THE U.S. PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION | MY TAKE

What can we hope for?

I’m afraid the best we can hope for is that independent, progressive candidates do well and if possible make significant gains. It is only through disruption of the current duopoly with the rise of a viable, crowdfunded, third party that any significant change for the better can come.

We can, if we are being realistic, invest hope only in the future, for the brutal reality currently is that neither candidate shows any real promise in regard to taking the USA and our world to a better place.

Both Trump and Biden offer no policies which bring the world together to counter the enormous threats of further pandemics and encroaching cataclysmic global warming effects. Climate change is of course the greater of these two by far. This is not to minimize the continuing effects and consequences of the Covid-19 pandemic which will be severe and long-lasting... but the effects of climate change will be so much greater, more devastating and much more long-term, continuing from here on out in fact.

At the moment western leaders show us that, at least in the West we remain stuck in the kindergarten stage of humankind’s evolution, at least as regards our political realm. Technologically we have moved up into the early stages of adulthood. We have the tools, we now only need the minds that realize in full how they can be used to benefit all of us rather than a small minority.

If the tools and the right minds could be brought together we are at a stage of development where we could work wonders. Instead we war against each other, we see differences between us when we share so much humanity in common. We seek ever more for ourselves when those in the upper echelons already have more than they could ever need. Those upper echelons are also driving a purge of our planet’s resources and at the same time driving a consumerism to eat into what’s left. We already require the resource of two planets for our appetites. How soon does Mother Earth show us in human-disastrous ways that we are on a completely unsustainable path? Very soon I suspect. The early signs are already here.

So, this fractious, juvenile and grotesque election in the USA, what does it herald?

More of the same I fear.

Another cycle of the four year dictatorship by the mega-corporations of Wall Street, the Military Industrial Complex, The Jewish Lobby and Big Pharma. The Puppet in Chief will wiggle and wriggle, dancing to their tune while deploying the smoke and mirrors of deception to maximum effect.

The same old, same old... fiddling the same tedious tune while the world metaphorically burns.

The greatest danger is the continuance of war and the initiation of yet more conflict, destabilization, name-calling, threats, demands and accusations. The danger with a Biden administration lies in what will inevitably be its wholly ideological nature regarding foreign policy, its continuance of the well-beloved dualism of the simple-minded extreme right that is now shared with the well-heeled elite liberals in a devil’s brew consensus.

Biden and his devotees will seal the deal on an aggressive foreign policy stance with a pervasive cancel-culture against any dissident voices questioning its war mode mentality. It will repeat time and time again that “The Free World” is at risk from malign foreign actors and must unite to fight them with all means possible. There will be no diplomacy, only demands. No talking, only threats. The old meme of “you don’t negotiate with terrorists” will be re-used as “you don’t negotiate with evil”. Reagan’s ‘Evil Empire’ will be resurrected in reference to all those who do not submit and bow to western superiority and inalienable right to govern our world.

And Trump? What of him? If reelected we can probably expect more of the same in regard to Israel and Saudi Arabia. On Venezuela, Cuba and Nicaragua he may relent no longer requiring the Floridian vote. On Iran more of the same. On Syria he will continue to “take the oil”. On China more of the same most probably. On Russia...

On Russia there is just a chance Trump may make good on his 2016 campaign promises. Even if he does so just to spite all his critics who put him through the wringer on Russia for four entire years of his presidency.

Other than all of the above we just might see a few further surprises regarding his view to a legacy. This is not certain as Trump’s mentality remains largely a mystery other than his obvious narcissism, need for gushing praise and lust for both power and wealth. Would we see a softening of his demeanor? It’s perhaps unlikely but it may hang on how the pandemic plays out, how the U.S. economic situation fares in the aftermath of the pandemic and just possibly on his bringing America’s troops home from its wars.

If I was a betting man I’d bet on Biden. But it seems the polls are narrowing in the swing states in Trump’s favor. The liberals may be in for a massive shock. Then again it may be Trump’s most simple-minded sycophants that are about to be traumatized.

We will just have to wait and see. (For how long is anyone’s guess.)