View from America
By M.R. Josse
GAITHERSBURG, MD: President Joe Biden came with hopeful dreams of bipartisanship; increasingly, he faces the hard reality of post-Trump era politics, a weird stew of rage and disappointment enveloped in far-right extremism, now bubbling in a simmering political civil war brewing within the Republican Party.
Biden’s hopes, or dreams, of bipartisan unity have been predominantly underscored in his $ 1.9 Trillion Covid-19 relief plan, which – as of this writing – has small chance of being approved, as is, by Congress. Presently, the Republicans have signaled that they would be amenable to only a modest $ 600 Billion relief package.
AMERICAN DYSTOPIA
President Biden for Bipartisan Agreement
While the to-and-fro between the Biden administration and Republicans continues, the dimensions of the public health challenge thrown up by the pandemic could not be any sharper: Of the nearly 50 million vaccines distributed, only a little more than 31 million has been administered; while more than 26 million people have been affected by the dread disease, over 440, 000 have succumbed.
And, what is more, currently, a massive winter storm is furiously sweeping along the east coast of the United States, a natural phenomenon that is bound to adversely affect vaccine distribution in the region for some time to come.
Far more invidious, however, is the broad overarching political landscape of today’s America that is slowly but surely emerging: a dystopia created by a growing cultural divide that has been in the making for some decades now, but which is evident today in a seemingly Grand Canyon-like gap between the two opposing sides.
As CNN’s Fareed Zakaria explained in his “The Divided States of America” presentation Sunday night, that divide is manifested in a variety of ways and at different levels: geographic, in terms of education, economic status, ethnicity/identity and race.
Insecurity among the less privileged, including those in rural areas, has gradually fuelled a sense of fear and deprivation mainly among whites sans college degrees, Zakaria claimed. Many of them resent the better economic status of those in the cities with higher education, including among the non-white segment of the population.
It is from this insecure, febrile pool of individuals that today’s white extremist groups appear to have been birthed, including those who are blatantly Islamaphobic or anti-Semitic. To be noted, as Zakaria pointed out, is that while in the 1950s America was 90 percent white, today that figure has plummeted down to just 50 percent.
Resentment against blacks and ‘colored’ people, including Hispanic and Asian immigrants who live mainly in the cities and are doing relatively well, would thus also appear to be linked to the rapid, ever-changing demographic dynamics of American society.
Even more relevant to this discourse is that this mass of humanity seemingly constitutes the core of Trump supporters. Indeed, even today, 75 percent of them believe in the Big Lie: that Trump, not Biden, won the 2020 presidential election!
Though to many observers beyond the golden shores of America it would seem that Trump has single-handedly created the monster of rabid extremism and violence so brutally unleashed on 6 January 2021 at the Capitol, he has actually been using the playbook of Republican Newt Gingrich, 50th Speaker of the House of Representatives, 1995-1999, according to clued-up political analysts.
That grouping includes David Gergen, former political aide to Presidents Nixon, Ford, Reagan and Clinton, who credit Gingrich with playing a key role in undermining democratic norms in the United States and hastening political polarization and unleashing aggressive partisanship.
GOP CIVIL WAR
The above observations aside, it is clear that a political civil war now rages within the Grand Old Party, with Trump’s legacy hanging over its neck like an albatross. Indeed, the Republican Party is currently fractured over Trump’s impending trial in the Senate, beginning Tuesday, 9 February 2021.
But, as Maeve Reston of CNN observes, “while the GOP continues to bend to Trump’s whims, forgive his dangerous behavior and quiver in the face of his election threats, the judiciary and the legal profession are adhering to a higher ethical standard – and have largely refused to tolerate his efforts to ramrod the nation’s democratic institutions and founding principles throughout its baseless election charade – making the GOP’s loyalty to Trump even more appalling.”
Yet, five lawyers he had appointed for his defense have quit, reportedly because they were unwilling to plead their case on the basis of alleged electoral fraud, rather than the unconstitutionality of convicting a former president. Trump has since managed to hire two new lawyers for his defense.
The divisions within the GOP have in the past week been embarrassingly flaunted. On the one hand, there is the spectacle of House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy of California jetting down to Trump’s Florida retreat, Mar-a-Lago, “to kiss the ring”, or seek his favor – after, several days earlier, publicly holding him responsible for the Capitol insurrection of 6 January 2021!
