I’ve been encouraged by some recent discussions to write an analysis of what’s going on in the USA, and what we can learn from it. Of course, much has already been said about Donald Trump and how he has brought the great American experiment to the brink of collapse. So this is probably not going to be the definitive story about it, but it will be my take, with the essential background I think matters to truly understanding what’s going on.
Now, I’ve mentioned Trump before in the journal entry “Mind of the Antichrist” (where I ask myself what kind of mind it would take to choose to be the Antichrist, if such a thing existed. It would take a very foolish, egotistical, and unscrupulous, yet very charismatic, person, and before Trump I didn’t think any human could possibly even get close to this). But the fact that a lot of Americans still support him, shows there’s much more to learn. Let’s get started.
Democracy on the edge
Let’s start with this. In my article “Why democracy works”, I mention the necessary conditions for a healthy democracy. For example, there has to be a realistic choice of at least three political parties. But in the United States, only two (Democrats and Republicans) are realistic in practice, and therefore it’s a dysfunctional democracy, meaning its government does not always represent the actual will of the people, and not even its survival as a democracy is guaranteed. There are many reasons for this lack of political diversity (archaic laws such as the electoral college, lack of ranked-choice voting, and so on) — and, of course, those who could change it, usually don’t want to because they would lose power. The later European democracies are generally much healthier, but this is something that’s still holding the United States back, even allowing them to devolve.
Donald Trump before his presidency
I haven’t looked much at the details, but it’s somewhat relevant, so here’s the way I understand it (if you want the full story, I hear there’s a book by Mary Trump about it):
Fred Trump, Donald Trump’s father, was himself an unscrupulous businessman, and wanted Donald to eventually take over his business empire. So he soon took little Donald under his wings and taught him the ropes, which included the art of lying and deceiving in order to get what you want. However, as Donald grew up, and it became clear he was completely incompetent about pretty much everything else, Fred started becoming disappointed in him. But Donald still inherited much of Fred’s empire.
Not only did Donald never build his own fortune, he was also too incompetent to manage the fortune he got very well (Warren Buffett famously said monkeys would make more money than Trump did). He bankrupted six of his businesses (three of them casinos, which is something that’s hard to bankrupt unless you’re a special kind of fool). The only thing he could do well, was to lie and manipulate. So, desperate for affirmation and respect from the people around him, he made it his life’s mission to achieve success the only way he knew how: fraud.
He developed many ways to get away with fraud, breach of contract, and other crimes (including rape, evidently), doing things like dragging out court cases until whoever sues him could no longer pay their lawyers, or even attacking them and making their lives miserable until they give up and withdraw their case. And, of course, his charisma and ability to lie fairly convincingly about anything didn’t hurt when trying to get away with things. His children, no doubt raised to be loyal to him, also helped him with his schemes. Ivanka Trump, his daughter, was the only one of them with any kind of intelligence, and became his favorite (and, incidentally, there are interview clips, as well as a recently released book, with him essentially bragging about his sexual fantasies about her — yes, about his own daughter).
However, even after becoming a reasonably successful con man, the New York elites (the real businessmen) still only saw Donald as a clown. So, still desperate for respect, he one day decided to run for president. It was a win-win for him, because if he lost, he could just say it’s because the system was rigged against him. (But, in breach of tradition, he would never show his tax returns, because he thought they would show the world how incompetent he really is as a businessman. I mention this because I think it’s important to understand what his highest priority really is.)
And he certainly would have lost, if he hadn’t received some serious help. Which brings us to the next topic…
Right-wing politics and media before Trump’s presidency
For decades, conservatives had been playing the long game in order to gain disproportionate power over the country. For example, Machiavellian politicians like Mitch McConnell had worked on using dishonest means to get as many conservative judges as possible into federal courts (which later, under Trump, allowed them to take away the right to abortion, and other rights belonging to women and various minorities, without needing to first change the Constitution). On the state and county levels, gerrymandering (the act of drawing voting district borders in a way that isolates known voters of the opposing party, so that their vote can’t really affect the outcome anymore) meant that political advantages could be magnified disproportionately, and give the Republican party much more power than they would have had if only the total number of votes mattered.
