treaties require congressional approval). Then he also had his allies in Congress block a debate of a disapproval motion with only a minority of votes in both houses. In doing this, the president imposed what may turn out to be the most consequential international agreements for the nation’s security in decades, even though a majority of Congress in both houses opposed the agreement (and, indeed, based on opinion polls, two-thirds of the U.S. population did as well).

But, likely the most egregious evidence of authoritarianism is the selective interpretation of prosecutorial powers under the Obama administration. Not even under the Nixon and Clinton administrations was the Justice Department as politicized and corrupted as in the Obama administration in failing to prosecute very obvious abuses of power and in using the criminal justice system in pursuit of political goals. None of the scandals that have come to light during the administration were ever pursued by the Justice Department: not the IRS scandal, not the Veterans Affair Scandal, and not the Bengasi scandal (where, totally overlooked by the media, the real question is not where was Hillary Clinton and the degree of her involvement but where President Obama was, and the degree of his involvement). And yet on the other extremes, perfectly-timed threats of prosecutions or actual prosecutions have silenced political opponents more than once (General Petraeus and Senator Menendez are good examples, and Hillary Clinton may become one).

In order to equalize economic conditions for the underclass, the ultimate aim of all permeations of Socialism, of course including Marxism, has historically been “revolution.” Only a revolution of the masses can against the capitalist system can end their discrimination (under Communist dogma, the masses are represented by the “proletariat” under a professional leadership), and initiate the masses’ ascent to power. Since the power of the masses represents the ultimate achievement of any form of Socialism, it should not surprise that such revolutions rarely voluntarily transfers government power back to opposition forces. As contemporary Venezuela well demonstrates, once in power, Socialist/Marxist governments become increasingly authoritarian. They are supportive of liberal democracy as a tool to obtain power but, once in power, quickly dispose of democratic pretense.

Though these movements are often corrupt and outright anti-democratic within their own areas of power, even within the Western capitalistic system, political parties on the left demonstrate strong allegiances to revolutionary movements (see new York’s openly Socialist Mayor de Blasio, a longstanding supported of the Marxist Sandinista movement in Nicaragua or the new Labour Party’s Chief in the U.K., Jeremy Corbin, an avowed supported of Hamas, which is not only radically anti-democratic and homicidal, but also religiously fanatical). Allegiance to the internationalist Marxist view of worldwide solidarity between Marxists and poor, mostly brown and black exploited people, very obviously supersedes any defense of humanitarian and/or democratic principles on the extreme left. As class warfare all around the world appears to come into fashion again, the world will, therefore, witness increasing authoritarianism, while liberal democracies will find themselves under increasing siege.

Though in his upbringing and belief system he is very clearly a Marxist Socialist, President Obama avoided these labels in his election campaigns, and on multiple occasions even went so far as to demean opponents who described him as a Socialist. But in his very obvious contempt for Congress and especially the Republican opposition, he increasingly demonstrates the authoritarianism of his Marxist ideology, characterized by the dictum that ultimate goals have to be achieved by whatever means. His party appears to support him. The party discipline Democrats have exhibited in support of Obama’s policies is indeed remarkable, but better fits Soviet than U.S. parliamentary history. This country can expect considerable authoritarian tendencies from the president in his last 14 months in office.

How Israel Became the Enemy

Posted on by in Blog, Foreign Policy, Israel and tagged , , , , , , , .
Canary in the Mine: Netanyahu

In our last post, we discussed how Jews had helped found the European socialist movement to then become excommunicated by that very movement.

After Israel’s overwhelming military victory against the united Arab world in the 1967 Six-Day War, the political left immediately started questioning the continuous inclusion of Jews and their nation-state, Israel, in the international socialistic brotherhood. Indeed, the left increasingly rejected the concept of the Jewish “victim,” and replaced him with a brand-new victim – the “Palestinian”-Arab. This concept had never even existed before 1967.

Continue Reading