On the other, there is the case of five Republican Senators who went along with the procedural motion to hold a trial to convict Trump in the Senate – though 45 other Republicans opposed a trial of a former president. Recall, too, that last month 10 Republican members of the House – including Liz Cheney of Wyoming, the party’s third-ranking leader – joined Democrats to impeach Trump. It made him the only American president to be impeached twice.
Tellingly, Republicans who have defied Trump with their votes on impeachment are currently in political peril, not only excoriated by party colleagues in Congress but also physically harassed by members of Trump’s base in their respective home districts.
Interestingly, while several GOP lawmakers have called for stripping Cheney of her leadership position, former president George W. Bush publicly thanked former vice-president Dick Cheney, father of Liz Cheney, “for his daughter’s service.”
Most egregious of all is the case of Republican House member from Georgia, Marjorie Taylor Greene, who, as per CNN, not only bragged of having had a “great” conversation with Trump – amid calls for her ouster from Congress – but declared that she would “never apologize” as she faces a backlash over controversial actions and recently resurfaced comments, incendiary rhetoric, including Islamaphobic and anti-Semitic tropes, as well as ties to the baseless and thoroughly debunked QAnon conspiracy theories.
CNN’s KFile exposed that she previously indicated support for executing prominent Democrats! At least 50 House Democrats have called for censure or stripping her of her committee assignments but there is no indication yet that she will be upbraided by GOP leadership.
Another vexing question – perhaps a more seminal one – is whether Greene is the problem or the symbol of a condition spawned by an American dystopia, depicted above.
DOMESTIC TERRORISM SCOURGE
In earlier columns, references have been made to the burgeoning scourge of domestic terrorism in America. More light is now being shed on this once-taboo subject, including that within the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) via a report warning about it, as far back as 2009.
Former senior DHS analyst for domestic terrorism, Daryl Johnson, speaking to CNN the other day, disclosed that he had penned a report about that problem in 2009 and that it had been circulated, but only internally within the Department.
He disclosed, most chillingly, that in that document he had warned of the grave possibility that some members of the military returning home might become attracted to violence and political extremism due to a variety of possible causes or factors, including frustration and rage. Johnson averred that returning veterans could be considered as constituting “a very good pool” for recruitment by white extremist groups.
Against the backdrop of the above revelations, news reports that as many as “20 percent” of the 6 January 2021 insurrectionists have had a military or law enforcement background are decidedly unnerving – or should be.
It may be recalled that recently, too, the DHS issued warnings about potential violence by domestic extremists in Washington D.C. and elsewhere – in the aftermath of the 6 January 2021 mob storming of the U.S. Capitol, a horrific, unprecedented event in the annals of American history which they perceive as a grand success and an encouragement for their nefarious cause.
The DHS has besides specifically expressed concerns about lawmakers’ safety. That is why no doubt some Democrats among them have sought government funds to hire security personnel to ensure their personal safety.
Finally, on this score, a CNN analysis published on 31 January 2021, merits serious attention. Its thrust is that a disproportionate number of current and former military personnel were among those arrested in connection with the 6 January 2021 outrage on the U.S. Capitol.
Specifically, analysis by CNN of Pentagon records and court proceedings show that 21 of the 150, or 14 percent, arrested for the Capitol assault, are current or former members of the U.S. military. Its grim implications for U.S. national security are obvious, especially when conflated with the threat posed to America’s national interest by foreign extremists/terrorists.
REVEALING SHORTLIST
As a tailpiece to this column, I now record a revealing shortlist of the first reported tranche of telephone calls by President Biden to foreign leaders, conversations that were substantive, not merely pro forma.
Without offering any personal comment, I merely place on record what I gathered on the subject, culled from news reports from a couple of news sources, including the BBC. I have listed them as follows: 1. Russian President Vladimir Putin. 2. British Prime Minister Boris Johnson. 3. French President Emmanuel Macron. 4. German Chancellor Angela Merkel. 5. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. 6. Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador and 7. Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga.
Other calls will no doubt be made to other foreign leaders in due time. Readers are, in the meantime, invited to draw their own conclusions.
The writer can be reached at: manajosse@gmail.com
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