But the most important asset to Republicans, was no doubt right-wing media, Fox News in particular. In court (and in their Terms of Use), Fox News does not claim to be a news network, but an entertainment network, and as such have no obligation to report actual news. (It’s also a cable-only channel, so it wouldn’t be subject to ordinary broadcast regulations anyway.) Rupert Murdoch and other Fox VIPs have taken full advantage of this to make Fox into a Republican propaganda machine, giving a conservative spin on everything that happens, often outright lying in order to engage (or, perhaps more accurately, enrage) their viewers. This has kept money flowing in, but has, of course, also contributed immensely to the polarization of the United States, and arguably caused untold amounts of damage. Murdoch doesn’t care; as he recently testified in the Dominion lawsuit against Fox, for him it’s all about the greens (money).
In most cases (before Dominion), even defamation lawsuits against Fox would go nowhere because they could always argue that they are a parody channel, which is protected by freedom of speech. For example, Fox lawyers successfully argued that Tucker Carlson’s lies aren’t punishable because no reasonable person would believe him. And obviously, Republicans aren’t interested in fixing such loopholes in the justice system — how else are people going to be convinced to vote Republican?
This ecosystem, of course, helped Donald immensely once he became the official Republican candidate. Although Donald was constantly lying about the most ridiculous things, and Fox knew he was lying, they still defended him and publicly acted as if everything he said was true and that everyone who fact-checked him was dishonest, because how else would Fox keep the money coming? There’s no way Fox would inform their viewers about how much they actually hated the man. Instead, insane conspiracy theories were allowed to flourish and be treated as true.
(Donald, of course, arguably also got a lot of help from social media algorithms, which did very little to stop his lies. On the contrary, Facebook and others generally amplified his disinformation. Extra boosts were given by fake social media accounts owned by rival countries like Russia, who no doubt loved the idea of putting an incompetent leader in charge of the United States. The FBI going after Hillary Clinton publicly, though she was never charged, also certainly made an impact in Trump’s favor. However, I’m not convinced such factors matter much for the bigger picture, so I won’t say more about those things here.)
Followers of the MAGA
Even with the help of the Republican propaganda machine (and social media), it still seems like it would take a particular brand of human to blindly accept the man’s juvenile antics, and never see through his lies. So who are these people?
One of the best answers I’ve seen to this, is provided by a professor in psychology, Bob Altemeyer, who managed to predict this long before Trump’s candidacy. Probably his most prominent work before Trump’s presidency was The Authoritarians, published in 2006, after decades of research. This book is free to read online, but probably the most important takeaway here, is that he estimated that about 25% of the general population suffers from the psychological traits necessary to blindly follow a savage leader that promises to destroy their enemies. As far as Altemeyer could tell, these people were just waiting for such a “savior” to show up, and it scared the crap out of him.
So the charismatic, savage Donald Trump became the answer to their prayers. Fox News had already given them their “enemies”, and so Trump needed only promise to destroy those “liberals”, and the loyalties, and votes, of these authoritarian followers were his. He also got religious groups like Evangelicals on his side, after their leaders got onboard with Trump’s promises to destroy the “sinners”, conveniently overlooking Trump’s own obvious lack of morals. (I’ve written a separate analysis about how I think Christians could accept such a savage leader.)
But of course, this is politics, so not everybody around Trump was actually a true believer. There were some (e.g. Steve Bannon) who could see that Donald was a moron, but chose to help him out anyway so that they could use him to push their own radical far-right agendas. (Until, of course, Donald’s ego and capriciousness would end up ruining many of their schemes, but that came later.)
Conservatism’s downfall
Due to the lack of political diversity in the United States, both of the two major parties ended up being mixed bags, encompassing a wide range of political views, with Democrats taking all viewpoints left of center, and Republicans taking all viewpoints right of center. As such, Republican views ranged from moderate, pretty centrist views, through traditional conservatism, and all the way through to far-right radical beliefs. The far right had previously made noise through stunts like the Tea Party movement, but they were usually kept down by the conservative majority of the party.
Not so after Trump gained power. Donald said pretty much all the things that the far-right groups wanted to hear, allowing even the alt-right (which has fascistic roots) to gain strength. Furthermore, Donald’s ego could not take criticism of any kind, so he could not tolerate the existence of moderate conservatives who pushed back on his whims, calling them RINOs (Republicans In Name Only) and other names, and doing everything he could to force them out of the party, almost always with success. Thus, pretty much the only people left in the Republican party, are now Trump loyalists with radical far-right beliefs. Traditional conservatism no longer has a place in the Republican party. It’s now just a cult of Trump, where the only allowed belief is the idea of a supreme leader who commands absolute loyalty and may not be challenged in any way.
Many conservatives who helped Trump to power (thinking they could use him to push their own agendas), have since seen themselves sidelined by him, and are now regretting their choices, but the damage is done. There’s no longer a conservative party in the United States, Trump destroyed it. In recent times, Trump has even started openly using the same language as historical fascistic leaders, confirming that where the Grand Old Party once was, there’s now no more conservatism, only fascism.
Could all this have been avoided?
Now that we have a reasonable understanding of what happened, let’s look at some of the most important things that could have prevented this assault on democracy. (Or, if that sounds boring, you can also skip to the next section, I suppose.)
The election system
The founders of the United States probably did not imagine that their federalist system with full separations of powers and everything, would devolve into a dysfunctional two-party system. (It’s thought they didn’t imagine political parties at all.) If they had, they could have tried to mitigate the loss of choice through measures such as mandating proportional representation (particularly in the electoral college), and/or mandating ranked-choice voting. (Proportional representation would stop gerrymandering, while ranked voting would help smaller political parties make a difference.) In the present day, it’s unlikely to be possible to fix this federally, but it might still be possible to change state by state. A couple of states have already done something about it, but certainly not many enough.
Judicial appointments
In the United States, judges are appointed by politicians. As we’ve seen, Republicans have taken advantage of this fact to pack the federal courts, which has made it possible for them to do things like, for example, destroy women’s rights without having to first change the Constitution. Here in healthier democracies, though, judges in high positions are appointed through a combination of the Department of Justice and a council made up of existing judges. If this had been the case in the United States, then Trump would likely have gotten away with much less than he did, and the rights of women and minorities would still have been protected there. I understand that the founders of the United States did it this way because they were afraid the justices could take over the country by themselves if there was no political oversight, but vetting by the DoJ ought to be enough oversight for this (although I admit that could have its own risks, if not done right). For me, it just seems a bit too risky to let politicians pick and choose individual judges directly themselves (although it probably still could have worked if the United States had at least three relevant political parties).
Political accountability
When voters do not have the facts, democracy fails. Thus, it is absolutely critical for democracy that when politicians are caught in a lie, they are punished for it. Typically, the role of holding politicians accountable is given to the free press, which can help ensure corrupt politicians do not get re-elected. This can work well enough when the press is respected, the democracy is healthy (has at least three relevant political parties), and the politicians are generally honorable. However, here none of these were the case; Trump and the Republicans constantly attacked the credibility of the free press, and since the United States has only two relevant political parties, the right-wing ecosystem was able to actually reward the lies, rather than subject them to punishment. And in the United States, no other way exists to punish politicians in a party that has majority. There are laws protecting politicians from lawsuits and criminal prosecution. Politicians can, with impunity, pass legislation that kill people, and they often have. No punishment beyond a few words in the other side’s media ecosystem.
This could be solved with another way to keep politicians accountable, which can be used when politicians lie as severely as happened here, or even when they cause as much unnecessary death as happened during Trump’s presidency. I think it should be possible to sue and prosecute politicians that lie or do serious harm, at least if done intentionally or through willful negligence. Now, I’m aware of the common counterarguments, let me address them here:
Who’d be the arbiter? Are we going to create a “ministry of truth” (as in the novel 1984)?
My response to that is, why, we already have one. It’s called the justice system, it’s always been part of its job to determine if something is true, by using something called “evidence” (an exotic substance causing allergic reactions in a wide range of politicians, evidently).
If politicians were held accountable for their mistakes, who would become politicians?
Well, I agree we shouldn’t punish honest mistakes very much, and it definitely should not be easy to take down a completely honest politician. Thus, I think politicians should have a malpractice standard, kind of like what doctors have. A doctor unintentionally killing a patient generally does not result in severe punishment if the doctor acted in good faith and could not possibly have known better. But if the doctor should have known but just didn’t care, then the doctor can be punished. Something like that should be true for politicians too, after all politicians often have even more power over life and death than doctors do, and should take their responsibilities similarly seriously. This kind of accountability would probably reduce the number of corrupt politicians that treat politics as a game, but should not appreciably reduce the number of honest politicians that treat politics with respect and compassion.
Media accountability
The free press do deserve strong protections from the government. However, that doesn’t necessarily mean that it should be okay for an entity like Fox News to present itself as a real news network, when it isn’t. Any channel that advertises itself as real news, ought to have a commitment to reporting truthfully, and to issue corrections and retractions where warranted. So, the United States used to have a FCC rule called the “Fairness Doctrine”, enacted in the 1950s, but killed again in the 1980s by Ronald Reagan. An attempt to instead codify the doctrine into law (Fairness in Broadcasting Act) was also vetoed by Reagan. And since then, the United States have had no effective protection against propaganda masquerading as news. (Technically, the Doctrine only applied to broadcast and not cable, so it would not have stopped Fox News, but there’s probably no reason it could not have been extended to cable news, if it had not been killed.)
(On the other hand, it could also be said that the press didn’t actually have strong enough protections from the government, since Trump could keep attacking the press while being part of the government, without him being punished for it…)
Could Trump return to power?
During his presidency, Trump did immense damage to the United States and the world, some of which I may have to write more about later. But the key institutions of democracy survived his term, barely, despite his best efforts at trying to stage some coup d’état to stay in power. It’s not likely they would survive another term, though. I know there have been people that have been concerned that Trump might actually win again, so let me address that here.
No, I think Trump’s chances of winning again, in a fair election, are quite minimal. In the first election, many Republicans voted for him only because he was a Republican and a well-known businessman, they didn’t know what kind of person he really was. Now they know. Even though Biden doesn’t seem to have a very high approval rating for some reason (likely due to media not fact-checking disinformation from the right), those traditional conservatives who aren’t fans of fascism could never vote for Trump again, and would rather vote for Biden, whether or not they like his policies. The Internet is full of tales from former Republicans who will, from now on, only be voting Democrat, because the Republican party is no longer a conservative party. Many otherwise apolitical female voters are also upset at Republicans for taking away the right to abortion and such. Furthermore, the way Trump keeps doing moronic stuff like e.g. attacking Taylor Swift is also not going to help him much (about half of the U.S. adult population are Swift fans, antagonizing them all is hardly a brilliant move).
The justice system is also closing in on him. American justice is slow and unreliable when the defendants are rich people, but it looks it’s possible the courts will get to it before the election, despite his best efforts at delaying it. As an aside, I think it’s worth noting how he defends himself. In the criminal cases against him, his defense usually isn’t “I didn’t do it”. It is “you’re not allowed to, or shouldn’t be allowed to, prosecute me”. It shows he’s not interested in being innocent, he’s only interested in being allowed to do anything he wants, up to and including staging a coup, becoming dictator, and exacting terrible revenge on everyone that’s ever gotten in his way. So that finally, he can sit back and be worshipped for the rest of his days. USA would be in ruins, but “better to rule in hell than to serve in heaven”, right?
Trump will continue to be enthusiastically supported by those about 25% of the population that are authoritarian followers. Although their votes would not be enough to win him another election, they may be enough to cause widespread violence, perhaps even a civil war. Currently, politicians, investigators, prosecutors, and judges who’s uncovering Trump’s fraud schemes and other crimes are regularly receiving death threats and have to get bodyguards, even wear body armor. The great American experiment is definitely still in great peril, with the very soul of the nation at stake.